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skzfairies · 3 years

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sooyoung’s relationship with nct dream!

✿ mark

he was actually the first one to introduce himself to her in the dreamies

he was really sweet towards her but wasn’t like, over the top, he was kinda chill yk

and that just made her feel so comfortable because she had so many worries about joining nct dream as a girl, she knew monique would also be there, but they weren’t in the same unit so it was very nerve racking for sooyoung

and this girl was like, 15 and she was being thrown into debut suddenly with a bunch of boys, and it was very overwhelming

but mark assured her that it was all okay, and that everyone wanted her there, and that she deserved to be here

if she was ever having any problems with anything, he would always try his best to help her out, or direct her to someone he knew would help her

and now they are the bestest friends, sooyoung admitted that out of the members he feels like an older brother the most to her :D

their always goofing off or messing around, but not like bouncing off the walls together, they just make jokes to each other and burst out laughing

they have so so many inside jokes omg

and whenever they randomly make eye contact, they would always burst out laughing, they literally can NOT be serious around each other ....

mark is basically the reason she knows so much english 😭 she literally just repeats whatever he says and then studies it later....that’s basically how she learned lmaooooo

✿ renjun

renjun ALWAYS clowns her, like she could just be breathing and he would make fun of her (all jokes ok he loves her)

and she’s just like .... did i ask

but she always gets him back :D

she doesn’t roast him, but rather she EMBARRASSES him

if renjun teased her a lot in a video that was uploaded fhat day, she would go on vlive and tell a VERY embarrassing story of renjun and go in COMPLETE detail and then she’s done she’s like “how are you guyssss?”

once renjun saw that she was doing that and he went to where ever she was and complained about it and she just laughed at him while he was begging her to stop 😭

they love each other i promise

they also play fight a lot, like they could just randomly be hanging out in the living room and they would just randomly start fighting each other until they called a truce

sooyoung always wins ☺️, you gotta learn a few tricks if you spend the majority of your time with seven boys

also, when sooyoung got confindent and comfortable with speaking some mandarin, she randomly started speaking it renjun

and he was SO touched like 🤞 he was in shock he was like “when did you- how- what?” and she was just like “ i wanted to learn some so i can talk to you and chenle, i don’t know much but it’s a start!”

and renjun just hugged her, he didn’t know what to say and he was like I LOVE THIS GIRL SO MUCH

no bcuz sooyoung literally deserves the world okay shes so sweet

and renjun would teach her and help her practice when he saw her studying and they just have little conversations with each other in mandarin, and it’s so cute hehe

oh yeah stargazing is a thing for them heeh, when neither of them can sleep because their stressed or it’s just not happening, they both go outside and attempt to watch the stars, even if you can barely see them since their in the city :/

✿ jeno

GAMING BESTIES

they stay up so late playing games whenever they are off and always regret it in the mornings 😭

when she first started playing games w him she was rlly bad and jeno would always beat her and he was SO SMUG ABOUT IT and he was like “haha loser💪”

and sooyoung being the hard worker she is, she practiced her gaming skills for a few months and watched a ton of vids and jeno would ask her to game and she was like “no, not yet.” “i’m kidding your not a loser!” “i’m not playing w u until i can beat ur ass!”

and then a few months later she finally asked him to play

and jeno was like YAY ☺️☺️

and he kept on hyping himself up,,, and then sooyoung beat him

she ended up beating him 4/6 times they played 🤞

JENO WAS SO SHOCKED

HE WAS SO HEARTBROKEN

and sooyoung was just like :))) it’s okay jeno, maybe next time!” and she skipped out of his room happily while jeno was still like :0

he sat there in shock for awhile...

song writing besties 🤞

he actually helped her a lot when she was first learning, and when she completed her lyrics she had him check them over

same for him, she would always read over his lyrics he written, and sometimes she recorded a guide for him !

they always bounce ideas off of each other whenever their stuck, and then their like “damn we rlly are big brain 🤞”

OHHHH SHE MET HIS CATS ONCE

she fell in love with them, and his cats were instantly drawn to her

jeno has like 100 pictures of her w his cats he’s like :)) my childern

after meeting them sooyoung wont stop asking for asking for pictures of them or asking if their okay 😭

jenos like “do you love my cats more than me?“ and shes like “YUP:D”

✿ haechan

oh my gosh someone seperate them

these two are so chaotic omg

they are always coming at everyone’s throats omg

they roast the shit out of everyone 😭😭

whenever they are together there’s always loud laughing, BECAUSE HAECHAN IS JUST SO FUNNY OK

completly random but they look so cute and pretty sitting next to each other :D

haechan does tease her, but it’s not as much as the other members and she’s like :) “i’m special”

he’s always hugging on her and she either has two reactions:

if she’s sleepy and haechan throws himself on her she’s like ??? who tf is on me ??? and she looks so confused while haechan is moving around on her to get comfy and hes lowkey screaming and shes like 😳 i just woke up, and then she just goes back to sleep

if she’s wide awake she will scream and laugh and jokingly push haechan off of her until she gives up and just hugs back onto him, and she pats his head and goes “haechannie, your so cute :) i love you!“

its kinda a suprise that he’s older than her because he acts SO CUTE AROUND HER

and normally sooyoung would judge tf iut of u if you acted cute around her but wirh haechan she gets SO SOFT

like internally screams with haechan looks at her with a soft expression on his face because HE IS JUST SO CUTE AWH

another gaming duo <3

although it’s harder to beat haechan for her 😭😭

she’s only beat him like 5 times of the 6 years she’s known him 🤞

they also stay up late together, like they’ll be facetiming and they will litwrally just talk about ANYTHING and laugh their asses off

he lets her ramble about the random facts that she knows or the show she has been watching and jes just like :D your so cute, even if she repeated the same thing 2828 times or is not making any sense at all

haechan and sooyoung are so soft for each other 🤞

but they also arent afraid to roast tf out of each other 💪

✿ jaemin

these two are the sweetest omg

like they are SO CLOSE

and they are always together omg

like they always hang out in either one of their rooms and chill, it’s mostly her room tho because she complains about jaemins bed 😳

jisung feels like jaemin is his roomie too because he’s in there so much :0

dw sooyoung and jaemin are considerate 🤞

if jisung is sleeping and they wanna have a deep ass talk then jaemin will drags her to his room, because lets say jeno is a heavy sleeper (idk if he is but lets just say he is ☺️)

they are ALWAYS cuddling, like whenever she walked infront of his and he is sitting down, he’ll pull her to either sit next to him or his lap, it depends if cameras are around 🤞 and then once she’s sitting he’ll wrap his arms around her and just cuddle until they get uncomfortable lmao 😭

sooyoung will not fall asleep on any other member but jaemin, it’s just a thing idk, not that she’s not comfortable with the other members she just prefers to cuddle w jaemin since they cuddle so much hehehehe

whenever they are out walking in the streets and she’s tired she’ll grab onto jaemin’s shirt and he just down at her like :0 oh my god your so cute i just wanna protect ☺️, and he just puts his arm around her shoulder while she holds onto him :( i love them their relationship is so soft

ohhhhh jaemin made her go bike riding w him one day and she felt like she was going to DIE, her legs were so sore afterwards but jaemin was semi fine, and she was just like 😡i hate you.

she always asks jaemin to edit her photos for her, cuz she doesn’t know how hmph, and jaemin offered to teach her so she was like ☺️ okay so she sat in a chair next to him, and she ended up falling asleep.... whoops

jaemin was like “so you just do this to remove any- sooyoung?” and he looked down and sooyoung had her head against her knees, and she was OUT, like jaemin tried everything to wake her, so he ended up having to pick her up and put her on his bed while he finished editing her pictures 🤞

best boy jaemin YUP

i could write for AGES about them because i just love their relationship so so so much but all you guys need to know in summary is that they are such a soft friendship, they can always be seen cuddling together, they talk about almost everything, and their just besties :D

✿ chenle

01 liner babe’s yup !

they were close before debuting because they were close in age, and when they found out they were debuting they were like YESSS I KNOW YOU 😟😟

they call themselves twins hehe, even if they aren’t even born in the same month 😭

if they say they are twins, they are twins.

HIGH PITCHED LAUGH DUO YUP

sooyoung also has a higher pitched laughed, so whenever they laugh, it’s VERY high pitched

also they love to randomly harmonize?

like they could just be sitting in the waiting room and then they would just sing in harmony and then go back to whatever they were doing :0

ohhhh and they LOVE doing tik toks together

they will do covers of dances together or those silly duo ones and it’s so FUNNY because they are both so chaotic and it’s so cute

they really killing everyone w their cuteness 😭😭😭

he was also so shocked when she spoke mandarin to him, even if it was just a little bit and kinda awkward because she had just been studying to for a few months (she started studying it in january 2021!) and he was like 😟😄😄

he also gave her a big hug but he was way more entergetic than renjun, he shook her back and forth and yelled in her ear, NOT ON OURPOSE

he was just excited 🤞🤞

ohhhh they also post lil duets together :D and it’s so CUTE

like their both bare faced in a dim lit vocal room and one of them is playing the piano, and they just sing, and it’s so raw and beautiful, OH MY GOD I LOVE THEM

vocal icons

✿ jisung

at first he was kinda shy around her, since hes normally shy around new people

and sooyoung was like, i understand, but shes an extrovert so she tried her hardest to be friends with everyone and talk to everyone, and jisung was like ???? how are you so talkative ???

the first thing he ever said to her was “your shirt’s cool, i like shinee subaenim too!” and it was really quiet and sooyoung was like “thanks ☺️”.

she was wearing a shinee tshirt btw, she’s a big shawol 🤭

they eventually got close though, i mean your bound to be when your with them all day yk

but sooyoung was so soft and gentle w him and reassuring him that it’s okay that hes a lil shy and he just felt comfortable around her, even if it was kinda hard to have conversations

now their inseparable!

she always laughs whenever he breaks something, but she always grabs it and sees if she can fix it for him, while laughing

for the first few years of their debut jisung was like her lil bro, she would always tease him or fool around him

and now its the reverse 😭

jisung always roast her or teases her, and it’s so subtle she would just laugh whenever he said something and then after awhile she realizes what he just said so she’s like ... ☺️😟😳😕

shes like wHAT HAPPENED TO MY LIL BRO

jisung always pats her head when she has her mouth open after he teases her, and is like “hehe, love u”

“sure you do jisung, sure you do.”

she gets him back by blasting twice or shinee and dancing on her bed until jisung gets out of bed and turns it off 😭

she never does that when he’s sleeping because she doesn’t actually wanna make him mad 😭

they have never fought and she’s not willing to loose that streak

jisung compared their hand size once and it litteraly made sooyoungs hands look like a baby hand and she was like ... i hate it here

now he always asks for a high five and then he laughs because of the size difference

and she gets SO MAD

“STOP DOING THATTTTT, ITS NOT FUNNY”

“stop falling for it 🤷‍♂️”

“hOLD ME BACK.”

jaemin actually had to hold her back from running after him after he teased her

not that she would hurt jisung....she would just hit him a few times

jaemin scolds her for fighting the members he’s like “we do not condone violence in this household!”

then she goes “condone violence my ass! just let me flick him.”

jaemin doesn’t let her flick him 😭😭

she does it before jisung goes to sleep tho 💪

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astarkey · 3 years

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Tagged by @yossariandawn Thank youuuuuuuuu!!! 🥰💓 It’s the same as the previous tagged game I did, except video edition; and believe it or not, I used to be a video editor back in the day when I was in middle school and high school (in like the early years of youtube and myspace lmao). But then I just ended up uploading some of video/animation projects I did in college.

WIP Game: Vidder Edition

How many vids have you uploaded: 17 (1 was taken down because of music copyright and 3 weren’t on youtube and are just floating around in the internet void I guess)

What programs do you use to edit? I used Windows Movie Maker

What are your top 5 vids by views? (or comments or likes, whatever metric you want to use for ranking): I’m just going by views, so here they are lol.

Kingdom Hearts - Exodus 04 (Double J Radio Mix) (Warning: Flashing)

Aaliyah - Sure Thing

Aaliyah’s Amnesia (It might be blocked because of music copyright)

Untitled (A Kingdom Hearts Tribute)

Miss You Love (Silent Hill 2 & 3 Tribute)

Do you respond to comments, why or why not? I used to, but I haven’t gone back to those videos in years 😬

What’s the vid you've edited with the happiest ending? Sora & Kairi - No Air

What’s the vid you've edited with the angstiest ending? The Miss You Love vid.

Do you edit crossovers? Uh... I can’t remember if I did. I don’t think so.

Have you received hate on a vid? Not really. I’ve gotten some thumbs down, but nothing serious.

Have you ever had a vid stolen? Yeah. Before youtube, there was google videos, and I uploaded a Kingdom Hearts fanvid that had the song from the Rugrats movie called “Take Me There” and like after google video was down, I found my video that somebody uploaded on youtube. I can’t find it anymore since I guess it’s taken down lmfao, but I had my old username in the credits (astarkey3) and that’s how I knew that was mine!

Have you ever worked on a collab before? No.

What’s your all-time favorite ship? Sethkate obviously lol.

What’s a WIP edit that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will? I was experimenting in OpenToonz of doing a rotoscope of Kate swimming at the pool in ep.4, but the program is just so hard to understand, I don’t think I’ll ever get back to it.

What are your editing strengths? I like to have a narration when I used to edit, like telling a story and separate clips to make it match with the story I’m trying to tell. Also, cutting scenes and having them match with the beat of the song. It’s like I want the narrative, but I also want the music to be important to the story as well.

What are your editing weakness? Idk lol, I can’t remember what I had problems with other than staying up late on school nights working on fanvids and trying to accomplish them in one night than doing school work 🤣 I have no idea how I did back then.

What are your thoughts on using V/O's and subtitles? I actually used subtitles from Kingdom Hearts 2 for a fanvid I was doing (It’s this one if anyone’s curious [Roxas/Namine’ Final Goodbye]. And I think that was the one time I used them to fit with the narrative I was going for, even though some subtitles were like backwards and were sort of unnecessary lol). I would like to use voice over’s one day in one of my vids lol.

What are your thoughts on effects and transitions? I used them all the time lol. Depends on the tone of the vid to make them effective. If it was like an upbeat song and upbeat vid, I used white fade-in for quick flashes, and for melancholy vids that are angsty I used black fade-ins and fade-outs. Sometimes I would use crossfades and others I spliced scenes to make it look like one scene fits with the other. It’s hard to explain, but the Exodus and Amnesia videos are good examples.

