#how do i even stop having those tics??? my mum tells me to try and think of something else and do my best to not do em

[fluttershys-lament]

dude my nervous tics are just getting worse aaaaa (in spanish they're called tics nerviosos so i just translated it literally lmao) (and actually they got worse the past year and then just. Stayed like that,,,,, aaaaaaaa)

#i had them since i was 9. and that's almost six years ago now nooooooo #they just started as a single little thing. annoying? not at all. just s veeery little #then i got over it. and after a while new ones started to come until now that i have like #more. i dont know how many but they aren't like three or even four anymore #i mean. they don't always like. ''activate''. just when im in zoom or another place in which i dont feel comfortable #either because im not familiar with it. or there are lots of ppl. or idk #but still it is ANNOYING that everytime a zoom class starts. all my tics are like the ''its showtime'' meme #i do my best to not like. blink v hard. do weird annoying sounds with my mouth #(did you know that you can somewhat fake a fart or sumn with your mouth closed and no hands. #it doesnt rlly sound like that but it's the closest i can think of lmao) #(ok back to where i was) #or even touch an object harder or sumn because if i did it v slightly it starts to annoy me #or if there's a faint sound. it also starts to kinda annoy me and then i want to hear music or something louder #or also pet one one of my plushies to make me feel less uncomfortable. i dont think it rlly works tho but #i can feel my hands wanting to pet sumn and im just ''>:(((( calm down'' #all of it stops after a while tho. but what i feel when it happens is annoyingggg i cant stand it #how do i even stop having those tics??? my mum tells me to try and think of something else and do my best to not do em #which i try but it doesnt work at allll #aaaaaa #ok i dont think i should've written a lot but ok lmao

[mollyolikeme]

Any Way The Wind Blows SPOILERS

Okay. Here are my ramblings in no particular order. Proceed if you care and/or dare. They a lot.

- I am emo shit. (I’ve said it before and i’ll say it again. Brilliant.)

- Honestly the ‘break up’ is important even though it HURTS

- Holding the wand together. I CRY. Knocking foreheads. STAP.

-The first real snowbaz conversation during the make-up. Was just …......… FAN-TAST-TIC. Just real conversation and being patient and listening. Like they were both being so SOFT and UGH!

- Fuck yes the emotional intimacy!

- The first night in bed… like simons trauma and love and how they interact and how he can’t cross the lines right away but wants to and he’s just trying to process NEVER having to ever make a decision for himself and think about his own emotions in his life. Boy thought he was never gonna grow up. He thought he was gonna be dead! UGH. He just. Can’t handle the emotions and I FUCKING RELATE!

- SNOWBAZ MAKING OUT. GIMME MORE.

- Snowbaz hunting that first time and the conversation about simons sexuality (no label!) and further talking about how Simon thought (but really never thought!) about his relationship with Agatha

- The fact Simon wanted to JUMP ON baz and never thought past that

- Simon telling baz he would let him drink him. Yup. Good boy. Good bois.

- The mutual OBSESSION they have for each other!

- NANDOS! Yes sir.

- Penny and Shepard. Penny and Shepard. Penny and Shepard.

- Penelope deserves SO much. She is such an amazing friend/family to Simon AND to baz. Ugh their LOVE for each other.

- I think Shepard is v good for her

- YES bitch get him out of that engagement!

- Shep reaching slowly for penny and then penny just moving his hand to reach her cheek. I CAN NOT!

- KISS HIM! You go Penny! GET. IT.

- DOMESTIC SNOWBAZ DOMESTIC SNOWBAZ DOMESTIC SNOWBAZ

- IKEA trip. Just get out. That’s my dream for them.

- MORE KISSING. KEEP KISSING. I LIVE FOR IT.

- every damn time Snowbaz goes to lady Ruth Salisbury’s. I love it!

- I love lady Ruth! Like YES grandmama you are an open minded and smart powerful woman!

- SNOWBAZ MAKING OUT AT WATFORD! DO IT AGAIN!

- TEAM SOLVING PROBLEMS! YES TEAM.

- Smith smith Richards can accept my foot in his ass. I agree with Baz’s reactions. Like yes son.

- I get simons too honestly. For him as a character, as the guy that he is, ya know.

- Smith smith is a HILARIOUS and TERRIBLE name.

- LOL. What a scammer though eh?

- CULTS! Why is it ALWAYS cults these days!!!

- The whole bring the magic up and then burn it out thing smith does. Like fuck you. Why do you think your special because you made up a new spell?! Lots of people do that!

- The kind of first time?!?!?!?!?!!?!?! MY PRECIOUS BOYS. YOU DESERVE THAT AND MORE IM SO HAPPY!

- Fuckin GET. IT.

