10/01/2022: HOW DARE YOU??? I Read This In The Morning, Went To The Dentist, Had Lunch, Went To Work,

10/01/2022: HOW DARE YOU??? i read this in the morning, went to the dentist, had lunch, went to work, came back home and the entire day was just a BLUR because all that i could think about was THIS!!! 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 favorite parts are below the cut, you are a menace!!! (ily)

“you’d never once had the desire to call a partner that before in bed - ever. but with bradley it just fit.” your characterization is always on point, it always makes sense and i love you for it, jordan!!! i personally don’t always like when people overuse daddy (it just doesn’t do it for me) BUT AGAIN, with bradley it just fits it works you are always correct and i have died from this!!!

“but something you probably should have brought up at another time. like when all seven and a half inches of your fiancé’s dick wasn’t inside you.” STOPPPPP

“please,” you said into his neck, but bradley grabbed your chin so you were looking into his eyes.” GRABBED HER CHINNNNNNNNNNN

“‘atta girl…” DO NOT DO THIS TO ME THIS IS TOO MUCH

“‘s all you, kid. come on,” he groaned.” i have died.

“daddy, huh?” he said after a moment.

you sighed and pulled back to look at him, knowing you were in for some teasing, but still more than willing to give it just as good.

“don’t get used to it, bubs.”

(but he would. and he did.)” BUT HE WOULD AND HE DID 🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡 their banter will forever be unmatched!!! best people ever!!!

Jordan!! Share the thoughts!!!! We all are having the same ones!!! Especially since we talked about spanking!!! I seriously need to get laid or find the charger to my vibrator I’m going insane™

the aforementioned spanking will have to wait until later because i can’t quite think of how to incorporate it into their storyline yet (what can i say he’s a Giver in the next two things i’m gonna post), but here’s some good old fashioned daddy shit and cockwarming to hopefully wet your whistle (why did i say it like that?)

OR the first time you call bradley daddy (18+)

Jordan!! Share The Thoughts!!!! We All Are Having The Same Ones!!! Especially Since We Talked About Spanking!!!

the first time it happened was an accident.

well, maybe not an accident, per se. you had thought it plenty of times since you’d been dating bradley and even more since you’d gotten engaged.

but you’d never said it. or at least not to him.

daddy. daddy. daddy.

you’d never once had the desire to call a partner that before in bed - ever. but with bradley it just fit.

and so one night, you had been a little tired from the edible you’d taken earlier (obviously bradley had to refrain) and buzzed from the champagne you were convinced you needed, and your inhibitions had been lowered - drastically. but the ironic thing was, you hadn’t been doing anything out of the ordinary. it wasn’t a scene or anything like that.

no. you were just sitting on his lap, chest to chest, as you warmed his cock after going another round earlier in the evening.

and again, you were a little tired from the edible and the champagne and your head was resting on his shoulder at the perfect angle for you to press little kisses across his cheeks and neck. so when you’d kissed the pretty little scar on his shoulder, he’d shuddered and shifted and you had let out a pitiful whimper. god, you felt so good. he always made you feel so good.

“feel so full, daddy.” you sounded wanton - you barely even recognized your own voice - you sounded tired, young, bratty.

daddy. daddy. daddy.

and then bradley tensed.

and then bradley dug his fingers into your hips.

and then bradley slightly pulled you off his cock.

and then bradley settled you back on his cock, deeper this time.

and then bradley groaned.

and then bradley said: “what was that again, sweetheart?”

you whimpered and couldn’t help but clench your pussy around his cock. embarrassed, you burrowed your face into his neck, knowing even on the cloud you were floating on that you had said something wrong. well, maybe not wrong. but something you probably should have brought up at another time. like when all seven and a half inches of your fiancé’s dick wasn’t inside you.

“daddy…” you whispered, except it came out needier than you would have liked.

bradley groaned and you could feel his cock twitch inside you. “you want more of daddy’s cock?”

“please,” you said into his neck, but bradley grabbed your chin so you were looking into his eyes.

he slipped his thumb into your mouth and you sucked on the tip. his fingers were still sticky from when they’d been inside you a few minutes ago and you felt warm at the thought of tasting yourself.

“you’re gonna have to work for it then…”

you nodded, eagerly. anything. you’d do anything for bradley - for daddy.

daddy. daddy. daddy.

bradley slapped your ass with his other hand and you moaned around his thumb. the action shot a hot wave of arousal straight to your throbbing core. god, you hadn’t even started moving and you already felt so full.

“come on, be a good girl and bounce on daddy’s cock.”

he was loving this, you could tell. if not from his physical reaction then from the cocky tone of his voice and the pleased smile on his face. but a breathier, sluttier voice at the back of your mind kept drowning the rational voice out and could only focus on one word.

daddy. daddy. daddy.

daddy wanted you to bounce on his cock. daddy wanted you to work for it. daddy wanted you to be a good girl.

you started off with slow, languid thrusts of your hips, gradually becoming deeper knowing that was the way bradley liked it - the way daddy liked it. his thumb slipped out of your mouth and then he drifted his hand down your body to play with your breasts. they were desperate for some attention and you jutted them out towards him. they were full and heavy and so sensitive and you let out a whimper as he pinched a nipple.

“‘atta girl…”

the obscene sound of the two of you fucked up against each other filled the room. you were so wet and turned on it was almost pathetic. granted, you still had bradley’s cum inside you from when you had fucked earlier. but god - it was so delicious. you could cum from the sound alone.

daddy. daddy. daddy.

as if reading your thoughts, bradley glanced down to where the two of you were connected and clicked his tongue. “fuck, ain’t that pretty?”

you nodded multiple times in quick succession. god, you were so close. so fucking close.

“harder, daddy, please.”

his hands snaked down to your hips and settled the two of you in a bruising pace and you swore you saw stars again for the second time that night. knowing you were close, bradley brought his hand down to where the two of you were connected and rubbed your clit. his middle and index finger played with the nub and you felt a pull in your stomach.

you arched your back and let out a moan, which he swallowed with his mouth. you both let out desperate gasps and grunts against each other’s mouths as you tried to see who would come first.

“‘s all you, kid. come on,” he groaned.

with a final cry, you came and bradley spent himself inside you soon after. you collapsed against his chest, utterly spent from the multiple times you had already cum that evening. god, you were so overstimulated. your entire body was wrought and warm and yet you still wanted to be closer to bradley. you peppered kisses along his jawline in between catching your breath.

“daddy, huh?” he said after a moment.

you sighed and pulled back to look at him, knowing you were in for some teasing, but still more than willing to give it just as good.

“don’t get used to it, bubs.”

(but he would. and he did.)

Tags

fic recs 2022 i am unwell Top gun top gun maverick rooster january i will never recover bradley bradshaw my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing i know his [redacted] is big i know it THE “ATTA GIRL” REALLY GOT ME I WASN’T READY IT CAME OUT OF NOWHERE AND THEN I DIED “kid” too like??? jordan you will be paying millions for psychological damages they’re so needy for each other <3 bradley and smart aleck

you left me no choice but to stay here forever (right where you left me)

masterlist

pairing: jake ‘hangman’ seresin x reader (hotshot journalist!reader)

synopsis: you and jake have been best friends for years and eventually he becomes the love of your life - which makes it that much harder to cope when he starts pulling away with no explanation

wc: 14k (yoo I think I actually may'd)

warnings: angst with a happy ending, explicit language, pining, supposedly unrequited love, kinda sad feels, reader wearing heels.

A shoutout to gretagerwigsmuse and @seasonsbloom - I wouldn't have gotten through this fic period, let alone begun writing in the first place without them. Please check out their writing, send them a sweet message or two <3

AGE SIXTEEN (pages turn and stick to each other)

This is not a date.

On a crisp Wednesday in October - well, as crisp as it can get in Texas - you find yourself sitting across from your high school’s running back in a greasy booth at your town’s renowned pizza parlor. And even though he’s objectively the hottest guy in your grade - not to mention the fact that he’s kind, well-liked amongst your peers, almost too charming for his own good - there’s no way you would ever go on a date with Jake Seresin.

For that matter, you’re not even friends. The only reason he’s even here is because you managed to pique his interest with the promise of a free meal in exchange for an interview for the school newspaper. So even though he held the door open for you and let you choose the side of the booth to sit in and even insisted on getting your favorite pizza toppings, you’re not going to let it distract you from doing your job.

You had been invited to join the school newspaper team in August, but you had yet to write a story featured in the paper. By some stroke of luck, Newsteam President Joe thought you were ready to handle your own solo project: a profile on one of your school’s football players. And while you aren’t exactly thrilled to interview Westwood High School’s star running back you’re determined to deliver a moving, heart wrenching piece about #25 and the trials and tribulations of high school football that’ll have Joe reaching for tissues.

No one needs to know that you’ve never even been to a football game in your life.

“Thanks for agreeing to meet with me,” you tell Jake briskly after your waitress walks away after passing you your drinks. You pull out the giant legal notepad you stole from your dad’s study and your favorite ten color shuttle pen, then push down the lever for dark blue ink - for your more serious projects.

The boy in front of you nods once, stretching both arms out on either side of him to rest on the back of the booth, eyes darting around. “Sure.”

“So...” you start, then trail off, eyes scanning the list of questions you’d meticulously drafted the night before. You decide to start from the very beginning: “What can you remember about the first time you played with a football?” you ask, and Jake shrugs his shoulders.

“Blood,” he says simply, and you wrinkle your nose.

“What? Blood?”

“Yeah. I was six. My dad was trying to teach me how to catch the ball, and ma kept telling him to use the foam ones but he said they didn’t spiral as well. Ended up pelting a pigskin at me and clocked me right on the nose. I can still feel a bump here,” you briefly look up from rapidly transcribing to watch him idly rub the bridge of his nose with his index finger.

You nod, scrawling down the details, mentally planning out how you could possibly fit this into an article and thinking of potential titles. Child gets pelted with a football and vows revenge. Becomes Westlake’s Star RB. Pathetic.

“So you’ve been playing since you were six?” you try to establish a timeline. “Ten years?”

“No. I joined a youth league when I was nine,” Jake corrects. He doesn’t elaborate.

You sigh, tapping your pen on your legal pad idly, then another question catches your eye. “What do you enjoy most about football?” you flip over to a clean page and smooth it out, not missing the flash of incredulity on Jake’s face.

“You kidding? No offense, but these questions suck,” he snickers, and your shoulders sag as you flip back to scan your messy notes. “Do you even want to be doing this little interview?”

“Do you?” you throw back, angrily, nervously clicking your pen as you try and figure out how you’re going to salvage this meeting, reaching into the crevices of your mind to craft a less sucky, more thought-provoking question.

The one thing you know about conducting an interview is asking the right question, one that will unleash your subject to go off on their own path and tell their story the way they want to. This way, you find that you get the most details, the most honest perspective. And so far, all you had from Jake was a stupid story about a childhood injury doesn’t lend itself to writing a tear-jerking profile.

Jake’s smirk doesn’t waver and after a few moments of silence, he relents. “I was promised free pizza. What’s in it for you?”

You sigh and rest your head back against the worn pleather of the booth seat, squeeze your eyes shut, tighten your grip on your pen as you deliberate his question. “Will you answer my questions if I tell you?”

“If they’re better questions, yeah.”

You shoot him a quick glare, then let out a resigned sigh and click your pen, setting it down on top of your scribbled notes. “First off, I hate football. Never even seen a game.”

“Seriously?” Jake says and folds his arms together to lean in closer over the sticky tabletop. “We live in Texas. You’ve never even watched a game on TV?”

You shrug ambivalently. “No, it never really caught my interest. I mean, what’s there to watch? Someone screams out a bunch of numbers and then you all just charge at each other to wrestle for five seconds while a stupidly shaped ball gets tossed around? And don’t even get me started on your weird scoring system-”

“- It makes sense if you actually commit to watching it!” Jake defends hotly, crossing his arms over his chest and looking like he’s trying his hardest to fight a pout. “Why’d they even put you on this article? Doesn’t seem like you give a damn about writing football.”

“I don’t,” you agree, sitting up straight and daring to look him straight in the eye. At this point, you don’t care how little you know about the stupid sport - you just want Jake to answer your questions so that you can go home and cobble together something, anything to show Joe that you can handle writing your own opinion pieces. “But Joe said if I write a great profile, he’ll print my story about the cafeteria workers.”

Jake pauses, mentally chews your words. “Seems like he set you up, then, darling,” - your surprise at the sweet name is overtaken by the harsh reality check - “Seeing as he asked you to interview me when you’ve never even been to a game.”

A wave of clarity washes over you. You didn’t think about it that way - that Joe might have intentionally put you on this project just to watch you struggle, so he could easily shut down your other ideas. You deflate, shrinking into yourself, and your solemn expression suddenly has Jake shaking his head and trying to backpedal.

“Look - hey. I’m sorry. I’m sure... Maybe he’s just testing you to see if you can write things out of your element. Isn’t that the mark of a good newspaper... writer?”

It kind of makes sense, but the first reason hurts more, resonates with you, and opens the door for self-doubt to stride right in. With how hard you had to fight tooth and nail to even be offered a spot on the school news team, it’s easy to imagine they didn’t want to make things easy for you. Suddenly, you find yourself questioning your writing ability, wondering if you’re really cut out for this. You shrug. “Yeah, maybe.”

Jake purses his lips, drumming his fingers again on the tabletop. “What’s the story with the cafeteria workers?”

At this, you perk up slightly, straightening your back and halting your anxious pen tapping. “There’s just been lots of wages being cut, some layoffs early this year and now they’re being asked to work overtime and the supervisors keep changing the schedule around and giving them such a hard time for wanting to take time off. I think they let someone go because they wouldn’t come in when they had the flu. Can you believe that? Someone was literally sick and didn’t go to work in a kitchen where they could easily infect the whole school. And Sandra - you know Sandra the cashier? She told me they’re all planning to walk out in two weeks, which I think is really admirable - but honestly, I think they need someone to talk about their complaints y’know? Let their voices be heard?”

You stop, finally realizing that you’d been rambling for the better half of a minute about a topic the star running back probably couldn’t care less about. But to your surprise, he’s listening intently, nodding encouragingly, looking contemplative. It’s weird - you’re not used to people being interested in what you have to say.

It’s nice.

“Sounds like you’re a lot more keyed up about this story than stupid football,” he finally says with a half smile, and you push down the warm feeling it ignites.

“Yeah,” you clear your throat and shift uncomfortably, bashfully. “It’s just... It’s what I want to do. Write about real people and real events. Give the silenced a voice. Which I know, it sounds kind of cheesy and idealistic and quixotic - but I don’t care. I just want to make a difference. Maybe win a Pulitzer Prize, I don’t know.”

His eyebrows furrow - maybe he doesn’t know what a Pulitzer is - but he nods thoughtfully. “I mean... Don’t really know what quixotic means, but I don’t think you’re being cheesy. Speaking of cheese, though...” his eyes flit over your shoulder.

Your waitress interrupts, setting down a large pizza with the toppings of Jake’s choice. He eagerly loads two slices onto his plate and continues his train of thought: “Tell you what: how about I give you a hand with the article? I’ll tell you what you need to know about football, at least.”

“You’d do that for me?” you ask, and you’re honestly shocked he didn’t just brush off your whole rant about your hopes and dreams, amazed that he’s even offered to help.

He shrugs and swallows the huge bite he’d taken. “‘Course - but in exchange, you’ll have to go to our games. You know, all my friends come to support me.”

You first open your mouth to object to having to watch football - then close it, sending him an incredulous look. “We’re friends?” you ask dumbly.

He shifts, looks the tiniest bit bashful, busies himself with the straw in his drink. “I mean... I’d like to be. Who knows, maybe you’ll be famous one day or you could help me with my English essays - ”

“- You want to be friends so I’ll cheer on you at games and tutor you for free?” you interrupt, narrowing your gaze.

But despite your tone being riddled with annoyance, despite the glare you’re now sending his way, Jake sends you an easy smile, serving himself another slice. “Nah, you just seem pretty cool.”

By another stroke of luck, you manage to pump out a puff piece about Jake Seresin - something along the lines of how the first time #25 threw a football was the moment he resolved to never back down after the first hit, to wipe the sweat and blood from his face and keep pushing forward. Joe is more than impressed with the quality of your work - almost surprised, you annoyedly observe - and agrees to run the profile for the following week’s issue, just in time for Westlake’s playoff game.

On Monday evening, you’re reviewing your interview notes with Sandra the Cashier at your kitchen table when suddenly, the landline rings. “Hello?” you answer, anticipating it to be one of your parents’ friends calling to gossip. The line is silent for a few moments, and you clear your throat to try again. “Anyone there?”

Suddenly, Jake’s laughter flows into your ear. “‘Never back down’?” he quotes through a wheeze, and you hold back a smile, this time letting yourself feel the butterflies that come alive in your stomach at the sound of his voice.

“You didn’t give me much to work with for your story!” you tell him with a small giggle. “So I managed to pull this together, and I’d say it’s a heart clencher - a tear jerker, even. Joe’s happy, at least.”

“He gonna let you write that other thing?”

“About the cafeteria workers? Working on it right now, actually,” you tell him, twirling the phone coil around your finger idly.

“Well darling,” Jake says and you feel your heart skip a beat at the sweet name, at the sound of mirth filling his voice, at the memory of his smiling eye crinkles that involuntarily flashes in your mind. “I’ll hold onto this profile, hang it in my gym locker. But let me know when they print that union thing. I’d like to hold onto a future Pyoo-litzer Prize winner’s first ever real story.”

“Pulitzer,” you correct him, and despite your writing hand hurting terribly from all the notes you’ve been scribbling and the slight twinge of a headache from your eyes straining, your heart feels full as ever as you chat with Jake - your new friend - into the late hours of the night.

AGE EIGHTEEN (wages earned and lessons learned)

Almost two years later, you find yourself seated across from Jake at your town’s fanciest Italian restaurant. It’s been a while since your waiter has checked in to take your meal orders, but his absence easily slips your mind as the two of you gossip while munching on garlicky breadsticks that are way chewier than you’d like.

After a lull in the conversation, you take a deep breath. “How’s your mom doing?” you carefully ask, taking a sip of your coke to avoid tacking on more words, to fight the urge to add more useless attempts at hopeful sentiments.

Jake shrugs, unbothered, nonchalant. “She’s holding up.”

You wait for him to elaborate, but he just drums his fingers on top of the white tablecloth impatiently, turning his head to glance behind him at the swinging door to the kitchen. “Have you... spoken to your dad?” you probe, and while Jake doesn’t react harshly like you expect, his hand momentarily freezes.

“No,” he finally says. “I don’t think I’m ready to talk to him.”

“Right,” you pause. “Do you think you ever will?”

Jake heaves out a sigh and turns back to face you, idly chewing at a hangnail. Your fingers twitch and you hold yourself back from reaching out to pull his hand away from his mouth. “There’s not much to say, really. They were married, and now they’re not.”

You nod slowly, taking another sip of your drink, briefly lamenting the fact that it’s now just melted ice with a dash of soda. “How are your sisters?”

Again, he shrugs. “Fine. I’m driving them around a whole lot. Kinsey won’t come out of her room, but that’s no different than usual. They won’t talk to him either.”

He’s silent, doesn’t seem to want to say much else, instead tries to play off his nervousness by taking another large gulp of his drink and shifting his eyes to watch the Cowboys game playing on the tiny TV behind the bar. But you can tell he’s gotten himself worked up by the way you can feel his foot tapping impatiently under the table, the way he presses his finger harder into his teeth, by virtue of knowing Jake so well.

So you change the subject. “Are we doing this every year now, then? A friendship anniversary?” you ask.

Jake visibly relaxes, almost looking grateful. The foot tapping stops, and he pulls his hand away from his mouth to sling an arm around the booth and send you a signature Jake Seresin smirk. “Of course - gotta celebrate the day you learned about football - ”

“- I swear, I’ll break your nose again with one later - ”

“With your aim? Please,” he scoffs, a goofy smile breaking the moment he makes eye contact with you.

You roll your eyes. “Plan B is always my fists. Anyway, how do you think we’ll even keep up every year while I’m at school and you’re at the Academy?”

“I’ll visit you at Columbia - and before you say it, shut up. You’re getting in, Miss Pulitzer. As for the Academy... Depends on whether I even apply.”

“Why wouldn’t you apply?” you ask, even though you’re sure you know the answer, ready to pour out words of affirmation, tell him that there’s no way they’d turn him down.

“Not sure if I’d get in,” - bingo, but he follows up with something that stuns you - “And I think I might want to stick around here for a bit. Take care of the family for a bit.”

You’re not sure what to say to that, exactly. Because you were prepared to jump into a supportive best friend mode: reassure him that he’s a shoo-in, remind him of his accomplishments, deliver your long-winded ramble of uplifting words that’ll make your mouth feel like you’re chewing cotton by the end of it. But that’s not what Jake needs right now.

“I don’t think your Ma would want you to do that, Jake,” you say quietly. “She wouldn’t want you to abandon your dreams just to take care of her.”

He stretches his arms back, rolls his neck out hard enough so that his joins sound like crackling rice krispies in the silence. “She’d never ask me to. But I don’t want her to have a hard time, make her shoulder the burden.”

“Knowing her, she wouldn’t want to unload anything onto you, Jake,” you tell him firmly, sitting up straight in an attempt to look more certain, strong. “You’ve wanted this for such a long time. Don’t let your dad ruin this for you - I know a part of you wants to stick it to him or something. But fuck that, Jake. If you put your dreams on hold, you’ll regret it. You have to do this for yourself.”

“Yeah... I guess,” he trails off, still sounding uncertain, but a little less subdued. His hand lifts up and he’s again gnawing at the raw skin on his fingers.

“- You offering? I tell you, it’s not like I haven’t thought about it -”

“Shut up,” you snipe, feeling the heat rush into your cheeks at the suggestion. You shake off your embarrassment. “How ‘bout chewing gum?”

“Hate gum,” Jake pouts. “Makes my jaw hurt.”

“You’re such a baby. Lollipops?”

“Charles would hate me,” he replies, and you internally roll your eyes at him calling his dentist by his first name. His sincere dedication to exceptional dental health and maintaining his teeth was sure to win him the best smile Senior superlative. “If your next suggestion is smoking -”

“- It’s not!” you glare. “How about toothpicks?”

“You want me to roll a sharp piece of wood in my mouth? Sounds delightful,” he drawls sarcastically, and you scoff, turning your eyes to look up at the ceiling.

“Better than sticking your fingers in your mouth all the damn time. What are you, two?”

“I’m a ten, thank you very much.”

“You’re insufferable,” you groan out, fighting back the urge to smile. “You won’t stay a ten if you rip your fingers apart though, Jake. You should give it a try. They have flavored toothpicks, too.”

He ponders this with narrowed eyes, pulls his hand away from his mouth to lay it flat on top of the table to examine his cuticles carefully. “Think they have cinnamon?”

“Probably. Would keep your mouth fresh too.”

“Oh, the ladies are gonna love that,” he laughs, smiling so big now that his eyes crinkle and it feels like someone’s opened a window in this dim restaurant, pushed the sun higher in the sky and bathed your whole body in sunlight. You laugh along with him, rest your elbows on the table to prop your head up and just look at him, appreciate him as a boy who offered to help you within the first hour of knowing you, a man who’s willing to give up his aspirations to care for the people he loves. Your best friend who stopped giving you butterflies a long time ago and now brings you a feeling of comfort, of warmth. Of home.

Suddenly, Jake reaches across the table, palm facing up. You eye it carefully, slowly sliding your hand into his. “You good?”

“Thanks for putting up with me for two years,” he tells you seriously. And you shake your head with a smile, can sense the emotions well up in your eyes, feel your heart beating faster.

“Of course,” you breathe out. “Thanks for always supporting me.”

“Always,” he parrots back. “Anything for a future Pew-litzer Winner.”

You huff out a wet laugh, and the two of you just sit there across from each other, smiling like idiots until finally, with your vision slightly blurred and your hand still squeezing his across the table, you glance around for your waitress who has yet to make an appearance. “You wanna just... go get some pizza?”

“God, yes,” Jake agrees, immediately moving to stand up. “Think we can find some toothpicks on the way?”

