Latest Posts by guessyourenottheone - Page 8

In front of the United States whitehouse there is a poster board with this written on it: "A message from Gaza: We do not just want your eyes on Rafah. We want your foot on "Israel's" neck. Organize and escalate."

Source image re-posted on X post by: @/mxyaslytherin with the caption "a reminder" [May 30th, 2024.]

SUMMERWEEN SERIES | FORMULA 1

“It’s Summerween!”

monster mash | oscar piastri

oscar gets stuck babysitting on halloween night. with the help of a seven year old, he gets the number of the cute neighbor

thriller | mark webber

(90s au) mark’s crush is stuck working in a video rental store on halloween night so he keeps her company.

ghostbusters | max verstappen

max’s is jealous of his girlfriend’s crush on egon spengler

this is halloween | logan sargeant

logan comes back home to florida just in time for the biggest halloween party yet

love potion no. 9 | sebastian vettel

(teenage sebastian au) can a nerdy teenager make the prom queen fall in love with him?

(don’t fear) the reaper | jenson button

jenson’s idea of a first date is the drive in where ‘friday the 13th’ is showing (spoiler alert: it doesn’t end well)

season of the witch | charles leclerc

charles finds out the reason for all his good luck

coming soon…

an: hi friends! this little idea came to me when i was watching the summerween episode of gravity falls lol I’ll try to post all the fics before june 22nd because according to google that’s the day of summerween but if i don’t then it’s ok either way <3 enjoy! also i am aware that not everyone from the current grid is on here, i know for a fact that i won’t ever finish a series with all the current drivers so i just did a couple :)

this pride, i learnt about the Palestinian trans woman Oscar Al-Halabiye, dancer and resistance fighter against the israeli occupation in Southern Lebanon. she named herself Oscar after Lady Oscar from the "The Rose of Versailles", a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Riyoko Ikeda.

her story is documented in Cinema Fouad(1993). zionists use pink washing to reinforce their genocidal terrorist narrative when queer Palestinians have been fighting against the occupation since the very beginning. you can watch it here with english subtitles. long live the intifada!

YouTube

Cinema Fouad (1993) with English Subs

Documentary by Mohammed Soueid. Republished here for educational purposes. "Cinema Fouad is a documentary portrait of Khaled El Kurdi, a Syr

Daily reminder that the U.S. has been supporting these kinds of genocidal wars of aggression for 100+ years. This is nothing new and not a recent phenomenon-this has been going on for a long time.

It's important during times like this that we make sure people don't fall down the trap of blaming everything on the so called "ZOG" or "Zionist Occupied Government" which basically leads to the brain dead and fucking utterly stupid neo-Nazi route of blaming everything on "da Joos”

The U.S. has had horrific foreign policy long before there was even a strong and influential Israel lobby.

The Korean War occurred before AIPAC existed, and during the early 20th century before Israel existed the U.S. brutally colonized and occupied the Philippines, invaded Russia right after the Bolshevik revolution to crush the communist movement there, and plenty of other examples of this kind of foreign policy. And of course during the 1800s in the era of Manifest Destiny you had the genocide of native Americans, the Mexican-American war, and so on.

The idea that this is all the fault of Zionists is an absolutely brain dead analysis. The problem is mainly just capitalism (as well as racism and other factors of course, especially during the 1800s) which is a system that always leads to the most insane people ruling over us, regardless of ethnicity.

Zionism just happens to be compatible with the interests of imperialists in the Middle East region.

Blaming everything purely on Zionism and "ZOG" is completely insane and shows a profound ignorance of the history of American foreign policy.

🍉 fics for gaza

while @ficsforgaza is focused on animanga and video games fandoms, it's inspired me to do something similar to help raise funds for palestine ! click here to learn more about this amazing initiative (how to participate, creator masterlist, etc.)

other ways to support palestine:

boycott companies complicit in israeli apartheid

click this website daily; generated ad revenue is donated to palestinian causes

follow palestinian journalists like bisan owda, plestia alaqad, and hind khoudary; al jazeera is a news outlet that reports on what's happening, without an western bias

learn more about the history of palestine (some resources are the palestine academy and decolonize palestine)

check out this post (updated regularly) for donation links and petitions to sign

how does it work?

🍉 choose a WIP you want to support or/and send me an ask with an idea you would like me to write !

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request a fic - $10 per request (recommended)

🍉 in exchange for your donation, i'll write you a short (1-3k words) one shot !

note: while i recommend $10 per request, i also recognize that everyone has different financial situations. if your donation is less (or more) than the recommended amount, i might still accept your request depending on if it is within my scope as a write. any donation helps!

🍉 i can write for these fandoms/characters:

percy jackson and the olympians: luke castellan, book!percy jackson (18+)

marvel: shuri udaku, michelle jones, peter parker (mcu or tasm), kate bishop, gwen stacy

miscellaneous: conrad fisher (the summer i turned pretty), any zendaya or ayo edebiri character (but no rpf!!)

🍉 i write pretty much any genre (fluff, angst, smut, etc.) and i'm open to any trope (friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, found family, secret relationship, college au, etc.), but please contact me with your idea before to make sure i can write it; you can send me a message or an ask !

🍉 if you aren't sure what to request, @nightprompts has this list of general dialogue starters i'm open to writing; remember to also lmk which character you are making the request for !

last updated: 31/5/24

girlfriend of the enemy | charles leclerc

face claim: none ♡

request: here !

tags: max verstappen x reader, thoughts of infidelity, max sucks a lil in this i'm sorry

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You knew the novelty had worn off. Max was known for picking up things that were shiny and brand new to him and dropping them without a moment's notice. You just never thought you would be one of them. The two of you had met in the paddock, you having been invited by your reporter friends. Instantly the two of you had hit it off, chatting the whole night and enjoying each other's company. 

That was 7 years ago. 

Now the two of you were attending the end of the race year celebrations but you may as well be strangers. 

He’d swirled you around his friends, eye candy on his arm to match the fact that his face was plastered across the entire room. After he was sure everyone had seen the two of you together, he subtly brushed your arm off and went to talk with Daniel and Checo who were standing by the bar. 

Taking a seat at one of the tables strewn out across the large dance hall, you picked nervously at the acrylics on your nails. Max knew events like this made you nervous, with the large crowds full of people you barely knew. At the start of your relationship, he never used to leave you alone, constantly having a hand around your waist or resting on your knee so you knew he was there, but it was as if he no longer cared. You hated this side of him, missing the funny and attentive man you fell in love with. 

Drivers passed back and forth behind your chair, often bumping it accidentally as they walked, too deep in conversation with their walking buddy to notice they had knocked you. It had been at least 2 hours since you had seen Max, having watched him stalk off to a dark corner with the two men he was chatting with at the bar. You knew you looked miserable, but you were so tired of hiding how you truly felt, how Max made you feel. 

A hand brushes the back of your chair as someone takes a seat beside you. A soft voice barely audible over the loud music pumping through the room, close enough that their breath brushes across your neck. 

“Not having fun?”

You jump at the proximity, whipping round to come face to face with Max’s longtime frenemy, Charles Leclerc. He simply smiled, either not noticing how close the two of you were or simply ignoring it.  

You’d come to know Charles through the years you’d spent as a wag. He was always polite, full of kind smiles and funny anecdotes. You knew he wasn’t a fan of these things either, choosing to excuse himself early, either with his teammates or Oscar whenever things got a little too raucous. His two closest friends on the grid, Daniel and George, were more open to the party atmosphere, often getting to the point of drunkenness where you had to mother them a little, rounding up the giggling boys and wrestling them into an Uber. 

You loved chatting with the group of friends, never having a dull moment as each of them tried to outdo the other with a joke or a roast. However, you were always a little more drawn to the Monagesque, finding his warm voice and awkward jokes lightened the tension that festered deep inside whenever Max abandoned you at one of these events. 

You smiled back at Charles in the present, toying with the Tiffany bracelet around your wrist. “Not particularly. Never really liked these kind of events.”

If it was anyone else who had asked, you would have lied. Various excuses of not feeling well or simply needing a moment to yourself, but Charles had never once shown judgement towards your lack of enthusiasm for these nights. 

“Where’s Max?” His eyes flick around the room, elbow coming to rest on the bar. He must realise his mistake straight away as he pulls away, the stickiness of the counter following him. 

You sigh, reaching to drain the last of your mojito. “Fuck knows. Last time I saw him was just after 9.” 

He raises his eyebrows, turning to catch the attention of the bar staff. “Another mojito and a vodka soda, please.” Turning back to you, he checks his watch. “It’s 2am.”

You return the eyebrow raise, welcoming the new drink he hands you. “Yeah, it is. He’s probably with Daniel and Checo if you want him.” 

You were used to people approaching you just to get to the other. Nothing new but it still irked you a little that you were only ever seen as an extension of the great Max Verstappen, never just y/n l/n. 

Smiling softly, he raises his glass for you to clink yours against. “Nah, I’m fine where I am.”

–

The hours passed quickly, the two of you hunched over the bar as you tried to make out what the other was saying over the loud bass of the music. You could lie and say your heart didn’t flutter every time he laughed, eyes sparkling as he listened intently to every dumb joke you made. It made you feel a little bit sick, the butterflies in your tummy stabbing tiny little daggers into you as you try to remember the last time Max had ever spent time with you like this. 

He was a busy man, with the racing and Twitch and the various other events Redbull required him to do, the two of you rarely saw each other. You tried to organise monthly date nights in order to reignite the spark you once had but every time Max texted that he couldn’t come, not even mentioning the word sorry, you felt a little piece of your heart fall away. 

Through some kind of sick manifestation, Max rounded the corner of the bar, flagged by a barely conscious Daniel and a still chipper Checo. 

“Charles! Nice to see you!” Checo was his ever lovely self, dapping Charles up and pulling him into a brief hug. Daniel barely acknowledged either of you, slumping into the chair on the other side of you and drunkenly resting his head on the back of your shoulder. Max was neutral, eyes darting between the two of you. 

“Yeah, nice to see you Charles. I see you’ve met my Mrs.”

You hated that term. “Mrs”. Maybe if he showed any kind of interest in actually taking the next step and marrying you after 7 years together maybe you wouldn’t mind. He knew you hated it to some extent, having used it often as a joke in media events to make you roll your eyes and send him a cheeky text. But now the word just grated you, imaginary hackles rising at his standoffish tone. 

Charles smiles at the two, briefly eyeing Daniel from where he was snoring on your shoulder. “Yeah, me and y/n have met quite a few times at these things. Normally when I’m too tired to deal with Daniel and George’s shit.” He aims the last sentence towards you, joining you in a small chuckle. 

Max laughed sarcastically, hand coming to grip your free shoulder. The strength of it made you shrink slightly, hating the possessiveness it held. “Well, it’s getting late, I better get her home.” His head nods down at you, the resignation in his voice a poor attempt at humour but it lands flat. 

Charles eyes him, then the hand gripped harshly on your shoulder and finally lands on you, eyes warm with a tint of ice. “Sure. It was nice to chat to you, Y/N. Don’t be a stranger.” He rises from his seat, hand raised to deliver a half hearted fist bump to Max and Checo before he disappears, swallowed by the horde of people still present at the event. 

You grab your bag as Max shakes the sleeping Daniel on your shoulder. The two of you work side by side to sling an arm of Daniel’s around each of your shoulders, Max thankfully taking the brunt of the weight. Silently, you make your way to Max’s car, humming at the drunken gibberish from the man hanging between the two of you. 

As you settle into the passenger's seat of Max’s car, you can’t help but wish it was Charles sliding in beside you. 

–

👤 maxverstappen1 Liked by redbullracing, charles_leclerc and 592,048 others

y/nstagram eindejaarsfeest met mijn lief en jouw wereldkampioen ♥️ (end of year party with my love and your world champion)

fan she’s so gorgeous, maxverstappen1 can you fight? ♥️ 39,927 others

redbullracing never mind the trophy, we think you’re the real prize ↳ fan damn admin got rizz ↳ redbullracing 😎

fan why does max never like her photos anymore i miss the “here before the dutchman” jokes ↳ fan they’ve been together 7 years maybe the honeymoon phase has just worn off? ↳ fan idk even when we see them in the paddock he brushes her off all the time  ↳ fan i thought we all agreed to stop prying into their relationship?  ↳ fan true but 7 years and no ring?? I’d have wifed her up immediately 

charles_leclerc si belle ↳ y/nstagram merci charlie :) ↳ fan ariana what are you doing here?  ↳ fan he’s been in her likes / comments since he joined f1, i’m pretty sure they’re friends ↳ fan he always comments “beautiful” or smth sappy on her posts… ngl i kinda ship them ↳ fan saying that on a post where she’s just called max her love… seek help ↳ fan damn sorry that i just wanna see her be treated the way she deserves???? She posts max nearly weekly and the last time she graced his ig was like 6 months back ??? AND he never likes / comments on her posts even when she tags him AND he ignores her in the paddock like all the time ↳ fan he’s a 4x world champion and the face of redbull, he’s a busy man damn 

-

-

Another country, another race, another day of Max ignoring you. You’d always been understanding of the fact that, as the current world champion, he had a lot of pressure on his rather wide shoulders. People called for him wherever he turned and he’d follow, giving piece by piece of him to whoever needed his attention. Race engineers, press, other drivers, even Christian himself. In the earlier years, he’d drag you along with him, hand wrapped firmly around yours as he discussed better ways to reduce drag or answer the same god damn question from the same 10 faces you saw at every race. 

Nowadays, he’d barely look your way as he gets out of the car, instead letting you roam around of your own volition. You often found yourself walking up and down the paddock, looking at all the other drivers who would throw a loving glance to their girlfriends as they rush around their garages, or drop a small kiss to the crown of their heads as they pass by to the back rooms or even something as small as readjusting their stance as they spoke to their engineers so they could press a thigh or an arm against their other half. 