- The conversations the communication! KEEP IT UP MY GUYS!

- They just love each other so COMPLETELY. Despite everything and especially INCLUDING each other’s ‘flaws’ (I weep with joy for it)

- Honestly the Britishism’s in this book were prime!

- GETTIN THE TEAM BACK TOGETHER! Legit gives me ENERGY!

- GREAT Watford action. Simon being Simon like ‘nope imma lie to keep my people safe’

- His people then being pissed at him. lol yup

- Fuck you smith you deserve to be embarrassed by Simon!

- You look like a fool because you ARE a FOOL!

- GO PIPPA! Spell em like you see em! LIAR!

- KAY. The character growth for all of our mains …….. you guys I caaaaaant, stop it! (Don’t ever stop. Keep improving yourselves you guys are magical beauty’s)

-omg and AGATHA. girl you get your fucking story how you like it. this is about you now! your life is your life and you get to do what you want with it! Herd goats and just chill! uhuh uhuh!

- WERK HEADMISTRESS BUNCE. YOU ARE QUEEN AND YOU ARE SMARTER THAN EVERYONE!

- Simons true nature just being protective boy to people who are assholes to him. Yes sir you are too precious.

- V interesting that rainbow gave us an open ended thing with smith. Like at least somewhat. I’m assuming the coven will be like ‘yea you are a fraud and we will not have you around people anymore’ but also she leaves it with him still being delusional and like ‘I chosen one. Uhuh dat me’ … ya fuckin’ knob. You aren’t it Smith!

- ALSO WOAH WOAH WOAH! On the MF SLY Nico (good for Fiona. Marry your angry boy. You deserve it. Whatever it is.) being like ‘you can’t be immortal only drinking animals’………………

- IM SORRY!

- That is a BOMB!

- WHAT. WUT.

- OUR BOYS CAN LIVE AND DIE HAPPILY EVER AFTER!?!?!? You are fucking kidding me! THAT IS ALL I EVER WANT IN MY LYFE! (Healing healing healing emotional healing)

- Beautiful addition with the Excalibur sword to give us the Simon Salisbury reveal. Just Beautiful. Thank you thank you thank you Rainbow. I think that is exactly as we need it. Like obviously a lot for Simon to work through. And he and baz LITERALLY have that conversation (‘it’s too much.’ ‘It would be too much for anyone’) I REALLY appreciate that scenario as the reveal. Like Ruth already knows all the important things about Simon and now they can just be a supportive and CONSISTENT presence in his life. BAWLING IM BAWLING.

- And Simon has his sword!!!! Yes boy! You look good with it! Baz thinks you’re Hot! Because you ARE!

- THESE BOYS ARE HANDSOME! WE ALL WISH!

- Okay but also the moment it hits Simon (and baz) that he killed his father…… noooooooo. POOR THING. (Crying real tears. Crying real tears in the park reading. It’s true.)

- HE WAS NEVER YOUR FATHER SIMON! NOT REALLY!

- ROSEBUD BOY!

- Yes that is the pet name and henceforth will be the ONLY pet name! (Actually baz should keep saying love because I SWOON)

- my thoughts are Simon is gonna keep his wings.

- Like he likes them and so does baz and honestly everyone does. I actually love that every time anyone who is important to Simon thinks about him without his wings they get a bit sad about it.

- I think he’ll keep them.

- I like that they left things with the nownext like….. those Vegas vamps will probably fucking kill them, let’s not get involved. And then literally didn’t talk about it. HA. (Fair enough. Not their problem.)

- Our baby’s get normal lives now!

- Like normal for them

- But they get to GO ON! ITS AMAZING!

- AH IM SO HAPPY FOR THEM!

- HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY

- Penny and shep are getting his passport and moving to LONDON! They gone be cute cute cute together and it’s LOVELY

- SIMON AND BAZ LIVING TOGETHER FOREVER!

- MY BOYS (crying crying crying crying crying)

- I can just picture Simon doing Sunday night dinners at the Salisbury’s and coming home with HEAPS of take home leftovers for his week because grandmother Salisbury would NEVER let him leave without it

- He’s got an uncle! And probably/maybe cousins!? Sweet baby aaaaaahhhhhhh!

- Daphne at home again. THANK HEAVENS!

- I really enjoy that baz calls her mum. I think it’s so soft and important on so many levels because she did raise him.

- BAZ DRESSING SIMON! COME. ON.

- I CANT HANDLE ALL THIS BOYFRIEND BEHAVIOUR THAT I AM CONSUMING! IT. IS. PERFECT. I AM EATING IT UP.

- every time each of them comments on how sexy the other is.

