Jaidon (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cridecoeur) wrote2011-06-07 07:48 pm
cridecoeur) wrote2011-06-07 07:48 pm
Entry tags:
bingo, six ficlets
So the thing is, I think I have given you guys the wrong impression of me, as a whole. Because, by and large, my posts here are of serious content/have at least a little meaning to them/aren't so stupid you just want to roll your eyes. So, the thing: many, many things I write and then let languish on my hard drive are incredibly stupid and done simply to entertain me, spur of the moment, and never meant to be finished. Which is separated only from all the other things I never finish only by original intent. I even have a special file for them. The file is called "what the hell why not - OR - what happens when you have stupid ideas often."
The reason I am telling you this: a forewarning. These bingo fills are really fucking stupid. For real. No joke. I dare you to get through this without rolling your eyes. In fact, I double dog dare you. (Luckily I have no idea what that actually means - double dog? - so you can probably slide by, even if you don't.)
So, my fills.
title: because i like skaters, okay
prompt: celebrity/notable person
rating: pg. and then only for using the lord's name in vain.
universe: amé
Dafydd is pretty sure he hasn’t reached epic levels of pathetic-ness as far as Amé goes - he hasn’t bought notebooks just so he can write their names all over them, surrounded by little hearts and stars, and he hasn’t once stolen an article of Amé’s clothes, even though he has legitimate access, which is more than can be said for Amé’s fans, who don’t - but that doesn’t mean he isn’t kind of pathetic. Like now, watching him sleep, even though Dafydd in no way had sex with him the night before. Aksinya had just sent him to wake Amé, assuming, probably, that he’d, you know, wake Amé up and not stare at him like a creeper. Amé is just. He’s just really pretty, like what Dafydd, in his weaker, more romantic moments, imagines a fairy tale prince would look like, if that fairy tale prince happened to be kind of fabulous, with a penchant for sequins. Dafydd catches himself before he puts his chin in his hand and sighs dreamily because, seriously, he’s not that pathetic.
Amé stirs gently in his sleep, mumbling softly, words Dafydd can’t make out even though he strains to hear them. And then, of course, that one stupid pop song worms its way into his thoughts, all and I know that I’m right, ‘cause I hear it in the ni-i-ight. Not that Dafydd really knows any secrets that Amé keeps, unless you count knowing the entire contents of his underwear drawer and his taste in fruit smoothies, but that’s kind of Dafydd’s job. Being Amé’s personal assistant isn’t always glamorous, but Dafydd prides himself on being good at it.
“Dafydd?” Amé murmurs softly, accent more pronounced on the edge of sleep, eyes fluttering open in a way that makes Dafydd swallow hard. He’s such an idiot, Christ.
“Yeah,” Dafydd says, “Sorry, I was just about to wake you up.” He’s not sure if he means sorry for having to wake Amé at - he glances at the clock - 5:30 in the morning, or the fact that he was staring at him like a total creeper at 5:30 in the morning. Not that staring at him like a creeper would be better at another time of the day. He’s just - God, he needs to get over himself. “We have to leave pretty soon.”
Amé glances at the clock, then jerks upright in bed. “My hair!” he exclaims, bunching his hands in it, “I do not have time!” He gives Dafydd an injured look. “Why did you not wake me earlier?”
Dafydd laughs. “You needed the sleep,” he says.
Amé throws back the covers and practically runs to the bathroom. “Terribile,” he moans, which just make Dafydd laugh again.
“Half an hour,” he says, in warning, and then leaves Amé to a more frantic than usual morning routine before he can do something stupid, like tell Amé that he’s always beautiful, even when he’s sleep rumpled with pillow crease-marks on his face. Maybe especially then. He even knows what to say, now - sei bello in ogni senso - but instead he shuts the door behind himself and walks down to the lobby to find Aksinya, and tell her that Amé is more or less on his way.
title: when a rock star stalks a fan
prompt: celebrity/notable person. that's right, i was so excited about this one, i filled it twice.
rating: pg-13
universe: mazurka
Marlowe spots him for the first time at a show in San Francisco, which turns out to be where he lives so, okay, not unusual. What is unusual is the fact that he’s wearing eyeliner that kind of, um, glitters, pink lip gloss, and grommet-studded leather, which is weird enough taken all together - if you’d asked Marlowe before then about wearing lip gloss with leather he’d have said, are you serious, you can’t do that, not if you’re a guy - but even weirder when pretty much everyone around him is wearing some variation on plaid. Or denim. Marlowe’s pretty sure he saw someone earlier that day who’d really gotten into the spirit and worn plaid denim.
Then he sees him again in San Jose. It’s not even like he’s looking for him, the guy’s just really noticeable, and not because he’s, “smoking hot, Jesus Christ, I’d bang him like a screen door,” like Shayna says - Marlowe thinks that’s a really disrespectful thing to say, to begin with, okay, and his Mom taught him better than that. Not that Marlowe doesn’t think he’s attractive because, um, Shayna’s not really wrong. He just stands out. Marlowe figures that’ll be it, though, two shows kind of near each other, and he won’t see the guy again.
