#(something about a year's salary going to the family. aka half a year's salary to Me. and isnt That mind boggling.)

[orcelito]

I think I cried harder today over my dad's jackets than I did at his deathbed. That was a miserable time of course, a memory that will likely be seared into my brain until I die, but I cried... I think a normal amount, all things considered. More than I ever usually do of course, but I typically don't cry At All. All this free crying is certainly surreal.

The jackets, though. I was put in charge of doing his laundry, because we don't want to pack up dirty clothes. I was expecting it to be unpleasant bc my dad's dirty clothes - gross. But really, it was much more unpleasant in that... those were his. It felt wrong to touch them. Felt wrong to treat his jackets as gross. Because they were just his jackets. They weren't even in the hamper. And then I was remembering him wearing them, and then I was crying. Again. And again. Weeping over these damn jackets.

Then I found a shirt on his bed that still smelled like him. It smelled like a Hug From Dad. And that set me off crying even harder.

In total, I think I cried like 6 times within 40 minutes. It took me that long to finish sorting the damn clothes bc I just. Was a wreck. Like, what are you supposed to do when you're living life like normal, vaguely hopeful bc you're taking steps to secure your own happiness, and then 4 days later you're sorting your dad's laundry because he fucking died. Suddenly. Without a goodbye.

And you have to worry about his lack of a will (even under an ideal situation, only 2 heirs and no conflicts between us, probate's a fucking Bitch), and arranging the funeral, and prepping his obituary, and picking out pictures, and writing a speech bc you want to talk at his funeral, of Course you want to talk at his funeral, but even just thinking about anecdotes you could share has you crying yet again.

I've cried more times in the past 3 days than likely the entirety of last YEAR. And that's WITH my cat, and uncle, and family friend dying. Those all hurt, my uncle most of all, & I was real fucked up over it. But this? This was my Dad. Likely the person I'd have named 2nd closest to me in my life, second only to my sister. He wasn't perfect, but he did so much for me throughout my entire life. All he wanted was to raise us to be happy and independent. And he accomplished it, we're getting by without him, but we still wanted several more decades with him. He was only 57. We should've gotten several more decades with him.

But here we are now. Playing investigators to his life, digging into all his shit, trying to find documents and take inventory of all his things, and learning Many things about him in the process. In his lockbox of sensitive documents, like his SSN and birth certificate and all that stuff, we found an old letter. About a decade old now, written in my hand. Right at the very top, we found that he'd kept the letter I wrote to him telling him frankly about my struggles and the things I wanted him to do better. He kept it. He tried to take it to heart. He looked at it again, sometime more recently than all the rest of the documents. That was on top.

His love for us is evident everywhere. The pictures he has hanging up all over the place, majority of them with us in them. The old fathers day cards placed on display in his bedroom bookshelf. The gifts we gave him, even stupid little knick knacks, placed around his apartment with pride. I wish we'd taken more videos of him. I don't want to forget the sound of his voice. I don't want to forget his smell either, the smell of a Hug From Dad, but I still tossed that shirt into the wash even though it felt like saying yet another goodbye.

It's the suddenness that hurts the most, I think. We were planning on having him help me finally get my license this year. My final words to him, the last thing he would've seen from me, were messages asking up on whether he'd called his car insurance company to make sure there wouldn't be problems. I should've called him more. I don't know if I'm going to learn from this.

I cut my 2 weeks off early to have time to grieve and to work on things for the funeral and settling the estate. The last thing I'd wanna do right now is selling fucking bubble tea in a job I already decided to leave. So here I am without a job, though with potentially two life insurance policy payouts to come. Inheriting half his 401k. Inheriting couches, knickknacks, keepsakes, paintings, art pieces, maybe even his guitar and other furniture if we can figure out what to do about space (I don't have room for this furniture, I don't know if I even have room for the couches, but God do I want to keep so much of this furniture). It has me even considering keeping one of his guns, just one. A tiny little revolver, it sits so comfortably in my hand. I don't even want to use it for anything. I just want to have it, keep it stored in a drawer with its ammo kept separate. I don't like guns, but this is a part of him. He loved collecting guns. He was about as responsible with them as someone can be, keeping them locked in a lockbox and impressing upon his children the importance of gun safety (I've known the basic gun safety rules ever since I was a little kid. Of course, of course, of course.) It reminds me of him. It's horrifically easy to have a gun in Indiana. I apparently don't even need a permit to carry anymore. (I have no intention to ever carry this in public.)

It's all a cycle. Business, grief, thoughts about my future. Round and round, like the most nauseating carousel in existence. I don't know how I'm still so functional. My skills with compartmentalization have been my lifesaver.

And im just thinking about the story my dad's best friend shared today. About a friend of theirs who lost her father. She reached out after hearing about my dad to share his words with her: "it's okay to grieve, but don't make his death your life".

He explicitly referenced himself in this, saying if he were to die suddenly that he wouldn't want us to define ourselves by it. Grief is expected, but he wants us to be able to move on. He's always wanted us to establish ourselves and make ourselves happy. He wouldn't want to be a weight holding us back from that.

So every time I start to feel guilty for thinking about having nicer furniture or using his life insurance payout to fund the rest of my college, I remind myself of that. Thinking about the material isn't a bad thing. I'm only human. And in the end, he'd Want me to be thinking about it. He never intended to die, certainly not without warning like this, so he would've only encouraged me being pragmatic about it all.

He only ever wanted us to be happy. So I need to do what I can to live up to that.

I love him. I miss him already.

#speculation nation #negative/ #this got really long on accident. but i think typing this out was really helpful for me. #getting the thoughts out. processing. the works. #nearly cried several times just from writing this. #...and honestly i might reference this again when i start seriously writing my eulogy. #things suck a Lot right now. and i really wish they were different. #feels like i picked a bad choice in a video game and am now seeing the Bad Ending or whatever #all i need to do is reload a previous save. it's all still there. perfectly preserved in my memories. #but... that's all gone. as suddenly and unfair as it is ive been thrust into a new chapter of my life so thoroughly. #it's not all bad though. he wasnt prepared for dying so it's been hell to prepare for him #we dont know if we'll even be able to get into his fucking iphone. stupid piece of shit. #but he had life insurance. he had a union job. and That comes with benefits #(something about a year's salary going to the family. aka half a year's salary to Me. and isnt That mind boggling.) #as much as it hurts im going to be realistic about it. im going to do what i need to finish my education. #and im going to use it as a springboard for finally becoming a 'proper adult'. #the kind who could own a nice kitchen fridge. one with an ice machine on the front of the door #and freezers in the drawers. #maybe then i could think about getting motorcyle lessons. not from my dad as i originally wanted #but i wanna keep the family biker spirit alive. i wanted it even before he died. and now i want it even more. #ive had so so many thoughts. it's only been 3 days. ive had to emotionally numb myself several times just to Get Through It. #everything is exacerbated. my mom wants to go to the funeral. we will have to fight her on this. my dad Hated her. #and i certainly dont fucking want her around either. not then. not when im talking about my dad. #(my dad. my Dad. i saw him die. i felt him cold. i do not regret it. it still hurts me.) #it's overwhelming. i loved him so fucking much. even with his flaws he was truly an amazing father. #i'll... shut up now. if you read this far. well. hug your loved ones a little tighter. you never know when youll lose them.

[ronninoir]

Can I Steal You for a Second? CH2

Summary: Adrien is forced to participate in a new dating show, but becomes more excited when Ladybug says she’ll participate as her civilian self. AKA: AU where Adrien doesn’t know Marinette, the superheroes are 22 and Gabriel is mean and ruthless but not Hawkmoth.

Read on AO3

Chapter 2

As predicted, Tikki wasn’t for it. “Marinette! You can’t leave Paris unattended and just chase after your prince charming! Being Ladybug doesn’t work like that.”

 “But Tikki, I have to. I’ve been in love with Chat for 5 years and haven’t said anything! I was too nervous because he flirts with everyone and” a little bit of excitement sped through Marinette as she remembered something to help her argument. “he already knows. How do you expect him to trust me if I break his heart by backing out now?” The grin on Marinette’s face was devilish.

 She walked away from Tikki and took a seat on her chaise. Pulling two cookies from a box on the desk, Tikki flew over and handed one to Marinette before she began to munch on the other.

 “Just because you two are yin and yang doesn’t mean that you’re meant to be together romantically. Not every Ladybug and Chat Noir pair end up married. You shouldn’t use that as an excuse to do something crazy!” Tikki argued after she had swallowed her first bite.

 “That’s the thing though, Tikki! I love him. I’ve loved him for so long and I just want to get his attention in a different way! What if this is the way I’m supposed to complete him? What if this is our fate? By doing this show?” Tikki didn’t look convinced, so Marinette tried a different approach.

 “I’m also supposed to protect the black cat superheroes, correct?” Tikki gave a slight sigh and a nod. “How am I supposed to protect him if I let 30 girls throw themselves at him without keeping an eye on them and him. He needs me to be there.”

 Marinette finished her cookie as Tikki processed what she had said. After about 30 seconds of Tikki not looking up from her cookie, Marinette continued, “Look, I’ll put in my application. If they reject it, then it wasn’t meant to be and I’ll just keep an eye on Paris while Chat is away. He can’t be mad if the producers were the ones to make me break my promise. But if I’m accepted, then I get to fight for him. I get to be there for my other half. I promise, I’ll find a way to be Ladybug and a contestant. I’ll stay on super high alert for akumas, scope out all of the best transformation shots, and even see if I can get one night off a week to do patrol. Ladybug won’t fall to the sidelines.” Marinette paused, making direct eye contact with her kwami so she’d know how serious she was. “Deal?”

Reluctantly, Tikki looked up into Marinette’s eyes. “You’re not going to let this go until I agree, aren’t you?” Tikki responded with a sigh, “Fine, we have a deal.” 

Marinette couldn’t wait to begin.

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

 The next day, Marinette had already enlisted the help of her best friend Alya for her mission. Alya didn’t know the real reason she was interested in auditioning for the dating show, as that would involve revealing both her and Adrien’s identities, but Alya did know about her huge obsession with Gabriel Fashions, and by extension, Adrien, and so she was fully supportive of Marinette following her odd dreams by participating in the show.

 “Girl, I cannot believe you’re doing this!” Alya squealed as she dug around in Marinette’s closet.

 “Yeah me neither,” Tikki muttered in Marinette’s purse. She was loud enough that Marinette heard the sly comment, but Alya, who was too distracted editing the video anyway, could not.

 Becoming a contestant on a reality TV show was a lot more than Marinette had expected. She had to fill out a 6-page questionnaire, answering questions such as, “What is your current annual salary?” “Do you drink alcoholic beverages?” and “Why would you want to find your spouse on our TV show?” It was oddly a lot of work and some of the questions really made Marinette think.

 After the paper application was done, she needed to record a video of herself answering a series of questions and then pick anywhere from 5-15 pictures of herself. Then she would pack them all up and mail them to the studio.

 Alya had been called as soon as the paper application was done. She helped Marinette pick out the perfect photos (there were 8 of them, all of them showed off Marinette in a very good light and also showed her being a good person) and directed the video.

 As it turns out, the hardest part of the video was finding the perfect outfit. After 10 minutes of digging, Alya found the perfect dress, one that Marinette had designed, that made her look beautiful and professional without too much stiff-ness. Once the lighting was adjusted and everything was perfect, Alya began asking her questions.

 These questions were similar to the ones on the paper application, which helped because she already had her answers ready to go. She started off with a summary of herself, then moved on to her dating history (none, except for Juleka’s brother, but that was one date), then with her ultimate fantasy date (traveling to see the different fashion shows around the world), what her family was like, her traveling dreams, what she would do on a date in her hometown (obviously stroll around the Eiffel tower and all the sights, as well as baking with her parents), some of her special talents (thankfully she had some finished designs lying around and it gave her an excuse to talk about her dress), and finished up the video with a tour of her house. That part was fun because she got to show off her room and the bakery, where her parents were hard at work.

 Once the whole thing was done, Alya began editing on her computer. Marinette began cleaning up her closet and was only half listening to Alya’s comments, most of which were very sarcastic.

 “I should make a blooper reel to add to the end of the interview, this stuff is comedy gold!” Alya called to her with a laugh. Marinette pinked remembering how many times she had to do some of the questions before she got it sounding okay.

 “Honestly, Alya, they want to see my personality. As long as it’s not too embarrassing, I won’t say anything.” Alya’s squeal of delight made Marinette roll her eyes.

 “When you make it, you’re going to have to keep me updated on what it’s like to date none other than Adrien Agreste!” At that comment, Marinette couldn’t help but giggle.

 “You sound really cocky for someone who was just joking about my blooper reel!”

“Confident, not cocky, sweetheart!” Marinette smiled, despite herself. Alya’s confidence and excitement was contagious. She was also hoping her Ladybug luck would carry her most of the way through this process, even if Tikki didn’t think that was fair.

 “Anyway, Alya, you know they take the contestants phones from them once they arrive! No cell phones, no social media, no communication with the outside world. I even heard that there is no internet.”

 “Ugh, I couldn’t survive without internet! That’s why I didn’t audition! I couldn’t imagine being in a situation like that and NOT blogging the whole thing!”

 “But what about Nino?” Marinette asked with a raised eyebrow. Alya had been dating Nino, Marinette’s other best friend, since she moved to Paris in high school. The thought that Alya would ditch Nino to go on a dating show seems kind of extreme.

 “Nino would get over it. He knows I love him and would only go on the show to promote my blog. Can you imagine how many more followers I would have if I could promote the Ladyblog on National Television! It would be amazing!” Another squeal from Alya although Marinette didn’t smile.

“But, Alya, girls aren’t supposed to go on the show to promote their own things. They do it to find love. You can’t go on the show for the wrong reasons!” The rising anger in Marinette’s voice became very obvious, as well as very uncalled for, and it startled Alya a little. The thought of Alya, or anyone for that matter, using her kitty to promote themselves made Marinette fume with fury and she couldn’t stand the thought of him being used like that.

Thankfully, a smile broke across Alya’s face, “Relax girl, that’s why I didn’t audition! I couldn’t imagine using a person like that!” Alya then turned to Marinette with a smirk on her face, “Plus I knew that Nino wouldn’t know what to do without me while I was gone!” Alya began to laugh, and not long after, Marinette joined in, although her laugh was a little forced. She still couldn’t get over the fact that some of the girls could be there for the wrong reasons. At least Marinette will be there to help steer Adrien in the right direction. AKA: her.

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

About a week later, one of the producers of the show was sitting in a dark office, stifling a yawn. The office was small and boring, only holding a cramped desk, a computer, a chair, and an over-flowing pile of packages. He had been the unlucky one assigned to sorting through all of the potential contestants. The deadline for applications was yesterday and they had to wait for the mail to come in today before he was to start going through it all.

 He swiveled in his chair bitterly. Come and work on this new reality show, they said, it’ll be fun, they said. He rolled his eyes and began grabbing packages and ripping them open. He began downloading all of the videos onto the computer and labeling them with the girl’s name. After that was all done, he began flipping through the applications while watching, or rather ignoring, the same girl’s video, which he played on the computer.

 The hardest part of the job was finding 30 girls who fit both Adrien’s list of things he’s looking for in a girl, as well as Gabriel’s things. And when it came to it, all of the girls HAD to be Gabriel-approved, or it was going to be his head.

 Truthfully, he felt like a creeper looking through all of these pictures of the potential contestants. All of them included at least one swimsuit pick and they were all between the age of 21 and 25. That was all good for Adrien, but for him, a married guy... not so much.

 After a few more hours of work, he was going bleary-eyed and was ready to go home and give his wife a big hug and not tell her about this. The last video/application he looked at caught his eye. It was this pretty, petite girl with blue-black hair and a very nice smile. He thought he recognized her, but that couldn’t be possible. He checked her application again and noticed she was from Paris too. Her last name, Dupain-Cheng rang a bell as well.

 As he continued watching her video, during the house-tour, she showed the camera into a bakery. Yes! That was it! She was the daughter of the owners of the Dupain-Cheng bakery! Man, they made the best pastries. He had even considered stopping by on his way home tonight, to get his wife something sweet.

 Well, that settles it. She just has to be on the show. Completely ignoring the two requirement lists he had been religiously using, he moved her application into the “Casting Interview” pile, shut off his computer and headed out for the night. The Dupain-Cheng bakery wasn’t too far out of his way, and if he hurried, he could make it home right as dinner hit the table.

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

Weeks went by and Marinette had almost forgotten about the show and her application. Everything was normal: working in the bakery with her parents, going to classes and completing projects for University, and even her patrols with Chat were normal. He hadn’t brought up the topic of the show, except to confirm that she had applied. Life was normal.

That is, until she received a phone call from a producer saying that they would like for her to come in for an interview, a photoshoot, and some medical testing. She was thrilled, called Alya right away, and was able to clear the weekend in her calendar. The next night, on patrol, she told Chat just because she couldn’t contain her excitement.

“They said that just because I was called doesn’t mean I’m guaranteed a spot, but that I’ve made it to the top 50!” She let out a small squeal as Chat wrapped her in a hug and spun her around.

“Oh, Bug, this is wonderful! You are going to have a great time! They told me that this is the easy part! In fact, since most of you are going to be on the show with me, I’m not allowed to even leave my house during that weekend, for fear that I’ll see one of you.” Chat let out a short laugh at that, “Not that I’m normally allowed to leave the house, but now I’ll be under a heavier lock and key.”

 “Don’t worry, kitty, after the whole weekend is done, I’ll come and get you and we can run around the city so you don’t feel too trapped.” She leaned forward and flicked his bell, giving him a seductive smile.

 Chat gulped a little before responding with a choked, “Sounds good.” Ladybug couldn’t help but laugh. It was easy to make him flustered when she directly flirted with him, and it would provide better ammo once she was on the show. How he was going to survive 29 other girls flirting with him though, she had no idea.

Before Marinette knew it, the weekend of her interview came. She was pushed into a hotel room with 9 other girls and was forced to interact and bond with them. They started out with the interviews, where the girls were escorted one-by-one into another hotel room and interviewed by 3 of the producers. They asked simple questions and Marinette felt really good about it.

Then, once all 50 girls were done, they were served dinner and sent to bed. Early Saturday morning, they were escorted to the nearest hospital, where they would be getting some medical tests done. They did it in groups and rotated through. Some went to get a physical, some went to get the psych exam, some went to a drug test, some went to get fitted (the producers thought it would be easier this way and therefore could have the seamstresses working on clothes for the girls who get cast) and some went to get tested for STDs (what they thought Marinette would be doing on this show, she had no idea).

 Then came the part that Marinette had been most nervous for, the photoshoot. She was never super comfortable in front of the camera, as she was usually the designer behind it. Thankfully, they were photographing them as a group first, then breaking them up for their solo shots. Marinette’s group was in the middle, and it allowed plenty of time to watch and get tips from other girls. One of the girls in Marinette’s group named Sasha was a model and she was more than willing to give everyone some helpful tips.

 Once it was all over, the girls were forced to go to a pool party at the hotel and mingle. Marinette met lots of really nice girls there, and even had a little fun. She almost forgot what they were doing all of this for. She did notice that some of the girls didn’t get-along with everyone and one particular girl named Lila, seemed to be collecting a cult-following of other potential contestants.

Marinette wasn’t impressed with Lila and elected to steer clear of her while she could. She reminded her too much of her high school bully Chloe Bourgeois, and she’d rather not go down that road.

Finally, it was time for bed and almost time for her to go home. She enjoyed being with some of these girls, but she couldn’t wait to sleep in her own bed, as well as see Chat Noir tonight. The superheroes had been a popular topic among the potential contestants. Some had never been to Paris before and were hoping to see a glimpse of the super-heroes. Even though Marinette knew that wouldn’t be happening, she couldn’t help but enjoy the excitement that her presence could potential cause.

 Sunday morning came with breakfast and a meeting. Something super formal that told the girls that they would be receiving a phone call from a producer whether they are cast or not. They were also reminded to not tell anyone about the beginning of the journey, as it would spoil the fun for some of the viewers. Although Marinette knew Alya wouldn’t let her get away without ALL of the details, she agreed to their rules anyway.

Before she knew it, she was back in her room, hugging her parents and waiting for the sun to set so she could meet up with Chat. She passed the time by helping in the bakery and as soon as dinner was eaten and cleaned up, she excused herself for the night and ran upstairs.

She had barely come close to the Agreste Mansion when she saw someone standing at the window staring at her. Adrien was waiting for her. The thought made her heart soar, and his facial expression when he spotted her helped a ton. He quickly transformed and jumped out to meet her.

 “How was your weekend, milady?” He asked as they ran towards the Eiffel Tower.

 “Oh, it was so much fun,” the sarcasm was clearly heard and it made Chat laugh. “There was so much testing done and so many questions, and so. many. girls.” Ladybug let out a groan as they both touched down at the bottom of the tower. “Race you to the top and I’ll tell you what I can.”

“You’re on.”

 Once at the top (Ladybug won by one second), Ladybug told him everything that had happened, only leaving out the STD test (he was going to be super awkward about that and she didn’t want to be the one to tell him) and any specific girls she had met. She didn’t want to spoil his thoughts on any of the girls just yet. Although she did mention one girl, if not by name.

 “She was just horrible, Chat. I couldn’t exactly put my finger on it, but the other girls were flocking to her like she was their queen. It just didn’t sit right with me.”

“Hopefully she won’t make it past this level. If she does though, I’ll be able to spot her and eliminate her night one.” Chat said confidently while Ladybug played with his hair.

“We are just going to have to wait and see though.”

“Speaking of spotting people...” Chat trailed off and Ladybug looked around, wondering who he could have seen from this high up. “Are you going to reveal your identity once you’re officially cast or should you just get it over with now?”

 Ladybug’s hands froze in his hair. She had been waiting for him to ask this, so thankfully, she had discussed and rehearsed this moment with Tikki.

“Neither,” she replied as nonchalant as she could.

 Chat sat up fast and turned to look her in the eye. “What?”

“I’ve been thinking, and I don’t think it would be fair to the other girls if you already knew who I was. How are you going to convince the cameras, as well as all of France, that you are seriously looking for a wife out of these 30 girls if you already know one of them super well? It would show favoritism and I can’t support that.” The dumbfounded look on his face made her smile.

 “B-but, I need to know! You have to tell me! It’s only fair!” She rolled her eyes at his whine. He could be such a baby sometimes.

“Yes, it is fair for the other contestants. Plus, it’ll be more fun if you can pick me out of a crowd. It’ll make the game on your end more exciting.” He groaned and laid back down to where she could continue scratching his head.

 “I hate when you’re right,” was all he said.

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

A couple more weeks came by and Marinette was starting to get nervous. Because of Chat, she knew that they started filming in 3 weeks, and yet she still hadn’t received a phone call. Thankfully, Alya understood her stress and swore to not call her until she found out.

“Maybe they are just running behind?” She suggested helpfully as she spun in Marinette’s desk chair. “Maybe they want you freaking out so you’ll act more desperate on the show.”

 Marinette let out a strained laugh and then fell silent as she stared intently at her phone.

“Have you ever heard the saying, ‘A watched phone never rings?’” Alya asked, stopping her spinning to eye Marinette in her desperate position.

“That’s not a real saying,” She replied without looking away from her phone.

“Even so, it’s true,”

 The days went by so slowly, Marinette was sure an akuma was responsible. By the time Friday rolled around, Marinette felt as though she’s lived through a whole month. Tikki tried to talk some sense into her, but Marinette wouldn’t hear it.

 She ended up working the whole day in the bakery, which helped take her mind off of things. When she took her lunch break, she quickly escaped upstairs to the apartment before her Maman could ask her to do something else. She quickly made her lunch and began eating.

