You've Never Been So Used As I'm Using You, Abusing You, My Little Decoy Don't Look So Blue, You Should've

Can you confirm or deny the rumor that you're a pillow princess?

"I'm not a pillow princess. Check the back of my head.. this is top hair."

renfarber​:

He said he remembered the night better than she did, and she smiled, but shook her head. There was no way that was true. There was no way he remembered the exact placement of the mustard stain on his uniform, or the scent of honey-roasted duck when they whispered close to the kitchens, or the Frank Sinatra song that was playing as his hand brushed hers when they hid behind the bar, or the one unruly curl that would have fallen into his eyes if it had been long enough - just like it had tonight. There were so many differences between that man and this one, but the feeling in her gut was the same. That she had always known him. And that she always would.

But he did remember. A thousand lifetimes, she’d said. It sounded ridiculous, she knew, but it sounded right, too. She’d known from the start that whatever happened between them, there was something there that wouldn’t die, or even lessen in its intensity, and she was even more sure of that now. It’s what had always, always scared the living shit out of her. But then, just as now, he’d made a joke and calmed her down without even knowing he needed to. 

“You know, anybody else, and I would have rolled my eyes at a line like that,” she laughed. “But like I said, nothing you ever say could surprise me. You’re just you. And I just… know you.” She leaned in, too, then (to whatever remained of the space to lean into), and lowered her own voice, just reveling in getting to whisper with him again. “And in any case, I’m pretty certain you got me naked in every single one of those lifetimes,” she smirked.

-

Leo smiled as she laughed, their meet cute was precious to him. He thanked his stars that he was fortunate enough to have met her a thousand times in their past lives. See, Leo was just as starry eyed and eccentric as she. 

Leo’s suave demeanor softened, as she said she knew him. She did. But she knew him before he evolved into the mess he was today. He desperately wished he was still that guy. The way she looked at him made him feel like he was, and in this moment, he wanted to stay there under her gaze forever. Be the one she knew and she once cared about. “Serenity...” he murmured her full name like a prayer, and in a way her name alone was one for him. He hoped she’d answer it. He closed the space between their faces, and looked at her before pressing his lips against hers in a blink of an eye. He had meant to be soft, careful, but it was like ten years of chained up affection came flooding through his veins. His kiss a mixture of both tender and fervent. He was too far gone to realize his clutch on the popcorn had weakened and fell off his lap and onto the floor. 

jfcjosefina​:

Josefina was having the time of her life. The ballet had spared no expense for the extravagant evening, and it showed. And the patrons who arrived at the event seemed to take the theme seriously. Everybody donned masks of different intricacy, and somehow, Josefina almost felt underdressed upon seeing the fluffed out ballgowns some of the women were wearing.

The attorney had approached the donation table, her small purse slung across her body. She reached down to pick up a donation slip, grabbing a pen. It was a great cause, one that Jo was more than happy to donate to. She tilted her head in the direction of the voice that had spoken, raising an eyebrow. “Um, if that’s all you want to donate, I suppose it’s better than nothing.” She commented, writing out the four digit amount she had planned to contribute. 

-

Leo nodded, and he was left with a certain desire to get a rise of this stranger. for some reason receiving common courtesy wasn’t working for him tonight. “How about four ninety-nine?” He asked again with quippy tone. His michievous nature, seemingly amplified by his lion mask. “I told you mine, so I think you should tell me yours.” Leo argued, brown eyes behind his mask looked pointedly down at her slip. He let out a low whistle as if he saw the huge number she had written down. Though he didn’t see much from his angle. He only wanted to put in a front that he did see her slip. Another way for him to get a reaction. 

PENN BADGLEY as JOE GOLDBERG YOU | Season 4

Top ten student pet peeves you have?

"Top ten?" He sucked in a breath. "I don't believe I have ten but let's see... one, when they're late. two, when they're not off book. three, when they're not in the right mindset to act. which leads to four, they're not confident in their choices. five, when they're afraid to ask for help. six, when they come to lessons after eating, I hate that. seven, when their ego is in the room for all the wrong reasons. eight, when they're afraid to improv. nine, when they don't practice, that shit's noticeable. and ten, when they cry."

renfarber​:

Something in the way he was looking at her was making her head spin. No matter how much she tried to stay in the present here, and no matter how many times both of them mentioned how much time had passed, he was still looking at her the same way he used to. And her heart was still skipping a beat the same way it used to. And she hated that she couldn’t stop it - even if she didn’t hate the feeling, at all. 

Just as she was beginning to fall into her all-too-familiar pit of guilt over cheating on him, he winked and grinned, and she rolled her eyes and laughed, and whatever year it was, they were there together. He was way too fucking charming for his own fucking good, and he knew it. She’d never put up with that shit from anyone else, but… it was Leo. So. She stole some of his popcorn, arm brushing against his, and stopped fighting it - at least for now. 

