just saying if zoya ever died before nikolai how fucked up would it be if he planted something for her in her own garden. if the altar of her grief became his own. happy weekend!

Head Over Heels (Boxer!Steve x Librarian!fem reader)

summary: you meet the handsome boxer Steve Harrington at a party. he falls head over heels for you instantly.

uses she/her pronouns and female anatomy.

♡ the steve collection ♡

author’s note: if you’re new to this series (since i didn’t write chronologically but this is the first fic): the reader’s name is “libby” which is just a stand-in for “librarian.” it’s still you!

warnings: fluff, casual dominance (yes, even from the start), steve being uncharacteristically sweet and nervous

hawkins, indiana july, 1989

The house seemed to be a rotation of young, twenty-something year olds, and the upbeat thump of the radio’s biggest hits. Right now, the stereo was blasting Rick Springfield, and though you knew the song and hummed the words, you couldn’t find it in yourself to dance. Instead, you remained seated in the La-Z Boy in the corner of the living room, watching your friend twirl between different men. You’ve been out of high school for two months, and she’d already been through a handful of them. You were by far the youngest here, and though you usually wouldn’t be so easily intimidated by a crowd, you were when you locked eyes on him.

Steve Harrington.

About thirty minutes ago—as your gaze wandered the room, chin in palm with boredom numbing your brain—you spotted him. Through the thick sea of people wading back and forth, on the other side of the wide living room, Steve Harrington lounged on a gingham sofa. Cigarette in hand, sunglasses tucked in the collar of his navy blue polo, biceps bulging and straining against the cuffs.

He looked just as handsome as he did four years ago, when he graduated from Hawkins High as swim team captain and resident heartbreaker. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t stop and stare at each one of his photographs in the display case near the gym.

Since he graduated, Steve started boxing. The town gossip usually fixated around him and his new career, and when he had his first big title fight in Indianapolis last year, Hawkins displayed a giant poster of him at town hall. Now, rumor had it they were asking for Steve in other cities around America, impressed by his violent skills.

And now he was staring at you. You shifted in the chair, cheeks warming under his steady gaze. The thump of the music found home in your chest, the rhythmic beat of your heart so forceful and intense that you felt flushed all over. You waited a beat, and looked up again. He was still looking. A girl walked in front of you, and as her blue skirt flitted by, Steve tipped his head to find you around the obstruction.

Your lips cracked into a giddy smile. He was watching you. At the sight of your pleasure, Steve mirrored it: a half-mouthed grin that softened the intensity of his brooding features. It was princely and handsome, and your smile only broadened knowing that it was directed at you. Steve took a drag of his cigarette, tipped his head back in place, and drew his arm across the back of the sofa. His eyes never left your figure, tucked in the armchair in a floral cardigan and denim shorts. Your sneakers were perfectly white and tidily knotted.

In a room full of blazing neon blue and painful bubblegum pink, you were soft and glowing. If he was being honest, Steve had been watching you for a while now—watching you glance around the room with your lip between your teeth, playing with the white laces on your Reeboks, fiddling with the most adorable pair of tortoise shell glasses perched on your nose. You hadn't spoken to anyone since you entered the room, but when you thought no one was watching, you sang along to the songs playing on the stereo. At first, he glanced over on accident, but he found himself mesmerized by your quiet grace and natural beauty.

Stomach flip-flopping and heart thumping, you inhaled shakily and tried to tear your eyes away from the handsome boxer. You weren't clueless—you'd heard all about his promiscuous (whoreish) antics all throughout high school and beyond. There's no way someone like that would bother with you.

Just as you swiveled the chair for a change of scenery, a boy nearby stumbled back into the arm of the chair, tipping his red solo cup onto your leg. You gasped at the cold, sticky beer sloshing over your bare thigh, leaping from the chair just as the boy jumped back.

"Oh, shit, I'm so sorry, are you—"

"—hey! Why don't you watch where the fuck you're goin'?" A new voice suddenly barked over the music.

Heads turned and cheeks warmed (mostly yours, now blazing hot and fiery) at the sight of Steve Harrington standing beside you, glaring sharply at the perpetrator with an empty cup of beer. Steve's hand cupped around your elbow to pull you away, and the rough touch of his big, warm palm had you shivering.

"S-sorry, man, I didn't mean to."

Steve only waved his hand, head shaking as he dismissed the beer-spiller. The younger boy skittered away, and when he was gone, Steve turned to you. His hand hadn't left your arm and you couldn't stop blushing. Your entire body felt like it was on fire. God, were you sweating through your shirt? Beer was still running down your leg and into your white socks.

"You okay?" Steve asked, brows furrowed.

You swallowed, nodding mutely. Steve looked you over, frowning at the beer on your leg. He snatched a napkin from the coffee table nearby and watched you rub it over your leg.

"Fuckin' idiot," he huffed, eyes flitting back up to yours then. His cheeks suddenly pinkened. "I...Sorry, I just...I came rushing over—I'm Steve."

Left hand on your arm, he extended his right for you to shake, and your smile returned as you peered at it. A musical giggle bubbled out of you as you clasped it in a gentle shake, flashing that pretty smile that his knees buckling. His chest felt so tight and odd. Something ached in his throat. Your hand was soft, and up close, you smelled like something sweet and floral—lilacs. Lilacs and...beer. Your lips were shiny against the yellow lamplight.

"I'm Libby," you declared.

Steve inhaled sharply. Your fingers slipped away and he found his eyes chasing them. Jesus, what the fuck's wrong with you Harrington? He only had one beer, he wasn't drunk—but he surely felt like he was. His head felt light and full of air. He's staring at you for too long, now.

Clearing his throat, Steve ran his hand through the front of his hair—long, chestnut brown, fanned outward behind his ear—and motioned toward your beer leg.

"Should I—do you want—if you want, we can...get out of here? If you're not...doin' anything? The, um, music's givin' me a headache anyway." What the hell, Harrington?

Steve clenched his teeth and exhaled sharply through his nose. You were just so much prettier up close. He could barely think with your eyes blinking up at him from behind those glasses. And blink you did (in disbelief) at his proposal. Your mouth ran dry, heart on your tongue, palms slick with sweat, stomach bloated with butterflies.

All you could do was nod for a moment, before you swallowed once more and finally found your words. "Yes. Y-yes, I'd like that."

It was hard for Steve to contain the joyous grin that broke out on his face, but he did his best. It showed face with another lopsided smirk, and then Steve was stepping back to motion toward the door.

"After you."

It was exquisite, to be leaving a house party with half your senior class and a group of random twenty-something year olds watching Steve Harrington trail after you. Heads turned to watch the two of you head toward the door, mouths moving rapidly to murmur about the predicament. Steve's friends hollered after him in search of explanation, but Steve never even stopped to justify.

He opened the door, smiled, and waited for you to pass through.

♡ ♡

After deliriously wandering along the sidewalk for about ten minutes, the both of you decided that the refreshment situation at the party was dastardly—and you were starving. Steve immediately questioned what your favorite food was, promising you whatever you liked. As you approached the town square, suddenly all you could think of was Tony's, the tiny mom-and-pop pizza parlor on the corner next to Melvald's.

Steve pulled your chair out and pushed it back in once you were seated, and as you waited for your greasy cheese pizza to share, set his eyes upon you with eager attention. Your shoulders squeezed together, lips pursing to conceal a smile, and your eyes touched the wooden table with nerves reddening your face.

"What?" you squeaked under his stare.

Steve eased back into his chair, head cocking toward his shoulder. You peeked up through your lashes and watched his eyes roll over you. He took his lip between his teeth and shook his head as though in disbelief.

"Just lookin' at you," he graveled.

You giggled, reaching up on the table to grab the paper straw wrapper, playing with it in your lap to ground yourself. He was so handsome. His shoulders were broad and muscular, and he smelled like something musky and manly. You didn't even mind the cigarettes. Something about them sticking out of his back pocket made your heart flutter. Your mother would lose her mind.

After a moment of silence and low jazz on the stereo overhead, you piped up. "Is your head any better?"

Steve furrowed his brows for a moment, before they relaxed and he grinned. "Oh, s' fine. I get 'em a lot, headaches. Comes with the territory. I'm a—"

"—a boxer. I know," you murmured sheepishly, ducking under his raised eyebrows.

"Oh, is that so?" Steve squinted amusedly, tapping his finger on the table.

Your eyes followed, admiring the wideness of his hands, the slender length of his fingers. He wore a brown leather-banded watch around his wrist, and you swallowed at the sight of it.

"Yeah. It's...kind of hard to miss your face on the side of the Super Mart." You giggled.

Steve's cheeks reddened, a chuckle huffing out of him. He scratched at the nape of his neck and shifted in his seat.

"Yeah. Yeah, you got me there. And, uh, what do you do?"

He watched you perk up, hands tucked under your thighs. Pride seemed to glimmer in your eyes as you tipped your chin up and smiled nervously.

"I'm a librarian. I started last summer just for fun, and when I graduated they gave me a full time position."

Steve's eyes flitted over you adoringly again. A librarian made so much sense.

"And you like it?"

You bobbed your head eagerly, eyes rounding behind the reflective lenses of your glasses.

"I love it. I love books, so...I guess that helps." You laughed.

A waiter in a black t-shirt and jeans came to table and slid a metal tray with a steaming, gooey, and glistening pizza on it between the two of you. When he was gone, Steve grabbed one of the plates at the head of the table and pointed to the tray.

"How many do you want?"

Your cheeks swelled with heat again. "Two, please."

He handed you the slices, and you waited until he had four of his own to begin biting at yours. You took tiny, delicate bites, and Steve watched over the pull of his white cheese as you paused to sip at your water occasionally. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but there was something gentle about the way you moved. He could still smell your lilac scent.

"What's your favorite book?" Steve mumbled around a mouthful of cheese.

Your eyes popped over to him, surprised at the question. In all honesty, you were surprised he hadn't chuckled at your occupation. Most of the boys you'd gone out with poked fun at it—or made inappropriate jokes about bending you over in your cardigan and pencil skirt. You were either terribly sexualized or laughed at.

But Steve Harrington did neither.

"Oh, um...ever? Or right now?"

Steve chuckled, wiping his shiny fingers on a thin napkin crumpled beside his plate. "I didn't know you could have both."

You beamed. "Of course you can. My favorite book changes the more I read."

Steve smiled, watching you swoop down for another bite of your nibbled pizza.

"I'm not much of a reader," he explained. "I was never very good at it."

You shrugged, wiping your own fingers.

"That's okay. I'm sure I wouldn't be very good at boxing."

Steve chuckled, reaching over the table squeeze your bare bicep. He smelled like pizza and Marlboros and he was so pretty. You always thought his eyes were brown in the dully-colored photographs at school—but in the fluorescents of the pizza parlor, they held sparks of olive and gold, more hazel than anything. His lips were plump and pink and soft and he had a bruise on the underside of his jaw that you hadn't seen until now.

"With these muscles? I think you could give me a run for my money."

You giggled, rubbing at your arm where his touch was when it disappeared back into his lap.

"Should we bet on it?"

Steve placed his elbows on the table and leaned forward. "Whatever you want, baby."

Your entire face felt like the surface of the sun, and you did your best to hide your smile in a mouthful of pizza. But his flirtatious stare caused a giggle to burst through, and you felt like you were in fifth grade passing notes to your crush all over again. Steve cocked his head again, the smallest tip to the left.

"What?" you pouted, riddled with anxiety at his stare.

Steve arched his brows, holding his empty hands up. "I'm just lookin' at you."

You shifted on your chair, gazing down at your plate. Steve tipped his chin down to follow.

"You're nice to look at," he murmured gently.

You were certain you'd never felt this giddy before. You tucked your hair behind your ear and played the ends anxiously, gnawing on the inside of your cheek. Your stomach rumbled with hunger but you couldn’t find it in yourself to eat. Steve was too handsome, too pretty, too sweet.

And though he looked a little mean if he didn’t plaster on a smile, and the sheer size of him made you nervous, and the sound of his voice, gruff and unemotional even with the sweetest sentiment, made you shiver and squirm and your stomach ache—you could tell that beneath that broody exterior, Steve Harrington was a kind and loving man.

You could see it in the way he coaxed you to eat just one more slice of pizza, and offered to refill your Coke once it was down to the ice. It spoke through the way he collected your trash and pulled out your chair, and held the door open for you in the wild whipping wind. He moved you to the inner position on the sidewalk so you weren’t near the road, and wrapped his arm around your shoulders at every crosswalk.

He was an attentive listener, and didn’t seem the least bit bored when you went on a rant about why Virginia Woolf was better than Jane Austen, but why it wasn’t fair to compare the two all the same. He was humble with his boxing stories, and refrained from boasting about his current undefeated status across America.

“I have a fight comin’ up in Cleveland, actually,” Steve said.

You trailed along the streets through the town square, past the closed shops and darkened window displays. The street lights bathed the mostly-barren road in a soft white glow. Your fingers had been brushing together for the past twenty minutes since your departure from the pizza parlor, but you were both too nervous to join hands. Steve didn’t any to push, and you didn’t want to assume.

“Oh, that’s cool,” you beamed, tipping your head back to gaze at him. “How many cities have you fought in now?”

Steve pursed his lips, humming lowly. “Fifteen, I think, but some are in the same states, so…s’ nothin’ too special. My coach says I might be goin’ big time soon, though. Like…bigger than state clubs.”

You smiled, scuffling to a stop near the movie theater entrance. Under the glowing yellow bulbs of the promotion sign, Steve turned to face you.

“I’m happy for you, Steve. It seems like you’re really passionate about it. Which means it is special.”

Steve gave a sheepish shrug, stepping closer. You could smell him again, feel the warmth from his buttoned chest. You swallowed as his eyes moved to your mouth.

“S’ the only thing I’m good at.”

At your side, he brushed his fingers against your wrist. Your breath hitched, eyes rounding in delight. Steve took that as a sign to slip his fingers into your palm, and when it flowered open in invitation, he wove your fingers together.

“I’m sure that’s not true,” you whispered.

Steve smiled, reaching with his free hand to tuck a strand of hair falling in your eyes behind your ear. The side of his knuckle grazed the arch of your ear, trailing down the side of your neck. You straightened at the wandering touch, skin buzzing with warmth and excitement. Steve followed his touch all down your neck. When his hand fell to your shoulder, he took it away, and met your gaze again. His was soft, round, warm and gentle. He had the faintest collection of hair above his lip.

“You’re so pretty,” he confessed quietly.

You could have burst with delight. Though it was always implied when boys took you on dates, or made out with you in the back of their cars in the gymnasium parking lot, rarely had anyone told you how beautiful they found you. Rarely, in the company of a man, had you ever felt it.

But standing under Steve Harrington’s gaze, you felt like the most beautiful girl in the world.

“Steve?”

Steve seemed surprised by the sound of his name coming out of your mouth. His eyes widened.

“Yeah?”