 “Could I have that strawberry?” Tikki was sitting by her plate, staring hungrily at the very sweet-looking strawberry.

“Sure, Tikki,” Marinette responded with a smile. How lucky she got to have a kwami with a sweet tooth. She didn’t know what she would do if she had been stuck with someone like Plagg, who’s constant need for cheese, and expensive cheese at that, was hard to maintain.

 She heard a ringing and a vibrating from the counter that jerked her out of her thoughts. When she looked at her phone, it was an unknown number. Marinette’s heart sped up as she reached to answer.

“Hello?”

“Hi, this is Pierre from the TV studio. I’m calling to talk to Marinette Dupain-Cheng?”

“This is she.” She had to take a sip of water because her mouth had suddenly gone dry.

“Hi, Marinette. I just wanted to call and let you know that you’ve been cast on this season of The Bachelor! I am currently sending you an email with your packing list, everything you need to know pre-filming, as well as when the car will be at your house to pick you up. If you have any questions, feel free to email us. Congratulations and we will be seeing you in two weeks!”

Marinette was staring at her plate with her mouth gaping. Tikki gave her a quick nudge and she started, suddenly realizing that she needed to say something to the man.

“Thank you so much! I’ll see you in two weeks!” She quickly hung up so as to not say anything stupid.

“Congratulations, Marinette! You’re going to have your work cut out for you, but I know you’ll be able to pull it off!”

Marinette couldn’t believe it. She’d made it. She’d be able to go on a proper date with Adrien and possibly get him to fall in love with her! She didn’t realize she was screaming until her mom ran up the stairs, a worried look on her face.

“Marinette, what’s wrong?”

“Maman! I made it! I got cast on the show!”

Sabine engulfed her in a hug and dragged her downstairs to tell her Papa. He was so excited, he told the whole storefront, which resulted in spattered applause and a very red-faced Marinette. Numbly, she moved back upstairs to finish her lunch. 

“What an exciting day, Marinette!” Tikki said, resuming her work on her strawberry.

“And it’s only lunch! Wait until I tell Alya!” A wonderful thought then crossed her mind and a slightly manic grin spread across her face. “Oh man, wait until I tell Chat!”

~~

Let me know if you wanna be tagged for updates! 

@legendaryneckjudgestudent

@discoveringmiraculouswriters

#can i steal you for a second #ml fanfic #ml fic #MLB #miraculous ladybug #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #ml ladybug #ml ladynoir #alya cesaire #ml bachlelor au #ml au #the bachelor #bachelor! Adrien #ml chat noir #chat noir

[svtntntn]

crazy rich asians (1/?)

traveling all the way across the country for a wedding wasn’t too hard of a task, but meeting your boyfriend’s mother and finding out he’s a multi-million dollar, sought after bachelor was another

inspo: CRAZY RICH ASIANS aka when I wrote this last summer!

a/n: REPOST bc tumblr did something weird when I edited the title on my phone! this is gonna be either 2 or 3 parts btw! this has been in my drafts for aGES 

Something is wrong, something is very very wrong.

Or it's about to be wrong.

You can feel it.

But you're drinking champagne from a crystal clear glass overlooking the gorgeous city skyline from a rooftop decorated with white silk ribbons and twinkling lights everywhere, the delicate glow of each bulb reminding you of fireflies gathering along a grassy field.

People are abuzz with laughter and giggles as more and more bottles of champagne are popped open and couples glide across the dance floor in a poised fashion.

Your eyes catch the gaze of another's across the rooftop, his brown eyes twinkling under the white lights as he makes small talk with an elderly woman at the food table. She nudges his side when he gestures over to you with the plate in his hand, a bashful smile on his face as he shakes his head to something she says.

You smile at the scene and turn back to sip on your champagne, your eyes sweeping over the clear night sky again.

Nothing should be wrong.

"Another plate of strawberries for m'lady." Minghao sets down the plate on the table and just like that, your doubts are cast away from your mind in the blink of an eye as he smiles at you, "I almost lost these to Junhui's eldest aunt, right over there."

Minghao holds out a strawberry for you, "How'd you manage to get them away from her?" You bite into the juicy strawberry, the berry's red color tinting your lips.

"How do you think I got them?" Minghao steals a bite from the very berry in your hands, a mischievous smirk on his lips.

You begin humming in thought, "You told her these were for me and seeing me across the room, she just had to give them up to you?"

"Nope." He shakes his head incredulously, scoffing at your idea, "not everything is about you."

"And yet," you steal back the strawberry from him with a coy raise of your eyebrows, tossing the pit to the side, "here you are, feeding me strawberries on the rooftop overlooking an entire city in a nice suit."

You pull him closer to you by the lapels of his overcoat and bring him into a curt kiss on the cheek, smoothing out the wrinkles on his shoulders right after.

The wind sweeps over you in a cold shudder, making goosebumps appear on your skin as you tense up. His cheeks warm up slightly as he removes his coat from his body, draping it over your shoulders and buttoning the middle.

Your arm slink into the sleeves of his jacket as you lay your head on his chest, looking over the city and studying each of the windows. Office workers running between floors in a haste, important businessmen and women pacing their offices—working overtime—doing exactly what you should be doing to afford a trip like this with the love of your life.

Instantly, you can feel the price of the entire trip, of Minghao's expensive jacket weighting you down.

"What's wrong?" Minghao brings your hair behind your ear, his hand traveling over to your shoulder. His touch is comforting and yet, it conjures butterflies in your stomach all at once, "You have this look, like you're distracted by something… or something's bothering you."

You pause because you know he's right; Minghao can read you like an open book, "Minghao, how are we here?"

"How are we here?" He repeats your question with a suspicious voice. "By plane. If you want to be more specific: we took a car from our apartment, then a flight all the way to Seoul—"

"You know that's not what I mean." You cut him off.

Your voice becomes a hushed whisper, "Minghao, how are we able to afford coming here? I know it's your best friend's wedding and all, but coming to Korea for one wedding ceremony and then going to China next weekend for another? How Junhui and Hana can afford this i-is beyond me, a-and that flight on that luxury plane last night costs us almost an entire year's salary, we can't be traveling like this if we want a future together—"

Minghao chuckles at your rambling, his heart skipping a beat at the mere mention of a future together. "Junhui and I have it covered, promise."

"Xu Minghao, you know how I feel about stuff like this." On your first date, Minghao was ready to cover the entire tab but was persuaded to split the bill after hearing you rally off reason after reason on why you two should split the check for nearly half an hour.

The last reason to fully convince him was the threat of no second date with you.

He pauses before shrugging, "My family has a deal with the airline and the tickets were a gift for doing business with them for so long."

"So your family just casually does business with a luxury airline that just gives away tickets like they don't cost hundreds of dollars?" You raise an eyebrow, "So you're saying that your family is rich?"

He nods unconvincingly, "We’re comfortable."

You smack his shoulder with your hand, "No no no no no, that’s something only a super rich person would say."

Minghao shrugs, not denying the words but not explicitly confirming it. "You know my family owns a successful photography company and they're the curators of a couple of art museums around Asia. To some people, they’re boring positions, but to my family, it means the world to us."

"Which also means..."

"Which also means that my family takes great pride in knowing and recognizing art... even making it their entire career and devoting their life to it." He shrugs, your hands over and over again. "We're rich in happiness."

"Just in happiness?" You repeat, your boyfriend nodding along. "I was worried you were holding some sort of big secret, like your family's involved in dealing something or something shady."

He laughs with a small chuckle, "If I was, would you still be with me?"

"Well," you feel Minghao's hand wrap around your waist as you think about the situation at hand, a teasing hum coming from your lips, "if you answered a few of my questions and offered me a slice of the deal, then yes I would."

"A slice of the deal, huh?" Minghao snorts, looking over at the skyline before his eyes concentrate on your eyes alone, "What, an entire lifetime with me isn't enough for you?"

No it is, it's more than enough, you think in your head.

Ever since the moment you met Xu Minghao, you knew you wanted a lifetime and more with him.

"That sounds like a proposal, Mister Xu." You don't dare to look away from him, the hint of a smile creeping up at the word 'proposal' on your lips.

You dreamt of the whole nine yards with him—marriage, kids, dinners surrounded by friends and family till you and him were wrinkled with age.

Minghao leans in closer to you, his lips hovering right above yours, "If you think that was your proposal, just you wait. I can't wait to call you Mrs—"

"Xu!" He's cut off by the sound of another person shouting his name, the bubble of the moment broken by two figures walking over to you, one of the two clapping your boyfriend on the back with a wide smile, "Xu Minghao! Happy to see you living and breathing fresh air instead of inhaling paint fumes inside your studio all day long!"

"Chan, I am not inhaling—"

"And you must be the lovely (y/n), I’m Chan." He studies you as he shakes your hand with a small wink. "And this is Soonyoung." The second figure gives you a polite smile as he sips on an amber-colored liquid before being carried away to talk to another group of people. "Or was."

"Nice to meet you, Chan." You return his kind smile as Minghao hugs his old friend, "I've definitely heard stories about you two and Jun and Hao from college, and I can gladly tell you that Hao hasn't been breathing in paint fumes in awhile."

"He hasn't, has he?" Chan laughs, "What's the newest thing you're working on now, Hao? Claymation?"

"Ha ha," Minghao playfully rolls his eyes at Chan's remark, "I'm still working in photography, showcasing local photography and portfolios from local artists. I still paint from time to time."

"That's good to hear, I can finally answer everyone's questions on what you've been up to since you dropped off the face of the planet three years ago." You raise an eyebrow at the sound of Minghao going MIA for three years, but don't say anything. "But I'm happy you and (y/n) are here tonight! I can finally tell (y/n) all the embarrassing stories from grade school to university, like that one time we snuck into the game room and painted—"

"If you tell that story, then I'm telling Seungcheol that you were responsible for the power outage that took out the entire dorm and the west wing of the library."

Chan glares back at him, "I wasn't even at the dorms that night and you know it."

"Seungcheol doesn't know that." Minghao retorts with a smirk.

"Can I get a say on wanting to hear this story?" you ask aloud, nudging Minghao's shoulder with your own. "Because I really want to hear everything." Minghao pulls a face and Chan avidly reminisces about the college years with you, leaving no detail out as Minghao corrects him on what actually happened years ago.

As Chan entertains you with story after story, Minghao watches you listen with a close ear, watching the way your eyes crinkle with amusement, the way you smile and grin in shock and awe at the stupid, college mishaps he found himself in.

Soonyoung and another friend of theirs, Seokmin, stop by your group and listen in on Chan's storytelling, filling in the blanks with their own versions of what happened, making you laugh with the four different versions of the truth.

Yet, with the group of Minghao's friends surrounding you and bombarding you with their loud personalities, you don't back away from them, if anything they help put you at ease, knowing you're immediately accepted into their world.

Minghao seems to notice your relaxed demeanor and squeezes your hip, bringing your attention up towards him. You begin to lean more into Minghao and he takes the moment to wrap his arms around you, placing his head on your shoulder as his friends barely even notice beyond their bickering.

"Lee Chan, is that you!" A female's voice yells across the rooftop, interrupting Chan's storytelling with an abrupt cliffhanger. All the guys turn to see a stunningly beautiful woman waving at him, but Chan's face contorts into displeasure, "Oh! Well, would you look at the time! I have to go," Chan begins a hasty round of goodbyes to you all. "It was great seeing you all again, especially you, (y/n)."

"I'll see you all at the wedding on Friday!" Chan quickly ducks behind you before backtracking, "Wait, are you both flying to Hong Kong for Junhui and Hana's second wedding?"

"Yes," Minghao answers immediately for the both of you and you nod your head in agreement, "yes."

"I'll see you all this Friday!" Chan disappears into the crowd and you turn to Minghao and the rest of the group with a questioning look.

"Let's just say that Chan has a way with women that many of us do not understand." Minghao explains, chuckling at the younger's escape. "And it typically ends up with someone screaming one way or another."

"And on that note, I'm going to find Junhui and Hana, I think they're going to be making their last toasts of the night." Soonyoung nods towards you and Minghao as Seokmin follows his lead, "I think I saw Seungcheol and Jeonghan by the bar, it was nice meeting you, (y/n)! See you at the wedding!"

The two leave your presence and you're left with Minghao lazily yawning by your ear, swaying you side to side as he closes his eyes. You peer around at him and nudge his chest, "Hey sleepyhead, you can't fall asleep on me just yet." He pouts and you can't help but nudge him again, "I'm pretty sure you owe me a dance."

"I do?" Minghao scratches his head before grabbing your hand and twirling you out of his arms. "Well, if my lady demands a dance, then a dance, she gets."

He pulls you back into his arms and you can't help the smile pulling at your lips, "I did not demand," you scoff, feigning insult. "I requested."

Minghao hums in thought, "How about strongly requested? I think that's a better way of phrasing it."

"Well then, I strongly request that you kiss me."

"I think I can strongly agree to that." He presses his lips over yours and there's that unmistakable parade of fireworks in your stomach just as your heart flutters over and over again in your chest. Once you pull away, you can't help but place another kiss on his lips before resting your head on his chest, feeling Minghao tighten his grip on you warmly as he smiles in content.

"Hello, attention everybody!" Junhui and Hana stand above everyone on a stage with microphones in their hands, blissful smiles on both of their faces. You and Minghao pull apart from one another and stand side by side as the happy couple thanks the party in a cheerful and raucous toast.

Off to the side, you don't seem to catch sight of two women talking with half-full flutes of champagne in their hands, disdain in their eyes and ruby red lipstick marring their lips. The priceless jewels adorning their ears and necks only serve to remind everyone of their wealth and power as they mindlessly scan the rooftop.

One woman prods the other with her elbow, pointing in you and Minghao's direction, "Is that Xu Minghao? He hasn't made a single appearance at parties since he fell off the map, was it two? Three years ago? He's still so handsome," she gushes.

"Who is that with him?" The woman glares daggers into your head, but you barely even notice as you whisper something to Minghao with delight in your eyes. "I've never seen her before."

"I don't know, but we'll find out soon enough." Where you and Minghao stand, you don't even notice the way she angrily taps away on her phone, the way she turns with her back to you two and raises her camera to snap a photo of you from afar.

"This is so going in the groupchat."

*sent 1 photo to groupchat*

I didn't know Xu Minghao had a girlfriend?

What? How do you know Xu Minghao has a girlfriend?

He has a girlfriend?!

OmG he does??

I'm at wen junhui's pre-wedding party in korea, xu minghao is here too and so is kim mingyu and kwon soonyoung and lee chan

what does she even look like?

They must be serious if she's at a wedding party with him

I don't see them lasting long

What family is she from?

not sure, she looks to be friends with wen junhui and lee chan

DOES HIS FAMILY KNOW??

I mean he's at a wedding party in seoul, so they must know!!

But do they know know her??

My auntie's visiting the Xu's tmrw, I'll ask her if his parents know;)

what's his gf's name? I'm gonna look her up

I don't know, let me ask around

Just as the woman begins to stalk her way over to someone to dig dirt on you, there's a special shoutout over the speakers, "and to my best friend, Xu Minghao and (y/n)! Thank you for coming out all this way to celebrate one of the happiest days of my life with me!"

(y/n), her name is (y/n)

(l/n) (y/n)? what family is she from?

I've never heard of her in my life

*received 1 photo from groupchat*

found her;)

.

#Seventeen #seventeen au #minghao scenarios #xu minghao scenarios #seventeen scenarios #seventeen imagines #xu minghao imagines #minghao imagines #the8 imagines #the8 scenarios #my work

[laylabahiti]

HSHQTASK005: A REFLECTION 

i originally posted this task in march 2017, so almost 3 years ago (wow). i already regret looking at this old one lmao

001. name / age / pronouns

2017: xee / twenty / she, her 2020: xee / twenty-three / she, her — fun fact, mine and evy’s bdays are 2 days apart #taurussquad

002. which character(s) do you play?

2017: my complicated af beaN layla. idek what’s going on with her at this point. 2020: i’m screaming i can’t believe i thought 2017 layla was complicated. i had no idea what was to come. i picked up biel not long after that. also had katalina aka brucey’s wifey n i miss her. juliana is a fairly recent addition and, i’m about to spill the beans, a glücksburg is coming.

003. nationality / ethnicity / timezone

2017: american / lots of white european and the other half o’ me is ashkenazi jewish / right now i’m back and forth between pst and mst. homeland is mst though. 2020: obvs nothing has changed except no more back and forth with timezones. strictly mst now.

004. tell us a bit about your  home state.

2017: it’s the first day of spring and we almost reached 100 degrees F :’) we don’t really have autumn or spring here tho. it’s either hot as balls summer or frozen. no in between. like, as soon as temps get below 70 F people break out their jackets. 2020: welcome to the desert, “it’s a dry heat”

005.  favourite color / fruit / season

2017: green / honeydew melon / spring 2020: still green and all its shades / tbh idk how i chose a fave fruit bc i raaarely eat it but bananas and watermelon too / “spring”

006. favourite books + writer whose writing style you admire the most

2017: this isn’t a fair question smh. i have too many titles and names going through my head at once to answer this. 2020: still no fave so i’m just gonna answer this with what i’m currently reading. it’s called suffer strong and it popped up on my insta feed last week (big brother is listening and they know i’m a stressed mf) cheese moment: i admire all ur writing styles :~)

007. what kinda music do you listen to + any fave bands / musicians

2017: listen to a lil bit of everything. these ‘favorite’ questions are difficult for me to answer 2020: same answer tho i grew up listening to the eagles so they hold a special place in my heart n soul. i get to go see them in a couple months (hopefully w my dad) and i’m v excited

008. what are you doing for a living / what are you studying?

2017: lmAO well rn i work in the kitchen of a gas station (sah classy). 2020: went from working in the store to working in corporate *finger guns* apparently i never said what i was studying but i was still in school then. justice studies with a minor in military leadership and certifications in human rights and socio-legal studies. then i studied astrophysics with minors in cyber intel + security and math for a semester, but i didn’t want any more debt ajskdf

009. what’s your dream occupation?

2017: IDK but it has to involve happiness and a nice salary. i have to feed my zoo somehow. 2020: what r dreams lmao

010. relationship status

2017: single then. single now. single forever. 2020: every time i think about putting myself out there, something happens. i don’t have time to date atm

011. coffee, tea or hot chocolate?

2017: it depends on the weather. if it’s cold i’ll have hot chocolate. i usually drink tea at meals whenever though. 2020: i blame my work for all the coffee i drink now, but still all of the above.��

012. dream holiday destination?

2017: santorini 2020: honestmeme....where the hell did i pull santorini from. idk i was supposed to go to iceland for study abroad last year but yknow i withdrew from the university. i still wanna go tho

013. the thing you’re most proud about yourself

2017: not afraid to stand up for myself + others 2020: young me made it sound noble but honestly i’ll put ppl in their place, i don’t have patience anymore jakdas. but tbh right now i guess it’s my perseverance? life has been shitty for a few months but u gotta keep on truckin’

014. tell us a bit about your family!

2017: goD they’re nuts. i’m the middle child out of all my siblings but the youngest on my dad’s side. large age gaps are common, like half my sisters are old enough to be my mom. lots of grand babies and great grand babies. when we’re all together (like this past weekend) it’s ….wild. communication is v poor too. i only have one brother out of my eight siblings, and all those siblings are only half-related to me. at 5′5 i’m one of the tallest in the fam which says a lot. 2020: they’re still nuts n i don’t speak to my mother anymore. i should probs add that my parents have been divorced since i was a few months old so she hasn’t been in the pic for a while. even when she had custody of me jaksldf find me ron howard i’ll give him the rights to my life story

015. how long have you known your closest friend?

2017: three years. 2020: we’re going on 6 years jaksdf i’ll be maid of honor in her wedding this year. i also have another friend that i failed to mention last time but we’ve been close for 9 years (jfc)

016. superpower you’d like to have?

2017: invisibility 2020: mind reading so i know who’s Fake jaklsdjf

017. celebrity you’d like to meet?

2017: john stamos ?? idk i never really thought about it. i’ve met michael phelps though!! 2020: ig i’ll stick with stamos?? ooh or steve carrell or jennifer aniston. 

018. guilty pleasures

2017: chocolate and french fries. i love love love french fries. 2020: now my guilty pleasure is dr. pepper bc i cut it out of my diet.

019. pet peeves

2017: mouth noises (misophonia). people talking over each other and not listeninG. lowkey people leaving the toilet seat up or leaving toilet paper in the toilet like…just flush again. 2020: i really went off on tp huh?? another pet peeve is people committing to something then backing out/flaking without a heads up

020. do you have any hobbies?

2017: sports !!! i’m a grade a heaux for sports. tennis, archery, golf. anything that doesn’t require lots of muscle ya feel. one of my ~hobbies~ i guess is organizing things. i have multiple planners and use them all daily. 2020: i miss how sporty n active i was jkasdf this is my hobby.

021. where would you like to live in the future?

2017: i would looooooove to live in san diego but i’ll probs be stuck in the desert drylands. 2020: tbh i was looking into memphis homes bc it’s cheap compared to here but i don’t really care where i end up. just want a place of my own yknow

022. tell us a story about a thing that recently happened to you! it can be a funny, scary, sad story, your pick!

2017: redacted bc it was college angst lmao and not pretty 2020: i found out this morning that my cell phone # is somehow linked to some random guy a few miles away and idk how to fix it online. got some texts today and yesterday this one guy called me 6 times back to back while i was on the phone with someone else. i guess that’s another pet peeve of mine, pls leave a message if it’s important jaklsdf

#hshqtask005 #really had to go back n look at 20 year old me #who tf was i #how did u tolerate me

[mechaphoenixrising]

Color oracle

I don’t usually make any sort of personal posts, but today, the Color Oracle test came across my dash again. Out of curiousity, I decided to take it, since I didn’t remember my previous results, and it was uncannily accurate.

(Of course, I took it again later with completely bogus color choices, and that result was still uncannily accurate, so I think the algorithm is skewed to spit out something vague enough and yet meaningful enough that people generally will accept whatever is given to them. Still. It made me reflect on where I am, where I’ve been, and where I’d like to go.)

I don’t expect anyone to read this, least of all the ones I’d really want to read this, but it’s still worth putting my thoughts down for later reference and reflection.

First, the negative, aka where I’ve been:

I’m currently $5000 away from paying off a $15000 credit card debt, accumulated over three and a half years of not working, living at home with my stepmom (henceforth referred to as Mom) and brother, and trying to pull my own weight regardless. In May of 2015, I left my job as a Program Manager with Microsoft in Seattle because my Mom needed help with her construction startup, I missed my family a ton, and I was feeling empty inside, despite having the American dream with a good 401k, amazing six figure salary, and an extremely cushy job with benefits (health insurance galore!). I figured I had a lot of buffer room, between stocks, my $20k in savings, and my 401k plan.

It’s all gone. I spent it all. Don’t ask me how. I won’t tell you the specifics. Just know that three and a half years living at home with a family that really doesn’t know how to budget or delay gratification wasn’t good for my personal finances. And I’m not blaming them. I couldn’t and wouldn’t say no, especially when I had the need and desire to pull my own weight and help out as much as I could.

Thankfully, I’ve been employed again since the beginning of the year at this awesome tech startup where I’m surrounded by wonderful people and amazing work. I have health insurance now, and will gladly pay into Colorado’s Medicaid program for the rest of my life. It saved me when I was diagnosed with narcolepsy in 2016 and paid for expensive sleep tests and stimulant medications.

