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hannahssimblr · 7 months

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Chapter Seventeen (Part 2)

We get dressed and head off to the festival grounds after that, and Claire, Shane and I agree that we want to go and see Fight Like Apes who are playing at midday. Jen opts to come with us, and I expect Jude to come too, but he decides to go with Joe and Kasper to see some DJ called Tiga, which throws me even more. Maybe I’m just overthinking. I tell myself he’s being normal, and that he’s probably just playing it cool.

The festival is so busy that day that I don’t see him around again after that, but I try my best to ignore the heavy feeling in my stomach, and the increasing thoughts that maybe I did something to annoy him, or maybe I’m a bad kisser and he’s disgusted by me. Maybe I’m too young and immature, or that he’s figured out that I’m actually a big loser with nothing interesting to say. Maybe everyone is right about me.

Claire is having fun though, and she looks so beautiful dressed all in white in the sun. Every time I think it’s impossible for her to look prettier, she somehow does, and I know I’m not the only one who’s thinking it. I catch Shane looking at her more than once with an expression I’ve never seen him wear before: pure unabashed adoration. Like she’s the sun that lights up his sky. I hope he realises how lucky he is. They’re inseparable all day, and stand together through every concert we go to with their arms around each other, him delivering little kisses to the top of her head as he holds her. Watching them like this makes my heart ache. I want more than anything for somebody to look at me like that, or to touch me like that, but instead I feel heavy with the knowledge that the boy I like is off somewhere, lost in the realm of this gigantic festival, probably with a plastic cup of Corona in each hand, listening to some mindless electronica that he doesn’t even enjoy and not thinking much about me at all.

I don’t do a good job of hiding my listlessness when Jen and I sit down for lunch together in the shade of the marquee we were just crammed into for a Crystal Castles gig a few minutes ago.

“What’s up, chicken?” She unwraps a burrito and lays into it.

“Nothing. I’m tired.”

She nods. “Have you had anything to drink?”

“No.”

She slides the cup of beer she bought for herself across the picnic bench to me and gestures to it like Bon Appetit. “Have one on me, it’ll make you feel better.”

“Won’t drinking just make me feel worse?”

“No! There’s truly nothing a drink won’t fix, right?” She nudges Shane, who’s just joined us at the table with Claire still stuck to his side. He looks at me disapprovingly and then starts to say something boring about how I’m too young to drink, even though he was miraculously fine with Claire doing it yesterday, but Jen just rolls her eyes and tells him to shut up. “You have to stop with this protective-older-brother craic, let her live her life.”

“Well I know her mam, and I know what she’d say if she knew she was drinking.”

“Are you going to tell on her?”

He knows it’d be heinous to do that, and I know that he never would. I grab the beer and I gulp it down, just to show him that I can. I’ve been drinking since I was fifteen and I know how to handle it as well as he does.

“Better?” Jen asks me, and I nod, even though I find beer to be generally disgusting. The taste transports me to days spent drinking Tesco lager in a field after school until someone throws up. I bring the empty cup over to a nearby bin where a guy with shorn hair is openly urinating. “That’s so foul.” I tell him, letting my horrible feelings seep out of me. I don’t care, he’s a stranger.

“Piss off.” He suggests, and then directs the stream towards me instead. I jump out of the way too late and it splashes on my wellies. I cry out and try to shake them dry while he cackles with delight. Everything around me seems ugly, I’m so aware of the litter all over the ground, overflowing bins, the horrible man who pissed on my boots, and the smell of distant porta-loos. The sweet, cloying taste of beer in my mouth is making me feel ill.

Claire is so happy that she’s able to buy alcohol now, so throughout the day I keep giving her money to get me cups of white wine. I drink them quickly, and eventually they do make me feel better, in an synchronously awful kind of way. We go from gig to gig, and I have drink after drink until the day blurs together into one long smear of loud drum beats and bitter wine. I don’t ever really get drunk, the time between each break and the queues for the alcohol stands is so long that I just stay in this queasy purgatory state between states of being until I run out of money and nobody wants to buy anything else for me.

The evening settles down with the smell of bonfires, and eventually we meet up with the three others under the entrance to go and see Foo Fighters, which everyone unanimously decided would be the unmissable gig of the weekend. I feel nervous in anticipation of seeing Jude, now so entirely convinced after a whole day of catastrophizing that he hates my guts, actually, and wouldn’t come to my funeral if I died.

He’s not that bad, but he’s not being especially friendly either. The only way I can think to describe him is as neutral. Like he’s not experiencing any emotions right now, and when I’m used to him being so lively and expressive it’s very unsettling to be around him. When we start pushing into the crowd I give in to my anxiety and touch Jen’s elbow. “Is Jude okay?”

She nods while rolling her eyes. “Yeah, I think he’s just in one of his moods.”

I didn’t realise he had moods. I can’t think of what to say to that, my thoughts feel fuzzy, so I just utter a dejected: “Oh.”

“Don’t worry about it, he woke up on the wrong side of the bed. I had to see him like this all the time at school. Just ignore him, he’ll be grand tomorrow.”

“Nothing happened to him, did it?”

“I doubt it. He’s just in his head about something, probably.” She leans towards me. “He’s a scorpio.” She explains, as though that’s supposed to mean something to me.

I’m still trying to remember what scorpios do when we reach the churning centre of the crowd. It makes me anxious, but everybody else is just diving right in, so I do too. I’m wedged between walls of bodies on all sides of me, but there’s a distinct excitement rising all around. I’m still holding on to Jen, the others seem to have been swallowed up by the crowd like they were never there in the first place.

The first thing I can hear is the soft plucking strings of the opening line of The Pretender rings through the air, and then I can’t see Dave Grohl, but I can hear him. The crowd starts to transform from a solid mass of bodies into something fluid, and I realise that I’m being pushed out of the way, my spot being stolen by big men shoving their way to the front, all limbs flailing everywhere, launching themselves through the crowd to try and get closer as the drums start pounding. One of them actually grabs the back of my shirt and yanks me backwards out of Jen’s grip like I have no right to be where I am, no girls allowed in the Foo Fighters mosh pit. Another one crashes suddenly into the side of my ribs and I am so desperate to escape. When a third bangs his body against me he catapults me into the man behind me and tears spring to my eyes. I let myself go totally limp and let the heaving motion of the animal spit me out to the back shoulders shaking, sobbing and alone.

When I look back at the pulsing crowd I can’t believe I was in there. It’s a rat king of testosterone, men shoving each other around to the music, hands grabbing collars and shoulders, and in the middle of it I see Joe, Kasper and Jude, gleefully participating in the chaos. I can’t help but feel dismayed, remembering how quick he’d been to save me from the crowd yesterday, holding me in front of him and shielding me from pointy elbows and stomping feet, and today when the crowd is bigger and rougher he’s left me to fend for myself. I don’t know what I did. Maybe I’m just too inexperienced, and he wants a woman, not some seventeen year old. I should have let him keep kissing me, I should have let him take me back to his tent and shown him that I’m grown up enough. That’s what a normal girl would have done.

I go and stand at the very back where I can see the band, but barely. They’re just little black smudges on a blazing stage. I know the songs but I don’t sing along, or dance, or even uncross my arms from my chest. I stand there until they finish, crying my makeup off my face. I feel like a husk. Hollowed out, nauseous, tipsy.

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#sims #sims 4 #ts4 #simlit #sims 4 story #romance #fiction #writing #sims story #sims 4 storytelling #sims storytelling #sims4 storytelling #lucky girl part 1

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chrryblssmninja · 2 years

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Please comment on this NPS form (deadline Nov 22) that they need to listen to the community, conduct an environmental impact study, and not consider mass euthanasia for cats that have been there 100s of yrs

Comprehensive article in English:

Article by Carlos Edill Berríos Polanco

"The old city’s street cats, first brought to Puerto Rico by Spanish conquistadors more than 500 years ago, have been a staple ever since and are now a tourist attraction. You can’t walk the cobblestone streets without seeing cats slinking between cars or lounging in the sun, at home in the city as much as their human cohabitants.

The NPS claims it has received a series of complaints from “visitors” about cats attacking them and the foul smell of urine and feces. The agency says it has been looking into the issue for years but only recently started putting more resources into the issue after an uptick in complaints.

