Once they’re home they agree that Tommy will stay in their room, and Buck will sleep in the spare room.
The next few days are quiet, Tommy sleeps more than normal, but the doctor’s said that was to be expected. They eat dinner together, Tommy asks small questions about Buck, but never anything about them. Buck finds himself locked up in the spare room most of the time, he tells himself he’s giving Tommy space.
The reality was he couldn’t step outside of the blank room, they had promised to get to decorating, without being constantly reminded of the gaping hole in his chest. The framed pictures that lined the bookshelves, the calendar on the fridge - full of dates they’ll never get to, it was too much.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 1/3
Fandom: Hollyoaks
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Lucas Hay/Dillon Ray
Characters: Lucas Hay, Dillon Ray, John Paul McQueen, Ste Hay, Scott Drinkwell
Additional Tags: Kissing, Panic Attacks, Discussions of religious trauma, Mentions of conversion therapy, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Ste Hay's less than perfect parenting, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Canon Compliant, Attempted Sex, No Smut, Internalized Homophobia
Summary:
Dillon invites Lucas over when no one is home. What's the worst that could happen?
An exploration of Lucas's struggles with intimacy and the lasting impact Carter's teachings has on him.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
fragments of the day
“You’ve got so many knots tonight, Kento,” Yu commented, and though Kento couldn’t see him, he was sure Yu was frowning. “You gotta tell me when it starts to get this bad, okay?”
“I didn’t want to worry you.”
I didn’t want to bother you.
“You’re my best friend, Kento. I’m always gonna worry about you,” Yu replied easily, pushing into his muscles even harder and damn, that felt amazing; Yu really was good at giving massages. “I don’t like seeing you in pain.”
Kento sucked in a breath, then coughed, trying to play it off as a tic. How was Yu able to be so open with him? How was he able to share what’s in his heart? Hell, Kento can’t even say I love you. He has to rely on don't be stupid and be careful to get the message across.
Sometimes, he wished he were more like Yu.
So, Kento passed him another orange.
[or, nanami has bad shoulder pain and haibara makes it a little better]
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Donnie and Mikey are trapped, brainwashed, as Raph struggles with the guilt of leaving all of his brothers behind. But all is not lost. And perhaps all he needs is a little light to chase away the shadow of lies.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Laura Hollis/Carmilla Karnstein
Chapter 6/7: Chocolate with Vanilla Icing and Mint Sprinkles (Christmas)
Rating: T, Total Word Count: 5310 (WIP)
Chapter Tags: Christmas, Baking
Carmilla sat at the kitchen table, sipping her coffee as she waited for the oven to ping. She let her thoughts wander, and unsurprisingly they wandered to last year’s Christmas. A lot had changed in only one year.
Last year, she’d come here feeling like an intruder. She’d barely known Laura, and hadn’t known Sherman at all. And they hadn’t known her, but made a place for her where she fitted more comfortably than she’d imagined she could. In that place she’d fallen for Laura, hard and fast. It had made her cautious the first week she’d been here. She hadn’t wanted to make Laura feel uncomfortable and regret inviting her, and she definitely hadn’t wanted Sherman to think she might be a danger to his daughter. The man was a force to be reckoned with.
She smiled into her mug when she remembered the last minute gifts Laura had managed to find for her: a Tardis mug, twin to Laura’s own so Carmilla would stop stealing it; a collection of 17th century poems, a lot of which were overrated in Carmilla’s opinion, but she’d been touched by how well Laura seemed to know her; and somehow Laura had found a book with tips on how to keep your dorm clean. Sherman had looked confused by that one, but Carmilla had chuckled and promised she’d read it, even if she couldn’t promise actually using it.
The oven pinged and Carmilla was startled out of her reverie. She put her coffee down and quickly grabbed the oven mitts to get the cupcakes out. She set them on the counter and looked them over. They didn’t look too bad for a first attempt. Some of them were a little lopsided, and one had spilled over the edge of its cup, but they weren’t burned.
Her initial plan had been to buy cupcakes, as she usually did, but Laura and Sherman lived in a small town, which meant only the churches were open on Christmas. Feeling mildly panicked, she’d looked up a recipe on the internet, and then conspired with Sherman to get Laura out of the house so she could get baking.