I pay $800 a month for rent, $200 a month for student loans, and $2000 a month into my credit card bills. I drive a car that my dad lent me, haven’t bought new clothes since I left home last October, and my biggest purchase this year has been a refurbished Nintendo Switch, which I’m so grateful for. I could probably be more frugal and pay off my credit card bill a little faster, but I decided to enjoy myself at least a little along the way. Ever since I let it slip to my boyfriend that I owed so much money, he hasn’t felt right about letting me pay for half of our dates, but I want to. I need to be self-sufficient and stop taking from other people, especially when I can spare the extra. Even though I owe a lot, I’m not in scarcity mode. I’ve just reprioritized.

I slept on an air mattress for two months at the beginning of this year until my landlord told me I could use his extra mattress. I bought dishes from Goodwill and rummaged amongst my boxes of belongings for things that would make my new room feel like home. I taught myself to make wirewrapped earrings and necklaces so I wouldn’t feel the desire to buy anything sparkly. I went back to eating vegetable stirfry for every meal so that I wouldn’t want to buy takeout all the time. I visit my great-grandparents on the weekend so I don’t stay home filled with want or, what would be worse, hit the town in search of expensive but ephemeral thrills.

Once my credit card and student loans are paid off, I plan to start an IRA or 401k again, as well as an HSA (narcolepsy meds aren’t cheap, yo!), maybe buy my own used car so I can give my dad his car back before the end of the year.

I’ve taken one day off from work this year. Now that I’ve typed that out, even I recognize that’s not good. Maybe I’ll take my birthday off. I’m already planning a trip to the Bay Area in October or November. Even if things are a little tight right now, there are good times ahead, and there are good times now.

...This turned out to be much longer than I expected. More later.

#self post #color oracle #debt #finances #everything's gonna be just fine

[delanceyxbrothers]

All I Ask

Lucille never truly understood the meaning of ‘no strings attached’ until she met Jack Kelly

AKA

For someone who has lived through everyone she knows asking something of her, Lucille can’t help but question why this time feels so different.

TW for references of past child abuse, rape, and abusive relationships. The Jack Kelly in question is @dimenovelhero who, y’know, is literally Jack Kelly.

If there was one person— or, in her case, two people— who Lucille would always have to rely on, it was her brothers. Oscar was a typical middle child, enough fights and squabbles between them to rival the Senate, but he fought for his sister as much as he fought against her. He was her right hand man, the one person on the world she could always count on to have her back in any fight, the only person she trusted to see her at her weakest. All Lucille had to do was call for Oscar, and she knew she would have someone to lean on and share the burden of responsibility. Even before he’d quit school— something she still didn’t forgive herself for—he’d been the person she went to when the rent money was a few cents short, someone to hold the house together while she went shopping, and someone who watched their baby brother like a goddamn hawk— even in the times when she would rather he separate himself from Morris.

She couldn’t blame him for the protectiveness— the youngest Delancey had captured her heart with one look of his big, blue eyes. All he would have to do is ask, and she’d do anything for him without question. Morris has his own version of care as well, a playful nickname on his lips at the same time that he searched her tired face for anything he could do to help. God, the boy had learned to cook in order to take some stress off of her shoulders, and he’d easily surpassed her in both skill and knowledge on his own. She’d been there from the day he was born, always ready to reach out a hand when he needed it— even more than their father had ever tried to do.

Phineas Delancey was not a cold man, but an unstable explosion waiting to happen, all heat and fire and flames. There were times where he seemed stable, when he held down a job and hid his drinking from their mother, but a temper to rival a hurricane was always lurking just beneath the surface. He was a bastard, and a drunk, and a womanizer; but he was also her father, the only one she’d ever get to have. After their mother left, it had been her job to help him as much as it was hers to watch over her brothers— the tables turning as the child became the parent. She spent nights worrying about his emotional state, whether or not he would find something wrong enough with the apartment to warrant a punishment, if he would be able to keep this factory job long enough to keep food on the table. If he was happy, they were safe, and she spent every second trying to keep her little brothers safe. There were times when her apartment became messy and she could feel herself tense every time someone walked by her door, expecting a key in the lock and heavy boots at the door despite knowing only her brothers had a key, and her father would never hurt her again.

After years of dealing with her father’s tumultuous ups and downs, living with their uncle should have been easy. Hell, it should have been a goddamned vacation away from the pain and guilt of the past two years since Abigail Delancey decided her vows to her husband and children could be thrown away for a life of peace and mutual love and respect— something even Lucille could hardly blame her for. Still, Elijah Wiesel was a mystery that his niece could never solve. With her father, it was easy to know what would set him off; just keep food on the table and the apartment beyond spotless, and he won’t use his belt. With her uncle, things were muddled. He didn’t want a picture perfect home for the neighbors to see, but for her to be perfect— or, at least, the kind of perfect her mother had never achieved in his eyes. Every inch of her appearance was from her father except for her eyes, and he could see it with little trouble. He wanted her to be everything her mother hadn’t been, but expected her to fail. The exhausting paradox left her working herself half to death, stress and desperation seeping out of every pore as she tried fruitlessly to balance his impossible expectations with her exhausting daily schedule.

He used their money to fulfill his own desires, never once putting them first. To him, letting them live in his house was enough of an excuse to drink and gamble away their salary— and, if the money didn’t cover rent at the end of the month, it was them who suffered. They were an expense he regretted taking on, and it showed to the point that his niece lost all faith in his ability to help, her money stashed away where no one else could find it. Even Morris’ learning how to cook or Oscar taking over the laundry when he could wasn’t enough to keep the circles out from under her eyes, determination driving her to any extent necessary to protect her family when no one else would.

It was no wonder Snyder had been able to spin his web before she knew the danger. She wore her fears and failures on her sleeve, and he easily used them, sneaking under her skin while she thought she would have something to gain from him. One night became another, and another, before he managed to steal the better part of a year from her. Not just the year— time being the easiest thing to give him— but every part of Lucille she had to give: her body, her peace of mind, her affection, her heart, even her soul. It was all his to take, with what scraps of affection and care he thought to give her only gain.

Everything about him was a transaction. The shallow compliments only came when she wanted to go home, gifts appearing at her work when she tired of the games he tried to play with her, insults and threats fading into sweet nothings when she started to cry. Even the smallest hint of love— although it could barely be called that— came with a cost, something she had to do or say to keep him interested in a relationship she had no urge to continue. He took and he took and he took, without giving Lucille anything but bruises and tears and hate filling her chest. The price of keeping her family safe was every inch of herself, picked apart and used for his gain. It didn’t take long for her to realize what kind of game they were involved in, the lure of alcohol and a chance to black it all out more enticing than anything the man had to offer. He didn’t want to wed her any more than she wanted to bed him, and she knew it. They were caught in a dangerous game of tug-of-war, with her heart and soul as the rope, and it didn’t take long until she began to fray at the edges. Lucille was no fool, she knew what kind of man she was provoking, but there were times when making him angry was the only thing she knew to do. She wanted him to hurt her on purpose, to call her names and insult her, because then she had a reason to hate him— something she desperately needed every time she had to walk to his door as if she had any choice. If he hit her, she could hit back; if he called her a whore, she could release the anger she had been biting back. It was a war she could never win, but being a victor for a battle or two kept her sated, kept her from letting the bitterness in her heart break through, and that was all she could ask for.

Then, there was Jack Kelly. Lucille was no stranger to dating or flirting, but he was something else entirely. There were no rules or systems in place, not like with everyone else she had known. Even the most innocent relationships, boys from Brooklyn who called her pretty and newsboys from Manhattan who flirted with the hopes that she would buy a paper, were all because of what they wanted. Just like everyone else, they wanted her time, or her body, or her heart. That’s what made Jack so incredible to Lucille: he didn’t ask anything of her. Jack brought more to her than he had ever asked of her. He brought his boys— Blink, who always teased and tested his boundaries while still respecting that she was Jack’s girl; Crutchy, who seemed to carry sunshine in a smile and laugh and joke to make her day better; Les, whose ‘poor orphan boy’ act was enough to melt her heart and make her laugh harder than she had in years— and the welcoming chaos that came with them. She wouldn’t give up Blink’s teasing requests for a dance, or Crutchy’s heartfelt compliments on her costumes, or Les’ excitable commentary on whatever show she was working on in the theatre, because it made the theatre feel like home.

The most important part was that Jack brought himself to her. Not just Jack Kelly, cowboy and strike leader; but also Francis Sullivan, the convict’s son who would do anything for his boys. He was real, and caring, and he didn’t want to take her time and heart, but share his with her. He didn’t wrap an arm around her or hold her tight because he wanted her to love him, but because he loved her, and it showed in the softness of his touch and the warmth in his eyes. If she fell asleep in his arms, she knew it was because she trusted him to protect her until morning. He was more than just a fling, but her best friend, someone who brightened her day just by walking into the room. He made her laugh, and smile, and offered her a shoulder to cry on or someone to turn to when the rest of her world was in shambles. She’d protect him from anything, but he never expected it from her, and that was what made her love him.

He wasn’t her brothers, who needed someone to watch them until they were old enough to take care of themselves; or her father, who needed her to keep the house running when he pushed his wife into someone else’s arms; or her uncle, who needed her to be someone she wasn’t and expected her to fail. He wasn’t Snyder either, who wanted more than she had, and took it without giving Lucille anything in return but anger and bitterness.

He was Jack Kelly, someone who opened his heart to her without expecting hers in return, and offered her love and safety when she finally trusted him enough to do the same. He was gentle, and caring, and wild, and funny, and everything she had ever craved throughout her life. He was solid ground after years of stormy seas, and she was the same thing for him. She gave him an out that wasn’t found in a train station, while she quietly set money aside for the day he decided to follow his sunset to Santa Fe. It was balance, and unselfish, and everything she had ever prayed for.

Most of all, it was Jack, and that was all she could ever ask for.

#I MENTIONED I WAS WRITING ABOUT OUR BOY JACK KELLY #BECAUSE HER HAVING UNSELFISH LOVE AND SHARING IT IS SO DANG IMPORTANT #rape tw #abuse tw #queue

[pettybkang]

HESITATE

Group: GOT7. 

Pairing: Y/N + Jackson Wang. 

Genre: Fluff, comedy, romance. 

Word count: 6k+ 

Description: Your best friend is getting married. Finally! But your only ride to her wedding is her noisy annoying older brother. So much can happen while driving from Vegas to LA. 

Inspired by this gifset. 

 [4:30PM] Don’t hate me. -SW 

[4:31PM] I can’t hate someone that is getting married two days from now. What happened? -Y/N [4:31PM] It’s about your ride to the wedding. -SW Only my brother’s car is left. -SW With my brother in it. -SW Your ride is with my brother. -SW 

[4:36PM] I was wrong. I can hate someone that is getting married two days from now. -Y/N

[4:38PM] I promise I’m saving you two bottles of whatever you want? -SW

[4:39PM] Half hate then. -Y/N

As soon as the conversation was done, Y/N pretty much threw her phone in frustration. The only reason she wouldn’t simply punch her friend was because the girl really was getting married in two days and a black eye wouldn’t look pretty in her wedding photos. And Youngjae would yell at her. She’s not a big fan of Youngjae yelling at her. No one is a big fan of that anyway.

Sophie and Youngjae were about to get married after a couple years of dating and a lot of mental breakdowns about finally settling down with someone for the rest of their lives. They were getting married in Los Angeles, somewhere near the beach and pet friendly. Her dress was a lot of shades of lilac and his suit was explendid. Their friends and family were the ones invited to the wedding and around a hundred and fifty people would be attending.

Y/N was one of the bridesmaids, being friends with Sophie for ages now it was an obvious choice. The not so obvious choice was to pair up Y/N with Sophie’s brother, Jackson, as he was one of Youngjae’s best man. It made absolutely no sense to Y/N, she texted Sophie several times about it and all the girl could reply was ‘you’re both single! I’m sorry!’. It was such a poor excuse it fitted Sophie perfectly.

After months of planning, of stressing out and of eating so much cake, they would be getting married. In two days. And now Y/N found out her ride to the wedding was no one but Sophie’s loud older brother. Life of the party. Someone who would never in any circumstance let the party die. Jackson Wang. All Y/N knew was that she wasn’t ready for the four hour drive from Las Vegas to Los Angeles. She was dreading the day she moved to Vegas to work - the exact same city Jackson lives, also because of work.

[4:45PM] He should pick up you tomorrow at 10. -SW 

[4:50PM] Your most expensive champagne. I want two bottles of that. -Y/N

[4:52PM] Yeah. I knew I had it coming. -SW

It was around 10:45am the next day and Jackson hadn’t come to pick her up yet. Y/N was all packed, sitting on the steps in front of her apartment building, sunglasses on, headphones on, waiting for the blond loud man to show up. She was going to murder the Wang siblings. Both of them. Don’t they understand the concept of being on time? At all? 10 am means 10 am. 

She was about to start cursing their tenth generation of grandkids when a black Kia Quoris parked in front of her apartment building. The music was so loud Y/N would hear it through her own headphones. With a frown, she paused her own music and took the headphones out and that’s when she noticed the blond running out of the car, stopping right in front of her and swearing.

“Shit! I’m sorry I’m late. Did you wait long? I’m so sorry,” he was standing right in front of her as she tried to look up at him, the sun right behind his head wasn’t helping much. The fact that he was rambling wasn’t either. “I forgot half of my things at home. Then I had to pick them up. When I was done, Sophie asked for extra things. I swear, I hate my sister-”

“That’s something we can agree on,” she finally said, standing up and grabbing her bags, moving towards the car. Jackson was left with a confused face, staring at Y/N. “We both hate your sister right now,” she added when she noticed she had left Jackson without further explanation. He simply laughed, shaking his head and moving to help her get her bags inside of the car so they would leave Vegas.

When she got into the car, she noticed that it sure as hell looked expansive and for a second she couldn’t remember what Jackson did for a living. And then she did. Damn Wang family. Owners of half of the Chinese restaurants in the west side of the USA. Jackson was the cook in one of them, the one in Vegas, and Sophie was the one taking care of their marketing team that was settled in LA - no one could trust that girl in a kitchen, her mother would always tell Youngjae that they would have to live out of ramen. Y/N had moved to Vegas to work too, but in another restaurant. An Italian one. Just as big and expensive as Jackson’s if anyone is asking.

Even though the salaries were compatible, she didn’t have a car just as loud as his personality. How can someone have a car that matches one’s personality in noise and annoyance? She had no idea what song he was listening to, but it wasn’t English. And it was definitely a girl group.

“Okay. We’re all done,” he said, getting into the car and putting his own sunglasses on. “I’m only gonna stop at McDonald’s to grab a milkshake…” he said as he was starting the car, making Y/N groan and roll her eyes.

“We’re never getting to LA on time for the wedding.”

  They made three other stops after the milkshake. Number one was because Jackson had forgotten his phone charger, number two was because he needed to stop at his restaurant to check something and number three was because it was so fucking late they stopped to have lunch. 

Y/N had told him to just go through another drive thru if he was hungry and grab a burger, but apparently it was a Wang Family Tradition ™ to eat sushi before long road trips so they ended up stopping to eat some. At least Jackson begged to pay and the lost guilty puppy face he made had Y/N thinking about all the wrongs he had done so far and forgiving him for pretty much half of it.

Lunch wasn’t actually that bad. They received several texts from the couple getting married tomorrow, asking them where they were, how the trip was going and several things that they simply replied with ‘we’re still in Vegas’. Youngjae sent Jackson several texts about being on time and it wasn’t a big surprise when Sophie’s only reply was ‘k. drive safe!’

When they finally left Vegas, it was around 2PM. They were supposed to be getting to LA around 3PM that day, but it was obvious that they were going to be late. Youngjae had called all of their responsible friends - aka Jaebum and Jinyoung - to scold Jackson about not being on time, but all their calls were missed since the blond was driving and wasn’t a fan of putting his phone on speaker.

“Do you want me to change the music?” he finally asked after they had been in the car for half an hour, the girl group songs still playing. “You can connect your phone to the radio if you want,” he said and Y/N frowned because Jackson looked serious for a second, paying attention to the road in front of them, not humming to his songs as he had been while they were driving around in the city.

“I guess… Maybe something in English,” she said, going through her songs to find something that both of them could sing along to and while she was looking for it, she could hear the loud laugh coming from his side of the car.

“Shit,” he said softly, laughing some more. “I had no idea I was listening to Red Velvet again. Their songs are just so dancy though. It’s good to drive and listen to them, makes waking up in the morning way more fun,” he added, making Y/N laugh.

“As if. Happy songs in the morning are just annoying. You need fight songs to wake up, you know? Songs that make you feel like breaking everything. A wall especially,” she said, punching one of her hands with the other right after she had settled for a song from her own phone. It wasn’t a fight song and it wasn’t a happy song.

“Are we going to listen to four hours of emo?” Jackson said the moment the song started, making Y/N roll her eyes and simply groan. Loud. Loud enough for him to understand how frustrated she was.

“I knew I couldn’t trust you with good music.”

  There isn’t much to do while you’re driving through the desert besides listening to music and talk. And Y/N refused to do the later. That was Sophie’s older brother she would have to do the talking to and honestly? She had no idea how someone could stand being in the same room as Jackson for more than two minutes. Sophie would always tell her that Jackson isn’t always like that - loud and outgoing - but she had never seen him quiet before.

I mean… Until now. She had never seen him quiet until now. He was driving calmly as if that was something he was meant to do, a talent even and for a second Y/N caught herself imagining him cooking. Being a chef herself, she knew some people changed when they were immersed in the kitchen and she wondered if Jackson was one of those people. Without thinking much about it, the question simply left her lips. “When did you decide to become a chef?”

She cursed herself for asking. The silence and the emo songs - according to Jackson - were pleasing and she could deal with them for the next hours, but no. She had to ask. She had to be curious and now Jackson would probably yell his answer back at her.

“Uh… I don’t know,” he started, still paying attention to the road. His voice quieter than usual, making Y/N frown. “My mom would always ask me to help her with dinner. She isn’t the healthiest person there is, so I would always help. Soph would too, but she isn’t as good. And when I say that I mean Youngjae will probably die of food poisoning if he ever eats something she has cooked,” he laughed. Y/N couldn’t believe her friend was such a horrible cook and Jackson noticed that in the silence. “I mean it, she’s horrible. But anyway… I used to cook with my mother all the time. Then when the opportunity came, we opened a small restaurant. Now we have a lot of big restaurants,” he shrugged.

“That simple, uh?” she said, raising an eyebrow and staring at him.

“It wasn’t that simple. It was pretty hard actually, but eh. The hardest part is over, it’s better to think about the future and what’s to come. I’m pretty sure Dumbledore told us to not waste time on the past,” he shrugged, smiling and glanced at her for a second.

“Did you just mention Harry Potter in a conversation about restaurants?”

“Maybe.”

“Unbelievable.”

The car fell silent for a moment and around them there was only the desert still. Y/N was starting to worry they wouldn’t be on time for the rehearsal dinner and Sophie would murder both of them for it. Even though the bride herself will probably not be on time.

“Hey. Honesty hour…” Jackson called and before Y/N could say anything or tell him to fuck off, he continued. “Do you think Youngjae and Soph are good together?”

The question caught Y/N out of guard. Was Jackson seriously worrying about his sister? Loud Jackson? Life of the party Jackson? Rich boy with a loud car Jackson? She sighed, closing her eyes and shrugging for a moment. “They are annoyingly perfect together,” she said, making him laugh. Her laugh followed, making the girl shake her head and roll her eyes. “Wasn’t he your friend though? I mean, she told me they met because of you.”

“Kinda. Youngjae and Jaebum are pretty much tied to the hip. And Jaebum is one of my best friends. So yeah. That happened. Now he’s marrying my sister,” he shrugged, looking at Y/N with a smile. A beautiful smile she had never paid much attention to, but what is there to pay attention when you’re stuck in a car, right? And damn. What a beautiful smile that was.

“Right. Well. Yeah…” she started, feeling her cheeks burn because of that damn smile, looking away towards the road. “If he hurts my friend, I’m blaming you.”

Jackson laughed, shaking his head and shrugging.

Sophie better have those two bottles of champagne ready. Y/N plans on drowning in them the moment they reach LA. And if her friend ever decides to marry ever again, she’s going to make her promise that she will pay for plane tickets so she doesn’t get stuck in the same car as beautiful smile Jackson ever again.

  The second hour was over and they were half way through this hell of a road trip when both phones started ringing like crazy. The phones pretty much blew up with texts and calls and if someone was trying to send a smoke signal, the phones were trying to detect it. 

When Y/N finally found Jackson’s phone, it was Youngjae’s number calling him while Sophie was calling on her phone. And with one look both knew to answer Youngjae first.

“Hello?” Y/N answered Jackson’s phone, ignoring her friend for a second, figuring she would be right next to her soon to be husband - who both Jackson and Y/N hoped would be much calmer about the fact that they were four hours late.

“Tell me you two are closer to LA than we think you are,” were the first words Youngjae said.

“Depends how close you think we are?”

“Thirty minutes from here?”

“Try two hours,” Y/N replied and the groan that came from the other side of the line was audible even for Jackson who was hearing from the driver’s seat.

“Sophie just realized Jackson is driving you here. And she’s used to Jackson being late but I don’t think she’s used to you being late?” and right when Y/N was about to reply, she could hear her friend pretty much yelling from the other side of the line with her husband. Being loud was definitely a Wang Family Tradition ™ too. “Please tell me he hasn’t kidnapped you and is taking you to China! Or worse, Canada!” were the first words Sophie said when she stole the phone from her soon to be husband.

“We left Nevada already if that makes you feel any better? We’re in California. Two hours away from Los Angeles. I think I saw a sign to Barstown,” Y/N tried to make her friend calm down a little. She definitely sounded like a bride now. When both her bridesmaid and best man were stuck in the highway.

“Put me on speaker,” Sophie said and when she got the confirmation that her brother could hear her, she started the speech. “Jackson Wang. If my friend doesn’t get here in less than three hours safe and sound for this damn rehearsal dinner I swear to all things holy that I’m sending both Jaebum and Bambam after you. I don’t know why I said Bambam instead of Jinyoung, but now I can’t change that,” she said, taking a deep breath to try and sound more threatening than before. “You were supposed to be here two hours ago! How can you be four hours late?! I understand when it’s Christmas because who cares about Christmas eve when the presents are given on Christmas morning, but a rehearsal dinner is a rehearsal dinner, Jackson. It’s important, do you hear me? Be here in three hours. Or I’m sending your friends to get you,” and before Jackson could say anything else, she hung up.

Y/N put her phone down. Stared at it for a couple seconds and then started laughing. And Jackson followed. He had to pull over because laughing that hard couldn’t be safe. After a couple minutes, both Y/N and Jackson were hurting because of how much both had laughed. “Shit. I don’t think I’ve ever heard her this angry with you before. She’s usually all ‘he isn’t that bad’ or ‘Jackson is sweeter than you think’ and now… Damn,” Y/N couldn’t stop laughing and neither could Jackson.

“I think she finally realized she’s getting married in less than twenty four hours. And we’re not there yet. She’s going to kill me so bad,” he added, biting on his lower lip to try and stop laughing so they could start driving towards Los Angeles again.

A few miles ahead and the third hour was done. And Y/N couldn’t help but think about Jackson’s laugh. And that this road trip - despite the horrible beginning - wasn’t that bad. They were having fun, laughing and talking about several things. Without meaning to, Y/N ended up getting to know Sophie’s brother a bit more than she wanted to. She got to know the Jackson Sophie would always talk about, the sweeter, quieter and more serious version of him - even though it was impossible for him to be serious for more than five minutes. In a few hours, when Sophie asks her how the trip was, she was obviously not going to say that being stuck in a car with Jackson Wang was actually nice. Even if that’s how she felt right now.