It has come up with two plans of action: either let the cats stay as they are, or begin systematically removing them. While the NPS insists that removal means the cats will be adopted, activists fear that it would mean most being euthanized."

More from the article:

"The agency held two open houses on November 2 and 3, where it presented its plan and timeline to residents, allowing the public to comment. As reported by the AP’s Dánica Coto, the first night was tumultuous, with members of the public voicing their frustration at being asked to only leave written comments without being able to speak. The second night, things went a little more smoothly, but people still had a rage in them that was felt with every rousing speech and reinforced by applause from the audience.

Activists in attendance wanted to completely halt any plan that would remove the cats from the area, instead pushing for the NPS to work with the community-led organization Save a Gato to systematically trap, neuter, and release (TNR) the cats."

It is through community actions orgs like these that almost all of the cats are spayed/neutered, vaxxed, and fed.

"Save a Gato has been practicing TNR at cost for years —bringing the group “up to their neck in debt”— and ships cats to the United States, where they have a greater chance of adoption. Cartagena claims the little help they have gotten from both the NPS and the San Juan government has led to the cat population booming over the last decade."

Major point from this article:

"The lack of data and environmental impact studies was one of the most salient issues raised by activists during the two open houses. The only NPS study done was through feeding cameras over a period of a few months, which Save a Gato claims is not enough to assess if there is an actual cat problem. Multiple activists told Latino Rebels that it was “unconscionable” to outline a plan to remove the cats without any studies that show how removing them would affect the old city.

“Things need to evolve. We don’t need to stay in the past,” said Viviana Busquets, who spends about $800 a week running her own program to neuter cats from Puerto Rico.

She is a huge advocate of TNR and has raised the alarm about the “vacuum effect,” wherein removing cats from an area creates a vacuum leading to another cat colony moving into the space formerly occupied by the first.

Busquets proposes that the NPS change its one-size-fits-all policy to better adapt to the environment of Puerto Rico.

... Many activists, like Busquets, recognize the overpopulation of cats in Old San Juan and are not against removing them if they were to be adopted, but they oppose any plan that would kill cats. They push for all levels of government to work with people living in the community and groups like Save a Gato to help adopt the majority of the cats out of the city.

Old San Juan has been one of the hottest sites for gentrification in Puerto Rico with many of the colonial buildings being bought up by crypto millionaires and other rich foreigners as people who have lived there for decades are unable to deal with rising rent prices. Some view the push to remove the cats as merely an extension of this trend."

#Puerto Rico #cats

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littlesniggy · 2 years

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Princess in a Shithole Part One

Hey everyone! Long time no see....been really busy with work and also had some writer's blockade. I'll try to post more regularly but I won't promise anything. Anyways, this is not a One Piece fit but MHA. Been trying to write something for Toya for a long time now but it's really difficult for me to write for him. Please let me know if you liked it. Thanks!

Warnings: quirkless AU, kidnapping, threat of death, threat of violence, abuse, blood, mild cursing

Pairing: (Todoroki Touya) Dabi x female reader

Word count: 3.3k

The cold dirty tiles of the old bathroom are like ice against your skin. The ammoniac smell of urine from the brown toilet next to you is clouding your senses and your stomach is revolting. You would throw up again if there was anything left in your stomach beside the stomach acid which has been burning your throat and mouth ever since the second time you emptied your belly’s contents on the floor in front of you.

The thin nightgown you’re wearing is doing next to nothing to shield you from the cold of this shit and urine covered square room with the flickering neon lights on the ceiling. You wish you still had the blind folds on so you didn’t have to look at the disgusting picture which is presenting itself to you but unfortunately, they took it off.

The rope binding your hands behind your back is tight; no matter how much you struggle against your restraints they won’t budge an inch. Your legs are free but you have long given up on trying to get out of here since the door is locked from the outside. So, you submitted to your fate and sat back down on the only clean spot in this entire room which sadly happens to be the spot right next to the stinking toilet.

You rest your head against the white tiles behind you at the wall and look at the locked door with tired eyes. You have no idea how long you’ve already been here. It could be hours, it could be days. The only thing you remember is when you went to bed, texting your parents good night and soon after falling asleep. Next thing you know you’re trapped inside this hellhole.

If they know you’re gone? Maybe if you haven’t contacted them for long enough. Will they be worried once they find out? Probably. You’ve always had a pretty good relationship with your parents so it gives you some sort of comfort that they will probably start looking for you. But it also gives you anxiety knowing that they will most likely worry sick. You don’t want them to be worried about you.

A sudden metallic noise disrupts your thoughts and your eyes focus on the big metal door on the other side of the bathroom. A key is being turned three times until the door slams open and gives view to one person standing in the door frame.

You instinctively press your body against the wall behind you and try to make yourself as small as possible but there is no way for you to hide. You hold your breath as the person enters the room, grimacing at the foul smell.

“Look who’s awake.” The tall man says amused but he can’t quite hide the fact that the stinking smell also gets to him. You press your lips together and stare at him, desperately trying not to cry even though you really want to burst out in tears and beg him to let you go.

“Had a good night’s rest, princess?” he asak, slowly stalking over to you, his heavy combat boots echoing through the small room and the hallway behind the open door. Maybe you could make a run for it…

Your eyes dart over to the open door for a split second but that’s enough for the man to smirk at you tauntingly.

“Wouldn’t try it if I were you.” He says as he stops in front of you, crouching down to come somewhat eye level with you sitting form. His black hair is messy, standing up in all directions. There is a hint of white in between the black strands but maybe it’s just the light. He has piercing blue eyes which makes a shiver run down your entire body. His nose and ears are pierced and as far as you can see there are tattoos covering his neck which seem to at least extend to both his hands since both of them are covered as well.

“It’s impolite to stare at people, princess.” He comments in a husky voice; you can smell the faint scent of cigarettes in his breath and also his dark blue coat omits the same smell. In response you press your lips together tighter, not trusting your own voice.

“It’s okay, you can talk. Not gunna kill you if you do. Need you alive, y’know.” He chuckles at you shocked expression. Apparently, you haven’t even thought about the possibility he might kill you. Cute.

“W-who are you?” your voice sounds not as broken as you thought but it’s still far from sounding confident.

“None of ya business, princess.” He replies and, as expected, pulls out a pack if cigarettes, pops one between his lips before he lights it up with some old lighter. He blows the toxic smoke right at you and you cough. A huff leaves his lips at your reaction and holds the glowing stick right in your face, his one brow is raised.

“You want a drag?” he asks and you vehemently shake your head.

The man simply shrugs and inhales the smoke himself again before slowly blowing it your way once more. His turquoise eyes watch you intently as you try to squirm away.

“Hope you feel comfortable.” He says as he slowly gets up again, the rustling of his clothes fills out your ears.

“Cause you’re gunna stay here a little longer.” He turns around and walks back towards the door.

“Wait!” you yell and he turns around surprised. “For what?” he flips the half-smoked cigarette into a corner but his eyes stay on you.

“Don’t leave me here!” you plea. The man looks at you impassively.

“It smells so bad!” you add, this time a little quieter but you manage to keep eye contact with him.

For a while, there is silence between the two of you and you have the slight hope that he shows mercy on you and takes you to another room. Your hopes raise higher when he slowly comes back to you. With big eyes you watch as he leans down to you and grabs your chin between his fingers. His face comes uncomfortably close to yours until your noses almost touch. You hold your breath as his eyes seem to bore into your soul.

“Too bad, princess.” Chills cover your entire body at his cold voice and your face turns pale.

You can’t do anything but watch as he gets up again, makes his way back to the door and closes it with a loud noise behind him. Now, you’re alone again.

The next time he comes he brings you a water bottle. He is still wearing the same clothes as before so you assume he is also staying here, probably hiding from the police. It kind of gives you some satisfaction knowing he can’t move freely either.

He crouches down in front of you and stares at you for a while. You uncomfortably shift under his eyes and look away, feeling nervous with this blunt stare. Once he seems satisfied, he unscrews the cap from the bottle and places the opening at your mouth. Slowly, you part your lips and he lets you drink. Just now you realize how thirsty you really are and you can’t get enough of the cold liquid.

He pulls the bottle away from time to time to give you time to take a breath but he lets you empty everything. Now, that you have drank you also realize how hungry you are. Pleadingly you look up at him. “Can I eat something?” you ask, voice sounding hoarse.

