#bring him to college with me and tell my roommate that he’s my mental illness baby

[bearring]

Which Bearson brother would you buy from the shop. I would’ve bought Brian sorry guys

#my art #digitalart #oc #Dennis Bearson #Carl Bearson #Brian Bearson #I’m a fan of bassists #and depressed loser men #he would go perfectly in my collection #I want to make a doll of him #bring him to college with me and tell my roommate that he’s my mental illness baby #Buck ocs

[alastaircarstairsdefenselawyer]

champagne problems (part 1)

here's my first part of my modern no magic "champagne problems" singer-songwriter quarantine thomastair AU! happy birthday to @foxglove-airmid even though I don't think it's your birthday where you live anymore (and I still haven't posted zia's birthday fic, it'll happen I swear)!

no content warnings for this part (besides maybe quarantine), but future parts will include discussions of mental illness, substance abuse, and a suicide attempt

obviously, the song alastair "wrote" in the fic is not mine, it's by taylor swift! and a few of the lyrics have been changed!

Masterlist | AO3

Thomas breathed out a sigh of relief as he lugged his suitcase up onto the fifth floor landing.

“‘Ere we are,” Piers announced as he unlocked the door.

Thomas was utterly exhausted, such was the result of taking a redeye flight across the Atlantic during a global pandemic, but any idea of rest that he’d had was interrupted when he heard the sound of piano flood the apartment.

“Ah, sorry about that,” Piers nodded, “One of my flatmates, the walls are paper thin. He can’t record at the studio right now, but he’s trying to finish his EP, so it’s been a bit noisier around here. He’ll take a break soon, hopefully.”

Thomas shook his head. “It’s no problem. Thank you, again, for allowing me to stay here. I’ll be looking for my own place as soon as the quarantine is up.”

“Of course. You’ve got the couch as long as you need it. Couldn’t just hang you out to dry, could I? Although, you did pick a god awful time to move to the city, if I do say so myself.”

Thomas sat down on the couch and tried to make himself comfortable. It was more comfortable than the flight or the airport, at least. “I know… I considered postponing the move, but the visa was so difficult to get, I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity. They say this will all blow over in a couple of weeks, but borders are closing and I heard talk of them suspending all pending visa applications. I didn't know how long it would be if I waited, if the job was even still here for me at all.” Although at first entrance, the music had seemed to be a nuisance, it now comforted him. It wasn’t bad at all, in fact, it quite reminded him of the days Alastair’s playing had filled their flat…

“Where did you say you were working again? At a record company?”

“Yeah. I’m just doing pretty basic stuff for now, but if I ever do want to record my own music, I’ve got to start somewhere.”

“Hm,” Piers said, gesturing to the room the music was coming from. “Perhaps you’ll get on with him well, then. Would you like some tea?”

Thomas nodded and Piers went to start the teapot. Piers continued, “Though I suppose he's more of the tortured artist type. Very reserved, quite prickly. I didn't even meet him until a couple weeks after I moved in here because he was off in some psychiatric hospital.” Thomas shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He was never one for gossip. “My other roommate’s nice, though, I think you’ll like him. He-”

“How did you end up in New York, again? I don’t think I ever asked.”

Piers dove into the subject change quite readily, explaining his uni - or college - years in New York City and his decision to stay afterwards. Thomas had tuned most of it out, truthfully. It wasn’t that he was trying to be rude, but he was rather exhausted, and Piers was wearing thin on his patience.

As the kettle started to whine, Thomas heard the musician begin to sing, and he froze. It sounded so much like Alastair. But it couldn't be, could it? With over 8 million people living in the city, he would not end up in Alastair's apartment by accident. His Alastair was certainly reserved and prickly, but it wasn't possible. It must be like all those times he thought he saw him on a street he'd never walked or heard his laugh in a café he'd never been to. Just his mind, tricking him. Even if he knew that voice so well, despite not hearing it in so long.

“It’s quite good, isn’t it? His first single just dropped.” Piers asked, bringing over his cup of tea. He hadn’t realized it, but he’d been staring intently at the door.

Thomas took the cup. “Hm? Yeah, I guess. Thanks.”

“You should look it up. It’s called “champagne problems” by Simurgh. That’s spelled- Well, it should come up.”

The name Simurgh sounded familiar, but Thomas couldn’t put his finger on where he knew it from. At Piers’ insistence, he pulled out his phone and brought up the song. As he skimmed through the first few lines, a cold feeling settled in his stomach.

“You booked the night train for a reason So you could sit there in this hurt Bustling crowds or silent sleepers You're not sure which is worse”

“Simurgh,” Thomas realized.

“Yeah, I think it’s Arabic or something.”

It took Thomas a moment to process that Piers was responding to him. “It’s Persian.” He was certain that Alastair would have some very stern words to say if he heard Piers confusing the two, actually. Thomas had admittedly let his Farsi skills deteriorate quite a bit since the breakup, but he was fairly certain the name came from the Shahnameh. There was no doubt in Thomas’ mind now: he was staying in Alastair’s apartment, and Alastair’s first single was about one of the most painful days in Thomas’ life. “I, er, I used to study it.”

“Oh, yes, that’s right!” Piers launched into a tangent that Thomas tuned out as he read through the rest of the page.

“Because I dropped your hand while dancing Left you out there standing Crestfallen on the landing Champagne problems”

“Thomas? Are you alright?”

He realized then that his hand was trembling so badly that his tea nearly spilled. He used his other hand to steady it. “Oh, uh, yes, I’m just tired.”

“Perhaps you should rest. I can ask Alastair to quiet down for a while-”

“No!” he exclaimed rather too forcefully. “No, that’s not necessary. I’d just rather not talk, if that’s alright.”

Piers nodded.

Thomas kept reading.

“Your mom's ring in your pocket My picture in your wallet Your heart was glass, I dropped it Champagne problems”

Of all the songs, why did he release the one about him? Why was it about a memory still so painful in Thomas’ heart, all of these years later? He remembered it so well, standing there, alone, shattered into a million pieces.

“You told your family for a reason You couldn't keep it in Your sister splashed out on the bottle Now no one's celebrating”

He was fairly certain that Barbara had been more excited than even he was, confident that Alastair would accept, and so very proud of her baby brother, all grown up. She’d been furious when it fell apart, but it was her who stood with him during the aftermath, who boarded him onto a train to Edinburgh to visit Eugenia when he couldn’t stand to be in the same city as him any longer, who went through his phone, blocking all of Alastair’s accounts so that he could obsess over him no longer, who comforted him as he wept and held him as he picked the pieces of himself back up again.

And all the more sour was the memory in light of her death.

“Dom Pérignon, you brought it No crowd of friends applauded Your hometown skeptics called it Champagne problems”

He looked up at Piers, who had fortunately become enthralled with something on his phone and was no longer paying Thomas any mind. He lifted the teacup gingerly to his lips, but he felt far too sick to take a drink.

“You had a speech, you're speechless Love slipped beyond your reaches And I couldn't give a reason Champagne problems”

A reason, that’s all Thomas had wanted. Just any explanation. He understood if they were moving too fast, or perhaps he’d misread something, but he just didn’t understand it.

Why? Why can’t you tell me why? I deserve an explanation, Alastair. Please, anything.

I… I’m sorry, Thomas.

Stop it! Stop apologizing! We can just go home and pretend this never happened, please, forget about all of it, it was a stupid idea-

Thomas, stop. I shouldn’t’ve… This was a mistake. I’m sorry I didn’t see that sooner.

That was the moment Thomas felt his heart stop beating.

“Your Midas touch on the Chevy door November flush and your flannel cure "This dorm was once a madhouse" I made a joke, "Well, it's made for me" How evergreen, our group of friends Don't think we'll say that word again And soon they'll have the nerve to deck the halls That we once walked through”

Despite the nearly two decades Thomas had spent in London before Alastair, it was never the same without him. He saw him everywhere he went, despite knowing he was thousands of miles away. After graduating uni that May, he accepted a spot at a graduate program in Spain and didn’t look back.

“One for the money, two for the show I never was ready so I watch you go Sometimes you just don't know the answer 'Til someone's on their knees and asks you "You’re the only one I want by my side, What a shame you’re fucked in the head," you said”

Those were the words that haunted Thomas’ nightmares, even now.

It’s you! It’s only you for me! It was always going to be you! But I can see now that I was never going to be enough for you, you and your secrets and walls and your lies. It’s a shame… it’s a shame you’re so fucked in the head, Alastair. You’ll never truly love anyone, will you? You’re not physically capable of it.

Alastair hadn’t responded. Thomas had wanted a rise out of him, any reaction at all, despite knowing how lethal and volatile Alastair could become when provoked. But there was nothing. Not a flicker of anything in his steeled expression. He’d simply looked down, apologized again for any pain that he’d caused, and left.

That was the last time they’d spoken.

Thomas and his sister left for Edinburgh that night, and when he’d returned to London, Alastair was gone.

“Well, you'll find the real thing instead Who'll patch up your tapestry that I shred And hold your hand while dancing Never leave you standing Crestfallen on the landing With champagne problems”

Thomas couldn’t imagine giving his heart to anyone again, not now and certainly not then. He’d dated in Madrid, but it had always stayed casual. He’d made sure of it. He could see now that he and Alastair had gotten together quickly, moved in together quickly, done all of it very quickly. After all, he’d fallen hard and fast. He gave all of himself to Alastair, and he’d nearly lost all of himself in the process.

“Your mom's ring in your pocket New picture in your wallet You won't remember all my Champagne problems

“You won't remember all my Champagne problems”

Now, he wondered what the rest of the story was. He’d convinced himself that Alastair had never loved him, that he was heartless and cruel, though he’d known that wasn’t true. Could Alastair have written this song if he’d never truly loved him? Perhaps he was a sociopath.

Thomas felt like he should run. Like he should pick up his bag and dart out of the apartment before Alastair could notice him, find some hotel somewhere with undoubtedly extraordinary high rates and just pretend like this never happened. He could get back on a plane and go back home to his parents and delete his phone browser history and pretend like this was all just a bad dream. But he could not move.

He didn’t know how many minutes had passed before Alastair’s door opened. He looked up with a start.

“Thomas,” Alastair breathed. He stood wide eyed, flushed.

“Do you two already know each other then?” Piers asked.

There was a moment of silence before Thomas cleared his throat. “We used to,” he said, looking down.

“I, er, I forgot that your friend was coming today,” Alastair told Piers. “It’s quite a long journey from London, you should have told me, I would have been quieter.”

Thomas considered correcting him for a moment, but decided not to. “Don’t worry about it. I heard you had your first big release. Congratulations.”

Alastair gave an awkward nod. “Thank you. Right, well, I’ll just…” He rushed over to the kitchen and pulled a bottle of water from the fridge. “I’ll try to be a bit quieter.”

“Don’t- It’s fine, really. In fact, I’m sure there’s some hotel in the area I can stay at for now, actually-”

“Well, don’t leave on my account,” Alastair interrupted. “We agreed to let you stay here, and the city’s a bloody mess right now. I’ll stay out of your hair, Thomas.”

Thomas only nodded as Alastair disappeared back behind his bedroom door.

Thanks for reading! Taglist (ask to be +/-): @stxr-thxif @chaos-and-starlight @zosiaenrique @lifewouldbebetteronmars @littlx-songbxrd @dianasarrow @eugeniaslongsword @bookswitchcraftandcats @jamesherondaleofficial @thomas-gaypanic-lightwood @livingformyself @anarmorofwords @foxglove-airmid @writeforjordelia @sapphic-in @jem-nasium @fortheloveofthecarstairs @alastair-esfandiyar-carstairs1 @shadowrunner2000 @thewarthatsavedmylife @fair-childd @itsjusta-j-really

#alastair carstairs #thomas lightwood #thomastair #tlh #the last hours #fanfic #fanfiction #champagne problems au

[twilitty]

Moonlit ch.1

This is the first chapter in my new fic Moonlit, it will be posted on Tumblr, ao3, and ffnet. New chapters uploaded every week and a half. Message/comment to be added to my tag list.

3k words

big thank you to my beta reader @effervescentlyirrevocable who has given me the absolute best criticism and helped make this chapter so beautiful :)

Bella moves to Forks Washington, her first week is uneventful. This fic has aged up characters, making them all at entry-college level ages.

Chapter One

My senses are sharper in Forks than they were in Phoenix, I’ve only been here a handful of days yet everything seemed brighter, louder, more alive than my past home. There was something here for me, something that made me feel more alert than I have in years.

The sound of heavy rain slowly pulls me out of my restless sleep, an elbow is thrown across my eyes in an attempt to keep the real world at bay. It’s always raining, the mist layering the ground never abandons its post, and the chilly air seemingly lasts indefinitely. The rainy town of Forks Washington sooner resembles my personal hell than it does a sleepy old town. The forest that borders the town at each cardinal point is layered in green moss, damp dirt, and an endless supply of fresh animal tracks. I’d moved to Forks only a week ago, the sum of which was spent unpacking dreadfully thin clothing and acquainting myself with the few stores and public access areas the town has to offer.

My father, Charlie, has had little to do with this process apart from moral support and the occasional bag of fast food that he’s picked up while on shift. Charlie is the town's police chief, a job that both seems ill-needed and also unbearably boring. How much crime can be committed in a town of fewer than ten thousand citizens? Other than the odd tag on a school building or bush party, what does his shift consist of? I have yet to bring my insulting opinions on his career to his attention, and likely will never do so. He’s a good man with a heart of gold and a passion for the judicial system, which is ever-present in his TV browsing as he cruises through endless episodes of Law & Order.

I’m not a big TV person, even back home in Phoenix, I preferred reading to the television. Perhaps this was related to my mother’s endless stack of yoga DVD’s that seemed to consume our viewing; her in a downward dog position gossiping about her latest advancements at her newest club membership, me sitting on the couch finishing a craft for her so she won’t be late submitting it. My favourite of her crafts was embroidery, one month I embroidered nearly two hundred dandelions on a pair of jeans for her. She gave them to the club administrator as an apology before she quit.

Regardless, at night when the TV is blaring the intro theme to a cop show, I am curled in bed with a book under my nose and headphones in my ears. Blocking out the rain is a full-time chore.

This morning is a particularly eventful morning, not because of any specific events, but rather the events that will be set into motion because of this morning. Today is the first day of my online college courses. I’m currently enrolled in an undeclared major. My hope is that the three courses I’m taking this spring term will help me decide on what I want to do in the future.

Charlie had given me a new laptop upon my arrival in Forks, a current model with modest upgrades to “enhance my academic experience”. Or at least that’s what the box boasted. I am not entirely convinced that a larger memory will miraculously cure me of my educational despise. High school was tortuous, I had few friends and fewer interests outside of my mother’s hobbies. I had no extra-curricular activities that were not synonymous with financial responsibilities. The monthly budget book was mine to care for, as was the constant, intrusive phone calls of the bank when my mother got too engaged in a store. She’s a gullible woman if nothing else. If a store clerk tells her a blouse suits her figure, she’ll purchase ten colours in the article along with two in a size lower just in case she finally loses the ten pounds she’s been trying to shed.

My eyes have barely opened, the down of my forearm just a fraction away from my pupil when Charlie pounds against my door. You’d imagine I was fostering a fugitive in here with the noise he’s making, but this is just the way my father is, loud noises and soft voices. I wonder, idly, if perhaps he has minor hearing loss from spending so much time around guns.

“I’m up!” I call out, my voice is thin and calloused with morning sleep. I clear my throat as the knocking cuts off, “Good morning, Dad.” Charlie doesn’t like me calling him Charlie.

“Morning, Bells,” he calls back through the door, quiet enough to not be taken as aggressive yet loud enough to sound authoritative. He is a father, my father, at heart. He pauses, and it’s as if I can hear the mental gears shifting in his mind. He hasn’t had to be a father since I was a baby, after that Renee was the parent. Charlie was the summer distraction. “Don’t be late for school.” I grunt a response, reaching for the alarm clock on my nightstand and groaning at the early hour of the morning. Barely eight, class doesn’t officially start until noon. I guess there’s nothing wrong with logging in early, although I’d much rather catch up on the sleep I’ve lost to the thunderous storms we’ve been experiencing recently.

As if he could sense my intentions, Charlie knocks against my door again. “Bella, I mean it. You didn’t come here to slack off, now.” No, I think nastily, I came here for peace and quiet.

Between unpacking my belongings and touring the town, I’ve developed a routine in my new living situation. Charlie is fond of my company, enjoying having a woman in the house outside of his ex-wife, my mother and ex-roommate. Although, his fondness of my presence does not directly translate to time spent together. He makes me breakfast, occasionally placing it in the oven to keep warm, and then immediately heads off to his family that is the Forks police station. We meet again for lunch, depending on our individual plans for the day, and then reunite again just in time for dinner. Food really is the great American pastime.

I dress in jeans and a light blue sweater that smells mysteriously of mildew although it’s a recent purchase and has yet to be worn outdoors. I suppose the rain permeates every available space, closed windows be damned. My socks are tall and I have to roll my jeans up at the bottoms to accommodate for the thick, high fabric of them. It’s a trick Charlie taught me for wearing rain boots, the higher the socks the less likely they are to run down to your toes as you walk. Immediately after that trick was taught I went to the nearest hiking store and purchased a pair of rain boots. My first pair of rain boots at nineteen years of age. Unfathomable yet ironic considering my lineage marks back to the wettest town in the continental US. My ancestors roll in their graves every time I step outdoors and forget a jacket or umbrella, I’m sure of it.

Charlie is waiting for me downstairs, both a surprise and unwelcome presence. I had a battered copy of Dorian Gray under my arm, I was expecting philosophy and moral ambiguity, not idle conversation. Before the chief notices my book, I slide it over the back of the couch and enter the kitchen with a polite smile. There’s bacon frying on the stovetop, the police chief is dressed in uniform already, but has a stained white apron tied around his neck. “Dad?”

“Oh,” he turns around and gives me a tight smile, “Excited for your big day?” You’d imagine it’s my first day of preschool with the amount of enthusiasm he’s trying to keep hidden from me, not my first day of online school. I don’t say anything to dampen his mood, I’m glad he’s excited about something. His life is repetitive, if my existence here proves to be no more useful than just disrupting his schedule, it will still be a success.

“Yeah, I guess.” He turns back to the bacon and shifts it around quickly, the grease snapping up at him. If it burns him he doesn’t show it, just maintains the stiff-backed posture of a respectable police officer cooking his daughter breakfast. “I’ve gotta ask, what’s up with the apron?” I stifle a giggle behind a bite of the toast that’s sitting in the middle of the small table. He shakes his head in faux annoyance.

Charlie takes the pan off the hot element, sliding the bacon onto two plates and pouring the grease into an open can. The second trick he taught me since arriving here: never pour grease down the drain.

“I’m in uniform, it would be disrespectful to the badge to stain it.” He slides a plate of bacon in front of me, sitting down in his designated seat across the table. “Besides,” he takes a sip of coffee from his to-go mug. “Can you imagine walking into a police station smelling of fried pig?”

Breakfast ends quickly. We each eat a piece of toast, Charlie stuffing a second piece into a plastic bag “for later” and heading out the door. I still have half a plate of bacon in front of me after he leaves, the maple glaze filling the small kitchen with its smell.

After my Mom and Charlie got married, Renee redecorated much of the house. Her lace curtains still hang in the master bedroom window, constantly drawn closed. The rest of the house has been minorly updated with age, the TV got bigger, the couch more comfortable, new bed linens and even newer rocking chairs on the porch. I had asked Charlie if they were Moms when I first came up to the house a week ago.

They were rocking gently in the wind, the wood seemed to be polished as it shined in what little light filtered through the depressive clouds. They were sitting side by side, matching pillows on them both, a coffee table in the middle with a stack of coasters. It was an old person's porch, where husband and wife would sit all grey and wrinkled, waving at the neighbourhood kids as the bus dropped them off from school. I could almost picture Charlie and Renee sitting there, her knitting a scarf and him content to just watch her and the scenery.

He informed me that they were relatively new, a purchase from a shop down on the Reservation. We haven’t spoken about them since, but I wonder if perhaps he wishes he had someone to sit out there with him.