AGE TWENTY-THREE (she’s still 23, inside her fantasy, how it was supposed to be)

The October after you graduate from Columbia and Jake’s graduated from the Academy, you visit him in Pensacola in a bar that’s packed to the brim with patrons in Navy-issued khakis. You find yourself in a booth across from Jake, snacking on greasy bar eats and nursing some shitty beers.

“Aren’t you gonna introduce me to your date, Hangman?” a dark-skinned, intimidatingly handsome man in uniform leans against your table and looks down at you with a grin that could rival a hyena’s. You glance over at Jake, who rolls his eyes.

“Coyote,” Jake says admonishingly, flips a toothpick between his teeth, but goes on to introduce you. “This is my best friend from back home.”

You wave awkwardly, pondering where his callsign may have come from - unless that was his birth name, in which you’d love to have a quick interview with his parents. Coyote raises his eyebrows and slides into the booth next to Jake, subsequently pushing him closer to the wall and rests both elbows on the table. “So you’re Jake’s friend? With all the articles?”

You whip your head to look at Jake, who’s bearing a sheepish grin with his cheeks getting slightly pinker. His hand raises up to rub the back of his neck. “It’s nothing -”

Coyote’s rubbing his side where Jake elbowed him harshly, cheeks still red and teeth furiously gnashing down on the toothpick. Underneath the table, you can feel Jake’s leg start bouncing, and you shift your foot forward to lightly brush his, tap the side of his tenderly. He halts his movements.

“He’s just a great friend,” you clarify, beaming at Jake, who seems slightly less tense with his jaw unclenched. “Anyways, is Coyote your callsign?” your curiosity gets the better of you, and you figure it might be a good chance to get the spotlight off Jake.

“Sure is. Name’s Javy,” he smirks at you, then jerks a hand over at Jake. “Has he told you his sign?”

“Yeah, Hangman. Which is stupid, because he honestly sucks at the game -”

Coyote attempts to stifle a laugh, but you let a giggle bubble right out of you. “I like to use it as a learning opportunity.”

“Here’s a word for you: buzzkill.” Jake retorts, and you scoff, holding back a smile, about to snark back when you feel your phone vibrate from your purse.

“One second,” you pull out your Blackberry, glancing over the email from your coworker at The Washington Times and tapping out a brief response.

“Still on for Friday night?” she asks, and you envy how cool she sounds saying it, like there’s no doubt in her mind that Jake will say yes, against your better wishes.

“Of course, wouldn’t miss it,” he replies easily, the dimple on his cheek popping out, deflating you further.

She flashes a quick smile at you as well - no malice or threat in it whatsoever - and you wonder if it’s that obvious that you and Jake are friends, that you’re not on a date even though you’d both been seated in this booth for the better half of an hour.

Maybe she thinks you’re just here with Javy, who’s been watching the whole interaction with a smirk, eyes laser focused on you trying your hardest to keep your expression neutral. “You’re going out with Imani? What happened to Priya?” Coyote asks after the girl walks away, his pointed look at you unwavering.

Jake shrugs. “She knew I didn't want anything serious. So does Imani. It’s just drinks and dinner and you know... whatever comes next.”

They both share a chuckle and your heart clenches painfully. You’re no prude - you’re all in support of people having casual sex, and you’re glad Jake is forthcoming with these girls. He’s not breaking their hearts, and they seem content to just have one night with him and be done with it.

There’s just the tiniest whisper of anxiety that wonders if there’s something wrong with you for rarely engaging in hookup culture, for not feeling comfortable enough to have meaningless flings. The one time you took a step out of your comfort zone and hooked up with a stranger, your walk of shame felt like a daze - inside, you were empty, despondent. A part of you envies Imani and the mysterious Priya for being able to cast aside their emotions so easily, fall into bed with a stranger, step out the next morning without feeling like they’re missing a part of themself.

The little green monster in you also flares up at the realization that they’ll know Jake in a more intimate way than you ever will - in a way that you’ve only dreamt about a handful of times. Give or take. You’re not sure when you started seeing him in a different light, as more than a friend, more like the person you’d want to get old with and celebrate milestones besides the anniversary of you becoming friends - but it happened slowly, suddenly, then all at once. And now, your feelings just sit with you, tethering you to the impossible dream of knowing Jake as so much more.

All this to say, you can’t be angry with Jake or any of these women. It’s not a crime for him to want to sleep around. You just wish you had the courage to tell him it’s not entirely victimless.

Jake rolls his eyes. “Always been a heartbreaker, darlin’, it’s an occupational hazard.” he tells you and you agree mentally, idly picking at the basket of cold fries on the table. “You’ll always be my number one girl, though.”

Ah, and the dream lives on.

AGE TWENTY-SIX (time went on for everybody else, she won't know it)

“Happy tenth anniversary to a spectacular, intelligent, absolutely phenomenal woman,” Jake toasts, grinning across from you at Malatesta Trattoria in West Village. Jake had insisted on treating you in celebration of your new job at The New York Times - did the research and made reservations all on his own, took time off and everything.

“Happy friendship anniversary to a guy who still forgets to pack his toothbrush,” you snicker, and laugh even harder when his look of pride quickly turns into a mock glare.

It’s been a full year since you physically saw him at your last anniversary dinner - Jake had been away on a longer assignment in Lemoore, and you’d been busy churning out inflammatory political op-eds for The Washington Times and applying to jobs in the Big Apple. The two of you called pretty regularly, but this was officially the longest the two of you had gone without seeing each other.

You thought it’d feel awkward, like you’d have to fumble to find your footing with him the same way you have to figure out how to balance when you put on roller skates, but it’s easy. The moment you stepped outside of your building to meet him, he’d rushed to lift you in a giant bear hug, like no time apart had even passed. And the whole night, the two of you chat about anything and everything- he fills you in on his assignment and about something he’s gunning for called Top Gun, and you tell him about an upcoming project covering creative renewal in Beirut - you both nod along as best as you can while the other speaks.

After your plates are empty and cleared out and you both have determined that you’re too full for dessert (although, the ice cream calling your name at your apartment might have you singing a different tune later), you both stand up to exit the restaurant.

The wine you had with dinner has loosened up your movements - typically, you have to move through the city streets with big strides and purpose - like you’ve got somewhere to be and you’re already ten minutes late. But with Jake, there’s no timetable, no place you have to hurry to reach. Right now, the only thing on your agenda is to stand next to Jake in the middle of the sidewalk outside of this fancy restaurant and appreciate the moments you have with him.

And figure out how the hell you’re getting home.

“You wanna call a cab?” Jake asks you with an arm wrapped around your waist to steady your swaying form, and you balk at the thought of having to pay a hefty fee just to sit still in a car and try to keep your spinning head from making you throw up. God, your tolerance has become abysmal.

And you know he’s only trying to keep you upright, probably just trying to gauge your level of drunkenness and assess whether you’re good to make the thirty minute walk plus subway ride to your home. But he doesn’t know that it’s not the three glasses of wine you had at dinner that’s intoxicated you this much, that’s made your mind feel lighter than air and your heart ten times fuller. It’s all Jake - Jake - who’s looking at you like you’re the only thing on his mind, the only person in the world, the only one who matters.

“Are you fine with that?” he asks, and the softness written in his features reminds you of all the times you’ve looked at Jake and found a new favorite thing to fall in love with.

The very first time you looked at him - really looked at him - you fixated on the way his dimple poked out while you regaled him with a story about how you exacted revenge on your friend’s two-timing ex by pouring your entire yogurt cup on top of his head. The way he threw his head back with his eyes squinted shut and hands clapping together made you feel more enamored with him than ever, had you scraping the back of your mind for more stupid jokes to make him laugh that hard.

Another time, you remember looking right at his nose and thinking about how much you wanted to plant a sweet kiss on the tip, found yourself wondering how it would feel pressed against your neck as you both drifted off for the night, and how the sound of his soft breathing beside you would be the most comforting, reassuring sound to fall asleep to.

This time, you’re completely mesmerized by the way the streetlights hit the flecks of green in his eyes, the way his pupils look slightly dilated, the way his gaze darts down for a split second to your lips and right back up to meet your heated look. If you weren’t drunk you’d fall right into the moment, lean right in and press your mouth to his like you’ve always wanted to, let his perfectly brilliant teeth clash with yours. Maybe see for yourself if you can taste cinnamon on his tongue.

Jake’s talking, murmuring something low in your ear. “You sure? Those shoes look like they hurt.”

You look down at your heels - and yeah, they’re fucking painful. These past few minutes of Jake’s inebriating presence has given you the briefest reprieve from the sharp pains shooting up your calves. You’re desperate to take them off - but you can’t recall when your last tetanus shot was. And even if you were up-to-date, no one could convince you that it’s safe to walk barefoot in the streets of New York. “No, I’ll make it. Need to walk off the wine.”

“You wanna wear my shoes?” Jake offers and you scoff.

“You wanna walk barefoot? What, do you think they sanitize and mop the sidewalks every night?”

“I’m wearing socks!” he defends and you roll your eyes.

“Still gross. Besides, you know what they say about guys with big feet?”

Jake’s eyebrows furrow, looks momentarily stunned as his eyes dart to his shoes, then return to your face. “Big dick?”

“Big shoes,” you deadpan. “And if I take one step in your big clown shoes, I’m faceplanting right on the sidewalk. You want that to happen? ”

“Clown shoes?” he repeats to himself quietly with an amused smile, then shakes his head, finally relenting. “Fine. But if you get tired, I’m not carrying you.”

“I’ll make it,” you insist.

“Jake?” you say thirty minutes later after traversing up the subway stairs, stopping for a moment to bend down and massage your ankles. Jake stops, shifts the paper bag with leftovers from one hand to the other and places his free hand on your back. He looks down at you with concern.

“Yeah?”

You pause for a moment, wondering if he’d turn you down, deliberating if you even feel comfortable asking him for a piggyback ride for the five minute walk back to your apartment. But the aching toe cramp that you’re trying and failing to stretch out drowns out your insecurities, silences your fear that he wouldn’t be able to manage. You remind yourself that he’s been bragging about his new squat record for weeks now, anyway. “Can you carry me on your back? Please?”

A sigh. Then, “Sure darlin’. Hop on.”

You wordlessly reach to take the leftovers from him and he turns away from you, couches down low enough to let you clamber onto him. With an arm secured under each leg, he extends to his full height and lifts you up onto his back.

“Alright?” he rumbles, and you nod wordlessly, wrap your arms around his neck and hook your chin over his shoulder. Your eyes flutter shut, and you breathe in his familiar cologne, some Tom Ford scent you’d gifted him a few Christmases ago. It grounds you, keeps your head from spinning even more as you relish the feeling of your ankles not supporting your whole body weight.

You feel the alcohol hit for a second wave, completely demolishing your self-control, unleashing your thoughts to race limitlessly, to see no bounds. At this point, your head is close to mush, your limbs feel like they weigh twice as much, and you think you’ll never let yourself drink rosé again. But you’re certain of one thing. “I think you might be the love of my life,” you murmur sleepily.

Silence. Jake doesn’t stop walking, doesn’t acknowledge it, doesn’t even say it back. So maybe you were too quiet, or perhaps you completely imagined saying it at all.

Because it’s unlike Jake to let you have the last word.

AGE TWENTY-EIGHT (I'm sure that you’ve got a wife out there, kids and Christmas, but I'm unaware)

“Have you ever thought about this?” Jake asks you, leaning back against his chair as he watches the happy couple swaying in the middle of the dance floor to an Ed Sheeran song - not your personal choice, but the rest of the onlookers seem to be incredibly moved by it. This year, your friendship anniversary coincides with your old roommate’s wedding, and after much pleading (and the promise of an open bar), Jake agreed to fly out to be your plus-one.

It surprised you how much you had to beg for him to come. At first, he had been hesitant, imploring you to attend the wedding instead of meeting him for your usual dinner. You didn’t hesitate to dismiss that idea - it’s been twelve years of celebrating, and there’s no way you’re stopping now. Not when it already feels like Jake’s been pulling back for the past year or so: calling less often, answering texts hours after you sent them, sometimes not even replying to your articles with anything aside from a little thumbs-up emoji.

At this point, it feels like this anniversary is all that’s tethering him to you.

“Have I ever thought about my wedding?” you ponder. “Yeah, sometimes. Don’t think I’d ever spring for something as big as this, but -”

“- No, no,” he interrupts, “you wouldn’t want to make a big fuss of it all, not a crazy big party and definitely not a five hundred person guest list. ‘Course I know that about you.” Jake smiles and shifts forward, leaning in close; you can just barely smell the sandalwood and vanilla musk of his cologne. He seems relaxed, finally looks content to be here - though you’re sure that’s all thanks to the top-shelf whiskey he’s imbibing. “I meant marriage, commitment, settling down. You think you’d ever want to do that?”

You purse your lips, gaze still locked on the newly wedded couple, appreciating the matching expressions of adoration written on their faces as they twirl around their guests. “Of course. Just haven’t found the right person who’s ready to do that with me.”

He scoffs. “What, like you’re struggling to find someone? You know, from the minute I walked into this banquet hall with you, I’ve counted maybe five death glares from interested parties.”

“Yeah, I’m sure you did,” you snort, tilting your glass up vertically to catch the last few drops of champagne.

“Sweetheart, I’d never lie to you. In fact, I think the redhead over by the bar is still sending daggers my way. And she’s hot, so I’m kind of turned on by it,” Jake adds seriously, and you roll your eyes. “Come on! I thought you were going to give Tinder a shot earlier this year?”

You snort again, this time feeling a little more jaded. “I did give it a shot. And all I found was guys holding up fish and finance bros asking for my snap. I don’t even have a Snapchat, Jake. What happened to just getting people’s numbers and having a normal conversation?”

“It’s a new era, all this online dating stuff,” he replies, crossing one ankle over his knee and interlacing his hands over his abdomen. “But I see your point, maybe Tinder isn’t the best place to find your forever partner.”

“Don’t know why I even bothered,” you remark and look over at him, momentarily allowing yourself to appreciate the way his tux fits over him. “Maybe if we’re both still single by the time we’re forty, we get hitched,” you muse, only half joking.

He chokes on his whiskey, coughing loudly with the liquor singing his throat. “Yeah, right!” Jake finally manages out with a laugh and teary eyes, and it feels like someone’s poured a bucket of ice water on you, wakes you up from the lighthearted banter you lost yourself in.

“Okay,” you narrow your eyes, heart dropping at the rejection. “Don’t sound too eager. I’m not down on one knee here or anything.”

“Sorry,” he apologizes but it doesn’t reach his eyes. He swirls around the remaining amber sea in his drink, slightly mesmerized by the mini whirlpool. “You know me though. Never settling down.”

You know you should take the sign to drop the conversation, but his quick refusal and blasé tone rubs you the wrong way. “Why? Because of your parents?” you hedge, leaning in to get a better look at his face, which has slightly hardened in the dim glow of the bulb lights strung across the venue. The extra bubbly you’ve consumed pushes you to question him, to finally figure out why he’s so resistant to letting himself be loved. “I know you’re scared you’ll end up making the same mistakes as your dad, but you know you’re not like him. Not in any way.”

He grits out your name warningly, arching a brow and gripping his glass tight. You run the risk of it shattering if you keep pushing. But that’s the least of your worries; right now, you’re blind with hurt. How can he just dismiss you like it’s nothing? How can he close himself off so easily?

“Typical Jake Seresin, you know?” you cut him off hotly, trying with all your might to keep your voice even through the haze of champagne. “Always so ready to let your daddy issues ruin your chances at happiness.”

He glares at you, knocks back the rest of his drink without even grimacing, doesn’t meet your gaze. Crunches the ice bitterly. “Get off your high horse, sweetheart,” he finally says roughly. “Stop pretending like you know me.”

You scoff, still not backing down. “You think after over ten years of friendship, I don’t know you at all?”

Another shrug. His leg starts bouncing incessantly. “People change, darlin’. You certainly have.”

You draw back, feeling like he just slapped you in the face. “What d’you mean by that?” you ask a little quieter, with a slight waver, still audible over Ed Sheeran’s ballad. Where’s he going with this?

He groans again, turns to look at you, but you don’t quite recognize the expression on his face. It’s menacing, hardened, darker than the amber liquid in his cup. “We do our separate things, sweetheart. We call a couple times a year and meet up on the same weekend to do the same dinner and yeah, that’s nice. It’s great. But that doesn’t mean you know me as well as you think you do. Quit grilling me - I’m not just a sad story for you to write about.”

His words punch you in the gut, sock you in the ear, send blood coursing angrily through your veins. Part of you wants to tell him off, unleash your fury, make a scene in the middle of this reception hall. Another part of you wants to storm off and leave him behind, but you’re not sure if you want to face the reality that he might not follow, might not chase after you with apologies and promises to soothe the burn from his words.

Slightly misty-eyed, you fight to reel your emotions back in, not wanting to draw attention to the two of you or make Jake feel like you’re guilting him. It feels an awful lot like using thimbles to catch roof leaks. Your strength comes back to you in slow, even waves: your heart returns to its normal pattern, your chest no longer heaves for air.

“You can’t say things like that, Jake,” you tell him, your voice surprisingly steady, rock solid. “You’re my best friend, and you can’t speak to me that way.”

His jaw ticks, his expression remains unchanged. “Sure, right. Sorry.”

The easy dismissal brings your anger back in a rush, yet gives you time to think about your next words carefully. “You’re such an ass, Jake,” you bite out, and maintain decorum, calmly push your chair back to stand up, send him a glare with all the furiosity you can muster before making a bee-line for the exit without looking back to see if he’s following suit.

You dodge fellow wedding attendees, snatching champagne from a waiter with a platter before knocking it back and setting the empty flute back down and continuing to make your way to the exit. Over Ed Sheeran’s second ballad, you can hear Jake quietly calling out your name, his footsteps right behind you.

As you burst through the doors, into the crisp outside air, you teeter for a few steps in your heels before leaning against a pillar, trying to contain your emotions, lest you say something silly or embarrassing or humiliating.

“Would you just wait? Would you let me talk?” Jake’s hot on your heels as he steps over the threshold.

“You’ve said plenty,” you throw back.

“Come on, darlin’, I didn’t mean it like that,” Jake says behind you, closer now.

“I think you made it very clear,” you grind out, turning on your heel and looking him straight in the eye. “You can’t smooth-talk your way out of this, Seresin. That might work on everyone else, but it’s not doing jack shit on me!”

He throws his hands up in the air, shakes his head. You eye how his fingers are twitching, how he’s chewing the inside of his cheek. “What do you want me to say? I’m just saying we’re not the same people we used to be -”

Jake’s expression stays ablaze, but his spine stiffens, hands twitch twice before he clenches them, digging his nails into his palms harshly. You meet his heavy gaze, mouth slightly agape, mind running a million miles a second until it starts to decelerate, slows down gradually, then stops on one thought, one single thought alone.

“I love you, Jake,” you say. Like you’re stating a fact, common knowledge for everyone and their mother. The sky is blue, the world isn’t flat, and you’re in love with Jake Seresin.

He inhales, shaking his head, and looking down at the ground.

You falter, furrow your eyebrows, wonder if maybe he didn’t hear you. “I love you, Jake,” you repeat, this time a little louder, taking a step forward, closer to him. “I’m in love with you.”

Jake looks up, his face contorted into a look of pain, eyes void of its usual light. Inhales sharply. “I know.”

You falter. “You know?“ the words feel like marbles rolling out; you can almost hear the tiny plinks as they hit the ground.

“Yeah.”

”…How long?”

He swallows. “Since New York.”

You’re transported back in that moment, a montage of scenes from your tenth anniversary flashing through your mind like you’re in a cinema. You remember the night’s end in a haze: his warm body next to yours as you stumbled to the subway, you gripping onto his arm tightly with every lurch of the train, Jake carrying you on your back and you saying -

Jake lets out a pained groan. “Listen, darlin’, don’t get me wrong. I... care about you so damn much, but I can’t feel for you the way you want me to. We wouldn’t work.”

His words make you freeze and your anxiety screams out ‘I told you so!’ in a manner that echoes thunderously throughout your brain. This unrequited love is something you’ve always expected, always prepared yourself for, yet you never gave it much further thought to safeguard your heart.

You’re rapidly accelerating through the stages of grief - next, your anger comes back to you. First, in small rivulets that trickle down your spine - then as a rush of agony that feels an awful lot like the crash at the bottom of a waterfall. Your eyes burn with the tears you refuse to let fall, your palms already stinging from how hard you’ve dug your manicure into them - but is it fair for you to be mad at him? For not loving you the way you desperately want him to?

For the longest time, a small, tiny part of you hoped Jake would come around, decide to knock on your door, knock you back with a signature bear hug. That he’ll swear to be there always, love you the way you love him.

After tonight, you reflect, it seems like that might never happen. And quickly, you surmise that you’d rather have one part of him than nothing at all. So as you finally reach the stage of acceptance, you vow to treasure every moment of friendship with Jake Seresin.

“I understand,” you tell him, feeling like you’re miles away. “It’s okay.”

“You sure?” His eyes still rake over you with concern.

“Positive.” You do your best to plaster on the most reassuring smile you can.

“Sweetheart -”

“- Can we just talk about this later?” you interrupt, feeling defeated and embarrassed all rolled into one. There most certainly is more to the conversation - but all you want to do is prolong it for longer, preserve the fantasy in your mind that you can Jake are alright, that the past few minutes never happened.

He closes his mouth, nods, pushes his hands deeper into his pockets.

From inside, the music suddenly changes - still a slow ballad, but this time it’s Al Green, Let’s Stay Together. “I believe you stipulated that I had to dance to at least one song,” Jake holds out a hand, looking at you almost hopefully. As if the last few minutes hadn’t completely shattered your heart and sent the pieces flying away with the wind.

“Ah,” you say, feeling a wave of exhaustion overcome you. “You go on ahead. Think I just need some more air.”

Internally, your heart is deflating, sending slight tremors throughout your body. But you can’t have Jake know that, can’t have him feel even worse about this, won’t have him feeling an ounce of guilt for something so out of his control.

Despite your best efforts to hold it all in, a small tear escapes and slides down your cheek as soon as Jake’s back turns, and you feel like you might have kicked a pebble that’s about to precipitate an avalanche.

---

Jake calls you up a few days after, initially sounding like he just wants to check in until his tone takes on a more somber note, and your heart drops to your stomach. “Listen, I know we had a little bit of a heated... discussion at the wedding. And I just need you to know I really, really, appreciate you. And I’m sorry I can’t give you what you want, but I just want to make sure we can still stay friends.”

“Yeah, of course -” you stop yourself from readily agreeing, pause to reevaluate how you really want to take this moving forward.

Jake is the love of your life. That much is certain. And you’re not sure how willing you are to push aside your feelings, pretend your confession never even happened, just to go on with the guise that you guys are simply friends. Just friends. Holding off on love in hopes that he’ll come around.

If you’re being completely truthful, a part of you does feel empty without a person by your side, without a companion to walk through life with, without a partner to share all the moments of joy and despair and everything in between with. You’ve tried dating throughout the years - agreed to so many blind dates, worked up the courage to ask guys at the bar out. And somehow, you always run into the same problem.

They’re not Jake.

And it’s not like they’re not as funny as him, or as charismatic or charming or sweet as him. It’s not the fact that they gave you spearmint kisses when you’ve always craved cinnamon. It’s the harsh truth that no matter what, they always feel threatened by your passion for your job and your drive to succeed. Always find problems with you jetting across the world for different projects, and patronize you for saying you wanted to make a difference with your stories.

One Tinder date even mocked you for aspiring to win a Pulitzer - you’d promptly excused yourself to the bathroom and never came back, instead ending your night with a long phone call from Jake, who was six hours ahead at the time but more than happy to console you.

Jake’s always encouraged you, from the very first day at the pizza parlor to now. And the more guys you took a chance on dating, the less hopeful you felt about finding a future with someone as kind, as wonderful, as unwaveringly supportive as Jake.

Maybe it’s time to let go of the pipe dream.

“Actually, no. I don’t think I can move forward as just friends,” you rush out, and admittedly, it feels like you’re ripping off a bandaid but the sting feels more like an ache. “And don’t get me wrong - your friendship means the world to me. Even if you think we’re different people now. But it feels like nothing’s changed for me, Jake. I think for years, I’ve been holding onto the hope that you’ll come around and feel the same way. But after this past weekend... I think I need some space. Just so I can get over you, if you’re not changing your mind anytime soon.”

