#remind me never to procrastinate on a master list ever again master list | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

unohanadaydreams · 4 years

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Master + Character List

If there are no links corresponding with a character’s name, it means there is no content currently written for that character. That said: ALL characters on this list are ones I’m willing to write for.

NOTE: If you don’t see a character you’d like to send in an ask for here, feel free to message me if I would be willing to!

HC = Headcanon

Scene = Scenario

TP = Thirst Post

note: many of these feature writing from other blogs either somewhat or heavily and I HIGHLY recommend you follow them.

All Gotei Divisions HCs

5th Division HCs

8th Division HCs

Izuru Kira as new Yachiru AU

No Aizen AU

Retsu Unohana’s motivations for forming Gotei 13 theories

Chikane Iba theories + analysis

Royal Guard general theories + HCs

CFYW novel info theory + HC (Mayuri + Urahara)

Bleach characters in Narutoverse AU

Ulquiorra dragon symbolism analysis/theory

Mayuri Kurotsuchi character/zanpakuto analysis/theory

Mayuri Kurotsuchi character analysis/theory

(nsfw) who fucks and who doesn't among the captains HCs

note: the following is solely my writing and features only imagine + request content

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Gotei 13 (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Shunsui Kyoraku

React to falling in love HC

Shipped with Jushiro relationship HCs

(nsfw) Fan of squirting HC

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Threesome w/reader + Jushiro Ukitake TP

Nanao Ise

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Soi Fon

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

What does she bring to the lake HC

Marechiyo Omaeda

Gin Ichimaru

Reader left behind after Gin’s death HCs

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Edging as punishment TP

Izuru Kira

(nsfw) Fan of squirting HC

Izuru in the 11th Division Scene

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Falling in love and flirting HCs

Retsu Unohana

Relationship HCs

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Doctor w/reader patient meme HCs

(nsfw) ties reader up TP

general + analytical HCs

Isane Kotetsu

React to falling in love HC

Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Hanataro Yamada

Sosuke Aizen

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader + Shinji Hirako meme HCs

(nsfw) Doctor w/reader patient meme HCs

Momo Hinamori

Byakuya Kuchiki

React to falling in love HC

(nsfw) Relationship HCs

React to reader getting lost HC

Falls for shy reader HCS

(nsfw) Shipped with Jushiro relationship HCs

Reader has overprotective brothers HCs

First time seeing reader dressed up Scene

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Quarantine w/ MALE reader meme HCs

Being a father to a son HCs

Renji Abarai

Reader angry their brother is hurt HCs

Realizes he’s in love with reader Scene

Reaction to reader being a quincy HCs

Finds out reader cheated on him HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Doctor w/patient!reader meme HCs

Sajin Komamura

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) fem!reader begs him to breed her TP

(nsfw) Who in the Seireitei is a werewolf fucker?

Tetsuzaemon Iba

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

Kaname Tosen

React to reader getting lost HC

Shuhei Hisagi

(nsfw) kinktober choking reader Scene

Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Angry sex TP

Toshiro Hitsugaya

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

summer ficlet + fireflies + fluff

Rangiku Matsumoto

(nsfw) Fan of squirting HC

Kenpachi Zaraki

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

Reader angry their brother is hurt HCs

Falling for a badass reader HCs

(nsfw) Relationship w/reader HCs

Dealing with Yachiru being “gone” HCs

First kiss w/reader + how he kisses HCs

React to reader dying HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Predator w/reader prey TP

(nsfw) eating pussy w/fem!reader TP

summer ficlet + watermelon + fluff

Yachiru Kusajishi

Dealing with being “gone” HCs

Ikkaku Madarame

(nsfw) Relationship w/reader + Yumichika HCs

Yumichika Ayasegawa

(nsfw) Relationship w/reader + Ikkaku HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Mayuri Kurotsuchi

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Getting first blowjob from reader Scene

First kiss w/reader Scene + how he kisses HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

*dubcon/unhealthy relationship* relationship w/reader TP

Nemu Kurotsuchi

Akon

Cowokers meme him HC

Falls in love w/bubbly reader HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Jushiro Ukitake

Shipped with Shunsui relationship HCs

React to reader getting lost HC

(nsfw) Shipped with Byakuya relationship HCs

React to having twin boys + one is bedridden HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Threesome w/reader + Shunsui Kyoraku TP

hurt & comfort w/fem!reader scene

Kaien Shiba

Rukia Kuchiki

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

What does she bring to the lake HC

Kiyone Kotetsu

Sentaro Kotsubaki

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Royal Guard (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Tenjiro Kirinji

(nsfw) Bullies fem!reader TP

Kirio Hikifune

Oetsu Nimaiya

Senjumaru Shutara

Ichibe Hyosube

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Visoreds (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Shinji Hirako

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

Reaction to reader being a quincy HCs

Reaction to seeing reader after 100 years in Karakura Town HCs

Catching up with reader after 100 years HCs

Reader comforting his hurt Scene

React to reader dating Aizen after he “died” HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader + Sosuke Aizen meme HCs

(nsfw) Doctor w/patient!reader meme HCs

Rose Otoribashi

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

Reaction to seeing reader after 100 years in Karakura Town HCs

What kind of BF to reader is he HC

Sweet reunion with past love reader Scene

Kensei Muguruma

React to falling in love HC

React to reader getting lost HC

Reaction to reader being a quincy HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Relationship with shy/flustered reader HCs

Love Aikawa

Hiyori Sarugaki

Lisa Yadomaru

React to falling in love HC

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

React to reader getting lost HC

Mashiro Kuna

(nsfw) Fan of squirting HC

Hachigen Ushoda

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Urahara Shoten + Rukongai Rebels (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Kisuke Urahara

React to reader getting lost HC

His daughter HCs

Yoruichi Shihoin

React to reader getting lost HC

What does she bring to the lake HC

Yushiro Shihoin Tessai Tsukabishi Jinta Hanakari Ururu Tsumugiya Kukaku Shiba Ganju Shiba

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Karakura Gang + Humans (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Ichigo Kurosaki

Friends w/ Uryuu pre-arrancar arc Scene

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Hichigo pleasures reader TP

(nsfw) Doctor w/patient!reader meme HCs

Relationship with shy/flustered reader HCs

Orihime Inoue

BROTP w/ Chad HCs

Uryu Ishida

Reaction to reader being a quincy HCs

Friends w/ Ichigo pre-arrancar arc Scene

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Sado Chad Yasutora

Reaction to reader being a quincy HCs

BROTP w/ Orihime HCs

First kiss w/ reader Scene + general kisses HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Doctor w/reader patient meme HCs

Yandere w/reader HCs

(nsfw) Sweet but Wild in bed TP

Kon

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Ryuken Ishida

(nsfw) Doctor w/reader patient meme HCs

Isshin Kurosaki

(nsfw) eating pussy w/fem!reader TP

Yuzu Kurosaki Karin Kurosaki Tatsuki Arisawa Keigo Asano Mizuho Asano Mizuiro Kojima Chizuru Honsho

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Arrancar (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Espada:

Yammy Llargo Coyote Starrk

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Lilynette Gingerbuck Baraggan Louisenbairn Nelliel Tu Odelschwanck Tier Harribel

(nsfw) Fan of squirting HC

Ulquiorra Cifer/Schiffer Nnoitra Gilga

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Luppi Antenor Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez

(nsfw) Fan of squirting HC

Reader angry their brother is hurt HCs

Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

(nsfw) summer ficlet + moon + sweet smut

Zommari Rureaux Szayelaporro Granz Aaroniero Arruruerie

Fraccion + Other:

Wonderweiss Margela Ggio Vega Tesra Lindocruz Emilou Apacci Cyan Sung-Sun Franceska Mila Rose Yylfordt Granz Di Roy Rinker

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Fullbringer (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Kugo Ginjo

General HCs

Shukuro Tsukishima Riruka Dokugamine Girko Kutsuzawa Moe Shishigawara Yukio Hans Vorarlberna Jackie Tristan

(∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั ) Quincy (∞ ❛ั ⊝❛ั )

Yhwach Jugram Haschwalth

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Bazz B Kang Du Candice Catnipp Bambietta Basterbine Giselle Gewelle

(nsfw) Quarantine w/reader meme HCs

Liltotto Lamperd Meninas McAllon As Nodt Gremmy Thoumeaux Askin Nakk Le Vaar Quilge Opie Lille Barro BG9

#required reading #required master list #remind me never to procrastinate on a master list ever again master list

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mshermia · 3 years

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Christmas Eve - At Peace

That holiday-themed story that I will totally blame @superherotiger for making me procrastinate with ;)

###

Just a couple of months after they defeated Thanos, Tony and Pepper throw a Christmas party. Instead of a partying kid, Tony finds his Spiderling outside in the snow at the grave he has been trying to ignore ever exists.

I'm using my own Fix-it to Endgame "Like You'd know how it works" as a basis for the timeline, though the prompt will work fine without having read that story. The important part is, that Tony's not dead.

Baseline: circa 5 months after Tony is brought back from the multiverse.

###

The sky above him was clear. No clouds. No moon. Above him only the stars. The stars, he still avoided looking at too much. It made the night a little colder, a little darker despite the white snowy blanket covering the hills and trees.

It wasn't that Tony minded the solitude, quite the opposite. That had been the idea behind moving out to the cabin after all. Peace and quiet. Less exposure. Privacy. But of all the places on their property, why did the kid have to go there?

In all fairness, there was nothing quiet or peaceful about what was going on at Tony's house right now. There were 13 people gathered in his living room and kitchen, one of them a black-eyed alien who didn't quite understand the concept of Christmas but had been positively eager to experience all the "merriment and joy" that the little Madame Secretary had been promising from afar. Leave it to Tony to have to explain a spaceship landing in his backyard on Christmas Eve and talk down an international response.

"Morgan said it's an important gathering that every family member is obligated to attend." Nebula's eyes were on Tony, unblinking. "You should have told me sooner. I could have been here last year and the year before but I didn't know."

"Not to worry, Smurfette." There was a sense of genuine joy at seeing her again, that let the smile on his lips come quite easily. "You're here now, so that's that."

It was a sight to be seen how willingly the blue meanie allowed Morgan to put a party hat on her before she was sent off to mingle with the rest of them, studying the mini hot dogs on her plate. That hadn't been the only surprising sight of the evening though. Tony's jaw had equally popped with stunned surprise as he opened the door to a paler and distinctly shorter human version of Bruce Banner. A face Tony hadn't seen on him in years, as he showed up on his doorstep accompanied by a certain master spy that Tony had frankly not been expecting either.

"Making things work then," Tony mused out loud as he hovered next to them while Pepper fetched a welcoming drink.

Bruce cleared his throat. "Just... you know... happy to... to have her back."

"Of course." His head bobbed a short nod with a sincere smile in Natasha's direction. There was no denying that Tony, too, was glad to have her back. Retired or not, he had no illusions that the Avengers would remain anything but a constant in his life one way or another and while Natasha might never be a definite number on his side, she was an ally. Of sorts.

"Well, it's good to see you guys. I know it's quite a drive out here and we had suspected things might be a little more entertaining at the Compound." His thoughts still trailing a little behind, the words had slipped off his tongue before his brain could catch up with what he was saying. He hadn't meant to just straight up mention the Compound, the rest of the team by extension who hadn't received an invite to this particular gathering.

Pepper had wanted to discuss the guest list more than once. Had asked him repeatedly if he wanted to extend an invitation to the others, the team... but Rogers... Steve... no. Christmas was for family and while Bruce and his plus one did count - because Tony wanted him to count - Steve... Steve was not family. When it came down to it, they were hardly even friends. Natasha's eyes were on him and Tony was painfully aware that he was spacing out. No glasses to hide his face, all of a sudden he felt almost too exposed in his own house.

"Oh, we're just splitting the time equally over the holidays." Natasha smiled brightly. "Christmas Eve with one side of the family and then Christmas Day with the other."

Bruce's face fell a little, looking back and forth between them. "It's not sides as much as... just..."

They were saved from more awkwardness as Pepper arrived with the drinks and ushered them further into the house. Bruce was happy to follow along but Natasha hung back, her eyes still on Tony.

"There don't have to be any sides in this." She linked their arms, pushing Tony along, as Bruce shot a glance back at them, just out of earshot. "You can just decide to let it go, Tony."

"I did." It wasn't all that easy to keep the tone light but he was determined not to let this get to him. "I told him, I moved on from all of this years ago."

"We both know that's not the same as solving the real problem." Her voice was low but not unkind. "We both know you never forgave or forget, that he has never earned back your trust."

It didn't matter. He didn't even want to think about how much of that was or wasn't true. Rogers had no place in his thoughts tonight. So the timing was perfect when his eyes came to rest on a brown-haired boy who was creeping closer and closer to the pot of mulled wine. With a lame excuse, he pulled away from Natasha, away from the world he had officially retired from towards the buffet.

"And what do you think you're doing?"

"Me?" The boy's eyes were wide, the cup in his hand already filled to the brim.

"Listen here, squirrel!" His finger poking against Harley's chest, Tony could at least pretend that this was a situation he could actually control. "You take your grabby hands off that mulled wine or so help me..." He snatched the hot drink out of the boy's hands.

"Oh, come on..." His long lashes were blinking at Tony with feigned innocence. "It's not for me."

"That routine might work on some indifferent cater waiter at those benefits but if you think I can't see past your ridiculously lazy—"

"Yeah, yeah..." Harley just waved him off. "Don't be such a killjoy!"

Tony narrowed his eyes at him. "I mean it!" For good measure, he took a healthy gulp from the cup, positively burning his throat in the process. But it wasn't until Harley threw his hands in the air and turned his back in defeat - for now - that Tony allowed his face to cringe at the sting. Those little trouble makers were not helping with his heart condition. Speaking of trouble... "Where is Peter?"

Harley crossed his arms in front of himself, his mind clearly brooding on a new strategy. "No clue."

Tony's next sip of the hot wine was a lot smoother than the first. "What do you mean, no clue?"

"It generally means that the person doesn't have any information about the subject that you are—"

"Alright, short stuff..." Tony's eyes were searching the room but the little spider was nowhere to be seen. "A bit less of the asshole routine please?"

"Listen, if you want me to babysit, same rules apply as they do for Morgan." Brazen in his brattiness, the little shit ladled a good helping of mulled wine into a new cup. "I'll need a heads-up and generous compensation that I'm happy to re-negoti— Hey!"

Harley tried to hold on to the cup that Tony once again just plucked from his hands. "You've had enough of this!"

"That one is for Rhodey," the boy scowled.

"Uh-huh. Sure. I'll get it to him and you can enjoy your night without any errands, hm?"

Tony made a point to stare at the kid until he huffed and finally skedaddled away from the wine pot, possibly in search of his sister, or maybe more likely trying to stay out of her and Morgan's way. Careful not to spill either of the two cups, Tony made his way across the room towards Rhodey who had brought a "friend", a development Tony had been mindful not to comment on all night.

The Colonel's eyes looked him up and down as he made a beeline towards them. "Because one is never enough with you, is it, Tones?"

"You..." he hissed, his lips pursed. "You better not try to quip with me, you enabler!" Tony pushed the second cup he was holding into Carol Danvers' hands instead of Rhodey's. "Are you seriously letting my boy use you as an exit strategy to score a buzz?"

Rhodey's eyes shifted to the cup in his "friend" Carol's hands before he nipped on what was left in his own cup and then gave a shrug. "Which one?"

"That's not funny!"

With a deep sigh, Rhodey exchanged his empty cup with Carol's hot one. "Tony, you need to lay off the mother-hen vibes. The boy is 21 years old, as for Peter—."

"No, he's not," Tony growled. "Not for another 6 days!"

"Geez, daddy, do I really have to remind you how old you were when I 'enabled'," Rhodey air-quoted, "your ass in college?"

He said it like he had a point when that was exactly what Tony was afraid of. "And how did that turn out?"

His eyebrows pulled up, Rhodey made a gesture like that would somehow prove something, but Tony was not in the mood for semantics. His eyes roamed across the room - pointedly ignoring Harley who tried to usher Nebula closer and closer to the pot of hot wine - in search of the other little trouble maker.

Where was the kid? He hadn't seen him since... since he had ducked away from awkwardly shuffling his feet back and forth between May and Happy. Without another word, Tony strode past his friend, checking the kitchen but there was no Peter in there either. Everyone else was happily chatting, eating, enjoying themselves exactly like they were supposed to. Not so the Spiderling.

For a few more minutes, Tony quietly, discreetly wandered around the house. He had a feeling, a feeling that something was up. It didn't take long for him to give up the pretense and outright mutter to FRIDAY, asking in which room Peter was hiding.

"He's not in the house, boss."

That was how Tony found himself outside, stalking up a snowy hill in the dark. The wind was icy, but it wasn't the cold that made the hair on the back of his neck stand tall. He had avoided this for months. Had avoided even thinking about that spot on the hill where his other-dimensional self had been buried before he ever made it to this timeline. With how loudly his brain was rattling, there was a part of him that couldn't deny that right about now, he appreciated the silence in the dark. They were so far away from what people would call the 'civilized' world out here. Surely, with Peter's senses constantly strained in the city, that was the basic appeal to him as well.

It was also how Peter had heard him coming before Tony even had the chance to call out to him.

"How did you find me?"

A little winded from the slippery ascend to the hilltop, Tony paused a couple of steps behind where the boy was sitting in the snow. "Oh, come on... It's me."

Peter pursed his lips, refusing to turn his head. "So, you questioned every single person at the house about when they had seen me last and then calculated the radius of how far I might have come?"

Tony only blew out a huff.

"Ah," Peter exclaimed and pulled his phone out of his pocket. "Tracking me after all, aren't you."

"Well, duh." Slowly, Tony came closer until he sank to the ground right next to the boy. "Not that I needed it. You're a Spiderling, not an Elf, kid."

"Right." Peter grimaced to himself. "Footprints."

"I keep telling you. Gotta learn how to fly."

The smile that tucked on Peter's lips seemed genuine this time. "You didn't have to come out here."

All of a sudden, Tony contemplated that the boy may have picked this particular spot not because of what it meant to him, but because he had been sure that of all the places, few of the people staying at the house that night would voluntarily wander up here. Tony least of all. There was no denying that the kid had picked up on how much this all freaked Tony out, the fact that there was a dead version of himself buried so close to where he still lived. Silence hung heavy between them before Tony's voice echoed a little quieter, a little hesitant.