So far you’d passed Alpine; exchanging quick hugs with Kika and Flavy before they went to the back rooms, McLaren; where Lando and you had exchanged a quick fist bump whilst you swiped away his questions about Max’s whereabouts, and Haas where both Kevin and Nico had waved brightly at you as they entertained their children on the garage floor. Looking up, you find yourself standing in front of the Ferrari garages. More specifically, in front of Charles’. 

Whether the halt in your footsteps has been subconscious or not, you couldn’t stop yourself from hoping for a glimpse of Charles. Flashes of red passed your vision, engineers and strategists moving amongst one another like a well oiled machine, but no sign of white fireproofs or padded red race suits. 

Sighing softly, you turn on your heels, ready to head back to the Red Bull garages where you’ll inevitably end up being forced into putting on a headset and a fake smile when it’s race time. 

Eyes focused on the ground, you walk slowly away from the Ferrari garages, not wanting to see all the loving couples around you. Only three steps down, a pair of race boots pop up in your vision, eyes trailing up until you meet Charles’ worried gaze. 

“Y/N, what are you doing all the way over here? It’s nearly race time?” His head quirks a little to the left, reminding you of an inquisitive puppy. 

It’s enough to bring a small smile to your face, eyes flicking over his face. “Hey Charles. Honestly, I didn’t even realise I’d made it this far into enemy territory until I looked up and saw your garage.” 

He matches your teasing smile, nudging his foot with one of yours playfully. “I wouldn’t say enemy, just unfamiliar.” He takes a moment to give you a once over, eyes clinging to the ever present furrow of your brows. “Where’s Max?”

Resisting the urge to roll your eyes, you huff quietly. “God knows. Last I saw, he was in a very heated debate with GP, something to do with the rear wing.”

He nods in response. “Does he know you’re in enemy territory?” He teases softly, aware of the way your expression darkened at the mention of your boyfriend. 

“I don’t think he would realise if I upped and left to be honest.” The second you said it, you regretted it. Charles has enough to worry about on race day without you piling your relationship problems onto him. “Sorry, ignore me. Must’ve woken up on the wrong side of the bed or something.” You laugh unconvincingly, trying to avoid his knowing eyes. 

He’s quiet for a moment, pensive silence spreading between the two of you. It makes your skin crawl, all too aware that he was probably already clued into your crumbling relationship. You wanted him to make a joke, to nudge his shoulder with yours as he quips about how you should join the other side for once. You wanted him to make you smile, knowing he’s been the only one to do so in so many years. 

A knot sits heavy in your stomach. Wanting another man to make you smile like your boyfriend isn’t standing 20 feet away. Another man who was the best friend of your boyfriend. 

Yours and Max’s relationship wasn’t all arguing and sneaking into bed whilst the other slept far on the other side, but the only times he made you laugh recently was in front of cameras, smiles too large and laughter too loud to be believable to either of you. 

With Charles, it was easy. Almost like breathing. He was still a little awkward with you, jokes sometimes landing flat but the way he would wince and chuckle at his own bad lines were enough to have you laughing loudly and unapologetically. 

You needed to get out of here before you said or did something you’d regret. Luckily, Xavi came to your rescue, spotting Charles out on the paddock and rushing over to sling a friendly arm around his shoulder. “Charles, vamos! We have to get ready for the race. Sorry to steal him from you, Y/N, but I can’t risk him sharing trade secrets with the girlfriend of the enemy.” He pairs the teasing jab with a wink at both of you, the arm hooked around Charles’ neck pulling him gently away. 

Charles’ throws a smile over his shoulder, waving a hand goodbye as he’s dragged into conversation with Xavi. You wave back, energy not quite matching his. 

It was a throwaway comment, something every team said when you’d chat with their racers, normally coupled with a squeeze of the shoulder or a friendly grin. Charles had even said the same thing himself two minutes prior. But something about it being Charles’ race engineer left a sour taste in your mouth. 

To Charles, you were just the girlfriend of the “enemy”, and that’s all you could be. 

-

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a/n: i swear i'm working on a happier one for charles' monaco win buuuut before i spend another 2 weeks finishing this off - anyone interested in a part 2?

she’s out of her mind

luke castellan x daughter of hades!reader

anon prompt: Hey babes! I saw your post about wanting prompts and I was wondering you could write Luke Castellan x Daughter of Hades! Reader where it's like sunshine (Luke) x grumpy (Reader) trope?

authors note: hello i am back with a small drabble for the cute prompt above! i got drunk off of applebees dollaritas and wrote this in 15mins so do with that information what you will. hope you enjoy! :)

title is from she’s out of her mind by blink-182. lyrics are a lil fitting.

warnings: none? i think? it’s just fluff, i think. sort of.

“Wake up, sunshine.”

You groaned low and deep, releasing a guttural sound full of pure agony. Rolling over on your (extremely warm, cozy, sleep inducing) bed, you came face to face with your boyfriend, Luke Castellan, who was currently opening up the curtains in your cabin.

Being the only child of Hades at the camp, the entire cabin was sparse and empty, save for the corner you called home. There was a bed with black sheets and blanket, a side table full of the few memorabilia you had to your name, and a dresser beside that which held your extensive collection of black clothing. The walls resembled the inner workings of a cavern; slick rock prodded with small bones and beautiful jewels encapsulated the bedroom areas. Sconces held lit torches burning bright with turquoise Greek fire.

Your favourite part of the cabin, though, was the specially-crafted blackout curtains that were typically drawn tight over the windows. Not even a sliver of light could penetrate the thick, black, velvet drapes. That was, until, your idiot boyfriend took it upon himself to draw them open. The harsh blades of sunlight violated your eyes, illiciting your pained groan. You hated it when people interrupted your sleep.

“Luke,” You whined, shoving your face into your pillow, hoping to evade the blinding light. “Let me sleep, please, for the love of the gods.”

“Fuck the gods,” Luke said, and you could hear the smirk in his voice without needing to see his (cute, devilishly handsome) face. “Anyways, it’s 9am! You’ve slept in long enough and I wanna have breakfast with you and your pretty face.” Luke flopped down on the bed beside you and flipped your body back over with ease, in a foolish attempt to force you into the world of the living.

Typical for a child of Death, you kept your eyes squeezed shut and pounded the bedsheet with your fist. “I will literally, genuinely, actually murder you without hesitation if you don’t leave me the fuck alone.”

“That’s no way to talk to your boyfriend.” Luke said, pressed a small kiss to your nose. You swatted him away with anger.

Any other (normal, rational, smart) kid at camp would’ve soiled their pants and fled in terror from such a threat uttered by the one and only daughter of Hades. You were capable of a simple killing — you were graciously bestowed the gift of sucking out the souls of mortals with a mere flick of the wrist — and so it was only logical to fear such a ghastly claim. Luke, however, had released early on in your Camp days that you were full of shit and would never hurt a fly. He took an opportunity to befriend you and you’d been dating for a few years now. You were (truly, madly, deeply) in love with him and yes, despite your immense hatred for morning sunlight, you would never actually hurt him.

“Come on,” he prodded again, cuddling up beside you and tapping your forehead mischievously. You mustered the courage to crack open one eye (barely) and saw him grinning down at you. “Wake up, baby. Let’s get breakfast and then spend the day at the docks. We can swim and sun bathe and have a picnic—“

“Gods, your ambitious today,” you grumbled, rolling back over to face the opposite direction of Luke (and, the open windows), allowing him to grab your waist and pull you up against his chest. “I hate being in the sun. You know this.”

“Yeah, but I like to try new things with you,” Luke said, peppering a few kisses down your jaw and the side of your neck, squeezing his taut arm around your torso. “And I’m dying to see you in a bikini.”

“Perv,” you mumbled, but deep down you felt butterflies erupt in your stomach, causing a crimson blush to bloom over your chest. “Give me another hour to sleep.”

“No,” Luke said, and now it was his turn to groan impatiently. “Please, now, for me? I love you and want to spend time with you.”

“I hate you and want you to leave me alone,” you replied, pulling your fluffy duvet back up over your shoulders. “Bed time.”

“Beach time,” Luke decided. He sat up slightly and ripped the blankets entirely off your form, exposing your body to the cold air of the morning.

You shrieked. “Luke, you asshole—“

Luke jumped out of the bed, smiling wide. He gathered up all the blankets up into his arms, much to your dismay, and held them away from you. You only wore shorts and a tank top to sleep last night, and the chill in the room froze you right to your bones. Luke bundled up the bedding into a ball and fired it across the room. “There, now you’re acclimated.”

“You’re dumb as hell.”

“You are a grouchy, sleepy demon who needs breakfast and vitamin D.”

“Ugh!” You exploded, finally shoving yourself out of bed in a fit of exasperation. Luke had the audacity to applaud you. “Okay, there, I’m up!”

“So proud of you, my sleeping beauty,” Luke remarked. He crossed the room to you and placed a tender kiss to your lips, making sure to nip at your pouty bottom lip.

“Sorry for being rude,” You murmured, after having kissed him back. “I love you. I just don’t love being woken up.”

“I know,” Luke said with a grin. “I actually think you’re cute when your grumpy, so I do it on purpose to bug you.”

You rolled your eyes, but couldn’t stop the small smirk from appearing on your cheeks. “Whatever. You promised breakfast and I’m starving, so let’s go.”

Luke mimicked your playful eyeroll. He took your hand, leading you out the door and towards the dining pavilion.

note 2: hi hi! if you read this and enjoyed it and maybe want to read more from me, i would super appreciate prompts and requests sent to my inbox! can’t guarantee i’ll write them all but i will for sure try my best! thanks for reading! :)

Luke, who´s obsessed with saying, ´where my hug at?´

fully based on this post

warnings. fluff <3, little drunk!luke

₊˚⊹♡

The phrase had become a running joke, a playful thorn in your side. It all started innocently. You and Luke had been sparring very intensely, just like you always did when you wanted to put your engines to work and you had some free time. And like most times, he would beat you.

And after he helped you get up from the ground, he let it out.

“Where my hug at?”

You turn to him. He was standing there, sword in hand, with his arms open and ready to receive you. "What?" you laugh.

"Come on” he gestured you with his fingers to get closer to him, “Don´t you need one after stomping your ass to the ground? Again?”

You scoff. It was ridiculous, yes, but there was something about the way he said it, a goofy earnestness that made you want to laugh. And partly, because you knew he knew you too well; you did like giving hugs, just as much as you like receiving. But still, you knew he was teasing you.

“I´m not giving you any hugs” you say.

“You´ll need it later” he teased.

You hesitated for a moment, but then with a groan, you gave in, wrapping your arms around his torso as he wrapped his own over your shoulder to keep your head close to his chest.

But that one hug was a button you shouldn´t have pressed. From that day on, ‘Where my hug at?’ became Luke's catchphrase, deployed with strategic precision to elicit a reaction from you.

You sat on a sturdy tree trunk one night, a steaming mug of hot chocolate warming your hands. Counselor duties had been particularly demanding today, and a pleasant weariness settled over you as you watched the flames lick at the night sky.

“Hey” Luke said as he appeared behind you, taking a seat next to you.

You hadn't seen Luke all day, his schedule as busy as yours. “Hi” you greeted.

“Rough day, huh?” he asked.

You glanced at him, a tired smile tugging at the corners of your lips. "You could say that. You?"

He stretched languidly, his arm brushing against yours. "Same" he said before taking your own mug from your hands, taking a sip.

A comfortable silence settled between you, punctuated only by the rhythmic roar of the fire. You both sat there, lost in your own thoughts, enjoying the shared camaraderie.

"Got any plans for tonight?” he asked casually.

You shrugged, tossing a charred stick onto the growing pile of embers. "Probably just stargaze for a bit, I need that."

"Sounds boring" he declared.

“You´re boring” You chuckled, nudging him playfully. "You spend all day teaching swordsmanship."

"Well, someone needs to make sure these kids don't accidentally poke someone's eye out” he declared. And there was another soft silence, before he broke it with another comment. “I´m really fucking tired” he groaned.

“Yeah, me too” you say, squeezing your own neck as you feel a knot growing bigger and bigger every time you move.

“Where my hug at, then?”

“Oh, Jesus”

Gods, wouldn't he let it go?

“Pleasee-ah, I need to squish something” he said.

"Where does this obsession with hugs even come from?" you ask, taking another sip from your mug.

He shrugged. “Beats me. Maybe because I just happen to know a certain someone who´s all about physical touch?"

"Oh, please," you scoffed, stepping on his foot on purpose. "You just like messing with me."

"Maybe a little," he admitted, “Come on! Don´t you feel sorry for me?”

You couldn't help but laugh at his ridiculousness. "Fine, fine" you conceded, scooting closer to him. As you leaned in for the hug, Luke chuckled, his arm wrapping around your shoulder and pulling you close. You both stare into the flames in silence.

"See?" he murmured with satisfaction. "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

And because of how proud he feels, you pull away and push him down to the grass, his feet being the only thing visible over the tree trunk as a small group of campers erupted in laughter.

Gods, you had to be careful when he got drunk.

He was already clingy enough when he drank, but ever since the questions became his whole personality, he was much more annoying. "Man, it´s getting cold" he declared, throwing his arm dramatically around your shoulders. "Where my hug at?"

"You've asked me like ten times already, Luke” you groan, unwrapping his arm around you.

He blinked slowly, processing the information. "Oh," he mumbled, his grin faltering. "Have I?"

You nodded, fighting back a smile at his sheepish expression. There was a moment of silence. Just as you thought you might have escaped the hug-question, Luke spoke again.

"Well then," he declared, his voice thick with drunken confidence, "where my eleventh hug at?"

“It´s not here!” you yell.

Then he disappeared from a moment with Chris, and just a few minutes later, he came back. Pocking on his own biceps.

"Hey," Luke called. "Did I ever tell you how much stronger I'm getting?"

"Uh-huh" you replied cautiously, sensing another round coming on.

"Yeah," he continued, his voice laced with a newfound seriousness. "I could, like-, totally take down the entire cabin five."

You patted his back awkwardly, unsure how to respond to his drunken boast. "That's...great?”

