Wallpaper

When you've already read all the good fanfics

Imagine showing up to work one day and people are like "jesus fucking christ there's a corpse in here", herd you to the back room and everyone who sees you also agrees that there is now a dead body where you are sitting, with the appropriate amount of shock and disgust about it. You figure it's some kind of a prank that they're pulling, but also the people that you know aren't into pranks, or aren't very good actors, are treating you like a corpse. They go weirdly back and forth between talking about you as if you're not there, and politely asking you to stay still while they figure out who you're supposed to call in case of a dead body randomly appearing.

Paramedics show up, study you thoroughly and agree that while they can't see any apparent sign of death, you are, indeed, dead, and ask you to climb aboard the ambulance. You're taken to the temporary corpse storage that hospitals have.

On the way there you ask them whether this kind of shit happens often, and while they won't look at you, the paramedics agree that they've never had a talking corpse before, though they won't question the fact that you're moving on your own.

You're eventually led to a morgue, where you're shown a slab to lay on, and at this point you don't really even question it, you just climb onto the Corpse Shelf and lay down, maybe have a little nap, with no idea what's going to happen next.

Then you wake up to someone walking into the morgue, who has the shit scared out of them when you move, and they're like "dude what the fuck, you're not supposed to be here, this place is for storing dead bodies" and when you're like "aw man sorry I thought I was a dead body" they have no idea whether you're joking and they don't care, you're just chased out of there.

And you just kinda go home and take a shower, show up to work normally the next day and nobody questions it.

And basically that's probably how those ants feel when scientists spray them with the Pheromone That Dead Ants Smell Like, and just hang out at the dead-ant-pile until the smell wears off.

i cannot describe how much i love him

nothing would’ve been better than an episode where dean is being all sweet on cas and there’s a voice over of dean saying things like “cas is just this cute dorky lil guy” and it cuts to cas with angel powers flaring as he takes out 5 demons at once. “he’s so angelic in all the conventional and unconventional ways,” while cas is beating a werewolf bloody. “he always makes me laugh” and it cuts to cas as he’s glaring down a vampire. “he watches movies with me and wears a cowboy hat for me” flashes to cas as he’s tearing heaven apart. “he’s my best friend, and I think I love him… yeah, I love him,” and cas is casually throwing angel blades at monsters. and the end of the episode is dean and cas being domestic and dean’s like “I didn’t see you today, what were you up to?” and cas is like “nothing at all” even though he was out chasing monsters, but then he leans down and kisses dean and it’s soft and tender and gentle and dean smiles and is like “movie date night, sunshine?” and cas smiles so brightly it rivals the sun as he says, “anything for you, dean.”

hello! it's been a while since you've posted any essay collection 👀 would you be willing to share your favourites of this year with us?

yes! here you go —

Disunited Kingdom by Fintan O'Toole

South Asia's place in contemporary climate fiction by Evan Tims

What's the matter with men? by Idrees Kahloon (archived)

Power to the Caribbean people by V. S. Naipaul (archived)

Can Russia ever be democratic? by Kyle Orton

Death by Design by Daniel Callcut

Joshimath: once upon a town by Rahul Pandita

Exposed by Sadie Levy Gale

In the Shifting Embrace of the Ganga by Arati Kumar-Rao

(Less essay, more interview) Matty Healy by Alexis Petridis

The Roots of Global South's New Resentment by Mark Suzman

How TikTok Became a Diplomatic Crisis by Alex Palmer (archived)

This review of Oppenheimer by Richard Brody of the New Yorker (archived)

India's new growing elite by Shekhar Gupta

There are definitely more I'm forgetting and which I will try to excavate!

verity

summary: an inadvertently broken heart and a girls' night in can only lead to one thing: you drunkenly confronting the very man who broke your heart in the first place - aka your best friend, bucky barnes pairing: bucky barnes x female reader word count: 3253

warnings: angst, alcohol consumption, reader gets drunk with friends, pet names, sad bucky, sad reader, drunk confessions, swearing, misunderstandings, reader gets sick (vomit), fluff, kinda friends to lovers (??)