“That’s all you get.” He simply replies. He tosses the empty bottle to the side and gets back up, ready to leave you alone again.

“Please! Just a little! I’m starving!” you beg, desperation clearly audible in your tone. He looks at you for a moment but then wordlessly leaves the room yet again, leaving you behind in this stink hole.

“Asshole!” you yell but either he doesn’t hear it or he doesn’t care. Probably the latter.

It feels as if your stomach is eating itself; the cramps of your hunger are almost unbearable and you desperately want to eat something. You have looked around the small bathroom and see if there is anything – really anything – edible around here but to no avail. He hasn’t come back to give you something to drink either so dehydration is also adding to your misery. And to top it all off you still have no idea what he actually wants.

You also haven’t really slept in what feels like forever; the bright light of the flickering neon lights is preventing you from falling asleep. Every time you close your eyes you see his intense scare at that and your eyes snap open almost immediately. You feel so vulnerable, so exposed in front of him that you’re sure that, if you make it out of this alive, these eyes will haunt you for the rest of your life.

When he finally comes back you’re slumped against the wall, eyes half-open with huge, dark bags underneath them, your chapped lips are slightly apart, and there is dried blood on your wrists from all the times you so desperately tried to free yourself.

You don’t know if it’s pity or not when he rudely grabs your arm and pulls you to your feet. Not used to standing anymore, your knees immediately give in and you would’ve hit the floor if it wasn’t for his strong hold.

“C’mon, princess. Don’t have all day. I need you to do something for me.” He says and you let yourself drag him with you out of this shit hole. Your eyes are strictly staring in front of you on the ground, not daring to look up at him. But what you can make out from the corners of your eyes is that this entire building seems to be an old factory which has been abandoned for many, many years.

He leads you to the middle of the big room which you can only guess must’ve been the warehouse. There is an old chair standing in the middle and a camera set placed right in front of it. You know what he expects you to do. You want to say no, want to kick him and tell him to fuck himself but your body obeys his order when he pushes you on the chair.

“If you play along, I’ll might give you somethin’ to eat.” He says in a casual tone as he lights a cigarette between his lips. Disgusted but defeated you look at him as he places himself behind the camera and grabs some pieces of paper on which he has scribbled something – your script.

“Let’s practice this and get it over with. The sooner we’re done the sooner we’re all gonna be on our marry ways.” He lifts the first piece of paper up and looks at you expectantly, his cigarette still between his lips.

“Action.”

It feels like there is a lump in your throat and no matter how much you swallow it won’t go away. Your lips are parted but no word wants to leave your mouth and you watch in horror how his face contorts to an angry grimace.

“Thought I made myself clear.” He says slowly. Your choked breathing and your hammering heart in your chest make it really difficult for you to think straight.

“Sorry…!” you press out, suddenly fully awake and not one bit tired anymore.

“Read. Or I’ll have to help you.” In any other circumstances you would’ve appreciated some help but you have a vague idea what “help” means in this situation and you absolutely don’t want him to come anywhere near you.

“Action.”

“I-I’m L/n Y/n and I’m currently being held hostage.” You start reading. As you read, the entire situation comes crashing down on you. Thinking these words is one thing but actually speaking them out loud another. A long sob cuts you off and you can’t help but start crying.

“Please! Let me leave!” you beg him, tears blurring your vision. He remains silent and besides your silent pleas and sobs there is no other sound. You don’t even realize how he turns on the camera and simply films you.

“Please let me leave, I will do anything! I can give you money, if that’s what you want!” you try to bargain but he does not answer. “But please, let me go home!”

Then, he starts moving but not without taking the camera out of its stand and holding it right in your face. “Please!”

A loud scream leaves your mouth when you see him pull out a long knife from his pocket. You shake like a tree in the wind and more and more tears pour over your face. The man almost gently caresses your neck with the sharp blade, filming everything with his other hand.

“Please don’t hurt me.” You whisper, fear oozing out of every pore of your body. The pointy tip bores right into the juncture between your throat and your head until a small drop of blood runs down your skin.

“Please don’t kill me.”

Satisfied, he turns off the camera and puts the knife away.

“Good job, princess. Better than expected.” He chuckles and turns around, placing the camera back on its stand.

“Bet we can use this little clip.”

True to his word he gives you some chocolate chip bread and an apple. Since he doesn’t want to feed you he decides to untie your hands but he remains close by just in case you try something funny.

The freedom you suddenly feel with your hands free takes some of the stress from before off of you. You rub the bruised skin on your wrists but wince every time your finger touches the bloody bruises.

You eat the bread quietly, eyes looking down at your hands, avoiding eye contact with the man at all cost. He, on the other hand, is leaning against a pillar, arms crossed in front of his chest and not leaving you out of his sight. You’re kind of grateful that he hasn’t locked you in this stinking bathroom again but it is only a matter of time until he will drag you back.

The sudden ringing of a phone has you look up at him. Without taking his eyes off you he fishes it out of his pocket and answers it.

“What?” He answers.

“Yeah, got the tape. Not what we had planned but it’s even better. Started crying like a baby.” At the mention of you crying he smirks at you and the tears start dwelling up again.

“When you gunna pick us up?” now, you listen up. Pick us up?

“’kay. But don’t leave me waitin’ for too long. This place gives me hives.”

With that, he ends the call and drops his phone back in his pocket.

“Good news, princess. We’re gunna change locations tomorrow.” He informs you as he pushed himself off the pillar.

“Only one more night in your little room.” He slowly strides over towards you and you instinctively get up and take a few steps back. His eyes widen a little in surprise but he continues to walk towards you, slowly cornering you against a wall as you keep backing away.

“No.” you say quietly but firmly as he stops right in front of you, your back against the cold wall.

“No?” he inquires, amusement swinging in his voice.

“No!” you confirm. “I will not go back into this room!” you announce, earning yourself a chuckle from the taller male.

“Yeah, you don’t get a say in this, princess.” He reaches out for your arm but you slap his hand away.

“I will NOT go back into this room!” you stay your ground and lift your chin in fake confidence. He seems impressed by your action and you feel a small victory but he immediately takes this victory away from you as he grabs your throat with an iron grip and slams you against the wall. All the air is pressed out from your lungs and you see stars for a moment.

The confidence you have just felt vanishes as he presses his body against yours, his sharp nails digging into your skin and his other hand presses the knife from before into your stomach. Fear paralyses your body and you can’t do anything but stare up at him wide eyed, lips parted and gasping for air.

“You gunna slap my hand away again, princess?” he whispers into your ear, voice cold as ice. You’re shaking as the knife presses further and further into your stomach and you only wait for your skin to break.

“Yeah, thought so. Now turn around and let me tie your hands back together. And just cause I’m such a nice guy Ima give you a warning. Don’t mess around or I’ll kill you. I don’t care if we still need you. If you get on my nerves one more time I will personally slit this pretty throat of yours and send your dead body right back to your mommy and daddy.”

You couldn’t sleep at all, always wondering when he would come back. You can still feel the knife pressing against your body, robbing you of every last bit of hope you’ve still had of coming out of this alive. You’re pretty sure that he and his friends want money but you’re not so sure anymore that, if they get the money, they will let you simply leave. Given your captor’s warning yesterday you can also imagine him simply cashing in on the money and either kill you or leave you somewhere to die.

The door opens and you flinch away. The dried tears on your cheeks itch a little as you press your eyes shut in order not to look at him. Determined, he crosses the short distance and grabs you, pulling you back up to your feet and dragging you out of the bathroom for the last time. Neither of you says a word as he brings you back to the big warehouse where he sits you down again on the chair. You watch him look through a black bag and pull out what seems to be a sac and another rope.

“Is this really necessary?” you meekly ask but him pulling the sac over your head and fixing it with the rope around your neck is answer enough. Defeated, you let your head hang low and simply sit there, waiting for whatever happens next.

It doesn’t take long until you hear the sound of a car coming closer. At first, you have the hopes that it might be the police who found you but these hopes are crushed when you hear two voices talking, one of them being your captor’s voice. Silently, you start crying again.

You don’t protest, you don’t make a scene when one of them grabs you again and leads you towards the running vehicle.

“Get in there.” Your captor says and helps you up into the trunk of a car. Not a very big trunk but at least you can move a little bit.