Jake’s silent on the other end of the line - the only indication that he hasn’t dropped off is the sounds of cars rushing on the other side. A part of you hopes he’ll take the bait you cast with your final sentence, that at the very least, he’ll consider reconsidering. You don’t think you’ll get that lucky.

“If that’s what you want.”

“It’s not,” you quickly reassure him while blinking away tears, feeling numb. “And I don’t want to be cliche and tell you it’s what I need, Jake - because believe me, sometimes it feels like I need you like I need a Pilot G2 pen or the sun. But I can’t live like this. I can’t settle for just having part of you because that’ll be agonizing for me.”

Silence on the other end. “I hope you understand,” you quietly add.

“I do, sweetheart. I’m sorry,” his voice is void of emotion. You try not to think too hard about it, try to transport yourself back to a better moment when he was right there in front of you with every feeling written on his tanned, chiseled face.

Deep inhale. “Bye, Jake.”

AGE TWENTY-NINE (I cause no harm, mind my business, if our love died young, I can’t bear witness)

These gentrified tapas places are a menace to society. You shift uncomfortably on the cold, sad metal excuse for a barstool. This restaurant is noisy - glasses clinking together, patrongs cheers-ing to various occasions, champagne bottles popping open. Yet, the sound of the entrance dinging open is the only thing that makes you perk up, has you involuntarily glancing up hopefully in an attempt to manifest a familiar handsome pilot walking across the threshold to join you on your anniversary. But to your disappointment, it’s only a bunch of drunk bankers stumbling out.

In the past year, you’ve found a number of ways to distract yourself from the pain of not having your best friend. As per Dr. Richard’s advice from your first therapy session, you tried your hardest to find comfort in solitude: catching films in the theater alone, wandering through new art exhibitions by your lonesome; you even attended a wine tasting in Brooklyn and ended up passing the time with a group of ladies who encompassed very similar energy to the Sex and the City Quartet (and you ended up getting some solid reassuring advice after you lamented your complicated friendship - Samantha’s carbon copy was all too ready to shit on Jake by the end of your tale).

All in all, you’re content to be scoping out this restaurant solo, trying their featured cocktails and appetizers and people watching. You’re trying your best to convince yourself that you’re okay being where you are right now. The only thought that puts a damper on your night, sets your pride back a little is the realization that this might be the first October thirteenth you’ve spent alone in thirteen years. It shakes to your core, makes you flag down a bartender for a whiskey neat, but you calm down, take a deep breath, and let it out.

Jake’s a different man, not the boy who sat in front of you in your beloved pizza shop with a crinkly-eyed smile, telling you “you’re just a cool person.”

In the same way, you’re most certainly a different girl than the one who sat in front of him with a ten-color shuttle pen and bright eyes, one who was just grateful he’d seen a companion in you to begin with.

You’re a strong, self-assured, career-driven woman now. You’ve been featured on a variety of articles ranging from the devastating 2016 US Presidential Election, to a Buzzfeed Guest Feature on what your favorite ink color said about you, to discussing culture and conflict in the Middle East. While Jake’s support from the very beginning was part of what motivated you, what spurred you on, you are the one who did all the hard work. You are powerful, driven, intelligent, sophisticated.

You’re also drunk, and dialing a number you know by heart.

“The number you have dialed is not available. Please leave a message or...”

After the beep, you steel yourself. “Hey, Jake,” you clear your throat, gripping your phone tightly in your palm and taking a deep breath. “I, uh... Just wanted to wish you a happy anniversary. Think it’s the first one I’ve spent without you in a while.”

You pause, look around at the tapas bar as you try to gather your thoughts, wistfully eye the empty barstool next to you.

“I know I said I needed some time before. And I’m glad you honored that - truly, from the bottom of my heart. Even though a part of me wanted you to change your mind and chose me over not having me. Does that make any sense?”

Your eyes catch on the bartender who’s cleaning glasses with a towel a few feet away from you, catch him shaking his head slightly.

“Do you mind?”you snap, and he at least has the decency to look a little embarrassed at being caught eavesdropping. Quickly, he flashes you an apologetic smile before comically pretending to hear a patron calling out their order and dashing across the bar.

You snort, shaking your head. “Sorry. Some asshole was just... Never mind. You would’ve hated this place, Jake. I mean, aside from nosy people, it’s got overpriced drinks with Edison lights hanging from the ceiling. And there’s no jukebox - they’re just playing top 40s hits over and over again. Like, this is the third time I’m hearing Shape of You and I got here less than an hour ago.”

Again, you pause, feeling embarrassed at your incessant rambling. Debate whether to blab about what’s been plaguing your mind since you woke up this morning. “Sometimes I wish I never said anything and that we could’ve just stayed friends. I just don’t think that would’ve been fair to me - because I meant what I said, Jake. I’m in love with you. Even if we’re different people - I would’ve loved getting to know every version of you.”

It feels like a breakthrough, saying the words out loud, realizing that things truly are going to be more different than they used to be. And for the first time, you don’t feel like you’re perpetually mourning a friendship, you don’t feel waves of anxiety that try to convince you that you conflated your friendship to mean more. You can breathe easily.

“I think I’ve realized that the person I am today is all a conglomeration, a constellation of every interaction I’ve had with other people. And for the most part, I am who I am because of our friendship, because of your presence in my life. So a part of me is finding it hard to let go of that and move on without you being so ingrained in me. But I’m trying. I’m going to therapy, at least,” you smile optimistically, wiping away the first tear you’ve let yourself shed today.

“So rest assured, I’ll be okay without you, Seresin. In case you were worried. But no matter what, this day will always remain special to me. You’ll always be special to me.”

AGE THIRTY (and it’s been so long, but if you ever think you got it wrong, I’m right where you left me)

You don’t realize it’s the day of your anniversary until you catch a glimpse of the date on your phone, realize why you felt like you were missing something the entire day. At first, it sends a wave of anxiety over you, makes your stomach swoop like you missed the last step on the staircase.

But as best as you can, you remind yourself that taking on this special day alone is part of your healing process, that sometimes we create our own heartbreak through expectation, and that it’s just a matter of managing your hopes, assuaging your guilt, honoring your friendship by yourself for the second year in a row.

It’s taken time, but you’ve made your peace with the fact that Jake won’t be playing as active a role in your future as you’d hoped. Maybe you two can just be the type of friends who send each other Christmas cards and call on your birthdays. Years later, maybe you’ll finally settle down and find someone who will support you just as well as Jake did, who will treat you kindly and see you as more than a friend to hold hands with from time to time and look at your lips sometimes and give you piggyback rides when you’re too drunk. If you have kids, maybe you’ll have Jake over to meet your family, oblige him to regale them with tales of your friendship, send gift cards for their birthdays and talk about his time in the Navy - if they’re interested in hearing about Uncle Jake’s career path.

That’s all. You settle for keeping him in your footnotes, for cherishing the memory of who he used to be.

Even if you’ll always be in love with Jake, that doesn’t mean you have to wither away waiting for him.

In the middle of catching up on some editing and shooting out some emails from the comfort of your plush couch, your phone rings with a familiar name proudly displayed at the top. Immediately, you narrow your eyes, wondering if he’s remembered or if it’s some weird fluke that he’s calling you on today of all days.

“Hello?” you answer cautiously.

“Hi Jake,” you force out, feeling as nervous as you did that day you interviewed him at the pizza place. At times like this, you wish you had your old landline from back in the day so you could coil the cord around your fingers idly, distract your nerves momentarily from the fact that this is the first time you’ve heard his voice in two years. “How’ve you been?”

“I’m alright,” His voice is stilted, slightly muffled. Sounds just as easy as you remembered it, “Just... Remembered what today was.”

“It’s Saturday.” The quip rolls off your tongue before you can think any better of it - and you cringe inwardly at how rude you must have sounded. “I’m sorry, that was...”

But Jake’s chuckling on the other end, a delightfully warm sound, one that pulls a surge of pride from deep within your chest. “Yeah. You're not wrong.”

And just as quickly, it fades into the awkward silence - the kind you never used to have with Jake. Mentally, you flow through all the happenings in this past year, think about where his Ma told you he’d been last.

“I’m outside your building, I think. Unless your Ma sent me the wrong address, which admittedly, I’d deserve but - "

“- You’re in New York?” you ask, still in shock, finally feeling in control of your muscles and limbs and words. Hurriedly, you scramble off your couch and swipe up your empty tea mug, then rush to your kitchen to deposit it unceremoniously into your sink.

You hear the sound of a car horn beeping on the street echoing both in real time and on the line, further sending your heart into a frenzy. “Yeah - you do live off 65th, right? I’m sorry, I don’t mean to just pop in like this - ”

“No, no, it’s fine,” you breathe out, making your way to your front door with your phone still sandwiched between your ear and your hand. “I just... Wasn’t expecting company.”

He snorts on the other end. “S’not like the Queen of England is coming. It’s just me.”

“Maybe so,” Jake agrees, and you can practically hear the forlorn smile in his voice. “Mind letting me up, though? Just wanted to talk. In person.”

The reality of the situation crashes down on you - that Jake’s practically been AWOL for the past few years, that your friendship has felt one-sided and exhausting to try and keep up with, that you spent your last anniversary alone and sobbing into your cellphone So a part of you wants to turn him down, hustle him out of your safe space - but your heart pounds rapidly with its demands for answers, your brain implores you to hear him out.

Without a second thought, you push the button and hear the resounding buzz on Jake’s side, followed by a “See you soon, sweetheart.” The line clicks.

Mind going a million miles a second, you turn to glance at your reflection in the hall mirror that you’ve procrastinated hanging up for months now. You level a determined look at yourself, brush some crumbs off your sweatshirt and smooth some flyaways before pushing your shoulders back, standing up tall and proud in an attempt to exude confidence.

Three heavy knocks sounding out at the door immediately makes your look turn panicked, sending you stumbling over your feet as you reach to grab the doorknob and pull it open to reveal Jake Seresin standing in your narrow apartment hallway.

Not even five seconds have passed and you’re already annoyed with him. He’s still mind numbingly handsome: tall as ever, blonde hair still infuriatingly shiny and soft, green eyes catching the dim evening light, glimmering back at you like gemstones. It makes your stomach swoop, brings the butterflies fluttering back into your chest from where you’d banished them.

Asshole.

“Hey,” he greets, quirks up a corner of his mouth into a half smile that would normally have you swooning if you weren’t already frozen.

“Hi, Jake,” you manage out, eyes raking over his figure just to convince your mind that he’s really there, actually standing just a few feet in front of you. Shaking away the doubts, you step to the side, gesture for him to enter your apartment.

It’s not the sound of his footsteps that convince you, nor is it the brief brush of his arm as he sidles into your narrow apartment hallway or the unreal sight of how he fills up the space and how his shoulders stretch from wall to wall. It’s the familiar heavy scent that hits you - tobacco and vanilla - which makes your cheeks flush, your heart skips a beat.

He’s really here.

Gathering your wits, you follow him into your cramped living room, grateful that you’d done some vacuuming and tidying up that morning in an effort to banish all the anxieties and ruminations that come with this special day. “Feel free to sit anywhere,” you find your voice, snatch up an oversized throw to make some room on the couch.

He nods, turns around to assess your space thoughtfully before settling himself into the cushions.“I got your voicemail,” he tells you. “From last year.”

Oh. It suddenly feels bitter, leaves a sour taste in your mouth. “You didn’t call back?” you hedge, immediately going on the defense. Instead of sitting down next to him, you elect to slide into the armchair furthest away from him, an attempt to shield yourself from him. An attempt to avoid making the same mistake twice.

“I was going away on assignment the next morning,” Jake explains quietly, patiently. He meets your disbelieving look with somber eyes. It only slightly alleviates the pressure building in your chest. “And... honestly, I didn’t want to worry you. It was one of those missions. The kind I wasn’t sure I would come back from - like, where they’re telling us to call home and lay down all the cards.”

You pause for a moment, absorb his words and feel a twinge of hurt upon the realization that you weren’t kept in the loop, that you never even knew you stood a chance at losing him. Before the emotions can rattle you too much and send you spiraling with anxious thoughts and what ifs, he explains further..

“I thought I would spare you the details, spare you from having to prepare to lose me. I was okay with that decision up until the moment one of my engines failed and my jet was going down - and the one thing that flashed through my mind was that I wouldn’t get to talk to you again, or see you, or how when you win your Pulitzer you wouldn’t be able to call me to tell me the news or how I wouldn’t be able to hang up the print of your winning piece next to your union one,” his voice is shaking slightly, and you know if you even attempted to reply your words would quiver just as much. In this moment, you’re trembling with your hands folded over your eyes to hide the tears brimming.

It’s a mix of sadness and anger and disappointment and you try your best to hold off on the tornado, but it rips your soul to shreds the more you realize the gravity of the situation. “You’re fucking kidding me,” you grit out, pressing your lips together to barricade the sobs. Your hands are tightly wrapped around a throw pillow, squeezing and kneading out your frustration on it. You can barely stand to look at him. “Took you a near death experience to call me? You think I haven’t already put myself through the fucking wringer after feeling so guilty for cutting you off just because you were too scared to love me? And you almost died?”

“I’m sorry,” Jake repeats, at least sounding sincerely apologetic.

“I appreciate that, Jake,” you reply bitterly, then defeatedly toss the pillow to the side. “When did you even get back?”

His jaw tenses slightly and he sighs, and you immediately feel triumphant for successfully frustrating him, as petty as it sounds. “Few months back. And I’m sorry for not calling you. I wanted to as soon as I got back, but I wanted to say all this face to face. And it took some time for me to figure out my shit, but I’m here now, if you’ll hear me out?”

All you can do is nod, purse your lips and let him say his piece - there’s no pressure to forgive him or fall into his arms.

“I think you were right,” Jake continues seriously. You dig your nails into your palms anxiously. Under any other circumstance, you would have loved hearing those words from anyone else. Not now. Not Jake. “You were right to call me out when you said I was letting the fear of becoming my dad hold me back from chasing what I want.”

As your anger slightly dissipates, you think back to that moment - about how those were just a few of the words you wish you could snatch up out of your past and make them disappear. Your breath hitches. “I was a bit harsh - "

“- But you were right,” he interrupts. “And I think that’s another reason why I shut down, because you know me so well. After all these years, I think you know me better than I know myself.”

You nod, not sure what exactly to say to that. It’s not like you can explain to him that you were so incredibly taken by him, that you held onto his every word and agonized over interaction in hopes of really getting to know your best friend.

Jake goes on: “And you have to know that my dad broke Ma’s heart like it was nothing. Married for twenty years, dated for five years, friends for another ten years. Even after you add all that up, it’s still not enough to keep them together. He still went for the first temp who waltzed into his office, still fucked with both of them for months on end. If my parents couldn’t keep it together, how could anyone else?”

You’re stunned, frozen in shock before you manage to gather your strength, pick up your thoughts and hurl them right back at him. Screw this defeatist attitude he’s picked up. “You have to understand that’s the nature of some relationships, Jake. Sometimes they’re not meant to last forever, sometimes people change - "

You halt, feel a wave of déjà vu. The words on the tip of your tongue sound eerily familiar to something that’s replayed in your mind for the past two years, and a couple puzzle pieces start to fit together. “Is this why you were spouting all of this bullshit at the wedding? About us changing?”

Suddenly, he launches up from the couch, walks two steps across the room and pivots on his heel to walk the two steps back in an attempt to furiously pace. He groans out exasperatedly, rakes a hand through his stupid perfect blond hair. “I mean... Yeah. It made sense at the time,” he admits. Briefly, you wonder when his nervous tics changed in the past few years, when did he switch from bouncing his legs under tables to wearing a path into carpets?

People change indeed. In more ways than one.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” you tell him matter-of-factly, and there’s no sugar-coating your words anymore. He makes a sound, as if he’s about to feign offense, but you power through. “People change all the fucking time, Jake. How the hell are we supposed to grow and become better versions of ourselves if we stay stagnant? Where’s the fucking story in that?”

You huff out a laugh, don’t even wait for him to reply before continuing on a rant. He’s stopped pacing now, is looking at you, but you’ve sprung up to your full height to look at him straight on, deliver your words as firmly as you can.

“People change, Jake, especially when they’re in relationships - it’s a matter of adapting, supporting them and loving your partner through it. And like, let’s be clear: I’ve changed a lot, too. Physically and emotionally - but I’m okay with it because I realize it’s made me become someone my sixteen year old self would be stoked to meet. And not just because I live in the city or because I have, like, 2 Montblanc pens - but because I’m working on these stories and they fly me out wherever to interview people, and I know I haven’t sent my stuff to you in a while, didn’t think you’d still want to read it - ”

“- I’ve kept up,” Jake interrupts. You stop in your tracks, tilt your head to the side as you process this. “I wanted to read them.”

“You have?” you ask dubiously, doubtfully. Hopefully.

“‘Course,” he affirms, sends you a reassuring smile and stands up straighter, takes a step forward. “I mean, not while I was overseas, I read up when I got back. I really liked that one about the Obamas’ portraits. Thought that was pretty cool. But the one about the grassroots movements for peace in Afghanistan got me thinking. Like, obviously I was assigned there for a while, but didn’t really consider other things happening there - Actually, I had some questions for you, but we can talk about it later...”

“Oh. Sure.” You’re slightly shocked at the confession, at the small vision that flashes through your mind of Jake typing your name into Google and catching up on your stories, determinedly following your career even during the most unstable moment in your friendship. It sparks hope in you, sends a wave of hope crashing down on you forcefully. “Wow. I didn’t think you… That means the world to me, Jake.”

He’s quiet for a moment, excitement reverting back to a somber contemplative expression. “I understand what you’re saying about change,” he says hesitantly, rocks back on his heels. “And I think I’m starting to understand what you meant in your voicemail about the... conglomeration stuff. Loving every version of me. Because I really feel the same way about you.”

It’s ambiguous, a little mysterious, his words a little stilted and broken, and you replay his words over and over to try and dig up the meaning behind them. But he’s taking another step towards you - if you reach out, you can certainly reach up and run your finger across the small bump in his nose from that football all those years ago. Hold his cheek in your hand like you've always wanted to.

Your heart stumbles, crushes up against the front of your ribcage as it tries to peek out at the man you’ve loved since you were seventeen. “Oh, Jake,” your response rolls out along with two tears down your cheeks.“ It’s okay - “

The scent of vanilla tobacco hits you first, then his chest as he pulls you into a giant bear hug that envelops you in a warmth that could put both the sun and Texas bonfires to shame. Your face is pressed into his jacket and he’s talking, saying something that you don’t really register until you tilt your head up and dig your chin into his firm chest.

“I’m in love with you, sweetheart,” the words burst forth. His hand’s resting gently on the small of your back - the warmth of his palm radiates comforting heat through your body that only multiplies as he pulls you into him. You stabilize your hands on his shoulders, crane your neck to look up at him and map out every part of his face - from the small lines in his forehead to the slope of his nose to the slight redness in his cheeks. “It’s okay if it’s too late, if you’ve moved on. I just don’t want to lose you again, don’t want to risk not talking to you, can’t - ”

“Of course I’m in love with you, stupid man,” the words come to you as easily as breathing does. The smile that spreads across his face brings back your favorite eye crinkles, carves a dimple into the corner of his mouth, makes it feel like you’re bathing in sunlight. And Jake wastes no time, doesn’t even hesitate before he’s breathing out a question and you're nodding tearfully and then he's cupping both of your cheeks gently and surging forward to press his lips to yours.

Jake tastes like cinnamon, just as you’ve always suspected. Aside from that, nothing about the way you love Jake is predictable. Nothing is ever steady, nothing is ever expected. Every moment with him brings forth a new set of revelations that drives you crazy, tears you to pieces. And somehow, it’s all incredibly worth it, worth the brief heartbreak, worth the years of hoping and waiting for him to join you. Because in the end, he made it. In this moment, it feels like everything is just right.

Tags

fic recs august 2022 Top gun top gun maverick jake seresin hangman my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing best friends to lovers with jake i’ll never recover SO MUCH FUCKING ANGST i went through a roller coaster of emotions i’m majoring in journalism so this was <3 never getting over “How’s San Diego?” - “Can you buzz me up?” pls tell me they get married

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

20/09/22: again: i read this the day it was posted but college has been kicking my ass so it took me a little longer to reblog with highlights!!! anyways!!! 9.8k words… jordan, you’re too good to us!!! i fall in love with bradley and smart aleck every time you post something new. i think they’re both very complex characters that sometimes have a hard time saying what they feel. so it was beautiful seeing both of them talk it through and be okay with each other again. HERE ARE MY FAVORITE PARTS!!!

“He liked that he could come home from a really long or hard day at work and you would both just talk about your days in the simplest terms and work through your shit together while eating dinner and then watching TV. Because work was work, no matter what field you worked in - coworkers were still assholes, your bosses still gave you shit, and deadlines still loomed.”

“Because Bradley knew that you adored him. He knew you loved him, obviously - he was pretty sure he had had a perpetual smile on his face for two days after you had told him, all nervous and sweet and endearing one morning. But more to the point, he knew that you adored him - figurative warts and all.” of course she adores him. of course. of course.

“You had taught him that he was more than his rank or his callsign or his military ID number or - hell - even his last name - he was just Bradley. And for so long he hadn’t been living as Bradley. He’d gone through the motions, sure. But he hadn’t really let himself just be until he had met you.” AND FOR SO LONG HE HADN’T BEEN LIVING AS BRADLEY??????? BUT HE HADN’T REALLY LET HIMSELF JUST BE UNTIL HE HAD MET YOU???????????? 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

“And he knew he would have to confront it sometime (maybe, eventually, like when you got married or something - maybe), but he didn’t think it would happen so soon.” HE’S THINKING ABOUT MARRIAGEEEEEEEE!!!

“It wasn’t even ten yet, but Bradley didn’t push it. He knew he had fucked up and you deserved to have some space to think things over.” giving her space even tho it hurts!!! beloved!!!

“You paused to give him a kiss, which was far too brief for his liking, and dashed out of the kitchen. Once he was sure you were gone, he leaned his elbows on the kitchen island and then hung his head in his hands. God, he fucked up. He really fucked up.” the kiss being to brief for his liking!!! i love that you mention this!!!

“He had made you feel less than.” ANGST TERRITORY!!

“The two of you didn’t fight often - was this a fight? He had really just fucked up, you hadn’t done anything. And even when the two of you did fight, it was normally over trivial stuff like not cleaning the stove correctly (which Bradley did not do) or sometimes not telling the other what time either of you would be home or when Bradley had offered to watch Fanboy’s dog for the weekend even though you were terrified of any dog over thirty pounds.” bradley being The Cook but not knowing how to clean a stove correctly. why am i even more in love? also, smart aleck being terrified of FANBOY’S DOG? jadgjwhxsjcghw i love everything about this because i just KNOW bradley would like big dogs and if they ever started talking about adopting that would just be so entertaining. WHAT DOG WOULD THEY HAVE????

“Sure, it was nice to be getting an award for saving Maverick last November during the uranium enrichment plant mission - but that wasn’t why Bradley had done it. That was never why Bradley would do anything.

He did it because it was the right thing.” HE DID IT BECAUSE IT WAS THE RIGHT THING!!!!!!!! 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

“And right now, as much as it hurt him, it was the right thing to give you some space.” beloved.

“Fuck - did your voice sound thicker than normal? Were you crying? God, he really hoped you weren’t crying. Shit, now he was going to start crying.” not my stomach turning in knots 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️

“He loved you. He loved you so much.

And you loved him. You loved him so much.” YEAH!!! THIS PARALLEL!!!

“Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed your pajama shorts and t-shirt neatly folded on top of the toilet tank. Before he even realized what he was doing, he hung them both up on the hooks next to your fluffy white towel, knowing you hated dripping water on the floor when you got out of the shower. He figured it was the least he could do; just something so you knew he was there.” PIJAMA PEACE OFFERING YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS TO ME!!! such a sweet gesture!!!

“Bradley noticed with a sinking heart, and even in the darkness, that your eyes were puffy, only confirming his suspicion that he had heard you crying in the shower. He felt like the world’s biggest asshole.” the puffy eyes :((((((((((

“They were serving grilled cheese on that thick bread Bradley liked so much and tomato soup and he had been looking forward to it after leaving his lunch in the refrigerator at home.” idk why but i love this little info.