"I wasn't sure if I should, but..." He swallowed hard. "I can leave if you want to be alone."

There was another pause. Wanting to give him room to speak if that was what he wanted, Tony waited but the kid didn't say a thing.

With a shaky exhale, Tony kept his eyes on him. "But then I thought, I'd rather have you send me back than not be here if... if you would need me."

The kid's eyes were still staring straight ahead at the headstone in front of them.

"I know, I'm not him—"

"Of course you are," Peter breathed quietly.

Tony lowered his gaze, faltering. Maybe. "Not really though."

The kid's lip was caught between his teeth, refusing to look over at him. "In... in every way that matters."

"If you want to talk about it—"

"I don't," Peter mumbled.

It had been weeks after he had come back when Tony's curiosity had won out against his anxiety. Late at night on his own in the basement, he had asked FRIDAY to play him the footage of what had happened that day. That day he had died. Pepper, the kid, Rhodey... seeing their agony in the face of what he had done to protect them... it was a memory he just couldn't shake.

"I know, me being here doesn't change what happened. Kid, I know you were there when he..." Tony glanced to the side, searching the kid's face for a reaction. "...when I died."

Peter's head moved in a mixture of a shake and a shrug. "It... it doesn't matter..." His voice shook, possibly trying to convince himself as much as Tony. "You're back. You're... here. It... it's fine..."

"You're sitting at my grave in the freezing cold in the middle of my Christmas Eve party, buddy."

It was as bluntly as he could put it. He could see no benefit in tiptoeing around the demons the kid was battling.

But Peter shook his head more distinctly this time, still denying him. "It was just because... so many people and my senses, they... I just needed a little quiet to... calm down."

"Right. We have about 60 hectares of land out here and still..." Tony blew out a breath and leaned a little closer to the kid. "Still, this is the spot you picked to go." There was no answer from the Spiderling. "It's okay, if it still hurts, buddy."

The humorless chuckle that bubbled out of the kid didn't make things better for either of them.

"Pete, can you look at me?"

He didn't though. His eyes didn't stray from the inscription on the stone. 'A.E.S. - At peace.' A shudder went through Tony at the thought of how his wife had decided on that particular inscription.

"You're here." Peter's eyes dropped further, away from the stone, down to the snowy ground. "You're okay. It... it shouldn't matter..."

Tony grit his teeth then threw caution to the wind. "It's been 5 years and a little more than 8 months since you dusted in my arms, Pete."

The kid visibly shook next, his hands braced against the cold ground as he finally turned to look at Tony.

"5 years, 8 months, and some odd days." Tony's lower lip was caught between his teeth, his cheeks flushed. The images in his mind were as vivid as they had been on that fateful day on Titan. "You're here now. You're back. You have been back for 6 months and I can still hear your voice in my head pleading how you don't—"

"I'm sorry..." the kid whispered.

Tony huffed out a low chuckle. "Yeah. You said that too."

"I'm sorry that... that you felt responsible," the kid started and Tony had just wanted to protest when the boy stopped him with a wave of his hand. "I am, but it's not the same."

For a brief moment, Tony closed his eyes, trying his best to calm himself and keep the dry bite from his tone. "No. It really isn't the same."

The breath Peter blew out was harsher, angrier. "It's not, because I didn't choose to get dusted," he growled, refusing to look away from Tony now. "I didn't want to die!"

"I know, Pete. I remember." The beat of his heart hurt in his chest. "You think I would have wanted to die?"

Peter shook his head, tearing his gaze away again. "It doesn't matter."

"Kid—"

"Can we just... I don't want to argue about this."

Peter pulled his knees close to his chest and the way his hands were shaking made Tony want to drag him back inside so he could focus on giving him a proper lecture without having to worry about the cold the kid might catch out here.

Instead, he filed that back for later, deep breaths keeping his own frustration in check. "Maybe we do need to argue about this."

"I just want to move on!"

"And I..." Tony couldn't stop his voice from shaking. "...would really appreciate a chance to argue my side here."

"You don't need to argue your side," the kid hissed at him. "It's not you, I'm mad at, okay?"

Tony studied his boy. He was becoming painfully aware, how strung up the kid really was, how agitated. "It's not a choice anyone wants to make, kid. Sometimes, there is just no other way to —"

"There were like 10 people close by who could have done it." Peter shot him an angry glance. "It didn't have to be you! What about Morgan and Pepper, huh? What about—" He shook his head, eyes back on the snow-covered grave. "Captain Danvers. Thor. King T'Challa. The lady with the flying horse. Strange. Rogers. Barnes. Wanda Maximoff. Me." His head spun back towards Tony. "I could have tried."

Tony's stomach turned at the mere thought of that. "Yeah, there's no way in hell, Pete."

"Why not?" Peter's eyes burned with tears. "Why not! I could have taken it!"

"You have no idea if that's true." His heart was racing, his throat dry. "You might have died."

"So it's fine for you to sacrifice yourself on a whim but for me it—"

"Stop!" The way his hand hit the ground didn't have the grand effect he wanted. "That's not how this will work, kid. Ever. I will always try to keep you safe."

"And what about what I want?" Peter spat at him.

Tony shook his head, his eyebrows knitted close, desperately grasping for control. "I'm here now, am I not?"

"Yeah, for now..."

Any frustrated retort that might have been building up on his tongue died instantly as he watched the boy rub a hand across his face, the way his lower lip was quivering.

"Kid... come here..." His agitation evaporated and without another beat of hesitation, Tony pulled him close, his arms tightly wrapped around the boy's small frame. "Shh, it'll... it'll be alright."

There was nothing he could say, nothing he could do that would take away the pain of the days when he had seemed lost forever to the people who loved him most. Just like Tony would never be able to quite shake the deep sense of loss he had carried for years when the kid had been dead and gone.

Peter's hands were clasping the thick fabric of Tony's coat, his face pressed against his chest.

There was nothing he could say, no promises he would make, not the ones the kid wanted to hear right now cause he could never keep any of them. When it came to the kid's safety, his life, he would always put it above his own. No matter how much it might hurt him again, at least the kid would be breathing, would get to live.

"I'm sorry, buddy."

"But... but you're not," he mumbled against Tony's jacket.

He had a hand on the back of the kid's head, holding him tight. "I hate that I hurt you, Pete. I do." He pressed his eyes close, ignoring how the cold was creeping up from underneath him. "But I'll never apologize for trying to keep you safe." The boy shook in his arms, but Tony didn't let him pull away. "I sure as hell won't apologize for succeeding." There was a low tremor in the kid's body that was definitely more than emotions. "You're shaking, buddy. Let's get you back inside."

"I'm not c-cold," Peter hiccoughed.

"Alright, then..." Tony ruffled a hand through the boy's hair, his own digits frozen stiff. "Well, I'm going to get pneumonia and you seem to be very invested in—" He groaned as Peter slapped a hand against his chest.

"It's not f-funny!"

"No, at my age it really isn't something—"

This time, he caught the kid's hand just in time to soften the blow. In the process, Peter sat up straight enough for Tony to squint at his red-rimmed eyes.

"In there, you could watch me bust Harley for sneaking around the mulled wine?" There was a sparkle in the kid's eyes at that. A real sparkle he couldn't quite hide. "Ha! Knew I'd get you with that one."

Peter moved back a bit, shaky fingers rubbing his face. Squinting at the boy, Tony was weighing his words, wondering how many hornet's nest he should be poking at.

"You should get over this, buddy." Tony cringed at the look of utter discomfort on his boy's face. "I mean it. That little power struggle the two of you are going through..?"

"There's no power struggle."

Tony crocked his head at him. "You know what I mean... Kid, I know you want to keep your secrets but Harley can be a great ally to you."

"Right," Peter mumbled. "Can we just like... do this another time?"

He nodded before the kid had even finished the sentence. "Course, buddy." For a moment, Tony held in, his focus never anywhere else but Peter, as he tried to control the tremor in his voice. "So, we should get back inside, right?"

"Yeah. Right." The kid leaned back against him, his voice muffled. "Just... just a couple more minutes?"

Tony swallowed hard, nodding soundlessly. He'd never refuse the kid. Never. How could he ever?

###

Merry Christmas and happy holidays wherever and however you guys are celebrating!

Thank you for reading. And thank you even more if you take the time to let me know in the comments what you think about the story and reblog it!

This story is part of my Post-Endgame timeline. More about my Endgame Fix-it and the connected series of stories: “Like You’d Know How It Works” timeline

#tony stark #tony stark lives #IRON DAD AND SPIDER SON #iron dad #iron dad fanfiction #nebula #natasha x bruce #christmas #christmas eve #merry christmas #holiday themed #peter parker fic #peter parker #post-endgame #LYKHIW-timeline

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yodawgiherd · 3 years

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Red flag pt.2

>>>Read on AO3<<<

Q and A sessions are surprisingly fun to write. Rating still M, I'm not thErE yEt. ^^

A week.

One week was how long Mikasa managed before the curiosity killed the proverbial cat and her fingers tapped the name of the newest addition to her contact list. Eren picked up on the fifth ring, sounding sleepy, which she thought was strange considering that it was about two in the afternoon.

“Yeager.”, came his muffled voice, followed by a yawn.

It took her a second before Mikasa realized that she didn’t give him her number, as per their agreement, so he had no idea who’s calling.

“Hey, it’s Mikasa.”, she re-introduced herself, “Remember me?”

There was a sound on the other end, a shuffle of bedding as he sat up straight.

“Of course I do, the pretty girl with the pretty name.”

“The one and only. Listen, is that lunch offer still on the table?”

“Totally, just tell me the place and time and I’ll be there.”

“Really? I can pick anything?”

He chuckled at how excited her voice became.

“I’m not a picky eater.”

“And it’s still on you, right?”

“Yep.”

“Well then…”

The sushi place was fancy, far above her poor-ass student budget. She was there twice so far, once Levi treated her when the news of Mikasa being accepted at the university arrived, and once when it was her birthday and Sasha decided to splurge for her best friend. And boy did Mikasa love both those experiences. She felt a bit guilty, abusing Eren’s blind trust like that, but hey, he offered it first, and judging from the state of his flat, he wasn’t doing half bad for himself. If it came to the worst, Mikasa was prepared to split the bill, she did have some money from her part-time job. The food was worth it.

Eren wasn’t there when she arrived, so Mikasa picked a table, getting herself comfortable. When the waitress came, she almost sent her away, to wait for Eren, but then reminded herself that she’s , most likely, not paying. Appetizer it was. When he finally arrived, she was already halfway done with the fried chicken pieces, which earned a raised eyebrow.

“Hungry?”, he asked, removing his coat and sitting down himself.

“Famished.”, she agreed, “Forgot to eat breakfast.”

She skipped breakfast willingly to save space for this feast, but that was something Eren didn’t need to know. Most likely satisfied with her little lie, he nodded before picking up the menu himself. The evening progressed with somewhat casual conversation and excellent food. Eren asked her how she’s doing lately, and Mikasa described the procrastinating bliss she’s been living in since her last exam. That paradise was coming to an end, however, as she needed to get out of the city soon and back to her hometown.

“To visit your parents?”, he asked, understandably not knowing the bitter truth that Mikasa wasn’t ready to share yet.

Instead, she shook her head.

“No, I have a part-time work at my brother’s gym.”, she pointed towards herself, “One personal trainer, right here.”

Luckily, Eren didn’t press the issue. The way he knew when to stop asking was an amazing thing, and Mikasa secretly wished that more people would be born with that gift. To break the silence that followed, and to change the course of the conversation, Mikasa decided to strike back.

“So, Eren, how about we stop beating around the bush.”

His grin was cheeky.

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Please, as if you don’t know why I came here in the first place.”

He picked up one sushi roll that he was eating, with a fork like a damn savage, turning it against the light.

“The free food?”

She scowled at his amused expression.

“Because of my amazing company?”, he guessed again, getting a sigh in return.

“As if.”

“Wow, you hurt me.”

The smile present in the answer was infectious, and Mikasa had a hard time resisting it.

“You are quite the egoist, aren’t you?”

“So I’m told.”, Eren shrugged, unbothered by that accusation.

Unsure how to continue, Mikasa massaged her forehead. This guy was something else.

“Since it’s so important to you, “ Eren offered, “Why don’t you just ask?”

“Fine.”, looking back up, she met his emeralds with her own eyes, “What do you do for a living?”

“Care to guess first?”

More games? Fine, you’re on.

“Okay, sure.”, putting her chopsticks down, as she was a civilized person, Mikasa rested her chin on her intertwined hands, “Let’s go over what I know then. First, there is this strange… rope fixation you have, and you said that was caused by your job, right?”

“It’s not only ropes,”, he corrected her, “But it is related to my job, yes.”

“Second, when I called you yesterday you were still in bed, and it was around two, which means that you work late at night, right?“

“I could have been gaming all night, didn’t think about that?”

“Maybe, but maybe not. I’ll take my chances.”

“All right, then put the two together. What do you think I am?”

“A smug bastard.”

Of course he grinned at that.

“That’s true. But professionally?”

Putting on her best thinking hat, Mikasa rolled the facts around in her head.

“A policeman?”, she tried.

“Not a bad guess, handcuffs and night shifts.”, Eren took the time to have a dramatic sip before finally revealing the truth, “But you’re wrong. Try again.”

“Some sort of artist then?”

His eyes narrowed.

“I guess you could say that. But what kind do you have in mind?”

“Singer?”

“Nope.”

“Painter?”

“No.”

Mikasa tried a few more art-related jobs that would fit Eren’s profile, but he shot down all of them. At the end of her rope, she pulled out a trump card. Even looking objectively, outside of that “he was totally her type” thing, Eren was very attractive. Combine that with strange working times and….

“Are you a model?”

“Yea…..Nope.”

Damn it. Out of ideas, Mikasa put up her palms in the international gesture of surrender.

“Ok, I give up.”

“Guess we will never know then.”, Eren leaned back in his chair, smugger than ever before, “What a disappointment.”

Out of words and completely against her usually serious character, Mikasa kicked him under the table. Hard.

“Ow, what was that for?”

“Spill the beans, Eren.”

“Or what?”

“Or I’ll kick you again.”

Rubbing his shin and not sure that his bones would survive another kick like that, Eren decided that the teasing stage was over.

“Very well then.”, leaning closer, he put both his elbows on the wood, looking right into Mikasa’s eyes when he spoke.

“I’m a dom.”

The clueless look on her face was priceless.

“H-Huh?”

“Dom, master, and a hundred other ways you can call it.”

In slow motion, Eren watched as that clueless expression changed. With words falling and clicking into place, the not-understanding look was replaced by a blush that began creeping up to her cheeks. In short, it was adorable.

“Y-You mean like… like….”

“Yes.”

“Err… I…”

And Eren waited patiently, finishing his drink, while Mikasa kept trying to say a word and completely failing at it. It took her about five minutes before she finally closed her eyes, took a few deep breaths, and steadied herself.

“So you’re like a s-sex worker? P-Prostitute?

“No and yes.”

“Huh?!”

“Technically, you’re right. But since I don’t have sex with my clients, I don’t usually call myself sex worker.”

“Ok, I’m lost.”

“Well, it's actually quite easy. I fulfill the fantasies of the client, I take care of their needs, I make them…. Err..”, he looked around to see if no one was around – they were in public after all, “…finish, but I don’t do it myself.”

“So what you’re saying is…”

“I’m saying that I can satisfy my clients needs without doing it the old-fashioned way. God bless technology.”

Mikasa was rubbing her forehead now, taking the information in.

“And your clients… what are they?”

“I deal with women exclusively if that’s what you are asking. But if you have a male friend in need of similar services, I know a great dominatrix, mistress A, that can take them, she’s a real top of the class. She was my…”, his gaze slid over Mikasa’s face, lingering over the shape of her eyes for a second, “ senpai back when I was beginning.”

She groaned. He had to use that word to tease her, abusing the weakened mental state she was in right now – she couldn’t think of a comeback. And, to salt the wound, he was grinning again.

“You can’t dump something like this at me without any explanation.”, Mikasa demanded, “How did you even end up working like this?”

“It’s…”, kind of personal, he was about to say, but then he met Mikasa’s eyes and that defense he usually held up around his secrets melted.

It was crazy, he didn’t even know the girl that well, he had no idea what she was truly like. But she was here, sitting across the table, and her grey eyes saw right through him. And he… he simply told her.

“When I was a kid, I was a bit fucked up. My dad…. He was not exactly a great role model. My mom was his second wife, he left the first after having a kid with her.”, he answered her follow-up question before she even asked, “Yes, I have a half-brother but we are not in contact. After leaving her, he married my mom and had me. I can’t say that he was a bad guy, from what little I remember, but he was hardly ever home. And one day, he completely disappeared. I don’t know if he’s alive or dead, neither does mom, and the police couldn’t find him. He’s gone.”

Mikasa, who had her own tragic parents-related story, remained silent, knowing that even years later it is hard to talk about stuff like this. Eren took a small break, a sip of water, and went on.

“I had a lot of issues from that, anger mostly. I lashed out on anyone or anything that I didn’t like, punching before asking. Bloodying people and getting bloodied myself was the only way to get the anger out, I did not know any better. You can imagine that didn’t go well in school. Mom did her best to keep me in line, but it was hard for her, too hard at times. Through sheer luck and endless patience of my teachers, I managed to graduate, but the anger inside me didn’t die. Even as an adult, I was a colossal dickhead. But all that changed shortly after I turned eighteen and moved to college.”

“Why?”

“Because I met her.”

Who? and How? were on the edge of Mikasa’s tongue, but she held those questions in. Eren would tell her.

“It was one of the college parties, you know how those go. I was there mostly to get drunk and get into a fight with someone because that was about everything I cared about back then. I succeeded in that too, I punched some blonde dude in the face and he didn’t take that lightly.”

“Did you beat him up?”

To her surprise, Eren tipped his head back and laughed.

“No. The dude completely wrecked me. He was a titan, both taller and heavier than me, and I later learned that he was a boxer as well. When I woke up from the beating he so generously gave me, I saw that a blonde girl had dragged me out on the lawn and was standing there still, waiting. Naturally, as I was a real gentleman back then, I spat out the blood in my mouth, told her to fuck off and tried getting up. Do you know what she did?”