I spend the morning before class doing odd chores around the house. It’s nice living at Charlie’s, nicer than I had expected it to be. I’m not a fan of the weather or the fact that I currently have no social life, but it’s nice to just sit. I throw my laundry in the wash and manage to get the kitchen cleaned up with just enough time left over to sit on the couch and read a chapter of my book before class.

School has never been my strong suit. That’s not to say I get poor marks or intentionally skip classes, I just never found it as fulfilling as my peers seemed to. I never woke up and looked forward to the social or academic aspect of high school. Perhaps this contributed to me postponing my college experience and only starting it now when I should already be a year into my program.

When I log into my schools online database and click on my first class, Social Psychology 1001, I’m immediately transported to a screen filled with windows and the faces of my classmates. “Hello, class!” The professor's voice calls out over my computer. Perhaps online school won’t be my strong suit either.

Class ends and the next one starts, and I get through all three classes and an hour's worth of homework by the time Charlie pops in for dinner.

“Hey, Bells,” He calls as he opens the front door. I can hear him from where I sit in the kitchen, hanging his gun belt up by the front door and kicking his boots off into a heap on the floor. I imagine Mom back in Phoenix, walking into the house with arms full of bags and tossing her flip flops onto her pile of shoes beside the coatrack she used for purses. Some things won’t ever change.

“How was work?” I ask. He pauses to poke his head into the kitchen, moustache moving as he chews on his lip. I can’t remember when Charlie initially grew out his moustache, just that one summer I arrived and thought could he look more like a cop?

“Good, good, just some meetings. New family moving into town, all foster kids around your age.” He takes pause, staring off into some middle ground in the hallway as if deep in thought. His eyebrows furrow, “Don’t want any trouble makers coming in, but the father seems nice. Respectable.”

“That’s nice,” I contribute conversationally. Charlie and I rarely have material conversations, always just idle talk of the weather or what's for dinner. I’m not entirely sure how to approach this topic, which clearly seems to be occupying his mind.

“Yeah, he’s a doctor.” He grins at this, toothy and a little crooked to the right side. A pang of embarrassment settles in my chest before he speaks, as if knowing where this will turn. “Perfect for you, considering how often your clumsiness-” I wave a hand over my face, grimacing at his words. “Don’t speak it into existence,” I mutter with a half-hearted plea underlying my words. He chuckles, disappearing up the stairs.

I hear the shower turn on after a few minutes of him fumbling around, presumably trying to get undressed. I’m sure once he’s showered and in sweatpants it’ll be twenty questions about my day of school. I’m not sure I have the heart to break the truth to him: it absolutely sucked.

The material was interesting enough, psychology has always been close to my heart. I loved the idea of people being more than their actions and thoughts, that there was something making them say that or something making them act that way. Perhaps this was yet another symptom of having Renee for a mother.

I sit at the kitchen table for a moment longer, my computer is closed in front of me and my pencil case- dreadfully unnecessary with school being online-sits closed and untouched. I haven’t made any friends in my classes, not that I had expected to. Twelve years of public school and no friend group to show for it, just a few texts every couple of weeks. Why would I have believed college, and an online college at that, would be any better?

Having enough with my thoughts, I get up from the table and pack my things into my bag. I’ve completed enough work for today, the rest of the evening I’ll spend either with Charlie or in my room. I’d rather not be nose deep in pdf textbooks and youtube videos constituting as follow-up lectures, I’ve had enough of that today. As if sensing the immediacy of my departure from the kitchen, the shower cuts off and I hear the bathroom door squeak open. For a man who, until recently, lived alone with too much free time, you’d imagine he’d have taken better care of the house. Nearly every door, except my own, creaks open and closed. I made sure to oil my hinges nearly immediately after moving in, I didn’t want Charlie to wake up every time I sneak downstairs for a comfort snack or warm glass of milk to help me sleep. He’s lived alone for nearly twenty years, he doesn’t need his sleep schedule disrupted now.

“The game is on in-” Charlie pauses as if double-checking the times mentally, “- an hour and a half. Are you interested?” He’s calling from up the stairs. I wonder if he truly wants me to watch the game with him, whatever sport it may be, or if he’s only being polite.

“Uh, I was just going to organize my room right now and then maybe make something for dinner,” I say in response. The floors don’t make a noise and I know he’s heard me, but he doesn’t respond. A lump forms in my throat, perhaps he really did want to watch with me.

“That’s fine, but if you want we can order in?” The lump passes and I convince myself that there is no reason to avoid the TV. It’s not like I’ll be a disruption, if I get bored I can read on the couch. I’ve only watched TV with Charlie on a few occasions since my move here, and each time I strategically saved my questions for the commercial breaks.

“Sure! That works.” The floorboards creak and I hear him retreat into his room, the door closing with a pitiful squeak.

We eat pizza on the couch, a large meat-lover for the carnivorous father and a small vegetarian with extra mushrooms for the daughter who cares about her cardiovascular health. We eat slowly, occasionally Charlie will make a face at the television or mumble something under his breath, but other than that we’re quiet. The sport turns out to be baseball and I recall a few of the basic rules from the tragic gym classes of my past. It’s not disastrous in any way, and surprisingly I don’t get bored. There is something relaxing about the repetitive nature of the game.

After the game ends we box up the remaining slices and put them in the fridge to be eaten tomorrow, say good night, and go our separate ways at the top of the stairs.

taglist:

@musingsofvenus @maybesandohnos

#twilight #edward cullen #bella swan #jasper #the twilight saga #carlisle #twilight saga #smeyer #2008 #twilight renaissance #bella/jacob #jacob/bella #jacobxbella #bellaxjacob #fanfic #fanfiction #twilight fanfic #mine

[excitedlysuffering]

OMGOMGOMG possibly Kakashi head-cannon collection? He is the love of my life (lmao don’t tell my bf that)

Your secrets safe with me he’s my love too😂

Kakashi Headcanons Collection

What He Looks For In A S/O~

• A reader, they don’t have to read Icha Icha (bonus points if you did) but someone who appreciates a good book

• Someone laid back and not very high maintenance

• I see him wanting a shinobi S/O cause he needs them to be to take care of themselves or he’ll worry too much

• he’ll worry anyways

• Someone who understands his pain and won’t shy away from him when he’s going through a rough patch

• Someone who is good with words, like say something sweet and he’s metlinggg

• A person with considerate personality traits

• He would like an S/O who’s willing to try new things and adventures

• Someone who would take things slowly

• Someone who could honestly make him laugh

• He’s DadKashi he’s going to want someone good with kids

• To be frank, he would probably want a relatively stable S/O so that in his mind there’s no chance of them ending up like his father

• He wants companionship so someone who’s not distant and who wouldn’t mind him being around all the time

• I really can’t see him with a tsundere S/O, he needs to see that his partner loves him as much as he loves them

Relationship With Kashi Stuff~

• Please do domestic stuff (Sending him off to work with a kiss, a note in his lunchbox, kissing him when he gets home) he will be near tears every time

• TEAMWORK MAKES THE DREAM WORK™ (whether it’s kicking butt, making dinner, or teaching (raising) Team 7)

• You probably won’t notice moving in with each other until you look up like ‘holy crap I haven’t been to my apartment in like 2 weeks?’

• Read with him or read to him, and you will have his HEART

• He’s not clingy per se, but he loves to be in your presence whenever he can

• Will take you out on dates once a week EVERY WEEK (Sorry Tsunade-sama, I have a date then, but I’ll leave right after?)

• Dating Kakashi means you’re now honorary rivals with Gai (who knows Kashi better, who can make him laugh most etc.)

• Pick up line wars 24/7, the loser has to do the other’s chores Kakashi wins

• Okay, but Kakashi never had a childhood, so make a list of everything he never got to do and you slowly complete them together

• He’s such a sweetheart like, surprise, he’s so sensitive

• Get’s so flustered seeing you in his clothes, he temporarily shuts down

• He’s given up trying to take back his mask whenever you’re wearing it

• Okay, we all know this silver-haired hottie is suave, but he is SMOOTH, he will 100% find ways to have you blush whenever possible, he is the CEO of leaving you hot and bothered

• Made you your own area in the Hokage office as a hint that he needed your company

• Has never forgotten an important date (he uses his Sharingan on the calendar)

• He’s fought demons and other crazy villains, but will still be terrified of you on your period (he’s brave tho he’ll just bring a lot of peace offerings)

• He heard you refer to him as DadKashi in front of Team 7 and/or your friends and just about loses his mind

• When you first see his face without his mask you’re probably pissed cuz WHY would he hide that beauty from the world?! it’s for the greater good hun

How To Lose/Annoy Him~

• Being insensitive/ignorant about things like loss or mental illness

• Constantly distracting him from his duties or hobbies

• Being rude or uncompassionate

• Being willing to abandon people or being self-centered you SCUM

• He always makes time for you, so he’d be a bit bothered if they didn’t put forth any effort to spend time with him

• Little pranks are harmless, but things that make him scared for your wellbeing or stealing his mask are big fat NO

• Being reckless just because, being a shinobi is already dangerous with would you play with death like that??

• Being lazy, Kakashi at his core is really something of a go-go-go person, he doesn’t want to just do anything all the time

Soft Kakashi Things~

• Kakashi is such a softie omg

• He likes to fall asleep last just so he can tell you how much he loves you and you saved him while you’re asleep

• If you’re having a bad day, he’ll drop everything (if possible) to hold you and be there for you in every way you need

• Definitely has Sai draw a small pic of you so he can carry it around and/or put in the Hokage office

• Mission dates are a thing like imagine flirting with Kakashi while destroying your opponents (so romantic)

• He’s big on practical gifts. If he notices you’re running low on shuriken? Expect a box of them from him

• He’ll read a particular *wild* Icha Icha quote to you just to make you flustered (bonus points for him if you’re in public)

• His students question you all the time like how did you end up with their lonely, pervy sensei?

• Will sweep you off your feet for no reason other than he likes to hold you and carry you

Random Kashi Facts~

• Kakashi’s love language is words of affirmation like he craves hearing that you love him and the like

• He hums and sings around the house or whenever he’s bored or preoccupied

• After having eating fish out of necessity day after day he prefers not eating it if possible

• He will often fall asleep a good while after he actually lays down because he enjoys debriefing himself of everything that happened during the day

• Actually sleeps really deep when he’s next to you, otherwise, the smallest sound can wake him up

• He likes to put notes or letters from you in his Icha Icha books so he can read them whenever and no one will peak cuz ew, Icha Icha

• In all honesty, Gai is a common factor in why he’s so late everywhere, but it’s mostly him walking around and taking in the sights like a nostalgic old man

• In the episode where Sakura and Naruto transformed into kids and called Kashi and old man, giving him an identity crisis is actually common. His hair color and the fact that you can’t see his face make some kids think he’s old

• Sometimes when he can’t sleep he’ll find a random tree and fall asleep in it (he’s a strange one)

• He lost his newest Icha Icha book when he was Hokage and very nearly (thanks to Shikamaru) called a citywide search party

Little Things~

Favorite:

• Place to kiss- Your temple, it feels really intimate to him and he’s so tall it’s an easy place for him

• Way to hug- Kakashi loves those giant bear hugs where he just envelopes you like you’re basically one with him now

•’Thing to do with you- He really loves reading with you, whether it’s the same book, or you’re just both sitting next to each other reading

• Type of date- Although your most common date is a mission date (lol), his favorite is being able to take you to a nice restaurant and then on a walk around the city

This or That:

• He’s a winter person actually, he loves being cuddled up with you and blankets, and the abundance of hot drinks

• He’s a morning person because he’s been waking up early since he was a child, and doesn’t really know how to enjoy sleeping anymore (but if that wasn’t the case he’d be a night owl)

• Loves both cooking for you and being cooked for he puts Bobby Flay to shame honestly

• He spends all his time reading obviously and if his S/O is a writer or he’ll be soooo excited and will read everything they put out

Conflict Happenings~

• He knows disagreements are a normal part of relationships (in moderation of course) so if there was a real problem, he wouldn’t shy away from it

• He won’t raise his voice or take a tone with you, he doesn’t feel the need to, but he will definitely get his point across

• To his fault, he might throw in a slight or cutting remark here and there but he will regret it the second your expression changes

• He’s a real go with the flow kind of guy so if he realizes that something is his fault, he will correct it ASAP

• If he notices you’re getting really worked up, he’ll just hug you until you calm down and can speak coherently but at that point it’s like ‘what was I mad about??’

• If his S/O is headstrong it’ll probably bring that side out in him, even if temporarily

• If it’s a minor disagreement he’ll probably say something funny to diffuse the situation

• He would rather die than argue in public, to him it’s a private thing and he hates causing a scene

Modern Kashi~

• I can see him as more of a club/extracurricular activities leader than a teacher

• He’s really close to those kids in his group and probably sheds a few proud DadKashi tears at their graduation

• That one fine teacher that all the students are thirsting over

• If not a teacher he’d probably be an elite CIA agent or a higher ranking FBI officer

• He has so many dogs like he sees a stray and how could he possibly give them up??

• He’d probably walk around Playboy Magazines just cause he can

• At one point he dyed his hair black cause he thought it’d look more ‘normal’ but he HATED it

• He likes plants but he’s so bad at taking care of them?? He can remember all of his dogs’ names and their food preferences but can’t remember to water a plant

• His house is so clean he’s been doing all his household chores since he was a child

• He definitely met Gai in elementary school and they never parted, even going on to become college roommates never again

• Gai probably barges in Kakashi’s classroom so often he’s most likely considered the co-leader/teacher

• Kakashi has definitely gotten drunk on school nights before but he’s such an in-control drunk no one ever noticed

• Kakashi was my first Naruto love and my first husband. BACK OFF

Masterlist

#naruto scenarios #naruto shippuden #kakashi x reader #hatake kakashi #reader insert #Dadkashi #headcanon #hes so perfect

[victoriareyloficlists]

There Was Only One Bed

Updated 7 November 2021

Rest of the Masterlist.

as luck would have it by prncesselene (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 16 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: When a case of violent food poisoning ruins Rose and Hux’s honeymoon plans, who better to take their place at a pre-paid Hawaiian beach resort than the Maid of Honor and Best Man? Sure, it’ll take some maneuvering, but a free vacation is a free vacation. They just have to pretend to be devoted newlyweds for a bit to enjoy it. There’s only one glaring issue, really: they can’t stand each other.) Crisis: Girlfriend by perperuna (AO3 2018  Rated G Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben had been in love with Rey for over a year when he asked her to go with him to his ex’s wedding as his date and ‘girlfriend’.) Deceit, Delusion, and Desire by AttackoftheDarkCurses, thebuildingsnotonfire (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, 16 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: When Rey realizes her student visa is about to expire, she struggles to find a way to stay in the country legally. Her roommate has a terrible idea, and it's just risky enough to work.) Fireproof by SpaceWaffleHouseTM (AO3 2020  Rated M Complete, 7 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: When Rey's home is overrun by a wildfire, she has to evacuate with little time and no warning. Then she saves the life of Ben Solo, the neighbor she barely knows, on the road and he offers her a place to stay in the aftermath.) Gimme Shelter by JaneNightwork (AO3 2018  Rated T Complete, 14 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben Solo meets Rey Niima when his mother asks him to drop off a few boxes of old sheets and towels at the animal shelter. He is immediately charmed by her and decides to volunteer at the shelter to get to know her better. In the process of building his relationship with Rey and learning to take care of the animals, Ben learns new ways to heal old hurts.) Happy to Help by SuchaPrettyPoison (AO3 2020  Rated E Incomplete, 13 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Sometimes you just need your neighbor to pretend to be in a relationship with you. Repeatedly.) Home for the Holidays by LarirenShadow (AO3 2016  Rated T Complete, 5 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Kylo Ren, in a moment of weakness, tells his mother he'll be home for Christmas and will bring his girlfriend. Problem is he doesn't have one. Enter Rey, his grad assistant. He makes a deal with her so she'll be his girlfriend for the trip home.) In the Woods Somewhere by Verdantsolstice (AO3 2020  Rated T Complete, 5 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Hikers Ben & Rey meet on the trail when they’re both lost. Hours of walking lead them to a convent in the woods. The sisters are very friendly, but refuse to let them both stay unless they’re married. TW: Mentions of ICE and immigration.) Laid Between Words by jeeno2 (AO3 2019  Rated E Complete, 15 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey is nearing the end of her temporary work Visa. Her friend Ben offers to marry her so she can stay in the U.S. She says yes.) Let me Dream, Let me Stay by Melusine11 (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, 12 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey has kept up a charade of a non-existant boyfriend for two years and now that Rose and Finn are getting married, she needs someone to pretend to be said boyfriend, enter her coworker Ben.) Look No Further by thewayofthetrashcompactor (BriarLily) (AO3 2019  Rated T Complete, 9 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey is spending Thanksgiving alone but a late-night Craigslist ad ends up with her agreeing to crash some asshole's family dinner. At the very least, she's curious what kind of people name their son "Kylo Ren" anyway.) Lucky Number Seven by Pearl Gatsby (DrPearlGatsby) (AO3 2019  Rated T Complete, 3 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Number seven on First and Order orders pizza again. Rey groans when she sees the address, remembering how they didn't bother to tip; but that's nothing compared to how she feels when she's been standing outside the door for two solid minutes, knocking and calling the cell number she has. Nobody answers. :: pizza delivery/college AU) Merry Christmas, I'm Yours by captain_staryeyed (AO3 2018  Rated T Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: After finding out that Rey has nowhere to go for Christmas, Ben invites her to spend Christmas at his parents’ house. During the time spent together, they are forced to confront their growing feelings toward each other.) miles from where you are by Mooncactus (AO3 2018  Rated T Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: After an argument over Star Wars fandom with a "gatekeeping, entitled monster" with the cryptic username of KyloRen, Rey finds herself stuck in a series of unavoidable video calls.) Miss Johnson & the Professor by ElegyGoldsmith (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Professor Ben has his TA Rey accompany him to a conference in Japan but she accidentally booked a single room.) mountain at my gates by KyloTrashForever (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 7 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Hard Outside/Soft Inside Lumberjack Alpha Ben Solo and Horny Engineer Omega Rey Johnson featuring Explicit Hand Holding, ABO, and Mutual Masturbation. (Ft. Snowed In and Bed Sharing for funnies.)) My Whole Life by AttackoftheDarkCurses, thebuildingsnotonfire (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, 13 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: The "Without a Hitch" high school sweethearts, fake-dating rom-com AU.) Needing A Teacher by Twisted_Mirror (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 4 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: When Rey tells her roommate, Ben, that she has only had sex in missionary position, he offers to let her use him to see what she likes. He vows to himself it's all for her pleasure, he has no idea that Rey is trying to drive him crazy.) Nominis by Oh_Snapcrackle (AO3 2019  Rated E Complete, 8 Chapters, Harry Potter AU, Quick Synopsis: When Professor Skywalker partners Rey with the notorious Ben Solo for occulmency lessons, something goes wrong (or very right) and now their minds are bridged. Between sharing thoughts, inconvenient astral projections, and bedsharing Rey starts to learn that while Ben Solo deserves the reputation he has built, he also deserves the opportunity to change.) Off the cuff by Blueyedgurl (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 4 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Poe gets Ben a stripper for closing a business deal. Ben reluctantly takes part to not waste Poe's money. The stripper hand cuffs him and robs him of clothes and money. Rey heads back to the office late night and finds her hot boss cuffed to the office chair in nothing but his tie.) Only Make-Believe by Hartmannclan (AO3 2020  Rated T Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey is in a car accident, so best friend Ben races to the hospital to be with her. What happens when she wakes up with amnesia and believes they are married?) Peacock by AttackoftheDarkCurses (AO3 2019  Rated E Complete, 22 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Thanks to a series of misunderstandings, failed attempts at flirting, and loud Katy Perry music, Ben grows to hate his new neighbor. Proposing to her wasn't the best solution to his problems.) Plus Won by AmberDread, DarkMage13, Erulisse17, Trish47, venetum (AO3 2020  Rated T Complete, 5 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: After a drunken night of complaining at a bar, Rey and Ben agree to be each other's plus-ones for a variety of events. As friends and family continue to invite them to things, they discover that they really enjoy spending time together. And holding hands. And... kissing. What happens when their relationship starts to feel a lot more real than fake?) Saving What We Love by naboojakku (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 18 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: In which Ben and Rey are voluntarily quarantined together for two weeks. Includes: copious amounts of fluff, discussion of mental illness, and way too many hours of Animal Crossing. Feel-good read during these batshit crazy times.) Say it With Sugar by fettuccine_alfreylo (AO3 2016  Rated E Complete, 20 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben Solo is the owner of his family’s small chocolate shop. Rey Kenobi is a talented chocolate maker he hires. They both share the same passion for chocolate. Unfortunately, they share the same kind of anxiety, too.) Snow Sparkles Like Stars by raptorginger (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, 9 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: A blizzard forces Professor (of mythology and cosmology) Kylo Ren, aka Ben Solo, off the road while on his way to his parents’ house in Seattle for the holidays. Luckily, the woman who owns the house he’s stranded at is well prepared for a snow-in and (as a bonus) is adorable. Unluckily, she’s the owner of eight mischievous Alaskan Malamutes, who may or may not be the physical manifestations of the old gods of Norse myth.) Someone to Watch Over Me by AttackoftheDarkCurses (AO3 2019  Rated E Complete, 6 chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: When Rey is gifted a state-of-the-art all-house AI to beta-test, she never expected "Kylo" to become her best friend, and she never expected him do anything within his power to give her the winter holiday she's always wanted.) Someone You Love(d) by AttackoftheDarkCurses (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 7 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: A misunderstanding leads to a lot of hate sex between roommates Ben and Rey. But when Rey ends up joining him on his trip to visit his family, the truth comes out.) Stone Hollow by violethoure666 (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben and Rey have been tasked with convincing a very grumpy old man to let them use his private road for a bus route. They’re stuck in the middle of nowhere and there’s only one room at the inn *smirk emoji*) Sugar and Spice by Rebel_Scum1221 (AO3 2019  Rated E Complete, 6 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey bakes when she's stressed, but unfortunately never has enough room to finish all of her baked goods. Thus leading her to give her neighbor- who she may or may not have the hots for- her leftovers. Shenanigans ensue.) Sweet Home by Violetwilson (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Honestly, she only came to Waffle House at two AM to pick up Finn and Poe and maybe order some pancakes. Maybe. But what was she supposed to do when she found a hot businessman with a broken car in the parking lot? Not invite him to sleep over at her place until the town's only mechanic sobered up?) the man, the stallion, and the wind by voicedimplosives (AO3 2018  Rated E Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Weary and alone, Rey barrels west on the Trans-Canada Hwy in her old pickup truck. Weary and in need of a lift, Ben Solo stands by the side of the road with his thumb out, in the hopes of hitching a ride. One hell of a winter storm’s about to roll in, leaving them stranded. What ever shall they do?) The Trial of Naboo: Fall of a Duke by Twin_Kitten (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 2 Chapters, Historical AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben and Rey are engaged to be married, but after several attempts on her life, he takes personal responsibility for her safety, including keeping her in his bed at night. Problem? Ben is extremely attracted to his bride but the MUST wait until marriage. ) Trapped by spacey_gracie (AO3 2019  Rated E Complete, 5 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey and Ben have been sworn enemies since they were eight years old. When their best friends Rose and Hux start dating, they decide they're sick of the fighting, and force the pair together to work out their issues once and for all.) under thy own life's key by galvanator (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 7 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben and Rey share a bed on a trip and everything is totally normal and nothing is weird.) variations on a theme of you by diasterisms (AO3 2017  Rated E Complete, 7 Chapters, Canon AU, Quick Synopsis: "Who knows?" Luke darted a faint smile at Ben and Rey as they stewed in silence and disbelief. "The two of you might even learn to get along. Right, Leia?" "Like a house on fire," the General deadpanned. "Complete with screams, flames, and people running for safety." "Indeed." Luke's blue eyes twinkled. "There may be no survivors.") What if I want to kiss you tomorrow? by Hellyjellybean (AO3 2020  Rated T Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Ben needs to share Rey's bed for the night, but does he want to share more than a bed with her? ) what you take with you by irridesca (AO3 2021  Rated E Complete, 16 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: When Rey's former boss, heartless defense attorney Kylo Ren, is shot in the head, she's asked to return to her position as his assistant to oversee his recovery. The only problem? When he wakes up two days later, he has no idea who Kylo Ren is. According to him, his name is Ben Solo.) When the party ends by Blueyedgurl (AO3 2021  Rated E Complete, One-Shot, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: Rey gets wasted at a frat party. Ben finds her, puts her in his room, where she's safe. Rey wakes in the morning after Ben comes out of the shower and nakedness ensues.) would you be so kind? by youcarrymeaway (AO3 2020  Rated E Complete, 3 Chapters, Modern AU, Quick Synopsis: An au where Ben accidentally hits Rey with his car, and also falls in love with her a little.)