What was the first fandom you edited for? Kingdom Hearts

What’s your favorite edit you've ever made? The Silent Hill one is my favorite by far. Like... if you know the context of the game series and know the context of that song (which is NOT a love song lmfao, it’s like deeper than that), it’s just my favorite one because it’s like my interpretation and a character analysis of most of the characters and it’s like they’re missing something they want, and love seems to be a recurring theme in the series. Like James, well he misses his wife that he loves; Angela misses her mom and wants that love and nurture from a parent that she probably never received but she hoped or longed for; Maria doesn’t want to be alone and wants to be loved, and she was literally born out of James’ subconscious to love him, even though repeatedly he denies his love for her; Eddie wants to feel loved and accepted but he’s never gotten that because everyone around him has bullied him; Heather, like obviously there’s a wall she’s built up around herself when she speaks to men and she’s quick to be defensive, especially when it comes to mentioning her dad, who is the only man she’s ever cared about and loved because he’s been so protective of her for all these years, and when he died, it’s like her world came crashing down and that protection and love, it’s gone and it’s like she still has to put that wall up, but on the inside she’s mourning the loss of the one person who really truly loved her as if she was his very own daughter. So yeah, there’s a sense of love and there’s a sense of loss, and it’s like you kinda ask youself, “Is it possible to feel that way again, or one day know what it feels like to love or be loved?” IT’S DEPRESSING AS HELL, BUT I LOVE IT!!! Also the editing was on point! I wanna give my younger self a high-five lol.

Tagging anyone who’s a video editor that wants to do this!!! 🤗💖

#yossariandawn #personal

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ikonprobably · 4 years

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A Collaboration

Member: Chanwoo

Prompt: (ask) reader and chanwoo are both youtubers who meet while filming for a collab and how their friendship would develop to something more

Genre: Fluff

Word Count: 1264

A/N: I kinda made them meet somewhere different, through vidcon but I still hope that you enjoy this story as I enjoyed writing it. If you like it then feel free to support my page by buying me a coffee!

“Hey everyone it’s y/n and welcome back to my channel! Today we are going to be vlogging at vidcon!” You started off the introduction of your video early in the morning, as you wanted to vlog your process of getting ready to go to vidcon, and then your experience there.

You had started a youtube channel a while back, after watching so many videos of your favorite YouTubers, you did various types of your own such as get ready with me’s, vlogs, let’s plays and more. Your following started to grow over time, and the more you did it the more confident you got. Arriving at the convention center, you got out of your car and took your followers, or your camera, along with you.

“Guys, this is my first time being at vidcon, and I can’t believe how many people are here.” You said looking back into your camera while a wide smile was apparent on your face, you had already ran into a few of the people you looked up to, and you couldn’t help but show the excitement when you got a chance to talk to them.

“Hey! It’s y/n.” A male voice had called from the background, and suddenly a face had appeared on the screen of your camera, and you quickly turned around to see who it was. “I’m Chanwoo!” The voice said happily while greeting you.

“Oh! I know who you are.” You said in a small voice, somewhat shocked you that he recognized who you were. “I’m y/n…. I guess you know that though.” You let out a small chuckle while rubbing the back of your neck awkwardly. “I’m a big fan of yours though!” You continued.

The two of you had talked for a little bit, having clicked with each other really well, and experienced the rest of vid con together, and during the stay in your hotel you had did a collab video of playing mario party games together, rating them from the best to the worst on your channel and then on his channel, you both had played a horror game together, and ended up vlogging through the rest of vid con together. By the time the weekend was over, it had felt like you had gained a new best friend and you felt as if you didn’t want to go home and wake up from the dream that you were having.

“So that was my weekend at vidcon. I hope you all enjoyed this video as much as I enjoyed my time there.” You said closing off the video, before uploading it on your computer, editing it, and then posting it on youtube. Laying back on your bed you sighed before grabbing your phone out of your pocket and looking up, deciding to go through all of your notifications that you had missed, and scroll through social media.

–

A few weeks had passed since your weekend at vidcon, and you had kept in touch with Chanwoo, messaging back and forth talking about new video ideas, meeting up, and getting to do a new video together. So when the time had arrived that he was supposed to come over and do another video, you couldn’t help but feel super excited, he had a pretty busy schedule, and this was the first time you both would have been able to hang out together since then.

A knock on the door had pulled your attention away from your thoughts, and you went to answer it smiling at the male standing on the other side. “Hi Chanwoo.” You said standing to the side as you let him inside your apartment, before walking over to your couch and sitting down. “So do you know what kind of video we are going to do today?” You asked excitedly.

“Well you sent me a few of your ideas but I know you said you wanted it a surprise, so I’m clueless.” He chuckled sitting down on the other end of the couch facing you, crossing his legs one over the other, his back leaning against the arm of the couch.

“I already have the camera recording.” You pointed at the camera that was sitting on your entertainment stand with the red light on. “So today we are going to….” You paused getting up and running out of the room quickly, leaving Chanwoo in the living room. It wasn’t long before you had come back with your arms filled with covers and pillows. “BUILD A FORT!” You said dropping the items on the couch in front of him. “Are you as excited as I am.” You said not able to get rid of the smile on your face.

“For your channel?” He asked as he picked up a pillow and observed your apartment. You could already tell his mind was working on how he would put up the fort. “So what’s the idea for mine?” He asked, finally turning to look at you.

“Scary stories, of course.” You said with a confident nod.

The night had went on with the two of you building the fort, filled with laughter and a few disagreements on how it should look and blaming the other when something went wrong, and finally the fort was built and the two of you were sitting inside with a small lamp light in the middle, and the camera in your hands. You had finished your video off with your closer and then started up Chanwoo’s video in a smooth transition before the two of you had begun telling ghost stories, both of them that you either experienced, heard from somewhere else or made up.

It wasn’t long before the night had drawn on and the both you had got tired, and yawns began filling the air, Chanwoo had found you asleep hugging on of the pillows that you left inside of the fort, and he let out a soft chuckled before turning the camera off, pulling a blanket over you and laying down beside you, and drifted off to sleep after you.

The morning after you jumped up realizing that Chanwoo was sleeping beside you and the fort was still around you, “Did we finish the video?” You asked, shaking Chanwoo lightly, looking around for the camera confused.

“Yes, y/n I turned finished it after I saw you passed out.” He said groggily, pulling you down to lay down next to him, his arm around your waist. You face instantly turned red, not realizing what was happening until you found yourself cuddled up next to the male.

“Uhm.” You started looking at the other, his eyes still closed, you knew from the beginning that you had a crush on him, but you never thought you would find yourself in this moment, even if the two of you were still just friends. “I– Chanwoo?” You continued, and his eyes opened to look at you and you watched as they grew wide, but neither of you moved.

“Yes?” He asked calmly. Looking back into your eyes.

“Nothing.” You said quickly, and grew silent as you were trying to figure out what was running through his mind, and for a moment you weren’t sure, until you felt your eyes closed and his lips on top of yours, kissing you gently.

“Will you be my girlfriend?” He asked after pulling away from the kiss looking at you with a small but hopeful smile.

“I–” You paused still in disbelief that this was happening. “Yes, I will be your girlfriend.” You answered him and a smile grew over your face.

#ikonprobably #ikonprobaly requests #ikon #ikon scenarios #ikon scenario blog #jung chanwoo #jung chanwoo scenarios #kpop secnarios #kpop scenario blog

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uzumaki-rebellion · 5 years

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“Wet Sugar” [Part 6 of 30]

youtube

"I'm making you wait for the fifth date I need to know if you're worthy Making you wait Never too late I need to know if you're crazy I'm making you wait A-ha, I need to know that you're worthy I'm making you wait (wait, wait, wait, wait)

I'm making you wait I can't give the sweet of me so quickly I gotta know if you're strictly Dictation, saying what you said before to that other girl You know I gotta find out if it's true…"

Jill Scott—"Making You Wait"

NSFW. Mature Audience Only. Share. Comment. Like. You know!

CW: Some mention of sexual abuse.

Summary: Trouble in paradise and Erik has to leave with Klaue...

Linda Chambers.

Her fair skin was deeply tanned and a bit sunburned. She was in Spain on vacation. She spoke to Erik from a small tablet propped up on a table inside a private villa. For someone with so much debt, Linda was living large.

"You're fast," he said while sitting inside Klaue's living room.

"Glad I passed," she said. Her voice was playful, her eyes trying to be sly as they checked him out.

"How's the gazpacho?" he asked staring at the bowl in front of her.

"Quite tasty. How did you know I was eating that?"

"What else would you eat on a warm day in Spain?"

"So…," she said.

"So?"

"How does this work? Do I come in for an interview, or does this count?"

"You've been vetted, but this is an extra formality. I gotta see what we're dealing with."

"Like what you see?" she said.

"My boss needs superb skills. You might just be what we're looking for—"

"So you're not the main dude?"

"I'm the man next to the man."

"Got it."

Linda waited for him to say more, but he studied her face. Her look was cute but plain. The kind of plain that could be forgettable which was a plus in their work.

He spoke to her in Arabic and she conversed with him for a full ten minutes before he switched back to English.

"Are you available now?" he asked.

"I'm in Spain getting burnt to a crisp. What do you think?"

"How long are you staying there?"

"You offering me work?"

"How long?"

"Another week—"

"I'll get back to you."

"When—"

He cut off communication.

She would do. Afghanistan could be her preliminary probation gig. Her Arabic was good, and she wasn't intimidated by him.

He checked his watch. He was late for dinner.

###

Yani brought out another tray of broccoli casserole hot from the oven and placed it on the self-serving table. The men fixed their own plates and all she had to do was watch for anything that needed replenishing.

Her eyes kept checking the side entrance that everyone used to come into the dining room. Erik hadn't shown up yet and she felt her tummy getting butterflies waiting for him to walk in after he had made her cum so hard from dry humping.

When he finally stepped into the room, his face looked serious, and she figured he was trying to act normal around the others.

Klaue eyed Erik from the head of the table.

"Things going well?"

"Spoke to Linda."

"And?"

"We're good. She's good."

Erik fixed his plate without looking at Yani.

Linda?

Her eyes tried to connect with his, but he ate his meal and concentrated on Klaue.

He had a woman?

She felt ridiculous now. Of course he did. He probably hooked up with all kinds of women wherever he went. She was just another girl on his hit list. He was sweet and seductive when he wanted to get between her legs, and did the same thing with others. Did this Linda know that about him?

Yani felt her cheeks tighten as she walked into the kitchen to retrieve a fresh batch of dinner rolls. The guys were going through Leona's food like it was going out of style. There was only half a tray of grilled steak left and one bowl of glazed carrots warming on the stove.

She went to put another pitcher of iced tea on the second serving table and Erik was there refilling his glass with water. His eyes finally looked at her.

"Why you frowning, girl?" he said, his voice playful but low enough so that only she heard him.

"Who is Linda?" she hissed, leaving the ice tea and the room.

He followed her into the kitchen and went into the freezer looking for ice. Leona took the last of the steak out to the men.

"What's with the attitude?" he asked.

She couldn't answer him.

"Can't talk to me now?"

She crossed her arms over her chest.

"I like it when you look mad," he said.

He stroked her arm and she pulled back.

"You have a woman, Killmonger?"

"Now you're being nosey—"

"You do," she said moving away from him.

Leona came back into the kitchen and saw them in the corner together.

"Yani. More blue cheese, please. On the table," Leona said grabbing a food net cover for the meat.

Yani opened the fridge and grabbed the extra blue cheese crumbles. Erik blocked her when she tried to leave.

"Let me give you a word of advice. Whatever you hear that isn't directed at you, you best pretend you never heard it. You got that? Now take that blue cheese out there," he said.

He was serious when he spoke and he pushed her toward the dining room.

"Watch your fucking hands," she said while shoving him back as she left the kitchen.

She watched him sit back down in his place at the table. Huntsman's eyes were on her and she felt the uncomfortable gaze that some of the men gave her when they looked at her in that way. Disgusting.

She went back into the kitchen and pulled out her cell. Texting her cousin Twyla she asked about Sydette. All was well and she was able to relax. She wanted to go home. As soon as these men were finished, she could help clean up and take her Aunt's car back to the apartment.

Thirty minutes later the men were done eating and moved down to the pool to smoke cigars and cigarettes. She saw Shipley grab a full bottle of rum from the kitchen pantry. There were four steaks leftover, so she would be able to take three home for herself, Twyla and Kendall. Leona would eat the fourth steak.

Yani filled a plastic food container with the carrots and a few dinner rolls. Everything else was gone and she felt bad that she didn't grab some broccoli while she had the chance. Clean up was relatively fast. They were finished by eight.

"I can handle breakfast tomorrow. They will make their own breakfast burritos. Sleep in with the baby and come in around three. They will be gone after breakfast and won't return until dinner," Leona said.

Nice.

She could maybe get some real sleep and have time to fill out her school application. She put away the last of the silverware and washed her hands.

"I forgot to show you the vid of Kendall," Erik said walking back into the kitchen.

He ignored Yani and stood next to Leona with his phone. Of course, her Aunt was all smiles for him. She waited quietly by the sink as Leona watched his phone. She could hear Kendall being hyper and shouting out to the crowd and then she heard her own voice singing to Erik. Her eyes glanced over at him and he was staring at his phone and stroking his beard.

"What him say?" Leona asked when the vid reached the part where Chez called her out.

Erik's eyes sought hers and Yani looked away, letting her eyes stare at the floor as she heard her voice rip Chez a new one. When the vid ended, her Aunt's eyes were on her. She was not happy at all.

"Why would you say that to him in public like that Yani? Other people probably recorded that and upload it for the world to see. You nuh disrespect your pickney faddah like that. What if Sydette see that one day? What that gyal think about you both? Huh? You nuh wan the sins and hate of the parents going down into you pickney like that. You nuh think 'bout that? Think about Sydette's feelings?"

Yani felt shame heat up her cheeks and throat. She cut her eyes at Erik for showing all of the recording. All he had to do was show Kendall's part.

"You always take his side. He treats me like dirt and I have to think about his feelings? I never get to say how I feel. And yuh know how him treat me—"

Leona shook her head and waved her hand.

"He still your baby's faddah. No matter what. His blood is in yuh baby—"

"And so is mine, Auntie, and so is mine. You should be on my side. Him say all kinds of evil things about me in front of alla dem. Erik heard him too—"

"Who is Erik?"

"Me," Erik said, his face looking slack. Almost like he regretted showing the vid.

"And him fight Zachary and beat him up…knocked me over too. But I have to be nice to him?!"

Leona still shook her head.

"Let me have the car keys, Auntie, I'm leaving now," Yani said picking up the bag of leftovers she was taking to her family.

Leona pulled her keys from a kitchen drawer and handed them to her. Yani didn't bother to say goodbye. She left them both in the kitchen.

Stepping outside she swiftly made her way to the car and placed the food in the backseat.

"Yani."

Erik approached her and stood by the driver side door. His eyes looked remorseful. Towering over her she felt crowded by his body again. Men were always boxing her up, invading her space and making her feel small. She didn't need another man stealing her joy again.

"I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to know you. Just fucking turn your head when you see me from now on."

She climbed into the car and slammed the door. The compound gate automatically opened for her and she drove off.

Fuck alla dem men.

###

Erik walked back into the kitchen and found Leona sitting at the dining room table. She ate a re-heated steak and picked at some carrots.

"I'm sorry I upset you and Yani with the vid," he said.

"It's not your fault. We go through this often. I have to learn how to hold my tongue with her sometimes. I do tend to take up for Chez. I don't want Sydette to be ashamed of her Dad. Him no good. I know this. But he wasn't always a bad man. Him change—"

"He's violent and he did say some terrible things about your niece. He brutalized Zachary. If Tahir and I hadn't been there—"

"I know, I know…I just don't know what to do for her."