“No idea.”

“She slapped me. Hard. I called her a stupid bitch, and she slapped me again. The third time, I got about two syllables out before her palm made another imprint on my face. And after all that, she kissed me, and I realized I was never so turned on in my life.”

Mikasa honestly didn’t know what to say.

“That’s….random?”

“I was a raging asshole back then Mikasa. I know that saying it now, it looks like she was acting out of her mind, but you weren’t there.”, Eren shook his head, “Anyway, that’s how I met the future mistress A. Annie.”

“How did she even know that you won't just flip out after she slaps you?”

“She didn’t. Later she told me that it was a hunch on her part, that watching me get into a fight with that giant for no good reason tipped her off, showed her that I might have some anger issues.”

“So, after that, she showed you the ropes?”

He didn’t miss the reference, it earned a respectful nod from him.

“Yes. She was already working as a domme, on her own back then, and mostly for fun and the experience. Annie was older than me by a year, and she spent that year mostly half-assing school and perfecting her skill for her future job.”

“What happened after that party? Did you two became a couple?”

“Not really. We didn’t date, like at all, but we became good friends, and Annie would train her techniques on me.”

“So what, she like tied you up from time to time?”

He nodded.

“That and other things. We practiced on each other, but we never made it sexual. I know it sounds crazy, but you didn’t meet Annie, she’s can drip hot wax on your nipples without batting an eye. I’d say that’s part of her charm, she’s completely stoic while working.”

“And you?”

“Honestly, in the beginning, it was weird as hell. But when we kept doing it, I realized that my anger was subdued by it, that this helped me overcome it for the first time in my life. With all the discipline and focus this required I managed to be in control of my life for what felt like the first time. It was still difficult for me from time to time, I admit, but Annie was always there to put me back to my place.”

“How did she know that this was what you needed?”

“Annie also had… issues when she was younger. And this thing helped her through it, so she thought I might be the same. For the record, she was right.” Eren was having a pleasant memory trip, and Mikasa kept silent, not wanting to interrupt, “Anyway, after I realized that I prefer being the top, Annie found me a girl who liked being the bottom.”

“Finally a girlfriend?”, Mikasa tried again, but he chuckled.

“Nope, this one had a catch too. She was mostly a lesbian.”

“Mostly a lesbian?”

“Yea, she’s bi, but prefers women.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“Why would I? She was tiny and amazingly flexible because she does gymnastics. Incredible performance partner, I still work with her from time to time.”

“But why didn’t she find a female partner then? If she prefers women that is.”

“She did, sort of, Annie worked on her too sometimes, I think that was why she even agreed to do it in the first place. But with a blindfold around her eyes and tied up so she couldn’t touch us, she kind of stopped caring who’s holding the vibrator.”

Mikasa felt like this was all a big joke, but Eren was completely serious.

“You had this little triangle of fun for how long?”

“Till we graduated. After that, Annie and I found the agency and got employed there, and Krista went on to become a doctor.”

“I’ll presume that Krista was that flexible one?”

“You’d presume correctly.”

“She’s a doctor, but she still does… things? With you?”

“She performs with us sometimes if that’s what you’re talking about. Nothing else.”

“You want to tell me that you’ve been doing BDSM…. stuff to each other for years and never fucked?”, Mikasa shook her head, “I don’t buy it.”

“You don’t have to, but it’s the truth. My relationship with both Annie and Krista was strictly professional, however crazy that sounds.”

“Then how did you develop your “can’t have sex until the girl is tied up” thing.”

“I dated in college normally, not much mind you, but a few flings found their way to me. Then it was pretty simple. When I had normal sex, I didn’t find myself half as aroused as I was when Annie slapped me for the first time. So I tried getting my hobby into play.”

Hobby, that’s one way to call it.

“And how did it go?”

“Not great. The first two girls said that I’m a creep and left. But the third one agreed and…”, Eren leaned back again, folding his hands behinds his head, “best sex of my life.”

“Fine, but if you enjoy it, why don’t you do it at work then? I’m sure some of your clients would appreciate it.”

“I’m sure they would, but I have this strange need to differentiate between work and pleasure - I think I caught it from Annie. I can’t get into it when I know that the person I’m tying up paid for it.”

“Strange.”

Eren didn’t argue.

“Strange indeed.”

All right, cool info dump and all, but Mikasa was more confused than anything. He was a sex worker BUT he didn’t have sex with his clients BUT he preferred to have the toys in bed while doing it. What the hell?

“Can you like, describe what you do then? I still can’t wrap my head around it.”

Eren shrugged.

“Sure. After making the initial contact, through the agency of course…”

“You’re still at the same one?”

“Yup, much easier that way. Don’t have to deal with things.”, Eren scrunched his nose, “Like taxes.”

“Okay, so some bored lady picks you at your company’s website, and then what?”

“Then we do the first meeting, through phone, email, or in person, that’s up to the client. There, we discuss important things, like what my hard limits are.”

“Which means?”

“Things that I won’t do, for various reasons.”

Mikasa didn’t ask what those were, so Eren continued.

“With that out of the way, we talk about what my client wants, what sort of fantasy I would be fulfilling. Once I have a picture in my head, I recommend the place to meet – one of the places owned by the agency, dungeons if you want, or even the clients own place.”

“You go to people’s homes with that?”

“If they want it, yes. It fits the best for certain scenarios, and people usually feel much more comfortable there.”

“And they trust you? I mean, you could tie them up and rob the place.”

“Would you believe me if I told you that I never thought of that?”, Eren scratched the back of his head, “That’s a valid thing what you said, but I have the agency to vouch for me.”

“Okay. And then?”

“Then we meet at the place we picked, have a quick recap to make sure I’ll do everything she wants, pick a safeword and we are good to go.”

“And you do what?”

“Mikasa, my range of services is very wide.”, putting one hand on the table, Eren began counting, finger by finger, “Bondage, suspension, pain stuff like caning, whipping and more. Waxplay, petplay, some electro, and…”

“Ok, ok! I heard enough!”

“I’d imagine so. From how you reacted when I put the rope around your hands, let me guess that you are very vanilla, right?”

“Huh?”

“It means like basic – that you don’t do anything strange in the bedroom.”

“No, I…”, Mikasa ran her hand over her somewhat heated forehead, “I’m very vanilla.”

“Weird.”

She fixed him with a look.

“Why is that weird?”

“It’s just…” he gestured towards her, “People with your style are usually into it.”

“My style? You mean black?”

“Dark, goth, however, you want to call it.”, he reached up, tapping his ear, at the same place where Mikasa’s cartilage was pierced, “And those things are also not completely usual.”

“I guess I am a bit strange, but nothing compared to you, sir. I never even imagined….”

“Well, the big mystery is over, the cat is out of the bag.”, he looked at her with a strange emotion in his eyes now, one that Mikasa couldn’t quite decipher. It looked like… worry?

“We can still be friends, right?”, he asked.

It was not like Eren did anything bad to her, and while his job was a bit shocking, he was still nothing but the perfect gentleman.

“Right, of course. I… I’ll need some time to digest this, I think.”

Eren watched her, tapping his fingers against the table, teeth chewing his full bottom lip. He was thinking about something, Mikasa could tell, but before she could ask, he dropped the bomb at her.

“Come to one of my shows.”

“Huh?”

“My shows. I don’t do individual clients only, I perform at clubs too. BDSM clubs that is. I’ll write the address down.”

She was shaking her head before he even finished the sentence.

“N-No, I.. .No... I’d never.”

“I’m not asking you to take part, there will be plenty of people as spectators. And don’t worry about being recognized or something, the club is members only and you can grab a mask at the entrance if you want, your identity will be safe.”

His words burned with intensity now, but his eyes did even more, and Mikasa was drowning in it.

“W-Why is it so important to you?”

“Because I can see how you look at me now. You think that I’m some sort of pervert, that I what do is unnatural, not normal. I want to show you that it can be beautiful too, that there is nothing wrong if two consenting adults have a go at something like this.”

“I.. Uhm…”

The address written on a napkin, Eren slid it over to her.

“Listen, I obviously won’t force you into anything, this is your choice. The show is next week and then again in two weeks. You said that you are leaving the city soon, right?”

She nodded, wordless.

“Is it far? Or could you theoretically come back for the evening?”

“It’s not that far.”, Mikasa replied, finding her voice again, “Like an hour and a half drive.”

“All right. Let’s put it like this, if you want, come to the second show, the one that is two weeks from now, the club will be less packed, and I will tell the bouncer to let you in. Just let him know that Eren sent you. If you don’t want to, that’s fine too, I will understand.”

She nodded, once again retreating to no-words strategy. Eren took it as a cue, standing up.

“I’ll go settle the bill.”

When he came back, he grabbed his coat, putting it on while Mikasa sat there, gears in her head turning.

“If you won’t show, I’ll know that you are not interested in that part of my life, but that doesn’t mean we can’t meet again. Right?”, he smiled at her, “If you ever want a free lunch, give me a call, okay?”

That said, Eren half-turned towards the exit, ready to go when Mikasa’s voice interrupted him.

“Eren?”

“Yea?”

“Give me your phone.”

He did so automatically, even unlocking it for her. It wasn’t like there were any more dirty secrets he had to hide from her, not after today. Mikasa worked for a while, tapping the screen before she set it back on the wood and slid it over to him. Picking the device up, Eren saw that he had a new contact added – certain Mikasa Ackerman.

“This will be easier if we have a way to get in touch with each other right?”

Now he was the one dumbly nodding.

“Right…”

“I don’t know if I will turn up for your show, but I want to meet again. I don’t want to cut and run because of what you told me today. You’re a nice guy.”

“You’re saying that because I bought you lunch.”, Eren accused her with a smile, getting some bravado back.

She winked at him.

“Perhaps.”

Still smiling, Eren pocketed his phone, feeling like he got more out of this meeting than he even dared to hope for.

“Well, I’ll see you around then, Mikasa.”

“Take care Eren.”

She watched him leave the restaurant, her own lips curved upwards. When he disappeared from view, she ran her hands through her hair, a half-amused/half-nervous giggle falling from her lips. She had never asked this many questions in her life, not even in her classes. And the answers she got were…. something else.

This guy? This guy was getting more interesting by the second.

#fanfic #snk #eremika #why yes I do prefer doing new drafts instead of finishing WIPs #how could you tell?

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chaoticspacefam · 3 years

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OC Music Meme

I was tagged by @raven-of-domain-kwaad , thank you! :D I shall tag (no pressure as always, only if you want to!): @mercurypilgrim , @mimabeann, @rainofaugustsith , @thelastenvoyyy , @a-master-procrastinator and anyone else who wants to do this one, yes, I promise I mean you!

Yaaay another music meme, I LOVE these, as any of my long-term followers/mutuals probably know :P Oh no, Raven what have you done! 🤣🤣

List one or more songs that relate to the following

*drags Rai and her three consecutive playlists full of songs in here and plops her down proudly* Now I’m not joking when I say combined her three playlists would run for ~10 hrs if I played them all back-to-back. Sooooo for that reason I will be trying to restrict myself to 3-4 songs per “question”, except for the last one which is annotated with an explanation there, ANYWAYS!

reminds you of them most:

Down To The Bottom - Dorothy :: This is a very new one to her playlist (discovered a few days ago), but it still vibes so well with Saarai’s attitude to love, and her need to have some sort of emotional closeness to other people, to love and be loved, or else she just doesn’t function quite right

Up The Wolves - The Mountain Goats :: This was one of Rai’s first EVER theme songs that made it onto her list as I gave the Ahaszaai the backstory that led to them becoming main characters, so it feels only right that I include it here. To me it perfectly sums up her character progression, from a frightened young woman with a lot of skeletons in her closet and no willingness to be a commander of anything or confidence that she could, to a strong and dedicated leader willing to do whatever it takes to protect the people she works with, and make sure that the person who once took it from her family will suffer the righteous justice he deserves for his actions. Oddly enough, Saarai never goes back to take over the Sith Empire as D’leah planned (in Subterfugeverse anyways), they do eventually “come home” and build something of their own with the other members of the Alliance <3

Bruno Is Orange - Hop Along :: This song is very important too. It makes me feel a lot of things and as I developed more of Saarai’s backstory and began tying everything together, it became an essential part of her backstory. This is 100% a “Saarai Song” in my brain (and I’ve had the script for that meme planned out for over a year, I’ll get to it soon :3), summing up the chaos and her own feelings on what happened with Tsâhis (and her mother and sister’s reactions to finding out about what happened, and Ty, the baby which resulted from that clusterfuck of a relationship)

Someone New - Hozier :: Kinda supplements “Down To The Bottom”, Saarai was a character who puzzled me sexuality-wise for a long time, she has a lot to unpack and a lot of nuances in her attractions, and for a long time (because it is the default for modern media) I tried to shove her in the monogamy box, except...that doesn’t work for Saarai LMAO. I remembered this song existed one day (I think it came up on Youtube shuffle or something) and it was the lightbulb that went on in my head that finally clicked and told me she was actually polyam as well (though ironically I forgot to actually put it in her playlist until @darth-bagel reminded me it existed again a few months ago LOL).

reminds another character of them:

All The Pretty Girls - KALEO :: (Sash - Zephyrverse AU) This one had a few options too, but I think this is the best song that Sash would associate with Saarai. Their relationship was slow burn, although there was near-immediate attraction there, Sash struggled with self-doubt and her own insecurities for a long time, firmly believing that Saarai would get bored of waiting for her to be “ready” to take things further and explore other options (she didn’t. They’ve been married something like 20+, nearing 30 years now, you’re stuck with her sweetie <3)

The Last of the Real Ones - Fall Out Boy :: (Lana - Subterfugeverse) “I know this whole damn city thinks it needs you, but not as much as I do.” Lana wasn’t looking for Saarai when she found her, but Lana wouldn’t have it any other way. Though Lana is a big pillar of support for Saarai, and Saarai in turn is the social “glue” that holds the Alliance together, what many people don’t realise is that the feeling is mutual and Lana relies upon her just as much. Saarai’s dependable, and trustworthy, even if sometimes she makes Lana want to roll her eyes into the ceiling because of her antics, she wouldn’t want to change her for anything, it’s that part of Saarai that she secretly loves the most because it reminds Lana that it’s okay to unwind and have fun or be silly every once in a while, especially with the people you love.

Shut Up And Dance - WALK THE MOON :: (Koth - Subterfugeverse) Koth’s relationship with Saarai took a lot longer to develop into something openly romantic because Saarai had a lot of stuff to work through before she could accept her own feelings for him, but the cantina party at the end of KOTFE was the moment that Koth realised she was comfortable with him, because it’s the first time she really opened up to him, the first time she asked him to do anything together, and the first time she didn’t flinch or jump away from him when he touched her.

reminds you of a relationship of theirs, doesn’t have to be romantic, can be paternal, friendly etc.: I’m taking that as an invitiation to do a song for each of the main ones of any kind and that means this one has like six songs because...Saarai has a lot of influencial relationships in her character arc, I’m sorry (but not really) :’)

Broken Crown - Mumford & Sons :: Saarai & D’leah (Familial, It’s Complicated). This one is probably gonna be the “controversial” song of this post but you know what I’m gonna do it anyway. Saarai and D’leah have a very complicated relationship, because on the one hand Saarai does love her mother very much in spite of the horrible things she said and did, and on the other...the last thing that she wants is to turn out like her. And sometimes, sometimes you gotta call your mom out on her toxic shit. Hey Brother - Aviici :: Saarai & Ni’kasi (Familial Love). “What if I lose it all? Oh sister, I will help you out. Oh, if the sky comes falling down, for you...there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do.” The “brother” part does not apply to the twins, gender-wise, but the essence of this song is undoubtedly Saarai & Ni’kasi’s relationship. When Saarai thought she had no-one else, Ni’kasi was there to pick up the pieces and get her back onto her feet. They’re ride or die till the very end, wherever Saarai leads, she knows Ni’kasi will follow her.

Son of A Gun - Lord Huron :: Saarai & Tsâhis (Romantic ”Love”, though I’mma be very clear here that he was a manipulative abusive asshole, but Saarai loved him so...quotation marks. Y’get it yeah? Good.) “Well she fell in love with that son of a gun, but he was not the man that she took him for.” This line in particular sums it up. Saarai was young, naive and a perfect target for someone like Tsâhis to take advantage of because she didn’t know any better and believed him when he said he “loved her”, only for him to pull the rug out from under her feet later on. (he got his tho, don’t worry 😈)

Youth - Glass Animals :: Saarai & Tyûk (Maternal Love). This is the closest I can find to a song that sums up their relationship, I have a lot of thoughts about it but there are very few songs (that I’ve found) that touch upon the essence of Saarai & Ty’s relationship. D’leah chose to blame Ty for his father’s actions, Saarai chose the opposite. She chose to love him in spite of what his father had done to her, and to make sure he grew up feeling safe, loved, and learnt to be better than that.

Curses - The Crane Wives :: Saarai/Sash (Romantic Love) Both Saarai and Sash have had difficult pasts, with a lot of emotional trauma, and they both had hurdles they had to overcome in order for their relationship to truly work and stay healthy. But with each others’ support, they’ve managed it and are all the closer for it. If you asked either of them where “home” was, they’d say the other’s name.

