new light.

closed.

[nitrohelium]

macheriewrites‌:

‘‘No, that’s pretty much perfect, thank you Johnny,’‘ Aubrey took a look at the bar display that was now fully stocked with the bar’s logo etched into it in delicate letters. The design was superb, if you asked her, and many people seemed to agree. In fact, that was precisely why she was asked to relocate to New York City, at least for a while. Of course, she was not given an ETA of any kind, but Aubrey didn’t mind. Ever since high school, she always wanted to move to a big city. Those longings dispersed over time into loving her hometown and wanting to stay there, but there was always a certain kind of – well, call it curiosity about making it out there. New York City was a world of its own; the flashlights and tall buildings held little interest to Aubrey personally, she was always far more curious about its people and the seemingly endless possibilities. Now that she was actually living there, things were about to become far greater, and she was somehow truly satisfied with how things were panning out.

Having left a good chunk of problems behind in Wilmington, problems she had tried to tackle so many times before but things just never seemed to work out, perhaps it was time to leave, too. The departure wasn’t something she was planning on doing per se, but it came just in the right moment. Maybe this time away from home was a blessing in disguise as well – maybe a much needed getaway for a restart she was hoping for. Aubrey always knew she would return to Wilmington one way or another, but a little exploring wasn’t something that could’ve done her any harm, at least she was hoping it would not.

It had been almost three months since she started working on the specific franchise, one of their biggest openings set for the Big Apple of course, and tomorrow night was the big night. She wasn’t nervous, moreso excited that they finally reached that point after so much work. The booking of the performers was done by her assistant and she normally trusted the girl enough to make a solid choice, the only thing she concerned herself with were the books and finances – everything needed to be in order on that front. And since it was, Aubrey didn’t even have the time to glance over the invitees. Another guy with a guitar wouldn’t have attracted her attention either way, and the unknown name of the act wouldn’t have, either. It was the small print underneath that should’ve though – ‘’ex King Silver’’, but of course, who ever readed the small print like that? Grabbing her iPad quickly, she went over the last of the details as the musicians were having a soundcheck, placing the instruments and other necessary equipment. @nitrohelium​

Ex-King Silver still left a bitter taste in Serge’s mouth. The band, the sold-out concert halls and rocking on stage with his brothers was always his dream, and to know he played a big role in its downfall was still a fresh wound despite being sober for the past year. Year in and out of his same bullshit, in and out of rehab and the boys’ patience wore thin with each of them leaving in turn. His own best friend decided to leave the band for good to pursue a life back in Wilmington with the woman he loved, and Serge was hit with sinking realization that everyone was growing up and settling down instead of spending nights in foreign hotel rooms and strip bars. Los Angeles, with all its comforts and temptations, was the furthest away from Wilmington, but he always preferred the rough edges of New York city. People were honest to a fault, instead of the plastic facade in the Orange County, and it was something he could appreciate. In New York anything was possible, even for a washed up rockstar restarting his career as a solo musician.

The sounds of his guitar came over the speakers as he gave it a quick tune, about to begin the first few bars of a song he wrote for his father. The song was an honest look at the fraught relationship he had with the Reverend, but reflective in the ways he sang his apology through the chorus. It wasn’t a secret how complicated their relationship was; there were plenty of interviews Serge gave over the origin of many of his songs and quotes he had said half-drunk and still angry at the older Halliwell. But things changed after funeral -- something about the fact that was a little too late, a theme that underscored most of Serge’s life lately and what he thought about Wilmington. Beyond his mother, his sister and a few old friends, there wasn’t a reason to return to Wilmington when he now lived a few hours away... and he was certain there wasn’t any need to rehash the past with a certain blonde who treated him as a near stranger. 

Rightly so. It was better to let bygones be bygones without him making another fuckery of how their lives intertwined. He was sober now for a year, but could he truly blame the alcohol and the drugs? Serge was still the man he was; toeing a dangerous line and taking whatever he wanted -- which at the moment, with a cigarette dangling from his lips and a guitar on his lap, was the pretty little brunette leaning across the stage in front of him. “Gav? Yeah, gotta turn up the bass on this a little. We want the place humming like a livewire when the drums kick in,” he drawled out over the microphone, shooting a smirk at the brunette as he pulled the cigarette away with a puff. “Gotta get gorgeous girls like you up and dancing, y’know? We can’t afford a fuckin’ dull show around these parts.” 

[nitrohelium]

holywitchkid‌:

         “I gotta say, I was kind of dreading seeing you.” She for once said completely honest. The wall she’d so easily built for herself since childhood at this stage becoming easier and easier to chip away at. It was that—a bone thrown to growth or something. Adulthood. Or, the most likely attribute was the courage in liquid form. Another toss to adulthood too. The whole becoming her mother once just a joke, a warning and yet…

        Sitting in her parents kitchen that once was the very place she’d yearned for mostly every and any time she’d attempt her own casserole that severely failed at. Mostly a place of pride and familiarity.  A house of firsts and lasts. The returning and not just for holiday’s sake reeked of failure now. 

       It was painful sitting across the island to her wayward friend who’d actively kept it at an arms distance, saw ‘home’ as a place of drowning and suffocation. Never had she felt that same, never had she needed too. Meant to be just a back up plan—never dreaming she’d fail New York. Not after so long… she understood now, at least in a roundabout way that you can’t always just go home. “Didn’t know if I should expect a radical head shave, crazy dye job or dreads. The salt and pepper look is working for you…you look good.”       

@littleatlas​

        Five years stood between Adam and those tequila golden nights in New York but time and distance faded easily every time he caught up with Kate. Another night floated through with nostalgia, another kitchen wafting with the delicious aroma of bacon and vodka, but here they were in something akin to home with its familiar comforts of a six-pack, one crumbly pecan pie and two forks sitting between them. “And if I did show up at your doorstep with the French flag dyed into my hair? Gotta say, I take great offense to how much you’d be embarrassed to see me. Blue, white and red would be callin’ it tame — you should know that by now.” His trademark boisterous grin spread as he waved the fork in her direction, before taking a messy bite of his favorite pie.

       Genevieve Buchanan could hardly stand if all her children weren’t home for her youngest son’s wedding, and a few strongly suggestive phone calls were enough to bring the blue-eyed nomad back to South Carolina. Hell, even clean-shaven and dressed in a suit and tie, proof that he’d grown milder over the years. Perhaps there was a certain critical blindness in his youth that kept him from acknowledging his roots, but the vigour in his wandering years was beginning to wane. There were birthdays, weddings and Christmases a phone call or a postcard couldn’t do justice, and after losing his niece Lily... well, suffice to say Adam was learning to treasure whatever time was left in Charleston. 

       For all the times he feared a boring existence, the sense of ennui was all the more overwhelming. He was beginning to see traces of himself slipping in that direction if something wasn’t about to change, but he was no longer twenty-two and drinking himself to oblivion, or twenty-eight and running through airports to catch the next connecting flight. There was routine to his days now, a steady apartment lease and to everyone’s surprise, a job that didn’t include whiskey-soaked carpets and ushering drunkards into Ubers at the crack of dawn. “And I’d say the same about you but you just look the same old. Gotta step up your game, darlin’. Y’know, try a little quarter life crisis on for size and go wild. Paint yourself purple, become a furry,” a pause, running his fingers through the gray whiskers in his beard, “Shit, we’re nearer to midlife than a quarter-lifer, aren’t we?”