“Watch your head.” He warns before he slams the trunk shut. The sound of two doors opening and closing has you flinch. The engine roars before the car starts moving. From back here you can hear parts of their conversations.

“This went better than expected.” The unfamiliar voice states.

“Could’ve went better if you hadn’t taken so long.” Your captor mumbles.

“Stop complaining, Dabi. I told you this might take a little.” The other man sounds as irritated as your captor.

“Cheap coming from you since I had to do all the dirty work.”

You try to listen more but judging by the sounds you’re entering a highway and the car is simply too loud. But now you have a name to the face who had kidnapped you.

Dabi.

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icedteaandoldlace · 2 months

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Just had the worst litter box cleaning experience of my life, but by the grace of God and the wonderful scientists at Nature's Miracle, it didn't take as long as it could have. I wish I remembered what brand of litter that was, because I don't often leave product reviews, but it should be illegal to make a cat litter that bad. Had a thick layer of crystallized litter/urine caked onto the bottom of the litter box that WOULD NOT budge for anything and smelled to high heaven. I only bought it in the first place because I thought McGonagall was peeing outside of the litter box in protest of the new (and far superior) litter, so I'd started looking for a new go-to litter again (McGonagall just had a minor bacterial infection, and a week on antibiotics cleared it up straight away).

Thankfully I only bought one bad of the cursed stuff, because not only does it have BY FAR the worst clumping function I've ever seen, but it does basically nothing for odor control, and it's WHITE so the litter box looks extra gross when it's been used because you can see the yellow of the urine.

Even with the help of Nature's Miracle—the aptly named enzymatic foaming litter box cleaner that has made my life so much easier in many ways, and no one is paying me to say that—I still had to use the litter box scoop to scrape all that mess off the bottom. Usually all I have to do is wipe the box, MAYBE scrub just a little bit on really stubborn spots, but never have I ever had to clean a litter box like this before. It was also the first time I ever had to spray the box down again a second time after I'd already cleaned it out, because the residual smell still on it was just so foul.

A million stars to Nature's Miracle, and a big fat negative zero to whatever the hell that horrendous litter brand was. Negative zero isn't even a real number, THAT'S how bad it is.

#there have been times #before I knew about cat urine containing ammonia and about the dangers of chlorine gas #where I cleaned my litter boxes with bleach spray #obviously I survived that era of my life #without even minor poisoning #but if I had tried that on this mess it would've killed the whole house

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gelato444 · 3 months

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ok I toured the apartment and it was literally perfect. But the two current tenants have 2 Maine coons and.. the litter boxes were foul like they hadn’t been cleaned in forever.. and the apartment smelled of cat urine. So like…. Ugh I don’t wanna pass this place up for that but also that’s a huge deal breaker .. like what does everyone think? Can that smell be removed? Most people are saying yes but it would be a professional cleaning job (which I think we could ask the landlord to do that’s no unreasonable) but what does everyone think?

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shaunsummers · 5 months

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And Boom Goes the Dynamite

"Fair." Though recent, the transition hadn't gone unnoticed. The calm brought anxiety all the same; but also all the time in the world to read, to research, but also...to cry. So many options in her isolated cave of dim lighting. With a smile, Robin extends her palm for Shaun's wrist as she watches the wound dried by an overly expensive washcloth. Soon going to work with gentle placement, her hand lightly layers the knarly punctures with Neosporin.

"You know, I never fucked with heroin. Or meth. But coke? Oh, I fucked with coke. I used to do it all the time. It chilled me out. Gave me superhuman focus or something. I don't know if I would've gotten through classes without it. I once snorted a line off some girl's pussy and finished a five hundred page essay in the same night. It was about the fall of Rome, if you were wondering."

Having left a good amount of goo, Robin casually tosses the small tube back into the well organized top drawer. "I didn't stop that long ago. I'm not exactly counting the days so I couldn't give you a number. It's certainly not longer than a few months, though. So, I get the not so peaceful head thing. That part is hella fresh. But no more sleeping with dangerous men for Robin. We love to see it." Though the laugh that followed was forced, Robin grins as she plops her body off the counter with a small grunt.

Entering the home, Lilith states in her still observation. Though even as her eyes scanned the room, her nose crinkles in the mild assault of something foul. It would've been commented on otherwise but with no one in view and concentrated smears of blood on the floor, it easily didn't matter. Without another word, Lilith breaks from her small group to venture towards the obvious sound of Robin's voice, tossing her purse on the couch on the way to the bathroom.

Talk about pearl clutching on the drive home. Never before had Rebel seen such smooth fast and furious traffic dodging. Only the queen of hell could weave in and out of close call collisions and have the confidence to say 'Its fine. It's not like I drive like Robin'. Was it really the driving? Or was it that the car could pass inspection? "It smells like pee." Rebel comments though relieved to see not a peep of anything broken. If no doctors or repairmen were needed, she'd consider that a win.

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

Still a bit frazzled from the hectic drive, it takes a second for Tek's nose to register the acrid smell of pee. Why pee? "Ew." Her nose crinkles, wondering how and who's urine could end up in the foyer, but with the blatant spatter of blood dusting the floor like twisted confetti, the worry immediately took over. "Uh..." From the sound of it, Shaun and Robin were in the bathroom, and Lilith was already going in to check on her boo. But there were two involved in the deathmatch, and one unaccounted for.

"I think we should go check on Siren..." Tek's gaze lingers on the mess before trailing back to Rebel; sure, there was no blinking red, blue, or white lights, but the fact that Ash had found out where they lived wasn't good news. And with how far away Siren seemed since she'd gotten back, it was too easy to worry.

She'd felt the need to internally prepare for Robin going in on her arm, but surprisingly, she was rather gentle. And even if she wasn't, the information dump that poured over Shaun in a blunt deluge was plenty to distract. She'd also primarily been into coke, but it had amped her up and left her with a pretty short fuse, though paid its rent by keeping her wired all night. Either fucking around or fucking someone, but it certainly hadn't pushed her into anything productive. "I don't...coke made you calm? I've never heard that. Ever. The only thing it ever made me was an asshole. But, maybe that's how I kept up with Ash for so long."

Casting her eyes down to the subtle shine of ointment, Shaun turns over her arm; it did look a bit better. Still fucked, and she was concerned that the marks would fuck up her tattoo, but the irony of the snake of the Garden of Eden getting marred by the chaotic vengeance of her crazy-ex-first-girlfriend wasn't lost on her. "But, it does get easier. The mental bit. My head was definitely done in by two months, but it's really just sorting everything you didn't when you were using. You'd think sobriety would throw you a bone after going cold turkey, but it doesn't even wait past withdrawals. But, it does get easier." Shaun didn't know the full story about what happened with Kane, only the basics from what Jade had told her. What Robin had done was a whole other can of worms, but being around someone so volatile—as she knew all too well—tended to get sponged up and spill onto everyone else in the process. She'd made her own share of fuck ups in that regard, so for that part? It wasn't hard to find sympathy.

"And there hasn't been another 'Ash', so you've got that to look forward to." Shaun chuckles, but the humored smile suddenly dissipates as the stray piece of information finally clicks in her brain. "Wait....you did coke off of some girl's snatch?" Was it just in the general area, or was she talking about snorting a line out of an ass in reverse? Wouldn't that cause some issues for the snortee? There were so many questions about the mechanics of that scenario, but with Lilith unexpectedly swinging around the corner, Shaun's eyes raise to a far more concerning sight.

It brought a little clarity to why Lilith had seemed so brusque—and just 'off'—on the phone, but she still couldn't peg what exactly was going on in her head. Shaun hadn't never seen this look on her face before. Features set in stone, but her eyes looked...wild. Like an antelope catching the smell of a lion in a nature documentary, just a second before the chase. She'd said they were okay, didn't Lilith know they were okay?

"Hey..." Brows furrowing in concern, Shaun takes a tentative step closer, reaching out to touch her gently on the arm in an effort to pull her out of whatever was going on in her brain. "Are you alright?...Siren's just outside with Sam, but we're all in one piece. Everything's okay."

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alittlemxchievous · 1 year

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Golden Survival

It was a cool summer morning. Miss Kae spent it like any other, doing her normal morning routine. Naturally, that would eventually lead to her relieving herself, but not yet. That could wait.

Moving through the house to the bathroom she smiled as she looked down.