Sorry I Stole Your Girlfriend - Stereo Skyline :: Saarai/Lana/Koth (Romantic Love). Okay, I really really wanted to pick a more serious song from their playlist for them, BUT....this song is the song that started this ship in my brain so here we are. LMAO Originally, this popped into my brain as an idea of Saarai’s response to Koth’s attempt at getting between them in that scene of KOTFE on the Gravestone. Koth and Saarai’s moral compasses are very similar and I wanted them to sit down and have a proper, healthy discussion about their feelings instead of becoming enemies and sort of agreeing not to hold a grudge against each other, though I didn’t expect for that piece to get away from me and for Saarai to end up developing feelings for Koth too, I can’t say I’m unhappy with it. I love them and I will fight anyone who tells me I can’t make them an OT3, I can, I will, and I have. >:) (Healthy Polyam Good, Love Triangles Are Fucking Stupid (tm). No I am not taking criticism on this lmao) Though Saarai & Koth’s relationship isn’t sexual in any way, they love each other just as much as they love Lana, just express it differently. So even though the snideness of this song doesn’t really apply to them, I kept it in their playlist and it also became their ship name because it was too good to pass up, though “Stole” is in inverted commas as it’s definitely more of an inside joke between the three of them than actually seriously accusing them of stealing each others’ girlfriend. 🤣 (as always, Saarai & Koth thinks it’s hilarious, Lana rolls her eyes at the stupid pun but also secretly thinks it’s funny as hell)

#swtor #star wars: the old republic #swtor OCs #tagged meme #OC music meme #swtor oc: saarai ahaszaai #sith pureblood #the outlander #LS! eternal empress #subterfugeverse #ot3: sorry i ''stole'' your girlfriend #saarai/lana/koth #saarai x tsâhis #zephyrverse au #saarai/sash #the ahaszaai twins #the sith twins #yes i have written down a lot of stuff regarding the ot3's relationship and how it developed etc #one day i will throw them out into the world when i feel like they're ready #but they're not ready yet so sorry y'all you gotta wait #but trust me when i say this is very elaborately planned out #LMAO #[banging pots and pans] they're. poly. and. in. love. fucking. deal. with. it. or. leave #my ships my rules #complicated mother daughter relationships are complicated #projection? i don't know her #no sir #tw: manipulation #tw: abusive relationship

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l0chn3ss · 4 years

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l0chn3ss update

I feel like the last time I ever really active on tumblr was in the year 2016, so i want to address my absence between 2017-2020. Part of it is because I feel like I owe it to my friends and mutuals who I just basically left on read and another part is because I’ve always treated this blog as a personal blog that documents my life and my growth. I put off writing this for a long time but now that I have a huge paper due, now is definitely the time.

You are welcome to skip but I will address a few hard hitting questions I feel should be answered, especially since I feel like I departed like an anti-hero of a bad tv show.

Where I am currently: I am in grad school to obtain a master’s in library and information science. I have a full time job at different middle school libraries, though I work from home now. I also tutor kids on the side to pay for my tuition because I basically make minimum wage. Quarantine messed with my head at first, but now I’m feeling much better and I’m trying to reconnect with friends and close a lot of loose ends.

TLDR: I took an extended break because tumblr mobile sucks and my laptop needed serious repairs. I made a huge migration away from social media in 2018. I prioritized my education and in-person connections, which fell to shit because of my fandom involvement in the past. I did not like the direction of the main fandom I participated in and knew that many of the people I once respected did not respect me in return/ Us versus them mentality. I recognized that I treated my life on tumblr too seriously and took petty drama personally. I am sporadically on tumblr now because I genuinely enjoy the social connection and because I still like running fandom events.

Yes, you can reblog this. I’d love for this narrative to be heard.

Long version: To preface this, this post is being written to give myself closure and because I really am procrastinating on my final big paper of this semester. I’ll be tackling on the points in the tldr in a longer narrative that will appear to be in an expository fashion, which I recognize will be a source of contention, but my intentions are to throw it onto the table so that I can be freed. I can let it go and move on. I’m no longer a 20 years old who cared too much of what other people think and will think; I think differing perspectives are important and I want to give myself a chance to say my piece. That and I recognize that I lost the audience that I once had, so I doubt this will be an issue at all. It’s been 4 or what ever years, let’s just not.

Back in 2015-2016 there was a huge back and forth between three groups of people in the SE fandom. The reason why I’m not listing out the name is because I don’t want this to show up in the tags. I’d say that the three groups could be seen as quite literally the soma shippers (mostly white, demi sexual girls), lgbt centric bloggers (very kid or star oriented, very fed up with soma), and the people who were deemed as alright to soma shippers (c r ona, ste inm arie, jac k im centric people). There was a constant (and understandable) tension between the first two groups while the third was like the weird cousin that everyone in the social circles liked because they sprinkled in soma for the masses. Don’t argue with me on this-- this was literally how the fandom was in 2015 and you know it.

The main issue was that one group felt that they were being inclusive towards identities and sexualities while the other felt that they were not. I remember that one of the arguments was that soma WAS an LGBT ship because people headcanonned the members to be demisexual. However, the other side of the argument was that it wasn’t good representation of a gay pairing. Now that we can look back at this 5 years later, I have two things to say: 1, I now very much understand why the argument broke out because of how heated the topic is, and I do believe that I lean more towards the “other side” now that I’m not wearing rose tinted glasses, but 2, I need to make it clear that demi people are lgbt, but a headcanon is not fact and ship diversity was the main question at hand, not the ship itself. This argument lasted for weeks, destroyed my friendships, and no matter what I felt I did in the moment (which was to mend the fandom), it was taken as an insult.

(Side note: Somethings that I remember was being in someone’s DM’s to encourage them to participate in the large fandom events more, but once they twisted my intentions and rallied their friends, I became their enemy. I also became the mods’ enemy but then again, when was I not? I was made fun of for saying “queergender,” a term that is now currently being widely used, quite openly by someone I wanted desperately to be friends with. I was outwardly mocked by popular users who only apologized behind closed doors but didn’t bother to clear things up with their followers. Adults who were in their 30s quite literally attacked a 19 year old. It was in that moment that I realized I would never become friends with either side, and not because I didn’t want to.)

I bring this up because as I begun to stop writing soma fics, I also begun to see and understand why people moved away from it. It wasn’t the ship itself, it was the culture surrounding it. However, on tumblr we have the ability to connect intensely with the content we produce. Therefore, the ship itself began to be connected with the shippers and their attitudes towards outside pairings-- that attitude being tied into elitism.

I say this with every ounce of love I can because I once had the exact same mannerism. When you become so tied into one pairing to the point where other ships appear to threaten the existence of it and you react negatively towards it, you become rancid. The popular tag “everything is soma” takes a very dark turn. Even if readers consume another pairing’s work, they will be obliged to say “I ship soma more BUT that was cute.” They will read an entirely different topic and wonder why soma wasn’t inserted into it in the background. They will reject pairings that separate the two as if breaking them up is sin and an insult.

The only reason why I stopped writing my soma fics in 2016 was because I saw a real need to fill in the gaps of other pairings. I took what people were saying to heart and I wanted to change my ways and my perceptions. I saw the animosity of the ship culture and rejected it. I wanted to use what little influence I had to make the fandom just a bit more accepting. In 2016, I don’t think the fandom was ready for it. In 2017, they still weren’t ready for it. In 2020, I see hope, but I wonder sometimes if it’s masqueraded pity because of previous treatment.

In the middle of it all, I went from being the soma angst master to becoming the weird person everyone once knew. I was the friend that people excluded from group chats and I just “wasn’t the same.” Cliques grew extremely large in power in 2017 and exclusion hurt like a bitch.

The straw that broke the camel’s back and completely shut me down was in 2017 when I was graduating as a bachelor. There was a fandom event that I decided to go all in to. For context, there used to be a huge debate on how many times a person should enter in an event, but in my mind, the more exposure the better. My graduation and the event took place at the exact same time, which was cool, but what hurt me was what happened after.

I was lucky enough to be accepted into field school (when you travel to do outdoor excavating) for my major. I’m an anthropologist-- it was an honor. I didn’t plan in advance for it, and if anything, I thought that I would be committed completely to the events and my 5 or what ever entries at the time. I’ve always prided myself in communicating with others, so I made sure to let my partners in the event know what was going on. I was so excited to be going on my first ever excavation and no one at the time said anything otherwise, in fact, they all seemed incredibly supportive.

What I didn’t know was that I would be called out by name in the event feedback response by one person who felt that I didn’t take the event seriously enough and that I should’ve prioritized my time accordingly. Two of the mods let me know because it referred to me directly, though the name of the submitter was not included. It was not only a slap in the face, but a dumbfound moment that reminded me that wow, fandom content really is someone’s life out there. My enforced silence because of lack of internet in the woods actually upset someone and made them believe that I wronged them, because I put my real life ambitions first before a fandom event.

It was then when I woke up and I remember very clearly thinking to myself: I don’t want to be like them. I don’t want to treat my fandom life seriously. I want to participate in fandom for fun, not out of duty. I don’t want to prioritize this life because in the end, if I am hated for putting my work and education first, then I don’t want it.

(For context, I suspect that it was the same person who made a 200 note call out on me during the fandom tension. I respected this person immensely, but I also treated them like the flawed person I believe everyone is. I’m sure because of this, I’m pretty much trash in their eyes, which is totally fine. They have really cute cats so they can’t be all too bad. Don’t look into it too deeply.)

Once my month long field school was up, I was already used to not being on the internet or any of my social media accounts. I didn’t play my mobile games for a month. I didn’t read the news for a month. It was like going cold turkey on the internet, which reshaped my habits entirely. The only time that I had online within that time span was during the weekend, but I spent my time working on my projects and catching up with friends instead of being on apps.

I was also completely fed up with tumblr’s mobile app at the time, so one by one, I deleted my apps. Good bye to tumblr, snapchat, what little I used of instagram, twitter, everything. The only thing I kept was facebook, which was because it is the main platform that I use to message my boyfriend. That meant that any friends I retained from the fandom (who I still contact now) were also friends who had the chance to add me on facebook.

This was the cause of my 2 or 3 year hiatus on tumblr, and therefore the fandom. I occasionally checked back every 6 months to do a few fandom events, but I have several unopened messages and notifications that I haven’t been able to get to. I open my instagram for a few days once a year, and I only go onto twitter if my friends tell me (through facebook) that they dm’d me a post there.

When I left my online persona behind, I quickly strengthened my in person connections. New drama that erupted every other day became replaced with starbucks and boba runs. Reality TV shows replaced fanfiction. Text messages replaced the tumblr activity feed (which still doesn’t work on mobile BTW). I study at cafes unironically with friends instead of typing alone in my room. Overall, it opened my world considerably.

I still like making fun of myself and I try not to take myself seriously. I still make self depreciative memes to send to friends but then double up with kermit heart pics. I’m still a plot bunny, I still write my fics, I still watch my anime, I still play video games, I still sleep at 4am, I still take my depression medication, I still love potatoes, I still use my voice for people who can’t find theirs yet. But I think I’m in a much healthier mindset now, even if I still make stupid shifty posts calling out bad behavior.

Nowadays, I’m working on my Master’s degree in secret. My parents don’t know about it because my mom doesn’t like that I want to go out and do unladylike things like getting an education. I tutor kiddos and I’m really good with younger children, but I’m not going to do anything with kids because I just don’t want to. Instead, I want to work at an archive or a museum to bring my library interests and my anthropology background together. If I had my dream job, I would be a marine archaeologist; however I love my boyfriend of 8 years whom you probably all remember and I really came to terms with my grandeur dreams. I’m extremely happy with living in a small town with loved ones now, and I don’t need to move somewhere far away from my parents to be content. It’s a huge realization.

From 2018 to 2020 I got into actual drama in person while I was job hunting. Adult people suck and honestly it’s kind of embarrassing how ill equipped some people are. Even so, I currently work in middle schools as a media assistant. One of those realms is the library, and honestly it’s like fulfilling a prophecy. As much as I love the social aspect, public schools are an absolute train wreck.

I’m going to wrap this up now. This post is meant to help me close the past and move forward because the fandom culture feels different now. Things from several years ago don’t need to resurface. I want to enjoy my life fully, and fandom life is one of those aspects that I truly did enjoy. I’m going to keep using my voice and act like a fool, but I’m also not going to be losing sleep because of this. People are going to talk about you no matter what, whether positively or negatively, and it’s important to not take it personally.

Idk, go enjoy yourselves. Do things for yourself. It’s more fun that way.

#nessingaround #this was cathartic #huge thank you to my friends who stuck by me and to my friends who welcome me back with open arms #big shout out to my disney girl gang and another big shout out to 'ma girls'#another thank you to my sweethearts on google hang out #and thank you especially to the group of se lgbt users from 2016 who truly did open my eyes to the severity of the fandoms actions #even tho u still hate me and have me blocked hahaha i consider this growth

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takadasaiko · 4 years

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Compromises (a Veronica Mars one shot)

FFN II AO3

Summary: Logan has been in limbo since returning from deployment, spending every night at Veronica's, but never actually moving in. When he starts looking at buying a place of his own, both he and Veronica find themselves having to answer the tough question: what do they really want?

This particular story was requested via a prompt from @elby3000 : "I want to take a shower so you should probably join me. It’ll save water."

Yeah.... it kind grew beyond that, but there are definitely shower shenanigans involved :P

Compromises

The sun was streaming in through the bedroom window, pulling Veronica reluctantly from the ease of sleep. It was Saturday. And early. Too early for the sun to be peeking in and waking her up. She rolled over with a frustrated sound, fully intending on putting her back to the offending ball of light, wrapping an arm around her boyfriend, and falling immediately back to sleep.

Only she found an empty space where Logan had slept the night before. That's right. She forgot. Apparently the Navy has managed to train his ability to sleep the day away right out of him. He'd likely already been up for hours if the cool sheets on his side of the bed were anything to go by. Awake and productive like a real, functioning adult. It was still a concept she was wrapping her mind around some days.

Veronica yawned and stretched as long as her body could reach. She supposed she should try being a functioning adult too, even if she was getting a later start. She should go get curtains. That would keep that sun out.

After another few moments of procrastination she finally rolled off the bed, bare feet hitting the carpet of the bedroom floor and she sauntered tiredly towards what smelled like breakfast. Okay. She could get used to Adult Logan. Especially if Adult Logan was cooking breakfast for her.

"I smell bacon!" she announced over the sizzling as she rounded out of the bedroom and into the hall.

She found him leaning on the counter opposite the stove and scrolling through something on his laptop. He turned at the sound of her voice, that lopsided smile of his tugging into place. "Did it call to you?"

"It did. Loudly and flavourfully."

He quirked an eyebrow at that. "It called flavourfully, huh?"

She smacked him on the arm playfully and his grin returned. "Tell me there's coffee already made. Then I'll start making sense."

He twisted around to flip the bacon. "It's been in the pot for a couple of —" She grabbed the pot and poured the dark coffee into a fresh mug. "Okay. Don't say I didn't warn you," he finished.

Veronica made a face at the burnt coffee, but he didn't seem to notice, his attention re-focused on his laptop. She poured the remains out into the sink and started a new pot. "What's got your attention this morning?"

"Looking at apartments," he said, turning the computer so she could see.

"For that price tag, we call those condos," Veronica answered as she peered at the very nice layout with an address not too far from there. Funny what a few miles up the beach changed. Gotta love Neptune.

Logan huffed a laugh and turned back to the bacon. He fished it out of the grease and onto a paper towel to pat it dry, then dumped a couple of eggs in the scramble.

"You thinking about having some lady friends over that you don't want me to know about?" she teased as she stole one of the barely-cooling pieces of bacon.

"Oh yeah. Definitely. Rave parties every night, wild bingers. Like college all over again."

"Or high school."

He made a noncommittal sound as he stirred the eggs and shrugged. "I need to get my stuff out of Dick's place."

"Why?" Right after Logan had gotten home from deployment Dick had told him that he needed the guest house that he rented from him for another friend coming into town. Logan had talked about getting a place then, but Veronica had just signed the lease where she was and had roped him into helping her move in. One night led to the next and it wasn't like he would have been sleeping at his old place anyway. Somewhere along the way he'd moved anything that would have gotten in Dick's buddy's way into one of Dick's many guest rooms in the main house and still used that as his home address for any official paperwork.

He dumped the eggs out onto a plate for her. "Apparently his dad's selling the place."

"Did you ever have a lease when you were in the guesthouse? If so, he can't just kick you out, even if he sells it."

"We don't. It's not a big deal. I should have done this after I got back. I've just been putting it off."

It was strange. Logan hadn't moved in, per se, and she wasn't sure she even wanted to start in on what it would take to contemplate it officially being their place versus her place that he slept over at, but she did know that she liked having him there. It was nice - comforting, even - to have him so close after they'd been away from each other so long. She'd gotten used to it faster than she ever thought she could. It was one thing if he just had a room or a guest house he rented from his best friend - a crash pad, really, for between deployments - but if he had his own place, what was that going to do? Would he suddenly want to start sleeping over there rather than here, remembering how much more he enjoyed his million dollar condo on the beach lifestyle versus her rent controlled three story walk-up on the beach? He'd have room for his weights and his surfboards, and all the other things still stored at Dick's place. Then what? Veronica's little apartment would gather dust while his neighbors gave her that look 09'ers gave to the riffraff that stumbled in where they didn't belong. That was his world, not hers and she —

"Veronica?"

The spiraling slammed to a halt as Logan's voice cut through. She blinked hard.

"Coffee's ready."

"Yep," she answered automatically.

"You okay?"

"Yep."

"So do you want to?"

Oh. He'd asked her a question. Shit. "Want to….?" she prompted hesitantly as she poured the fresh coffee into the mug. That smelled glorious. She might actually be able string coherent sentences together with that stuff.

"Go with me to check a few out today," he said in a tone that clearly meant he was repeating the question.

"Oh," Veronica manages, finding that clever gaze of his fixed on her expectantly. She took a long sip of scalding coffee and a deep breath. "What I want-" she set it down on the counter and moved forward, her fingers dancing around the hem of his pajama bottoms and up under his t-shirt, nails scraping lightly against bare skin and she saw him draw in a sharp breath - "is to take a shower. You should probably join me. You know, save water?"

"I think I could get behind that," he answered, his voice low and amusement dancing in his eyes as he ducked down, catching her in a kiss. Veronica felt his arms go around her waist and a muffled laugh escaped her as he hauled her off her feet. She shifted, arms around his neck and legs around his middle as he started back towards the bathroom, the list of available condos left forgotten on his laptop.

------

Several weeks later Logan finally managed to convince her to go with him to check out what he was still determined to call an apartment rather than a condo. The building wasn't technically a high-rise building, sitting at five stories tall with a separate garage rather than street parking. You needed a fob to get past the gates and there was an elevator up to the floor with the specific unit he was looking at. Logan was not nearly as amused as Veronica was with herself when she asked - in a quality 09'er impression that she had perfected years before - where the doorman was and why they'd have to fob themselves in. What if her hands were full of all the clothes that daddy's money had bought her? She thought she saw Logan roll his eyes at that one.

