Stand On The Rock.

Stand On the Rock.

And don’t tell me no!

I have given you so many snips at this point that you've read most of what I've written, haha. Stand on the Rock is a slice-of-life one-shot that takes place in my People Still Listen to Fleetwood Mac in the Apocalypse series. I gave Tommy and Maria three kids in that universe (one biological child, and two older children they eventually adopt) but those stories aren't really about them, so I never really got to flesh them out the way I wanted. The story really ended up growing as I got into it, so we actually get a glimpse of how Tommy and Maria begin seeing each other, and then fast-forward into them trying to deal with the fact that the children in their house now outnumber them. Have a tiny snip:

“One dance – then I’ll fuck off,” Tommy promised, covertly wiping his palms against his jeans and then extending a hand out to her. Maria didn’t reply for a solid few seconds, and it was an eerie thing to be on the receiving end of such an intense gaze. The weight of her stare pinned him into place, a laser that felt likely to bore right through him – but she took his hand anyway; lightly, hesitantly, as though she was afraid she was condoning something wicked if she at all squeezed his fingers or showed any enthusiasm whatsoever about what she was currently instructing her body to do. 

“That a promise?” she asked, and he snorted, drawing her a little closer, taking a chance to slip his arm around her waist – and this resulted in a rather withering look, certainly, but after a quick scan around the room confirmed many other dance partners in similar poses, she seemed to relax a little, the tension slowly seeping out of her shoulders. She settled into his hold, if not with enthusiasm then at least with a grudging acceptance.

“I’ll getcha it in writing,” he said with a nod, and she choked back a laugh. For a wonderful few moments, she allowed him to lead her; they swayed with the crowd, following the melody of a vaguely familiar country ballad that Tommy thought he’d last heard in an Austin dive bar, but wasn’t entirely sure. And it was easy – easy to lead, to keep his arm wrapped around her waist, to try to pretend as though he’d ever been this nervous at any point in his life that did not involve him aiming a gun at someone. “So,” he said finally, slowly turning on the spot, apparently determined to immediately ruin this, “Jay, huh?”

“Oh, here we go,” she sighed. 

“Nice guy,” he said, “but don’t you think he might be a little…I dunno…young, for you?”

“Is this how you flirt?” Her voice held an edge to it – he grinned anyway. “By telling women they’re too old for their dance partners?”

“Nothin’ to do with you,” he reasoned, and he took a step back from her, quickly, lifting her arm – and though she was surprised by it, she followed his lead, allowing him to spin her. When they came back together, it was with a laugh that she tried and failed to hide. “Just him. Don’t get me wrong – Jay’s a nice fella. Real nice – but, do I really gotta say it?”

“Say what?” she asked coolly.

“C’mon, now,” Tommy huffed, “you know what I mean. That one – he’s a boy. You don’t need that. You need –”

“So help me,” she warned, rolling her eyes to the ceiling, “if you finish that sentence with ‘a man,’ I’m leaving.”

Sorry I know I'm predictable, but I would like "3.) Smut Smut Smut Smutty Smut Smut" Pretty please

OH WOW GO FIGURE 🤣

Tbh I couldn't even remember what it was until I clicked on it just now, haha. It's just a few scenes of cute smut between Joel and Benny that I never got to fit in anywhere. Have a snip:

It was only then that she caught his reflection in the mirror – and she paused, momentarily stunned. “I’m sorry – what are those?” She spun around immediately, her surprise morphing quickly into a wide-eyed grin.

Joel Miller, a man seasoned by the salt of a lifetime's worth of judgments, rarely tasted the tang of bashfulness. He'd spent his entire childhood being ridiculed by his peers for his threadbare clothes, his unruly hair, and the rust-bucket cars of his later youth – and his adulthood came with a whole different type of judgment, other adults (usually the parents of Sarah’s classmates, who were mostly older than he was) looking down their noses at his perpetual lack of everything (money, time, patience). And yet it rarely touched him, this prickling self-consciousness. But this was different somehow; his wife’s gaze, wide and shimmering with disbelief, suddenly a spotlight on something he didn’t know he was insecure about until this very moment. Heat crept up his neck, a brushfire warming his cheeks. He snapped the book shut, letting it fall flat in his lap.

“Don’t start,” he warned her, but his tone lacked bite. She edged closer to his side of the bed, one delicate hand tracing along the edge of the quilt. 

