line without a hook

[audreyrousx]

status: open to walsh affiliates, friends of audrey, others admitted to the hospital, and/or wanderers of the hospital. time: the morning after the explosion location: university of chicago medical center

the events of the art gallery replayed in her mind, the smoke entering her lungs while she longed for an escape before she was crushed under the rubble. she made it out as quick as she could, trying her best to use the fabric on her dress to keep the passageway to her throat clear. despite all her efforts, after her rescue it was encouraged for the blonde to stay the night for observation — but she wasn’t the priority. “just tell me if he’s here, keeping this from me isn’t going to help!” she huffed, ignoring all of her doctor’s attempts to keep her mind on anything that wasn’t her brother’s well being. it wasn’t like cyrus to not check in, especially after an explosion like that — something wasn’t right and she couldn’t be left to sit here and wait. the doctor took off down the hallway and audrey quickly began fumbling with the iv in her hand, it had to come out — it had to come out now. 

a few footsteps approached the side of her bed, causing the girl to jump and pull the needle from her skin. “ouch — hi, okay this isn’t what it looks like…just a normal discharge.” 

[sangranteria]

It had taken forever for Jude to be seen, but he didn’t mind. He knew that there were more serious matters to be taken care of, including the woman who had been in the middle of the cross fire between mistaking vodka for water to put out a fire. It would have been a cool party trick any other time, a river of flames, but it was poor circumstances.

As he was leaving after getting a set of stitches, he saw Rousseau written under a room number. He could only imagine what the night had sparked for his friend, the nightmares he thrashed against suddenly real. He peered inside but in anticipation, saw Audrey instead. At her outburst, he jumped back. 

“Woah, woah, Little Rorosusu,” Jude said, taking a blanket and wrapping it around her hand as the blood that dripped from her new wound. “Do what you gotta do, but don’t you know the process to this? I thought your brother was in here. You seen him yet?”

[sangranteria]

littlcxbirdie​:

“take all the time you need… i uh… i got the space.” she smiled up at him as she made sure he was okay before making sure that he was safely in her car. once she had gotten into the car herself she smiled. “my name is birdie… and i mean it. you can hang out at my place as long as you need… just promise this isn’t some sort of ruse in order to like take me out or something.” she joked softly, a short giggle escaping her lips. 

“my apartment isn’t very far.” she assured him as she drove, her eyes flickering to the clock in her car. they didn’t have much longer until curfew kicked in and she couldn’t handle getting into trouble again. 

If trusting this girl was how he got killed, at least Jude could say he was taken in by a raven haired angel. He always assumed most of them had silvery hair, a soft gleam to them, but he would gift Birdie her halo. He was the one who was unwell, so she had the advantage even if he was at least twelve inches taller than her.

“I should be telling you the same thing,” He chuckled. “I think you can beat me up with ease if you wanted to, but I hope you don’t. You look like you can throw a good punch or two.”

[chazelle]

[sangranteria]

crimsxndesire​:

At least he was honest about his failures and didn’t try to make himself seem better off than he was. Chuckling, “that seems to happen a lot with you.” She had seen Jude multiple times in Wolves and The Den and he was an interesting character. Someone she couldn’t define or make an assumption about. Shrugging, “Sometimes I come up to get some quiet.” The Den was a rowdy location, especially on nights like these and as much as she enjoyed watching people beat the shit out of each other, she needed a break. “It’s interesting to be in an empty quiet bar all by myself.”

“Well, how do you feel about a quiet bar... not by yourself?” Jude proposed, folding the towel in his hand as he carefully dabbed at the blood that was crusting around his eye. Brown flakes returned to bright red under the melting ice. It stung, but it was manageable. He prayed he wouldn’t need stitches but even if he did, it wasn’t the worst of his injuries to date. Jude simply hated how long they would take, and then there was the worry of it on his face and what that posed. He had even less patience about waiting to take the stitches out and he always ended up pulling them out himself. 

[sangranteria]

silverncrimson​:

She’d only been there maybe an hour, two tops, although she felt herself already starting to slip away. It didn’t help that someone - Diamond couldn’t even begin to remember who - had handed her this pretty little blue pill that she’d recklessly and without any sort of hesitation swallowed down with a sip of her favorited red wine. The drug, whatever it had been, was actively in effect and while she was subconsciously aware of that fact - she’s taken enough psychedelics in her life to know what losing control of her psychosis felt like - it still left her reality undisputedly warped. Convinced that the painted lady was staring at her had Dime’s skin crawling, but she blinked slowly as she recognized Jude’s voice beside her. Or who her mind perceived was Jude - she honestly couldn’t be a hundred percent sure. 