The condo was beautiful, even if she wouldn't admit it. The floor-to-ceiling windows reminded her of the guesthouse at Dick's that he'd stayed at, but this one looked down over the ocean instead of on level with it. There were two and a half bedrooms, two bathrooms - the one attached to the master bedroom making her just a little bit jealous with its deep soaking tub - a massive kitchen, and a deck that looked out on the ocean as well.

"Do I even want to know how much something like this costs?" she asked, joining him on the deck where he was leaned against the railing, taking in the view. He liked it. She could tell he liked it.

"Do you?"

Veronica loosed a long, loud, dramatic sigh. "Yeah. Hit me."

"Just under two."

"Two what?"

"Million."

She nearly choked on her own breath. "A month?"

That finally broke the love affair gaze he had going on with the waves rolling in and he turned to look at her, laughing. "A month? Seriously? I know I threw money around when we were younger, but hell, Veronica." He turned back to the view. "No, overall. Might be over with taxes."

"Oh," she managed. "You want to buy it."

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"Why not? It's an investment. I'm not going anywhere permanently and there are a few other perks." When she crossed her arms to wait on what those were, she saw him give her a quick glance, almost like he was trying to make adjustments for his example. "Next spring you won't have to deal with the idiot AirBnB renters you know will be in the complex raging all night. You can just come crash over here."

"What if I like my idiot AirBnB renters?" Veronica snapped, the question sounding absurd even as it left her lips. She'd grown up in Neptune. She and everyone else knew spring breakers were what they were. No one liked them.

Logan quirked an eyebrow at that. "You spent a Skype session that took me three days to secure last March to bitch about spring breakers in general. That was before you rented a place right on the beach."

"So's this place. What's the difference other than the price tag?"

Logan loosed a long breath, frustration clear even if he looked like he was desperately trying to keep a lid on it. "Okay, what is it you hate?"

"What do you mean?"

"You obviously hate something about it, but you hated the last three places too. I thought you would've liked this one."

"Why does it matter if I like it? You're the one buying it."

"Not yet," he popped back, his tone increasingly more strained and he watched her expression carefully. He was looking for whatever she wasn't saying. Damn him. "What's going on, Veronica?"

"Nothing."

"Something is."

She felt her temper flare, even if there was no reason for it to. She knew that. Logically she knew that, but it was like she couldn't stop herself. "You know what, buy it or don't. It's your money, it's your place. If the ritzy, multi million dollar condo is where you feel at home, I say go for it."

And then she was storming out, something in the back of her mind screaming at her that it wasn't fair to do that to him without even trying to figure out why she was reacting this way. It didn't seem to matter, even if it did. She couldn't stop herself.

----------

Logan had been left standing alone on the balcony of an apartment that he wasn't even sure that he wanted to own as Veronica had stormed out. Distant chatter below on the beach joined the sound of the waves and the eventual awkward question if he was done viewing the unit from the realtor that had made herself scarce during the abrupt argument that he'd been blindsided with. He thought he had been asking her opinion. He thought he'd been including her in a life decision. He wasn't sure where he'd gone wrong.

Veronica's phone rolled straight to voicemail when he called. Not once, not twice, but three times over the next hour, and Logan had taken the next several to vent his frustrations with the top down on his convertible, hitting breakneck speeds down the PCH to try to work through some of the confusion he had and give both of them time to breathe. He didn't know what she wanted and Veronica sure as hell wasn't telling him. Every night she wanted him to stay, but she never actually asked him to move in. He'd been left in a sort of limbo, even after he'd explained that he was being moved out of his apartment at Dick's. He had thought maybe he misread her signals and so he'd started looking for a new place. Apparently that had been the wrong move too.

The sun was setting by the time he pulled up to park the BMW along the street outside her apartment and killed the engine. It took another five minutes to convince himself to get out and start up the stairs. He had a key. It wasn't that he couldn't get in, but suddenly in the wake of a fight in which he still wasn't sure how it'd been started, he wasn't sure if he should knock or just walk in. It wasn't like it was his place too. There had been a few brief times that she had referred to the apartment as theirs in some form or fashion. It always caught him by surprise in the best of ways and he had thought she'd follow it up with something that indicated that he actually belonged there permanently, not that it had just been a slip of the tongue, but she never did.

Finally, he dug the key out of his pocket and stuck it in the lock, turned, and pushed the door open.

Veronica was sitting on the couch with a bowl of ice cream balanced on one knee and some show that he didn't recognize playing on the TV. He closed the door behind him, locked it, and circled the couch. "I need you to give me a hint."

"About what?" Veronica asked around the spoon in her mouth.

"What the hell that was."

"I don't know. You're the one that took forever to get home."

The word struck a nerve and Logan felt his temper flare dangerously. "This isn't my home, Veronica," he snapped. "This is your home. Your name's on the lease, you pay the rent, you have all of your shit here. I just sleep over."

"If you need your space go buy your condo," Veronica popped back and it felt like a slap to the face, even if somewhere under the sting he recognized that particular brand of venom in her voice as the type she used when she was trying to hide something else.

"Don't give me that!" he shouted, finally drawing her gaze around. "You want me over here, but I'm still living out of a bag like when I'm deployed. I try to go get my own place and you storm out like I just threw something in your face. I don't know what you want from me!"

"You!" she shouted back, suddenly on her feet, the bowl somehow deposited on the coffee table. "I want you!"

They stood there staring at each other for a long moment after the outburst, her words hanging between them. "I don't know what that means," he confessed softly and without warning she covered the space between them. Her hands reached up to his face, dragging him down to hers and he felt her pull him into a kiss that he was powerless to stop. Suddenly her fingers were pulling at his belt and he was tugging at her shirt. They were moving together and it was sort of an answer to his question. A piece of the answer. He wasn't sure, but in that moment, he just needed to be close to her in any way that he could.

----------

Sex was a good distraction. Sex with Veronica was the best distraction, but when the distraction ended and they were left breathless in bed, pillows thrown to the floor and the sheets crumpled at the foot of it, the questions started to seap back into his mind. Dangerous and loud and swirling, threatening to drag him under and drown him. Sex was good, but if this was going to work - and Logan wanted this to work with Veronica more than he wanted anything else in his life - it had to be more. They had to figure this out.

He rolled over in bed, finding her tugging the sheets up to wrap around herself and he laced one arm around her middle to curl into her, pressing a kiss against her shoulder. In turn, Veronica shifted onto her side so that she could wrap an arm around him and she ran one bare foot up his calf. He shivered, tightening his hold. "Hey."

"Hey yourself," she answered, her voice relaxed.

"I need to know what I did wrong."

And just like that he felt her tense, but he refused to let go. Finally, she turned those clear blue eyes on him. "Do we have to talk about this now?"

"No," he breathed out, "but I want to. Please."

She sighed deeply and nuzzled in, sending a rush of relief through him. "Talk," she huffed and he had to stop himself from chuckling. Instead he kissed the top of her head and felt her nails scrape along the skin over his spine, threatening distraction if he'd let it.

"I just need to know what you want."

There was a long moment before she loosed another breath. "I don't want things to change."

"Veronica, Dick's selling the house and, crazy thing, for all the places that the Navy sends me, they kinda want a home address. I get that it's too soon for that to be here, but -"

"I never said that."

That stopped him. "You never said it… should be either."

There was a lot of sighing coming from her tonight. She moved, nudging him so that he rolled to his back and she eased herself up on her elbows so that she was looking down on him, her expression tight as she worked through what she wanted to say. She started several times, but the words seemed to get stuck somewhere between where they formed up in her mind and when they actually rolled off her tongue. She would open her mouth, close it, and those pretty blonde brows of hers would draw together as her lips tipped down in a frown.

"Veronica," he coaxed, "I just need to know what you want."

"I don't know," she confessed softly. "It was easier when you had a place but just…. chose to stay with me."

"I'm always choosing to stay with you."

"Are you?" she huffed. "Because you've never really lived with me. You're the man that lives in mansions and suites and -"

"Tiny quarters on the USS Truman," he offered the alternative.

That stopped her. "What?"

"Well, you seemed to be really focused on all the crazy nice places I've lived, but you've never seen what the ships we deploy on look like. There's something like five thousand men and women on my ship. I may not have to share my bunk with a dozen other guys, but it's tiny. Makes this place look like a castle."

"I like this place," she said softly.

"Me too."

"But you also like the condo, and if you bought it, someday…. you'd want me to move there."

"I'm gonna tell you something crazy. You listening?" He waited until she nodded and he couldn't stop the small smirk that tugged his lips. "Just because you buy a condo doesn't mean you have it for life. You can sell it. Rent it out even. Not signing my soul over to it."

Veronica snorted a laugh and nudged him hard in the ribs with her elbow. "Asshole."

"Yeah, but you knew that getting into this." He leaned up and pecked a quick kiss against her lips before falling back down against the pillow. "Here's the thing, Veronica: I want to be with you. Where doesn't matter."

"Even if it's a box on the street."

"Okay, I'm going to redirect you back to my earlier statement about the US Navy wanting a permanent address."

"So give them this one."

The statement hit him hard. "You want me to move in?"

"I don't want you to go."

"Getting my own place doesn't mean leaving you."

"But you won't be here."

"And you want me here?"

"I do."

"Okay," he breathed. "Here are my terms."

She cracked a smile at that. "I'm listening."

"I need more than a drawer."

"We might be able to swing that."

"And I need to pay half the rent and utilities."

And just like that he saw her expression darken. "I can pay my own rent and utilities, Logan."

"I'm not asking to pay them for you. If I live here, I'm asking to pay my half."

"And when you're deployed?"

"We'll cross that bridge next time we get there."

She considered that for a long moment. "Done."

"And I want my name on the lease."

Veronica sighed loudly. "You drive a hard bargain, Echolls."

"It's all about compromises, Mars. So I hear."

"Fine."

"Okay," he murmured with a grin, catching another kiss. "Hey, you know what I need?"

"To stop while you're ahead?"

"A shower. Since I'm gonna pay half the water bill, I think it's only reasonable to conserve water."

"Yeah?"

"Absolutely. For the environment."

She choked on a laugh with that one and leaned down to kiss him again before rolling, taking the sheets with her as she started for the bathroom. She turned back to watch him as he stretched out on the bed, grinning at her before finally moving to join her.

-----------

Notes: Have I mentioned that I love the idea of them learning to communicate as adults? Because I love the idea of them having to communicate as adults. Their wants, their fears, and everything in between. Honestly, I just love them.

#Veronica Mars #Logan Echolls #VMfanfic #VeronicaMarsFanfic

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like-a-bag-of-potatoes · 4 years

Text

12 Dates of Christmas - Rooftop Memories

A/N: I know Christmas is over, but since I’m the master of procrastinating, I didn’t get around to posting them all before Christmas.

Prompt: Cuddling for warmth

Characters: Sebastian x Reader

Warnings: Some angst and some fluff. Mentions of cheating.

Wordcount: 1854

The vibe between you and Sebastian had been strange ever since Chace’s party and the short kiss you had shared, but Seb had made a list of things to do to get you into the holiday spirit and he was determined to stick to it. It was the list that now had brought you to Central Park to get roasted chestnuts and some hot cocoa while enjoying a sleigh ride through the park. Technically, since snow had yet to fall, it was a regular carriage ride, but it was the thought that counted.

“So, how’s that Christmas spirit coming along?” Sebastian asked as you made your way to the little stand that sold the cocoa. After that kiss a few nights ago he had been really nervous and awkward around you, like he didn't know how to start a conversation with you all of a sudden… which was ridiculous since he had known you since he moved to New York.

“It's getting better,” you said honestly, looking up at him with a smile on your face. “So I think you can officially call success on your plan.”

“Yes!” he exclaimed, pumping his fist in the air in victory.

“You’re a dork, you know that right?” you asked, laughter filling your voice. If that kiss the other night told you one thing, it was that Sebastian was no longer just a friend to you, but all of a sudden he was this amazing man that you had started picturing your future with. You shook the thought from your head as you got in line to get your beverages.

“I'm offended,” he said with a gasp, but it was soon followed by a cheeky grin. The sound of your laughter sent a warmth through his body, even in the cold December air.

As you reached the counter and saw who was manning the booth, you froze in place, something that didn't go unnoticed by Sebastian.

“Hey. What can I get you today?” the cheery blonde on the other side of the counter asked.

Sebastian furrowed his brows as he looked from you to the woman and back to you again, you were practically shooting daggers at her and he didn't really understand why. “Uhm- Two cups of cocoa, please,” he said a little hesitantly, looking at the other woman again.

“Coming right up,” she chirped before starting on your orders.

“What's goin-” he started, but you cut him off before he could finish.

“I have to go,” you stated, not meeting his eye before turning on your heel and walking away in a brisk pace.

“(YN),” he shouted after you, but you didn't stop. He put a five dollar bill on the counter for the cocoa and then jogged after you, calling your name as he did. “Hey,” he said when he finally caught up to you, grabbing your arm loosely to get you to stop.

“I need to be alone,” you explained as sternly as you could while you turned to look at him, your eyes swimming with tears. “Let me go, please.”

He released the grip he had on you and let you walk away, not really sure what was happening, but he let you go nonetheless. It was probably not the best decision he had made, but he also knew you so well by now that he knew there was no reason to chase after you or make you talk until you were ready.

***

A few hours had passed since you left Seb in the park, and now that your anger and hurt had subsided a little, you felt guilty for just leaving him there without an explanation. Truth was that you had been caught off guard by that woman, and all of a sudden you were pulled back a month and a half ago, reliving Jeremy’s betrayal all over again. It wasn't until you had been in the cab that the reality hit you and the dots connected in your head.

So now you found yourself on the roof of your building, looking up at the stars as you hugged your coat tightly around yourself. Up here you could hardly hear the noise from the busy streets below, and the clear night gave you a perfect view of the shimmering lights in the sky. It was peaceful up on this little patio, and you enjoyed it.

Sebastian knew where to find you, but he had decided to give you some time before he sought you out, so when the daylight faded and the stars started appearing in the sky, he went to look for you. He found you exactly where he thought you’d be. “There room for one more up here?” he asked as he stepped out on the roof and your head turned to look at him.

“Always,” you answered with a sad smile on your lips, one that nearly broke his heart.

He sat down on the couch next to you and wrapped a blanket he had brought around your shoulders before handing you a to go mug of cocoa. “With Kahlua, just like you like it,” he said with a small smile.

“Thank you,” you offered as you took the cup and clutched it between your hands, enjoying the warmth it provided for your hands. “I'm sorry about earlier,” you apologized, taking your eyes off of Seb and returning them to the stars above you.

“It's okay,” he assured, offering you a smile that you didn't see. Your bright eyes sparkled in the light of the moon and Sebastian couldn't help but think that he could spend his whole life looking into those eyes if he got the chance. “Wanna tell me what happened?” he wondered as he tore his eyes from yours and looked up at the night sky.

“That girl in the cocoa booth… she was the one I caught Jeremy with,” you explained, sadness in your voice. “And that's not even the worst part,” you added, turning your head to look at your friend.

“What's the worst part?” he asked, meeting your eyes and furrowing his brows.

“If she's here and working, that means that she isn't the Jessica that went with him to Hawaii,” you replied, connecting the dots for him. “And her name tag said Amy.”

Seb’s eyes widened in realization and he wished now more than ever that he could go give Jeremy a piece of his mind, or fist. “Have I told you what a massive dick that guy is?” he asked as he carefully wrapped his arm around your shoulder and pulled you into his side, placing a featherlight kiss to your hair.

“Once or twice,” you said, a small smile playing on your lips as you took comfort in his embrace. “I just feel so fucking stupid, you know?”

“You’re not stupid. He's a dick,” Sebastian assured. “You deserve so much better than him, (YN).”

“Thank you.”

Silence fell between you for a while as you just sat there and enjoyed each others warmth and comfort. It wasn't until Seb shivered next to you that you got pulled out of your train of thought. You sat up straight and held out the blanket towards him, silently inviting him to come sit under it. “We can go back inside if you’re cold,” you suggested, not wanting him to get sick.

“In a little bit,” he returned as he moved under the blanket with you, wrapping it around his shoulder. “I remember many nights like this that we have spent together,” he said suddenly. “On a rooftop, wishing that the world beneath us didn't exist.”

“Remember the first time?” you asked and you could see the wheels turning in his head as he tried to find the memory. It took him a few moments before he gave up and shook his head. “I believe we were fourteen and it was after Violet Walker pulled my skirt down in the middle of the school cafeteria during lunch,” you reminded.

“She was just a grade A bitch, wasn't she?” Seb said as he thought back.

“I believe that's what you said back then too. And then I found you up on that same roof a few days later when Sophie Collins said no when you asked her to prom.” Seb chuckled at the memory. “Grade A bitch that one too,” you added with a giggle.

“She was really hot though,” he defended, making you laugh. “There were some good nights on the roof too, though. Like when I caught you and Marcus Robbins making out,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows.

You couldn't help but laugh at that particular memory. “Yes, you and Maya Barker, if I remember correctly.”

“Ah… that's right. I forgot about that.”

“Yeah. You managed to cock-block us both that night,” you accused, making him laugh. “Was probably for the best though,” you noted as an afterthought. “You've always been there for me, Seb. I love you for that.” A more serious tone laced your voice now.

“That goes both ways, sweetheart,” he said softly, looking into your bright eyes. If only you knew how deep those feelings sat in him.

“I never brought anyone else up on the roof after Marcus. I know it sounds stupid, but I feel like this is our thing and I didn't want to taint that with memories of other people,” you told him, directing your attention to the stars again.

“It's not stupid at all,” he said, his eyes taking in your profile, eventually landing on your plump lips. “I never did either.”

His confession made you look back at him and there was something in his eyes now that you couldn't put your finger on. Something that made you think for a second that his heart was in the same place as yours, but you couldn't be sure, and you didn't dare hope. Instead you linked your arm through his and hugged yourself to his strong arm, resting your head on his shoulder as you tried to keep the cold out. “Thank you for being you,” you said in a soft voice as he used his free hand to wrap the blanket tighter around the two of you.