"Yeah, it is!" he declared, pulling away and looking at you with wide, glassy eyes. "Come on, feel my arms, where my hug at?"

You started to poke Luke´s arms as he only looked at you, puffing up his chest as he waited. “I can feel your arms without having to hug you” you protest.

“Ugh” he groaned, “You´re so difficult to convince”

But sometimes, when the atmosphere was different, so was the question.

You sat perched on a rock overlooking the beach, waves crashing rhythmically against the shore. A soft crunch of gravel alerted you to Luke's presence. He climbed onto the rock beside you, his gaze mirroring yours as he took in the breathtaking sunset. You could feel Luke's concerned gaze turn towards you, and you knew he'd noticed the glistening tracks of dried tears on your cheeks.

"Your mom?" he asked softly, his voice laced with concern as he looked down at the piece of paper you had on your lap.

You nodded, unable to speak past the lump in your throat. A sniffle escaped you, and you quickly folded the letter again, tucking it away with a sigh.

"What'd she say?" he pressed gently.

You forced a smile, but it reached neither your eyes nor your heart. "I can't go," you whispered, the disappointment heavy in your voice. "She won't let me."

Luke shifted closer, his presence a silent source of comfort. He didn't bombard you with questions or try to offer false reassurances. He simply understood. “Well, at least you´re staying here with me” He bumped his shoulder against yours playfully, a subtle gesture that spoke volumes. You couldn't help but let out a soft, shaky laugh.

"Yeah," you mumbled, the weight on your chest lifting a little. "Yeah, that's not too bad."

The two of you sat there in companionable silence, watching the last rays of sunlight surrender to the approaching night.

The silence stretched on, punctuated only by the rhythmic roar of the waves. You turned your head towards Luke, his profile etched against the vibrant sunset.

"Luke" you called.

He turned toward you, his eyes searching yours. A hesitant smile touched your lips, a flicker of hope igniting within you. In that moment, the question that usually brought forth annoyance now carried a deeper meaning.

"Where my hug at?" you whispered, your voice barely audible.

He didn´t need you to ask twice. Without a word, he opened his arms wide, a silent invitation for comfort as he couldn´t hold back a little laugh.

You didn't hesitate. You leaned into his embrace, burying your face in the familiar scent of him. He wrapped his arms around you tightly, holding you close as if afraid to let go, silently acknowledging your pain. His touch was a promise to be there for you whenever you needed him.

The tears you'd been holding back finally spilled over. You let them flow freely, finding solace in the warmth of his embrace. In that moment, the disappointment faded into the background, replaced by the comforting knowledge that you weren't alone. You had Luke, and that, at least for now, was enough.

[original post that sof's library (@/folkoftheshelf) is reacting to: Globe Eye News reports: "White House says no "genocide" happening in Gaza." May 13, 2024]

Mass graves have been uncovered in Gaza.

Do you think this is okay?

⋆· ༘* you belong with me !

pairing ★ jock!luke castellan x drum major!reader

synopsis ★ the one where you come back from winter break and start operation cupid. meanwhile, charles and silena meddle in your affairs on their own mission. (3.9k)

content ★ no pronouns used for reader, lowk photography/carnival date weewoo, bad matchmaking shenanigans, will they wont they, best viewed mobile obv

notes ★ ngl this went in a slightly skewed direction than what i put in the synop, subtext reading may be needed to figure out what charles and silena r doing to meddle.

series masterlist

operation: cupid aka super evil plan >:)

NO ↓ ← yes ← ABSOLUTELY NOT

— blind date

— CARNIVAL @ ANTHOS FEST ^^ ok thats good

— get hmart napa 4 mom NOT A GROCERY LIST!!!

— fake dating? OPINION REJECTED

— SAYING TO GO SMWHERE AND THEN DITCHING THEM TOGETHER ^^ is this a romcom or smth??

You shift your shoulder to let your phone press closer to your ear, cringing at the uncomfortable warmth from the screen.

“So the festival’s a go,” you say, loud enough to be heard over the dishes. “All VAPA will be there early for the parade. Make sure you get to Hesperides Park at noon and meet at the big apple tree.”

“There are, like, fifteen apple trees in the park,” Luke says, voice bouncing around the tinny speakers of your phone. “Besides, the festival’s in February. We have weeks.”

“We’ve started practicing already,” you tell him, adjusting your shoulder again. “There’s a run through on the track next Tuesday, if you need some shots for yearbook.”

Luke hums and you hear him shift around over the phone, the noise captured between satellites. “Okay, I’ll be there. What are you doing right now?”

A plate clinks into the prongs of the drying rack, water running rivulets down your arm. You cringe when the soapy streams reach and soak into the edges of your rolled-up sleeves.

“Finishing the dishes,” you tell him after a moment.

You think Luke bites back a grunt, moving around again. There’s background noise with him, soft and faint. You think you can hear music, too.

“I’m getting napa cabbages for my mom. She’s been practicing kimchi,” he tells you, and then you hear the whine of a grocery fridge. “Do you like Asian soft drinks, by the way? Got a coupon.”

You consider it, turning off the sink and drying your hands. They feel all crunchy now, skin tight over your bones with the winter’s absence of moisture. You really need to remember to put on some lotion.

“Nothing too sweet, maybe fruity. I’ll pay you back if you buy Pocky.” You exit the kitchen, fuzzy slippers padding on the floorboards. You hear a staticky thud, and the whirring from the fridge stops.

Luke sighs, the sound nestled pleasantly in your eardrums. You flop onto your bed, listening to the not-silence. He talks faintly, words far-off and lost in the background, whirs and beeps and plastic crinkling.

He speaks finally, “I didn’t know how much you wanted…so. You owe me ten.”

You scoff, sardonic and not at all serious. “Fuck you, man.”

His world on the other side goes quiet for a heartbeat.

“Well,” he says, breaking the pause, “I’ll see you on Monday with the goods.”

“You sound like a dealer.”

“Yea, a dealer in love.” He sneers out the last word, a smile sewn into his voice.

You groan and hover your thumb over the hang-up button. “Cringe, go back to watching your Grand Prix or whatever.”

“Hey, pre-season testing hasn’t even started.”

“Whatever,” you grumble, sliding a palm down your face. “I’m hanging up.”

Not even five seconds after you press the red button, he calls you again. You swipe to accept begrudgingly, and then Luke’s voice cracks back into existence.

“You forgot to say goodbye. That’s bad manners, you know.”

“Good-fucking-bye, Castellan.”

He laughs, the sound of it swirling in your stomach strangely. “Thank you, major. See you Monday.”

You toss your phone to the foot of your bed when the line cuts and tangle your legs in the blankets, mortified at the heat curling around your neck.

♫ TV Girl ・Taking What’s Not Yours

[ IMAGE: a photo of you in your band uniform, baton in hand and a silver whistle looped around your neck. The jacket is orange with a pale yellow lining, gold buttons glimmering, and you wear a pair of black, straight-legged slacks. Your face is half eclipsed by the shadow of your cap. The photo may have been taken with an old digital camera, giving it a washed-out, nostalgic look. ]

Liked by luvvbeaus and 345 others

lukestellans sweepstakes at anthos fest, congrats @.majmajmaj

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majmajmaj dont tag theyre gna find me

↳ travstole fratrnisng w the enemy ICKK 🫵🤮 ↳ anniebethc That’s not the right spelling for ‘fraternizing’. You should enable auto-correct on your device settings.

The weather under the fruit trees is better than out in the street. You’ve shed your itchy uniform jacket, opting to just wear the loose, white under-tee to cope with the temperature. At least the metal of your camera keeps your hands cool, and the dry breeze that filters through the verdant boughs sends soothing, dappled shadows stretching across the grass.

It’s hot, and unbearably so. Marching down Zeus City Boulevard from the high school to city hall was hell; it’s only late winter, almost early spring, and the temperature is already in the high seventies. You can only dread the heat come summertime.

“If you told me it was this tree,” and Luke’s coming around the trunk, camera strap strung over his torso and glasses hanging from his shirt collar, “I could’ve gotten here sooner.”

Castellan pats the bark, disregarding the sign that reads DO NOT TOUCH welded to the small fence that encircles the roots. You try not to look at his arm, lean and veined, the pale stretch of skin under his bicep growing larger as the sleeve of his airy polo rides up.

You clear your throat, fiddling with the settings of your own camera. Around you, children shriek and dash in the alleys between the carnival game stalls.

“This is the apple tree, everyone knows that.”

“I told you,” Castellan says, rolling his eyes, “that there are a ton of them here.”

You snap a quick shot of some teens sharing a big, pink cloud of cotton candy. They’re smiling wide, wrinkles of joy arrowing around their mouths. It would have been a nice picture if not for the overexposure—you kiss your teeth and delete it.

“Sorry, was I supposed to say the biggest apple tree planted by Mayor Hera’s great-grandmother, coincidentally also named Hera, in the park next to city hall?”

He shrugs, making a face of agreement. “It would’ve helped. You also could’ve mentioned that it was the golden apple tree and not one of the red apple trees.”

You snag a fallen fruit off the grass, turning it in your hands. “Does this look lustrously golden to you?”

“Fine, the yellow apple tree.”

“Uh-huh,” you say, slipping it into your camera bag. You can already feel the imminent sweat stain forming under where the thick strap rests on your shoulder, and hope that Castellan won’t take notice

“You aren’t supposed to take the fallen apples, you know.”

You look at him, brows raised innocuously. “Who took what?”

Before he can chide you again, Charles steps up to your side, wearing the same black slacks and white under-tee. Castellan doesn’t seem fazed, unfolding the arms of his thin-framed glasses and pushing them up his nose.

Your bandmate stiffens when Silena skips over, still in pep uniform, her manicured fingers wrapping around Castellan’s shoulder. It’s the first time you've looked at Silena closely, all shiny black hair and round face—she’s more cherubic now that she’s right there in front of you, full-bodied and not as slight as you’d previously thought she was.

She waves at you, cute nails glimmering pale pink in the dappled shade.

“Hi,” she’s smiling, a little giddy, honeyed kick to her voice, “I’m Silena. Luke told me a lot about you.”

( Now you kind of get why Charles and half the guys and girls at school have a crush on her. )

You try to play it cool. “Really? I didn’t know he talked about me.”

She nods, and her dark hair sways mesmerizing with the movement. Castellan looks away, embarrassment creeping up his neck. You elbow Charles in the ribs when he stays silent for too long.

He speaks, although the words are punched-out and tremoring. “I’m Charles Beckendorf.”

Silena smiles politely, lips pink and glossy, eyes a bit too wide. “I know.”

Charles is a big, tall guy. Most people who don’t know better would think he did football and go about their lives not knowing that he used to be four feet zero and played piccolo since sixth grade.

So when the cheerleader of his dreams smiles at him, you can quite literally feel his body temperature rise, the skin of your arm prickling even though he’s standing half a foot away.

“I think,” Castellan pipes up, strained, his eye twitching, “I actually have to go take some pictures for yearbook.”

He’s really fucking bad at this matchmaking shit.

“Yea—” and your voice comes out in a near squeak too “—uh, Charles, you can go with Silena. I need stuff for Heralds too.”

Okay, you’re just as bad as Castellan.

Charles shifts, confused. “You sure? We could just all go together and hang out while you do your thing.”

You and Castellan—and Silena too?—nearly shout in protest. The cheerleader laughs it off and stiffly walks over to Charles, taking his wrist gently and tiptoeing to whisper to him. The rate at which the air around your fellow drum major heats up could be considered exponential.

Charles chuckles awkwardly and steps back, wrapping his hand around Silena’s in return. “Yea, right. We’ll meet back at sunset?”

“Sure,” Castellan says, putting up a hand, arm too stiff to wave. “See you.”

Silena skips away with Charles behind her. You breathe a sigh of relief in unison and drop down onto the grass, legs splaying over the green blades.

Castellan joins you on the ground, pinching his shirt and flapping it in an attempt to cool off.

“That was fucking painful.”

“No shit, major.”

You huff, prickles creeping up your neck. The shade barely does anything against the heat now, a stiff breeze blowing hot air through the fibers of your loose shirt. Castellan looks as worse for wear as you do, nose crinkled and hair gone wild.

A puff of air makes its way out of his lips. “So what now?”

You groan and stagger up, standing on weak legs. “We should follow them just in case.”

Castellan squints up at you, dappled shadows burnishing his face, curls bouncing leisurely in the wind. He groans and holds up his hand, jello-limbed and sloth-like. You take him by the wrist and heave until he’s standing.

“The first thing Charles does when he gets set loose in a carnival,” you tell Castellan—he’s chasing your steps doggedly, blushed from the heat, “is buy cotton candy.”

“So what do you do?” he asks, a hand shielding his eyes from the unforgiving sunlight.

“I’m gonna pay the stall operator to make an extra large one so they can share.”

“No, I mean what do you normally do at a carnival?”

You slow down momentarily, nearly tripping over yourself. “Uh…I kinda skip the festival most years. It’s too hot most of the time.”

“Oh,” he says, a little dumb with the way his mouth hangs open by a smidge. “I normally get tickets for the games first.”

“Cool,” you tell him absently, searching for the volunteer-run food stalls, “we can try that next year.”

He’s weirdly silent, the blunt of the sudden quiet unnerving you.

( You do not realize your mistake until after the festival ends. )

Percy and Annabeth are operating the cotton candy stall, perspiration beading at their hairlines and ridiculous aprons hung over their white tees. It seems that everyone in band decided to forgo the ugly-ass jacket, and for good reason.

You sneak around the back, Castellan not far off, pulling two five dollar bills from your pocket.

Hissing, “Percy, Annabeth.”

The girl turns, braids swinging in the air. They nearly hit Percy across the eyes.

“What are you doing here?” Annabeth asks in a high-pitched whisper. She does a double-take at Castellan. “What are you doing here?”

Percy looks over Annabeth’s shoulder curiously. “Is that money for me?”

“No time to explain—if Silena and Charles order two cotton candies, I need you to lie and just give them a super huge one, okay?”

