#and trying to learn how to play the game on keyboard; especially with the slide notes; is.........small hell | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

passi0np1t · 2 years

Note

AIGHT OKAY SO LIKE

i always loved the idea of eddie meeting his s/o via live streams, maybe theyre just checking it out until they respond to him and he goes "oh? Crush?" And basically talks to them everyday until he gets caught and they learn who he really is

ohoho i love this concept, haven’t seen anything like it on tumblr yet. i gotchu x

Curiosity

(The Riddler)

Summary: In which the gn reader lets their curiosity get the better of them as they make their way into a Riddler stream, and they don’t go unnoticed

Warnings: None! P tame

Notes: Ok so I lied, here’s half of a new mini series, there is defs gonna b a part two

—

You recall a saying your grandma always used to tell you as a child when she’d find you in trouble, “Curiosity killed the cat”. And maybe she was right about that. Or maybe grandma just needed to learn to live a little. Cats have nine lives after all.

Since the murder of Gotham City's mayor, his killer has been the talk of the town, especially among the poor and common folk of the city. Some are down bad and some are against the violence. And some, like you, don’t know what to think. On one hand: violence is never the answer, but on the other: when violence doesn’t answer to peace nor peace to violence, then sometimes you just have to beat them at their own game. You think you can understand that, appreciate the desperation even. This appreciation is how you find yourself in the situation that you’re in now.

You’re sitting amongst the crinkled sheets of your unmade bed, laptop resting on your thighs and fingers hovering above the keyboard. It’s taken a few long days of impersonators and dead ends to finally find the real deal, and now that you have the killer's actual website before you, you’ve got chills. It’s only a bit of curiosity, some mindless sort of investigation, you tell yourself assuringly. You’re trying to occupy your time in between gruelling shifts at work, and then the few hours of social life you manage to squeeze in on your days off. This is the fruit of your labour.

There’s a countdown for his next stream, the glitching text flashing across the screen as 10 minutes tick away. It feels like forever though, you have to do something else to occupy your time; boredom is the enemy. You click open a game of solitaire, though honestly, you never bothered to learn how to properly play or even understand the game. Though, you do remember watching your dad while away his free time competing against a computer-generated opponent, and sometimes even a few of his childhood friends — if they would have the guts to brave a stay in Gotham — that is.

You start your game, gathering your aces to start up your foundation piles. There’s only the sound of incessant clicking and your exhales as you work, your stacks building. When you run out of face-up cards, you pause, racking your brain for the next step, but you come up with nothing. Accepting defeat is easy in this case as you click the ‘?’ button and hints pop up on your screen. You need to start picking up cards from your face-down pile. You find yourself bored if it all quickly though. Solitaire has never been an engaging game for you, maybe if you were middle-aged and beaten down more by capitalism, but that day is not today.

You slide your fingers across the touchpad mouse and it zips up the screen to your open tabs, switching you back to the Riddler’s website. The grainy green numbers a stark contrast against the otherwise black screen as the last minute begins to count down. You wait in suspense and it occurs to you that you probably need a hobby. Then you remember that you do have hobbies, things you used to be able to enjoy more often before adulthood and full-time work. You’d gladly be cooking or knitting or painting if you had the time and the energy, you tut at yourself, that little voice of reason in the back of your head should shut up. Maybe a few years ago you would’ve listened to it but you feel a touch too bitter for that now. Though maybe you are becoming like your dad, this new Riddler enigma is your solitaire. Before you can get too deep, the screen in front of you goes black, dragging you away from psychoanalysing yourself for the time being. It’s stays like that, just blank, and for a second you worry your laptops gone flat, and then the screen crackles to life again.

Sounds of laptop keys clicking fill your room as a green text emerges, one letter at a time: ‘i am first on earth and second in heaven and appear twice per week. what am i?’.

A riddle. Of course, it couldn’t just be easy. You re-read it to yourself a few times, speaking aloud as you attempt to connect the dots, “First on earth, second in heaven…” As you analyse the words you realise, “E! First in ‘earth’ and second in ‘heaven’. E appears twice per week on Tuesday and Wednesday…” You input the answer with a half-grin, watching as more little green letters appear.

‘smarty…’

‘if you know me, you’ll want to share me. if you share me, i’ll be gone forever. what am i?’

You go through the same process as you did the first riddle, though this one takes you a little longer, you eventually come to a half-hearted conclusion, ‘a secret’.

It must be right because more little letters appear, ‘can you keep a secret?’ and underneath it ‘Y/N’. You click the bold ‘Y’ without hesitation, eyes glued to the screen as the game continues.

‘we’ll see…’

‘last one, what belongs to you but others will use it?’

You know this one, you’ve heard it before and you type up your answer quickly, ‘your name’. Correct again. You feel a certain hesitant pride at being able to guess his riddles, though he hasn’t made them particularly hard for you. You watch as yet again, more green letters appear, no riddles this time, just a simple question: ‘what should i call you?’ You feel like you’ve made it through some sort of initiation ritual as you gingerly begin to type out a pseudonym: ‘curiouscat’. It’s kind of cheesy but the nickname makes you smile a bit.

The screen fades to black, accepting your answer, and then finally, he appears. He’s a little grainy, cast in dim white lighting from an unknown source off-screen. He’s in his full get-up, still as stone but his other viewers are eating it up regardless as subtle flashes of text on the top left of the screen notify you of people’s donations. On the right third of the screen is the viewer's chat. There are only about 29 of you so far but you can see the numbers rising now and then, stopping at a fixed 47 after a few minutes. This takes you by surprise, you thought that there’d be many more, and for a moment you start to doubt the man before you, and then he begins. He stirs to life, cocking his head to the side, it looks like he’s reading the chat, light eyes darting up and down his screen behind clear-rimmed glasses as his heavy breaths filter out from his mask.

“Thank you for all the donations,” his gaze flicks back to the middle of his screen, “And welcome to some of our new viewers, it seems not everyone in Gotham is as stupid as I thought.”

Your eyes widen a bit at this, nerves prickling at the nape of your neck. He isn’t addressing you directly or anything but it feels weird having him acknowledge your presence. Then your relief and slight disappointment, he moves on, discussing the mayor's murder with a grim delight. His voice is deep and scratchy as it infiltrates the otherwise stark quiet of your room. It’s late and most should be asleep by now but you know how sound travels in your apartment building, so you fetch your earphones from your nightstand, plugging them in and shoving the buds into your ears.

“-loween night, I killed the mayor because he was not who he pretended to be. But I am not done.” The chat blows up at this but he doesn’t yield, any info on his next victim kept tightly under wraps as his viewers begin to discuss the mayor's death with feverish excitement.

You quickly conclude that his viewers are crazy, but also kind of funny. You wonder if you know any of them personally, if you’ve ever sat beside them on the subway or ordered your morning coffee and muffin from them. They could be anyone, the anonymity is exciting and freeing and altogether dangerous.

DData_Drag0n: can i put a hit on my boss

xXhushXx: lmao he isn’t a hitman

tr0ubleboi: i rlly liked the severed thumb, was a nice touch

xAstroCrabx: r4dioh3ad im in your walls

C10ckbreak3r: so who do we reckon the next unfortunate pig is

With the latest comment you begin to type out a reply, you’ve done a fair bit of investigating yourself — albeit light — and you’ve narrowed down the Riddler’s next victim into two categories.

curiouscat: well it’s probably a cop, right?

curiouscat: or a rich socialite but that seems unlikely atm

DData_Drag0n: oh hey newbie

C10ckbreak3r: ok smarty pants y do u think that

G0THAMSUX: are you a girl

You sit back and think for a moment, planning your next move as you watch the replies flood in. It’s not that you don’t know what you’re talking about but you are new here and they’re all for the most part giving Redditor incel. You’ve been ganged up on and doxxed by sad old men a few too many times on forums and chats and you aren’t planning on letting that happen again. Not this time. Not in front of the Riddler in a chat full of serial killer fanatics.

curiouscat: the mayor seemed close to some of the police force

curiouscat: when you think of the most corrupt groups in society it’s usually cops and politicians right? and ridding gotham of corruption is the riddler’s m.o soooo

DData_Drag0n: they’re speaking facts suck shit c10ck

C10ckbreak3r: alright fine lmao

r4dioh3ad: cat how do u know so much hm

r4dioh3ad: methinks ur a mole

xAstroCrabx: lmfao radio, not every new person is a rat stop gatekeeping the riddler

You notice that the Riddler is reading the chat along with you all, not making a sound besides his heavy sighs, but you can sense a hint of curiosity behind the frame of his glasses and you smile a little to yourself.

What you don’t know is that you’ve caught his attention. He watches you converse with the others with a quiet interest, observing you pave the way and figure out his next moves while the others squabble amongst themselves.

He won’t say his fans are dumb, every time he’s streamed they’ve managed to get past his riddles and they’re full of handy tips for weapons and tactics. More importantly, they understand him and his mission. They’re there for him to bounce his ideas off of and plan out his next moves. Hell, they pay him even when all he does is sit there and breathe. But they squabble. They have no idea. And he likes that, keeping them all on their toes, giving them just enough to keep them excited. Also, it’s better he not just come straight out with everything, who knows who’s behind these silly little usernames, he doesn’t need his plans foiled just to make a few people happy. So he supposes he should just ban you, you, you who knows too much too soon. Who are you?

He can’t bring himself to do it, even as his mouse lingers over the ban button, circling it helplessly. He knows he should but he doesn’t want to. You’re like a breath of fresh air, he doesn’t even know you but god he fucking wants to. He wants to know what you know and how. The burning curiosity begins to eat him up, gnawing at his insides and he knows he has to end the live stream early.

He waves farewell to everyone, only laughing dryly when his fans begin to pour out with last-minute questions and beg for hints that he ignores. He stares straight through the camera and it feels like he’s looking directly into your soul as the screen goes black.

You let go of the air you’ve been holding in your lungs, relief and a small sense of accomplishment filling your body with warmth. Almost a full week of searching and you finally found the Riddler, made it through one of his streams even. Though you’re not sure if you’ll be back for the next one, for now, your curiosity feels quenched. You pause in this train of thought as a yawn overtakes you, screwing your eyes shut and stretching out a bit from your stiff position in your nest of a bed. God it must be early in the a.m. by now and you have work and chores and good knows what else to do. You hate your life sometimes. Most of the time. Or maybe you’re just sleep-deprived and bored again.

You blink a few times as you think bitterly to yourself and when you fully open your eyes you find some little green text waiting for you on the black screen. Perplexed, you sit up straight again, pulling the laptop onto your thighs once more as you read it aloud to yourself, “who are you?” The question mark blinks up at you as it waits for a reply.

“Surely it’s not asking for my real name?” You ask your empty room, voice soft and a little croaky from lack of sleep. You suppose you could just leave it, shut your laptop down and never go on a Riddler live stream again, but your curiosity always gets the better of you and you type in your pseudonym, ‘curiouscat’.

Almost immediately, more letters begin to appear, backspacing on typos before settling on ‘you know that’s not what i mean’.

As you read the reply aloud to yourself you feel as if all the colour has drained from your cheeks, feverishly typing out your response, ‘who am i talking to?’ But you already know the answer to that. There’s no way you caught his attention with your few minutes of chat, the possibility of it feels thrilling and treacherous all in one.

You try to wrack your brain for what possibly could’ve hooked his interest, and then you suppose he probably didn’t like you guessing at his next victim, meaning you probably got it right. A smirk tugs at the corner of your lips as he types out his reply.

‘don’t ask silly questions. you seem smarter than that’

You scoff, typing away your reply as you shove away the alarm bells of reason ringing in the back of your head, ‘says the serial killer asking for my real name’ and then ‘are you mad that i guessed your next victim?’ He at the very least definitely hadn’t been expecting it, he seems to like watching his followers scramble around in the chat.

His replies are quick, though riddled with typos that he has to keep going over. You try to imagine him hunched over his computer, breath heavy as the pads of his fingers slap against his keyboard, typing in some frenetic haze as he awaits your replies, ‘not mad, just curious’.

You laugh as he sets himself up for a perfect comeback, teasing men who think they’re so big and bad has always been a favourite of yours. You wonder if he’ll ban you if you push him too far and the outcome seems likely but you suppose it’s for the best, ‘well, curiosity killed the cat’

His reply is instantaneous, like a desperate man hoping to get in the last word, green letters form together to string a simple reply, ‘but satisfaction brought it back :)’

#edward nashton #the riddler #batman #batman2022 #the riddler x reader #batman 2022 #edward enygma #edward nashton x reader #edward nashton x you #edward nygma x reader #the riddler x you

684 notes · View notes

felassan · 3 years

Text

DA4 Lead Producer Scylla Costa’s BIG Festival talk, “Challenges of Dragon Age production during the pandemic”, can currently be rewatched on YouTube here starting roughly at timestamp 8:57:02 after a lil presenter blurb/intro. It’s 1 hour long. When it was streamed live, there was an English translation ‘voiceover’. There isn’t in this vid, however I want to post the link for Portuguese speakers, and also it’s neat for everyone to be able to see all the slides he presented with for themselves in context.

I don’t know if an English-language version will get put up so I’m sharing the notes I took during the talk below, in case anyone’s interested and because I might as well since I wrote them. The rest of this post is under a cut due to length.

Edit: Found a place to re-watch the English version of the talk

(Quick note: I didn’t note down everything, mostly things that caught my interest, so this isn’t exhaustive, and when I was watching I was real tired, so pls bear that in mind and don’t take these notes as bullet-proof 100% accurate gospel or direct quotes. If you watched it and think I’ve written down something wrong/misunderstood, let me know and I’ll fix. Also if you’re a Portuguese speaker and I’ve gotten something incorrect or missed something important etc, again just let me know.) **

** Edit: I’ve now gone through my notes while watching the talk again. I’ve filled in some of the gaps (although they still don’t cover everything said) and so forth, and now I’m no longer worried about there being possible errors in this post.

-----

For some context, this slide contained the breakdown of the talk’s structure. Bear in mind there are other slides present in the talk than the ones I’ve posted here, I didn’t include caps of all of them, just ones which were of note to me.

In the talk, chief Producer Scylla goes over challenges of DA4 production during the pandemic. He discusses the adaptations - necessary skills and learning from remote work - and he ponders on the future of teamwork.

After the launch of ME3 he became a producer, all his MMO and other experience helped a lot. He was on DAI for 3 years and MEA for 9 months, then Anthem. Today, on DA4, Scylla and another Lead Producer were the heads of the whole project, and there is his boss is the Executive Producer Christian Dailey.

^ the usual AAA game development cycle (brief introduction)

AAA games are games that are launched for several platforms simultaneously.

In BioWare’s case, the pre-production phase of the game development cycle can have from 5 - 30 people, and up to almost 60 people when they’re just about to go through the gate to production.

In the pre-production phase, they go through the game’s concepts and prototypes and start developing systems. They seek the game’s concept and focus, and its key features. They do lots of market research. In the case of BioWare, all their games are strong in narrative, so they have lots of tools related to game narratives and supporting the development of a narrative (cinematic design, dialogue system etc) that get focused on in this phase. Other parts of the team such as writers and cinematic design need these systems to do their own roles.

In BioWare’s case, the pre-production phase through to launch can take 4 - 6 years, but it does depend on the size of the team during development.

With regards to Dragon Age 4, they were coming close to the time when they would shift from pre-production to the production stage when the pandemic hit.

During the production phase is when the development of content and features takes place, with the systems mostly already existing from the pre-production phase. A few new systems may be developed in this phase. In the production phase is when things start escalating, and the team really starts growing, to like 2- or 3-fold the prior pre-production phase size.

(DA4 is currently in the production phase.)

In the alpha phase, features have to be fully implemented and systems all have to be running / working. All the game features should already be in the game by now. They test from pre-production onwards, but this phase is when they run heavy technical tests with lots of players trying to play at the same time. In the beta phase, the idea is that you should now have full content and that now you’re balancing it and running more and lots of different tests with players before launch. There are final tweaks and then the final launch, when in the weeks prior to launch, all the different business units and areas e.g. marketing team, technology team, publishing team, get together once a day and all of the game’s issues are reported and brought to the table to be prioritized. Then they decide the next steps re: these issues (this is known as ‘the war room’).

After the launch there are usually patches like day zero patches and other patches, this being standard industry practise. The last stage is the new content stage where there are DLCs and a game with more content.

On March 12th 2020, the team gathered to review the DA4 story in the new office. Everyone was very excited. (They had spent over 10 years in their last building and had noticed that with the team growing they needed more space. In August 2019 they found the new studio in the city center.)

Anyway that evening, they got an email from the CEO which contained instructions and said that due to the pandemic, they should from now all start working remotely. They had known that this happening was a possibility so they had been planning on how to have all the devs working from home, but initially less than 50% of the devs were able to work from home successfully/efficiently due to various issues e.g. you need a VPN to be able to log in remotely to do your job normally, varying home office setups. The day after this, the office was basically deserted, except for Scylla, the IT infrastructure people and one or two odd devs.

Scylla was part of the team that was working on allowing the devs to work from home. They first started looking at the short-term changes they needed to make to allow this.

“First, take care of our developers”.

When the pandemic first hit, their and Scylla’s [as Lead Producer] first priority was to look after the devs. Many of them are parents (schools and day-cares were shut, children were studying from home), others have relatives living with them, others have other personal circumstances which of course need to be taken into account when it comes to assessing what needs to be taken into consideration for this new scenario. So, they looked at each dev on a case-by-case basis in order to evaluate, speaking to each one and asking them what they could do to support them.

One of the first changes/adaptations they could implement was flexible working hours and flexibility around deadlines. Generally speaking the devs got a lot of support, EA was really good and really supported the devs especially in the first months of the pandemic (and they are still supporting them). Initially not all devs had suitable office spaces at home, some were working from the living room from laptops or at the kitchen table. The whole covid situation basically just happened over night and nobody was really ready to deal with that change. So their first step was to enable their devs to work remotely. As a producer, Scylla’s main task is to communicate with the team such as via a number of daily meetings. He doesn’t depend so much on powerful hardware.

“Enable developers to work remotely”.

This slide shows some of a BioWare audio team. Different teams have varying and specific needs in order to do their jobs and therefore in order to do them remotely. For example, the audio team need good-quality speakers and amplifiers, while the lighting and art teams need other specific equipment such as tablets and large screens. So there was a lot of work they had to do to go through each dev to understand their individual needs and what needed to be done for them. ‘Could they download the builds? Did they have the right performance [tech-wise]? Could they submit their changelists, their codes to the server?’

Some devs needed a more powerful internet connection as it would take 6-8 hours to download a build (some devs live rurally). Some needed a lot of cable, as they were working far away from their routers (sometimes up to 50m). As time went by things got better and better.

The chair devs work from is also important; a kitchen able chair etc is not suitable to sit in for long-term desk work, possibly leading to health issues like back ache and blood circulation problems in the legs.

Every 3 months they had money given to help devs buy new mice, keyboards, monitors - anything they needed really in order for their office setting at home to be improved. For a while, because lots of people [generally, in society] were needing and buying them, it was quite hard to buy things like webcams and microphones.

On mid- and long-term changes:

In terms of DA, we have to look at this from 2 perspectives, the change in the personal and the professional environments.

As a consequence of working from home, people tend to be less active during the day (even in an office, you go between meeting rooms, up and down stairs etc). Physical activity supports life quality and therefore work quality. Scylla noticed that he began to feel listless and such, and found that he needed to change his routine that he had initially developed when he started working from home, for example; having a normal start time (as in, have a semblance of structure in your day as if you were still working in the office site), get dressed at the normal time, not having meetings over lunch etc. This wasn’t just him, lots of other devs encountered this and had this experience too. Devs which adapted faster had better productivity and became more productive faster.

Scylla bought a stand-up desk which he can raise up and down, and at meetings he would be delivering a talk while standing or even while walking on a treadmill. Other devs also got stand-up desks. He tracked his body’s data on a Fitbit. These sorts of things helped improve physical and mental wellbeing. Other devs did similar things, like starting going out for jogs or began practising yoga. Essentially, everyone needed to make changes to their daily routine in comparison to what they had been doing prior to the pandemic.