He didn't know what to say to that, so instead he rested his head on top of yours as the two of you sat there in the chilly night, cuddled together so you wouldn't freeze, memories of many night's like this filling both your minds. One of these days he would find the courage to tell you how he felt about you, but for now he just wanted to enjoy this moment.

#Sebastian Stan #sebastian fluff #sebastian stan fanfic #sebastian x reader #Sebastian stan #12dates

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helloreminiscence · 4 years

Text

What I completely missed out on

How many times have you watched a personal growth Ted Talk, or listened to a spiritual master, or read a book, or viewed a blog online designed to change your life? I am sure you are already aware of the number of times you did get a high when you completed the program.

Personally, I have experienced that this high slowly starts to dissipate and leaving me exactly where I was before I started. What's even worse is that it leaves you at a place where it is reinforced that nothing can actually change in me. I am going to continue to be my miserable self.

So what is it about these techniques that do not work? How can something that connects the dots of human psychology and aspects of the laws of the universe not work for me? (Do not tell anyone but I have also imagined I may have been an alien for whom these things just don't work!)

Based on everything we know about change, they should work.

Every time I have started to rigorously follow my Goals list it has dwindled in the first few hours. My weight post watching hours of tutorials on YouTube should have dropped and I would have by now reached my summer body given my data consumption. My Six Sigma Green Belt Training would have by now changed all the processes at my work place and we would be working towards the next big concept. (Do not do the course trust me! It's just common sense written in Japanese lingo ssh....)

Let's take a simple example. I will take mine as who else to bash up better given the years of experience :) I am a pretty regular procrastinator; until sometime back I would have called myself a Perfectionist but we all know the truth by now so what are we even hiding :) I always leave things until the last minute. As a result, I am anxious most of the time and sometimes I turn things in late, which subjects me to the disapproval of the stakeholder. In fact, I have heard all these people tell me, "I would like to consider you for X and Y, but I can't as long as you keep delivering things late".

That is when you really feel bad and decide you must change and you really want to change. So what do you do?

You now come up with a step by step action plan (Bollywood tempo music playing in the background) 1) Let us start prioritizing our activities, assuming that it will help keep the focus on what's most important. 2) Create a reward system a.k.a. Food because let's face it I always need a reason to emotionally eat (We will talk about the justifications for this some other day). 3) Come up with a schedule so I can divide my time in an optimized fashion (Apologies for the corporate lingo, I am trying and I really want to get off it) 4) I now set up reminders - mostly on Outlook and on my phone. The ones on outlook still work but the phone ones are already in the middle of 40 other notifications. 5) I go ahead and prematurely announce this to those people who mean a lot to me!

So now I have gathered all the information and resources I need to get this done on time. And I have several strong reasons for doing it: the reward system and definitely this reassures me that my constant anxiety will be reduced.

But let's be honest! After I have done all this, plus all the other variations, has my attitude really changed? By that means, Intention and my Will Power should have been equal to the Desired Result. So this formula should necessarily enable me to achieve things right?

Let's say out of will power and the embarrassment of again not giving up, it does work for a few days, even weeks. So if it does today, does it continue to be easy month after month? For most of us, the answer is no.

My resistant mind kept saying that this is in no way a valid assumption. I can't let it chatter so let me give it some more data. Consider all the times I have committed to some change in my life, made tall claims and promises, but for some inexplicable reason I failed to follow through. This list was long and almost a hard hitting reality. Why?

I completely missed one component in my equation - My Belief System. My version of the truth. It's always easy to ignore this component because a lot of it depended on my emotions and attitude. Another quote from self help here - Give up your Emotions and stay committed. It does not work that way even a bit! It is this belief that is of my own unlike all the forcefully fed data. How can I disregard something of my own?

Here are some of the examples of what I really feel like deep down.

I am not worthy.

Nothing I do can ever be good enough.

If I do not do something perfectly, it makes me a horrible person.

Making mistakes and experiencing failure is bad.

I am not capable.

I should never be trusted.

With this kind of a belief system, I have noticed that it is far more easier to have people upset with me for not completing something than to make a mistake(it's wrong!). This is very easy to achieve because anyway nothing I do can ever be good enough, then people are bound to find out that I am really not capable and I will be my anxious mess because I have my entire self-esteem based on the fact that I need to do things perfectly.

I did have the facts and the will, but what I never even considered was my belief system. It is this current behavior that I want to change which is also because of what I feel about myself. I kept on fixing the symptoms without working on the root cause. Any change is meant to happen naturally and effortlessly; pressure is only needed during the morning routine :)

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dendrite-blues · 5 years

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The Pace Gremlin

My writing pace is something of a personal gremlin.

Most days it doesn't bother me. I'm proud of the work I do. I put deep thought into every line.

When I hand it off I have zero anxiety about the feedback, because no one could ever pick it apart as thoroughly as I have.

I beta for opinions, not quality. To have someone else check my character's logic (they have a tendency to make snap decisions without explaining themselves adequately) and to find my infamous typos. By the time others read it, my prose is already at my current personal best. If it wasn't, I would still be writing it.

But when something brings me down emotionally, the pace gremlin is always right behind. Vulnerability has a pheromone that insecurity can't resist. It smells your self doubt and comes running.

I'm sure everyone has their own personal wounds. I'm sure lots of people struggle with the "I'm not creative" demon, the "I never finish anything" demon, the "someone else already did it better" demon. All valid. But not what I struggle with in writing. (Art is different but that's another post.)

The trouble with the pace gremlin is, everybody has a magic trick to "fix" slowness. I've read them all. Good advice, if speed is beneficial to you. I'm sure some people feel very good about a fat word count, and for them such advice is probably a life saver. A few common points in these advice posts:

1) Stop procrastinating. Make a schedule and stick to it. Write everyday.

I'm sure this works if you happen to have fully developed ideas on a schedule. I don't. I need time to gather my thoughts. I burnout, I get stuck, I mope because I'm a bit melodramatic about being stuck. But if you do have endless ideas and energy that never end up on the page, it's solid advice.

2) Stop editing while you write. Force yourself to write without stopping. Time yourself. Don't ever stop to research. Don't ever stop, period, until you've reached your word count.

Because a word count is the end all be all, right? Never mind prose, diction, attempts at originality and style.

People love to blog about this point because there are so many apps to cure it. It makes for good top ten lists, which always get more hits than actual content.

Advise blogs will tell you to turn your monitor off so you can't see what you wrote. They will tell you to put a coin under your backspace so you can't even press it. They will recommend you apps that track your output, apps that mimic typewriters, apps that block your internet usage, apps that punish you for failing. (shudder)

I don't see how any of this promotes quality writing, personally. I don't agree that all writing is good writing. I think of you input half baked crap you get out half baked crap. Who cares if you cover it in buttercream, it's still got raw eggs in it.

I don't buy that it's a bad thing to stop and rearrange the structure of a sentence, to find the exact right word, to question if there's a better way to reveal this plot point. I don't think word counts should be the goal.

3) Let go of perfectionism, "all first drafts are shitty."

Again, I understand that this is important advice for people who are paralyzed by self doubt. The compulsion to rewrite continuously and never progess is strong for some. But there's a difference between finessing and fixating. This advise shouldn't be taken as gospel.

Perfectionism is not an addiction, and it's not something I can quit. It is ingrained in how I evaluate myself. In preschool I arranged my Legos by color. I was literally born this way. Its not going away now.

If I make crap, I feel like a crappy writer. Which makes me hate the crap I made, which discourages me from writing more. Rushing to write crap is the fastest way to sabotage myself, I have learned. (Painfully.)

If someone is genuinely struggling with perfectionism, this is THE WORST advise you could possibly give them. Perfectionists need to feel confident in what they do. They need to produce good results. No, the first draft is never going to be perfect. But it can be good. It can even be great. And the feeling of writing something great can fuel my motivation for weeks.

Which is not to say that it's okay to indulge in endless editing loops. There's a limit. But it's also not okay for me to "write crap and fix it in revision."

I can't polish an paragraph if the paragraph is incoherent, if it has no unique qualities, if its just a meandering line of words I regurgitated to meet a quota. When I come back to edit I will just delete it and rewrite... In which case I'm actually spending more time than if I just wrote it slowly to begin with.

Which brings me to my real point:

There's nothing wrong with slow.

When people talk about slow, all of these other accusations are automatically made. Because it must be that there is something wrong, we are capable of zooming if only we weren't stunted by some hidden inefficiency that prevents us from joining the fast fiction master race.

Nonsense. I'm not slow because I edit too much, or because I don't know what my story is about, or because I lack discipline. I am capable, if given something to copy, of typing 60 words per minute. But I can't think at 60 words per minute.

(In fact, according to my sprinting stats, I think at about 10 words per minute...14 if I'm rushing. Please, hold your applause. Haha)

I'm a slow writer...because I'm a slow thinker. I don't "waste" time spinning my wheels on stuff that doesn't matter. I don't need an app to trick me into being productive. I just need time to think.

When I don't give that to myself... When the pace gremlin catches me unable to defend my insecurities...I make crap. I feel crappy. I convince myself I am the problem and I would already be published if only I let myself write "crappy drafts." If I wasn't held back by my toxic "perfectionism."

Enough. I'll always be slow. Its not a condition, it's the way my brain works. As far as I know, there's no cure for being a tortoise.

And that's fine. In my right mind I am proud of my pace. I take pride in considering every word in every line. I care about craft.

I find drafting sentences at a snail's pace satisfying. It's deliberate. It has gravitas. It's laced with complexities I hope others will detect and appreciate. And when I place my pages in stranger's hands, I know I have raised them with the ability to defend themselves. I have no fear.

I know I will still feel bad about it at some point. That's the nature of creative life. But now I have a post to remind myself why slow is okay. And I guess if anyone else had the same problems, then this post is here for you too. Don't get discouraged. Do it your way and make stories with meaning.

#writing #writing advice #advice meta #in defense of slow #slow writers #critical

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dearjacobwren · 5 years

Text

Dearest Dragha,

Thanks a lot for your last letter. I've just re-read it. You know that you are the last one that still sends me real letters? Jaap either stopped, or keeps sending them to the wrong address. Probably he lost count of numerous address changes in my recent nomadic past :)

It's a beautiful thing – seeing that there is a proper letter waiting for me in the mailbox. Usually I postpone the moment of opening the envelope until later in the day, until I feel like it's the right time. What that means is that I carry the unopened letter in my pocket (that I think about all day long), and I masochistically wait to be in an appropriate space and in the right state of mind so I could really dedicate myself to it and read it properly. As if the letter were a gift. Christmas or a birthday present.

Which reminds me

As a kid I was suuuper hyperactive, one of the most impatient kids ever. I'd often get these crazy outbursts of energy - I didn't know what to do with my body, so I'd usually do a crazy energetic dance or hang from the top of the wardrobe whilst singing my favorite pop song (my mother used to call these moments 'žuta minuta'). When I look back at it, it seems quite pathological to the extent at which I wasn't able to harness my excitement :)

On Christmas eve I usually couldn't get to sleep. I’d be shaking and sweating in my bed hoping that Christmas morning would happen IMMEDIATELY, and after a couple exhausting hours, I'd finally enter theizbrisi 'the' pliz dream land, but not for too long. I'd wake up in the middle of the night, get up, run to the living room, stand in front of the Christmas tree and marvel at the presents underneath it. I'd cover myself with a blanket and wait until my mother woke up and start her morning routine. She'd see me, tell me off because I didn't sleep at all, but then she'd allow me to open my present.

Christmas presents were always a downer, because my parents are those who think that they should be of use. Meaning, no toys ('you have enough Lego bricks to play with'), no candies ('bad for your teeth'), no new clothes ('your brother's pants fit you well'). Literally everything that I liked at the moment of growing up (music, books, films etc.) was off the list ('your taste changes rapidly from year to year, we don't plan to satisfy every capricious wish of yours').

Still, that never made my Christmas orgasm less intense – after the manic act of tearing the wrapping paper and excitedly admiring what I'd gotten (usually a pack of socks, a pair of underwear or a pack of empty video cassettes plus a chocolate), I'd pass out on the sofa in the living room cause the exhaustion of not having slept for more than an hour the night before was just too much for my tiny body.

And look how far I've got. I resisted my desire to open your letter immediately, kept it in my pocket for almost the whole day until I found the right moment. I even enjoyed procrastinating this crazy letter ceremony.

I know how to harness my excitement, I'm all grown up now. My mother would be so proud. If she only knew.

* * *

'What's on your big mind right now?', Charlie asks me sometimes. Actually, he poses this question every time he sees me fading away, when he notices I stopped perceiving the outside world. It's happened quite often lately.

He knows that there is something on my mind all the time – even whilst I'm brushing my teeth, peeling the potatoes, cleaning the toilet or having my daily tea ceremony. He also knows that these silent conversations are playing out very loud in my head. Sometimes I argue with people, sometimes I'm analyzing an argument I've just read in the newspaper, and sometimes I'm trying to unpack what's behind apparently benign comments creepy posh guests say all the time in the hotel where I work.

Charlie says that it looks fun my little performance. I make faces, I do small gestures with my hands, I nod and shake my head, I sigh and laugh. Usually this imaginary conversing is happening in complete silence, I don't say a word, but sometimes a part of the sentence unawarely slips out of my mouth. These are his favorite moments.

He can be funny too. Often I see his hands moving, his fingers flying over an imaginary piano, even when his mind is occupied with another activity. 'What's the tune?', I ask him in the same manner he asks me what's on my mind. He looks at me with his big eyes, as if he was caught stealing, then smiles, relaxes and sings out the tune that was stuck in his ear. Together we come across like two weirdos, him with his inaudible excercises, me with my invisible conversations. If our friends only knew.

I'd like to share one of the things that happened not so long ago, that I have been coming back to ever since it unfolded. It was one of those Dragha situations, I immediately thought of you the second it happened, instinctively I knew you'd be excited to hear about it.

You remember that amazing flea market next to our old house, right? Well, on the same square there's a swimming pool. Building from the sixties, public showers are on the ground floor, swimming pool is on the third floor. I go there once a week, usually sometime in the early afternoon, just before lunch. At that time of the day two out of six lanes of this 25meter long pool are reserved for swimming courses for preschoolers and kids not older than 10.

I hate kids in swimming pools, especially where the rules are not strict. And of course that in this one pool guards just don't give a fuck. So the kids are allowed to constantly switch between the lanes or jump on other people whilst they are swimming. I get super annoyed cause I have to stop, change the technique and my breathing routine, talk to them and ask them to go to the part of the pool designated to their class if they don't want to be attentive to the rest of the crowd.

So one day I was doing my swimming routine and realized it was getting impossible to swim because the waves were bigger than usual. I stopped and saw a group of at least 25 preschoolers jumping in the water in the most absurd way possible, I guess they had a competition who could do the funniest jump. They were screaming all in the same voice plus throwing all the swimming accessories at each other (boards, fins, paddles, caps, goggles and various other items). But what I found shocking was that the instigator of this infernal pool carnival was their own coach, a thirtysomething straight white guy who was acting as if he was 10 again and it seemed like he was enjoying himself big time.

It all lasted 15-20 minutes, and at first I was shocked. 'The rules have to exist, how on earth can I finish my routine if this is how you teach kids to behave in a pool?' a small nazi in me was already silently arguing with the guy responsible for this bacchanalia.

But then I went to the side, took a small break and remembered one eerie moment I experienced a couple of years before in a public swimming pool in Amsterdam. The situation was almost the same - it was the same part of the day, late morning or early afternoon, 25 meter pool, 2 lanes reserved for preschool swimming classes. It's just that this pool was taken care of - recently built on one of the canals close to centre, everything new, sleek Dutch design, lots of windows, natural light etc. The parents were even allowed to sit next to the pool (they had to were these special shoe covers that surgeons wear in operating rooms) so their kids would be more assured during their first swimming lessons.

Since kids were dressed up normally (meaning outside clothes, they weren't wearing swimsuits), I thought it was one of their first classes where teachers are just giving a preparatory 'theoretical' introduction. But what happened after the presentation was super strange. Kids had to jump in the pool with their clothes on. It was a really weird moment – a group of ten completely dressed six and seven year-olds (wearing pants, shirts, jackets, even sneakers!) struggling to repeat movements they'd just learned from their coach, but this time in the water. After a couple of minutes of struggling, the instructors had to help get them out of the pool because their clothes were wet and heavy, poor kids couldn't carry their weight all by themselves.

I approached one of the parents and asked them what type of course that was and why kids were obliged to swim with their clothes on. I got an answer that it is a non-swimmers course and that the point of the lesson is that kids need to learn what to do if they fall off a boat into the sea.

I kind of got it, but I wasn't convinced. I tried to put myself in their skin – you're six, you don't swim, you are probably afraid of water, it's your first time at the swimming pool, it's a completely new setting, semi-naked people wandering around doing silly exercises in and out of water, and then your teacher tells you to jump in the pool, move your limbs in the manner he showed just a minute ago even though you're wearing heavy wet clothes and you have no idea how to move your hands and legs to keep your head above the water. I was trying to imagine how it must have felt for those poor kids struggling to swim wearing jeans and sneakers.

I mean, it's not a drama, it's not like I'm describing a domestic violence situation. A group of ten six-year-old non-swimmers trying to cope in the water with their clothes on, ça va. Still, what bothered me is that I intuitively realized that none of those kids are ever going to return to the swimming pool after they've finished with their swimming course. They will learn how to swim properly, they will master the technique and what to do in an emergency situation, but they will hate swimming forever, or at least until they decide to fight off their childhood water trauma.

That was the Amsterdam memory that came back to my mind whilst I was on my short break in the pool and looking at the first group of kids, this time 25 six- to ten-year-old going completely wild whilst[izbrisi ovaj whilst pliz] doing whatever they wanted on one of their first swimming classes. Goggles, boards, fins and other swimming accessories were being thrown everywhere, in and out of water, 10 tiny girls were trying to submerge their coach, and a couple of them were trying to undress him. He was fighting them off, laughing super loud. The rest of the kids were running around, uttering screams I never thought human beings were able to produce, and jumping in the water in the most unimaginable ways. One preschooler even took his swimming trunks off, was parading around completely naked and proudly showing his butt to his friends.

(Btw I remembered one of my colleagues at work telling me that the problem with kids these days is the diet. You can't expect they'd act normal if you feed them with chocolate and Haribo candies all the time. She said of course all the kids are crazy these days, they're sweating sugar, and they have this manic sugar rushes all day long).

