svphias:
one should instantly panic upon realising that their engagement ring is no longer on their finger, however sophia’s reaction is different. it could be because she’s already panicking about the missing twenty-grand from her bank account or perhaps it’s because she doesn’t remember what on earth she got up to last night. nevertheless, the horror that comes from losing an important ring hasn’t hit her yet. “ ed, there is definitely supposed to be a ring on that finger. i haven’t taken it off once… y'know what, i’m sure it’s fine. i probably left it near the sink or something. ”
kicking off the blanket and dragging her aching body out of bed, she nonchalantly wanders over towards the ensuite and begins fumbling around with last night’s makeup that she had left out on the benchtop, searching for the missing piece of jewelry. " hey, uh, did you help murphy pick out with the ring by any chance ? i think i’m gonna need to get another one becase it’s, um, not here. ” the anxiety’s starting to kick in now, her nails meeting with her teeth as she makes her way back towards the bed. “ shit, he’s going to kill me. fucking fuck ! you CAN NOT tell him. ”
half asleep, edward only felt a dull sense of shock when he heard that yes sophia’s ring was in fact missing from her hand. burying his face back into the pillow as sophia shifted out of the bed he debated just going back to sleep and hoping to wake up in his own apartment ( which, thanks to soph and murphy’s penthouse was now several blocks away ), or, at the very least, not have the room spinning around him and warping at the corners. didn’t he used to be good at this ? unfortunately, the past few years had softened edward’s edges. still, he pried himself from the bed, determined to find his phone so he could check that he hadn’t transferred a large sum of money to some sort of cow related ? what he wasn’t sure, it sounded bad.
fumbling around the room he tried to no avail to find his phone, but he did land on the soft leather of his wallet. heading over to the ensuite when she called, he leaned against the frame of the door and bit his lip, unsure of how to break it to her that it was an irreplaceable piece of jewlery. “ok don’t panic sophia. but, replacing it is kind of off the table. murphy is so loving right, and that’s what make’s him amazing. and he can kind of be a perfectionist, which yeah can be annoying but it’s also endearing. so really, when buying something so special for someone he loves so much no ring would be uh, good enough — and the amount of rings he looked at was actually insane, and those are just the ones he showed me — so your ring is actually one of a kind, he found out you can custom order them and uh, yeah.” he inhaled, standing up more confidently, “it’s fine, i’ll just call an uber and we can retrace our steps, or, shit i don’t know where my phone is, i’ll get us a cab.” a bad feeling washed over him and his eyes darted down to his wallet, finally checking it’s contents to find it conspicuously empty of the cash he usually carried. “fuck, strippers.” he groaned under his breath, “you’re gonna have to pay though because all of my bills are gone and my credit card is bent in half.”
mvrphys:
“no, i mean, i did think about doing a screening of borat in central park or, like, repelling down from a helicopter, but i went simpler,” really better that way considering for all his athletic prowess, there was no way dropping down from a helicopter would end well, “i rented out the whole balcony of a restaurant she really likes.” then he grinned, nudging ed with his elbow fondly, “uh huh, raph is good that way. hope he makes you change any diapers, though.” murphy was endlessly thankful for the other couple and the way they care for their daughter. he knew he never had to worry with them around. plus, isla always came home with some new, big fancy word to share every time she hung out with her godfathers. murphy ducked his head, nodding, “yeah, i know… it’s been a long time comin’. you think she’s gonna say yes, right?” he was pretty sure, but there was always extra anxiety around big steps like this.
“oh right, so then you could be all like my wife when she said yes, yeah bro ?” edward questioned, providing a truly awful borat impression. “simple is good. balcony is good. man, you really are a romantic.” then, groaning “god, i forgot about the diaper part. can’t we just like, hire someone for that ? and then me and raph can just stick around to hang out with isla and make sure the babysitter isn’t crazy.” he smiled at the endearing nervousness in murphy’s tone. “of course she’s gonna say yes, you’re like a total catch, the nhl said yes to you first round, yeah ? and they’re an international sports association that grosses millions she’s just a girl — besides, you guys love each other, that’s all that matters, right ?” nudging his shoulder, “so have you figured out what you’re gonna say yet ?” not that edward would ever bring up the fact that his best friend wasn’t the best with words, but he really wanted to make sure he didn’t accidentally call her malevolent when he was trying to say she was marvellous. “you can practice on me if you want, i’m pretty like soph.”