- Simon thinking about Baz keeping his wand in a holster on his wrist. And it being dead sexy without his shirt on. FUCK. ME.

- Okay okay okay but MORE physical intimacy!!!!

- Like Clothes. Get rid of em. Don’t need em. Confident with where things are going. Check. Communicating consent and checking in. Fuck yes check. Sexy sexy sexy. Check. Kissing kissing kissing. Check. (I’m dying just about here) (get it my sons)

- What does Simon say? Just like ‘do you trust me’ ‘yes’ ‘can I touch you’ ‘yes’

- I. HAVE. DIED.

- (I’m dead)

- (Me being dead) AAAAAHHHH

- I LOVE the on going ‘is this what people do?’

- That makes me feel so many things.

- FUCK

- Simons like ‘we just get to keeping trying and working and being close and trying and working and making each other happy’

- I WEEP!

- These. Boys. Have. My. Heart.

- They have it they have it they have it they have it

- UGH

- okay better leave it there. I need to READ. THIS. AGAIN.

- LOVE ❤️

#awtwb spoilers #awtwb #snowbaz #rainbow rowell #simon snow #baz pitch #penelope bunce #shepard love #agatha wellbelove #i am no longer a functioning part of society... #i breath and think only rainbows words

[the-moon-prince]

The Last Of us~Kurapika x Reader ~Chapter V

AN: Hi my lovely fellows!

This chapter contains a mention of sexual abuse. I understand how hurtful this topic may be to a lot of people (me included). Likewise, I'll mark it at the start and the end, so you don't have to read it if you prefer. I made sure for people to be able to read the chapter without reading forcefully that part. I added this as a form of venting. I feel like it's an avoided topic, and it's my form to show support to other trauma survivors. This was made with the only intention to comfort. If something is bad written or harmful, please tell me. I also ask for your understanding if you plan on commenting, thank you very much!

I wish you a pleasant read, and I hope you’ll enjoy the new chapter of my story.  (Chapter I) (Chapter II) (Chapter III) (Chapter IV ) (Chapter VI coming soon!)

Paring: Kurapika Kurta x GN! Reader

Word count: 2 888

TW: Mentions of sexual abuse / Mentions of abuse ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(Y/n) appeared more comfortable around Kurapika. Occasionally letting their ears escape while staying in the privacy of their houses.

But there was still something mysterious about (Y/n). Some of what they didn't say. Kurapika was filled with doubts and fears because of that. He pondered scenarios, each one worse than the other. Are they lying to me? Maybe they're in some kind of danger or distress. Creating a vicious and unhealthy cycle in Kurapika's spirit. 

The two were patient in the relationship, neither comprehending fully how to give or receive affection. But despite the time they had been together, (Y/n) seemed resistant to accept fondness. Particularly physical. They had never tried to hold hands. When Kurapika attempted it, they recoiled in alarm more than once. In the few hugs they had given each other, (Y/n) shivered. Loud noises made them shake and jump, and they hand a list of tics as sudden shaking chills or protectively shrugging shoulders. Kurapika could understand that, he had tics as well. But his partner seemed triggered by his touch. They continued to be protective of their eyes. It was normal they didn't meet his eyes often, however, they tried to hide her eyes whenever they looked more cat-like.

~

Suspicions of his beloved being at risk grew bigger. He didn't want to, he couldn't permit himself to lose someone else. What kind of cruel mockery of life would be that, when finally there was someone like him-Someone who understood and supported him-was erased from this plane. The idea that these funny tail and ears weren't going to survive grieved Kurapika. The plausibility of not seeing those (curly/wavy/messy/straight) (hair/color) strands nevermore haunted him. Undoubtedly, it didn't end there. Fury consumed him when he conceived the idea of someone injuring more further a being so humane, kind hearted, and compassionate as (Y/n). Hadn't both of them grieved enough? But what they were suffering, adding would be disastrous.

Yet, (Y/n) didn't utter a single word regarding the matter.

~

Kurapika entered a state of fright. At that limit, he needed at the very least to know what was going on. He showed up that night at (Y/n)'s residence, knowing that they had no guard at the hospital and that they would be there. He had a spare key and wasn't abnormal to simply arrive at the other's place. Either of them had the habit of picking phone calls or answering messages.

Except for the scene he arrived at was abnormal.