Looking at those kids I realized that I'm not going to swimming pool because I want to learn how to react if I fall off a boat into the water, nor because I think it's an useful activity that could help save other people's lives. There's nothing pragmatical pragmatic about it - I just like swimming because it makes me feel good. As simple as that.

If swimming teacher that was having fun whilst fighting off the oversugared over sweetened hyperactive girls that were trying to undress him was by any chance trying to do the same thing any of the existing swimming pools in Amsterdam, he would be fired in less than a week. His teaching skills just wouldn't be appreciated there. The number of concerned parents who were present on their kids' first swimming class in the swimming pool in Amsterdam was quite astonishing, and lets me think that the class of people who think overparenting is the only way of raising their kids is not growing, but it has become a new normal.

On the contrary, these kids here were just having fun, as simple as that. And I'm sure that at least half of them will come back to the swimming pool on weekends or on their school break. And if only half of those succeed in developing a healthy approach to their bodies, it's a lot already.

At the same time, what they managed to learn during this completely anarchic swimming class is a feeling, one might even say a skill, that their Amsterdam peers will probably never acquire in their whole life. They learned how to overcome their fear of water. The method used might have been completely un-methodical and unreflected, but it was successful. And i'm sure that in the situation of 'emergency' (in case a kid falls off a sailing boat or off a cruise ship, as one of the parents in Amsterdam told me), a child without fears stands better chance of surviving than the one who got the knowledge in the 'proper' way.

As I have already said, the swimming teacher that lets his THEIR pupils run around a swimming pool naked whilst throwing swimming accessories at random visitors would have been fired anywhere else but here. Here nobody cares.

2011 was Amsterdam, 2019 is Brussels. It's by no means heaven here. But on that day on my short break in the swimming pool on Place du Jeu de Balle whilst I was watching the most anarchic swimming lesson I've ever seen in my life, a strange, but pleasant feeling got over me. I felt like I know why I'm here and not there.

* * *

I don't enjoy art anymore. I really don't. And it's not like I don't try – I go to theatre and galleries as religiously as before, sometimes even a couple of times a week. But it really doesn't work for me as it used to.

It's not a new thing this art disdain, it has been growing in me for awhile now, and I have become aware of it ever since I moved to Brussels. I tried to unpack this aversion in conversations with Charlie. Once he told me that I have to become bourgeois in order to enjoy art again.

I have been coming back to this thought quite often recently. Three weeks ago I saw this piece performed by members of an art organization from Brussels, a safe space where refugees and recent immigrants to the city can work on their artistic ideas and develop them with the help of settled (legally speaking) Belgian citizens. The majority of 15 performers in the show were people of color that are active as artists and participants of various workshops that take place there.

I would love to be able to say that they were performing. It seemed more like they were puppeteering. The thing is, most of the credit for their work went to a white straight Western European guy that usually works as a scenographer (that's what Wikipedia says), but in this piece he was responsible for 'artistic direction'. The show got standing ovation, almost every night apparently. Audiences were praising how daring this piece was, both artistically and politically.

Unfortunately after the piece not a single person that I talked to and that was smitten by its profound political, ecological, and social commitment (this is an actual quote from a panegyric published in one daily newspaper) seemed to be concerned with the fact that performers were paid merely 10 euros for a show.

A couple of months before, I'm not so far from the place where I recently saw this piece, this time it's a smaller scale program,program; 4 young writers in a relatively unknown studio space are reading excepts excerpts of their work. It was an evening organized by writers themselves, big institutions weren't involved, so I didn't fear that I was going to be confronted with a work of a yet another young Western European maker that was going to change the world with His radical take on art and politics that involves unpaid immigrant labour.

The event went well. Writers seemed humble, well aware of their vulnerability, especially in a situation where they needed to perform in front of an audience, no matter the fact that there were no more than 20 people in the room and that they knew most of the faces that came to their reading.

There was this guy, in his late 20s, curtain haircut straight from the 90s, tiny round glasses, acute level of social awkwardness. I could barely hear him even though he was using a microphone. Before he started reading he gave out a couple of copies of his publication so we could follow his poem in written form. Thin books he shared with us looked a bit like anarchist zines I used to read when I was a teenager.

His poem was long and senseless, and in the book he was playing with different fonts and typefaces. It was fun hearing his timid voice and at the same time following it in written form, realizing how he graphically organized his text.

I didn't dislike the show, it didn't make me angry or sad. But during and after it, I had only one question on my mind. As much as I wanted, I just I couldn't get it out of my head all night long. 'How do you pay your bills?', I wanted to ask him. 'Do you poems cover your rent?', was on repeat on my mind after every sentence he uttered. I went home thinking about the connection between the amount of money on artist's bank accounts and the type of art they're putting out in the world.

Fuck, I'm becoming really bitter, my mind is corrupted with these sinister ideas, I thought the next day. Fuck, I thought the next day, that I'm becoming really bitter, that my mind is corrupted with these sinister ideas. But then, I gave it a second thought and I realized that there was something in his lecture that made me think of this guy's bank account. There was something present in his voice, a specific quality of his behaviour, the way he was holding himself, his pronunciation, that made me think that this guy has never spent one single day of his life having a job outside of claustrophobic art world. Not a single day spent serving people behind the bar, counting money at the till, sorting products on the shelves in a supermarket, or chopping onions in the restaurant. Not a single day of experience that marks the last 10 years of my life, ever since I left my uni.

Let me be clear, I am not cynical. I'm not retreating to irony. This is not where my mind's at now. Nor I would like to personally attack this guy for what he is or how much money he has. I'm more trying to understand how am I supposed to connect to his work having in mind all the differences that structure and organize our everyday life? How to empathize with his poetic abstraction, how to enjoy in his imagination knowing that the way he makes use of his own time bears no resemblance to how my daily schedule looks like?

Polyamorous Love Song, the book I'm sending with this letter, didn't drastically change my opinions on art. It didn't make me a believer again nor did it give me reasons to fight off my lapse from art grace. Why is it here in the same package as this letter (aside from the fact that it's a part of Jasna's project :)) is that there's this thought by the end of the book that might help me in formulating why I feel what I feel recently.

Pop songs that we know of are all monogamous, no matter how open-minded the artist is. Serge Gainsbourg and Britney Spears have one thing in common: the both wrote songs (yes, it might be hard for you to believe, but Britney was involved in the process of creation of her own music) whose addressee is one single person. 'Love songs are propaganda for monogamy', as Mr. Wren (better said, one of the narrators in the book) would say.

Imagine a world were where love songs are not monogamous, I read a couple of pages later. Envisage an universe where pop songs are dedicated to various individuals. How would that change our perception of reality? If we lived in a possible world where pop songs we hear on the radio, sing in our showers, stream and share are not dedicated to one single person, but to a lot of different people at the same time, would our feelings be shaped differently because we'd have a language for something that exists outside of daily perceptions of the contemporary reality we are living in at the moment?

I remember well, in 2012 I saw a movie Weekend by Andrew Haigh. Have you seen it? The main characters are two guys, late 20s, early 30s, one is artist, other pool lifeguard, they hook up one night in a gay bar, start hanging out. The plot is set in England (I can't remember where), and doesn't cover a long stretch of time, only a couple of days. It mostly consists of their conversations about love, life, sex, coming out, gay marriages etc and their unimportant everyday life rituals like drinking coffee or cycling around.

I didn't experience a massive catharsis during the film, but I can still recall that a deep feeling of sadness hit me after I came back home from the cinema. The morning after the feeling was still there. It wasn't suffocating, but for the whole week after seeing the film whatever I was up to I could sense a feeling of soft and profound fragility that permeated all my actions. A type of vulnerable sensitivity impregnated my whole being.

I knew what instigated this state, and I was aware that it started after I've seen the film. But I didn't feel like it was one of the top ten films I've ever seen. I tried to analyze why I'd been so moody and realized that that was probably the first time in my life that on big screen I've seen a queer film where one of the gay characters doesn't die, isn't beaten up, castrated or raped, isn't ostracised by their community and where gay relationship isn't portrayed like a fucking war zone. The story of Weekend is simple – two gay guys hook up and spend couple of days together, eating, fucking, cooking, drinking coffee, chatting. Of course that there are consequences to my emotional wellbeing if gay reality in every film I'd seen until 2012 is depicted as tragedy.

Imagination is a powerful tool. And I'm not talking just about the under- and mis-representation of sexual and gender minorities on big screens. It's also about the fact that in 2019 I find absolutely necessary that we start treating art spaces as safe(r) spaces. Violent imagination in art works i'm seeing lately reproduces and reinforces the same power logic that exists outside of art world. The more time I spend finding the examples of an influential nature of aesthetic experience, and its complicity in the formation of how we perceive the world, how impregnated our minds are with what we've seen on TV and heard on the radio, the more I find non-negotiable the idea that artists should be accountable for the artistic universe that they present, and that only in safe(r) spaces a different type of creative imagination has the potential to emerge.

I don't think my art disdain will merely disappear once I become bourgeois (though I am glad to announce that this might finally happen quite soon). Even with more money on my bank account I will think that there are theatre makers and choreographers whose works are producing serious damage to our collective imagination, who don't recognize that this sacred ideal of Western European romantic tradition called freedom of artistic expression has it's its clear borders.

This idea from the last chapter of the book that pop songs not only depict but they also create is one I find truly revolutionary. Yes, we do need polyamorous love songs to change our boring monogamous reality :) But it's not just about non-monogamous pop songs, it's about the all forms of possible lives and existences that we sometimes successfully, sometimes tragically, but definitely very intuitively, are trying to articulate in our charged 2019.

Read the book and pass it on please. I'm sure you'll find someone interesting to share your thoughts with.

What about the swimming pool lesson? I don't know. I had a thought about the alternative ways of fighting my own fears of becoming creative being again and another thought about my new bank card, and another one about the updating the definition of the working class and another one on the different shades of whiteness and Western European wannabe radicals, but then I totally lost the connection with the rest of the letter :) Next time, I promise.

How's your new cyborg life? I want to hear everything. Come for a visit please, it's about time.

I love you, hope to see you soon XX p

ps Jasna's explanation is here! More on http://dearjacobwren.tumblr.com/

'So, I am giving this book to you, as a present. I am giving it to you, but on one condition. Or actually two. The first one is that you read it. The second is that, upon reading it, you do the same as I did: you think of a friend who you think might like it, who you think will be a nice addition to our small community, you give it to him/her as a present and along with it, write a letter to explain why you think this person and this book might go so well along. Then you give them the letter and the book, and you forward the letter to me, so I could publish it here.

You decide on the length of the letter, I am just asking for the language to be English so that more people could understand it… and, of course, at the end of the letter you make a small note about this principle so that when your friend is done with reading, he or she can send it to the next person, including a personalized letter, so that this circle could go on expanding…'

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allthingsdarkanddirty · 23 days

Text

But Stock Creek is more than it seems, and so am I. My heart still races at night, not just from the memories of the cold steel pressed against my temple or the scent of gunpowder, but from the piercing green eyes of Ashton—a man shrouded in as much mystery as the town itself. A dragon-shifter with scales as dark as the secrets he keeps, his presence ignites a fire within me that I cannot quell.

Ashton's whispers are like a balm to my scarred soul, but his touch? It's an inferno that promises to consume us both. They say fate brought us together, two beings caught in the relentless storm of our intertwined destinies. He's the protector I never knew I needed; the missing piece that makes sense of my fragmented world. But even as we grow closer, danger lurks in the shadows, a reminder that my past is never too far behind.

***

I never believed in destiny. As a dragon-shifter living among humans, I've always been a master of my own fate—until Erin Montgomery crashed into my life like a tempest with eyes the color of a wild forest and hair like autumn's most daring flame.

She doesn't know it yet, but Erin is my fated mate. She sees me as the mysterious stranger who strolled into her B&B and saved her life. But our connection runs deeper than she can imagine. I can feel the pulse of her blood like the beat of a drum, calling to the very core of my being.

Erin's in danger and doesn't even know it. The shadows that chased her from the city streets of Chicago to the deceptive calm of Stock Creek are closing in. And I'll burn the world to ash before I let them touch her.

About Lia

USA Today bestselling author Lia Davis spends most of her time writing racy romance and witty women's fiction, the majority of which takes place in fantasy worlds full of magic and mayhem. She prides herself on her ability to craft strong and sassy heroines, emotionally intelligent alpha heroes, and rich, expansive universes that readers want to visit again and again. She is the mastermind behind the bestselling Ashwood Falls Series and the co-author of the beloved Witching After Forty Series. She currently resides in Florida where she's working on her very own happily-ever-after with her supportive husband and spends her free time doting on a pack of feisty felines and her loving family.

About Lainie

Lainie lives in East Tennessee with her husband, three children, and an ever growing number of cats. She loves reading, watching TV, and procrastinating by browsing Facebook. Her passions include vampires, food, and listening to heavy metal music. She once won a Harry Potter trivia contest based on the books and lost one based on the movies. She has two bands on her bucket list that she still hasn’t seen: AC/DC and Alice Cooper. Feel free to send tickets.

Get Social With The Authors! BookBub - Lia: http://bit.ly/2N3X2dS BookBub - Lainie: http://bit.ly/2Z2VA24 Facebook - Lia: http://bit.ly/2H7mhbL Facebook - Lainie: http://bit.ly/2ORBhk6 Website - Lia: https://authorliadavis.com Website - Lainie: https://laboruff.com

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scarletwritingwolf · 7 years

Text

THE ART OF HEALING

Chapter 1: First Day Ghosts

Claire Elizabeth Beauchamp was having a good look around her new office, and was being rather critical of its emptiness. She needed to inject this office with a little homeliness and personality.

. . . . . .

The office, had a large oak desk, with a big white swivel wing chair on one side of it, and two smaller oak chairs on the other. Off to the side there was an enormous cowhide rug, with two grey armchairs facing each other placed on it. The only thing hanging on the walls, in a modest frame, was my very recently acquired master’s degree in psychology.

Other than that, there wasn’t a plant, painting or trinket in sight. I began making a mental list of all the things I’d need; side tables, two plants, a couple of simple canvases, a table lamp and a floor lamp, and most definitely trinkets for the desk.

I felt the slight draft as the door opened, and my new boss and old friend; Joe walked in. “So Jane, what do you think of the digs?” he said in his American drawl.

“It’s incredible Joe, you’ve done a wonderful job setting up the office spaces. And I won’t say that I’m not thrilled you decided to stay in Edinburgh to practice, not just because you offered me a job once I’d finished.” I smiled guiltily, it had been very nice of Joe to wait the additional year after he had finished his own degree (and mentoring), before hiring anyone to assist him, to ensure that the vacant place would go to me.

He knew well enough that I couldn’t afford to set up my own practice, but Joe’s father had left him a sum of money to do just that, and good old faithful Joe stuck to his promise, starting practice almost immediately after finishing his degree last year.

I’d already made several mental notes to repay him for the rest of my existence.

Neither Joe or I were strictly native to Edinburgh, and in that respect it was an even greater comfort to the soul to have a familiar face to turn to.

Joe had had difficulty getting into a University anywhere in America, and knew his next best bet was to find one in Europe that would agree to have him, so Edinburgh it was. With great determination and hard work he finished at the top of his class, leaving his mark on the place he had adopted as home for the six years previous.

I, on the other hand, had a far more complicated back story, Edinburgh wasn’t where I was born, but I had spent much of my life there, and it had eventually come to feel like home for me, despite the loneliness of it at times.

“I’m glad you like it Jane, you think you can be happy here?” He had already formulated a guess as to what she was going to say next.

“Oh most definitely”, she hesitated before letting the next words tumble out of her mouth. “Although it is practically bare aside from the staple pieces of furniture, I would like to make it my own, if you don’t mind.”

“My Lady Jane, I would have been disappointed if you hadn’t.” He said, eyes twinkling with humour. “Shall we go and look for some things to fill up the space? Don’t disappoint me now and tell me you haven’t already prepared a list.”

I tried to look demure while plastering my best shocked look upon my face. “Alright, you’ve got me, I have a list. Any complaints about going antiquing?” I grinned slyly, knowing full well he’d hate it, for Joe loved to hate the junk (or so he called it) that I collected from antiquing stores. I chose not to mention that I collected these items because they reminded me of my Uncle.

“I’ve offered now, I suppose I can’t back out.” He said good naturedly, returning a toothy smile. “Let’s go.”

. . . . . .

She returned to her office that same evening, arms laden with her purchases. After several trips back to her car to gather the other pieces she’d picked up, she began the set up.

After the first half hour had passed she was still battling with her flat pack coffee table, and she began to lose faith in her abilities to live without a man, or at least without the supervision of one.

She sent Joe a text:

*Starting to wish I’d taken you up on your invite to stay for dinner, this flat pack nonsense is giving me hell :) *

Two more hours had passed; after the victory with the coffee table she’d managed to set up almost entirely. There were now muted canvases hanging on the walls, plants in two corners of the room, the afore mentioned coffee table nestled between the comfortable armchairs (that now held cushions), the table was decked out with tissues and a small abstract sculpture of a human brain.

Lastly she’d set up her desk with all the stationary she would need (likely enough for the next 10 years as well), a bespoke lamp, a telephone and the most beautiful antique gold clock. The clock reminded her, almost painfully, of her dear Uncle Lamb, it was very similar to one that he had sitting at his extremely untidy desk in Oxford.

How she wished now that she had had the courage to return to his office after his death, and retrieve some of his beloved possessions. Alas Claire Beauchamp had never been the sort to place much value in material things anyhow; and it was far easier to keep up this façade than to admit just how much value she placed in those things.

She glanced at her watch, wondering how so much time had escaped her, it was already 9:30pm, she would have to leave now in order to get home and actually rest before her first day tomorrow.

She left her laptop on her desk, tidied up the remains of her pizza dinner, and took one final look around, feeling proud of her accomplishments, she switched off the desk lamp and headed out the door.

The car ride home made her acutely aware of just how tired she was, rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she forced herself to concentrate on the road. “This is ridiculous” she said out loud “pull yourself together Beauchamp, the drive home is barely 10 minutes!”.