svphias:
the mention of a cow triggers a memory for a split second, pure panic setting over sophia’s face as she quickly grabs her phone from the bedside table. unlocking her device and opening her banking app, her jaw drops in disbelief. " cool, so i’ve transfered twenty-thousand dollars out of my account to god knows where… and i’ve written the transfer reference as ’ moo. ’ did i buy meat ? did i buy live cows ? who the fuck did i send the money to ? that’s… a lot of money. let’s keep this as a secret between us. ”
“ be fucking gentle, you neanderthal.” clearly not impressed by edward’s man handling or his question, sophia can’t help but get a tad defensive. " what are you talking about ? did murphy say that we got into a fight ? we’re definitely on good terms… i think. couples on good terms go to strip clubs without eachother, right ? ”
“ok so we’re gonna be calling your bank, like asap.” the ever fiscally minded edward announced, making a mental note to check his own banking app as soon as he could figure out where his phone was. “we’d probably have to find your fiancé if i was gonna tell him anyways, considering that i’m on his side of the bed. anyway secrets safe with me if you want to pinky promise on it, and like maybe we could also not mention to raph that i remember like none of last night, or that i’m like old man hungover.” of course edward knew murphys side of the bed, what, like grown men can’t have sleepovers ?
edward's eyes rolled at her protest. sitting up in the bed and stretching out his aching muscles as he allowed sophia to have her hand back. “can you be chill for like one second ?” he pauses, looking over at her trying to decide on the best way to mention the missing diamond, “do you like, usually take your ring of to sleep ? or — ?”
svphias:
it’s been a while since sophia’s had the time to really let loose and party, but never in a million years did she think she’d wake up after a night out to find ed snoozing on the other side of her bed. with last night’s makeup smudged across her face and her clothes reeking of booze and cigarettes, she can’t help but feel ill. what on earth did these two get up to last night ?
“ oi, wake up. ” she gently hits ed’s side, brows raising as she notices the stamp marked 'sapphire’ on the back of her hand. " did we go to sapphire last night ? why the fuck did we go to the strippers ? what the fuck, my head hurts. ”
“raph — ?” edward murmured out, feeling the sharp pain of a jab to his side. it only took a split second between when the name left his lips and when he realized no — that was decidedly not raph and this was decidedly not their bed. he forced himself to pry open one of his still half asleep eyes, wincing as the soft light of the bedroom hit his retina. “soph.” he confirmed, slow on the uptake. edward was out of practice when it came to waking up places that he shouldn’t have, and judging by the aching in his body more hungover than he had been in recent memory ( sue him, he was in his thirties now after all ).
glancing at the slightly too on the nose blue stamp on the back of her hand he swiped his eyes over to the back of his own, sure enough marked with a slightly more smudged version of the same mark paired with nearly illegible handwriting that said sophia business partner plan with several dollar signs next to it. “i guess we were like uh, celebrating or something ? i don’t really remember, was there something about buying a cow ? or like a goat or something ? wait — can i see your hand again ?” his hand darted over, tugging her wrist before she could protest, brows furrowing. “uh — you and murph didn’t get in like, a fight i don’t know about or anything right ?”
mvrphys:
“hey, do you think you and raph could take isla tomorrow night? like… to spend the night?” murphy asks ed as they leave the gym, slinging his bag over his shoulder, “it’s, ya know, the big date.” the one in which he finally uses the engagement ring he’s been holding hostage since before their daughter was born.
edward’s heart warmed slightly at murphy’s question. he had ran from the ideas of marriage and children, but ever since raph, ever since isla, suddenly family just seemed so simple. grabbing his friend by the shoulder, “the big date yeah ? so what have you got planned ? fireworks ? hot air balloon ?” pausing, “i’ll have to ask raph about tomorow and you know how much he hates taking care of isla,” an obvious lie, if not from the playful smile on edward’s lips from the way that raphael would dote on his goddaughter whenever he had the chance, “i think i can convince him though, i’m just a good friend like that y’know ?” allowing for a moment of sincerity “bro, you know i’m really excited for you, yeah?”
goldvnby reblogged
goldvnby reblogged
mvrphys:
murphy laughed, “oh yeah, totally- who the fu- heck- knows how genetics works anyway.” though, she seemed to have some qualities of murph’s and a lot from sophia- at least, by murphy’s probably biased assertion- so maybe genetics did make some points, “isn’t she beautiful?” murphy mumbled, “she’s like… she’s so perfect, ya know? i can’t believe i helped make her.” it was still pretty unbelievable that he was a father, “she’s for real a little person! like, here…”
edward rolled his eyes, no less happy in the current moment but slightly concerned for his best friend’s awareness of high school biology, “i knew i shouldn’t have done all your biology homework for you, basically like, the sperm has half of your dna and soph’s egg has half of hers, a random half but genetic code for all of your traits, and then whichever trait is more dominant is expressed in the child. there’s also epigenetics, but that wouldn’t really be expressed in her yet because she hasn’t been exposed to much yet.” he smiled, confident in his explanation, “but like she’s definitely gonna get some of my traits from nurture, i’ll make sure of that, won’t i isla,” he cooed at the baby, “you’re gonna have a great little stock portfolio and also be cool and funny aren’t you,” he nudged murphy’s arm, “she’s your little person, perfect thanks to your totally sick hockey superstar mother teresa genetics. you should be proud.”