But he does. He sees him again in Fresno and Bakersfield and Los Angeles, and Marlowe’s not even really famous enough to have groupies yet - Shayna’s the closest he comes and since she, “won’t fuck anything I’ll break doing it,” he figures he’s safe with her - so he’s not really sure what the guy’s doing there. Not that minds him being there! He doesn’t. He’s just kind of confused by it.
“Hey, Marnie,” he says to his manager after the Los Angeles show, “could you, um, I mean, maybe you could - “ and then she looks up from her phone- she was totally playing Bejeweled, Marlowe can tell - and says, “Yeah, Marlowe?” and he just kind of stares at her with big eyes, hoping she’ll just be able to, like, osmose what he wants so he doesn’t have to say it. When she just stares back at him and lifts an eyebrow, he flushes and says, “Um, there’s this guy that I saw, he was watching the show, and, I mean, I’ve noticed him before, - “ and, wow, that totally sounds like - like, not how he means it to, but there’s already a smile spreading across Marnie’s face, kind of gleeful and maybe a little disbelieving.
“Oh my god!” she says, “You’re trying to pick up a fan!” and Shayna’s walking by at the same time that Marlowe says, “Oh my gosh, no, no!” and she’s all, “What’s going on?” and when Marnie tells her, she goes, “Whoohoo, Marlowe’s gonna bang his fans! He’s a fucking rock star!”
“Oh my gosh, no I’m not,” Marlowe says, feeling completely and totally humiliated. He just wants to talk to the guy. He’s come out to all those shows and everything, he might have cool things to say about the music or whatever, and, okay, he really is pretty but Marlowe doesn’t want to, like, sleep with him, he just maybe wants to stand around him and - be totally lame, oh my gosh, what is he thinking?
“You know what, never mind, I’m just going to - “ Marlowe starts to say, but Shayna goes, “Oh no way, man, we are totally getting you laid,” and Marlowe says, “Oh my gosh, please don’t!” but it’s too late, and Shayna’s already dragging him out from backstage and going, “Okay who is he?”
“I’m not going to just tell you! You’ll like assault him with me!” Marlowe says, but Shayna’s just all, “Never mind, I don’t even have to ask, it’s totally hot eyeliner guy,” and starts dragging him towards the bar, through the crowd that’s kind of drifting around after the show, still drinking and talking.
She pulls up short, maneuvering Marlowe between herself and the counter, so he can’t just run away, which is what he really wants to do. “Hey,” she says to the bartender, “we’re looking for somebody. Tall guy, black hair, eyeliner, got a leather jacket,” and then when he doesn’t immediately answer, she adds, “he’s fucking scorching hot,” and the guy laughs and says, “You must be talking about Chick.”
“Oh, no,” Marlowe says, without really meaning to, “He’s definitely a boy,” and the bartender laughs at him - definitely at him and Marlowe is just so embarrassed - and says, “No that’s his name. Chick Reed. He does the club circuit. Plays here sometimes.”
“Ooooh,” Shayna says, “A musician,” like that’s all significant somehow. Not that Marlowe minds musicians or whatever but he could totally date - or just talk to! - people who aren’t musicians. Although if he is maybe he really will have something cool to say about the music.
“Um,” Marlowe says, “I guess that’s kind of neat.” The guy raises an eyebrow when Marlowe says neat, like maybe people who say neat shouldn’t be talking to Chick Reed. Probably Chick never says things are neat, not if he wears a leather jacket and isn’t completely embarrassed to wear eye liner in public. Glittery eye liner.
“I could get him over here, if you want,” the bartender says, already scanning the crowd.
“Oh, um, no, you don’t have to do that!” Marlowe says, at the same time Shayna says, “He does!” and the bartender must like Shayna more than Marlowe - probably, Marlowe thinks, a little meanly, because Shayna likes to show off her breasts - because he’s waving at somebody and shouting, “Hey, Chick! Somebody here wants to meet you.” Somebody with a deep voice, kind of rough like maybe he smokes too much, and wow, Marlowe hopes that’s not Chick, because nobody who sings should treat their voice like that, calls back, “He’d better be fucking sexy! Because I am talking to someone sexy right now!” and somebody laughs.
The bartender looks Marlowe up and down in a way that makes him want to pull his jacket tighter around himself and maybe hide behind Shayna a little. And Marlowe must not have passed inspection because he doesn’t say anything about Marlowe being sexy - which Marlowe’s actually pretty relieved about because if people thought he was sexy, they’d probably try to grope him more, like they do with Shayna, and, oh my gosh, he always wants to hit people when that happens so he’d probably just want to hit them more - he just says, “Just get over here!”
“Alright!” Chick calls back, “I’m coming!” and the same person laughs, again, and Chick adds, “Oh my god, sexy, with a dirty mind. I hope you are worth it mystery boy!”and Shayna calls back, “He totally is!”
Marlowe grabs onto her arm as hisses, “Shayna!” at her because, oh my gosh, why is she doing this? She must be getting back at him for something. Probably the time he spilled coffee on her favorite shoes, but it wasn’t his fault! He wasn’t really paying attention and he tripped on a cable backstage and - okay, so it kind of was his fault, but he didn’t mean for it to happen, and he was really sorry! Shayna is definitely not sorry for this, at all. She’s enjoying it, Marlowe can tell.