Finally parking outside of her home, she sat motionless in her car for a further 5 minutes staring up at her building, preparing her tired body to walk the four flights of stairs that would deliver her to her apartment door.

The climb seemed shorter than usual, her body sort of carried itself, allowing her mind to wander freely. She was thinking of a reference in a textbook and a strong cup of oolong tea when she found herself outside of her door.

She crept inside, maintaining a stealthy silence despite knowing that there was no one to disturb within. In the comfort of her room she immediately began removing all of her clothing, and sliding herself into a heavy silk robe, before setting out to prepare a cup of tea.

Traipsing about her home, she absent mindedly checked that everything was in it’s place, which it was, and then turned towards her version of a library; a few shelves crammed to the hilt with books of every genre. Running her fingers over the spines of the many volumes, she came across the book she had wanted to reference, and took it over to the chaise seat in front of her window.

She flipped through to find the the passage she was after in B.F Skinner’s Beyond Freedom & Dignity, it read:

‘Freud was a determinist – on faith, if not on the evidence – but many Freudians have no hesitation in assuring their patients that they are free to choose among different courses of action and are in the long run the architects of their own destinies.

This escape route is slowly closed as new evidences of the predictability of human behaviour are discovered. Personal exemption from a complete determinism is revoked as a scientific analysis progresses, particularly in accounting for the behaviour of the individual.’

. . . . . .

The words eased my mind, as I remembered why I had decided to become a psychologist; the science of it, the concrete proof that the mind was a most complicated thing, and that you couldn’t simply choose your circumstance.

My mind drifted further, I curled myself into a cocoon on the chaise, and stared out of my bedroom window. The streets were quiet, and the only sound that could be heard was the white noise of the rain outside, ever present in Scotland.

I fell asleep watching the dewy drops fall to the ground.

. . . . . .

Claire sat in her office the next morning, bleary eyed, tired and surrounded, in the metaphorical sense, by the pressure she had put upon herself, the weight of it was heavy on her mind as though someone was steadily injecting liquid into her brain, the sensation of drowning in it was very real.

She took deep breaths in, out, in, out. The nerves about her first day had caused serious disruption to her sleep, so much so in fact, that sitting up reading her old psychology text books were the only thing that would soothe her troubled mind.

The new day had also, thankfully, brought with it some kind of distorted belief that she knew what she was doing, and that she was ready.

She checked her clock again; 9:01am.

Her first patient would be waiting by now just on the other side of the closed door, and there was no longer time for procrastination.

She took the eight long steps to the door in her stride, saying the patients name over and over as she went, so that she wouldn’t forget; Louise de La Tour, Louise de La Tour, Louise de La Tour…

. . . . . .

Opening the door, smile plastered on my face “Louise de La Tour?” My eyes landing on the woman whose name I called.

Louise stood up fumbling with her purse to put away the self-help book she had been reading, likely attempting to conceal the cover of it from me

I took a moment to glance at the other patient waiting to be seen by Joe. He had the most beautiful masculine face, encircled by a halo of red hair. He was looking at me too, his face bearing the strangest expression, I couldn’t decipher it’s meaning and nor would I have the time to do so, so I simply smiled and gave a nod.

I remembered where I was, and that my self interests where not of consequence at this moment, and jolted out of my trance “please come in Louise.” Gesturing her inside with a wave of my hand.

. . . . . .

Claire’s first session passed by in a blur, unable to shake the image of the man in the waiting area. Louise had been eager to tell her story and to discuss her issues, so needed very little encouraging; meaning the moments for Claire to speak or provide input rarely presented themselves.

This allowed for her to escape into her mind, delving in to find the image of him; the red haired man with his piercing blue eyes. He was burned there in her mind, sure to scar and leave its mark.

When the session had concluded she was embarrassed with herself, for focusing on a man rather than her patient, it was beyond unprofessional. For the sentiment of it, she was also disappointed that she hadn’t even bothered to pay attention to the significance of the first patient crossing the threshold of her office.

She knew she had to forget this man and simply carry on as though she had never noticed him.

To ease her conscience she began to take notes on her session with Louise, thankfully Louise hadn’t had any inclination of Claire's mental absence, seeming more relieved to have someone to listen to her problems.

Louise was pregnant, not with her husbands child, but with her lovers, this presented her with a number of difficult choices to make.

Claire noted that she would need to help Louise come to a conclusion about exactly what she wanted, and then address the different ideas for change.

. . . . . .

The last patient exited at 5:30pm. The hours had crawled by and Claire was ready to blow off the steam of her first day, and was sincerely hoping that Joe had the same thought in mind.

She turned towards the practice kitchen, opening each cupboard and drawer, attempting to will a bottle of whiskey into existence.

In her search she had failed to notice Joe standing, watching her.

“The liquor is in my office locked in a cabinet, come on Lady Jane.”

Two hours later, and slightly buzzing, Claire had debriefed with Joe, doing her best to conceal the true reason for her agonising day.

Although she knew Joe would understand, she felt far too ashamed to admit any hint of ‘feminine weakness’, choosing to chalk up her poor performance with her first client to nerves.

. . . . . .

Back at my apartment that evening, I resolved to go straight to bed; no reading, no working, just sleeping.

Two hours later, I was still staring at the ceiling despite my exhaustion, so I gave up the idea of sleep and went to sit on the chaise by the window, just as I had done the night before.

I picked up the book I had left there last night, and immediately thought of Louise. I re-read the passage I had found, and felt like a hypocrite. I had told Louise today that she was the master of her destiny, and uttered many other encouraging words of complete bullshit. But didn’t believe in them, I wasn’t a Freudian, and Skinners books reminded me why, so what had possessed me to abandon my beliefs with my very first patient?

I looked out of the window once again, questioning myself, blue eyes and red hair consuming me without my permission.

Then there he was again; the any season jogger, who ran almost every night and always at the same time, never deterred by snow or rain.

I admired his dedication, and was always impressed by his routine. On the nights that he ran, he wore the same black tracksuit, hood up, was gone for forty minutes and always returned with a coffee from the same shop.

He disappeared into his building, the one directly opposite mine, and one minute later the light in his sixth floor apartment came on.

I watched as he drew his curtains shut, and decided that my bed was where I needed to return. I fell asleep quickly, my last thoughts whirling around were of the jogger in black and those intense, deep blue eyes.

#outlanderfanfiction #fanfiction #fan fic #outlander

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theliterateape · 4 years

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Odyssey Preppers: A slothful meditation

By Dana Jerman

“The end of the world is on people’s minds. We have the power to destroy or save ourselves, but the question is what do you DO with that responsibility.” —Nicolas Cage

For the life of me, I cannot get the go-bag together. You know, the emergency kit.

From time to time, you’ve seen those lists of what to pack on random flyers/pamphlets. Closest thing I’ve got going is a really solid air-travel toiletry kit.

And the emergency plan— Oh Christ, the plan. That’s another matter entirely. Perhaps you, too, have thought about this, and maybe even done something about it.

This shouldn’t be so hard. So why does it feel that way? Indecision, natch.

Perhaps it’s the untrustworthiness and inadequacy of any inventory I would take. That I would dip into the bag for something I might need, and then never replace it. Or the notion that it would take up space in my apartment no matter where I decide to keep it, and there’s no guarantee that in a true emergency I would be able to get to it.

Carrying something, anything heavy out of a burning building, say, that isn’t my husband, or my neighbor, or their girlfriend, or both, or some yet-undetermined highly sentimental artifact or heirloom, has minimal appeal. You’re laughing right now and so am I.

Really? if I’m honest with myself—an heirloom? For fuck’s sake, I would only look at the thing later on, whatever it may be—all singed around the edges, probs—and be reminded of catastrophe. Just a thing in a past life that ties me down to feelings of loss.

Surely also, how heavy can a first aid kit be? Should I not be able to have such a simple thing on my person at all times?

Already I schlep about, day to day, so many everyday objects in a messenger bag out of mindful but mostly manufactured necessity. So again, natch, nearly every day I think about what happens when/if I’m forced to live out of that bag exclusively.

When considering this, the true usefulness of cash as an object also becomes anti-food for introspective thoughts.

Okay, here’s the gear I’ll give myself the chance to amass instead: items with an interactive creative existence in mind. Tools for the voyage by choice, not via outside fear-driven circumstance.

There will be no basement or manhole-covered shelter overfilled with canned soup and bottled drinking water. No macaroni-shaped lightbulb cache and heavy steel petrol heater that doubles as stove.

Altho’ there probably will be a well-sharpened machete and a hand crank solar-powered radio! And as many pens as I can possibly find, along with a lot of scavenged paper.

In the vein of doomsday prepping, there seems to be a negative connotation within the act of hoarding resources for the sake of survival. Basic survival only. Survival’s simple gesture of power and potential is not to be underestimated, but screw all that!

I want cultivation. A chance to thrive, exhilarated! And a place to do so- bunker-less and wild and hyperactive with horizonless possibility!

I’ll make sure I have a healthy lavender garden somewhere, or a window box teeming with things that help abate radiation sickness. Nearby will be the labyrinth piled round with magic stones. I’ll build a bo…

Holy hot shit. I know. I figured it out. I’ll be an Odyssey Prepper.

Check it out—an Odyssey Prepper will repurpose random objects into new tools. Improvisation will be the rule. Perhaps it’s a bit of a steam-punk fantasy, but the Odyssey Prepper will be spending lots of time near water or in it- swimming as a mode of transportation.

You know: “You take your car to work, i’ll take my board…” Right?

There has to be enough room in the boat for my friends, new and old, who have survived some epic end-of-times ordeal. “Friends” are anyone who can/wants to work…

But so help me in the accident that betides a general misfortune will I not be able to say: get thee behind me, procrastination? It’s now! Now more than ever before it’s time for sit-ups and push-ups and getting off of my flat ass for kung-fu and self-defense class because, as an Odyssey Prepper, one must be in shape to heave the rope ladder from the tree-house. To hoist the sail for the mast of the ship. And we’ll all have to figure out how to be doctors, scientists, carpenters and navigators while soaking wet.

Ah… but the weak, self-involved flesh dances and delights only in these wistful imaginings from its comfortable spot. Healthy and whole, it pauses to close the eyes, in the middle of a good book. At rest and seated in the sunbeam at the window. Gravid with anti-will and idealism.

How easily even the driven-to-dream Odyssey Prepper becomes paralyzed by the myriad comprehensive depths of MacGyver-esque preparedness choices. The Platonic mind frozen in delicious deliberation of future liberation.

It’s not hopeless. I could re-think all of this.

I could do something, nothing, anything. Do, and do not.

Come to think of it- the end-of-the-world is also pretty lazy getting around to itself.

Time, as we know it, really is on our side.

Which turns out to be a good thing.

“What the caterpillar calls the end of the world the master calls a butterfly.” —Richard Bach

#stuff #procrastination #indecision #time and space #randomness #choice #thinking too much #emergency prep #go-bag #prepping #thoughts #slothlike #deeds #friends and neighbors #jokes on us

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dillenwaeraa · 5 years

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Five Ways to Make Your Workload Less Stressful

Your email inbox is overflowing, you’ve got a day full of meetings, you didn't finish that research yesterday, and you’ve got that presentation due in two days. Sound familiar? I’ve had a few of these days, so set about finding ways to manage my workload better. The overarching approach to how I manage my workload is to trust in my decisions and create positive habits.

Here are the top five ways I made my workload more manageable and less stressful; And I became more productive as a result!

1. Gmail is your best friend!

I appreciate you may not be using Gmail, so here’s my first tip; if you can, switch now.

A cluttered inbox always leads me to distraction, but having a well-managed inbox helps reduce stress and frees up headspace. My daily quest is to have no emails in my inbox, known here at Distilled as ‘inbox zero’. How do I do this? Simple. Liberal use of the archive and snooze functions of Gmail.

1. Archive

I’m ruthless when it comes to managing my inbox. If it’s not relevant, I archive it. If I’ve read it, I archive it. If I’ve read it and responded, I archive it ( you get the picture). Any opportunity to remove an email from my inbox I take it. Archiving is excellent, and the email is always there if I need it ( I search for it via Gmail Search). Trust in the archive, if you search you will find.

2. Snooze

The snooze function is going to be your best friend. If you’re not familiar with snooze, the feature lets you reschedule emails to appear at a time when you want them to. This works great if you're going to reply later or if you’ve sent a response you want to follow up in a few days. Just click snooze, select the time/date, and the email’s removed from your inbox (and headspace). It will pop back in like magic when you’re ready for it! I use this to follow up proposals or remind me I need to respond, and it’s a great way of prioritising what you need to do and when to.

Bonus tip: You can do this in any section of your Gmail account ( e.g., your sent emails).

I’ve found by using these functions my inbox is better managed, helping me to be more productive and less stressed.

2. Have a personal organisation system

Having a personal organisation system is crucial to managing my workload and being productive.

Get a system in place where you can collect and prioritise what you need to do and when. Don’t use paper, it will get lost (plus let’s save the environment people). There’s plenty of systems you can plug into (Monday, Taskworld, Asana, and many more)

I use Trello. I’ve created a board that lists the days of the week. Here’s mine below:

It’s simple. As soon as I have a task, I make a decision when I need to do it, I add it to that list and forget about it until it’s time to do it. I know what you’re thinking, “what if I have to do it every Monday?” I label it appropriately, i.e. “Do this every Monday.” What if one day becomes super busy? I make a decision, does it need to be done, or can I roll it to a later date?

The beauty of Trello is that you can move the card along to another day. If you like, you can also incorporate the organisation into your personal life. You can be a super geek like me; I even have a list of items of clothing I want to buy and where they’re located.

I find an added benefit of having a system in place is that I naturally develop a structure to my day. My ultimate tip is; try to do it consistently, so that it becomes second nature. If you can learn to trust your method, it will free up headspace. When I started using this system to help me develop this habit, I used to add tasks and review what I needed to do first thing in the morning, then at lunch (so I could realign priorities if needed) and then at the end of the day to prepare for the following day. Now I add tasks as and when they come to me; when I get a task, I assess what I need to do and by when. Then I add it to my Trello board.

When you first start to set up your system it may take a bit of time initially to get used to capturing your tasks and organising them. After a couple of days, it will become second nature, so stick with it, and you’ll reap the benefit.

Get a system in place that works for you. My system has made it easier and given me more confidence in making decisions. It helps me to capture takes, close loops and, as a result, frees up my headspace because I don't have to worry about a mental to-do list - I trust in it and work through it methodically instead of procrastinating or flitting between different tasks as I remember them. It’s helped me to focus on my tasks better and made me more productive.

3. Be aware of other people’s headspace

If I need an answer, if I need to know how to do something, If I need to know anything, I Google it. Google is always my first go to.

Asking someone a question I can find myself takes up others headspace. All I’m doing is shifting my workload and adding stress to someone else. I’m not saying don't ask any questions ever, rather ask questions when you need to. It’s far easier and more efficient to just Google “how do I do” something rather than interrupting someone to show you, and a bit of self-learning is always fun!

I’ve found I’m less stressed as I can save time and find the answer myself, rather than waiting on someone else and watching that clock countdown. If you can get it done yourself, you’ll be more productive and tick off another thing on your to-do list!

4. Create templates

Creating templates saves time, makes me more efficient, and speeds up getting things done.

This is about working smart. Only create templates for the most common, regularly occurring things. There’s no point in a template for a super bespoke thing that will never happen again. Use templates as a starting point to save time, but remember adding a personal touch is always a good idea.

I work on a lot of proposals, and all of them are different. That said, there are parts which won’t change, e.g. who we are and what we do. I’ve created a ‘master deck’ that has all those things which most proposals will include. I can create a structure quickly and get to focus on the questions that need answering. This significantly reduces my workload as I’m not starting from scratch every time. I’m less stressed and have more time to focus on things that will make the difference, e.g. answering that specific client question. Where it works, I share my templates with others to help them reduce their workload, and that creates a multiplier effect - more people get more time, more stuff gets done!

5. Do you need to do it?

This is dependent on the kind of person you are. I like to think most people want to help others, and, for me, that can create a challenge.

Because I like to be helpful, I find that sometimes (fairly often!) I offer to help others or take ownership of tasks that aren’t my responsibility. Ultimately, I’m adding to my workload and stress, and distracting my focus away from the task I’m responsible for. If it’s not your responsibility, don’t do it, direct it to the person who’s responsible. This is the concept of ‘who’s got the monkey’.

This helps maintain a workload that consists of things I’m directly responsible for. It also means my time’s productive getting things done that I need to do, and I’m not adding stress by taking on other people’s work!

Summary: Build a routine

You’re always going to have new tasks to do. By using the methods I’ve shared; hopefully, you’ll manage your workload better, feel less stressed and become more productive. I’ve found by developing a routine and repeating the approaches daily until they become second nature, is the way to go. I’d recommend cherry-picking one or two of the tips I’ve shared, to begin with, so you can familiarise yourself and adjust to a new way of managing your workload.

I’d love to hear what you do and how you manage your workload, do you do anything I do already?

from Marketing https://www.distilled.net/resources/five-ways-to-make-your-workload-less-stressful/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

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ronijashworth · 5 years

Text

Five Ways to Make Your Workload Less Stressful

Here are the top five ways I made my workload more manageable and less stressful; And I became more productive as a result!

1. Gmail is your best friend!

I appreciate you may not be using Gmail, so here’s my first tip; if you can, switch now.

1. Archive

2. Snooze

Bonus tip: You can do this in any section of your Gmail account ( e.g., your sent emails).

I’ve found by using these functions my inbox is better managed, helping me to be more productive and less stressed.

2. Have a personal organisation system

Having a personal organisation system is crucial to managing my workload and being productive.

I use Trello. I’ve created a board that lists the days of the week. Here’s mine below:

3. Be aware of other people’s headspace

If I need an answer, if I need to know how to do something, If I need to know anything, I Google it. Google is always my first go to.

4. Create templates

Creating templates saves time, makes me more efficient, and speeds up getting things done.

5. Do you need to do it?

This is dependent on the kind of person you are. I like to think most people want to help others, and, for me, that can create a challenge.

Summary: Build a routine

I’d love to hear what you do and how you manage your workload, do you do anything I do already?

from Digital Marketing https://www.distilled.net/resources/five-ways-to-make-your-workload-less-stressful/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

#digital marketing

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