You smiled a soft, shy smile, and tipped your chin down. “Can you…can you kiss m—“

Two fingers curled under your chin and lifted your head before you could finish, and then a mouth attached itself to yours. Steve’s mouth: warm and soft and filled with the aftertaste of pizza and a faint, few-hours-ago trace of tobacco. You squeezed your eyes shut and sighed against his cheek, tipping your head to meet the ministrations of his mouth. Your hand squeezed tighter around his. His fingers left your chin to cup your cheek. He handled you like something delicate and special.

You broke away when the air grew thin, and each of your eyes fluttered open to blink dazedly into each other’s flushed, swollen-mouthed faces. You brought your free hand to your mouth and giggled against your fingers. Steve’s smile was broad and boyish, and he gently stroked his thumb against your cheek.

“Like that?”

You nodded your head quickly. “Exactly like that.”

♡ ♡

Your spontaneous date with Steve Harrington came accompanied by a restless night of sleep. You tossed and turned and kicked your sheets, mind full of images of Steve kissing you under the streetlights, and again on your porch when he walked you to the door. You scrawled your number on the back of an old receipt, and, unbeknownst to you, Steve stared at it in his hand all night.

The morning came sticky and hot, with a soft golden sun that filtered through your floral curtains and cast pink blobs across your sheets. You were finally sleeping peacefully, drooling onto your pillowcase, sprawled out across your ruffled bedspread, when the phone shrilled downstairs. You groaned at the sound, burying your face deeper into the pillow. Your mother, flipping pancakes in the kitchen, answered the phone.

Less than a minute later, she poked her head into your room.

"Honey?" she cooed.

A moment passed without response.

"Honey, it's for you."

Blearily, you rolled onto your back and grunted.

"Whois it," you slurred, dazed from sleep.

"Someone named Steve? He said—"

You jumped out of bed, hurriedly shoving your feet into your ratty bunny slippers. You practically flew down the stairs and into the kitchen, where your father was reading the newspaper at the table. He furrowed his brows over the rim of his glasses as you picked up the phone and rubbed your eyes free of sleep.

"Hello?" Suddenly, the sleepy mumble of your voice was gone—replaced with a chipper coo.

"Hey, beautiful."

Your cheeks immediately bloomed pink, and you glanced over your shoulder toward your father at the table. You slipped into the dining room, stretching the coiled cord as you went.

"Hi."

Steve chuckled. "Hi. I'm sorry for calling so early, I just...I was hoping I could see you again."

Easing back against the floral wallpaper of the dining room, you took your lip between your teeth and held your breath. A flutter entered your chest.

"Libby?"

You released your breath and swallowed. "Yes, I...I'd love to see you again. When were you—"

"—what are you doing right now?"

For Steve Harrington, your answer was nothing. You were doing nothing at all but rushing to your room and readying for a morning full of him. When the doorbell chimed, you breezed down the staircase in a white sundress and what Steve still called 'the fuckin' cutest' pair of powder blue kitten heels. Through the frosted glass of your front door, Steve was a blob of white and blue and a pop of vibrant pink—swinging open the door, you realized the pink were a large bouquet of pink peonies.

"Oh, Steve," you gasped, eyes wild with delight.

Steve's cheeks burned, holding them out by the stems. In the kitchen, your mother peered around the corner to snoop. You collected the flowers in your arms and beamed at him. The faintest smile touched his lips, but inside, he was melting. The back of his white t-shirt already gathered with sweat.

"They're beautiful."

Steve didn't know a fucking thing about flowers, but if they got him a reaction like that, he'd buy you a bouquet every day for the rest of his life.

"I'm glad you like them."

You drove this time, tucked neatly into the passenger seat of his burgundy BMW. He parked on the curb of Laurie's Diner and held your hand until you were seated in a vinyl booth pressed up against the window. You plucked a laminated menu from the table and flapped it open, looking over the options. Your hair was pretty today, and Steve found himself flitting between his menu and your head, unable to take his eyes away. It caught the light in such a glorious way.

"I'm not very fond of omelets, but I love scrambled eggs. But then, French toast sounds good, especially now that strawberries are ripe," you rambled, with a certain air to your voice that made everything sound like poetry.

Steve felt like he couldn't breathe just watching you read a fucking breakfast menu. You were still gazing down at it, brow furrowing frustratedly at your own indecision.

"Steve?"

Steve blinked back to reality, cheeks blazing hot again. "Sorry. Just lookin' at you again."

You giggled, hiding a blush behind the menu. Steve set his down, flipping over his coffee mug.

"Get all of it, if you want. French toast, scrambled eggs, pancakes—whatever you want," he declared.

You closed your menu, placing it on the table. "Really?"

Steve shrugged, tossing his arm on the back of the booth. His watch glinted in the sun and temporarily blinded you.

"Really. Whatever you want, angel, s' on me."

The new nickname made your stomach flip, and you toyed with the ends of your utensils to avoid meeting his amused gaze.

"Only if we share."

Steve chuckled. "Fine by me."

You grinned, sliding your menu toward the end of the table with a new sense of determination and cheery delight.

"I hope you can eat, champ."

When the food came—pancakes, scrambled eggs, fried eggs, French toast, two kinds of muffins, sausage, hash browns, and practically every drink on the menu—the two of you made good on your deal and split it fairly evenly. Steve was surprised at how much you could put away, watching with raised brows as you finished your fourth pancake and third egg.

All the while, you made him laugh. You told him about the library—which he never imagined to be such a fun place but you made it sound like DisneyWorld—and when you asked him about boxing, you seemed genuinely interested.

"So...you can knock someone's teeth out?"

Steve reached over and took the strawberry jam from your hands, twisting the lid off and holding it out.

"Mhm, and I have. It's a rite of passage, only a matter of time until mine are gone."

You giggled, dropping dollops of jam on your plate as you scooped it with a butterknife from Steve's palm.

"I hope not."

When your toast had been buttered and jammed, you took a bite, and held the other half out to Steve. The two of you seemed to move with the comfort and familiarity of a five year relationship, never pausing to anticipate, never stopping to wonder—you just knew. You knew what Steve was going to do before he did it, and he knew what you were going to say before the words even came out of your mouth.

Your stomaches burned from laughter and your cheeks throbbed from blushing, and it was as Steve watched you hiccup from too many giggles that he suddenly could no longer ignore the weeping ache of his heart.

"I really like you," he murmured softly.

But over the chime of the bell above the door, and the chatter of diner eaters, and the clank of dishes and utensils, those words were all you heard. You smiled, full-mouthed and pretty, and reached over the table for his hand. Between the half empty plate of scrambled eggs and a bowl of blueberries, your fingers intertwined.

Steve really liked you. And he knew, as you collected his mouth in a syrup-sticky kiss, that in no time, Steve would love you, too.

♡ ♡

So happy you're back after all this time! I have a question, do you happen to know how people fought in ancient rome? Particularly gladiators and soldiers? Sorry if this isn't the blog for this question tho!

I think we've covered both of these questions independently over the years.

Gladiators were a performance sport. It was more about glorifying the Roman Empire and its victories, than a conventional fight. As a result, most Gladiators were armed with specific variant, “loadouts,” designed to cosplay as various enemies that The Empire had conquered, and they only fought against specific countering variants. Specifically, the variants would be matched in such a way that it would be difficult for either combatant to have a decisive advantage over the other, with an eye towards creating situations that would result in a lot of visible injuries, without serious harm to either participant.

In case it needs to be said, gladiators were a significant financial investment, and they weren't casually killed in the arena. The point was for visible injuries, and a bloody spectacle, not a slaughter. Sometimes someone would die, but having them die on the field wasn't the intention, and they generated a lot of money, and on the rare cases when they were killed, it was meant to be a climactic moment, not someone taking a blade to the gut and collapsing mid-fight.

Obviously, I'm barely scratching the surface here, because it gets a lot deeper, but the simple answer is that in the vast majority of cases, gladiators were armed with weapons that were designed to make seriously harming their foe difficult to impossible. Also, the gladiators were something that evolved and became more complicated over time. When they first started in the Republic, it was a much more stripped down structure with prisoners of war being given a sword and shield and forced to face off against one another.

As for the Roman Legions. I'm not sure I've ever seen a comprehensive description of their training techniques. The Testudo, (or Tortoise) is one of the more famous examples of their specific combat style. Legionaries would create a shield wall, and the soldiers behind the front line would raise their shields to cover the formation against attacks from above (usually arrow fire, or thrown spears.) While being able to strike with javelins. In practice, the formation had issues, including being vulnerable to siege fire, and mounted archers were able to easily flank the formation. It's a neat story, but the formation had serious limitations.

One thing we haven't talked about before (I think) was the Roman's use of biological warfare. During sieges, they would load (locally sourced, I assume) corpses onto catapults, and then launch them into the besieged city.

Beyond, the major thing about the Legions was the extremely disciplined and orderly combat formations, with a lot of attention paid to managing battlefield movement. It wasn't so much about exceptional individual performance, so much as their ability to operate as a unit. This isn't a particularly mind blowing concept today, but in an era when professional soldiers were the exception, or limited to the elite forces, it had slightly more impact.

Regarding the details of their training, I've never seen any of that come up. Now, granted, I've really tried to research that degree of Roman history. So, if you're asking, “how, exactly, did they swing the gladius?” I don't know, and I don't remember ever seeing anyone credibly claim they had that insight. As far as I know, the only surviving Roman training manual was De Re Militari, (there's around 200 surviving Latin copies) which is far more concerned with overall strategic planning and command. If you're trying to write Roman era military fiction, it's probably worth reading. So, I'm not sure this is exactly what you were looking for, but I do hope it helps.

-Starke

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HII !! love ur content sm and i think this is for requests BUT if you can…could you do Scott pilgrim headcannons! SORRY if this is too much to ask for PLEASE AND THANK U -🪄 anon!

omg it's NEVER too much :DD i never get requests for scott so this was super fun to write HEHEHEHEH

scott pilgrim headcanons!!

he collects matchbox cars and plays with them whenever wallace isn't home

he also has like, no idea how to cook

he can't use most candles cuz they burn his nose

laughs whenever he sees 69 anywhere

i feel like he definitely likes my chemical romance.......... i can't explain it, it's a gut feeling

he gets wings every friday

he fucking LOVES tortoises like he could talk about them for hours if you gave him a chance

most of his shirts are ones he stole from his dad before he moved out

total blanket hog

also probably hogs the pillows too LMFAO

he doesn't smoke but he always has a lighter on him for some reason??

there was definitely a period of time where he wasn't participating in sex bob-omb and tried to start a soundcloud rap career that didn't take off

in most of the tracks you could hear wallace telling him to shut up

he tried to play five nights at freddy's ONCE and damn near pissed himself in fear

maroon 5 is his guilty pleasure

he has a tattoo of patrick star on his right ass cheek

him and wallace are matching (wallace has spongebob on his left ass cheek LMFAO) and they got the tattoos when they were both very very drunk

he has NEVER worn a pullover hoodie in his life and he plans to keep it that way

i imagine that the only thing inside of his brain is two caterpies playing a 1v1 tennis match

have i ever mentioned that he's bi?? he is very bi have you SEEN HIM!!!!!!

In Between Feathers and Smiles

Kanene's notes: As it seems when I wasn't looking ??? Fucking Felipe Minecraft just came here and made a nest in my mind and refuses to leave so now I have a new comfort character as it seems.

Also I know that Richas and Philza didn't interact a lot but I like to think they are final bosses for each other. The day Richas adopts him as his father and Philza adopts him as his son the island explodes and life come to a full cycle.

Warnings: None! Just a tad of angst with plenty of fluff and some silly cheer up tickles. Ticklish!Richarlyson and Ler!Philza. Around 4.000 words. Richas uses all pronouns here.

[~*~]

Tio Phil had a nice place.

Richas didn’t spend a lot of time there. Important talks were usually held in other secured spaces and he would rather spend some time building with her parents or causing some ruckus somewhere in the island than constantly invade Tallulah and Chay’s home. Even if they got closer after the Egg Island, it didn’t mean that he stopped feeling awkward around his siblings.

But today… They was tired.

So they hiked to the top of the wall, turned off Philza’s collecting machine and fell in the middle of the potato crops, watching the clouds as they calmly danced around their always-perfectly-sunny sky. 

Looking at them, she wouldn’t have to think about how much she missed pai Cellbit and Pa Roier every single day, about how scared Empanada looked and the way she was always clutching her scythe now or how she and mãe Bagi barely came out of their securated base anymore. 

If he watched enough the fading forms of the fluffy clouds and the occasional birds that came and went, he wouldn’t have to think about the sharp shapes and bright colors he saw today when he woke up in his old room in pai Cellbit’s castle, full of new stinging scratches covering entirely his arms and legs, the canvas and room filled with red drops of paint and blood. Nor how it felt to burn the piece of art and bury the ashes aways before anyone could see it.

Yes. The Wall was nice. It was calm and beautiful and since her tio and siblings were sleeping like rocks somewhere well hidden he could sneak a few jumps in their trampoline before coming back to a second nap by the plants. 

From time to time he would feel something bump on his hand and turn around only to see a cute, small tortoise calmly biting and chewing on a leaf of the crop, probably a fresh fugitive from Talullah’s pond. They could respect its chaotic nature.

“Holy fuck!” A shout nearby almost made him jump out of his skin, fastly turning around, sword in hand, only to see his tio in a similar situation, hand on his heart as he tried to regain his breath amidst his surprised laughter. “Gods, Richarlyson you scared the shit out of me.”

That fished an amused crackle out of Richas, who didn’t feel much like it, but got up and waved a few times, writing a greeting for the adult. She kind of was in his home, afterall.

“Hi, tio! Good afternoon.”

“Good afternoon,” Philza answered, putting his tools back on his trusted backpack once again, now already realizing what was the reason for his machine to have stopped working out of nowhere. He instead pulled a basket out of it. 

It has been a while since he harvested his own potatoes by hand, but he had no hurry or plans today. Besides, it was quite a calming activity. 

“Were you looking for me? Sorry, me, Chayanne and Tallulah have been spending a lot of time in our… other house.” 

It was definitely a way to explain Rose’s protected sanctuary, but he couldn’t tell the kid about that.

A crossing thought made Philza’s body freeze and his eyes became wide. “Wait, is it about our trip? Is it time? Ok, I already got everything prepared but I still need a couple more minutes to leave Tallulah and Chayanne somewhere safe with someone and then we can go… Let me see who is already awake…”

A push in his arm stopped his sentence and called his attention to the dragons’ words. 

“It’s fine! :D” Another blue sign quickly followed the first, the sentences being written fast and messily. “It’s not the time for our trip yet, don’t worry. I was just passing by here and decided to take a nap.”

The small dragon, a barely nestling, crouched and let their tail drag across the soil in a calming manner. 

There was no rush today. Philza felt his muscles untense.

“Alright then. That is good.” The adult smiled, more relaxed. Richas never commented this with anyone, but sometimes his tios looked like they’re a thousand years old. “Sorry for interrupting your relaxing nap then, mate. As I said, I already got everything covered. The moment you need me, just call, ok?”