Erik sat down at the table across from her. Leona scratched the skin of her left shoulder, lifting up the short sleeve of her shirt to do it. He noticed two dark black tattoos inked on her flesh. One looked like a flame and the other some sort of knife.

"My niece so sweet…Yani special. She carry so much shame because of her parents. She was on her way to University y'know. She so smart, and she has healing hands…hands of a doctor. She gave up her dream of being a baby doctor, but she's going to be a nurse, and I want her to succeed…so she can show her parents that she is still a good girl. A brilliant young woman. She walk around her family like she's no good no more. And it hurts me. She carries shame and it's so heavy on her…on her baby. I don't want to see her have any more problems with Chez, but that vid…"

She put down her fork.

"Will Chez come after her for that vid?" she asked.

"I won't let him."

"I don't want you getting caught up in this mess. His friends pulled guns on you—"

"Tahir and I took them. His anger was directed at Zachary, not Yani. I think he still wants her."

"Having another child with another woman was not the way to keep her. Jesus…that girl always have problems with you men. Them chase after her, fight over her, but never want to take care of her right."

Leona picked at her steak and took a few sliced bites. She wiped her lips with a napkin.

"You want something to drink?" he asked.

"No, I am done eating."

She stood and picked up her half-eaten plate.

"Thank you for saving Zachary. I am sorry you got caught up in Chez's foolishness."

She left him and he heard her washing her dishes.

Erik walked out to join the other men by the pool. Tahir handed him a cigar and he smoked it, enjoying the sweet cherry taste blended with the tobacco on the first drag that hit his tongue.

The other men laughed, cracked jokes and let loose more once Klaue left them alone. Shipley pulled out a joint and Erik gladly toked it up. Yani was upset with him. Perhaps it was a sign. Focus on the job at hand. There were other women on the island he could chase after if he really wanted to smash yams.

But damn.

Yani had him wound up and ready to give her anything when she had her legs wrapped around his waist. He hadn't even enjoyed the full fruits of her, and she was cutting him off already.

Fuck.

###

She hardly saw Erik anymore.

At least not alone.

The energy in the compound was tense and the men spent most of their time in Klaue's main house. She and Leona were not allowed in there when the men were meeting with him for hours.

The last conversation she had with Erik was over ten days ago when she told him to leave her be. And he did.

He never looked at her directly. Not even during meals. When she did have to speak to him because Klaue needed something, his eyes cut away from her and he only nodded his head or shook it, and gave one or two words to answer her when he had to. His gorgeous face was pinched tight all the time, she rarely saw his dimples anymore, and when the other men were done meeting with Klaue, Erik and Klaue would hole up alone for another few hours, often skipping lunch with the group and arriving to dinner late with grim expressions.

Yani worked her hours and minded her business. She still went down to the cove to swim and they never ran into each other alone. A few times she saw him return to the compound in the early morning, so she knew he was out fucking. And on those days her stomach would feel sour when she saw him strolling through the gate.

Once, when she brought their lunch out to the gun range, she noticed red marks on the side of his neck. She watched him gulp down a large glass of cold water and felt her blood boil when she saw those hickeys. She lingered above the gun range, covering her ears with her hands so she could watch him take his turn shooting weapons when he was done eating. He was fast, precise, and clearly dangerous with a gun. All kinds of guns. Especially the big ones she only saw in movies with the rapid-fire bullets. Chez's friends never had a chance with this man. Erik…no…Killmonger…that man was a killer for true.

Tahir was timing Erik with his turn at the gun targets, and when Erik was done with his Glock, the two men high-fived and she saw him smile, his gold slugs gleaming. The tight long-sleeve white shirt he wore accentuated the muscles in his arms, his pecs outlined so clearly.

Some woman outside the compound was getting him at night, getting those muscles, getting those teeth on her body. Her stomach was in knots thinking of him sticking his face between some other woman's legs, kissing her down there…

The back of her left back pocket vibrated with her cell. She checked the message. Her Aunt was letting her know to get started on Klaue's house. She had laundry to do and needed Klaue's household sheets to clean within the hour.

Yani walked to the first house and grabbed the laundry net bags from the laundry room. Spotting Jerome near the pool wall, she took a moment to feed him leaves and talk to him about his poor behavior, always blocking the walkway when the men needed to pass through.

Once she was inside Klaue's house, she got to work on the bedrooms, stuffing Boss Man's dirty linen in the laundry bags and re-making his bed with clean sheets and pillowcases. She took time to dust and sweep his bedroom floor and checked his bathroom for toilet paper and toiletries. She tidied up and switched out sheets in two more bedrooms before she hit the master bedroom. The bathroom there was spotless and when she dusted the furniture, she noticed prescription pills on the bureau. She read the pill bottles, recognizing the medications. One was paroxetine an anti-depressant and the other was doxepin, a sleep medication to help with insomnia.

She read his name on the bottle.

Erik Stevens.

Such a normal-sounding surname. Killmonger had to be a nickname.

She pulled back the thin yellow velour blanket from his bed and grabbed one of the pillows to remove the pillowcase. Reaching for the other one, she lifted it up and discovered a gun underneath it. A hefty-sized piece with a silencer—

"Fuck you doing in here? Told you I clean my own room!"

She jumped when she heard Erik's voice barking at her, and she dropped the pillow. Her eyes stayed on the sheets.

"I forgot. I'm just getting the dirty linen to wash—"

He snatched the sheets from his bed, balled them up and shoved them into her chest.

"You want me to put the clean-?"

"I said I can do my own room. I can put some damn sheets on the bed. I don't need a maid to do it for me."

Erik's gold slugs flashed, the teeth sharp and menacing, his eyes gone dark and brutal.

He grabbed his weapon and placed it inside the drawer of the nightstand next to the bed slamming the drawer hard as he closed it.

"Get the fuck out!"

She crammed his dirty linen in the bag she had with her and backed out of the room without another word to him. Snatching up the other bags of sheets, she made haste back up to the front house.

When she made it to the laundry room and started loading up the washer, she finally noticed she was crying. She stopped to wipe her eyes and saw that her hands were shaking. She was terrified. Was that the real Killmonger?

His true face?

That couldn't be the same man who fed her baby and burped her gently on his lap. No way that was the man who cradled her face and said her name so softly that it sounded like an angel speaking to her.

She finished loading up the bedding and detergent, then turned on the washer. She texted her Aunt to let her know the first loads were in. Klaue always had his things cleaned first. Shoving her cell into her back pocket she took a deep breath and shook out her hands.

She saw the outside light in the laundry room darken and when she turned around, Erik was taking up all the space in the doorway staring at her. His eyes were still hard and his lips were poked out.

He was so huge compared to her. And they were alone. Her Aunt was in the middle house cleaning and all the others were at the gun range. Her hands automatically balled up into fists.

Erik stepped into the laundry room and she made a run for it, pushing past him. But she wasn't quick enough. He grabbed her arm to stop her and she yanked back from him, hitting him with her other hand.

"Yani, stop!"

His voice was still coarse, surly even, and she didn't want to be alone with him. Her mind flashed to his meds. Those were drugs that people with PTSD often took. She knew this because her Uncle took meds like those before he killed himself. Maybe Erik was having an anger episode. He was ex-military like her Uncle. All of Klaue's men were ex-military.

The thought frightened her more and she pulled back from him falling onto her backside. She turned over pushing up from her knees and she felt his strong arms lift her up by her waist. Instinctively she tightened up her body pressing her balled up fists against her eyes.

"Don't hurt me!" she shouted. All she could think about was her baby and what would happen to her Sweet Pea if this man physically harmed her.

Tears stung her eyes again and she could feel water leaking onto her thumb and index fingers still jammed against her face.

Erik put her back down on her feet, but he didn't release her waist. He squeezed her tighter and pulled her closer against him.

"I wouldn't hurt you," he said.

She tried pulling away from him, clawed her fingers against his arm, but he was steadfast.

Heat.

Soft wet heat.

His lips kissed the back of her neck and she froze up. She could feel him exhaling gently on the back of her nape and his warm breath made her body relax in his grip. She waited for the worst, her mind automatically jumping to the worst-case scenario. If he was going to molest her or sexually assault her, it was best to let him have his way so she could just get back to her daughter without injury. He was faster, stronger, and she knew what he could do with his hands when he was in attack mode. And he had a gun. She had been abused once as a young teen, playing around with a boy she liked, sneaking kisses with him until he wanted more and she wasn't ready. He had groped her breasts until her other friends found them and distracted the boy from doing more and she got away, but her body automatically did what it did back then, grew slack and endured.

Erik's lips continued pressing into her skin, and she could feel his hot tongue giving her tiny licks, pulling goosebumps on her arms.

"I could never hurt you, Yani. I'm sorry…sorry I talked to you like that back at the house. Some shit is going down and I'm in a fucked-up mood and I took it out on you."

Yani remained motionless, still too scared to move. His arms released her and she took a tentative step away from him, the open door only eight feet in front of her. She turned to look at him and when he saw her eyes his face grew less tight.

"Fuck, I didn't mean to make you cry—"

"You scared me," she said feeling her eyes well up again, "I was only doing my job. That's what a maid does!" she spit out.

His eyes darted away from hers. He pressed his hands together and lifted them to his lips.

"I shouldn't have said that about you—"

"But you did—"

"Okay, okay…I know. I'm not in a good place right now and I lashed out—"

"I don't wanna talk no more, Killmonger."

She left him in the laundry room. She had to finish Klaue's main house. She had to stay away from him.

Rubbing her arms, she saw that she still had goosebumps on her skin, her body still reeling from his kisses on the back of her neck.

###

He would have to start taking his meds regularly. Up the dosage perhaps.

The sleeping pills weren't helping anymore and his body was reacting to the lack of sleep now, making him irritable and easily agitated. He noticed some of his obsessive behaviors kicking in, things that developed in his childhood that were appearing in intensity, mainly making sure everything around him was in order and running on time, and constantly checking his computer for communications in Angola that he had already checked a gazillion times already. He was also having nightmares, memories of his childhood visit to Sao Paulo, on that day, memories of running into his Baba's apartment, on that day, memories of his grandfather taking him to his mother, on that day…all the bad days, all the traumatic times that molly-whopped his life into the trajectory he was riding on now.

The sleeping pills didn't knock him into oblivion, and because they didn't, his body would get anxious when he did lie down at night afraid that the dark dreams would come again. The dread of it was the worst part, creating negative chemical reactions in his body that made him lash out in the daytime, turning him into the bullish leader that he was, pushing the men hard and often antagonizing them too.

Huntsman and Gertz had fucked up some communications in Angola because they weren't persistent in staying on top of some contacts as Erik had insisted that they do, and some paperwork they needed was delayed, possibly tangling up their transportation dates. Erik's obsessive need to control all outcomes kicked in along with his quick anger, and he had gone to his room to blow off steam. Finding Yani there touching his things set him off and he reacted as he normally did by bringing on that heat and he had frightened the girl. She was a woman, but in many respects, she was still a young girl. She was terrified of him when he walked into the laundry room.

In the past, he wouldn't give a shit how someone felt when it came to his personal things and his privacy…but…damn, she was really trying to flee from him.

She was so soft.

Holding her by her waist as she struggled against him, he was re-introduced to the delight her body gave him by being lush and round, and so damn soft. Holding her made him feel calm. Eased the stress in his mind. Tempered the tension in his limbs. He wanted to give that calm back to her.

He caught sight of the back of her neck, the space where the bottom of her neck and shoulder met. Why he hadn't noticed before surprised him, but she often wore necklaces, and he wasn't always behind her to see that she had two small tattoos there. The same tattoos her Aunt Leona had. A small flame…no a small torch…a small torch and an ancient curved blade. The onyx ink-stained her satiny brown skin making the tats extra vivid and his lips automatically kissed her there. She smelled like sugary vanilla and nutmeg, and the tip of his tongue darted out to taste her. She had relaxed in his arms then, and when he dropped her to her feet, she turned on him, her tears weakening him where he stood. The last thing he wanted to do was bring her grief because he couldn't temper his emotions. He didn't want his Sweet Pea's mother feeling hurt by him.

His Sweet Pea?

A smile grew on his face thinking of that little bundle of energy. He wanted to sit and hold her again, tickle her toes, and try to make her little dimples pop out for him.

Probably wouldn't happen now since Yani was frightened and shedding tears because of him.

Being at the compound with various levels of competence surrounding him was choking his spirit. He was glad Tahir was there with him. Klaue was a serious taskmaster, but after the Angola job, he was going to have to get rid of several mercs from the man's team. The tensions among the men only exacerbated his nerves because they knew he had Klaue's ear and what he said nearly always made Boss Man jump.

Erik walked back to the gun range and the moment he put in his earbuds and slipped his goggles back on, he froze up. The way she was acting, the way she tried to get away from him…even the way her body went slack when he wouldn't let her go…had someone done something to her?

He ripped the goggles off of his face and placed the AK-47 back on the gun rack.

"Where are you going now?" Tahir called after him.

"Gotta check on something," he called back.

He had to find her.

###

He should've known she would be there.

The cove.

He found her sitting on the sand, her knees tucked up to her chest, her eyes closed.

"Yani."

Her head turned toward him and he saw her body tense, the fight or flight response already set in motion.

"I just want to talk, that's all. You don't have to get up. I'll stay over here," he said, crouching down. He let the fingers of his right-hand drag in the warm sand.

Her big wide eyes watched him carefully.

"How is Sydette? She still being greedy?" He gave her a smile.

"She's fine."

"Chez hasn't been giving you any problems-?"

"What do you want?"

Her eyes had narrowed, her dark brows furrowed with annoyance.

"I wanted to make sure you were okay. I don't want you to be scared of me and I want to make sure you can work around here without worrying about me picking you up like I did in the laundry room. I just didn't want you to leave without hearing me say sorry, and when you fell down-"

"Forget it," she said. She turned her head and stared at the water.

"Are we good?"

"I'm here to work. That's all, man. I'll stay out of your room. You can do what you want…whatever. I don't want you grabbing on me—"

"I won't lay a hand on you unless you want me to."

"Fine."

He stood up and gazed out upon the water. It glittered and beckoned to him to wade in and swim.

"You want to take a quick dip with me?" he asked.

"No."

"I'll leave you alone then—"

"Please."

He felt his lips twist up a bit in a half-smile. She was not going to cut him any slack. Good.

"We'll be leaving in a few days."

She looked over at him.

"Less money for me, that's all," she said.

"Won't be back for a minute."

She stuck her index and ring finger sideways giving him the deuces sign. He laughed out loud.

"You going to hold my feet to the fire from now on, huh?" he said.

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I know you can't have your baby here, but…could I come by your house and see Sydette before I leave?"

"Why?"

"The dimple mafia has to stick together."

She smiled at that and it made him feel better.

"I'll see you around. Let me know if I can come see her," he said.

Heading back up the path toward the main house he felt a heaviness come down on him. He might not see her for weeks, and that depended on if Klaue wanted to come back to St. Thomas after the Angola job. He'd been hinting at setting up shop back in South Africa, and Erik didn't want to stay there until the Kabul gig. He considered going back to Sao Paulo and maybe heading back to Oakland if Klaue stayed in Jo'burg.

Until then, he hoped she would let him see Sweet Pea.

He needed to be around a tiny bit of innocence.