The pandemic has been a thing for over a year now. In their location, every couple of weeks a new restriction is put into place or a rule is changed, and every two weeks there’s a new thing that you can and can’t do. Scylla also started moving around his property. He worked on his desk, fixed it up and painted - taking up a new hobby. Other devs picked up new hobbies too. These are good ways to be active and also to be somewhere else, i.e. to break up the working day and not be spending it all in one home office-type location. Scylla found that when he made these sorts of changes to his routine to improve his lifestyle, the data output by his Fitbit as indicators of his health/wellbeing etc improved, e.g. number of steps taken in a day, heartbeats per minute while at rest. As stated many of the other devs went through a similar process.

On the professional side of things:

They had to improve remote delivery of builds. Accessing things from home as a dev requires a VPN. They need to download a build every day and then upload it to the server after making their changes to the game. They had to work with infrastructure and research other tech, such as streaming tech to allow remote console access, in order to better facilitate this process. For remote access, they also had to work on adapting communications channels.

“Adapting channels of communication.”

In this slide, the team are working on the storyboards. Before you can implement motion capture & performance capture, you have to ‘run the storyboards’ like this. These are small illustrating drawings which reflect the drafts and are meant to quickly reflect the intention of the scenes that are to be built. Before the pandemic, the team would go to meeting rooms like this, sit down, talk and interact in person. After the pandemic, the question became ‘How do you do this over Zoom?’ You can, but it’s not quite the same; it’s harder to see peoples’ expressions, some people are embarrassed speaking over Zoom etc. Therefore they had to adapt their communications systems, and unlearn the ways in which they developed before in order to relearn and learn new ways of communicating.

Slack was a tool that they adopted on this front. Communications channels can be confusing on Slack, so there was a need to develop structure. For example, how quickly should someone reply (as a recommended convention for the purposes of work)? They had to define the process/procedures for the channels so it was clear for the team as a whole how it would all flow (this is important especially if you have a team with say 30 people or as a whole hundreds of people). Before the pandemic, they had stand-up meetings where they’d go around in a circle every morning and talk about their activities - what they’re going to be working on, any roadblocks they had encountered etc. The question arose ‘How do you replace these?’ They ended up doing Slack messages at a certain time of day and updating their statuses with some details on what they’re working on and color-coding (green - fine, yellow - need help, red - busy/blocked out).

Another issue that they faced was unforeseen - the number of meetings that devs were having really shot through the roof. When there wasn’t a good structure of communications channels, any conversation would become a meeting. Everybody began scheduling meetings left and right, and at the end of the day they would have little time left in which to actually work on their to-do lists. Hence, they had to work with the team to really analyze and be very pragmatic. ‘Which meetings needed to happen? Which didn’t? Is a specific meeting really necessary? Which meetings should be recurring? What can be done over Slack?’ This guideline had to be given to the team to help, and it improved things a lot. The number of meetings decreased a lot and they got more effective. For example, by making sure to set an agenda for meetings beforehand, and by having meeting notes (then a dev who didn’t really need to be at a meeting could skip attending and just quickly review the notes output after instead). They also decreased the standard length of meeting times from the default Outlook blocks of 1 hour and 30 mins to 55 mins and 25 mins respectively. This 5 minute change gave devs time for things like bio breaks (also 4 hours in a row at a computer in a home office with one meeting after another just isn’t good for a person).

“Adapting p-cap and mocap”.

On content:

From a content point of view, the most difficult thing in terms of the pandemic was adapting p-cap and mocap (performance capture and motion capture). They hire actors and it’s a large studio. The pandemic meant big limits to what they could and couldn’t do. The actors had to be masked and 5 meters apart in distance (although it doesn’t look like it in some of these shots due to angles). Also there could be no other person around in the studio - only the actors. The directors instead would ‘patch’ in remotely on big screens (you can see this in the second photo in the top right).

Before the pandemic, they felt that they wouldn’t be able to do p-cap or mocap properly remotely, as the directors would usually stand right next to actors giving guidance on their performance. The techs would also usually be near. But they adapted! The keyword is adapting, changing process. It’s harder and it’s different, but it is possible, and people start rethinking what is possible. What was said to be impossible before now is possible.

P-cap differs to mocap in that it also captures voice and facial expressions.

On the future of work after covid:

There will probably be more working from home and more flexibility for workers e.g. being able to work say 3 out of 5 days from home. It does depend on what a dev’s specific job is however. For example, the audio engineers require lots of specialist equipment and said equipment is of higher quality and quantity in the office. So, depending on role, devs might be working more often or less often from home.

Another development is that lots of devs are moving house. In lockdown etc people started reassessing what’s most important in life. Some are moving further away from the studio to get a cheaper rent or for example couples who both needed an office space to work from home from but their current place only had one area. Others are moving closer to nature for a better quality of life, and still others have other different reasons for doing so. Over 10 devs that he knows in fact have recently moved, including Scylla himself.

The pandemic changed certain skills being used by people on a daily basis. Scylla used as an example of this one of his soft skills, being able to tell from looking/interacting in-person with someone if they are stressed out. Obviously it’s less easy to tell if someone is stressed out when you’re remote, so you adapt different ways of checking in with people in the new situation. To continue carrying out his role as Lead Producer, he began checking in with his team pro-actively on the new comms channels and asking how they were doing.

Also, now that companies are more open to working remotely, there is going to be increased competition for hiring devs. They saw both sides of this coin at BioWare. They were able to hire devs from many places that they couldn’t hire from before e.g. Montreal, Vancouver, the US, as there’s less need for devs to relocate to Edmonton or Austin. This opens up opportunities to hire really intelligent and skilled people that they would not have had access to before.

Question and answer segment:

The pre-production phase has been concluded. They’re in the production phase.

They are not giving out a lot of details yet but Scylla is really excited as a big fan of the whole series. He thinks that with DA4, they will have the opportunity/possibility to launch the best story out of all DA games. He feels that the characters they’re making are amazing. He’s dying to say more but can’t.

When you work from home you need to keep your team as productive as possible. During the pandemic, when people started working from home, they noticed that some people became more productive and some people became less productive. They were analyzing it on a case-by-case basis so as not to make assumptions. They were interested in seeing what they could do to help. At the beginning of the pandemic, they were looking at the devs as people and seeing what they needed.

Production of DA4 still needed to continue during the pandemic because they want to be able to launch the game.

This slide shows a writer. Writing is an example of a role which is more able to work from home easily.

Their productivity did go down in the first month of the pandemic. After adaptations, some people then became more productive than they were before (this was role and personal situation-dependent, examples of this being artists and coders who were able to art and code at home without being interrupted, thereby being able to produce more). Covid has affected productivity in general, but this is part of our new reality. They have adapted and adjusted some deadlines. They have enough data (Scylla LOVES data) now to understand how long it will take them/how long they’ll need to launch the game. They have always had historical data for this purpose, but they’re doing more of this sort of thing now to ensure that they are doing things at the right time.

Remote hiring opens up the door to more talent joining, so if someone has talent geography will hold them back less. Some companies though may choose not to hire people from other countries due to labor issues, cumbersome legal aspects, time zones. But even in such cases there are activities for example that can be carried out while the rest of the team is asleep such as testing or working on the build, or there are cases where those companies still will want to hire a specifically/highly talented person even in spite of the potential legal aspects and so on.

On mental health: People were affected. There is the mental, physical and social impacts of the pandemic situation on people. EA supported them during the pandemic in terms of their mental wellbeing, there are specific companies (services offered, speaking to a therapist) that they can contact if they need something or help. EA had always been good at supporting them with this sort of thing but this has improved further during the pandemic. Another change was that they could/can take a couple of days off if they needed/need to because of the pandemic e.g. to take care of children, who were obviously not at school at the time. As a producer he had to be very mindful of all of this. How much they were monitoring peoples’ wellbeing really went up during the pandemic.

A question that was asked - in terms of DA4′s storybeats, is there anything in there that they decided to change due to the pandemic as it wouldn’t be sensitive or appropriate to include anymore, for example a plague plotline or something? Scylla’s answer is that DA and ME are games in which they try to have narratives that are relatable, which include things which people will identify with, so that players understand what characters are going through etc. Nothing in DA4′s plotline/storybeats has been changed (in the frame of this question, relating to the pandemic), as it didn’t have anything in it that could be specifically or a directly connected to a pandemic-type situation or anything. Of course the DA story has Blights and the Taint, but these are different & fantastical things and existed long before the pandemic situation. So this wasn’t the case with DA4 and there was no need to change anything, but this has happened to other games where they decided to change a storyline due to a strong correlation with something in the real world.

There were then concluding/closing remarks. The message he wants to send is that a crisis will always spark opportunities. Look at a crisis and try to see how you can grow.

-----

[☕ found this post interesting or useful? my ko-fi is here if you feel inclined. thank you 🙏]

#dragon age 4 #the dread wolf rises #da4 #dragon age #bioware #video games #covid mention #long post #longpost #wanted to write these up properly and post them yesterday but wasn't able to #mass effect #anthem

107 notes · View notes

cosmiclatte28 · 3 years

Text

My Fault (Jeno x reader)

a/n: semi angst - fluff- happy end!

trigger warning : mentioned drunk scene, break up, nothing too wild i guess

tag list @neopalette @yutahoes (it's jeno your little boy) and idk who else hahaha

enjoy!!

It's just another day in the big study room and you're busy looking for motivation to start preparing for your upcoming tests. Life has been great for the first few weeks, parties, strolls, games, picnics and boom midterms! Your boyfriend has been a great moral and mental support for the last three months and you cannot exchange him for anything in this world! Not even extra sleep.

“Where should we sit?” Jeno, your lover for three months, asks you with his trademark smile on his face.

You look around the room, there's not many people studying. Afterall it's Friday and people usually go partying or go for a movie night but you can’t. Not when you have test next week.

“That table has a chair for two and it's next to the window! The sun is still bright and we can open the window if you want some air.” You point to the spot that looks warm with the sun and no one seems to be around.

Jeno nods and just walks to take the other seat when you quickly drag the chair to sit down.

You begin to open your laptop and Jeno also opens his own laptop. He agrees to come with you tonight not just to accompany you, but he also has a paper due by the weekend and he hasn’t started yet.

In the comfortable silence both Jeno and you are submerged in your own focus. Occasionally you see Jeno typing furiously on his keyboards but sometimes he just has his hand on his face while his eyes scan through some journals maybe.

You giggle as you take a sip from the cold fruit tea you bought along the way. Your slurping sound makes Jeno looks up from his screen and raises a brow.

You hand over the drink and shake it in front of him. He knows what you mean and just simply take it from you and sip some to refresh his mind.

“Ooh I like that! What's that again?” he asks since every time you order a fruit tea it’s always a different flavor.

You reply to him as your eyes continue to read your slides and textbook “Mango?”

He hums in respond and you just ignore him.

It goes on for an hour or two. With your foot occasionally bumping his under the table and Jeno's groan when you accidentally kick his shin. You're still on the last chapter when you feel a big warm hand holding your free hand on the table and giving it a soft stroke.

You glance from your notes and blush at Jeno. Who still has his eyes glued to the screen but his hand is holding yours and his thumb is slowly caressing you. You squeeze his hand, knowing this is something Jeno always do when he feels nervous or worried about something.

You pause your reading and rub your thumb on his hand “Jeno? What’s the matter honey?” your calm voice grabs his attention and you can see how tired his eyes look.

“I run out of ideas or journals that can support my argument.” He sighs and slumps on his chair.

You only smile and hold his hand harder “Come on, let's just wrap up for today hmm? The sun is pretty hot outside maybe we can just lay down and chill under the heat.” You give his hand a jiggle and that brings a smile on his face.

“Gosh you really know me.” He says as he saves his work and turns off his laptop.

You wink at him “Of course I know you! Let me turn this off and we can go.” You keep your notes and book then close your laptop.

Jeno stretches when he gets up from the chair and offers you his hand when you already has your bag on your back.

“Did you bring a mat?” he asks you, worried if you’ll get itch from the grass

You nod “I happen to have one”

“Let's rush!” he pulls you excitedly to look for an empty space.

Both of you settle somewhere near a tree where the shade is also saving you from sunburn. Jeno opens the mat and after placing your bag and his to keep it from flying, both of you lay down on the grass side by side and close your eyes.

You feel his hand creeps to hold yours and you only smile. Jeno is always shy in public, but at times like this, he can turn into a pda boyfriend.

“I love the sun… and you… and oh the pretty flowers.” He breathes in the fresh air and watches the trees filled with colorful petals.

You turn your body to face him and put a hand over his trained muscles “I love you too, don’t ever leave me.”

He turns his head to face you and smile “I'll never leave you.” He presses a quick kiss on your lips and you turn red.

“Life sucks.” You throw your plushy to the wall and that makes Renjun and Jaemin duck away from you.

“Come on, it's been a month! Move on (y/n)!” Renjun groans when he has to spend another Friday night comforting you in your apartment.

Jaemin lays down on his back and stare at the ceiling while his limb dangle off the sofa “Moving on is hard Renjun. Especially for (y/n)! Jeno has been super sweet but ooof suddenly-" he pauses because you threw him a pillow which hits his face.

“don’t mention his name ever again!” you feel your eyes wet again and Renjun only rolls his eyes because oh well here goes the same routine.

Jaemin and Renjun are your bestfriend. They are the men who introduced you to Jeno and now when Jeno and you are no longer a thing… you hog Jaemin and Renjun to accompany you every weekend.

“He's a jerk.” You punch your doll and Jaemin flinches “Can you not punch that rabbit! I feel bad.”

You force a laugh but end up tearing down “Jaemin why did he do this to me.”

Renjun stands up and sits by your side. He taps his shoulder twice and you directly cry on his shoulder.

Jaemin sighs, all of you have discussed this for a lot of times. Jaemin tried to explain but you never listened. However today he'll do it again.

“Look Jeno was not the wrong one. He was unconscious (y/n) when that girl kissed him.” Jaemin massages his temple. “And you saw the wrong thing at the wrong time. You blamed Jeno since you're also not in your right head and you broke up with him before giving him a chance to speak.”

“But he could’ve begged me to stay or explain. He didn’t even try to explain!” you blame the poor guy again.

Renjun chimes in “He tried okay the next day, but you were both hungover and you don’t give him a chance at all. You blocked his number duhh.”

You punch Renjun “I block him coz he was wrong.”

“He was drunk (y/n)” Jaemin pulls his own hair in stress “He was drunk and that chic just lost her mind and kissed Jeno.”

“Even when he's drunk he should’ve remembered he has me!” you don’t want to let the boys blame your fault. Well you did break up with him but he was the first one to play with fire. Right?

“Oh come on! Both of you are stubborn. You were not on your mind neither was Jeno and boom you didn’t allow him to tell you what happened and you just storm out of the door saying it's over.” Jaemin can still remember the picture in his brain because first it was his party and second he felt guilty because it happened in his party and third both of you are his bestfriends.

“So you're blaming me?” you scoff at Jaemin which makes both of the guys in your room groan.

“This! Look you're always blaming others.” Jaemin loses his cool. He's tired of dealing with you every Friday to Sunday. He and Renjun also want to enjoy their weekend but they can’t because you force them to be here while threatening them that you'll go drink by yourself if they don’t want to come. And oh boy Renjun and Jaemin knew better to never let you go anywhere by yourself.

“Renjun back up please?” you groan when Renjun shakes his head “Jaemin is right. Maybe this is your time to learn that sometimes you have to admit you're wrong.”

You freeze at that point, you don’t know what to do. One part of your heart screams you're not wrong but the other part of you is considering listening to the boys… coz after all you really did not give Jeno a chance to explain at all.

You sigh and close your eyes as you lean to the big cushion. “I'll think about it. Fine… let me try to listen to what Jeno has to say.”

Renjun pats your shoulder “That's so cool of you. Sometimes in a relationship, you can’t always be the right one. It takes communication and dialogue not a monologue (y/n).”

You nod “I miss him so much, but he probably hates me already.” you wipe a tear that left your eyes

Jaemin scoots closer and pulls you to a hug “Hey listen, tomorrow just come to him and say what your heart wants to say. He'll listen and he won’t hate you okay.”

You push a small smile and glance at two of your best friends “I am so lucky to have you guys.”

They pat your shoulder “We’re glad we can help.”

The boys were right, a two way communication works and solves the problem. Jeno really explains how sorry he is about that night, although it was not his fault.

“Shh I forgive you already. I know you're angry well if that’s me. I'll react the same way, maybe I'll let you explain though.” He smiles and pinches your cheek

You turn red “Sorry. I am so immature in this relationship."

Jeno takes your hand “Well, you're lucky I am willing to teach you to be more mature in this relationship.”

You gasp “You're giving me a second chance?”

Jeno pulls you closer and tuck your hair away “I never stopped loving you.”

You snake your arms on his waist and pull him to a hug “Me too. I love you so much Jeno. Thank you for everything.”

“Promise me we'll solve things by talking okay and not just by judging the scene.” He ruffles your hair

You bury your red face in his chest “Promise.”

In the corner, Renjun and Jaemin give each other a fist bump

“Looks like it’s our turn to find each other a girl.”

end

#multifandomnet #jeno x reader #jeno x you #jeno x y/n #jeno imagines #jeno scenarios #jeno oneshot #jeno fanfic #jeno fluff #jeno soft hours #jeno angst #jeno #nct fluff

67 notes · View notes

writers-block246 · 3 years

Text

OHSHC Imagine- Kyoya, Tamaki, and the Twins react to you playing Just Dance

Authors Note: Hello guys! It’s been a while since I’ve uploaded so here is a draft from the summer of my four favorite boys. Don’t worry, I’m working on some new stuff and will be up soon! I’m currently watching MHA so there will be content of that :) anyways enjoy this for now

TW: suggestive themes

• tamaki suoh

you smiled as you watched the disc slide into the console. just dance: a game you haven’t played in years, but one of your favorite video games growing up.

‘just dance! dance, dance!’ you heard the game say, and indeed you shall.

you guided the tiny hand across the screen to choose one of your old favorite dances. you pressed ‘a’ and the music recognized as good girl by carrie underwood started to play.

you play through half of the song and you already were 3 stars in. you heard the familiar squeak of your bedroom door open, the smell of tamaki’s cologne entering the room, though your oblivious self did not notice his presence.

your boyfriend leaned against the wall, his arms crossed as his eyes were stuck on your moving body.

he chuckled.

“you enjoying yourself there, princess?”

you gasped, pausing the game, turning to tamaki.

“hey babe,” you managed to say, blushing at the sudden embarrassment.

he must have sensed your shift of emotions because the next thing you knew his arms wrapped around your waist, turning on his princely charms you always fell for.

he caressed the side of your face, causing your pink cheeks to deepen to a crimson red, something tamaki was only able to do.

“now princess, don’t be embarrassed... you dance so gracefully. the sight of your smile causes the fountain inside of me to start overflowing.”

one thing for sure is he had a way with words.

“besides my love, you look sooo cute when you’re dancing!”

you laughed as you grabbed another wii remote, handing it to tamaki.

“wanna dance with me?”

he smiled as he grabbed the remote.

“okay, you may look cute while dancing but i will still beat you.”

“bring it on,” you said as you unpaused the game.

tamaki may have had a way with words, and he may be amazing at ballroom dancing, but one thing for sure:

he will never master the art of just dance the way you do.

the scores proved it.

player 1: 5 stars

player 2: 2 stars

• kyoya ootori

you began to grow bored watching kyoya type away at his laptop, he was sitting at his desk for hours as you were trying to find a foolproof way for him to finally stop. he had been working on something for the clients of the infamous host club, and nothing you could do could convince him to take a break.

you sighed and stood up, walking over to his dresser, where sat a wide screen tv and a game console. you flipped through the games he owned, pulling out just dance. you look over at kyoya, still clacking away at the keyboard. you roll your eyes and put the game on.

you scroll though the options and suddenly got an idea. you turn on the song mr saxobeat, hoping to gain your boyfriend’s attention with the suggestive moves in the dance.

the song began to play, and you turned to face kyoya, moving your hands seductively as if you were trying to pull him in with a non existent rope. he was facing your direction but his eyes did not even move off of the screen.

you continued without worrying about kyoya, until you get to the bridge of the song. you moved your body along to the beat, kyoya finally looked up and watched you with a smirk on his face. you had him exactly where you wanted him.

soon the song was back to the beginning, pulling the non existent seductive rope, to which kyoya actually played along with.

he walked towards you and grabbed you by the waist, pulling you into the warmth of his body.

“finally, i got you to get off the stupid laptop,” you muffled into his chest.

he chuckled softly, his hands on your hips.