《《《《 ♡ 》》》》

The music flowed through the living room around you, quiet enough to not overpower the conversations you were having with your friends, but loud enough for you to know what you were swaying in your seat to. 

It had been a while since you had a girls' night, though you were all but forced into this one; it was made clear by Nat that your presence was not an option - you were the only reason you were all gathered here now, each of you at least a bottle or two in. 

At first you resisted. You wanted nothing more than to wallow alone in your room, watching trash TV and crying over cheesy scenes. It wasn't that you didn't love the company you had right now, you just wanted other company. You wanted the same company you had every day for the last year. The same company that became your only solace ever since it took a literal bullet for you without thought just to keep you safe. The same company that read your favourite books so you had someone to talk to about them. The same company that sat with you and watched all your favourite shows so they could get a better glimpse of who you are and what you like. The same company you thought you were finally getting somewhere with. 

It felt like you got hit by a truck when the words "You know Bucky's been dating?" nonchalantly left Sam's mouth one day while you were having lunch. You didn't want to know more about it. You didn't want to know who they were, how the two met, or what they did for a living. You didn't want to be told anything other than the fact Sam was joking, that what you thought you had with Bucky really was real and not just in your head. Sam never said anything close to that, though. 

Bucky never brought up the dates to you, and you almost felt that was even worse than if he did. Why did he not want to tell you? Were you really not as close as you thought? Did he not trust you enough to tell you such a thing? Your thoughts continuously spiraled over the next few days, stealing away your self confidence and the air from your lungs. Nothing was the same anymore. You thought you knew where you stood with Bucky. You thought it all meant something. All the stares from across the room, the lingering touches, the 'just because' gifts, the movie nights, the sleepovers, all of it. But it meant nothing. You read it all wrong. And now it's been two weeks since you were able to look at him long enough for you to even say hi to him, let alone have a conversation with him. 

Bucky noticed the shift the moment it happened; when you slid ever so slightly away from him when he tried to hold you in his arms like he did every movie night. He noticed when the smile stopped reaching your eyes. He noticed when you stopped showing up for dinners with the gang every night. He noticed when you couldn't hold his gaze anymore. He noticed that you two just weren't the same, and it killed him. It killed him because he didn't know what he did, and he tried everything under the sun to get things back to the way they were, but nothing worked.

Everyone noticed when his demeanor changed. His fuse was shorter, his temper was stronger. He spent even more time in the training room, pummeling and destroying bag after bag until his knuckles were bloody; letting himself heal overnight only to do it all again the next day. He shamelessly threw a dining chair into a wall when Tony made a joke about how you must have smartened up and finally got sick of him, and his expression was so murderous that a Code White was called, effectively resulting in him being locked down in his room for a full 24 hours - he ended up staying in there even after the lockdown was over. The only reason he started leaving the confines of his room was to spend time with his best girl, and he didn't have that anymore.

All your friends were sick of it. They didn't know what was going on, and you both refused to talk about it. No one could even mention the others' name to either of you anymore without fear of having the nearest object thrown at their head. 

So plans were formed, and you now sat on the couch with a glass in your hand as you mindlessly swayed to whatever song was currently playing. 

"Who is in charge of this music? It is awful!" Yelena stated from her spot on the floor, taking yet another shot. 

"I picked it," you crooned, stilling your movements as you looked at her. "It's completely free of attachments to you-know-who."

A cohesive muttering came from all the women before you, and Yelena cleared her throat. "It is not bad," she corrected with a grimace, taking pity on you. 

"Are you drunk enough to tell us what happened now?" Nat asked, raising an eyebrow at you. 

Downing the rest of your glass, you looked at her with a thoughtful expression for a minute. "No," you concluded, filling your glass again. 

"Okay, this is torture. Time for a drinking game!" Wanda exclaimed, standing from her chair. "Everyone take a mustache and tape it to the TV. We're putting on a trash show and drinking whenever it lines up with someone."