Before Marlowe can run away or, like, hide behind the bar - even though probably the bartender wouldn’t let him - the crowd parts and Chick Reed steps through, almost like in a movie, only the music in the background doesn’t suddenly swell up, just kind of thumps along, all boom-boom-boom, heavy with bass, the kind of music that, um, kind of gets on Marlowe’s nerves, actually, so that doesn’t really lend to the moment.
Chick gets one look at him and actually claps his hands.
“Jodie, baby, you are officially my favorite person,” and the bartender - um, Jodie? - says, “Seriously, you keep calling me that, I’m going to start letting the good ones go,” at the same time Chick grabs onto Marlowe’s jacket and starts dragging him away from the bar.
“Come on, we’re going to dance,” Chick says, and Marlowe turns back to make big, pleading eyes at Shayna, who just waves at him, smiling in a totally evil way, and shouts after them, “Remember, no public sex! You’re not famous enough for the tabloids,” and, oh my gosh, Marlowe just wants to sink through the floor.
“Um, I don’t, um,” he says, as Chick stops in sort of the center of where everyone’s still milling around, not so much a dance floor as a place you can dance, if you’re determined, which, apparently, Chick is. He wraps an arm around Marlowe’s waist and pulls him close. Marlowe tries not to instantly die which he succeeds at mostly because people don’t actually instantly die from touching people they think are, um… okay Marlowe can’t really say handsome because Chick is pretty.
title: this is why you don't let strange men tattoo you
prompt: ghosts/hauntings/afterlife
rating: pg
universe: eGad
Reagan probably should have listened to his mom when she said not to get tattoos outside of parlors. Okay, so it had started out as, don’t get tattoos, period, but once that ship had sailed and Reagan’s ink-virginity had been taken, she’d started up with the don’t let strange men tattoo you. But, in his defense, she’d always said he’d get some sort of disease from it, which wasn’t going to happen, and not that he was going to get whacked-up superpowers from it.
“Oh, yeah, sometimes that happens,” the guy who’d inked him - Joss - said, when Reagan called him to say what the fuck only with more words and an edge of hysteria because he didn’t have a reflection, anymore, and sometimes he walked through walls. “See, my mom’s a witch, and she doesn’t really like it that I didn’t finish college, so sometimes she curses shit I use. I haven’t figured out how to tell when.”
“Fucking what,” Reagan said, and that started a whole tangent on growing up with a witch mother and the difficulty of having no gift for the Craft, when the rest of his family did, and also how majoring in business was the worst thing that could happen to a person, which ended with, “So what power did you get?”
Reagan took the phone away from his ear and stared down at it. Then he slid the little bar across the screen to unlock the keypad and hit end call. He was pretty sure you couldn’t sue somebody for giving you super powers, but Reagan would really, really like to try.
#
The next day, things got even weirder. And Reagan didn’t even mean the three plates he broke when he turned into a fucking ghost or the time he accidently fell through a wall while trying to put his shoes on and landed right in his neighbors apartment, which would’ve been really awkward if she’d actually been home, seeing as it was her bedroom, but really just meant he had to scramble through the apartment - because of course, of course, he’d lost all his ghost-ness on the fall through - away from her mean fucking dog.
No, the weird part is when a total stranger shows up on his doorstep and introduces himself as, “Gad, but all Joss’ boys call me eGad. Oh, and my arch-nemesis. But the dude’s a serious dick so, you know, don’t call me that just because he does.”
Reagan just kind of stares at him for a moment because, is this guy serious? “Uh, your arch-nemesis?”
“Yeah,” Gad says, “Mister Seed. I’ve told him that’s a fucking retarded name, but he doesn’t listen to me. We met at a mixer.”
“A mixer.” Reagan says, kind of stupidly, and, at some point he’s going to have to move past stupidly repeating everything Gad says, but Gad’s going to have to stop being patently fucking ridiculous first. Although, okay, so Gad met his arch-nemesis at a mixer, Reagan guesses there are weirder ways to meet an arch-nemesis like at a garage sale or while dating online. Actually, wow, the last one would be really awkward.
“Yeah, Joss was there, he can tell you. It was, like, enmity at first sight. Things just took off from there.”
title: that was stupid, dude
prompt: free space
rating: pg
universe: eGad
“So, uh,” Reagan said, because being the damsel in distress was awkward and all, but the silence was killing him. “Network of Conquerors, huh?”
Mister Seed turned away from the controls he was fiddling with - hopefully not to, like, flood the chamber Reagan was in with gas or something. Reagan might be able to phase through that, but Seed had managed to come up with a ghost-proof container for him, and Reagan didn’t really want to find out if he’d come up with ghost-proof gas.
“Yes,” he said, “pooling our resources seemed a wise move. You wouldn’t believe how difficult coordinating world-domination can be. Although the in-fighting is tedious at best.”
“No, yeah, I can see that,” Reagan said, and then an alarm went off, all whuu-whuu-whuu wailing, and the console Seed had been working on started spitting licks of electricity, then exploded. When the smoke cleared, Seed was standing, brushing dust off of his suit, across from Gad, who looked seriously pissed. Not that Reagan blamed him. Aside from the fact that he was trying to enslave the human race, Seed really was a dick.