###

The sky at dawn was layered. Scarlet orange. A hint of purple with a sprinkling of magenta. A vivid violet-blue and the silvery glint of the moon slowly fading behind a cotton candy pink cloud.

Yani made sure to wear her bikini…just in case…and her body dived under the first warm wave of the day at the cove. She arrived extra extra early only because she had to hitch a ride with Twyla who took Sydette with her. She needed the car to run errands and Yani had no choice but to go and then come down to the water before the fish in the ocean had even woken up.

Erik was true to his word.

They moved around the compound together in a cordial manner and whatever troubles he was having with the other men seemed to have subsided, probably because they were leaving. She was glad to see the others go, including Klaue. But she would miss Tahir's kind words in the morning and evening, and of course, Killmonger. She knew for sure her Aunt was feeling sad about Erik and Tahir departing the compound. They had only been there a little over a month and Leona was moping around the grounds like her own children were leaving her.

The sun was beginning to lighten the horizon more and she left the water quickly, pulling on capri pants and a long sleeve hoodie. She took her time meandering up the path enjoying the solitude and quiet before the compound came to life with burly men and loud voices.

"Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Ashhadu an la ilaha illa Allah. Ashhadu an la ilaha illa Allah. Ashadu anna Muhammadan Rasool Allah. Ashadu anna Muhammadan Rasool Allah. Hayya 'ala-s-Salah. Hayya 'ala-s-Salah. Hayya 'ala-l-Falah. Hayya 'ala-l-Falah. Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! La ilaha illa Allah…"

Tahir's beautiful voice stopped Yani in her tracks. The echo of his lyrical words surrounded her and thrilled her spirit. She crept closer to Klaue's main house

Tahir and Erik were standing and facing away from the ocean out on the veranda. Tahir wore a long cotton white shirt and a light-colored skull cap. Erik also wore a long cotton shirt in a light blue color. His locs wore tied up with a white headwrap knotted at the nape of his neck. They both held their arms cradled in front of them, heads bowed slightly, and Tahir's melodic voice reverberated throughout the space.

"As-salatu Khayrun Minan-nawm. As-salatu Khayrun Minan-nawm…"

Yani clasped her hands as she watched the men stand together as the sun rose.

"Bismillaahir Rahmaanir Raheem Alhamdu lillaahi Rabbil 'aalameen Ar-Rahmaanir-Raheem…"

Yani closed her eyes and tried to remember the Arabic words as Tahir repeated himself. He sang the prayer, his voice doing runs that made Yani's heart flutter. She had never heard a Muslim call to prayer before and yet it moved her just as much as her Aunt Leona singing in their little Baptist church some gut-wrenching gospel verse. She knew that the word "Allah" meant God and Tahir kept saying it. Soon they were prostrating themselves, the sunlight bathing them in a golden glow. She could feel the warmth on her face and she closed her eyes again and let Tahir's voice carry her to a peaceful place.

When she didn't hear his voice anymore, she opened her eyes and saw Erik staring down at her. He was alone and looked so regal with his hair wrapped up, the long blue shirt made him look like a King peering down on his royal subjects. And then he smiled, making her swoon a bit.

"You're here early," he said.

She nodded and he walked down from the house to get to her.

"That was so beautiful," she said still feeling moved.

"The adhan…the call to prayer," he said.

"You two do that every morning?"

"I try to when I'm with Tahir."

"Are you Muslim?"

"Nah…I uh, I had an ex-girlfriend who was raised in the faith a little bit. I kind of do it like meditation… to help relax my mind. Keep myself focused."

She thought of the prescription pills in his room and it made sense.

"I like how Tahir sings. It sounds like he's rounding up the morning angels," she said.

"It's good to see you smiling at me again," he said.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah."

His eyes felt a little too intimate on her. She still wanted to keep some distance between them. Her eyes fell upon the fading hickeys on his neck.

"Your woman nuh care you have that all in the open?" she said.

"Have what?"

She pointed at his neck and his teeth grabbed on his bottom lip in a grin that made him look embarrassed.

"She give you a proper goodbye, Killmonger?"

"Nah, I haven't had a proper goodbye yet," he said.

"Killmonger! Let's talk!"

Yani saw Klaue standing on the veranda, dark glasses on and his face pensive.

"You can come by tonight and see Sydette…if you still want to," she said.

His face broke out into a wider smile and he walked away from her. The swag in his walk when he sauntered over to Klaue had her thinking terrible things. When had a man's back been sexy to her? A fully clothed back at that?

She kept watching Erik until Klaue pulled off his glasses looking back at her.

"You need something, Yani?" Klaue asked.

"No. Mr. Klaue," she said scurrying back up the walkway to get to the laundry room.

###

He would be leaving in the morning.

Erik rubbed some cologne onto his neck and then checked the black rubber bands keeping his locs tied back. He had twisted his hair into four big rows and tucked it in the back. He trimmed up his beard and thought about shaving it all off and starting all over again. His shit was getting patchy and it had been a minute since he had been clean-shaven. His father's ring dangled on a new silver chain on his neck. He wore new diamond studs in both ears and stood back to gauge his appearance better. A soft dark yellow button-down linen shirt. Black jeans. Black Oldschool timbs.

He wanted to look nice for his visit to see Sydette…and Yani. He snuck off to an island Kmart and bought Sydette a cute little three-piece outfit. A big yellow bow with a matching halter blouse and the cutest white bottoms with yellow sunflowers all over it. Leona told him at lunch that Sydette's birthday was due in a couple of months and there was going to be a big beach party for her because it fell around a big island holiday. Erik felt bad that he might miss it for he hadn't had a chance to see that side of the island. He was tickled to know that Sydette's birthday was only three days after his. He was an April baby too. Two fire signs. No wonder he liked her so much. A fellow dimple twin and an Aries too.

He borrowed one of the compound SUVs. The other men were having pizza brought to them and Leona had the night off. He looked forward to being on his own. He had to fight Tahir from coming with him because he wanted this time to be his.

He was happy to see Leona when she opened the apartment door. Sydette was in her arms and Erik broke out into the biggest cheesy grin when he saw her.

"Hey! Sweet Pea!" he said.

Erik held out his arms for her and Sydette turned her face away at first. "Sydette!" Leona said, and the baby grinned, gifting Erik with her dimpled cheeks.

"There she is!" he said.

Leona handed her over to him, and Erik braced himself in case she started to cry, but Sydette looked him in his face and grabbed for the diamond in his right ear.

"She already knows quality," he joked.

He held up the gift bag.

"A little something for her birthday. Really early," he said.

"How thoughtful," Leona said.

He walked into the apartment still holding the baby. He looked around.

"You think Yani will let her open her gift now?"

"Yani's not here," Leona said.

He couldn't hide the disappointment on his face and Leona caught it.

"She's working at the restaurant tonight. She's a hostess. Won't be back until later tonight."

He nodded his head.

"You are welcome to wait for her—"

"Nah, I just came to see the baby before I jet out of here."

"Compound won't be the same without you and Mr. Tahir. Sit, sit…"

Erik sat on the couch. He handed Leona the bag.

"Sydette, you want to open your present from Mr. Killmonger?"

Sydette had one hand on Erik's ear and the other on his father's ring. She tried putting it in her mouth and he tucked it into his shirt.

"You don't want to chew on that little girl," he said giving her a kiss on the cheek. She smelled like Yani, a touch of vanilla and nutmeg.

Leona opened up the bag and dug through the lavender tissue paper covering the outfit. She pulled it out and her face broke into a wide grin.

"Oh! This is just too darling! Lookie, Sydette!"

Sydette's hand shot out grabbing the big hair bow.

"I have to change her right now. Here, let me go dress her and we can see how pretty she looks!"

She took Sydette from him and he didn't like the feel of her absence from the crook of his arm.

"Would you like something to drink?"

"I'm good for now,' he said.

"Be right back."

Leona took the baby and the bag and left the room. He stood up and looked around, his eyes focused on the photos hanging on the wall next to the flat-screen TV. A few recent photos of Yani and Sydette and her younger sister Anika. Yani and Sydette could be twins. The same round face, big eyes, and snarky facial expression. They looked like they were waiting for someone. Something tugged at him and he pulled out his cell and took a picture of their picture. Maybe he would just pretend they were waiting for him while he was in Angola.

"Lookie!" Leona squealed.

He turned and saw Sydette wearing the full ensemble he picked out. The big bow sat on top of her forehead and everything else fit well. He was good at guessing her size.

"I put some earrings in to match yours. They not real diamonds, but them still cute."

"Aye!' he said holding his hands out for Sydette again, "We match Sweet Pea. Yellow on yellow and diamonds in our ears. Can't tell us nothin'."

Sydette balled up her fists and pressed them on his cheeks.

"I eat cute fingers," he said slipping two of her fingers in his mouth. She laughed and he felt his heart soar. His eyes fell on Leona.

"Miss Leona, go get dressed. I'm taking you and Sydette out to dinner. I can't be here for her birthday, but we can celebrate tonight."

"You don't have to buy me no dinner Mr. Killmonger—"

"You took care of me for a whole month. Let me show you my appreciation."

Leona touched her hair, her gray plaits neat against her face.

"My hair's not even fixed, and you two look so fancy—"

"Your hair is beautiful. Put on one of your church dresses and let me treat you and baby girl."

He needed her to be with him. She had made his stay at the compound bearable and she was so much like his great-grandmother that he wanted to have that elder energy around him. Sydette leaned back in his arm, her bright black eyes studying his face hard.

"Please?" he said.

"Give me twenty minutes," she said.

She practically skipped to her bedroom and it made Erik chuckle.

###

Auntie wasn't answering the house phone or her cell, and it had Yani worried.

Her break times were always spent calling and checking on her daughter and catching a cool breeze from the back of the restaurant. She rubbed the bottom of her feet after taking off her heels. The weekend crowd was intense and the restaurant was doing a brisk business and the tips had been off the chain for all the waiters and even her. A summer regular, a Mr. Guyot from New York slipped a crisp fifty-dollar bill in her hand when he left.

She tried calling Leona again and even texted Twyla to see if maybe they all went somewhere. Her Aunt had been complaining of feeling more tired lately, and it concerned Yani, especially when she was alone with Sydette. What if she fell down, or maybe had a serious health crisis? Everyone was gone tonight, and there would be no one going to the apartment to even check-in if something did happen. Her nerves kicked in. Would she have to leave her job to go check? The owner would not be happy about that, especially since she was a popular Hostess and she knew how to handle an overflow crowd and keep people happy while they endured the long wait for a table.

Checking her phone one last time, she texted her Aunt, put her heels back on, and hustled back into the restaurant to find her boss. She needed to go check on her Sweet Pea.

"Samantha, have you seen Olivia?"

"Yani, there you are!"

Her co-hosting partner, Samantha a bubbly British red-head with a love for bright matte lipsticks and hair gel pulled on her wrist.

"You didn't tell me you had a husband!"

"Come again?" Yani said.

Samantha dragged her out from behind the Host podium and led her to the main room. "I know you are very private, but my God woman, where have you been hiding him?" Samantha said, her voice all breathy and excited.

Yani saw her boss Olivia laughing while standing next to a table that sat her Aunt, Erik, and her Sweet Pea. She felt her mouth drop open. Leona was dressed to impress. Even her plaits were undone and her gray curls fluffed out. And Sydette was wearing the cutest outfit that Yani never bought her.

At the center of it all was Erik, holding her daughter in his lap.

"I'll be right back. Make sure you look after the customers," Yani said as she made her way to Erik's table.

Leona noticed her first and waved her hand at her.

"Surprise!" Leona said.

"What are you all doing here?"

Leona stood up.

"I need to use the restroom, but your boss has been really nice. Gave us the best seat in the house!"

Leona kissed her cheek and scooted around her.

Erik's eyes rested on her face and for a moment they were the only two people in the room. He gave her the same look he did the first time he saw her away from the compound. She did have a more dramatic look when she dressed up and put on make-up, but the way he was looking at her now…

"Hey," he said.

"Kill-…Erik…"

"Yani, you have such an adorable family! Why are you hiding them?" Olivia said.

Olivia's aquiline nose that was often up in the air at everyone all the time, that same nose was now wide-open sniffing at Erik like he was God's gift to her establishment.

Yani's left eyebrow went up at Erik and he tilted his head.

"I work in the states and she wants to keep Sydette here with family," Erik said. Yani tilted her own head at that before she wrenched her eyes away from Erik and put them on her boss.

"Muh-muh-muh."

Sydette's left hand touched Erik's lips and he nibbled on her fingers and Yani watched her daughter cackle and give a high-pitched squeal. They both smiled at each other, their dimples complimenting each other.

"Oh, how sweet, she has your dimples too!" Olivia said to Erik.

"I'm going to head back to the front—"

"Spend a few minutes with your family, I'll handle the front for you. So nice to meet you Mr. Killmonger."

Olivia stepped away leaving Yani with Erik and her daughter.

"Have a seat," Erik said.

"It's really busy tonight—"

"Your boss just said you could chill for a few minutes."

Yani glanced over her shoulder and watched Olivia entertain her customers.

"I thought you were going to be home."

"Gotta work. You said you wanted to see Sydette."

"I wanted to see you too."

"Why?"

"Yeah, why."

"I might not see you again."

Sydette started fidgeting in Erik's lap. She reached her hands out for her daughter but Erik reached down into her baby bag and pulled out a large silver cylinder. He popped it open and one of Sydette's bottles popped out. He put away the cylinder and slipped the bottle nipple between Sydette's lips. Her daughter's feet wiggled and she calmed down in his arms while sucking away to her heart's content.

"You told my boss that you were my husband?"

"I didn't really say that she just assumed because of the dimples and me holding the baby, and I just ran with it."

"So what happens when you disappear and they ask me about you? They'll think mi pickney's Daddy left me. You're messing up my personal life. Now, these people are going to bug me all the time—"

Samantha walked past them ushering a couple to a table next to them.

"Hi, Yani…hello, I'm Samantha."

Samantha stood in front of Erik being flirty, and Yani didn't know what annoyed her more, this pushy white woman hitting on Erik in front of her even though she thought he was married to Yani, or this pushy white woman butting in on their conversation because she knew she could regardless of the situation.

Samantha stood there, teeth all out in the open, literally blocking Yani's view of Erik and her child. Yani smoothed down her dress and stood up.

"You're being really rude right now. I'm having a conversation with my wife and you just insert yourself right in front of her? What's up with that?"

Yani felt her face go still. She tucked her lips into a thin line waiting for Samantha's reaction. Him calling her his wife already had Yani squirming.

"Excuse me?" Samantha said, her voice fluttering.

"You heard me."

Erik's tone was not playing. His lips were slightly parted and his gold slugs looked even sharper up close.

"I'll see you up front, Yani," Samantha said scuttling away in her six-inch heels.

"I'll never hear the end of that," Yani said.

"Shit was hella rude," Erik said.

"I don't appreciate you telling people I'm your wife or you letting them think you're my husband. These people talk and it's going to get back to the wrong ears."

Her eyes were already peeping Kim, one of the waiters who lived in Red Hook like her and knew Chez. Kim was already scoping Erik and would probably jump on her phone the moment she went on break. Perhaps it didn't really matter. He said he might not return to the island again…

Her eyes jumped back to his and he was watching her.