There on the cold tile, was her loyal little whore. She couldn't help but grin and giggle as she stepped onto them. Her feet were a bit cold so naturally, they first landed on the slut's face. Surely their desperate breathing and licking would warm them up.

And warm up they did, the whore feverishly licking Miss Kae's divine toes and soles. Whatever their mouth could reach was worshipped like the most heavenly being.

While her floor mat was working tirelessly, Miss Kae flashed a sadistic grin. Gently placing one of her divine soles on the neck of her slut. Gently, then applying more pressure. More. More. More. The doormat notices a lack of air. More. And begins to lose their breath. More. The floor mat desperately wants to breath but no mercy from such a sadistic Goddess. More.

And then... life. Given back in the form of precious oxygen. The floor mat gasps, greedily consuming all the air they can.

Miss Kae never skips a beat. As her slave is recovering, she pulls down the pair of pretty white panties that currently hides her growing bulge. Putting them right over the slaves face and naturally ensuring that the ass of the panties is directly over the slaves nose. Don't want them getting too nice of a scent after all. Not for what comes next anyway.

That slut. How lucky they are, given mercy from Miss Kae. Still greedily inhaling air. Albeit, now much less fresh. The smell of Miss Kae's ass musk is intoxicating. Mesmerizing. So much so that they fail to notice a wet drop on their nose. Then another. Then a few more. Then a torrent!

First is the heat. As the warm liquid comes crashing down with so much force. Powerfully slamming into the whores... no urinals face. It's so hot. So very very hot. And the smell. It warps the brain of the urinal slut. It's so intoxicating that it melts the mind.

But the primal desire for life comes before all. Always kicking in at the most desperate of times. Like now, when their body realizes they can not breathe. Naturally, they try to inhale. To no avail, piss stained panties block the path of critically needed oxygen. They open their mouth, only to be met with the same. Blocked by piss soaked panties and now open to receive more of Miss Kae's golden nectar. Panic sets in as more and more urine fills the mouth of the urinal. Body spasming. Desparate for air but unwilling to go against the wishes of its true lord. The only one with power over the urinal's body is Miss Kae.

Just as all begins to fade to black. It stops. The torrent recedes, leaving the slave to swallow the warm beverage. It's bitter and leaves nothing but a foul taste behind. Her panties, once white, now stained in the golden hues of her nectar and left soaking into your skin.

Miss Kae is wildly amused. To her, it was just a normal morning piss; but to her slave, it was a long battle of life or death.

Very well done slut.

#writing assignment #kae answers #little knight #piss k1nk #breathe pl@y #kae feet

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nnytweets · 1 year

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There’s an odd feel and smell to this day, like God is a wino and he pissed onto a hotplate, enveloping the world in a plume of urine vapor.

May 7, 2008

Not as bad as yesterday, but still a foulness in the atmosphere. Gas mask helps a bit, but still not safe to leave the house.

May 7, 2008

#jthm #jhonen vasquez #johnny the homicidal maniac

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sabraeal · 2 years

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All Pain Will Turn to Medicine, Chapter 6

[Read on AO3]

There are ways sickness leaves its mark on a house.

Stale air, for one. Shirayuki could explain the benefits of proper ventilation until she turned blue herself, but the windows are always shuttered when she visits, rooms left dark and stagnant, as if the sickness might simply go away so long as the neighbors don’t hear.

An untidy house, for another. Dishes left teetering in the wash basin, clothes laying heaped in their basket, never put away. Dust over every surface, settling like dew on the grass, with only fingerprints left to prove anyone lived there at all.

Poor fools, Anda muttered, when he’d taken her on her first rounds. You and I know that taking care of the sick is work, but these people, they don’t. They’re always trying to do two jobs at once with half the care and half the thanks.

Lastly, was the smell.

It hits her as a wall when Suki pulls back the curtain: urine and sweat in equal measure, the scent of a body unwashed and bedding unchanged. The stench of the sick, Anda called it, always accompanied by a sniff and the quivering of his cane. He never stayed long in rooms like these; blood he could handle aplenty, but these long, wasting illnesses-- they left him shaking in the night, calling out wordlessly for a comfort she’d never been able to give.

Herr Bauer hardly resembles himself; gone is the fleshy man who stood at Shou’s counter, letting his granddaughter count out pennies. Skin hangs off his bones, wrinkled and yellowed like old parchment. He doesn’t even stir as she enters, his snore thin and wheezing as she comes to her knees.

His skin is papery when she takes his wrist in her hands, counting heartbeats. “How long has he been like this?”

“Days now,” Gen grunts, scowl scouring brackets around his mouth. Suki’s a friendly girl, she always has been, but her husband’s only gotten sourer with each daughter. He’d keep those lines one day, just as his father had, and never lose them no matter what joy he found.

If he ever found some. Shirayuki can’t help but think it unlikely, the way he glowers. “Can’t get up, barely eats. Says nothing tastes right, even though Suki makes everything the way she always does.”

She frowns, letting his arm settle back on the pallet. Herr Bauer huffs, shifting restlessly, and turns his back to her. His undershirt sticks there, the thin fabric clinging like a second skin, nearly translucent stretched across his back. A gnarled hand reaches back, itching absently at his shoulder blade, and there--

“Hah.” Shirayuki squints, leaning closer, making out a patchwork of thin lines, pink and raised though not quite angry yet. They would be, given time. “Has he been scratching at himself more?”

There’s been more than a few nights in these past years where Shirayuki has spent the night on this very floor-- first to bring Suki’s daughters into this world, and second to keep them there, when croup struck the quarter hard this past winter. And even still, Gen’s never quite warmed to her, never quite believed her to be Anda’s equal once he stopped following her on her rounds.

And it’s all the more apparent now when he looks at her, flat as a sheet and twice as coarse. “All old men scratch themselves.”

Anda may say taking care of the sick is work, but between the two, taking care of the well is harder. It takes a deep breath and a determined cheerfulness for her to answer, “I meant, is he scratching himself more? Complaining of discomfort, maybe?”

It’s consternation that fouls up his brow, impatience that makes his mouth rumple into that scowl. “Just going on about his joints, the way he always does. Nothin’ special.”

“Well now, just the other day he’d been saying his ribs hurt,” Suki offers, coming in with a handful of cloths, wrinkled but laundered. It’s not something Shirayuki needs-- not yet anyway-- but it’s a kind gesture, one she takes with a soft smile and a grateful nod. “He asked me if a grandpa could have sympathy pains, since he--” she flushes, looking younger, almost like the girl Shirayuki remembers from the market square-- “well, he’d thought something must be kicking him from the inside, the way he was aching.”

Gen stares at his wife, all accusation. “He didn’t say anything to me!”

“That,” Suki informs him, real crisp, “is because you ain’t known for your listening.”

“Hey now--”

“Thank you.” Shirayuki pitches her voice loud enough to be heard, hoping it’s enough to stem the tide until she gets out the door. “That’s very helpful, Suki.”

She settles back on her heels, slicking away sweat with the back of her wrist. Gen barely allows her a breath before he presses, “So what is it? You got something he can take?”

“Ah...” Her teeth clack together, not quite gritted, but still on-edge. This is the part she likes least, especially with folks like Gen. “Maybe. Once I talk with Herr Anda, perhaps I could--”

“Oh to hells with that,” he huffs, arms folding over his chest. “Your opinion is just as good as that stubborn old fool’s, and you give it twice as fast.”

Shirayuki knows she could collect flies the way her mouth is hanging open, but she can’t help herself, not when her only thought is, but you’re not supposed to like me.

“Whatever you think is fine by me, Shirayuki.” He grunts, giving her the sort of nod men do when they think all the work is said and done, save for their say-so. “Just give it already. Can’t afford to have him under the weather when the girls need watching.”

Her smile pulls thin, held up by will instead of humor. “There’s plenty of things I could give, but there’s a chance they make it worse as well. Herr Anda is the expert, so I should really--”

Gen snorts. “Come on now, everyone knows you run that shop. Herr just sticks around for decoration. Give him what you think is best and be done with it.”

Her hands shake as she gets to her feet, cheeks hot and skin flushed, but her voice is even-- oh, so even-- when she says, “Thank you for the vote of confidence, Herr Bauer, but Anda is the one between us with the most experience, especially when it comes to--” she hesitates, shuffling through words-- “this sort of thing. I’d rather take my time and know I’m giving your father the right treatment, rather than rush and put him in more pain.”