“(However, you had texted him your Wordle score - 2/6. He still couldn’t figure out how you managed that with twang, but he figured that meant all hope wasn’t lost between the two of you.)” 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 bradley and smart aleck being in their respective emotional trenches, yet they still play wordle together 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 stupid people in love 😭😭😭😭😭😭

“His stomach dropped. Small. You had felt small. Bradley had made you feel small.” MY STOMACH ALSO DROPPED THIS LINE REALLY HURT.

“She adores you and I know she respects you. He knew that stuff too - obviously - but sometimes it was nice to hear it from someone else. That someone else could tell how much you and Bradley meant to each other and loved each other even without seeing some of your most private and intimate moments - whether changing the sheets on Saturday mornings to preparing the next day’s lunch after dinner every night.” BUT SOMETIMES IT WAS NICE TO HEAR IT FROM SOMEONE ELSE!!! i love this paragraph so much.

“Little stuff like that. Stuff that made a relationship - that made a life together.” A LIFE TOGETHERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR. jordan, i need to know how he proposed.

“But the groveling should be at a maximum - hey, have you thought about going down on her until your old man knees crack - oww!” PHOENIX MY BFF!!! ALWAYS SO RIGHT!!!

“He noticed you didn’t close the final distance to where he was still standing on the front porch. And he also noticed you didn’t have your overnight bag in your hands. His heart dropped - god, he fucked this up so badly.” HE NOTICED THE OVERNIGHT BAG MISSING ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞

“You gave him a hesitant smile, clasping your hands together at your stomach. You looked pretty in your work clothes. But you always looked pretty.” BUT YOU ALWAYS LOOKED PRETTY!!!!!!!!! FAVORITE LINE!!!!!!!!!

“God, you were so wrong? How could you be so wrong? Fuck. You thought he was embarrassed of you? Clearly, you’d given this some thought, he had to have done it before. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” yes i’m crying. the response she gave was heartbreaking, saying she was gonna wait home with champagne to celebrate LATER? NO 💔💔💔💔💔💔💔 HE WANTS YOU THERE YOU’RE GONNA BE THERE!!!

“You’re my Bradley.” 😭

“He smiled and pulled you in for a hug. You wrapped your arms around his stomach in response, squeezing him tight. “And I love you and I want you to share all parts of yourself with me, alright? I’m a big girl, I can handle it - even though sometimes I still think you should just be an astronaut,” your voice came out slightly muffled against his chest.” YES THE TENDERNESS AND THE HUMOR THEY’RE BACK I LOVE THEM SO MUCH.

“So,” he said your first and last name, “will you go to this slightly pretentious Navy gala with me and whisper snarky comments in my ear all night and dance with me until our feet hurt?” oh i BET there will be plenty of snarky comments being whispered.

“You tucked your hair behind your ears. “Oh, err - I actually just left it in the car…didn’t want to seem too eager if you didn’t actually want me to stay over…” THIS GOT ME BY SURPRISE 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

“Silly girl,” was all Bradley said before he unlocked your car and got your leather overnight bag and work tote out of the passenger seat.” SILLY GIRL!!!!!!!!!! ❤️‍🩹

AND HE GOT HER FLOWERS!!!

“Normally, Bradley got you flowers just because. Just because he got out of work early that day or just because you looked particularly pretty the day before or just because you had made him laugh. Which is all to say, he got you flowers quite frequently. And he always kept track of when to get the next ones by slipping one stem out of the bouquet and keeping it in his office on base; if the flower in his office died, then it was time to get you some new ones.” getting her flowers just because <3 yes that’s bradley bradshaw.

“But the flowers sitting on his kitchen island - a gorgeous arrangement of white tulips and pink peonies - were most definitely apology flowers. Because Bradley had been an asshole and had made you cry and doubt him and feel less than. And he had made a promise to you after your first date that he would try his damn hardest to never make you feel less than ever again.” BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!!!

“Bradley hadn’t gone back for Mav because he wanted the praise or an award or anything like that. He had done it because he loved him - plain and simple. He loved his godfather and couldn’t bear the thought that he had sacrificed his life for Bradley just as they were getting towards an understanding again. Because though he had originally said otherwise, there would be someone to mourn Maverick if he burned in - Bradley.” OF COURSE HE WOULD MOURN MAVERICK I THINK ABOUT THAT DAMN LIVE EVERY DAY IT’S SO SAD AND THE BIGGEST LIE AND HE SAID TO MAVERICK’S FACE AND I KNOW IT MUST HAVE HURT BOTH OF THEM SO MUCH ANYWAYS I’M GLAD THEY’RE OKAY AND I LOVE THAT YOU BROUGHT THIS UP.

“The fact that Bradley had been projecting when he had originally said that to Mav was something he had only brought up with his therapist - and it would remain that way.” ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

“That’s all I ask, bubs.”

He gave you a quick kiss on the lips. “Back to bubs, am I?” BANTERRRRRRR TEASINGGGGGGG

“It was so simple and stupid and probably didn’t even stand for anything, but he loved it. Loved hearing it fall from your lips, whether as you teased or taunted him or as you mumbled it against his skin in bed at night.” <3

“But sweetheart,” he leaned his elbows on the island and gave you a hammy smile, “you’re my sugar mo -” thank god she didn’t let him finish!!!

“Can I come in with you?” 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

“Your hair’s gotten lighter in the sun,” you said mildly, before lathering some shampoo through it. Your fingers kneaded at his scalp and he let out a sigh.” i really loved this part since the sneak peak you posted.

“He could feel you styling his hair into some sort of half-assed mohawk. “Do I want to know how ridiculous I look?” You giggled. “Think I’ll take that as a no. Just wait till I get my hands on you, missy.” MY ABSOLUTE BELOVEDS!!!

“You cupped his cheek, gliding your thumb over the scar he hated so much, and then leaned forward to kiss it briefly.” GLIDING THE THUMB OVER THE SCAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THEN KISSING IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ROMANCE!!!!!!!!!!

“I did not force you, I only said I would not shower at your place if these were my only -”

“- But you knew the prospect of limited sex at my house would make me cave, hence you forced my hand to buy this thirty dollar shampoo and the conditioner.” he’s ridiculous he’s horny i love him.

“- Shhhh, s’alright.” He started you off slow, at a lighter speed, just enough to rile you up and keep you wanting more. Once he got comfortable with maneuvering the showerhead, coupled with holding you against him, he really started to have some fun.” SHUT UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“Bradley loved hearing you babble. He loved when you talked smart to him and sassed him. But he really liked when you babbled incoherently. Because to have you - the smartest, wittiest, most capable girl he knew - be unable to form any words because you were so lost in him was the hottest thing in the world.” 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫

“Shh, shhh, good girl, that’s my good girl,” Bradley muttered, this time pressing butterfly kisses to your neck and shoulder. “Such a good girl for me.” FEELING VERY ILL AT THE MOMENT. HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?

“You good, sweetheart?”

You nodded, still a little dazed after your orgasm. Bradley always found it endearing that you always got a little sleepy after you had an orgasm or two. Well, maybe not endearing - he took it as an ego boost even though it was a bit primal of him - but it was always good to know how well he took care of you.” YES. YES TO THIS ENTIRE PART. SO WELL WRITTEN.

i love how they switch from horny to silly.

“You know it’s lieutenant commander…”

“Doesn’t roll off the tongue quite as nicely.”

Fucking brat.” AAAAAAAAAAA JUST KILL ME.

“It was nice to just have time together - especially after such an emotionally and physically exhausting week - and to go to bed early and wake up late, wrapped in each other’s arms, and plan out the day.” you guys deserve some peace 😭🥰

“Because there was something so inherently satisfying in the domesticity of running errands with someone and combining your routine with theirs.” yessssssssss this is so beautiful and domestic and it’s all people needs in this world.

“Bradley put down the paring knife and wiped his strawberry stained hands on his apron. He said your name and you glanced up at him a moment later.” SHUT UP ALREADY WITH THE APRON AMD STRAWBERRY CUTTING. FAVORITE STUPID SCENE AND STUPID DETAIL I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU FOR THIS.

“He started rocking you back and forth in his arms. God, how could you not see that you were all he wanted? That you were perfect for him?” THROWING UP BECAUSE I’M IN LOVE.

“Then we’ll just do that,” you said simply. “I’ve never danced with you before anyway.”

He exaggerated a gasp and you smiled. “Do our kitchen dance parties mean nothing to you?” he’s ridiculous ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹

“Ella Fitzgerald, good choice.” He spun you out and got a giggle from you. “You’re too smooth, lieutenant.” god i really am not tour strongest soldier.

“Once the chorus hit, he dipped you for good measure and - god - the smile on your face made him feel about ten feet tall. The two of you eventually settled down from your more ambitious dance moves to just swaying in each other’s arms.” THE SMILE ON YOUR FACE MADE HIM FEEL ABOUT TEN FEET TALLLLLLLLLLLLLLL. KILL ME.

“Bradley never got tired of hearing you say that. I love you. He’d heard it and said it before, but it never had carried as much weight as when he had heard it from you for the first time. I love you.

And Bradley knew that you were going to be the only person he ever said it to again.” HOW DO YOU COME UP WITH THESE?????? INSANE.

i can’t wait for part 2.2!!! i’m gonna be so sad when it’s over because i could read about them forever!!! jordan, once again, you’re one of the best there is. share your secrets!!!!!!!!!! ❤️

and even when we’re wrong in every way, we come out the other side okay (part 2.1)

Summary: in which lieutenant bradshaw is getting honored with an award and behaved like an absolute idiot when he didn’t initially ask his girlfriend to be his date even though she’s the best goddamn thing to ever happen to him

OR you take on the pacific fleet’s awards gala

Pairing: Rooster x Fem!Reader 9.8k

Warnings: 18+, explicit language, explicit sexual content (p in v, vaginal fingering and slight dom/sub and praise and rank kink elements), and shower sex and soapy titties

[Part 1] [Part 1.5] [Part 2.1] [Part 2.2]

A/N: this was really fucking long, so i split it up. the final final part will be posted soon! but i just want to thank everyone so so so much for all the absolutely amazing support i’ve gotten on this entire series including my little bradley and smart aleck drabbles and the respective lore about the two of them. i have so many people to thank for reaching out and leaving the absolute sweetest comments and replies and messages, but i’d be remiss if i didn’t call out sol, may, cass, ava, giza, and kylie for all their help and encouragement and listening to me complain via dms these past few weeks! so without further adieu…

and all these situations we go through, we come out the other side brand new

Bradley couldn’t believe it had almost been six months since the two of you had gotten together. Nearly six months of dinner dates, movie nights, cooking at each other’s places, beach trips, hikes (begrudgingly on your part), and even a couple jaunts down to Tijuana just for Caesar salads - all to say nothing about the sex.

Continuar lendo

Tags

they’re adorable fic recs 2022 Top gun top gun maverick rooster september bradley bradshaw my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing bradley and smart aleck just bradley being in a kitchen and doing kitchen stuff idk it works for me angst so many feelings pls write about them forever

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

02/09/2022: technically, i read this on the 28th but have not been able to go back to normal until now. okay. MAY??????? not you breaking my heart again????????? i’m so excited to see where you’re gonna take this story. i already love them so much. the way you write bradley just does things to my heart that are unexplainable!!!!! plus your attention to details just makes everything so much better. anyways. THIS WAS BEAUTIFUL AS ALWAYS YOU NEVER DISAPPOINTS. YOU SHOULD BE OUT THERE SELLING NOVELS I AM SO VERY SERIOUS. HERE ARE MY FAVORITE PARTS (i literally just highlighted the entire thing):

“Inside the bar, everything is like it always is. The chatter of the customers, the drawl of the music, the smell of beer, and the Ocean Breeze scented cleaner you use to wipe the floors. Far below it, the scent of the real ocean breeze drifting in through the opened windows. It seems wrong for the Hard Deck to be unchanged, unaltered, untouched when your own life has gone so completely off the rails.” you really know how to set the atmosphere for us readers.

“Allergies,” you lie. “I’ve got two on tap here, which one did you guys have? The German or the…”

“You don’t have allergies,” Bradley points out. You’d made it a point not to look at him, but now your gaze snaps in his direction. He stands with his eyes narrowed, with his hands on the polished wood of the bar top. Concern flutters across his face.” OH HE LIKES HER SO MUCH!!!!!!!!! I ALREADY KNOW IT!!!!!!!!!!!! THE FACT THAT HE REMEMBERED HER ALLERGIES 😭🥺🤲 you got me giggling and kicking my feet.

“There’s something about Bradley Bradshaw. You like to think of it as a gravitational pull. Something with force, something that makes people look at him. Something that grounds them, too, though, gives them a tether.” HE REALLY DOES!!! NO WONDER HE GENERATED 1.4 BILLION DOLLARS WORLDWIDE (AND COUNTING)!!!

“Bradley Bradshaw makes for a good North Star.” not me sobbing already… and the fact that you bring this back at the end… favorite detail!!!!!!

“He places a large hand on the countertop, palm down, and you should be looking busy, but all you can do is stare as his fingers starfish across the wood.” starfish across the wood!!! aaaaaa may, the imagery <3

“You do look up then. Bradley has brown eyes, round and big and deep. There’s something about them that makes you want to trust him, trust his words, trust the sincerity. It almost makes you start crying again.” so tender 🥺🥺🥺🥲🥲🥲

“Under any other circumstances, you would have laughed. But your stomach is coiled up in knots so tight you wonder if they’ll ever untangle again. Like the earphones you fish from the bottom of a purse.” :((((((((

“You’re never going back from this, you realize suddenly. No matter what happens from here on out, there’s never going to be another moment where this hasn’t happened. Where you weren’t pregnant, where you didn’t mess it all up. The plan, the dream, the life.” you didn’t mess it up you’re going to be okay. i need someone to reassure her.

“And you’d been stupid enough to hope. Hope for more, hope for better, hope for something.” to live for the hope of it all???????? reader is august… AND YOU POSTED THIS ON AUGUST. MAY!

AND HELLO MOJITO MENTION!!!!

“That’s not true. You’d like him to hug you. You’d like him to tell you it’s going to be okay, even if that might be a lie. You’d like him to be nice to you.” SHUT UP SHUT UP AND THEN AT THE END BRADLEY DOES EXACTLY THIS!!!!!!!! HUGS HER AND COMFORTS HER!!!!!!!!! IS NICE TO HER!!!!!! MAYYYYYY THE PARALLELS!!!!!!

“It’s the most terrifying thought of your life. You’ve never experienced something so wonderful. Even as the fear eats away at you, even as your stomach churns and your head spins, some part of you feels illuminated with light.” getting major waitress vibes!!!!!!!! normally the protagonist would automatically view the pregnancy as something bad especially in her situation but she feels ILLUMINATED WITH LIGHT !!!! beautiful !!!!!!

“And then he does what men do best: He leaves. Walks away from you and the baby growing inside of you. Walks away from the mess he made, the dream he shattered, without a care or a thought. Without looking back.” he’s such a piece of shit and i love how you phrased this.

“Twenty minutes later, Bradley Bradshaw finds you in the exact same position.” YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!

“It’s like somebody’s cut your chest open. Scooped you clean like taking a spoon to a tub of ice cream. Behind your ribcage, you feel hollow in a way that aches down to your bones. That spiderwebs through your veins.” she needs to rest :(

“Only this Virgin Mary wears Hawaiian shirts, apparently. It almost makes you laugh.” this whole virgin mary comparison was so funny ajdhhsfhhsyh

“What happened?” Bradley asks, something hard to his voice. But when he goes to touch the side of your face, carefully as if you’re injured, as if you’re made of porcelain that’ll break at the slightest jostle, his brown eyes show nothing but genuine concern.

It makes you cry harder.” SHE STARTS CRYING AGAIN BECAUSE BRADLEY IS JUST BEING SO KIND !!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAA !!!!!!!! I UNDERSTAND !!!!!!!! AND YOU CASUALLY MENTIONING THERE WAS SOMETHING HARD TO HIS VOICE I JUST KNOW HE WAS READY TO BEAT WHOEVER MADE HER CRY !!!!!!

“But he doesn’t push. Doesn’t try to get you to explain it, doesn’t ask again. He just sits there with you, elbows on his thighs, and lets you cry.” my most beloved man <3

“Bradley looks at you, then pulls his knees up, lets his arms dangle between them. “You don’t have to tell me,” he says, and his voice is very gentle. “But if you want to… I can listen.” giving her space and being patient so she feels comfortable if and when she opens up 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

“This is the thing about Bradley Bradshaw. He has the kind of face that makes you want to tell him things. Makes you want to spill your secrets to him, pour them into his space. He’s steady, reliable, calm. It would be so easy to trust him.

That’s dangerous.” FAVORITE DESCRIPTION OF BRADLEY EVER??????????????

“You just want to pretend you don’t have to do it alone. Just for a moment.” just for a moment!!!!!!!!!!!! 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO IT ALONE HE’S GONNA HELP YOU AND YOU’RE GONNA FALL IN LOVE AND IT’S GOING TO BE BEAUTIFUL!!!!

“Bradley’s eyes are very brown. A soft shade of brown, like milk chocolate. When you look at him, you feel warm all over.” BUT NOW I SEE DAYLIGHTTTTTTTTTT

“One moment - and in it the rest of your life.” 😭

“After half an eternity, Bradley says, “I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.” STOP. THE FACT THAT HE PICKS UP ON *THIS* DETAIL?????? OH HE’S BEEN OBSESSED WITH HER FOREVER RIGHT?????? JEHCHEGCHSGXSHHXYSD I LOVE THISSSSSSS.

“Beside you, Bradley shifts his weight. “Sorry,” he mumbles. “I’m really putting my foot in it today, aren’t I?” beloved 😔😔😔😔😔😔😔❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹 he’s doing his best!!!

“There’s always been something traditional about Bradley Bradshaw, like he’s one of those men written by women people rave about all over TikTok. If he takes a girl out on a date, he probably holds open car doors and pulls out chairs for her, hands her his jacket if she gets cold.

Distantly, you wonder what that would be like.” DISTANTLY… SURE MAY… I KNOW WHERE THIS IS GOING WE ALL KNOW…

“Yeah,” Bradley says, completely sincere. “Your body, your choice.” FEMINIST KING 👑

“It’s endearing in a strange way because there’s nothing performative about it. It’s just bumbling and awkward and peculiarly genuine.” the way you write bradley is also so genuine!!!!! all the little details about him just MAKE SENSEN and makes him so real. of course he would be one of these men that really cares about women’s rights and know a couple of things but not brag about it. i love him.

“Bradley’s got a nice laugh, one that starts in his belly and seems to end at the back of his throat, punches out into the air from back there.” SEE!!!!!! THIS IS WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT!!!!!! HOW ARE YOU SO GOOD AT MAKING HIM REAL????? THIS IS EXACTLY HIS LAUGH!!!!!!

“But when you glance up at him from beneath lowered lashes, stomach tight with anticipation, Bradley doesn’t look judgmental at all. Instead, his face is wide open, his eyes clear, the corners of his lips still curled upward with the remnants of his smile.

Luke laughed at you, but Bradley is looking at you with something like admiration, and it takes your breath away.” TAKE MY BREATH AWAY REFERENCE PERFECTLY PUT I LOVE THIS!!! MAY YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS!!!

“No,” he says. “I think you’re really, really brave.”

And then you’re crying again.” I AM INDEED CRYING AGAIN.

“And Bradley is so nice. So goddamn kind even though he doesn’t know you, not really, even though this isn’t even his problem. Sits there on the floor of the Hard Deck with you at half past one am on a Sunday night, and doesn’t complain, doesn’t sigh. He just listens.” ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

“You don’t feel brave. You feel terrified, you feel overwhelmed, you feel… you feel… you feel like the whole world has toppled over. You feel like Atlas crashing down, buried beneath the weight of his burden. You feel tiny. Inadequate. You feel scared, scared, scared.” LIKE ATLAS CRASHING DOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HELL YEAH THE MYTHOLOGICAL REFERENCES!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“Suddenly, you think of that tiny, unborn child inside of you. Abandoned before it ever came into the world.” :(((((((((((((

“Instead, Bradley takes a deep breath and says, “Marry me.” EVERYBODY CHEERED!!!!! i would also like to know how his brain goes DIRECTLY to this solution jahdhshdhshfjshdhd <3

“Bradley pushes on, “It wouldn’t be permanent. We could get a divorce quickie in a year or two, just stay together long enough for you to get settled with the baby and everything. Plus, you’d get free healthcare.” He glances at you, and the blank expression on your face must light a panic in him. Now his words come faster. “I wouldn’t expect anything from you, of course I wouldn’t. It would just be… keeping up appearances. Just for a while….” and he just keeps talking ahdhshfhshdhshdhshdhdhd because he’s so nervous he’s overstepped but he just wants to help and make this make sense <3

“But I could babysit, and then you could go back to work. I really wouldn’t mind. I’m good with kids, you know?” AND HE COULD BABYSIT- HE’S GOOD WITH KIDS?????? OH BRADLEY. SWEET BRADLEY. BRADLEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.

“For a second, just a second, you let yourself imagine it: Imagine saying yes to this mad, insane, incredible proposal. Imagine marrying Bradley, someone soft and warm and responsible, someone completely opposite to Luke. Imagine him in a tux and you in a white dress, imagine his mustache tickling against your cheek as he leans in to kiss you. You imagine one of the quaint little houses you grew up in, but one that would belong to you, at least for a while. You imagine a toddler running through it, imagine Bradley bending down to scoop them into his arms. You imagine a life without this aching, shifting loneliness. You imagine a life with Bradley.” THE WAY YOU FOLLOW UP “A LIFE WITHOUT THIS ACHING, SHIFTING LONELINESS” WITH “A LIFE WITH BRADLEY” IMPLYING THAT BECAUSE OF HIM SHE’S NEVER GONNA FEEL ALONE AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!!!!

“When you do marry, when you walk down that aisle, you want it to be for love. And people can call you delusional, naive, whatever. You don’t care. You just know you want the big thing, the real thing, True Love, capital t, capital l. You want the hurricane of romance, the monsoon of love. You want to fly into it.” i relate. this is very real. and i loved how you described it as a hurricane.

“And he means it. Bradley carries his heart on his sleeve, you’ve learned this much. He tries to hide it, but he’s no good at it. Eventually, his emotions always get the better of him, burst forth like fountains. It’s part of his charm.” JUST A VERY PERFECT PARAGRAPH.

“You pretend like you’re not still reeling from his proposal, like it’s not suddenly become impossible to do so much as look at him without your heart flopping around like a fish finding its sad end on dry land.” WITHOUT YOUR HEART FLOPPING AROUND LIKE A FISH FINDING ITS SAD END ON DRY LAND??????? HOW DO YOU COME UP WITH THESE??????????? PERFECT.

“I know,” he interrupts you, a smile spreading on his face. “But I’ll feel better knowing you got home safe.” CHIVALRY WILL NEVER BE DEAD AS LONG AS WE HAVE BRADLEY BRADSHAW!!!

“That makes your insides clench in a way they shouldn’t. Your chest feels tight, and you look away just in case you start crying again.” 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺😔😔😔😔😔

“It ends quicker than expected because time always goes the fastest when you want it to go slow. Then you’re thanking him, saying goodbye, both of you pretending he didn’t just propose some strange, fake marriage to you behind a bar counter not even thirty minutes ago.” time really does go fastest when you want it to go slow!!!!!

“It’s like being five again, trying to get somebody to look at the picture you drew. It’s like being ten again and being overlooked. It’s like being fifteen again, still vying for the attention you’ll never really get.” STOP HURTING ME??????? WHAT IS THIS????? ENOUGH.

“So, like a child, like you’re five again, like you’re ten again, like you’re fifteen again, you say, “I’m getting married.” and then you bring the “you’re five, fen, fifteen” motif again <33333333333333333 PERFECT.

“It might be the worst thing you’ve done in your life: Dragging poor, kind Bradley Bradshaw into the mess you’ve made of your life. Nevermind that he offered. It doesn’t matter.” DANCING WITH OUR HANDS TIED STARTS PLAYING IN THE BACKGROUND!!!! I’M A MESS BUT I’M THE MESS THAT YOU WANTED!!!!!!!! SORRY FOR THE TAYLOR SWIFT CONNECTIONS I AM AWARE THAT I AM ILL.