Energetic nods. Philza answered with one of his own and turned around, going back to his activity. It was already a habit at this point, to watch a kid with the corner of his eyes as he went on about his day, always aware to any danger or enemy that could appear. That is how he watched as Richas swayed in the same place when he turned around, expression falling to a neutral face as they broke their signs and threw them out of the wall before falling on the ground again, closing her eyes.

Richarlyson was a good kid. An energetic little shit rocketing from one place to the other with an adventurous and reckless spirit almost as big as his heart. Anyone who spent more than 2 minutes with him would see, clear as day how much he loved his parents and loved even more to give them gray hair, always ready for a playful chase, a harmless prank or a fun playdate with his siblings. They didn’t stumble on each other too much nowadays, but at any given time Philza would protect and take care of him just as much as his own kids if needed. 

He was a good egg (literally).

That is why it was easy to see that something was off with her. Seeing her walking around without one of his parents or Bad was rare, but not an alarming sign itself, being as independent as they was. But that together with the way that her gestures lacked their usual uncontrollable energy, how he fell the moment Philza turned away and how tiredness clung in his form and brought shadows to her eyes and a weight to her shoulders was definitely something worth noticing.

Something had been bothering the boy and knowing his family and their history on the island… Well, not a single islander had been free from the horrors that permeated every corner of the place, but the brazilians seemed to receive a special - and not in the good way - attention more often than not. 

Needless to say, Richarlyson probably had a lot to get worried and sad over, unfortunately. 

All of them, the guardians, did their best to save their nestlings the best they could from the enemies and disasters that seemed to follow their every step. However there was just so much a small group could do against gods knows how many entities before their children also began paying a parcel of the price.

It was sorrowful to see the young one like this, but Philza wouldn’t pry. If the kid wanted to come and vent he would happily lend them an ear and give his best comfort. If Richas wanted to just hang out in silence and enjoy the refreshing breeze from the top of the wall then Philza would let him be, as well.

Therefore, he kept collecting the potatoes, humming one of Tallulah’s songs while putting them in crates and organizing the crates in a pile next to the security fence together with the other thousands crates that were already there.

Maybe he should follow Pierre’s example and start selling them to the Federation. Getting paid and becoming an official provider or something like that.

… Nah, he would rather die.

Philza turned around to get another round of potatoes, this time to make more avocado toast to nibble on until dinner, where his daughter would oblige him to cook actual true food for them - which is unfair, because avocado toast is a very good, healthy and energetic, fulfilling food! - when he saw it. ‘It’, more specifically being Richarlyson, who was still around three feets away from him, just like she was after the end of their conversation. Which didn’t make any sense since Philza had moved a good distance further away from his initial spot while harvesting and taking care of his plantation.

Hm. 

Interesting.

He kept his gaze forward and his hands moving, not actively watching the kid but still paying attention for any kind of move.

A few steps away, he crouched to adjust a crop that had been almost removed from its spot, planting and firming it back on the soil before getting up again, his wings partially open to lower the sun rays hitting his back.

(With them being destroyed as they were, there was little use he could give them, but this would have to do.)

Pretending to stretch, he tilted his head just slightly amount, in the perfect angle to see that Richas, once again, had moved somehow in this short period of time and was now closer to him, laying on the ground with her eyes closed, a light snore coming out of her muzzle in a quiet ‘mimimi’ sound.

Philza held back a snort.

They kept this up for a while, almost as a game. Philza would continue his task, turn his head for half of a second and when he turned his attention back to the young one it was to see that they was already close again, “napping” with no worries, dead to the world as a rock, all across the field. There was a moment when the winged blonde could almost swear that he saw him crawling amidst the potatoes while following him. 

Philza thinks he did a pretty good job in not laughing out loud at their antics, only letting out one or two small snickers here and there fly in the air before being swept away.

He was taking the toasts out of the furnace and storing them in pots when the little dragon “woke up”, yawning and stretching, an amused grin blossoming in his face.

“Hey, king, glad that you're awake. Just made a fresh stack of avocado toast. Here, take some, take some, make sure you have enough for any emergency or attack.”

A loud wheeze was pried from his lips at watching her previous grin quickly turn into a sour face at the sight of the toast, stepping away from them in a half of second. 

Richarlyson quickly shook her head as she emphasized that he “would rather have a short and happy life instead, thanks” and that “Tallulah told me terror stories about these when we were in Egg Island 0_0 I am traumatized”, as the signs he placed on the ground said. 

Philza had to hold himself on the fence so he and the toast didn't fall from the wall with the force of his laughter.

“Alright, alright.” He quickly acquiesced, putting the rest of the food in the remaining pot and disposing them all in his backpack, planning to bring it to the pantry later. “What if we shared these sandwiches Chayanne made me this morning, then? He is trying a new recipe and it's just delicious.”

The disgusted expression quickly melted away when they heard the mention of a new snack. Philza unwrapped it under Richas’ wide attentive eyes and offered him only to have his hand pushed away, the kid shaking his head furiously.

“What? Why? Did Tallulah tell you scary stories about her siblings’ cooking abilities too?”

Richas denied, looking a tad out of the place before apparently deciding on their words.

“You can keep it, tio! Chayanne made it for you and it's no problem, I am not hungry >:D” 

Another sign. 

“Besides, if I need some I can just go to Tio Bad's house and steal his refrigerator! I still have a lot in my backpack though.”

To show his point, the small one began pulling pot after pot of cooked goodies from his backpack: lasagna, soup, candies, more candies, chocolate, a not very good looking or even fresh bread, tamales… He proudly showed his collection, bouncing on the same spot before starting to put them back from where they came from.

This nestling…

“I am not saying that you don't have food. I know you're always prepared and I am pretty sure you even have one or two illegal items in your backpack too.” He rested his back on the tree behind him, careful to avoid hitting Missa's painting, smiling as his nephew stared at him with a mischievous glint in his eyes, bouncing on the same spot, not denying or confirming his suspicions. “But I still want to share a good sandwich with you, mate.”

Richas still didn't look convinced. He seemed to be listening, though. That was a good step.

“I am sure that Chayanne wouldn’t care too. He actually loves giving everyone good food and showing his skills to the island. Which is perfect. I can send him your thanks later.”

It was interesting how, even though all the similarities, every sibling was still very different from each other, in both their personalities and actions, and sometimes Philza liked to muse about it. At his words Richarlyson didn't nervously twist his fingers like Tallulah used to do when thinking hard about something or deviated his gaze like Chayanne when he knew what he wanted but thought that he should want another thing. Instead, the dragon fledgling watched him intently, looking for something. 

They must have found it, because they smiled in an embarrassed manner and let his tail wag excitedly once, breaking the signs and walking to his side on the tree.

Philza handed them their sandwich and Richarlyson began eating, satisfied, small growling sounds escaping between each bite as they enjoyed the moment. 

Without meaning to or even thinking too much about it, Philza answered back with a quiet, pleased caw, his right wing expanding to surround the little one, not locking her amidst his feathers, but creating a shield from the Sun.

(If only it could completely shield them from the dangers.)

“Do you like it?” Richas answered by taking a large bite and ripping the sandwich in half, ears wiggling in contentment. The adult chuckled.

“Good to know, king.”

They spent some time like this before a sign was placed, successfully calling the other’s attention. 

“How is it to have feathered wings, tio? Yours are so pretty! :D” 

Flashes began filling his mind. The feeling of the wind hitting your face, the sound of the birds singing and chirping when flying in flocks, the adrenaline of falling without a single fear of hitting the floor, of expanding his wings and feeling each one of your feathers bristle in the air…

A light touch in one of his primaries shook him out of his memories and his eyes automatically flew to the… mess that were his wings now, with weak muscles and feathers missing from some spots. 

Grimly, Philza could surely think about plenty of adjectives he could give them, “pretty” definitely weren’t one.

It was quite hard to focus on that when the fledgling kept carefully touching and looking at them with so much curiosity, however. 

“It’s incredible.” He sighed, a mix of longing and awe painting his voice. “They can help with so much stuff, like, I’m not even kidding. Mine are very roughed up, especially after Purgatory, but when they were in their prime they were perfect not only for flying but also for shielding, holding stuff, attacking…There is a lot you can do with them. You also will probably be able to do all of this and more when yours grows.” 

“You could attack with them? 0-0”

“Pff, yeah. Actually, you would be surprised about how many people wouldn’t be prepared to have a face full of feathers swinging with full force when fighting an avian.”

At the mention, he shook his black, glistering feathers in demonstration, finishing his sandwich with a final bite when a snorted squeal cut the air. 

Philza turned around to see Richarlyson rubbing a spot on his neck, their other hand pushing his wing away while a small smile grazed his lips.

Hm.

“Also, you see those muscles?” He purposely brought his wing down, letting all the black feathers hit and briefly wiggle on the young’s face and neck, pretending to not notice the way he squeaked and jumped away, shoulders bouncing with the uncontrollable giggles that naturally resulted from the tickles. Philza continued as if nothing happened. “Lot of people don’t think too much about them, but to be able to carry a whole person, the muscles, tendons and bones need to have a lot of strength. So, being punched by them usually hurts a lot more than attentive enemies are prepared for and gives you plenty of time to run away or finish the fight.”

Richas rubbed the buzzing, tickly tingles left by the sudden attack of feathers away, airy titters still escaping from their mouth while they squinted suspiciously at the blonde, who seemed distracted enough by his explanation to realize the onslaught of accidental tickles. 

The dragon risked a step closer. The conversation continued to flow without interruption.

“That is also why it’s important to always keep exercising your wings, especially during their initial growth or periods of recovery. Have you been building your core strength, mate?”

Brushing off the previous episode aside, Richas nodded, not helping the excited thrill that filled the air. 

“Yes! Tio Bad taught me how and pai Mike has been trying to build a machine to fly with me so he is studying a lot of mechanics about how it works and accompanying  me with the exercises. Pa Roier also said he will help me when he comes back, since he used to watch a lot of tia Jaiden and Bobby training.”

Philza tried to not visibly frown at the words. How long has Roier been sleeping, again?

He would have to ask Bagi and Fit for news later. 

For now, he had a kid to distract.

“Sounds good. If you need any help you can call me, I wouldn’t mind giving you a few tips. Even if crow wings aren’t that close to dragon ones, they still have a lot in common.”

“Can you teach me the attacks? I want to surprise Dapper the next time he tries to fight me.”

The avian laughed. “Sure, king. Come a bit closer.” 

Richas gave two more steps in his direction with wide watching eyes. “Alright, it depends a lot on your wingspan but usually you will need to be in close combat to use these techniques, so that is something to pay attention to. A good tactic you can have is to use them as a distraction.” 

With a mischievous smirk, Philza began quickly moving his wings around the kid, letting them get close and then moving them away before he could touch them, the feathers skittering freely across his neck and ears with each swipe. When Richas squirmed to one side to hide, trying to push them away while firmly pressing his mouth shut so no squeak or squeal would escape, Philza simply attacked the other side, even managing to slip a few wiggling of the fluff feathers on his belly and armpits when the shirt would move up enough to reveal a bit of the scaled skin, catching a new giggly growl every time.

“And, when the target is sufficiently confused by them is the moment that you attack.” 

Before the words could sink in the kid’s mind, Philza striked, giving to one of his sides a quick tweak, successfully fishing a loud yelp and managing to free a string of snickers that only grew louder and gigglier as he kept the soft, light feathery tickles intertwined them with more and more surprising squeezes and tweaks. 

“You can keep it up as long as you need. Remember: confuse, confuse and attack.” Swipe. Swipe. Squeeze. “Again: confuse, confuse and attack.”

Laugh, laugh, laugh.

Richas gave up trying to push his wings and hands away, instead trying to hug himself to hide his most ticklish spots. However, the playful, soft and silly tickling  kept following them no matter how much they wiggled or squirmed around, totally surrounding him with those fluffy bristles that made every single patch of skin buzz with a funny kind of electricity, freeing more and more squeaks between peals of uncontrollable laughter. 

She started walking backwards, trying to put some distance between her and the tickles, almost stumbling on his own tail by how hard it was wagging in adrenaline and joy.

Philza’s eye twirkled with a gleeful shine. 

He stopped his playful attack, but the young one kept stepping away.

“Another good technique that you can use is to create a physical barrier with your wings. It can be dangerous since your enemy can get a hold of them if you’re not careful but very useful in the case you want to stop them from touching you or, in our case,” Richarlyson’s back hit something soft but immovable and suddenly the wheezy titters and snickery snickers were back in full force once again, bordering on a hysterical laughter when skillful hands began scribbling and scratching his ribs. “Preventing them from getting away.”

His fingers danced and burrowed themselves in the space between their ribs, vibrating on the spot, which made a funny kind of squeaky growl escape from the dragon, more high pitched, bouncy laughter and unstoppable wiggles taking over him when the hands kept running away and attacking all over his torso. They spidered over his ribcage to then poke his armpits, or washed down to sneak some digging and squeezing on his stomach and also even skittered across his spine, pulling all kind of yelps, chortles, snorts and high pitched, wheezy laughter over and over again. 

It took a few more minutes and a bunch more of snickering and wiggling - which was actually even worse now because each squirm made him sink even more on the tickly feathers - before the avian eventually let him go, chuckling in amusement at the way Richarlyson fell on the floor and curled in a ball, shoulders bouncing with the leftover giggles.

An amused snort was pried from the adult when they showed him their middle finger, trying with no success to frown in his direction while still smiling and snickering non stop, remnant sniggers twinkling freely in the air.

“That is a surprise tickle avian attack for you. Now you already know a few uses for your wings in a battle.”

The dragon nestling ignored him, dramatically rolling and turning around and away from the avian, still fully stretched on the floor as if he had just survived a fight for his life and not some harmless playful sillness. Philza chuckled a bit more, not resisting and giving his unprotected neck one last tickle, which immediately melted the half heartedly pout in a smile and made him turn back again and hold a tnt as a threat, making the adult laugh and pull his arms up in rendition. 

Richas showed off his tongue and then fell dramatically on the ground again.

(It was good to him in a lighter spirits, again.)

Philza then got up, stretching and shaking his wings fervently, wincing a bit when their muscles trembled a tad more than normal while holding them, probably from getting so much exercise after being kept so long hidden and immobile. 

Maybe he should follow his own advice and build more of their core strength.

Letting them rest, he went back to adjust a few more crates around before checking on his communicator to see if Chayanne or Tallulah had woken up. 

It was almost evening now, and yet it showed not a single signal of life. 

Hm. 

Well, he could give them their cookies tomorrow if needed, there was still plenty of time before the end of the week.

A light poke hit him right below his shoulderblade and suddenly a loud giggly yelp was ripped from his throat. He turned around quickly only to find his own nephew looking at him with a malefic grin in his expression.

“No.” He said, wagging a finger in warning at them, already realizing their intentions just by the slight slow drag of their tail and the step they gave in his direction. His tune tried to come out as stern, but he was pretty sure that even the kid could see there was no real heat behind his words. 