He looked so good.

She liked how he fixed his hair, liked the way his outfit matched Sydette's and liked the way he took his Aunt out to the most expensive restaurant on the island.

"You wearin' the hell outta that dress, girl," he said.

His eyes drifted down her body and she felt her skin tingle from the sound of his voice.

"I need to get back to the front."

Looking down at her daughter she wanted to pick her up, but she looked so peaceful in his arms, her cheeks puffing and her left foot lifting up and down on his arm as she fed. That big adorable yellow bow made her look like a doll baby.

"You buy that for her?"

"Early birthday present. Her birthday is a few days after mine."

"But her birthday is not for a couple of months."

"Like I said, I might not be around."

His eyes held hers again and she walked away

She watched her Aunt and Erik eat a big meal as they took turns holding Sydette. They used her car seat as a booster seat and had her sit between them. She moved back and forth throughout the main room and out on the beach section, her eyes checking on her daughter each time she passed their table. Olivia returned to their table and shared a bottle of wine with Leona.

She had finished seating an older Asian couple out on the beach when she ran into Erik and Leona back in the front leaving for the night.

She took another break to walk them out to Erik's borrowed SUV. She fastened Sydette's car seat in the back of the car.

"That food was wonderful. This was such a nice evening. Thank you for treating us Mr. Killmonger," Leona said.

She clutched a doggy bag filled with rolls and a container of lobster bisque that Olivia insisted she take home for free.

"Can you hold on for a few minute? I need to use the restroom before we go. The traffic looks bad and I don't want to get stuck doing the dance," Leona said placing her bag of food on the passenger seat.

"Take your time," Erik said.

They watched Leona head back into the restaurant.

Things seemed so final now.

"Thank you for doing this for her. She hardly gets to do nice things. We both work all the time and I never get to do things like this with her. And thank you for the baby clothes. Sweet Pea looks amazing."

"You're welcome," he said.

Awkward silence.

Yani twisted the toe of her right shoe nervously.

There were so many dimensions to this man. She still felt cautious with him, but not so much for him with her daughter.

"You all head out on Monday—"

"I leave tomorrow morning," he said.

"Tomorrow?" Her voice hitched a bit and her eyes dropped to his chest. He was really leaving. And so soon. She thought for sure he was leaving in two days like the others.

"Lemme get a picture."

"A picture?" she asked.

"Sit up next to Sydette," he said pulling out his cell.

He helped her climb up onto the backseat next to the baby car seat. Sydette was wide awake and watching them. She leaned in toward the baby.

"What's your favorite thing about Sweet Pea?" he asked.

"Her dimples," she said.

"Muh!" Sydette squeaked and Yani laughed. Sydette giggled with her when she touched her nose and Erik snapped the picture.

"One more look this way," he said.

Yani kept her finger on her daughter's cheek and stared at Erik. For a moment he stopped looking at the cell phone screen and looked at her. The flash went off.

"Can I see?"

He handed her his phone and she swiped between the two shots.

"Cute,” she said.

"You really won't come back?" She didn't mean for her voice to come out a whisper.

He shrugged.

"It's up to Klaue."

"Well, thank you for all of this. It was really cool—"

He moved closer to her and she felt him take up so much space again in front of her.

"Take good care of my daughter," he said.

She smiled.

"I kept getting bugged about that all night. The chef is mad because I never invited him to my wedding—"

He brought his face closer to hers.

"Take care of yourself too, okay?"

"Yeah, I will—"

Heat.

Wet softness again.

There were lips that kissed and lasted a moment, and then there were lips that kissed and promised a lifetime. Her mouth fell in sync with his and she forgot everything…her name, what she did five minutes ago, what day of the week it was and where the hell she was. There was only his kiss. His lips. His mouth. His teeth. His scent. The tiny tickle of his facial hairs. The sharp tang of the chocolate espresso he drank with the desert.

"I want to come back," he whispered in her ear when he released her lips and she pulled his face back to her front so she could kiss him again, suck on his tongue and hold onto that small piece of him.

"You come back and I'll make you wait for alla mi. I'm not easy," she sighed. She licked the seam of his lips and reached up to cradle his neck, pulling him closer, strumming her nails across his nape making him shiver.

"I don't want you easy, girl. Make me work for this shit."

He picked her up and brought her back down to her feet. She stood on tippy-toe to get his lips back on hers but he turned her around so that she faced the inside of the car. His mouth came back down on the back of her neck and he spent delicate time there licking and kissing her sensitive skin. His fingers skimmed her breasts, holding them tight as his tongue explored every inch of her neck.

"I come back and you tell me about these tattoos, yeah?" he asked.

"Deep history. You handle that?" she panted.

"I can handle anything you give me."

"You sure 'bout that?"

"You my wifey now, whatchu think?"

She groaned when he sucked on her neck harder, his fingers pushing her breasts together.

"Will you let me have you if I come back?"

It was best to be honest. She twisted her body around so that she faced him again.

"Killmonger…I haven't been with a man since I had my baby. I mean, really been with a man."

"That's okay. Your speed. I take whatever you give. Okay?"

"Okay."

She took his lips again, her mouth feeling impossibly wet while joined to his.

"Muh-muh-muh—"

Yani released Erik's mouth and turned to look at her daughter. She realized that the entire time Erik had Sydette at the restaurant, her daughter didn't reach for her or fuss for her not one time. It was like she wasn't even needed with Erik caring for her. That sneaky dumpling. Not even needing a real titty with this strange man around her. Erik cradled the back of her smooth head.

"Now see, this right here…this is a proper goodbye," he said.

She smiled and he plundered her mouth.

Lookie.

###

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] [Part 5] [Part 6] [Part 7] [Part 8]

[Part 9] [Part 10] [Part 11] [Part 12]

Taglist (Please let me know if you would like to be added):

@fonville-designs @soufcakmistress @cherrystainedlipsbaby @tclaybon @thadelightfulone @allhailqueennel @bartierbakarimobisson @cpwtwot @shookmcgookqueen @yoyolovesbucky @raysunshine78 @the-illllest @terrablaze514 @l-auteuse @amirra88 @jimizwidow @janelledarling @chaneajoyyy

#wet sugar #killmonger #killmonger smut #erik stevens #erik killmonger #njadaka #black panther #klaue #linda #Black panther fanfiction #killmonger imagine #killmonger x oc

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kaizerssaucywritings · 4 years

Text

Through the looking Glass

Voltron based Fanfiction.

Original post: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24712486

Lance sighed as he finished staring at his textbook for the longest time without remembering a word of the text he was trying to read. Letting his hand flop onto the bed below him, book abandoned with it and lay staring up at the ceiling listlessly.

He had been told by his mother over and over to "find a hobby" to stop him from complaining about the move they had made recently... that he would "make friends" with the new school. But that didn't stop Lance from hesitating. He didn't want to make new friends he wanted to be with his friends Lance had back in Cuba, the ones he didn't have to struggle so much to communicate with.

Okay...maybe struggle wasn't the right word. After all, Lance and his siblings had been taught how to speak English from a very young age. And his mother and father had gotten them, tutors, when they had found out that his father was being transferred to a different office. Despite Lance's understanding of the basics of English, it was almost as if people here in this city spoke another entirely different language than English. They used all sorts of slang that Lance didn't know.

Still, with being the middle child, Lance knew he wasn't really allowed to complain or make a ruckus... Lance had to be an excellent example for his sister and brother and help his elder siblings settle with their families here. Lance had plenty to keep him busy...but maybe his mother was right... Lance needed a hobby or something to keep him engaged when he wasn't failing at making friends at school... that was when his eyes locked on his laptop.

It was brand new, and it was one of the few things that Lance had gotten in recent years that wasn't a hand me down from his older siblings. His father had known that Lance was not excited about the move and that having a way to communicate with his old friends might help the brown-haired teen. With this in mind, he had splurged on getting him the newest model of laptop for him. Honestly save for the sporadic emails sent out now, and then it had gone until recently mostly neglected.

Getting up, Lanced headed over to his desk and booted the computer up and signed into his email. He had been emailing his friends now and then since the move. Still, often he found that they were asleep or away when he was on because of the time difference, which was a disappointment to Lance. Still, Lance got a laugh out of the emails and even got sent a few links to a site called Utube. It wasn't anything exciting outside of the funny cat videos and derp vids his friends sent him as it was still relatively new.

That was when he noticed another section of the site seemed to be used for people making online blogs about their days and their lives. Hey, that would be a neat way to keep his friends updated with his life without the struggle of typing everything outright?

It took him a few hours of doing some quick research online to find out how the site itself worked and how people did this whole "online video blog." Fiddling with the computer, Lance tried to figure out how to use his web camera and the site to figure out how to create a channel. He made his first, not so put together vlog about the move and how things were for him and uploaded it.

Sending his friends the link and then signing out. Going back to his homework, finally able to be even somewhat productive. After this, he spent the evening playing charades with his younger siblings to keep them amused. At the same time, their parents had a rare moment out to themselves.

What he had not been expecting the next time he logged into his computer was a wave of emails from Utube. All of them informing him that he had new subscribers and comments on his video. Okay, so yes, he had expected a few, but there were far more than he had been anticipating.

Logging into the site to see what was going on, he rose a brow as he saw that the site's natural notification system was showing at least 20+ new notifications. Scrolling his mouse over it only to see that there was a splattering of new followers and comments, he clicked in to see what was left for him.

There were the expected grins as he read posts that were so blatantly from people from back home, with their inside jokes and their playful barbs that made him laugh out loud. However, there were also a few smaller comments from other people; he had no idea who the user names were from. Nothing negative, really. Just a few comments about how his story was so relatable. He had told them about how he had made an attempt to create a funny joke in class and had failed miserably as Lance had misunderstood the context of a word he was using. He attempted to make a fast retreat and ended up tripping over his own feet and falling on his face.

To his surprise, the comments were even supportive, wishing that he was okay and thanking him for a laugh. There was a small jostle of joy in Lance's chest, reading one of the comments. It described how they had gone to their first day in a new school and ended up feeling that they had failed their own introductions to the class and were horrified. But that hearing about his personal issues had made her smile and not feel so alone!