“you should play with me kyo... i’m sure you’d be just fine at this game.”

he pulled away from you, adjusting his glasses as he kept that damn smirk on his face.

“that is an intriguing offer, in its own way. is this all part of your plan?”

“pshhh, no. it’s just that i would totally beat you..”

he kissed your temple.

“challenge accepted, my love. though, you should know. i never lose.”

and he was right, he never played the damn game in his life, and still managed to beat you. and the fucker still went back to that laptop right afterwards.

though, he still looked up at you when you were doing some not so kid friendly moves. and that’s when the laptop shut.

• hikaru hitachiin

you had just arrived at your boyfriend’s house, you stood at the door after knocking, waiting for hikaru. to your surprise, his twin, kaoru opened the door.

“hey, y/n, nice to see you, come on in,” the boy said, opening the door slightly for you to enter their mansion of a home.

“hikaru is in the living room, he’s kinda been in a shitty mood all day, so good luck,” kaoru warned before heading off.

this was no surprise to you, however, you were one of the few people who can change his mood within seconds.

you walked into the large room, seeing your boyfriend, slumped over on the couch.

“hey handsome, you okay?”

he crossed his arms as he felt the shift of the mattress.

“yeah, just bored. i was waiting for you all day.”

oh yeah, that’s right. you came over a few hours late. you decided you needed to find a way to make up for his bored-ness.

you put a hand on his knee, looking up to see his slight blush.

you move your hand slowly up his thigh and to his waistband, you hear his breathing hitch. bingo! now you knew exactly what you were gonna do.

you pulled your hand away and walked towards the tv. you heard hikaru groan.

“y/n...”

“oh hush, hikaru.. i’m gonna make it up to you.”

“i thought that was the part where you make it up!”

you chuckled as you turned on just dance, scrolling to the song.

“this is the part where i make it up to you,” you smirked knowing full well how suggestive this song was.

the song on the floor by jennifer lopez started to play. you knew the moves by heart.

you turned to face hikaru, imitating the moves of the tiny woman on the screen.

you noticed his demeanor change, and you can see the bulge in his dress pants grow. you could tell he especially liked when you shook your hips to the beat of the music.

at that point, the red haired boy couldn’t hold back any longer. he practically rushed to the tv, yanking the console’s cord out of the socket.

“aw hikaru... why’d you spoil my fun?” you smirked.

“i think you made it up to me plenty,” he spoke lowly, tugging at your jeans.

and soon enough, you both were literally on the floor.

• kaoru hitachiin

you sighed, turning towards your long-time boyfriend, kaoru. you were laying in his bed watching movies for the past couple of hours, but now you were quite bored, even though you did enjoy the comfort of being in his arms.

he looked down at you as you looked up at him, and you immediately locked eyes.

“bored?” you both asked.

you heard him chuckle as you shuffled closer into his chest.

“yeah,” you answered.

“well, what do you wanna do? we could go to the park, i could ask the club to get together, i can have hikaru grab us a pizza or something, uh—“

you smile just before you cut him off.

“i have the greatest idea.”

you suddenly see him perk up.

“ooh! are we gonna make out?”

you shook your head, then kissed his cheek.

“maybe later, handsome,” you said as you sat up, “i actually was thinking about a game i played when i was younger.”

“oh! a commoner’s game, fun!”

you gave him a glare, signaling him to shut up. you continued, grabbing your bag at the end of the bed.

“i actually brought it with me, you wanna play?”

“sure!” he said with a grin, taking the disc from you, “just dance? never heard of it.”

“seriously? it is like the best game of all time, kaoru! all you do is dance, but lucky for you, at least you’d look good doing it.”

he blushed at the compliment, not used to hearing any from anyone. he was used to handing them out to the ladies who came to the host club. but he learned to get used to them, especially when hearing it from you.

he popped the game into the console.

“you can have first pick, babe,” he said.

he had no idea what he was in for. you picked oh no by marina and the diamonds, one of your favorites.

not even a minute into the song, he was already complaining.

“y/n! how are you so good at this?”

the reason he said this was because he almost tripped over his own two feet for a spin move. you obviously perfected the move and dived right into a whole new one, scoring perfect on that one as well.

“well, i spent my whole childhood on this game, kaoru, maybe this is something i can teach you for once.”

he chuckled.

“i’ll tell you one thing, you are the one who looks good doing this, not me,” he breathed out, watching as you perfect yet another move, blushing slightly at the fact you were shaking your hips.

though being right beside him, you could feel his stare on you.

“get your mind out of the gutter, hitachiin, you have other things to worry about, like beating me at this game!”

“i don’t think so y/n,” he practically flops on the bed and lets out a breath.

“that i can agree on you with,” you say arrogantly, finishing the song.

“hey!”

you laughed, laying on top of him, seeing the red headed boy smirk.

“now can you take me up on that make out session, love?” he asked as he wrapped his arms across your body.

you chose to answer him by filling the gap between you both, both of you chuckling as you start to get carried away.

You were not bored anymore, that was for sure.

-Admin Maddie

258 notes · View notes

dulce-pjm · 3 years

Text

“f” for effort

word count: 3.6k

genre: fluff

summary: this feud has gone on far too long. the study room is yours and you no longer care what namjoon has to say about it.

You’re running for your life.

At least, that’s really what it looks like. If you weren’t so goddamn fast, bystanders might have stopped to ask if you were safe or needed help. You’re huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf’s elderly grandma as you tear across campus with only one destination in mind. Beads of sweat drip down your forehead and stains are threatening to form in the pits of your shirt but frankly, you couldn’t give a shit. You’ve got a place to be, and fast.

Said place is your heaven. Your paradise. Your land of milk and honey. Or as a moron would call it, the corner library study room.

It’s roomy, it’s quiet, almost no one knew it was there. When you had loads of coursework to catch up on (which was often and just so happened to be the case on this Friday night), you sought refuge in your precious study room. During the day, the lighting was beautiful. The windows were massive, letting all of the sun’s rays beam into the cozy room and make you feel warm, bright, awake. At night, when you became especially frustrated, you could always slide your rolling chair over to said big windows and gaze at the stars or stare off into the night.

No one appreciated that room correctly, not like you did it.

Which is why you had to stop that little fucker, Namjoon, from stealing it from right under your nose.

The two of you were only freshmen, but your ongoing feud over the glorious study room was intense enough to have lasted generations. You both were willing to pull out all the stops if that’s what it took to keep the other from making it to the room. You used the cheapest of tricks, flat out sabotaging the other if you felt it necessary.

You recall one particular time you planted a fake spider (one of his biggest fears, you’d learned) in his backpack before the end of your shared Calc II class, making him let loose a shrill shriek, much to the annoyance of the professor. And while Namjoon was getting lectured on disrupting class and not acting his age, you were waltzing off to the study room, internally flipping him off as you did. The memory makes you chuckle as you heave and sprint.

It wasn’t that Namjoon had done anything particularly wrong to you. You figured in another context, you might have found him much more bearable, maybe even nice. But something about him just rubbed you the wrong way.

For one, he was an applied mathematics major. Who the fuck majors in just math? People who want to flex how much smarter they are than you, that’s who. And what did the applied part even mean? You suspected someone just as unbearable as Namjoon had added the word in so that he (because of course it was a man) and all his other mathematician friends could be pretentious, annoying fucks together.

Secondly, despite being one of the top students in your class, he was a member of a fraternity. How he had time to both outperform everyone else in the STEM program and party it out with the frat brothers every night was beyond you. You’d heard from your senior friend (who also notified you that Namjoon was after your precious study room) that was also part of the brotherhood that Namjoon was on some kind of fraternity-specific scholarship and that was the only reason he joined. That you understood, tuition was no joke. Didn’t make him any less annoying, though.

And third? Third... Well, you couldn’t think of a third point right now but you’re certain there is one, you know it. You probably couldn’t remember because you were running out of oxygen and dying under the beating sun.

You’re almost crying tears of joy when you enter the library, head whipping around to search for a particular tall blonde. Luckily, he’s nowhere in sight.

Your feet scream as they carry you to your safe haven but you can’t even be bothered until-

“Going somewhere?” He strides next to you, his effortless speed-walking easily overtaking your sloppy attempt at a run. Your books are threatening to slip from your arms and you’re fairly certain you lost the sunglasses on top of your head long ago when you came barreling down the bio building stairs.

“Fuck you, Kim,” you spit harshly. “I came in here first so I get the room.” Your crudeness only makes him laugh maniacally. You curse the little dimples that crease into his cheeks, taking them as an insult to your misery.

“As far as I can see-” He takes advantage of your height difference and takes a massive step in front of you. “-I’m going to get there before you.” As if to tease you further, he spins to face you as he easily surpasses you, approaching the study room and its sign-up sheet with increasing speed.

If you want to win this round- and you really, really do, not only to get your work done but to rub it in his smug face- you’ll need to play dirty.

Moments later, Namjoon is picking up the pen, smirking at you as he moves to haphazardly scribble his name into the time slot. But you’re already formulating a plan. Your textbooks were pretty damn heavy, you bet it’d definitely throw him off if you managed to drop them on his toes. Actually, it definitely would, since the idiot was wearing sandals in late October. As you’re taking aim, however, Namjoon’s face falls.

“The fuck is a board game club?” You freeze, mere steps away from dropping your books on his foot.

“What?” When he doesn’t explain, you nudge him aside and peer at the sign-up sheet. Lo and behold, there it is.

From eight p.m. to midnight, the room is booked. By a... board game club. And it’s seven forty-five now, which means you’re shit out of luck.

“Well, looks like neither of us-”

“This is bullshit.” Namjoon chuckles at your disgusted expression.

“It’s just a study room, Y/N. I’m sure there’s another free one.”

“Well, I don’t want just any study room, Kim. I want my study room.” He scoffs at your arrogance and (quite unfortunately) follows you as you spin on your heel and take off in the other direction.

“Well, what are you gonna do about it? Tell off the game club?”

“I’m going to lodge a complaint and get my study room back.”

“Mhmm.” He trails you incessantly as you march up to the nearest help desk and drop your books in front of the poor employee about to suffer from your wrath.

“Can I help you?” the sheepish girl asks. She couldn’t be much older than you. You almost felt bad for what you were about to do.

“Yes, can you please explain why a-” You raise your fingers for air quotes. “-‘board game club’ has booked a private study room, taking priority over student study time?” The girl is taken aback at your abruptness, clearly not used to being confronted in such a manner. But you weren’t here to waste time by avoiding hurt feelings.

“I-” She hesitates, looking to the blonde beside you for help, of which he gives none. “I’m not sure what to tell you. The study rooms are first come, first serve.”

“For students,” you emphasize, pressing your palms into the desk and leaning forward. “Not unofficial club gatherings.” Something changes in the girl’s face and she turns away from you and faces her computer, typing something across the keyboard. In just a moment, her entire demeanor has flipped. It seems she’s not interested in entertaining your attitude anymore.

“Well, looks like the ‘Board Game Club’ is an official, university-sponsored club. Which means they’re just as much entitled to study room time as you are. Actually, more-so, since you didn’t book your room in advance.” She spins her office chair backs towards you. “Sorry.” She shrugs, flashing you an all-too-fake smile.

“Ugh, fine.” You pile your books back into your arms and roll your eyes, leaving the library altogether.

And your trail follows you.

“What, you’re just gonna leave? There were other study rooms open!” You scoff, annoyed at his ignorance.

“Well the other study rooms that are open at this time either smell like ass or have no air conditioning. So that’s a no-go.” Namjoon laughs quietly, agreeing with your sentiment. He’s been stuck in his fair share of poor study rooms before and knows it can ruin the experience.

“So.... what are you going to do now?”

You find yourself wondering why he’s still here, talking to you when he should be organizing his own study plan for the night. Further yet, you wonder why you’re entertaining his stupid questions at all.

“I dunno. Camp out at the campus Starbucks?”

“What? But they close at ten!” You shoot an exasperated look in his direction.

“And what’s it to you?” You pick up the pace in an effort to shake off your stalker, but much to your annoyance he jumps in front of you, thrusting out his hands before you can take a step further. You nearly collide with his chest.

“Would you just wait a sec?” Your eyes glide up to meet his as you tap your foot, barely acknowledging you’re listening. “Why don’t you just come back to my place with me?” Your eyes narrow.

“I’m not sure what you’re insinuating, but-” His eyes widen and he begins frantically shaking his head. You almost smirk. It’s fun watching him squirm.

“No! That’s not what I meant!” He sighs, wringing his hands. “Most of the fraternity is at this other party so the house will be empty tonight. And quiet. I know that’s why you like the study rooms and it’s the least I can do for you.”

You’re still suspicious. What’s in it for him? He certainly wasn’t just being nice to be nice. There was something else involved.

“If you knew the house would be empty tonight then why did you try to take the study room?” Namjoon shrugs, grinning mischievously.

“You’re just too fun to tease.”

That remark has you scoffing and brushing past him, not even dignifying him with a response.

“Wait! Just slow down, would you?” A heavy hand settles on your shoulder and Namjoon is beside you again. You’re about to scream with frustration.

“What, Namjoon? What could you possibly tell me that will convince me to come study with you?”

He grins sheepishly.

“I’ll buy you pizza?”

Okay, yeah, you’re a tad ashamed you let your morals slide in exchange for greasy pizza that will wreck your stomach in the morning. But you’re hungry, okay? And the dining hall was already closed and your wallet was empty and it just happened.

And now you were plopped on Namjoon’s bed typing away furiously at your laptop. He’d made a few efforts at light conversation, but he quickly gave up trying to push that boulder when you barely grunted in response to his questions.

His room was surprisingly nice and organized. The bedsheets were barely wrinkled and the room smelled pleasant despite it being apart of a literal frat house. Though his desk was a mess, littered with math theory books and philosophy papers and historical fiction novels. The books appeared well-loved and cared for, not like they were simply written as required on a syllabus.

He appeared pretty organized, too. The oak-colored round glasses he’d donned after arriving made him look older, more scholarly. And definitely more pretentious.

You were glad the two of you weren’t doing this at your dorm. Your room was an actual nightmare. Your life might be organized and planned down to the minute, but your bedroom was an entirely different story.

“So...” Namjoon chews on the end of his pen as he reworks old calculus problems. “Psychology major?”

Really, trying at the small talk again? Good luck with that.

You’re about to completely ignore him when it occurs to you that if you don’t talk about your major he will most certainly talk about his. It wouldn’t be the first time you’ve heard him rant and preach about math and its many uses in modern society. So before you end up stuck in that situation, you entertain his question. If it could even be called that.

“Mhmm.” You bite the bottom of your lip as you contemplate the next line of your essay. You don’t notice Namjoon staring. “I plan to graduate a year early and go straight to med school. Probably open a family practice one day.” Namjoon leans back into his bed frame, nodding in something close to awe.

“Wow, you really got it that planned out?”

“Yup,” you reply, popping the ‘p.’ “Since I was fifteen. I only majored in psychology because I think it’s interesting and I’ll look well-rounded when I start applying to med school. I’ll definitely just be a family doctor.”

“Well, you are a great people person...” You finally crack the next line of your paper and type it away, completely missing the joke and subtle jab.

Ding dong.

“That the pizza?” It’s the first thing you’ve said to him unprompted since you got here.

“Think so. I’ll be back.” He heaves himself up from the bed and trots out of the room, right as your phone buzzes. You only spare the screen a passing glance, but upon seeing the notification is a text from your roommate, you immediately open it.

9:18 pm. Yeji: where are you? ive looked for you everywhere >:( 9:22 pm. Yeji: Y/N? pls respond or ill be worried 9:23 pm. Y/N: I thought you were using the room for yourself tonight. Why are you at the library? 9:23 pm. Yeji: suho cancelled :( i came to find you at the library but you aren’t here ? 9:24 pm. Y/N: The study rooms were all taken. Me and Namjoon are studying at his place. 9:24 pm. Yeji: wait, really?!?! 9:24 pm. Yeji: oh my god, FINALLY 9:25 pm. Y/N: ??? 9:27 pm. Y/N: Yeji?? 9:28 pm. Yeji: im just relieved you two are finally owning up to the obvious sexual tension in this stupid feud and banging it out ;)

You choke. Is that what people thought about you? The idea made you want to gag.

9:29 pm. Y/N: What ?? 9:29 pm. Y/N: NO 9:29 pm. Y/N: That is most definitely NOT what is happening. 9:29 pm. Y/N: That’s disgusting. 9:30 pm. Yeji: aww booooooo 9:30 pm. Yeji: and to think, i was getting my hopes up for you 9:30 pm. Yeji: but seriously tho 9:31 pm. Yeji: whatever dance you two are playing isn’t gonna last long 9:31 pm. Yeji: its obvious you two like each other

With that, you shut the phone off completely and set it face down, suddenly feeling very, very hot.

Yeji was an idiot. She didn’t know what she was talking about.

Right?

This argument, this feud, this competition, it was fueled by anger and annoyance and, as much as you hate to say it, pettiness. You couldn’t stand Kim. And he didn’t particularly like you either. There was nothing else going on here.

Your arguments weren’t flirting. They were arguments. Simple as that.

But then again, you were sitting in his room. Studying together. Letting him buy you dinner.

Well, fuck.

“Pizza delivery!” You scream in fright as he enters the room, making him nearly drop the box full of your precious dinner.

“Oh my god, fuck, are you okay?” You quickly fan at your cheeks to combat the furnace burning underneath them.

“Yep! I’m fine! Just don’t scare me like that, for god’s sake.”

When you meet his eyes, Namjoon looks genuinely apologetic.

Your heart flutters. This little shit.

“Well, uh, here’s your pizza.” He slides the box next to your laptop and settles on the opposite side of the bed, returning to his work.

“You’re not gonna eat?”

“Nah, I ate earlier. And your stomach is growling. I can hear it from over here.” Your eyes bulge.

Had he cared like this all along? Had you just been too blind to notice it? You were freaking out, your heart rate climaxing and your hands quickly becoming lightly coated in sweat.

The weight of the past few months hits you like a freight train.

It’s much too overwhelming.

You’re suddenly aware of your close proximity. The smell of the room, of him, is overpowering and suffocating. The air is thick and you think you might choke. When did that dimpled grin become so attractive? Just before it immediately pissed you off but now...

You eye his blonde locks, imagining what it’d be like to run your fingers through them before you can stop yourself. The glasses you’d found pretentious somehow make him cute, maybe even endearing. Did you always feel like this?

“Are you sure you’re okay, Y/N? You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Or like you might throw up. Please don’t puke on my floor, I’m begging.”

“Fine!” you squeak, whipping your face back to the laptop screen, unwilling to let your eyes move even an inch in his direction.

Even still, it’s like you can feel his body heat from across the bed, calling you in, taunting you for being the biggest moron you knew.

You gotta get out of here.

You finish your essay in record time, just as the clock strikes eleven. You’ve already instructed Yeji to pick you up at eleven-fifteen, and she’s always early. Now all you had to do was ignore the way your heart was beating in your throat and slip away to forget this ever happened.

After a few days used to succumb to logic, you’d realize this was all a mistake. A misunderstanding. An unnecessary emotional reaction.

“Well-” You stand, gathering your books in your arms. “I’m off. Thanks for buying me dinner and letting me intrude.” He looks up from his work to you, eyes bleary and exhausted. You hate the way you enjoy how he gives you his full attention and concern.

“It’s really no problem. Do you want me to walk you home?”

Goddamn, Namjoon. Stop being such a gentleman, would you?

“No. It’s fine. My roommate is picking me up.”

“Oh, okay,” he replies, appearing slightly disappointed. No, he wasn’t disappointed. You’re just crazy and emotionally unstable at the moment.

You bid him an awkward wave and slowly back out of the room when he calls out for you.

“Y/N!” You freeze in the hallway as he approaches, noticing how his hair has fallen out of its styled position and hangs loosely rumpled in his face.

“Yes?” He probably was gonna ask for you to pay for the pizza since he didn’t eat it. Yeah, that seems like a Namjoon thing to do.

He pauses and grins awkwardly, making your eyes fly to those dimples. He wrings his hands.

“I- uh-” He breathes out sharply through his nose. “I had a nice time.” You nod, allowing no change in your blank expression.

“I appreciated the quiet. Thanks.” He sighs, looking as tired as you feel.