“Ah, eGad, so good of you to join us,” Seed said, and Gad said, “Yeah, no, I don’t have time for your exposition. I’ve got a date,” and Reagan had a total girl moment where he thought he called it a date! before he remembered, yeah, ghost-proof chamber, so the date was kind of imperiled. Gad paused for a second before adding, “You dick,” and then, “So, yeah, we’re just going to go now,” and jumped towards the chamber Reagan was trapped in, spitting electricity, and joined with the circuitry, emerging beside Reagan and grabbing his arm. “Come on,” he said, then tried to dissolve again, only to kind of fizzle and stay right where he was.
“Dude,” Reagan said, “Dude, that was stupid.”
“Fuck,” Gad said, just as Seed said, “Ah, eGad, you’ve fallen directly into my trap,” as if that weren’t totally obvious to everybody, already, “You see… “
“Fucking exposition,” Gad said, under his breath, as Seed warmed to the topic of just how he’d predicted Gad’s every move.
title: what the heck... you have breasts!
prompt: genderswap
rating: pg
universe: mazurka
When Chick Reed turned into a girl, Marlowe didn’t even notice, at first. But sometimes Chick dressed like a girl and he wore make-up all the time and his hair was really pretty, all streaked with color, so it probably wasn’t that bad that he hadn’t notice, just - okay, it was really bad that he hadn’t noticed.
“What the breasts didn’t give it away?” Chick said - after Marlowe had totally dropped a plate and gotten syrup all over the floor because it was breakfast time and, oh my heck, how else was he supposed to react? - in the same smoke-rough voice he’d always had, and he was kind of, um, groping himself when he said it.
“Oh my gosh, stop that!” Marlowe hissed, grabbing his hands and then… not really knowing what to do with them and just kind of holding on for a moment, awkwardly, because if he let go Chick was probably just going to grope himself again, just to make Marlowe all embarrassed. He really needed to meet some people who didn’t like that so much. Not, um, groping themselves, which, okay, Shayna kind of did when she was dancing with guys, too. But people who didn’t think it was hilarious when he turned all red and stuttery.
“Stop what?” Chick asked, like he didn’t already know, and he probably just wanted to hear Marlowe talk about his breasts. Then he tried to pull his hands away, and Marlowe tried to hold on, and they sort of ended up tussling in the middle of Marlowe’s tiny kitchen, so that it was inevitable when they banged into a counter and Marlowe ended up pressed against Chick all over.
“Um,” Marlowe said, a little squeakily, because those were Chick’s breasts, breasts that he absolutely should not have, and now Marlowe was kind of groping him, oh my gosh, how embarrassing. “You have, um,” and tried to pull away, but now Chick was the one holding on.
“Breasts, yeah,” he said, looking down at Marlowe, “I told you.”
Marlowe just kind of looked at him, all big-eyed, biting down on his lower lip, and trying not to stare at Chick’s mouth that was even fuller now that he was a girl and kind of slick. Chick just watched him a little more and Marlowe could feel himself start to flush.
“Oh my god,” Chick said, as Marlowe looked anywhere but at him, “Don’t tell me I’m giving you some kind of sexual identity crisis.”
Marlowe’s gaze snapped back to Chick, flush spreading further. “Um,” he said, kind of miserably, and then Chick leaned forward and kissed him. Marlowe made little muffled surprised noises against his mouth even though he probably shouldn’t be because Chick kissed everybody even people who were mean or who he didn’t really like, but he’d never kissed Marlowe before and, okay, Marlowe hadn’t been ready, he wasn’t doing very well!
title: like blake, except for how i haven't read blake
prompt: fairy tales/folk lore/mythology
rating: pg.
universe: space dragon au 'verse. so au you probably won't even know which character's au forms these are.
Only an angel would hold a protest of one. The fact that he was protesting the Westboro Baptist Church was just a delicious irony, the sort I would like to have orchestrated, if I had any real sway over the angel, which I hadn’t, despite the angel’s seeming enthusiasm for my company.
“Naamah!” Paschal cried, going so far as to wave and jump up and down as he caught sight of me, standing beside a woman in a highly unattractive yellow track suit, holding a sign that proclaimed broadly that “God Hates Fags,” which was uncreative to such a level that I had little desire to even Tempt her to, say - another delicious irony - fornication with the young man holding a sign quoting Leviticus - how utterly trite - that she’d had her eye on all morning, despite her marital status. I doubt she would have understood the irony even if her hypocrisy had been pointed out to her, and if I were going to populate hell for sexual misconduct I would at least not populate it with idiots.
Tipping my sunglasses down my nose and peering at Paschal over top of them, I decided that, yes, crossing the lines would sow enough discord in the ranks of supposed believers that it would be worth the inevitably effervescent conversation with Paschal that would follow. I pushed my glasses up into my hair and walked across the imaginary line between the Westboro Church members and an angel they’d probably prostrate themselves before if he weren’t, say, protesting their treatment of their homosexual brothers and sisters. That seemed to upset them, in particular.
“Hello, Paschal,” I said, as I drew close to him, then reached out to cup one of his cheeks in my hand and kiss him firmly on the mouth. The cry from the crowd that followed was particularly fervent.