Richas answered him with an excited thrill, ignoring the threatening caw - more like a soft chip but he wasn’t about to admit it - he gave her in return.

“No. Richarlyson, you do not want to get into this fight with me, ok, mahahate?! Hey! No! Lehehet go!”

There was indeed a valiant and grandious fight. One of the most playful, silly and joyful ones to ever graze that land, they said. The winner was never revealed at the end but passing friends mentioned listening to plenty of surprised caws and giggly growls falling like waterfalls from the wall, especially when certain two other kids woke up to the lack of their father and went to investigate his whereabouts. They said that the growing match continued until the sun set. 

Who knows, who knows.

And since that day, if Richas decided to visit his tio Phil more frequently and if Philza would take the habit of turning off his harvesting machinery from time to time to watch the clouds, that is nobody’s business but their own.

An African Fine Press Friday

As we continue to celebrate Black History Month, I was introduced to this handmade, hand-printed little book by noted African American book artist and letterpress printer Amos Paul Kennedy Jr. (b. 1948),entitled How Wisdom Came to the World, printed in Oak Park, Illinois at Kennedy’s Jubilee Press in 1992 in an edition of 50 copies.

The piece is an adaptation of a Yoruba folktale about a man named Ijapa who tried to keep all the wisdom of the world to himself and, with the help of his son, comes to realize that wisdom is for everyone. Ijapa literally means “That which moves around awkwardly” in reference to a turtle or tortoise, which is an animal trickster of Yoruba legend. Therefore, this accordion book is printed on pages that are hand-cut in the shape of a turtle. Although the pages are unnumbered, each page has has a different number of small, printed turtles to indicate the order it should be read. The accordion folds down into a 10 x 13 cm square that is housed in a handmade, four-fold amate “paper” enclosure with a turtle motif on the outside.

View more posts on the work of Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr.

View more Black History Month posts.

View more Fine Press Friday posts.

- Elizabeth V., Special Collections Undergraduate Writing Intern

the friendship problem

synopsis: in which you have company during morning break, and it is strangely tolerable.

cast: jiung (p1harmony) x gn!reader

genre: strangers to friends, high school!au

wc: 1.1k (1,117)

warnings: discussions of loneliness, reader is implied to show some symptoms of social anxiety, barely proofread

notes: looking back at my high school experience (and reflecting on my growth throughout school in general) thus far makes me oddly nostalgic. this one's definitely self-indulgent. here's to the people who didn't ask me why i was so quiet, who accepted my idiosyncrasies and admittedly, brought out a friendlier side in me.

(also peep that word count i wasn't gonna post this originally but i must, i count 1117 as a small ateez reference.)

erasing the inappropriate drawings from the side whiteboard, you began to write a problem from your calculus textbook.

“integral of w squared times sin of 10 w…” you said out loud to yourself.

you could have gone outside, as it was time for break, but you found your math teacher’s classroom to be more comforting. natural light gently shone through the windows, the air freshener emitted a scent of pine, and best of all, there were no crowds to be found.

you had tried to get over your discomfort around large crowds and navigate to the cafeteria to buy a snack, but found that it was quite the pain in the ass to squeeze between couples who walked as slow as tortoises and boys who elbowed people everywhere they went.

through those wonderful experiences, you learned that the epicenter of your high school’s social life overwhelmed you the hard way.

shaking intrusive thoughts from your mind, you began to visualize solutions to this calculus problem. after a minute or two of writing, you had the answer.

“let’s go!” you cheered, knowing no one else would hear it, but finding it funny nonetheless.

suddenly, you heard a voice and turned around to see a classmate you vaguely recognized from classes you shared. jiung, that was his name.

“don’t mind me,” he said, “just looking for a place to read.”

your shoulders tensed up a little, but you nodded, resuming your work on another problem.

normally, you would expect an noticeable and uncomfortable silence, but jiung seemed to be just as at peace with the quiet as you were. that was more than you could say for a lot of people, who felt as if they had to fill silence with words that seemed rather meaningless.

curiously, you glanced at him reading. the book was an alternate history fiction novel by haruki murakami, titled 1Q84. you've read it before, of course.

"uh, enjoying your book so far?" you asked him, cursing under your breath afterwards when you got the low battery notification on your laptop.

"well," he paused briefly, "murakami's descriptions tend to be long-winded and i find some of the scenes a bit odd, but it's interesting for me. have you read it before?"

"yeah, i have. i had fun trying to make sense of all the symbolism, but i admit that 1Q84 can be a tough read for some."

you tried not to show it, but your eyes sparkled with excitement.

"since you've read it, it'd be nice to talk to someone about the book once i'm done." he smiled. "wait, your name is y/n, right? i've seen you in some of my classes."

you set the whiteboard marker down. “yep. and i know your name is jiung.”

he stared at the board in front of him, now filled from the not-quite-top to the bottom with math problems. "you wrote a lot in such a short amount of time. do you find math easy?"

you shrugged. "let's just say it's relaxing for me."

he did ask an interesting question. to be fair, you hadn't always liked math as much as you did now, being a highly stubborn child who was averse to doing their homework back then.

however, a natural curiosity to learn new concepts coupled with a preference for being alone gave you the time to sit down and ponder random topics, developing a special love for math due to its basis in objectivity.

in general, your teachers loved the fact that you asked questions and stayed during morning breaks and after class sometimes—their classrooms felt like a second home.

so yeah, you discovered that you liked doing math, and it was better than being around people who deliberately excluded you, or trying to participate in conversations where you knew you wouldn't get a word in.

better to be alone than to feel lonely, right?

(yeah, just keep telling yourself that.)

he stood up to stretch. "that's cool, i definitely admire that. you don't hear people call math relaxing often."

"to each their own. i just think it's important for someone to have something they enjoy, and who gives a shit what it is if it doesn't hurt anyone?"

you probably shouldn't have added the last part, as it came out more defensive than you anticipated. however, jiung didn't seem surprised. his eyes were kind and welcoming.

"i think it's a good rule to go by. there'd be way less conflict in the world if people minded their own business. oh, speaking of that, i hope i didn't bother you by coming in."

to your surprise, you didn't mind. "of course not, it is a teacher's classroom anyways, not mine, so obviously people have the right to come in, although most don't. and i mean, i do prefer it to be quiet while working. but your presence isn't bad or anything."

you twirled the whiteboard marker around in your hands. “quite the opposite, really. i actually liked talking to you.”

“do you not like talking to others?” he joked, probably noticing the emphasis you put on “liked.”

“i figure i either scare people away or they’re not the kind of person i want to be friends with anyways. also, not gonna lie, socializing is hard.”

for better or for worse, you knew what people thought about you—this was a fairly small school, after all. it was easier to just isolate than to worry about who was judging you.

"nothing wrong with incompatibility," he said with a small smile and a shrug. "it just means there's people out there who are better suited for you anyways."

you hadn't thought about your situation like that, but that was probably a wise way to put it.

"that... actually makes sense."

where was this dude lurking? it would have been nice to get to know him earlier, you thought. although it might be too early to tell, you had put him tentatively under a category of "people that were better suited for you."

jiung glanced at his phone for a quick second. "break's ending soon, so i have to head to my history class, but i enjoyed talking to you!”

he headed toward the door, but as he was about to leave, he turned back, as if he was forgetting something. "hey, mind if i get your kakaotalk information? let's chat again sometime."

you entered in your number, voice a little shaky. "i'd love to chat. and if you ever need to find me, i'll be here, like i always am."

"well then, i'll see you around!"

he walked to his next class, leaving you to ponder if it really was so difficult to make friends after all.

Can I request yandere raph (romantic) with gn reader who's affectionate and a sweetheart, worst part or maybe best part is that reader is more closer with raph compared to the other's

you didn't write what cartoon to take Rafael from, so I hope you don’t mind that I write Rafael 2012 YANDERE! RAPHAEL (2012 ) X GN! SWEETHEART! READER Raf needed affection and care for a long time.

He was often stressed and afraid of anything.

he argued a lot with Leonardo about leadership.

Because he was very worried about his family, no less than Leo. but you appear in his life. You pretty quickly make him fall in love with you, with your kindness, affection and smiles directed towards him. He is too clingy to you.

He is jealous, but tries not to show this nature when you are around.

But it's one thing if you communicated with a stranger (for raf), and another when you interacted with his brothers. He is in a stupor.

He is both angry and tense at the same time. they are his family. He cannot somehow humiliate them for interacting with you.But his jealous, evil nature makes him steal you. He's holding on, at least he's trying. When you get home and go to bed, he watches you sleep. His desire to kiss you on the lips doubles. You are sleeping so sweetly and peacefully that it is hard for the turtle to keep from doing so.

But for a ninja, it is important to know the measure and patience, right? he wants to make you his. But self-control still keeps him from this act. if Raph is still your best friend, that would be the worst thing you could get from a yandere Raphael. He is even more clingy and irritable.

You can communicate, for example, with the same Leonardo, and the tortoise in a red bandage will immediately hug you from the back, and put his head on your shoulder, closing his eyes. You embarrassedly apologize to Leo and go with Raph to his room.

All his brothers already think you're dating.

And Rafael would like it to happen. Only you didn’t know yet that very soon Raf will force you to be with him, whether you like it or not.

now that both shelby and katherine’s episodes are out its time to share my amazing headcannons that half of them have zero proof

everyone is under here if you want to read it’s probably long though lol

shelby

-started working out only because she saw katherine do it

-is besties with sausage and oli

-first started dying her hair all different colors and even had orange for a while before just letting it stay white

-has ptsd dreams about the fog and sculck

-she has a little garden for flowers at her house

-sometimes she calls joel to ask how to use her powers

-she is biromantic with preference for women

-at first she thought she had a crush on joey but nope she just really wanted to be friends (100% not me)

-every so while, her grandmother has to replace tortoise with a frog that looks exactly the same and she never knows (this was inspired by shelby’s qna and how she accidentally killed tortoise then replaced him)

-she loves reading so much that she would just stay up reading

-as a kid, she was bullied up into witch high school where she basically just beat them up and nobody bothered her since

-She is genderqueer and uses she/they pronouns

katherine

-she is 100% transfem and you cannot tell me other wise

-she tried to be goth in princess high school but just couldn’t get rid of the pink

-she can do eyeliner in one fast swoop

-shes trying to get into making her own armor but keeps burning herself

-She is a horse girl

-she really wants to get into painting but isn’t very good

-she is demiromantic lesbian

-she is 5’11 but wears like 4 inch heels anyway

-she still sleeps with her stuffed animals

-she is only productive at night

-the curse represents depression (i could write so many essays about that)

-She is best friends with Lizzie

Both!

-Katherine has to pick Shelby up so they can kiss

-Shelby took Katherine to a flower garden for their second date

-Shelby will stop at nothing to sit in Katherine’s lap

-Katherine makes Shelby watch sitcoms and Shelbt doesn’t have the heart to say no

-One time, Shelby was on Katherine’s shoulder and everything was great and then Katherine walked through a doorway and Shelby hit her forhead

-Lizzie and Oli are the biggest shippers of them

-During witchcraft they are dating and Shelby proposes when she comes back

-Shelby often falls asleep at her telescope and Katherine carries her to bed

-Neither one of them is the big spoon, Shelby just uses Katherine’s chest as a pillow

-Katherine often surprises Shelby with her favorite flowers

-Sausage started asking “whens the wedding?” just after their second date

-Joel married them in the cathedral of Saint Pearl

writing a modern zoyalai actors au where they paparazzi manages to catch and leak photos of their make out session and I'm having too much fun with the banter

Easy Surrender

Summary: Yu faints. Jamil takes care of the problem. Word count: ~900 A/N: This was supposed to be wholesome. Guess what it ended up being? Not entirely that, but hey, it's better than outright angst. Only so much you can do about writing Jamil during Book 4, I guess, and only so far you can go with a pre-friendship/pre-relationship fic set during that time. Oh, well~ Enjoy! <3

~

[ You’ve scared SANTIAGO out of his wits. +10 concern points, +1 fear point. ]

[ You’ve startled JAMIL considerably. +5 concern points, +1 regret point. Character’s satisfaction has increased, reasons unavailable. ]

[ CURRENT DEBUFFS: Dehydrated — USER may experience lightheadedness and other adverse symptoms until he has taken in enough liquid and rested sufficiently. ]

…

Consciousness and coherence return to Yu at the speed of a tortoise—which is to say, not very quickly. When his eyes flutter open and his parched throat tries to take in air through his mouth, he finds himself underneath an extravagant ceiling. Beneath him is the wonderfully soft mattress he’s enjoyed since he got here, just barely firm enough to support his back.

How did he end up here; is the question that comes to mind. Last he remembers, he was being accompanied to his room by Santiago and—

“You’re finally awake.”

—Jamil, who is standing by his bedside and watching over him with his arms crossed, like some kind of well-meaning guardian-aide. 

“Ja…mil?” Yu asks, although it comes out as something more of a weak rasp. He could really go for some water right about now. “What happened—?”

The vice housewarden sighs, which is just as sympathy-inducing as it elicits shame. “You fainted about a minute ago; from dehydration, I’d reckon. Santiago’s getting you some water bottles as we speak.”

Oh, right—

(Following behind an eager Santiago and an exasperated Jamil, Yu was about to step into his room before feeling a sudden spell of dizziness. Instead of stepping carefully, he staggered forward, and then all of a sudden he saw the floor coming up to meet his face—)

If that wasn’t embarrassing enough, Yu feels himself almost wilt with humiliation under Jamil’s sharp gaze. Regardless of any concern that might be found in those onyx-like eyes. 

“Sorry,” he mumbles, observing the well-made sheets under him to avoid eye contact. “I shouldn’t have gotten distracted at the oasis—I’ll be more careful next time and hydrate…”

At the same time, he thinks despairingly, With my luck, this’ll somehow screw me over later in the Main Mission.

“It can’t be helped now,” Jamil says neutrally, clothes rustling and hair ornaments chiming as he kneels. “You’re technically a guest, not a Scarabia student. If I can catch Kalim in a good mood, I’ll tell him to keep you out of the training. Worst comes to worst, I’ll have you ride up with him if there’s another march.”

“What?” Yu sits up so fast his head starts to pound, and he’s left reeling for a moment, unsure if he’s swaying or not. Judging by the alarmed little ‘hey!’ he hears and the hand Jamil puts on his back to support him, he probably is. “But everyone else… That… It won’t be necessary…”

There’s a note of exasperation to Jamil’s voice as he dryly remarks, “Please don’t be reckless. You are my responsibility as long as you’re here, so I need to be mindful of your wellbeing.”

Yu hesitates, still not daring to meet Jamil’s eyes. “Right. But it still feels unfair to everyone else…”

“Yu.”

The firm tone has Yu tensing up and, out of instinct-based compulsion, glancing back over at Jamil to make sure the expression on his face isn’t anger. It isn’t, and yet… 

One accidental flick upwards of Yu’s gaze, and sharp dark-brown eyes lock onto golden ones for a moment—but a moment is enough for him to experience an odd sinking feeling, like he’s falling without any ledges to grab onto and stop his descent. Or is that just the lightheadedness he feels from having fainted?