“Huh? Should you be what?” she questioned in confusion, frowning, breaking her paranoid-induced eye contact with the painting to turn her head towards him. “Me? Yeah…yeah, dude, I’m totally fine. I just hate that she thinks she knows everything about me. Do - do you think she’ll say anything to the press?” she asked in honest concern, twisting her hands uneasily in front of her, whilst twitching involuntarily as she could have sworn she just heard the conniving bitch cackle but just barely fought the urge to turn and look. Even though she could still feel the painting’s eyes on her.

It was just as amusing as it was concerning. “Nah, mija, you’re fine. If anything, she’s probably. a little jealous of you but she can’t do anything about it but stare. Her lips? Sealed forever. You see they have to seal all these art pieces so they last so long. It’s safe to say you’ll be just fine, Diamond.”

He looked back to the painting, searching for the details that made her uneasy with a smile bitten back. He remembered the days where he would indulge himself like that, little thought about the consequences or the hangover.

[sangranteria]

xofaddiction​:

he dodged the swipe of jude’s leg as best he could. it was a small hop, but his landing felt uncertain. he felt his left leg buckle a bit, as if there was a bowing of the steel rod in place. there hadn’t been, it wasn’t medically possible, especially after all the reconstruction he’d managed to get past. still, that part of him felt foreign, and all the phantom pain and nightmares he suffered were tied to it. 

backing out of the way of the fist swipes, cyrus rolled his eyes, brushing off his uncertainty with ease. “what code? c’mon man,” he smirked. this was all in the hypothetical, egging jude on just never stopped being funny. “it’s an archetype. the best friend and the sibling hooking up? it’s a classic.” he rushed forward, throwing his fist into a fruitless punch near the side of his buddy’s head. 

bouncing away on the balls of his feet, cyrus shook out his shoulders, tongue dragging across his teeth as he moved from side to side, careful of the shift in his weight and the rapid movement that would, with any hope, make his idiot friend dizzy again. “aint that your career? show off the family jewels?” he teased again, laughing a little as he took a step back. 

“Claro que si, acere,” Jude grinned against the dots that returned to his vision. “So, you get with my sister and you can salvage your eyes for when I get with yours? She’s a doctor, right? I bet I can head over right now and she can let me know if you gave me a concussion.”

Their banter and jabs, by words and fists, didn’t last long though. His shirt was pulled bakc over his skin that was yellowed with bruises, already churning from color to color from Cyrus’ beatings. Jude would eventually get what he deserved for his comment, and he would return to the couch where he would slowly inch his way over on top of him to antagonize him, bother him, and in their own twisted way, show his care for him.

END.

[sangranteria]

juliafaust​:

“Judie, you have to just have something. How about a Shirley Temple? It has a good amount of sugar in it, and it can help. Here, can I please get a Shirley Temple with extra ice? You need cold ice.” Julia told him, her voice soft and concerned as she went to stroke his hair back. “You’re sweaty, too. You look as if you were doing it too hard on the dance floor, were you? You don’t need to prove anything to anyone, my love. Nothing at all.” Julia chuckled, shaking her head and when the drink came, she gave it to him, looking expectedly. “Come on, sip down. It will help.” Julia took his wrist back gently and looked at his pulse again. “My girlfriends? No, they’re - they’re not worth it. I don’t care about them. I care about you. You’re family, Judie, and those girls are just vicious and nasty, even more so when they’re drunk, not to mention, stupid. I would much rather hang here with you.” She flashed him a big, warm smile, stroking his hair back. “Talk to me. What’s up, how have you been?” 

Doctora Faust. Jude knew that if he had to avoid anyone in this moment, it would be Julia. As sweet as she was, he knew she had eyes like a hawk and that knowledge of hers could wrap around him like a snake. He never felt like he had something to hide, though he was well aware that the word insecurities and their weight in her little community. He had never been to a psychologist, much less a psychiatrist, but he had heard about them in the movies and ever bitchin’ post online. Nature and the gym was less expensive and gave better results. As long as Jude was able to spread love and make it, he was certain all was fine. 

He smiled softly at her insistence. “You have no boundaries when it comes to helping others, Julia. I hope that means you’ll never work a day in your life because it comes so naturally. But tonight, mija, enjoy yourself. Make it that someone has to do their job and help you.” He gave her a smile, standing up and kissing her hand as he pulled away from her company.. “I’ve been doing well, and I’ll stay just as fine. I expect you to swing by the apartment hungover for that culinary disaster your cousin makes. Maybe bring one of your friends. Rowan needs new ones.” He winked at her, and in a slight stagger, founding his place again in the madness of the club.

END.