“Look, I’ll cut to the chase. I’ve been trying to tell you I’m interested in you for a few months now.” Your heart stops and you’re unable to offer a response. “I may have got a bit carried away teasing but, well…’

“What do I need to do to secure another study date with you?”

You’re shocked. Flattered, even. But more than anything, you feel your pride inflating in your chest. You quickly forget that just moments before, you were the one drooling over him and instead bask in the fact that he’s been pining for you this whole time. You feel emboldened.

You give him a half-hearted shrug. Namjoon’s face falls.

“If you want a second date with me, you’ll have to do better than trashy pizza and textbooks.” A smile spreads across the boy’s face as he lets out a laugh that he’s desperately trying to contain.

You love seeing him flustered. You’re a bit more comfortable admitting that now.

“Yeah, yeah. Of course. I’ll work on that.”

You give him a curt nod as the two of you walk towards the front door.

“Find me in the corner study room when you come up with something.” You give him a glance over your shoulder as you step out into the night.

“Yes ma’am,” he shouts back, playfully saluting you. You’re already missing his annoying presence as he closes the door.

When you collapse into the passenger seat of Yeji’s car, you aren’t listening to her chatter at all. Not that you normally would, but this time there’s not even a chance you don’t tune everything out.

You know, you think you could make room for Namjoon in your life plan. He was a little shit, sure. But you’d be lying if you said you weren’t too. And something tells you that you won’t be getting rid of him so easily anymore.

#bts #bts scenario #bts fanfic #namjoon #namjoon fanfic #namjoon scenario #namjoon fluff #not quite enemies to lovers but somewhere in that realm #more like unknowingly flirtatious idiots to lovers i'd say #namjoon as an asshole #OC as a bigger asshole #but they're assholes in love #ya feel?

36 notes · View notes

butterbuni · 3 years

Text

♥ Prologue ♥

Prologue of Disguise, a Kaminari x Fem Reader

"Hello my dear viewers! Thank you for joining my stream. If your new here thanks for coming. If your one of my regulars welcome back, you know the drill." I looked up at my left monitor watching the numbers of watchers rise as well as the number of donations.

"We are just waiting for one more guest! LightningMcSpark101 he is always late." I rolled my eyes playfully knowing he would be watching the video later when I upload it. My discord rang and I quickly answered it, "Dude you are so late!! The viewers were waiting!" I said into my mic.

"Aw man, I was so sure I was on time this time!" I heard him say from the other end. "Alright alright, all is forgiven! Hurry up and let's get this started. I only have 2 hours today!"

"Sure thing dude! I am so beating you this time!"

"In your dreams Sparky!"

"It's on G/N (Gamertag name)"

I smirked at my screen and took hold of my controller pressing play on the newest battle game that I was sent to try and review.

The screen lit up as it announced my ultimate victory. "Haha! In your face Sparky!! I win once again!"

"Awe man!!! I was so sure I was going to win this time!! You defeated me dude how is that even possible!!!" he exclaimed from his end.

"Ha, you thought. Thanks for helping me show off this game!" I looked over to my left monitor and saw my view had only gained as well as the occasional donation, "I hope you guys enjoyed my demonstration as much as I did! Make sure to go out and buy this amazing game! It's a lot of fun to play especially with friends maybe one of you may get lucky and I would play with you next time. Unfortunately, it is time for me to log off however same time next week. What do you say Sparky?"

"You bet!"

"Bye guys!" I said as I waved goodbye with one hand and clicked end stream. I let out a sigh of relief. That was so much fun. "Sparky you do not know how much fun that was!"

"I am so glad you let me try it out with you! Hey, when are you going to let me see your face you always wear that face mask. I only see half of you!"

"I will let you see my face when pigs fly!" I said scratching the side of my face avoiding not wanting to give him a straight answer. He asks this every single time we go on live together. "Plus it's not like I've seen your face either for all I know you are a 40-year-old man, but you don't sound a day over 15," I said cheerfully.

"Oh wow thanks." he said sarcastically, "I would show you my sexy awesome face but I don't think you would be able to resist me."

"Ha, you wi-"

The alarm on my phone went off stopping all conversation, "Oop looks like my time has come! See ya later dude!" I said quickly changing tabs to end our call. "Aw, c'mon just a little longer. I'll promise I'll be good."

"Sorry, sparky you know the drill I really need to go now," I said hastily wanting... no needing to end the call.

I heard him sigh from the other end. My cursor hovered over the end call button impatiently. My eyes kept darting to my bedroom door. He was taking too long and I didn't want to end without saying goodbye

"I'll catch ya next time G/N. Next time I promise to beat you in whatever game we play."

"Don't hold your breath," I laughed and clicked the end call button. Once it ended, I quickly tore off my face mask and took off my headset. I pulled out a medium-sized box from beneath my desk and put both of them in.

I quickly took out the game cd and put it back into its packaging. I pulled out a bigger box from beneath my desk that had various other games I've collected and put the game in. I sighed, "I wish I didn't have to live like this." Almost as soon as I closed both boxes and put them away, there was a knock on my door.

Fuck. Already?

"One moment!" I called out. Why why why now. I went into my walk-in closet and quickly changed into clothes that my parents deemed suitable for walking around the house. There was another knock at the door, "I'm coming!" I fixed my hair and opened the door quickly revealing my butler. He wore a simple black and white suit with a handkerchief hanging off his arm and as usual his gray hair was slicked back.

"Hello Bertrum," I said standing up as straight as possible.

"Hello ma'am your parents are waiting for you downstairs. Dinner today is coffee-rubbed steak with brussels sprout salad." He bowed down to me.

Great just my luck. I rolled my eyes just before Bertrum rose from his position. "How wonderful I will be down in a second."

He nodded and went on his way. I shut my door closed once he left. With my back against the wall, I slide down to the ground. I wish we could have normal food for one. I would kill for a hamburger right about now.

I got up from the floor and dusted myself off. I might as well get this over with. The sooner I get there the sooner I can leave.

I walked over to my vanity mirror making sure all my 'imperfections' were perfect in the eyes of my parents.

Once I felt ready I walked out of my bedroom making sure to be extra slow about it. I walked through the halls of our family portraits and statues. I've walked this same path for years and each time I still don't feel like I belong.

Every single one of the pictures had a family member who did something great with their lives. Some went on to be some of the greatest support items manufactures. Some became politicians. Some even became costume developers. But here I was, some random teenager who just happened to be born in a family with everything.

I walked down our spiral stairs my hand running down the banister. Well, everything except parents with the capability of love and care.

I walked into the family dining room to see the long table completely dressed in fancy dishes. Both my mom and dad weren't looking at each other. Mother was typing away at something on her laptop and Father was talking to someone on the phone.

I don't even know why they require me here anymore when they wouldn't even pay attention to me.

"Hello Mother. Hello Father." I said flatly announcing myself in. "Hello Y/N," they said without even glancing at me.

I sighed. Of course, they wouldn't even look at me. I am sure they have even forgotten how I looked considering I don't even remember the last time they looked at me for more than 10 seconds.

I took my seat at the far end of the table to wait for the maids to deliver the food.

The dining hall instantly fell into silence with nothing but the clacking of Mother's keyboard and the low gruff talking of Father on his phone. It was unbearable.

Mother finally spoke to me as the maids came into the room with our dinner.

"We have decided where you will be going for high school." She spoke, "With your quirk, we decided that you will go to U.A and join their support course."

"But mother I was planning on becoming a hero like the rest of my friends," I spoke up as a maid dropped my dish in front of me.

She scoffed at me, "I can see why the Todoroki family would want their son to be in the hero course but I don't know why the Yaoyorozu family would let their daughter partake in such a trivial career."

"Mother heroes have a lot of importance in our society! Without them, the world would spiral into chaos. Plus the support course won't even have people to sell their inventions."

"Support for quirks will always be in business with or without the heroes. The heroes are the cause of chaos. They refuse to properly dispose of villains, making our society go into a cycle of a hero-catching villain only for the villain to escape and wreak more havoc. If they would make an example of one of those good for nothing bastards, the people in our society wouldn't have the nerve to stand against heroes."

"But Mother that is such a horrible-" I started to say looking at Mother in disbelief.

"I know you are not talking back to me right now!" she raised her voice at me slamming her fork down on the table.

"No Mother," I said looking down at the plate of food.

"Good."

It was silent once again. Father didn't even bother trying to come to my side and I didn't even bother standing up for myself.

I've learned the hard way that when something is asked of me, I have to do it. Or else.

I picked up my fork and picked at my food. I wasn't even that hungry plus it wasn't like brussel sprouts and steak were very appealing.

"Aren't you eating Y/N?," Father said turning off his phone and picking up his own fork to eat. He only said that to me so he could still pretend to be that caring father he once was in his only little fantasies.

"I just don't have the appetite right now," I said dejectedly. "You should eat your food. Do you know how many kids are starving?" Mother said.

"Maybe you should feed them this nasty stuff," I mumbled.

"I didn't quite hear what you said. Could you repeat that for me?" Mother's eyebrow twitched as she gripped the fork in her hand tightly. I didn't think she could hear me. "I just think we should distribute our wealth to help people less fortunate. People could stop going home hungry," I said dropping my fork down. If she wanted to talk about starving people we can talk about starving people.

"It is not our fault that they made bad choices in their lifetime and ended up poor. Why should we share what we worked hard to get." She said not sparing a glance at me.

I rolled my eyes once she paid more attention to her food than me. Every time I try to have this conversation with her she shuts me down with her hypocritical ass. I stared at her as she ate her food. Who is she to talk about hard work when she worked her way up into my father's pants. The only hard thing she's probably ever done up till now was picking a way how to seduce him.

After a considerable amount of time of pushing my food around my plate the maids came and whisked away our plates. I gave them my thanks. Mother and Father however just picked up their laptop and phones and excused themselves from the table leaving me by my lonesome.

I sighed. Welcome to the life of L/N Y/N.

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

Once my parents were out of sight I rushed up the stairs and past the halls filled with everything my family wanted me to be and into my bedroom. The one place in this house that I felt comfortable. The one place in this big mansion that felt like home.

I locked the bedroom door and quickly logged into my computer. I looked at the number of donations I received from today's stream. I let out a yell of excitement seeing the 2000$ on the screen. A whole 500 more than last time.

I could do more with this money. I pulled up a list of local poverty fundraisers. If Mother and Father won't do anything, I will.

I donated the money equally between the topmost trusted charities. As soon as I clicked the submit button for each I felt satisfied. Even if it wasn't much, the money I made off my twitch account was what kept me motivated to keep going. People out there were suffering and people like my parents were sitting down and letting it happen when they could be doing something about it.

I've thought about wiring money from my parents' accounts but I'll just get myself in trouble so two years ago I started live streaming. When I started earning money from it, I realized I could be making a difference with it.

I sighed as I leaned back in my chair. Two years ago I wouldn't have dreamed of going against my parents' wishes but here I am. Created my own monitors from scratch with the help of my quirk and Momo making the parts. I let out a sad laugh. I even went as far as to covering half my face just so I won't be recognized by anyone.

Just as I spun in my chair looking at my ceiling, my phone buzzed on my table. My head perked up looking at it. Who could be texting me at this time?

I picked up my phone seeing it was a discord notification from Sparky. I smiled softly at my phone. It's like he always knew when I was down in the dumps. I may not know who he is behind that screen but he has quickly become my best friend. ~~~~ Y/N Character Sheet

#bnha #bnha reader insert #bnhareader #bnha x reader #bnha x you #bnha x y/n #reader insert #reader #mha #my hero academia #mha reader #mha reader insert #bnha kaminari #bnha kami #denki x you #you x denki #kaminari denki #denki kaminari #kaminari x reader

10 notes · View notes

felicia-cat-hardy · 3 years

Text

My 'Pretty Little Liars' Obsession Led Me To My Best Friend

“Got a secret, can you keep it?” Well, I’ve got one: Though Pretty Little Liars ended in 2017, the seven-season mystery thriller schemed its way into being an integral part of my life for the long haul, so much so that the opening credits live in my head rent-free. To this day, each time I hear the sinister theme song — “Secret” by The Pierces — I’m brought right back to my childhood comfort show (ahem, obsession). The visuals begin with a swipe of mascara, the smear of red lipstick, and a clasp of a heel onto a porcelain doll, which makes me feel like I’m watching someone get pampered for prom. Until, of course, it cuts to four girls standing in front of a casket. It's a chilling moment, one that, until Season 6B, ended with Aria Montgomery (Lucy Hale) delivering her iconic “shh.” I got cast under the show’s spell the first time I saw it, and I wasn’t the only one: Pretty Little Liars led me to my best friend.

Ironically, plotlines about deceit and betrayal actually helped ignite a long-lasting friendship. In 2011, the only other person I knew to be watching PLL was my now-BFF, Taylor, who’s been by my side for over a decade. We were only about 11 and 12 when it premiered, so shout out to our parents for letting us watch a show that dealt with very adult themes like substance use disorder, assault, and grief. Unlike our classmates, who watched tween-appropriate hits like iCarly and Victorious, we became PLL stans.

As fans know, the show is loosely based on the Sara Shepard YA series of the same name, and the first book was my entry point into the PLL universe. I loved reading about blackmailers and murderers navigating high school, but I thought I was the only one who was into it. (Was this my ~I’m different~ complex showing, or were my peers just naturally more inclined to recap Dance Moms? I’ll never know.) So, Taylor first struck up a conversation with me at school because she spotted the first PLL book on my desk — you know, the one painted with porcelain wax dolls warning to “never trust a pretty girl with an ugly secret” in a Gothic script. She asked if I’d watched the TV adaptation yet and we immediately exchanged phone numbers to text about upcoming episodes. We then fell into the fandom. Fast.

I’d never talked to Taylor before this interaction — we had only been in a few classes together — but I always saw her as approachable and friendly. Universally, the beginning of middle school is a big and terrifying year when kids from different elementary schools unite. Eager to meet new people, I reached for friendship at any chance I could get. Taylor made it easy. Aside from being a genuinely kind person (a rare trait for a middle schooler!), she was fangirling over the same thing as me.

Fast forward over a decade later, and the show still feels timeless, especially in its accurate depictions of how dramatic high school can get. It’s no surprise there’s a PLL HBO Max reboot on the way along with the remakes of other buzzy shows from that era (hello, 2010s nostalgia). Ah. It was a simpler time. Back then, Freeform was still ABC Family and for me, Tuesdays meant one thing: PLL is on. What first started as a solo viewing experience soon became a designated hangout time, a time slot reserved for me and Taylor to gush over how much we loved Ashley Benson. (We still do!)

The series had a vibe similar to Gossip Girl or Bridgerton in that a mysterious, unidentifiable pot-stirrer keeps fans guessing each episode, but it was arguably so much better since “A,” the anonymous villain, is out for, you know, murder. Ultimately, it was the type of whodunit that made me and Taylor (and millions of viewers) go down a couple of Reddit rabbit holes — remember the “Aria is A” suspicion? — and this is where my and Taylor’s experience with fan theories began.

Oh, and let’s not forget the location. PLL takes place in the fictional suburb of Rosewood, Pennsylvania, and for two girls from Bucks Country — aka the Philadelphia ‘burbs — we ate it up. The beloved “Welcome to the Dollhouse” episode was exceptionally creepy not only because the Liars get locked into a life-size replica of their bedrooms, but also because our real neighborhood looks extremely similar to their hometown. It operates like Rosewood, too, in that small-town gossip travels at lightning speed.

The Pennsylvania-based plotline also made it easier for us to identify with the characters, who felt like extensions of ourselves. In many ways, we got to know each other through their personalities. Taylor is studious and high-achieving, obviously a Spencer. And I owned feather earrings because I saw Lucy Hale sport them in Season 1, so obviously an Aria. Asking “Are you more of a Hanna or an Emily?” held as much weight in 2012 as asking someone their rising sign in 2021. While it might not say much, it also tells you everything you need to know about a person.

PLL got its start right before live-tweeting shows became popularized, so when we weren’t together, I used to text Taylor on my slide-out keyboard phone (only Zillennials will remember) to compare notes without stumbling upon many spoilers. They read something like this: “Caleb and Hanna are soul mates, TBH.” Like every other fan, we theorized about why A had to be Ian… and Melissa… and Jenna… and Mona… and, you get the point. When our elaborate speculations ran cold, we’d pause DVR’d episodes to gather more clues, like glimpses of Red Coat’s face in her second season introduction, or inspections of those eerie-gloved hands assembling dolls and sharpening knives at the end of each episode.

This game of Clue made room for conversations about all the things. We were in high school during the show’s peak, so it felt like the Liars had laid the groundwork for how to operate our school’s halls. Rosewood High was not traditional — uh, multiple students came back from the dead (*cough* Mona and Alison) — but it did prepare us for the stressors of college applications and first romantic relationships. In fact, Benson’s Hanna Marin would be proud of my matchmaking skills because back then, I introduced Taylor to the boyfriend she’s still with today.

As we both grew up with the show, our friendship got even deeper. The Liars weren’t the only ones to share secrets, and I found it incredibly easy to confide in Taylor. She’s trustworthy, level-headed, compassionate, and an excellent listener. She’s someone I know will always pick up on the second ring and is the type of friend to be there with advice, reassurance, and a quick-witted one-liner. She once joked about never needing a diary because we’ve transcribed the past 10 years of our lives via text.

Our bond has remained strong, especially because the most outrageous PLL-esque plotlines of our lives are ones we’ve experienced together. I love Taylor because I don’t have to provide background for my stories. I’m even so familiar with the cast of characters in her life that when someone re-enters after a long period, I like to say they Alison DiLaurentis’ed her.

And on the off-chance she’s not there to witness something meaningful happen to me IRL, she’s always ready to decipher what went down over texts or dinner and drinks — just like we did when we were teens trying to figure out who A was (minus the wine, of course).

The way she can reconstruct my way of thinking and offer up a perspective I hadn’t seen before is almost paranormal. Whether these are Taylor’s naturally given talents or traits learned from peeling back all the layers of the series, I’m not sure. But she’s always there to decode situations with me — whether they relate to a TV show or during moments when I feel lost.

I couldn’t be more thankful that Taylor entered my life and that PLL played a role in our friendship. I feel so incredibly lucky to know someone like her. Plus, now I have someone who is obligated to watch the reboot with me. Ali was right: Friends do share secrets. And she’s ~quite literally~ the reason Taylor’s got all of mine. Spencer and Aria, you’ve got some competition.

Get Relationship Advice Here

3 notes · View notes

b-icetea · 5 years

Note

prompt n. 71 pls??

Silly relationship

nonsense :)

71. “You are the single best thing that has ever happened to me.”

David hates this fucking website.

He really does. Especially now that it’s time to upload his portfolio but the site is apparently not equipped to handle the high resolution of David’s work. The files were too big before, so he’s done his best to make them smaller, but he absolutely refuses to make them smaller yet again.

He’s got his standards, damnit.

The page keeps crashing. Four times now, he has tried to upload the pictures. David is pretty sure he is going to dream of the error notifications tonight.

Now, though, finally, the page isn’t crashing, wonder of wonders. Instead, the little round thing next to the mouse icon is circling. Mocking David. Around and around it goes and the longer it happens, the more David can feel his shoulders tense. They’re somewhere near his ears right now.

Growling, David stares at it. Clicks out of the tab and onto another one where he has Netflix open, only to switch right back again, because a trailer for one of the site’s movies immediately, obnoxiously, starts playing and he doesn’t care about Wine Country or whatever the hell it is this time.

The website is still loading. David hits refresh. He’s pretty sure that made it worse, because this time the browser just gives up and shows him the error message again.

For the first time, he understands Matteo’s impulse to slide off of any furniture he sits on whenever life gets to be too much. Melting into a puddle of goo onto the floor sounds really awesome right about now. Goo puddles probably don’t get fucked over by university websites.

Since melting isn’t an option, because, sadly, he isn’t that flexible, David just crumples into a heap onto the desk. His head ends up buried in his arms. It’s really uncomfortable, because the position puts a lot of strain on his back and there has been a kink somewhere in his spine all day anyway. He can feel exactly where it is, directly between his shoulder blades.

It reminds him of that stupid mouse with that stupid circle. While he’s in the middle of contorting himself, trying to get the knot out of his spine and probably looking like a deranged cobra, he hears Matteo snort from where he’s sitting on the bed.

“You’re small”, he says, casually and basically out of nowhere.