The excitement that the idea brought Lance was intoxicating, and he knew that he would love to make more videos if he could help others in the same way! Scratching his head, he thought about what he could do to make others feel the same way he had helped this one person...

~~~~

After hours of writing on his computer, Lance sat back to crack his knuckles with a pleased grin. Having spent a little while doing research on how to make good Vlogs, they had all said the same thing. Keep to a few related topics, be organized in what you want to say, and don't be afraid to be completely genuine.

He knew he could easily follow the first and last point, but Lance was known to run off on tangents when he spoke. The only thing Lance could think of to do was to create lists of what he wanted to talk about. This had evolved into him, writing a few stories about things he wanted to share with people. Lance had happily turned out about five or six short stories of goofy things that had happened to him over the last little while. Sometimes using the emails, Lance had sent his friends as a reference and otherwise just drawing from the plethora of situations Lance often found himself in. Lance was a bit of a klutz, and it also seemed like he had the worst of luck when it came to things happening to him.

Armed with these anecdotes and the motivation to begin filming, Lance practically jumped out of bed the next day. He asked his mother if he could borrow their camera - a small handheld camera that they used for family events and when participating in school events like plays and the like. She was obviously surprised, making a comment about why he couldn't just use the camera that came with his own computer. Lance didn't even try and explain that the quality of a camera was often considered by far better than the one built into a laptop.

From that one impulse and desire to give others the comfort of showing that they were not alone, no matter what they were going through, Lance began to make videos. He had read that a consistent upload schedule was necessary, and more importantly, he wanted to share more. And by the end of the day, he had enough previously recorded videos to have two uploads during the next three weeks.

What had been a way to keep in touch with his friends soon became something else altogether. Because although Lance's friends all commented on his video and gave his other classmates the links and shares. It seemed some other people on the site had just stumbled on his video and decided to leave him comments as well.

He had, of course, been incredibly polite and replied to their messages. When things began to move far more rapidly than Lance could ever have expected. Within a few weeks, his channel had blown up to almost five hundred incredibly active and responsive users. When Lance woke up the morning to find the five hundred subscriber notification, he actually found himself staring at the computer screen in stunned silence. It was utterly unbelievable that so many people had come to enjoy his weekly posts and were even asking for more content.

From then on, he had started making daily videos, and things had even evolved from there.

#voltron #Voltron fanfiction #Voltron fanworks #Voltron Keith #Voltron Shiro #Voltron lance #lance mcclain #VLD Shiro #VLD Keith #VLD Lance

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kuramirocket · 4 years

Text

I am so glad and proud that my 4+ years of editing videos came in handy for this group project I had to do for college.

For the project me and three other students had to write a 10 page professional business report. Let me tell you, it was such a headache researching the costs of building a new parking lot and buying + installing new security cameras. I did that research and wrote the revenues section of the report and part of the Works Cited Page. The others, ofc did other sections of the report.

Afterwards we all did the video portion of the assignment seperatley since we couldn't meet up (thank god - agoraphobia yo!! Takinh an online class, btw). BUT! The video had to be combined. Honestly, I had doubts if the others would be able to combine the four seperate vids, but had to study for my Spanish final. So, I trust them with it.

Right when I'm ready to take my exam early, BAM! The group chat intensifies since the person in charge of the video combination can't access some of the videos and can't combine them because the videos are in different video formats.

Me internally: I fcking knew they wouldn't be able to do it! (Like damn, I don't want to be mean or stuck up, but I had a strong feeling. And sadly, I was right. Ahh.

So I'm like 'I'm good at video editing. Send me the vids and I'll try to combine them.' I go to my email and was about to freak out cause one vid wouldn't download. And the other wouldn't open. So, what I did was try to open the one that would not open in this video editing program I got free on amazon, and yayy it worked. Next, I was like F it, I'll just screen record all three vids. That way they'll save in whatever format I want and won't have to go through the process of converting each one seperatly to the same file type. Once that was done. I put all vids in Windows Movie Maker and saved it.

Then another problem! Yayy! Apparently we could only upload either the report or video. It would not allow both. Okay fine. We uploaded the report and I was going to attach the vid to the comment section, but haha nope. I guess the file was to large. Urgh, okay I'll email it to the professor and explain. I sent it and it was just 'sending...', 'sending...', 'sending...'

At this point it was hella late and I was about ready to bang my head against the wall. I just had like an hour to take my fucking exam before it closed. And the fcking vid wouldn't send anywhere. I was like 'fuuuuuuck what do I do?!!' Then it finally sent.

Sent a quick message to the group that it was done and quickly set up protcorio or whatever it's called and all its stupid requirements.

I still finished the exam early yayy! And well, here I am. Hopefully my written exam went well and also the project!!!

But yeah. I just found it hilarious how I somehow knew the group would not be able to combine the videos. I'm sorry guys just ayyye. Is it really cause I'm used to editing vids? Like I'm no pro and I use simple programs like WMM. But still. Lol. I'm so glad my fandoms always help me out in school. (As in I edit amvs/tributes ans have writen fanfiction before). Seriously. Not the first time something like this happens where fandoms have really helped me out with course work.

Fandoms really have, I feel, strengthend both my editing video skills AND writing and reading skills through fanfiction xD

#college #college problems #personal #my posts #video editing #amvs #tributes

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askroahmmythril · 5 years

Text

A Look Back at the Past 10 Years

I had wanted to put this in the video description for the 10th Gag Reel vid : https://youtu.be/ovzRypMF_BM However, it told me the description was too long. So I’ll post it here instead and link it from the video info. Basically, these are just some thoughts and memories looking back at my first major video from each of the previous years’ worth of content.

2009 : "Mega Man 1 - Cut Man Perfect Run" Ahh, my first video, back where it all started. Yeah, my vocal energy has changed a lot since then as I got more confident in what I'm doing, kind of found my own groove, that sort of thing. I've had people ask if I'd ever go back and re-do these with my current energy or what have you, but I think it's important to remember the past, it's kind of interesting seeing how I've grown since then, if that makes sense. That and I really would rather not re-do some of these stages again, thanks.

2010 : "Mega Man 9 - Splash Woman Perfect Run - Part 1" Continuing on with the Perfect Runs, by this point, I had acquired the Gamebridge, my first video capture device. It had its issues, sure, but hey, it opened up a lot of possibilities for things I could work on. Also interesting to see, this was a "Part 1," due to the old YouTube video length limitations. When I first started, videos couldn't be longer than 11 minutes. It later upgraded to 15, and now these days, no more limits.

2011 : "Let's Play Secret of Mana - Pt 1 - Who So Pulleth Out This Sword..." Secret of Mana is probably one of my favorite projects I've done on the channel. I have a lot of nostalgia for this game due to playing it with my mum way back in the days of the SNES. It was a project I had intended to do for awhile, but other things kept getting in the way. It led to an inside joke when the people on Pink's old forums made a Touhou-style game where I was the Stage 5 boss. One of my spell cards was called Event Horizon "Delayed Mana."

2012 : "The Situation At Hand, and Also Endless Mega Man 3" Something I always try to do is keep my fans and viewers informed if something has gone pear shaped on my end. I do a lot of info updates on my social media, mostly Twitter these days, Tumblr if I need more room to talk. If however something is going to cause very long delays, I try to upload update videos to fully discuss things. This particular update video was, sadly, due to having to take time away to deal with the aftermath of my mum's elderly aunt passing away.

2013 : "Mega Man Maximum Demo - Bell Man Stage" Okay, so I cheated a little on this one. There was actually a video in 2013 that came earlier than this, but it was a short five minute audio only update in which I discussed the then "secret project" (Eternal Darkness Blind Run) taking longer than expected to finish up. During the downtime, I ended up recording this demo. It was really nicely done, though sadly, I haven't heard much since about progress on the game. It's one that honestly I wish had gotten finished, it seemed quite promising.

2014 : "Where Has the Dragon Been? - The Medical Lowdown" The first vid for this year wasn't even in January, and ow, there was a good reason for it. This was the era of Appendageddon. For those not in the know, late December of 2013, my appendix went boom. So during January, I was under strict orders to take things easy after the surgery. By February, the stitches were out, everything was healing well, and I was finally starting to get back to normal routines, and so I was able to finally tell the tale of my apparently horrifically large mutant appendix that had somehow wrapped itself around other organs. Seriously my doctor couldn't resist telling everyone stories about how unusual it was. It was kinda weird yo and squicked me out a good bit. And then he wanted to show me pictures he apparently took... Thanks no.

2015 : "Let's Play Silent Hill Homecoming - Pt 34 - Hard Mode : the Abridged Version" Generally, I finish my horror LPs during October, November at the latest. Of course, this doesn't count issues of technical difficulties like Silent Hill Shattered Memories or Resident Evil's Advance Mode. Sadly, this delay had nothing to do with technical difficulties. In early November of 2014, when I had been working on the Silent Hill Homecoming LP, my aunt passed away in the hospital, losing her long battle with cancer. This loss hit my family hard, so I had to take a good bit of time off for this one.

2016 : "Let's Play Megaman Battle Network 4 - Pt 76 - Grinding and Gunplay" Hoo boy. The MMBN4 project. This one took a LONG time to finish. Seriously, this project lasted 90 vids, stretching from Part 1 on March 1, 2015, to Part 90 on July 11, 2016. To be fair, there were phases where I simply couldn't work on it due to things like our house's central air conditioning going out during an intense summer heat wave (yeah, wearing headphones in that was not fun) or taking breaks for things like that year's October horror project, but also, a lot of periods of burnout. When I say I want to wait to do MMBN5 until I truly feel like it? This kind of thing is why. I'm not quite ready to throw myself into that long of a project again just yet.

2017 : "Let's Play Spyro 2 : Ripto's Rage - Pt 18 - Regurgitate" Mostly what this reminds me is that I still need to take some time to do more testing with the Elgato card I now have so that I can hopefully do more PS2 and Gamecube era stuff again. I really want to get projects like Spyro 3 and Pikmin 2 going. Still also really hoping Spyro Reignited Trilogy gets a Switch release... As far as channel related stuff for this one, I don't remember too much going on around this point in time, just the average "working on the current project" type thing.

2018 : "Make a Good Mega Man Level 2 Blind Run - Pt 10 - Chomp Man" Another lengthy project, and another where things got delayed through January. This time, it was our internet connection breaking. Good ol' HughesNet, they're just the best. This had been after the lengthy setup of trying to get my room rearranged so I could get Groose (my current computer) up and running, which was experiencing a lot of delays due to the unfortunate fact that my step-uncle was in and out of the hospital. Sadly, in March of 2018, we lost him as well. The last ten years have definitely seen a lot of changes in our household. This project itself would also see further delays due to our internet breaking again to where I couldn't upload videos for awhile for some reason, and one of Groose's cooling fans breaking.

2019 : "Let's Play Cuphead - Pt 14 - The Haunted Mouse (1941)" And so, here we are on my 11th year of work. It's been quite a ride, and one I hope to continue for quite some time to come. I just want to thank all my fans, viewers, and supporters, whether you've been with me since the humble days of 2009, or if you've just joined us here on the channel. Your continued support and enjoyment of my work is truly what keeps me going, and hopefully there will be plenty more fun to be had in the years to come.

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wordsandshawn · 5 years

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Before Now - chapter 8

Previous Chapters

Kristen waits until we’re both back in her car before she brings Shawn up again. Its already past midnight because we didn’t leave the festival after an hour like we had originally planned to get back home at a decent time. We both love live music far too much for that.

As soon as I’m seated back in the passenger side of Kristen’s car, I immediately pull my laptop out and start importing the photos from my camera. I can’t wait another second to see them and get started on the editing. Kristen starts backing out of the parking stall, “What was that all about?” And even though it’s been almost three hours since Shawn left the festival, and we had been rocking out that entire time, I know what she’s talking about and she knows I know.

“My photography professor didn’t get me the gig,” I admit.

“I got that much.” She says shortly, her eyes glued to the road. “How do you know him?” She’s being a lot calmer about this than I expected, but I’m not sure if I should take that as a good sign or a bad sign.

I realize now that I’m in this situation, but I should have never kept this secret from Kristen. When I first met her, sure, it was understandable, but I’ve known her for two years now. I should have told her.

“Kris, I’m really sorry.”

Her voice gets low, “Skylar, just tell me how you know him.” She’s done with bullshit.

“I’ve known him my whole life.” I blurt.

“What do you mean?” Her voice is shrill and for a second, I’m afraid that she is going to crash the car. I’m starting to rethink having this conversation while she’s behind the wheel of the car, but there’s no going back now.

“I mean, my mom and his mom are best friends. They have been since they were kids, so we kind of grew up together, a little.”

She’s silent, and Kristen is rarely ever silent, so I know it means something. I know it means a lot. “You’re lying.” She says, but in a tone that says she doesn’t know how to believe me, but she knows that I’m telling the truth.

“I’m not. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier.”

“I don’t get it.” I know her mind is in a million places. I’m only grateful the anger hasn’t set in yet.

“I’ll explain whatever you want to know.” I offer, knowing she deserves an explanation, and it’s time for me to be honest.

“Well for starters, how could you have never mentioned it, not even a little? You know how much we love him.” She’s still in disbelief.

“It just felt weird to say after keeping it a secret for so long. I didn’t even know if you’d believe me.” She just glances at me quickly before looking back at the road.

When she doesn’t say anything in response, I take a deep breath, “In high school, when Shawn started to get famous, fans started digging up older pictures of Shawn and putting them on the internet. Some of those pictures had me in them. Shawn and I never went to the same schools, but when the kids at my high school learned that I knew him, that we grew up together, they wouldn’t leave me alone. They wanted information about Shawn, they wanted to be my friend because they thought that would mean they’d get in backstage to his shows. Some kids I thought wanted to be friends with me for me turned out to have only wanted to see if they could get to know Shawn through me. It hurt, and I got tired of being used like that. I wasn’t even close friends with Shawn by the time we reached high school. He was always gone, and we drifted apart. So, I just stopped telling anyone. I pretended I didn’t know him, and it seemed to work better.” After I finish talking, there are a few seconds of silence, probably because she doesn’t know what to say, and I’ve already said everything I have to say.

“Okay,” She pauses, still staring at the road, and I’m a little glad that her attention is divided between driving and this conversation. I’m not sure if I’d be able to have it face to face with all her attention on it. “Why didn’t you tell us later, when we were already friends. Why did you pretend to hate him? You knew we loved him.”

“Things are,” I pause, trying to find the right words. “Complicated between Shawn and I.” I dare to glance at her, and I notice her eyes widen. She knows that there has to be something within that word, complicated. And even I don’t know how to describe it, to explain what complicated even means.

“So, the ‘text me so I know you’re home safe,’ thing. That’s part of the complicated?”

I hesitate. I hadn’t thought too deeply about that sentence, except that it was what alerted Kristen to the fact that I didn’t just happen to get this gig for no real reason. “I think that’s just Shawn being Shawn.”

“I knew it!”

I’m startled by her shouting, but I ask, “Knew what?”

“I knew that he was a fucking sweetheart. You can’t fake something like that.”

I roll my eyes at her, but the smile on her face is so big that I can’t help but smile too. I’m glad that this took a turn away from the personal, even if just for a second or two. Surprisingly, Kristen doesn’t ask a ton of personal questions about Shawn. Instead, she’s more interested in what happened between us, my role in the story of the two of us. Eventually, we move on to other topics, although I know that we’ll be back on the topic of Shawn soon enough.

I spend the rest of the two-hour drive editing my pictures and trying to put together a mini video. I have a ton of fun editing the video, and I’m pleased to realize that both the pictures and videos turned out pretty great. I can get used to this concert photography thing. Tonight was the most fun I’ve had in a long time.

When Kristen and I finally arrive back at our apartment, it's past two am, but I remember to text Shawn, well, Peter(bio101). We’re home, thanks for everything tonight. I’m sending a link to a drive of the photos and a video over in a bit.

I’m so glad you came, and I’m glad you got home safe. Looking forward to seeing the pics and vid.

I don’t reply for a while, since I’m busy uploading everything to the drive to send over to Shawn. During the ride back home, I carefully chose only the best photos and focused on editing those well. I’ve seen some of the photos that Shawn’s tour photographer has taken and they’re always stunning, so I know there’s a high standard for me to live up to, and I want to do my absolute best.

