62) In Champagne Weather, is there a deleted scene/idea you wish you could have included? Why did it get cut?
--Shy Feedee Anon <3
I just looked back, and I have fourteen pages of cut material from Champagne Weather, as well as partial alternate POVs for a couple of chapters that started out as P/S and then switched! Process, man.
Here's a piece of Philip's original proposal—that scene went through many, many, many drafts before I felt like it was rght.
__
“It’s wonderful,” he said.
She looked up at him, waiting for the second half of his thought to finish forming.
“The way you think. You collect things and consider them like I’ve seen antique dealers do. You’ve never made a rash decision in your life,” sensing her, he squeezed her hand when he knew she was about to argue, “because everything you do that feels sudden only happens after you’ve already warmed to the possibility.”
“Because of your passion,” she admitted, feeling the profound sense that they were both thinking of their kisses, their affair—and her sudden flight to London. “You make me…”
“Irrational?”
The look she gave him was of fond eyes and a rueful smile. “I was going to say bold.”
Philip Ryder was not the fool she first made him out to be. Instead, he was so single-mindlessly focused on his present goals that ambitions he did not even know he had manifested right in front of him, and he unconsciously made other men look like fools, especially Sidney. By a cold father and a social-climbing mother, Sarah was bred to be the sort of deferential wife that attracted men like her husband. As that was not her nature, her marriage to Sidney taught her how to pretend to be self-assured when she had no other choice, but her constant hiding kept her sense of self obscured behind a veil while she slipped into and out of the shadows for protection.
But, in the months she knew Philip, slipped into bed with him, and made a home for herself alongside—not despite—him, her confidence had flourished. Like waking from a long sleep, Sarah felt new. She was on steady ground, now, and standing fully in the light.
For the ask game, headcanons for modern day Sarah and Philip please?
https://www.tumblr.com/theshotsheardacrossworlds/810178156445270016/omg-thank-you-so-much-nick-boraine Emmrich's VA wrote a lovely little bit of dialogue for a plus size Rook. "Every curve is a verse in a poem I shall never tire of reciting" goddamn sir.
Hope you're having a lovely day!
--Shy Feedee Anon <3
Ooooooo I've never thought of this but this is amazing.
Sarah's definitely an attorney, but she works for the ACLU or similar and the government hates to see her coming. (I'm sure there's a British equivalent of this?)
Philip is a beneficiary of generational wealth. He was left a bunch of shares in a bunch of businesses in a far-off relative's will, which is great and all but he had no hobbies to fill his idle life before, and now he extra doesn't have to work?
Rather than being his cousin's widow, I think modern!Sarah would be his best friend's ex-fiancée.
She fucks him for revenge and he instantly falls in love with her.
Insert 20 chapters of chasing.
Philip finally gets his shit together and opens up some sort of animal sanctuary in the middle of nowhere. He begs her to do some legal paperwork for him ("But that's not my specialty." "But you're the smartest." "I can give you someone else's card." "How about you just come out and see the property?")
Hallmark movie nonsense ensues.
Lewis is a veterinarian.
Edith is Sarah's best friend, most likely a nurse whose parents forbade her from going to acting school.
Everyone bonds over sheep.
Philip still finds a way to nearly get himself blown up.
Philip still overeats as a ploy to make Sarah like him.
It still works.
Brbbbb going to watch the video once I'm not at my silly little job, but like. I can't believe it exists and also I'm so glad it does?? What??
As a fellow Emmrich enjoyer, I thought perhaps you'd appreciate this artwork of him with a plus size Rook. https://www.tumblr.com/theshotsheardacrossworlds/806000171889639424/emmrichexe-has-stopped-working
Loving the new story so far. I hope you're having a wonderful day.
--Shy Feedee Anon <3
Oh? My gosh? "Appreciate" is the understatement of the year. I need to spin this around in my head for about fifty years before I can be normal again, omg
14) sleigh rides with Philip and Sarah, because I can't stop/won't stop being obsessed with them.
Thanks again for the prompt fills and your writing. It's inspired me to be more open about feedism in my own writing.
--Shy Feedee Anon <3
Aw anon, I'm so proud of you for opening up in your writing!
I’m doing Christmas prompts<3
Philip had arranged the whole afternoon rather smartly, he thought: as soon as the snow in Sandon had fallen hard enough for a proper ride along the meandering River Trent, he herded his wife and sisters-in-law to a barn belonging to the Trotshams—one of the young tenant families—where a small restoration project had been hiding all autumn long.
“Sleds!” Phoebe had exclaimed, overjoyed when Mr. Trotsham showed the young girls a pair of single-seat, polished-wood sleds with curving blades shined to gleaming, steel perfection. While Maybelle and Emmeline gathered around Phoebe, Sarah drifted, and Philip was very pleased with where she had gone.
“This is what you have been working on,” she said once she felt him wander up behind her. “I knew you could not have been only planting all season. I’m glad to see you had time for woodworking.”
Philip admitted to himself that it had been a challenge to make time for projects in between summer tasks at the estate and with the tenants, and with the headache Mr. Vane had caused when Philip bullied him into releasing his iron-fisted hold on the girls’ guardianship.
There were times when he kept how tired he was to himself.
But when Trostham opened up the old, then-rotting barn with the mind to restore it to house goats, none of the men helping with the project expected to find the building already occupied.
Sarah ran her hand over the shiny, green-painted wall of the tall, low-sided sleigh, from which two iron lanterns hung and beneath which ornate, filigree blades, painted red, were attached. Philip did not find himself particularly good at painting fine details when he attempted to add holly and berries along the corners, but when Sarah’s hand traced the curving leaves and swirls of red berries, he could no longer fret that it wasn’t good enough.