  The last hour of driving to LA was filled with laugh and texts from every single friend they had in common. Even the Wang mother was texting them, worried not about Jackson being late but about Sophie getting into a car and coming to Y/N’s rescue from wherever they were. And to help them some more, there was traffic. The trip that was supposed to last four hours, lasted five. And Youngjae was about to send the army after them when Y/N texted Sophie a photo of LA’s welcome sign. 

They were late. Very late. Extremely late. But still in time for the rehearsal dinner. The moment they parked in front of the place they were having the wedding the next day, Sophie ran towards her friend to hug her.

“Are you okay? Alive? Breathing? You’re never riding the same car as Jackson again. Never. Again,” she kept on saying as she pretty much dragged her friend by the arm inside the place.

“It wasn’t that bad…” Y/N started but the look she got from Sophie quickly stopped her from saying anything else. There was both anger and mischief in that look and Y/N had no way to interpret that right now. All they knew was that Soph would be married to Youngjae in less than twelve hours now and it was a miracle they were both still alive and not freaking out under a table. 

Jackson had to deal with Youngjae who dragged him inside too but towards the bar. All the best men were waiting for him there, all their friends from childhood. Jaebum and Jinyoung looked both worried and angry, Yugyeom looked like he had just gotten there, Bambam was taking a selfie - let’s repeat that one more time, Bambam was taking a selfie - and Mark looked like he spent the entire afternoon laughing at everyone’s drama but was also about to jump Jackson’s neck in a second.

After a couple drinks from the boy’s side and a full bottle from the girl’s side, they left to the dinner. The food was good, their parents’ cried, the mothers hug each other and all the friends couldn’t stop feeling like tomorrow would be one of the happiest days of their lives. Youngjae wasn’t the first of them to get married, but when the ray of sunshine of the groups decides he’s going to spent the rest of his life with someone, you pay close attention.

The speeches weren’t rehearsed in front of the bride and the groom - especially because they had no idea there would be speeches. Jackson and Y/N had decided on the last hour in the car to write something together that night. Sophie and Youngjae had such a crazy funny story they thought sharing it was their gift to the world so later that night when everyone went to bed, Y/N sneaked into Jackson’s room in the hotel they were staying to the speech could be written.

  They ordered a bottle of wine and two bottles of water. It wouldn’t be clever to show up late and hungover to Sophie’s wedding. She’s still Jackson’s sister and the grudge she would hold would last at least three generations, upsetting her even further wasn’t an option here. That’s one of the reasons they were writing a speech, reason number two was because after talking so much in the car they decided that they could do this together. They had more in common than they had thought. Writing a speech should be easy.  

Jackson was in sweatpants and a black tank top, Y/N was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. It was spring in LA and that meant air conditioner was a must. They were both sitting on the floor, his laptop was open and they were brainstorming ideas. Should they talk about Youngjae’s laugh when he’s around Sophie? Should they talk about the smile on her face whenever Youngjae makes a stupid joke? Or should they talk about how the two met: at a freaking aquarium staring at otters?  The wine was over, the bottles of water two and they had written exactly two lines and they went like this:

“We are all gathered here today to celebrate a wedding. Two of our closest and best friends are getting married to each other. Gross. Cute, but gross, right?”

They decided to delete those two lines before it was too late.

It didn’t take long for them to order another bottle of wine and for the conversation to go somewhere else. Soon Jackson was talking about his job as a chef and his life in Vegas, how weird it was to actually live in that city. They started sharing experiences, talking about their jobs, about Vegas, about how they ended up in that city anyway. When bottle number two was over they were laying down on the floor, side by side, computer on the bed and empty bottle on the table. They weren’t drunk, but tipsy was a word.

In a moment of pure drunk blindness, Y/N raised her hand and poked one of Jackson’s shoulders. He frowned, looking at her who was frowning and inspecting the shoulder quietly, concentrating and then poked again.

“How is this shoulder even possible?” she asked, still frowning.

“I might work out from time to time,” he said, moving his hand to poke her frown, laughing softly at her confused face. “You frown too much.”

“It’s because you are a very confusing person,” she shrugged, poking his arm now and then giving up, laying on her back and staring at the ceiling. She sighed, closing her eyes and started to feel the wine making her a bit drunker than before. “Besides, your sister is getting married in a couple hours.”

“So?” he laid on his side to look at her, waiting to see where that thought was leading them.

“You should be writing a speech. Because I can’t write one to save my life. I mean, I can tell her she has a very hot brother that happens to be quite nice when he’s stuck in a car and can’t do much yelling and that I would go on a date with him if he asked me to, but I don’t think that would be a very smart wedding speech now, would it?” she said, shrugging. The room became quiet for a second and then Jackson started laughing, shaking his head and laying down on his back again.

“Yeah. I don’t think I can tell my sister her friend isn’t as petty and pretentious as I thought she was in a wedding speech.”

Y/N sat up quickly, looking down at Jackson and frowning one more time. “You thought I was pretentious? And petty? Woah, woah. Bad Jackson Wang!” she pointed at him, shaking her head. She felt a bit dizzy because of the full bottle of wine, sighing and standing up.

“Sorry, alright. Here, lemme help you? I’ll be good Jackson Wang,” he chuckled. Y/N just shrugged and let him take her back to her room. They giggled all the way to the third floor, stumbling in the hall and trying to be quiet so they wouldn’t wake up the other people around them.

Jackson didn’t walk into the room with Y/N but the smile on his face showed he wasn’t sad about the drive and the talk. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “See you tomorrow. Have good dreams,” he pretty much whispered with his lips still touching her skin. Y/N nodded and walked into the room, waving goodbye. Did Jackson feel like floating on his way back to his room? Maybe. Did Y/N feel like she was sleeping on clouds that night? Also maybe.

  Y/N didn’t expect it, but the moment she heard the phone the next morning she figured it was Sophie. Or at least her doing, because it was the hotel’s phone ringing. The receptionist on the other side of the line told her that the bride had asked him to wake up all the bridesmaids and the best men at nine that morning.

It was an afternoon wedding as it was expected of spring, but they had so much to do that it was obvious that Sophie had been up and running since five am. Their parents pretty much prohibited Youngjae and Sophie to sleep in the same bedroom the night before the wedding, so Y/N simply knew her friend had stayed up all night making last minute check ups and probably crying about her dress. And the wedding. And everything. She didn’t have much time to think about her night with Jackson though, but when it hit her she was in the elevator to get some breakfast.

Did she really tell him she wanted to go on a date with him? Who the hell does that? Drunk Y/N needs to be controlled. What a nice girl to be friends with, what a horrible girl when it comes to keeping her mouth shut about hot guys. At least she didn’t start a fight because of a soccer team this time. After a lot of frowning and groaning at the elevator - and the knowledge that the security team was probably watching her and laughing - Y/N made it to breakfast. That’s where she found Sophie.

The curly haired girl was sitting by herself in the corner. Y/N knew something was up because she was drinking coffee and Sophie doesn’t drink coffee. She made sure to grab her own breakfast first because she knew she wouldn’t be able to get up once she sat down.

“Sleep is necessary for everybody. Even for you,” was the first thing she sat when she sat down. Sophie looked up from her phone, shrugging a little and then sipping from the coffee cup.

“I had a couple hours of rest. My parents didn’t let me sleep in the same room as Youngjae but they didn’t say anything about Skype. We talked a lot and I was able to sleep. He also made me promise I wouldn’t yell at anybody today and we ended up settling for three people only. My brother, my mother and Bambam. Those are the people I’m allowed to yell at,” Sophie shrugged, chuckling a little and stealing a cookie from Y/N’s plate, shrugging one more time.

If only she wasn’t getting married today, Y/N would kill her for that cookie.

“Why am I not on the list? I’m usually yelled at in situations like this.”

“Jackson made the cut first. And because I want some information…” and then the same look from yesterday was back. The look that had some mischief hiding underneath. “How come the trip with Jackson wasn’t that bad, uh? You wanted to kill me for putting you two in the same car. Don’t think I didn’t notice you two laughing and giggling and all smiles,” she said, pointing at Y/N with her cup before taking another sip from it.

“I guess you were right about your brother…” Y/N tried, making Sophie laugh and shake her head. The bride could say what she wanted, she could say that she knew Y/N would fall for her brother at some point, she simply knew they were actually too similar. The ride to the wedding wasn’t a plan though, it simply happened because fate is weird as hell, but when it did… Sophie made sure to forget to buy plane tickets.

“I’m always right, you know that,” Sophie laughed and finished her coffee. She waited until Y/N was done with her breakfast, both girls catching up on gossip and laughing about a couple stories they had to tell each other. Once breakfast was over, they moved to the stressing part of the day: getting ready.

Youngjae was supposed to entertain the parents and take them for lunch. Jackson and all the other boys were supposed to help. Sophie, Y/N and all the other bridesmaids would be spending the day in a spa to get ready.

As Sophie’s dress was several shades of lavender, the bridesmaids were encouraged to find a dress that suited them best and in purple. Same thing with the tie and socks of the best men. The colours of the wedding were lavender and several shades of blue. It was gorgeous and the sun was shining and everything was going according to plan.

That doesn’t mean the bride wasn’t running around and late when the time for the wedding arrived. Jackson and Y/N were exchanging texts about the status of the groom and the bride. Sophie still didn’t have her make up done and Youngjae somehow managed to lose his tie. When Sophie was ready and getting inside the car, Youngjae was tying his shoes inside the venue already. Bambam got a call from the bride only so she could use her last yelling card of the day and yell at him for not giving her updates on Youngjae and her parents, the young boy did sound a bit confused when he gave the information to Youngjae a couple minutes later.

In the end, everything was beautiful. Sophie walked towards her soon to be husband by herself, no man needed to carry her to the sunshine of her life. (Her father was upset for a single moment when she told him, but then the explanation had him way too proud of her to care.) Jackson started crying the moment he saw his sister as if that was his cue and Y/N - who he had been paired up with - moved slightly closer to hold his hand, she figured she could after the kiss she had gotten the night before.

Jackson looked at her, frowning a little and when she thought he was actually going to move away, he pressed his lips against the back of her hand and smiled. His attention turning back to his sister as he continued to cry.

They exchanged vows and both were crying messes when they spoke. Sophie promising to take care of Coco and Youngjae promising to never stay away from home for more than a month - he is a singer, traveling is part of the job. She promised to stop being such a workaholic and he promised to never stop making her laugh. It was both soft and romantic. Yugyeom and Bambam called it gross later, but they were both lucky only Mark heard them.

Then came the kiss. Slow, tasting like tears, trying not to ruin the makeup, the hair, the suit, the dress, making them laugh at the end, making everyone cheer and making whoever it was that was crying, cry some more. Right after they broke apart, everyone who was near them ran for the hug - Jackson being the first to do so and pretty much smoother the couple in his arms. Y/N couldn’t help but smile at that man, so much love to give Jackson Wang was definitely a Jackson she wanted to see more of.

  Five hours later, a couple bottles of champagne and the now husband and wife’s dance, they were all too drunk to care about high heels and ties. Food had been served, most people had forgotten about their shoes already, the cake had been cut and neither Sophie or Youngjae had had spare time to actually taste it. They had been dancing together and drinking together since the dance floor was available. Laughing and having fun as it had always been with those two.

Friends came and went away a lot, but the two were still dancing with everyone who felt like dancing and drinking with them. It was obvious they were each other’s best friends. Y/N and Jackson had found the perfect spot to sit for a wine: right next to the bar. The bridesmaids all had access to some secret drinks Sophie had chosen just for them and Y/N was thanking her friend for that. She had had everything from Sex on the Beach to Mimosas and even some crazy shots in the last three hours of party. And, of course, her two bottles of the most expensive champagne the bride owned.

“I’m free next Thursday,” Jackson said out of a sudden, making Y/N frown as he sipped from the bottle - yes, the bottle - of champagne she was drinking. “And you’re frowning again. I mean for that date. I’m free next Thursday.”

She had to think so she wouldn’t spill the drink or even choke on it. It took her a while to process the information, biting on her lower lip and feeling her cheeks burn. “Yeah, uh… I guess… I could be free on Thursday too. What about, uh, lunch?” she tried to sound like she wasn’t nervous, as if going on dates with guys such as Jackson Wang happened to her all the time. What a pro ™ she was when it came to dates, look at her.

“I know this Chinese restaurant-” he started and soon he felt a slap on his arm.

“You’re not taking me to have lunch in your restaurant!” she pretty much yelled, making Jackson look at her both surprised and amused. Yugyeom who was around turned to pay attention, which made Bambam turn too. Soon Jaebum and Jinyoung were also paying attention to their conversation. “And I’m not taking you to mine. It makes no sense!” Y/N continue, moving her arms after sipping from the bottle again. “You’re supposed to take me to neutral ground first. Like that Brazilian place on the main street. Are you Brazilian? No. Am I Brazilian? Also no. See? Neutral,” she sipped from the bottle again.

“Okay… So, uh,” Jackson said, rubbing his hand behind his neck, chuckling a little and stealing the bottle to take a sip himself. “Lemme start over. I know this Brazilian place on the main street… I heard it’s a good…”

“It’s horrible actually,” Y/N cut him, making everyone who was watching laugh. The pair still didn’t realize they were being watched. Mark had joined them now. “I think a hamburger would be a good idea.”

“Fine. I know a very good hamburger place…”

“If you say McDonald’s…”

“It’s not McDonald’s.”

“Deal. Pick me up at noon. You know where I work,” she said, stealing the bottle back. Now both Sophie and Youngjae had joined the crowd watching, laughing softly and loud as the pair usually would. Before Y/N could leave though, Jackson held her close by the wrist because who else but Jackson Wang would do that? And smiled. All the did was smile at her, bringing their faces close together. Y/N laughed - nope, she giggled - when she realized where his was heading.

Soon, they were kissing. And it was soft, gentle and messy like all drunk kisses are. It also didn’t last as long as it should have because the people watching started clapping, cheering and yelling as much as they usually would. Both Y/N and Jackson thought Sophie and Youngjae were doing something important, but when they turned around they saw pretty much all their friends clapping at them. Y/N gave them all the finger while Jackson started yelling and telling them to stop ruining his life.

Yep. Y/N could totally get used to Good Guy Jackson Wang.

Did you enjoy HESITATE? Let me know. 

#got7 #jackson wang #got7 fanfiction #got7 fanfic #jackson fanfiction #jackson fanfic #got7 au! #jackson au! #jackson wang fanfiction #jackson wang fanfic #jackson wang au!

[papermoonloveslucy]

DESI DISCOVERS!

June 30, 1974

BY BEN FALKE, Sunday Group Writer 

Who says they never come back? At 57 and in better physical condition than he's been in for years, Desi Arnaz has finished a pilot which he hopes NBC will convert to a prime time series. 

The show is called "Dr. Domingo” and it's about a doctor in a small northern California town who adds to his income by acting as the local coroner and medical examiner. 

"He's a cross between Marcus Welby and Columbo," says Arnaz gleefully.  If "Domingo" never makes it as a series, Arnaz has four or five other projects in his hopper more than enough to justify the rent on his office at Universal, just around the corner from Lucille Ball Productions. (1)

Desi, who invented television reruns and syndication of hit shows, feels he still has some contributions to make to the medium he did so much to shape 25 years ago. 

MENTION ARNAZ' name and most people think first of "I Love Lucy," those 180 merry half hours which, ever since they went into syndication, have been showing somewhere in the world virtually every hour of every day. A New York critic complained recently that one station in that city was showing "I Love Lucy" reruns five times a day! 

Those who remember TV credit lines also recall Arnaz as the producer and occasional director of "The Untouchables," another series with gargantuan longevity. (2) Then there was "Desilu Playhouse," a quality anthology series which introduced many top film and stage stars to the small screen. Not to mention shows like "December Bride," "The Mothers-In-Law," "Guestward-Ho," and others whose ghosts still enliven daytime television. 

"I quit the business in 1960 because it got to be a monster," Arnaz recalls now. (Actually, he says it "beez-ness" his Cuban accent still as thick as ever). 

"At the beginning, It was fun but when you art in charge of three studios, with 3,000 people and 35 sound stages working all the time, the fun is long gone." 

He and Lucy, after many stormy off-camera scenes, were newly divorced then, so Arnaz moved quietly out of Los Angeles to breed horses farther south, in Del Mar, and to fish and build a showplace hideaway house at Las Cruces in Baja California. He married again in 1967, to a non-show biz lady who shared his love of horses, and he even found time to teach a course in television at San Diego State College. (3)

DESPITE THE FACT that he is (he says) far from the multi-millionaire which all those reruns of "Lucy" and "The Untouchables" might lead you to suspect, Arnaz claims that it isn't money pressure that's bringing him back to work now. 

“I'm okay for money if I don't live too long," he says with a chuckle. "The funny thing is that I never really cared that much about making money just for the sake of making money. I wanted to be able to take care of my family and to live well which I've done. The rest you never see anyway." 

What prompted this particular comeback was a call from MCA-Universal boss Lew Wasserman last Christmas. "Lew used to be my agent when I first came out to Hollywood in 1940," Arnaz reminisces. "To show how low he was on the totem pole in those days, he used to pick me up at my house every morning and drive me to work and I was only making $1,500 a week! 

"But Lew called me last Christmas and said, 'What are you going to do - play golf and fish for the rest of your life? Why not come to Universal and develop one show at a time? We'll handle all of those administrative details that you hate you just concentrate on the creative end.' 

"Well, that sounded very appealing. I already had the idea for 'Dr. Domingo' from an old paperback mystery that somebody left in our Baja house, and to tell the truth, I was beginning to miss show business. After all, I've been in it since I was 16!" 

SO NOW this onetime boy bongo player (4), bandleader and star of many a film musical before he and Lucy developed TV situation comedy, is back behind a producer's desk. 

"Television comedy has changed a lot since we did 'I Love Lucy,'" he admits. "I don't think you could do a show like 'Lucy' now but some of the things we learned from doing it are still important. "You still have to have a viable premise, not only for the series as a whole but for each individual episode. 

"You also need a cast that works together to produce a kind of chemistry. The audience has to like them as people as well as characters in the show. 

"That's where we were so lucky with 'Lucy.' I found Vivian Vance playing a prostitute in a play in La Jolla (5) and signed her up on the spot. Then I said to myself, 'What have you done, you mad Cubano? Suppose Lucy doesn't like her?' Luckily, they got along splendidly from the start it could have been a disaster." 

How did he invent the rerun? 

"I didn't do it on purpose, I swear," he says jokingly. "I never even allowed reruns of 'Lucy' during the summer which was only 13 weeks in those days. But the reruns got started because we made the big decision to do the show on film instead of doing it live the first time anybody had thought of it. 

"They wanted us to do the show live in New York in front of an audience. Lucy works best in front of people. But we didn't want to move to New York; we had just bought a new house and we liked it in California. 

"When CBS bought the show, they gave us a total budget of $19,500 a week -  you can't even hiccup on television for that now. I said to them, 'Let us film the show in California, that way you'll have a much better quality print... and we can stay here.'  

"They wanted to know how much more it would cost that way; I had no idea so I picked a number out of the air - $5,000 more a week. Now Lucy and I had been getting $5,000 a week between us, plus 50 percent of all rights in the show. 

"CBS came back and said okay, they'd give us the extra $5,000 if we would take a salary cut to $4,000 a week. Again out of the blue, I said, 'Okay but then we have to own 100 percent of the show' never thinking they'd say yes. But they agreed, and we wound up owning everything." 

ASIDE FROM such show business triumphs, Arnaz gets most pleasure from talking about his family his daughter Lucie, and son Desi Jr. 

Desi Jr. began his film career with "Red Sky at Morning"; his latest picture is "Billy Two-Hats." (6)

"I always' knew Desi would make' it," his father says now, "but Lucie was always so stiff and shy when we brought her on the show that I thought she'd be a teacher or something. I never dreamed she'd want to act. But she has just landed the lead role in the touring company of 'Seesaw,' so big things could be happening for her, too." (7)

Arnaz is currently putting his life together into a book, for which he reportedly is getting a $125,000 advance. (8) Despite the stormy scenes he and Lucy used to have when they were married, he says it won't say anything bad about his former wife, co-star and business partner. 

"We're friends now," he insists. "We gave a little family party for young Desi on his 21st birthday last year. I looked over at the two kids standing together and said to Lucy, 'If we never did anything else, that makes it all worthwhile.' And she agreed."

#   #   #

FOOTNOTES FROM THE FUTURE

(1) “Doctor Domingo” did not become a series.  The character was introduced on an episode of “Ironside” titled “Riddle at 24,000″ as a ‘backdoor’ pilot.  It aired March 14, 1974. 

(2) Desi was never credited as director of any episodes of “The Untouchables”. That doesn’t mean he didn’t step in or assist, as he did on some episodes of “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour”, but he was never credited. 

(3) On March 2, 1963, Desi married Edith Eyre Skimming Mack Hirsch aka Edie in Las Vegas, Nevada. The remained married until her death in 1985, just a year and a half before Arnaz’s passing. 

(4) Conga drums, not bongos. This is a frequent error by journalists. 

(5) Vivian Vance was appearing in the 1943 John Van Druten play “The Voice of the Turtle” at La Jolla Playhouse. Vance had also appeared in the play in the mid-1940s when she had a nervous breakdown, and had to leave the cast.  She played Olive Lashbrooke, described as “a promiscuous, worldly girl, questioning the practicality of the lessons in chastity she received as a child and wondering if she is alone in her passion.”  Vance, who had Broadway credits, did not appear in the Broadway production. When the film was made, Olive was played by Eve Arden.  Vance acted opposite KT Stevens, who played Mrs. O’Brien (the new tenant plotting to ‘blow up the capitol’) on “I Love Lucy.”  In some productions, Hayden Rorke (Mr. O’Brien) also appeared in the play. 

(6) Red Sky at Morning was released in May 1971. Desi Arnaz Jr. won a Golden Globe as Most Promising Newcomer, Male. His character was named Billy...

Billy was also his character name in Billy Two Hats, released in March 1974. 

(7) Lucie Arnaz has stated that she never appeared on “I Love Lucy.”  Desi is probably referring to her early appearances on “The Lucy Show” as Cynthia, a character seldom seen but often spoken about.  From Hartford in April 1974 to Los Angeles in September 1974, Lucie toured the Broadway musical Seesaw to a dozen cities with John Gavin and Tommy Tune. 

(8) Desi Arnaz’s autobiography was titled A Book.  It was first published in 1976 by Warner Books. It covers Desi’s life up until 1960.  In 2018, an audiobook was released read by Juan Pablo Di Pace. 

#Desi Arnaz #Lucille Ball #Desilu #Lucie Arnaz #Desi Arnaz Jr. #A Book #Red Sky at Morning #Billy Two Hats #Seesaw #Vivian Vance #Voice of the Turtle #edith hirsch #I love Lucy #ironside #Doctor Domingo #Detroit Free Press #1974

[ronaldsmcrae86]

How to Write a Bio Like a Superhero (Don’t Do These 6 Things)

Writing a good bio is hard.

You have to knock ’em dead with two or three dazzling sentences that show you’re a likable, credible, and accomplished expert.

When readers read your bio (aka byline), they must believe you’re the answer to their prayers — a superhero who will swoop in and solve the big problem keeping them awake at night.

(And if you’re a freelance writer, your short professional bio should make a potential client want to hire you on the spot.)

No pressure, right?

Here’s the good news:

Learning how to write a compelling bio that dazzles readers doesn’t require feats of strength or the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound.

And, best of all, it’s a process that works whether you’re doing a professional bio, an author bio, or a Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram bio.

Let’s dive in.