[sangranteria]

crimsxndesire​:

Raising a brow, “It’s not a lack of faith, it’s a realistic view on life.” He was not ’depresivo,’ he just knew not to get his hopes up with certain things. His mother taught him that sad fact of reality, over and over and over. Until he was fifteen, he assumed that he could fix his mother and get her off drugs and they could have been a real family. She would come to him, swear she had quit and wanted to be the best mother to him and eventually she would relapse and leave him again. Every time, he had gotten his hopes up and she maLove was a foreign concept to Rowan and he wasn’t setting his sights high on that front.

Eyeing him, “I’m not looking for the one. I’m not looking for anyone.” A woman would complicate his life further than it was already and it was too difficult for the Faust. Chuckling, “I don’t think that’s how it supposed to go. We’re supposed to love the same person…” At least that’s what he was told as a child, “I think this is all an advertisement for your jewelry.”

“Jewelry is forever, that’s for sure. A good watch will out live all of us,” Jude grinned, standing up off the couch solely to inspect Rowan’s concoction with a closer eye. “It will go from one hand to another, faster and longer than most of us. That’s not the point, though. It’s what it represents that matters the most, and it’s my job to make sure it’s nice enough for people to respect what it means.”

Taking a knife from the drawer, he cut the smallest sliver of Rowan’s culinary monster and took a bite from it. “But if you keep eating like that, I don’t think she’ll be in love with you long.”

END.

[sangranteria]

xmaggie-birchx​:

She listened to him as she sipped her water, leaning on the bar as she did, turning her full attention to the man across from her. She nodded, listening to him speak about his family and everything. “Right, you were adopted. That had to be interesting growing up though. Being a different race than you’re family. I bet it didn’t take away from them being your family though. From the little you’ve spoken about them to me, they seem extremely loving and sweet.” She smirked.

She always found it cool that his Spanish was so good but that’s how he was raised. When they’d first met, however, it definitely through her for a loop. “The only other language I can mostly speak is French. I haven’t used it in a while but I can usually pick it back up pretty easily. Do you only speak Spanish and English?”

“French? That’s a love language. It’s one of the most important languages to know,” Jude insisted. “It’s only English and Spanish for me, but don’t think I don’t kick myself every day for not taking that one class in high school. I’m sure I would have fallen in love with it immediately. It’s easy for me to that, I’ll admit it. Fall in love with anything, all at once and hard. French would have been my true love back then, and I would have used it to find love just as quickly.”

Jude had spent so much of his life loved so deeply and while he was never afraid of losing it, he still had some anxiety regarding his worthiness of it. He spent his time trying to make sure others didn’t, but also becoming fixated on any bone anyone was willing to toss him. Even now, he was focused on every perfect dark spiral of Maggie’s hair under the heat of the club lights and how any frizz only served as a halo that caught the light around her. He watched every laugh line ripple and prove that she hadn’t ever cracked under pressure, just laughed it away with ease and peace. Some part of him recognized the hesitance in her motions, a reflection of his own, but he would look away. He would let himself see the best despite knowing better. He would take her hand and guide her back to the dance floor where she would have the lead once more. It was the place she didn’t to pause and breathe, but move with that very same breath so naturally. It was Jude who was left reminding himself to breathe. They would dance until both of them had an ache in their soles, and Jude would offer to carry her shoes if she wanted to kick them off. He would open the car door, he would walk with her down the sidewalk to her place after parking much too far at the early hours of the morning, and he’d dance with her in the street again as he reminisced the night. He’d say a prayer against her lips for another night like this if she’d let him, and sneak one more dance at another venue if he could whether it be the next day, the next week, or the next few hours horizontally.

END.

[sangranteria]

xian-lockex​:

“I mean this place is fine. They serve food. The fruit can’t be that bad… could it?” he looked over at the bartender questioning him and shrugging. The bartender had a grimace on his face and then snapped out of it and nodded quickly. Ian rolled his eyes and shook his head. “Convincing, mate,” he scoffed.

“But yeah, something. Anything, really. Are you alright though? Need me to call you an Uber or something?”

Jude tried to hide his grimace, tilting his head away from the light when it took its swipe across the club to illuminate it in one giant wave. The last thing he wanted was to eat. His stomach seemed to built up into more knots, tightening at the thought enough to make him gag on it.

“I’m good,” He said, a polite protest. He pushed himself back to his feet. He took a glass of water, barely sipped it, and glanced towards the exit. His eyes flickered to the back of the club, a corner with buzzing white lights looking like a small corner of peace. Jude shook his head to himself before making his way out. “I’ll take it easy the rest of the night.”

END.

[loveless-anime-deactivated20230]

[silverncrimson]

Location: Art Institute of Chicago

Open to: Everyone | @crimsonstarters​

“Is my mind just playing tricks on me again, or is this bitch actually smirking at me? Staring at me like she knows all my dirty little secrets?” she muttered aloud, her dark hazel eyes narrowed suspiciously at the painting before her, feeling oddly unnerved by the all-knowing look on the painted woman’s face as she stared right back at her. The two of them having what seemed like a very intense staring contest, although it was a contest that Diamond would inevitably lose. “I don’t like it, it’s fucking creepy.”