“Just rest for now,” Jamil insists in a deliberate tone. “You’re obviously not cut out for the physical exertion Kalim is putting us through, so don’t push yourself. Especially after your fainting spell.”

And just like that, much of Yu’s willpower to fight, to resist, to be contrary—it crumbles away like sand dunes in the wind. 

“Okay,” he replies, nodding curtly to punctuate his words.

Jamil hums almost approvingly, and with a faint hint of relief. “Glad to see you can listen to reason. Now, where is Santiago—”

As if on cue, there’s a sound not unlike a feather-filled pillow bursting that comes from beyond the closed door—followed immediately by someone cursing under their breath. Jamil mutters, “Speak of the devil,” just as the door opens and Santiago—clutching several water bottles to his chest—stumbles in.

“Sorry it took so long,” the beastman pants, looking less like his usual smug self and more like the frantically genuine teen he should be allowed to be. “I really was trying to go as fast as I could, but—”

“It’s fine, I don’t need excuses,” Jamil says, tiredly, and takes a bottle while turning to Yu. “Here. You’d better start replenishing the fluids in your body.”

“And quickly!” adds Santiago.

Yu smiles a little, quickly forgetting about that weird weightlessness he’d felt earlier (it felt so familiar, like he was losing control of his body, but when had he experienced it before, again…?) as he takes the water bottle and takes a long drink. “...Thanks, you guys,” he says sincerely, catching his breath after finishing.

The way Santiago almost preens with pride is enough to overshadow how Jamil says, “It’s no problem… no problem at all.”

…

If Yu just looked and listened a little more closely, he would have noticed the ominously self-satisfied glint to Jamil’s eyes.

Last set of entities are finished !!

Headcanons are below!

Hellow, I’ll be now accepting questions and doodle requests either for the entities, my headcanons on them, or for me :) I rlly like to talk to yall

vvv

A timid and anxious Curious Light

Curious Light is capable of doing the crucifix power, it just doesn’t know that idea yet.

Curious Light did interact with the Rooms entities but rather stays distant to them and watches them.

60’s aura is always really hot compared to Ambush, but rather appearing through emotions it’s just normal like that. Strong emotions makes it MORE hot where players’ hands get turned to ashes.

60 doesn't always have a bright red, burning, glitchy appearance. Its aura wasn’t an aura, rather it was once dark red, 60 was hairy (like Dupe) and with no glitches.

60 is the first Rooms entity to “break in” the Hotel, it was confused how it got here until it was banished back to their realm by Glitch. Glitch gave 60 an odd effect on their body after being teleported back.

90 doesn’t mind the Rooms entities a lot, but it doesn’t like 60 even more.

90 is the newest denizen in the Rooms

Sudden movements, touch or any action (even to the entities) makes 90 flinched and glitched a lot, so nearly most entities have to directly call 90 before sudden action.

Short 90 lol

90, like Halt, also owns a stop sign

A-90 🤝 Halt: Stop sign wielders

omg I made 120 into art……

120 is a rlly good sketch artist, it likes drawing a lot. It also likes to write for books either about fairytales, dark stories, romance, or history. Sometimes it does origami too.

120 has a sketch book filled with crude and impressively detailed drawings. Some of the drawings has a dark meaning to it.

120 once (and only once) drew Cat (the neko kind) Seek and Figure in a rlly realistic look on a piece of paper.

As you can see, that small creature looks like some sort of tortoise. Small Snares break off the greenhouse floor tiles and bury themselves in and cover their shells with dirt.

That human looking Snare is the owner or like the mother of the smaller ones.

The big and small Snares put delicate care of the flowers in the greenhouse and they’ll be strict about it if Rush, Ambush or Screech comes in. Eyes doesn’t reck the place, so Snares wouldn’t mind them.

Not much about Shadow honestly, it just likes to dangle around places. It suddenly disappears with the flickering lights when a player comes where it is. It doesn’t like to be seen my trespassers.

Shadow was unsure of itself if its being a good parent to Sally. Rush or Hide assured Shadow is doing great there.

Shadow has met and talked to Bob alive once (before El Goblino)

Void doesn’t have a physical body, unless u count its eyes as its physical body. Imagine your in a dark room and see a pair of white eyes and you tried to shine your light at it and it’s just gone. That ain’t Screech, Screech was also freaked out about this too

(btw, this is my first time drawing these entities in my style)

girls just wanna have fun

a rockstar!eddie x actress!reader / boxer!steve/librarian!gf crossover extravaganza.

Get ready for the FEELINGS train, it’s rolling in! Today’s lesson is on minding your own business before you get your feelings hurt. The girls have a girls day after being bored at the gym and we learn a little something about everyone here in crossover land. God forbid I ever write a real happy ending and if you didn’t want Boxer!Steve and Actress!Wife to fuck, you might by the end of this crossover. (One day I’ll write Rockstar!Eddie smut, I promise.) To get the full effect, please listen to Madi Davis’s cover of ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’ near the middle to the end. It’s what I listened to on a loop while I wrote this. For context, I might recommend reading ‘Not Givin’ It Up’ part one and part two but long story short, Rockstar Eddie and Actress Wife separated for half a year after a lot of promises of Eddie getting clean and always coming up short. He’s semi sober now, just not doing opiates and we are PROUD OF HIM! I’m not a huge Y/N girl, so for all purposes I’ve inserted the name Stella for actress!wife and Libby for librian!GF as approved by @rollergirlworld​ who also helped me in the creation of this crossover! WORD COUNT: 9k+ WARNINGS: Swearing, controlling behavior, addiction and drug mention, fighting (boxing), blood, sexual innuendo, some sexy shower stuff but no sex. All around sadness but plenty of cuteness – we stan the girls. Lastly, there’s definitely some mistakes in here and I don’t care. Also, if you’re under 18, don’t read my content.

The drive was longer than you’d hoped, traffic was unbearable, you were sweating — and now you had to go sit in a boxing gym and watch two stupid boys work out and box for who knows how many stupid hours. Your only saving grace was getting to spend a couple days at the beach house and getting to see Steve Harrington’s little woman. The sun beat down on the convertible, a dark cherry red ‘71 Jaguar. It was a gift from Eddie on your twenty-fifth birthday, which was only a little funny because you never really got to drive it.

“Was this secretly a gift for you?” you asked, sliding into the passengers seat to head to your birthday party. “What?” he feigned offense, but he knew you were right, “No, of course not, baby. You just look so good in red.” You rolled your eyes at the lie, but still let a laugh sneak out between your teeth. Today, you wished he hadn’t put the top down, it was too humid. It had been a drizzly month and the rain felt trapped in the air even with the sun out. Thick, sticky, and unforgiving even with the wind whipping your faces. Eddie on the other hand loved watching your hair fan out behind you on the high way. He loved your little squint you made before you’d put your sunglasses on. Big, vintage cateye ones he snagged for you at a big flea market somewhere in Massachusetts on an east coast tour. “Said they were from the 60s, surprised how cheap they were,” he said, passing them to you in the case, “They got a lot of weight to them. I liked the little engravings on the inside. Kinda cool, right?” “I love the tortoise print,” you said, folding them over in your hands. He always rambled when he thought you weren’t going to like something – when the gift wasn’t extravagant. When he was nervous you were going to think something was stupid. It couldn’t be further from the truth of course, there wasn’t anything he could get you or find for you that you would think was stupid. The case balancing on your thigh toppled to the ground. Before you could think, he bent down to pick it up. “You were saying in New York you wanted a pair like that, so – I did my best,” he smiled, still squatting and letting his hand rest on your knee. You tried them on and he dramatically put a hand to his chest, toppling over just like the glasses case. “Oh baby, you’re killin’ me,” he said from the floor, “You look so pretty.” That had been a good day until he got arrested for indecent exposure and public intoxication outside of Rainbow bar. You pleaded with the cops to let him go, that he was just too fucked up and you’d take him home – he didn’t mean anything by it. Eddie couldn’t keep his mouth shut though, “Fuckin’ pigs,” pouring out of his lips in a haze while the cuffs got tighter on his wrists. You bailed him out later and he passed out in the back seat of the Chevrolet, liqour on his tongue and coaine residue still on his nose. You used all of your strength training to help carry his dead weight to bed – only making it to the couch in the main first floor sitting room and covering yourselves up with a cashmere blanket. You kept him on his side and stayed up the whole night rubbing his back until he woke up and ran to the bathroom to puke – starting your day with a cocktail of ibuprofen and electrolytes. You were jostled out of your memory when the car pulled into the gym’s parking lot. You noticed the condominiums that Steve and his little woman lived in were merely steps away. Made sense, you guessed, since he had to train so often – even if they were only here for a few months out of the year. “You okay, sweet thing?” Eddie asked, taking the keys out of the ignition. He reached out to rub your shoulder but you pulled out of his grasp, getting out of the car. The vintage white tennis dress you wore suddenly felt suffocating even while the skirt of it flounced at the tops of your thighs. “Hey,” Eddie said, coming around to your side of the car. His tone changed, more worried while he tried to scan your features through your sunglasses, “Baby, you alright?” You took a deep breath through your nose and nodded while taking your sunglasses off. You reached into your purse and put them back in the case, “I’m okay, Ed.”   He reached over your seat and pulled his gym bag out from behind it, slinging it over his shoulder. His wife beater riding up showing off the top of his black shorts and his tight stomach – a smattering of hair trailed down past the band. “You upset with me?” he asked, putting his hand back on your shoulder. He could feel how tense you were under his touch. You both had been practicing being more communicative about your feelings after he got clean. He knew he had a long way to go, that you didn’t owe him forgiveness all the time. He’d beg you to tell him what you were thinking about when you got distant so you could talk it through. He wanted to hear you be mad at him, ‘It’s not healthy to hold that in baby, you gotta tell me. It’s okay if it hurts my feelings, I hurt your feelings first.’ “Just thinking about something from before,” you confessed. He put his gym bag on the pavement, touching the edge of his Converse to the edge of your sandals, your perfectly manicured toes looking so different from his beat up sneakers. “You wanna talk about it?” he asked, eyes so gentle on you that you’d tell him the sky was red if he asked. The way he’d throw away everything to hear one word come out of your mouth. “It doesn’t matter, it was in the past,” you shake your head but he doesn’t buy it. He reaches forward to brush some stray hairs out of your face, his calloused fingers grazing your cheek. “It does matter,” his tone gets serious but his touch is soft, “Don’t say that shit to me, Stell. It does matter if it’s making you upset.” “I was thinking about one of those nights outside of Rainbow,” you mumbled, looking down at both of your shoes. Your arms instinctively crossed across your chest, a habit Eddie caught you developing when you talked about something that made you uncomfortable – like you wanted to protect yourself from the memory. “The night I gave you those glasses?” he asked, nodding down to your purse, “I remember.” You laugh a little, “I’m surprised. You were so fucked up.” Eddie laughed back with you, your smile making his chest swell and his breath catch in his throat a little. He could never get over how sometimes it felt like he was talking to you for the first time all over again. “Come here, pretty girl,” his voice was a little gruff while he wrapped his arms around you, squishing your crossed arms against your chest. “It’s okay to still be mad about that,” he ran a hand soothingly on your back, “I’m still mad at me, too.” “It feels stupid,” you said into his chest. “It’s not stupid,” he said, “Whoever is telling you it’s stupid? Is stupid.” You moved back from his grasp and smiled up him, his boyish toothy grin shining down at you, “You’re stupid.” “You’re stupid,” he challenged back before peppering your face in kisses. The way he knew would make you giggle. “You here to box or you here to kiss cheerleaders under the bleachers, Munson?” Big, Steve’s trainer, was at the entrance door, “He’s gonna be pissed that you’re late.” “By two minutes, you serious?” Eddie hoisted his gym bag up over his shoulder again, reaching for your hand for you to follow into the lobby. Low and behold, there’s King Steve, broody as ever refilling his water bottle. It was clear he trained before this with Big, waiting for his chance to train Eddie after – almost like a pre-game to get the rest of his rage out. Sweat glistened on his shoulders and biceps, down his defined chest. You couldn’t help but feel your cheeks burn a little at the sight of him, boorish but so hot. You would’ve had a poster of him if you were still a teenager in Syracuse. Even just shy of an inch shorter, he loomed big and powerful over Eddie when he approached him. He stared at Eddie down the slope of his nose, “You’re here on my time, Munson. If she’s gonna be a distraction, she can go.” Eddie’s arm protectively reaches for you to pull you in. Steve doesn’t even look at you while he says it.You started to understand why Eddie didn’t like him. Never a kind word to spare anyone except – “Wait! Wait, before you go to the locker room!” Ms. Harrington burst out of the gym doors with a book in her hand getting between Eddie and Steve, “Here.” Eddie took the book, smiled, and looked down at Libby who was gasping to catch her breath after running the length of the gym, “Night Things, Michael Talbot – kind of freaky like Labyrinth but scarier.” “Fitting, considering how much you remind me of the babe,” he sing-songed while fishing a different book out of his gym bag. He ignored Steve’s clenched jaw, but you notice his hands ball to fists by his sides. “Preferred The Elementals, but Babylon was okay – 4 stars,” Eddie said, passing the book back to Libby. She cradled the copy of Cold Moon over Babylon to her chest. “Fair review. I totally agree,” she said, now walking back into the gym with Steve following close behind her, “I’ll try to pull something more Tolkien next time.” “If it’s from you hot stuff, I know it’ll be g–OOF!” You watched it happen in slow motion even with how swift it was. Steve sent a hard jab to Eddie’s abs without warning, sending him hunched over. You stifled a laugh even though you did feel bad, that had to hurt. “That was bare knuckle man, that’s not ever fair,” Eddie gasped, holding onto the door frame, “Holy shit, dude.” Steve didn’t respond, just put his arm around Libby and walked her further into the gym. She turned her head around and mouthed, “Sorry!” to you, but she had nothing to apologize for. “You gotta get a hold of yourself, Munson,” you teased, rubbing your hand on his back while he stood back up to full height, “You okay, handsome?” “I’ll be fine,” he said, stretching out a little, putting the new book in his bag. “Plus, I got a real hot nurse to take care of me at home,” he winked, reaching for her hand again, holding it until they got to the locker room. You watched him disappear behind the double doors with a frown. The leather was stiff on the benches by the ring, you and Miss Harrington sat there with a magazine in your hands while the boys sparred. Sharing eye rolls to each other while they argued over whether Eddie could block or if Steve was just taking cheap shots. (If you’re wondering, Steve was just taking cheap shots.) You watched them for a minute, wincing while Eddie got a right hook to the face – not hard enough to break the skin but hard enough to send him into the ropes. “If you don’t keep your hands up…” Steve started, pulling him off the ropes, “You’re gonna get a concussion.” “Ugh, so right, don’t wanna end up like you,” Eddie loved a sassy retort, spitting blood out into the bucket in the corner of the ring. Eddie put his gloves up in time to block the next roll of punches toward his face. “Y’know his right hook is getting really good,” Libby said from behind her magazine, “He’s a natural at jabs.”