But first, we’ll look at a few short bio examples that make readers run for the exits…

The 6 Common Bio Blunders That Make You Look Like an Amateur (And What to Do Instead)

1. Making It All About You

I’m Jill — a free-spirit with a passion for quilting, bird watching, Tai Chi, and calligraphy.”

Thanks for sharing, Jill. But do I really care? Nah.

It’s confusing, I know. “Bio” is short for biography, which suggests it should be all about you.  But the main purpose of your author bio is to show your audience how you can help them solve their problem with the professional skills you bring to the table.

So, it’s not about you, Jill. It’s about them.

What to Do Instead:

In this post on sensory words, using almost the same number of words as Jill, Kevin gives us just enough information about himself to tell us what he does and how he helps his audience.

As the Editor in Chief at Smart Blogger, Kevin J. Duncan helps readers learn the ropes of blogging, hone their writing skills, and find their unique voice so they can stand out from the crowd.

It’s clear, precise, and focused on the outcome, not on Kevin. He uses phrases like “hone their writing skills,” and “stand out from the crowd,” which directly target the deep-rooted desires of aspiring writers. He speaks their language.

Here’s another tip: It’s usually best to write in the third person, as Kevin does in the above bio example. It’s more professional.

2. Writing a Condensed Resume, or a Laundry List of Accomplishments

John Brown is a qualified personal trainer with a sports medicine degree from Fremont College, as well as professional certifications from the American College of Sports Medicine and the National Strength and Conditioning Association.

Your professional biography is not a dumping ground for your career path, job titles, and qualifications. It’s a tiny elevator pitch that’s selling you as a credible solver of your reader’s problems.

So don’t list every degree you have or talk about your first job out of school. Readers don’t really care. They only care whether or not you have the solutions they are looking for.

What to Do Instead:

Your bio should only include details about yourself that directly relate to your intended audience’s problem.

Think about your career, education, and skill set, and then carefully select the most pertinent facts that are going to impress the audience you are writing for. Like this:

Jessi Rita Hoffman is a book editor who helps authors get their books out of their heads and into print. A former publishing house editor-in-chief, she has edited books for Donald Trump and bestselling/award-winning authors. Visit her blog for writers here.

Jessi tells us the most important thing about herself (that she is a book editor), and what she can do for her audience (get their books into print), while establishing her credibility (“best-selling,” “editor-in-chief”).

Everything she mentions is designed to appeal to the audience she’s trying to reach.

3. Sharing Irrelevant Details or Stuff You Think Your Audience Should Care About

Joe Brown is a content and affiliate marketer with a passion for snowboarding. When he’s not at his computer, you can find him at his nearest half-pipe, or maybe on Twitter @joeb, where he likes to tweet about his pet python. Alternatively, try his email at [email protected], and he’ll probably shoot you back a list of his favorite origami folds.

This sample bio is from someone whose expertise is content and affiliate marketing, although he hides it well.

Much like your degrees and career path, your audience doesn’t care about your hobbies, passions, and personal details either, unless they directly impact the problem they’re trying to solve.

What to Do Instead:

As mentioned earlier, only share the details that your audience will find relevant.

If you’re mad keen on knitting and you’re writing for an arts and crafts blog, then go ahead and mention your passion. It’s relevant. But don’t tell them about your cat, unless Fluffy can knit too.

4. Trying to Cram Too Much In

Okay, so you’ve managed to include only relevant details about yourself, so you’re safe. Right?

Not if you included too many of them.

Like this one from Jo. She’s had an impressive career with many accomplishments, but her bio feels endless:

Jo Smith is a personal finance blogger with 20 years of experience in accounting, international banking, and financial planning. She started as a trainee bank teller in Little Rock, Arkansas, before completing her accounting degree and climbing the corporate ladder at Citibank. More recently, Jo decided to follow her dreams and leave the safety net of her six-figure salary to start her own coaching business.

This is way too much information.

Writing your own bio can be hard. Sometimes you’re too close to the subject matter to realize what’s important and what can be left out. But your bio isn’t the place to share your entire life story and every single accomplishment, and it certainly shouldn’t have an endless word count. You need to be picky.

What to Do Instead:

With some careful pruning, the real gems hidden away in Jo’s personal biography can be given center stage:

Jo Smith is a personal finance blogger and coach with 20 years of experience in the high-powered world of international banking and accountancy. Jo is on a mission to help everyday families build sustainable wealth, stop stressing about their financial security, and start living the life they’ve always wanted.

Go through your bio word by word and ask yourself, “Does this bit of information make any difference to my audience?”

If the answer is no, take it out, and limit your bio to two or three sentences.

5. Being Overly Formal (a.k.a. Boring)

Joe Jones is an accomplished marketing consultant who specializes in the field of physician practices. He works with medical centers and practitioners to maximize their online real estate, garner new market segments, and engender business growth.

If you’re anything like me, you had to read this bio more than once to get a sense of what Joe does. It’s way too formal. Most people will just glaze over this.

What to Do Instead:

Instead of using stilted words and phrases like “maximize their online real estate” and “engender business growth”, Joe missed a great opportunity to showcase his personal brand and make himself stand out from the crowd.

Perhaps he could have started with something like:

“Joe Jones is an expert marketer who can take your medical practice from queasy to fighting fit…”

Do you see how that might grab a few more eyeballs, cut through the noise, and make an impact with his target audience of doctors?

6. Being Vague (or Overly Woo-Woo)

Cecile is a life coach and devoted mom. She loves day breaks and giving things a go. She is passionate about her fellow humans and wants to be their inspiration for growth, as they find their way through the dark to their true self.

Hands up, whoever doesn’t have a clue what this person is talking about. What does she do? How does she help solve my problem? Why should I be interested in her?

You need to avoid ambiguous phrases like “inspiration for growth” and “find their way through the dark.” These phrases might have a nice ring to them, but they mean very little to your reader. They’re too open to interpretation.

What to Do Instead:

You don’t have time to beat around the bush in your bio. Get straight to the point. Like this:

Cecile is a qualified self-development coach who is passionate about helping professional women develop the skills and self-assurance they need to take control of their working lives. Download her free guide, How to Quit Your Dead-End Job Without Risking Your Income, and open the door to your dream career today.

In two sentences, Cecile tells me everything I need to know about what she does and how she can help me. No fluff, no messing about, and a juicy opt-in bribe to seal the deal.

How to Write a Bio That Begs to be Clicked

Introduce Yourself with a Bang

Call Out Your Audience and Say How You Help Them

Offer an Irresistible Reason to Click

So now you can see where you might’ve gone wrong with your bio after you started your blog, and you’re dying to write a new version of it. But how do you ensure your next bio won’t commit the same blunders?

Easy. Just follow this simple three-step process to write a professional bio that your ideal readers can’t resist clicking.

1. Introduce Yourself with a Bang

This is where you tell the audience who you are and what makes you different (while avoiding the common blunders we’ve just discussed). You need to spark their interest and curiosity and get them to say, “Tell me more.”

Let’s start with this example from a blogger in the personal development niche.

Sue Smith is a self-help writer and coach with a degree in psychology…

This tells me what Sue does, but it’s rather dull and same-y in a sea full of personal development blogs. For a first sentence, it’s too bland. There’s nothing here to set her apart or pique our interest.

Let’s give it a twist:

Self-help writer, Sue Smith, is part social scientist, part agony aunt, who…

That sounds a bit more interesting. Sue manages to appeal to her audience on different levels by sounding educated, professional, and personable at the same time. Describing herself as an “agony aunt” downplays the more clinical “social scientist.”

I’m curious to know more, and it certainly makes her distinctive.

But there’s another angle Sue could take:

Sue Smith is a certified psychologist who specializes in beating social anxiety.

Now, this one is more similar to the first example, but the difference is that it adds more credibility — “certified psychologist” sounds much more credible than “has a degree in,” which suggests she’s fresh out of college — but it also sets her apart more.

She has a specialty, which gives her ideas on the topic more weight than others. If you suffer from social anxiety, you’d want to listen to the expert on it, right?

Compare also:

Sue Smith’s books on beating social anxiety have won her international acclaim. She has been featured as an expert on Psychology Today, The Oprah Winfrey Show, and Good Morning America.

This version goes even further in establishing Sue’s credibility. Not only has she published multiple books on the topic of social anxiety, but she’s even been featured on some well-known media channels, adding social proof to her expertise.

We’ve talked before about not delivering a laundry list of accomplishments, but if you have specific accomplishments that make you stand out, those are worth including.

Here’s an excellent bio example that both offers a point of interest and adds credibility:

Jessica’s outside-the-box approach to business plan writing has helped her clients collectively raise almost $50 million in financing to start and grow new businesses. Sign up for her 5-part business plan training series for FREE here so you can get your business plan done and get your money sooner.

Jessica doesn’t just say she’ll help you write a business plan, she mentions she has an “outside-the-box approach,” which immediately makes you curious what that approach is. Then she steps it up even more by mentioning her approach has collectively raised $50 million in financing. That’s nothing to sneeze at and creates instant credibility.

It’s an excellent bio that will absolutely pique her audience’s interest.

2. Call Out Your Audience and Say How You Help Them

Remember, this isn’t about you, it’s about what you can do for your audience. So you need to define who they are and what problem of theirs (their key fear or desire) you can solve.

You should aim for both a logical and emotional connection.  It’s tough, but do-able.

Let’s take Kim, a blogger in the parenting niche:

Kim’s passion in writing is to inspire other parents to not just “hang in there” or “make it through” but to thrive. She does this through blogging at kimbiasottotoday.wordpress.com and speaking engagements.

By using language most parents will relate to and zeroing in on their fears, Kim makes a strong emotional connection. At the same time, there’s no mistaking the practical (logical) solution Kim offers.

Note: Of course, Kim’s bio would be even further improved if she had a call to action that linked to an incentive rather than her homepage. More on that in the next step!

Here’s another example:

Jessica Blanchard, registered dietitian and Ayurvedic practitioner, helps busy people re-energize with super simple food, yoga, and wellness strategies that work. Grab your free 7-Day Plan and learn to eat, move, and live better in ten minutes a day.

Jessica clarifies immediately who she helps (busy people) and how she helps them (by re-energizing them through food, yoga, and wellness strategies).

You must be absolutely clear about this. If readers can’t identify themselves in your bio and see you have the solution they’re looking for, they will move on.

3. Offer an Irresistible Reason to Click

You’ve told your audience who you are, what you do, and how you can help them. You’ve impressed them with your credentials and sparked their curiosity.

They’re ready to move to second base, but they need that last push. An irresistible reason to click through to your site and sign up. You need to offer an incentive.

Take a look at this bio:

Henneke Duistermaat is an irreverent copywriter and business writing coach. She’s on a mission to stamp out gobbledygook and to make boring business blogs sparkle. Get her free 16-Part Snackable Writing Course For Busy People and learn how to enchant your readers and win more business.

Boom! In 46 carefully curated words, Henneke tells us who she is, what she does, how she can help, and then gives us a gold-plated reason for parting with our email address.

Her free report is 16 parts, but it’s “snackable,” which makes it sound very easy to digest. And it’s for “busy people,” which shows Henneke understands her audience. She promises results and cleverly relates this back to her own blog, Enchanting Marketing.

Unfortunately, we can’t all steal Henneke’s bio, but we can use it as a fine example of how to write our own.

Ready to Write Your Best Bio Ever?

Writing a bio like a superhero is simple, but it’s not easy, so give your bio the time it requires. You should brainstorm several options for each of the steps.

Whether they’re concluding an article you’ve written or they’re inside your Instagram bio (or Twitter bio, Facebook bio, LinkedIn profile, or, heck, any other social media profile), a great bio is hard to craft. But, they are also one of the most effective pieces of marketing you can create when you get it right.

You now know how to write a bio your audience will love. They’ll want to know more and they won’t be able to resist your free offer.

They’ll see you as a credible, personable problem-solver. Their problem-solver.

And they’ll click through to your personal website, ready and willing to hand over their email address to their new blogging superhero.

You.

Note: For a handy visual reminder of the six bio blunders you can download or share on your own website, check out the image below:

Embed This Infographic On Your Site:

<!—– Copy and Paste This Code Into Your Post —-><a href=”https://smartblogger.com/how-to-write-a-bio/”><img src=”https://smartblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/6-common-blunders-v3.png” alt=”The 6 Common Bio Blunders That Make You Look Like an Amateur (And What to Do Instead)” width=”700px” class=”noa3lazy”/></a><br></p><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> <p><a href=”https://smartblogger.com/how-to-write-a-bio/”>The 6 Common Bio Blunders That Make You Look Like an Amateur (And What to Do Instead) from SmartBlogger.com</a></p><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> <p>

The post How to Write a Bio Like a Superhero (Don’t Do These 6 Things) appeared first on Smart Blogger.

from SEO and SM Tips https://smartblogger.com/how-to-write-a-bio/

[an-inbetween-place]

12. Return

12:48 AM

Guess that didn’t last long, huh?

I was so close to deleting both blogs associated with this email address and starting with a clean slate. But despite the immense amounts of cringe I experienced from scrolling through this blog, I feel like it would be too much of a loss. To miss out on all those past posts/the memories they conjure up simply because of embarrassment.

So we’ll try this again, right? (I wholeheartedly understand that this reads like a bad fanfiction but I cannot stop myself 🤷🏻‍♀️good thing this isn’t my day job...)

At the risk of sounding like the first five minutes of a terrible romcom, so many things have changed.

As I type, I’m now 26 years old - a real adult, with a whole ass job and a 401K. We’re* even on the brink of purchasing real estate (and along with that a M O R T A G E - spelling it like that makes it less scary, right?).

SO, not like it’s anything that we don’t know but I graduated from NYU in 2016 (NOT with honors, thank you very much ... me) but with a major in computer science and a minor in web programming/applications (..so more computer science). We spent exactly 1 month job hunting (got our offer from bluewolf on the 1 month mark after graduation) and have spent the last four and a half years making money for the man. Halfway through that, the IBM acquisition went through and we went up in salary but went down in culture/coworkers/anything fun. 

There weren’t only bad times though. We managed to squeeze in a free trip to Morocco (along with comp’ed flights to Barcelona + the Canary Islands) and have made some great friendships along the way (cue the sparks and melodic background music). 

It makes me immensely sad at this moment to think about how one day, I may be scrolling through this blog and no longer in close communication with Mickey/Swati/other Bluewolf friends. I know that it’s probably going to happen (given the natural course things take - i.e. what’s happened with Leo, Mary, Shelby, Caitlin, Emily -- pps, this makes it sound like something terrible happened, which it did NOT, life just goes on) but I just wanted to note this brief moment of sadness.

In addition to that brief moment of sadness, I also regret not keeping up with this habit/not picking this up during.. let’s phrase them as ‘highlight’ moments of my life. If only I had a post - no matter how brief - during graduation, first day at work, first vacation, really good days, really bad days...

Since we don’t have that - here’s a quick rundown.

Graduation - 2016, super sunny, Yankee stadium did NOT have enough shade (I got sunburnt on my nose), super hectic afterwards, felt like something was happening in my mind/body but I couldn’t really tell what it was (like a feeling of something building up), hopped on a flight to Puerto Rico, first family vacation overseas!, June had to do something for work so everyone was tense, but it was a great week or so

Job Hunting - 2016, super nervous/scared, got really good at getting on the phone immediately after waking up from a nap, thought I crushed a interview - didn’t get it, got crushed by an interview - left the building in the elevator crying, and finally things fell into place

Working! Romas Regime - 2016, super scared of code review and being accepted by the rest of the devs, super scared about being able to complete the ask(s), learned so much, had a weird crush on K/L?

Working! Niki/Kate Regime - 201?-2018, had it under control, considered job hunting?, maybe this was the golden age...

Working! TD Regime - 2018-2019, big shift to full time/classic services client/traveling, DEF had a .. i’m not going to demean myself and say it was weird - crush on S (weirdly had a dream involving him the other night...my feelings did not get returned even in dream form.. that’s rough, buddy), got REAL close to mickey (yay :’) ), def had a lil blossoming crush on A (is it a crush if I just want to wrap him up in a blanket and keep him safe? mans is a sweetheart), learned my lesson about eating out all the time.. lol

Working! 2020 - pandemic vibes, we’ll definitely be getting into this more (in future posts? optimistic but I think I can carry that out), working from queens home is pretty sweet but that division between home + work has disappeared (a easy thing to give up in a hard year), no boss regime!, not good for career growth (aka me flip flopping between feeling guilty about this and not caring)

Just right now, figured out a hack in inserting bullet points since I was too lazy to look up the HTML for it... still got it

I knew this was going to blossom into a.. unsurmountable task once I started. I’ll have to go into more detail in future posts. HOWEVER, the reason I wanted to get back into writing posts today was because I was ~~~reminiscing~~~ about 2020.

Obviously it’s been a hard year. I can’t even begin to describe how it felt back in March -- how I woke up in a panic that grey and rainy Friday morning, fretting over buying groceries because that was the only thing I could control. The sheer defeat I felt when I got to TJs and the line was down the block. The ease and relaxation I felt when I finally got home that Saturday morning.. it felt like my entire chest was opening up.

But the sheer fact that what I’m describing is just around the fear of covid and not about loss or sickness or job security says a lot. And the fact that I felt like I had to say that on a personal blog that literally no one reads (and I’d like to keep it that way, thank you) says a lot about the guilt I feel with my privilege during this year (not that I’m trying NOT to feel guilty.. I am cool living with it).

But my conversations with Sharon lately/the posts I’ve been seeing online pushed me to write/reflect on this. A lot of good has happened for/to me this year! And I want to put it into words and celebrate it.

Here we go again with the bullets hack:

Weight Loss - I really never thought I’d be able to accomplish all the work I’ve done so far. We started in July 2019 at 174 pounds and today I weighed in at 135 pounds. Let’s cut ourselves a break and give us that last pound.. that’s 40 pounds! 

Fitness - This basically goes hand in hand with the last point but I’m also .. shocked with where I’m at today. I can run a few miles, no problem. I feel good! during my run. I know even if I feel poorly, I’ll get back on the starting line and have the potential for a great run - and even if the next one isn’t, it’s still a run in the books! I know what a figure four stretch, a lateral squat, a romanian deadlift, a bear crawl, what all those things are now! 

Family - I’ve spent a TON of time with my parents/family this year (it’s been my only social interaction really). It’s hard at times sure - I miss certain things from last year/pre-covid thats FOR SURE - but it’s nice to spend time with my parents as a ... ‘adult’. It’s nice for us to have this time together.. and for us to be able to make these memories. 

It’s late now (lol that depends on your POV) so I’ll leave those bullets as summaries and go into further detail later on. I do want to say, I’m glad I’m doing this. As cringy as it will be to reread, I’m glad to have this down and appreciative of the reflection.

1:35 AM

*P.S. (the ROYAL) we are aware that we’re popping between the use of ‘I’ and ‘we’ here... it’s a thing we do now. It’ll make us cringe in the future, WE KNOW

#no posts will ever be revised #we live in the now #lol i said this is late but what i really meant was this is late for me to be using my brain

[fumblingxmuses]

All in My Head

Fandom: Teen Wolf Ships: Sterek Plot: AU where the entire canon storyline is an elaborate reality created by a traumatized teenager and Derek and John [aka: Noah, because I refuse to change a name this far into a story] are struggling to bring said teenager back from the brink.

Wednesdays are the hardest days of the month.

The drive is too quiet, with not enough noise but he has no will to turn on the radio. He sits still behind the wheel, watching the road around him as he heads to the building. It's an hour from the station, but the man has done this enough in a year that he knows all the shortcuts and can get there in half an hour. Pulling in is always easy at first, and then he remembers why he's here in the first place. Flashbacks run through his mind as he parks, and he has to sit and brace himself for the familiar scents that await him inside of the structure.

Wednesdays are difficult to stay calm and supportive after he clocks out.

Outside the massive building is trees. It's chilly, but watching the leaves gives comfort as he looks up to the third floor and watches the fourth window from the left. He isn't right there inside the room, but he knows what the sight will be. Whiskey colored hues will stare almost lifeless through the window, an aged and distant look in eyes once vibrant and full of life, promise and opportunity. Sitting cross-legged on the bed, the teen hardly ever moves anymore. The nurses have tried time and again to make him move, but eventually he just goes back to his bed to sit and stare out a window that had nothing but the preserve as scenery. He does still eat, but he has to be in his room. People being around him make the teen too anxious and panicky to eat properly. The thought makes the man's heart drop every time as he gets out and closes the cruiser door, hitting the button that locks it.

Wednesdays are always hard for John Stilinski.

The state of the art hospital nestled just outside the small town of Beacon Hills is barely affordable on a sheriff's salary, but John manages with the help of an unknown benefactor to his only child's well-being. John doesn't have to ask, because he knows who it is. If the circumstance were different, he would be yelling at the other male to leave them alone. But he doubted it would help keep the male away. John had accepted that and simply allows the help he had never asked for, but needs desperately. The generous but anonymous party and John left it at the fact that they never came at the same time and never spoke if need be. Walking into the building, he pauses at the front desk long enough to greet the woman behind the counter and get his visitor's tag. Not that he needs it anymore. Every staff member in the building knows who John is by now, who he came to see and how long he stayed. They didn't need the little blue and white tag with his name on it to say hello, or ask how he was holding up. Up the elevator and down the hall that has always seemed much longer than it actually is, he counts the steps to the destination. He pauses at the door, looking through the small window at the form of his seventeen year old son, Stiles, as the boy just sits on his bed and stares out the window as if he were alone. Just as he did almost twenty-four hours a day.

"Hello John, it's good to see you again." a familiar voice says, and the sheriff is pulled from his mind as he turns to see a dark haired woman with a sad smile. John manages a smile at her before he motions his head at the door.

"How's he doing, Melissa?" he inquires.

Melissa sighs and shakes her head. "I'm not sure. He's not letting anyone in. His psychiatrist is having trouble getting in, but he's making slow progress."

"Doctor Le Salle said it would take time." The sheriff briefly stops as a look crosses the nurse's face and he frowns. "What is it?"

"Nothing."

"Melissa, what's wrong?" John insists, not dropping the moment. He can read just about every nurse in the hospital at this point, so why the woman tries to hide it is a bit disconcerting for the officer.

"Doctor Le Salle is leaving, and he's the only one willing to take Stiles." Melissa explains softly, a heavy sigh escaping her as she looks down, almost defeated. "I've been trying to find someone to take him when the doctor leaves, John, I swear. Stiles is like a second son to me." The pain in her eyes is a blow John still finds painful every time they talk.

"I know he is. It just..." the man paused and looked through the window. "It hurts seeing him in so much pain."

Melissa nodded, looking towards the door. There's a brief moment of anger that John will always feel guilty for, before it's replaced with a guilty kind of sympathy from the woman. John makes no mention of it because the subject he knows crosses Melissa's mind is one neither of them have coped with yet. "He should let you in. He lets people he knows in the room." the nurse says calmly.

"Knows?" John asks, looking back at the woman. When Melissa nods, he wants to ask more, inquire what it is she means, but knows he shouldn't; that the answer would hurt more than wondering ever could. As the woman walks away, John watches her, murmuring an apology that gets a simple 'I know' as she goes to finish her rounds. Taking a slow, deep breath, he moves to knock on the door, opening it slowly as he steps inside. "Stiles?" he asks in a soft tone.

At first, there's nothing. John begins to wonder if his son is lost forever in whatever reality is in his mind when the boy moves and his head is turning towards him. A smile lights up his face when he sees who stands at the door. "Dad!" the teen says happily, moving out of his chair and going to sit on the full-sized bed provided by the hospital. John can remember when the doctors told him that Stiles moved so much in his sleep the boy needed the larger bed. When the teen goes to pat on the bed, John pulls up the second chair and sits down in it, watching as Stiles leans over to the desk and pulls out a chess board. The wood is old, worn and a few scratches carve the surface of it, but the marble of the board itself is still pristine. Stiles slides open the top and pulls out the pieces, setting them up. "I've been practicing. I'm getting better." he promised, not looking up. "How long are you here?"