#reylo #reylo fanfic

[riveir]

wishlist plots & aus.

i’ve been meaning to do this for a while but because i’m a person that really strongly prefers plotted interactions and also runs into problems with actually getting those more developed things going, i figured compiling wishlist stuff and stuff that comes from my own brain might be helpful. i’ll keep this linked in the pinned post if anyone ever wants to draw from it for a starter call or whatever, and to also make it easier for me to find if plotting ever hits a road block.

peace corps. this would technically fall under the umbrella of one of river’s canon au verses, the one in which he lives but is in the less realistic scenario where he rejects his parents’ wishes and goes ahead and joins the peace corps. this could be a really good way to get muses from two different canons / universes / etc. to meet, because the organization brings all these people together into one group sent to work somewhere overseas. river works as an english education teacher, and where they’re working can be totally open. could be used as mentioned before, but also as sort of a stepping stone for river to start a life beyond the states / open up opportunities for him that will take him away from home, etc etc. just a fun way to take him out of his usual settings and throw him in a new place under new circumstances, whether your muse is in the corps with him or if they’re just in the same place and they meet under different circumstances.

political dynasty. rather than holding a high position with goldman sachs, river’s father has an influential political position ( like a diplomat or foreign ambassador, which could explain river living years of his life at least somewhat abroad ), something that would put the family under a microscope on a national scale. could be a very kennedy-esque thing where politics is sort of just like the family business and river would be expected to carry that mantle as well ( which, obviously, he doesn’t really want ). this could go a number of different directions because the barkleys would be considered high profile individuals: bodyguard stuff, danger stuff, etc. i’m open to anything here, this would just be the groundwork to set up some conflict that would be more specific to your muse and their circumstances, since this is pretty adaptable on river’s end. i’d also be willing to write river older than i usually would ( as a younger adult ), because i think being nationally known would change his circumstances a bit and yada yada i can elaborate on that more if anyone asks, if we wanted to go the route where river himself is the political figure, probably a junior congressman or something. he could pretty controversial, as mental health advocacy and gun control would probably be two of his biggest agendas / two of the most important components of his platform.

modern royalty. similar to the above, but rather than coming from a political family, river comes from a monarchical family. obviously not based in the united states but could open up similar plotting opportunities as listed above. for one example he could still be attending a traditional university, and could open up opportunities for your muse to be a classmate of his ( as a friend sure but maybe there’s some benefit your muse could gain from making friends with him or something shadier like that ), or maybe you’re super annoyed that he’s there because like who cares about the royal family and why does he get so much attention, or maybe your muse knows he hates the attention and it gets to a point where he actually has to be fearful about it and there’s some way your muse can help him out.

fake dating. this is a jam of mine always. river could have several reasons of his own to be in a fake relationship, and this could work especially well in another au like the political dynasty or modern royalty scenarios, but it could totally come more from your muse’s end as well. it could also be a thing where river’s parents are trying to set him up with your muse if that would make sense, because that’s a very wasp-y rich people thing to do. 

period aus. this one is super open but river could work really well for this type of thing, especially because his family is so old fashioned in a lot of ways and very traditional in how they expect their family to be and how they expect river to be and all that. also could work super well for this letter writing plot i have in my wishlist tag.

ghost!river. this would have to be plotted for sure because the way river’s “ghost” canonically manifests is as an extension of the other person; he exists to give them advice or as their moral compass/conscience or something like that. it can be different depending on the muse, but he manifests at their own will and serves some sort of purpose for them. he’s more of a guiding force of some sort rather than an actual ghost coming back to reveal new information or anything like that. he wouldn’t do anything that the other muse wouldn’t think he would do, and wouldn’t tell them anything they didn’t already know. the exception to his in river’s canon is when the protagonist has a near-death experience and sees river in the afterlife and they have an actual conversation as two separate entities, and that could definitely be something i’d be up for, too.

champagne problems. this song off of evermore has enormous river energy. from the genius description of the song: “’champagne problems’ tells the story of a woman who shocks her would-be fiancé and their loved ones by turning down a marriage proposal right before christmas ... the song depicts ‘longtime college sweethearts [who] had very different plans for the same night, one to end it and one who brought a ring.’ the song implies that the protagonist has a history of mental illness, which the town subsequently stigmatizes in their gossip surrounding the failed proposal.” river could be either of the people in the couple for obvious reasons ( either the wealthy person from the well-to-do family all expecting the proposal, or the person who breaks it off and is subsequently - or, maybe, already is - the subject of that gossip ). the circumstances of the breakup can vary depending on the specific relationship between the muses: maybe they were really in love and had a great relationship but the influential family just had too much influence and pressure, maybe the stigmatization and gossip was a bit too much, maybe neither of their hearts were really in it and it was just an advantageous thing that appeased the big family but the other person ultimately just decided they couldn’t go through with it. as i am with everything i’m totally open here. it also totally doesn’t have to match the exact circumstances and can just be based on the general idea. ( in the same vein, here’s a link to some cool folklore-based plots )

apocalyptic danger. or to be honest, any sort of scenario that creates a life or death (or near life or death) situation for one or both of our muses. in all honesty i just love raising the stakes.

musician or actor river. even though it’s not my favorite alternative path to explore for him to seriously pursue acting or music as a career, it could open up some potentially cool dynamics that i’d be down with. maybe river plays piano in a bar or restaurant or whatever at night during college and your muse loves open mic night. maybe they’re doing a show together in college or maybe even out of college if i think it would make sense that river could get to that point in life. maybe river’s actually achieving some level of success and has some degree of notoriety. idk this is just an option that could be cool if we develop it enough ( cause like i said, without that development and specificity to our muses i’m not as into this route for him specifically)

childhood best friends to lovers. ( or some variation ). self-explanatory, just my favorite trope. some wishlist stuff here.

wishlist post #1: “i just want a plot where it’s two rich kids who live in neighboring estates and their families always throw parties together and they have vacation homes in the same spots and their elite parents are too busy to notice when they sneak off to fuck in that second guest bathroom that no one uses or get high in the back library and makeout”

wishlist post #2: “give me a we broke up because i had to move away because of school and we knew we couldn’t do long distance but oh my god i’m home for christmas and you’re still beautiful and we’re wine drunk slow dancing to the sound of elf on the television and you smell like hot chocolate and i miss you so much please don’t let this end again plot !!!!!”

wishlist post #3: “someone give me “you live in the apartment across the hall and you’re so fucking hot but i get so awkward around you even though you act completely normal and i stutter every.time. you’re out of my league anyway but then one night my stupid roommate locks me out and i forget my key and you see me sitting the hallway so you invite me in. and obviously i say yes but holy crap what is happening” plot pretty pls”

wishlist post #4: “au where it's a blind date gone wrong/really awkward first time/two people who just get off on the wrong foot but keep on running into each other and then slowly fall for each other”

wishlist post #5: “give me best friends who harbor feelings for each other . they’ve acknowledged the feelings but they don’t do anything about it , because the friendship is too precious . and when one of them is finally ready to say “ fuck it, let’s take the risk ” , they see the other making out with another person”

i also always just want more college things and things in pre-established canon universe aus ( all linked in my pinned post, but including hogwarts, gossip girl, legacies, riverdale, etc ). i’m also always down for plotting ships.

#。 ·ﾟ ⎛ 𝘰𝘶𝘵 ⎠ wishlist.

[dumbcuckbucket]

i uhh wrote a thing and i just need to put it somewhere and forget it exists.

no one talks about the ugly nights when youre chronically ill. you hear about the bad nights, the dangerous nights, and occasionally even the good nights. but you rarely hear about the nights when someone lays awake in bed, crying from pain that they cant stop and wondering why the fuck they deserve to feel this way.

why am i, at twenty, so tired of living in so much pain all the time, that im questioning life? not in a suicidal way, let me make that very clear. ive been actively suicidal before, and this is different. i want to stop existing, but i dont want to die. i simply want to stop hurting.

why is it that when the sun comes up and ive gotten little to no sleep, my body still screaming in pain, must i pretend i am okay? brush it off as simply a life i am used to and thats that. i am used to it, but why must that be okay? why must i exist this way?

around nine i will roll out of bed and pretend my joints dont burn and that my head doesnt weep and act as if i havent spent the better part of the night terrified of how my illness will affect my future and silently sobbing about it. i’ll feed my dog and take him out. there’s some fresh air. its nice, but i’m tired. i want to lay down again.

i’ll shower, which will take so much of my energy that i do not have anymore. i’ll make phone calls. it seems like all my life is is phone calls, and then spaces between calls where life moves around me and i make no progress. i’ll call my doctor and ask for blood tests to see if my meds are working. i’ll call a different doctor to make sure my referral was granted by my other doctor. if it hasnt been, i’ll call that doctor.

i have an appointment at 11. its supposed to help. im getting screened for adhd and other mental disabilities that may be affecting my studies. what doesnt affect my studies anymore? im stressed about work, im stressed about my family, im stressed about covid and money and my studies and i am so tired. its supposed to help. i am already so resigned to hear that theres nothing wrong, because nothing is ever wrong if i dont fight and get different opinions. i am so fucking tired of fighting. i hope i get the help i need, because i dont think i can keep trying to get it.

my mom died. did i tell you that? two years ago, right after i moved away for college. her birthday is in 9 days. i wish i could talk to her. its hard, holding resentment for someone because of how they treated you while missing them so deeply it feels like a bullet wound.

her funeral was weird. it never really hit me that she died. i mean, i know shes dead. ive known. but when the treatments stopped and the cancer spread, she died long before her heart stopped. i wish i had better memories. i know there had to be good ones there, but i only remember the bad and the dying.

its crazy that of all the things that could be wrong with me, its chronic shitting disease. it feels like a joke. trying to talk about a chronic illness in almost any setting is hard enough. imagine that chronic illness relating to poop. it sucks.

after my appointment i have to go pick up a prescription. i hope it helps. it needs to help, because i am so tired of doctors and phone calls and the ever piling list of meds that dont work. having medication lists sent to new doctors and having to say “no i stopped that one when i started this one” and “that one didnt work” over and over and over gets exhausting. i don’t remember half of the meds they name anymore.

my roommates dont understand. i wish they did. they dont realize how hard it is for me to brush my teeth, let alone cook and clean. then to have to socialize with them at the end of the day feels like pulling teeth. i love them. theyre my best friends, my tether to life when i feel like im floating while the world moves without me. i just wish they understood.

i’ll try to go to class after i get my prescription. i’ll log on and ignore it, like i always do. i’ll lay down in bed with my computer muted, looking through twitter or looking at etsy. anything to not deal with the real world for a few minutes. the real world is so exhausting.

im still crying, but its fine. this is my life, its how it is. im used to it. its okay. (a lie, but a good one).

i’ll call my dad. i’ll lie when he asks how i am. i’ll tell him im tired because i havent slept well this week (lie of omission). he’ll ask how im feeling. i’ll tell him im fine (a direct lie). ill tell him about my appointment and my new inhaler and all the calls ive made. i’ll make a joke about how much it all fucking sucks (not a joke, but my tone doesnt let the truth out). he’ll tell me about his days off. he’ll tell me about work, and the grocery shopping he did, and how he still has laundry and that he hasnt done anything in the garage yet. he’ll tell me what hes making for dinner. i’ll say it sounds good (a lie; nothing sounds good to me anymore) and i’ll say im jealous (a truth; i miss his food). we’ll sit in silence for a bit, then he’ll say “well i gotta get going” and we’ll say goodbye. he’ll say i love you. i’ll say it back (the final truth). one of us will remember something to talk about. we’ll say goodbye again.

i’ll lay down again, and while the sun is out i wont think about how much i hate this. how i, at twenty, dont deserve this. how i have had my future robbed from me so i can make calls and appointments and run through a mile long list of medications.

my dog will lay down with me, and i will feel guilty for not taking him to the park to play.

i’ll remember i have to pay rent. i get up to do it. i bring my dog, and we go to the park. he runs himself hard, so we only stay for half an hour. we’ll go home, he’ll be happy, and i’ll be exhausted. i’ll go lay down and vaguely think about my school work. i wont do it. i’ll let my roommates decide what we do for the night. i’ll try to make some food, or order something. they’ll make fun of me, not realizing it hurts that they dont see that being alive is so hard for me. they dont understand, but thats okay. it has to be okay.

ive stopped crying. my knees and ankles and elbows and fingers still hurt. my stomach churns and my head is pounding, but im used to it. its okay. it has to be okay.

#mine #my post #jes talks #jes writes #chronic illness #crohns #long post #suicide tw #not suicidal but it is mentioned #death tw #ask to tag #personal #okay to rb

[lifeisbooksandcats]

Since posting on tumblr feels like just screaming into the void; where maybe someone might throw a glance your way to see if maybe you’re both screaming about the same thing, but at the end of the day, no one is really paying attention to you..and I feel like that’s what makes me feel like I can post this. Because it’s not something I can say out loud, not really, not yet. Except to my fiancée because it’s something we’ve talking about for a while. This is going to be long, I’m certain of it, and it’s going to be rambley because I’ve been trying to put my thoughts into words and those words into coherent...anythings...and it just isn’t going to be in any sort of order. I’m not expecting anyone to read it and I’m hoping the read more button actually works on mobile. If not, then I’m sorry, you’ll be scrolling for a while.

I don’t know how valid people feel self-diagnosis is, but I honestly feel like I fall somewhere on the autism spectrum. And that’s something I’ve thought about myself since my first year of college. Someone in a communications class I was taking did a presentation on autism, and throughout the entire thing all I could think was how much everything resonated with me. So that’s, since the fall semester of 2009, this has been something I’ve quietly thought about myself and wondered and honestly just been pretty sure of. That’s 12 years this fall, and I still can’t bring myself to say it?? And I think it’s a good bit because I’ve been asked so many times throughout my life if I’m autistic - by family members, by friends, by a college roommate, by people living on the same floor as me at college - and it’s ALWAYS been (or at least felt like to me) in some sort of negative way. And I don’t want to apologize for being myself, but fuck it’s just hard sometimes???

When I walk into a room, especially one I’m not familiar with, my first instinct is to look for the exits and figure out how I can get out of there if it gets too loud/too hectic/too EVERYTHING and I start to panic. And if I’m in a situation where I can’t leave, I have this little clear stone that I play with in my hand, just something to focus on to help keep me just a little bit calmer. When that doesn’t work, it’s like my mind just...goes. I don’t know how to explain it; physically I’m still there, but mentally...even if I wanted to pay attention to something, I literally could not. It happens the most when there’s too many sounds/voices/conversations happening at once, they all blend together, I can’t understand anything and after a second it feel like it’s all just muffled and I’m not there anymore, I feel so disconnected from my body, like there’s someone else controlling my brain and I’m just there watching. It happened at the zoo just recently, when we went into one of the restaurants for lunch. I was already panicked because of the number of people inside without masks on. From the second we walked in, everything from the number of people inside, to the volume, to the lights being too bright (but looking back, I feel like they were probably an appropriate brightness? It just felt too bright with everything else going on), to the lack of masks, everything was too much. My fiancée and I stood in line with one of our friends, waiting to order our food, and I stood there rocking slightly on my ankles and fidgeting with that little stone, just trying so desperately to calm my internal panic and to not “check out” mentally and to just appear “normal”. I stood there waiting for our food, rocking on my ankles, running my thumb along my fingertips, listening to the conversations all around me merging into one unintelligible mess and on the inside, full on panicking while hoping that from the outside, no one could tell. I got our food, set it on the table, and stepped into the bathroom to wash my hands, the quiet welcoming me like nothing else. I closed my eyes and just stood there, breathing, letting the warm water run over my hands like some kind of magic balm bringing me back down. I opened my eyes again, a woman with a toddler smiled at me like she knew - which made me worry again because it’s not something I want people to know because I don’t want to be different, I don’t want anyone to look at me differently. But at the same time, I do. I want to be able to stand up for myself and say “I literally physically cannot go into this loud, crowded restaurant because I’m autistic and it is so auditorily overwhelming in there.” And maybe that wasn’t even what her smile meant. Because I literally never know how people are feeling and I try to figure it out but honestly 90% of the time it’s just guesswork.