You beamed with excitement, ready to both watch crappy TV and get drunk - gods know you needed at least one night to forget about Bucky. 

And forget you did. You can't remember the last time you were this far gone, the last time you had this much fun. The drinking game was very successful; it even got Yelena and Nat a little tipsy, which was not easy to do. No one said anything when you went a little harder than everyone else, when you drank a little more, taking shots when you weren't technically supposed to. You haven't smiled like this in weeks, and they weren't going to take that away from you. 

Your giggles carried on down the hallway, the echoes of your voice, of your laughter, music to everyone's ears - having gone so long now without hearing it. It captured someone's attention, socked feet being dragged towards the sound before even knowing what was happening, a seat being taken in the kitchen just to be that much closer, eyes gazing across at you, a face with such an amorous expression it would have made anyone who saw it sick. 

You audibly gasped as you caught sight of him, your eyes meeting his for the briefest of seconds before he looked away, contemplating whether he should go back to his room or not. 

"Oh, my god. Why is he here?" you asked the girls, unable to take your eyes off of him. 

"Why is who here?" Kate asked, following your gaze. "Him? What are you talking about he-"

"We don't know!" Nat chimed in, sending a warning glare to Kate that you were too distracted to see. 

"Why don't you go talk to him and find out?" Wanda suggested, quickly catching on to Nat's motive. 

You shook your head vehemently, making yourself momentarily dizzy. "Noooo. He broke my heart, Wan. What would I even say?" you replied with a whine, sinking into the couch as you lifted the glass to your lips again. 

She shared a look with Nat, two looks that said 'fuck, maybe we shouldn't let her do this' and 'what the hell does she mean by that?' You couldn't decipher either, though. The blood was rushing in your ears as you stared across the room again, torn between going to confront this beautiful, asshole of a man and staying in the comfort of the living room.

Before you could really think it through - and in your state, it's not like you really could anyway - you abruptly stood from the couch, taking a few seconds to steady yourself on your feet. 

"Fuck him," you muttered to yourself, vaguely aware of the girls trying to get your attention as you marched across the floor. 

His head snapped up when he heard you coming, his enhanced hearing paired with the fact you weren't exactly in a graceful state didn't give you the advantage of sneaking up on him. 

"Hi, doll," he said once you approached him.

Had you been in a more collected frame of mind, you probably would have noticed how quiet his voice was, how strained it was from the fact he was holding his breath in the hopes the two of you would go back to normal. You would have noticed the pain, the hurt, the confusion, and the hope dancing around in his eyes; making the blue that used to be your favourite colour now dull and stormy. 

You didn't notice, though. All you noticed was the burning pain in your heart that was supposed to be gone after all those drinks, but just one look at the man before you brought everything back. 

"You can't call me that anymore," you declared, shaking your head so much it made the room spin even more. "You gotta keep that name reserved now," you added bitterly. 

"Reserved?" Bucky asked, his brow knit together in confusion. "For who?" 

You scoffed, walking forward to close the distance that was left between you and the table he sat at. A few steps in and you lost your footing, but before you could even stumble Bucky was already out of his seat. His hands were on your arms in an instant, the feeling of hot and cold both burning your skin in a familiar way. The tenderness of his touch and the yearning you felt for it after all this time was almost too much to bear; your mind was spinning. Spinning from alcohol. Spinning from heartache. Spinning from anger. Spinning, spinning, spinning. 

"Let go of me!" you exclaimed angrily, shrugging yourself out of his grasp. "I don't think your little lover would want you touchin' me." 

Bucky could only stand there, blinking in surprise with his hands still outstretched. "My what?" he asked, his hands slowly falling back to his sides. "My lover?" he repeated. 

"Yeah, your lover - or… whatever the hell you want to call them. Sam told me, because you didn't," you told him indignantly. 

"I- what? Sam told you? Sam told you what?" he asked, more confused than ever. 