A grin splits Percy’s face wide, eyes gleaming devilishly. You think that the time the Stolls spend bothering him is starting to influence his behavior.

“Is this what I think it is?” he asks, fixating on the bill, completely ignoring the customers waiting for their sweets. “Charles getting the girl of his dreams?”

You groan and hold out the money vehemently. “Just take the fucking bribe and act normal!”

The speed at which Percy snatches the two fives could be considered non-human. Yea, the Stolls are definitely rubbing off on him, but he splits the bills, gives half to Annabeth; she often says that she doesn’t care about money, but her eyes sparkle nonetheless.

Huh, interesting.

Castellan pulls you away to hide behind a thick tree trunk. You hold your camera up to your eyes, zooming in on the couple as they converse with Annabeth at the register. Her customer-service smile is strained, eyes wide, a little nervous.

You were right—Charles and Silena hand over their money separately.

Percy gives them a huge cloud of wispy pink sugar—it’s nearly thrice the size of his own head and—makes some lame excuse, probably that they ran out of cotton candy sticks because he’s literally hiding the paper cones behind his back.

Silena asks Charles something and he gives her a nod of agreement. She holds the candy between them—they’re walking shoulder to shoulder now, Charles picking off small clumps and Silena almost skipping with how peppy her steps are.

Mission one accomplished.

You tail them for some time, occasionally snapping pictures of kids playing rigged games and couples holding hands. When you hold up your camera, Castellan does too, and you stand back to back sometimes, taking in every angle of the carnival.

“Wait,” Castellan speaks, putting a hand on your shoulder and pointing the other towards your friends, “they’re walking out of the park.”

You frown. “It’s not even sunset yet.”

He hums—right next to your ear. “I think she’s taking him to that boba shop she likes. It’s close by.”

“So that’s good, right?”

“Yea.”

“So mission accomplished, I can go home?”

Castellan chuckles, sliding his hand cautiously from your shoulder to your wrist. His touch is light, barely a feather’s weight.

“Nuh-uh,” he grins, shit-eating. “We’re playing the games.”

You protest but don’t make any move to break away, “They’re rigged, dumbass. It’s a waste of money.”

“We need to pass the time somehow. Remember we’re meeting back at sunset to watch the fireworks?”

“Ah, fuck you.”

He leads you all the way to the ticket booths, fingers sending tingles burning up your arm when he secures a wristband around your wrist. Castellan tugs you along by the wristband thereafter, flitting between rubber duck and ping pong ball and dart games.

He wins some, loses some. You win none and lose a lot. It’s mainly him catching prizes, and you have to cross the street to get a bag at a nearby grocery store to hold all the cheap stuffed animals.

You pass by the boba shop, brightly lit and colorful, and Charles waves at you from inside. Silena makes an enthusiastic heart with her hands and Castellan blushes, looping his fingers under your wristband and darting away.

♫ Sonic Youth ・Sunday

[ IMAGE: Two pairs of beaten sneakers facing each other on a well-tended stretch of grass. Luke’s scuffed Air Forces are easily recognizable with a small Spiderman doodle at the toe. His middle and index fingers extend in a peace sign at the top of the frame, meeting the points of yours at the bottom in a diamond shape. ]

Liked by lukestellans and 255 others

majmajmaj sunday comes n sunday goes

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perciusjakcsn CHAT R U SEEING THIS 🫢

↳ naka.ethan git saw them holdin hands n walking round the fest 🤢 ↳ conmanstole sm1 ask annie if we can disown a drum major or smth

travstole sarge connor says he was joking n to pls unblock him 🙏

FROM: becky d

(18:32) so silenas kinda tired (18:32) gna walk her home

TO: becky d

(18:34) oh? 😏 (18:34) wait no ur gna miss the fireworks (19:00) BECKY ANSWER ME WHAT ABT THE FIREWORKS (19:01) fake friend bc now m stuck w castellan until fireworks 😭

FROM: becky d

(19:45) yk u dont hafta stay right… (19:45) cant even take good pics in the dark w out lookin goofy in flash

Charles had texted you halfway through sunset, the sky beginning to pinken along with broad, orange brushstrokes of sunlight—yet you still hang around between the apple trees and the carnival stalls. It’s well into the night, temperature dropping steeply, and the once stiff breeze has you suppressing a shudder.

Castellan must be feeling the change too, because he stands so impossibly close that each time the space between you two decreases by some increment, sparks begin to unspools from your nerves and smart along your skin.

“Fireworks in a few,” remarks Castellan, pocketing his phone. “D’you know Phaestus does them?”

You pick absently at the skin beside your nail. “Like the woodworking teacher?”

“Yea.”

“Cool.” It’s stilted, stiff and brittle. Now that you know for sure that Charles has left you for the wolves, you don’t see much reason in staying longer. The only problem is getting out without feeling guilty for ditching Castellan—not that you’d feel bad for him. “I dunno if I can stay, though.”

The boy furrows his brow, a little line forming on his forehead. “Why not? It’s barely eight.”

How do you tell Castellan that you want to be far, far away from him? That at the same time, you want to press yourself into and through his skin and twine around his bones?

“Uh…I need to finish my apps.”

“College apps got submitted like, a month ago.”

Fuck, shit, fuck again. You desperately need to take a masterclass in lying your way out of situations. Castellan slides his warm fingers under your flimsy wristband, tugs on it lightly.

It barely makes a mark in your skin despite the fact that he’s been pulling on it for practically half the day. The cheap material scrapes against your wrist when he tugs it again, something skating too quick to place up your spine.

He smiles, small with undisguised encouragement. “Let’s try the Ferris wheel.”

“No way.”

Castellan laughs and wraps his fingers gently around your wrist, thumb pressed to your pulse point. “Look, we haven’t gone on any rides, and honestly, the Ferris wheel’s a lot better than that.”

He tilts his head towards the Kamikaze ride: two hammer-shaped structures swinging around in 360 degree arcs like a pendulum. You can hear someone wailing faintly, cries fading in and out in time with each rotation. You aren’t too sure, but it sounds vaguely like that one sophomore trombone kid…Grover Underwood?

( At least, that’s what you think his name is. It’s hard to keep track of who’s who when the Stolls’ stupid and distracting antics preoccupy a majority of your attention during practice. )

You rub the strap of your camera between your thumb and index finger, weighing your options.

“Fine.”

Castellan cheers, pumping his fist and pulling you towards the empty line. People begin to race to the queue as the time for fireworks begins to near, but you and Castellan beat them all to it.

He slides onto the bench and you take the one opposite of him, placing the bag of cheap stuffed animals next to you. You take one—a squishy black cat—and squeeze it, watching the plush expand between your fingers.

Castellan’s got an angry-looking dog in his lap, playing with its soft polyester ears. You see him backlit by artificial light, all carnival colors and little house windows. From a distance, a rocket gets set off, a faint boom echoing sputters of red.

Without thinking, you raise your camera up and snap a picture of the firework’s colors splattering over his frame. A snap of the shutter and then you find he’s looking right at you, eyes gleaming, face softened by the night.

You’re then distracted by a flurry of pops, a bright, phosphorescent shower sparkling on the horizon. Your head feels hazy, cloudy, too stuffed with sugar like a half-developed photograph of what’s happened today.

A shutter, a snap. Castellan holding his camera up to his eyes. You both lean together, foreheads magnetic, pulling up the pictures you just took. The fireworks continue to sound off, faint and forgotten.

In his photo of you: your shoulders are relaxed, lips in a shallow part. The black cat plush is squished under your forearm, camera half-held by your loose fingers and all-hanging from the strap looped over your neck. Everything’s backlit blue and green and white like an aquarium, sea foam threaded in the phosphorescent fireworks.

In your photo of him: he’s painted a pale red, carnival lights splashing anywhere else they can. You can’t even tell what the color of his shirt really is like this. Castellan’s hair has the image of it being freshly mussed, like he’s been running his hands through it. The angry dog lays lopsided in his grip, expression warped under his fingers.

You’re about to open your dry, dry mouth when the wheel comes to a stop and a worker yanks open the door roughly. You hurry out with Castellan not far behind.

“I gotta go,” you say, jutting your thumb towards the end of the street. You’re really telling the truth this time; it’s nearly nine and you have a stats test on Monday. Or, tomorrow. You can’t really think straight when Castellan’s right next to you.

He touches your shoulder, fingers careful. “Send me that picture, ‘kay? See you tomorrow in math.”

Castellan’s hand peels away when he begins to step backward slowly, waiting for you to say something before he leaves. You wet your lips quickly, molars teething at the inside of your cheek.

“Yea, I’ll see you. Good luck on the test.”

His lips quirk, smile lines arrowing in his skin. He waves, and you wave back. Like two ships passing in the night.

[ IMAGE: a blurry, unprofessional, iPhone camera photo angled towards the sky and extra-zoomed in on two unidentifiable teens sitting on opposite sides of a Ferris wheel car. Their outlines are lit in neon carnival lights and soft fireworks, heads bent together. ]

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perciusjakcsn why r the rides diabolical af 😭

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tankadreww waittt whos in the ferris 😮

groovewood FUCK kamikaze all my homies HATE kamikaze i almost saw god three times

↳ anniebethc Can confirm, the Kamikaze was terrible.

majmajmaj werent the fireworks past ur bedtime percival,,,

↳ perciusjakcsn NO AND FYI ITS PERSEUS JUST LIKE HOW UR MAJOR NOT SERGEANT ↳ majmajmaj THEN WHY DONT U CALL ME MAJOR U FUCKING DUMBASS

p.s. ★ nearly finished w this, we have two more chapters left!! might take a small break next week until finals season and journalism summer work is done obliterating me

sharing is caring, so pls rb and also lmk ur thoughts ₍⑅ᐢ..ᐢ₎ ᡣ𐭩

luke tags (closed); @melllinaa @amortencjja @arsonnaire @m00ng4z3r @saltair-and-palemoonlight @witch-lemon @ahh-chickens @spiderbeam @jennapancake @traumatrios @omg--bluexx @dangelnleif @apolloscastellan @hiraethavis @lukecastellandefender @bookshelfminstrel @cherr-y-eji @solangelotus @liviessun @thaliagracesgf @ddarling-ddearest-ddead

© klineinie 2024 — do not plagiarize, translate, or use ANY works to train ai

everything has changed

part eight — the killerverse masterlist

pairing: luke castellan x daughter of ares reader

summary: you, luke, and the aftermath of the way you’d kissed him last night

content: lots of fluff and a sprinkle of angst

notes: title from everything has changed by taylor swift. special dedication to @locknco thank u for fighting through this fic with me

There’s so much pressure on your head that you have to make sure your brain isn’t currently being sucked up by a vacuum.

It’s not the worst headache you’ve had, but it’s been so long since you’ve drank. The pain behind your eyes is enough to have you resisting the urge to even stand up.

But the need to get rid of the pain wins out in the end. Eyes barely open, you lean over to the bedside table where Luke usually leaves painkillers for you—

Holy shit.

Luke.

The banging in your skull quiets the second you sit up, your hands curling into the sheets.

The bed is empty. The sun has barely risen.

You can tell it hasn’t been too long since Luke’s left because you can still see the clear outline of where he’d been sleeping next to you. You stop yourself from chasing after his residual warmth and curling up on his side of the mattress.

The rest of the beds around you are full, everyone sleeping soundly through the early morning.

You feel the breeze from the open window tickle the top of your head.

It’s been humid all week and everyone keeps forgetting to fix the air conditioning, which has turned all of Cabin Eleven into a muggy swamp. Every other window is cracked open, letting the cool air from outside circulate into the cabin. It’s dark out too, but the sun has risen enough that you can just about see through the rest of the room without needing any of the lights on.

It’s very still inside of the Hermes cabin. The only signs of life are the little movements of the campers while they’re still asleep. One of Luke’s brothers nearest to the door mumbles something before turning over with a huff. The girl across the room from you stretches, then kicks off the blanket strewn across her legs. She settles back against her pillows and doesn’t shift after that.

Something tells you that Luke won’t be back to bed for a while, so you do your best to rub the sleep from your eyes before getting up.

You bring Luke’s blanket with you when you slip out the door. It gets so painfully hot during the day, but the mornings at camp can be unbearably cold. The air nips at your bare legs when you find them carrying you into the woods.

The rays of the rising sun peek through the oaks as you walk the path you have a million and one times. It might be crazy for you to assume where Luke is, but you have a good feeling.

A rabbit darts across the path ahead of you. The land parts for it while it pushes through the green sea of lemongrass.

You find Luke where you’d expected: his legs dangling over the old dock and staring out across the water.

You don’t bother approaching quietly because you can tell he knows you’re there.

“You’re up early,” you say, voice hoarse with sleep.

Luke is quiet, but you know he’s listening. He moves away from the edge of the wood before he turns to look at you.

He drums his knuckles against the planks, so you step over his knee to settle between his legs. His arms come around your front and you’re surprised to find he doesn’t feel as warm as he looks.

“Are you cold?”

He leans down to press his face against your neck, and he shakes his head against you, a silent no.

You can’t help but shiver at the feeling of his lips ghosting over the skin there, and he takes to rubbing his hands along the outside of your thighs.

“You should’ve put pants on,” he says quietly, taking your shuddering as something caused by the morning chill and not the feeling of his skin on yours. “And I mean real pants. Not shorts. You feel cold.”

You’re very lucky. You’re always immune to the morning chills at camp when you’re close to him like this. You rest your face against Luke’s matching sleep shirt and feel the warmth from his arm seep through the fibers.

“I’m not cold. But what’re you doing up? It’s so early.”

The water ripples below you, though you can’t quite see your reflections. Luke stifles a yawn.

“Woke up and started thinking. Couldn’t go back to sleep.”

You hum, and Luke slides one of his hands up the front of your shirt.

“Did you have a nightmare?” you ask.

“The opposite. I was thinking about you.”

You’re happy he can’t see the smile on your face. “You were?”

“I think about you all the time, you know that. I was waiting for you to come out here and find me.”