“Oh my gosh, you did that on purpose,” Paschal said, as I drew away. “You’re totally undermining my protest.”
“Thwarting,” I said, “I tend to do that. Now, what are you doing out here alone?”
“I’m not alone!” Paschal said, “You’re here!”
What am I, what am I, etc.
These were also posted on![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
origfic_bingo over here where people were very tolerant of my silliness.
The reason I am telling you this: a forewarning. These bingo fills are really fucking stupid. For real. No joke. I dare you to get through this without rolling your eyes. In fact, I double dog dare you. (Luckily I have no idea what that actually means - double dog? - so you can probably slide by, even if you don't.)
So, my fills.
title: because i like skaters, okay
prompt: celebrity/notable person
rating: pg. and then only for using the lord's name in vain.
universe: amé
Dafydd is pretty sure he hasn’t reached epic levels of pathetic-ness as far as Amé goes - he hasn’t bought notebooks just so he can write their names all over them, surrounded by little hearts and stars, and he hasn’t once stolen an article of Amé’s clothes, even though he has legitimate access, which is more than can be said for Amé’s fans, who don’t - but that doesn’t mean he isn’t kind of pathetic. Like now, watching him sleep, even though Dafydd in no way had sex with him the night before. Aksinya had just sent him to wake Amé, assuming, probably, that he’d, you know, wake Amé up and not stare at him like a creeper. Amé is just. He’s just really pretty, like what Dafydd, in his weaker, more romantic moments, imagines a fairy tale prince would look like, if that fairy tale prince happened to be kind of fabulous, with a penchant for sequins. Dafydd catches himself before he puts his chin in his hand and sighs dreamily because, seriously, he’s not that pathetic.
Amé stirs gently in his sleep, mumbling softly, words Dafydd can’t make out even though he strains to hear them. And then, of course, that one stupid pop song worms its way into his thoughts, all and I know that I’m right, ‘cause I hear it in the ni-i-ight. Not that Dafydd really knows any secrets that Amé keeps, unless you count knowing the entire contents of his underwear drawer and his taste in fruit smoothies, but that’s kind of Dafydd’s job. Being Amé’s personal assistant isn’t always glamorous, but Dafydd prides himself on being good at it.
“Dafydd?” Amé murmurs softly, accent more pronounced on the edge of sleep, eyes fluttering open in a way that makes Dafydd swallow hard. He’s such an idiot, Christ.
“Yeah,” Dafydd says, “Sorry, I was just about to wake you up.” He’s not sure if he means sorry for having to wake Amé at - he glances at the clock - 5:30 in the morning, or the fact that he was staring at him like a total creeper at 5:30 in the morning. Not that staring at him like a creeper would be better at another time of the day. He’s just - God, he needs to get over himself. “We have to leave pretty soon.”
Amé glances at the clock, then jerks upright in bed. “My hair!” he exclaims, bunching his hands in it, “I do not have time!” He gives Dafydd an injured look. “Why did you not wake me earlier?”
Dafydd laughs. “You needed the sleep,” he says.
Amé throws back the covers and practically runs to the bathroom. “Terribile,” he moans, which just make Dafydd laugh again.
“Half an hour,” he says, in warning, and then leaves Amé to a more frantic than usual morning routine before he can do something stupid, like tell Amé that he’s always beautiful, even when he’s sleep rumpled with pillow crease-marks on his face. Maybe especially then. He even knows what to say, now - sei bello in ogni senso - but instead he shuts the door behind himself and walks down to the lobby to find Aksinya, and tell her that Amé is more or less on his way.
title: when a rock star stalks a fan
prompt: celebrity/notable person. that's right, i was so excited about this one, i filled it twice.
rating: pg-13
universe: mazurka
Marlowe spots him for the first time at a show in San Francisco, which turns out to be where he lives so, okay, not unusual. What is unusual is the fact that he’s wearing eyeliner that kind of, um, glitters, pink lip gloss, and grommet-studded leather, which is weird enough taken all together - if you’d asked Marlowe before then about wearing lip gloss with leather he’d have said, are you serious, you can’t do that, not if you’re a guy - but even weirder when pretty much everyone around him is wearing some variation on plaid. Or denim. Marlowe’s pretty sure he saw someone earlier that day who’d really gotten into the spirit and worn plaid denim.
Then he sees him again in San Jose. It’s not even like he’s looking for him, the guy’s just really noticeable, and not because he’s, “smoking hot, Jesus Christ, I’d bang him like a screen door,” like Shayna says - Marlowe thinks that’s a really disrespectful thing to say, to begin with, okay, and his Mom taught him better than that. Not that Marlowe doesn’t think he’s attractive because, um, Shayna’s not really wrong. He just stands out. Marlowe figures that’ll be it, though, two shows kind of near each other, and he won’t see the guy again.
But he does. He sees him again in Fresno and Bakersfield and Los Angeles, and Marlowe’s not even really famous enough to have groupies yet - Shayna’s the closest he comes and since she, “won’t fuck anything I’ll break doing it,” he figures he’s safe with her - so he’s not really sure what the guy’s doing there. Not that minds him being there! He doesn’t. He’s just kind of confused by it.