The sleigh, needing two horses, sat two on a cushioned seat, and there was room in the back for luggage—or a picnic basket, which Philip had brought along and reached to set inside. “Trotsham hopes to offer rides in Sandon and Salt.”
“And you hope we’ll be the first?”
Philip shrugged. “He offered.”
Already reaching to balance her hands on the sleigh’s edge and lift herself up, Sarah laughed. “I am sure you already had it in mind.”
While the girls frolicked off and Trotsham hurried to fetch the stableboy and pair of horses, Philip stepped behind Sarah to help her up, then lifted himself to sit beside her. It was a tight squeeze at once, and although he tried to compact himself, to offer her as much space as his damned winter weight would allow—Sarah scooted closer with every measure of space he gave her.
“Sweetheart,” he chided.
She blinked, the picture of innocence. “Pardon?”
“I am trying to give you room.”
“Oh.” She looked between the two of them, where there was no space at all. Indeed, when the cold settled in, more weight than he previously thought possible settled upon him. What had previously been powerful thighs, a solid belly, and a broad chest-and-shoulders had since swelled: his belly now dipped onto said thighs, even when he was standing, and struggled against his every waistcoat such that he felt perpetually packed into nearly every garment he owned. His thighs pillowed, weight settling both up and sideways to now pin a stray fold of Sarah’s dress underneath him. Philip had thought discomfort trumped however much she liked this—evidenced by the longing looks she gave him at nearly every meal—but the look on her face was that of the softest kind of delight. “Why should I want room when I could have your comfortable, warm embrace instead, dearest?”
Philip exhaled swiftly. Well, then. “I shall never understand it.”
Sarah’s expression brightened. “I think you do, and rather too well.”
44) fresh-baked cinnamon rolls for Colin and Maybelle
Thanks for that wonderful fill for Philip and Sarah. ❤️
—Shy Feedee Anon
Thank you for requesting them<333
I'm doing Christmas prompts<3
Colin was grateful for his indulgent staff, especially now that the weather had turned cold. Maybelle was not given to it—no matter how he implored the lady’s maid to bundle her up, his poor wife was so often frozen that he simply had to remain attached to her at all times.
Ergo, breakfast in bed.
Not minding the mess of frosting on his own fingers—for that was a waiting opportunity—he broke off a bite of one steaming cinnamon roll and guided it into her mouth. As she was in her blissful three-quarters awake state, she murmured fondly while she ate.
Colin nuzzled against her temple and whispered, “Very good?”
He knew it was. Hampton Court had the best kitchen staff he could find.
She murmured again, only to do exactly as he had hoped: curl her soft, pink tongue around his thumb and suck. Desire jolted through him like lightning, but it did not fade; instead, it simmered, so cold that it forced every inch of him awake while it burned like fire through his blood.
He swallowed. Hard. “Careful.”
She blinked up at him, her doe-eyed innocence undoubtedly faux by this point in their marriage. She was the only one capable of ideas that rivaled his own, but hers had the shocking effect of tearing down the wall he had carefully built between physicality and intimacy. Plenty of women sucked plenty of parts of him—and yet Maybelle Devereaux was the only one who managed to touch his soul when she did it.
How odd.
Thus, when she reached for him—both hands on his shoulders, she pulled him overtop of her, and who the Hell was he to deny a woman begging him to sink into lush, heavy curves—he was the one who moaned like an awakened virgin, for his heart had been freshly melted.
100-200 words my ass (Cherie hack: ask for Philip/Sarah and you'll get like double the w/c)
I'm doing Christmas prompts<3
Lord Harrowby’s London study was quiet when the earl, weighed down by his desire to escape the city and a belly that threatened his buttons in a way Sarah, Lady Harrowby, had not seen in…well, months, arrived after sundown.
Seeming to anticipate that the room would not be empty when he entered it, he declared, “I could hardly afford myself an afternoon off.”
He stripped himself of his jacket and draped it over his desk, then turned and strode—sauntered, rather, belly swaying opposite the rest of his body by force of gravity alone—to settle on the loveseat by the small hearth, which was framed by a pair of bookshelves joined by a wooden arch with a handpainted inlay. Sarah reached for her husband, for she had anticipated him and, thus, placed herself in the best position to disrupt his work.
Alone. With her hair down. Wearing the day dress that had the most daring neckline in her wardrobe.
Philip gathered her in his arms and breathed deeply once his nose was buried in her hair. “Would you kindly beg me to take you home?”
Sarah smiled into his neck, warm because of his wool scarf and his natural insulation alike. “May we go to Sandon, husband?”
He made a noise like a dying animal. “Would that I could…”
She knew there was far too much to be done before the end of the year, and unfortunate as it was, business moved faster in London than it did in Sandon. So, instead, she pressed her mouth against his chin once, twice, three times—trailing her way up to his ear, the lobe of which she briefly closed her lips over.
“You’ve missed a meal.”
“I have not,” he bickered, although he sounded immediately interested and instantly aware that Sarah was offering a game.
Clever husband. Wonderful man.
“I’ve asked for drinking chocolate,” she informed him, “and, one mustn’t have a drink without something small to eat with it.”
Pressing his cheek against her crown, Philip sounded amused when he agreed, “Certainly not in this house. Ah—it’s here already?”
“I do follow your schedule.”
A pause preceded a lower, more tender, “Mm, then you must be right, sweetheart. I have missed a meal.”
23) fics you wanted to write but didn’t
--Shy Feedee Anon <3
Mmmm, this is tough because I have several stagnant WIPs that I think I will come back to, but not many that I've fully canceled. Maybe the Hannah/Jessie Champagne Weather spin off. Maybe more Edith/Lewis (there's a fake wedding).
I wanted to be deeper in the mafiaverse, but hockeyverse called me more strongly and that's where my heart's stuck for a bit<3