Mentally crossing her fingers that the cupcakes are not still raw on the inside, Carmilla grabbed the ingredients for the vanilla icing. The recipe made it look easy, and the picture made it look delicious, but she had no illusions that she could make it look like that. She just hoped for something that tasted good, even if it didn’t look amazing.
And that’s exactly what she got. The icing looked great, silky smooth, when still in the bowl, but when she scooped it onto the cupcakes, both she and the cakes quickly became a mess. Too late she realized she probably should’ve let them cool a little longer. With a shrug and a sigh, Carmilla grabbed the green, minty sprinkles and carefully dropped a couple into the icing on each cupcake. The recipe warned about overdoing it, you didn’t want cupcakes that tasted like toothpaste, after all.
When the cupcakes were all decorated more or less to her liking, she placed them on a plate, and started on the cleaning. She had no idea when Sherman and Laura would be back, and she didn’t want them to come back to a messy kitchen.
Cleaning allowed her mind to wander to last year’s Christmas again. She’d slept on a mattress on the floor of Laura’s room. Every night she’d waited until Laura was asleep, then turned to face the girl and watched her sleep until sleep finally caught her, too. She’d been aware it was a little creepy, but since Laura didn’t know, she’d figured it couldn’t hurt. This year she was sleeping right next to Laura, in her bed, with Laura fully aware that her girlfriend watched her sleep. And each morning she woke up with Laura in her arms, or she in Laura’s. It was a definite improvement.
She had put away the last spoon, and was starting on making a new pot of coffee when she heard the key in the front door. Laura and Sherman came in with a lot of noise, stamping the snow off their boots, Laura talking, both of them sighing at the comfortable warmth of being inside.
‘Carm? What’s that smell?’ Laura called out. The quick padding of socked feet approached the kitchen.
Carmilla stood by the kitchen table, hands squeezing the back of one of the chairs.
‘Oh my god!’ Laura yelled. Her mouth dropped open at the sight of the cakes. She glanced between them and Carmilla, then grinned. ‘Did you make these?’ she asked. Her eyes sparkled and she slid across the kitchen floor until she was next Carmilla, then dropped into a chair.
‘I did,’ Carmilla said, taking the chair next to Laura’s.
‘They look and smell amazing,’ Sherman said as he walked into the kitchen, and sat down in the chair on Laura’s other side.
‘Let’s hope they’ll taste just as great.’ Carmilla gave them both a tentative smile.
‘Can I?’ Laura asked, her hand already hovering over the cupcakes.
Carmilla nodded. She held her breath as Laura picked up a cupcake and took a bite.
‘Oh my god,’ Laura groaned. ‘These are amazing! Dad, try one!’
‘Don’t mind if I do.’ Sherman grabbed the nearest cake, then hummed and nodded approvingly to Carmilla.
Carmilla released her breath and relaxed in her chair, quickly schooling her expression into one of nonchalance. She knew she could do it.
She grabbed a cupcake for herself, took off the sprinkles, not being a fan of mint, and took a bite. She had to admit they weren’t bad. In a couple years, she might even rival Perry’s baking skills.
Laura quickly polished off the first cupcake, then grabbed another.
‘I really love these,’ she said. She dove in and pressed a quick and sticky kiss to Carmilla’s cheek. ‘And I love you. Thank you.’
‘What would Christmas be without cupcakes?’ Carmilla asked, raising an eyebrow.
‘Like most other people’s Christmases,’ Sherman teased.
‘Pffft,’ Laura snorted and waved her hand. ‘Why would we want other people’s Christmases? Ours is much better.’
Carmilla’s lips tugged up into a smile. She couldn’t agree more.
This one Hork-Bajir caught me with his blade and chopped my left arm off, right? I mean, I’m in grizzly morph, we’re totally outnumbered, and this Hork-Bajir gets behind me and SLASH! This sudden pain! Then, thud, and I realize my arm is on the ground. Hah HAH! On the ground. So you know what I do? I reach down, pick it up, and use it like a club to beat him over the head.”