“I don’t know what that means,” you frowned, “But his backhand is getting really good, I can tell you that.” Libby’s nervous giggle floats out from behind the glossy pages in front of her. “Do you always just sit here and watch him practice? Don’t you get bored?” you asked. You hoped she’d say yes so you’d feel less guilty about being bored yourself, you’d already counted the flourescent lights over your head four times. “Oh! Um…” Lib looked at you, then back to the ring where Steve looked over at her. “I’m gonna go get my nails done I think, you should come! My treat,” you offer, “You deserve a break.” “Ah..um, okay, yeah,” she agreed, sliding her Keds back on and leaving the magazine on the bench behind her. “HEY!” Steve’s voice boomed across the gym even though you were only twenty feet away at most. Steve looked menacing, breath flaring out of his nostrils like a bull ready to strike, his eyes fixed on his girl. “Sit back down,” he spat, words coated in dominance, “Where d’you think you’re wanderin’ off to, angel?” “I’m taking her to get her nails done,” you stepped in front of Libby, feeling responsible for her safety. The way he looked at her made you feel uneasy, but you’d been around types like him before.   “I didn’t ask you,” he barked, “I asked my woman.” “Woah man, don’t talk to my wife like that,” Eddie yelled coming up behind him, only stopped by a quick gloved jab to the chest. “Shut the fuck up Munson,” Steve turned his attention back to Libby, his voice softening, “Sit back down, honey.” “I think I’m gonna go, Stevie. I’ll be back soon!” she squeaked out, grabbing your arm and taking off in a scurry with you out of the gym. You heard Steve’s exasperated sigh, a stern ‘Learn how to fuckin’ block,’ before the squeak of their sneakers disappeared behind the gym doors. “Whew! Y’know, I just stay cause there’s nothing else to do,” she confessed, a little embarrased. “Not a bad view, I guess. Surpised you didn’t just sit back down,” you said with a little shiver, “With that voice? I would’ve.” “Oh his big bad man act? Please,” she scoffed, adjusting her glasses, “He just wants me to be around to give him a kiss when he’s done.” “We’ll get you back in time for that,” you tossed her a wink, Libby blushing the same way she does when Eddie tells her she’s cute. The air outside is still hot and sticky and with a huff to your banfgs you put the top back up on the Jaguar. “Let’s take my car,” you call over while Libby steps over to their Caddilac. “Steve said it’s a death trap,” she’s nervous to let go of the Caddy’s handle, you can tell she’s thinking about all the things he doesn’t want her to do. “He thinks it’s a death trap because Eddie drives it,” you laughed, “It’s my car. He wouldn’t have bought it for me if he thought I’d get hurt in it, Lib.” “He bought you this car?” she asked, her eyes wide like saucers. Her hand fell to her side from her car’s handle. “He can’t stop buying me cars,” you groaned, popping into the drivers seat and leaning over to open her door, “Don’t act surprised. Didn’t Steve buy you a whole house in Indiana?” “I mean yeah, but that’s our house,” she blushed, bouncing into the passengers seat. The white leather sticking to the backs of her thighs, “It’s for our future. Y’know he wants to open a gym over there? For kids?” “Why? So he can grind their bones to make his bread?” you asked, putting a hand behind her head rest to pull out of the lot. “So sorry, it’s like Ed just spoke through me,” you said, feeling guilty at the joke, but Libby laughed all the same. Her eyes lingered on you, like she couldn’t believe that you looked graceful in everything you did. “No, no, don’t be sorry. He wants to help out kids who were like him,” she explained, “He likes rye bread anyway. I don’t think children come in rye flavor.” “You better hope not,” you laugh back with her, quickly hitting the street to find the closest nail salon. – The scent of acetone was comforting, more so than the plastic, sweat, and blood that filled the gym. You had already gotten started, resting your chin on your other hand while the manicurist filed off your acrylics. You watch Libby nervously look over the wall of nail polishes, reaching out to finger a hot pink bottle only to second guess herself. “Why don’t you do the same red as me?” you asked, “We can match. It’s Malaga Wine.”

Libby turned and smiled, “I’d love to but I just don’t think Steve would like it. He’s already upset that I left.” You huffed to yourself: Steve this, Steve that. You’d rather die than let Eddie have that much influence over your day to day life. It’s supposed to be a girls day. “I think I’ll just get a french,” she meekly told the manicurist leading her to her station. “A french will be so pretty,” you encouraged. You could tell she wasn’t used to this, being told to pick for herself. Being out and about without Steve to hover over her. She kept looking over her shoulder, maybe not in fear but in uncertainty that she was never making the right choice. With Steve, she never had to worry about it, he’d make the decision for her. “So what’s it like,” Libby asked, getting seated at the station next to you, “Being with a rockstar? I feel like I’ve never gotten to sit and chat with you about it.” “Um,” you guessed, “Unpredictable.” “He keeps me on my toes,” you went on, “Total nut case cassanova, but stuttered for thirty minutes on our first date because I was ‘so overwhelming’. At least that’s what he told me.” “He loves you, talked about you all the time at the gym,” she said, “Talked to me a lot about how to get you back when you were away. Which like, was totally justified by the way. Totally on your side.” “I think he just wanted to talk to you,” you were being honest, “He thinks you’re too precious.” Libby’s face was as red as the nail polishes on the wall, a small collection of sweat beading up under her tied up, pre-faded, blue Malibu t-shirt which definitely had been Steve’s before she stole it. She swung her legs on the chair, her white Keds with white socks tucked neatly under them dragging against the bright white tile of the salon.

“And you don’t have to take sides, we both made a lot of mistakes,” you said, never wanting to fully blame Eddie. It was a disease, you had to keep reminding yourself of that. It’s not who he is, it’s who the drugs wanted him to be.

“Does Eddie like red on you?” she asked inching away from the subject. “I like red on me,” you said confidently, “If I like it, Ed loves it. I think that’s why we work out so well. Do you like red on you?” “Y-yeah,” she stammered, “But I don’t know, Steve’s always liked it when I’ve gotten a French done. He always says something about my ‘pretty hands’ when I get a manicure like this.” You guessed it was probably when she was giving him handies in hotels. “Get red for me, next time,” you smirked, “Tell Steve to fuck off.” “Okay, okay, next time I’ll get red,” she nodded, “Just for you, Stell.” “How’re you liking Malibu?” you asked, switching hands over. “It’s um, it’s nice? We walk the beach a lot since we’re so close.” “Just the beach?” “I mean, we’ll drive into LA every now and again and he’ll take me shopping but – otherwise we’re not here long enough for us to go do any real exploring outside of the gym.” “Why don’t you meet up with some friends while he’s training? Have them show you around?” “I don’t…” her voice trailed before she could finish her sentence. Her shoes stopped swinging against the tile slowly until they came to a complete stop. “Next time you’re here for a stretch, if I’m not working on something – give us a ring. We’ll show you the ropes,” your voice was warm, doing your best to soothe her through words. You knew the feeling of being in a new place with no one to run to but at least you didn’t have a five foot ten middle weight on your back the whole time. “That’d be nice.” You spent the rest of the appointment talking about each of your favorite hotels around the country, which ones Eddie is banned from, and where you can get the best mimosas. Giggling up a storm and taking shots at the boys every chance you could, you felt a smidge of normalcy you hadn’t felt in a while. Like when you’d go home to upstate New York and have a girls day with your mom and sisters. Libby protested for the entirety of you paying her her manicure, not even noticing the bulky silver chain attatched to the wallet you pulled out. Eddie never let you go anywhere without all of his cards and cash, “What’s mine is yours, sweet thing.” If he thought for a second you’d paid for your nails with your own money he’d fall into a fury that would rival Steve’s. “I got it, I got it,” you hushed her, “Technically Eddie’s got it, but I got it.” You passed her a fifty dollar bill to tip her manicurist and took out another fifty for yours, Ed’s words from your second date ringing in your ears every time you got a tip ready. “I’d lose my shit if someone even left me two bucks when I was bussing at The Hideout, so I’m always tipping everyone a bunch of money. I mean, I have more of it than I can spend so why wouldn’t I give it to everyone I know, y’know? You never know whose going home to a trailer park like me.” Your next stop was a little cafe you’d frequent every time you were staying at the beach house, cozying up across from eachother in a booth away from the main street windows for privacy. Sure, it was normal to be stared at and you knew Libby was used to it, too. But sometimes, you just wanted to eat a croissant without The Sun talking about how much you love carbs. “Can I get a vanilla latte, please?” you asked, “And a chocolate croissant if you have any left over, I know it’s later in the day.” “I think have a few left, I’ll just make sure. Is almond okay if we don’t have any chocolate?” “Almond is great. Actually, can you just pack me up an almond one either way? My husband loves them,” you gushed. “We know. Eddie finds a way to clear us out every time he visits,” the waitress laughed with a knowing look, writing down the order and looking at Libby, “What can I get you, dear?” “Um, just a coffee is fine – decaf,” she said, pressing her glasses up on her face again. You weren’t much older than her, but she had a way about her that made her seem younger. Wide eyed, like the world was so new. “Anything else?” “No, no, just the decaf. Thank you so much,” she beamed. “Don’t like coffee? I’m so sorry, I should’ve asked where you might’ve wanted to go,” you said, your shoulders sulking. “Oh no, no, I do! It’s just, it’s after twelve and Steve doesn’t like when I –” “Enough about Steve. About what Steve likes, about what Steve wants,” you’re surprised by the short fuse of anger on your tongue, but this was getting ridiculous. “Do you ever get to be yourself? Do you ever get to be Libby?” She shuddered out a sigh, her cheeks reddening. Libby toyed with the frayed edge of her Levi cut offs, “We put green tile in the kitchen.” “But you can’t paint your nails red?” you asked, exasperated, “I mean, Christ Lib, you can pick out kitchen tiles but you can’t have more than one glass of champagne at a New Years Eve party?” “It’s not like that,” she said, sweat beading at her hairline. “Then what’s it like? I mean, he’s got you wrapped around his finger I’m – I’m like – I’m sort of worried about you,” you offer your hands to her over the table, she takes them. Warm and soft after her manicure, her French tips glinting in the low light of the cafe with your red ones. “I know this is so cliche, but it’s just…how he is?” she shakes her head trying to come up with a better explaination, “I know it’s because he loves me.” “Love shouldn’t come with so many rules, Libby,” you urged, sounding like an older sister begging her to see the light. “They aren’t, that’s the thing. They’re just suggestions and I…I like following them,” she blushed a little, “He just makes me feel so…safe? When we’re in Hawkins it’s so different y’know? I have all my friends there, I go out and have girls nights, we do all the things we’d do if I was still around. Here I’m just…I’m just Harrington’s ‘little woman’.” You see her deflate at the title, you didn’t ever have to worry about those things. You were never ‘Eddie Munson’s Wife,’ in fact, it was more common for him to be listed as your husband. “You’re Libby to me,” you assured, “You’re my friend.” “I am?” she asked. “Of course you are,” you let go of her hands while the waitress put your coffees in front of you, a chocolate croissant on a plate placed in the center of the table. Another waitress came over with a bag of almond croissants with ‘Eddie Munson Stash’ written on it and you could barely stifle a laugh. “On the house,” they said while you tucked the bag next to you. “No! No, not all these croissants, he’d kill me if I just took them,” your smile was blinding. “He’s been paying in advance all year, trust me, it’s fine,” she said back to you, “Enjoy, please!” The women walked over to their other tables and you made quick work of ripping the croissant in half and holding it in front of Libby, “Here, they’re to die for.” “Also this,” you said, swapping your coffees, “Best vanilla latte on the West Coast, I can’t have you miss out.” Libby hesitates, taking the croissant and eyeing the latte. “C’mon Lib,” you smirked at her again, “Have a little fun.” “Yeah? I should, right?” she said, seeking your reassurance. “Right! Fuck Steve!” you laughed, cheersing your pastry halves. “Fuck Steve!” Libby’s smile was so broad you could’ve sworn it hurt her cheeks, but it was sweeter than the croissant melting on your tongue. You put the top back down when you got in the Jaguar together, making use of the upgraded sound system and not being shy about it. “OH! I WANNA DANCE WITH SOMEBODY!” “I WANNA FEEL THE HEAT WITH SOMEBODY!” “WITH SOME BODY WHO LOVES ME!”

Did either of you sound like Whitney? Of course not, but all of Malibu was going to hear you both screaming it out of the car and down the freeway to make it back to the gym. You drove too fast and made too quick turns just to watch her squeal and and laugh while clutching the side of the car when your tires skidded to stop. “DON’T YOU WANNA DANCE? WITH ME, BABY.” “DON’T YOU WANNA DANCE? WITH ME, BOY.” “HEY DON’T YOU WANNA DANCE? WITH ME, BABY.” “WITH SOMEBODY WHO LOVES ME!” “Don’t you wanna dance, say you wanna dance, don’t you wanna dance?” you both kept singing after the ignition turned off only to realize you might’ve only sounded good with Whitney’s vocals booming over yours. You both laughed with eachother in the parked car, catching your breath before sliding out of the white leather seats and back onto the pavement. Libby’s hand was still soft in yours when you made it back into the gym, your other hand clutching the bag of almond croissants. The boys perked in the ring, both sitting in opposite corners, shirtless and sweating. “I got the good stuff, baby,” you called, waving it over your head. “Fuuuuck me, yes,” he called from his stool, “You’re so good to me.” “Hi Stevie,” Libby said, letting go of your hand to run to the corner Steve was sat at. He knelt down, putting his head through the ropes to lean down and kiss her. You watched her show him her nails and the knowing look he gave her after he saw them. ‘Pretty hands, angel.’ “You almost done?” you asked, putting a hand on one of the ropes by his calf. Eddie looked down at you and nodded, squatting to meet your eye. “Missed you,” he said, a sweet smile on his face, looking at you through his eye lashes. “I missed you, too, baby,” you cooed, flouncing over to the bench from before. “Gotta be careful in that dress, sweet thing,” he said after you, “You know what you’re doin’ to me.” You turned your head back to him over your shoulder, tossing him a little ‘Who me?’ look. He blushed immediately, but the distraction might’ve been to his detriment – Steve was right, you should’ve stayed home. Before the last round even fully started, Eddie was on the ground with a split above his eyebrow that could’ve given Steve’s a run for his money. “Fuck, FUCK,” Eddie called out, ripping his gloves off, holding his forehead with blood pouring out through his fingers. Steve laughed, “All day Munson, I’ve been beggin’ you to learn how to block head shots. You listenin’? Got a brain under all that hair?”   “Fuck off, man, Christ,” he glowered, “Bell didn’t even ring and you went the fuck in.” “Gotta be prepared, Munson,” he shrugged, pulling his own gloves off to reveal taped hands, slinging the gloves over his shoulder. He hops out of the ring and calls Libby over, only she looks a little unnerved. “I don’t think she knows how to fix that,” she says to Steve. “Not our problem,” Steve furrows his brow while guiding her to the locker room but she stops before they get through the door. “Well I was gonna invite them come over for a late lunch but I think we should get him to the house to get him fixed up. I saw how hard you hit him,” Libby was urgent and he couldn’t say no to her. Those sweet saucer eyes, her ache to help others – she really was his better half. Steve ran a hand over his face, “Yeah, yeah, fine.” Libby met eyes with you, “We’ll meet you at the house, I know just how to take care of stuff like that,” she nods toward Steve, “Have a lot of practice.” – The townhouse they have is nice, and clearly recently renovated – in some way still smelling like fresh paint and leather apholstery. “I was gonna make sandwhiches but I really think I gotta take him to the bathroom,” Libby said, looking over at Eddie in the kitchen who was looking particularly white. Back in his regular rockstar get up, shorts and tank back in gym bag hell where they belonged. “I can make sandwhiches, Libby,” you smiled, shoving Eddie lightly towards your little librarian, “Take him.” “Oof, hellllooo nurse!” he said when they were partly down the hall, disappearing into the bathroom. “Keep that door open!” Steve called down the hall, sitting roughly on one of the barstools on the island. His sunglasses pressed hard against his forheaed. “Like a couple of fuckin’ teenagers,” he grumbled to himself.