His nails drag slowly over your stomach. Goosebumps rise in his wake.

“I always do.”

“I know you do.”

The two of you get quiet again, watching the sun rise above the horizon. Both of you sit there and try to gather the courage to bring it all up.

This has been a long time coming. You think it’s been part of your lives since the moment you were born—an inevitability. You were always going to end up here eventually, with your hand in his and his arms wrapped around you. It just took you an embarrassingly long time to get here.

You feel like you should be more scared to talk about something as serious as this—something that could change you two forever—but you don’t think it's possible to doubt your relationship with Luke. You already know what you want to say to him.

“Luke?”

“Yeah?”

“I really want this with you.” You let his blanket fall from around your shoulders so you can turn in his hold. “I don’t think I’ve wanted anything more than you.”

“You have me.” His voice is serious. “You always have.”

Luke’s had you since the very second you understood what it meant to love. He’s your best friend. Half of your mind. All of who you are.

You can’t help but take his face in your hand and brush your thumb under his eyes. Your eyes slide shut while you kiss down the length of his scar, soft and chaste across the expanse of his face.

You can’t tell if it’s you or Luke who tilts his head to the side to kiss you again.

You’d been grateful for your first kiss last night. But you think this is the first one that really counts.

He holds you like you’re going to float off into the sun. One of his hands snakes around your waist to hold you to him while the other reaches to caress your face.

Luke’s never held you without unadulterated love. You feel it at night in his bed, and in the morning when he's brushing a hand over your shoulders as he passes by. And you feel it now, when he breaks the kiss to drop his face into your chest. He lets out a heavy sigh against you, like a ten ton weight is sliding off his shoulders. You’re content to stroke his hair and cradle the back of his head until he squeezes you a little too tight.

You twist one of his curls around your finger. “Are you okay?”

He leans back slightly—making sure not to stray too far—fragments of a smile on his face. His eyes shine like glass, and you’re quick to swipe your thumbs over the apples of his cheeks.

Luke’s voice is a whisper when he says, “I don’t thank you enough.”

You frown. “For what?”

“For this.” He gestures at you like it’ll get his point across. “For—for everything.”

“Luke…”

“For putting up with me. For leaving with me as kids, for—”

“Luke, stop.”

“But I should,” he insists, always so persistent. His eyes have dried up, but his voice isn’t nearly as steady as it was a second ago. “You’re the most selfless person I know. You do everything for me, and I just—”

You shake your head and he stops talking, the last of his words dying on his tongue.

Luke’s always had a hard time accepting things.

You remember being nine and somewhere in Massachusetts. Luke had been so sick that he was constantly feverish and couldn’t walk more than half a mile without needing to sit down. But still, he’d refused the bites of your food you’d demanded he eat, even though he’d been unsteady on his feet for the past week.

And you see bits and pieces of it now, too.

You compliment him all the time—maybe a little too much—and you see the way his smiles are always tentative, like he doesn’t quite believe you. You see it when you talk about the future with him, like he doesn’t believe he’ll ever get to experience something that good. He’s always waiting for the other shoe to drop, never fully letting himself be happy.

But there’s no catch. Your feelings for him are about as straightforward as they come.

You place both of your hands on each side of his face, trying to drag his eyes back to yours. You don’t know what other way to make him understand than to just say it.

“I love you, Luke.”

You watch the shadows of his face shift as he tips his head down.

“I’m with you because I love you. Not because I feel bad, or—or because I want something in return. I just love you. That’s it.”

His fingers dig into your back. Three times. There’s pressure at your side where his other hand works nervously at your skin.

Luke’s voice breaks. “I don’t deserve you.”

He kisses it in the gap between your collarbones and under your skin and into your bloodstream, and you understand exactly what he’s trying to say.

“I can’t believe it took so long.” It sounds like he’s thinking out loud rather than speaking directly to you. “Nineteen whole years.”

“Think we were just being stupid for the last few,” you say around a yawn. He exhales in what you know is a laugh and it makes you shiver.

You’re tracing something into his arm in silence, listening to the sounds of the early morning when something comes to you. “Do you remember the trip we took to Olympus?”

His face screws up at the old memory. “‘Course I do. Why?”

You can’t help but smile when you hear the sound of the turtle doves chirping in the trees amongst the other noises of the forest. “Do you think Aphrodite knew about us?”

You’d been so embarrassed by what she’d said, you’d brushed it off before you could give it too much thought. You feel like an absolute idiot now. The goddess of love, basically handing him to you on a silver platter, and it had taken you almost half a year to come to your senses.

Luke laughs, and you can’t help the way your chest warms. “I think everyone knew, to be fair.”

“Like Chris! What an asshole.” You shake your head. “I think we need to throw him a party or something.”

“What’d he do?”

You’re very quickly reminded that his best friend confessed his little scheme only to you.

You snitch. “He only brought up Callea in the first place to see what we’d say.” You enjoy watching the way Luke’s face flickers through about ten different emotions before settling on unamused. “He thought we’d started dating without telling him.”

Luke sighs, but doesn’t sound surprised. “Of course he did.”

“Wonder what he’ll say once he finds out.” You rub a greedy hand down Luke’s back. You know your cabin isn’t going to let you hear the end of it, Clarisse especially.

You still when Luke says your name quietly, his hands pausing around your waist.

“Yeah?”

“We should probably… probably keep this a secret, don’t you think?”

Your heart sinks.

“Oh,” you say, the word coming out frighteningly stilted. “Okay.”

Luke can’t pull away from you faster.

“I don’t—fuck. I don’t want to keep this a secret, I swear.” His face pinches when he looks at you, so you smile, trying not to look too upset about it. It does nothing but make the furrow of his brows worsen. “But if Chiron or—or Mr. D finds out about it, we’ll never be able to be like this again.”

His words are making sense, but you don’t want them to. You finally have him, and only the two of you will ever know about it.

But then you think about what you’d lose—the sleeping together, the touching, the alone time. They’d watch you like hawks.

“We’re already lucky they gave up trying to stop you from sleeping at mine,” he points out, smiling at you sadly.

You’ll never forget about those early days at camp, the both of you freshly fourteen and wary of everyone that wasn’t each other or Annabeth. You’d gotten such weird looks from the other kids when you’d dragged your sleeping bags right next to each other, and then even weirder looks when they’d started waking up to find you in the same bed. It had only got worse when you’d gotten claimed and had to move cabins. You’d been more than excited to meet your siblings, but then you’d found out you no longer were allowed to spend the night at Cabin Eleven.

It was safe to say you didn’t take that lightly.

You’d brought your protests all the way up to Chiron’s desk yourself, even when he’d refused your begging with a firm no each time.

You didn’t care. You just got very good at evading the curfew harpies and sneaking in through windows.

They’d tried punishing you with dishes, and then laundry, and then the stables, but you took each punishment without complaint—especially since Luke took them on with you. All of you knew they would have to drag you kicking and screaming from his cabin if they’d wanted you to leave.

You didn’t give in, and it had only taken them four weeks to cave.

The two of you theorized they gave up because they had expected you to grow out of the habit with time, and they’d been right—to some degree.

You had stopped sneaking in every night, but your nights spent at Luke’s cabin were still just about as common as the nights you spent at yours.

“If we’re together,” Luke adds, “and I mean, together together, there’s no way they’ll let us be the way we are right now.”

No more hand holding under tables. Or friendly kisses on shoulders. Or hugs just because you feel like it.

You only realize you’re frowning when Luke kisses you again.

“They’ll ban us from being near each other,” he mumbles against your lips. “And then make us watch another awful sex ed video.”

Ah. That’d been Mr. D’s one final punishment for you both.

You’d been forced to sit down in the Big House while they played that video for the two of you, both of your faces on fire. The video had been on an old VHS tape and you’d watched it on an ancient box television, so you and Luke had been forced to sit shoulder to shoulder during the most uncomfortable fifteen minutes of your life.

“I forgot about that,” you say, thinking about how you’d been unable to look him in the eye after. “We should’ve had him charged for cruel and unusual punishment.”

Luke grins, and you find that your chest pulls in on itself. You love Luke. You want everyone to know.

“I’m still sad,” you say quietly. “Sometimes I wish we were normal, but now I really do.”

“Yeah? Why?”

“If we were normal I wouldn’t have to keep you a secret.” You run a hand through the curls hanging over his forehead, letting them get tangled in your fingers. “We could just have each other and… I don’t know. Be normal.”

He rubs a long circle into your hip, leaning forward so his nose knocks against yours. You go cross-eyed trying to look at him.

“Yeah. Normal.”

Normal teenagers don’t have to live their lives behind an invisible barrier because of the threat of mythological monsters. Normal teenagers go to school, and live in real houses, and don’t have to pretend they aren’t dating their best friend.

Jealousy burns hot under your skin.

Luke knows. He holds you out on the dock until the ring of the conch shell sounds in the distance.

—

The two of you don’t end up formally talking about it — not in the way you’d expected. But thinking about having to flat out ask if you’re dating feels weird when the both of you just know.

You doubt the decision at first, nerves and uncertainty looming over your head. You’ve never dated anyone before, but you know it’s probably normal to at least say something to make it official.

But then you feel the way Luke slots his hands with yours on the walk back to his cabin, different but sure, and you know it’s real.

It’s as real as your lungs expanding in your chest and as real as the kiss you give him before you go to breakfast, his hands closing around one of his spare camp shirts hanging over your shoulders.

The two of you walk so close together your shoulders brush with each step, and you stay like that all the way until the pavilion, your heart racing.

Everyone’s already seated. Your tables are right next to each other by some stroke of luck, everyone already getting started on breakfast.

Luke only lets you go when you have to sit down, giving you one last lingering squeeze on your shoulder before greeting his own campers.

“Where were you?”

Clarisse spits out the words the second you sit down across from her, squinting at you.

“I slept over.” You scoop some food onto your plate, surprised to see it’s not completely gone yet. Meals are usually a bloodbath. “Where did you think?”

She ignores your question. “Obviously you slept over. I mean why didn’t you and Castellan show up with the rest of his losers?”

You don’t quite look at her, trying to relax your nerves while you think of what the version of you from last week would’ve said. You’re an okay liar, but Clarisse is known for pressing and squeezing and wringing people out until she gets an answer she wants.

You end up giving a nonchalant shrug, filling your goblet and taking a long sip. “We took a while to get ready. Why?”

You can’t see the face she makes because one of your sisters reaches across her to reach for the plate of fruit. When she sits back down, you are met with her narrowed eyes and hard stare.

“Chris said you guys were gone from the cabin this morning. Where were you actually?”

“Chris,” you say thoughtfully, your eyebrows raising. “Didn’t know you two were close.”

She’s not amused. She points her fork at you accusingly. “Can you answer my questions?”

“We were at the lake,” you say, your voice pitching at the end in annoyance. “What’s with the interrogation?”

“This early?” she pries. You groan before you can stop yourself. “Doing what?”

Her raised voice draws the attention of Nathan, who butts into your conversation.

“Fucking around with her boyfriend, Clarisse,” he says, a smug smile on his face. He turns his back to you and wraps his arms around himself, miming kissing noises and moans of Luke’s name.

You whip your fork at him, which he is unfortunately quick enough to bat away.

“You’re fucking disgusting, Nate,” you snap, your face undeniably warm. You resist the urge to turn around in your seat to see if Luke heard.

He just shrugs, grinning at you with a mouth full of food.

“And Clarisse,” you hiss, turning to her. “We just woke up early and couldn’t go back to sleep. Are you happy?”

She seems to accept your answer but doesn’t stop giving you that stare of hers. “Was just wondering.”

“Wonder a little less, maybe.”

She rolls her eyes and finally goes back to eating, leaving you to your own meal while your siblings talk about their bets for whatever activity they have planned for later.

You zone out in a second. You find that it’s very easy letting yourself get swept up in dreams about being normal.

—

Thoughts about you and Luke and the future and everything in between rage through your mind, and you pay miserably for it.

Your cabin rushes to the climbing wall after burning their offerings, as excited as always for the cutthroat competition. You only realize how far away your mind is when you’re barely fast enough to dodge the flaming boulders coming your way.

You give yourself a break after almost getting your hair singed off by the lava, your chest heaving with exertion. Clarisse gives you a very unimpressed look, her eyebrow raised and her lips pressed into a thin line. You’d been lagging so far behind that she’d had time to sit and wait for you at the top.

“I’m getting a drink,” you say to one of your younger brothers next to you.

You aren’t sure he actually hears you, though, his eyes looking a little dazed from the rock that’d whacked him in the head earlier.

There’s a cooler just by the edge of the arena, filled to the brim with melting ice and wet plastic water bottles. You’re lucky that no one takes much notice when you head towards the mess hall instead.

It feels like your head is slamming against your skull from how hard you’re thinking, so you let the slight breeze cool you down while you walk.

You love Luke, and he loves you too. That much is clear, but you can’t help the way that doubt gnaws on your insides.

How long do you have to keep it a secret? Until the end of this year, or even longer? Does he plan on staying here this summer? Do you?

It’s the start of July, which means that there’s only about a month and a half left of camp. Once the middle of August hits, the non-year-rounders will leave for the rest of the year, going home to see their families and their friends and go to school.

You’ve taken plenty of classes yourself, courtesy of Chiron, who wouldn’t let any of you fall behind academically. But those were lessons taken at the amphitheater, and at the mess hall, or in your cabins. You haven’t been in a real school since…

Gods, when was it? The second grade?

It’s been about five long years since you’ve moved to Camp Half-Blood, which means it’s been five years of watching everyone move in and out. Each of them go on to live real lives—something you’d do anything for.

Sam, a girl from Apollo, just got accepted to some prestigious school for music about an hour away. Annabeth’s older brother, Martin, is heading down to Jersey at the end of this month to spend time with his family before leaving for college.

And you want to do it too, more than anything. But you don’t think you’d be able to do it without Luke.

You remember a conversation you had by the lake years ago, sometime before he had left for his quest. You’d planned to leave together—go to college and live somewhere away from New York.