svphias:
“ please don’t do this, erin… ” sophia’s holding onto her friends hand for dear life, leaning over to whisper in her ear. “ not only did you you promise me that you wouldn’t ditch me for james, but leaving me alone with ed ? this is something that i can’t forgive you for. ” it’s not that soph didn’t enjoy being around edward - in fact, the two usually had a lot of fun together, especially if drugs were involved, but tonight was different. ed had made flirtatious comments in the past and every now and then she’d play along but never let it go anywhere. what’s different about tonight ? she’s just been dumped for being ‘ high maintenance ’ and now she’s on the rebound.
despite her pleas, she watches her friend mouth the word ‘ sorry ’ before abandoning ship, scurrying off with edward’s friend. “ so…. ” taking a moment to take a long sip of her negroni, she turns around to face ed, smiling. “ what are your plans for tonight ? i saw a cute blonde before and i feel like she was totally your type. maybe we can try to find her or something. ”
edward watched james walk off with erin with a smirk on his lips and a glint in his eyes. he wasn’t exactly the most generous person in the world ( in fact he got quite the kick out of raking in money at work off of deals that left others for lack of a better word totally fucked ), but he did consider himself one hell of a wing man. now, safe in the knowledge that he had continued his pristine record of set ups, he turned his full attention to sophia.
sophia, if he was someone that had a type she’s what people would expect to a t. pretty, perfect hair, shinny nails. always outfitted in designer clothes, happy from an afternoon at bloomingdale’s. the perfect foil to his wall street boy, wealthy and materialistic. but that wasn’t what drew edward to her. fifth avenue model types were a dime a dozen in manhatten, their vapid chit chat had become ceaselessly boring to him years ago. no, soph was something else entirely. he saw himself in her, in the mischievous glint in her eyes, the quickness of her tongue in an argument, the recklessness he had seen from her on occasions when they had slipped to the bathrooms of clubs for party favours that weren’t on the menu. and then there was the fact that edward loved the chase, and it seemed that soph equally loved being chased. pretty, charming, and always unavailable for the night.
“well i couldn’t leave you all alone,” he smiled, sipping on his scotch without breaking their eye contact, “plus you’re more fun than all the boring blondes in new york combined — and i have a gift for you. no good here though we should head to the bathroom.”
mvrphys:
murphy cradled his newborn daughter in his arms, a lopsided smile on his face- she was so perfect, she was already starting to look like her mom (to murphy, at least), “you wanna hold her? soph just fed her and i changed her, so… she shouldn’t get too upset or somethin’.” he kissed isla’s head softly, “i mean, you are her favorite uncle. obviously.”
eddies eyes gazed down at isla as murphey handed her over to him, an uncharacteristic softness colouring his features. it was never once expected that edward would ever hold a baby and feel anything other than fear, panic, or fight or flight. but here he was, feeling an overwhelming sense of familial love for the little bundle breathing softly in his arms. his nose scrunched, a smile on his face as he flicked his eyes back up to murphy, “i think she has my eyes, yeah?”
✰ — — * sms / sophia.
sophia: really? like what? the breakup? you don't seem too bothered about being single 🤷
sophia: baby announcement has nothing to do with it?? it all couldn't have happened at a better time. call me opportunistic but i'd rather have ppl talk about robin and raph than my "tragic" life choices
sophia: but if it makes you feel better i can agree so you don't feel like you were the only one who was jealous?
edward: sophia, darling, am i wildly unbothered or bitterly jealous? can't you please make up your mind?
edward: either way, it's not my fault that i found out about robin so why am i the one that getting the blame for his lies, doesn't really seem all that fair, does it
✰ — — * sms / sophia.
sophia: wasn't even rude but i'm sorry if that's the way you interpreted it and if it hurt your feelings
sophia: ok so you knew for 36 days? i understand giving him a few days or even a week to come clean but 36 fucking days?
sophia: why tell him on nye? why tell him right after they kissed? it just seems that you waited for the right moment to really create a shitstorm idk 🤨
edward: sophia has it occured to you that i may have been a bit preoccupied with any other major life events at any point during the past month.
edward: do you really care so much about the fact that they had just kissed or are you actually just upset that it happened after your news.
edward: because listen i apologize for stepping on your baby announcement but that's really not a priority for me at the moment.