“The loneliness is everywhere, then. In your chest, in your bed, in your veins. Crawling like a shadow that swallows you whole.” this description??????????? yes.

“You lead him out the back. Out of the corner of your eyes, you spot the exact corner you huddled in a few days back, agonizing over the positive pregnancy test, the decline of your life, the decay of your dreams. Don’t look, you tell yourself, and then do it anyway.” sometimes idk what to comment next to the quotes so i just write nonsense but i just really feel the need to highlight them because i loved how you wrote it.

“When you look up at him, there’s something strange on his face. Something that looks less like surprise and more like awe.

His eyes are so brown, and your heart beats so fast, and you’re dizzy like you just got off a rollercoaster. ” LIKE AWE?????????? AND IF FEELS LIKE YOU JUST GOT OFF A ROLLERCOASTER????? I LOVE ROMANCEEEEEEEEE

“An opportunity. That sounds like business, sounds like a transaction, sounds rational and level-headed and reasonable, and you latch onto the idea. Maybe if you try to take the emotion out of the equation, it’ll be easier.” oh we’re gonna *suffer* with this one aren’t we????? i can already tell she’s gonna try denying her feelings really hard…

“Bradley hesitates, and for a second, you think he’s going to say something. But then he just shrugs, nods, says, “That’s fine. Yeah. Whatever you want.” WHATEVER SJDHSJCSJDHEJDHSJD OK SURE BRADLEY. SURE. stupid boy he’s not fooling anyone <3

“As you look at him, here in this pastel lighting, here on the verge of something monumental, there’s something so reassuring about him. Something so steady and reliable and constant. Something that makes you think, with him, maybe it could be okay, no matter how insane the whole idea is. An opportunity. An investment that just might pay off.

North star, you remind yourself. Bradley Bradshaw is the North Star.” NORTH STAR ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹 I AM OBSESSED WITH THIS!!!!!!!!!

“Then he says, “Can I hug you?” I AM BAWLING MY EYES OUT. WHY IS HE SO KIND?

“When Bradley pulls you into his arms, when he holds you against his chest loosely, carefully, giving you room to pull away at any moment, the whole thing almost bowls you over. It’s the first time anybody’s hugged you since you found out you’re pregnant, since your entire world came crashing down, and you can’t help yourself. It’s a visceral reaction. You cling to him, wrap your arms around his neck, press your face into his shoulder and your chest against his and squeeze your eyes shut, and stay there for longer than you planned to, longer than you should. Let him hold you tight enough that for a moment, for a while, it almost feels like you’re whole again. Like you’re not alone.” beautiful. so so so so beautiful.

“You could get addicted to it, could get greedy and selfish and never-satisfied. Could eat it raw.” I LOVE THIS PART I LOVE HOW YOU WROTE IT THANK YOU FOR WRITING IT? WOW. POETRY.

“Bradley smells like sunscreen and sandalwood. You try to commit that scent to memory, try to ingrain it into your brain and your body. Something to remember the next time the loneliness sets in.” stop 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

“Finally, he pulls away, and his smile is gentle. You feel every inch of separation like an ache in your bones, like an echo, like a reverberation.” HUG HIM AGAIN!!!!!!

“I don’t even have a ring for you,” Bradley says, a frown etching itself into his forehead. “I’m sorry.” WHY IS HE THE SWEETEST MAN ON THE PLANET? WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS???????

“I think you should have something, though. I want to give you something,” he interrupts you. “I just don’t know….” i’m so in love it’s ridiculous at this point.

“Bradley reaches into his wifebeater and pulls his dog tags from beneath the fabric. Before you know what’s happening, he’s tugging the thin silver chain down over your head, moving your hair out of the way carefully. It settles against the skin of your neck, warmed by his body heat.

You stare down at the metal dangling over your dress, the letters of his name etched into it. Bradley Bradshaw.

Your heart seizes.” SHUT UP SHUT UP MY JAW DROPPED TO THE FLOOR. THE DOG TAGS!!!!!!!!!!!!! SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!!!!!!!

“He never had a mustache. He was never a stranger. Your dreams were never this: Rushed and fake and no ring at all. You, pregnant with somebody else’s baby, and Bradley, marrying you to get assigned to a base of his choosing. None of it real. No True Love, no capital t, no capital l. Not even lowercase. Nothing but madness and guilt and business between you.

And still you want it, want it so bad it swells inside you, pushes against your ribcage with enough pressure to crack bones - you want to be wanted.” THIS WHOLE PARAGRAPH IS SO BEAUTIFUL I THINK IT SETS THEIR STORY UP PERFECTLY. what we might expect from now on. because nothing is going according to her plan but it’s all goinf to be okay and perfect regardless. also the “you want to be wanted” line feels like it was extracted from the depths of my heart.

“Friends. This man you barely know. This man who is doing something unfathomable for you.” BECAUSE HE LIKESSSSSSSSS YOU!!!!!!!

“And then later, in the bar, as Bradley’s friends discuss some new Star Wars show you haven’t seen, as they order round after round of beer you can’t drink, as the sky goes from pastels to blues to blacks, you’ll pretend you don’t see Natasha staring at the dog tags around your neck, pretend you don’t wish you could hold Bradley’s hand, pretend you don’t feel like you’re falling apart, like you’re capsizing where you sit, like you're kicking water miles and miles and miles below the surface.” star wars name drop ☺️☺️☺️☺️☺️☺️☺️. also: this paragraph, like the entirely of this chapter, was beautiful. VERY SAD AND ANGSTY BUT BEAUTIFUL.

“Beneath the table, you put a hand on your stomach, fingers spreading out, close your eyes, and let the current drag you under.” i am 100% not mentally stable enough to survive this story i know it in my bones.

MAY!!!!!!!!!!! i’m already looking forward to the emotional turmoil these babies are going to go through!!!!!! I’M SO EXCITED!!!!

baby, let's play house. rooster (part 1)

pairing ; bradley bradshaw x female!reader

synopsis ; marriage of convenience. you got yourself in trouble. bradley has a bit of a savior complex. together, you come up with what could potentially be the worst idea in the longstanding and illustrious history of bad ideas.

wc ; 12.5k

warnings ; 18+ only, minors do NOT interact; angst; explicit language; explicit sexual content in later parts; pregnancy; mentions of infidelity; mentions of vomit; mentions of Tom Cruise; unhealthy family dynamics; one mention of suic*de but it's not a plot point; age gap

note: uhm... i blacked out. idk either. part 2 should be out eventually, which of course means that i haven't even started writing it yet. there will probably be several mistakes in here regarding the navy, etc. so i'm sorry about that i'm just dumb :-(

sol. sunderlust. crab. bestie... i love you forever, what would i ever do without you?

When you’re fourteen, sitting on a floral couch in one of the nondescript, army-commissioned houses you’ve been moving to every few months since you were old enough to remember, your mother turns on Cocktail with Tom Cruise, and you decide that, once you’re grown up, you’re going to be a bartender. You’re going to do just what Tom does - get a job in some dive, work your way up, learn the bottle slinging and the shot pouring and the flirting, and then you’re going to franchise the whole thing and take it national. It’s going to be just like TGI Fridays, except your drinks will actually be good instead of whatever watered-down punch they serve.

Of course, you’re fourteen, and you don’t even know what alcohol tastes like yet. Years later, you’re going to take a shot of Tequila at a bar, you’re going to splutter and cough and think you might choke, and it’ll leave you wondering if maybe you’ve made a mistake. But for now, you’ve got a dream, and you’ve got a plan, and not a smidge of doubt that you’ll make it all come true.

You’re going to do just as Tom Cruise does - minus the best friend’s suicide from the movie and the real-life Scientology thing and all that. But you’re going to be successful. You know it.

So this, then. This is not part of your plan at all.

Behind you, there’s a bang, and then the back door is ripped open. The buttery light of the bar spills in a rectangle across the beaten path, but it doesn’t reach your little corner. You hear the muffled thud of footsteps, a curse, followed by a shout of your name.

“Yeah?” you call back, hope you don’t sound like you’re balancing on the edge of a mental breakdown. Hope you don’t sound like you feel.

“Your shift’s about to start. I really need you in there cutting up some limes, please,” Jerry, your co-worker, says. Thank God he doesn’t walk over to investigate just what you’re doing huddled in the sand behind the bar.

“Okay,” you answer, voice a little wobbly, “I’ll be in in a sec.”

You wait until you hear the door shut behind Jerry, then you unfold yourself, get your shaky legs underneath your weight. You feel like somebody hit you over the head with one of those huge hammers they use to knock down walls. The nausea is back, too, something queasy and watery that shifts through your stomach.

Inside the bar, everything is like it always is. The chatter of the customers, the drawl of the music, the smell of beer, and the Ocean Breeze scented cleaner you use to wipe the floors. Far below it, the scent of the real ocean breeze drifting in through the opened windows. It seems wrong for the Hard Deck to be unchanged, unaltered, untouched when your own life has gone so completely off the rails.

You sneak in a quick, discreet bathroom break to swipe at the mascara smudged beneath your eyes, to dab at it with some damp toilet paper, to hope nobody will notice the obvious signs of tears still clinging to you. To stare at your reflection in the mirror for a moment, try not to think about that stupid test you buried at the bottom of the trashcan. You can taste your heartbeat in your mouth.

You don’t look any different - same nose, same hair, same eyes - but something has irrevocably shifted inside of you.

Behind the counter, you cut up the limes you promised Jerry. The scent clings to your fingers, the juice settles in the calluses. The steady sound as the knife meets the cutting board and the familiar motion of your hands help to ground you a little.

“Could we get a refill?”

You lift your head and then immediately lower it again, shoulders going up, turning to the side in an attempt to hide your face. If there are two people you don’t want to see tonight, then…

“Oh my god.” Natasha’s face pushes into your line of vision, her eyebrows crinkled, her mouth pursed. “Have you been crying?”

Waving her words of concern away with one hand, you grab for their empty glasses with the other.

“Allergies,” you lie. “I’ve got two on tap here, which one did you guys have? The German or the…”

There’s something about Bradley Bradshaw. You like to think of it as a gravitational pull. Something with force, something that makes people look at him. Something that grounds them, too, though, gives them a tether.

Ever since he first walked into this bar a little over a year ago, it’s like he’s become a fixture in your life, even if you only see him once or twice a week, even if it’s just a quick exchange of words over a countertop. Bradley Bradshaw makes for a good North Star.

He shrugs, and there’s something almost sheepish to it. “It was part of your list of reasons why you’re better than Hangman last month.”

You pause, still holding the glasses, and stare at him. He looks right back.

“That’s beside the point,” Natasha pipes up. She’s balancing both her elbows on the bartop, pulling herself closer. “Why were you crying?”

That sort of shifts reality back into focus. What are you supposed to say? I let a guy who isn’t even really my boyfriend but also not really not my boyfriend knock me up, and now I have no idea what the fuck to do? To two people who are little more than glorified acquaintances?

You shrug and decide they look like they’d enjoy the new craft beer Penny got on tap. It has notes of vanilla and apple, and you’re not much of a beer person, but even you like it. Or at least you used to.

“It’s nothing,” you say, drawing the first glass. It ends up perfect - amber liquid topped with just the right amount of foam, the little bobbles popping as you push it across the counter toward Natasha. Your life might be a mess, but at least you still know how to draw a damn good glass of beer from the tap. “Don’t worry about it.”

Natasha’s eyes narrow, but then she lets it go. “You know I’ll beat a guy up for you, right?”

You don’t doubt it. If there’s anybody in this bar you wouldn’t want to cross, it’s Natasha, and not just because of whatever training the Navy put her through. You’re convinced she came into the world knowing how to take a guy out.

“Yeah,” you agree and are surprised to find you mean it. Realistically, you’re not particularly close to any of the pilots. You chit-chat sometimes, have had a few drunken conversations after everybody else has filtered out of the Hard Deck while wiping down tables or collecting shot glasses, but that’s not really enough to support a true friendship. Still. If you asked, you have no doubt Natasha would go to bat for you. “It’s okay, though. I’m fine. I’ll put this on your tab, yeah?”

She looks like she wants to say something else, but then decides to let it go. Sighs, “Okay.”

As Natasha pushes off the bar to rejoin her group of friends toward the back of the bar, Bradley takes a step closer instead. You make it a point not to look at him, but the yellow and white of his Hawaiian shirt flashes in your periphery despite your best efforts.

He places a large hand on the countertop, palm down, and you should be looking busy, but all you can do is stare as his fingers starfish across the wood.

“You can talk to me, yeah?” he asks, and his voice is soft enough that it almost disappears in the din of this Saturday night. “Whatever it is.”

You do look up then. Bradley has brown eyes, round and big and deep. There’s something about them that makes you want to trust him, trust his words, trust the sincerity. It almost makes you start crying again.

“Okay,” you whisper. “Thank you.”

Then somebody’s shouting an order at you, and you’re pushing a coaster under a sweating Cuba Libre, you’re pouring a Tequila shot, you’re looking for the maraschino cherries, you’re passing out salt shakers, and you don’t notice as he disappears and you don’t think about anything for a short, blissful, beautiful time.

Two months ago, you met Luke halfway through the door of a bar you’d seen on Instagram, something with low lights and neon signs and booths cushioned in lush, ruby velvet. They had this signature cocktail there, something with rum and gold foil and a lot of smoke that drifted up in sweet-smelling plumes.

Luke was charming and laughed a lot, and when he put his hand on your waist, when he looked at you, your heart skipped a beat or two. And still, the first thing you told Penny about at work the next day was the cocktail and not the guy.

You’re almost entirely sure you’re not in love with him, but you’re excited about the idea that maybe someday you could be. Luke is a nice guy. He works in finance somewhere in San Diego, takes you to expensive seafront restaurants, and once or twice, he even bought you expensive lingerie. Luke likes the same movies as you do, likes putting on Jazz music when you go down on him in his car, and that always manages to make you feel strangely sophisticated even with a dick in your mouth. He’s older, and he has a real, grown-up job, completely unlike you with your singles soaked in beer.

He’s a stead-fast, reliable guy. If you have to be in this situation with anyone, you figure it’s better to be in it with him than some twenty-something surfer dude who couldn’t even find the word responsible in a dictionary.

The anxiety has been gnawing at you since last night, has been chipping away your composure and your calm. Has reduced you into a jittery, terrified, chafing shell of your former self. All day you were fumbling - burning your hand on the heated water kettle in the morning, almost running a red light, cutting your finger deep enough it didn’t stop bleeding for a whole five minutes.

Earlier today, you took a last, desperate stand. Propelled by the sort of hope that exists against all better judgment, you went on a CVS run and returned with three more pregnancy tests. You left them back at your tiny apartment, right on the counter where you put them out in the first place, those three tiny, horrible, life-altering plus signs laughing right in your face.

And that was it then. Your fate decided. Your luck run out.

Since you were fourteen, sitting on that floral couch, the course of your life had seemed so clear to you. You’d been so sure of where you wanted to go, so sure of how to get there. And yeah, okay, maybe you used to think you’d get there sooner, but that’s never deterred you before. Slow and steady wins the race, that’s what you used to think.

Now, ten years later, everything is muddled. You can’t see an inch ahead in the fog of all this.

To add insult to injury, those tests were fucking expensive. The next time you check your bank account, you might start crying.

So you spent a good fifteen minutes curled up on your bathroom tiles, staring at your shower curtain, blinking away tears you never shed. You spent a good fifteen minutes trying to figure it out, trying to untangle it, trying to make sense of how you could fuck up so completely.

And then you finally picked yourself up, massaged the grid pattern of the tiles off your cheek, and shot Luke a text asking if he was free tonight.

He drops by at the end of your shift.

“Hi, babe.” Luke grins as he slides into one of the bar stools. “You good?”

You nod, then pause. “Not really?”

You’re wiping down the bartop, dumping an ashtray you collected from the smoking zone outside into the trash. The Hard Deck is empty now, even the last stragglers filed out. Bob selected a song on the jukebox before he left, something slow and decidedly country. Your hands shake when you go to wet the rag again.

Luke frowns and leans across the bar to look at you closely. “What happened?”

“I have to tell you something,” you say and run the tap. The water hits the chrome of the sink with a splatter.

Luke raises an eyebrow, grins. “Illicit confession?”

Under any other circumstances, you would have laughed. But your stomach is coiled up in knots so tight you wonder if they’ll ever untangle again. Like the earphones you fish from the bottom of a purse.

You just so manage a half-hearted chuckle, a sad, pathetic little sound that has Luke’s eyebrow climbing even higher.

He pushes a brown paper bag across the counter. “I brought your favorite take-out… Would that cheer you up?”

Almost immediately, your stomach growls in answer. You’ve been so hungry the past few days that you can’t even manage to be embarrassed. “Mexican?” you ask, something like excitement in your voice for the first time in over 24 hours.

“Ah...” Luke bites his lower lip. “No, uhm… I got something from that one place we went to. The fusion kitchen?”

“Oh…” The excitement dampens immediately, and you force a smile. “Yeah, cool. Thanks.”

“Sorry… you did say you liked it when we went.”

He’s right. You did say that.

Luke likes experimental food, things like that cocktail with the gold foil. Things that look much better than they end up tasting. He takes pictures of them and posts them on his Instagram, and he always makes sure not to get your hand in, your purse, your foot. He doesn’t even follow you back, and you want to not care about trivial things like social media so very badly that you never ask him about it.

He looks genuinely apologetic, though, so you resolve to forgive him. You smile and say, “I did! This is great. Thanks, Luke.”

His satisfied smile puts you at ease.

“So, what did you want to talk about?”

It’s a bit like a bucket of ice water. The ease slips away as quickly as it came. You start wiping almost furiously at a stain on the bartop, then give up. Stare at your fingers gone wrinkly with the sudsy water.

You open your mouth, and then you say, “I’m pregnant.”

It’s not what you meant to say. You meant to ease into this, make it sound… less final, somehow. As if that’s at all possible. As if that isn’t exactly what it is. Final.

You’re never going back from this, you realize suddenly. No matter what happens from here on out, there’s never going to be another moment where this hasn’t happened. Where you weren’t pregnant, where you didn’t mess it all up. The plan, the dream, the life.

Tears aren’t enough anymore. You’re going to run headfirst into the ocean and scream until the saltwater fills your lungs.

Luke laughs. You stare at him.

It takes a moment, but slowly he realizes that you’re not joking. That this is serious. The smile slides sideways off his face.

“Oh,” he says, and you can’t look at him anymore. So you let your eyes wander, down towards the lapels of his white dress shirt. He’s still wearing his suit and tie, and the realization that he’s come straight from the office touches you more than it should. At the same time, guilt settles in your stomach. You’re doing this to him, you’re altering his life, you…

The rational part of yourself scoffs, takes over the reins. It takes two to tango, you remind yourself. This is as much his fault as it is yours.

But that doesn’t get rid of the bitter taste in your mouth.

“Why…” Luke pauses. “Why are you telling me this?”

When you look up at his face again, his expression is carefully blank.

“Uh…”

“Shouldn’t you be telling the father?”

You blink. The cogs of your mind turn slowly like somebody slapped gum between them. “I am,” you say, wondering what the hell he’s on about.

“I’m not the father,” Luke says, very matter-of-factly. “You don’t need to lie about it.”

“I’m not lying.” You’re too stunned to even be insulted by the insinuation.

“It’s alright.” He shrugs his shoulders, his expensive suit in the tacky, glossy fabric catching the light. “It’s not like we’re exclusive. I don’t mind if you slept with somebody else.”

“Not exclusive,” you repeat lamely. Maybe that part shouldn’t catch you as off guard as it does. You’ve never discussed it with him in as many words, never sat down to have the whole boyfriend/girlfriend talk, but you’ve been seeing each other semi-regularly for two months now, and you’d just sort of assumed…

“Sure.” Luke nods. “Don’t blame this one on me, then.”

Oh. Your heart clenches, and suddenly it feels like you can’t breathe.

“I didn’t sleep with anybody else,” you say, but your voice sounds far away.

Luke shrugs. “Well, it can’t be mine.”

You don’t even know what to say to this. You’re in desperate, burning need of a shot, and the realization that you can’t have one zaps through you like a pain.

“We always used a condom,” Luke is saying, and his words drift to you through a fog, through a mist, through a thicket of fear and anxiety and ice-cold panic. “I made damn sure of that.”

“It’s not….” You clear your throat. “They’re only like… 98 percent safe. Condoms, I mean.”

“What, so you’re saying we’re those two percent?”

He looks like he’s about to start laughing again, and suddenly you barely recognize him. You’ve always known that Luke wasn’t the love of your life, but that was fine. Love hadn’t been part of the plan anyway, that was for later, much later, after you’d gone international and gotten rich off Mojitos and Pina Coladas and the occasional Old Fashioned. But Luke had been… well, he’d been nice. Always. He’d been someone to laugh with, had been long walks on the beach, and quick tumbles in his backseat. He’d been fun and nice and…

And you’d been stupid enough to hope. Hope for more, hope for better, hope for something.

“I can’t have a baby with you,” he says. His voice rings with finality.

What are you supposed to say to that? With those three positive pregnancy tests back home on your bathroom counter. With the knowledge that you haven’t slept with anyone else.

“Well,” you whisper, and the words come out softer than you want them to, “you are.”

Luke is very quiet for a moment. He’s looking right at you, the blue eyes you used to think were open, inviting, now slitted and probing. Like a snake.

“Jesus,” he says finally, draws back to run his fingers through his hair, a gesture of exasperation. His voice has lost some of its calm. “What do you want from me?”

You wonder if you look as dazed as you feel. “I don’t… I don’t want anything from you.”

That’s not true. You’d like him to hug you. You’d like him to tell you it’s going to be okay, even if that might be a lie. You’d like him to be nice to you.

Instead, Luke, who looks increasingly distressed, jerks his head and says, “If it’s a family you’re after… I can’t give you that.”

Everything has happened so quickly - the toppling of your plans, the chaos of your life. You haven’t really had time to think about how you want him to react. Not like this, though.

“Why not?” you ask and regret the question the moment it’s out of your mouth. You sound like a child - lost, confused.

Luke sighs. He rakes a palm over his face and shakes his head. When he finally looks at you again, there’s something almost guilty on his face. You can’t tear your eyes away, can’t help but feel your stomach plummeting down down down toward the ground. It’s like standing on the ledge of a skyscraper, feeling what the fall might be like even with both feet firmly planted.

“I can’t give you that,” he says, “because I already have a family.”

Beneath you, the ground seems to quiver.

“What?”

Luke pinches the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger, then reaches into his pocket and produces a shiny, golden wedding band. When he slips it back onto its original place on his finger, you watch the patch of pale skin, several shades lighter than the rest, disappear.

Your breath gets stuck somewhere in your chest.

“You’re… married?”

“Going on five years,” he says, and you think he sounds sad, but maybe that’s just your hope getting the better of you again.

You don’t know what to say. For a moment, you just stand there with the rag still in your hand, listening to the sad, sad voice of some wanna-be cowboy drawling from the speakers. Hear the phantom thud of the cues hitting pool balls. Turn your head to where the pilots were having fun earlier, back when things weren’t all jumbled up.

The whole world moves far, far away from you. Like something you watch on TV screens, something intangible, something fake. It’s not something that happens to people like you. It’s not something that happens to real people.

“It’s… you didn’t tell me that,” you say, and it’s like your voice echoes through a long, long tunnel, bounces off the walls like a tennis ball. “I didn’t know.”

And then you think back on it. Think of whispered phone calls in the dead of night, think of erratic work schedules, think of his insistence to come here instead of going to San Diego. Think of how little you know of his life, how firmly he kept you locked out of it.

Suddenly you’re not so sure if you didn’t know or if you just didn’t want to know. If you closed your eyes to what was right in front of you.

Guilt and anger and confusion flash through you in rapid succession. You feel sick to your stomach.

“I’ll give you money,” Luke says. It’s a peculiar thing - you see his mouth move before the words ever reach your ears, like a movie that’s gone out of sync with the audio.

“Money,” you repeat, very slowly. Or maybe not slowly at all. You just feel like you got stuck in molasses, like the whole world has been dipped in something sticky.

“Well. You’re getting rid of it.”