He saw (Y/n) from behind sitting on the floor, a thing they never did, and if anything was remarkable about them, it was how strict they were with their customs. They had their elbows leaning on the coffee table, looking down at something. They did not react upon his arrival. (Y/n) never missed a noise, even less the one of a door opening. Yet, they remain immobile as if the lives of the universe depended on them staying frozen in place. Kurapika approached them. To see that there was a call in progress on their phone resting upon the table. (Y/n) did not dare to see the phone directly. Their hands held their head by the forehead, their gaze hidden behind their (curls/waves/strands). Just as Kurapika opened his mouth to speak, a female voice came from the phone's speaker-"So you won't answer me?"-silence again-" My baby... I know you think I broke you..."-the voice was sweet and honeyed, full of compassion"-Who could that woman possibly be? Why did she address (Y/n) like that, what did she mean by "break". Kurapika craved to question (Y/N) what, for love for his clan, was happening. He was relucted from doing so, he could perhaps extract information from the person on the other end of the line, taking advantage of the fact that she believed that (Y/n) was alone.-"But that's not true! I didn't do anything, my love. You were born broken, your demoniac eyes are the proo-" (Y/n) abruptly cut the call before the sentence finished. They didn't turn to see Kurapika, despite knowing he was beside them. 

Kurapika had his breakpoint. "What's happening (Y/n)?! Who was that?! You can't keep things as such from me?! Do you understand that?!"-he started to scold, raising his voice. His eyes would look scarlet if it weren't for the contacts he was wearing at the moment. Someone else knew about (Y/n) identity. Who can say such atrocities? On top, with such a sound and sweet voice, it was twisted. She was talking about their eyes. Did she want them? Was she behind (Y/n)'s eyes? All these questions flooded incessantly in Kurapika's mind. (Y/n) hid upthrusting their shoulders and covering their face with their hands, their whole figure was shaking. They drew their ears back and adhered the tail to their body, probably changed on instinctual reaction.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry"-(Y/n) started to lament, voice quivering. Their breaths were heavy as if it were inhumanly tough to keep breathing. Whoever the other person was, were bad enough to provoke a position of panic on (Y/n).   Kurapika knew that and seeing that getting angry only seemed to affect the feeble trembling figure in front of him, he decided to calm down. He was greatly concerned that someone he esteemed as highly as (Y/n) was in that position. It was not wise to let his humor aggravate things. 

He lowered himself to their level and sat down next to them. He raised his hand to stroke their hair. As soon as the tips of his fingers touched the (curls/waves/bangs/strands) he heard a heavy "Don't!" and backed up his hand.-"It's alright. I'm not touching you. Still, I require you to explain to me what happens. Who was that woman?" Besides offering physical contact, Kurapika had no distinct idea how he could comfort (Y/n). He felt frustrated and powerless.

"My mum."-they whimpered, (Y/n) was distressed although not crying. Not a single tear came out during all that night. Kurapika no longer understood.

"Weren't your parents deceased?"- He felt that they had lied to him, and it sure bothered him that he kept that from him. But this was not the time to discuss that part.

"No, my family is dead..."-(Y/n) began to breathe more calmly. They readjusted, moving their hands away from their faces to hold their arms. "They did not raise me. My grandparents did. When my grandad got ill and died I left to study. They always lived far away." -(Y/n) didn't look at Kurapika at any time. They kept their gaze at a standstill. Nevertheless, he could notice that their pupils were very dilated, reminding him of the stare of a scared soaked cat.

"What did she mean by break you?"-he continued trying to maintain a moderate voice. He was somehow scared to hear the answer. It would hurt to know that someone hurt (Y/n).

"I wasn't the legal age. Someone had to take my guard when my grandfather died."-Their face stayed still in a sober expression.

"Did they hurt you?"- He felt progressively more scared and worse.

"It's not important. I don't believe it's something you desire to know." -Even with everything happening, (Y/n) refused to speak. How could they be so obstinate?

"(Y/n), this cannot continue. I require to know. You are not delusional, you know you have to tell me."-Kurapika got a heavy sigh.

"They never loved me, you know? I was never certain why. I tried my best. Maybe they were expecting a human... Maybe they blamed me for their separation...Perhaps they were disappointed to learn that I have a disability."- Kurapika didn't know that (Y/n) could have a difficulty, they never mentioned any medical condition. He would ask about that a little further. They were finally discussing if he interrupted now, possibly the opportunity will not present again.-"I spent most of my time in the university's boarding. Only I wasn't allowed to stay on vacation, so I would go home. Sometimes they put a muzzle on me so I wouldn't bite - although I never bit anyone. They put an electric collar on me once. I guess they were scared of me. "It's for your good because we love you, and you have to behave. Good kitties don't scratch and don't bite." my mother told me. They believed it to be true. They did many things to me under that pretext..."-They stopped there. Still having something to say, but not wanting to.

(WARNING: MENTION OF SEXUAL ABUSE AHEAD)

"Did they... something else to you?"-Kurapika asked again. At that point, he was not surprised (Y/n) never mentioned their parents and did not consider them family. His anger was replaced by compassion. Expecting the worst.