I send over the photos and the video, then text Shawn. I sent them over. If you post them, do you mind not tagging me or mentioning my ig? He’ll probably think I’m weird because the whole point of this was supposed to be to help my career, and I should want the recognition for my work, but I don’t. Not for this, not right now. I’ll probably use these pictures in my portfolio, but I don’t need Shawn linking them to my social media. If it's linked then people from my Uni will probably start asking questions, and Greg will find out. It’s that last part I’m trying to avoid most. I honestly don’t think Greg processed in his mind that the person who stood up for me that night at the bar was Shawn Mendes. And as long as he never does, then we should be okay.

I’m about to fall asleep when Shawn finally replies. It all looks amazing, Skylar! Are you sure you don’t want credit?

I’m sure. I type back. Thanks again, Shawn, I really appreciate it.

And I fall asleep before bothering to wait for a reply.

If last night was a dream, then I certainly wake to reality. Four missed calls from Greg, and a string of text messages I strain to read through barely open eyes. The essential message is that he knows I went to a festival last night when I said I had a photography project. I don’t answer right away, but I start planning my response. I’m tired of lying, but I feel trapped, like I have no choice.

Greg has been going through a lot lately with his work and his family, so I don’t want to make things worse for him. I don’t want to upset him, although it is so hard not to, no matter what I do. I open Instagram and see Kristen’s Instagram post from last night. Even worse, her Instagram is public, and Shawn followed her. How he found her, I have no idea, but it is what it is. Who else follows her, none other than Greg, so my first question of how he found out is answered. It isn’t Kristen’s fault, its mine. I didn’t ask her not to post anything from last night. I didn’t even tell her that I lied to Greg. It’s my own fault for not seeing it coming. And now I have to face the consequences.

I finally gather up the courage to call him, knowing I can’t put it off any longer. He doesn’t answer, so I assume he’s busy. I text him back telling him that I did go for photography and I didn’t mean to lie to him. He doesn’t respond. I try catching up on some homework, but I’m bombarded by my other roommates who have obviously found out my connection to Shawn. They have a lot of questions, even more than Kristen. Most of the questions I don’t even have answers for, and I try to explain to them that I don’t know Shawn anymore, not really.

When I think about Greg again, I realize it’s been three hours since I texted and called him, and there hasn’t been a response. I’m trying not to read too much into it, but I do anyway.

By the time its six pm and I’ve texted and called him several more times still with no response, I think it’s clear that he’s not wanting to talk to me. I normally spend Saturday nights with him, but since he’s not picking up the phone and I don’t know where he is or what he’s doing, I decide to go out with my friends instead.

This proves to be the second big mistake of the weekend because he texts me at midnight asking me why I’m not home. He’s at my apartment and he’s upset that I’m not there. I leave the club to call him, and this time he actually answers. “Where the fuck are you?” He questions.

“I’m downtown, at a club.” I say, forcing to keep my voice even although my heart is beating out of my chest right now. A club was not my first choice for a fun Saturday night, but all my friends were going, and my boyfriend was ignoring me, so my choices were club or stay home alone in my apartment.

He sounds angry, but he also sounds sad, which catches me by surprise since he ignored me all day. I ask him to pick me up from the club and we go back home together. He’s been depressed or angry a lot more than usual lately, and I’m never exactly sure what I’m going to get when I talk to him. I want to love him, to show him that I love him because he’s sad. But he’s still mad at me for not telling him about the show and for not inviting him, and he’s made it clear that even though he picked me up, things are not okay between us. I have a lot of making up to do for lying, but he’s so cold to me, I can’t even make it up to him. I’m torn with what to do. I’m confused. I feel like this is my fault, that it's my fault he’s sad, but I don’t know how to make it better. I don’t know what to do to make things better for Greg or better between us. I just want to stop feeling like I have to walk on eggshells around him all the time. It’s exhausting, but I don’t know how to fix things, no matter how desperately I want to.

chapter 9

#Shawn Mendes #Shawn Mendes fanfic #Shawn Peter Raul Mendes #Shawn Mendes imagine #Shawn Mendes fanfiction #Before Now

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ajeevan · 5 years

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04/30/19

9:49 PM

Just got off work. 4.25h.

Probably my last post for this month. We're already 5 months into 2019.

I'm turning 18 in almost 4 months.

The older I get the faster time goes by. Like 4y ago I was like "just 4 more years and I'm 18!".

Found out that I'm getting the paycheck on the 2nd.

Saving up money.

Gotta film the 3y anniversary vid tomorrow and upload it. I haven't studied for the math exam yet.

Ah the train is finally moving. Delayed.

I should study for that exam. I kinda paid attention in class and looked at math on Friday so let's see how much I know. Physics on the other hand... Well fuck that.

Anyway. Gotta finish the intro do a quick outro and I'll be ready for the 3 year anniversary. Will probably do most of it tomorrow.

#work #hustle #grind #moving out #saving up #YouTube #paycheck #hard work #intro #content creator #entertainment #TRANSFORMERS

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bionicdragonguardian1 · 5 years

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Day 6: Supernatural

I think I misunderstood the question because by the time I realized I was wrong I was already done and went full stream-of-consciousness style back to Day 5 for this one, but technically they do occur in the correct order. By misunderstood the question I kinda did Day 23 here by accident. This is pre S5, other than that it’s really open-ended.

When Pidge and Hunk found out their apartment was haunted

They expected a movie’s worth of problems

Instead, the two ghosts, two young men in their early twenties were rather content to let them live here

Apparently, they only kicked people out who were assholes

Some people got freaked out because they were… well ghosts

But other than that Lance and Keith were totally chill roommates to have

Hunk and Pidge would occasionally forget that they were actually ghosts

That is until someone broke into the apartment and tried to rob them

The door was busted out into the hallway, blown completely off the hinges

The worst of the damage was in the kitchen

But it was simple things mugs, silverware, and Hunk’s really common kitchenware

The thing was, Lance and Keith got really quiet about it

They clearly didn’t want to talk about it

Pidge didn’t want to go behind their backs, but they had to download some of the videos off of the cameras they had installed before properly meeting Lance and Keith

What they saw was something else

The guy wasn’t there to rob them like the police said

He was there to ambush her

Even though she couldn’t hear what he said, because Keith was screeching and actually turning tangible enough to take the guy down, she could guess what he said

Turns out it was Lance that started throwing mugs and forks at him.

Though “throwing” wasn’t quite right considering Lance apparently had telekinetic abilities

Keith eventually got him back into the kitchen and the two of them pushed him through the door with a combined power

Pidge resolved to talk to them about it

But a notification popped up of one of their channel’s followers asking if more vids were going to be dropped

Since they had nothing else ready to go they uploaded the fight in the apartment

Apartment Ghosts Catch Intruder and Save Tenant went viral within the day

Pidge and Hunk should’ve been less surprised when not one, not two, but three journalists showed up at their door.

Two guys and girl

Sam, Dean, and Jo. apparently.

Something about the questions they were asking made Pidge feel uneasy

Though when they and Hunk saw both previous tenants shrug they decided to be honest with the journalists

They’d probably finish and think they were crazy behind their backs anyway.

“Why do you keep looking in that corner?” Dean finally asked

Keith, who didn’t do people, according to Lance, made the lights turn off for a moment then turn back on.

“Hey.” Lance greets still in the corner while Keith was now standing by the light switch

“I thought you said there were two of you living here?” Jo accuses, seeming to look around for the source of Lance’s voice

“There are.” Hunk replied rather simply. “We weren’t lying when we said this place was haunted.”

“You wouldn’t know their names by any chance, would you?” Sam asks

“Sure, it’s Lance and Keith.”

“Full names, Midget.” Dean snaps

“Don’t call me that!” Pidge snapped back

“Lance and Keith what?” Sam asks more calmly.

“Why don’t you just ask us?” Keith huffs.

All three of them turned at the sound of his voice.

This time they can see him, and they watch with stunned expressions as he plays with the light switch.

The only thing off-putting is that Keith is partially see through.

“Which one are you, ugly?”

“Who you callin’ ugly?”

“I’m sure he meant me.”

“That doesn’t make it better, Mullet.”

“You two are the ghosts that have been haunting this place?” Jo asks

“Sure.” they’re both rather casual about it.

“Are you sure?” Dean questions

Keith huffs, jumping the seven feet that separate him and the couch to sit down on it.

“You make a better door than a window.” he informs Dean.

“Shut it Casper.”

“It’s Keith.” he corrects.

“Dean, calm down, none of this matches the lore.” Sam tell him

Pidge perks up. “Yeah, you see I was checking that too and they don’t really match the stories of any sort of haunting we’ve seen recorded.”

“From what Pidge and I can see Lance and Keith are something different.”

“Different how?” Jo asks

Lance huffs. “My Dad was a Hunter, you know, I know you are too.”

Pidge, Hunk, and Keith are all thoroughly confused and can only watch as the conversation leaves them behind

They understand it all, but the context of things go over their head

Salt and Burn?

Exorcism

Poltergeist?

Iron tools, EMF readers, and Rock Salt pellets?

Yet, they all watch as Lance not only keeps up with the conversation but keeps the three guests on their toes

“What happened to you when you died?” Dean asks as the conversation wanes

Completely ignoring how Keith looks like it’s the last thing that he wants to talk about

“It was a house fire, in the middle of the night.” Keith says rather darkly, this time the lights flicker, the one on the side table pops

“That’s a little wrong,” Lance admits looking at the three. “They said it was a house fire, but that usually gives you some time to escape. The gas stove leaked in the middle of the night, meaning we missed the warning signs.”

“So what, there was no fire?” Jo asks, crossing her arms

“No, there was, it’s just that the gas lit when Keith knocked his lighter on the floor.” Lance admits lowly

“Lighter?” Hunk and Pidge ask even they didn’t know that.

“I smoked.” Keith says simply, but not meeting Lance’s eyes. “I had woken up and realized that I felt… wrong so I reached to grab the phone we kept next to the bed.”

Lance looks down too. “I wasn’t awake enough to process anything beyond the fact that I had a headache and was having a bit of trouble breathing. So I tried to keep Keith from getting out of bed.”

They all knew what happened next, they could almost see it

Keith’s hand missed the phone and knocked his lighter off the bedside table.

They couldn’t even process anything before the spark lit the gas and a fire started.

“Flash Burn.” Sam mumbled, before turning to the other two still living people. “Thank you for your time, we’ll be going now.”

Lance and Keith watched them in the hallway how Dean and Jo got angry and said they should destroy them, and most surprisingly how Sam defended them.

How if they hadn’t gone crazy and lost their humanity yet, they likely never would.

Lance and Keith already knew that to be true, they had expelled some less than friendly haunters from the building before.

In the end the Ghostly Roommates were allowed to stay.

#klance #klance au month #day 6 #Supernatural AU #I might've made it Supernatural like the show #i hate my noob ass

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violetemerald · 6 years

Video

youtube

Or watch the version with all sorts of potentially distracting, potentially just explanatory, text on top of the screen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Htd9luUsMe8

I had to delete the first copy of the no-text version and re-render/re-upload because I forgot to list Shameless as a fandom in the end credits. And I wanted to fix a small 1 frame black gap. But yeah there are actually 33 fandoms, not 32, I had missed one when counting them up, whoops!! XD For the original posting with the text all over, the original text version, I’m not deleting and re-posting because it’s an entry in a contest, but the mistakes are still present in there. But yeah this is my entry for the 3rd and Final round of the Who You Are contest GlowingAprilSky has been hosting, season 2. The round was called "Journey Backwards" and the rules stated here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVJHoaJ-cDE explain: "Start from where you are now, and go back to the beginning of your story. Show me all about you and your story."

Ask if you want me to type up the voiceovers.

Starting off with where I'm at currently in my life, I just turned 28 years old and I'm:

1. starting to do real Asexual Activism including last weekend I presented at one workshop and at one caucus at the Creating Change (an LGBTQ) conference in my city, I'm

2. employed and doing well at my administrative assistant type contractor job in a government building, I'm

3. learning to face my grief over my friend perpetrating a murder-suicide. See this video for more info: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGPFGnZ3XEE

4. I live with my wonderful dad as an adult with no intention of moving out anytime soon, and my dad has been having a few health diagnosis things lately and needs heart surgery to put in a defibrillator very soon

(Now those 4 are all kinda overlapping and at once. I'm trying to do this whole vid in reverse-chronological order, but my dad specifically found out in December he'd need to get a defibrillator ASAP so that a fairly likely sudden heart event will, instead of almost certainly killing him, much more likely him surviving it, surgery has now been scheduled for February, whereas it was still the end of November when my suicidal podcasting partner murdered his wife before ending his own life. But my grief over that friend of mine I did a podcast with, the part of this that is “my story”, is an ongoing thing (as grief often is)-that spans both before and after me finding out about my dad's recent news with his health. Similarly ongoing is me living with him as it's a “for many years” situation that's still important to capture SOMEWHERE for an autobiographical vid. Etc. So I was trying my best and picking when and how to capture a lot of this.

The car crash happened when I was distracted and near-tears over my breakup because of the music I was listening to too intensely and I think that's one of the "life events in my story" that I won't be forgetting any time soon.

So much of this vid is more personal than I can explain, little choices of scenes that ring truer than you could even know.

I think blogging helped me a lot with processing my asexuality and my mother's abuse, and I did it for years and still do it. I started about my mom on tumblr in 2010 even maybe but my real WordPress blog I started in 2014.

Around 1:43-1:48 in the video is me having started attending Asexual Meetups in mid-2014! Which is a HUGE deal, all my closest friends since then were pretty much from that group plus I organize the meetups a lot of the time now, host in my house etc!

Right after that, 1:48-1:52 I kinda "gloss over" my uncle's suicide which really was a pretty huge traumatic deal, and I still am grieving him in some ways, of course I am, he was such a great guy. I went on a suicide prevention walk last summer (2016) with him in mind but that didn't make it into the video, eventually I'll finish a full vid themed just around loved ones of suicidal people, I already started such a vid around then...

I really stressed before I knew about asexuality about being a 22 year old person who had never been kissed, being a 23 year old virgin, about being a social failure. I believed the amatonormative idea's like what John says to Sherlock ( https://everydayfeminism.com/2016/04/amatonormativity-expectations/ ) and I tried online dating and finally went on a date and had a first kiss, as soon as I healed from my foot surgery. I had this final foot surgery right after I graduated college. I spent a lot of my life on crutches, in casts, if you add up all 3 surgeries, the chronic foot pain after I first broke it is an important part of "my story" so I wanted to jam it in there. Go OTH for having a realistic recovery time and elevating Haley's foot a lot. ;) Not the 5 pillow high like me since it was so painful and needed to be so elevated but... STILL. XD

Blake on Criminal Minds is maybe the only Linguist I've ever seen on TV? Not realistic at all and I think a lot of what they call Forensic Linguistics is just myth and Criminal Minds is a pretty imperfect show but whatever. :P

I also "glossed over" just how important and involved I was in atheist circles, although the fact that I later volunteered for a hotline where people might call in and say "I think I'm an atheist" for 2.5 years maybe gives you some idea. My podcast was about atheism, and I also occasionally organize atheist meetups and regularly attend some atheist and freethinker meetup groups since around mid-2015. I'd like to probably make a full length atheism vid at some point. :P Which is a weird topic but I'd like to try. There's... There's NO good representation that goes far enough at all on TV, but I appreciate Grey's Anatomy a lot for doing what they've done with Jackson, and I'm glad Kurt on Glee was an atheist while being a beloved person who isn't even known for being too scientific or anything. Appreciate less that Grey's Anatomy, in season 14's premiere, seemingly erased Amelia's atheism that was first present on Private Practice (see this vid above)... :P

I withdrew from Chemistry, Semantics 2, and Infectious Human Disease in college. Those left W's on my transcript, which are better than failing. I had to make up the credits by taking summer classes at a different college in order to graduate on time (took French and Biological Athropology classes as my credits instead over two summers). I also "dropped", penalty free, Russian, and Medieval Spanish History. Senior year of high school I was living with my grandmother and lonely and became truly unhealthily addicted to vidding, which I still clearly am now a decade later but I think vidding is a part of my story that didn't make it into the vid (perhaps that would have been too meta?) lol... but I started then, senior year of high school, to get worse grades. My straight-A, I'm naturally smart and will succeed and am a little bit of a perfectionist tendencies were suddenly just flipped and not true really?? XD

Hopefully most of this is fairly self-explanatory. The court stuff could be pretty traumatic so I tried to capture those feelings... I've vidded stuff about my abusive mom before and about Beverly/Scarlett in general, and about Maggie/Abby in both a collab and my first ever personal vid about my mom... I was trying to vid mainly stuff I haven't before in those vids. :) I appreciate for my own sake the variety. And I rushed the ending to squeeze in some of me as a little kid.