"That you're dating someone!" you yelled, the anguish clear in your voice. 

Bucky sighed and ran his hands over his face in exasperation before resting them on his hips, his lips pursed as he collected his thoughts. "What the fuck are you talking about?" he finally asked, trying to put the pieces together in his head. 

"Didn't expect me to know, did you?" you spat furiously. 

"I don't- sweetheart, what the hell is going on?" he asked softly, trying his best to remain patient. You were finally talking to him again, and it's definitely not the way he imagined but he'd be damned if he was going to let you slip through his fingers again. 

"No!" you said forcefully. "I'm not your sweetheart. She is. Whoever she is." 

"There is no ‘she’," Bucky told you calmly, trying his hardest to make sense of what was going on. 

"Okay, then he is!" you replied in defeat, finally throwing yourself down on the chair beside you. 

"What? No, that's not-" he tried to answer you, but you quickly cut him off. 

"Why didn’t you want to tell me?" you asked quietly, your voice cracking. 

“Because… I’m not dating anyone,” he replied slowly, more of a question than a statement. 

“Just stop lying!” you yelled, hands slamming onto the table. “Please, I can’t take you lying to me anymore, okay? You’ve been lying to me all year,” you added in desperation, your eyes starting to glisten with tears. 

“All year?” he asked, his voice quiet and shaky as he slid into the seat across from you. 

You could only nod your head, bottom lip trembling as the first tears started to fall down your cheeks. Bucky started burning from the inside out, wanting nothing more than to wrap you in his arms and kiss the tears away- but he couldn’t. So he stayed where he was, swallowing thickly as he willed himself not to start crying with you. 

“I never lied to you, you know that,” he said carefully. 

“You did, because this whole time you-... I really thought-... you made me think-” you couldn’t get the words out, falling silent as you tried to collect yourself.

Bucky instinctively reached his hands across the table to you before he caught himself, pulling them back and setting them on his lap. "What did I make you think?" 

"That you trusted me. That we meant something to each other," you explained softly, swallowing back more tears. "I thought you loved me back," you added, your voice so quiet it would have been inaudible to anyone other than him. 

"What?" Bucky breathed out, the air being stolen from his lungs with those last six words that spilled from your trembling lips. 

"I know you heard me." 

"Okay- now is not the time for this conversation," he sighed, running his hands over his face. 

You sat in silence for a moment, looking at him with such an recognizable expression Bucky felt like he was looking at a completely different person. "Figures," you muttered before shoving your chair back and standing up. 

"What are you doing?" Bucky asked, half out of his seat as he watched to make sure you were steady on your feet. 

Without another word to him, you turned and carefully started to make your way out of the kitchen and towards your bedroom. 

"Don't you dare walk away from me!" Bucky called from behind you, quickly on your heels. "No, you're not allowed to leave me like this again." 

"You left me first!" you yelled back, placing your hand on the wall to keep your balance as you walked a little faster. 

"I never left you once!" he argued, still hot on your trail. 

You scoffed, shoving open the door to your room and trying to slam it in his face; the attempt was unsurprisingly futile. "Stop following me, you said you don't want to talk."

"No, I said this isn't the time for this conversation," he huffed, shoving his way into your room and closing the door behind him. 

"Why? You don't want to admit what you did?" you asked, stumbling your way to sit on the bed. 

"For fucks sake, I didn't even do anything!" he defended with exasperation, leaning against the door.

"Yes you did," you argued, attempting to take off your sweater. 

"I'm telling you, I didn't," he told you, trying his best to not let out a laugh as he watched you struggle to lift the sweater over your head. 

"You did!" you yelled, voice muffled by the fabric. "You lied, and you kept secrets, and you - god, can you fucking help me?!" you asked with a huff, interrupting your own rant. 

Bucky suppressed his laugh as he stepped forward, kneeling down in front of you. "Alright, alright. Stop fuckin' squirmin'," he muttered. 