“Oh, Steve, stop, they’re just playing around,” you said, trying to keep your tone as light as possible. You opened the state of the art fridge to find all the cold cuts and condiments and setting them on the counter.   Steve ignores your attempt at friendly conversation, “Breads in the cupboard on the right.” You realize quickly that he’s just going to watch you make sandwhiches. – “Okay, just sit down, I got you,” Libby soothed, wetting a face cloth and wiping all the excess blood away from his forehead. She was gentle while he sat on the edge of the toilet seat cover. “Can you hold that there for second?” she asked, putting his hand over the face cloth. “For you? Anything,” he teased, watching her reaching under the sink and pull out a first aid kit and he clicked his tongue. “Aw c’mon sweet thing, all those bandages?” he asked, his hand motioning toward the gauze and medical tape she was placing by the sink. “What do you mean? What’s wrong with that?” she asked, looking back at him. “Baby, there’s other ways to make a man feel better. That’s all I’m saying,” he shrugged, his cool voice making her shiver, “Shame you gotta do it the right way.” Like clock work she covered her face, making him grin. “I get it though, he’s right down the hall. Don’t want him to hear us,” he egged on, “Maybe next time.” Libby, barely breathing at this point, takes the face cloth out of his hand and tosses it in the hamper at the edge of the sink counter. She holds one hand over his eye leaving the cut exposed, and the other holds an antiseptic spray about two inches away.

“Ah, shit,” Eddie hissed. The sting of the cut cleansing spray hurt more than he hoped. The stingy burn of it pooling from his eyebrow, mixing with blood, and dripping down to his eye. Libby caught it with gauze before it got to his tear duct, so used to this routine after Steve’s fights. “Sorry!” her voice was high and gentle, nerves clear on her tongue, “I’m so sorry.” “It’s okay, sweet thing,” Eddie said, his fingers gently reaching out to graze the side of her thigh in comfort, “You’re jus’ doin’ your job.” “You’re getting good,” she said, trying to bring the conversation to boxing so she could ignore his hand on her thigh. “Your jabs are starting to look like Steve’s,” she enthused, but frowned at the cut over his brow, it hadn’t quite stopped bleeding. Libby turned to grab more gauze, pressing it up against his forehead with a pressure she knew all too well. “Stell said your backhand was getting good, too,” she blushed at her boldness to say something so saucy, but two could play at whatever game he was always playing.  He laughed, a soft little ‘too cool for school’ chuckle, pressing the tip of his tongue behind his top teeth. “Did she?” he asked, his voice salacious and syrupy. “Not like, in the face right?” she blurted out, “Oh my God, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to ask that. I don’t know why that came out.” His chuckle got deeper, smooth and dark like seude, “No, no, never in the face. Just a couple on her ass.” Libby blushed, shaking her head, embarrassed at the information. Eddie rolled with her giddy response, unable to ignore his fondness for her bubbling in his throat. “Only when she’s been a bad girl,” he said, looking up at her, his fingers gently moving hers away from his forehead so he could hold the gauze that was soaked through with blood, “You’d know all about that, huh?” She fell into a peal of nervous giggles when he winked at her with his good eye, causing a booming ‘HEY!’ from Steve to ring down the hall. “Ope! Oops, totally forgot, no smiling. We can’t have any fun at all,” Eddie joked, zipping his lips and tossing the key behind him. “No fun at all,” she whispered back with a smile, reaching back to get more gauze only to see that they were out, “Oh shoot, let me grab a couple of paper towels. I’ll be back in a second!” “Don’t go wanderin’ too far, angel,” Eddie said, mimicking Steve’s gruff cadence. “Stop it,” she said with a laugh, turning back to scold him from the door frame, “I’ll be back. Don’t pass out.” “I’ve had worse,” he he sing songed while she walked down the hall. He had had worse – woken up with cuts and slices from some unknown source, praying he didn’t have tetanus. Concussions from falling down flights of stairs drunk on absinthe. Face planting on the sidewalk after a long night at the strip club putting who knows what up his nose. Dick still works, he’d say to himself when he’d wake up hung over and covered in a litter of bumps and bruises. “Hi!” Libby beamed at you and Steve while bouncing into the kitchen. You saw her flushed face, knowing Eddie was in that bathroom working his charm on her. He could never helpself around a nervous girl with a pretty face, she was so easily flustered. Libby’s face fell when she noticed tension in the room, slowly pulling paper towels off the roll. “Everything okay in here?” she asked, seeing the finished sandwhiches on the counter and you leaning silently up against the counter. “Sure is, angel,” Steve said with a warm smile, nursing a cup off coffee – he hadn’t offered to make her one, “You behavin’ yourself in there?” “Steve,” she said with a blush and an eye roll. He reached out to pull her in by the waist while she walked by, holding her close to him while he sat back on the stool. You watched him lean in to kiss her, his arm protective around her, his hand closing over her waist. He kissed her like he was claiming her, the grip on his coffee cup transferring to cup her cheek. You turned away towards the sink, grabbing yourself a glass of water. Their kiss felt like it was supposed to be private. As if Steve wanted it to make you uncomfortable. You heard them separate and a little yelp come from her mouth when he smacked her ass as she went back into the hallway. Always had to claim what’s his. You rolled your eyes, still staring at the backsplash and sipping your water. You started cleaning up, hearing Libby and Eddie’s giggles from down the hall, trying not to giggle yourself. God he was insatiable. You turned back around, seeing Steve’s clenched jaw and the way he gripped the mug in front of him. “Lighten up, Steve,” you said, not even trying to be nice anymore. He hummed, drumming his fingers on counter. “You don’t let her have any fun, of course she’s gonna find it where she can get it,” you said, crossing your arms, “I think I’m plenty fun,” he said lazily. “You know what I mean,” you said, “No caffeine after twelve while you’re sitting here nursing a double shot espresso? I mean for fuck’s sake she was afraid to get her nails painted. Who makes their girlfriend feel like that?”

“You sayin’ I don’t know how to treat my girl?” he snapped, a hand coming down flat and hard on the white quartz of the island. “You’re her whole life, Steve. Every decision she makes rides on you think it’s the right one. Like – damn, y’know? She can take care of herself, is all I’m saying,” you said, still trying to remain sure in your voice while packaging the cold cuts back up. His harshness made you flinch, cold sweat collected at the back of your neck under your hair.

Steve breathed a small laugh out of his nose, “You would say that.”

“What do you mean?” you said, half way in the fridge, “I would say that?”

“Because you take care of yourself,” he said, “You don’t let Munson take care of you.” His tone was matter of fact, like he knew everything about the both of you from such a short time together.

“He takes care of me just fine,” you huff.

“Don’t think he was doing much of that when you left him for me to clean up.” “I didn’t leave him for you to clean up, I didn’t even know he was gonna call you,” you glared, slamming the fridge closed, “And who the fuck are you anyway? He started boxing to work his shit out. All your shit’s still there and you’re fighting every week.” “Oh, ho, ho, there she is,” Steve breaks out in a bitter smile, the agrumentative side of him revving up for a fight. You’re annoyed at him enoying getting a rise out of you, but you’re never one to let it go until you’ve had the last word, “America’s sweetheart with a mouth like a sailor, color me surprised.” “Oh, shut up,” you rolled your eyes, so used to the same comeback from scuzzy men who’d hear you swear at a bar, “Don’t avoid what I said. You got Libby shaking in her boots every time she’s out and about without you. That’s not okay Steve, she shouldn’t be so scared of making you upset. Like i said, you gotta let her have a little fun or you’re gonna lose her.” Steve didn’t like that, you insinuating that she’d leave him if he didn’t let up. He was done pushing your buttons, now he was gonna just get mean. “You wanna tell my girl to go have fun? She can have all the fun she wants, who am I to stop her? But you, Stell, you? You havin’ fun?” He squared his shoulders towards you, hands talking with him while he spoke. He justs his chin towards you while he asks. “Of course,” you say, but your face and the catch in your throat betray you. “Yeah?” his voice is filled with mock concern and certainty, “You havin’ fun when he comes home late? When you gotta bail ‘im outta jail? Don’t know where he’s been or who he’s been hangin’ out with? Whose ass he’s grabbin’ at the bar after he’s done doin’ lines? You havin’ fun when the budgets not matchin’ up and he’s lookin’ a little thin? When he stays in Malibu to train a little longer than usual?” “Stop…” you start, choking on your words. Steve got up, predator to prey, on a roll now, taking slow steps toward you as your press yourself harder against the counter while he gets in your face. He knows he’s right by the way you’re reacting, and with the day he’s had and the giggles from down the hall, he can’t wait to hit more nails on the head. “And why do you think that is, Stell?” he cocks his head the the side, hair coming with him, “Think it’s cause you kept lettin’ him come back every time he fucked up? Cryin’ on his lap like a kicked puppy, beggin’ him to be better for you? Please. Should’ve cut ‘im off for good – now he thinks he can do whatever he wants. How long you think he’s gonna stay clean this time, hm? What happens when you get that late night call, Stella? And you’ll take him right back, won’t you?” “I…” you were at a loss for words, his voice was tight and hard. He scared you. Even with his sunglasses on you could see the tension in his face while he glared through you. His scent like Christmas time and blood, it filled you, it made it hard to breathe. “Keep letting him get away with murder, and you wonder why you’re not sleepin’? Oh yeah, he told me and Libby all about it. Never sleeping, tense all the time. And he can’t imagine why, right? Cause he’s all better now? I know you know better. So be honest with me, huh Stell?” He reached up to peer down at you from behind his glasses, his amber eyes wicked while they met yours – a cool smirk on his face, the tip of his tongue flicking quickly against the inside flesh of his cheek, “You havin’ fun, angel?” You couldn’t hold it in anymore, breaking down into a wracking sob in front of him – something you hated doing, rarely crying outside of acting. At least not in front of people like Steve. He strolled backed to his stool on the island, putting his sunglasses back over his eyes, the sound of you crying perking up a brewing headache. Eddie came in quickly, knowing the sound of you crying better than a mother to her child, “Oh no, no, baby what’s wrong?” He ran to you, almost tripping on his sneakers on the tile, his embrace tight and safe – the safest you felt all day. “What did you say to her?” Ed was shocked to even find you like this, his voice bleeding confusion, his chest vibrating against your ear, “What the fuck did you say?” Libby came in slowly, starting to recognize that the sounds in the kitchen weren’t people having a good time. She stood in the entry way, eyes flitting from Eddie holding a version of you she never thought she’d see, nand then over to Steve. Her gaze turned to ice on him and he felt it. “What did you do?” she asked, a bitter taste still on her tongue from your chat at the coffee shop. “What did I do?” he asked back, incredulous, “You’re down the hall playing doctor with Eddie fuckin’ Munson and you wanna ask what I’m doin’?” “That’s enough,” Eddie said, putting his hand up, the other still wrapped around you, “You wanna be mad at me? That’s cool man, be mad at me. Don’t be mad at her for putting a fuckin’ band aid on my forehead. You’re in here making my wife upset and that’s where I’m drawing the fuckin’ line. Sorry your girl patched me up and Stella took her out without the okay, but you don’t gotta take that out on her. Take it out in the ring man, isn’t that all you’re good for anyway?” “Get out,” Steve’s voice was low and measured. “No, guys you don’t have to leave, I–” Libby’s voice was desperate, aching for them to ignore Steve, but it was apparent that there wasn’t any fixing what might’ve been said. “We’re heading out anyway,” Eddie interrupted, he got close to your ear, “You got your things, baby? Your purse in the car?” You nodded and before you knew it you were back in the Jaguar, Eddie erratically pulling out of the condo lot and onto the road. “Slow down,” you said through you tears, snot pouring down the back of your throat, “You’re going too fast.” “I’m sorry I’m just…I’m so fuckin’ pissed right now,” he hissed, “The fuckin’ nerve of that asshole. Should’ve kicked his fuckin’ ass.” The sun was starting to set over the horizon, leaving a hazy orange pink in the sky over the highway. It should’ve been the end of a good day, maybe you would pulled over and got dessert or a night cap before going home. It wasn’t long before you were back at the beach house, the sky an bright magenta behind the white stone of the mini mansion. He pulled his gym bag out from the back and went to your side of the car to let you out. “C’mere sweet thing,” he held your hand all the way to the door, stepping into the cool air conditioned front hall. He takes you right to the living room, sitting you on the couch while you cry and gets on his knees. He silently takes your sandals off, rubbing your calves after each one, hoping you’ll start to calm down. He knows better than to press you before you’re ready, but he hadn’t seen you like this since your dad passed away. Eddie’s hair tickled your neck while he sat next to you, one arm around your shoulder while he pulled you in against his chest, “What did he say to you, baby? What’s got you so upset?” “I’m n-not having f-f-fun,” you said like you had just realized it yourself. You wriggled out of his hold, sitting cross legged over his thighs. “Today? You don’t wanna come to the gym with me? That’s okay, baby. It’s boring,” he reassured with a little smile. “No, Ed, I – I’m not having fun anymore,” you said, finally looking at him. “With…with me? You’re not having fun with me anymore?” you could see his heart breaking in front of you. Replaying the day you kicked him out in his head all over again. “I just,” another aching cry rolled through you, “When I wake up in the middle of the night and you’re not there it’s like…it’s like I can’t even breathe. Like you aren’t coming home again. Like you’re dead in a fuckin’ punk house or something. If you’re out at the bar too late, what cities you’re playing in where I know you can get oxy easy. I’m always waiting for the fucking call, Ed. I’m always waiting for the call.”