But it’s not just that. It’s not just the panic that sets in when it’s too crowded and the sounds are too much. It’s the fact that as a kid, I was never “just” a fan of something I liked. I either didn’t care, or it was an all-consuming obsession that basically became a personality trait. I was a fan of Aaron Carter, but god forbid anyone ask me a question about his music or anything — because whether or not you were interested (and unless you flat out told me you were uninterested, I literally could not tell), I was going to info-dump everything onto you. I could tell you what time he was born, how many minutes were between him and his twin sister, which concerts his sister Leslie sang at (because she also had a small music career), at what point in his career he actually started singing live instead of lip syncing most of the time...

And speaking of info-dumping. If I couldn’t info dump to someone, I would write it. As a child - second, third, fourth grade...- I wrote essays upon essays on things I was interested in just because I could. Just everything I knew on the topic, thrown out into words either handwritten as a younger kid or typed as I got older. When I was in about fifth or sixth grade, when Harry Potter was HUGE and all my friends were also into Harry Potter, I couldn’t tell everything I knew to my friends because they already knew a lot of it...and so as a kid, maybe a fifth grader, I wrote a six (maybe seven?) page essay - single spaced - with everything I knew about the series/the author/everything. Before the last book came out, I filled an entire spiral bound notebook with my theories for how the series would end and WHY I thought what I thought.

My first NOW That’s What I Call Music CD was Now 14. I was in 7th grade and I could tell you exactly what order the songs were in. That was something I did to calm myself down back then; listing the songs on that album over and over and over again, always in the right order.

From about 7th grade until high school graduation, I brought and ate the exact same thing for lunch every single day. I said it was because I liked it, but I really didn’t. I didn’t like the Oscar Mayer precooked bacon that I would put on my BLT. I didn’t like the texture, half the time I couldn’t bring myself to eat it and picked it off my sandwich. But the thought of changing it??? That wasn’t even something I would have considered because somehow in my mind, changing it was worse than eating it. Make that one make sense.

I love routines and schedules and things staying the same, and get annoyingly stressed out when things/my schedule changes. One little change or one little thing out of the ordinary and it’s like I forget how to function for the day. Everything seems off. And I hate it. Because I KNOW that it shouldn’t matter, but it does. Half days and two hour delays at school growing up?? Those stressed the FUCK out of me because the order of the day would be different. I loved school and loved learning, but those days I felt physically ill over the thought of going to school. Field trip days were okay though because I knew they were coming and I had plenty of time to mentally prepare myself. I remember as a child asking my teachers (on multiple occasions) for the itinerary for a field trip so I could memorize it and know exactly what to expect and when for the day.

There are times that my fiancée will turn on the tv for “background noise” while she watches videos on her phone, and I wish I could describe what I mean when I tell her that there’s “too many sounds”. Because between the tv, her phone, the hum of the refrigerator in the other room, the neighbors, cars driving by, the cats playing, the ceiling fan...I don’t know how else to describe it other than exactly that — too many sounds. And it gets to be too much. So I have to put headphones in and listen to music to drown it all out and refocus.

I’ve only just recently been able to put a word to what I now know is poor executive function. As much as I loved school, I could NOT do assignments until the day they were due. I could start on something days before it was due, but I couldn’t work on it. I couldn’t focus on it. I couldn’t get myself to work on it. But the morning it was due??? I could whip up a paper that I knew would earn an A just hours before needing to turn it in. I prided myself on that ability, but looking back it was most definitely poor executive function. If I couldn’t finish something that morning, which was a rare occurrence, I would lie - I’d look “everywhere” for my assignment and “panic” because I “couldn’t find it” and because I was a good student, I got away with it. Every. Single. Time. Even with the hard-ass teachers who no one could get away with things on. And magically by the end of the day, I would swing back by that teacher’s classroom to give them my assignment that I had finally “found”.

I remember sitting on the kitchen floor of our apartment as a kid and tracing my fingers along the lines on the floor where the tiles met. I remember the pattern was brown/white/brown/white, but there was one spot on the floor that made me so irrationally frustrated because two tiles were swapped; instead of the same pattern as the rest of the floor, this one spot was brown/white/white/brown/brown/white. I remember pointing it out and my mom asking me why I had even paid any attention to that. I didn’t know why, I just did. I remember her telling me that it was stupid to let it bother me and to just let it go, but I couldn’t. I stopped mentioning it, but right up until we moved out of that apartment, I couldn’t even look at that spot on the floor without getting frustrated by it. There’s more than that. But that was one of the first things I thought of.

I’ve been watching a lot of Yo Samdy Sam’s videos on YouTube, and especially her videos “Autism symptoms in GIRLS” and “Could YOU be autistic? (and not know)” and I just... I feel that. Everything she says, I feel that. I watch them just thinking “that’s me. That’s me.” the entire time. She mentions sucking on her hair as a kid, and I did that CONSTANTLY. My hair was forever in my mouth. And now that I’m an adult, I don’t suck on my hair, but my sweatshirt strings are always in my mouth. Obviously there’s more than that, but that was one that hit me hard because I didn’t realize that wasn’t just something everyone did as a kid. I didn’t realize not everyone couldn’t stand still and always had to be fidgeting or moving slightly, whether it was rocking on my ankles, running my thumb over my other fingers, crossing and uncrossing my toes inside my shoes. I didn’t realize not everyone had the same shitty executive functioning skills as me.

And it’s like... I’m so sure that’s me. I’m so sure that I am autistic. I know it. But it’s like...is getting a diagnosis at this point in my life going to change anything? I mean no, probably not, other than giving me that validation that I crave. I would feel valid when the world is too much/too big/too loud. I would have a reason for feeling the way I do and doing the things I do. So much of my life would make sense. But. I don’t know. I’m afraid I’ll try to get a diagnosis and have someone, some doctor or therapist or psychologist or someone tell me that I’m not. And then what? Then what is everything I’ve felt throughout my life? That’s what I’m afraid of, really. Because if I’m so sure of this and then some professional says “no that’s not it”, then what?

#personal #just venting I guess #not venting that’s not the right word #just throwing my thoughts on here and trying to make sense of them because it’s my blog and I can #autism #autism in adults #actually autistic

[maddox026]

"Good day. My name is Michael and I'll be your attendant today. Here is our menu and I'll be back after five minutes to get your order ma'am. We'll be serving your water in a while."

"Got it. Thank you Michael."

"You're welcome ma'am and thank you too."

Your eyes started scanning the menu card handed over to you by the waiter. This is the new Italian restaurant the two women at the washroom were talking about a while ago. Not really intending to eavesdrop, you overheard their conversation when you dropped by for a bladder break before the movie started. Both seemed to be on their early 30's reminding you of your own set of girl friends. The taller one of the two was telling the other one about her experience on the restaurant in that building which just opened two weeks ago.

"Imagine how shocked I was after seeing them there. I haven't had my usual coffee dose yet but my heart was palpitating already. Good thing I was done eating by the time they arrived or else I wouldn't have probably finished my meal. Awkward." 

"How was it? Did you guys had a little chitchat or did you just nod at each other? Did his partner smiled at you???" The shorter woman asked curiously while lathering her hands with the cucumber scented soap.

"I think he saw my eyes widen but I manage to do a quick smile both to him and to his, girlfriend or wife maybe before I went out. Sis, don't get me wrong. I've moved on and all but I think there will always be that slight feeling of awkwardness whenever you ran to your long time ex-boyfriend." As if wanting to put extra emphasis on her last statement, the woman responded while rolling her eyeballs.

“Ex-fiancee, sis. Hahaha! How was the food? I hope it was worth the run-in encounter with your past flame somehow.”

“Well in fairness the food was great. I read a review about it on Metro Story’s Foodtrip column and my expectations were met. You should visit it with Andrew one of these days.”

“I see. I’ll tell him about it. Sis, I just realized. Your ex-pectations were met indeed.Hahaha!”

“Sira.Let’s go.” The two women eventually left the washroom. You checked your seat number in the movie stub for the last time and headed out as well.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Exactly after five minutes, the waiter got back to your table to take your order. As he walks away you close your eyes and tried to absorb the classical music being played on the background. You tried to remember the grocery list you mentally did last night. Funny how just a while ago, you were watching the full movie version of a 90′s cartoon series you loved as a kid. Now here you are, back being an adult thinking about the household items you need to buy and whether you’ll be doing your laundry tonight or delay it tomorrow.

“So what are the chances?”

Startled at the voice which was coming from your back, you turned around and saw an old face with a goofy smile. What is it with this place making people cross paths with their past? Is this included in their specialty or something? Muling Ibalik with a side of Multo ng Nakaraan pasta?

“Oi.Hi!” Although still a little off guard, you were able to somehow respond with a small smile.

“I knew it was you the moment I saw your hair and your back. Kumusta?“

You wanted to say you were doing just okay right before he came in but you knew it would be best not to. Knowing him, that would make his goofy smile wider. “I’m good. Ikaw? What’s up?”

His lips moved as he answers your question but you can’t catch on to what he’s saying. You told yourself you’re going to bring up to your close friend who majored in Social Science how and who started the social norm to automatically ask the other person how they are doing as well after being asked “Kumusta?”

“...also, I’m not sure but did you watch Dragon Gang before coming here? I think you were seated a few rows in front of me.”

“Really? Yeah I was at Cinema 3 a while ago.” Okay. Maybe you should have just lied to cut this conversation already.

“Small world.Hahaha!”

Small world. Two words usually said to show surprise when an unexpected encounter or connection between people happens. Yet, the very same people who tells you this can also make the world seem vast, big and empty when their presence is no longer felt.

“Hi sir and ma’am. Sorry for the interruption but I would just like to check if you will be sharing this table together? If not, I’ll be happy to assist you to a vacant table sir.” Michael politely asked, perhaps noticing how the newly arrived guest was not yet seated somewhere.

“Oh wait. I’ll ask her first if we can share this spot. Maya, okay lang?”

If you say no, will the people nearby including the kind waiter judge you? Will they give you the wrong impression if you decline?

“Yeah sure. No big deal.” You swallowed the lump in your throat which started forming the moment you saw this guy who’s clad in denim jacket. Making a mental note, you remind yourself to control your voice and expression now that your conversation is obviously nowhere its ending yet.

“So did you liked the movie?” He asked while showing you the yellow movie stub he have as well.

Three years ago and you would have immediately given a lengthy reply to his question.  You would have talked about all the highs and lows of the film perhaps even enough to impress Mrs. Tagle, your favorite English teacher back in college.

College, where you two first met as classmates in one of your minor subjects. You went out together one time but things didn’t took a romantic turn after that as there were other incidents that occurred. 

Three years after your graduation, your paths met again unexpectedly while you were looking for this popular bookshop. The two of you went out for two or three dates but just liked before, things fizzled out afterwards. Back then the term, “ghosting” wasn’t as known as it is now but it’s kind of how it ended. Or how he, ended. It’s okay though as you both moved on afterwards.

The years after that, you stayed connected through social media although mostly just sending each other simple birthday greetings whenever one is celebrating.

Three years ago though, your simple greeting turned into more casual chats and there were times when you would talk about deep issues about life. Bucket lists, goals and aspirations, lessons on past relationships etc., these were some of the topics you used to talk about. Random conversations you started looking forward to especially during weekends and eventually became the source of your heart ache when they no longer started happening. A phase worthy enough to earn you a live performance of this new hip band who’s debut song is entitled, “You foolish girl.”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Yeah. I liked the movie. It was not disappointing.”

“Haha! I have to agree. It wasn’t disappointing indeed. Although there were just some scenes which I think were confusing for some fans who haven’t read the entire manga series.”

You stared at him just politely smiling, not really in the mood to be your usual chatty self. Slowly, people at the restaurant started coming in and you wished Michael would be back already with both of your food.

“They did not show in the movie what happened to Brutly’s parents and also how all of a sudden Gozu became well after that serious illness he had. Those were just my two cents though.Hahaha! They did however still managed to bring justice to Teriyene’s masterpiece.”

“Batang 90′s. Hehehe...” That was all the response you were able to think of at that moment. You weren’t really nervous being there with him and all but there’s a cloud of hesitation in your head and you wonder if he can feel it.

“Yeah...By the way, I’m sorry if you felt obliged to accept my table request in front of the waiter earlier. I guess I was just really happy seeing an old acquaintance after a long time.”

“What? It’s okay. Long time indeed.”

That’s it? That’s all this guy is saying sorry for, you asked yourself. What about those times in the past when -

“Here’s your food sir and ma’am.” Michael proceeded to enumerate the order he took a while ago and asked if there is anything else he can assist you with. You both shake your head as you said no and he left you two alone again afterwards.

“By the way, I’m not sure if you’ve noticed but I think most of the moviegoers were around their 30′s to 40′s.” 

“Really? I didn’t notice it. Based from the occasional cheer the audience were giving though, I think it’s safe to assume there were a lot of dads or titos who were watching.” Maybe you can make the conversation going but just avoid eye contact as much as possible?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“You know your eyes are very pretty. The color suits your complexion and your hair as well.” 

The 1st semester is about to end and he sent a text message after your class inviting you for a movie and dinner to unwind. Funny because for some reason your ex boyfriend and another male friend sent an invitation to hang out too that same day.

Maybe because you’ve been sharing a room together for more than three years already, your roommate Kris was able to read your bubble thoughts. 

“Maya? Go. Accept it.”

“Huh?”

“Go out with him. Not your ex and si other kuya. Your crushmate, I mean your “classmate”. I’ll wait for your post-date kwento.”

“But...I’m not really sure if...”

 “Why are you hesitating? Come on. Don’t you like him??”

“Hey! I admit he’s cute but - . Wait, why weren’t you this eager when I told you about the other two invites?”

“You know why? Because your facial reaction yesterday when you were telling me about it was your normal facial expression. But today, when you were reading his text message, your cheeks turned pink like this shirt I’m wearing.”

She’s right. You felt a thump in your heart after reading the text message. You’re hesitating though as you can’t get rid of the player vibes you’re sensing. The way he walks, the way he talks, his overall confident attitude gives off a feeling that he’s used to talking to or wooing girls that comes near him.

“They’re light brown, right?” Perhaps it’s because you were facing each 

[purplesurveys]

851

How have you been feeling lately? Have you been doing ok? Uncomfortable because of period cramps and the heat WHICH IS STILL HERE, even though it’s supposed to be gone right about now and it’s supposed to be raining at this point. I wish I was kidding saying this but we literally have three electric fans turned on just for the living and dining rooms. It’s crazy and stupid and it shouldn’t be this hot anymore. I’m doing better mentally and emotionally, so at least that balances things out lol.

Are you currently in quarantine? Still am. While all countries are slowly going back to normal, our Covid cases continue to get higher and higher everyday because our government hasn’t done anything except to make us stay home for three months. No mass testing, no alternate public transport plans, and for some reason Duterte keeps borrowing billions of dollars’ worth of loans from the World Bank nearly every week, and we have no idea where the stupid fucking money goes. Our government is convinced they’ve been doing everything right so they’ve loosened up quarantine protocols, so with malls and restaurants being open again we’ve done nothing but reach record high cases almost every day.

Do you wear a mask when you go to the store? I’ve gone outside a total of three times since March and I wore a mask for two of those times. The first time I went out I just genuinely forgot to bring a mask, but in the end it was fine because I only had to stay in the car.

Does your state require people to wear masks in stores? As far as I know it’s not a requirement per se, but fortunately everyone follows the safety precautions anyway.

Do you know anyone who’s had the coronavirus? Yeah, my mom’s former boss. This is a bit of a stretch but I also know someone personally who had immediate family members that tested positive.

What was the last sweet treat you ate? I had a peanut butter doughnut from J.CO! Soooooooo good.

Was it a nice day out today? No, it’s too hot. Even if life was normal rn I’d prefer to be indoors with air conditioning, like a mall.

Is the weather nice where you live usually? Fuck no. It is disgustingly hot, sticky, and humid 3/4 of the year.

What was the last thing you ordered online? I don’t do a lot of online shopping. When I get something online it’s usually to get food delivered, and the last time I did that it was me and Andrew getting Hong Kong noodles.

Are you expecting a package right now? Nopes.

Have you ever ordered anything from Wish? If so, what did you buy, and did you feel it was worth it? No, though I remember Good Mythical Morning featuring it in a couple of episodes. I don’t feel comfortable buying from stores or sellers that sell things for a lot cheaper because they could always be fake, so I wouldn’t feel comfortable buying from that site.

Are you a youtuber? If so, are you consistent with uploads? and how many subscribers do you have? I’m not, but I do have my own channel. I just use it to like videos and subscribe to my favorites, though.

What is one thing you hate about summer? The weather. Honest to goodness I’d really rather live somewhere that gave me -40C weather everyday.

Did you go outside today? No. My dad wanted to bring Cooper to my grandma’s place and I planned to come along, but at the last minute he changed his mind and did just the errands he was supposed to do.

What is the name of your youtube channel, if you have one? It’s just my full name because my YouTube is linked to my Google account.

What was the name of the last store or restaurant that overcharged you? I don’t know any instances where that would happen. I don’t find service charge inconvenient because I know that directly goes to the servers anyway so I don’t mind how high it gets most of the time. Is your room more often messy or clean? It’s clean most of the time but sometimes when I’m busy I won’t be able to keep it clean and it’ll be clean-messy? Like I’ll leave stuff around but I’ll still know where everything is lol.

Who is someone you miss? ALL MY FRIENDS BRUH

What is something you miss? Being able to go out and freely do activities. Life Pre-COVID < Life pre-COVID, perfectly put. I miss getting an allowance, being out until midnight, having dates with my girlfriend thhe most.

Do you feel like your emotions are often haywire? Not necessarily, but they can get pretty unstable sometimes.

Have you ever received a misdiagnosis from a doctor? Nah but I’ve been given a prescription that didn’t work. We went to our family doctor who made me take a certain medicine for three days, and I started getting worried when three days had passed and I still had my fever. I went to Angela’s mom and she was super quick to tell me that that medicine wasn’t the right one to take for a UTI and prescribed me with something else; and that second one ended up working like magic.

Have you ever been “diagnosed” with a mental illness from an online friend? who is not a doctor? If yes, isn’t that frustrating? That’s never happened before, but if it did I wouldn’t let my frustration get the best of me. I’d just tell them that they should avoid doing that if they’re not a professional because they could very much end up seriously harming people.

Do you have any friends that you can trust and tell everything to? All of them.

What was the name of your favorite roommate you’ve had? Kimi :)

Do you have a favorite book that you’ve read multiple times? Yeah when I was a kid I would reread this book that an aunt had given me for Christmas as much as I could. For many years I forgot the title but after painstakingly Googling the few keywords I could remember I finally found out it again – it’s a series called Three Girls in the City by Jeanne Betancourt, but I only ever read the first book because it was the only gift I got. It’s not my favorite book, but I’d be so happy if I got to be reunited with it again because I don’t think we got to keep it around when we moved houses.

What’s one book or book series that you’ve read multiple times? ^ That, multiple wrestling memoirs, and Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. I’ve also reread the Twilight Saga once.

What was the name of the funniest kid you’ve ever babysat? I never babysat anyone other than younger relatives, but the one I enjoyed taking care of the most was my cousin Lucas. He was the smartest kid I babysat so it was fun talking to him, plus his yaya was always nice to me, they had a playground and sandbox at home, and all I had to do was keep him company while he watched Thomas and Friends over and over.

Do you enjoy babysitting? Just the younger relatives that were smarter and more behaved. I didn’t like the kids who thought kicking and being rowdy were fun.