“Don’t start what?” Her voice was practically bursting with glee. “Where did you get those?”

“Tommy gave ‘em to me.” He shifted uncomfortably against his pillow, his fingertips brushing the black frames of his reading glasses. “Saw me squintin’ at the patrol log today, figured I could use 'em. Look, I’ll just –” With a sigh, he reached to remove the glasses, but her hand darted out, landing on his wrist. She perched herself on the bed’s edge right next to him, the mattress, worn and welcoming, dipping gently beneath her thighs. “You don’t…have to,” she drawled, and she met the tired raise of his eyebrow with a widening grin. “Why don’t you keep them on?” "Keep them on for…how long, exactly?" he huffed. Her hand drifted away from his wrist, traveling down until it could slide along the top of the quilt, running along his thigh. A shiver ran down his spine, her nimble fingers edging closer –

"Until I say you can take them off," she answered simply, and then she moved quickly; almost before he could react she swung her legs over the side of the bed and grabbed his book, tossing it to the nightstand so she had more room to straddle him – which she did, enthusiastically, as he groaned in surprise, her fingers already winding around the back of his head and threading through his gray curls. “Don’t tell me this is what does it for you,” he scoffed. She moved her hips against him, pressing against the length growing into the front of his sweatpants, and he immediately groaned. His hands found purchase along her thighs, following her purposeful movements. “I look like an old man.”

“Whatever you say, Mr. Miller,” she purred, her voice syrup-sweet, batting her eyelashes in a clumsy imitation of someone far younger and more doe-eyed than she actually was – a performance so exaggerated it felt like she was mocking the act of flirting itself. Joel snorted in amusement, the sound rumbling through his chest.

“No. We ain’t doin’ that,” he sighed, shaking his head. “S’weird.”

“I have an idea about some extra credit I can earn.”

“I got concerns about the teachers you grew up with.”

GIRL

Oh no…if Tommy takes Ellie to the fireflies, please tell me he makes the right choice at salt lake 😬

I don’t know! That was a WIP by @lauronk I reblogged! Lauren, any insight here? 🥹

I feel attacked.

I finished playing TLoU Part I last night, so if anyone needs me I will be sobbing while wrapped up in my softest blanket

Sunny Side of Heaven

Nobody mind me, I'm just over here happy-sobbing about this piece of fanart that @march-flowerr commissioned from @mote-of-star-dust, based on a scene from my GTHB fic, Sunny Side of Heaven.

🦋🦋🦋

As they watch, more and more of the swarm are coming loose from the tree – and then they erupt, like floating lava. All at once, an entire branch of them breaks free, and they begin falling through the air as a spiral, a chain reaction that unleashes the swarm from the trees in a cascade of orange and black. In just seconds they’re completely enveloped – and she gasps, instinctively takes a step toward him, and it’s second nature for him to wrap his arm around her shoulders, steadying her.

Everything about this is overwhelming to the senses; the air is full of orange and black, his good ear is hearing nothing but the rustling of wings that drowns out the rest of the world, and he can feel them, their delicate touch a constant whisper across his skin. Ellie’s shoulders tense against him, and for a breathless moment he’s blinded – by flashes of color, and a love so fierce that it all borders on unbearable – and he wishes that it was all easier, that this girl standing next to him, leaning into him can just know that the tangle of love and grief, for him, is sometimes indistinguishable, but that it’s also not her burden –

– and then it ends, the cloud lifts, the vibrant azure of the sky and the bright sun begin to shine through once again, and they’re left to stand together on that blanket, stunned and smiling and overwhelmed. They watch as the swarm ascends, and soon there are only flecks of orange left – including a single monarch that clings to Joel’s hair, wings bending slowly, blinking down at Ellie as she snorts back a laugh.

“Here –” she says, and he bends without question so she can reach, her fingers sweeping lightly at the butterfly until it finally flutters away, a zigzag of warm color against the clear sky that joins the few dozen other stragglers still circling through the trees. He watches it fly away, and he doesn't say it out loud, but he thinks it: Hi, baby girl. Behind them, their horses stir restlessly, and Shimmer whinnies softly, both horses pawning nervously at the earth, dark eyes following the cloud as it slowly winds its way south, low against the ground.

Thank you, my friends. 😭