David stops his contortions and looks back at him. He is propped up against the wall, headphones around his neck and plugged into his laptop. Judging by the way his fingers are moving across the keyboard, he’s probably playing something. His gaze is glued to the screen.

“No, you’re small”, David says, after a beat.

They’ve had this conversation before – if you can call it that, really – and he knows the script by heart.

“You’re smaller, though,” Matteo retorts instantly, eyes shooting David a quick look, before going back to whatever is happening on the screen.

“Wrong. I’m big.” David can feel a smile starting to tug on the corners of his lips.

He doesn’t really know when they started saying stuff like this. It’s super ridiculous – they just talk about the most inane stuff they can come up with until they can’t breathe because of all the laughing. That’s the purpose, of the whole thing, actually. Making the other one giggle and just marveling at the fact that you have someone you talk to about the literally dumbest things and they will not only love you anyways, they will talk right back at you, matching you word for word.

It means something, that. There’s intimacy in being stupid together, because it means you are so sure about the other person, you aren’t afraid of scaring them off with your dopiest self.

Matteo makes a skeptical noise in his throat and quirks his lips into something that looks like a downwards, frowny pout sort of thing. “I don’t see it. How big are you exactly?”

David throws out his arms out almost as far as they will go. “At least this big.”

His boyfriend looks at him and shakes his head a little. “I don’t know. That sounds like a lie.” He’s starting to grin as well, lopsided and dear.

“Are you calling me a liar, Mr. Florenzi?”, David says and lets his eyes go big in mock outrage.

“It’s because you’re lying.” Matteo presses his lips together and nods repeatedly.

“I’m not, though.”

“You’re small and soft and squishy, I don’t know what else to tell you, man.”

“I’ll show you squishy, you ass”, David half shouts and jumps out of his seat. Matteo instantly presses a button on his laptop, before hurriedly closing it and shoving it away.

It’s a good thing too, because David is already on him, fingers wiggling under Matteo’s white shirt and trying to find all the spots that make his boyfriend shriek with laughter. It’s one of the few times where Matteo is actually really loud.

Getting tickled is something he can’t endure quietly. He gasps and curls away from David, face bright and silly. Pressing his arms against his sides, he tries to make it impossible for David to get to his ribs, but David knows all of his weak spots, so he goes for his neck and after Matteo does his best impression of a turtle, he attacks the backs of his knees.

It goes back and forth a bit, Matteo feebly trying to give as good as he gets, but David won’t let him, because he’s ticklish everywhere, okay, so he can’t give Matteo even a little bit of leeway. It isn’t until long that they’re both out of breath and thank god it isn’t night this time, because last time they woke up Hans, who had the bad taste to tell them to keep their weird kinks to themselves.

David’s sides are hurting and his face feels hot, cheeks probably all red again, as they are all the damn time, anyway.

Matteo proves that perception right when he swipes his hand towards David’s head and drolly says “blushy, blushy” in a goblin voice. David catches his wrist instantly and bites him there, which makes Matteo snort.

They both sort of crumple into a heap then, David on top of Matteo, the two of them heaving for breath and letting out little giggles now and again while they calm down.

“I’m still stronger than you are”, David says once his heartbeat is back to normal. He feels like that needs to be known in case Matteo hasn’t learned his lesson.

“I’m still stronger than you are”, Matteo just says back in that stupid nasal voice he does for David sometimes.

In retaliation, David bites him again, this time on the jaw, because it’s the only place he can conveniently reach without moving too much.

“What kind of vampire are you, missing the neck and everything?”, Matteo grumbles, wiping the now slightly damp spot on David’s hair.

“You try to bite me all the time.”

“Yeah, but do I actually do it? I’m just playing. You’re the one that always makes things escalate.”

Indignant, David raises his head and looks into Matteo’s smug face. He looks like a gremlin. David has stopped questioning why he likes that so much.

“Are you for real right now?”

“First things first, I’m the—”

“Do not”, David interrupts him, putting Matteo in a headlock and pressing his face against David’s neck so that the rest of his sentence gets muffled by his skin and all he can hear is Matteo’s snickering.

After a bit, Matteo stops and only presses his lips against David’s pulse point. Everyonce in a while, he can feel them move a little. It’s like his mouth is fidgeting and that mental image is so purely Matteo that David can’t help but smile and let the headlock he still got Matteo in soften into an embrace.

“You smell good,” Matteo tells him and David can feel every word against his neck.

“Your hair is soft”, David says back while rubbing his cheek against the dirty blond strands gently.

“You’ve got the nicest eyes,” Matteo answers, untucking his head from David’s neck to look at him, touching the skin beneath David’s right eye with the pad of his thumb and then just leaving his palm to rest against David’s cheek. David turns his head a little and presses a kiss right into the middle of it.

“Your ears are cute.”

“I like you so much,” Matteo murmurs and maybe that wouldn’t mean so much to some people, but in David’s head, you can, of course, like a person very much and not love them, but what often seems to be forgotten, is the fact that you can also love a person and not like them all that much.

David and Matteo are together, sure.

But they’re also best friends and while he’s young and this is his first real relationship, he’s pretty sure that’s what makes all the difference.

“I love you,” he says anyway, because Matteo needs to hear that and David likes saying it.

“You’re the single best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

The breath in his lungs seems to get lost somewhere halfway out of his body when he hears that.

Matteo looks a bit shy, but not nervous. He means it and he wants David to know.

It’s become a bit of a game, a competition. Telling each other all the things they like about each other. Stupid things, like how David loves that one mole behind Matteo’s ear and insists the mole marks that ear as the good one of the two. Things like Matteo being completely preoccupied by how soft David’s eyebrows are and how he’ll sometimes stroke a finger over each of them, smiling. But they also tell each other stuff that’s less silly and a bit harder to get out.

How breathing is easier when the other one is around. How David makes Matteo feel like he’s less of a fuck up. How Matteo gives David the courage to stop running.

But neither of them has ever said those exact words. David doesn’t think he has ever been the best anything for anyone. The mere idea that Matteo actually said that, because he sees these words as true enough to let them out into the world …

David knows he’ll hold onto these words. He can already feel them, inside of himself, where his heart is, somewhere around where he feels overfull in the best way, making a nest and settling down there for good.

He pulls Matteo against himself more securely and cradles his head in his palm like the precious thing he is. He won’t ever let this boy go. Not ever. Because that thing Matteo said?

David feels that, too.

They can be each other’s best thing forever. He thinks that’s what being together should always mean anyway.

#druck #davenzi #david schreibner #matteo florenzi #davenzi writing prompts #blackhthorn #b-icetea's davenzi prompt fills

249 notes · View notes

infinitum-imaginaerum · 5 years

Text

Minghao | F. 25 “You look really cute in that.” | Anon

Words | 6,700

Warnings | Concerns mental health, but nothing too extreme.

Notes | College!Au. This boy really needs more gifs!!! All the ones that show up in the search are pretty irrelevant so I don’t know if that’s just tumblr being the way that tumblr is or what, but... MORE HAO CONTENT please.

PLEASE CHECK THE STATUS OF THE GAME AT THE TOP OF THE PROMPT LIST BEFORE REQUESTING.

Send me a bias, a section, and a number and I’ll write you a thing!

He seldom talked to anyone; he was mostly a lone wolf and you weren’t sure who he was friends with if he was even friends with anyone. All you knew about him was that he had been in a few of your classes for as long as you could remember, he was the black leather type, and he’d hardly said but ten words to you in the entire time that you knew him.

In fact, you had to learn from somebody else in your high school days that his name was Minghao. He couldn’t even tell you that much—or didn’t want to.

Over the course of the last couple of years, you couldn’t help but grow somewhat attracted to him in some weird way. You found his habits cute, like the way that he flicked his dark hair out of his eyes when he was working on something, or the way he tapped his foot and bounced his leg when he got anxious, or the way his teeth ground together when he was clearly in a situation he didn’t want to be in… some of the things themselves weren’t particularly cute by nature, but you were a strange one that way.

But those feelings came and went as every semester did. Boys were pretty much the last thing on your mind as you were preparing to graduate college. The only thing on your mind was work and school, you hardly had time to eat or breathe or concentrate on anything except assignments it seemed, and you were getting particularly burned out.

So, it wasn’t as if the notes that started appearing on your car weren’t sweet, they just… were poorly timed. The first note came in the beginning of the semester, just following winter break. You could remember the purple stationary as if it had come out of a young girl’s room, the kind of parchment she would write little love notes on, and maybe, to an extent, this was a love note itself. Remember to take care of yourself.

A curious little thing, that note was. Of course, the words were important. You often took care of everything at the expense of yourself and sometimes it really showed. Everyone you knew was aware of that, and that graduation was coming up and that some would be graduating with you and some wouldn’t be. The note could be from literally anyone, so you tucked it away in your school things and let it slide.

The next note came only a week or so later. This was extra curious because this note indicated that it was someone pretty close to you, probably someone you interacted with on a daily basis because the note read: Remember you come first; please sleep more. The intimacy of the note, knowing that whoever it was knew you well, drew your eyes to the surrounding parking lot. There were plenty of cars, plenty you recognized that belonged to your peers, but nobody was around that you knew.

You were startled by the sound of a revving motorcycle, kicking to life nearby. It had you jolting so hard, the note crumpled between your fingers as you looked over to the only person you knew who owned a motorcycle on campus: Minghao. He looked over to you for a moment, noticing you were staring, and gave you some semblance of a smile, the way he always did, before fitting his helmet on and taking off. That was the only interaction you typically ever got from him. He knew your name and acknowledged your presence and you supposed that was all you could ask of him. At the very least, he smiled—even if it was his version of a smile.

Another week or so passed before one of your closest friends—who didn’t typically arrive early the way you did—plopped into the open desk next to you with an ingenuous grin on her face. She batted her eyelashes, trying to get your attention but you were too focused on finishing an assignment for the following class that you hardly paid her any mind. Her smile faded as she turned in her chair, getting to the point of her behavior.

“I heard along the grapevine that you’re getting notes on your car,” she chirped.

Your fingers stopped typing as if they had been flash-frozen to the keyboard of your computer. The gears in your head were spinning, grinding, sparking and catching on fire as to how she could even know that when the only entity you told was your dog, Cerberus. Harshly, you swallowed and closed the lid to your laptop, finally granting your friend her warranted attention.

“And who did you hear that from?” you asked, trying to not make it too obvious that it was true, though you were sure you’d already given yourself up by now.

“Anyone and everyone; it’s the talk of the town,” she said.

“And what are they all talking about?” you inquired, genuinely curious at this point. It wasn’t a big deal that someone was leaving notes on your car; the only reason it was interesting or cause for anyone to care is that you had not made time for boys during college and were in the running for valedictorian. School was your only focus on campus; not having fun, not partying, not getting to know people, and certainly not boys.

“Just speculating who it could be. Lots of boys names flying around,” she stated, almost giggling as she gauged the look on your face.

Your nerves were a mess inside, but you weren’t sure what for. The feeling that you had been caught red-handed doing something you shouldn’t be doing was overwhelming, and for what? So what if some random guy—who you knew—was leaving notes on your car about taking care of yourself?

“I don’t have time for boys,” you replied, turning back to your desk after a moment of deliberation to tuck your laptop back into your bag and pull out a notebook. Your friend continued to rattle off about something while you fell deeper into your own thoughts, speculating about whom it could be yourself and who would even know about it unless one person you knew witnessed another person doing it. And if that was the case, why wouldn’t they just come out and say who it was instead of having all this speculation, unless they liked the drama. You were certain of a few of your friends who were drama queens, but why wouldn’t they come to you first instead of spreading it around your friend circle and further like a bunch of middle-schoolers.

Really, you didn’t have time for boys. The entire conversation in your first class had completely eradicated itself from your mind once it was time to get into school-mode; that’s what you called it, and it was a mode almost unbreakable by any outside influence. You didn’t let it bother you for the rest of the day, but once you were headed out to your car and saw that same purple parchment pinned under your windshield wiper, you were too curious. There was nobody in the parking lot as you glanced around; at least, nobody was visible upon first sweep. You were sure people were getting into their cars, minding their own business, but they weren’t your target.

The parchment was slick against your fingers as it always was. Carefully you unfolded the note, the familiar script flowing across the page that you’d come to expect. This note was simple, and a lot more encouraging than the others: You’re doing great. I’m proud of you.

Although it was more encouraging, it just confused you even further. You had taken it upon yourself to try and get to bed earlier and get as much sleep as you could, because not even you could deny the dark circles that stared you back in the face in the mirror. It had to be someone you saw on a daily basis, but that was too many people to count on numerous hands. Narrowing this down was proving to be more difficult than you thought, and the purple stationary was throwing everything off.

Another few weeks passed and more notes gathered on your windshield. It was getting into the warmer months, so instead of looking like you just rolled out of bed, you managed to put yourself together a couple of times which included one of your favorites: a rose print long sleeve bohemian maxi dress. It was too cold to be wearing things like sun dresses or skater dresses just yet, so you kept it a little warmer. You hulled your heavy bag onto your shoulder, smoothing out the white fabric printed with beautiful coral roses to lay flat against you and swept your hair behind your ear as you gathered the note on your car.

You look really cute in that.

Your eyes were darting around the parking lot again; completely unaware of when the notes were placed, but a paranoid part of you assumed that whoever had placed them would stick around to make sure you got them. Again, the only person you knew in the parking lot was Minghao, but he routinely got to the parking lot later than you. Still, you gave him a soft smile, the sun radiant on both of your faces as he mounted his bike, this time flashing you a smile that was a little more than a half smirk and gave you a quick wave.

Spring break came up fast and while you still didn’t know who the writer of the notes were, at least the hype about it started to die. Everyone either lost interest or knew who it was, which meant you probably knew as well—there was no reason to keep the buzz after that. But, you played it the same way you always did; you didn’t have time for boys. Spring break gave you a tiny bit of time to relax, most of it spent pent up in your apartment, especially on rainy days when you’d curl up in the bay window that overlooked part of the cityscape as rain trickled against the panes of glass and cupped your hot tea. Cerberus often lay next to you on the ground, enjoying the cool weather. He was convinced he was a lap dog, and Danes were anything but lap dogs. He took up most of your bed, coming up more often than not without your permission to try and find the space between your rear and your ankles to curl up into. He was a pretty big source of your lack of sleep until you’d finally kick him off—he knew when it was time.

You took Cerberus from a friend when he was just a puppy because her apartment wouldn’t allow giant breeds and you weren’t about to see that dog go to a shelter. A good deed done, but you were completely unaware of just how big he would get, and fast. The dog had an appetite of at least ten, and playtime was incredibly tiresome. When you walked, in the beginning it was hard to keep him still but over the three years you had him, he became well-mannered and easy to handle. He was not only your protection, but your best friend, your cuddle buddy, your stress-relief when it became too much. He was the only boy in your life that you could manage; he loved you more than life itself.

Your spring break didn’t go entirely undisturbed. Before the week was up, there was a knock on your door that turned your whole semester upside down. Cerberus growled, as he normally did, wary of anyone bold enough to approach your door without your prior knowledge; he was alarmed that you were surprised as it wasn’t often you got unexpected visitors.

“Cerbs! It’s just me!” a familiar voice called from the other side of the door. You hurried a little faster to let Junhui, a longtime friend, into your apartment. The door opened and your intimidating boy became all tail-wags and cuddles as he bumped his head into Junhui’s hand. The silver-haired male greeted him first, as he was making it difficult to get in the door, before you. His jovial smile was sunshine on a cloudy day as he looked at you.

“This is unexpected,” you said with a small smile of your own, “It’s been some time, Jun. It’s nice to see you.”

“Likewise. It seems you’re doing well?” he asked, taking a good look at your face. He was happy to see the circles had gone mostly away, that you were sleeping better and appeared that you were eating better, too. Not that you were ever on the unhealthy scale, he just knew better than almost anyone that you had a tendency to overlook your human needs for academia.

“I am, thank you. Can I get you some tea, water, a towel for your soaked self?” you asked, noticing that he had been slightly dumped on as he made it to your place.

“A towel and tea would be great,” he replied gratefully, still petting your very affectionate and somewhat attached hound that eventually let Junhui relax on the couch and went to lie in his own bed, giving him space once the excitement died down.

Junhui patted himself mostly dry as you set a piping mug of tea in front of him, nestling into the couch to his left. He just looked at you with another dazzling smile, not bothering to ask how school was, but instead spilled the gossip.

“I heard you’re getting notes from a boy?” he asked.

“You don’t even go there anymore and you still know the dirt?” you laughed. Junhui had graduated two years prior, but it appeared he was still in the know about you in particular and how you were doing with school and your health; he always made it a point to check up on you every now and again, but the notes were trivial when it came to things to talk about with him. It wasn’t really any of his business, nor did you think he knew anything about it, but now things were curious.

“Do you know who they’re from?” he asked you, ignoring your previous question as his gaze finally turned to yours. You looked at him hard, there was a glint in his eyes that revealed he wasn’t telling you something but instead of jumping the gun like he figured you would, you sat quietly and shook your head.

“Whoever it is, they’re pretty close to me it seems. They have a genuine concern for my well-being and if I didn’t know any better I would say it was you,” you accused with raised brows. You knew it wasn’t him. He wasn’t on campus for any reason at all and would have never known in just a couple of weeks that your condition had improved, much less about what you wore that day that you got that very complimentary note.

Junhui appeared surprised for a moment, but eventually settled back into welcoming stoicism. “Well, that’s an interesting take on the situation,” he commented to you, pretty quietly, albeit you still heard him.

“You’re not telling me something. You know who wrote them, don’t you?” you asked, but your demeanor didn’t change to more exuberant, you were just as calm as you ever were. Junhui, avoiding your question for a moment to decide the best course, took a sip of his tea and looked down at it, watching it swirl together in the white ceramic mug cradled in his large hands.

“Of course I know who wrote them,” he replied, but his eyes continued to be fixated on his tea. “I’m the one who told him to write them— I don’t know what any of them said, I just figured he’d know the best way to approach it.”

You narrowed your eyes at him curiously, some life springing into you. “What are you into, Junhui?” you asked him, probing his endeavors with whoever this mystery boy was and why these things were happening.

“An interesting game of match-maker,” he replied, taking another sip of his tea.

“In the middle of my final semester of college, Junhui, you rat!” you practically yelled.

“Hey, now, I didn’t expect things had escalated so quickly already! I figured by now he’d only have given you three or four with no real substantial bits of anything—”

Things were too curious, now. Your excitement came to a halt immediately as you settled back into the couch with nothing more to say. Junhui seemed open to talking, so you were just going to let him talk.

“—All he was supposed to do was give you a little confidence, a little encouragement, to make sure you were doing okay. You’re so academically oriented, I figured those things wouldn’t throw you off track, but it seems like you might be a little more invested in this than I had initially thought you’d be.”

“Who is it?”

“I’m not going to tell you that; I’ll wait for him to tell you.”

“Am I going to be mad?”

“I don’t think so. In fact, if he plays this right, I think you both will be very happy.”

“So I take it the goal is to tell me after the semester is over.”

“If it were me or if I knew the slightest things about you— that would be the optimum course of action.”

A low hum echoed through your small living room as you soaked in all the information; despite the fact that it wasn’t much, it gave you some sense of stability about the whole thing. At least you knew it wasn’t malicious, it was intended to do good things for you, and it wasn’t supposed to interrupt school which was your priority right now. You wracked your brain for a minute, trying desperately to figure out who it could be; the only problem was that Junhui’s circle of friends was your circle of friends, so that didn’t help narrow it down any.

Junhui spent a couple more days with you for the remainder of your final spring break—it was comforting, if nothing else to have another body in your home besides yourself as you tended to isolate so hard on your breaks that you got lonely. He reminded you to keep in touch as school started up again and not to forget to send him an invitation to your graduation.

The days continued to get warmer, the sun shined more often, you were feeling good about school but continued the same way you always did: entirely absorbed and unbreakable. The notes were coming more frequently in the days following the end of spring break, again just little reminders that you were the most important and that you should focus on taking care of yourself, even at the expense of a perfect score on an assignment.

Despite the warmer weather, there were some days it was really windy. One day in particular you remember losing grip of one specific note you had read over and over and over again; the day you wore that rose print maxi and the note read something about being cute—it blew out from between your fingers and while part of you just wanted to let it go and forget about it, the other part of you had a sentimental attachment to it. So, after throwing your bag in the back seat of your car, you took off after it, noticing that it was pinned under the boot of a familiar boy.