The Bauers have never been small men, but even sitting Gen manages to loom over her, a dark cloud threatening a storm. Still, he doesn’t speak, doesn’t push; no, instead he sits there and-- and--

Shrinks.

“Gen,” she murmurs, resting a hand on his shoulder. It’s so much larger than she suspects, her hand the size of a child compared to him. “I know you’re worried for your father, but I promise, I’ll have an answer for you by morning.”

His brow furrows, the shadows growing on his face. “Do what you have to,” he tells her, gruff and displeased. “I just hope nothing happens to him while you do your waiting.”

On any other day, Gen’s worry would set her on the shortest path through the quarter; a simple trip down the hill with maybe a turn or two to send her the back alley ways, keeping her from hitting the market during the late afternoon rush. But today, today--

Is supposed to be her day off. Not that a physic ever really and truly gets a day off; there’s always the chance there will be measles and babies and broken bones-- a hundred emergencies, all guaranteed to cut a good time short. Or worse, a good night’s sleep.

But still, with Herr Anda manning the shop, the afternoon was supposed to be hers. And so when she comes to the crossroads, Shirayuki’s feet lead her down the longer path, the one that will take her round the river and over the quarter’s bridge. Might as well enjoy what little time she can eke out from the wreckage of her plans. Once she gets to the shop and gives her report to Anda, it’ll be a long time before she has any time so carefree as this. Not when all her own answers are so...unfortunate.

Her hands give both her cheeks a steadying slap. There’s no point in worrying like this, not when Anda’s the one who will make the call. He’s the one who’s seen these things before, the one who always has some tip, some trick to see her through her worst storms. And yet, yet--

Cleverness can’t fix everything. He’d told her that, not more than a year past now, when Herr Kino died from the cough that’d been going around that winter. We all have our own time. All we do is stall the inevitable, and sometimes it takes.

Shirayuki purses her lips, fingers knitting in her skirt. That’s not what she wants to do, to just...stall for time and set her hopes on the odds. But that room hadn’t just smelled of normal sickness; there was a sweetness beneath it, something far too close to rot for her comfort.

There’s no reason to keep thinking about it, not when she’s already made up her mind, but still, she worries at it, the way a dog does a bone. It’s easy to question herself like this, alone with only her footsteps for company. With one stride she’s certain, and the next she falters, over and over again, an endless argument she can never seem to close.

A terrible state to round the corner in, especially when it’s Obi she finds hunched over the bridge. He stares down at the river like if he does it hard enough, it might give him answers. She could use some of those herself, if only to find the right words to say to close the distance between them.

“Are you waiting for a golden fish?” she asks haltingly, her hands gripping her skirts to keep from shaking. “I hear they grant wishes, so long as you don’t ask for too much.”

His head rolls, chin tracing along his collarbone until he marks her from the corner of one sullen eye. “Is that so? I always heard they made good bones.”

Shirayuki approaches him slowly, one step at a time, the wood grain worn smooth from a thousand hands as she lays her arms on top of it. There’s no hunching for her, but their elbows brush, the way they often would. For a moment, it all feels like it’ll be all right. “Why are the magical creatures always eaten in the stories you tell?”

She means to rib him, the way he’s so fond of teasing her, but when he laughs, there’s no humor in it. “Because where I come from, there’s nothing we do better than ruin a good thing.”

It would be easy to speak, to tell him that there’s nothing ruined, that nothing between them could ever be ruined, not by something so silly as Rina Kramer and her ridiculous ribbons. It’s always been her firm opinion that it’s none of her business who he walks out with; what she even knew came third- or fourth-hand, rumors bandied about by the old gossips when they came to roost at the kitchen window, looking to Oma for a good cup of tea and some hospitality. They all would smile behind their hands, talking louder when she walked through the kitchen, as if they could get a rise out of her with just a bunch of names and speculation. But she’s always known just where she stood with Obi; he could roll the whole town, but it was at Oma’s table he sat when she came through the door, her window he knocked on whenever she had a day free. But now, now--

Nothing is ruined, but the girls he’d stepped out with before had all been his age-- older, in a lot of cases, especially once word got around he knew how to kiss, and then later, that he knew what came after. And that all had made sense to her; it wasn’t like he could think of

her

like that, not young as she was. But Rina Kramer used to sit in front of her in the school room, those long ribbons spilling over her slate, obscuring her copy work until Rina deigned to flip her hair. She’d only been one year ahead of Shirayuki, the best speller in the class, her hair always tied up in the most complicated twists and braids, the sort Oma could never do with her aging hands.

Fancy

, the boys had called her, and she’d looked it, clean and bright and perfect.

Shion Bauer sat in another row; the boys had picked on her for her big eyes-- cow eyes, they’d laughed, big and wet and stupid-- but in that year before they’d gone to apprentice, cow eyes turned alluring, all dark and dewy and fringed with thick black lashes. She’d stayed on in the school room, meaning to be the next mistress when Herr Hoffmann retired to the country with his daughter. A threat he’s yet to make good on, but Shion’s kept on as an assistant of sorts-- she’d only been two years her elder, but Shirayuki still remembers how Shion smelled like sweet grass when she bent over her shoulder, showing her how to long divide.

She’s never wanted to be one of the girls he made time with behind stockroom shelves or in empty hay lofts, but that he’s letting their time bleed into her time...

It feels pointed, is all.

“I heard your day got cut short.” Obi’s got big hands, long and callused on the mounts, and one of them lifts, rubbing at his shoulder. The bad one, though as far as Anda’s concerned it healed right, even if something about Obi didn’t. “Got stuck going ‘round to Gen’s place, huh?”

She nods, small and tight. “Herr Bauer’s taken down with something. Suki thought I might come take a look.”

Obi cranes his neck, leaning close enough that she can see every thread of color running through the gold of his eyes, green and brown and black all together. His mouth twitches, but there’s no humor in that, either. “That bad, huh?”

“Ah, no, it’s not...bad.” The lie would be more convincing if she didn’t flinch telling it; as it is, Obi only grows curious, one eyebrow inching up his forehead. “I mean, it doesn’t have to be something bad. I’m probably just seeing shadows in sunshine today.”

His gaze skitters back to the river, his hands balled to to fists to the rail. “Wonder why.”

It’s little more than a breath, but Shirayuki still hears the words sagging, dragged down by the reproach he lades them with. Not for her, but for himself, laying blame on his back like a carter might his mule. If she gives him half the chance, he might even whip himself like one too, for not carrying it well or silently enough.

It’s hard to speak when she’s so aware of him, when she can account for every inch of space between their bodies. It’s usually so easy to stand beside him, her body and his fitting shoulder-to-shoulder like lock and key, but today she’s all knees and elbows, practically blurting out, “How did you hear, anyway? I thought only--”

Her teeth clack shut, painfully hard. Only Pavo knew, because Pavo had been there, his shirt half open and his-- his particulars half-hard as well. Because she-- because he--

“Pavo told me.”

For the first time in her life, Shirayuki truly understands how a palpitation could stop a heart. “W-what?”

“After I got myself-- er...” Obi coughs into his shoulder, the tip of his ear a painful red against his black bristle. “I thought I might head up to the pond, see if I couldn’t catch up with you. But I met Pavo on the way.”

Her palms prickle, fingers stiff where they clench the rail. It’s impossible that Pavo could have said something-- that he would have. Not after that first summer, when Obi spent more of his waking hours being her shadow than in the shop, glaring at him every time he passed. They might have become fast friends after harvest, but if he took up with all that love making mess as he always did--

“You’re going to ask Anda about it?”

She nearly jumps clear over the rail, only her white knuckles keeping her on the dry side. “A-about what?”

He blinks real slow, the way Pavo does when she talks about tinctures. “About Herr Bauer.”

There’s something in the way he says it, the smallest hint of incredulity wrapped in resignation, that gets her hackles up. Her heels clack as she pushes away from the rail, loud in the air between them. “Of course. He’s my mentor, why wouldn’t I want to ask his--?”

“Hey now.” Obi holds up his hands, eyes wide behind them. “I don’t think there’s any reason for you to be getting sand in your craw over that, Miss. I was just asking. Simple curiosity.”

She deflates, the fight going right out of her sails. “Ah, I’m sorry, Obi. It’s just...Gen asked the same thing.” The derision on his mouth fouls up her own just thinking about it. “He clearly thought I shouldn’t need to.”