"Yes."- there was the resistance again.

"What did they do?"-(Y/n) made a little movement with their head still hesitant.

"My mother did. She told me she had to check I was okay. Because I was not like other children..."-They lowered their gaze. Kurapika felt a chill. Neither of them was foolish, they knew what was to come. (Y/n) shrugged even more and started to play with their (color) hair -"It happened more than once, I don't remember precisely how many, but more than once for sure. She ordered me to... take off my clothes and... to lay down. It was unpleasant. For a long... for a very long time, I... I denied it. I told myself that she was an adult... that she knew better. If I doubted a bit more... If I weren't so naive... I would have done things differently, you know?"

(END OF THE MENTION OF SEXUAL ABUSE)

Kurapika felt horrible. It felt awful seeing someone he loved so much like this, someone innocent who didn't deserve anything of what happened. For the first time, he didn't know what to say. He had no idea how to act. It was something he did not understand.-"And the rest of your family? You couldn't ask other Uniliums for help?" he probed, wanting to understand their circumstances. 

"I tried. I ran away twice. They discovered me at the first try. Two adults facing a 9-year-old child. They clearly gave me the beating of my life.

The following was 4 years after, more prepared. When I returned to our community, I found out that they got butchered not long ago."-(Y/n) lamented. It was probably what ached most of all. That they got that tiny hope and comfort taken away. -"I'm convinced if they had known, they would have helped and appealed to my favor. I concentrated on my studies in the faith to forget. It was also my opening to escape. I like my career, you know? Although my father told me during the 10 years it lasted that it was disappointing and worthless."-they added with a trembling smile. Those were the two details that provided them any comfort.

"Why didn't you tell me any of that?"- Kurapika asked once more. 

(Y/n) raised their shoulders.-"I don't know. I was scared and ashamed. I was afraid that you would hate me. Perhaps I imagined you would be disappointed in me."-They were conscious that it was not a rational fear. But it was stronger than them.

"How could I hate you? It wasn't your fault."-He comforted. Full of regret for what happened-"It was not your responsibility at any time."

"I know... Though, still, sometimes I wonder if it was. Even acknowledging that it is a lie." (Y/n) sniffled without shedding any tears.

"They won't do a single thing to you, ever again. I'm present now, and I'll make sure they don't put a finger on you. You are safe. Okay?"-The blonde man secured.

"Thank you."-They smiled again. Many would have said it was the same smile. But for Kurapika it was different. This time it was a touch more melancholic than usual, but there was a side of profuse relief. They relaxed and their ears were forward, symbolizing more relaxed humor. 

"It's impressive you succeed the Hunter exam possessing a physical disability." It was Kurapika's crafty way of questioning the subject.

"It was quite difficult. I was born with a respiratory condition, so I cannot develop many physical abilities. I am not physically powerful and I have restricted time to run. I depend greatly on my ability Nen and my wits. However, I won't allow that to stop me. Nobody tells me what I am capable of or not."-(Y/n) bragged. They could be proud. Even with that disadvantage, they had come a long way. That night Kurapika was aware of how strong his companion was. It didn't seem like it, at no time did any of the people who saw (Y/n) imagine all this side of them. After so much, they stayed strong-minded and sweet. They were truly brave. They were both survivors after all. They had both succeeded to get so far despite all the grief. And they both held pride in that. For Kurapika, the fact that (Y/n) had a more sensitive and altruistic side did not make them weak. Of course, they were qualities disapproved among several Hunters.

However, no other hunter held him during his afflicted moments. He could be vulnerable with (Y/n), and he was safe with them.

"Can you remain with me tonight, please?"

Kurapika didn't expect that request.

It was the first time one of them stayed overnight in the other's place. They had stayed really late together, but they didn't stay until the next morning. Plus, knowing how reserved (Y/n) could sometimes be, he assumed they would favor time alone following such an intense experience. Nevertheless, there was something so personal and vulnerable about that request. Kurapika felt the immense desire to stay and protect them.

"Of course."-He couldn't help but use a soft tone.

During all that conversation (Y/n), although exhibited fear, did not manifest weakness at any time. They stayed dignified without losing control.

"Can we lay down, please? I feel a bit tired."-they called after a moment of silence. Their voice resonated dull and tired.

"We can do whatever you desire."- Kurapika smiled at them, his only preoccupation at that instant was to ensure the well-being of the person he treasured, and their head started to bob. (Y/n) slowly nodded and got up. They silently asked him to follow them and padded to their chamber. 