“Hey, Marnie,” he says to his manager after the Los Angeles show, “could you, um, I mean, maybe you could - “ and then she looks up from her phone- she was totally playing Bejeweled, Marlowe can tell - and says, “Yeah, Marlowe?” and he just kind of stares at her with big eyes, hoping she’ll just be able to, like, osmose what he wants so he doesn’t have to say it. When she just stares back at him and lifts an eyebrow, he flushes and says, “Um, there’s this guy that I saw, he was watching the show, and, I mean, I’ve noticed him before, - “ and, wow, that totally sounds like - like, not how he means it to, but there’s already a smile spreading across Marnie’s face, kind of gleeful and maybe a little disbelieving.
“Oh my god!” she says, “You’re trying to pick up a fan!” and Shayna’s walking by at the same time that Marlowe says, “Oh my gosh, no, no!” and she’s all, “What’s going on?” and when Marnie tells her, she goes, “Whoohoo, Marlowe’s gonna bang his fans! He’s a fucking rock star!”
“Oh my gosh, no I’m not,” Marlowe says, feeling completely and totally humiliated. He just wants to talk to the guy. He’s come out to all those shows and everything, he might have cool things to say about the music or whatever, and, okay, he really is pretty but Marlowe doesn’t want to, like, sleep with him, he just maybe wants to stand around him and - be totally lame, oh my gosh, what is he thinking?
“You know what, never mind, I’m just going to - “ Marlowe starts to say, but Shayna goes, “Oh no way, man, we are totally getting you laid,” and Marlowe says, “Oh my gosh, please don’t!” but it’s too late, and Shayna’s already dragging him out from backstage and going, “Okay who is he?”
“I’m not going to just tell you! You’ll like assault him with me!” Marlowe says, but Shayna’s just all, “Never mind, I don’t even have to ask, it’s totally hot eyeliner guy,” and starts dragging him towards the bar, through the crowd that’s kind of drifting around after the show, still drinking and talking.
She pulls up short, maneuvering Marlowe between herself and the counter, so he can’t just run away, which is what he really wants to do. “Hey,” she says to the bartender, “we’re looking for somebody. Tall guy, black hair, eyeliner, got a leather jacket,” and then when he doesn’t immediately answer, she adds, “he’s fucking scorching hot,” and the guy laughs and says, “You must be talking about Chick.”
“Oh, no,” Marlowe says, without really meaning to, “He’s definitely a boy,” and the bartender laughs at him - definitely at him and Marlowe is just so embarrassed - and says, “No that’s his name. Chick Reed. He does the club circuit. Plays here sometimes.”
“Ooooh,” Shayna says, “A musician,” like that’s all significant somehow. Not that Marlowe minds musicians or whatever but he could totally date - or just talk to! - people who aren’t musicians. Although if he is maybe he really will have something cool to say about the music.
“Um,” Marlowe says, “I guess that’s kind of neat.” The guy raises an eyebrow when Marlowe says neat, like maybe people who say neat shouldn’t be talking to Chick Reed. Probably Chick never says things are neat, not if he wears a leather jacket and isn’t completely embarrassed to wear eye liner in public. Glittery eye liner.
“I could get him over here, if you want,” the bartender says, already scanning the crowd.
“Oh, um, no, you don’t have to do that!” Marlowe says, at the same time Shayna says, “He does!” and the bartender must like Shayna more than Marlowe - probably, Marlowe thinks, a little meanly, because Shayna likes to show off her breasts - because he’s waving at somebody and shouting, “Hey, Chick! Somebody here wants to meet you.” Somebody with a deep voice, kind of rough like maybe he smokes too much, and wow, Marlowe hopes that’s not Chick, because nobody who sings should treat their voice like that, calls back, “He’d better be fucking sexy! Because I am talking to someone sexy right now!” and somebody laughs.
The bartender looks Marlowe up and down in a way that makes him want to pull his jacket tighter around himself and maybe hide behind Shayna a little. And Marlowe must not have passed inspection because he doesn’t say anything about Marlowe being sexy - which Marlowe’s actually pretty relieved about because if people thought he was sexy, they’d probably try to grope him more, like they do with Shayna, and, oh my gosh, he always wants to hit people when that happens so he’d probably just want to hit them more - he just says, “Just get over here!”
“Alright!” Chick calls back, “I’m coming!” and the same person laughs, again, and Chick adds, “Oh my god, sexy, with a dirty mind. I hope you are worth it mystery boy!”and Shayna calls back, “He totally is!”
Marlowe grabs onto her arm as hisses, “Shayna!” at her because, oh my gosh, why is she doing this? She must be getting back at him for something. Probably the time he spilled coffee on her favorite shoes, but it wasn’t his fault! He wasn’t really paying attention and he tripped on a cable backstage and - okay, so it kind of was his fault, but he didn’t mean for it to happen, and he was really sorry! Shayna is definitely not sorry for this, at all. She’s enjoying it, Marlowe can tell.
Before Marlowe can run away or, like, hide behind the bar - even though probably the bartender wouldn’t let him - the crowd parts and Chick Reed steps through, almost like in a movie, only the music in the background doesn’t suddenly swell up, just kind of thumps along, all boom-boom-boom, heavy with bass, the kind of music that, um, kind of gets on Marlowe’s nerves, actually, so that doesn’t really lend to the moment.
