🎄A Chelsie Christmas - chapter 22 🎄

Obvious reasons for the delay in these, but I am determined - I set it as my December goal and I need to finish it for my own peace of mind. 😘

@christmaswiththecarsons

With thanks to @olehistorian for the prompt list I used, to @chelsie-carson for being my extra set of eyes, and to all of you for your kind and thoughtful reviews. 

I hope you all have been enjoying a fabulous holiday season. x

This is the last entry into the @unofficialdas8 challenge (and I’m tagging @christmaswiththecarsons ), and I hope you will enjoy it. Thanks so much for all of your love and support (in whatever form that takes) for my writing efforts. You really know how to spoil a girl.

Massive THANKS to @dameofdownstairsfor the artwork for this chapter. It’s like she peeked into my head and painted what I imagined. Also, massive THANKS to @brenna-louise who supplied me with the prompt words I used for this series.

And now, I present you with:

JOY!!! (on ffnet)

🎄The funniest part of Baxley in Text Santa. 🎄

these cuties, their eye contact haha (x)

Raquel is so funny!

🤣

Phyllis Baxter and Thomas Barrow. I love their friendship.

Many thanks and lots of love ...

... to everyone who contributed something to our Unofficial Season 8. Thanks also to everyone who supported the contributors and their works. Autumn Sundays without new Downton episodes were still painful, but this made them soooooooo much better!

As a side note, I’ll keep this blog open so that we can find all the S8 offerings in one place, but I won’t be posting anything new here until Christmas. I know some of you have “Christmas Specials” planned as part of your offerings, so we look forward to those. Until then, Chelsie love to all!

Very, VERY late offering for Week 8 of S8.  Please enjoy despite the tardiness of its arrival.

I was hoping to have this ready last Sunday for week 8 of the @unofficialdas8 challenge, but I couldn’t finish it in time. It’s a (very fluffy) sequel to the story I posted last year for the s7 challenge, All the Difference. You don’t have to read that story to understand this one, but I included the link in case you’re interested. This story takes place the evening after the events of 6x01.

Apologies for the late entry to the @unofficialdas8​ prompt. My final prompt (until the Christmas Special) is:

Undone – posted on ff.net

Excerpt:

Her body is still humming, and her mind refuses to settle down enough for her to sleep. She doesn’t really mind since she is no longer bound by bells and the demands of others. If she chooses to sleep a little later in the morning, her Charlie won’t mind. In fact, with little persuasion on her part, she is certain he can be convinced to join her. She smiles as she imagines them rising late into the morning like a lord and lady of a grand manor house.

I know I’m a few minutes late, and I wasn’t planning on contributing to this week’s Unofficial Series 8 offering, but as it’s almost on time, can we call it good enough?

Excerpt:

“Love has never been like this for me,” I tell him as he lifts my shirt, sliding his hand up from my hip, over my belly to my breast. It’s both wonderful and painful, this thing I’ve gone and told him. My heart threatens to burst from the sheer volume and intensity of love I have for Richard, and at the same time it hurts, raw and searing. How can there be more between myself and this man whom I’ve been with for a few months than there was with the one I’m still in love with, who grew up alongside me and delivered our son and whom I still miss as much today as the day he died? “As much as I loved Reg, as much as I still love him, I never had to have him like I have to have you. I want to reconcile that and I can’t.”

“I’m sorry that it hurts you,” he says softly, “but I understand. Better than you know.” He twists my hair up and out of the way and kisses the back of my neck, sucking gently. His hips roll against my bum, just a little, enough to keep the embers burning.

“I knew that there was something,” I reply, pushing back against him softly. “You’ve been my rock, and you’re the only person who has ever understood me — this me, post-Reg. I’d always marvelled at that, wondered how you could possibly, and I decided it was best not to look a gift horse in the mouth. But nobody’s that good … to just give and give to me for all those years when I never gave you anything in return. Unless you’d been through something similar, and knew that I was dead inside. But you never said, and it’s the sort of thing I know from experience I couldn’t push you on. I know it’s hard to believe that I could keep my mouth shut, but …”

It gets a chuckle out of him, which is what I was hoping for. “Yeah, I haven’t said … not because I wanted to keep it from you or anything of the sort, but … It was all so long ago. After med school, when I was a junior, with massive debt and working ninety-hour weeks plus a second job to pay for it all — you know how it is …”

I’m kind of sorry for this one - fair warning. It gets a bit angsty. Also not terribly well proofread, but I didn’t want to wait any longer to put it up for you all. I appreciate all your kind reviews and messages. Next up will be a VERY fluffy Christmas Chapter on Dec 25. I promise. xxx

Broken Hearts, Broken Vows: A Downton Abbey Fanfic

Rather than keep the last part until the  @unofficialdas8 Christmas Special, I have posted the story in its entirety on FFnet so that y’all can finish the last part.  

Broken Hearts, Broken Vows

Raquel Cassidy backstage at the 22nd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 30, 2016 in Los Angeles, California.

This is LAST week’s offering for Week 7 of S8.  Yes, it’s very late.  And I hope to have a new chapter ready very soon for today’s Week 8.  Thank you for your continued support.  Please enjoy!