It was the first time that Kurapika entered their bedroom as well. It was fairly more adorned. It had a relatively big bed, with light cloths and a  fluffy (color) colored bedspread. Without neglecting its childish side, it was full of stuffed animals of all kinds, colors, and sizes. Several shelves were overflowing with books. Shelving with toys and cute figures, alongside a record player and a cloth case with music records was also in the room. Next to the bed was a stool with a lamp and a framed photo. The apartments had their private bathroom, on which (Y/n) entered. Kurapika sat on the bed- or in the space left without stuffed animals- and waited. No longer than 15 minutes should have passed before (Y/n) came out with slightly wet hair, and a matching (color) pajama shorts and shirt. Kurapika didn't identify the exact scent at the time, but they smelled good, familiar. (Y/n) took the stuffed animals and arranged them as best they could on an individual loveseat.

"I apologize for this disorder."-they pointed to the bathroom door.-"There is the other toilet, so you can use it whenever you desire. I have each item, please serve yourself."-They laid on the left side of the bed and rested their head on the puffy pillow.

Kurapika merely laid down next to them, not too close. He was uncertain if it was correct to hug them or stay near. (Y/n) arranged the beddings covering the two. They smelled identical at them.

"Kurapika..."-an reluctant voice called his name.

"Yes?"-It felt strange, being in that place that, until then, seemed confidential. But it wasn't unpleasant at all.

"May I hug you?"-The request was bashful and quiet.

He thought of just opening his arms but preferred to give a vocal response as well.-"Of course you may."

(Y/n) approached him steadily. They proceed to timidly embrace him, after their arms were wrapped around him, they snuggled their face on him.-"You're warm... I feel ... comfortable ... with you. Which is bizarre. I don't feel secure with anyone since I was 6 years old."

Kurapika held them protectively. He felt profoundly touched by that strangely honest statement. He attempted to affectionately stroke their (curls/waves/locks). They allowed it.-"I love you (Y/n)."-He couldn't think about anything else he wanted them to know.

"I adore you, Kurapika." 

(Y/n) ultimately permitted themselves to be vulnerable with Kurapika too. It felt good. It was good for them to have someone so strong to have their backs and accompany them.

They could hold each other.

#hxh scenarios #kurapika x reader #kurapika kurta x reader #hxh x reader #hxh #kurapika hxh #kurapika kurta #hunter x hunter #kurapika #kurapika imagine

[mellohyi]

wooowowowoo i miss summer camp so much

like this is my second year without going and as much as it sucked i loved it

there is a large rant about the place and like every single living detail i remember about it under the cut (is that the right phrase to use for this idk)

like the big field with the train tracks next to it and the beehives on one edge. i miss throwing a frisbee for my few friends there and laughing when i would get it stuck in a tree or they would throw it and it would go so far away. and i miss jumping on the trampoline and getting so pissed off (jokingly) at the dudes spending like 10 decades on it and because i was the only british person there they would be somewhat scared of me? so i would literally stare at them somewhat angrily and with my shitty latvian accent complain about how long they are taking and they would get off LMAO it only worked on the dudes younger than me but it worked... and the basketball on the small court !!! :D im not good at like,, throwing ball type games tbh? but like this court was magical because like 9/10 i would actually get it in and score a point and i loved how,, rapid (?) the games were like if you failed to get it in at a certain point you would be out and you had to get it in to stay in the game !!

and i remember the lake!!! it had a lot of those thingies.. oysters? idk i googled it and thats what they looked like. i can still remember the feeling of them and they were sharp LMAO and there was a zipline thing you could go on and it would take you to the middle of the lake and you could jump into it from there. and there was a game we played where we would be in two teams and then we would send a person down the zipline and if they fell in we would all have to do i think 10? pushups and it was fun cheering on people from the small platforms next to the zipline !! and we used to build a sorta dodgy looking sauna using some planks of wood and a big blue tarp that was held down by some rocks and we would collect sticks to make a fire with and then we would go sit in it and just talk and chill in the sauna. not everyone wanted to go, understandably considering iirc i put it off the first year i went but then tried it the next and loved it, so there was enough room for all of us to comfortable sit and even lie down on the log benches !! and we even had like,, bay leaf sticks with the leaves on it and stuff and we would dunk them into a bucket of water and then gently hit someone who was lying down as a like,,, relaxation thing? and it was so nice and it smelt SO GOOD it smelt like wood and grass and nature and it was sweet in a savoury way and i miss the smell so much just thinking about it. like you could literally smell the bay leaves because of the water evaporating after you take it out the bucket. and the hot air was so much harder to breathe when you stood up and it felt thicker and the air lower to the ground was cool so when you found it hard to breathe you would basically stick your head onto the grass to get a bit of cool and it felt so good !! and we would take breaks to drink water and pour cold water on ourselves or we would go into the lake though the last time i went a lot of the lake had dried up D: but its okay because i still have good memories with the lake when it wasnt like that. once during the sauna we went in the lake after and the sky was so clear like i could see all the stars and i could see the big dipper and it was just so beautiful. i even used the zipline to get into the lake that time as well and it was just so magical. i was kinda like,, sleepy (?) so i kinda was just not fully there so it was like so much cooler because i didnt feel real during it and it was just amazing.