He watched as you skidded to a halt in front of him, the purple parchment under the toes of his shoe and he gave you a curious look, the raise of his eyebrows felt judging somehow, even though he looked at you with the same stoic look he always did. His leather jacket was tugged over a plain white crew neck, dark hair shading his eyes the way it always had.

“Lose something?” he asked you; it was the first time you’d heard his voice in such a while, you almost forgot what it sounded like. How could you, when you were sure it haunted your dreams for the entirety of your junior year.

“Ah… maybe,” you replied nervously. You were shrinking under his intense gaze, eyes boring holes in you like a magnifying glass would with the sun. Another harsh gust ripped through the parking lot and since Minghao parked in motorcycle parking, there were barely any cars to shield the gust, pushing your body unwillingly a step and a half forward and right into him. The burning on your face was unrivaled, even by the sun, especially as his arm wrapped around you to hold you steady, his other hand bracing the both of you on the seat of his bike.

It was daring, the way you looked up at him with both of your hands pressed against his chest to brace the contact. Your eyes peered at him under your lashes, knowing for sure your face was on fire, but felt it necessary to check his. He seemed shocked, an emotion you seldom saw on his face, with a soft pink tinge across his cheeks too, something you never saw.

“I’m so sorry,” you uttered, but made no attempt to scramble away from him, especially not with the way his fingers furled into the back of your dress under the dark jean jacket you were wearing which meant it was incredibly low on your back. One of his legs was awkwardly outstretched, keeping his foot atop the note you had lost—how incredibly thoughtful considering the moment and chain of events.

“It’s not a problem,” he replied smoothly, no detection of falter in his voice. He waited until you were ready to stand back up which, perhaps, was a little longer than either of you thought necessary. Regardless, he helped ease you up and back onto your feet before you were kneeling down, ready to collect the note from under his boot.

“I’ve heard the rumors about these notes. What’s got you, miss valedictorian, so smitten about them?” he asked. His foot was still firmly on top of said note, waiting for you to answer before he would give you what you wanted. He considered it leverage; the note seemed important enough to you that you weren’t about to give it up and just walk away, so he knew you would answer.

“It’s…” you delayed for a moment, thinking about the best reply. “I’m not valedictorian, yet. Besides that, we’re in college and they don’t recognize that anymore.”

“Pardon, Summa Cum Laude, miss top-of-the-class,” he replied.

It was pretty clear he wasn’t playing games with you, he wanted an answer to his initial question and would go through all of the stalling you wanted before he would give you the note and if that meant that you were going to be kneeling in front of him for quite some time, well that was a choice you made on your own. With an audible sigh, you answered him.

“It’s not really them, it’s that one in particular, that you are standing on,” you said.

Clearly, it wasn’t good enough for him, because he raised his eyebrows for an explanation.

“Come on, surely you know that even I struggle with myself. This particular note makes me feel… adequate,” you continued, trying to give him an adequate explanation even though you didn’t feel like you owed him one. You just wanted the note back.

“And why would a girl like you—smart, funny, pretty—not feel even adequate?”

The blush you had finally staved off returned to a dull burn on your cheeks. Xu Minghao just called you funny, and pretty. The things he made you feel comfortable to say in front of him all the sudden would have been too much to just stand there and say to him. You could merely shake your head, gaze casting away from him as you looked back down to the note that he gingerly stepped away from, allowing you to gather it in your hands before you stood to address him.

“Smart is one thing. I’ve studied hard. My personality was never really popular, the guys that were interested in me were sleazy; my self-worth…”

“Don’t you know that you’re the galaxies people only dream of when they think of stars in the sky?”

“Minghao…” You didn’t want to have this conversation anymore, not with him. The untouchable feelings were bubbling inside you, only now they were much more restricted than they used to be. You didn’t have time for boys, and you made that pretty clear throughout the entirety of your senior year but now he was getting a glimpse into why—it wasn’t because you were too busy with school, it was because you felt like you weren’t good enough for a good guy.

“We never were too close, but even I know you’re a diamond in the rough,” he continued, reaching out to push some stray strands of hair away from your eyes so he could look into them. “But what I think matters not—you come first, and you’re doing great. By the way, you look really cute in that,” he muttered, glancing down at your floral red sundress.

He didn’t even give you time to reply as you just stood there, the gears spinning as he fitting his helmet on and kicked the bike to life, taking off right in front of you. It took you a minute to gather yourself and make it to your car, but you were fairly certain that with that, Minghao just admitted to being the writer of your notes.

That thought was only solidified when he stopped showing up to the parking lot immediately after you made it, albeit the notes still kept coming. They were encouraging and sweet as they always were, but now they were a little lengthier. Sometimes they detailed little things he loved about you, sometimes they were observations about habits and corresponding scenarios, sometimes they were just reminders to eat well and sleep more and drink lots of water and worry less about some things. Either way, every note ended with an M now.

“It’s Minghao, isn’t it?”

Junhui rolled his eyes as he sat on your couch with a defeated sigh, giving as much attention to your needy Dane as he requested in a vain attempt to avoid eye contact with you. That didn’t matter, you were going to sit there and stare a hole in the side of his head for as long as he didn’t want to answer.

“You really are too smart for your own good,” he replied.

“Maybe you should have told him not to flat out repeat the notes he’s written to me and assume I’m too stupid to figure it out; I didn’t get to be top of the class by—”

“Yeah, yeah princess, I’ve heard it all before. Maybe he wanted you to know.”

“Like I even have time—”

“Sounds like you have time to me, sitting with him in the plaza during your breaks?” Junhui fired back, throwing the facts right in your face as if you assumed he didn’t know. Minghao shared everything with him; they were the closest of friends, so you shouldn’t have been surprised. But, you still were, and the knowing look that Junhui turned to give you had a sinking feeling developing in your stomach.

You opened your mouth to reply, knowing full well that you didn’t have a good one. It was true, ever since that day with the note when you figured it out—or rather, Minghao spilled the beans—you sought him out be it in class or somewhere on campus. He habitually sat under a big oak tree in the plaza on campus. There was a nice planter surrounding the tree with built in benches, that’s often where he sat to have lunch. You saw him every day on your way to classes and there would have been no reason for him to change habits.

“Cerbs, your mom may be smart, but she wouldn’t know a boy in love with her if he gave her a note two times a week,” Junhui spoke to your dog, cupping Cerberus’ large head in his equally large hands.

With the roll of your eyes, you scoffed. “Yeah, in love with me, that’s the funniest joke I’ve heard ever.”

Junhui said once upon a time that he was the one who told Minghao to start leaving the notes and while the intention of that command was still unknown, you had a few guesses. He sounded misleading, the things he said to and about you regarding Minghao, but despite all of that, Minghao had been the only object of your affections in the history of your college career, even if it was just admiring from afar.

That didn’t stop you from continuing to seek him out on breaks, often having lunch with him, enjoying his company on the warm spring days and every now and again you got to see him actually smile which just made him that much more gorgeous to you. The end of the semester was coming up quickly, so with only a couple of weeks and final assignments coming up, you decided it was a good opportunity to confront Minghao about the notes for the first time.

“You asked me a while back, the first time we’ve actually spoken in a long time, what got me so smitten about the notes,” you started in after settling down from some good chuckles. The mood was light; you were comfortable with each other, so it seemed like a good time to bring it up especially since he was still dropping them off in secret.

“I did ask that,” he replied, remembering the incident as he drew the strawberry he was about to take a bite from away from his mouth to look at you.

“At first, I was smitten about how they made me feel, and we had that conversation,” you continued.

“We did have that conversation,” he remembered.

“Well, the notes continued coming, as I’m sure you’re well aware of. What would you say if I said that I was smitten about the boy writing them?”

Minghao’s breath seemed to hitch in his throat despite his best attempts at hiding it from you. He contemplated for a moment, clear across his face as he thought.

“I would probably say that said boy would be incredibly lucky to have you, but I would also advise that you should wait until after graduation so that you may carefully balance taking care of yourself and school first before you have time for other things like that,” he replied meticulously, carefully, well-thought out as to exactly what he was hoping you would do.

“And what would you do if I said I promise that I will wait, on one condition?”

“Well, naturally I would have to ask what that condition is before I would agree to the contract,” he replied, watching the way you shifted on the bench, shifting your legs underneath you as you faced him.

“What if the condition was that I request a kiss from said boy to satiate my welling feelings until after graduation, as I will be away from said boy for a couple of weeks almost exclusively.”

“Said boy is probably very nervous about that condition, because those welling feelings may not be satiated so easily, both his and yours, as the chemistry between you and said boy has been brimming for quite some time now.”

“And while I have to agree, the fact that the chemistry has been recognized by both parties makes it that much more difficult to stay away from said boy.”

Minghao’s shaky lip found its way pinned between his teeth as he watched you push yourself onto your knees. “While I agree with that, I’m nervous about the end of the school year and the way you’re going to handle this since I wasn’t supposed to reveal myself until it was over.”

“Well, you blew that quite soon after spring break, now, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I did,” he replied, taking one of your hands to lace with his for just a moment before it slipped passed him, both of your hands planted firmly against the bench on either side of him. His eyes, which you had mistaken for painfully dull for so long, held so much life right now, glimmering as they looked at you. You were leaning progressively further and further over his lap, his left hand had to reach back to brace against the bench. “And while I admit that I messed up, I think I salvaged okay considering how badly I wanted to kiss you right there.”

“You say as if you knew I’ve had feelings for you.”

“I’m the only guy you’ve spared a passing glance to in over two years.”

“The quiet ones always were observant.”

“I will heed to your condition if you follow through with the rest of your promise,” he reminded you, unable to contain how pitifully whipped he felt with your mouth practically already on his. He could feel your warm breath against his face, could touch your nose with his own as his right hand cupped your jaw, slender fingers around the side of your neck while his thumb brushed against your cheek. “That means sleeping enough, eating well, and ignoring me for two weeks.”

“I promise,” you uttered.

“You’re going to look so gorgeous in your robe and honor cords, two weeks can’t go fast enough,” he whispered back, anticipating your warm mouth slanting against his. His sharp inhale in response to the sensation drew you in deeper, but kept it tame, even when he sighed against your mouth as you pulled away.

Minghao turned his face, landing your lips against his cheek. “Ahh! You said one—” The rest of his sentence was muffled against your mouth and although he wanted to protest…

“I’m greedy,” you muttered against his mouth.

…he was a little greedy himself.

Word spread like wildfire across the school—some of them were witnesses, some of them had evidence, but Minghao took the brunt of it while your phone and social media were banned from your existence for two weeks. You spent most of your time holed up in your room; the only reminder to eat was the cute purple stationary with Minghao’s immaculate script pinned to your cork board. Every time you looked at it, you thought of him, and remembered that you had to keep up your end of the bargain.

For the most part, when you saw him on campus, the two of you pretended you didn’t even know each other—back the way it was at the beginning of the semester. You never talked, never exchanged glances and it had people really confused. Finals week was complete hell for the both of you as the most intense studying ensued. Minghao consumed most of your free time thoughts and your phone, powered off, ached in your hand when you begged to talk to him. He made you promise no contact until you walked and received your degree so when the day came, you were even more giddy than expected.

When your name was called and you crossed the stage, Minghao sighed from the audience having opted out of walking.

“Dazzling, isn’t she?” Junhui asked, looking over to his counterpart.

“I told her two weeks ago how gorgeous she was going to look up there, and I’m not even slightly disappointed,” he replied, never once peeling his eyes away from you.

“So, I’ve heard a lot of things have happened before now?”

“Come on, Junhui… cut me some slack one time,” Minghao groaned, looking over to his older friend who just laughed.

“I’ll admit you played it well; you got her, after all.”

Minghao was far too eager for the ceremony to be over. He wouldn’t admit it, but spending two weeks going back to completely ignoring each other after perhaps one of the most invoking kisses of his life was a lot more difficult than he initially thought it would be. After spending a lot of time on an empty thread with your name at the top, the only way he could adequately occupy his time was gushing to Junhui like he had for years.

Actually seeing you for the first time again in those two weeks had a feeling boiling in his stomach he was unfamiliar with. He was completely enamored with the way you looked in your robe, unzipped to reveal the navy lace skater dress underneath it. When you saw him, your eyes lit up brighter than the sun and a grin broke on your face. Your heals clicked against the pavement of the stadium parking lot as you approached him, a sharply dressed man with a single rose in his hand which you promptly ignored to wrap your arms around his neck.

He chuckled softly into your ear, swaying with you with his arms low on your waist. “Hello, gorgeous,” he uttered to you.

“And what about you, handsome? Looking positive dashing in a three-piece and bow-tie,” you returned, finally reeling back to get a look at his face.

“And a very warm congratulations from me,” Junhui pipped up; leaning into the picture to remind you of his presence, though he was sure you had the blinders on.

“Ah, yes, the co-orchestrator of my blissful post-graduation happiness,” you noted, pulling away from Minghao with a little bit of coaxing, an unrelenting grasp that reluctantly let go with a simple gaze, enough to let you hug Junhui.

“See, now. I told you that you would be happy, but you weren’t patient enough.”

“I don’t think I should take the entire blame.”

“You one hundred percent initiated the kiss,” he fired back, “Minghao was doing well enough until you had to go and stick your nose in your secret business.”

Speaking of Minghao, he was waiting for you. He handed the single rose over to Junhui, well aware that you were much more enamored with him than any flower he had to offer you. Aside from that, it was meant to compliment the bouquet the Junhui held for you, but he handed it over and took you back into his arms.

“It’s been a rough two weeks,” you uttered as he pressed his forehead against yours.

“You’re telling me. It was hard going back to basically pretending like we didn’t know each other, especially while constantly being grilled about the kiss with pictures shoved in your face at all hours of the day.”

“There’s pictures?” you questioned.

“Of course there’s pictures,” Minghao scoffed, none too happy about the situation himself, “you honestly expected no pictures of you—top of the class, highest honors imaginable—lip locked halfway over my lap with me—the quiet recluse, ‘bad-boy’ black leather motorcyclist? We’ve been the exclusive gossip for two weeks, and then for us to go back to pretending we don’t know each other—“

It was easy to shut him up, finally able to kiss him again. His fingers pressed into your back, tugging you into him with your arms wrapped around his neck, fingers ruffling his dark hair. The way he tugged you in, eager for more of you had you instinctively on your toes, one leg barely fluttering off the ground. Whispers filled the air, people stopped walking, a few things you could make out about the two of you being the most unlikely couple, a few more pictures were undoubtedly snapped, but you didn’t care. All you cared about was the softness of Minghao’s lips against yours, the impatient tug of his fingers against your back, and the warmth of his body against your front.

Junhui was right, the both of you were pretty happy with the outcome of that purple stationary, all the rumors, and the end of college.

#minghao #xu minghao #the8 #svt #seventeen #minghao scenarios #xu minghao scenarios #the8 scenarios #svt scenarios #seventeen scenarios #minghao fluff #xu minghao fluff #svt fluff #prompt game: fas svt

111 notes · View notes

onyour-right · 5 years

Note

Titans prompt request #3

Sure. Hope you enjoy this. (Sorry it took so long, blame my muse). As always, please feel free to comment/like/reblog if you enjoyed.

3. “Take off your shirt”

Kory stretches her arms above her head as she slowly rousesherself up from the deep slumber she’d been in only minutes ago. Sunlight streamsinto the bedroom and casts a yellow-orange hue across the room that manages towarm her up from the inside out, from outside the window birds chirp noisilyand it makes her lips curl upwards into a soft, appreciative smile. Doing whatthey do can get disheartening sometimes, especially having to deal repeatedlywith the same misguidedness and cruelty of villains who swear they’re all just sounique, so moments of blissful simplicity are moments that she never takes forgranted.

She can’t say the same for her partner though, whose side ofthe bed is long gone cold telling her he’s been absent for quite a while. It’snothing she isn’t used to, him waking up early when his thoughts won’t leavehim be, but it still rankles her that on a Saturday morning she’s left loungingin bed by herself when what she really wants is some company. Reluctantly Koryheaves a sigh and rises up from the comfort of the bed, quickly finding one ofDick’s oversized shirts to cover her naked form with before making her way outof the room.

As is expected she finds him sitting on a high stool at the blackand white kitchen island, wearing a pair of grey sweats and a white t-shirt, hisblack hair adorably mussed from sleep and his body held fraught with tension ashe types furiously away at his laptop keys. Kory can’t see his face from whereshe’s standing, but she’s pretty sure she already knows his expression: browsfurrowed in concentration, lips down-turned into a frown.

Dick’s so preoccupied by his work that he doesn’t noticeKory’s presence until she’s pressing herself against his back and wrapping herarms loosely around his waist, her chin coming down to rest lightly on hisshoulder. The effect she has on him is almost instantaneous, the way his bodyloosens just a fraction and he leans back into her. The action speaks ofsomething more that neither of them are quite ready to voice yet, she thinks.

“How long have you been out here?” She asks carefully,softly, trying not to let the words sound too accusing. The last thing shewants to do is push him away.

He hums distractedly, tilting his head to the side so he cansneak a quick glance at her. “Uh, not that long. An hour, maybe?”

Kory narrows her eyes suspiciously at his response,something about the way he phrased that makes her think he’s been out hereworking way longer than just an hour, but she decides to let it go.

“Can I help?” She says instead, lifting her chin from hisshoulder and dropping a kiss through his shirt, then to the crook of his neck.

Dick’s fingers flittering across the keyboard pause inmid-air for a brief second and Kory hears him inhale sharply. “Yes,” hereplies, resuming his typing as if the few seconds of stillness hadn’t evenhappened. “Stop distracting me.”

A wide grin spreads across Kory’s face and she hides halfher face into his shoulder, suppressing the rising giggle that threatens tospill out from her lips. “Sorry,” she murmurs against the thin material on hisback, although she’s anything but.

Dick lets out a loud, incredulous snort that’s filled withnothing but amusement. Clearly he’s not buying her apology either.

A comfortable silence settles over the both of them, thesounds of his typing and their breathing filling the air. It’s such a relaxingatmosphere that Kory feels her eyes falling shut once more and her breathsslowing as she’s lulled by the promise of sleep, but then she feels the tensionslowly return to Dick’s body and it sends alarm signals through her.

Lifting her head up from where it had been resting onlyseconds ago on his shoulder, Kory’s words come out anxious and concerned. “Whatis it?”

He shakes his head, his jaw clenching and unclenchingrepeatedly before he responds in a low murmur. “Nothing, it’s nothing, justwork.”

A heavy sigh falls from her mouth. She hates seeing him likethis, clammed up with pent up tension that prevents him from truly being ableto unwind. But then, she figures, that might be what she’s here for, to helphim learn how to step away every now and then. At the sudden revelation Koryunwinds her hands from his waist and moves out from behind him - ignoring theway his head instantly turns and his questioning gaze tries to seek her out.

“Kory, what – ”

She shushes him quickly and instead of offering anexplanation for what she’s doing, reaches for his laptop and closes it shut - notbefore saving the documents he was working on. Only then does she turn towardshim, meeting his curious expression with an innocent smile that warns of somethingplayful.

“Take off your shirt.”

Dick blinks once, then twice, an annoyingly cute frown crossinghis face as he tries to figure out whether or not he heard her instructioncorrectly, or possibly try and work out why she’d randomly make such a request.Damn him for being so irresistible even when he’s not trying. What a dick.

“Huh?”

Kory rolls her eyes fondly before raising both her brows athim. “I know you have great hearing,” is all she says. The smile on her faceonly gets wider as Dick rolls his own eyes and grumbles something under hisbreath that Kory misses, or that she chooses to ignore out of the goodness ofher heart, before pulling off his shirt and playfully tossing it over to theside where she’s standing.

“Your Highness…”

She snorts most unladylike as she catches his falling shirtand places it on the marble white countertop, a playful glint to her eyes asshe says, “I could have you thrown in the dungeons for that.”

“Uh huh,” is all Dick says, incredulous, like he knows thateven if she could, she wouldn’t.

Kory loves it, the thrill this game they play incites withinher, the pulling and tugging that is their whole relationship.

In answer she places her hands lightly on both hisshoulders, stepping back behind him so that she can place a kiss on the outershell of his ear and then trail soft kisses down the crook of his neck and murmuragainst the heat of his skin, “just trust me, please.” She doesn’t really waitfor an answer before she starts, but the sharp intake of breath and the faintnod of his head are good signs of approval if any.