Do you have any big regrets? One big one.

Are there things about your past that bother you? Of course. My entire childhood is one.

What was the last thing you saw or read on social media that made you angry? OMG get ready for this one. Our dumb as a rock presidential spokesperson was talking about how happy he is that the country beat UP’s (my school, which the government hates because we always talk shit about them lol) prediction of 40,000 Covid cases by the end of June if the government doesn’t do anything to prevent more cases. How many cases do we have? Fucking 36,000. Our government is happy because they finally beat our school over something for the very first time and they are technically happy that we got 36,000 cases, which if you round up will give you 40,000 anyway. My school had a fucking FIELD DAY over it and now he is a national meme.

Do you often post about controversial topics on facebook? At first I didn’t but that’s because I wasn’t active on Facebook in the past anyway. After I realized that I had a bigger friends list on Facebook I decided to put it to good use and post about controversial topics to educate others. It’s made a bunch of conservative family members uncomfortable and that’s the goal, son. 

Do you think it’s a good idea to post about serious topics on social media? or do you think that it’s better to discuss serious topics in person? It definitely is. In person is good too but you don’t always get that opportunity, so sharing stuff through social media doesn’t hurt too as long as information is accurate. For instance most of my relatives life far from me, so if I want them to get a piece of my mind about Trump or BLM or abortion, sharing informative graphics and tables is always convenient.

What was your favorite book you had to read for school? Without Seeing the Dawn by Stevan Javellana is my absolute favorite. It’s probably the closest thing to being my favorite book. Number the Stars by Lois Lowry is a good runner-up. On the other hand, Dekada ‘70 by Lualhati Bautista is my favorite that was written in Filipino.

Have you ever failed a class and had to repeat it? Nope. I really believe I was meant to fail algebra in my freshman year in high school because I failed every exam, but I think my teacher just took pity on me and gave me a barely-passing mark at the end of the year so that I didn’t have to go to summer school. As for college, I’ve never failed a class.

What class in school did you hate the most? In college I hated my economics elective. I still don’t know why that’s mandatory for us journ students... I also dreaded a couple of journalism classes, but it was more because of the teachers than the classes’ topics.

Have you ever wanted to be a teacher? I don’t think so.

What’s one childhood dream that has stuck with you, and one that has not? Having a big house; becoming a firefighter.

Would you want to re-live your childhood over again if you could? I’ve already said it on this survey, but: fuck no. I’m ok where I am now, even if I am a clumsy adult.

Which do you like more: being an adult or being a kid? Being an adult. Being a kid meant having to stomach the smell of hard alcohol and cigarettes from morning to evening everyday; being caught in the middle of screaming matches between drunk relatives; and being cramped in a single-floor home with 12 people. Like I said, I love where I am now. The amount of independence I gained in college was freeing and felt so nice and I’m glad my parents never tried holding me back. I’m also glad that I didn’t fall into the same alcohol trap, and that I know how to deal with my alcohol responsibly.

At what age were you when you started to feel like you were mature enough to offer others advice? Around college-age, so like when I turned 18.

Did your parents smoke or drink when you were growing up? Neither of them did, because we had enough alcoholism happening at my old home. It was actually my drunken relatives that finally drove my mom out of that house.

Do you enjoy bonfires? I’ve only been to one and I was like 9 years old then, so I wouldn’t know how I feel about them now.

Have you ever stepped on a sparkler? Nope.

What, do you know of, are you allergic to? No allergies.

Have you ever ridden in an ambulance? Also nopes. I always feel bad for the ambulances that I see because I live in a very traffic-heavy city and they always end up getting stuck and crawling through traffic like the rest of us. We do try to swerve, but our roads are so tiny and always cramped that there’s little space left for us to move out of the ambulance’s way, so even though we’re able to make a path for it, the space is not big enough for the ambulance to drive in the speed it’s supposed to.

What is your favorite version of the Bible to read, if applicable? That’s a big no thanks from me.

Do you follow trends? or are you a trendsetter? Yeah, I follow some of them if I think they are nice.

Has anyone ever described you as a trendsetter? Nope, because I am not.

Do you know anyone who used to be loving, but then turned cold? List three people you’ve known whom this has happened to. My mom, Athenna, Macy. The only person I don’t resent out of these three is Macy, because I know she turned distant due to mental health issues and because she wants to fix herself first, which is responsible.

What SAT subjects, if any, did you get a perfect score in? We don’t have SAT.

What were your best subjects in school? and what was your favorite subject in school? I loved taking history electives in college, and I performed the best in them too. I also did well in international relations, which was under the political science department.

Have you ever been abused by a parent or legal guardian? I’ve been verbally and emotionally abused by my mom ever since I can remember.

Do you have a lot of wounds from your past? If we’re getting visual then I’d rather say that I have one ugly, infected gash that gets bothersome from time to time. My past isn’t made up of little tiny scattered wounds.

Has anyone ever called you a jerk? Behind my back, probably.

Are you a jerk? I can be, so I don’t mind being called it. I never said I was the nicest person.

What color were your bedroom walls in high school? They have always been white. My mom doesn’t let us have control over our own rooms, so in the beginning it’s always been plain boring white. Don’t get me wrong, I like my room but sometimes it just feels like living in a cell.

Is there a girl or guy you wish you hadn’t let slip away? I wish I was still close with my high school friends, and I remember saying how they were for keeps in my old surveys so that makes me extra sad haha. I’m civil with most of them, but no longer close. And I only ever talk to them if it’s their birthdays or if they achieved something big. The only people I’ve remained close with from that original group are Angela and Hans.

Is there an old friend that you miss and would like to reconnect with? Not really. Sofie and I have grown apart from each other now and we’re both very happy, so there’s no need to change that. I’m okay with seeing her once or twice a year.

Who has hurt you the most? My mom.

Have you been bullied? Yeah in kindergarten. Long-lasting effects though.

Which talent show, if any, would you most like to audition for? and have you auditioned for one? No thanks. I don’t have the kind of talent that I can show off, like singing or playing an instrument.

Do you know anyone who’s auditioned for American Idol? I don’t think so. But my mom knows someone who auditioned for our local version of America’s Got Talent. He’s a ventriloquist that my mom used to get for our parties. As far as I know he got into the grand finals, but I’m not sure if he won.

Is there someone you think should audition that hasn’t yet? American Idol’s been over for a while now.

What time of day do you usually feel your best? I love the evenings.

What’s one way in which you’ve changed within the last ten years? I was in sixth grade then, I’ve graduated from college now. My mom was purely verbally abusive to me then, now we have brief stints of having an actually healthy relationship. I had one dog then and I have two dogs now; I had no friends then and I have tons of them now. There’s been a lot of tiny changes but nothing that were life-changing.

Do you feel like time goes by fast, or slow? It goes both ways depending on how stimulated I am or how much fun I’m having.

Who do you know who has died of cancer? One of my great-aunts.

Has there been cancer in your family? Yeah, ^ that. Other than her I’m not sure if we’ve had other cases. My family tends to be hush-hush about cancer and only ever call it ‘c’ or ‘the big one.’

Have you ever stayed overnight in a hospital, and if so, what for? Yes, once for a low platelet count.

Have you ever been a victim of police misconduct? No but the cops here are just as corrupt as the ones in the US, so I can very much be a victim any time. It’s just a matter of being in the wrong place at the right time.

Have you ever been so angry you wanted to sue someone? Not so much that I wanted to sue someone, no.

Have you ever been a victim of racism? My country isn’t diverse at all and we’re all Filipinos here, and I’ve only ever traveled to Asian countries, so no. But racism is a big reason why I have no plans to go to other countries known for it.

Have you ever deleted a friend on Facebook for making racist comments? I’ve unfriended those who were being little bitches about BLM and George Floyd’s death, so I guess that kinda counts as being racist. I still have a few racist Facebook friends that I keep around, but that’s because they’re family members.

What was the last thing you ate? Binagoongan.

What was the theme of your senior prom? Clair de Lune, so like the moon and shit.

Did you go to prom? It was mandatory, so I had to go even though I really had no interest.

Have ever been engaged or married? I have been neither.

Are you an aunt or uncle? Nah but I’m a godmother to one of my cousins.

Do you live to glorify God and to do His will? LOL no

Are you happy with the way you are living your life day-to-day right now? It could be better and more filled with activity. But I’m not miserably depressed right now and that’s more than enough for me.

Do you feel like your life was better or worse six years ago? It was slightly better. I feel like 2014 was my best year.

Have you ever made a huge, catastrophic mistake? Not anything that ruined my life or someone else’s, no.

Do you feel like you are currently in a state of suffering? and that not all of your basic needs are being met? If so, how long have you been in a state of suffering? Basic needs?? So you mean poverty? No.

Do you hate social injustice? Absolutely. Anyone who tolerates it is automatically a gigantic prick, I’d say.

Are you happy with the current social class you are in? No. I don’t know how it translates to English, but in Filipino we have this term called naghaharing-uri that comprises the very very very very tiny top of the social pyramid and it’s made up of top government officials and their families, heads of corporations, old money families, etc. It’s no secret that it’s this 1% that exploits the 99% remaining in the pyramid, so even though I’m relatively comfortable in my class, I hate that, when it comes down to it, we’re only being used by this 1% for their own benefit.

Life isn’t fair. True or false? True.

Do you hate that life is so unfair? Sometimes, if it’s for stuff about social injustice and how some people have to be homeless, why homophobia exists, etc. But if it’s for tiny problems, I feel like they’re necessary sometimes so we can learn from them.

Name a few people who seem to have everything handed to them. Some richer kids that I know.

Who do you go to when you’re upset? Sometimes myself, sometimes Gabie.

Do you pray less or more than you did 5 years ago? A LOT LESS, thank fuck I got out of that trap.

Do you pray a lot? Definitely not.

Do you frequently have back pain? Yeah, haha. Kinda expected considering I have scoliosis.

What’s the worst side effect you’ve experienced for a medication? and what’s the worst withdrawal effect you’ve experienced from a medicine? Nothing worse than diarrhea. I’ve never experienced withdrawal.

Have you ever used an epi pen? Nopes.

What’s a name that you like but probably wouldn’t use for one of your kids? Isabella because I’m already an Isabelle and my girlfriend has a sister named Isabela.

What’s your name, and do you like it? Robyn. I like it now.

Would you prefer to give your kids common names or unique names? Common, more old-school names. I just feel like they sound super elegant.

Do you feel like anybody values you in the way that you deserve? Angela, Andrew, and Gab.

Who have you felt the most valued by? ^ Them.

Have you ever been treated like you were inferior? For sure.

What was the name of the biggest bully in your high school? Oh my god this survey is so long... we didn’t have bullies in high school. We had mean girls and mean girl cliques, but as long as you weren’t involved in drama with them you’d be fine.

Do you ever sleep outside? Nah. I’d sleep at the rooftop but there are sooooo many mosquitoes at night.

How many siblings do you have? Two.

Are you the oldest, youngest, middle, or only child? Eldest.

How many kids do you want to have? One or two would be great.

Do you want to get married? Yessssssss.

Best date you’ve been on? Probably that time we went to BGC so we can feel fancy and have a fancy dinner, then when we meant to walk back to our car to go home we ended up having impromptu drinks at like 11 PM when we randomly found a jazz bar loudly playing live music in the area. OH and that time we went museum hopping in Manila and we ended the day having delicioussss Italian food.

Dream date? Traveling out of the country.

Ever kissed someone on New Year’s? Nah. We celebrate New Year’s with our respective families so there’s no chance of that happening. Which is fine, because New Year’s is traditionally a family-centric holiday here so it would be weird for anyone to ditch their families.

Have you ever had an experience so good you felt like you were flying? Sure.

Have you ever been in so much pain you prayed that you would die? YES, with my toothache last year.

What brings you the most joy? My dogs.

What is your passion; what is it that would bring you the most joy and fulfillment in life? I’m at a point where it still keeps changing, so I don’t wanna give an absolute answer to this just yet.

Have you ever laid your dreams aside because someone else wanted you to? That’s never happened to me. I only ever gave up on one dream because it realistically wasn’t attainable, when it came down to it.

Who supports you in everything you do? My two best friends.

Who always tries to stop you whenever you try to go after your dreams? I haven’t had anyone bar me, but if someone tried to they would definitely hear from me.

Do you believe in following your heart, in going after your dreams? Not always.

Do you wish other people would want you to be happy? Of course.

Do you wish you had someone who loved and supported you? I already do.

#survey #surveys #fuck me this was long

[jess-abides]

FMLS90 - 10/1

My fitness journey has been long and repetitive, if I’m being honest. I’ve been overweight for most of my life, and have felt it since I was in 4th grade. 

I realized that this is getting very long--I’ve never actually written all of this out, and it’s becoming sort of cathartic. I’m adding a break here in case you don’t want to scroll for 9 years to get through this story. I won’t be offended.

I lost a lot of weight in 6th grade due to a bizarre illness, but didn’t really realize it until I started to gain it back. In middle school, my mental health started to become problematic (it happens in 8th grade for everyone, right? Ha) and, although anxiety had always been pretty present in my life, depression started to settle in and make itself at home inside me. At that point, I was very unhappy with myself and my body, and started to try to change it. In high school, I was trading fad diets like baseball cards and stealing money from my parents so my older friends could buy me diet pills. My friend and I posted pictures of skinny women on our refrigerators and inside our kitchen cabinets to discourage us from eating (old school “thinspo,” lmao). I dreamed of going off to college, where no one would make me eat dinner and I could get skinny in peace.

By my sophomore year in college, I had discovered Tumblr and made a thinspo blog (I just did the math and realized that was circa 2010. I’m old!) and dropped about 40 pounds in just over a semester by extremely restricting calories, doing workout videos (s/o to Jillian Michaels, I hated her so much) and running.

Eventually, that behavior started to get old and I loosened up. However, I am a person of extremes and I’m not great at middle ground or moderation, so my fitness journey became a rapid cycle of “do whatever you want” -> “restrict and exercise obsessively” -> “do whatever you want” -> and on and on. This was basically the rest of my college experience, with the periods of “do whatever you want” getting longer and longer. As I got healthier mentally, I realized I had a tendency to go overboard with this. I resolved to never count calories again, because it made me crazy. I think this realization and resolution were important, but also led to me kind of babying myself. It became an excuse for my poor eating and inactivity.

I continued this sort of half-assed cycle for a while, and then got on the Beachbody bandwagon around 2015. I did 21 Day Fix and several other programs, and loved it. I was living with a roommate who was my best friend and we would grocery shop together, cook together, work out together, run together, and do yoga together. It was a really amazing time while it lasted! I lost weight in a healthy way, was feeling strong, and was really proud of myself. 

When I started dating my boyfriend, I was working out less and eating out more. I was also very unhappy in my job, so I’d been drinking a lot before I met him and then continued when we started dating. Then I moved to California and we were long-distance for about 6 months. During that time, I was eating better and getting more active. I did Whole30 for the first time in January 2018, along with a Beachbody program called 80 Day Obsession. I lost 20 pounds in a month during my first round of Whole30, and was hooked on the way I felt! (Tiger blood--if you know, you know!) Unfortunately, as is my pattern, I couldn’t figure out how to incorporate Whole30 into my real life. The goal of the program is “Food Freedom,” and the basic idea is that you figure out what foods make you feel best physically, mentally, and emotionally, and then...just eat those foods and avoid or limit the others. I love the idea of it, and it doesn’t seem like it should be that hard to simply eat the foods that make me feel amazing. But it’s proven to be a challenge. I’ve done three rounds of Whole30 in the last year and a half, and each time I have the same experience as the first--and then end up back where I started a couple months later. It’s incredibly frustrating, and it’s my ultimate goal to be able to listen to my body and really figure out Food Freedom.

My boyfriend and I complain about our weight and our bodies often, and make deals and plans to do better. But neither of us have much follow-through, and we tend to bring each other down rather than pushing each other forward. Over the last couple of months, though, I’ve started to put my foot down and make good choices for myself, regardless of what he’s doing. I’m currently experimenting with Keto, and enjoying it so far! I don’t know if it’s a great long-term solution for me, because I miss fruit and sweet potatoes, but I have been losing weight and eating a lot of cheese, and it feels good to be eating fat on purpose and still seeing results. It is strangely healing, because I don’t feel limited or restricted and I’m still losing weight. 

Anyway, as you can tell if you’ve gotten this far, my “fitness” journey has been primarily focused on weight loss. I have only ever really exercised to encourage weight loss, although I really love the feeling I get when I am consistent and start to feel stronger. I am still focused on weight loss, because I have over 100 pounds I’d like to lose, but I want to try to shift my focus a bit and see if that’s helpful. I hope these next 90 days will help me do that! If you read this whole thing, bless you. You’re a real champ.

#fmls90

[harbingham]

                   Harry took one look at the survey && rolled his eyes. What a waste of fucking time. As if they were all going to BOND because a survey supposedly confirmed they could be  f r i e n d s  . Or at the very least good roommates ?? Whatever. Harry quickly wrote his name, crossing out the rest of the questions with EASE. Besides, they knew who he was already.

          Instead, cursive letters inked the paper — If you put me with someone annoying, I’ll make sure the trip is absolute hell. Ending the sentence with a thick period, annoyance festering as it usually did with life’s POINTLESS trifles.

                    The usual smug smirk dipped over his lips, carelessly turning the questionnaire in without a second thought.

so yeahhh, because my son is the way he is ... i filled it out for him bless up. why do i love harry bingham when i fucking hate him ?? idk fam, idk.