California had been the dream, of course, but it didn’t matter where you were. It mattered if you were together.

But the two of you are old enough to enroll now, and Luke hasn’t said a word about leaving this summer. You’re honestly scared that he never will.

The next fall semester deadline has crept up on you faster than you’d thought. You’d have to make a decision soon, and the thought of it was impossible.

Your movements are near robotic while you drink from the water fountain by the side of the mess hall. It’s empty at this time of day, and you let your thoughts cloud your senses.

It’s why you jump when Luke appears at your side.

“Sorry,” he says through his laugh. He has an easy grin on his face and pats your back while you cough to clear your throat. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Luke wipes the water from your face while you give him a closed-mouth smile. There’s a wet spot on your shirt from where water had dripped down your chin, but it’s so hot out that it’ll dry in no time.

“You okay?” he asks when you don’t answer. “I was calling your name.”

You nod, watching as the smile on his face fades into just the softness of his eyes. You look down the hill where the rest of his cabin is, playing a game in the field between here and the beach.

Luke doesn’t look tired at all, though he’s breathing a little hard, like he’s just come back from a run. You watch a frisbee fly in the distance and understand why.

“I was melting by the climbing wall. I wanted a break,” you explain, fanning your face. You can’t believe it’s this hot out when it’d been freezing a few hours ago.

Luke nods in understanding. “Want to join us?” he offers, gesturing to where his siblings are. Someone gets tackled into the grass, and a collective groan travels through the crowd of kids. “It’s not nearly as hot here. It’s pretty windy since we’re close to the water.”

You shake your head, letting yourself sit and stare at his face. You study his features—the shapes of his eyes and the crease between them—and comply as easily as a soldier when he nods in the direction of one of the tables. He urges you to sit but doesn’t follow, leaning against the marble and letting you wring out his hands.

“What’s got you so sad?” he asks, letting you squeeze his palms intermittently.

“The summer session is almost over.”

He nods. “It is. A little more than a month, yeah?”

“Yeah.” August 16th is marked on your calendar with a massive red circle. “Did you—did you know that more people are leaving camp for college this year than any other year we’ve been here?”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“Good for them,” he says, a smile pulling at his face. “But you don’t have to be sad about that. They’ll visit. And we can always write as often as we want.”

You shake your head, your brows furrowing. “No. That’s not what I mean.”

“Oh. What is it, then?”

You swallow before speaking. His head is turned while he assesses you, and you remind yourself that it’s just Luke. You can admit anything to him.

“I’m scared.”

He pushes hair away from your face, soft as always. “They’ll be safe,” he assures. “It’s what they’ve been training for for so long.”

You shake your head again before you let the words spill out. “Luke, I’m scared that we’re going to be stuck here forever.”

It ends up sounding more like one huge word than a coherent sentence, but you know he still understands.

He drops down next to you on the bench so he can look at you better. “We won’t. We’re going to leave together, aren’t we?”

“I want to leave camp at the end of the summer session,” you admit. You can’t help but feel like you’re committing an act of betrayal against the place that’s kept you safe for so long. “I love it here, I do, I just… I can’t stay here for another year. I want to… I want to—”

“You want to leave? This summer?” he can’t help but ask, his eyes widened the slightest bit. He’s rubbing your hands in the way that always soothes you. “You—you want to go now?”

It hurts to admit, almost. Last summer, you’d put it off for another year, but you know it’s time to go.

You want to leave Camp Half-Blood.

“Yes,” you say. “I do.”

You aren’t sure how Luke will answer. All you’ve known for the last five years of your lives is this. It’s fireside singalongs and Capture the Flag. It’s always being together, and your spot by the lake, and never having to worry about getting hurt at the hands of another monster.

You don’t expect for Luke’s entire chest to stutter as his sigh of relief gets caught between his laugh. “Me too.”

“You… wait, you also want to leave this summer?”

Luke nods quickly, drawing your hands closer to him. “I do. I think… I think I’ve been ready to go for a while.”

You can picture everything now: you, Luke, and California, just like you’d always planned. Sunshine and school on the west coast.

“It’s just me and you, killer,” he swears.

“Me and you,” you repeat. It sounds a lot like a promise.

He starts mirroring the smile that’s growing on your face, and it does nothing but make yours widen even further.

“Thank you,” he breathes out, unable to help himself. You lean closer to him just because. “I didn’t think I’d be able to leave without you with me.”

“Me too,” you say honestly. “I would wait here until we were fifty if it took you another thirty years to decide to leave.”

He laughs, one of his arms going around your waist. “You really have no idea.”

The two of you don’t move apart. Your hand finds its way into his hair like it always does when you’re sitting this close together, feeling his curls that are hot from the sun.

You feel hot from the sun too, and it only worsens when he slots his lips against yours again for a kiss that’s over so quickly you almost miss it.

“Does this mean this is our last month at camp?” you can’t help but ask. The thought of it is making your heart ache. You can’t imagine leaving this place behind.

The realization settles slowly on Luke’s face too. “Yeah. I guess it is.”

You shut your eyes and relish in the feeling of the breeze from the water as it rolls in. This is the last month you’ll spend in the place that raised you. You aren’t sure how you’ll say goodbye to it all.

“Luke!” a voice shrieks from nearby.

You’ll have to say goodbye to your family. And Luke’s family too, the one that’s currently walking up the hill towards you now.

You can’t help but inch apart as if you’d been doing anything but holding him. The group of kids flood into the mess hall, grumbling and arguing amongst themselves. It’s impossible to miss the fact that everyone has at least one part of their person stained with grass.

Chris managed to survive mostly unscathed, save for the line of dirt smeared down his arm. He’s staring openly at the space between both of you, an eyebrow raised. After a second, he snorts. “I think this is the farthest apart I’ve ever seen you two sit.”

“Shut up, Chris,” you say, though there’s no real bite to it.

Luke ignores him, but you can tell he’s a little flustered when he stutters for a second while talking to the kids.

There’s been an issue between one of his sisters and a son of Hecate. One of them had played dirty by pulling on the other’s shirt, and then they’d both fallen into a heap on the ground.

It doesn’t explain why everyone else looks like they’d gotten dragged through the mud—especially Chris, cause he’d been reffing—but Luke doesn’t mention it. He uses his camp counselor magic to make them apologize to each other and the crowd of kids rushes away again, ready for another round.

There’s a certain kind of look on his face while he watches them go. You lean into his side again and the two of you watch as the frisbee gets thrown into the air at Chris’ whistle.

“I’m going to miss this,” you say.

How do you leave behind a place you call home?

Luke presses a kiss into your forehead. “It’ll be okay.”

He sounds so sure of himself, you can’t help but agree.

—

The month of July passes almost as quickly as it came.

You and Luke keep quiet about your relationship and your plans to leave, and you find that you don’t mind keeping those secrets anymore.

You receive a mountain of notes from him each day, all of them signed with his first initial and slipped into your pockets or hidden between your things. The contents of the notes range from little compliments to heartfelt messages you read so often the paper grows worn out.

You commit each and every one of them to memory.

One of your favorite notes had been delivered to you by one of the younger campers. You’d been sweating like a pig after a match with Clarisse when one of his little brothers came right up to you with a piece of paper clenched in his fists.

“Hey, Richie,” you’d said, crouching down to talk to him better. “What’s up?”

He’d shoved the paper into your hands, wiping sweat off his brow. “This is from Luke.”

He’d looked totally wiped, so you gave him a water bottle and fanned his face for him. He drank it in that very audible way all little kids do.

“Did Luke have you bring this all the way to me?” you’d asked, bringing the boy under the shade of a tree. The Hermes cabin was at the arts and crafts cabin right now, a pretty far distance away.

Richie nodded furiously. “He said it was an important message and I couldn’t look at it.”

Your brows had furrowed, and you were quick to unfold the paper. It’d been a thicker material than usual, the side jagged like it’d been ripped out of a book.

It was a coloring page. Two warriors, side by side, colored in with waxy crayon. There was a pink heart drawn between them, and in Luke’s handwriting at the bottom, it read:

Us.

You must’ve been grinning like a fool, because Clarisse whacked you upside the head.

“The hell are you grinning about?”

She’d moved to grab the paper out of your hands, but you’d shoved it into your back pocket before she could manage it.

“Nothing.”

“You look flustered. What is it?”

“It’s nothing,” you’d insisted, your smile only growing. The soreness of your muscles was instantly cured. You didn’t feel exhausted at all.

Clarisse definitely hadn’t believed you, but that was fine.

You think this month with Luke has been the happiest you’ve ever been. You’ve always been clingy with each other, but it makes new emotion well up in your chest when you hold his hand now. You curl into his side by the fire and he pulls you against him, and not just as friends. It makes you feel hot and cold and unwell.

And you get to kiss him like this now.

That’s good too.

It’s the annual Pie Eating Contest today, where the cabin that eats the most pies is set free from chores for two entire months. No one would dare miss such an important event—which is exactly why the two of you have escaped to your cabin.

You think Luke likes it when he can kiss you lying down, but you think he likes it even more when you sit on his lap like this. His eyes are just the tiniest bit wider, and he sometimes smiles without really realizing it when he pulls back from smothering you in kisses.

“You look cute,” he compliments, eyes shining.

Luke’s back is propped against the headboard and you’re very pliable draped over his front. His hands are placed on your hips, and every once in a while one of them will inch up towards your ribs and you’ll get ticklish.

“Thanks, hero.”

You also think Luke really likes it when you call him that—a silly nickname from years ago you’ll never let go of.

Your lips are swollen from how insistent Luke’s been with his kisses, and you’re resting your chin over his shoulder, limp and tired. You’re exhausted from the run around camp he forced you on earlier and are now happy to let him do whatever he’d like. He’s taken full advantage of it, your lips worked over by his mouth a million times over.

“Did you make me do all that running earlier so you could have your evil way with me?”

You think your shirt collar is going to be stretched out with the way that he’s been pulling on it for the past hour, taking care to only kiss you hard where no one else will see. The two of you have been kissing as lazily as humanly possible, but it hasn’t stopped Luke from waging war on the skin of your throat.

“Who do you think I am?” he asks, pulling you closer in a way that makes you choke. He gives you a very pleased smile in return when you try to shove your face into his shoulder.

“Someone who wants me dead,” you complain when he tries to pry your face away from him.

Your eyes slide shut when you tilt your head down to kiss him again, your mouths moving so slowly you aren’t sure if it even counts as kissing anymore. One of Luke’s hands splays itself across your lower back, his touch warm.

You’re sitting flush against his front, and you realize distantly that you can make out the lines of his chest where he’s pressed to you.

“I can’t wait until we get to have our own place,” you say absentmindedly.

Luke snickers. He pinches your sides. “Can’t wait until you get to have your way with me? That’s dirty, killer.”

You do wonder what it’d be like to be able to kiss him without the threat of twenty other people walking in, but that’s not totally why. You’re about to defend yourself, but then he encourages you onto your back and your vocabulary seeps directly from your brain and out your ears.

He takes extra care not to hit you in the face with the beads on his necklace, and he very politely pulls down your shirt so your stomach is no longer exposed.

“You’re burning up,” he says, like he hasn’t just sucked the air out of your lungs. “Is this okay?”

You nod your head, letting your hands come around his shoulders to urge him downwards again. He drops onto his forearms to get as close to you as possible, and you drag his upper lip between yours, enjoying the way it makes him shudder. You’d accidentally bitten him there earlier when you’d gotten a little too jittery, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

Luke’s humming when he takes his hand down to your thigh and rubs half circles into the skin. Your hands link together and you bring his to your chest, where he feels the rise and fall just next to your racing heart.

The sound of the conch signaling the end of the contest is just barely audible over the sound of your blood rushing in your ears.

You probably would’ve bolted upright in bed if Luke wasn’t pinning you, his teeth dragging over a sore hickey.

“Luke,” you protest lightly, nudging at his chest.

His eyebrows furrow, eyes still shut. “Huh?”

Pulling away takes every ounce of willpower you have. “The contest is over. I have to go talk to Chiron.”

“Okay,” he agrees, capturing your lips in another kiss. “In a second.”

It pains you when you swerve away from him, but you do this dance every other day and know that ‘a second’ usually means fifteen more minutes. He looks offended.

“I have places to be, people to talk to,” you say, trying to be stern. “Get up, Luke. I’ll be back.”

Even though you’re alone, you know you’re playing a risky game now that lunch is over. He’s frowning, and you exercise the highest level of restraint when you don’t lean in again to kiss him again.

“You’d seriously rather talk to Chiron than stay here with me?”

“Luke.”

“Gods, what is it? It’s his beard, isn’t it? I should’ve known—”

The comment gets one last laugh from you, and he squeezes you in his arms once more before letting you get up. He settles in the space you’ve just vacated, watching interestedly as you pull your shoes on.

“I’ll try not to let it drag on too long,” you swear. He catches you by the arm when you nearly tip over, your sneaker halfway on. “And you know I wouldn’t go unless it was important. I’ll be done before dinner.”

His eyes are soft. For a second, they look misty, but then he blinks and it’s gone. You wonder what has him thinking so hard.

“Don’t take too long.”

You kiss him again for good measure, nearly falling forward onto the bed when he tries to drag you back towards him.

You huff his name very angrily, but the smile on your face does nothing but encourage him.

“My bad.”

—

The next time you see Luke, it’s after you burst free from the doors of the Big House.

It was hot inside the building, with nothing but the small fan in the corner of Chiron’s office to cool you down. You hadn’t expected the conversation to go on for so long, but it’d been all worth it in the end. He lets you go with a smile and a firm pat on the back.

It’s not late enough for it to be dark out, but the sun has started setting, making it much cooler outside. Luke’s waiting on the wrap around porch for you, a surprise as pleasant as ever. It’s clear he must’ve woken up from a nap because his hair is messy and flat on one side, like he’s just been asleep. He’s leaning against one of the pillars on the patio cracking his knuckles, impatient.