It’s not a question. He says it like it’s a fact, like it’s something that’s already been decided. Like it’s something you don’t get a say in.

You stiffen, fingers sinking into the wet rag. Soapy water drips over the lacquered wood of the bartop.

“No,” you say. “No, I’m not.”

About five minutes ago, you hadn’t even made your mind up about it yet. Hadn’t decided whether to keep it or not. Had still been weighing the pros and cons in your mind, turning them over like a Rosetta Stone that might help you decipher the encrypted, tangled mess of your thoughts.

And now that he’s said it, now that the option is right there in the open, suddenly you know that’s not the way you want it to happen.

“What,” Luke says, “you wanna have it?”

“Yes,” you answer, and you know it’s the truth.

Maybe it’s stupid. You’re twenty-four. You’re broke. You pick up shifts at a bar to pour tequila shots for other people. You live off the guys you flirt with long enough they decide you’re worth a tip. All those plans of grandeur, of franchises and cocktails and Park Avenue apartments, are dead-ends. You’ve been walking a cul-de-sac your whole life.

And still… something about it feels right to you.

You’ve been thinking about the whole thing in theory - the theoretical truth of that test, the theoretical reaction of Luke, the theoretical existence of that baby, the theoretical impact on your life. But it’s not a theory. It’s real.

There’s a baby growing in you.

It’s the most terrifying thought of your life. You’ve never experienced something so wonderful. Even as the fear eats away at you, even as your stomach churns and your head spins, some part of you feels illuminated with light.

Luke laughs. “Babe… no offense, but that’s a horrible idea.”

You clench your teeth and grit out, “I didn’t ask for your opinion.”

He shrugs. “Well, you’re gonna get it. You really think you could raise a kid?”

“I don’t know,” you say, truthfully, and wonder where all this calm is coming from. “But I want to try.”

Luke stares at you as if you’re growing a spare set of ears right in front of him. Then he laughs again, shakes his head. You can’t see what’s so funny about any of this.

“Babe,” he says, “this isn’t some new Cocktail recipe. This is an actual child you’re talking about.”

If you weren’t so goddamn tired, it would make you angry. Set fire to you like a fuse. But you’re drained, empty, hollow. You want to go home, want to curl up in bed, want to cry. You want to go back two weeks in time, back when you were still just a failing waitress with a big dream. Back before the responsibility of it all hunched you over.

“I’m doing it,” you say, and hope he understands the decision is final. Hope your voice is firm.

Luke exhales. A muscle in his jaw twitches as he grinds his teeth, as he turns half away from you.

Finally, after an eternity, he says, “I can’t be involved in this.”

For your part, you understand that decision is final too.

You nod, grab onto the bartop to keep yourself from toppling over. The ground beneath you is a gaping, beckoning abyss. It’s going to swallow you whole.

“Fine,” you whisper. “I’ll do it alone then.”

For a moment, Luke looks almost surprised. As if he was sure you’d fold eventually, see reason. Listen to him.

You wonder if that’s how it’s been before - him pushing and you giving in. Rearranging your life to fit his schedule, his plans, his wants. Shrinking yourself to make room for him. And you didn’t even notice.

You straighten your spine.

“For what it’s worth,” Luke says as he slides off his chair, “I’m sorry.”

And then he does what men do best: He leaves. Walks away from you and the baby growing inside of you. Walks away from the mess he made, the dream he shattered, without a care or a thought. Without looking back.

You watch his retreating form, watch the set of his shoulders, the spring in his step, watch as he bounds down the steps onto the gravel of the parking lot, watch as the shadows eventually blot out the sight of him.

Good riddance, you want to say, but you can’t even form words.

With your heart torn to shreds, with your fear clawing a bloody path up your throat, you sink down onto the floor, press a hand to your mouth, and you sob.

Twenty minutes later, Bradley Bradshaw finds you in the exact same position.

You know it’s been twenty minutes because you’re staring at the digital clock of the dishwasher, counting down the wash cycle. The neon red of the numbers blurs through the veil of your tears.

It’s like somebody’s cut your chest open. Scooped you clean like taking a spoon to a tub of ice cream. Behind your ribcage, you feel hollow in a way that aches down to your bones. That spiderwebs through your veins.

Bradley pauses in the doorway, silhouetted by the outdoor lighting you still haven’t turned off. Like this, with your vision blurred, he looks like a drawing of the Virgin Mary on one of those cheap, tacky candles. Descending on a flurry of clouds and light and doves. Only this Virgin Mary wears Hawaiian shirts, apparently. It almost makes you laugh.

He casts his eyes over the room, a slight furrow dipping between his brows. It takes you a moment to understand he hasn’t seen you yet, not with how you’re crouching by the crates of Corona.

Part of you wants to hide, wants to crawl under the jutting canopy of the bar. Wants to pretend you’re not here, fold yourself into a tiny pocket square of a person until he leaves again.

“Hello?” Bradley asks, genuine confusion laced with the word, and you know you can’t do that.

“Hi,” you call back, and your voice sounds tiny. Miserable. You push up on your knees to preserve a bit of your dignity. The room goes spinning in a whirlwind, and you catch yourself with both hands on the wood, lifting up to peek at him over the edge of the bar. “I’m down here.”

For a moment, Bradley just stares at you. He takes in the scene, the smeared mascara, the swollen eyes, the fresh tears leaving tracks down your cheeks like you’re drawing rivers on a map.

Then he snaps into action. He’s crossing the room before you can even really come to terms with the fact that he’s here in the first place, pushing through the hip-high swinging door that separates the oval space hugged by the bar from the rest of the room and falling to his knees by your side.

It makes you cry harder.

“Nothing,” you say, which is a ridiculous lie, all things considered. You’re crouching on the floor of your workplace, over an hour after your shift has ended, crying your eyes out. Clearly, there’s something wrong. “I’m fine.”

Bradley sits cross-legged on the hardwood floors, his knee close enough to graze against yours. He looks decidedly out of his depth, almost uncomfortable. Helpless. His mustache quivers as he opens his mouth, then closes it again.

But he doesn’t push. Doesn’t try to get you to explain it, doesn’t ask again. He just sits there with you, elbows on his thighs, and lets you cry.

It’s nice not to be alone. To have somebody with you, even if he doesn’t know you. Even if he has no idea what it is that has you on the brink of a complete crisis.

You do your best not to think about it. Not about the baby, not about the guy who just dumped you. Not about gold foil and Instagram posts and wedding bands. Not about how he’s made you a homewrecker, and you didn’t even know.

Maybe this is karma. The universe punishing you for your sins. Something like that.

Maybe it’s just really, really bad luck.

“What are you doing here?” you ask when you’ve finally calmed yourself enough the sobbing has subsided to sniffles.

Bradley jerks his head noncommittally. “I forgot my wallet.”

“Oh.” You try to get up, but your legs won’t cooperate. “I’ll help you look.”

He shakes his head, pulls you back onto the floor by the elbow. “It’s okay,” he says. “I’ll look for it later. What happened?”

There’s something about his tone that tells you this time he won’t let you get away with a half-assed lie. Which doesn’t stop you from trying.

“Just… rough day.”

Bradley looks at you, then pulls his knees up, lets his arms dangle between them. “You don’t have to tell me,” he says, and his voice is very gentle. “But if you want to… I can listen.”

This is the thing about Bradley Bradshaw. He has the kind of face that makes you want to tell him things. Makes you want to spill your secrets to him, pour them into his space. He’s steady, reliable, calm. It would be so easy to trust him.

That’s dangerous.

But you’re so tired, and you’re so broken, and you’re so terribly, horribly lonely. With Luke gone, with your parents out of the picture, with nobody to help and no one to hold you, the loneliness is like an ache, like a stain, like something that festers and spreads and unfurls inside of you.

You just want to pretend you don’t have to do it alone. Just for a moment.

So you say, “I think I did something stupid.”

Bradley’s eyes are very brown. A soft shade of brown, like milk chocolate. When you look at him, you feel warm all over.

“Alright,” he says, and there isn’t an ounce of judgment in it. It’s just a gentle, careful nudge for you to continue.

“I…” You exhale shakily, look down to the floor, twist the bracelet around your wrist. It’s so much harder to form the words the second time around. “I’m pregnant.”

Saying it to Bradley, who is practically a stranger, saying it to someone outside of whatever little bubble, whatever vacuum two people playing at love built around themselves, makes it real in a way it wasn’t before.

You’re pregnant. In a few months, your belly is going to grow to the size of a watermelon. You’re going to get ultrasounds and wear maternity clothes and buy a crib. You’re going to hold a baby in your arms, a baby that will become a toddler, will become a child, will become a teenager, will become an adult. They’re never going to leave again.

I’m pregnant.

One moment - and in it the rest of your life.

It’s a skyscraper, it’s a monument, it’s a mountain. It dwarves you. How can you ever be enough for the path that lies ahead?

The panic jumps you. It rattles you. Suddenly you’re panting, you’re shaking, you can’t think, your head spinning circles around the enormity of it all.

“Oh,” Bradley says. He sounds like he expected you to say just about anything except that. “Congratulations.”

You stare at him, and he backtracks.

“Unless you don’t want me to congratulate you? Sorry, I shouldn’t just….”

“No,” you stop him, your voice a tiny, trembling thing. “It’s okay. Thank you.”

You wonder what it might be like if you were older, if you were married, if you weren’t such a fuck-up. Would people beam at you, hug you, shake your hand? Would they share the joy they must assume you feel?

Neither one of you says anything for a while. Through the opened windows, the sound of the ocean drifts in, of the waves crashing against the shore. The chrome of the fridge you’re leaning against is cold even through the layers of your shirt. You count the wooden tiles on the floor.

After half an eternity, Bradley says, “I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.”

It’s like a knife to the heart, it slices right through you, stabs you between the ribs. And you’re not even angry, don’t even feel betrayed… it just hurts. The kind of pain that stays with you. The kind of pain that leaves phantom traces even after the wounds have healed.

“I don’t,” you say finally.

Beside you, Bradley shifts his weight. “Sorry,” he mumbles. “I’m really putting my foot in it today, aren’t I?”

It’s almost enough to make you laugh. “It’s okay,” you say, even though it isn’t. This whole thing isn’t okay. “I’ll be fine.”

Without hesitating, Bradley says, “I know you will be.”

There’s such conviction in his voice that it baffles you. You stare at him, but he doesn’t seem to notice.

“He’s… have you told him, though? Or are you guys not in contact?”

Still trying to recover, you shrug. “Yeah,” you whisper, drawing your shoulders almost all the way up to your ears, “I told him.”

You can tell he wants to ask more, but he gives you a second before his next question. “And you… you guys are gonna try co-parenting? Or is he… are you going to get married?”

That makes you frown. You say, “What is this, the 1950s?”

“I just think….” Bradley clears his throat. “I just think if you get a girl pregnant, you should step up. Take responsibility.”

Of course he’d think that. You’re not even surprised.

There’s always been something traditional about Bradley Bradshaw, like he’s one of those men written by women people rave about all over TikTok. If he takes a girl out on a date, he probably holds open car doors and pulls out chairs for her, hands her his jacket if she gets cold.

Distantly, you wonder what that would be like.

“I don’t want somebody to marry me out of responsibility,” you say. “I can take care of myself.”

Bradley scrambles. “I know that!” he says quickly, and out of the corner of your eye, you see him shift his weight forward, elbows resting on his thighs. “Of course, I know that. I just thought… I just thought you shouldn’t have to do this alone.”

It’s such a simple thing to say, but it almost bowls you over. You turn your head to the side, press your face into your shirt sleeve and dig your fingernails deep into the skin of your shins.

Bradley watches you, eyes intent, and then he probes carefully, “Are you… are you going to keep it?”

You sink your teeth into your lower lip, blink against the sudden dampness. Keep your face turned away from him. The shame of it all, of the situation you’re in, of him seeing you like this, overwhelms you. Your vision blurs.

“I think…” You swallow around the lump in your throat. “I always used to think if I ever got in this situation, I’d just get an abortion but now… I don’t… I just don’t think it’s the right thing for me.”

Slowly, he nods. “You want to have the baby,” he says, and it’s not really a question, but you answer anyway.

“Yes. I mean… I don’t know, it’s just… I want this. I don’t know why or how, but I… it feels like I have to do this.”

“Yeah,” Bradley says, completely sincere. “Your body, your choice.”

Now you do snort. “What, are we at a rally?”

“I follow a few Instagram accounts,” he admits. His voice has gone almost sheepish. “Abortion rights should be everybody’s concern. Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.”

It’s endearing in a strange way because there’s nothing performative about it. It’s just bumbling and awkward and peculiarly genuine.

“You sound like you spend too much time on Twitter,” you say softly, and it makes him laugh. Bradley’s got a nice laugh, one that starts in his belly and seems to end at the back of his throat, punches out into the air from back there.

After things have gone quiet again, the anxiety sets back in. Or maybe it’s been there all along, chomping at the bit, and you just didn’t notice.

“You must think I’m crazy,” you say finally, a self-deprecating chuckle loosening from your throat.

But when you glance up at him from beneath lowered lashes, stomach tight with anticipation, Bradley doesn’t look judgmental at all. Instead, his face is wide open, his eyes clear, the corners of his lips still curled upward with the remnants of his smile.

Luke laughed at you, but Bradley is looking at you with something like admiration, and it takes your breath away.

“No,” he says. “I think you’re really, really brave.”

And then you’re crying again.

You’re surprised there are any tears left in you after your earlier session, but they burst forth now, in a sudden eruption of all the fear and all the pain. And Bradley is so nice. So goddamn kind even though he doesn’t know you, not really, even though this isn’t even his problem. Sits there on the floor of the Hard Deck with you at half past one am on a Sunday night, and doesn’t complain, doesn’t sigh. He just listens.

You don’t feel brave. You feel terrified, you feel overwhelmed, you feel… you feel… you feel like the whole world has toppled over. You feel like Atlas crashing down, buried beneath the weight of his burden. You feel tiny. Inadequate. You feel scared, scared, scared.

“I don’t know what to do,” you confess, choke it out between sobs. Wonder why you’re telling him this. When you don’t know him.

Funny how it is so much easier at times to be honest with strangers than it is to be honest with the people we love the most.

“I’m so… I’m so scared, Bradley.”

He moves as if to touch you, then seems to think better of it and slumps back into himself. The expression on his face is unreadable, his eyebrows furrowed, his jaw clenched.

“He’s not gonna… the father isn’t going to help you out?”

It makes you realize you never really answered his earlier question. And you don’t know why, can’t explain it rationally, but for some reason, this, too, makes embarrassment well up at the back of your throat.

What is Bradley going to think? The poor, little, stupid girl who got herself knocked up by a guy who won’t even stay? Is that what everybody’s going to think now? Is that all you’ll be?

It’s a life sentence, this whole thing.

You shrug, pause. Shake your head. “No,” you say finally. “He’s not going to be involved.”

You know it’s true. Luke won’t come back, not now, not in ten years, not in twenty. There was something final about that exchange, something permanent. Something that can’t be undone.

Suddenly, you think of that tiny, unborn child inside of you. Abandoned before it ever came into the world.

It’s just you and me now, baby, you think to yourself, and it goes through you like a current, sweeps you under like a wave. We’re all alone. All we have is each other.

“What about your parents? Your dad’s in the Navy, too, right?”

If you could, you’d run away. Fold yourself to invisibility. Slip into the pockets between moments and become something other, something that exists out of sight.

You think of your parents. Floral couches and polished hardwood floors. Tom Cruise on the television as your mother scrubbed every part of the house like she was getting rid of an illness, wiping away a disease, perpetually finding another stain or another cobweb or another wrinkle to smooth over. Think of your father, rigid and strict and absent. Always on some mission, always thinking of a greater good that definitely didn’t involve you, always looking through you even as he looked at you. You don’t know if you have a single memory of him smiling.

You haven’t spoken to them once since you gave up a perfectly fine full-ride scholarship to college.

“My parents,” you say, and as the words spill from you, you realize they’re the truth, “would probably kill me if they found out I got pregnant out of wedlock. Maybe if I were married, they’d give me back my trust fund or something, but… No, I don’t think they’d help me out.”

A muscle in Bradley’s jaw jumps, then he’s looking away. Turning to the side so you’re knee to knee again. You stare at his profile, at the curl of his ears, the cut of his jaw. The jagged edges of his scars blur through the fog of your tears.

“So, how are you… do you have a plan?”

You had one. You had Mojitos and Daiquiris and Cosmopolitans. You had a slew of business classes at a community college. You had a dream and a set of tools to achieve it, and when you close your eyes, you can almost see it right there in front of you.

But now it’s been swept up in a hurricane. Swallowed by a tsunami.

“No,” you admit, and your voice trembles. “I have no idea what to do.”

Bradley’s jaw moves as he chews on his lower lip. He swallows, and his throat unudlates with it, and then he’s shifting, shuffling forward a bit.

“I…” He clears his throat. If you didn’t know any better, you’d say he looks nervous. “I may have an idea.”

“An idea?” you repeat slowly.

You think he’s going to tell you about some friend who’s looking to hire someone, looking to rent out a very cheap apartment, works at a doctor’s office and is going to treat you for free. Something like that, maybe.

Instead, Bradley takes a deep breath and says, “Marry me.”

It takes a while for the words to register. At first, you think you’ve misheard, then you wonder if maybe the romantic parts of your mind cooked that up. If he even said it at all.

But Bradley is looking at you expectantly, the only indicator of nerves the slightest glimmer in his brown eyes.

And you can’t help yourself. You laugh, even through your tears. It’s a sound that rips from you unconsciously, unstoppably, because surely he’s joking. It’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever heard.

“Good one,” you say, and wonder just how big of a mess you look like. You wipe at your cheeks, your nose with your sleeves and sniffle once, twice.

Bradley’s lips twitch into the pathetic half of a smile, then he’s serious again, avoiding your eyes.

And that, finally, is when you realize that he isn’t joking at all.

“I…” You pause, mind whirring, head spinning. “What?”

“It’s just….” Bradley shrugs, then explains, “It’s only a suggestion. But you said your family might consider supporting you again if you were married. It might be an option.”

You don’t know what to say. You feel like you’re in a low-budget Hallmark movie.

Bradley pushes on, “It wouldn’t be permanent. We could get a divorce quickie in a year or two, just stay together long enough for you to get settled with the baby and everything. Plus, you’d get free healthcare.” He glances at you, and the blank expression on your face must light a panic in him. Now his words come faster. “I wouldn’t expect anything from you, of course I wouldn’t. It would just be… keeping up appearances. Just for a while….”

Finally, he trails off. The silence stretches between you like a palpable thing, thick and dense like summer heat.

When you were twelve, sitting in the back of the car as your parents argued up front, the woods of Washington flying past in rapid ribbons of black and blue and green, the moon a disk of silver in the sky, a deer ran out into the road. You remember the screeching of the tires as your dad did what you’re not supposed to and brought the car to a sudden, abrupt stillstand. You remember the wide eyes of the animal, the muscles locked in its state of catatonic horror. You remember the flanks rising and falling quickly beneath the matted fur.

For a second, you feel like that deer. Frozen. Caught completely off guard. Vulnerable.

Then you think you might be a little overdramatic.

You say, “What the fuck, Bradley?”

Part of you expects him to backtrack immediately, laugh, and tell you that he was joking after all. But Bradley stands his ground, even as he still won’t look right at you.

“I probably wouldn’t even be home much anyway. I leave for work all the time,” he says, brows drawn into a straight line above his eyes as he stares intently at his thumb rubbing circles into the skin of his arm. “But I could babysit, and then you could go back to work. I really wouldn’t mind. I’m good with kids, you know?”

You’re not entertaining the whole thing, not really, but you can’t help yourself. Your curiosity takes the upper hand.

“Why would you… why would you ever offer this? You barely know me.”

Bradley seems to think about it for a long moment, his face unreadbale. Then finally, he says, “There’d be something in it for me, too, you know? I’ve been meaning to get assigned to North Island permanently, do a relocation. But those spots tend to go to the guys with family, so…” He shrugs, but the gesture seems forced. “I could help you out, you could help me out. Win-win.”

“That’s all?” you ask, and you don’t know why there’s something like disappointment in your voice.

Bradley looks like he wants to say something else, and for a moment his face is vulnerable. But then it shutters again, and he nods. “That’s all.”

For a second, just a second, you let yourself imagine it: Imagine saying yes to this mad, insane, incredible proposal. Imagine marrying Bradley, someone soft and warm and responsible, someone completely opposite to Luke. Imagine him in a tux and you in a white dress, imagine his mustache tickling against your cheek as he leans in to kiss you. You imagine one of the quaint little houses you grew up in, but one that would belong to you, at least for a while. You imagine a toddler running through it, imagine Bradley bending down to scoop them into his arms. You imagine a life without this aching, shifting loneliness. You imagine a life with Bradley.

When you finally shake your head, when you let go of that ghost, it feels like it takes a piece of you with it.

“No,” you say softly, and it breaks you open in ways you can’t describe. “I can’t let you do that, Bradley.”

It’s just too insane. Too far out there. It wouldn’t be fair to him, when you’d be getting so much more out of that arrangement.

And besides. I don’t want someone to marry me out of responsibility. That’s what you told Bradley earlier, and you meant it.

When you do marry, when you walk down that aisle, you want it to be for love. And people can call you delusional, naive, whatever. You don’t care. You just know you want the big thing, the real thing, True Love, capital t, capital l. You want the hurricane of romance, the monsoon of love. You want to fly into it.

Bradley’s quiet for a moment. Then he says, “Okay. But if you… change your mind, yeah? I’ll be here.”

And he means it. Bradley carries his heart on his sleeve, you’ve learned this much. He tries to hide it, but he’s no good at it. Eventually, his emotions always get the better of him, burst forth like fountains. It’s part of his charm.

“What,” you say, “right here on the Hard Deck’s floors?”

It’s a sad attempt at a joke, but Bradley is nice enough to laugh anyway. “Sure thing. You guys have the cleanest floors in all of North Island, did you know that?”

You hum. “Sure. I’m the one who cleans them.”

Finally, you get up off the floor, unfold yourself from the bundle of misery you’ve crumbled into. Your legs ache, your back hurts, your chest still feels hollow. All the crying has left a dull pain pulsating behind your left brow.

The two of you look for Bradley’s wallet together, finally find it over by the pool table. You pretend like you’re not still reeling from his proposal, like it’s not suddenly become impossible to do so much as look at him without your heart flopping around like a fish finding its sad end on dry land.

“Can I give you a ride home?” Bradley asks as he watches you lock up. The Hard Deck has an old lock that gets jammed whenever the slightest bit of dampness creeps into the air. You have to hang onto the doorknob with all your weight while simultaneously turning the key to get it to lock.

“I drove here,” you say, casting your eyes about for the tiny tin can you call your car. You can’t even remember where you parked earlier.

“You okay to drive?” Bradley asks.

You glance at him. With the lights off, the parking lot is almost covered in a thick blanket of darkness. The headlights of a few passing cars winding their path along the coastal highway illuminate patches of gravel now and then. Moonlight spills silver and dim across his shoulders, like fingers caressing him. He looks concerned, examining the state of you.

The truth is that you’re tired. Bone tired. Dead tired. So tired you could probably go to sleep where you stand if you put your mind to it. But you don’t want to bother Bradley anymore, have already stolen enough of his time.

So you’re about to decline, but it seems you hesitated too long.

“I’ll take you home,” Bradley says decidedly, “and you can come get your car tomorrow, okay? I don’t think you should be driving like this.”

“You don’t have to do that, you….”

“I know,” he interrupts you, a smile spreading on his face. “But I’ll feel better knowing you got home safe.”

That makes your insides clench in a way they shouldn’t. Your chest feels tight, and you look away just in case you start crying again.

Is it too soon in your pregnancy to start blaming raging hormones?

Wordlessly, you let Bradley lead you across the parking lot toward his monstrosity of a car. His hand hovers at the small of your back, incredibly close yet never touching. He’s big behind you, bulking, and you try not to think about it. When he opens the door for you and waits until you’re buckled in to close it, you feel like your head’s going to explode.

The ride home is quiet, as is the town around you on this Sunday night. An old Killers song plays on the radio, and you think of deer stepping out into streets, then press your eyes closed and will the thought away.