omg and the activities we would do. we went on a hike in a forest and it was SO COOL like we would have to go climb up the steep hill that separated the field area and the train tracks and we would literally go onto the train tracks and at the time there wasnt any trains so we got to literally touch the tracks and we would go into the forest and IT WAS SO COOL like the light came in at a perfect angle and it was so pretty and we would pick blueberries and aaaaaaaa it was so amazing !! and we would split up and walk to an area to play some games using the trees and it was amazing. and also we would just do sports games using the field but also we went BIKING!!!! they had so many bikes for the people who didnt bring their own and we would go on the bikes and cycle to some sand dunes literally like 5 minutes away from the place and climb up them and jump and stuff and we carved tic tac toe grids into the stable parts and played and it was so fun AND I LITERALLY SAW A LIZARD CLIMB UP ONE OF THE EDGES INTO THE GRASS LMAO and we also cycled to a lake

this one to be exact!! and we would jump off from the small pier thing and swim around back to the edge and it had sand and a slide and it was generally really fun cycling to and from there. i did cause multiple crashes with the bikes while cycling there LMAO mainly because my brain just tends to blow things out of proportion for no reason and like LMAO someone would start coming a bit closer to me and i would panic and stop and then everyone behind me would then have to immediately stop and they would crash into me.. like once i got my cousin to come with me and someone looked like they were gonna go behind my cousin who was in front of me and i panicked because i didnt want to be separated from her so i just stopped because i was panicking too much and everyone behind me crashed into me LMAO and they were all like 'bruuuuh' but anyways it was really fun cycling there because i went past the place my aunt on my mums side got married + the place my uncle on my dads side got married (no they did not marry each other it was separate weddings) !! a few times i didnt go cycling because i just didnt feel good and didnt want to go but it was okay in the end because i was all alone in the cabin and i would just sleep and draw while waiting for them to come back and they would flood in cycling down the small hill that leads to the field and has the bike area and i would just see them from the porch of the cabin and it was cool :D

mMmMmmmmmMMM and the food area !! we would usually sit inside the pizzeria (because the place was also a pizzeria more on that later) and it was fun because we had breakfast, lunch, dinner + a night snack thing (its called naksniņas) and like even though im usually the pickest eater at the camp and they had to make exceptions for me because we werent allowed dessert at lunch unless we ate all our food like i still got to eat a lot lol like there was usually something i could eat even if i couldnt eat all of it and the juice was so nice and ngl i kinda liked being on the like,,, duty of having to set up before the meals + clean up after because getting all the stuff and setting it up was just so peaceful and calm and i loved it and mmmmsmsmsmsmsm it was so cool and THE NIGHT SNACK THING WAS LITERALLY THE BEST it was practically dessert for dinner but right before bed + we would do an activity after dinner before it !! i talked to my dad and figured out the spelling of the word because im not that good at latvian atm and mmmm . also like we would have tea and it was so good !! we would also have a small snack like a biscuit or cereal bar and it was so nice good way to end the day :D

i also lost an entire waterbottle there dont ask how

the cabins were nice because i usually end up on the second floor level thing of it and theres a small window on it !! and a cool ladder to get up to it though its a pain when camp first starts + when it finishes because you have to pack everything up while trying to not hit your head on any of the beams or the slant of the cabin roof and you have to haul everything up and down... other than that its so fun because theres small holes (like,,, really small. cant fit a pen down it) and when the people in the two rooms below that cabin spot are being pisstaking you can pour water down it and they shut up LMAO its really funny because they see the water dripping and get more pissed off and then become less annoying and we used to slip them notes to tell them to shut up LMAO also listened into their convos to be annoying too

anyways to finish off with my favouritest things ever about it. last day we would make pizzas and your family would be there and you could make multiple pizzas ! i usually made one for my parents / family and then one for myself and my sister because we r really picky and dont like cheese . and it was so fun and the pizzas were SO GOOD and i share the other pizza thats not mine with my family because i hate cheese and they are happy too. i also love the one evening where we cook dinner ourselves i think thats the sauna night as well but omg its so nice we have dough balls to wrap around a stick and asduidfohih its so nice omg i love them so much right because we take the stick and then toast them over a fire and when you do them right its a tiny bit doughy on the inside but a safe amount and its like,, slightly crispy in a good way on the outside so amazing and like you can put stuff in it like cheese and ketchup and stuff but i just eat mine plain and they are so good mmmamMMm and we also have watermelon iirc and it was so good overall like best evening of the camp :)

anyways i love camp and i miss it

#mellow random #nah because i miss it so much i #pleading eyes emoji #i love latvia

[the-cosmic-blogger]

I finally finished another story for my Post-AHiT AU! hope you like!