Kory’s hands work out the knots in his shoulders first, her fingersdigging into and then releasing his skin as her touch draws out pleasurable moansfrom him that come from grateful relief. It spurs her on as she slides herhands further down the wide expanse of his back, her fingers gliding over themany scars and bumps eternally imprinted on his skin as she continues to work athis aching muscles. Kory relishes moments like these, where her touch causessweet sounds to fall from his mouth, it’s like nectar to a bee.

She’s not sure how long it goes on for, but eventually hermovements come to a natural stop and just as it does Dick mutters out, his voicelow and hoarse. “Fuck, Kory.”

Before she can even open her mouth to offer some smug andwitty comeback, Dick’s off the stool and sweeping her feet off the ground in abridal carry. Delighted laughter accompanies them all the way back to theirbedroom.

// end

#g writes #dickkory #dick grayson x koriand'r #dick grayson #kory anders #dc titans #anna diop #brenton thwaites #fanfiction prompts

38 notes · View notes

thaumaturtles · 5 years

Text

Begin ANGELQUEST

The other day, I was doing some.......

...... studying.......

When I came across an advertisement. This isn’t at all an unusual experience; I’ve been on the internet for a decade and change and I’ve come to accept that ads are a part of the experience. This was an ad I’d seen many times before, too. I’m so accustomed to seeing it that my eyes often skip right over it. However, I’ve been reading a lot of articles about Enlightenment, lately, and I’ve been trying to put that into practice in my everyday life. I’ve been attempting, to varying degrees of success, to become more aware of myself and my environment, to probe onward into my mind’s own blind spots. In short, I’m trying to blitz my chakras. (Don’t worry, am Indian, can reclaim.)

And so, for perhaps the first time, I took a moment to truly see the ad in front of me. To stop and smell the dogshit hiding behind the roses. And, goodness, was it a sight to behold. Ladies, gentlemen, and all who fall betwixt, I present to you, THIS:

Take a moment, if necessary, to take it all in.

Have you collected yourself? Good. You’re holding up the rest of the class.

I don’t know how I’ve managed to let this pass without mental comment on more than one occasion. How did I look at this image, think “angel reading? yeah, sure, that’s a thing that exists” and then shuffle along? The only explanation I can muster is Divine intervention, which would ironically lend this product some legitimacy. I need to understand. What does Angel Reading mean? How could such a process be personalized, and, furthermore, how could it take place over the Internet? Who is this “Celeste”? What is she after? Why does she look vaguely disappointed in me? Can she see my soul? What is an “Angelic Medium”?????

Clearly, if I want answers, I’m going to have to dive in. I place my Crocodile Dundee hat on my head with no small measure of trepidation, though I must confess a moiety of excitement deep within. As I hike up my Adventurin’ Shorts and stuff a few hundred metres of rope into my backpack, I consider the long road ahead. And then, with my cosplay explorer’s outfit put on to my approval, I sit down at my computer. I’m really not sure why I felt the need to do all that when I’m just gonna be here at home.

I steel my will, and I click.

This loading screen appears, and I’d like to mention that the URL for this page is perhaps longer than any URL I’ve ever seen before in my 16 years.

Okay, let’s just take a moment to get our bearings here and-

HOLY MACKEREL, THERE’S A COUNTDOWN!

And only twenty-seven minutes left! Sakes alive, I clicked this link just in time! Imagine If I’d wasted more time farting around and dressing up like Indiana Jones!

Although, weirdly enough, whenever I refresh the page, the timer restarts, and it always restarts at 27 minutes and 50ish seconds, which is a random-enough number to seem legitimate.

Hmm. Odd.

I wonder if maybe the countdown isn’t actually real and is just there to pressure you into typing your info more quickly so you don’t notice how fishy this whole opera-

OH MY GOD ONLY 26 MINUTES!!!!!!!

OK, gotta think quickly here. Gosh, they’re asking some personal questions right off the bat, but I can’t let them know it’s me; they might recognize me from tumblr. If this sting operation’s gonna go forth I gotta lie my ass off. My name? Uh, uh.. My name is Dyl-Dy- Uhhhh, shit, okay, it’s Dylan-NO, Dylllllllll...... Delilah? Delilah. Like from the Bible. Yeah, that’s fitting, especially since I’m swindling these fools. Soon, Celeste, your hair will be mine.

They’re asking for my date of birth, which I’m hesitant to put because my 16th birthday party was kind of a big deal and Celeste might’ve heard about it, in which case she’ll know it’s me AND things will be super awkward cause I didn’t invite her to the party.

I put 4/13/1969 obviously

They’re also asking for my e-mail address, which I can’t give out because it has my full name, address, and social security number in it, so let’s just pull this ripcord real quick and parachute out of this nightmare zone, and over to a quick, free, secure e-mail client. That is, protonmail.com, which is not my usual e-mail server and will thus throw Celeste’s goons even farther off my trail

Wow, that was a surprisingly quick and painless process! I might just have to use protonmail in the future

So anyway here’s my info, sent in right under the wire, with a mere 24.3 minutes left! God that was close. Picture that classic scene in Indiana Jones where he slides under the door and then reaches back in to get his hat, only it’s an out-of-shape teen and also the door hasn’t even started closing yet.

I went with my actual country because, c’mon, there’re a lot of people in Jamaica. Statistically speaking, how likely is it they’d find me through that?

You know I didn’t. You know I fucking didn’t. Why are you asking.

Also, here’s a quick rundown of what Celeste is actually offering in case anyone was curious. It does somewhat tickle me that she claims she’ll “get to work immediately” as soon as anyone clicks the link and subscribes, as though the process isn’t completely automated. It evokes a clear image of Celeste, in full angelic garb, sitting at a computer screen and answering calls while also typing into three discrete keyboards simultaneously.

The idea that she could personally take the order of every individual who clicks this ad betrays either a complete lack of confidence in the desirability of her product, or an incredible amount of confidence in her own ability to multitask.

Who is “she”? Celeste? That doesn’t make much sense in the context here. Peter’s Guardian Angel? But earlier Celeste made it sound like all angels use he/him! Also, what does “bring her back” mean if it’s the angel? Can angels leave and later be found again? I feel like if you find your guardian angel once, that should be it forever, but apparently they can leave and you have to ensnare them again?????

Hooray! A link from an unknown source to an unknown destination! I sure can’t wait to click it all day long!

The things I do in the name of science, I swear to God Celeste.

It took a minute but here it is. Sidenote: I rather enjoy the irony of an inbox which consists of three e-mails about encryption and ways to curate a safe internet experience, and one which is an automated link from a bullshit ad for a product that doesn’t exist. There’s a subtle poetry to this image. I almost want to frame it, and then sell it for an exorbitant amount of money.

Here’s the e-mail, folx. If ever you needed proof that this was a scam, look no further.

Who on this good green earth would think beginning such a missive with, “Thank you for your trust,” would be a good way to garner MORE goodwill? When I go to my local grocer and I purchase a party-sized bag of Tostitos to eat by myself over the course of a day and a half because I’m in control of my body, goddammit, the bag doesn’t say, “Thank you for believing in us! We promise we won’t give you dysentery!

Like, what the fuck? “Thank you for your trust.” Your product should be able to stand on its own two feet and proudly proclaim, “I’m gonna give you a fucking angel reading or die trying!”

That initial line has honestly made me more scared than ever for this process. I’m confident I’m going to click that link and it’s going to auto-download a terabyte of obscure Norwegian pornography to my hard drive. I did just update my computer this morning, however, and all my data are backed up, so I feel somewhat more secure than I might otherwise.

Did I really just say “data are”? I know it’s grammatically correct and all, but it’s still jarring to hear. Messes with my mental flow. And wouldn’t the proper, descriptivist thing to do be to use “data is” to avoid confusion? Using “data are” feels clunky, is more difficult to say, and makes me look a bit snobbish. I’d delete it but that would require hitting the backspace button on my computer and I’m frankly quite lazy about that sort of thing. What was I talking about again? Oh, right. I have to click the link.

Again with the “thank you for your trust” bullshit! Whatever, I’m going to let it pass. They’re clearly going for a friendly, approachable persona here, even if they’re doing it in the most threatening, ass-backwards way possible.

This next email took a seemingly endless eight minutes to arrive, during which time I meditated, raised a bonsai tree to adulthood, watched Marley & Me, grappled with intense feelings of loneliness, and worked on some of my homework.

Or maybe I just played games on my phone. You decide!

Okay, not quite what “hereby” means, but sure. It’s a common mistake, likely exacerbated by the presence of the word “here” within “hereby.” Sort of a “wherefore does not mean where” situation I suppose.

Anyway, I’m submitting to the mortifying ordeal of clicking the link yet again.

Christ get a load of this shit. How fitting that the Angelic stone for someone born on 4/13 would be Jade. My archangel is Megatron apparently??? His info claims he’s some sort of scribe. My major planet is Neptune, and my secondary planet is.... the sun? Is anyone going to tell Celeste what stars are or do I have to do everything myself around here? I do like that ram up in the top left though. I’m naming you Ram Elliot.

Now for the pièce de résistance. Meet Mahasiah. Mahasiah is not my guardian angel; Mahasiah is the guardian angel for anyone born between April 10th-14th. My guardian angel is Yerathel, apparently. A few things I learned while researching this: both Mahasia and Yerathel have “feminine energies” (???) and both have Fire as their associated classical element. Also, Yerathel rules over Intelligence, which is one thing I actually somewhat like about myself. This is actually kind of neat to learn about!

I mean come on. That’s pretty fuckin cool. His name means “He Who Punishes Evildoers” which is beyond epic, and his associated gem is Smoky Quartz, aka the only Steven Universe character.

You know, maybe this whole Angel Reading business isn’t a scam after all. Maybe it’s a perfectly safe process and I’ll be totally fine, what am I worrying about? At the very least, it couldn’t hurt to explore her site a bit more..... for research’s sake.

yeah baby tell me more

certainly, miss celeste, anything for you

wait, aren’t I already in a relationshi-

JAZZERCISING JUNIPERS BATMAN THERE’S ONLY 28 MINUTES LEFT

holy shit! I want accurate readings!

Oh god oh no okay i’ll do whatever you want celeste please don’t leave me i need my tarots

THEY KNOW ABOUT ME ALREADY OMG

Well, okay, even in my currently addled state I can still see that “Duo-Telepathy” is complete bullshi-

OH WELL IF AMANDA GAVE THEM THREE WHOLE STARS I HAVE TO TRUST IT

Amazingly, my info was pre-filled in. Almost like this site is linked to Celeste’s in some way, or perhaps even run by the same group of scammeUPSTANDING CITIZENS IS WHAT I MEANT TO SAY

Ooh, another e-transmission from my good friend Celeste! Oh, how I’ve missed her! And apparently large and surprising discoveries have been made concerning me! She’s presenting me a Guide? I sure hope I’ll be able to open it, hassle-free, with no additional purchases/information required!

OHOHOHOHO

bro i’m shitting my drawers rn

I have no fucking clue what that means but you said FREE so i’m in!

oh my god there’s still so much left. just shut the fuck up and take my money you fools

AW TITS YEAH

....i think

Okay, I know the original thing said FREE and I should be “mad” or watever, but look at that bargain! that’s more than half off! It might as well be free! I’d be stupid NOT to buy it!

I’ve invented a lot of secondary information for Delilah. The phone number is merely (559) YOU-SUCK, as a subtle way of establishing the power dynamic at play here. I’m sure Celeste will appreciate it.

Hmmmmm.............. It would seem my method of “just input numbers randomly” won’t work here. Such a shame. Credit card fraud used to be so easy. I’ll have to put that on the backburner, though, because look what just appeared in my inbox!

You can see where this is going.

I’ll take my leave now, this post is getting long enough as is, but I do feel it’s important to note that doing a quick bit of research shows that Celeste & co. are famous for emotional manipulation, as well as getting people addicted to their products and forcing a sort of dependency upon them. It’s important to do your research, and remember basic internet safety tips like don’t click popups or check if a site is legit before downloading from them. It’s incredibly easy to get trapped down this sort of rabbit hole, where you wind up buying more and more of their products like you’re stockpiling for the Rapture. Not me, though, I’m obviously fine and can quit anytime I like. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go try a bunch of credit card numbers until one works.

#dylan talks #angelquest #long post #why do i keep making these #also yes this post was inspired by 'come with me on a magical journey through the internet' and 'an offer you cant refuse'#what about it

15 notes · View notes

writingsofmyimagination · 5 years

Text

Conjecture |5|

Yoongi x Reader

Idol Reader Au, Enemies to Lovers AU

Summary: Your management refused to renew your contract unless you collaborated, so you ending up working with Min Yoongi. A guy you’d disliked from before both of your debuts. There is more to their past than meets the eye.

Words:2859

Links to other parts in my masterlist

if you want to be tagged let me know :)

Warnings: Smut :), soft piano scene,

(Mention’s on Monsta X’s Wonho)

Reblog, Like, Comment :)

//Yoongi was sparring constantly with regret, why did he choose to work over spending more time with you? The fact he couldn’t answer himself only exasperated his irritation; the only way he could justify himself was acknowledging you’d both probably be getting drunk and by not going he was severing any possibility he’ll leave himself vulnerable by confessing any of his true feelings. All reason ceased to exist when his phone pinged beside him.

-You’ll never guess who’s turned up as a surprise performer-

Hobi knew he was never indulge in this guessing game.

-When have I ever guessed anything you’ve said to me :P –

-True …-

He was never going to reply nor did even need to finish reading the name, he almost stumbled vaulting himself out of the chair and racing to get dressed before leaving in a frantic state. //

You followed Yoongi like a scolded child, conscious of your surroundings you had the sense to not cause a scene, your glare burned hot into the back of him as he ended up leading you to the underground secure car park of the venue. The minute you stepped out of the elevator the simmering temper boiled over.

“What right do you have coming here and telling me what the fuck to do, my career was nearly non-existent because of that prick” The start of your career was stunted slightly when you were due to release a collaborated song and you refused to agree to release it or have anything to do with it with no reason. That you gave anyway.

“You’re seriously going to make me repeat myself, I’m trying to save you from fucking yourself and your career over” He’d stopped and turned, his jaw muscles twitched as he clenched his jaw, it was as if he’d swallowed a hot fire seed which grew and he was fighting to keep the flames from escaping.

“And besides, how are you any better than he is” you spat back, his eyes grew as wide and as puzzled as physically possible.

“What did you just say?” the glare he shot at you had you stumbling over your thoughts as he minimised the distance between you.

“Well you know what he did yet you still thought it was okay to take me home and sleep with me when you knew I was in no state or right mind” and there it was, the root cause of all your distaste for the guy stood frozen completely flabbergasted in front of you.

“What? We’ve never… what do you actually remember from that night” Your anger was an inferno with no intention of dying out, you refused to acknowledge any excuse or explanation he’d try and offer. You stood there confidently chest out, refusing to back down.

“You storming into my dressing room peeling that asshole off me and saving me, then finding myself awake and undressed in your bed with you nowhere to be found”

“So you don’t actually remember much then, jesus is that why you’ve been such a bitch with me? You thought I’d do something like that?” He was expression was nothing less than mortified, his face drained of the little colour he already had. Scowls had seeped into his words at the accusation, your inebriated system had caused a delay in processing any of this information.

“Let me fill you in, I came to your room to congratulate you on the single and ask you out, I get outside your dressing room and hear some kind of struggle. When I saw him forcing himself on you I acted completely on impulse, yes I pulled him off you, how do you think he broke his nose huh? Me! You was in a complete state, hysterical. You made me swear not tell anyone and not to involve the police, you were petrified of anything affecting your debut. You begged me to just take you home but I wasn’t going to let you be on your own; so yes I took you home. I cold compressed where you felt bruised and even sat with you until your tears stopped. When I left you in my room you were dressed. Whatever you did when I left was nothing to do with me. I slept on the couch”

You may as well have been hosed down with ice water with how this revelation had slapped you in face. You were struggling to even formulate a response, your hot headed ness soothed rapidly to a quiet motion, your chest deflating, you’d shrunk dramatically in size.

“Why… why did you never tell me?” the toxicity of your tone had also dissipated into nothing.

“Tell you? You never gave me a chance, I’d left to go get you some breakfast and some toiletries or whatever so you could at least freshen up and by the time I’d got back you’d left. It’s not like we’d ever exchanged numbers, I got hold of your management and if you remember you refused any contact with me” he spoke with a subtle defensive aggression, his pride and beating heart wounded caused the brightness in his eyes to dim as the blood flow slowed. How could you have got this so wrong, you’d hated and blocked a genuine thoughtful guy from helping you and assuming the worst out of him. The spiral of guilt started gaining momentum dragging with it embarrassment and shame. Yoongi apparently seeing this downfall of your own declining thoughts on your face he comforted his hand over yours.

“Yoongi I’m…”

“Hey” his tone had lowered to a soft and soothing blanket. You hauled your chin up and met his gaze with heavily water filled eyes.

“It’s okay” the glaze of caramelizing sugar coating his eyes. Your mind became a void, unable to even comprehend how you felt in this moment. The only physical response currently manifesting was a racing pulse and the dull remnant ache between your legs that apparently had refused to subside through the drama.

“Okaaayy… you clearly need rescuing from your mind, come on let’s go home” Yoongi finally said.

“Thanks” you offered a weak smile and allowed Yoongi to drive you home.

“You came to ask me out?” you finally asked bemused after your brain had stopped endlessly whirring. Your mind had settled, a calm and contented void creeped over your being.

“That’s seriously the first thing you’re going to say?” he chuckled.

“Let’s just pretend it’s the drink, come on spill” the alcohol was only mildly impairing you or your actions but it was definitely making teasing him more amusing. Even in the darkness, the flickering of the street lights illuminated a slight tainting of his cheeks to a light pink. His mouth dropped opened slightly in a grin and rolled his tongue against the inside of his cheek.

Firstly fuck that was hot, secondly he still blushed, were there still feelings?

“Okay, now I’ll rescue you shall I?”

“Please” he was thankful for the dodge.

It was almost as if a dam had broken between the two of you, animosity completely evaporated you don’t remember ever laughing so much in such a short drive.

Your hand gripped at the back of your heels as your feet adjusted to the cold tiled floor of his apartment. You dumped your bag on the side and your shoes cluttered to the floor as you hoped onto the breakfast bar in a happily adolescent manner.

“And do you remember how much forehead you had when your hair was all spiked up” you jested, bending over to soothe your exhausted stomach muscles

“How is that worse than those pig tails you used to have on the side of your head and especially that weird bit of hair you had dyed separately” his adorable laugh and smile were constant, you were doing best to not snort in between hardly catching a second to take a breath.

“Okay, okay we both made some terrible fashion choices” you conceded sipping some much needed water.

“But didn’t we think we were IT”

“Oh my god we sooooo did” you took longer than you needed to sliding off the bar and bouncing to join Yoongi on the couch, your hand dripped over the back, legs tucked under you. Yoongi was practically a mirror at the other end.

“But you know what I stand by the music, I don’t regret any of it” a solemn smirk rested on your face, your mind skimming through your back catalogue and more early releases. It brought to you a sense of warmth that seared through your blood, re-iterating your passion for you work.

“Really? He exclaimed “Even your cover of Monster?” he winced, a coy smile burning through his scrunched features. In retaliation you launched a pillow as a projectile, he deflected the incoming with ease.

“I mean…” you chuckled “That was a steep learning curve but it was lesson I needed all tooooo much” The amused atmosphere dissipated into a calm contemplative silence. You observed his features with a fine toothed comb, adoring everything your eyes rested upon. You was lost in a vivid day dream come to life. The tall stand-alone lamp illuminated a glow around you and the piano. The piano.

“Play me something” you implored, pumping as much glucose into your voice and your pleading eyes to win him over.

“Now?”

“Mmmhmm” your head rested on the back of the sofa arm cradling your hair, you curled up nuzzling against the doughy comfort of the chair.

“Well how can I refuse when you ask so sweetly?”

He shuffled on the small leather stool until he’d achieved his desired position, his long slender fingers ghosted across the length of the keyboard as is to tease the music awake before he made his own. The melody was beautiful, so soft it breezed straight through you resulting in you feeling fuzzy, your gaze drifted from the hands capable of bringing an entire room to awe to the focused, absorbed face staring at nothing but the keys depressing down under his touch. At times he even closed eyes for several keys completely washed over with his first love. He plays like nobodies watching, and you watch drowning in the soul he pours out when he plays. He really was a beautiful human in every way.