I think I still belong with my dad, my whole life is tied together by my great dad. :) But also I just liked that Molly is a young girl and happy and that smile would be a fun way to end the video... :P I wasn't sure when I was editing it that that scene was really about my dad, until I was adding the text on top of the screen.

There is plenty left out but I'm pretty happy with this current result in terms of most of the really significant parts of my life story.

I think this song is about wanting "To let go of the pain I've held so long", to get from the bad to somewhere better. I think I'm pretty close to finding somewhere I belong in my life. I think this summarizes my past pretty well though, it's a little too angsty of a song but the lyrics are honestly HOPEFUL in some ways. It's about, as the bridge says, knowing yourself now that you do this on your own, it's about wounds healing, finding yourself!

Anyway... if you've read the whole description, WOW thank you for being so invested in learning more about my life. :P

#multi-fandom #actually asexual #abusive mother #fanvideo #atheism

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coffeeandcalligraphy · 6 years

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Evading eternal gloom and chaos in general | November Goals Update

Hey People of Earth!

Today is December 1st. Which means, November (death) is over, and I can officially restart life during Christmas break in 21 days. November as a whole was much better than October (so much, we don't even compare the two) which is strange, as November is the month of death usually because school gets crazy. Regardless, I’m very pleased that I somehow evaded eternal gloom (for the most part) in November.

Some cool things happened this month, including two university open houses in two different locations in Ontario (London + Windsor = two road trips, two weekends in a row), that high school dance life (my first hs dance when ur last year is next year and this is the first social occasion you’ve attended haaaa lol rip) and Literally The Worst Case Of Writer’s Block Ever I Kid You Not. (Which I will definitely go into in this month’s writing update!)

Overall, November was this very chaotic amalgamation of busy, but cumulatively, was pretty darn memorable. Darn.

Onto the goals.

(Also, I don't know if I’ve ever explained this in recent years, but I work with goals in a very strange way. As in, I don't really work with them, as in, I write these posts every month with goals, then never refer to them for the entire month, then come back a month later ?? and ?? for some ?? reason this ?? works ?? it’s also very entertaining to laugh at my failures is that morbid that I enjoy this very much oh no)

(I enjoy writing these posts a lot though, they give me some time to reflect on the last 30 or 31 days I’ve lived and they act as a great routine. :))

Anywhoozies, onto the things I did and mostly did not do:

1. Hit 15k in FOSTERED #6

So. Let’s just talk about this goal very briefly, shall we. As I mentioned above, November and I did not get along in terms of writing, as in, November served me a big ol’ slice of Writer’s Block and left me to choke on it. I wasn't really expecting this block to be so severe, but it was a thing, and it was very real. I mentioned this in DtWT #66, and I know writer’s block is controversial (some people thinks it’s a bullshit excuse, some people don't care, some people strongly believe in it, etc). I stand on the side of ‘in creative fields, every artist is bound to run into some form of a challenge at some point in their career’. As a creative person, I've experienced tons of creative block. In some cases, yes, this block is caused by fear, lack of ideas, sometimes procrastination, but ohhhh myyy, November’s writer’s block was none of these things.

Initially, it was straight up fear, I’ll admit that. I was just starting this book, didn't want to screw up the beginning of the *very last* book, couldn't piece together ideas that I thought were good even though @sarahkelsiwrites was very honest about them and had good feedback, etc, etc. I would say the first week and a half of this block were straight-up fear based. And then weeks 2 + 3 came and it sort of wasn't anymore. I wasn't scared to write this book because at this point, I was pretty fed up with my moping and fear, and just wanted to get some words out.

*and then the words stopped coming and they just stopped coming*

(which isn't entirely the truth, but let me elaborate)

In this time period, I was still writing. I was still hitting my 250 goal almost every single day, and there wasn't one day I didn't go about writing, or go about figuring out how to go about writing. To me, writer’s block doesn't mean I’m not writing. It just means there’s this disconnect that prevents me from immersing myself into my work, thus holding me back from creating the best thing I possibly can, OR making me think I’m creating something of unsubstantial standards. Does this make sense.

So yes, I was very out of it, and I really do think this block was triggered by fear, and once I got over that fear, lingered. BUT I’m doing MUCH better now, let’s not jinx this, AKA I hit 15 587 words this month and when I made this goal literally didn't think I would haaaa bless.

2. Outline more of ALANNIS, and like maybe try to finish it, though I mean this isn’t going to happen, so yeah, just work on it pls

No. lol. So. I’m going to count this as a half win, because I did complete this goal, but not by much. In October’s post, I mentioned I wanted to go through this outline to see if I could possibly shift some of them into the POV of my boi Matthew. This novel is narrated by Chris, and while I love my girl, something was missing from the story, and so I was like, yanno, screw it, let’s see if I can find some chapters to give to Matt just for the hell of it. Overall, I found about 12 or so chapters I could give to him (excluding new ideas that I haven't gotten, but yes), which is pretty good. Not sure I even want to do this dual POV thing, but I mean, I worked on the outline sort of so. (I really need to get on top of this thing I’ve been outlining it for like a year oops.)

3. Upload cover making video

So abridged version of this disclaimer: basically, my hard drive died on me this month, it had all the footage for all my upcoming YouTube vids, including all the speedpaints and cover making vids, lol sigh back up your stuff kids, didn't listen to myself, rip my data, you will be missed (didn’t lose anything personal and my documents are always protected because they’re the most important) SOOO that happened. HOWEVERRR, this is not an excuse for why I did not finish this goal because I literally had another cover making video exported and ready on my computer BUUUUT I’m vERYyyY extra and wasn't liking how my THUMBNAIL was coming out so yesterday when I was scrambling to actually get this goal done because good job time management, was like yo okay imma redo this tomorrow, and so here’s the thumbnail:

And here’s the ugly shit it was before:

AND ACTUALLY, the only reason I never got this vid up like I dunno THREE WEEKS AGO WHEN IT WAS READY, was because of this THUMBNAILLLL WHICH HAS BEEN LIKE A 2 WEEK PROCESS.

(why do I take these things so seriously)

(this thumbnail took me longer to make than the goddamn book cover)

(I digress so sorry for that rant)

(th u mb n a il)

I did get the video up today, though, and you can watch it right here:

youtube

4. Read a book yo.

I actually did this, lol. I finished Kristen Martin’s Shadow Crown this month and started History of Wolves by Emily Fridlund, but I’ve been reading that one at school and like, so far, I’m getting the vibe that I need some hardcore tea and snow and a fire log and some peace and quiet to just appreciate this book because so far I’ve read it in math class and while I do enjoy my math class, i’m getting the feeling this book ain’t no math class aesthetic. (so, the answer is, no I didn't finish this book, but yes, I really really want to because i’m liking it a lot so far and the voice is nice as fuuuuuuuuh and dooooon’t get me started on the writing clapz for dayz)

5. Finish another character portrait

I actually did four portraits this month, two of which are Christmas gifts so I can’t share those at the moment, but here’s one I did of @sarahkelsiwrites’ character Simon:

(and you can watch the speedpaint HERE)

And then one I did of Quinn, my MC for THIS IS WHERE THE END STARTS:

(which might be my favourite piece of art and you can watch the speedpaint HERE)

6. Find and finalize an ALANNIS epigraph

I dunno why this is still a goal because I’m literally not going to do it if I’m hardly working on the darn outline, but yes, no, fail.

7. Work on FOSTERED #5′s book cover

Epic fail, XD. I don't like the design of the re-designed FOSTERED covers, but for the sake of consistency, I’m going along, and that's serving for some unenthusiastic cover designing but I do need to get this done so I can order copies. (WHICH, by the way, I have a new copy of I’M DISAPPOINTED to order, a copy of my sister’s novel, A HAPPINESS TO WONDER, a copy of my novelette sort of thing THE TREATED and on top of this FOSTERED #5, you can totally call me cheap for realllyyyy not wanting to pay for that shipping twice, lol. Point is, I’ll be doing an unboxing because those are literally my favourite videos ever and I’ve watched every single one on YouTube no lie. ;))

So those were the goals. Finished 4ish/almost5 out of 7 goals this much which is pretty ass, but the ones I didn't finish (with the exception of one AKA THE OUTLINE) weren't super important. Some shtuff I’d like to get done in December:

1. Hit 25k in FOSTERED #6 (aka REWIRED)

2. Outline more of ALANNIS, and like maybe try to finish it, though I mean this isn’t going to happen, so yeah, just work on it pls

COME ONNNN

(it’s literally been so long since I actually outlined this book)

3. Upload a video

4. Read a book yo.

I really do doubt I’ll get this one done, but it’d be real nice.

5. Finish another character portrait

7. Work on FOSTERED #5′s book cover

Probably also won’t finish this oneeee haaaheeaahahe

8. Make a character aesthetic

(this is sort of a cop out because I have to make one for Lonan this month since his birthday is on the 9th and for those birthday posts I need one but also I've been telling myself to do this since the start of November and ohhh noo I’m running out of time oops)

So that’s it for now, folks. I hope your November was great. :) Keep an eye out for the monthly writing update! That’s it for now, thanks for reading!

--Rachel

#Writing #writerblr #goalsupdates

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hgfstreamchats · 4 years

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El Arca

Hello! Hello there! paused Castlevania for christian lion sex Castlevania would understand. but they just found the giant demon that I very much wish to smooch!!! Is the sound functioning? tis! Excellent! Oh, there we go Sound seems okay Well, in that case, I won't delay! Onto the lions we go. It was being... "funny" he wants a cursed kids show he should go watch donkey ollie agin Deleting my messages and so on OH NO NOAHS ARK Ahh, I see you're ahead of the game! I'm deeply suspicious already. did Saberspark ever upload his edited version that includes *all* the jokes You'll love it, night human. It's got lovingly rendered animal excrement. No, but this is the uncut version. oh good Jesus it does not help that they have regular human hands youre gonna see chicken strips, night When you say "chicken strips"... do you mean that a chicken strips? you'll see mr.... noseybonk.... jesus fucking christ And fire. Uh.... yeaah that's about normal for discord servers As you can see, we're off to a great start. prostitutes thinkin he's Zeus

Ha! HAH! I really dont wanna see that one dude's teeth like that again This seems. Familiar but not too familiar.... Oh man you are NOT gonna like what happens to those trees when they get soaked in seawater. the children are brats she's dumping him lmao Good for her! This is perverse. "are you... the devil" It really is. Especially your grandparents' trees. -calmly- "that's enough :)" And all those slaves you went into debt to free. I mean hey, at least the debt will be gone too! "what do you mean, the fuck do I know about boatbuilding" That's something! "well then. we're all going to die!" "Oh, finally!" "haha, we're all going to die" Oh. Well, that answers that. this is.... surprisingly well done "No more, no less. I want lots of sickly, genetically doomed animals in this new world." Is this some kind of... antisemitic caricature Probably. "kind of making me feel inadequate" chicken strips! Still less self-centered and malevolent than Primus. Pffff Okay, so, chickens don't have... mammaries. So is this some kind of weird roleplaying thing? Are the chickens furries?? He's summoned as many animals as he knows how to spell. Sorry, Xoloitzcuintli. this movine needs to slow the fuck down oh my god official favorite character I like how he spent valuable time illustrating each one. "I am SO going to this sex resort" She looks awfully happy for someone who just learned everyone she knows is going to die in a flood And the parents look awfully happy for people who just learned THEY'RE going to die in a flood they're going to spend the end times fragging I would. ...And did, come to think of it. Ayyyy. Her? Ahhh, a liar. I like him! I love her They're one another's beards for the sake of surviving the flood. And that's wonderful. True. Who made that chair. some of these animals are super uggo Wait, did both of those kangaroos have pouches? Hang on, were those--yeah, that They do! lesbians I support them The orangutans weren't the only ones to beat the system. Maybe they're pregnant That'd explain how come there's still kangaroos Ironically, if they got pregnant by different parents, they'd be the most genetically diverse species in the world. *partners Yes, exactly! "what was that last one 8)" ...Want to know a fun fact about kangaroos :) that they have multiple vaginas? ...Yes. that still fucks me up Their genitals are positioned in reverse? Oh, that. All this out of a patch of trees? They are PROUD of that model Y'know, you'd think that a LOT of other people would have survived. There was more than one boat in the world at the time this is set Okay so what ARE the carnivores going to eat idk why they call her fat. she's got an ass that just don't quit and I think that lion;s a fool for choosing some other lioness But the other one has tiddies. Lion tiddies. And a clever mouth, apparently. Where's the pig's partner? he is a bi disaster The male lion, I mean he is He'd be dead after that. But what ARE the predators going to eat There was a single, doddering old lion in the group. Maybe they're going to divide him up? Write up her report. "Write up my report" = "Legitimately weighing my choices between mating with you or a watery death." Harsh but fair. Ahhh, Perfect Storm-ing it. Well well well. "See, I'd rather room with that tiger" Hello! Hello! Hello, sorry I'm late--is this that weirdo Noah's Ark furry disaster?! It is! It IS Damn "hey do you guys hear music" ....Carrion. *Dear Unicron, are they feeding on the drowned corpses of the dead?* .... oh hey it's the vampires' plan from castlevania Oh hey, that's a possibility They bob right by and they just scoop them up. It makes as much sense as anything else Although, after forty days... reptile room Heheheheh those snakes just wanted to mlem!!!! hahahah "woah that is NOT the letter I got" okay well that explains how the carnivores arre geting fed FEESH Oh right I guess the carnivores are eating fish Fish aren't people! Considering they haven't broken out into an orgy, I'd say they're showing surprising restraint. a least he feels bad about it She has lipstick THATS THE SECOND TIME They... both have pouches. The good ship Bad Decisions in action The kangaroos got away with it. thats way more than two chickens though I guess to be fair eggs are necessary "THEN we can eat them" FISH AND EGGS YOU DUMB LASS this dude has the right idea What...w as that what is ANY of this Who even knows? Where's your *one* female? I like that he's buds with the pig trying to think of what a panlion would look like given ligers and tigons exist she's giving u the key to her vag I wonder where the male panther is https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Leopon01.jpg Found some. oh cute! Huh. In this scene: shadows are rendered. I'm sorry is her name "panty" Panthy, I think, but that's still BAD How charming and necessary. Wow, what a necessary scene those jerks should be thankful the raccoons helped them out All that craftsmanship and you couldn't rig the piles and piles of excrement to dump neatly into the water? nah that'd be too easy Ease of cleanup and sticking it to your god at the same time. Bah I bet he's not even dead that's three Oh no, they kicked the ladder down. How will he ever get out now he pinched a tiger's rear Does it even matter who steers, I mean none of them know where they're going "quick, smear this blood on your tits" lock him in the slammer oh so that's why it matters whether they can steer Where's he going to pause or rest? ... this is the worst haka I've ever seen doc I'm begging you to look up real hakas after this film to cleanse my eyes Will do. hahahah That was dark. "surrender, we can have a threesome" how convenient Already so many rabbits Monarchy or cannibalism. The only two choices. "You're here even though you got to this point in your life without knowing fire does that!" "did that lion just look at me?" holy shit lmao It gets caught in a southwesterly breeze and the ship goes up in flames. hukkhhkhkjhjk well the polar bears will be fine! Right? well I guess it woulkdnt be a south american made film without a huge party at the end Uh They're. Making her cage dance? I don't think they're making her do a thing LOL ALSO I'M SORRY WERE THE DONKEY AND DEER DOING IT IN THE CONGA LINE They've told her multiple times she's free to leave that cage. that was Well, then! look at that dummy thick jaguar That sure did happen That WAS. Let us be thankful it is over That certainly was a thing that happened. now for a much needed reprieve Peel off the tracksuits. I've seen some vids of the womens soccer team from NZ doing hakas and it's absolutely great Much better than the orangutan doing it. for sure Oh, good, she's sixteen Yikes Ewwwwwww I will be honest I thought this was going to be an LP a Planet Coaster thing It's exactly that, but you know...real. God "due to tax state regulation" ...oh, I bet that was LAX state regulation He's clearly someone who has any business demanding "the prettiest girl." [wasted] The advice in question" "Don't" Right? "We are smarter than everyone and that's why we're building the MURDERCOASTER" That one got to live. that kid's smart Apathetic Child is the smartest one in the video. Well that's not good jesus christ is that blood It is. They certainly did show those idiot mathematicians, physicists, and engineers. JESUS CHRIST Jesus Questions about the inspection process. Something special. "We all have something special to hold onto." Like a severed head. christ I'm gonna bump out for now. take caare all! Goodnight! Good night! Wait, did we watch the roller coaster one? I know I've seen THIS one... hmmmm Oh! With the giant hole! The giant body trench? Yes! Glorious! In that case, I'm all out of light notes to end on. Suggestions? SNL What's That Name? We could just browse this channel a little bit and look for one we haven't seen! All the ones I've seen have been... fun. This, then we'll browse the channel. I'm for it. God Hahhahaha Ohhh boy Finish that thought God They all look good tbh. 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It's like they're on roller skates. It does! or those wheelieshoes Heelies! yes! those. 24/7 Are those bloodstains Oh yes. Uh oh! I like the blow dryer next to her bed. Amazing. The only note worth ending on, something terrible happening to Grace. You might even call it... a Grace note. ;) Terrible. Shame on you. I love it. It's what I'm here for! It is, in fact, your saving grace HAH! :D Although, frankly, I don't think ANYONE'S saving Grace. She had her chance to run. She sure did. Well--thanks for the stream! It's been a great time, as usual. :) Thank YOU for gracing me with your presence! Ha! Good night! good night! Good night!

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