Reality would hit them eventually, but it could wait until the lights came back on. 

“I doubt you’d want to hear an actual explanation… even if I had a good one,” she said, watching as the monochrome movie light flickered on his face. She wondered whether to tell him that cheating on him had been the only real regret she’s ever had in her otherwise free-spirited life. But she was sure he knew. And anyway, what he said next confused her into momentary silence. 

It’s silly to expect that kind of commitment, he said, and she raised an eyebrow at him. “This, from the man in the legally binding committed relationship,” she said. She hadn’t really wanted to bring it up again, preferring to live in the past, in the dark… but part of her knew that if she didn’t say it out loud, they could easily slip a little too far backwards. 

He said that she didn’t need anyone, and even if it wasn’t entirely true, she loved that he still saw her that way. She’d always prided herself on her independence, choosing who got to be around her because she wanted them there, not because she needed anything from them. It had turned out not to be quite that simple, in the end, but she still liked it, as a concept. 

“It’s good to have constants, though, isn’t it? I’ve got a good support system, like my mom and my best friend. …A new best friend though, I got rid of Tori. She turned out to be a total asshole, just like you always said she was,” she smirked. “It’s probably kind of nice, though, to have a person who’s always there for you, and who you’re always there for. Is it?”

-

Leo had purposefully adjusted himself in his seat to face towards her rather than the film. He had done the same with the popcorn, offering it to her as well as offering all of his attention. “You don’t have to explain. It happened and we were so young.” He said, trying to avoid finding that wound and licking it. It had hurt. It him so bad losing that ounce of integrity when it came to trust. He hardly had it to begin with. But above it  all, it hurt losing her. Looking at her now, it panged a bit to see how much he had missed in her life and how much he missed her in his own life. Serenity had been the only one to reach him to his core, and he kept it that way since. Even though he was now married. 

Leo laughed at her mentioning the severity of commitment marriage was then he glanced down at that shiny ring around his finger. How long had he worn it till it stopped meaning anything to him? Would admitting he was an unfaithful husband give him a chance to turn back time for a night? Should he take that risk? “It is nice when I do get to see her.” He confessed, showing his current point of view of his marriage without being too detailed. “Constantly missing each other is probably not the constant you’re describing.” His loneliness finding its’ way out with his words. Being lonely and insatiable were the fundamentals to his catastrophic nature. No statement had ever been more true for the orphan. They were his demons then, and they were still his now. Still he managed to his head around what she mentioned about her best friend situation. He grinned because he loved hearing that he was right, of course. “Told you she was. How’d you figure that? And anything else in the span of the ten years we’ve been apart that I’ve been right about?” He gloated so openly, a smile on his face as he sunk into himself more comfortably in her presence. 

renfarber​:

It happened when we were so young, he said. He said it so easily, as though he’d moved on ages ago… and maybe he had. Maybe he hadn’t been as completely destroyed by it all as she had. He clearly at least had the ability (and desire) to fall in love again, which was more than Ren could say. …Not that she’d say any of that out loud.

She didn’t want to think about it, but she couldn’t help wondering what his wife was like. What was Leo’s type now? Was she anything like Ren, or was she the complete opposite? It wouldn’t make any difference to know, but she couldn’t help being curious anyway.

But then he spoke of her, and there was something in his voice that Ren recognized. Something similar to what had been there the rare occasions he’d spoken of his childhood - she could almost see the walls going up around his heart, as the charming smile faltered slightly. He was lonely. She didn’t know why that surprised her - she knew from her own parents that married people could be just as lonely as anyone else.

“Well. Absence makes the heart grow fonder… right?” she asked, not entirely certain if she was still asking about his wife.

Just like that, the grin was back, and she was laughing again, shaking her head. “Jesus, all this time and you’re still a little shit, huh?” she smirked. “Yeah, I know you told me. That was the first thing my mom said when I told her about it, she said ‘Leo tried to warn you, child’. Fuckin’ menaces, both of you. Always ganging up on me. …But yeah, Tori was always a hot mess, which was funny until I had this one party… she drank half a bottle of vodka, invited everyone she knew to my apartment, vomited on my bed and fell asleep on the floor. So…”

-

Leo, a decade ago wouldn’t have been so nonchalant and calm about discussing their breakup. There were still parts of his twenty something mind that wanted to tell Ren how she had broken him, and the ways he had to learn to cope. But this was neither the time or place. Not when he could hide in here with it being just them without the weight of their past and he wanted to keep it that way. Plus, he didn’t know if this was the first or last time their paths would cross.

“Yeah…fonder,” His eyes flickered to her face, “…right.” The absence of her caused him to grow fonder. And as he agreed, he found he wasn’t thinking about his wife but thinking of Ren. Ten years apart didn’t dull his longing for her. Hell, as he sat there in the dark with her, his mind couldn’t help but think of closing the inches between their bodies. He had chosen to look at her hands inbetween looking at her face and it took him clutching onto the popcorn bucket to behave himself.