Could things have worked out differently?

“Y/N are you alright?”

Pulled out from the waves you grew aware your eye’s had filled and small droplets had escaped and trickled down your cheek. Wiping the vulnerability away in a rush to sit up composed, eyes down as you became way too self-conscious.

“Yes, I’m fine that was just beautiful, and another word about thi…” your unfinished defensive threat was halted, the delicate comforting pressure of his lips soothing yours rattled your heart, swept you into a level of perfect contentment. You leaned into the hand cupping your face like a fragile shell.

“That was beautiful, I’ve wanted to do that for years” the subdued, washed out tone of his voice cracked the already frail shell that resembled any resistance to his words.

Any negative wrongly believed views or opinions of him melted down, fluorescing into a warm beautiful orchard of uncovered adoration.

“I should never have made you wait or been such a bitch” you leaned to him to acknowledge your mirrored feelings. It wasn’t long before the beautiful orchard became a blazing forest fire spreading through the pair of you dangerously fast. He offered up no resistance as you pushed him back and straddled his waist, his hand to the back of your neck; the other wasted no time in creeping up the outside of your thigh. His fingers teasing excited exhales from your lips which were directly captured amongst the flurry of hot and heavy kisses. Your lips hardly ever parting, his hand slipped from grasping the curve of your behind to navigating southwards towards your pulsing bundle of nerves. You refused him and clipped his hands together under one of your hands above his head.

“Did I say you could touch me there?” You teased unable to keep a smirk from growing wide across your face. He didn’t respond, his eyes were blown out full of swirling passion and disbelief that this was finally happening. You watched his eyes intently unaware you were staring directly into a warzone of thoughts

“We can’t do this right now” he breathed, even you could hear the reluctance in his voice.

“What…why?” you sat back onto his lap, releasing an exaggerated huff.

“It’s not that I don’t want to, god I do” he paused, you followed his eyes downs to rest at his clothed erection “Obviously” his eyes snapped back “You pretty much hated me for years because you thought something had happened when you were drunk. I’m not risking that again, I wouldn’t feel right”

You sat intently taking in every word like each one was a secret code to save your life. The respect you had for him swelled uncontrollably, you understood his reasons with perfect clarity but the frustration attempted to blur the view

“I’m not even that drunk!” you whined contesting against his good natured reasoning. He went to speak again but you were not done. “But I get it” you carried on more softly conceding. “And don’t think I won’t make you regret this, it’s not nice to get so worked up” you toyed, ideas of your own back already blooming in your mind.

“Mmm I can’t wait” his face creasing into an appeasing smirk.

Interesting

“Well I’ll see you in the morning then” you leaned forward and gave him a strong kiss dragging his lip out slightly between your teeth before abruptly leaving him like the flustered, regretful mess he was on the sofa.

You was still going to have a bit of fun with him tonight if it killed you. Once you was all settled in bed you grabbed your phone, the bright artificial light blaring away the true darkness around your vicinity.

-To think you didn’t even get to feel how wet you made me-[23:47]

Normally the fresh scent and the comfiness of the bed would threaten to drag you into an unconscious state but currently you was way too charged, your eyes were wide managing the silhouettes of your room. Your eyes dropped shut accompanied with an exhale as your fingers glided blissfully through your arousal.

-Is this you making me regret my decision? Because that ship sailed when you left me wanting nothing more than to feel that under my tongue??-[23:49]

-Well if you’d decided to not think so much it would be your tongue and not my fingers right now. Your loss-[23:50]

A quiet gasp left you as you began teasing yourself imagining the sight of his head nestled in between your thighs.

-Fuck.Want to know what I’m thinking now?-[23:52] You interest was piqued immediately, you began tilting your hips pushing into your fingers.

-Depends, if it beats me thinking about how I want you right now-[23:53]

-And how’s that?-[23:53]

You took a beat to slow the pace of your fingers and considered whether to tell him you’d like him beneath you begging you to let him cum whilst your hands were round his neck. Maybe not just yet.

-you first-[23:54] While you waited for his response you rolled over and fished out your bullet vibrator from the depths of your bag and clicked it on to your favourite setting. Your moan escaped you with much more volume than you could control.

-You better not be touching yourself, if you are stop. I never told you you could-[23:54] you hastily added.

-I’m just thinking of how I could walk in there right now get you on all fours and have you cumming around my cock while my hand is yanking your hair back with you crying my name.[23:55]

A second buzz immediately followed the first, you edged yourself to read the second message

-Also are you serious? Of course I’m touching myself and I can hear you moaning, it’s driving me insane-[23:55]

You was too far gone at this point to stop your climax pulsing through you. When you’d drifted back down from your high you sent your reply, hints of aftershocks were still washing through.

-Good!-[23:59].

You woke up in a vacuum of darkness, the day had yet to even stir. A Slight thumping clouding your head. You pulled over a nightshirt and slowly bumbled your way to the kitchen and helped yourself to a glass of water. Filling your second glass you headed back to hopefully shift back into your dreams, you hesitated passing Yoongi’s door teetering on your next actions. Decision made you twisted the handle delicately and crept around the furniture you could see through the shadows utilising the moonlight which trickled in through the curtains. He was asleep on the right side, you silently slid in on the left shuffling with gentle motions toward the centre of the bed before rolling over and shifting to face outwards. The sleeping prince next to you stirred, nuzzled closer into the back of your neck and an arm drifted round your waist.

#bts #btssmutclub #kwritersworldnet #kpopwonderlandtag #bangtanarmynet #bts smut #yoongi x reader #BTS suga #suga x reader #bts yoongi

141 notes · View notes

animeraider · 3 years

Text

Of all of the strange stories in my lengthy music career, this is one of them.

In the 1980's I was the lead guitarist and occasional vocalist for a band called ASK. We were pretty good after a while. It was me, Kevin Donville (bass and lead vocals), Ed Lee (Keyboards and vocals) and a series of drummers before we finally settled win with Tim "T.J." Klassen. We started off slow but after some rough gigs, including an horrific one where we were the act that followed the famed songwriting team of Holland-Dozier-Holland run through their biggest hits (we sounded nothing like them and the audience was there) we built up a reputation in West L.A. as a solid band and had earned the trust of the famed Esther Wong herself.

We played 20 gigs at Madame Wong's during our run.

In 1989 Kevin had to leave the band. The rest of us tried to soldier on for a bit, recruiting my brother to play bass and trying a few other guitarists to take over lead duties while I took over vocals. None of it really worked, but we did have fun with one song. Back in the ASK days we had a hard rocker called "Run To Me" that featured a riff I stole from Don Dokken. I re-worked the song as a ballad and we worked up a pretty good arrangement. Tim and my brother worked up a solid rhythm section part and we all agreed that this was pretty awesome.

The band fizzled out and that's mostly my fault. But one night Tim and I got some beers and watched a VHS tape of U2's "Rattle and Hum", and when they got to "Bullet The Blue Sky" Tim's air-drumming that slamming part and I'm pretending to be The Edge when Tim asks me if I can play that slide guitar part. I could and I can. He said, "wouldn't that be awesome in Run to Me?"

We had one more practice, jut him, me and my brother and it WAS awesome.

I then got sidetracked by the events that led me to record a song called "Favorite Partner", a dance track that was completely played on acoustic instruments. That song took off in the beach town clubs and I suddenly needed a full demo to shop around - because people were starting to ask who I was. I had two other songs ready to go in the same vein as "Favorite Partner" and I asked TJ and Alex (my brother) to come to a session and we'd record "Run to Me" like we had last practiced it, "Rattle and Hum" bits and all.

In those days I practiced and recorded at a placed called Pendragon Studios. None of us lived close to it, but their engineer - a man named Bill Krodell - was a genius.This of course means that we all have to drive there. On the day of the session Alex's car breaks down, and he can't make it. So now I have to play bass.

TJ and I record a reference track - my guitar and his drums, and then I record the bass. I had never tried to play bass on the song before, so I just copied with Alex had done. It's a pretty good bass line, and later he would be very happy that I had kept it. I record the guitars and when it comes time to do the solo I pull out the slide and do the "Bullet the Blue Sky" bit. It's only a few seconds but Bill claps his hands together and says, "Wait until you hear how I mix THAT!"

It gets time to do the vocals and it takes me a few takes to get the lead down. The harmonies were easy though (that had been my part when it was an ASK song). We're listening to a take and getting to the last chorus when TJ, who's been just sitting and listening for the past couple of hours as his part was long finished yells out, "Knock Knock Knockin' on Heaven's Door" in time with the drum part he played.

Of course, we just HAD to incorporate that. Understand, There were about a dozen version of the old Bob Dylan song making the rounds right around then, including the Guns 'N' Roses one, so it was once again part of the zeitgeist. In the space of a few minutes I came up and recorded with a blistering 4-part harmony of those six words, and then returned to the song as I had written it. It was a fun off-the-cuff moment and I love those.

We mixed the tracks and I suddenly had a 4-song demo. A friend of mine did a photo session for the cover. I'm terrible at those and to try to get me to loosen up she had me balance a small rubber shark on my shoulder. The photo that resulted led to not only the cover but the title of the demo, "Hand Feeding the Hungry Shark".

God's Teeth I'm young in that photo.

The demo got circulated around and label interest started up, but they wanted to hear more. They wanted live shows and at this point I really didn't have a band. I was getting club play though and I was selling demos, so I decided to record a full album. The result was the first album I released as Jim Christopher, "My World - Welcome To It", named after a television show I barely remembered from my childhood. It's available to this day:

https://open.spotify.com/album/0MZo7Zlk9cis5s0mcv0giy?si=RUce_ECtRH-ndKprKkx2QA&dl_branch=1

Thing is, if you listen to track Seven you will NOT hear the Bob Dylan Lyrics. You need to remember that this is 1989-90. The world wasn't then what it is now. I hadn't sampled Dylan. I had essentially just used his words, and I realized I was going to need his permission. So I asked.

It took a bit of doing, but I found his agent and sent him a letter outlining what I was doing, and sent him a copy of the demo. I figured that their publishers would want a cut and I was prepared to give it. Instead I got a letter back stating that if I were to release this version of the song with Dylan's lyrics included that they would sue me into the ground and crap on the smoldering remains.

Well, I'm this 24 year-old broke dude and this is Bob Dylan's battery of lawyers. I wasn't going to win this one, so I went to a studio and rented one of their editing consoles and spliced out most of the last chorus (I'm a VERY good editor - most people don't even realize the cut).

That was that. My little tribute to Bob Dylan was left on the cutting room floor. 20 seconds of the song just gone. End of story.

Except.

Long after I had left Los Angeles and retaken my own name as a recording artist, Dylan gives an interview about all of the covers of his songs done over the years, and how many musicians quote him. Part of the answer he gives is about how he got overly protective of his catalog at one point and wouldn't let anyone use his music without using the whole song. Guess about when this was? He goes on to say in the interview that he doesn't mind people quoting him - that he does it himself.

In essence, he was giving everyone permission to do the very thing his lawyers had told me not to do. I'm not going to go into the story of how I confirmed this, but I did learn that he actually had never even heard my song (Hugh Hefner did, but that's another story). The ultimate response I got? "We're cool."

But I had edited that chorus out of the master for the album. I went back to the original 2 inch tapes I had recorded on and remixed and remastered the song. I let it hang around bandcamp for a little while, but I never really gave any thought to releasing it.

Well, 2020 and 2021 have been such game-changers in my life. After spending years struggling with a new album the floodgates opened up for me as a writer and a recording artist. As many of you know, I've released a ton of material this year, including some of my older tracks that never saw the light of day. It took a while, but it finally got through myu thick skull that I could finally put out in wide release the original version of "Run to Me", complete with The Edge guitar solo and 6 words by Bob Dylan.

It's the opener of "Demolisten", which is mostly a random collection of songs that never saw wide release for one reason or another. Some of this work is seriously unpolished, but I figure if the big artists can release their back-catalog crap so can I. But I'm really proud of "Run to Me".

I played every instrument and sang all the vocals except for the drums, which are played by Tim "TJ" Klassen (who now lives in New York). If you listen very very carefully you can even hear TJ "singing" (screaming, really) as he plays drums, especially on some of the fills.

Every song on this "new" EP has a story behind it, but this one is the one from the very early days of my life as a solo artist. I can tell the other stories if you want. I promise to be less verbose on the others. Their stories are shorter.

#Spotify

0 notes

szopenhauer · 4 years

Text

Last thing that made you go “aww!” probably a dog I saw

Is a crow’s caw annoying to you? hmm... not usually, no

Do you enjoy jazz music? one song, when there’s another and more I get sick :x

Do you like the topaz birthstone? no What are your thoughts on gas prices? I don’t drive so no idea Are you an ass? can be Have you ever caught any fish while fishing before? I never went fishing nor want to Do you attend Mass? I listen to the mass online every Sunday even though it annoys me and I can’t focus much What was your favorite class in school? can’t decide, depends on the grade/school/teacher etc. Are you full of sass? I’m not Grav3yardgirl

Do you like razzamatazz ice cream? dunno what that is How often do you pass gas? in the morning - a lot, later - not at all unless I have a flare Do you have a favorite mug/cup/glass? I use those that I like less because I am afraid I will break those I love lmfao Name anything you own that is made of brass. I don’t think I own anything like that even tho brass is cool, I hate copper tho Does your grass need to be cut right now? I like it long, atural *wink wink* Would you like to live in a castle? Why or why not? too much space to take - that’s unfair as some ppl are homeless and nautre should be more free, it’s also too much space to clean and... to get lost in lol

Do you own a car? What kind? I don’t as I already mentioned I don’t drive

Did you live far from your parents, or close by? I live with them, still

Is it easy or difficult for you to open a jar? depends

Tell us how you got one of your scars. fallen from a clothes horse on a piece of wood and scratched deeply my left leg, wound was full of splinters

Do you wish upon a star? it doesn’t work, I tried...

Have you ever smoked a cigar before? nope, just a cigarette and didn’t like it

Would you ever have boudoir photography taken of yourself? Why or why not? hmm...

Do you know how to play the guitar? If not, would you like to learn? tried and it’s not for me

Have you ever had caviar before? Did you like it? I wouldn’t try that, gross and expensive for such a small amount of food

How old were you when you had your first kiss? 18 or 19

Miss anyone right now? sure

Are there some songs you cant listen to because they remind you of someone? could say so

Have you ever cheated on a partner? nooo

Ever been cheated on? kind of

Do you have a friend who you think you’ll be best friends with forever? my dad I hope

Does it annoy you when you accidentally delete things? very

What`s a movie / book / TV show / band / whatever you highly recommend? I usually don’t recommend anything to anyone without knowing them and their taste first

Are you anticipating or dreading anything? some things both at the same time even

What`s the most annoying thing in the world? can’t choose only one thing

When did you last use one of those water slides you put on hills? never

What does your bedside lamp look like? I have a green night light, used to have a mushroom one but I can’t find a light bulb to replace

What did you last take a photograph of? I took several today but the last one was of the wild flowers growing near my fence

When was the last time you got really frustrated with technology? today, my camera didn’t want to cooperate, not even mentioning my computer and cellphone failing me constantly

What was the last funny thing someone said to you? I don’t remember what was last, I know I said some dry/daddy jokes/puns myself

Who taught you to tie your shoelaces? I don’t remember but I know I do that differently than everybody else in my family

Do you want to move to somewhere else? If so, where? badly, just my own apartment

What’s your favourite picture of yourself as a child? hmm... dunno

Do you like your neighbours? some I hate

Does your room need to be cleaned? absolutely

Do you have a good relationship with your family? it’s complicated, depends on the family member, my father is my best friend tho

What is something people are surprised to hear about you? the truth? *shrug*

Do you hate any particular groups of people? yup but won’t list them in here

Do you fall up or down stairs usually? I don’t fall often enough to compare

Do you constantly break things? (By mistake or otherwise) luckily not

What was the last bug you saw? plenty of bugs this day

Are there any smells which make you feel nauseous? basically all of them make me feel nauseous

Do you have anything unusual in your bag? I suppose

What`s your favourite key on a keyboard? don’t think I have one, some I don’t use at all tho

Who`s your favourite character from The Simpsons? Or do you hate that show? Lisa I think

Have you ever had any friends who always tried to steal your things? sorta

If you were abandoned in the wilderness, would you survive? maybe How do you make your money? I use my parents money for now :( sometimes I sell my belongings

What color are your eyes? hazel?

How tall are you? 156 cm short

Which do you prefer, to eat or sleep? sleep

Do you look more like your mom or your dad? mom, besides eyes

How long does it take you to shower? about half an hour?

Are you flexible? in a weird way

Can you speak any other language than English? polish, a bit of russian and used to know Braille’a

What is the last letter of your middle name? I have no middle name, just confirmation one

Do you wear your seatbelt in the car?: yes

Are you scared of flying? not crashing but smells and noise and puking etc.

What do you sleep in? pajama Who was the last person you kissed? @muziasta

What jewelry do you wear all the time? recently necklace I got from my gf

Is the last person you kissed older than you? younger, almost 2 months hahaha

Do you have a favorite item of clothing? I like most of my clothes

Last movie you saw in theaters? last time I was in cinema I still attend high school, not a fan of that place

What was last thing you drank? water

Are you left handed? am not

What is the last thing you thought about? lots of stuff

Do you want to get married & have children one day? I don’t want any kids!

What is the most recent gift you’ve been given? a mug Did I just roll my eyes out loud Is what you’re wearing comfortable? why not?

Did you leave the house today? twice

Are there bumper stickers on your car? if I had a car...

Are you watching tv right now? What? I didn’t watch TV for months

Do you have a job? not currently

Have you ever shot a gun? in middle school

What do your parents do for a living? my mom is retired and my dad is a guard

Have you ever had a pet that had babies? noooo

What color is the blanket on your bed? blue and yellow with sun and moon

What are your parent’s middle names? they don’t have those

Have you ever broken a bone? just my nose?

Do you wear lasses? nope

What color are they? -

Are you currently reading a book? finished one and didn’t start another yet

When did you last get your blood drawn? not that long time ago

How many contacts are in your phone? about 5

What things do you take with you everywhere? that’s personal

Do you know someone that is/was over 100 years old? nah

Do you own any rings? yeah

Could you list all 50 states? no way

What internet browser do you use? Opera

Do you know someone that’s missing a limb? there’s this guy that sometimes takes a bus with me and he has no leg but that’s all

Are you a bad person? possibly

What was the last swear you said? not sure which was last, I say way too many for my own good :x

Have you ever called the police on someone? not me but my parents, also fire department

What is the most amount of pets you’ve had at one time? 2

When did you last check your email? last week

Have you ever ridden in an ambulance? few times

How long is your hair? short

Do you lock your doors at night? of course

Does your bedroom have a lock? sadly not

How big is your bed? smol

Do you know someone that was murdered? not personally

Do you know someone who’s pregnant not now

Do you wear a watch? no

How much jewelry do you own? too much for how often I wear it

Have you ever gotten x-rays? shitload

Do you wear gloves in the winter? fingerless

Do you consider yourself smart? in a way, I might be

Are your teeth straight? they’re not

Do you own a bike? push scooter but I plan to buy a bike of some sort this summer

Are you taller than your mom? I am :D

Have you ever been engaged? I have not

What, in your opinion, is the ugliest name? many are to me, especially those I relate to certain enemies

Have you ever come up with your own idea for an app? of a game

Do you remember to put the caps back on your pens? what for?

When’s the last time you sat on someone else’s lap? this week

Do you take naps often? once in a few months

Do you like to listen to rap? meh

Do you prefer gift wrap or gift bags? gift bags, gift paper annoys me and it’s worthless

What chore do you wish you could get done just by snapping your fingers? all of them? XD

Have you ever done tap dancing before? pretend

Have you ever felt trapped? always?...

Has a strap on your bag ever broken before? it started to so I changed it

Do you watch episode recaps, or skip ahead? skip

Do you know anyone who owns a Venus flytrap plant? my (now ex) friend wanted to, they’re interesting but you have to clean them and I’m not fond of picking up dead flies, yuk

Do you drink water out of the tap, or does it have to be bottled? bottled or I boil it

0 notes