"Two hours, unless something urgent happens and they need me." John answered, smiling as he leans in to move his pawn. Time goes in a haze for John. He doesn't get much time at all with Stiles these days, just two hours a week because of his career and Stiles' having to stay in the hospital to be watched. They play four or five games, Stiles winning a few, when John checks the time. Just fifteen minutes left and he'll be leaving. The thought makes his chest hurt, but he has to be back in time to eat and get some sleep before his shift starts at four the next morning. He's moving to play his rook when Stiles asks the question.

"When is Scott coming to visit?"

John looks up, fighting the tears threatening his control. "Maybe next time, Stiles. Things are rough, he's been working a lot." It's a lie, but John has learned that the truth makes his son fly into a panicked rage and the teen has to be sedated before the two hours are up. So the man plays along, unable to ruin what little time he has left with his son.

"I hope he comes soon. We're supposed to watch Star Wars. He promised." Stiles says, his tone almost thoughtfully absent from the real world, and John knows his time window is closing before Stiles is once more at the window staring out at the rarely changing woods. Honey eyes look up at the sheriff and the teen gives a smile. "You'll bring my copies, right, Dad? So we don't have to rent them?"

John nods, forcing a smile at how happy Stiles seems to be, but knowing the trauma that causes this event to occur isn't likely to go away. "Yeah, I'll bring them. Would you like me to bring your laptop?" his voice is having trouble staying even as he asks, but he manages to keep it steady through the words.

"Nurses won't let me have it. They say the cord is a health risk. Which is kind of stupid, because there's no reason for a cord to be dangerous unless you try to cut through it with all metal scissors or something." Stiles moves his king and John glances down, thirty seconds. Reaching out, the sheriff plays to check-mate and sighs.

"It's time for me to go, Stiles." he announces, moving to stand.

"I wish you could stay, Dad." Stiles murmurs, sighing sadly, the tone growing more distant. He moves to crawl off the bed, getting up to hug his dad tight. "You just don't die on me, too, okay? I can't lose anyone else."

John has to close his eyes as he clings to his son for the remaining fifteen seconds of their time together, nodding. The words are the closest to reality that John ever seems t receive from Stiles anymore, and it hurts to think that he has really lost his only child to trauma. "I won't, son. I'll be back." he promises, and he knows the one thing keeping him alive at work when things get messy is the fact that he has a son to take care of. As he releases the teen and heads for the door, Stiles is putting up the game. The man pauses as he shuts the door behind him, watching as Stiles sets the wooden box down and slowly, as if too preoccupied to finish putting up the game to sit in the chair and tuck his legs up under him. John goes back in, finishes putting up the game as quietly as possible, and is placing the king in the wood when he notices a name etched into the bottom of the inside compartment. John feels a brief moment of release from the heart-wrenching pain of seeing his son fade out again and finishes putting the game on the desk, leaving the room and going to the family waiting area, where he sits.

For ten minutes, he sits with his head in his hands, wondering how he had messed up so much that he had lost his son. But at last, the memory of the etched name comes to him and he rights himself. Reaching into his shirt, he pulls out his phone and unlocks the screen, scrolling through contacts until he finds what it is he's looking for. He calls it, knowing this is so far from the norm. But he has to try this, for his son's sanity, in the most literal of senses. A few rings later and a voice comes on the other side of the line. As soon as John hears it, he can't repress the slight, hopeful curve of his lips. "Derek. We need to talk."

#the trex writes | fanfics #fanfics; All in My Head #sterek fanfic #Cyn's fics

[easyfoodnetwork]

Dispatches From Food Service Workers Across the U.S.: ‘I’m Trying Not to Panic’

Shutterstock/Kondor83

Restaurant employees from Kentucky, North Dakota, New York, Oregon, and Minnesota share their stories

Last week, President Trump formed the Economic Revival Industry Group, a collection of 200 experts and industry leaders to inform the (possibly ill-advised) campaign to re-open the economy. The group, focused on restaurants, included numerous chain CEOs and celebrity chef-owners like Wolfgang Puck and Thomas Keller. And though the latter could hardly be expected to advocate for the needs of restaurant owners whose restaurants don’t have Michelin stars, there is another group notably absent from the committee: restaurant workers.

Independent restaurant owners are struggling with the realities and uncertainties of life in a pandemic, whether it’s having to lay off employees or trying to keep people paid as the business pivots to take-out only. But for your average food service worker — servers, bartenders, line cooks, and baristas — there is even less support. Restaurant employees made up 60 percent of the jobs lost in March. Twenty-two million people filed for unemployment in the past four weeks, leaving unemployment websites overwhelmed. The Paycheck Protection Program, which offers federal loans in exchange for keeping employees on payroll, is out of money. All this adds up to millions of food service workers being left without a paycheck.

Despite Trump’s plans, no one knows what the restaurant industry is going to look like on the other side of the pandemic. And so workers wait, hoping their restaurants will reopen, hoping they or their coworkers will be rehired, hoping there will be a workplace to come back to. As chains and fine-dining chefs are the only ones with access to the White House, it’s important to remember their experiences do not represent the restaurant industry as a whole. Whether or not restaurant workers, not merely restaurateurs, feel supported will be the true test of any government program’s success. With that in mind, we spoke to five restaurant workers across the country on what they’re experiencing right now. These are stories in their own words, edited lightly for clarity.

Gregg Adams, line cook at J Harrods, Louisville, Kentucky

The chef and I are the only kitchen staff left of four full-time and two part-timers. He takes a salary, I am on reduced hours, which means less money to repair the house and cars, much less save anything. Since this began we have been steadily losing customers. Our food isn’t geared for takeout, though we changed the menu some. Also, we made a lot of our money through drinks. Initially, the state only allowed the sale of closed alcohol containers, and some restaurants started selling flight bottles and half pints with soda or cup mixer on the side. Within a week, open alcohol sales were allowed rather than just packaged liquor, but it was too late for those who followed the rules.

I’m hanging in there, but I’m lucky. Not much has changed for me and my family. My wife is on medical disability with fixed income and doesn’t leave the house much. My teenager already practiced social distancing. My 26-year-old is working 60 hours a week at a local coffee chain. My 25-year-old works for UPS. I’m blessed to have employment. I know three other cooks and two chefs who are unemployed. But I can’t plan anything for anything now. I’m wondering about my concert tickets and my child’s education if my older children will get sick, and what my options are in general. I’m trying to not panic.

Massoud Violette-Sheikh, sous chef at the Heights, Ithaca, New York

I am 23 years old and have been working in the industry for five years, starting as a dishwasher at the Heights. My start in the industry was mainly out of necessity — dishwashing offered good hours and the possibility of upward mobility in the restaurant. But the work ethic and our local food community was contagious; I wouldn’t want to be in any other industry, even in these times. I rose to sous this past year. In an area where we are financially dependent on Ithaca College and Cornell as our main contributors to economic stimulation, this has train-wrecked the local economy.

At the Heights, all staff with the exception of our chef de cuisine have been temporarily let go. I think the post-pandemic dining landscape is going to be entirely different — staff cuts, wage cuts, and mandatory seating reduction will absolutely affect how we are able to eat. Even the most luxurious restaurants will have to cut back on menus, garnishes, and available reservations. I’m hopeful that diners will come out in droves after restaurants open up, but realistically that’s not likely. The social habits that we develop will linger. I spend a lot of time talking with my close friends and coworkers. Everyone just wants to be back in the kitchen — to be back home. As an individual I’m grateful for private grants such as the Restaurant Employee Relief Fund — programs like that are going to be our saviors. But our primary concern is how long our local independent restaurants, farms, and purveyors will be able to stay open. The debt to equity ratio in our industry is very high, and I expect to see places sink into irreversible debt. I hope customers will be patient as we get back on our feet; without their support, all that will be left is Chili’s and McDonald’s.

Marlena Chaboudy, cook at A Frame Bar & Grill, Westhope, North Dakota

Busy season is the beginning of spring through the end of summer. We are situated on Lake Metigoshe, and when the snow melts people start moving in their boats and readying their docks to enjoy their summer. We were all gearing up for that when the spread of the virus hit hard and hours were cut. Our place was then shut down for dine-in service and we tried to stay positive. I found out the secret was really not to make eye contact, because if I saw one of us start to tear up, it opened the floodgates for me.

I’m behind in rent, my vehicle is in need of a few repairs. I had planned on moving closer to work — I live about 40 miles away — and found a place, but will have to come by money for the utility and house deposits and rent in order to do so. My fiancé and I live together, and he also works at the A-Frame as a dishwasher. He has filed for unemployment but has a limited work history and hasn’t paid in enough in the quarters to draw unemployment. And he won’t get the one-sum stimulus check either, and that’s going to hurt. Living in a rural community, you can’t count on anything for relief. You can’t count on the small town store to get a delivery truck, or go to the store the same day and be able to buy a roll of toilet paper or a dozen eggs. I can’t guarantee that my internet will be functional much less my phone service, and trying to even access the unemployment website can take all day. You go to the gas station for a treat and you never know if they are open because if they haven’t had enough business that day to justify keeping the lights on, or paying an employee to sit there, they close early.

I don’t think the aid the government is giving is enough. Not at all! It’s getting bad everywhere. The people in the foodservice industry are the “blue collar” workers that everyone forgets about. We are not paid as much as the blue collar norm and making ends meet isn’t looking possible for most.

Rae Bullinger, former front of house at Rise Bagels, Minneapolis

We closed our dining room around March 16th, but kept our online and takeout phone ordering systems the same. After closing the dining room, it was fairly slow that first week, but we kept advertising the online and pick-up ordering and by the weekend our system just couldn’t keep up. On my weekend shift, we were so overwhelmed with online orders overnight that we actually had to turn the first customers away, because we were still trying to catch up with the online orders. The next day is when the owners decided to temporarily close. Before coronavirus, we had a good sense of how many bagels we needed each day of the week to fill our normal amount of orders. Once we started advertising more about online and phone ordering mid-March, our demand shifted to a point we couldn’t have predicted.

Before I started my job at Rise Bagel, I was a graduate student in the psychology field. I had to take a leave of absence in October due to an inpatient stay for my mental health, and decided to put school on pause and pursue a new career in food sustainability. I thought getting my foot in the door at a local restaurant that focuses on local, organic ingredients and sustainable practices would provide me with some great insight. The job finally gave me a sense of purpose and control when I hadn’t had that in a long time. However, when we suddenly had to close, it was like my sense of purpose also disappeared. My job was the one thing that kept me feeling certain about my future. Uncertainty about my future at Rise has led to an increase in my anxiety around leaving school and my future career. I have many fears of having to start all over again, and it’s hard to stay motivated when I can’t gain restaurant experience from my home.

Here in Minnesota, individual unemployment benefits are only given if you had made $3,000 or more before unemployment. Because I was in graduate school and had only been at my job at Rise for a few months, I did not meet this requirement and will not be receiving any unemployment benefits. For those making minimum wage (aka many of those in the food service industry), prerequisites like this may have some major impacts. I’m incredibly thankful to be living at home during this time with great support, but I couldn’t imagine being in a more dire situation and then denied benefits based on something I may not have had control over. I’m really glad something is being done for small business owners, but what really matters is what happens after this. A restaurant will only survive if better legislation is passed and people continue to visit even after social distancing orders are lifted. The attention and support food service employees and places are getting right now is amazing, but systematic change needs to occur for them to continue to survive.

Ashton Long, bartender, Portland, Oregon

We were all in an especially odd situation because we had just all been through training and had opened the restaurant, Bar King, to the public Monday, March 9th. Our restaurant closed down to the public on March 15th and began only providing takeout orders. Luckily, right now it is looking like we’ll be opening back up and all have our jobs back, but when? I don’t think anyone has even a clue. And that is terrifying.

My partner and I moved here in early January of this year. Luckily, he works from home, but I set out to find a job as soon as I got here, and even with my experience and my resume, it took me nearly two months to find something because of how competitive the service industry staffing is in Portland. I exhausted nearly all of my savings and threw all of my faith into the fact that I’d find a job when I got here, and then I worked for literally two weeks and then lost my job. I don’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t have two jobs and work anywhere from 40 to 70 hours a week, so having this much free time, and on such an incredibly STRICT budget of one income, has been extremely challenging to fill.

While I think the stimulus money is great, and quite literally a life saver for many — including me — unemployment has been a literal shit show and a nightmare to deal with. I still have yet to see any benefits or correspondence from either Michigan or Oregon to figure out what I need to do in this situation where I lived and worked in Michigan last year and Oregon now. While I do understand that having 2.2 MILLION people sign up for unemployment in the last month is overwhelming, if it weren’t for the stimulus check and my partner, I could very well be on my way back to Michigan right now to live with family. And as a 25-year-old who has never had to consider an option like that because I’ve always had work and savings, that is a horrifying and scary scenario.

If you’re a food service worker, Eater wants to hear your story. Please fill out this survey.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/3cz9Lic https://ift.tt/2KmWSfe

Shutterstock/Kondor83

Restaurant employees from Kentucky, North Dakota, New York, Oregon, and Minnesota share their stories

Last week, President Trump formed the Economic Revival Industry Group, a collection of 200 experts and industry leaders to inform the (possibly ill-advised) campaign to re-open the economy. The group, focused on restaurants, included numerous chain CEOs and celebrity chef-owners like Wolfgang Puck and Thomas Keller. And though the latter could hardly be expected to advocate for the needs of restaurant owners whose restaurants don’t have Michelin stars, there is another group notably absent from the committee: restaurant workers.

Independent restaurant owners are struggling with the realities and uncertainties of life in a pandemic, whether it’s having to lay off employees or trying to keep people paid as the business pivots to take-out only. But for your average food service worker — servers, bartenders, line cooks, and baristas — there is even less support. Restaurant employees made up 60 percent of the jobs lost in March. Twenty-two million people filed for unemployment in the past four weeks, leaving unemployment websites overwhelmed. The Paycheck Protection Program, which offers federal loans in exchange for keeping employees on payroll, is out of money. All this adds up to millions of food service workers being left without a paycheck.

Despite Trump’s plans, no one knows what the restaurant industry is going to look like on the other side of the pandemic. And so workers wait, hoping their restaurants will reopen, hoping they or their coworkers will be rehired, hoping there will be a workplace to come back to. As chains and fine-dining chefs are the only ones with access to the White House, it’s important to remember their experiences do not represent the restaurant industry as a whole. Whether or not restaurant workers, not merely restaurateurs, feel supported will be the true test of any government program’s success. With that in mind, we spoke to five restaurant workers across the country on what they’re experiencing right now. These are stories in their own words, edited lightly for clarity.

Gregg Adams, line cook at J Harrods, Louisville, Kentucky

The chef and I are the only kitchen staff left of four full-time and two part-timers. He takes a salary, I am on reduced hours, which means less money to repair the house and cars, much less save anything. Since this began we have been steadily losing customers. Our food isn’t geared for takeout, though we changed the menu some. Also, we made a lot of our money through drinks. Initially, the state only allowed the sale of closed alcohol containers, and some restaurants started selling flight bottles and half pints with soda or cup mixer on the side. Within a week, open alcohol sales were allowed rather than just packaged liquor, but it was too late for those who followed the rules.

I’m hanging in there, but I’m lucky. Not much has changed for me and my family. My wife is on medical disability with fixed income and doesn’t leave the house much. My teenager already practiced social distancing. My 26-year-old is working 60 hours a week at a local coffee chain. My 25-year-old works for UPS. I’m blessed to have employment. I know three other cooks and two chefs who are unemployed. But I can’t plan anything for anything now. I’m wondering about my concert tickets and my child’s education if my older children will get sick, and what my options are in general. I’m trying to not panic.

Massoud Violette-Sheikh, sous chef at the Heights, Ithaca, New York

I am 23 years old and have been working in the industry for five years, starting as a dishwasher at the Heights. My start in the industry was mainly out of necessity — dishwashing offered good hours and the possibility of upward mobility in the restaurant. But the work ethic and our local food community was contagious; I wouldn’t want to be in any other industry, even in these times. I rose to sous this past year. In an area where we are financially dependent on Ithaca College and Cornell as our main contributors to economic stimulation, this has train-wrecked the local economy.

At the Heights, all staff with the exception of our chef de cuisine have been temporarily let go. I think the post-pandemic dining landscape is going to be entirely different — staff cuts, wage cuts, and mandatory seating reduction will absolutely affect how we are able to eat. Even the most luxurious restaurants will have to cut back on menus, garnishes, and available reservations. I’m hopeful that diners will come out in droves after restaurants open up, but realistically that’s not likely. The social habits that we develop will linger. I spend a lot of time talking with my close friends and coworkers. Everyone just wants to be back in the kitchen — to be back home. As an individual I’m grateful for private grants such as the Restaurant Employee Relief Fund — programs like that are going to be our saviors. But our primary concern is how long our local independent restaurants, farms, and purveyors will be able to stay open. The debt to equity ratio in our industry is very high, and I expect to see places sink into irreversible debt. I hope customers will be patient as we get back on our feet; without their support, all that will be left is Chili’s and McDonald’s.

Marlena Chaboudy, cook at A Frame Bar & Grill, Westhope, North Dakota

Busy season is the beginning of spring through the end of summer. We are situated on Lake Metigoshe, and when the snow melts people start moving in their boats and readying their docks to enjoy their summer. We were all gearing up for that when the spread of the virus hit hard and hours were cut. Our place was then shut down for dine-in service and we tried to stay positive. I found out the secret was really not to make eye contact, because if I saw one of us start to tear up, it opened the floodgates for me.

I’m behind in rent, my vehicle is in need of a few repairs. I had planned on moving closer to work — I live about 40 miles away — and found a place, but will have to come by money for the utility and house deposits and rent in order to do so. My fiancé and I live together, and he also works at the A-Frame as a dishwasher. He has filed for unemployment but has a limited work history and hasn’t paid in enough in the quarters to draw unemployment. And he won’t get the one-sum stimulus check either, and that’s going to hurt. Living in a rural community, you can’t count on anything for relief. You can’t count on the small town store to get a delivery truck, or go to the store the same day and be able to buy a roll of toilet paper or a dozen eggs. I can’t guarantee that my internet will be functional much less my phone service, and trying to even access the unemployment website can take all day. You go to the gas station for a treat and you never know if they are open because if they haven’t had enough business that day to justify keeping the lights on, or paying an employee to sit there, they close early.

I don’t think the aid the government is giving is enough. Not at all! It’s getting bad everywhere. The people in the foodservice industry are the “blue collar” workers that everyone forgets about. We are not paid as much as the blue collar norm and making ends meet isn’t looking possible for most.

Rae Bullinger, former front of house at Rise Bagels, Minneapolis

We closed our dining room around March 16th, but kept our online and takeout phone ordering systems the same. After closing the dining room, it was fairly slow that first week, but we kept advertising the online and pick-up ordering and by the weekend our system just couldn’t keep up. On my weekend shift, we were so overwhelmed with online orders overnight that we actually had to turn the first customers away, because we were still trying to catch up with the online orders. The next day is when the owners decided to temporarily close. Before coronavirus, we had a good sense of how many bagels we needed each day of the week to fill our normal amount of orders. Once we started advertising more about online and phone ordering mid-March, our demand shifted to a point we couldn’t have predicted.

Before I started my job at Rise Bagel, I was a graduate student in the psychology field. I had to take a leave of absence in October due to an inpatient stay for my mental health, and decided to put school on pause and pursue a new career in food sustainability. I thought getting my foot in the door at a local restaurant that focuses on local, organic ingredients and sustainable practices would provide me with some great insight. The job finally gave me a sense of purpose and control when I hadn’t had that in a long time. However, when we suddenly had to close, it was like my sense of purpose also disappeared. My job was the one thing that kept me feeling certain about my future. Uncertainty about my future at Rise has led to an increase in my anxiety around leaving school and my future career. I have many fears of having to start all over again, and it’s hard to stay motivated when I can’t gain restaurant experience from my home.

Here in Minnesota, individual unemployment benefits are only given if you had made $3,000 or more before unemployment. Because I was in graduate school and had only been at my job at Rise for a few months, I did not meet this requirement and will not be receiving any unemployment benefits. For those making minimum wage (aka many of those in the food service industry), prerequisites like this may have some major impacts. I’m incredibly thankful to be living at home during this time with great support, but I couldn’t imagine being in a more dire situation and then denied benefits based on something I may not have had control over. I’m really glad something is being done for small business owners, but what really matters is what happens after this. A restaurant will only survive if better legislation is passed and people continue to visit even after social distancing orders are lifted. The attention and support food service employees and places are getting right now is amazing, but systematic change needs to occur for them to continue to survive.

Ashton Long, bartender, Portland, Oregon

We were all in an especially odd situation because we had just all been through training and had opened the restaurant, Bar King, to the public Monday, March 9th. Our restaurant closed down to the public on March 15th and began only providing takeout orders. Luckily, right now it is looking like we’ll be opening back up and all have our jobs back, but when? I don’t think anyone has even a clue. And that is terrifying.

My partner and I moved here in early January of this year. Luckily, he works from home, but I set out to find a job as soon as I got here, and even with my experience and my resume, it took me nearly two months to find something because of how competitive the service industry staffing is in Portland. I exhausted nearly all of my savings and threw all of my faith into the fact that I’d find a job when I got here, and then I worked for literally two weeks and then lost my job. I don’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t have two jobs and work anywhere from 40 to 70 hours a week, so having this much free time, and on such an incredibly STRICT budget of one income, has been extremely challenging to fill.

While I think the stimulus money is great, and quite literally a life saver for many — including me — unemployment has been a literal shit show and a nightmare to deal with. I still have yet to see any benefits or correspondence from either Michigan or Oregon to figure out what I need to do in this situation where I lived and worked in Michigan last year and Oregon now. While I do understand that having 2.2 MILLION people sign up for unemployment in the last month is overwhelming, if it weren’t for the stimulus check and my partner, I could very well be on my way back to Michigan right now to live with family. And as a 25-year-old who has never had to consider an option like that because I’ve always had work and savings, that is a horrifying and scary scenario.

If you’re a food service worker, Eater wants to hear your story. Please fill out this survey.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/3cz9Lic via Blogger https://ift.tt/2xPCMrm

#Blogger #cooking #Eater #food #recipes

[plantbased-elise]

One secret less to keep

This was requested by @stayinyourlehane​, who messaged me asking for this sequel to Secrets are the best when they no longer exist (aka Elise learns how to spell secret)

WC:2409

Warnings: Swearing, homophobia

“Dad!? Papa!? Is there anyone home? No, okay, I’ll finish the chocolate cake Louise gave me by myself.” Michael Howell-Lester entered the house he’d called home since he was 8 years old.

“Don’t you dare! I was planning on doing that before Dan gets home.” Phil, or papa to Mike, appeared in the doorway leading to the lounge. He was smiling, but something about the smile was off.

“Papa, are you okay? You look a bit off? Are you ill?” Mike knew he sounded like his dad, but couldn’t help it. His dad raised him this way. He approached Phil, who looked down at the 15 year old, and soon to be 16. The boy was tall for his age, but was still no match for his dads, only reaching 6’0.

“Oh, Little Bear you sound like your dad. I’m find, just read a sad article online about bees. Oh Dan texted me saying that he’d be home soon. Apparently he ‘gave up on doing any more work for those little monsters during spring break’. So I told him that it was his choice to start teaching Year twelve. How was your day? I thought Kennedy was coming today?”