“But you don’t, do you?” Obi doesn’t so much walk away but unfurl, each piece of him peeling away from the rail until his warmth radiates in the space between them. “You pretty much run the place, I think Anda wouldn’t mind if--”

“That’s not true.” The words rush from her too loud, too desperate, and she turns that energy into forward motion, setting a brisk pace toward the market. “I may do most of the rounds, but that’s only because it’s better for him to not put so much pressure on...”

His leg. The injury from the war, the one he’s never deigned to let her look at, no matter how bad his hobble. The same one that keeps him up at night, moaning a hundred names into the dark. He may pretend as much as he likes in the morning, but Shirayuki can see the bruises that bleed onto his cheekbones and the darkness in his eyes.

“I don’t know why Suki came to me when Anda was still at the shop.” There are places where her chemise sticks to her skin, damp with sweat, and yet her arms still wrap tight around her, as if that might stop her sudden chill. “If she’d gotten him, he would have been gone and done in half the time, leg or no.”

It’s unfair how much length these past few summers have given Obi; no matter how quick her steps, he keeps pace, not hurried in the slightest. Her breath huffs, but his is steady, unstressed, even when he says. “You know, people like you quite a bit. A lot better than they like Anda.”

“That’s--” unfortunately, undoubtedly true, and he’s earned every bit of it. She gnaws at her lip, a strange restlessness rushing up her legs and tickling her palms. As if she has too much limb and not enough to do with them.

“Well,” she tries again, slowing enough so that her breath doesn’t come faster than her words. “I suppose between the two of us, you could say I have the better bedside manner.”

Obi snorts. “It’s more than that. Anda’s been taking a step back the last year or two, letting you take on most of the work, especially outside the shop. You’re the face everyone sees, and it’s a nicer one than the old man ever showed them.”

“You know his leg bothers him,” she snaps, defensive. “He can’t be going around town all day on it, letting it get--”

“Hey, hey.” His shoulder bumps hers-- or rather, his arm does, luring her right into his grin. “I know Anda’s a spry old fart, and if you let him I’m sure he’d be all hither and yon, but I’m just saying...maybe he’s getting ready to pass on the torch. Not like he doesn’t know that leg of his gets worse by the day.”

More like ‘gets worse depending on the day;’ some mornings he’s hopping around the storeroom, giving her enough guff to tip the scales of her patience, and on others he can hardly rouse from his bed. But that’s not what captures her attention, oh no.

“Pass the torch?” She blinks. “He’s hardly fifty, Obi. He can’t possibly be thinking...”

Herr Hoffmann had hardly been older when he started making noise about moving to the country, and Opa-- ah, well Opa would have traded in his bar cloth for a fishing rod long ago, were her father still alive. Only this morning he’d complained about a creaking back, about how this heat always did in his knees, and maybe wouldn’t she go and find herself a nice man today who knew a good draft when he drank it. She’d laughed, and Oma had crowed, you got a few good years left in you yet, my love, but still--

“Do you think he’s found someone then?” There hasn’t been anyone new past the shop lately, but Anda had always been a private man; she wouldn’t put it past him to keep correspondence to simply letters until it was time. “Maybe there’s someone from the palace...?”

“Found someone? From the palace?” Obi blusters through a laugh, eyes crinkled at the corners. It’s strange how much she wants to touch them, to feel the physicality of his joy, but instead she just curls her hands in her skirt and looks away. “Of course he’s found someone, half pint. You.”

She blinks. “M-me?”

“Yes, you.” His mouth twitches even as he tries to hold it steady, that spark of mischief in his eyes. “You know, his apprentice?”

“Ah, but that’s-- that’s not right.” She shakes her head, trying to loose the knot in her throat. “I’m not-- I’m no trained physician, not like Anda is. I can’t possibly-- he wouldn’t--”

“Why not?” Obi’s head cocks like a crow’s, curious and sharp. “He’s the one training you, isn’t he? Most of the quarters out there make do with some half-taught healer, and some are lucky enough to get an herbalist with even a handful of schooling. Even if you never see the inside of one of those academies, you’re twice the doctor any of them will ever be.”

But she could be better. Without formal schooling, she’d never be as good as Anda, and to leave the quarter with less than it started, to be the reason some of these folk died when they could have lived--

“He wouldn’t-- he couldn’t leave the shop to me,” she insists, nails digging into cotton. “I’m not ready. This isn’t like-- like you and Shou. I can’t just inherit the shop, I’d have to be--”

“Woah, woah.” Fear sits stark on Obi’s face, his eyes so wide she can see the white around them. “I’m not the one inheriting anything. That’s for whatever’s in Seyha’s belly. I’m just...extra hands.”

In the fading sun, the bakery’s window glimmers. Not in the way treasure does in Oma’s stories, but the way the air wavers before the ovens, too hot and just right all in one. Like it had that night when Obi pressed his nose to the glass, eyes so wide they could have been stomachs themselves. He’d watched Shou pull loaves from the oven so hard it was as if he could devour them with his eyes alone, filling what was empty in him.

And Shou had seen him there, a creature more gaping mouth than boy, and understood. The same way he did now, standing at the door of his shop, great head sweeping from one end of the street to another, the furrow in his brow knotting tighter with each body that passed him by. It’s impossible to guess how long he’s been there, sweat beading at his brow and eyes squinted against the sun, but it’s her eyes he meets when they turn the corner, his shoulder easing back down to his collar.

Her hand lifts, a smile ready, but he turns before she can get higher than her waist, stepping inside without a glance back. Extra hands indeed.

“Obi,” she starts, bracing herself as they idle in front of Anda’s door. “I think--”

“IF YOU EVER LEARNED TO OPEN YOUR EARS, EVEN ONCE, MAYBE YOU MIGHT--”

Her teeth grit down, thoughts all in a jumble, and it’s Obi who sighs, “Is that my place, or yours?”

“Ah...” Her fingers tighten on the door. “I think it might be--?”

Her weight pushes the glass the slightest bit ajar, and-- “I DON’T RECALL MAKING PROMISES ABOUT ANY SUCH THING, YOU--”

“Hah.” Obi shakes his head, the tension in his body dropping like leaves in the breeze. “Well, have fun with that.”

“What?” Shirayuki reaches out, trying to grasp a sleeve, a belt loop-- anything that might keep him planted here, next to her. “You can’t just leave me alone to--!”

“Can--” he plucks her one lucky catch from his sleeve, giving her fingers a squeeze before he slithers free-- “and will. Have a nice night there, kid.”

It does no good to glare at his back; oh no, that just puts a spring in his step and whistle on his lips for good measure. But there’s nothing else she can do, not unless she means to go inside, and well...

Shirayuki winces, easing the door open. Obi may make slink seem like a word applicable to more than just cats, but she could walk as quiet as she liked and still Anda would call out from the back, as if she made no effort at all. So when Shirayuki enters the apothecary, it’s with the heavy air of a criminal at the block, braced for the blade.

It’s silent inside; not the quiet of an empty room, but of a whole house catching its breath, caught between words. She barely has time to catch her own before there’s the telltale clink of a cane against the floor, a sound that only abates when Anda emerges from the storeroom, flushed and hunted, his hands thrown into the air. “Can I not get a moment’s rest in my own home, woman? Or will I need to hobble to the privy to get some peace and quiet?”

For a moment, Shirayuki could believe he means her-- almost, since Seyha emerges from the dim behind him, eyes blazing and hot on his trail, despite her belly. “You were never such a fool as--”

Her long fingers reach out, snagging his sleeve, but he pulls away, whip-quick. That injury might slow his steps, but the rest of him is sharp, turning like a blade as she reaches out again, determination honing her already cat-like reflexes. Fingertips brush his sleeve--

And then snatch back, Seyha’s mouth and eyes going wide as she catches Shirayuki’s gaze over his shoulder. “Finally, Shirayuki-ya!” she gasps, eyes rolling heavenward. “Maybe you can talk some sense at him. He certainly won’t hear it from me!”

Her skirts sweep past him, moving toward the door with all the dignity-- and offense-- of a queen. One with a bit of a waddle now, but somehow it doesn’t detract from the effect.

“You have to have sense to give it,” Anda snipes at her back. “And gods above and hells below know you weren’t given the same considerations as an ass!”