The words just kept pouring out of you, all the fears you’d had since you let him come back, since that night at the beach. “And I just, I’m always scared you’re gonna be in those moods again. Never knowing who you’re gonna be that day. God you were such a fucking asshole when you needed to use. And it’s like, I gotta wake up and be at my call time but you’re in the bathroom for a little too long and I swear I think I hear you doing lines – and I know, I know you’re not. But it’s like I’ll never shake it off, baby. Like I’m always gonna be worrying about it.” Your body aches when you really think about it, and you plead to him with begging eyes, “When am I gonna get to stop worrying about you, Ed? When do I get to have fun?” He’s speechless, looking at you with his full lips slightly parted, his eyes glassy with tears that aren’t ready to fall yet. “I – Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked, his hands were shaking, anxious to hold yours but he could tell you didn’t want him to touch you. “I didn’t want hurt your f-feelings,” you whispered, trying to control the lump in your throat. Wishing your tear ducts would just dry up so you could move on from the conversation. Eddie could never let it go until he knew were feeling better. “Stell, I keep saying to you it’s okay to hurt my feelings about this,” he was frustrated with you, the vein in his neck greeting you with a pulse. You wiped your eyes, the weight of the whole day starting to feel heavy on your body, “Why can’t you hear me when I say that to you?” “Can we maybe just talk about this later? I want to go take a shower and wash this whole day off me,” your groggy voice made his chest ache. He could see exhaustion peeking through under your eyes. Eddie slid his hand back and forth over your thigh and leaned in to press a kiss to your forehead.   “Yeah, no problem,” his voice was soft, savoring the lull in your tears. Seeing you upset was hard enough when he was shooting up Persian, it was even worse when he was sober, “I’ll go unpack for us, princess. We can order Thai, have a nice little night in, okay?” You didn’t respond outside of getting off the couch and picking up your sandals to drop off in your closet upstairs before heading into the master bath, already shedding your tennis dress by the bed. Eddie would pick it up anyway. You only turned on the mirror lights, a deep warm yellow that barely lit up the room. You didn’t want any aid in feeling awake at all. Your bare feet padded against the tile while you turned the walk in shower on, rain water head and deatchable head hissing while the water hit the ground. You caught yourself in the mirror while you waited for the water to heat up, mascara tears staining all the way down to your neck. “Shit,” you whispered, padding back over to the sink to wash your face spending enough time on it that the bathroom had already steamed up. The steam was welcome, opening up your clogged, post cry sinuses, soothing your throat from trying to choke back your feelings. With a clean face, you step in the shower, letting the hot water totally envelope you. It stings, but it feels deserved. You run your hands over your hair, breathing through your mouth while the water flows over your lower lip – you feel the tension rinse out of your body and down the drain, too. You stand in the water for ten minutes, knowing it won’t get cold, before you reach for the shampoo bottle on the inlet shelf. You hear the door open but continue pouring the liquid into your hands, rubbing them together when you see him through the fog of the glass wall separating the shower from the bathroom. He flicks the stereo on, turning the sound on low before coming around the entrance to the shower. Eddie doesn’t say anything, he doesn’t have to. He sees the shampoo in your hands and then looks back up at your face, depuffed from your cry from the steam. He’s all muscle and tattoos, a single chain around his neck with a guitar pick dangling above his pecs, hair getting wilder with the humidity. He steps closer to you, the small splatter of his footsteps in the water reverberating off the walls. He can’t keep his hands to himself, reaching immediatley to your wet face hunching over to kiss you with more passion than your wedding day. “You don’t gotta worry about it,” he whispers against your mouth, he weight pressed against you “I’m taking care of all of it, you hear me?” He doesn’t give you a moment to respond, capturing your lips with his, his tongue snaking in past your teeth. You know he doesn’t close his eyes because you haven’t either – looking directly at each other while you kiss. You know he means it, you can feel him mean it. Outside of your heaving breathing, the stereo still plays softly in the background. Steam building in the shower from anything but the heat of the water. ‘When the workin’, when the workin’ day is done. Oh when the workin’ day is done, oh girls. Girls just wanna have fun…They just wanna, they just wanna…’

In 1872, Cincinnati Ground To A Halt As The City’s Horses Succumbed To A Virus

It sounds like something out of a science fiction movie. For nearly three weeks in the autumn of 1872, Cincinnati was paralyzed by a virus with no known cure.

Humans were not susceptible to this virus. It only affected horses, but the entire operation of Cincinnati life and business depended primarily on horses. When the city’s horses were incapacitated, Cincinnati screeched into paralysis.

The strange episode began one evening in October when Dan Rice’s circus rolled into town. Four of the horses showed symptoms of some sort of respiratory illness and were taken to veterinarian George W. Bowler for treatment. Dr. Bowler readily identified the affliction as the “Canadian horse disease” that was then infesting the northern tier of states but doubted it would spread beyond his stable on Ninth Street.

Alas, Dr. Bowler’s optimism was unfounded and the next few days found cases throughout the downtown area. Journalists struggled to name the disease. “Epizooty” was a common label, but newspaper reports invoked “equine influenza” or “hippo-typhoid-laryngitis” or “epiglottic catarrh” or “epizootic influenza” and even “hipporhinorrheaeirthus”! Whatever they called it, the disease would hobble a city absolutely dependent on horse power to operate at all.

Josiah “Si” Keck, presiding at the Board of Aldermen, introduced a resolution to draft squads of men for duty at the city’s firehouses. With the horses out of commission, only manpower could replace horsepower to haul the heavy steam-powered fire engines of the day. Thankfully, only a few minor fires were reported during the height of the contagion.

According to the Cincinnati Enquirer [11 November 1872], other horse-dependent companies tried different alternatives:

“The United States Express Company has prepared to follow the example of the Eastern Companies. All of their horses, twenty-two in number, being completely disabled, they will at once substitute steers, and the streets of this city will show the curious spectacle of express wagons drawn by the propelling force of a farmer’s haycart.”

Historian Alvin F. Harlow, writing in the Bulletin of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio [April 1951], noted that the bovine substitutes were simply not cut out for jobs readily accomplished by horses:

“The oxen, with great, wild, pathetic eyes, slobbering, swaying slowly through the streets, were a strange spectacle to city folk, and were followed by crowds of children for a day or two, until the novelty wore off. But as agencies of traction, they were a disappointment. Not all of them were well broken to the yoke; few men in town knew how to drive them, and as they are—with the possible exception of the tortoise and the two-toed sloth—the slowest walkers in the whole zoological category, they did not accomplish much in a day, according to city standards.”

Just think of an entire city operating on the capable talents of horses, now immobilized by an unseen microbe. Garbage piled up as the city’s sanitation wagons stood idle. “Garbage” back then meant kitchen and table scraps which, even in the chill of autumn, ripened malodorously in unattended cans. The situation was even worse at the city’s slaughterhouses. Even though the butchers had stopped working – there were no wagons available to deliver the slaughtered pork and beef – there were likewise no wagons to dispose of the offal and trimmings. The stench was indescribable.

Cincinnati’s streetcars were horsedrawn in 1872. It would be a decade before electrical trolleys debuted. The entire commuter system of the city shut down and the Cincinnati workforce, from C-suite executives to the lowliest laborers, had to hoof it. Harlow describes an exhausting scene:

“Towards dusk each evening the great trek homeward began, and from then until 9 P.M. the streets were thronged with business men, clerks, bookkeepers, warehouse and factory workers, trudging wearily. To reach their work again at 7 or 7:30 next morning, when most people's day began, soon proved too much for some of them, and they took to sleeping in their places of business; which in turn became less and less necessary, as those businesses were compelled to shut down for lack of transportation.”

Even funerals were affected. Teams of undertakers pulled hearses to the depot of the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton railroad, whose tracks ran along the front of Spring Grove Cemetery. Mourners followed along on foot until the hearse was loaded on the train, then rode out for the burial. Other cemeteries put interments on hold for the duration.

The city faced the serious prospect of starvation. Food arrived in the city by rail and by river, but there were no carts to carry it from the wharf or the depot. Fresh vegetables rotted down by the river while families went hungry just a few blocks north. Farmers from the suburbs refused to bring their crops into Cincinnati for fear that their own draft animals would succumb to the dread epizooty.

As humans attempted to fill the horse’s role, every wheelbarrow in the city was drafted into use and some sold for astronomical sums. Even so, as noted by Harlow, human power had its very fragile limits:

“If the load was very heavy, as for instance, hogsheads of tobacco, massive machinery or an iron safe of a ton weight, ropes were also attached to each side of the wagon and passed over the shoulders of two files of straining men, while three or four others, their feet striving for toeholds in earth or cobbles, pushed against the wagon's tail until shoulder-bones threatened to wear through the flesh.”

Among the worst effects of the pandemic was the inability to dispose of dead horses. Horses died in Cincinnati at the rate of twenty or thirty a day at the height of the disease in November 1872, and there was nothing available to haul the carcasses out to the reduction plants, where they might be turned into soap fat or fertilizer. Alderman Si Keck, who owned one of these “stink factories,” found a partial solution by renting a small steam-powered truck from one of the city’s pork-packing plants but could still handle only a few of the equine corpses.

By the end of November, new cases and fatalities had diminished considerably. As December opened, the city was almost back to normal, with a new appreciation of the four-legged residents who truly powered our city.

Only one case of a human contracting the epizooty was recorded in 1872. Joseph Einstein was a well-known dealer when Cincinnati’s Fifth Street was the largest horse market in the United States. Einstein spent weeks, around the clock, nursing his stock and developed symptoms remarkably similar to those afflicting his horses. Several local doctors confirmed that he had somehow succumbed to the dread epizooty.

Just as mysteriously as it appeared, the epizooty vanished, and never visited Cincinnati to that degree ever again.

🥤☁️ and 🌸!!

🥤⇢ recommend an author or fanfic you love

aaah i dont read as much as I want to as my wip list is ever-growing, BUT:

it will surprise no one that i recommend gossamer by @aevallare (tav/ascended astarion) mind the tags, but, truly. so good. Also just blanket recommendation for anything alex writes ever, you can trust her. I do!!

Party Favours by @wetcatspellcaster (howlsmovinglibrary on ao3) (tav/astarion) better known for Pieces Still Stuck in Your Teeth and An Honest Lie which I also love, but I read Party Favours first and I still come back to it. I've read it many times. my ao3 account is in shambles because I just now realized I'd never bookmarked it or left kudos, ms. wetcat i am so sorry

Devour Me by Syrina (tav/Gale) Sorcerer tav feeds the orb with her magic. eyes emoji.

Responsibility by @dishsaop. wyll-centric. If you've never tried second person pov before, try this!! it made me feel so much. wyll, my beloved

☁️⇢ what made you choose your username?

So here on tumblr, my username is a reference to the hobbit and to being short-- apparently Tolkien dwarves could get up to my height! I think at the time 'hobbitsized' was taken or id have gone for that, though im not. that short. at this point i kind of wish it was something different but ive had this username a very long time! On ao3, leetleblue is a reference to Jester, the little blue tiefling herself!

🌸⇢ do you have any pets? if you do, post some pictures of them

I do! I have two cats, Ginger and Puddin', and a tortoise named Tommy-- but, Skye, I know you want to see a picture of Periwinkle, who is my cat nephew, so I'll post a picture of him, too. ;)

Ginger

Puddin'

Periwinkle

School AU headcanons 1

Friendly reminder that English is not my first language. You can check my Masterlists both in English and Polish here.

Bennett

✧ That one person in the class who always gets things wrong? Who bumps into everything along the way? This is Bennett.

✧ People like him very much for his honesty and see good intentions but they strongly avoid him when it comes to learning. He usually forgets deadlines or the dog eats his homework. He swears to the teachers that it's not what they think  it is and that he doesn't lie. Some of them silently look down on him for being adopted.

✧ You met him in the most comedic way possible. He bumped into you carrying a stack of books. He tried to help you up but he fell down himself. Just like in the movies.

✧ Bennet believes he has bad luck. He usually stays alone to work in pairs because there is always an odd number of people in class. You invited him to your table and he has been orbiting somewhere close to you ever since.

✧ He's afraid you'll get hit because of his bad luck. He tries to protect you from him but usually to no avail.

✧ He is the only member of the adventure club at school. There used to be more people but apparently they've all left and the teachers somehow haven't shut the club down yet.

✧ Bennet has the longest attendance list with the school nurse, Barbara. He's always wearing plasters or bandages.

Xingqiu

✧ A high school student with his nose stuck in books. Only not the ones he should be reading...

✧ Since you met him, two things are certain. His friendship with Chongyun and the fact that he always has some book in his backpack and it's not a textbook.

✧ He is treated leniently because he is the son of a rather powerful family. He usually gets good grades, if not the best.

✧ Xingqiu writes and publishes his own books under a pseudonym. You've been a fan of his since the first book. By complete accident you discovered his identity when he left one of the scripts in an unlocked school locker and you mistook it for yours. He bought your silence in exchange for spoilers and extra content.

✧ Over time, he started to like how much you liked his work and realized that you wouldn't spoil the secret anyway. He wrote about a side character similar to you as a surprise.

✧ You sometimes hide him from teachers because he often reads under the desk during boring classes.

✧ He is your secret admirer, leaving you notes or small gifts in the school locker. He tries his best not to be recognized by you so he changes his handwriting. He's cunning if he wants to, he likes to watch your reactions.

Jean Gunnhildr

✧ Jean would be the president of her major and student council president. The only way to get acquainted with her would be to join some of this groups.

✧ The girl is always busy with student affairs. After classes, she struggles with extra things related to festivals or performances. She also calculates the budget and the professors have no idea how she carries it on her shoulders at such a young age.

✧ You won't reach her with calling. The line is always busy, forget it and write a message.

✧ Some accuse her of having no life outside of study and work. Partially it is like that. Her dream is to grow up to the legendary rector Vennessa at your university, who has changed a lot in her.

✧ But you also know Jean from the other side. You met, among others, her favorite pet - a tortoise. You also spend time with her sister, Barbara, because although they both want to be together, somehow they can't find a common language when they're alone.

✧ You know about the girl's love for romance books. She rarely admits it. Sometimes you come up with ideas to even take her to truancy on campus or an unexpected picnic. Sometimes you have to make her relax so she doesn't overwork herself.

Klee

✧ Klee goes to the kindergarten next to your high school. Most often you see her in the company of her brother - Albedo.

✧ For unknown reasons, she chose you as her best older friend after you had to do a school project with Albedo once.

✧ You don't have the heart to deny her anything. She often tricks you into letting her try an explosive machine game on the way home. Apparently, recently she began to be fascinated by everything that can be blown up. After class, she watches videos on how to make a bomb by herself which is pretty concering.

✧ Her mother, Alice, often goes on business trips and leaves her son to take care of her.

✧ Klee goes everywhere with her stuffed animal named Dodoco. She shows it to everyone he meets.

✧ Sh has a list of rules about good behaviour written on a piece of paper. She collects stickers for being good but often causes trouble even when she doesn't want to.

✧ Klee brings you drawings from kindergarten. The last time it was her and you with Albedo, holding hands. You didn't know how to comment it...