In Bradley’s car, with the windows rolled down, with the Californian night breeze whipping your hair into your eyes and clearing the fog from your head, for a short, blissful while, nothing seems real. It’s one of those liminal moments, a not-time, when reality feels like a dream and even the sharpest knives don’t cut deep enough to hurt.

It ends quicker than expected because time always goes the fastest when you want it to go slow. Then you’re thanking him, saying goodbye, both of you pretending he didn’t just propose some strange, fake marriage to you behind a bar counter not even thirty minutes ago.

Bradley waits until you’re inside the building before he starts the engine again. You hear the roar of it as you climb the stairs up to the second floor.

In your bedroom, you don’t even bother getting undressed. You just slip under the covers, pull them up over your head, bury in the sticky, stale air beneath them, close your eyes, and fall asleep within seconds.

The first time you told your parents about your bartending dreams, your father yelled at you for forty-five minutes. He hurled words at you that hurt, that left scars, that made you wonder and kept you second-guessing yourself for years, that stayed with you. Your mother didn’t say anything.

Somehow, that was worse.

You call her on the landline at five pm on a Tuesday, just before your dad gets back home, and she answers after the third ring. You’re so sure she’s going to acknowledge the four-year gap in contact, the crumbling of the relationship, the fall-out of screaming and crying, and your dad kicking you out of the house.

What you get, instead, is a ten-minute spiel about who brought what to last week’s church potluck and which laundry detergent your father’s contact allergies don’t act up with.

You’re sitting cross-legged on your bed, your digital alarm clock counting down the time in radioactive green. Outside, you hear the sounds of jets roaring through the sky. In your tiny kitchen unit, the faucet is leaking.

Finally, five minutes into a lecture on the advantages of pre-chopped garlic, you interrupt, “Mom?”

You wonder if she hears the shift in your voice, the slight tremble of it. Something makes her go very quiet on the other end of the line, no sound but her breath.

Drip-drip-drip goes your faucet.

When she doesn’t acknowledge you, you push on, your heart beating a staccato rhythm against your ribcage, “I might… I think I might need some help.”

She doesn’t answer for so long you think you might have lost connection. Then you hear shuffling, imagine her walking through her empty house the way she sometimes does - like a phantom, like a specter.

“With what?” she asks after an eternity.

It’s all you can do to keep yourself from hyperventilating. Years of pain and fear clog up your chest, settle like goosebumps on your skin. You close your eyes and let your head drop back against your pillow.

“I’m pregnant,” you say.

And then you can feel it through the phone, like something physical. What you’ve always known deep down. The disapproval and the disappointment, and the complete lack of understanding.

You’ve never been who your parents wanted you to be, and they’ve always punished you for it like it was a crime.

When your mother says your name, it’s so plain. That she can’t understand what you’re doing, with your cocktails and your late nights. That she doesn’t see why you’d ever choose something like that over a real education and a real job. That she cannot fathom how it could come to this now - you, broke, young, alone, pregnant.

It’s like being five again, trying to get somebody to look at the picture you drew. It’s like being ten again and being overlooked. It’s like being fifteen again, still vying for the attention you’ll never really get.

Your mother is a stubborn woman, set in her ways. She knows what she wants from people, more specifically, what she wants for them. And you’re no exception. Nobody’s ever asked her a question whose answer she couldn’t find in the bible.

More than wanting you to go to college, wanting you to work in an office, your mother has always wanted you to get married. To fit yourself into the picture-perfect stencil of white picket fence and smiling husband she cut herself. For you to let some guy put a ring on you, put a kid in you, buy you a house and a porch swing and a family van.

It’s pathetic, but it doesn’t matter how much time passes. How much older you get. At the end of the day, you still want her approval, just once, even if you have to lie to get it.

So, like a child, like you’re five again, like you’re ten again, like you’re fifteen again, you say, “I’m getting married.”

“Oh?” your mother asks, and there’s so much hope in the one word it hits you like a ton of bricks.

“Yeah,” you confirm, and then the lies just burst out of you, and you hate yourself, hate yourself so much it’s like bile on your tongue, “yeah, we’ve been engaged for a while, and now with the baby and all… It’s been long overdue.”

Your mother almost sounds excited. Sure, she’d probably prefer for you to have been married before getting knocked up, but all of this must still seem better than the last plan you presented to her four years ago. “What’s his name? What’s he do?”

You squeeze your eyes closed. If your mother knew you at all, if you hadn’t spent the past few years not speaking, you’d like to think she would have heard the shame in your voice when you say, “Bradley. He’s a Naval aviator.”

It might be the worst thing you’ve done in your life: Dragging poor, kind Bradley Bradshaw into the mess you’ve made of your life. Nevermind that he offered. It doesn’t matter.

Your mother starts babbling, the way she only does when she’s actually pleased about something. She’s talking about how happy your dad will be that you’re getting married to a fellow army guy, but you barely hear it. Now that you’ve gotten the approval, it doesn’t feel at all like you thought it would.

It just hurts.

For a while, you just let her keep talking as you blink away the tears, as you stare at your bedroom wall, as your mind spins and spins and spins in circles. Then you promise to send her an invite, say your goodbyes, and hang up.

It’s like you’re numb all over. You stay on your bed for another five minutes, and then another, and you feel just as empty as you did after your last conversation with Luke.

What has your life become? How could it crumble as quickly as it did, going from okay to horrible in less than a week?

Even when you weren’t speaking to your parents, you never felt this distant from them, this far removed. A chasm you’ll never be able to breach. An ocean you’re never going to bridge. The only way you’ve ever gotten your mother to be happy with a decision you’ve made is when you lied to her.

The loneliness is everywhere, then. In your chest, in your bed, in your veins. Crawling like a shadow that swallows you whole.

And then the panic sets in, ice cold in your veins, and with it comes the guilt. Your stomach rolls with it.

What have I done? you wonder. What have I done to myself, to Bradley? How will I ever get out of this?

You scramble. Blindly reach for a dress to slip into, for a pair of flip-flops, for your car keys. It’s a miracle you don’t crash on your way to the Hard Deck. Your heart works itself up into a frenzy, and the guilt gnaws at you, slashes at you, paws at you. All these emotions are tearing you apart.

In the back, Bradley and Bob are playing Pacman on one of the retro machines. They’re pretty loud, too, and from what you gather in your mad dash through your workplace, Bradley seems to be disproportionally competitive about the whole thing.

Figures. Nobody gets into Top Gun without a cutthroat streak and a mean penchant for ambition.

“Bradley,” you say, and when he looks up, his eyes sparkling, the smile slides right off his face. “Can I talk to you?”

He seems stunned for a second, then nods and deposits his beer on a nearby table. “Sure thing.”

You lead him out the back. Out of the corner of your eyes, you spot the exact corner you huddled in a few days back, agonizing over the positive pregnancy test, the decline of your life, the decay of your dreams. Don’t look, you tell yourself, and then do it anyway.

The sun hasn’t set yet, but twilight is descending on the world rapidly. Everything is washed into soft pastels, the sand and the last surfers shaking salt water from their hair. Bradley’s shirt and the honey gold of his skin.

You can’t look at him. It’s a shame that grows in the pit of your stomach, that settles there, heavy like a stone. How can you do this to him?

You’ve never felt worse about yourself, and still… The fear is too big.

Since you decided to give up on the scholarship, since you walked out of your parents house four years ago, you’ve been on your own. You’ve been footing your own bills and renting your own apartment and paying for insurance on your car. You were alone the time you got a cold so bad you couldn’t get out of bed for two days. You were alone when your tire popped on the highway and you almost hit another car. You were alone when you got rejection after rejection from the big San Diego bars, the ones that end up featured on TV and in magazines.

And that was fine. You’re strong, you know you are. Any issue that came your way, you managed to figure out eventually. You’ve been doing fine without any help.

But this, here, now. This… You just can’t do it on your own. Not when it’s about a baby. Your baby.

So you take a deep breath and ask, “Is the offer still on the table?”

Bradley exhales. You watch as he takes a step closer to you, as his shoes move in the field of your vision, grains of sand crunching beneath the soles. When he speaks, a cadence of insecurity has snuck into his voice, “The marriage?”

You nod because you can’t say it. Your mouth just won’t form the words.

“If…” Bradley clears his throat. “If you want it… yeah.”

When you look up at him, there’s something strange on his face. Something that looks less like surprise and more like awe.

His eyes are so brown, and your heart beats so fast, and you’re dizzy like you just got off a rollercoaster.

“I…” You pause to collect your thoughts, and then you rush it all out at once, scared that if you don’t say it now, you never will. “If I were to say yes, like, hypothetically… I’d need to know that you’re not just doing it for me. That there’s something in it for you, too, so….”

He’s nodding before you’ve finished. “I told you. I wanna stay here. I’m sick of getting sent around the country all the time, so… It’s good. It’s an opportunity.”

An opportunity. That sounds like business, sounds like a transaction, sounds rational and level-headed and reasonable, and you latch onto the idea. Maybe if you try to take the emotion out of the equation, it’ll be easier.

Bradley seems relaxed about the whole thing, much more relaxed than he should be given the absurdity of the situation, but you feel like you need to make things clear anyway, if only to put yourself at ease. That’s what people do before singing contracts, right? Put all the cards out on the table?

So you go on, “And I wouldn’t, like… Like you’d still get to do anything you want. I wouldn’t expect you to help with the baby or anything. And you could keep dating, of course, you could, I won’t mind. I promise. It’d just be for show, right?”

Bradley hesitates, and for a second, you think he’s going to say something. But then he just shrugs, nods, says, “That’s fine. Yeah. Whatever you want.”

For a moment, you both just look at each other.

“This is insane,” you say because it is, and you don’t know what else to say.

And Bradley just chuckles and agrees smoothly, “Yeah, it’s nuts, isn’t it?”

As you look at him, here in this pastel lighting, here on the verge of something monumental, there’s something so reassuring about him. Something so steady and reliable and constant. Something that makes you think, with him, maybe it could be okay, no matter how insane the whole idea is. An opportunity. An investment that just might pay off.

North star, you remind yourself. Bradley Bradshaw is the North Star.

At the very least, you won’t be alone.

“So is that….” Bradley shifts, scratches the back of his neck. “You saying yes, then?”

There’s a lump in your throat like you’ve swallowed a pebble. It almost chokes you.

“Yeah,” you agree finally, and can’t believe you’re saying this, doing this, can’t believe you’re this mad and this selfish and this desperate. “I guess I am.”

It’s awkward after that. You both just stand there, you with your arms around your own ribcage, Bradley with his thumbs hooked into his belt loops. Space and silence stretches far and gaping and glaring between you.

Then he says, “Can I hug you?”

That’s sort of the last thing you expected him to say.

You blink at him. “Uhm… sure?”

When Bradley pulls you into his arms, when he holds you against his chest loosely, carefully, giving you room to pull away at any moment, the whole thing almost bowls you over. It’s the first time anybody’s hugged you since you found out you’re pregnant, since your entire world came crashing down, and you can’t help yourself. It’s a visceral reaction. You cling to him, wrap your arms around his neck, press your face into his shoulder and your chest against his and squeeze your eyes shut, and stay there for longer than you planned to, longer than you should. Let him hold you tight enough that for a moment, for a while, it almost feels like you’re whole again. Like you’re not alone.

For the first time in a week, for the first time since that positive test, things feel real. You feel real. Only with his hands on you. The thoughts that have been echoing through your head constantly, loud enough to drown out everything else, quiet.

You could get addicted to it, could get greedy and selfish and never-satisfied. Could eat it raw.

Bradley smells like sunscreen and sandalwood. You try to commit that scent to memory, try to ingrain it into your brain and your body. Something to remember the next time the loneliness sets in.

Finally, he pulls away, and his smile is gentle. You feel every inch of separation like an ache in your bones, like an echo, like a reverberation.

You can’t cry again. You’ve been doing it so much recently that you just won’t allow it again. If you’re going to do this, if you’re going to be a mother and a wife, in whatever capacity, you’ll have to be strong. No matter how hard that will be.

“I don’t even have a ring for you,” Bradley says, a frown etching itself into his forehead. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh.” You’re shaking your head quickly, vehemently. “No, Bradley, that’s fine, you don’t need to….”

“I think you should have something, though. I want to give you something,” he interrupts you. “I just don’t know….”

And then he seems to think of something. The epiphany is practically written all over his face, and for a moment, he looks so much younger. Rosy cheeks and all.

Bradley reaches into his wifebeater and pulls his dog tags from beneath the fabric. Before you know what’s happening, he’s tugging the thin silver chain down over your head, moving your hair out of the way carefully. It settles against the skin of your neck, warmed by his body heat.

You stare down at the metal dangling over your dress, the letters of his name etched into it. Bradley Bradshaw.

Your heart seizes.

When you were younger, much younger, you used to dream of this. You used to imagine what being proposed to would feel like, what it would be like. A fancy restaurant, an expensive glass of champagne, and a diamond ring at the bottom of the flute. Something flashy, something extravagant, something beautiful. The man in your fantasy was faceless at first, and then he looked like Robert Pattinson, and then he looked like your first crush, and then he went back to being faceless again.

He never had a mustache. He was never a stranger. Your dreams were never this: Rushed and fake and no ring at all. You, pregnant with somebody else’s baby, and Bradley, marrying you to get assigned to a base of his choosing. None of it real. No True Love, no capital t, no capital l. Not even lowercase. Nothing but madness and guilt and business between you.

And still you want it, want it so bad it swells inside you, pushes against your ribcage with enough pressure to crack bones - you want to be wanted.

You wonder what Bradley dreamed of. Not you, probably. So much younger than him, so naive, so gullible, falling for married men and getting yourself into situations you can’t climb out of yourself. Making him do this when he deserves better, more, deserves something true and real.

It makes you sick to your stomach. It makes you want to cry. It makes you want to ask Bradley to hug you again, so you can forget, just for another second, just for another moment.

Instead, you say, voice barely a whisper, “Thank you.”

Bradley shakes his head. “You don’t have to thank me,” he says, and he sounds so genuine you have to avert your eyes. “We’re friends, right?”

Friends. This man you barely know. This man who is doing something unfathomable for you.

“Yeah,” you agree softly. “Friends.”

And then later, in the bar, as Bradley’s friends discuss some new Star Wars show you haven’t seen, as they order round after round of beer you can’t drink, as the sky goes from pastels to blues to blacks, you’ll pretend you don’t see Natasha staring at the dog tags around your neck, pretend you don’t wish you could hold Bradley’s hand, pretend you don’t feel like you’re falling apart, like you’re capsizing where you sit, like you're kicking water miles and miles and miles below the surface.

Beneath the table, you put a hand on your stomach, fingers spreading out, close your eyes, and let the current drag you under.

part 2 coming - soon

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fic recs i am very excited! 2022 Top gun top gun maverick rooster september bradley bradshaw my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing seasonsbloom you will always be famous FINALLY A ROOSTER SERIES I PRAYED FOR TIMES LIKE THIS the way you write him is so ❤️‍🩹 the angstiest of angst i am also very mentally ill but technically read it in august

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

i wish i could feel the same way i felt when i read this for the first time. one of my absolute favorite pieces of writing ever. i think about it all the time.

COMPLETED (2/2)

Part One: “Devils Roll The Dice”

JJ and Y/N‘s friendship has been different since they secretly started hooking up. With new feelings stirred up by the recent change in their relationship, Y/N avoids JJ until the Pogues gather them together for a Fourth of July party that can only end in chaos.

Warnings: Implied sexual content, strong language, alcohol consumption, angst, implied physical abuse, and mild violence.

Word Count: 17k

Part Two: “Angels Roll Their Eyes”

Hurricane Agatha approaches Kildare Island during the aftermath of the eventful Fourth of July party. JJ and Y/N are determined to continue avoiding each other after what happened at the party, but John B, Kiara, and Pope have other plans for them.

Warnings: Smut, strong language, angst, implied physical abuse, depictions of anxiety/panic attacks, and sickeningly sweet fluff.

Word Count: 24k

(gif: @jackpearcsn)

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brainrot fic recs 2023 jj maybank january im rambling outer banks all-time favorite my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing fanfiction hall of fame cruel summer > whatever’s considered the greatest novel of all time YOU PUT THEM ALL TO SHAME!!! perfect dialogue perfect everything everything is so IN CHARACTER and i THANK YOU for it!!! i think i first read this in august 2021? and it’s never left my brain and i’ll reblog it with highlights soon “DO I MAKE YOU NERVOUS? NOT AS MUCH AS I MAKE YOU” LINE YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

29/12/22: TOP GUN BOXER AU IS SOMETING I DID NOT KNOW I NEEDED IN MY LIFE AND NOW HOW HAVE I BEEN LIVING WITHOUT IT? I DON’T KNOW!!! i think boxing would be such a good outlet for rooster’s frustrations so this is very perfect and i can’t wait to see more!!! i also saw you’re including jake and bob in this universe together and i can’t wait to read their parts!!! my favorite parts are below, your writing is spectacular!!!

r“Bradley can still feel each punch in his fists and the pain that erupts like fireworks on his skin from where the textured leather of Billy’s gloves made a direct hit. It had been a good fight.” absolutely love this description!!!

“Thought you were gonna put Hayes in a goddamn coma last week.” Adler snorts in agreement.

“I’ll try harder next time.” pls why is he so unserious sjhfhehdjdh

the way you’re setting the scenes for us and introducing this universe!!! perfection!!! the atmosphere is on point!!! it’s like a movie!!!

“That catches Bradley’s attention, his eyes drifting down to the wet shirt plastered against your bra. He rips his gaze to the floor before he can get too caught up in your cleavage, shaking off any inappropriate thoughts quickly. Adler would beat him to a pulp.” ok FIRST i love how he just instantly kind of shakes it off he WAS gonna look but then decides not to, he is a GENTLEMAN!!! and SECOND i love the line “would beat him to a pulp”, it’s perfect. probably my favorite out of this part!!! so well written!!!

“You look at the large gray sweatshirt in your hands, before timidly peeking at him through your lashes. “Are you sure? What if you get cold?” SHE’S A SWEETHEART!!!

“You hold the zipper between your fingers, before a thought comes to you suddenly and you pause to look at him again. “You can’t peek.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.” Bradley deadpans and closes his eyes.” already loving this dynamic 🥺🥲🥹

“Bradley’s lips quirk up only slightly at your sincerity. “Keep it, toots.” AND HERE HE ISSSSSSSS!!! yes he beats people up for a living but he IS a gentleman ❤️

“The two hardly spoke now — not after Bradley bulked up during the off season and moved up a weight class — and Maverick was set on keeping it that way, given that Bradley almost killed Isaac the last time they fought. He wasn’t sorry about it then and, looking at the motherfucker who’s groveling in front of his friend, he isn’t sorry about it now.” i support rooster’s rights but also his wrongs!!! and i also love how you placed maverick in this story!!!

“Bradley holds his hands up in mock surrender, directing his next words towards Isaac as he steps closer to him, “I just wanted to see how the fake teeth were coming in. They look good, Golovkin.” PLS WJHFHEHDHDHHD THE MOCKERY

“Fuck it, Bradley will apologize later.” the way you go back to the line about penny not liking blood on her floors with this i love ittttt and it builds the scene so well, i could visualize everything in my head!!!

“Aw,” Bradley pouts condescendingly as Isaac spits out thick blood onto the gravel. “And you just got new teeth too. I’m sorry, buddy.” WHY IS HE LIKE THIS I CAN’T-

“You son of a bitch!” Adler seethes, bunching up Bradley’s collar in his fists. “What the fuck did you do to my daughter?!” at first i thought her dad was gonna freak out because of the hoodie BUT IT GETS BETTER YOU MADE IT BETTER

“Adler’s body tenses at the way your voice wavers. “What did you do, Rooster?” this took a turn i wasn’t expecting at all the tone shift was so good!!! i can’t wait to read the rest!!!

Staking a Claim

summary - Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw was ruthless, a stone cold killer both in and outside of the ring — with the belts and trophies to prove it. When a miscalculation results in a target being put on the back of his trainer’s daughter, Bradley finds himself facing responsibility he never signed up for. You’re a whole new challenge. And Bradley doesn’t think you’re one he can fight his way out of.

warnings - DARK THEMES, boxer au, violence, threats of violence, language, mentions of drinking, brief mention of pain killers, harassment, stalking, blood, men talking badly about women, no use of y/n, does Bradley have a pain kink? the world may never know

this series is 18+, minors please do not interact

word count - 3.4k

monsters in the dark masterlist

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fic recs 2022 Top gun top gun maverick rooster december bradley bradshaw my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing boxer rooster i will never recover this concept is so original i love it!!! [redacted thoughts]

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

16/08/2022: FAKE DATING TROPE YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS!!! there’s so much *yearning* in this oneeeeeeeee. the way their not-date starts blending in as the night comes to an end and things start to slip and get a little more real!!!!!! you wrote this so well!!!!! it was definitely worth the wait and COME ONE NOW PLEASE TELL ME YOU’RE PLANNING A PART 3??? maybeeee? pleaseeee? this was delightful, let the boyfriend experience live on forever!!!

”Well, you made sure I didn't have a run there to fake propose in front of all these witnesses. Left my fake engagement ring in my dresser drawer back at base,” he snapped his fingers. "Fuck." i love that he keeps saying fake in front on the words it’s so cute i just know bradley was having the time of his life playing pretend. AND YES PLEASE DO FAKE PROPOSE!!!!

“He nodded and grinned. "I'd guarantee you a life of no more wedding BS though.” oh he’s such a little shit please sjdhjshxhshdhshdhs <3

"You're such a dick," you could only respond, handing the glass back as he chuckled, putting the garter back in his breast pocket, patting it safely.

"Taken you 30 years to figure it out - that's more on you than me though," he teased.” i know i’ve said this already but i ADORE the way you write their banter. it’s simple and very believable dialogue and they’re so sillyyyyyyyy. babies.

“He took your hand and spun you back to him, facing the other again and he smiled slow, a smile you'd certainly never seen before but enjoyed thoroughly as his hands moved to the back of your ribs, dragging you closer to him.” *SCREAMING*

“Good, Please get my sister home safely?" she warned him.

"Of course, she's precious cargo," he smiled as Annie kissed you and waddled over to Arron, her extremely drunk hubby.” the older sister interactions are everything to me like SHE SEENS WHAT’S GOING ONNNNN!!!!! SHE GETS IT!!!!!! and bradley saying she’s PRECIOUS CARGO? 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

“Rooster pouted. "Then I'll piggyback you,” EXCUSE ME WHILE I CRY?????????

“You wished he'd stop talking because as he adjusted his hold on you, leaving one hand on your hip, the other arm wrapping around your shoulders, you only reaffirmed how good you fit against him.” she’s trying to fight her feelings so hard!!!! don’t do it!!!! he’s gonna be good for you!!! 🥺

”He nodded. It felt like a kiss-off, that was for sure. "I wasn't asking for the rest of our lives," he said quietly.

"I know," you pulled back, needing to be completely out of his reach. "But I just don't know what to tell you right now.” I WASN’T ASKING FOR THE REST OF OUR LIVES I AM IN SO MUCH PAIN RIGHT NOW BECAUSE I KNOW HE WANTS IT TO BE FOR THE REST OF THEIR LIVES.

“Goodnight, Rooster," you said as you unlocked the door and took a step in before pausing. Rationality be damned. "Unless you wanna come in?" you called softly in the dead quiet of the night. You could see his brain working a million miles a moment.” AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA I’M SMILING!!!!! I’M CLAPPING!!!!!!! I’M CHEERING!!!!!!! i can visualize his facial expressio here so clearly, his mind working a million miles!!!!!

“Always," he said softly and put the photo back carefully on the wall. "You keep it, it gives me something to see when I am here.” her picture with carol and this moment between them made my heart crack a little. the fact that she was this connection to bradley’s parents must be very special to him, you know????

“He wouldn't lie and say he hadn't memorised every curve of your body, your smile and that absolutely devastating self-deprecating wit but there were plenty of other distractions in his wake. But here you were, right before him. And you, at that moment, were perfect but he didn't know what you wanted from him and it ate him alive.” SO MANY FEELINGS HERE!!!! I LOVE IT WHEN AUTHOURS DO THIS *STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS* THING BECAUSE EVERYTHING GETS REALLY TANGLED AND IT’S VERY REAL!!!! BEAUTIFUL!!!!! MY FAVORITE LINE!!!!!!!!!