Chick gets one look at him and actually claps his hands.
“Jodie, baby, you are officially my favorite person,” and the bartender - um, Jodie? - says, “Seriously, you keep calling me that, I’m going to start letting the good ones go,” at the same time Chick grabs onto Marlowe’s jacket and starts dragging him away from the bar.
“Come on, we’re going to dance,” Chick says, and Marlowe turns back to make big, pleading eyes at Shayna, who just waves at him, smiling in a totally evil way, and shouts after them, “Remember, no public sex! You’re not famous enough for the tabloids,” and, oh my gosh, Marlowe just wants to sink through the floor.
“Um, I don’t, um,” he says, as Chick stops in sort of the center of where everyone’s still milling around, not so much a dance floor as a place you can dance, if you’re determined, which, apparently, Chick is. He wraps an arm around Marlowe’s waist and pulls him close. Marlowe tries not to instantly die which he succeeds at mostly because people don’t actually instantly die from touching people they think are, um… okay Marlowe can’t really say handsome because Chick is pretty.
title: this is why you don't let strange men tattoo you
prompt: ghosts/hauntings/afterlife
rating: pg
universe: eGad
Reagan probably should have listened to his mom when she said not to get tattoos outside of parlors. Okay, so it had started out as, don’t get tattoos, period, but once that ship had sailed and Reagan’s ink-virginity had been taken, she’d started up with the don’t let strange men tattoo you. But, in his defense, she’d always said he’d get some sort of disease from it, which wasn’t going to happen, and not that he was going to get whacked-up superpowers from it.
“Oh, yeah, sometimes that happens,” the guy who’d inked him - Joss - said, when Reagan called him to say what the fuck only with more words and an edge of hysteria because he didn’t have a reflection, anymore, and sometimes he walked through walls. “See, my mom’s a witch, and she doesn’t really like it that I didn’t finish college, so sometimes she curses shit I use. I haven’t figured out how to tell when.”
“Fucking what,” Reagan said, and that started a whole tangent on growing up with a witch mother and the difficulty of having no gift for the Craft, when the rest of his family did, and also how majoring in business was the worst thing that could happen to a person, which ended with, “So what power did you get?”
Reagan took the phone away from his ear and stared down at it. Then he slid the little bar across the screen to unlock the keypad and hit end call. He was pretty sure you couldn’t sue somebody for giving you super powers, but Reagan would really, really like to try.
#
The next day, things got even weirder. And Reagan didn’t even mean the three plates he broke when he turned into a fucking ghost or the time he accidently fell through a wall while trying to put his shoes on and landed right in his neighbors apartment, which would’ve been really awkward if she’d actually been home, seeing as it was her bedroom, but really just meant he had to scramble through the apartment - because of course, of course, he’d lost all his ghost-ness on the fall through - away from her mean fucking dog.
No, the weird part is when a total stranger shows up on his doorstep and introduces himself as, “Gad, but all Joss’ boys call me eGad. Oh, and my arch-nemesis. But the dude’s a serious dick so, you know, don’t call me that just because he does.”
Reagan just kind of stares at him for a moment because, is this guy serious? “Uh, your arch-nemesis?”
“Yeah,” Gad says, “Mister Seed. I’ve told him that’s a fucking retarded name, but he doesn’t listen to me. We met at a mixer.”
“A mixer.” Reagan says, kind of stupidly, and, at some point he’s going to have to move past stupidly repeating everything Gad says, but Gad’s going to have to stop being patently fucking ridiculous first. Although, okay, so Gad met his arch-nemesis at a mixer, Reagan guesses there are weirder ways to meet an arch-nemesis like at a garage sale or while dating online. Actually, wow, the last one would be really awkward.
“Yeah, Joss was there, he can tell you. It was, like, enmity at first sight. Things just took off from there.”
title: that was stupid, dude
prompt: free space
rating: pg
universe: eGad
“So, uh,” Reagan said, because being the damsel in distress was awkward and all, but the silence was killing him. “Network of Conquerors, huh?”
Mister Seed turned away from the controls he was fiddling with - hopefully not to, like, flood the chamber Reagan was in with gas or something. Reagan might be able to phase through that, but Seed had managed to come up with a ghost-proof container for him, and Reagan didn’t really want to find out if he’d come up with ghost-proof gas.
“Yes,” he said, “pooling our resources seemed a wise move. You wouldn’t believe how difficult coordinating world-domination can be. Although the in-fighting is tedious at best.”
“No, yeah, I can see that,” Reagan said, and then an alarm went off, all whuu-whuu-whuu wailing, and the console Seed had been working on started spitting licks of electricity, then exploded. When the smoke cleared, Seed was standing, brushing dust off of his suit, across from Gad, who looked seriously pissed. Not that Reagan blamed him. Aside from the fact that he was trying to enslave the human race, Seed really was a dick.
“Ah, eGad, so good of you to join us,” Seed said, and Gad said, “Yeah, no, I don’t have time for your exposition. I’ve got a date,” and Reagan had a total girl moment where he thought he called it a date! before he remembered, yeah, ghost-proof chamber, so the date was kind of imperiled. Gad paused for a second before adding, “You dick,” and then, “So, yeah, we’re just going to go now,” and jumped towards the chamber Reagan was trapped in, spitting electricity, and joined with the circuitry, emerging beside Reagan and grabbing his arm. “Come on,” he said, then tried to dissolve again, only to kind of fizzle and stay right where he was.
