Top Gun Drabble Challenge

Exactly 100 words for @topgundrabble (and also for @shorelinetides)

Huddled around Javy's phone, the squad peers down at the photograph with mixed surprise and delight.

It's Jake.

It's Jake in the world's tightest pants and a cropped t-shirt. There's a chain around his waist. His hair is free of its usual strictures, artfully messy. There's a pride flag slung over one shoulder. He is covered in glitter.

"Bradshaw, you run into Hangman at the Pride parade yesterday?" Natasha asks, sweetly. Across the room, Bradley looks up, startled, and frowns.

"Uh, yeah, I think I…. saw him. How'd you know?"

Nat's grin is predatory.

written for the @topgundrabble challenge prompt 'pride'

Community

Jake is watching the parade pass by, like he's done for the past two Junes. Doesn't feel ready to join them yet — unsure if he ever will — but he likes basking in the energy that the large crowd eminates all the way to the sidelines.

It's the same at church. He never joins in prayer or song, hasn't in ages. Just occasionally sneaks in to sit in the back during service and is out the door the second it's over. Witnesses the community nonetheless.

@topgundrabble

"You are still covered in glitter," Javy tells him as Jake flops into his seat.

“My best friend”—

“One of your best friends,” Javy corrects.

“One of my best friends,” Jake allows, “Is a drag performer at Wreckers.”

He delights in the confusion & dropped jaws from the Daggers who have heard of it.

"Please tell me you've tried on her heels," Nat asks eagerly.

“Of course I have. We’re the same size," Jake tells her. “She says I don’t have the legs for it which is horseshit. My calves are stunning. Right, Bradshaw?"

"I..."

Written for the Top Gun Drabble Challenge (@topgundrabble)

Prompt: "Pride" (100 words)

Ice didn’t understand pride.

Actually, he understood pride very well.

What he didn’t understand was gay pride.

His whole life he'd had it drilled into him–first by family then by the military–that being gay was not something to be proud of. It was something to bury deep down and never let anyone know. A dirty secret.

Yet as he stared at the man curled up in his bed, he couldn’t help but feel a swell of something deep in his chest. He loved Maverick with all of his heart.

Bradley swallows, gaze intent on the headstone ten yards away. His heart is rabbit quick in his chest, thumping rhythmically against his sternum like a war drum. If Jake wasn’t holding his hand he’s pretty sure it would be trembling. “Yeah, I am.”

Jake squeezes his hand once.

With a slow, soothing breath, Bradley pulls them over to the gravesite. “Hey–” his voice cracks, forcing him to clear his throat before trying once more. “Hey mom, I’d like you to meet my boyfriend, Jake.”

“It’s nice to make your acquaintance, ma’am.” Jake says, even ducking his head slightly in a bow.

Bradley smiles. “We’re uh, it’s the Pride parade today, so we’ll be heading there after this. But I wanted to introduce you two.” A beautiful butterfly lands on Carole’s headstone, wings fluttering. Bradley takes it as the sign it is.

written for the @topgundrabble challenge prompt 'sunglasses'

The sun is shining at a very unfortunate angle, directly into Amelia's eyes. Immediately sick of squinting, she loots around the glove compartment for a spare pair of sunglasses - and finds them.

"Jeez, Mom, when did your eyesight go to shit?" Everything is all blurry. Going without was actually preferable.

"What? My eyesight is fine," her Mom defends.

Amelia raises her eyebrows. "Then whose are these?"

Her Mom looks over and blushes. "Um-"

"Are you... seeing someone?"

"Maybe," she winces. "I swear I'll tell you about it when I'm sure."

Written for the Top Gun Drabble Challenge (@topgundrabble)

Prompt: "Sunglasses" (115 words)

The sunglasses were the final straw. 

Many things were broken in Bradley's betrayed tirade, but it was only when a lamp smashed against the mantle that both Bradley and Maverick froze. Together, they watched the aviators that had perched there for over a decade tumble to the tile floor. 

The two men stared at cracks now splintering across both lenses. All the fight went out of Bradley as he fell to his knees before his father’s sunglasses. 

Bradley takes a deep, slow breath in, holds it for a few moments before letting it out just as slowly. His bicep throbs, the type of pain that he feels all the way to his bones, but it’s a good hurt.

“Wanna check it out?” Mike, the tattoo artist he’d meticulously scouted around for, asks.

Clearing his throat, Bradley nods. “Yeah. Definitely.”

He stands, legs a little shaky from the session, and wanders over to the mirror wall. Inhaling sharply, his gaze snaps over the image now forever etched into his skin—it’s a portrait of his dad, flight suit on and grinning. But his favourite part?

The sunglasses with the gleaming reflection of the Missing Man formation.

“What d’you think?”

Throat tight, Bradley’s eyes burn with unshed tears. He sniffs, clearing his throat. “It’s good—perfect. It’s amazing. Thank you man, thank you so much.”

Jake couldn’t see Bradley’s eyes with those ever-present old sunglasses between them. It wasn’t even sunny. Bradley was hiding. 

“No,” Bradley said.

“No, those dates don’t work for you or—?”

“No, I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to come meet your parents...” 

Jake’s stomach turned. Sunlight flashed off dark lenses.

“I, uh, I don’t think—“ Bradley gestured vaguely between them. “I’m not sure this is a good idea either.”

They had both been in. All in, Bradley had said, halfway through Top Gun. Only now Jake was in it alone.

“Fine. It's over. But you’ll regret this.”

100 words for @topgundrabble

"Hold these, will you?"

Pete's hand reaches, automatically, for whatever Goose is handing him—doesn't bother lifting his head to check. He flinches back when something knocks against his face instead, and then his vision is smoky-dark, the glare of white paper made mute.

He frowns up at Goose—all his garish colors subdued, now.

Pete slides them off his nose, offers them back.

"Don't you need 'em?" he asks, gesturing at the eye-watering brightness beyond their little patch of shade.

"You gonna do it or what?!"

Chin out, shoulders squared, Jake's message is clear: Punch me. Let's deal with this. Once and for all.

Bradshaw stops in his tracks. He blinks as he thinks, infuriatingly slow, even now.

"Yeah. Yeah, I might."

Three long strides is all it takes for him to close the distance between them, fist his hand in Jake's shirt and tug. Lift his free hand up and-

It takes all of Jake's resolve not to flinch.

But then. Warm palm cups his cheek and soft lips meet his. Once.

But it might as well be forever.

Everyone's hiding something, you know? No one is a saint.

Sprawling in her seat, under the guise of confidence, Phoenix hides the fact that behind all her skill and under her uniform, there's still a woman aching to be loved.

In the cockpit and on the ground, Maverick hides himself from the ghosts haunting him every step of the way.

With harsh words and spat insults, Jake hides the blush that raises to his cheeks anytime Rooster as much as glances his way.

@topgundrabble came up with this little nice challenge and oh, im gonna grab the chance to remember how to write!

PROMPT: FIRST KISS

SHIP: Ice/Slider

Word count: 122

Enjoy~