BASIC INFORMATION

FULL NAME: Harold Theodore Bingham PRONUNCIATION: H EH - r uh l d   th EE - uh - d aw r    b IH  ng-uh m   MEANING: estate ruler  /  army leader  REASONING: Harold was his great-grandfather’s name, while Theodore is is father’s name that’s been passed down for quite a while as either a first/middle kinda deal NICKNAME(S): Harry, Har ( though he doesn't like it  ) Bingham, Pretty Boy PREFERRED NAME(S): Harry, just Harry unless you want a punch or a mean remark bless BIRTH DATE: April 13th, 2001 AGE: 18 ZODIAC: Aries !! GENDER: Male PRONOUNS: He/Him ROMANTIC ORIENTATION: Heteroromantic SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Heterosexual NATIONALITY: American ETHNICITY: wonder bread

BACKGROUND

BIRTH PLACE: West Ham, CT HOMETOWN: West Ham, CT SOCIAL CLASS: Upper/Close to the 1% FATHER: Theodore Bingham † MOTHER: Karen Bingham SIBLING(S): Stacy Bingham ( 12 ) BIRTH ORDER: Harry, Stacy PET(S): In the Bingham household ?? Never. OTHER IMPORTANT RELATIVES: He’s surrounded by family, they usually always have at least two reunions a year. However he’s never felt close to them ?? So he’d never list their names here really. He’s only somewhat close to his immediate family. Though, he was close to his nanny growing up if that counts bless PREVIOUS RELATIONSHIPS: it’s a list of like ... relatively short lasting relationships, hookups, && one night stands, until his most recent, kelly, which is probably his longest lasting one ?? ARRESTS?: Technically, on record, none :). He’s definitely been caught like, trespassing, underage drinking, && drunk driving lbh ... but yeah, no record. i hate him. PRISON TIME?: N/A

OCCUPATION & INCOME

SOURCE OF INCOME: intern at parent’s company  /  his parents CONTENT WITH THEIR JOB (OR LACK THERE OF)?: he doesn’t really like it tbh, but it’s done his family well so after college he definitely plans to continue the legacy && make if flourish even more. PAST JOB(S): n/a SPENDING HABITS: *throws money in trash can* MOST VALUABLE POSSESSION: the gold ring with the bingham family insignia his father gave him when he turned 13 ( made him feel like he finally belonged you feel )  though he’d tell you it’s everything he owns ... i hate him

SKILLS & ABILITIES

TALENTS: bringing people together ( or apart ), lightening the mood ( or you know, fucking it up too ), banter, racing, fixing cars SHORTCOMINGS: oh honey — saying shit he doesn’t mean, his own arrogance, addictive personality, emotional invulnerability, aloof nature, shall i continue ?? LANGUAGE(S) SPOKEN: English, French, Italian DRIVE?: Hell yeah JUMP-STAR A CAR?: Yes CHANGE A FLAT TIRE?: Yes, but he’d rather pay someone to do it before ever doing it himself RIDE A BICYCLE?: nope catch me crying SWIM?: Yes PLAY AN INSTRUMENT?: Does learning the recorder in 3rd grade count ?? PLAY CHESS?: Yes BRAID HAIR?: Yes ( Stacy made him learn since he was the only one home most of the time ) TIE A TIE?: Yes, his father practically taught him that in the womb. PICK A LOCK?: nah. he’s more into the jump the fence, break some glass, make a fucking scene, kinda trespassing

PHYSICAL APPEARANCE & CHARACTERISTICS

FACE CLAIM: Alex Fitzalan EYE COLOR: dark brown, specks of gold in natural light HAIR COLOR: Chestnut Brown HAIR TYPE/STYLE: Curly && wavy, his hair texture kinda varies by each strand unless he properly styles it ... which he does when feeling okay GLASSES/CONTACTS?: No, but he definitely likes the aesthetic of glasses sometimes. Like bet money on his ivy interviews he wore glasses ... did i mention i hate harry bingham ?? DOMINANT HAND: Right HEIGHT: 5′10″ WEIGHT: 140/150ish lbs ??? BUILD: Slender Muscular EXERCISE HABITS: it’s rather irregular and depends heavily on his mood. if he’s in a good/okay mood then a few times a week. otherwise it’s hard to do much of anything, let alone work out you know. SKIN TONE: light with pink/tan undertones TATTOOS: none PIERCINGS: none MARKS/SCARS: small dark birth mark near his right, outer ankle. shoulders/back && cheeks tend to get rather freckly in the summer && he hates it. some random cuts && bruises from blacked out drunk/high escapades, the occasional hickey bye. NOTABLE FEATURES: dimples when he actually smiles, white af teeth, the hair™ USUAL EXPRESSION: either completely unamused or smirking tbh CLOTHING STYLE: designer, preppy — think polos, ironed pants, or cuffed skinny jeans, all paired with some boat shoes. sometimes when he’s not feeling so great he’ll wear a plain tee/hoodie JEWELRY: gold pinky ring ( mentioned above ), apple watch on occasion ALLERGIES: long haired cats BODY TEMPERATURE: runs hot 😏 DIET: no such thing, boy’s metabolism is fast, the lucky son of a bitch. PHYSICAL AILMENTS: N/A

PSYCHOLOGY

MORAL ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Neutral TEMPERAMENT: Choleric  /  Melancholic ELEMENT: Fire MENTAL CONDITIONS/DISORDERS: Anxiety, Depression, Toxic Masculinity 👀 SOCIABILITY: Moody™, but very social. Popular™. EMOTIONAL STABILITY: um ... he tries ?? it’s not good though, nope. PHOBIA(S): autophobia ( fear of being alone ),  atychiphobia ( fear of failure ) ADDICTION(S): coffee, opiods, alcohol, etc DRUG USE: yes please ALCOHOL USE: yes please PRONE TO VIOLENCE?: if provoked yes, or if he feels the need to protect/stand against something.

MANNERISMS

QUIRKS: easily annoyed, rolls his eyes a lot, has a comeback for almost everything ( even if it’s just a fuck you ) HOBBIES: cars, racing, sailing ( learned from his dad ),  HABITS: drinking, swearing, pills, drinks coffee every morning NERVOUS TICKS: furrowed brows, pacing/unable to stand still, hand twitching, squinting eyes DRIVES/MOTIVATIONS: Money, Perfectionism, doing the Bingham name justice FEARS: Being forgotten, Isolation, Losing the rest of his family/the few he cares about, Death, Fatal Illness POSITIVE TRAITS: Charming, Adventurous, Witty, Ambitious, Assertive, Protective NEGATIVE TRAITS: Moody, Enigmatic, Cocky, Prideful, Destructive, Sarcastic, Stubborn, Impatient SENSE OF HUMOR: sarcastic, dark DO THEY CURSE OFTEN?: he fucking literally fucking says fuck every fucking other fucking word :D CATCHPHRASE(S): fuck you cassandra, fuck off, fuck you, fuck me, fuck that, we’re playing fugitive tonight

FAVORITES

ACTIVITY: Racing  /  Sailing ANIMAL: Otters BEVERAGE: any && all alcohol™ ... or secretly strawberry hi-c don’t @ him. BOOK: never let me go by kazuo ishiguro CELEBRITY: Margot Robbie COLOR: Navy Blue && Dark Gray DESIGNER: Balenciaga && Ralph Lauren FOOD: loaded fries FLOWER: blue stars GEM: Sapphire/Diamond HOLIDAY: halloween MODE OF TRANSPORTATION: he has a lot of favorite cars, but his black maserati ( aka the fugitive car ) is probably his favorite. he also likes helicopters MOVIE: Fight Club, The Wolf on Wall Street, The Breakfast Club MUSICAL ARTIST: blackbear, Drake are two of his go-tos, though the list is long QUOTE/SAYING: “Just do it.” boy bye SCENERY: nothing like overlooking a long wooden dock into a bright blue lake surrounded by trees  SCENT: cedar, sandalwood — anything kinda woody/musky ?? bless. SPORT: golf SPORTS TEAM: his father always rooted for the yankees, so he roots for the yankees TELEVISION SHOW: Mad Men WEATHER: cloudy with just a bit of sun peaking through, bright blue sky — not too hot, not too cold. VACATION DESTINATION: anywhere near a body of water, though he’s particularly fond of lake como in italy cause there’s a bit of everything ?? mountains, the lake, beautiful architecture, etc :’)

ATTITUDES

GREATEST DREAM: living that ‘american dream’ baby GREATEST FEAR: peaking in high school, being forgotten/not wanted (yet you push people away boii water u doing ?!), being vulnerable ... again there’s a long fucking list MOST AT EASE WHEN: in a fast car, living that reckless™ lifestyle LEAST AT EASE WHEN: realizing what a dumbass he is && having to apologize for it BIGGEST ACHIEVEMENT: getting into brown && columbia off some actual merit && not just money wow BIGGEST REGRET: not really being there for his dad near the end bc that would mean being vulnerable && saying goodbye coming on this fucking trip MOST EMBARRASSING MOMENT: losing the student body president position to cassandra BIGGEST SECRET: which one you want honey ?? TOP PRIORITIES: for everything to stay the same  /  go back to the way it was  :) :( :) :(

#newhamhq: task #( * you say a lot of things you don't mean !! ) — headcanons. #task 001. #death mention tw #drug mention tw #depression tw

[foodloverforever0]

Escape room  Jikook

More than the light can hold

Escape room series: part 1

Description: When Jimin needs to pass a test to finally be able to work as a doctor, but what he didn't know what the horrible truth behind those walls of the BTS hospital for mentally ill criminals

Genre: mental hospital au, agnst with a happy ending, a lot of swearing, blood included, slightly Horror and if you're uncomfortable with violence I recommend not to read this

“The plastic eye is watching.” - Jeon Jungkook

masterlist

This was it. After a whole five years of studying, stress, no sleeping, and eating are finally coming to an end. Jimin was staring through the window, watching as the world around his was passing by.  Jimin had his head on the glass of the window thinking about everything that happened last three years of his life. He was one of the best. Perfect grades, understanding of the situations and he finished one of the hardest colleges of six to seven years in three years and this was the last test, and after this, he will finally be able to work and move out from the dorms he was currently in. His roommate wasn't the nicest guy, although he didn't see much from him, the guy would constantly bring someone home late at night for sex and sometimes even ask Jimin to get out of his own room. And of course, Jimin being Jimin actually said yes many times. But those times were over now! Jimin had an evil smile on his face as he looked forward.

"what's up with that face? It's kinda scaring me."

Jimin looked at his red-headed hyung who was driving, glancing at Jimin from time to time.

" O nothing hyung. I think that my excitement is finally kicking in."

Hoseok chucked at that." Yeah? Because working in the most dangerous mental hospital sounds so much fun, doesn't it now?" Hoseok said sarcastically while making his eyebrows rise higher than the moon.

"Hyung we already talked about this. I'm doing this for myself and it's going to be good to have a little experience before I actually start working." Hoseok let out a big sigh through his nose as he kept his eyes on the road.

"I just think they could have put you in another position. Did you even read about that place? There are the sickest, dangerous people you could find Jimine. Even the last therapist went mad in there. I just want you to be safe. Jimin looked at Hoseok with a small smile on his face. He could always depend on his hyung, no matter what was it about.

"You don't have to worry about me hyung. I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself. You just need to take care of Ms.snowpaw for me like you promised!" Hoseok smiled a little, nodding his head. “ At least that cat likes me. do you remember your devil cat? I swear he wanted to kill me in my sleep.” Jimin gasped. he put his right hand on his chest like he was out of breath.

“ How could you say that! Grumpy- I don't like anyone- the cat was just scared of you and besides he was a lovely cozy cat.” Hoseok looked at Jimin with a face that said ‘ we both know that is a lie’. “ A so, you want to tell me that it scratched me accidentally. fought with other cats, and broke everything accidentally” Jimin was ready to fire back, but the stopping of the car caught him off guard. Hoseok opened the door of the car and got out.

“ Come on. We need to take your stuff form the car.” Jimin looked at him before he got up himself and got out. The first thing he saw was the forest surrounding them. They lost signals on their phones a long time ago and the closest town was six hours away. Right before them was a path that leads to the building he was going to stay for a few months. Building most of the people were terrified of. ‘BTSMHFIC’ standing for Biological testing system mental hospital for ill criminals. It looked like any other hospital, but then there was a big brick wall all around the place, with a lot of sings that said ‘ DANGEROUS NO TRESPASSING’, ‘PRIVATE LAND’, ‘STAY OUT’ and more. Even after the wall, there was a big electrical fence. Jimin felt a hand on his shoulder bringing him back to reality. Hoseok looked at him with a worried look and Jimin hugged him. They let go of each other after two minutes still holding onto each other's hands.

“Are you sure you want to do this Chim? You know she couldn't force you right?” Jimin looked at Hoseok’s eyes, putting his hands onto his cheeks.” I'm sure and don't worry I'm doing this for myself, nobody else.” Hoseok nodded.” You better send me letters every week or ill come here and kick your poor ass.” Jimin chuckled. “ Now wouldn't that be a sad death of my ass?”

Jimin wawed one last time as he watched Hoseok’s car disappear in the forest. Jimin took a hold of his suitcase. With a deep breath, he started walking towards the building. When he was close enough a guard asked who he was. Jimin showed his ID card and documents that he was here for education matters. After the guard let him in Jimin walked through a path where there were two fence boxes. On the left were held, girls. Some of them were just sitting talking with each other, others were in the corner by themselves and some were laughing without a reason running in circles. On the right were boys. Most of them played basketball, but there was some standing in groups smoking. The one that caught Jimin's eyes was a guy who was sitting at the biggest table, alone reading a book. Like no one dared to sit next to him. The guy probably left that someone was watching him as he moved his eye’s from his book to make eye contact with Jimin. Jimin felt his whole body shiver from the guy’s stare. It was so cold, intimidating, and his whole aura said dangerously. Jimin sure did feel unconformable so he turned his head down, rather look at his feet than anywhere else. Jimin kept moving forward as he can still feel the guy’s eye’s on him. He was looking at him like Jimin was some kind of a pray and he was the hunter. A big bell on the wall started ringing, the doors for the inside opened, boys and girls started getting in. Jimin looked at them. They all looked normal, well mostly. For some of them, you couldn't even say if they ever did something wrong. It was kinda sad, looking at them all like this. Most of them probably won't see anything else but the same walls, prison, and torture for the rest of their lives.

" It's sad, isn't it? But we're trying to help them get better." Jimin looked at the owner of the voice. It was a man in his late forties, he was taller than Jimin with a little bear and bushy eyebrows. He looked at Jimin with a smile on his face finishing his sentence. " At any cost."

Mr. Kang was one of the best doctors in the world. He won first places for the category six times and he's in the council where are only the best scientists So, of course, Jimin was surprised when Mr. Kang himself decided to show him around. " Jimin is everything alright?" Mr. Kang had a slightly worried look on his face, probably because Jimin zoned out for a while.” Everything is perfectly fine sir, excuse me because of my behavior, I zoned out for a minute there.” Mr. Kang smiled at Jimin again. “ You must be tired, right? You had a long trip. I'll go fetch one of my boys to show you your room. We can talk about your cases tomorrow.” “ Cases? I thought -” Jimin turned to look at Mr. Kang but he was already walking down the hallway. Jimin waited for five minutes when he suddenly heard a scream. It sounded like a male and it was definitely a scream of pain and fear. Jimin looked at the opposite hallways from where Mr. Kang went. “Bitch!” One guard came running down the hallway, he probably heard the scream like Jimin. He stood by the doors where the scream came from. “What happened? Did she bite you again?” Then came the second guard, probably the one that screamed. He had an angry, painful look on his face. “This time she stabbed me in the leg. With. A. Fucking. Fork.” It was true. On his right leg, you could see a fork sticking out of it. the stab was right above his knee. “ I bet you tried to have some fun, that's why she stabbed you, like every single time before Hwan.” the guy named Hwan mad an irritated look as he stepped out of the room. “ If you ask me she should be learned some manners, or be treated like an animal, not like she does not act like one.” When Hwan stepped out of the room you could see the ‘she’ they were talking about. She was pushing against Hwan with every move he did. Hwan was holding her right arm, so when the second guard got a hold of her left arm she finally calmed down a little. In the middle of those two guards she looked so small and breakable Jimin couldn't believe that she was actually the one to stab Hwan. They started walking towards Jimin, probably to get her to her cell when she started to fight again. She was constantly looking behind herself like she was looking for something or someone. Hwan slapped her, right across her right cheek. She didn't flinch or react. She just let her head hang down low. And Jimin asked himself ‘was it really necessary to hit her?“ ‘What kind of treatment is this?’ Stop being such a pain in the ass, your really starting to get on my nerves you little slut.” Hwan pushed forward and this time she didn't fight back, she just kept on walking, her head still hung low. When they passed Jimin guards nodded at him, as a silent ‘hello’, Jimin doing the same but he didn't pay them much time as his attention moved on the girl. He couldn't exactly see her face because it was cover with her obviously dirty dyed blonde hair. Her dark brown roots were showing so Jimin guessed she didn't dye her hair for a while. Her hair was reaching her shoulders, just enough for Jimin not to even see a tiny bit of her face. Her clothes were dirty and even too big on her small frame. Jimin kept his eyes on them as they moved through the hallway. “ Excuse me.” Jimin turned his head. “Mr, Kang told me to show you your room.” The guy was taller than Jimin, he wore a white coat and he had round glasses, maybe too big for him but it looked good. But the first thing you could notice about him was his bright red hair and a big boxy smile on his face. “ My name is Kim Taehyung, a doctor in children psychology and your roommate.”

First thing Jimin noticed was that Taehyung was a big goofball. He was open minded and would say something without thinking. Taehyung was actually younger than Jimin by a year and a second the younger heard that he started calling him hyung, not that Jimin minded. Taehyung showed Jimin around and they hung out for the rest of the day. Jimin got to see where Taehyung works with kids, and all of them actually were nice. And Jimin asked himself what have they done to be in a place like this? After that Taehyung showed him Where he was going to work, but they could go there so Jimin was just in the hallway. Around 11 pm they finally ended up in front of their dorm. “ So this is our place. There are three bathrooms if one of the family members visits, but I think no one would come here.” Taehyung laughed at his own sentence. Jimin looked around. You could see someone was already leaving here. It wasn't very colorful but there were a lot of plants and pictures o the walls. Jimin walked next to Taehyung who was putting his bag and papers on the table, taking a deep breath before he mumbled a soft ‘ home sweet home I guess’. Taehyung sat on the couch, taking his laptop, typing what happened with the kids throughout the day. Jimin sat next to him taking his own laptop into his lap. Putting his fingers on the keyboard to start typing away, but for some odd reason, he didn't know what to write. Instead, he looked at Taehyung who was deep into reading something on his own laptop. “ How long have you worked here Taehyung?” Taehyung looked at Jimin, slightly surprised not expecting the question. “ Is going to be four years almost.” He put a hand on his chin like he was thinking about the same thing. “ Your pretty young. How’d you get the job so young?” Taehuyung closed his laptop taking a remote and turning on the TV. After he let a random movie in the background he moved his eyes to Jimin’s. “ My parents knew Mr. Kang, like childhood friends or something. They died in an accident when I was seven.” Jimin looked at Taehyung with a surprised look that soon turned into a sad one. “ O  Taehyung.” Taehyung interrupted Jimin with a smile on his face.” No, it’s ok you were just curious. Anybody would be and besides, I don't remember my parents really, and what I do remember, let's just say it's not the nicest. When they died Mr. Kang took me in. Showed me love and affection I never had.......except.” Jimin tiled his head to the side. “ Except what?” Taehyung smiled his big boxy smile as he stood up.”That's a story for another time. God, I fell like death. I'll go to bed first. You should go too soon you have a big day tomorrow.” Jimin waved at him, letting out a sigh. He closed his eyes as he leaned on the couch. rolling his head. ‘Tommoeow is a big day.’

Jimin woke up the next day alone in the dorm. Taehyung left him a note saying he had an early appointment with kids. and he didn't forget to draw a little smiley in the corner of the note. Jimin smiled, Taehyung seemed like a good kid, it was a shame he was stuck here. Jimin ate, took a quick shower, dressed and was just ready in time to meed Mr. Kang. walking through the halls of the hospital wasn't very pleasant. For six in the morning, it was very loud. Especially when Jimin crossed the hall that led to cells, you could hear screaming, things breaking, hysterical laughing and guards ordering everyone to quiet down. Jimin walked to Mr. Kang office, knicking as he heard a ‘come in!’ Jimin opened the doors of the little office. Going in to take his paper cases. Mr. Kang was sitting at his desk reading something in front of him. He looked up to look at Jimin and smiled, Jimin doing the same.”Jimin come in, today is your first day. Are you excited?” Jimin looked at the dack form Mr. Kang seeing his cases.”More like nervous sir.” Mr. Kang laughed relaxing Jimin a little. You have nothing to worry about. Everyone is nervous on their first day. here take his four folders.” Mr. Kang said as he handed Jimin the folders.” I know it seems much for a student like you, but your school really wanted to test your abilities for this. Not many people passed their college in three years like you Jimin.” Jimin kelp his eyes on the folders, listening to Mr. Kang.” Your fists case starts now, with a number W654pL. Everything you need to know about his is in the folders. On the front page says witch floor and room.” Jimin was opening his mouth ready to ask his questions but was interrupted when Mr. Kang’s phone started ringing. He took his phone and answered the call before his eyes moved back to Jimin. “ Don't worry everything's going to be ok. And if you have any questions for number X09 You can ask Taehyung, He knows everything about him.” Jimin was ready to speak again but Mr. Kang started talking with whoever on the phone, so Jimin excused Himself and left the office. Jimin looked at the office door on last time before he turned around. ‘What did Taehyung know about a patient in the adult section? Didn't he work just with kids? Jimin was going to ask the younger later, for now, he had other worries. He looked at the file. ‘ W654pL “. God, it sounded so wrong saying it. Don't they save their names? Because Jimin sure did hope he doesn't need to call his patients like numbers. Numbers always change, in the age, year, month, week, day, hour, minute, second, it always changes. But people don't change, they just fade away, forever. So every single person wants to live the best life they could have. That's why they help people like this, but that doesn't mean they're better or more precious. And it especially means that they shouldn't treat them like animals. Jimin didn't forget how that guard Hwan hit the poor girl and now this? Jimin made a mental note to talk to Mr. Kang about this as he stood in front of the door he was supposed to get in. There was one door on the right side, it had a sign saying ‘ W654pL’ and it ad a removable hole on the ground, probably for food. And the left door said ‘ watcher’ which send shivers down Jimin’s spine. Jimin opened the doors getting inside of the room his going to call his workplace. The room was small, in the middle of the room was one half of the table and a chair. The table connected to the wall that was so black that Jimin could see his reflection on it. Jimin knew how this worked, last night before he went to sleep he red all about the system here. When you have a talk with your patient you are not in the same room. The glass that separates patient’s room and a therapist’s room, only that looks like its connecting them is the table, one half is on Jimin’s side and the other half is in the patient's room. It said it was for therapist’s safety better not to be in the same room, because of the previous events, but Jimin still found it a little cruel. There are special buttons, for special lights. one that is working right now and Jimin and the patient can’t see each other, two where only Jimin can see the patient and three where the therapist and the patient can see each other. Jimin sat at the table taking a deep breathe before he pushed the button for third lights. and at that moment Jimin was able to see the other side. There was a bed in the corner, not in the best condition. He could he the bathroom doors right next to the bed, and there were some shelves with books on the side. But there were no windows or any sign of natural light. Which made Jimin a little sad and mad. Everyone was treating these people like some animals, no it was even worse. They were treating them like they were some kind of monsters, and Jimin wasn't very fond of it. He Finally looked at where was supposed to be the other end of the table, but there was already sitting a person, he was looking directly at Jimin’s eyes like he knew where and when he was going to be there. Jimin took a better look at his face and then he realized.