“I know she was sick... but she really died of a broken heart in the end," he said quietly.” i’m so so sad. this is probably one of the saddest details about bradley’s past and his parents that i’ve ever read in any fic. so sad but VERY BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!

“When I find the one, I'll know," he added, taking your hand back into his and this time, he avoided your gaze as he drew circles around the pads of your palm. "I'm sure of it." He was sure of it.” OH THE IMPLICATIONS OF THIS!!!!!! BRADLEY I AM READING BETWEEN THE LINES YOU’RE NOT FOOLING ANYONE…

“I love flying," he looked up. "My fate is sealed, but the right person? Jesus, fucking the right person could make you wanna give it all up, you know?” jesus christ. i’m gonna need 30 days to recover from this line ALONE.

“He smiled, a small tint of red creeping up to his cheeks. "You're enjoying this, aren't you?"

"I think I like making you squirm," you said simply as dropped his eyes, coy all of a sudden.” BANTER!!!!!!!!!!! THEY ARE MY BELOVEDS!!!!!!!

“He adjusted his posture and he took your chin in his palm, his thumb imprinting on your chin. God, you were right there, so close... desperate to be kissed. "I like the chase," his voice low. "But the chase isn't all that much a challenge much anymore," he admitted and his wrist started beeping. 4am. He needed to go. He silenced it. "Saved by the bell," he announced. "That's my alarm.” NOT THE ALARM INTERRUPTION STOP THIS IS SO MEAN. THE NAVY CAN WAIT. also him taking her chin in palm!!!!! love this!!!!

“Fuck, you're so beautiful, do you know that?" he couldn't stop himself from saying. It just had to be said and put out there. Great, now it was done, he reasoned. You didn't break his gaze, you were daring him to make a move. He licked his lips and had to laugh. He'd already made the move. If you wanted him, he decided... the ball was in your court. Come and claim me, he wished.” he’s starting to crack!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Stay."

"No," he said, sitting forward. Fight for me.” i genuinely gasped and had to pause for a second when i read that he said “no”. and then you continued with the “fight for me” and i was like OH!!!!!!!!

“It was powerful and intimate and he didn't know if he trusted himself to be touching you like this.” AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA i’m about to combust.

“He bristled a laugh as you reached for a button on his shirt, dainty fingers making light work of the straining material over his chest. "Think I'm gonna just fuck you after all this?" he removed your hands, placing them back in your lap where he silently prayed you'd keep them because his strength was waning and if you tried really hard, you'd have him exactly where you wanted him. "You really wanna make this about a quick fuck and I just up and leave?" he shook his head. "I think you know by now I want a little more than that.” I THINK YOU KNOW BY NOW I WANT A LITTLE MORE THAN THAT!!!!!!! I GOT CHILLS ALL OVER MY BODYYYYYYYYYYYY. this whole sequence had me buzzing, the contrast between this words!!!!!

"What do you want, Rooster?" you asked, your fingers tracing his scars, finding one on his jaw you were particularly fond of and tracing it, feeling him tremor beneath you. "Tell me," you said reaching for the hem of your shirt and he knew he was going for martyrdom as he held your shirt down, whispering a curse.” i’m just a shaking and crying and throwing up mess by this point. absolute zero coherent thoughts.

“The blood was pumping so loud in your ears that you were finding it hard to focus. You were drawn out of your stupor as his alarm started buzzing on his wrist again. He was getting later.” STOP THE ANTICIPATION HERE IS KILLING ME!!!!!!! YOU GOT ME ON THE EDGE OF MY SEAT.

"And if I fuck it up?" you asked, scared as reality started to kick in.

"What if I do?" he challenged. "Do we not owe it to ourselves to find out?" i love this. i love that he reminds her this isn’t a one way street. that if they give each other a chance, they’re both responsible for working together to make the relationship work!!!! they’re both scared and it’s okay!!!!

“Soft, inobtrusive, it felt like you'd been kissing him your whole life.” I TAKE IT BACK THIS IS MY FAVORITE LINE. HOW DARE YOU WRITE “IF FELT LIKE YOU’F BEEN KISSING HIM YOUR WHOLE LIFE” AND EXPECT ME TO JUST MOVE ON??????

“If I don't front up today... every single person we know will know exactly where I am... and why," he said, voice laced in mirth.

You told him softly, "I will make it worth your while."

He groaned loudly, his body already ready and willing, pressed unyielding against you. "I believe you," he breathed.” I LOVE THIS!!!

“He gave a small smile, pushing some hair from your eyes. "Good morning, fake girlfriend," he kissed you gently again, let go of you to collect his gear at your feet and forced himself into opening the door, stepping over the threshold purposefully. He leaned back and kissed you once more. "I'll call you later," he breathed, trying to gather some resolve.” GOOD MORNING FAKE GIRLFRIENDDDDDDDDD!!!!!!! I SWOON EVERY TIME HE CALLS HER HIS FAKE GIRLFRIEND!!!!

“I got a wedding invite through the week," he smiled kindly and you bit back a laugh. "Thought maybe you'd like to go with me..."

“Think you can keep this fake dating thing going until then?" you asked, caressing his cheek.

“I'm pretty confident we may not be fake dating then..." he said quietly, kissing you just one more time.” OH THE UNIVERSE AND ITS BEAUTIFUL COINCIDENCES. AND HE’S SUCH A COCKY LITTLE SHIT!!!!!

“Jesus Christ, I want to stay. Please tell me to leave," his eyes fluttered closed.” I CAN HEAR THE RESTRAINING IN HIS VOICE!!!! I CAN HEAR HIM PANTING!!!!!!!! HOW TEMPTED HE IS TO STAY!!!!!!

“He nodded, thankful for your push. "I'll see you later," he said and forcibly turned away, his feet taking him away from you and when he was out of your view, you felt the weight of his dog tags on your chest.” THE DOG TAGS!!!!!!!! HOW DARE YOU!!!!!!

i loved it so much, this was the bumpy moment we have to go through in every romcom in order to get to the happy ending. we got fluff and pain and insecurities and BRADLEY BRADSHAW BEING THE BIGGEST CHARMER ON PLANET EARTH AND DOGS TAGS AT THE END!!!! ❤️‍🩹

The Boyfriend Experience - Part 2 / 2

7k words of Rooster being your super wonderful, pretend plus one! A few swears, but it’s the Navy, goddammit! The fluffiness should make up for it.

The Boyfriend Experience 1 / 2

“Thank God you didn’t catch the bouquet,” Rooster rolled his eyes as you wandered back, bored. “Could you look any less interested?” he bit back a smile.

“I could, yes,“ you told him, patting his cheek with a gentle thwack as he chuckled.

”Well, you made sure I didn’t have a run there to fake propose in front of all these witnesses. Left my fake engagement ring in my dresser drawer back at base,” he snapped his fingers. "Fuck.”

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fic recs august 2022 Top gun top gun maverick rooster bradley bradshaw my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing so many beautiful lines written in this one romcom excellence childhood friends to fake dating to lovers

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

15/08/2022: holy shit. okay. i stumbled upon this a couple of days ago and as soon as i saw it was inspired by chemtrails by lizzy mcalpine i had to take like 15 minutes to mentally prepare myself to read it. HOLY SHIT!!!!!!! that song IS rooster. it’s him and his relationship with his dad and his grief and the weight he carries and all these frustrations. AND THEN YOU GO AND WRITE IT ALL DOWN!!!!!!!! this one was intense and so beautifully written. i haven’t read the series it’s connected to (but i wasn’t confused without context or anything like that, i feel like this could be it’s own seperate little thing) but i just might because this was so beautiful??? i’ll never be able to listen to chemtrails the same way again.

“How does he even begin to describe you? How you put all your might into your work —whether it’s Top Gun or a romance with one other actor and a piano— without any pretense, emotions running high and mind going a mile a minute at work —a delicate art of letting go and reigning it back in—, and then come home and just be… human with him.” i love the way you described acting here. a delicate art of letting go and reigning it back in!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and then she goes home and she can just be HUMAN WITH HIM!!!!!!!!!!!!! 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

“She’s pretty badass,” he smiles a little. His hand picks at the grass under his palm, suddenly nervous about what he’s about to say next. “I think she might be it.” SHE’S IT!!! YEP!!!!!!! i love it when authors make their characters say the most meaningful things in the world with such little words!!!!!!!

“He doesn’t know why he’s saying it. For celebration, having made a very big, grownup step in his life? For comfort, because he doesn’t admit it to anyone (not even to himself) but he’s so scared he’s nowhere near grown enough to do this? Maybe for reassurance, because he so wants it to be true.” i love him so much, i desperately need him to be happy. this happened to make me emotionalllll because i’m also scared of everything all the time and no matter how many years go by i’ll never feel i’m grown enough for anything. i get him!!!

“White clouds paint the sky in an array of lines. A gentle breeze sweeps across his face, and the trees nearby whisper in rustles, and Rooster swears he almost hears it.

And so he asks.

“Talk to me, Dad.” no because when i noticed at the beginning that he was actually talking to goose… i’m not kidding, i’m not exaggerating: I GASPED!!! chills all over my body. it was so smart of you!!!

“The sight he finds upon opening the door isn’t surprising —you sat on the bench, fingers working the piano keys, phone propped on the music stand— but his heart catches anyway.” but his heart catches anyway ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ love it when men are whipped and head over heels in love.

“He kisses the top of your head and sits next to you.” such a tender moment. it’s very rooster. i’m in love with him.

“It just happens to be his dad’s first (and only) big purchase for the house.” NO STOP MAKING ME CRY IF IT’S HIS DAD’S OF COURSE IT’S IMPORTANT AND OF COURSE YOU GUYS SHOULD KEEP IT.

“You pause for a moment, and he squeezes your knee in reassurance. For you and for himself.” FOR YOU AND FOR HIMSELF!!!!!!!! my favorite detail!!!! my eyes are filled with tears i swear to godddddd. this is too sweet.

“Rooster collapses his head on your shoulder, and kisses you there in thanks. For understanding. For seeing right through him and communicating it in the exact way that he would understand.” beautiful. i love love. would love to be loved someday.

“The boy who grew up there is taller now. Older. Smarter, wiser —or so he hopes. A spitting image of his father —and yet, everything he wasn’t.”

Angrier. Older. Carrying a bigger chip on his shoulder.” favorite fucking line in the entire world. ANGRIER!!! OLDER!!! CARRYING A BIGGER CHIP ON HIS SHOULDER!!! my heart dropped. you managed to put rooster into words. and even more… you managed to put bradley into words. i like to think there is a little difference between who they are on the job and who they are at home. you summarized them both. perfectly. in the most heartbreaking way possible. seriously, you kind of changed my life with this one. i’ve been thinking about it for days. will be thinking about it forever probably.

“And yet… maybe, hopefully, he’ll hold up just fine.” by this point, i was bawling. i read this around 1am (i think) so i was feeling very emotional and i just love the song you based it off so so much so it was all perfect.

“Are you okay?” your hand slips into his, so easily and effortlessly that it just feels like it’s where it should be.” 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

“He brings up your intertwined hands to his lips, and presses a kiss there.” SO ROOSTER!!!!!! ALWAYS SO ROMANTIC!!! THESE LITTLE DETAILS ARE EVERYTHING TO ME!!!!!

“I love you so much, you know that?”

“I think I might’ve had a clue or two?” your voice, bright and laced with humor, rings almost out of place in the solemn stillness of this house. This moment.” they are very silly i literally just got this glimpse of their relationship and i already love them. i’m so fucking happy for them.

“Will you marry me?” DUDE HOLY SHIT- I WAS NOT EXPECTING A PROPOSAL!!!!! I GASPED FOR A SECOND TIME, THIS WAS PERFECT. I’M A SUCKER FOR SIMPLE PROPOSALS LIKE THIS MY HEART GREW 3 SIZES.

“I haven’t even got a ring yet.”

“That’s fine. We can always get it later.”

“I’ll get it, not you,” he corrects firmly, and it makes you laugh. It’s the most beautiful sound he’ll ever hear, and he finally pulls you in for a proper kiss. It’s not planned, it’s far from perfect, but he wouldn’t ever have it any other way.” HE’LL GET IT!!!!!!! HE’LL GET THE RING!!!!! OH PLEASE STOP!!!!!! ADORABLE!!!!!! HE’S THE LOVE OF MY LIFE!!!!!

i feel this is almost a character analysis of rooster in a way. of who he could grow to be as well. he’s such a complex character and every retelling of his is always so so sad that it’s heartbreaking because he’s a really tragic character at the end of the dag, we can’t really change that, you know? so reading this, KNOWING IT’S BASED OFF CHEMSTRAILS FOR GOD’S SAKE, feeling all the grief he carries, and then you go and give him these very tender moments filled with love made my heart almost burst out of my rib cage 💞💞💞💞💞💞💞💞💞💞💞💞 it was beautiful and i’ll treasure this forever!!!!

i’m almost scared to ask because this song kills me but i just need to read this fic for blurb week- chemtrails by lizzy mcalpine?

bro i gotta admit... this is killing me too. i cried basically the whole time im writing this, but i hope you like it bc im pretty happy with how it turned out. also! the music here is extra special bc i sang and played it myself <333

warnings: fluff, grief, this is very goose and rooster-centric, im just a big ball of mush guys <3

***

“Man, I forgot how nice it is out here.” Rooster leans back, hands propping himself up as he sits cross-legged on the fresh green grass. The clear blue sky sprawling over his head. Maybe it’s the peace and quiet, maybe it's the fresh air, but this is one of the few places where he can actually…

Breathe.

“We’re nearly packed up now. Found this nice place in San Clemente with a nice deck out, maybe even a fire pit —you’re gonna love it,” he chuckles, resigning with the fact that he’s excited about the stereotypically dad stuff now, like decks and barbecues.

“Yeah, it’s a bit of a drive to North Island, but we wanted a place somewhere in between there and LA.” It was an extensive discussion to say the least. You work in completely different fields with equally grueling and unusual hours —if not days, or weeks, or months. “I thought maybe we should keep our own places, so she can be close to her work and I can be near base, but… I don’t think I’d want it any other way?”

He’s already away from you so much. What’s an extra hour-and-a-half drive if it means he can crawl into bed and fall asleep in your arms? He wouldn’t want it any other way.

Not when it comes to you.

“She’s great, by the way,” he perks up immediately at the thought of you. “She does these musicals that Mom liked, and actions and all these cool stuff —I’ve even taken her flying for one of her movies. She’s, uh…”

How does he even begin to describe you? How you put all your might into your work —whether it’s Top Gun or a romance with one other actor and a piano— without any pretense, emotions running high and mind going a mile a minute at work —a delicate art of letting go and reigning it back in—, and then come home and just be… human with him.

Kind, caring, funny, imperfect, human.

“She’s pretty badass,” he smiles a little. His hand picks at the grass under his palm, suddenly nervous about what he’s about to say next. “I think she might be it.”

He doesn’t know why he’s saying it. For celebration, having made a very big, grownup step in his life? For comfort, because he doesn’t admit it to anyone (not even to himself) but he’s so scared he’s nowhere near grown enough to do this? Maybe for reassurance, because he so wants it to be true.

The earth below him is warm. Steady. The grass layers as a soft place for his hands to land. For his body to ground. White clouds paint the sky in an array of lines. A gentle breeze sweeps across his face, and the trees nearby whisper in rustles, and Rooster swears he almost hears it.

And so he asks.

“Talk to me, Dad.”

******

His childhood home, a modest two-bedroom with white-paneled front, sits on a quiet street in the suburbs of Virginia Beach. The maple tree out front has cuts and carvings on its trunk from when Rooster got into throwing knives (a hobby his mom had an ulcer over), and a broken branch from when he installed a makeshift swing and tried to get himself and two other friends swinging on it back in 8th grade. He hears the piano playing as he walks up the steps —the old, secondhand upright that’s a little out of tune now.

The sight he finds upon opening the door isn’t surprising —you sat on the bench, fingers working the piano keys, phone propped on the music stand— but his heart catches anyway.

“Still think we should keep it?” he pats the flat surface on the top, leaving his keys and his sunglasses there.

“Oh, definitely. This baby…” you thoughtfully stroke the lacquered wood finish, “She’s a gem. Nothing a little tuning can’t fix.”

He kisses the top of your head and sits next to you. Both of you know there’s nothing special about this piano in particular. Not when it comes to its sound or feel or anything taken into consideration for an instrument.

It just happens to be his dad’s first (and only) big purchase for the house.

“Hey, uh…” you pipe up gingerly, “I wrote something for you. May I…?”

You may be a lot of things, but shy isn’t one of them. At least not with him. He just throws you a funny look. “Babe, of course. What—”

“Okay.” With that you shift into a straighter position, fingers hovering just above the ivories. You’re quiet —hesitant, almost— before you play the first line. Pressing just one key at a time.

“I see chemtrails in the sky, but I don’t see the plane.”

Rooster’s breath catches in his throat.

“I know the feeling, but I don’t know the name.”

A simple melody, floating like a question, and he doesn’t understand how you could explain it before than he himself does.

“I still play with my food, and then I… throw it away.”

An admission so simple, it almost sounds childlike. You pause for a moment, and he squeezes your knee in reassurance. For you and for himself.

“It’s so hard to believe I had to grow up this way.”

The piano picks up, a simple sustained pattern, and he can hear you try to keep the emotions in your voice at bay. A valiant effort that even he fails to do at the moment.

I moved out and I made some new friends

Sometimes when I shout it feels like no one hears it

And there are some days when I that somewhere you’re watching

As I grow up without you

I miss it, I miss you.

Rooster collapses his head on your shoulder, and kisses you there in thanks. For understanding. For seeing right through him and communicating it in the exact way that he would understand.

For letting him know that his dad’s listening.

The childhood home, now bare —save for stacks of moving boxes and an old upright piano in one corner of the living room— sits quietly in the suburbs of Virginia Beach. The boy who grew up there is taller now. Older. Smarter, wiser —or so he hopes. A spitting image of his father —and yet, everything he wasn’t.

Angrier. Older. Carrying a bigger chip on his shoulder.

And yet… maybe, hopefully, he’ll hold up just fine.

“Are you okay?” your hand slips into his, so easily and effortlessly that it just feels like it’s where it should be.

“Yeah,” he answers, heady and dazed. He brings up your intertwined hands to his lips, and presses a kiss there. “I love you so much, you know that?”

“I think I might’ve had a clue or two?” your voice, bright and laced with humor, rings almost out of place in the solemn stillness of this house. This moment.

But it’s not. It falls perfectly in place as life breathes back in, a familiar little laughter shared between the two of you. Warmth in the face of grief and hurt and loss.

He straightens up and takes a good look at you. He’s not sure why, but at the moment, it feels right. And as it falls out of his lips, he doesn’t feel an ounce of regret.

“Will you marry me?”

And he’s not sure whether he should be more surprised by his question, or the fact that you answer so easily, so surely, so matter-of-factly. “Roo… Of course.”

“Yeah?”

You nod.

“I haven’t even got a ring yet.”

“That’s fine. We can always get it later.”

Tags

fic recs august 2022 Top gun top gun maverick rooster bradley bradshaw crying emoji my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing rooster my sad beloved chemtrails is rooster’s song forever this song makes me feel so fucking depressed it’s so haunting and beautiful lizzy mcalpine is very insane angrier. older. carrying a bigger chip on his shoulder. this line!!!!!!!!! I SEE CHEMTRAILS IN THE SKY!!!!! BUT I DON’T SEE THE PLANE!!!!! goose you will always be famous and loved we miss you

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fivsecondsflat

2 years ago

30/12/22: HOLY SHIT BOXER BOB!!! this is one of the best first chapters i've ever read, everything was do engaging and you gave us enough to want more i need to know how their date went i need to know more about bob and mickey’s relationship and the boxing and maverick and how the stories are all going to connect. i need it ALL. just so good. i think you really nailed his personality, or at least the little bit you showed of him in this chapter. all of bob’s lines were so on character but with an EDGE!!! something a little different, but that FITS!!! anyways i’m so excited for the future parts, you’re incredibly talented!!!

“Bob Floyd liked to think he was a good person.” such an engaging opening line!!!

“But there’s an unrelenting pressure that comes with being a good person. A weight that couldn’t be lifted as he exhausted himself with the idea of what exactly it means to be inherently good.” this is getting so good already!!!

“He gives up his seat on public transportation and has reusable shopping bags so he doesn’t have to use the plastic ones at the grocery store.” of course he does ❤️

“Bob Floyd was a good person. Bob Floyd was a good person until, suddenly, he wasn’t. And it could all be traced back to the first time he ever stepped foot into Sugar Plum Bakery.” the name of the bakery in contrast with the whole atmosphere you’ve created for this is so interesting.

“Hi!” You pop up suddenly, smiling brightly. There’s a smudge of flour on your cheek, stipples of it all over your apron, and Bob's almost certain there’s some in your hair too. “What can I getcha?” and i adore her already.

“You bite your lip, eyes squinting as you appear to be sizing him up. It reminds Bob of his opponents in the ring — though their eyes aren’t nearly as pretty as yours — and it almost makes him laugh.” 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰

“Bob’s eyebrows raise slightly in agreement. “Today’s special, huh? Then I should probably get one of those, shouldn’t I?”

“It’d be sacrilegious not to,” you tease back, a smile growing on your lips.” love this piece of dialogue!!!

AND THE 20% TIP FOR A 5 SECOND CONVERSATION AND AN APPLE TART HE IS THE SWEETEST

“You hand the box to him with that bright smile and — just like every romantic comedy Bob has ever watched with his mom — his heart stutters when your fingers brush.” AND HE WATHES ROMCOMS????? 😭😭😭😭😭❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨

“Oh?” You turn back to the croissants, pleased with their golden brown color as you move to transfer them to a different tray to bring up front. “And what would you call him?” i also adored this description and her attention to detail in the croissant!!!

“Don’t think it was a cupcake he was hopin’ for,” she looks at you knowingly and you feel slightly flustered at her implication.

He wanted to see you?” i am a puddle on the floor!!!!

“Ball cap guy sticks out like a sore thumb against the few customers in Sugar Plum, a head taller than everyone else even as his head is tilted down to look at his phone.” 😭

AND THEN HE GENUINELY PAYS ATTENTION TO HER RAMBLING ABOUT SWEET PEAS

“That’ll be—”

“What time do you get off?” He blurts suddenly.” I LOVE THIS TROPE!!! IS IT A TROPE??? SPEAKING OVER EACH OTHER IDK BUT I LOVE IT

“You ever think about fighting, Bob?” oh… maverick is RECRUITING???

“Maybe if Bob had done that to the landlord, he’d stop making his mom cry. Maybe if Bob had done that to those preppy college boys, Mickey wouldn’t have to shrug it off with a “People tip pretty good at Charlotte’s anyway”. Maybe if he’d never taken it, and taken it, and taken it, and actually stopped to wonder if maybe he didn’t have to, they wouldn’t have had to take it either.” LOVE THIS LINE

“How much would you pay me?” smart boy!!!

“Because if Adler could come out of it all a good man, Bob could cling to that hope for himself a little longer.” BOB 😭🥺

Do Unto Otters

summary - You should have known to question when Bob suddenly appeared in your bakery and made his place in your life — but, in your defense, his smile was so charming! Five dates in and he’s already swept you off your feet completely with his thoughtful nature and kind heart. But the question still remains: what do you actually know about him? And why does he always come back to you covered in bruises?

warnings - DARK THEMES, boxer au, violence, language, Bob is 6′5″ because I said so, I roasted Mav in this a bit my bad, mentions of violence, “Bob” is kind of a stupid boxer name so I changed it, no use of y/n

this series is 18+, minors please do not interact

word count - 3.5k

please take this as my thank you for 1.5k! I am so so honored that you guys think my stuff is worth reading, it means the world to me. anyway enjoy! - bugs

sweeter than sugar masterlist

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Tags

i adore this fic recs Bob 2022 Top gun top gun maverick bob floyd december my silly little goodreads masterclass in writing an incredible character introduction AND analysis for bob i will support every wrongdoing that this man performs from now on bob my beloved OF COURSE HE’S GONNA FALL FOR A BAKER THIS IS PERFECT boxer au might by my new favorite thing? i’ll clean up all their bandages!!! i’ll do it!!!

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