The noise Seyha unleashes from her throat isn’t so much a rumble as an earthquake, shaking Shirayuki right down to her toes. But she doesn’t turn, not one inch, her spine painfully straight as she replies, “Well, you would be the expert on asses, now wouldn’t you?”

The sign on the door clatters as it shuts, leaving Shirayuki alone with its echo.

“Finally,” Anda mutters, looking less pleased and more peeved to see the back of her. “Quiet.”

Shirayuki means to speak-- her mouth hangs open and everything, breath caught up in her throat-- but the door flies open, and oh, how Anda’s face lights. “This isn’t over, you know.”

“Of course not, you harpy!” His hand raises, like her neck sits in the space between his fingers, and clenches shut. “The only thing that could free me of your nagging is the sweet release of death!”

“HA!” One of her fingers snakes out, waggling. “You wish it would be that easy!”

There’s a quirk to Anda’s lips as they open, the sign of a particularly creative bit of nastiness behind his teeth, but the door slams before he can deliver it. It fouls up his mouth instead, rumpling like a piece of paper in the bin.

Shirayuki gives a quick look to the sign, still set to OPEN. “Do you want me to--?”

“Do not.” Anda holds up one trembling finger. “Get involved, girl.”

“Ah, I...wasn’t.” It’s a strain to smile, letting her head jerk toward the door. “I only thought...the sign?”

“Ah...” He clears his throat. “Right. Go ahead then. Don’t need anyone else sticking their nose into my business either.”

Shirayuki hardly needs to be told twice; it’s a relief to put her back to him, to be able to avoid getting in the middle of whatever muddle the two of them have gotten themselves into. So much so that she takes the time to flip the lock too, letting herself have an extra breath--

“You know,” Anda grouses, hobbling to the counter. “I thought she had married Herr Beck, and yet somehow she’s over here every day nagging me, as if I’m the one she shackled at the altar.”

--and sighs. So much for that, then. “You know that Seyha--”

“I said,” Anda snaps like a pulled shade, “do not get involved.”

It would be rude to tell him that she learned long ago not to put herself between their barbs, not unless she wanted to feel twice the sting. Instead she busies herself with straightening the counter-- a chore Anda only bothers with if it’s custom making the mess, not the proprietor-- letting a strained silence settle before she tries, “Meister--”

He eyes her over the till, warning heavy in every glance. “What did I just say?”

Her hands wave, trying to clear the air between the, “Ah, it’s not about Sey-- that. It’s about Herr Bauer.”

“Herr Bauer?” He blinks, cane tapping idly on the floor. “Is that boy giving you guff again about knowing more about his staff than he does? He couldn’t find the tail on a pig, let alone--”

“Ah, no, Gen is--” stubborn as a mule and twice as unpleasant-- “not the problem. I meant his father.”

Anda’s brow furrows. “Goro? Didn’t I see him only a few days ago, right over at the bakery? Seemed fine, from what I saw.”

Shirayuki takes a deep breath, setting her hands flat on the counter, as if that might somehow keep her steady. “Unfortunately, that’s no longer the case.”

For what felt like a saga’s worth of an afternoon, it hardly takes any time at all to give Anda both the broad strokes and gritty details of Herr Bauer’s condition. Through it all, he’s silent, a steady presence across the counter even if his mouth tightens as she comes to the end. “And what do you think?”

“It’s his liver.” It surprises her how firm she speaks, how authoritative. The way Anda is on a visit, once the door closes behind him. “Hepatitis, maybe. Or...another ailment, perhaps. But I worry...”

He waves at her, quick and impatient, urging the words out of her. “Well?”

“He’s never shown much sign of it before, has he?” Her teeth worry at her lip, wishing there was some loose skin to gnaw on, if only to give her something to do. “And he’s not much of drinker, considering.”

“Considering how a good half of his lot imbibe like fish?” Anda lets out a harsh hah. “Not saying much. Still, you’ll see stranger things on a job like this. I can teach you all the best knowledge the king’s college has to offer, but at the end of the day, sometimes all you have is your gut.”

“That’s a poor substitute for education.” Shirayuki shakes her head, ponytail sweeping over her spine. “Didn’t you always tell me that more mistakes were made by men who thought they knew better than the ones who came before them?”

Anda grunts, running his hand through the peppered thicket of his hair. “We all reach a point where the learning gives out, and we have to fall back on what feels right. You have to trust yourself.” A warm weight perches on her shoulder, tentative yet firm, and it takes a moment of her fully staring down, right at the callused fingers clutched there, to realize it was Anda touching her. “Especially you, girl. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, sure enough, but you’ve got even better instinct. That can make the difference between a patient and a corpse.”

“A-ah...” It’s a point she’d argue if it came from any other mouth, but Anda is hardly in the practice of giving advice he hasn’t earned the hard way-- or compliments. “I suppose...if you say so...”

“I do. Shirayuki...” He sighs, letting his hand fall back to his side with a shake. “How are you going to run this place if you have to come talk to an old man every time it gets hard.”

Shirayuki stares. “Run...?”

“Don’t get any fool ideas, girl,” he sniffs, waving her off. “Not any time soon. You’re nowhere near ready. But one day you won’t have me over your shoulder, giving you all the answers. Don’t forget that.”

“I...” She licks her lips, only to find her mouth is incredibly, impossibly dry. “I won’t.”

He grunts, giving her a firm nod before he hobbles past. “Good. Now go off and get what you need for Herr Bauer. No need to keep that man in pain now that you have your plan.”

“Ah, right!” His nod goads her into action, scurrying behind the counter. She shuffles at the stockroom door, almost unsure of what to do with herself. “I’ll get it ready now and drop it off first thing in the morning.”

“Good enough.” Anda hesitates on the first stair to his loft, looking back to tell her, “You can stay here tonight, if you like. It’ll take a while to brew up that tincture, and there’s no need for you to go all the way home in the dark. The Bauer place is closer here anyway.”

Maybe by a few steps, but Shirayuki knows better than to look Anda’s charity in the mouth, at least for too long. “Right. I’ll-- I’ll do my best.”

His mouth may not move more than it takes to open it, but his eyes crinkle at the corners.“That’s all I could ask.”

She turns back to the stockroom, taking in a deep breath of mint and nettle--

“Eh, hold up there, girl.” A stair creaks under Anda’s weight as he shifts around to look at her. “Didn’t I give you the day off? How is it that Suki Bauer even found you out on that lake?”

“Ah...” It’s terrible to be caught like this, pinned by her master’s gaze like a specimen to a board. “Er...”

Anda lets out a huff, chest puffing up as proud and as red as a robin’s. “That boy didn’t stand you up again, did he? I should go right on over there and give him a piece of my mind. That woman’s giving him too free a rein if he thinks he can waste your time--”

Ah. She slumps against the jamb. So much for keeping out of their scuffle.

It’s just as Anda said: by the time she’s done measuring and grinding and sifting and brewing, the moon’s already gone behind the rooftops, casting the cobbles in forbidding shadows. There’s no reason she couldn’t go home; there’s hardly any safer streets for her than these, but still-- she collapses into the spare cot before she can do much more than take off her stays, dropping into a blessedly dreamless sleep.

When she wakes, it’s with a shake, Anda’s sour expression hovering above her.

“Get up, girl.” His voice is rough from sleep, burred and bleary. “Your friend is here.”

She blinks, rubbing sleep from her eyelids. “O-obi?”

His mouth puckers. “No, not him. The cow who’s always in here having another girl.”

That gets her upright. “Suki? Is it Herr Bauer? Is he worse?”

“No.” He rises from her bedside, cane clomping across the floorboards. “It’s her husband. Seems he’s fallen ill too.”

“O-oh.” Her stomach churns, but there’s no time for regrets, not when there’s work yet to be done. “Tell her...tell her I’ll be right there.”

#obiyukibingo22 #obiyuki #akagami no shirayukihime #snow white with the red hair #free space #neighbors au #all pain will turn to medicine #my fic #ans #warnings for: mention of PTSD and illness #we are finally starting to get into the meat of this arc #i'm hoping to have basically about a chapter a month out #with probably a small break in october #since i don't think i could write something this long so soon after obiyukiweek #and i have other things to post that month!#but i don't want to linger too long on any of these chapters without answered #because as we go on it's gonna be...distressing

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