  It was the same guy who stared at him when he came here.

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aaa finally the first part is over. I hope you all enjoy and the next part will be out soon, at least I hope, depending on my mood and laziness.

#jikook #taegi #mental hospital #namjoon x oc #bts #jungkook #jimin #taehyung #yoongi #namjoon #hoseok #seokjin

[itstandsforthesun]

A little life review//spoilers

Two disclaimers before I start this. First, I have never written a review before from either fear or pure laziness, so take me easy on this one (also English is only my second language). Second, this is my opinion, if you loved this book then cheers to you. At the end of the day you got a new favorite book and all I got is the sweet taste of indecision.

With that being said, let’s start. I didn’t hate this book, I didn’t love it even though I enjoyed a big part of it. Do I feel like it has the potential of becoming a new classic? Absolutely not. But let’s start with the beginning, the writing style. I don’t usually pay too much attention to this unless it is extremely good, but this time there were a couple of aspects that were nagging at me. It seemed really try-hard. Try-hard to sound deep, try-hard to sound poetic, try-hard to sound pretentious (that The Secret History good pretentious). The descriptions were at times way too long and unnecessary just like the phrases themselves. A sentence could go on for 5 lines and by the time you got to the end you were filled with so much information that you didn’t even know what was important to the scene at hand and what not.

I’m not saying that the writing style was complete rubbish, it had its charm at times and there were also a lot of quotes that I enjoyed throughout the book, some beautiful descriptions, but even those were spoiled from time to time with sentences that were just too long.

Now that we got the writing style out of the way, let’s move on to the plot. In this book’s case, there’s not much of it. Not that it bothered me, it reminded me of The Goldfinch, a book I loved. The main difference between this book and The Goldfinch though is that the length is not justified. A Little Life could have easily lost at least 200 pages and it would not have made a difference.  The plot got repetitive and to be honest quite tiring. I remember the joy with which I started this book, so curious to find out more about our mysterious Jude and then I remember my only thought approaching the end: “Is this over yet?”

The book was simply too long in my opinion and it had little to nothing on which I could get hooked. I was curious for the end, but not that curious. I knew there was going to be death, it was expected, but I will admit that I was not expecting the actual death count.

And speaking about death, let’s get to the characters, shall we? A Little Life was advertised as a novel about friendship that followed the lives of 4 ex-college roommates through the years. And while that’s true to some extent, more often than not we seem to be concentrating on only one of these 4, Jude St. Francis. And don’t get me wrong, I do get it. Jude is the one with the most baggage, with the most interesting life and back-story, but if that’s the case, at least tell us from the beginning that this is a story about Jude! Don’t advertise JB, Malcom and Willem as main characters when they are not really, not when you know who you really want to write about.

I’ll express my opinion on each of these characters individually now and I’m going to be starting with Malcom since he is the most neglected out of the 4. I get very angry when I think about Malcom and his “character development” throughout this book or the lack of it. We get this dude’s POV once in a 720 pages book! And he is called a main character! A main fucking character! And what’s even worse, when we see him, the only time we really see him, he is filled with indecision, about his future, about his job, about his sexuality, about living with his parents. You want to tell me that these things are not interesting enough to follow, to see how a character gets out of his own head and decides for himself what his own life is going to be? After his short POV in the beginning of the book (which also seemed a little like a cheap anticipation of Jude’s part of the story, like starting with these 3 not so important characters to get them out of the way) we never really find out how he solved all of his problems. We get mentions of him getting a new job, one that he is actually proud of, finding a girlfriend who also becomes his wife later on and moving out of his parent’s house. But we never get his thought process, what made him take attitude in the first place, how he figured out his sexuality. Malcom’s whole character comes off as lazy writing. The author didn’t seem to care enough about Malcom to give him a proper story. Why make him a main character then? Malcom in my opinion had a lot of potential as a character, his constant indecision, still present in the story even without his POV, would have offered great literary material, a great conversation starter on the indecisiveness of people. But no, Malcom had to be resumed to an episodical character who was more often mentioned than present only to feed into the book’s theme of friendship. We could also consider Malcom as an instrument in establishing the theme of loss also present in this book. Malcom was killed off along with Willem and Sophie (a character who spoke a total of 0 words in the entire book) for a purpose unknown to me. Let’s say Willem and Sophie died and Malcom lived, wouldn’t that have offered him an opportunity to be seen by us, really seen, again? The death of the two could have been followed by Malcom’s point of view along side Jude’s. The author could have used it as an introspection into Malcom’s life and all it represented up to this moment. His character could have been redeemed and we would have also gotten an emotional roller coaster that would have brought us to tears. This would have saved the character of Malcom for me and it would also have brought him justice. In the end, Malcom was just a wasted opportunity for me.

The next “main character” that I’m going to bring up is JB. In no way as neglected as Malcom, but also not getting as much screen time as Willem or Jude, JB is a pretty interesting character. Selfish, self-centered, “always politically correct” and susceptible to bad habits, JB seems to be anything but a hero. That’s what makes him fascinating to watch, he goes from incidents like making fun of Jude’s walk to painting his friends in magnificent lively colors. We get to explore both his admiration for his own person and his hatred. JB is a complex character, not necessary my favorite personality wise, but definitely my favorite building and development wise.

Moving on to Willem, the character that gets screen time because he is the love of our main character’s life. Maybe that was slightly exaggerated, but we’ve all been thinking it. Willem is a very likeable character, in the beginning he was actually my favorite, I’m not sure what happened along the way. It was probably the fact that the story was dragged out so much that I lost interest in most things. I thought Willem was a very kind soul who truly loved helping people and more importantly his friends. I prayed until the very last moment that the relationship with Jude would not happen though. On one hand it was because it was too predictable, I would have loved to see a pure friend love story since we don’t get much of those if any. Second of all, back to the point of friendship, this was advertised as a story about 4 friends, not about 2 friends who fall in love with each other and then 2 others who are only half relevant. I wanted to be surprised by a story in which nobody fell in love with their best friend, where the kind friend always took special care of his best friend because that’s who he was, not because subconsciously he always wanted to kiss him and hold his hand. I still liked Willem as a character, maybe he wasn’t as layered as I would have wanted him to be and maybe he was frustrating at times (who takes 30 years to talk to their BELOVED BEST FRIEND about their self-harm?), but he was a well-rounded character in the end. With that being said, I think his death was a magnificent writing decision. It was a brutal, come out of nowhere death and it spiced the plot up. Unlike Sophie’s and Malcom’s deaths, Willem’s was completely justified in my opinion. It gave Jude a new challenge, it broke the repetitive pattern and stirred our curiosity about what was going to happen next. Even though I do not agree with the actual ending of the book I still believe that the events leading up to it were a good choice.

And now to the character we’ve all been waiting for, Jude. Listen, as everyone else I was really exited about Jude, I was counting the pages left until his POV, he intrigued me. There were lots of aspects that I liked about his character. His mental illness (yes, Andy, he was in fact mentally ill) was decently portrayed, I could relate to his mental process concerning self-harm and he definitely struck a cord with me. With that being said, his story could have been shorter and it could have left more space for other characters (*cough* Malcom *cough*). Jude’s story contained a repetitive pattern that had been dragged out for far too long ending in a predictable conclusion. Let’s start with the beginning, the back-story, the thing that we all wanted to find out about. I’m going to critic it’s credibility in just a second, but first I just want to say that the author’s attempt at building suspense completely flopped on me. The way she tried to spread the back-story all throughout the book did not keep me on my toes, it only annoyed and bored me, I couldn’t wait to get it out of the way once and for all.

Now, let’s say the monastery made sense, even Brother Luke made sense, but everything that followed was total bullshit. Is this boy just a magnet for abuse? Do abusers just sense him from 5 miles away or what? I’m not trying to seem insensible, but for real now! And how come every single person he meets is both a pedophile and interested in guys? I refuse to believe that every single counselor at that home and every truck driver is gay. What’s the actual probability of that being the case? I mean does nobody like vagina or what? The back-story is clearly exaggerated, but I guess that it does make Jude’s learning to trust people again more remarkable. I did enjoy the relationships he built for himself after everything that happened to him (except the one with Caleb of course) and I admired the courage it took him to trust Andy with his body, Harold with his fear of belonging to someone and Willem with his love and life. But in the end it was all for nothing, Jude still kills himself, all his progress is flashed down the toilet and you are left wandering what was it all for. I’m not saying all endings should be happy endings, damn, I love me a good sad ending, but making Jude’s suicide in the end come out as ok and acceptable just doesn’t send a good message, that he had nothing left to live for when he still got his goddamn parents who loved him more than anything else. Suicide should never be portrayed as something ok to do, something justifiable. Yes, Willem’s death was heart breaking for Jude, even more than that, it wrecked him all over again, but I really thought that this death would be used as an opportunity for Jude to get better, to show that you can get through anything. I get that life isn’t like that, I get that in real life suicide would probably be the actual thing a person would choose most of the time (hell, I don’t know what I would do if faced with this situation), I am not judging Jude, I am not condemning him, I’m just saying that there could have been a better ending. The least that could have been done was to still try to give it a positive note, Harold to remark that even though he understands why Jude did it and that he still loves him, there were alternatives, there was still a chance for him to be at peace with the world without dying.

All and all, I enjoyed A Little Life most of the times and I do not regret reading it even though it made me very angry at times. It is still a book I recommend, but I recommend reading it with a critical eye. 

#alittlelife #bookreview #firstreview #hanya yanagihara #reader #booklover

[eightmakar]

English Boy | Two

(College!Harrison Osterfield AU)

Teaser | One

Summary: Studying with a cute boy is hard

Word Count: 1.3k

Warnings: the beginnings of smut

(a/n: school sux im sorry this took ten years but enjoy!! tag list is open so send me an ask!)

can you help me study this weekend? i have a test on monday and I wanna make sure I’m good

sure! can I bring my Macbeth essay for you to proof?

definitely! if you come over to mine ill get pizza?

i never pass up free pizza! what time?

1:00 Saturday?

sounds good, see you then!

“That sounds an awful lot like a date,” your best friend said when you told her about your study session with Harrison.

You rolled your eyes. “Every meeting with a boy sounds like a date to you.”

“Okay, but you said this Harrison guy was really cute, so cute boy plus pizza plus “studying” at his place equals a date. I’m not a math major, but that’s some pretty solid math.”

You sighed. “Look, I need to pass both my English lit classes, so if your girl has to do some sexy stuff to get his help, you bet I’ll do it. And I wouldn’t complain if he insisted on thanking me for being a brilliant math teacher.”

Your best friend laughed. “Wouldn’t that be something. Fucking a cute English major to get better grades. Maybe I should get a tutor. It sounds like the university is playing matchmaker.”

“But babe,” you teased with a smirk. “You’ve already fucked 90% of the guys in the school!”

She pursed her lips. “It’s actually only 75%, thank you very much.”

You stuck your tongue out at her. She knew you could care less who she slept with as long as she was safe, and she had a good sense of humor about it.

But sleep with Harrison? You hadn’t really thought about it. Yet, that is. He was stunningly attractive, but he was also incredibly intelligent, and you loved that about him. You’d slept with guys before, sure, but it had been a long time since you felt an emotional, intellectual attraction to someone. You liked the way Harrison thought; he was analytical but not like you were. He didn’t look for formulas and patterns and numbers, he looked for meaning, which excited you, but also was quite intimidating.

Saturday came around and you drove yourself to Harrison’s apartment. You were nervous. You kept telling yourself that you and Harrison were just studying and that was it, but ever since your best friend had mentioned fucking Harrison, you couldn’t get the images out of your mind.

Harrison on his knees in front of you, his hair and blue eyes between your legs. Being on your knees in front of Harrison, staring up at him. Him hovering over you, fingers dancing against your skin. You shook the images out of your head the best you could as you knocked on his apartment door.

Another boy who was not Harrison but was still incredibly attractive opened the door. “Hey, you must be (Y/N)!” he greeted cheerily.

“Yeah! Is, uh, is Harrison home?”

“Yep, he’s getting out of the shower right now. I’m Tom, Harrison’s roommate.” He stuck his hand out and you shook it. “C’mon in!”

You walked in and took the place in. It was light and warm and comforting. You loved it.

“You guys have such a nice place!” You called as Tom scurried to a bedroom.

“Thanks, I decorated it myself,” Harrison’s voice said. You turned and there he stood, gray t shirt clinging deliciously to his arms, athletic shorts low on his hips, his hair still wet, and barefoot.

“Oh,” you said softly. You mentally slapped yourself for your reaction. You weren’t expecting Harrison to look so damn good in basic clothes.

“Oh to you too,” he said with a chuckle. “Pizza’ll be here in like 45 minutes.”

You cleared your throat and diverted your eyes from Harrison. “Good, I’m starving!”

You stood awkwardly until Harrison said, “You don’t have to stand the whole time, (Y/N). You can sit.”

You laughed nervously before sitting down on his couch. You dug your fingernails into your palm, trying to refocus yourself. “Sorry, I’m a little off today. What’s your test on?”

Harrison sat down next to you. You could feel the heat from his body radiating toward you. “Derivatives and their applications. Here, my teacher gave me a study guide.” He handed you a crisp piece of paper loaded with terms, definitions, and formulas.

“Okay, so should we just start from the beginning?” You offered. You reached for your backpack and produced your notebook. You preferred to write things down, especially when showing him math problems.

“Sounds like the best place to start,” Harrison said. He smiled softly at you and your heart pounded. You breathed deeply, then began to draw a graph.

Thank God for numbers. Harrison was much less distracting when you were thinking of numbers and how they interact with each other. They were clear cut, with rules that they followed, equations they were governed by. No emotions or feelings involved.

Or so you thought.

You were explaining the second derivative test to Harrison when his hand snuck its way onto your thigh. Your words stumbled a bit, but you continued to draw out your sign chart to determine if the graph was concave up or down.

He scooted over closer to you. He sat sideways on the couch, facing you, while you sat the correct way, facing the television in front of you. He leaned down and placed a soft kiss on your bicep, and you froze.

“Harrison? What are you doing?” You asked. Surprise made your voice sound angry, and Harrison looked scared.

“Fuck, you’re not into me,” he said, scooting back. “Oh, fuck, I’m so sorry, I’m such an asshole. I’ve ruined it now.”

“Oh,” you said. Your face felt furiously hot. “Oh, oh no, Harrison, I’m very much into you. I just wasn’t expecting that. I, uh, get really wrapped up in math.”

His eyes widened and his face brightened. “Seriously? You’re not saying that because you feel bad, right?”

“Oh, not at all,” you squeaked in disbelief. “I think you’re extremely attractive. I just about fell over when you came out of the bathroom.”

“Thank fuck,” Harrison said. He then leaned over, gently grabbed your face, and kissed you.

You shoved your notebook out of your lap and clambered into his lap, keeping your lips on his. His hands slid down your body and landed on your ass. You silently thanked your best friend for insisting you wear jeans that made you ass look incredible.

Your hands trailed over his chest, tugging on the fabric. He reached his arms over his head and allowed you to pull his gray t-shirt over his smooth body. You threw it behind him, mouth immediately finding his collarbones. You ground your body down on his, feeling his cock start to harden beneath you. It brushed against your core and you moaned into his skin.

He returned the favor, tugging your shirt over your head to reveal your lacy black bra. You grabbed his hands and moved them to grab your breasts. He took the hint and began to massage them. He groaned at the feeling of them in his large hands.

“You’re gorgeous,” he mumbled, kissing the swell of your breasts.

“You’re not too shabby yourself,” you giggled back, dragging your hand through his hair. You softly scratched at his scalp while he touched you.

“I guess I’ll take that,” he said with a chuckle.

Suddenly, Tom’s door opened. “Hey, H,” he called. “Pizza’s here, I just got the text.”

You and Harrison froze. Tom emerged from his room to see you straddling Harrison. Thankfully, all he did was laugh.

“Alright, H, I see ya. I’ll take my pizza and I’ll get outta here,” Tom chuckled.

Your face felt hot and you buried it into Harrison’s shoulder. “God,” you whispered to him.

“I’ve caught Tom in much worse situations,” he whispered back. “One time I caught him mid-blowjob. The poor girl giving it to him ran out crying.”

You laughed into his skin, suddenly feeling much better about your reaction.

Tags:

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[ikesenhell]

Deep Waters

You can find all other IkeSen works of mine here. NOTE: A conversation with @a-shout-to-the-void very pointedly inspired me; she made a statement about how Shingen is like an elder brother that you need to push in a pool, and, well... yes. Agreed. So here we go. There’s very lightly implied family abuse, and a lot of sickness/illness related content.

He’d always stood out one way or another. In middle school, he’d been talkative and charming in a way all the other boys weren’t, discovering girls long before his peers got the idea to be kind to them. High school, he grew taller than everyone else so quickly that one day, all of his pants were shorts. Typical Shingen: always making himself the center of attention, whether he asked for it or not. 

“You can stop showboating, you know.” Yukimura groused around a bottle of hard cider. They lounged at the poolside, languishing like snakes in the shade. Ripples of heat shimmered on the concrete, but none of them had thought to bring swimsuits. It was one of those lazy summer days, the last one before they all went to college, and she paced around the length of the pool, dipping her feet in as she walked. 

“Showboating. Me?” Shingen grinned at his friend, finishing up an Instagram post. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you mean, Yuki.”

“The way you’re posing for photos.”

The redhead opened his eyes in mock surprise. “Me? Posing? No, Yuki. I’m simply presenting my best side for the ladies who’ve so graced me by glancing at my page.”

“Allow me to translate.” Sasuke cleared his throat, his transition glasses dark as he sipped on his root beer. He hadn’t said as much, but they all got that he wanted to save his first drink until it was legal. “You know I--as the one and only Shingen Takeda--had to do it to ‘em.”

Kenshin swatted at his friend with his fan. “It’s too hot for your tomfoolery, Shingen. It’ll be your fault if Sasuke breaks out more memes.”

“Tough crowd.” But Shingen was utterly unphased. Instead he rose and stretched, joining her at the edge of the pool and wrapping an arm over her shoulder. 

“Shingen,” she whined. “It’s too hot for that.”

She knew a half-second before that he was taking the chance. A sly grin rising to his lips, he calmly answered, “I’m sorry. Do I need to leave so you can cool off?”

Just as calmly, she took a handful of his shirt and shoved him into the pool. 

“Shit!” Yukimura sprung backward to preserve his phone. The wave slapped the glasses straight off Sasuke’s face and sprayed Kenshin, who glared between dripping strands of hair. But Shingen surfaced grinning.

“You’re lucky my phone is waterproof.” He set it on the poolside anyway. “You wound me. My confidence was betrayed. That means this is war.”

“If you think you can pull the same trick on me, then you’re wrong.”

“I wasn’t thinking that.” Shingen trudged from the water, wringing out his shirt fruitlessly before casting it aside altogether. It was so, so hard to think of Shingen as the middle schooler she’d known when she could see the hard ridges of muscle laid out before her. Maybe it was his flirty nature. Maybe it was that he’d cared for himself for the last few years, bouncing between Kenshin, Yuki, and Sasuke’s couches rather than return home to his bad home life. Still, she held fast, backing up as he advanced. “Yuki?”