“Dude,” Reagan said, “Dude, that was stupid.”
“Fuck,” Gad said, just as Seed said, “Ah, eGad, you’ve fallen directly into my trap,” as if that weren’t totally obvious to everybody, already, “You see… “
“Fucking exposition,” Gad said, under his breath, as Seed warmed to the topic of just how he’d predicted Gad’s every move.
title: what the heck... you have breasts!
prompt: genderswap
rating: pg
universe: mazurka
When Chick Reed turned into a girl, Marlowe didn’t even notice, at first. But sometimes Chick dressed like a girl and he wore make-up all the time and his hair was really pretty, all streaked with color, so it probably wasn’t that bad that he hadn’t notice, just - okay, it was really bad that he hadn’t noticed.
“What the breasts didn’t give it away?” Chick said - after Marlowe had totally dropped a plate and gotten syrup all over the floor because it was breakfast time and, oh my heck, how else was he supposed to react? - in the same smoke-rough voice he’d always had, and he was kind of, um, groping himself when he said it.
“Oh my gosh, stop that!” Marlowe hissed, grabbing his hands and then… not really knowing what to do with them and just kind of holding on for a moment, awkwardly, because if he let go Chick was probably just going to grope himself again, just to make Marlowe all embarrassed. He really needed to meet some people who didn’t like that so much. Not, um, groping themselves, which, okay, Shayna kind of did when she was dancing with guys, too. But people who didn’t think it was hilarious when he turned all red and stuttery.
“Stop what?” Chick asked, like he didn’t already know, and he probably just wanted to hear Marlowe talk about his breasts. Then he tried to pull his hands away, and Marlowe tried to hold on, and they sort of ended up tussling in the middle of Marlowe’s tiny kitchen, so that it was inevitable when they banged into a counter and Marlowe ended up pressed against Chick all over.
“Um,” Marlowe said, a little squeakily, because those were Chick’s breasts, breasts that he absolutely should not have, and now Marlowe was kind of groping him, oh my gosh, how embarrassing. “You have, um,” and tried to pull away, but now Chick was the one holding on.
“Breasts, yeah,” he said, looking down at Marlowe, “I told you.”
Marlowe just kind of looked at him, all big-eyed, biting down on his lower lip, and trying not to stare at Chick’s mouth that was even fuller now that he was a girl and kind of slick. Chick just watched him a little more and Marlowe could feel himself start to flush.
“Oh my god,” Chick said, as Marlowe looked anywhere but at him, “Don’t tell me I’m giving you some kind of sexual identity crisis.”
Marlowe’s gaze snapped back to Chick, flush spreading further. “Um,” he said, kind of miserably, and then Chick leaned forward and kissed him. Marlowe made little muffled surprised noises against his mouth even though he probably shouldn’t be because Chick kissed everybody even people who were mean or who he didn’t really like, but he’d never kissed Marlowe before and, okay, Marlowe hadn’t been ready, he wasn’t doing very well!
title: like blake, except for how i haven't read blake
prompt: fairy tales/folk lore/mythology
rating: pg.
universe: space dragon au 'verse. so au you probably won't even know which character's au forms these are.
Only an angel would hold a protest of one. The fact that he was protesting the Westboro Baptist Church was just a delicious irony, the sort I would like to have orchestrated, if I had any real sway over the angel, which I hadn’t, despite the angel’s seeming enthusiasm for my company.
“Naamah!” Paschal cried, going so far as to wave and jump up and down as he caught sight of me, standing beside a woman in a highly unattractive yellow track suit, holding a sign that proclaimed broadly that “God Hates Fags,” which was uncreative to such a level that I had little desire to even Tempt her to, say - another delicious irony - fornication with the young man holding a sign quoting Leviticus - how utterly trite - that she’d had her eye on all morning, despite her marital status. I doubt she would have understood the irony even if her hypocrisy had been pointed out to her, and if I were going to populate hell for sexual misconduct I would at least not populate it with idiots.
Tipping my sunglasses down my nose and peering at Paschal over top of them, I decided that, yes, crossing the lines would sow enough discord in the ranks of supposed believers that it would be worth the inevitably effervescent conversation with Paschal that would follow. I pushed my glasses up into my hair and walked across the imaginary line between the Westboro Church members and an angel they’d probably prostrate themselves before if he weren’t, say, protesting their treatment of their homosexual brothers and sisters. That seemed to upset them, in particular.
“Hello, Paschal,” I said, as I drew close to him, then reached out to cup one of his cheeks in my hand and kiss him firmly on the mouth. The cry from the crowd that followed was particularly fervent.
“Oh my gosh, you did that on purpose,” Paschal said, as I drew away. “You’re totally undermining my protest.”
“Thwarting,” I said, “I tend to do that. Now, what are you doing out here alone?”
“I’m not alone!” Paschal said, “You’re here!”
What am I, what am I, etc.
These were also posted on
origfic_bingo over here where people were very tolerant of my silliness.