That struck a nerve. Mike flinched and the grin on his face faded. “We had a bit of a… falling out today. There’s this new kid in class, and he sat with us in lunch. He seemed cool, but then Peter and Colin, that couple I told you about that I’m friends with, walked by in the direction of the lunch line. David, the new kid, pretended to gag and stage-whispered to me and Kennedy: “can they not do it in public. It’s disgusting and shouldn’t be allowed. Can you believe gays are actually allowed to have children?” I was about to say something when Kennedy said something that I’d never thought she’d say. “Yeah, it’s so wrong.” At this point I just stood up and left to sit with Peter and Colin. Hey didn’t ask, but the majority of the lunch room had heard what had been said and they kind of just stared. Then after school I approached Kennedy to ask her what it was about, but I found her with Dave who was loudly talking about how ‘homos shouldn’t be allowed to have the same civil rights as the rest.’ And she just stood there smiling. I pulled her aside, and asked what was going on. And she answered “get away from me, you unnatural shit.” That’s why she not here right now.”

“Oh Bear.” Phil took the boy into his arms, hugging him tightly, as if to protect him from the world.

“Can we eat chocolate cake now?” Mike asked in a small voice.

“Yes, of course. Also we have birthday plans to discuss.”

They were about to start eating when a voice behind them rang out. “You weren’t going to start on that cake without me, were you?”

Dan looked at his son and husband, looking up from the cake guilty, Phil with a bit of chocolate icing on his upper lip. Dan couldn’t help but smile, then he was nearly knocked over by a Shiba Inu from behind. Daenerys wanted some attention (and food) and with the entire family in one room she knew those things were guaranteed.

“It’s not what it looks like. We were testing the cake for poison. Totally not eating it while you weren’t here.” Phil smiled, standing up and walking to his husband. “Do you forgive us, Bear?” he pouted for effect and Dan laughed. He kissed Phil’s pout away, and licked up the chocolate icing at the same time.

“Sure, only if I get a piece too. Oh Mike, can you get the green envelope from Papa’s desk. It has to do with your birthday.”

Mike left the room, and Phil faced Dan. “I thought she said she never wanted contact again. What changed?"

Dan sighed, contemplating for a few seconds before answering. “She was an only child, and in her family there’s this tradition that the first born inherits some old heirloom. She didn’t have any cousins either, so Mike is the only child in line for the inheritance. She has to give it to him.”

They stood in silence for a few seconds, until Mike returned with the envelope in his hand. He handed it to Dan, clearly curious as to what this letter contained.

“Mike, we… no I need to tell you something. I didn’t want to tell you until you are 18, because then I’ll have no legal authority over you anymore. I’ll explain it all I promise. But please, sit down.”

Mike, still curious took a seat and pulled his plate of cake towards himself, whilst Daenerys laid her head in his lap.

“I think you remember her, because you were 5 when she left, but your mother and I divorced then. It hadn’t been going well between us for a while, and she thought my job as teacher was too low to be married to a lawyer. She was having an affair with one of her co-workers, and she told me. We had to go to a judge to settle for the arrangement. She wanted to keep the house and you, but the judge decided that she got the house and I would get custody of you. She would pay child support every month. I couldn’t find a house on such short notice and with my salary, so Phil was my saving grace once more, and let us live with him. You probably remember the rest of that. We fell in love, got married and raised you. But before we got together, I was saving money to buy an apartment I had found. I was counting on the next child support deposit before I could pay the first rent. The child support didn’t come, and Phil called the office for me to ask what happened. They promised to call me when they had more information. So when I got the call I wasn’t prepared for what they were going to tell me. They told me that Kate, your mother, had moved to America and had given up her parental rights over you. She didn’t want anything to do with us. It also meant I would no longer receive child support and couldn’t afford to buy a house. Mainly, I had no idea how to tell a five year old that his mum wanted nothing to do with him without destroying him. So I kept it to myself. Phil knew and actually gave me the idea to tell you on your 18th birthday, when I’d no longer have authority over you, and you could choose for yourself if you wanted to do anything with the information.”

Dan paused. Mike sat in silence for a few minutes, until he opened his mouth. “Then why are you telling me now? I really do appreciate it, but what changed? Is she coming to my birthday? I don’t want that!” he seemed panicked now and Phil rushed to comfort him.

“No. I won’t allow her in here. She caused harm enough in this family. She was at our wedding, and she started telling Dan off for the way we were raising you. My brother had to escort her out. I’ve never seen Martyn so angry, not even when I told Caroline about his secret doll collection. So no, she won’t get in on your birthday if it’s up to me.”

“But she sent me a letter. It also contained letters for you. One was written by Kate but the other one looked really old. We didn’t open them, but Kate instructed me to give them to you a week before your 16th birthday, so here you are.”

Dan handed his son the letters. Mike read them both carefully, whilst Dan and Phil chatted, giving the boy some time to process it all. He was nearing the end of the second letter, with furrowed brows when the doorbell rang. Phil stood up and went to open the door. Mike was still looking down at the old letter.

TUQH HUBQJYLU,

YV OEK MUHU QRBU JE TUSETU JXYI OEK QHU JXU VYHIJ IYDSU Y IJQHJUT XQDTYDW TEMD JXYI YDXUHYJUT IUSHUJ. Y QC JXU VEKDTUH EV JXU ULUHIED DQJYEDQB RQDA. JETQO, Y MHYJU CO MYBB, UNQSJBO JMUDJO-VEKH XEKHI RUVEHU JXU TESJEHI MYBB UDT CO BYVU. WE JE JXU DUQHUIJ ULUHIED DQJYEDQB RQDA, QDT QIA VEH JXU XUQT EV JXU RQDA. IXEM JXUC JXYI BUJJUH, QDT JXUO MYBB ADEM MXQJ JE TE.

HUCUCRUH, ULUD JXEKWX YJ CYWXJ DEJ RU OEKH DQCU QDOCEHU, ULUHIED XEBTI FEMUH QCEDW ULUHOEDU. OEK XQLU WHUQJ FEJUDJYQB.

SEHDUBYKI MQBJ ULUHIED

It sounded like complete gibberish, but Mike already had an idea what it was. Something stirred in his mind, an article he’d found when he did an essay about Julius Caesar for history. He was about to take out his phone to test his theory when Phil came back to the kitchen. “Mike, Kennedy wants to talk to you.”

---

Later, Mike told his dads what had transpired between the once-best friends on their doorstep. Dan was enraged that is ‘little boy’ had had to go through that, but still praised him for not accepting her apology. She’d said that ‘she was just joking’ but Mike didn’t think he could ever look the girl in the eye again.

So now, on the night before his 16th birthday, he was sat at his desk, staring at the paper in front of him.

Dear relative,

If you were able to decode this you are the first since I started handing down this inherited secret. I am the founder of the Everson National Bank. Today, I write my will, exactly twenty-four hours before the doctors will end my life. Go to the nearest Everson National Bank, and ask for the head of the bank. Show them this letter, and they will know what to do.

Remember, even though it might not be your name anymore, Everson holds power among everyone. You have great potential.

Cornelius Walt Everson

He jumped up and sprinted down the stairs, to his dad, who was cooking dinner. It was an early dinner, but Phil had his radio show tonight, so this was a normal occurrence.

“Dad! How long do we have until dinner is ready?! And do you think Everson Bank is stilled opened?”

Dan looked utterly confused as he answered the questions. “About half an hour. And that bank is open till 7, why.”

But the teenager just thanked him and ran off to find Phil. He found the man in his office, gathering papers for his radio show. “Papa, can you drive me to the nearest Everson Bank? It has to do with the letter. Hurry, we have half an hour.”

Phil let himself be pulled to the car by his son, not really questioning it. He was used to it, the spontaneous actions. Dan did the same when he was excited for something.

They arrived at the bank, and Mike sprinted up the stairs, Phil following at a slower pace. The bank was nearing its closing moments, and there were no civilians except the people behind the desks.

Mike walked up to a desk where a fairly young man sat. He approached and started talking, not even letting the man talk.

“Hello, I need to speak to the head of this bank. The name is Everson.”

‘Brandon’ as his nametag read, looked him in the eyes, “Do you have an appointment?”

“No, but if you call them and say ‘‘Everson’ they will let me in regardless.”

Brandon picked up the phone and dialled a number. Meanwhile Phil scolded Mike for being rude. “You could have asked instead of demand to see them.”

Brandon cleared his throat. “Ms. Vanderwaal will meet you here.”

Phil had to wait outside while Mike talked to Ms. Vanderwaal. Brandon was being a bit too friendly, so Phil took out his phone and started texting Dan to pass the time. Mike reappeared not too long after, and they returned home. It wasn’t until they were almost finished with their dinner that Mike spoke about it again.

“I have inherited the entire fortune of my family, which is safely kept on a special bank account my great-grandfather set up when he opened the bank.”

Dan nearly choked on his water, Phil dropped his fork, and Daenerys whined as if she knew what he’d just said. Mike continued,

“I want to put part of the money away for university, and keep a part for other things. But I also want to give you two a part of it. So I’ve decided to split the money in three parts. One part will go to you, one part will be put away for future, and I’ll see what I’ll do with the third part. And you can’t refuse a gift, so no protests.”

It ended the conversation effectively.

---

Just when Mike was opening the present from his grandparents, the doorbell rang. Phil looked around the room, counting the guests. Everyone who confirmed that they could come, was there. Who could possibly be there?

The answer became clear when he opened the door.

“What are you doing here?” the venom nearly dripped from his words.

“Can’t I visit my son on his sixteenth birthday?” Kate’s smile looked faker than her tan.

“He isn’t your son. You gave up that right when he was 5, remember. Because I do. I had to help Dan. I had to clean up the wreckage you left behind.”

Just as Kate was about to speak, Mike appeared in the hallway next to his papa.

“Papa, who is this?”

“This is the woman who gave birth to you, Mike.” Mike backed away from the door, almost frightened at the sight he was seeing.

“Michael, my son. I heard you managed to unravel the mystery of our family. I gave birth to you, don’t you think I deserve a bit of it?”

Mike’s fear turned to rage, and he stepped forward again. “The only thing I’d give you is some spare change to take the bus to ‘get the fuck away from me and my family’. You were never my mother and never will be. Have a terrible day, goodbye.”

He slammed the door in the woman’s face. He turned to Phil and smiled. “Want a piece of citrus cake?”

--------

Fin.

thanks for reading

AO3  Wattpad

#phandom #phanfic #phanfiction #phan #dan #phil #parent!phan

[angeltriestoblog]

Your Comprehensive Guide to Surviving Grade 11

WARNING: The longest post I’ve ever made in the history of my blogging “career” is up ahead. Nevertheless, please read it so my efforts won’t be wasted.

In a nutshell, last school year was me trying to secure the Guinness World Record for the number of breakdowns on a bedroom floor. The amount of workload was unforgiving, the pressure to perform was crippling, the competition was inadvertently fierce and the standards set were higher than fun.'s friends in the Empire State. (Please get this reference.) Surprisingly, I survived and lived not only to tell the tale but to also help incoming Grade 11 students prepare for the year that is to come so they won't have to deal with the many risks of premature stress like I did! This is where this guide (with some unnecessary blabber on the side because will it really be an Angel Martinez post without it) comes in. Though it's a given that not everything that happened to me won't apply to you, I still hope you use these to better your experiences and emerge as a stronger and more productive person! Like me, I guess. In a way. 

To kick this off, let me just say that I know this notice might be coming in a little late, since enrollment for most schools (in the metro, at least) have already come to a close. Thus, by the time you've read this, you may have already chosen a strand of your own! The selection of some schools may be limited to the basics: Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM), Accountancy, Business and Management (ABM) and Humanities and Social Sciences (HUMSS) which are all pretty self-explanatory in terms of the topics of focus. But from what I know, others also offer Arts and Design and Sports for those who wish to devote their full attention to the talents they wish to hone and even a general academic strand for the benefit of those who remain undecided. I, for one, chose ABM: I didn’t feel like committing to a certain career yet and wanted to opt for the safest option among the choices.

The process of choosing which way to go is pretty intimidating at first especially once you figure out that the rest of your life may very well be at stake. But, it isn't that much of a pain once you reflect on your interests enough and see if those align with what you want to do and where you want to be in the future, if that’s not too forward looking for you! I know a couple of people who’ve had to compromise their true passions for the sake of pleasing their families. Whether it’s to continue a legacy that’s been passed down for several generations or fulfill a dream that belonged to someone else, some parents believe they have every reason in the world to demand their children’s future, even if it’s obviously against their will. Yes, I believe that it’s their responsibility to guide their kids through the process of figuring out what they want to be in such a fast-paced and ever-changing world where anyone can influence and be influenced for better or for worse. They must be able to provide the insight that only they possess after all the years they’ve spent collecting wisdom. They should help us plan out what’s gonna be on the blueprint of our lives, not finish it by themselves, present it and expect us to follow without any questions.

But as per usual, I digress. TL:DR choose the track you want, you don’t owe anything to anyone.

Generally, Grade 11 will be the hardest year on you. It doesn’t care if you came terribly unprepared, if you haven’t slept a wink in eons or if the people you live with barely even know who you are anymore. It’s unforgiving and relentless in the pursuit of giving you the biggest ordeal of your life. Based on my personal experience, I reckon it’s due to the fact that our teachers stand by their decision to treat us as young adults, seeing as we’d be in first year college anyway if the K-to-12 program wasn’t a thing. When we were children, everything we needed to know about a certain topic would be put on a silver platter and handed over to us, usually in the form of photocopied sheets of old handouts. All we’d have to do is memorize whatever was on them and eventually ace the tests that usually came in multiple choice or matching type form.

But now, we’re in charge of making our own notes, deciphering cryptic explanations for a certain lesson and most of all, making our own creative output based on what we could be often inaccurate interpretations. Grade 11 gave big importance to the performance task, much to the dismay of everybody. Whether individual or by group, it was always half our grade and due way before any of us were ready to face the task at hand. It also required coming up with original ideas, or solutions to the most common problems and it’s either bland when working alone or chaotic when with classmates, because everyone wants to be heard when we’re actually fighting for metaphorical spots.

I didn’t feel it much during the first semester though, because I had the best schedule on campus. Classes ended at 2:30PM for me so I had plenty of time at my disposal. I could hang out with friends, have a chat with my mom and procrastinate (responsibly) before proceeding with my work and still be able to go to sleep before the clock struck ten. My subjects weren’t terrible as well. Yeah, not all of them were anchored in the very foundation of my track but I was able to get grades far better than I would have expected, so it’s all good. Here’s a briefer on each:

General Math

A solid 8/10, which is a big deal considering the fact that Math has never been my strong suit. First quarter covers topics I barely understood when they were discussed to me in Grades 9 and 10, namely functions (linear, quadratic, polynomial, The Problematic Trio aka rational, exponential and piecewise) and equalities and inequalities. Second quarter focuses on business math, weirdly enough when there’s an entirely different subject for that, but the lessons don’t overlap. Annuities, stocks and bonds, and loans were explained plus a little bit of logic towards the end.

The key to Math is a heck lot of practice. Practice, practice, practice. Even when you know the answers, or more preferably when there’s no key given. Answer every problem in the book on a separate sheet of paper, make up your own, explain the procedure of solving to yourself, help a friend out and refresh your memory simultaneously. Do it when you get home, or when you have a free period at school or you have no idea what else to do seeing as that’s the only way you’ll develop the skills needed to become a human calculator.

Business Math

A more practical Math subject: every single topic discussed was something that could be applied in real life and useful to us when we have careers. The first few weeks consisted of our reviewing our favorites: fractions, decimal and percentage, and ratio and proportion, so it evidently started on a good note. It later on proceeds to buying and selling, computation for salaries and wages then the presentation and analysis of business data in table and graph form.

Though the lessons here are undeniably easier than our previous Math subject, it still wouldn’t hurt to practice, especially if everything isn’t clear to you from the get go. If your teacher is anything like mine and thrives on class participation, recite as often as you can whether it’s to give a recap of yesterday’s lesson or show the solution on the board. Her personal favorites in our class were those who made it a point to raise their hands as often as possible.

Physical Science

A mix of the deadliest sciences mixed in one subject. Physics and chemistry, folks. Just as appealing as it sounds. If you like both of them, you’ll breeze past this, no sweat. But if you’re like me and you stopped paying attention in science class after the teacher was done discussing the body system, you’ll have a lot of catching up to do. Subject matter included motion, energy, chemical reactions, force and energy. Don’t be too excited that there are only five, because these took two semesters to properly shove in our craniums.

There’s no downtime in this subject, you have to hustle every single day or else you’ll fall behind while the work just keeps piling up. Read up on everything and do not leave out even a single detail: know which causes what, and why well enough to the point that you can recite it in your sleep. Memorize the formulas and most importantly, invest in a double liner calculator! It’s a bit pricey but spending the amount required is far better than having to enter multiple parentheses to work your way around an equation.  

Earth and Life Science

Personally the superior science for me, considering that the topics were genuinely interesting and made me gain a better understanding of how the world works. We studied the origin and structure of the earth and beyond, earth processes, natural hazards, bioenergetics, perpetuation of life, evolution, organ systems and interaction and interdependence.

The only downside for some is that many terms will be introduced throughout the course of this subject, and you’ll obviously be required to memorize them all and at the very least, identify their definitions. Making flash cards for each lesson would definitely come in handy, even if takes a while and could very well cramp your hand but there’s this app called Quizlet which basically serves the same purpose and is easily accessible in any device you download it on.

Oral Communication

I think I was the only one in class who actually enjoyed what was going on for the most part of Oral Com, since I enjoy talking to a crowd and writing. If the mere mention of that phrase alone gives you shivers down to your spine, I guess you’ll have a lot of mental and emotional preparation to do. Normally, this subject would heavily rely on application of learnings through exercises and presentations but there was still a bit of (unnecessary) discussion here and there on topics like public communication skills and communicative strategies.

Expect a lot of speaking in front of the classroom! Tasks will range from impromptu (no time to think beforehand), extemporaneous (short preparation time upon receiving the question) and prepared speaking. Groupwork is also high in number: the teacher will give you a situation (e.g. you’ll be selling a product, your house is on fire and you need to call the fire department, ya know… the usual [?]) and you’ll need to propose your solution in the most eloquent and spontaneous way possible. Which means no reading aloud of lines scribbled on your hand with a G-Tec.

Organization and Management

Basically an introduction to the world of business and thus an essential subject for my strand. Points discussed were the nature of management, the firm and its environment, environmental scanning (PEST and SWOT analysis) and the functions of a manager in detail (planning, organizing, staffing, leading and controlling).

This subject was very detail-heavy so as much as I was willing to learn, I couldn’t avoid being overwhelmed by the number of things we were trying to run through in around sixteen weeks. It also didn’t help that we didn’t have a book to refer to and had literal stacks of photocopied handouts to lug around instead. But I guess by now, your school has a textbook to provide you with and if not, there are some published by Rex Bookstore available in big branches of National Bookstore like in Quezon Avenue. The best thing to do to survive this subject is to read so you can understand all the concepts. Everything discussed is important and the quizzes and quarterly tests you’ll take will require not only what you think it means, but also how you’ll use it IRL

Understanding Culture, Society and Politics

Potentially one of your favorite subjects, if you’re given the right teacher, since it focuses on the intricacies of our lives as human beings. From the study of humans past and present and the complexity of our cultures (anthropology), we head on to the analysis of government systems and activity (political science) and the nitty-gritty of our development and functions in human society (sociology).

I didn’t have a problem with this step the lessons were comprehensible enough to grasp my attention but just make sure that you exert effort to understand everything! Because even though a chunk of the activities also include matching type, true or false or fill in the blanks, essays are a mainstay. Usually, they’re not based on facts too but on your own personal opinion and the teacher will be able to tell if you don’t have a particular stand or you do yet you fail to back it up with actual evidence, so be sure to find a basis for everything you say.

Unfortunately, all fun and games were over when the second semester rolled in. Our privileges were taken back and our schedule was reverted back to the usual 4:20PM. Thanks to the fact that my busmates never went straight to the bus upon dismissal and liked roaming around the campus, leaving our conductor to search for them like she was in some sort of treasure hunt, I went home at 6:00PM every day. To make matters worse, this just so happened to be the season when the research papers started rolling in, one by one, all poised and ready to kill us ever so slowly. Let me give you another quick recap:

Pagbasa at Pagsuri

Definitely not the kind of “Pagbasa” I was expecting, if I’m being frank. I thought we were going to be reading and analyzing contemporary Filipino literature, which excited me since my knowledge in that genre was close to non-existent. Turns out, we would be looking at different kinds of texts (informative, persuasive, analytical, etc) then finding out how to write them afterwards. There’s a chance you might not experience this unless we go to the same school, but our teacher invented the ADIDS method in order to help us learn this more effectively through application. I forgot what it stands for, but basically all you do is discuss each facet of a very broad topic thoroughly in the form of a well thought out class presentation.

Meanwhile, the research paper takes up one whole semester. Not to sound boastful, but I had thought that I would be able to do this with ease because all I ever do with my life is write I mean I practically came out of my mother’s womb with a pen and paper in hand and I speak more Filipino than English these days seeing as  I spend a bigger portion of my day in school. But, the finished product is often bland and makes use of the same words over and over in a failed attempt to accurately describe what I want to put on paper. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, the topic also had to be narrowed down repeatedly to suit a particular audience, from a specific place within a specific time frame so we ended up doing a research on the effects of Jason Derulo’s songs on the opinions of Grade 11 students from our school in the academic year 2016-2017. Please don’t laugh at us.

You also don’t just write the entire paper, but also be briefed on its parts, their functions and determine what sets them apart from each other, and the specifications in making each of them. Which includes stuff as minuscule as the measurement of the margins, font sizes and types to use et cetera. It’s not that hard though because as you’re working on the paper, you familiarize yourself even more.

Komunikasyon at Pananaliksik

The easiest one I took the entire semester, and for obvious reasons, my favorite. Our teacher was brilliant in the sense that he was well-versed in the subject matter and got work done yet let us watch Train to Busan or Seklusyon on the TV if the schedule permitted. The topics weren’t mind-boggling either: we just covered the history of the Filipino language and communicative skills (which further cemented my belief that this was basically the counterpart of Oral Com). They may be confusing at first but the key is to notice sentence patterns! The number of activities given to us was reasonable and not particularly stress-inducing: just quizzes that were few and far-between, a groupwork and reaction paper for a performance task.

Fundamentals of Accounting

A lot of people are intimidated by the idea of studying Accounting, and I’m not surprised. It’s always described as something that relies on analysis and numbers, two things that we normally don’t excel in at school. But it’s actually nothing to fuss about as long as you do your reading, understand the basic guidelines, practice at home and have a qualified teacher who has the proper training and skill set. The first few chapters don’t even involve computation of any kind yet. You’ll just be acquainted with the very foundation of the subject: the branches of accounting, the users of accounting information, the forms of business organizations and types of businesses. Maybe the most important lessons that you could pick up are the accounting equation (assets = liabilities + equity), types of major accounts and the generally accepted principles because they serve as the rules to follow for making your accounting-related decisions.

Eventually, you’ll make it to business transactions and their analysis, where you’ll be taking a trip around the whole accounting cycle. You’ll have to fill out a journal, ledger and unadjusted trial balance then adjust that trial balance using the adjusting entries normally provided to create your income statement, balance sheet, closing entries and the end goal, the post-closing trial balance. Sounds like a lot of work, but it’s seriously not that difficult if you do your homework! It’s also best to invest in an actual journal and worksheet, instead of solving on sheets of yellow pad that can easily be misplaced.