“Oh no you don’t!”

It was too late. Yuki tackled her from behind, Shingen barreling into the two of them, and they all three went flying into the deep end of the pool. She surfaced in Shingen’s arms, swatting him around the shoulders. 

“You ass!”

“Agreed.” Kenshin sourly rubbed back his hair, eyes like a death laser on the redhead. “You got me soaked.”

“Don’t look at me like that.” Shingen propped her between the two of them. Not that she did much good as a shield; he was broader than her in every possible way. “And you can’t be mean to the Princess, here. Look at this Goddess’ face.”

“Don’t bring me into this!”

“Well.” Sasuke sighed and set his glasses down on the pool table. “I suppose that means that this is war for us, too, Kenshin.”

“It most certainly is.” 

“Bring it on, you fucks!” Yuki brandished a pool noodle at them, slapping it ineffectively as Sasuke dove in.

Sophomore year of college. Her cell phone rang while she lingered in her dorm. It was Sasuke, so she picked up.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Hello. Have you seen Shingen lately?”

Shingen? She was the only one that went to college with him. They shared Art History together, but he hadn’t been in a week, which was strange. He usually sailed in and snagged the seat by her, winking at the other women and text-flirting on tinder through the whole thing. “No. He didn’t answer my texts, either. He sick or something?”

“That’s why I was asking. He’s still posting on Instagram.”

Of course he was. She put Sasuke on mute and checked the app. Sure enough, he was posting all kinds of selfies, but... “Aren’t these from like, last year?”

“And he’s passing them off as from now? Yes. That’s why I called to ask.”

Huh. Well, his dorm was only two floors down. She shrugged. “I’ll go down and check, though if Yuki hasn’t already shown up to shake him, then I don’t know what world I’ve wandered in to.”

She knocked on the door and his roommate answered--a lean guy who played on the soccer team. For the life of her, she couldn’t remember his name. “Hey. Shingen there?”

The roommate just cocked his brow. “Nah. I thought he went off to stay the night at some girl’s house or something. You haven’t heard from him?”

“No. When’d he go missing?” 

“Like... last Friday?”

Four days ago. Brain spinning, she texted Yuki, Kenshin, and Sasuke a simple I can’t find him.

Shingen sailed into Art History on Thursday, taking the seat by her with all his characteristic dramatic flair. 

“Seat taken, little Goddess?”

She just glared at him from under her eyebrows. “Th’fuck have you been? We’ve all been worried as fuck.”

“I noticed.” His smile was quiet and muted, which boded ill. Waving his phone at her, he continued. “Sorry. I was a bit caught up. You know how it is.”

“I don’t know. Do I? You gonna scare us like that again?”

For the briefest second she caught a hint of something like worry in his expression. It was the fleeting honesty of a man feeling trapped. Just as quickly, he grinned at her. “I don’t know. Do I get rewarded if I don’t?”

“Yeah, by Yuki and I not beating the fuck out of you.”

He just winked at her. Against her wishes, her stupid heart thumped heavy in response. 

Next month he went missing again. This time, Sasuke was ready for it. 

“Alright.” The connection in the dorms wasn’t great, but the video chat held nonetheless. Sasuke shoved his glasses up his nose and resumed typing. “I’ll just switch on the tracker and you can go hunt him down.”

“Isn’t that like... spying?”

“No,” Kenshin snapped on the other line, not caring enough to keep himself properly in video frame. It looked like he was cleaning his knife collection. “It’s aggressive measures to make sure he doesn’t do something stupid.”

“I mean, Shingen does tons of stupid shit,” Yuki groused. “Anyway, is it turned on, Sasuke?”

“Yes. Let me just remote into her computer and upload the app.”

She followed the location downtown, navigating the patchwork maze of streets. The fall air was chilly now. Leaves skittered around her ankles as she rounded the corner to the last stop and--

Came face to face with the hospital. 

No way. This had to be a mistake. She checked the tracker twice, wracking her brain. Shingen seemed fine when he came to class. His color was good, he sounded fine... maybe it was a mental health issue? Her anxiety surged. Taking a stabilizing breath, she walked for the door--only to bump into the man himself. 

“Shingen?”

He faltered, staring at her as if she’d dropped from the sky. It was the first time she’d taken him by surprise in years, probably. Just as quickly, he composed himself. “Oh, if a Goddess herself didn’t come to walk with me. Was it fate that you arrived here?”

“What are you doing at the hospital?”

“Me? Visiting family.” Calm as could be, he tucked his hand in his pants pocket and looped an arm through hers. “Aunt. She’s in hospice.”

“I didn’t know you talked to any of your family anymore.” He smelled nice. The blend of crisp wind, his grey wool coat, the lingering aroma of his shampoo, and a distant campfire swirled together all at once. “I thought you’d been out of contact for years.”

“Ah, my aunt isn’t bad.” Shingen didn’t elaborate. “But anyway, she wanted someone to keep her company for a while, so I came and stayed a bit, went to her house and babysat her parakeets. You know.”

It did sound like Shingen to disappear in the name of helping someone. “Couldn’t you have--you know--let us know rather than worrying us all?”

“You know Yuki. He’d want to leap to my defense, tell me to stop seeing family members and all that.” A pause. “Princess--would you promise me something?”

“What’s that?”

And he turned to face her. All the charming glitter in his eyes was gone. Shingen was rarely serious--and when he was, it was never good. “Can you promise me not to tell the others about this?”

“What?” What was going on? “Shingen, why the hell would they care?”

“I just don’t want to hear about it. Please. Tell them anything. Just don’t tell them about this whole thing.” He paused. “Tell them you found me at some girl’s house.”

“Like that one time we couldn’t find you around Halloween, and Yuki went looking and walked in on you banging some chick on the couch?”

Shingen snickered and winked at her. “That’s the spirit.”

“I can’t just lie to them.”

“Why not? Kenshin will accept it. Yuki will accept it. Sasuke might not, but he also won’t press it, and he’s too far away to do his typical ninja act. Just--I just don’t want to rehash the same old conversation with Yuki. Please?”

A crumpled leaf caught in his hair. Reaching on her tiptoes, she brushed it from him, only for it to fall to pieces in her hand. Talk about a bad sign. 

“Alright,” she agreed at last. “Fine.”

He flashed a grin at her and kissed her hands. All the blood in her rushed to her cheeks in reply. “Thank you, my Goddess.”

“You have to stop calling me that.”

Shingen laughed, deep and rich, and took her arm in his again. As they walked, she leaned into the solid wall of his muscle, quietly wondering if he’d ever thought to build a gate past his exterior at all. 

It was Finals Week when it all fell apart. 

Half of the student body was already gone. All she had left was the Art History final--the very last exam scheduled on the whole week, naturally. All was quiet. Outside, tiny flakes of snow danced through the alleyways and sidewalks of the city. 

And someone hammered on her door. 

“Hold up!” She was only wearing PJ pants and a thin bralette. Flinging on a hoodie, she zipped it up and opened the door to see Shingen hanging in the doorway. 

Or--not hanging, really. Bracing. His skin was pale, eyes wide, hands flexing frantically. It took her a half second to snatch up her keys. “Are you okay?”

“Could you--” He paused to smile. As if that would help! “Could you take me to the hospital, maybe?”

No more questions. She wrapped his arm around her shoulder and half-carried him from the dorm. They only stopped once for him to throw up hard on the sidewalk. It was bright red.

“Fuck! Shingen--” 

“Sorry,” he wheezed. 

“Shut up. Don’t apologize.” 

Somehow she got him into the car, racing them to the hospital as quickly as the snow-slick streets would allow (and with a very liberal interpretation of acceptable driving laws). Even then, by the time they arrived at the emergency room, he was deathly pale. 

“Sorry,” he half-laughed again, the sound strained and nervous. “Sorry, this is all very--”

“Shut the fuck up, Shingen.” She didn’t bother getting him out of the car. Instead she sprinted inside and fetched a nurse. One look at his condition, and she called for a stretcher. 

It was bad. 

She lingered outside of the room for hours. A doctor came and gave her a diagnosis, treatment options, the... possibilities. “He doesn’t look great. There’s a chance he might not even make it. He named you as his medical advocate should he not be able to make choices.”

“Is--” Fuck. She rubbed the sleeve of her hoodie against her eyes, willing herself not to cry. God, she looked awful, too. “Sorry. Can I see him?”

“Yeah. He’s about to go into surgery. They’re prepping him now.”

Shingen was hooked up to more wires than she’d ever seen in her life. A nurse just finished delivering what looked like another shot just as she entered, the arrhythmic beating of his heart loud in the cold room. He tried to smile at her. 

“Oh, look,” he teased, his voice croaking. “A Goddess has graced me.”

“Shut up.” Hot tears stung at her eyes, but she squinted them away. “Shingen--”

But his smile faded. With more tenderness than she’d ever seen, he reached out and took her hand. God, she felt tiny next to him. She always had, but now--even now--especially now, with their palms matched up, she could see just how small she was in comparison. His grip was weak, so she tightened her grasp on him to compensate. 

“Princess,” he managed. “Don’t tell them.”

“You stupid fuck. I’m going to.”

“Don’t. I can’t do that to them.” He tried to reach across him to take her other hand, but it took so much visible effort that she just pushed him back down. “I can’t. Kenshin and Yuki and Sasuke have already done so much for me. They let me live with them. They’ve worried about me. I can’t burden them with this, too. I can’t stand burdening you with it.”

“You’re not burdening me.” What an idiot. She blinked at him, willing herself to be strong for the stupid, mule-stubborn, intelligent, handsome, charming man in front of her. “I want to be worried about you. I want to be here for you. Can’t you just let your friends love you?”

A sad smile slipped across his mouth, and though he said nothing, it whispered, I don’t know. 

She stayed at the hospital that night. It was freezing cold, and Shingen kept shivering, so she braved the snow outside and bought two blankets from a CVS. One had cats all over it, the other one planets. 

“Here.” She draped the cat blanket over him, tucking it in tight around his legs and arms. “Cause I know you just love pussy.” 

Shingen tried to keep down the laughter, but it was no use. Eventually he lapsed into coughing, dabbing a tissue to his mouth. “And you’ve got me all wrapped up like this. I feel like a cat burrito--a purrito.”

“I swear to God, Shingen. I’ll just leave you here.”

“Please no, my goddess.” He meekly wrapped his fingers with hers again. “Whatever you wish, so long as you stay.”

Silence draped between them, their hands entwined, the faint beep of the monitors a discordant beat with her heart. And then--oh. She’d read so many books about falling in love that she’d expected that moment; a surge like a tidal wave yanking her under, the spark of a flame, the blast of a roaring fire running through her body. Apparently not. And maybe it wasn’t love, exactly, not yet. Still. In her heart she could feel the first blast of air as she tipped over the edge of a cliff, and she wondered when it was that she’d taken the step forward to begin with. 

Where have you been? Sasuke texted her. You haven’t been showing up for our video chats. 

She didn’t get the chance to answer until after she’d helped Shingen back from the bathroom. He’d refused to let her help him with the blood still flecking his mouth, using her phone camera instead to help him clean himself. 

Sorry. Exams week is kicking my ass. 

That’s fine. Have you seen Shingen? He hasn’t shown up either.

For a long, long time, she stared at that text, wondering the best course of action. 

“Everything okay?” Shingen asked, as if he weren’t the one bedridden. “You seem deep in thought.”

“Yeah.” She tucked the phone away and propped his pillow up behind him. “That good?”

“Perfect.” For what felt like the millionth time, he wrapped his hand around hers again. Had he ever held her hand before this week? “Can I ask you something?”

“Hit me.”

“I think I’ll pass on that and just ask the question, thank you.”

“Shingen.”

He grinned cheekily and kept going. “Aren’t you planning on going back to your dorms at some point here? I don’t want to keep you away from your room on my account. You’ve got exams.”

“Yeah, it’s just for art history. Besides. Has it ever occurred to you that I’d want to be here?”

With a gesture, he answered, “This isn’t exactly an interesting place.”

“I’m not exactly an interesting person.”

For one rare, rare moment, his smile faded. Ever since his surgery he’d recovered a tiny bit of strength, and in the moment, it felt like he used it all to clench tighter around her hand. “I find you interesting.”

Flattery will get you nowhere, she wanted to say, but something in his stare arrested her. Instead they stood there staring at one another. His dark eyes swirled with a thousand unspoken thoughts, like the thrum of his heartbeat that she could hear around them hummed there, too. 

“Well.” That was all she could think to say. Her throat was dry, so she separated from him and fished up a bottle of water. “Yeah, so, I’m not gonna leave you here alone.”

“Is it because of my dashingly good looks?” He teased. She just rolled her eyes and swatted at his shoulder. 

That night as she curled up in the armchair to sleep, she watched Shingen toss and turn, his eyes unfocused and open. No doubt he was in pain. Without a word, she got up and slipped into the bed with him. 

“Princess?” He asked, wrapping his free arm around her regardless. “What are you doing?”

“You looked cold,” she lied, resting her head on his chest. “Is this comfortable?”

For a long, long time he was quiet. At last he leaned his cheek against her head. The soft huff of his breath tickled her brows, his thumb rolling in wide circles against her arm. 

“Yes,” he answered, low and certain. He still smelled good. How the hell could someone be brought so low, so sick, left for so long in a hospital, and still look and smell the way he did? Her heart thumped painfully in her chest as he nuzzled his nose into her scalp. “And you?”

“I’m where I want to be.”

“Mmm.” She felt his smile rather than saw it. “How funny. I was thinking the same thing.”

Okay, seriously. What the fuck is going on.

She stared at the text from Yuki and wondered how much longer she could keep up the avoidance game. Shingen wasn’t due for release from the hospital until at least next week, which was well into when the other three were back on break. Doubtless they’d want to get together, which posed an... interesting problem. That, and this wasn’t the kind of thing he could just play off. As much as Shingen tried to hide it, the physical stress showed. 

Besides--he was in his second surgery at that exact moment. She wasn’t in much of a mood to keep the secret. 

Some shit. I can’t exactly talk about it yet. I’m sorry for avoiding you guys about it. I promise I’ll come clean soon.

A long moment. Yuki copied in Kenshin and Sasuke on the next one. 

Uh, no. We come clean now. 

They discharged him on a Wednesday. He couldn’t walk without a cane, but he was walking, and that was an improvement. Gently she guided him into her car and they puttered down the slick, poorly-plowed streets. 

“We aren’t heading toward your apartment,” he noted. 

“No,” she agreed. “We aren’t.”

Shingen just smiled that quiet smile of his. “You told on me, didn’t you?”

“You bet your ass I did. What were you gonna do--tell Yuki you’d fucked someone too hard and thrown out your back or something?”

He laughed only a minute before it lapsed into coughs. “I was thinking more along the lines of being evasive until he gave up. He does eventually.”

“Yeah. Not this time.”

They pulled up in the driveway to Kenshin’s house. Almost immediately they were swarmed by the others, their doors being flung open. 

“You fucking jackass--”

“Now now, Yuki,” Shingen placated, struggling from the car with his cane. “That’s not the way to talk to your elder.” 

“Shingen.” Kenshin lingered on the porch, eyes flinty. “Welcome back. Now I’m going to kill you for evading us.”

“Good to know. If you’d do the honors rather quickly, that would be nice.”

As a unit they got him into his old, second-hand room. In years past they’d gathered on the couch in the living room, being noisy and rambunctious until Kenshin’s mother had come in to straighten them out, but now they moved all the Christmas decorations upstairs and made short work of livening up the room. Shingen set his mouth in a line, his eyes shimmering, and his friends did their best to pretend they didn’t see. Late into the night they all rolled around on the mattress, laughing and drinking and unwrapping presents until Kenshin’s mom poked her head in and shushed them.

“It’s four in the morning,” she whispered. “Go to sleep.”

 Twenty and up they all were, but they obediently opened the adjoining bonus room door, unrolling futons and sleeping bags. Kenshin eschewed his room to sleep on the floor with his friends, offering the battered plaid couch to her. Lights out. The rooms dipped into a hazy blue dark, snow outside catching the faint street lamps and reflecting in dreamy patterns on the ceiling. One by one, gentle snores encircled her. 

But she couldn’t sleep.

“Princess?” 

And apparently she wasn’t the only one.

Silently she slipped from the couch, pattering into Shingen’s room. He’d cast off his shirt, PJ pants riding low. She did her best to ignore the muscular dip of his hip down, down, down. 

“Hey, Goddess.” He smiled brilliantly in the dark, brushing back the blanket. “I’ve a question for you.”

“Hit me.”

“I’d rather not.”

“You fucker.”

His laughter was gentle, but then it dipped into seriousness, his eyes bright and vulnerable in the light. “I don’t suppose our napping together in the hospital was a fluke?”

There were no heart monitors here, but she swore she could hear her own pulse beep beep beeping right before a momentary flatline. What was she supposed to say? 

“No.” She swallowed. “No. It wasn’t.”

He lifted his chin, offering a tender smile. “Then I don’t suppose you’d like to come and join me now?”

“Yuki and Sasuke and Kenshin will see, you know.”

And Shingen paused at that a long, long time. She watched the thought roll over and over in his mind, but at the end of it, he just brushed the blanket back further. “If you’d rather not for that reason, then I’d understand. But I’m still game.”

Settling onto the mattress, she just crossed her legs and grinned playfully. “I dunno, Shingen. Aren’t there some of your girlfriends on campus that you’d rather cuddle?”

His smile vanished. Shuffling his hand backward over the nightstand, he flipped on his phone for the first time since they’d gone to the hospital. Almost immediately, it began vibrating off the hook--unread messages, missed calls, notifications--but he ignored that and swiped into the app menu, selecting every single messenger and dating app. 

“Shingen?” She asked, uncertain.

“Hold on.” One by one, he flipped them open. Deactivated. Deactivated. Deactivated. His messages to other people were almost singularly populated with a mass copy-paste from him, dated a month ago: I hope there’s no hard feelings. Just not in the same place in my life anymore. I wish you all the best.

“Shingen,” she repeated, her pulse hammering out of control. “I was just teasing you. And--and why?”

“Cause.” He turned the phone back off and set it on the bedside table. “I had a come to Jesus moment that day you and I walked back from the hospital.”

“You mean the day you lied to me?”

“Okay, yes. That too. I apologize, sincerely. I didn’t want you to worry about me.” He flopped over onto his side, soft whorls of red hair like licking flame on the pillowcase. In the half-light, she could see teenage Shingen again: so full of smiles and light, always hiding his feelings, always shielding his friends from his pain. Reverently he tip-toed his fingertips over the knuckles of her bare hand. “But we were standing there outside, and you gave me this look when you were getting that leaf out of my hair, and I kind of realized that...” And he paused. “That I couldn’t kiss anyone and not think of you, right then. Because I wanted to kiss you.”

Silently she wriggled her feet under the blankets, shimmying up to him. He shot her a questioning look but accepted it anyway, wrapping his arms around her waist. “Just because I deleted them doesn’t mean you owe me anything, by the way. I don’t want you to feel like--”

“Shingen?” She tapped her fingertips over his mouth. “How’s the view from that hole you’re digging?”

He snickered against her hand. “If all I can see from it is you, then it’s a wonderful view indeed.”

“Flatterer.”

He didn’t deny it. Quietly he brushed his thumb over her forehead, easing the strands of hair from her eyes, and leaned in. Oh. He caught her lower lip between his and pulled on it ever so gently before sealing her completely. She’d imagined what it might be like before, but she’d never thought it would be so stable. Between the solid wall of his chest and his sturdy embrace and the careful, sweet pressure of his mouth, she wondered what might happen if she just melted into him. 

“Princess,” he murmured, nuzzling his nose against her cheek. “I don’t know if you wanna think about this just yet, but I’m kind of sweet on you. So maybe--if you want to think about it for a little bit--I’d like to take you on a few dates.”

“Is this the first one, then? In your bed? A bit forward, isn’t it?”

But they both chuckled. This time she let herself slip further into his arms, held fast and gentle all at once, and he kissed her forehead. 

“If you want it to be.”

“Mmm. I’ll think about it.”

He curled his hand through her hair and pet it, the silence falling thick around them. Outside, the snow began to fall once more. 

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