You stilled, muttering a few choice words under your breath that did not go unnoticed by him. Grasping the hem of your sweater, he carefully lifted it up and over your head to reveal your disheveled, pouting face. 

"There's my girl," he whispered softly, delicately brushing back your mussed hair. 

"I'm not-" you started to argue, before he quickly cut you off.

"Yes. You. Are," he said firmly, enunciating each word.

"But Sam-"

"Is an idiot," he insisted, cutting you off again. "He tried to set me up with someone but I never went. When he asked me about it, I told him we were gonna go out again so he'd stop fucking bugging me about it. I lied, sweetheart. I was never dating anyone." 

"You- there was no one?" you asked quietly. 

"There was no one else," he told you, his thumbs brushing away stray tears you didn't even know were falling. 

Before you could ask him what that meant, your room started spinning once more and your mouth felt like cotton and your stomach felt like it was making its way up your throat.

"I don't feel so good," you mumbled, staring at him with wide eyes for a moment before rushing to your bathroom, barely making it on time. 

Bucky was at your side in the blink of an eye, holding back your hair as you let loose the contents of your girls' night, his hand ghosting up and down your back. He sat patiently with you, muttering comforting words between each second of you getting sick as you gasped for air and sobbed, occasionally wiping your face with tissues. 

"Better?" he asked after a few minutes, his hands never leaving you. 

You could only nod in response, shifting away from him to rest against the bathtub as you closed your eyes. 

Bucky immediately fell into his old habits, wasting no time in taking care of you. The only thing that destroyed him more than not having you in his life lately was watching you practically wither away, unable to do a damn thing about it. 

"Drink, sweet girl," he told you, caressing your cheek in an attempt to rouse you before handing you the water you had no idea he even retrieved. 

You blinked up at him, taking a moment to process what was going on before taking the glass from him. As you drank he gathered up a washcloth, running it under cold water before kneeling before you once more. 

"C'mere," he whispered, taking your chin in one hand to hold you in place as he gently wiped your face. Your eyes closed once more, sighing in content as the cold water eased the burning under your skin. 

"I love you," you found yourself telling him. Your voice was a delicate whisper, but the words were so heavy you felt like they echoed off the tiles surrounding you anyway. 

Bucky stayed quiet, but you refused to open your eyes and look at him. Looking at him would make this moment real, so as long as you kept your eyes closed, you could pretend none of this ever happened. 

"Let's get you to bed," he finally said, causing your world to implode once more. 

Completely defeated, you allowed him to lift you from the floor. 

Not having the energy to fight him anymore, you cooperated as he helped you into some sleep clothes. 

Wanting to just hide away forever, you let him tuck you under the covers, pressing a kiss to your forehead before he slid in beside you, wanting to be there in case you got sick again.

The room was engulfed by silence for so long it almost felt like it was suffocating you, but just before your whirling mind finally succumbed to the allure of sleep you heard Bucky's gentle voice speaking out to you.

"Sleep this off, angel. Because when I explain to you how in love with you I am, I want to make damn sure you can remember what I say."

(affirming myself in the mirror) if that fictional man was real he would fuck you. He would fuck you. You're his exact type. If he saw you he'd get a boner instantly. He would fuck you he would fu

"their son"

A Million Reasons - Masterlist

Pairing: College!Bucky x Reader

Summary: Bucky Barnes, with all of his trust fund money and family connections, gets assigned community service. You, as someone that’s technically part of the community, now have to put up with him. Every day. And he won’t stop killing your plants.

Warnings: Enemies (annoyance) to lovers, Bucky’s old money at an ivy league, angst, minor injury, drinking, eventual smut (minors dni, marked **)

a/n: Hello! I’ve decided there won’t be a set posting day for this series. This is something I’ve been super excited to share (even with my writing steam dying out) and I want to get it out here without extra pressure. I’ll be adding the dates for upcoming chapters as they are ready :) And thank you @traitorjoelite​ for that second, beautiful moodboard 🤍

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