You take him by surprise when you slot yourself against his side. “Nice nap?”

Luke flinches hard before realizing who you are.

“Hey,” he says, his voice sounding more breathless than you’d expected. He slides a hand around your waist. “How’d it go?”

You hadn’t told him why you’d needed to speak to Chiron so badly, and the envelope he’d given you is burning a hole through your pocket.

“I have something to show you,” you blurt out quickly, trying to stop the grin about to take over your face.

“Yeah?” he says. He links your hands together as you walk down the steps. “What is it?”

You lean over to fix his hair with your other hand, flattening out the back. “It’s pretty important.”

The nerves get to you very quickly, your hand already growing slick with sweat. You try freeing yourself from Luke, but he holds fast.

“I have something important to tell you too,” he admits slowly.

The levels of giddiness you’re feeling is right off the charts. You get the urge to come outright and spoil your surprise, but you pinch yourself to stop the words from spilling out.

“Yeah? Wanna head to the lake, then?”

The lake is public to everyone, but you like to pretend it’s a spot for you and Luke only. It’d been where you were the morning you’d first started dating, and where you’d gone the day Luke had come back from his quest. It’s very special, which is why you know that you have to surprise him there.

After all, your days at camp are limited. After you leave, you have no idea when you’ll be back.

Luke lets you lead the way without another word. Campers rush around the two of you, a few of them waving to one or both of you before heading away. You hear the occasional whisper about the events of the pie contest—the Ares cabin had won, of course.

Your meaningless conversation fills the air until you reach the lake. Luke tells you about how upset Travis had been about their loss in the competition this year, and you tell him about the argument you’d gotten into with Mr. D outside of Chiron’s office.

You reach the lake a lot sooner than you had expected. When you let go of Luke’s arm, you realize you’d been basically dragging him the last hundred yards to the water.

The sun is nowhere close to setting—courtesy of it being late July—but you can hear the crickets between the trees and you can tell it’s coming up on late afternoon.

Luke stares at you expectantly, so you break the silence.

“Do you want to go first?”

He cracks his knuckles again, starting from his middle finger and working outwards. “Oh, uh… no. You go first.”

You don’t need too much convincing.

“Okay,” you say quickly, your hand moving to your back pocket. You miss it about three times before you pass him the envelope with shaking hands.

“I’ve been talking to my sister.”

Luke loves Mel. She writes to you all the time from California to update you on her life and always has the craziest stories from her college there. You and Luke used to pore over her letters, dreaming about the west coast and the sunsets on the beaches there.

“She’s doing great. She moved off-campus for her last year,” you explain.

Luke nods along, drumming the envelope against the palm of his opposite hand.

“And she…” You trail off, the words getting jumbled in your mind. “Just open it, Luke.”

The envelope scrapes against itself when he pulls open the flap, and the two thin leafs of paper spill out onto his hand.

His mouth parts.

“She knows how badly we’ve been wanting to see California, and… now we can.”

The two glossy plane tickets shine under the light of the sun.

“And she’s out of the dorms now, so she’s offered us a room to stay in at her apartment.” You look up at him, apprehensive. He looks stunned, flipping the paper over in his hand like it’s a trick of the light. “We can go see her and get a feel for California. Look at colleges like we’d planned.”

His hands still, and you realize the fluttering of the paper a second ago had been due to his hands shaking. The tickets disappear inside the envelope again, and he wipes at his face.

“Shit,” he says. “I…”

You aren’t sure what’s wrong, but he’s upset. He’s frowning hard, his brows creasing with stress, and the feeling of your chest dropping makes you want to vomit.

“What’s wrong?”

Luke shakes his head firmly. He steps backward. He won’t look at you.

“I’m sorry. Fuck, killer, I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” you say. He hasn’t even explained what he’s sorry for, but you already know you’ll forgive him. You reach for his hands, and it feels like your ribs force inward around your heart when he moves even further away. “What’s the matter? Talk to me.”

“I can’t,” he grits out. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I can’t.”

“Go to California?” you ask, confusion distorting the features of your face. You don’t try reaching for him again despite how badly you want to. “Luke, you—you know that’s okay. We don’t even have to go.”

The words start rushing out as you try working out what’s wrong. You want Luke to leave with you, so, so badly. But you know deep down that you’re willing to stay another ten years if he’s changed his mind.

“We could go to another state. Or—or, stay here. We don’t even have to leave at all. I mean, I don’t even want to go that badly.”

You’re lying to him. Leaving with him at the end of the summer has been the only thing you’ve looked forward to for the past month.

Worry lines crease between his eyes as he stares at you, shaking his head robotically.

You can’t tell why you feel so nervous.

It’s just Luke.

The sun dips quickly past the tree line, casting half of his face in darkness. Your hands wrinkle and curl into the hem of your shirt.

It’s like a switch turns off in Luke’s eyes. You watch his face harden as he prepares himself for what he’s about to say, and your chest plummets before his mouth can even form around the words.

“I’m not talking about California,” Luke says, the word biting.

A hawk flies above your heads. The trees go silent behind you.

“I meant us. I can’t do this anymore.”

Your heart hitches inside of your chest.

You can’t remember the last time you’ve been this scared.

notes: sorry for that ending but all will be explained in due time! lmk what u thought :)

Who else up at this ungodly hour with an insatiable yearning that makes them sick to their stomach

⋆· ༘* GOT THE SUN IN MY MF-ING POCKET !

pairing ★ jock!luke castellan x drum major!reader

synopsis ★ the one where you lock in for your fall final project. you and luke spill your guts and then hatch a plan. (3.9k)

content ★ no pronouns used for reader, luke pov!!, bad teenager humor, very vague smau, read psa at the end pls

notes ★ luke literally cannot catch a break here, read his mind and all u hear is incoherent screaming and bawling like olivia in all-american bitch

series masterlist

TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT: DAILY BULLETIN FOR DECEMBER XX, 20XX

PACE: […] And here are the upcoming events. Football - come to the media center to celebrate the end of the season, say goodbye to departing seniors, and welcome new team members. Although we didn’t get far in regionals, Coach Ares would like to give kudos to Luke Castellan for making the most touchdowns this season.

MIYAZAWA: Seniors - the counseling office is holding their last session to revise regular decision college applications in the Career Center. Please RSVP by Wednesday with the QR code provided by your English teacher. [pause] Speaking of school, ASB will also be hosting tri-weekly study halls starting next Monday in preparation for finals. Good luck on your tests!

PACE: And now it’s time for our joke of the day. Hey, Alice, what do you call an edible farmer that takes care of chickens?

MIYAZAWA: I don’t know, Malcolm, what do you call an edible farmer that takes care of chickens?

PACE: [flatly] A chicken tender.

PACE and MIYAZAWA: [exceeding fake laughter]

PACE: That’s all for today, Centaurs. I’m Malcolm.

MIYAZAWA: And I’m Alice!

PACE and MIYAZAWA: Bye!

Dr. Medes is a sweet old man. He’s on the stout side, hair and beard gone completely white, arms freckled with liver spots and eyes starting to get that watery blue line around the irises.

He gives extra credit often, grades forgivingly, loves talking about circles, and throws Dum-Dum lollipops at volunteers even if they get the answer wrong. Stats is a shitty class but Dr. Medes makes it a bit better.

Except, when Luke walks in on an unassuming Monday, there’s a crowd of kids pushing around at the back board. Some look happy when they walk away but most…. Well, they aren’t too pleased.

He jostles his way through his classmates. The fight to see what’s on the board is all sharp elbows and yelps from stubbed toes. Luke’s pretty sure that there’ll be a bruise blooming on his side by the end of it.

It’s a spreadsheet. Big black letters line the top, all bold and all capitalized:

AP STATS FALL FINAL PROJECT PARTNERS

Fuck. Luke’s eyes scroll down the sheet, scanning the bars for his name. He finds it, sweep his eyes to the adjacent box. Double fuck.

Your name in black, 12px, Arial font grins back at him tauntingly.

Luke curses Dr. Medes and the randomizer from Google that he always uses. Triple fuck, because there’s a warmth at his back and you slide into the edge of his periphery.

You notice him, head turning in slow-motion, mouth coming down to solidify into the grimace of the year. He wants to run away but the frown lines arrowing in your skin keep him captive.

“Hi partner.” The boy manages a little wave, a sharp grin. It’s as genuine as he can get without encountering the nervous fear of you punching him.

Tire-flat, “Castellan.”

“So,” he draws out the vowel and juts his thumb at a pair of desks the corner, “let’s talk about it.”

He knows he has a steady voice. He controls his breaths well, speaks carefully, slowly, with purpose. Luke thinks you’re about to fall asleep by the time he’s asking if you have time after school to iron out the details. The question snaps you out of your reverie.

“Er,” you blink a few times, groggy. “I’m free until I have to show up for drills.”

He hums, nods. “So from after sixth period to five, right?”

“Yea.”

( Why did he remember your practice time? Now he feels weird. )

He types a reminder into his phone and shuts it off, sliding the device into his pocket casually.

The words come out without thinking, “How do you feel about my house?”

What the fuck was that. Luke’s panicking; you’re barely cordial with each other—hell, you hate him and he’s pretty sure that he feels the same—and he just invited you to the most intimate place of his life.

“Excuse me?”

Luke tries the best he can to salvage this. “I mean—like, for work. It’s just a block away, and I have the stuff we need to make the presentation.”

Please say no, please say no, please say no.

“Oh, yea, just—” your eyes go out of focus as you think “—well, I guess I could.”

Very strained, molars practically dust, “Great. I’ll text my mom and let her know.”

The voice in his skull is banging at his bones and shrieking FUCKING KILL ME ALREADY. He pulls out his phone again to shoot a frenzied text to his mom as soon as you turn away to work on something else.

TO: mom

(11:26) mom plz i swear ill do all the dishes n put them away scrub the toilet find u hmart coupons n drive u there ANYTHING U ASK just PLZ can u get poster board and markers b4 i come home 🙏🙏

(11:26) for stats its a project. my partners coming over too

FROM: mom

(11:30) Ok. You better keep the HMart promise lol 🤣

“All good?” you question, zipping up your backpack. There’s a gleam of curiosity hiding under the hood of your eyelids; the sight of it makes something cold slither down his spine. Like you want to slice him open and eat his secrets alive.

The bell rings.

“Yea. Just fine.”

( It’s really not. He goes to the restroom straight after, splashes his face, and zones out in front of the mirror as the water dries. )

TO: silena 🎀

(11:32) what would u do if u accidentally invited the person who reciprocates ur hate for them to ur house for a project that u had to sell ur soul to ur mom to get the supplies for

FROM: silena 🎀

(11:40) LMFAOOO R U TWEAKING 😝 (11:41) oh wait is it the drum major… (11:41) ask whether if beckendorfs taken for me pls 😘

TO: silena 🎀

(11:43) WHAT THE HELL BRU 😭😭😭

FROM: silena 🎀

(11:44) what can i say, im an opportunist at heart 🩷

TO: silena 🎀

(11:46) boooooooo 🗣️🗣️

Luke flies by the seat of his pants. It’s a good quality, especially when plans don’t work out on the field. But because his quality of being impetuous benefits him in one way, it must be unbeneficial in an another scenario. There must be balance in life, and now is no exception, to much of his chagrin. Exhibit one: his mom has now whisked you away onto the couch and—good lord, she’s pulling out his baby album from under the coffee table.

He suppresses his shriek of mortification to a pathetic squeak as you turn a page and see a grainy photo of little him—cheeks flushed, hair long, curls loose, a pair of garish upside-down sunglasses with gold frames sliding down his nose.

“He loved swimming when he was little,” is what his mom is telling you. “We used to go to the beach almost twice a month.”

“How cute.”

Your eyes are shining with mirth and something evil. Luke wonders if he could walk right back outside and scream at the sky.

“Mom,” he ekes out, strained. “We need to work on our project.”

May Castellan does a little thing with her eyebrows, mouth pressing into a thin line and eyes scrutinizing.

“Okay,” she says after a moment of thought. Her voice sounds small but Luke knows that his mother is anything but with that devious glimmer in her eyes. “Make sure to leave your door open.”

Luke thinks that you almost choke. He feels a prickling sensation burn all the way up his back, face warming up. “Mom….”

The woman hums absently, looks straight into his eyes with an innocuous lift of her brows.

“What?”

You ease off the couch and excuse yourself to the bathroom, wandering down the hallway. Luke immediately erupts into a furiously hushed whisper.

“Mom, we’re not like that.”

“But I think your partner is a good kid. Very sweet.” His mother put extra stress on ‘partner’, even throwing in a very obvious wink that she tries to play off as an unbalanced blink. Oh, if only Luke could stop getting embarrassed by the people in his life.

“Bro….”

“Who? I am your mother, I gave birth and raised you, bro.”

Luke bows his head like a kicked puppy. “Sorry, mom.”

She bobs her head side to side, skeptical. “Mhm, be a good host and show your guest to the bathroom.”

Luke pads away, floorboards squeaking under his socks. He finds you leaning straight-faced against the door to his bedroom, the Sesame Street-themed sign with his name on it pinned into the wood behind your shoulder.

“Not a word,” he hisses, stepping forward to reach for the knob. Like always, he regretfully acts before he thinks, subsequently caging you between the wall and himself.

You make a face, half-bewildered and all-disgusted. “Yea, like everyone wants to know about your ugly baby photos.”

The parts of Luke’s neck hidden under his hoodie flush. You’re so close that he can feel your words rattling in his nerves, as if you’re speaking right into his skin. He twists the knob quickly and skitters into his room.

You step in without another word, scanning his things. Luke kisses his teeth; he should’ve asked his mom to hide everything in the closet too because there’s a grin creeping into your mouth the longer you look around.

“Didn’t know you were a nerd, Castellan.”

He represses the urge to sweep the toy race cars off the topmost shelf and rip the blueprint posters off the wall. Burn the baby blue duvet on his bed with the Ferrari logo stitched in the corner, he doesn’t care—anything to save himself from the embarrassment.