  Leo let out of a disapproving click of tongue and shook his head at her question. “I don’t think it’s possible to grow out of being a little shit.” He smirked back, but then smiled so boastfully as he learned that her mother had agreed with him. He had missed her mother and her friends. He remember how much it sucked to lose those connections as well. He had accepted them as his makeshift family then. But upon learning about what the last card dealt from Tori was, caused Leo’s face to move almost cartoon like. His forehead creased from lifted brows and a parted mouth as he pictured the scene Ren had walked into. He couldn’t help but try to say something funny to hopefully see her smirk or laugh again. “I don’t know that kinda sounds like a good time, if you’re Tori.” He quirked his brow at her then tossed a kernel of popcorn in the air and catching it. he chewed, looking ever so smug. it was the first time in a while, that he had such charming banter such as this. he could get use to it all over again. 

astral-silk​:

closed starter to @le0davis​ location: dive bar on 9th

There was a certain tension to the expression she held as she practically stormed into the bar, as if she might turn into torrential downpour at the slightest twitch out of deadpan. Sometimes life just felt so frustrating and impossible. Like she was constantly swimming upstream and wasn’t going anywhere. Some days it was easier to handle, to stay focused and keep that dream alive she’d held since she was a child. Other days it felt like this—chaos in her head. Like she wanted to scream in the streets; ask all of New York why she just wasn’t good enough. 

It’d started from the moment she’d woken up. Late to class because she was late to wake up and had to commute from the Bronx into Manhattan because she was too poor to live down by NYU. The perpetual underlining of every experience; an emphasis she could never escape. It made every bad day even worse. And then to top it off, by the time classes were over and she’d rushed to get to NASA, a taxi driver had splattered dirty snow water all over her. That not only earned her some extremely judgmental looks from all the astrophysicists, but also had her pulled into a meeting with her boss. The boss that she’d been sleeping with to even have her internship spot—not that it was that big of a deal outside of the quid pro quo. She was actually attracted to them, all things considered. But the least they could do was understand she hadn’t intended to show up covered in mud—she just didn’t have time to go home and change. After twenty minutes of being spoken down to, the rest of her shift continued in similar fashion. It was like she just couldn’t get it right. Nothing she did, all day long. The last straw was being yelled at by one of her coworkers for interrupting him, to give him the seltzer water he’d asked for. 

That’s what landed her here, cheeks flushed with anger but unable to express any of it. She was negative in her cashapp—how the hell did that even happen? But at least she had some quarters in her wallet. “What can I get you?” the bartender asked. “A shot,” she responded, painfully obvious she wasn’t much of a drinker. She really wasn’t supposed to drink—the doctors said it was bad to drink on steroids and her nephritis wouldn’t take kindly to it. She didn’t care. She was frustrated. “Um…” she paused. “Vod…ka?” it came out like a question, like she was unsure of herself that vodka was even a spirit. And then slid her handful of quarters the bartender’s way. “Will this be enough?” She couldn’t even feel the embarrassment of it anymore with how exhausted she was from the day.

-

Leo’s index finger and thumb appiled pressure to his throbbing temple. today was one of those days where he couldn’t escape from his wife’s attempt to communicate with him. though he couldn’t blame his wife for the silly game of twenty-one questions about his feelings. no, that blame belonged to his therapist. he rubbed his eyes now, with elbows propped on the bar. why on earth was it so important to know what he was thinking about? he’ll never understand nor did he want to. he felt like he was exisiting and trying his best. how was that not enough? he let out a groan and pulled his hands away from his face to find the bartender freshening up his drink.

after some proper nursing of whiskey on the rocks, leo was feeling a lot better. he was buzzed. completely radiating with false energy that was just his heart stressing under the poison of his vice. leo offen people watched when he was this phase. his spotlight now shone on the tall, raven haired woman who sat adjacent to him. he watched her in silence, pinching his cold glass in his dominant hand. he took a drink just as the bartender had spoken to her. he almost laughed; his mouth curving around the glass as he sipped his drink. it was the most amusing order he’s heard since someone ordering a slippery nipple. 

Leo couldn’t help but insert himself, eyeing the mix of dirty and shiny quarters in her palm. He let out a low whistle. “Looks like we know where all the missing coins went.” He said, referencing the national coin shortage. Him making a joke, really kept him from sympathizing with her at first. He had been there once before. He couldn’t even afford a bagel with a proper smear when his career was going down the drain. “That’s not enough if you want to numb up whatever you’re feeling.” His tone still coated in smugness. His brown eyes read her face some more as he leaned back in his seat. His gaze shifted to the bartender. “I’ll cover the rest. Give her a triple and a water.” The bartender looked over at her for confirmation, as the amount of quarters she had presented them was barely enough for one shot. 

YOU | 2.03 “What Are Friends For?”