“i’ll take a vodka soda,” sitting at the bar across from tommy. he was heading over to murphys after work, thankful that their deeply different schedules meant there would be no awkward run in as he collected his things. eddie now without his boyfriend or best friend to live with was relatively homeless, luckily he was able to afford an air bnb in the meantime. “you know tom, we actually have so much in common, tons to talk about babe.” gratefully taking the drink from their hand and sipping on it as his eyes wandered around the relatively empty bar. “it’s a really really fine establishment you have here, you know,” leaning forward and lowering his voice so that only tommy can hear, “would you like to go do coke in the bathroom with me?”
he’s never been quite so fucked. it’s not like he’s never been the party at wrong before - especially when it came to raphael - but it’s never been quite this bad. here, there’s very little to redeem him and years worth of lies to indict him, creating a situation where it’s hard not to hate him. but at the same time, forgiving robin has always been raphael’s brand - they fight, robin’s mostly culpable, raphael tries to forget about him with some pretty thing, robin talks his way out of it, raphael remembers that nobody gets him quite like robin, they fuck and forgive, rinse / repeat. so he convinces himself that if he can just get raphael alone to speak to him, he can talk his way out of this, just like he always has.
except when he attempts to show up at raphael’s apartment hours after the new year’s eve mess, he knocks on the unlocked door only for someone else entirely to answer it. “oh, what the fuck,” he says as the door swings open and ed’s on the other side. “are you just a mold at this point? festering everywhere people don’t want you?” he considers eddie’s appearance, the fact that he’s answering raphael’s door so late (or at all), and he makes a face. “don’t tell me he’s back to das kapital already.”
edward wasn’t in the mood to sleep, or maybe he was in the mood and just couldn’t. either way, he was sitting on his old couch wide awake and staring at the ceiling. he had thought for a moment, when raphael offered for him to stay, that he might actually be able to sleep. every time he had been laying alone unable to sleep in the past two weeks was a stark reminder of the destruction of his relationship, so he thought maybe for a second that being so close to raphael could lull him to sleep. instead though, the familiar feeling of what used to be his apartment and the knowledge that raphael was tucked away in their his bedroom made him feel father away than ever. so, naturally, edward was unhappily awake when robin knocked at the door.
he steps into the hallway, pulling the door closed behind him unwilling to give robin an inch. “you shouldn’t be here, can’t you just leave him alone for once?” he glares unhappy at the sight. the urge to punch robin after seeing him kiss raphael certainly hadn’t disappeared, but luckily for the other man edward wasn’t in the mood to cause any more drama until at least the sun came up. he’s tempted to just tell robin he’s right, that he’s back, just to see the look on his face, but then he also doesn’t want anyone to think that they’re back together, so he refrains. “god could you shut up? not that it’s any of your business but no. and what exactly are you here to do? lie some more? make things worse? what is it?”
✰ — — * sms / sophia.
sophia: call out, verb - to draw critical attention to someone's unacceptable actions or behaviour.
sophia: anyyyyyway me telling it how it is isn't being disrespectful idk what you're talking about.
sophia: ok so how long did you know? are you gonna answer that or no?
edward: there's a difference between calling critical attention to an issue to an issue and just being dramatic and rude
edward: thanksgiving. there does that make you feel better? and he knew i knew the whole time, he had every opportunity to come clean it's not like i could just let him lie to all my friends forever.
goldvnby reblogged
he hates the way eddie’s words almost make him feel bad. he’s right, raph thinks for a second, look at what he’s done for you, how much more do you want? selfish, selfish, selfish. he pushes that voice in his head down. it’s what kept him with robin for so long, and with so many others in that long list of lovers that never gave him quite what he deserved. but he’s tired of that - of making himself quieter, softer, easier to swallow. “you know what, eddie? you’re right. god forbid somebody cares that you’re not lying dead somewhere and wants you to be home on time so we can do something utterly insidious, like eat dinner together or have anything beyond a surface-level conversation. you’re living in some real rusty shackles there, call the aclu.” he can’t foresee where this conversation is going, it feels like they’re just running circles around each other. raph just doesn’t know what to do with them anymore, with all this love and nowhere to put it. “so is that it, then? you give me the basic tenets of commitment and i’m not allowed to ask for anything else from here on out? i thought you did all of that because you loved me, not because - fuck, i don’t know, you’re just checking off boxes until you accumulate enough gold stars to get to hold them against me.”
“why do you care so much raph? why is it that if i’m a few hours late coming home from work i’m suddenly a villain? that i’ve made you worry, that i could be dead, that i’ve run off, shouldn’t i be allowed to do what i want ever once in a while without you knowing where i am? are you really not capable of eating dinner on your own? you’re being suffocating.” he sighs, running his hands through his hair. “of course i did it because i loved you raphael.” there’s anger in his now, raphael’s last words stung. love was a challenging thing for edward, and after everything he couldn’t stand the accusation that it had all been a ruse. that he had just been tricking raphael into a romance so he could show how good he was, pulling the wool over everyone’s eyes. edward didn’t need anyone’s love to feel complete. “how could you even say that. do you really after all this time still not believe that i’m here because of love? because i don’t know what else i can do to convince you at this point.”