You pick up a mini Mercedes from the shelf, turn it in your fingers, and set it back down wordlessly. Luke wants to kiss the feet of whoever controls his luck that you don’t insult him further.

“I, uh,” he manages, strained, “I’m gonna get the materials.”

You hum noncommittally and turn to read the white text on his Blueprint of an F1 Car poster. Luke skitters away, grabbing the poster board and marker box at lightning speed.

His mom gives him a weird look—brows raised and mouth pinched—as he sprints back.

Luke decides along the way that you aren’t so bad, because—well, you let him choose the topic of the project to be motorsports.

FROM: silena 🎀

(16:28) did u ask abt beckendorf 🩷

TO: silena 🎀

(16:30) girl bffr how can i do that if i cant be social w haters

FROM: silena 🎀

(16:30) www.wikihow.com/how2talk2urcrush (16:31) hope this helps 😊😘

TO: silena 🎀

(16:31) WHAT THE FUKC

Luke forgot one crucial thing in his panic: you’re in Heralds under his father. He’s lettering the topic of your presentation on the board when he hears the front door snick. His marker nearly slips.

“Uh—” you snap your gaze up as Luke’s mouth begins to open and close like a fish, fumbling for the words “—don’t you have to go to practice?”

You regard him momentarily before squinting at the screen of your school-issued laptop. “In half an hour.”

Luke thinks, just rip off the band aid.

“I’m gonna try to say this really nicely, but my dad just got home and I need you out of my house before it gets awkward.”

You don’t take offence, shutting the computer and squeezing your hunched shoulders back. “Thank fucking god, I’m free.”

“Luke!” His mom’s voice is faint, somewhere far-off in another part of his house. “Does your friend want a snack? Maybe dinner before practice?”

And then, “Luke brought someone over?”

He doesn’t know if he should laugh or cry at the sound of his father’s voice, but he definitely wants to die when his mom mentions you by name.

Luke watches the light leave your eyes when you listen closely to the footsteps padding along the floorboards.

“Sergeant, I didn’t know you were in the same class as Luke.”

You notably do not correct sergeant to major.

“Sir, hi,” you say, visibly cringing at the sight of his father standing awkwardly in the doorframe. “I’m actually just leaving.”

“Nonsense!” His dad smiles at you easily, envy digging between the rungs of Luke’s ribs. “Why don’t you stay for dinner?”

Luke jumps in, “Band practice.” And he really doesn’t mean for it to come out as disrespectful as it did, but when the man he’s wanted the most approval from gives it readily to you, the person who hates him most…well.

“Oh. How was your day, Luke?”

“Fine,” he grits, standing up quickly despite the way it makes his head spin. You get up too, patting at the imaginary dust on your pants.

His dad smiles at you again with his eyes twinkling, and when you walk past the doorway, he pats your shoulder fondly.

“Luke can walk you back.”

The both of you look at the older man, bewildered.

“What the hell?”

“Sir, that’s alright, I really don’t need an escort.”

May Castellan calls from that far-off place in the house. “Luke? Please walk your friend back, it’ll get dark soon.”

Luke uses his sweetest, mommy’s-dearest-boy voice while looking his dad dead in the eye. “Okay. You need anything else?”

“Just come back safe, baby.”

“Okay, love you.”

You look out of place, fingers wrapped around the straps of your backpack, tongue poking at your cheek. Luke cautiously puts his hand between your shoulders and steers you towards the door.

The both of you skitter out before anything else goes downhill, sharing a sigh of relief.

“So,” Luke starts once you’re halfway down the street. The toes of his sneakers catch in the concrete gaps, cushioned by the weeds growing from them. “Is Beckendorf single?”

You whip your head around, a small part to your mouth and eyes narrowing.

“Asking for a friend,” he adds quickly. “My girlfriend, actually. I mean, not my girlfriend, just my best friend who happens to be a girl.”

“He’s single, alright,” you admit after a moment of pause, hands hanging heavy in your pockets. “But he’s got his eyes set on someone already. Who’s your friend?”

Luke’s mouth twists. Should he really tell you? From what he knows, band kids are vicious with gossip. What if Silena’s senior year got ruined because of him?

You speak again, breaking him out of his thoughts. “Are you dating Silena, by the way?”

He’s quick to answer. “No, she’s my best friend.”

“Mhm.” You nod, deep in thought. “So she likes Charles.”

Fucking hell, Luke’s stupid. So, so, so fucking stupid. Now you know Silena’s biggest secret because he’s got a big fucking mouth and acts before his brain can fucking think and—

“You wanna get them together?”

He blinks, nearly tripping over an uplifted slab of sidewalk. “Huh?”

“They probably both think that the other is dating one of us…so.”

Luke never learns from his mistakes. “So, what? We pretend to kiss so they can get over themselves and do the same?”

Loose fucking cannon, you, goes the voice trapped in his skull, can’t ever keep your damn mouth shut when you need it to be.

“I mean,” you mutter, eyes cast onto the ground, sheepish with the way you begin to palm at your neck. He wonders if parts of you also itch and flush when you’re with him. “Never mind, that’s stupid. We’re just setting them up, there’s no need to do all that extra shit.”

Luke laughs, embarrassment creeping in hot. “Yea, sorry. That’s just insane, like—”

“—something out of a movie, I know.” You’re laughing with him too, mouth stretching wide and smile lines digging into your skin. He kind of gets why you’re his dad’s favorite now—you’re both similar in humor and expression.

He quells the thing in his stomach that continues to grow the longer he stares at your smile lines. “Okay, so obviously just pushing them towards each other, and it’ll happen naturally.”

You nod. “And after we’ll just go back to hating each other, yea? There’s no need to pretend.”

“But why do you hate me?” Luke loathes how involuntary his speech has become. People don’t just ask why others hate them. For the nth time that day, he wishes to crawl into a hole and—

“It’s not really you, I just have a vendetta against the football team in general. And I guess I felt pressured to hate you specifically ‘cause that’s what everyone expects, y’know?”

Oh, okay.

He starts—voluntarily, this time, because you deserve to know the same, “I don’t like you because of my dad.”

( Well, it was what he wanted to say, but not exactly how he wanted to say it. )

“You’re like, his perfect successor,” Luke continues, pushes on like he always does with every unfortunate mishap that befalls him. “I thought I could make him happy by doing my own thing. He wanted a track star for his team and I became football captain. And to really rub it in, I used his camera and got into yearbook instead of Heralds. Did you know he has beef with Ares and Clio?”

You shake your head, incredulous. The both of you have stopped moving, feet coming to a standstill on the broken sidewalk.

“That’s a dick move.”

He shrugs, a small smile gracing his face. “I know, it’s kinda too much, even if I was pissed. But looking back, I guess I’m happy with where I’m at.”

“I think that matters a lot more than your dad’s approval,” you tell him sagely.

“Yea,” Luke agrees, the toe of his sneakers leaving an indent in the gravel. “So we’re good, right? Friends?”

Your face pinches, mouth going sour and a little tender. “I wouldn’t go that far. I still hate grossly overrated sports.”

“Yea, and I hate writing in Associated Press.”

Your mouth tilts in an almost-smile, backlit pink by the horizon. It’s far enough into the year that the sun starts setting at five, and it’s chilly too, breaths starts to wisp.

You nod you head awkwardly in the direction of the school—he didn’t even realize that you’ve walked this far already.

“See you around, Castellan.”

[ VIDEO: a clip of someone’s living room decked out in festive lights. A group of rowdy teens are clumped together on the floor, a few older kids on the couches. The film is shaky and so is the audio, but the teens are clearly rapping—badly—along to Hamilton, which is playing on the TV.

The camera briefly zooms in on you and Charles sitting next to each other on the couch, you closing your eyes, knees slung over his thighs while he belts along to the singing portions of the song. The view then flips over to show Travis as the cameraman, tears in his eyes, a sugar-rush flush to his face before the video ends. ]

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travstole gna miss my favorite seniors 😞

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majmajmaj what happens at the semester end party STAYS AT THE SEMESTER END PARTY

perciusjakcsn GTFO THIS IS ACTUALLY WATERGATE FOR BAND 😭👎

conmanstole if i can prove that i never touched my balls 🗣️🗣️‼️‼️

↳ travstole can u promise not to tell another soul whatchu saw 🫵😩😰

“I need your number,” you tell him on the last day of finals, to a backdrop of students rushing out of class. He doesn’t know how you found him right after fifth period, but he doesn’t dare question. “I forgot to get it when we were working on the project.”

Luke only has the pen he used to fill out his physics exam, so he takes your hand gently and scrawls the digits onto your palm. It’s a little hard to read, kind of—very—smudged, but it works.

“See you after break?” he offers, clipping the pen onto the collar of his soft sweatshirt. Luke fidgets the longer you look at him, scratching at the stubble he missed during his morning shave, readjusting his computer glasses.

“Obviously,” you tell him after a lifetime—really just a split second—of deliberation. “Don’t forget.”

“I couldn’t if I wanted to.”

You raise your brows just slightly, a little furrow forming in your skin. There’s a small tilt to your mouth, almost disbelieving, skeptical.

“Congrats on MVP, by the way,” you tell him just as he’s about to awkwardly step away. “That was a better season than I expected.”

“Really?” He grins; his face nearly hurts from the force of it.

“Football’s still ass.” You shrug and step back, thumbs looped in the straps of your backpack. “Don’t go too far. I’m expecting an assignment on volleyball soon.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Luke feels so stupid when you give him a sardonic little grin in return, head beginning to pound at a hundred kilometers an hour.

( And then he remembers that he’s American and doesn’t actually know what the fuck a kilometer is outside of physics. See? He’s decidedly bam-fucking-boozled. )

The bell for the sixth period final rings, and he’s snapped out of it, realizing that he’s standing dumbly in the courtyard. He’s in sports—he doesn’t have a sixth because that’s the period reserved for practice, which he doesn’t have.

When he comes home to kickstart winter break, Luke actually—albeit curtly—greets his dad.

[ IMAGE: a screenshot of a DM. On the left side of the chat, two messages that read:

wild guess but maybe luke likes the band kid that everyone calls sarge or smth i saw them walking together after school and they met up when finals was over

anon pls

The right side of the chat has a message with one shocked emoji and a thumbs up. ]

Liked by luvvbeaus and 1,153 others

centaurs.confess movie plot ahh rumor 💀

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drewtanka ONG?? 😦😦

naka.ethan bruh i’m reporting this for misinformation on behalf of marching band as a whole #CASTELLANSUCKSASS

↳ damienwit #CASTELLANSUCKSASS ↳ travstole thats my cousin ur talking abt do it again #CASTELLANSUCKSASS

FROM: silena 🎀

(18:52) so i find out thru insta huh. ur so fake lucas castellan 🖕

TO: silena 🎀

(18:53) woahh those r some wild accusations silena beauregard (18:53) and thats not even the name on my birth certificate. its just luke.

FROM: silena 🎀

(18:54) how does it feel to be the most hated man at school #CASTELLANSUCKSASS 🎙️

TO: silena 🎀

(19:00) in a student body full of neanderthals thats a fucking badge of honor

FROM: silena 🎀

(19:01) what about the rumors abt ur crush on ur dads fav editor in chief 🎙️

TO: silena 🎀

(19:01) STFUU WHO SAID THAT EW 😨 (19:01) we legit hate each other idk what ur talking about. anything else u heard is misinformation bruh it was just a project

FROM: silena 🎀

(19:02) yall hear smth?? (20:00) SMH LEFT ON READ. BESTIE PRIVILEGES RE FUCKING VOKED.

p.s. ★ on the topic of #CASTELLANSUCKSASS - this is purely a work of fiction, and although this is based on real things that teenagers do, it is never funny to cyberbully people. if u are being cyberbullied, report, block, and tell someone who can help, like a counselor or trusted adult (also dont forget to have screenshots as evidence), and if u are someone who cyberbullies others, gtfo of my blog bc ur not welcome.

sharing is caring, so pls rb and also lmk ur thoughts ₍⑅ᐢ..ᐢ₎ ᡣ𐭩

luke tags (open); @melllinaa @amortencjja @arsonnaire @ma1dita @m00ng4z3r @saltair-and-palemoonlight @witch-lemon @ahh-chickens @spiderbeam @jennapancake @traumatrios @omg--bluexx @dangelnleif @lukecastellandefender @apolloscastellan

© klineinie 2024 — do not plagiarize, translate, or use ANY works to train ai

The Rafah invasion would be so catastrophic that even Biden momentarily called it a red line, though of course he walked it back.

It's hard to say something could be worse than what's already happened, nothing I could say wouldn't already apply, but this would massively increase the scale of this ongoing atrocity. Any pressure that can be brought to bear to stop it must be applied.

Israel's ongoing attacks on Gaza have killed over 34,000 Palestinians, with millions trapped in Rafah as Tel Aviv remains determined to storm the city - "with or without a truce."

This isn't the first time Israel has committed war crimes against Palestinians.

Credits - TRTWORLD

This is Rafah which the occupation army is preparing to enter and these small square-shaped plots are the tents of the displaced and they contain more than a million displaced people,reality on the ground is much worse than it appears from above,as there is no greater suffering..

conrad girls are edward girls are peeta girls are jacaerys girls are jon girls.

Here's your daily reminder to Click for Palestine!!!

Thank you!!! 💕

hey, daysie-way is a scammer. pls don't reblog their posts or donate to them. warn your followers not to entertain asks or messages from them as well.

ARE YALL SERIOUS!!! what the shit guys . god bless yall for telling me

[SOURCE]

Maternity kits, medical threads and scissors, water testing kits, anesthetics, mobile desalination units, etc do you see the pattern? Israel is not only starving the people of Gaza but it also wants to ensure the spread of disease through contaminated water and surgical tools, as well as ensuring injured Palestinians suffer through horrendous pain.

It's beyond sickening.

this is something serious fr

i see a pattern, do you see it too?

“ugh I need him so bad” then he’s just a paragraph on tumblr

Biden’s State Department in a nutshell.