[sangranteria]

“Probably not,” Jude said, brows knit tightly together. His focus had been taken by the jewelry at hand, artifacts and new designs inspired by what had been lost before the doors of the institute were reopened. His interest in whatever was on the walls was lacking but Diamond’s accusation was enough to pull his attention away from the pamphlet at hand, his map to find what he was intrigued by, and to the wall. “Actually, she does look a little concerned— that being said, should I be? You okay, kid?”

[sangranteria]

CRIMSONCITYHQ EVENT: GRAND REOPENING OF THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO 

[thehoeofthewhiteman]

[sangranteria]

alvarocabreraleon​:

Oh, Judie Jude. It was always a smirk and a smile with Jude, the practical jokester, the one to always make Alvy laugh as he sighed. “Cálmate, chico. Tan estúpido. Just sit the hell up, boy. Enough of the nonsense.” Alvaro told him, slapping him slightly on the cheek as they sat up together. “I’m getting you a cold compress. “¡Apurarse! Let’s go, the man needs a cold compress!” He sat him down and when the bartender handed him the compress, Alvaro put it on his forehead, sighing. “What has gotten you to this point? Is it exhaustion? You working too much?” He asked, letting out a breath. “I have to take care of you like you’re one of my children, don’t I? You might as well be.” 

Jude grinned, teeth painting pink with blood as he huffed a breath at the change in posture. It was embarrassing to say the least but he would lean into Alvaro and his presence here of all places to distract from the catastrophe he caused in the middle of the dance floor. There wasn’t a significant age difference between the two, but there was always a significantly different air between the two. It was part of the reason had slipped out from under his wing so easily.

“Children? I’m too old for that, Alvaro, y lo sabes. I’d be your hermanito antes que tu hijo,” He chuckled, but this time half heartedly as the nausea crept back up his throat. “I’m hardly working if I’m doing what I love. I think I just made the wrong move, lost my balance. I should be fine in a few minutes.”

[sangranteria]

xmaggie-birchx​:

She giggled at his exclamation and spun around, still holding his hand as they danced. “No! I just let the music take me! It helps having a great dance partner though.” She smiled as they danced and once the song ended to something softer, she stopped, ending the dance in his arms. She stepped back and curtsied. “That was a wonderful first dance, Mr. Castellanos.” She smirked. “Water?” she asked, taking his hand and guiding them over to the bar. She asked for two bottles of water and passed him one, placing a ten dollar bill on the bar.

“I’ve taken a lot of different dance classes along with pole dancing to keep my workout interesting from when I worked at Eden. So, I’ve dabbled in a lot of different styles for fun. I just love to dance.”

He bowed, matching her, and laughter sputtered from his lips as he did. He let her lead again, something Jude should have at least changed for the dance floor considering what he was taught in every dance his parents drilled into him. 

He drank the water slowly, knowing that without a pace he would only make himself sick. Just as he avoided certain things to ease whatever anxieties he had, he also found comfort in even the smallest of indulgences. 

“Dancing was never a hobby with my family, it was just a way of living. My grandma was always dancing, from the moment she was cooking to just eating. There was always a little sway to her,” Jude chuckled. “I think they always did it a little more once I joined them. There was always some worry that their gringo baby didn’t have any rhythm.”

[sangranteria]

littlcxbirdie​:

birdie knew it wasn’t far to her car. she could handle the extra weight even if it was for just a little bit of distance. his comment about her strength made her chuckle. “well uh… that isn’t exactly right but… thank you.” she murmured. she unlocked her car, the lights flickering as she pressed the button. “lemme open the door… you can just hang out at my apartment for a little while.” she didn’t mind offering up her place. she had spent far too many nights alone lately, the idea of company being far too tempting. “i have gatorade and some stuff like that… i’ll take the couch. it’s super comfortable.” she rambled for a few moments. she eased him into the car, carefully closing the door behind him. 

“You don’t have. I’m... trust me, I don’t need much. I just need somewhere that doesn’t feel like it’s spinning until I can get back on my feet, or at least until my roommate can come get me.”

Jude should have known better, but there was something about her that made him want to instill trust. He figured that if worse came to worse, his dead weight, literal or not, would go against his observation of her strength. He agreed, letting her take lead and guide him. The road was almost lulling the moment it moved beneath them just as much as it was unsettling. It felt better with his eyes closed. 

“I’m Jude, by the way,” He told her, the delayed formalities causing him to chuckle lightheartedly.