Statistics and Probability

Stat was weird for me in the sense that our lessons were generally ambiguous unlike what their names insinuated and I seemed to understand everything while it was being discussed but the minute I got home to work on assignments, I found myself staring at a wall until a friend who actually knows what to do goes online on Messenger. Later on, I found out it was because I needed to practice on my own to be familiar with the procedure instead of trying to memorize all the steps when it depends on the type of problem. We covered random variables, probability distributions, normal distributions, sampling, estimation of parameters and hypothesis testing (which was actually quite fun).

If you’re not keeping up to speed with everyone else, please do work on it as early as possible. The lessons here are somewhat connected to each other so if you failed to catch the drift on one of them, it’ll create a chain reaction and by the last topic, you’ll have zero knowledge of how to solve anything. Ask help, preferably from your teacher because not only do they explain it most accurately but it helps them see your initiative to do better, which they take into consideration when computing for your final grade. Do not settle for the exercises found on the book. Make your own, if you’re in the mood to cramp your hand, or turn to websites like The Oxford Math Center for useful worksheets with answer keys.

Contemporary Art

The very bane of my existence. The perfect way to sum up this subject in six words. Art was never my strength, anyone who knows me is aware that I can’t draw to save my life, but it didn’t really have much of a dent on my report card since it happened to be a minor subject. But thanks to the implementation of the new curriculum, it is given a new sense of purpose as a core subject with a weight of O N E. We had dealt with the different periods of Philippine art extensively, the National Artists of the country and different contemporary art forms such as film and the oddly interesting performance art. (Trigger warning for some graphic content though, so do be careful when searching these up!)

Activities ranged from making presentations similar in format to those in Pagbasa at Pagsuri, creating manifestos for the Philippine youth in relation to their role in the art world, holding a class exhibit to display the work you’ve made and my favorite: going on a fieldwork to hunt for contemporary art in the city. All this will lead to the culminating activity: the creation of your very own output, where anything is possible and depends solely on the one calling the shots.

This art class is no longer focusing solely on the physical aspects of a certain work, but also on what it actually means and what its relevance to society actually is. So, a good tip would be to always look at the bigger picture when given something to analyze! It’s hard at first, I admit I didn’t have much to say during the first few meetings but as the floor is opened to more interpretation and intellectual discussion, you’ll get the hang of it and instinctively feel the need to join in.

** We are about to dive in a zone that is fittingly named The Deadly Trio. ** Actually, if these were stand-alone subjects, I’d be fine but the fact that there are three of them in one semester when they’re basically discussing the same things and giving the same ridiculous amount of take home work was enough to drive me up the wall.

Practical Research

As implied by the very name of this subject, the main focus would be the creation of a qualitative practical research paper throughout the entirety of the semester. Discussions here were very minimal, as the teacher thankfully wanted us to focus on getting as much work done in the classroom as possible. I slacked off moderately during her period instead of lessening what I’d have to do at home, and in the end I ultimately suffered. But anyway, topics discussed include the importance of qualitative research, finding a good topic and sources to build it up, reviewing different types of literature, understanding and collecting data and further analyzing it to later on be able to report our findings.

One another thing to look forward to (not in a good way) is the dreaded thesis defense, where your paper will be dissected and closely examined for any possible shortcomings and held against you in front of a panel. It doesn’t always have to be the bane of your existence: as long as you contributed to the making of the project, you’ll know enough that you won’t be humiliated the minute you open your mouth.

A tip to take into consideration is to choose the right groupmates. Unless teachers pre-determine who you end up working with for two straight quarters (in that case, you’ll just have to learn how to accept your fate, whether it is for better or for worse), as much as possible, go for those who are responsible and actually care about their grades. It’s never fun to work with people who send you a montage of copy-pasted statements from Wikipedia pages and pass it off as their “contribution”, go offline Messenger the minute you even think about asking for help and think that printing the paper is a valuable addition to the team.

Reading and Writing

Contrary to what I initially thought, this was not the counterpart of Pagbasa at Pagsuri in the English language and I was thankful in a way because God knows the pain that inflicted upon me. The first quarter starts off quite easy, with critical thinking, fundamental reading skills, selecting and organizing information and critical reading skills. It may sound like a mouthful, but most of these are stuff you’ve picked up long before, without the assistance of a teacher! Some people may find patterns of development a hard topic, but if you read books, I guess identifying them just comes natural to you.

The latter part of this subject is where the ugly stuff goes in. I personally felt deceived into thinking that it would be as simple as our first lessons: identifying and writing the thesis statement and topic statement then it suddenly escalates and turns into SO MUCH ACADEMIC WRITING. When I saw that we were going to be making book reports and article critiques, I shelled out some of my favorite fictional reads and Man Repeller stories of the month only to find out that we’d be reviewing serious, educational material with very specific and strict guidelines to follow to make it as formal and cohesive (and basically not fun) as possible. Research reports, project proposals and position papers will also be in the works at some point: they are very structured and usually have to revolve around topics that are related to your strand, so there is a chance you may find it boring.

English for Academic and Professional Purposes

When I saw I had this for a subject, I was actually glad at first since English has always been my forte. So I was anticipating a repeat tutorial on all parts of speech and the basics of the subject-verb agreement when in reality, all I got was a dupe of Reading and Writing. Which is why, I had no idea why we had to take up both of them during the same semester.

Besides all subjects that required the submission of a research paper as some sort of culmination, this was the most demanding in terms of written output. During the first quarter, it’s still permissible to chill as you’re only going through reading and writing different types of academic texts (does this sound familiar to any of you?) but as the next one rolls along, BOOM. Reaction paper. Reflection paper. (Yes, there is a difference.) Concept paper. ANOTHER position paper. Report.

Now, if you’re already thinking about how you’re going to make it through when your writing is as lifeless and flat as can be (e.g. It is a sunny day, I ate an apple, I need to pee), don’t sweat it. That is exactly what your EAPP teacher will be looking for anyway. Academic texts do not require flowery writing that went through EDSA traffic before getting to the point (which was obviously an inconvenience for me): nobody cares about your opinion unless they say so and even if they do, they’ll probably require a sentence limit.

 Well, that’s a wrap! I spent approximately twelve hours working on this post: one of which was spent on the Kitkat bench in Landmark trying to find a catchy way to start it off, and my eyes hurt and I may be suffering from carpal tunnel but all of that means nothing as long as I’ve been able to guide one hopeless soul out of the dark. I’ll be back with much lighter content very soon if I can factory reset my head and get it to work properly again.

 Stay in school, kids!

Angel

#advice #grade 11 #senior high school #k to 12 curriculum #philippines #angeltriestoblog #pagod na ako #recs #life dump

[prorevenge]

Shady hotel business.

WARNING: This post is looooooong. If you want a quick fix, this isn’t the story for you. If you want to dive deep into the layers of corruption where it’s all about the little things, then please read on. Also, I'm fond of lists.

This happened two years ago. I was twenty and a recent university dropout. I needed a year to empty my head, recover from imminent burnout, and make some money to help support my single mom and my younger sister (who’d just given birth with no father in the picture). I was a very insecure person at the time. I really wanted to work, but without a degree life sucks balls... until I got contacted by Mr B.

Mr B found me on a federal website for job-applicants, where I was registered. He was looking for a manager to help manage his small hotel: a beautiful establishment with six lofts located in the heart of a medieval city (my city). I answered him immediately, saying that I had no prior experience with management and that my qualifications didn’t exactly lie in that area, but thank you very much for the consideration. He answered back, saying ‘just come take a look and we’ll talk about it.’

First thing I did was Google Mr B. He had an architectural firm and was coaching a professional football (soccer) club, which is kind of a big deal in my little country. Secondly, I Googled the hotel. It was indeed really small and fairly new; an old underground mill transformed into six luxury lofts, but with the medieval style and feel kept intact. I decided I had nothing to lose by simply visiting and hearing him out. I was extremely curious, too. Why me? Well, you can probably guess, but I couldn’t. I was naïve, terribly insecure and in desperate need for a job, to prove to myself and to the world that I hadn’t taken a gap year for nothing.

Long story short, I met with Mr B that same week. He was a short, business-like, fairly handsome man, friendly enough, didn’t sweat the little things, showed me around and explained to me what he expected. It was a slow season so I’d have some time to learn the ropes. Before I knew it I was employed. Mr. B made me three promises:

a salary between €1400 and €3000 that would increase depending on the hotel’s (my) performance

a job as a manager + receptionist, since the place was small enough to combine the two

my own room in the hotel, so I wouldn’t have to commute daily

The work started immediately. I was designing stickers to put on the doors, translating letters in German, French and English, working with the booking software, making schedules for the weeks to come… it was a rush, like nothing I’d ever done and I was loving the experience. Finally Adult Life, Responsibility, a way to prove my worth!!! As business started to pick up and all lofts were opened for rent, I was soon working from six in the morning ‘till ten in the evening, doing administration until it was time for check-in, then checking people in, communicating with clients and suppliers, checking people out again, preparing rooms for the next visit, grocery shopping at the market nearby and preparing breakfast for clients, etc, etc.. I also had an old work phone that I couldn’t turn off under any circumstance. If clients called, I had to be accessible.

PHASE 1. REALIZATION

Soon inconsistencies started to rear their ugly heads:

1. There was only one cleaning lady for the whole hotel. She had a second job at another, bigger hotel, so I could never be certain if she’d be available. I realized I’d have to jump in to help with the cleaning. I hadn’t been informed of that. I pressed my boss about this and he gave me the name of some African girl who ‘cleaned his house sometimes’. Off the books.

2. Only then did I realize that I hadn’t signed a single piece of paper. He said he’d fix that as soon as possible. I didn’t push my luck, since I was a new recruit and very eager to please.

3. The room he promised me (where I would be living) turned out to function as an office/supply room/washing room. In other words, the cleaning supplies were stashed there, as well as the washing machine, the keys and documents for all the lofts, etc.. I would be living at work, literally. Also, there was no bed. I was to sleep on the floor.

4. Mr B had disappeared from the face of the earth. Or, well, he acted like he had. He lived in a luxury apartment only 5 minutes from the hotel, but he didn’t like to be contacted about ‘all the little things’.

5. I soon figured out there had been a reason some of the lofts only became accessible once I moved in as a manager. They weren’t finished. Some bathrooms needed extra insulation, one of the faucets made a horrible noise, locks needed fixing, cables and insulation were visible in some spots, wood clippings were raining down from some of the beams (I would later discover there were WOOD BUGS in the beams, something he hadn’t informed me about and that he’d left untreated for months! Guess how I found out…)

6. Mr B started to ask little favors. Like could my mom fix some curtains for his daughter’s bedroom, or couldn’t my uncle help with the repairs in lofts 2, 3 and 4… all of it for a little price, if you catch my drift. I was the manager after all. I was supposed to fix that stuff. And if my family could do it for cheap…

7. At the same time, he managed my budget. This is understandable of course, but let me elaborate: managing a hotel costs money. The only money he gave me was on a credit card that was constantly empty. Be that as it may, I did the best I could, saving money by doing most of the washing and ironing myself (the laundry service he’d hired was extremely unreliable, but he didn’t want to change because it was cheap), being frugal with the food (every room had luxury coffee machines they were free to use and the coffee cost me a fortune), not making expensive phone calls, etc.. I handled huge amounts of money coming in (most of the guests were rich people), but wasn’t allowed to go to the bank and put more money on the hotel’s credit card.

Once we needed an extra mattress because more clients would be coming in than anticipated and they all wanted to stay in our biggest loft. I had already begged him for an extra foldable bed (the one he told me to use was so cheap it bent sideways if you put weight on it, so he reluctantly, after much begging, supplied me with a new one). I drove all over the province on my day off, hunting for the best, cheapest mattress. I found an incredible one, bought it with my own money, and informed my boss of the cost. I received a very angry e-mail, basically telling me I better watch what I spend…

8. As I became a more capable manager, Mr B became more demanding. I have a friend with severe schizophrenia that I visit in prison from time to time. You might know how harrowing a process it is to visit someone in prison. I had planned my visit meticulously to make sure I’d be back in time to relieve my sister who, with her little baby of a few months, was holding the fort for me, managing check-ins and phone calls. When I entered the waiting room, I had to turn off my work phone. This was no big deal, seeing as the fixed phone at work would always ring first and my sister was there to pick it up.

When I exited prison and jumped into my car to rush back to work, I had a few missed calls from my boss. I rang back, only to be cussed out for not picking up my phone. I hadn’t been at the hotel, either. I told him my sis was there in my stead. He said he didn’t want to talk to my sis, he wanted to talk to me – insert berating tone, short, angry sentences and a whole lot ot guilt-tripping.

9. Furthermore, since the card was so often empty but rooms needed to be cleaned every day (by a group of off-the-books cleaning ladies that I’d rounded up left and right, since I had no other choice) I was forced to pay these ladies out of my own pocket, which left me broke half the time.

10. Aside from hotel-related phone calls, Mr B had started to connect some of his personal calls to my phone as well, namely the ones he didn’t want to deal with himself, aka disgruntled companies asking for undue payments, creditors asking for his phone number and address, etc.. As he was my boss, I didn’t give these people his information. Occasionally, I got a call from a fancy pansy company in France, telling me it was time for Mr B’s bi-annual ordering of luxury wines.

11. The money didn’t come. My money, that is. My salary. My bread and butter.

12. Lots. More. Shit.

PHASE 2. DETERMINATION

Finally, I realized I needed to get out of this situation. Or rather, I’d known for a long time, but I had hoped things would settle, he’d give me my contract and I could start making demands. Pssssht, naw.

So I made plans:

1) The Turkish cleaning lady. Since this woman had been at the hotel from the very beginning and was way more experienced than I was, she didn’t like me at first (understandable: I was a stupid youngling but still technically her boss). However, all it took was a few questions about her kids and a whole lot of admiration (not fake) for her cleaning skills, and she opened up to me like a floodgate. I paid her more than Mr B had told me to pay her (out of my own pocket) because she really was the most reliable person I worked with and she could clean a loft like nothing I’d ever seen. She taught me a lot. Soon she was loyal to ME instead of him. And once that happened, the little secrets started coming…

2) My Turkish cleaning lady told me about the girls who’d worked at the hotel before me (all young, non-white and inexperienced, just like me). They’d all quit within the span of a month (there were six of them). I was the only one who had stuck around (probably because I lived with my mom so I wasn’t dependent on my salary to survive). I soon got hold of one of them. I visited her and did a cross examination. She told me about Mr B’s treatment, his refusal to make the job official and how he still owed her quite a bit of money. This was useful information, because I now knew for sure that this guy wouldn’t give me my contract, ever. I still had hopes, because he’d found me though a federal channel, which at the time I took to mean that he wanted to do things the right way. FALLACY.

3) I had my family behind me. At this point, my uncle had done lots of big repairs (insulation, plumbing, fixing furniture, etc), my mom had worked on most of the curtains and some of the flooring, my sister was pulling FREE SHIFTS to help me carry the enormous workload that no person in their right mind would give to a single employee...

Thing is, my family had only been keeping their mouths shut because they love me and want to support me. I was a bookish, introverted, insecure, eager to please little girl. My mom is a criminologist who works with very scary people on a daily basis. She knows a crook when she sees one. My uncle is the most brutally honest, short-tempered, intimidating repairman you’ve ever seen. He loves me, but he hates entitled little shits who call themselves businessmen. My mom’s calm and collected powers of logic combined with my uncle’s brash ruthlessness was a death trap waiting to happen. But that wasn’t all.

Let me tell you a little something about my sis. She’s fierce. In high school, she was a super popular bomb shell who got thrown out of two different schools for bad behavior and whom I witnessed cussing out a police officer on more than one occasion. Uhu, that kind of delinquent. All of that changed when she got pregnant. She cleaned up her act in a spectacular way and is now working as a human rights advocate. She’s also one of the best mothers I’ve ever seen. In any case, back then, when the mother things had only just started, she redirected her efforts towards her family. I guess she felt guilty for messing up my life for so long (I developed OCD because she used to stress me out so much – I’m fully cured now, though) She was helping me at the hotel because she knew I needed her in case things got bad.

4) Lastly, there was the thing that made ME angry. I’d been experiencing some difficulty with the administration of the hotel, mostly booking-related. When I went digging through emails and online payments, I noticed inconsistencies, and eventually concluded that Mr B was messing with my shit. He was cancelling services and contacting people behind my back, without telling me anything, leaving me to desperately search for bugs and fix last-minute bookings. That’s when I snapped.

PHASE 3: REVENGE, FINALLY

I convinced the Turkish cleaning lady, as well as all the other cleaning ladies, to stop working at the hotel. The Turkish lady had better prospects anyway, but she hadn’t been sure about leaving. I asked her to keep it a secret. I would inform Mr B.

I contacted the creditors who’d been bugging me for months, as well as the companies who were still waiting for their money, and gave them Mr B’s phone number and home address. Because, you know… business is business

I wrote a very honest review of the hotel on one of the major booking sites, telling everyone all about those giant bugs in the ceiling…

I basically told my family they could be themselves now, I was quitting the hotel anyway. So my mom sent the bill, my uncle made his phone calls and my sister, well…

I made sure the hotel was fully booked for the upcoming month (every year my city holds this huge street festival that people from all over Europe flock to, so that wasn’t too difficult

I sent Mr B an email saying I was quitting on Sunday. I was valiant enough to finish my work for the week. Oh, and the cleaning ladies would be quitting, too

I gave the work phone to my sis, reclined in my seat and listened to the beautiful conversation that unfolded when Mr B called. My sister didn’t disappoint. She spared no expense.

I thought about reporting his shady antics to the police, but decided against it (for my own sake, as well as the cleaning ladies). I did report him to the federal service for employment and told them he was using their site to lure people into undeclared work against their will. The person I spoke to made sure our conversation was confidential. So no further legal action for me. I was satisfied with the knowledge that on Monday morning, Mr B would have to drop everything and rush to the hotel to serve his snotty guests, prepare breakfast, struggle with his faulty administration, receive complaints from kookoo clients, write shitty emails to his angry suppliers, do the washing, the ironing, the cooking and the cleaning, and all the other stuff I had been doing for months, unpaid and underappreciated.

Thanks for making me a thousand times stronger, jackass. I regret nothing.

PS: The hotel is no longer in business. Whoops.

(source) (story by OpheliaoftheRipples)

#pro revenge #by OpheliaoftheRipples #prorevenge #pro revenge stories #revenge stories #pettyrevenge

[welcome-to-sanjis-shitty-kitchen]

This is why we can't have nice things Gabby. Please read if you have time, just sharing my thoughts a little.

Got assaulted by my sister over a pair of leggins, if she had just let it go i could have looked tomorrow but she had to punch me when i asked her to leave. And i did find a pair of leggins i can't remember if they're mine. So i did the only thing someone salty af would do, marked them with my initials, shoved them in her face and told her they were mine. But as my sister is the biggest failure in humanity i know she still believed they were hers. But it looks like i won for now, She acts as she owns everything in our house including the house itself, she owns 95% in our shared bathroom because she places her million of things on every available space there is and i have one tiny shelf, there's like no reason for me to have anything nice because she will take it. i'm so enclosed and store everything in my own room because sooner or later that shit will disappear. She's disgusting, annoying and the litteral worst type of person there is. So utterly selfish, stuck up, can't think for her self kind of person. And me as her sister is only good for serving her, there's so much fucking wrong and fucked up things with me because i'm not living up to her standards in what a little sister should be. Because apparantly i'm suposed to humor her and agree with everything she says...is she fucking insane? Just because i like sitting around in my underwear and play videogames and my room is "boy-ish" and i only care about essential hygene products and clothes rather then lots of lots of makeup and being a godamn fahsionista i'm not "normal". She calls herself a feminist but shoves that gender role bullshit down my fucking throat. Like different opinions doesn't even exsist in her dictionary, she is correct, she has the only will. Ofc she will think that because she only values her own opinion and can't respect anyone elses. She's like an obstinate fucking toddler and idk how to deal with this. So this scenario when mom bought her some soda, like a 2 L bottle. The one mom bought me today is 1.5 L. I would not say anything because maybe the store only had that soda, or maybe mom just grabbed one, or she didn't remember what she bought and is really tired from work and i'm just glad she didn't forget to pick that soda up from the store. But oh boy, my sister though, she would have screamed bloody murder at mom then start a fucking civil war with me because she wants half of what i have then. I'll still come out with less because she thinks she deserves more. Because it's unfair, well newsflash asshole, life aint fair. It annoys me to death how unacceptable she is of someone having more or better then her..... I don't fucking understand how she thinks, shes so stupid and overdramatic.... She has no fucking shame or compassion or humanity and it's honestly so sad that it is this way. My family is litterly the weirdest collection of selfish, racist, homophobic, biggoted cheating assholes i know and all i can say is thank fucking god i became nothing of that, thank god i don't drink, smoke, do drugs or is a garbage piece of human shit. I have a bad example of pretty much all bad there is in my closest family. I mean, i became a ball of anxiety and depression but hey thats waaaaay better then some fucking redneck biggoted asshole. My family is like a bunch of hardcore christians in a way except it's for the swedish lineage. YOU CAN ONLY BE SWEDISH IN THIS HOUSE. is basicly what my parents say aka i'm banned for speaking another language or things they don't understand or want to hear. I love my dads argument that only retarded fucking toddlers speak english. I would call that a gifted toddler u piece of shit. AHHH MAN, they hate me for being so "cultural" just because i can speak like 3 languages and some fucking latin, because i'm not interested in swedish culture. Because i'm different. Like i said different and different opinions is a bad thing here. And i'm not suprised parents don't understand anything whats going on the times and this world. Stuck in their little rutine and safe bubble of their work and home. Ofc they wont think anything different because they dont get involved with something else. As someone who invests in a lot of time on social media and see a lot of whats going on the world and different cultures and opinions, ofc i would have a broader perspective and way of seeing things. Thats not gonna change. I'm not gonna force any parents to see my way because thats a shitty thing to do. But i just wish, if someone bothered to read all this shit. No matter what, why can't parents be supportive, you don't need to understand it, you don't need be a part of it. Why can't u just tell ur own child like "ohh u wanna do that thing, well good on u! And have fun" is that too much too ask? Supportive parents could change childrens lifes, because no matter what happens you know mom and dad got ur back. So why is it that people like my parents cant even talk to their own kid unless its to relay information about something they have planned, or when they want me to do somethint. They dont ask about me, how im doing or what im thinking. It's probably been 10 years since i last trusted my mom to tell her anything i felt. And ive never talked to my dad that way unless its to defend myself for some bullshit. They cant even remember the names of my friends ive had for the past 7 years. They honestly couldnt give 2 shits about me as a person and it breaks my fucking heart having to deal with this shit. In like 90% of my conversations with my parents its either an argument or im lying trough my teeth to make it seem like im fine, that everything is fine. Because i can't trust the bastards with even my life, which why i fear for my godamn life everyday that they will get tired of me. Which is hella unfair seeming as my sister is barely employed and works like 3 months a year the last 3-4 years. For now i'm being forced to get a drivers license so i can get a job. But when i do get a job and make a decent wage im gonna move into town which litterly makes my cars useless as monthly bus card is probably cheaper then maintaining a car and paying for a parking spot and i would have to look for an apartment with a garage....no thanks..and everyday....just a parking spot at work would be like 1/3 of my salary. Because thise things aint foe free. But i guess i'm gonna be glad once i have a drivers license, even if i dont use it. But i am petty as hell that theyre gonna force it on me and not my sister. If you actually read this you deserve a godamn gold star. Or like an entire cake.

#By shivas titts this is long #i'm so sorry but i felt like ranting #not gonna lie iv'e been writing on this thing for an hour now #its 3 am and im very disapointed in humanity #at least my family #Seriously tell me if u read it #i wanna say thanks