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Apologies and Fulfilled Wishes

Mustache Girl, ever since her defeat, had been counting the days in Mafia Town. She crossed out tics in the cave she had called home, and kept the time piece she'd woken up to safe and hidden. The hooded blonde sighed and leaned against a wall, crossing her arms, and then slid down it, her hazel eyes glancing downward.

A shadow soon loomed over her, and it looked fluffy and familiar. "Oh, there you are, kiddo. I've been looking all over for you!"

"Really?" Mu frowned, recognizing the voice, and slowly looked up at him. "Come to gloat or perhaps finish the…" and that's when she noticed that Snatcher looked so much different from before, and the rest of her words died on her lips. Her eyes were wide.

There floated Snatcher, green tips marking his fluff, claws and tail. What's more? he had defined eyebrows! and he looked less relieved now and.. sadder.

"Snatcher?" she squinted, before the demon ghost quickly rushed to hug her, seeming to sob. Mu had let out a yelp, before she just.. stood there, brain not working. What the…

"I'm sorry, kiddo.." the dark apparition muttered.

And that's when her brain started working again, and she pushed him away slightly. "What? I literally made life hell for all of you. And you're the one who's sorry?"

The demon sighed, tears still falling from his almond-shaped golden eyes, and those white and large oval pupils stared into the red-clad girl. "You were just a kid… and.." he glanced around, biting his lip rather hard and rubbing at his arm. Her situation only just now hit him like a freight train.

"Homeless? resentful because of what those goons did?" she supplied with her hands on her hips, narrowing her eyes.

He slowly nodded. He also added, "You had grown up.. without anyone to guide you properly."

Mu's eyes widened and tears started to well up unbidden. Her stance got much less hostile. "How did you..?"

"A little birdy told me," Snatcher replied. He bent down to gently wipe the tears. The blonde raised an eyebrow, before she raised an arm and pushed his comforting claw away, unused to the feeling.

The demon understood. The mustached girl furrowed her brow. Hat Kid.. she was the little birdy. She eventually shook her head. "Who said I needed your help? I'm not some damsel in distress."

"I know, kiddo," he sniffled, and let out a shuddering sigh. "But you.."

"Not from you," Mu scowled, and he flinched back. She got up and started to pace, not once removing her stare.  "I recall quite clearly everyone saying that you all 'don't need a hero; get lost'. Well, guess what?" she stopped pacing, hands on her hips. "I lost. You won," she pointed at him, "and you don't need to associate with me."

"...I'm really sorry, kiddo.." Snatcher bowed his head.

Mustache Girl gazed at him, frowning. She eventually broke the silence with,  "You're a bad guy. Why aren't you acting like one anymore?"

"People change, kid," the demon ghost didn't hesitate. "It's been years since the fight."

She looked at her tics on the wall, grabbing one arm, and her eyes widened. He was right. Six years had passed. And everyone looked the same as usual. Including herself. Snatcher was the only one who visibly changed too.

"Well. I suppose I've also changed," she glanced towards where she kept the time piece. They didn't solve her issues at all. They seemed to have made them worse. Mu fidgeted. "All I've wanted now was for things to go back to how they were. Where there weren't any bad guys. Where mum and pa were still here. Where my friends were still here." She sighed. "But it's been so long that they're probably gone. Even if I use the time piece, it'll just be one shot and I can't handle that."

Snatcher just listened, his brow furrowed upward. Mu bit her lip and suddenly whipped her head up, both eyebrows raised. "Why am I telling you all this?"

"Dunno.. but you have a time piece?" he inquired.

The girl nodded. "It must have fallen from Hat Kid's ship. Somehow. But I've come to accept the fact that I can't change a thing. The one time I did I messed up." She shrugged nonchalantly.

Vin bit his lip. It was sad how accepting she was towards this issue. So much so that she stopped trying. And it was all his fault. She was just a kid. He reached for her chin to provide comfort, but pulled back when she gave him an incriminating stare. Right. "What if I helped?"

Mu's eyes practically bulged, but she quickly regained composure, looking up at him. "You'd really help a hero?"

The demon ghost didn't hesitate in nodding and the girl kept staring. He felt her shields lower when she finally nodded back. "Thanks, Snatcher.."

He replied with a soft smile, "Please, call me Vin."

The mustached girl raised an eyebrow. "Is that your real name or something?"

Vin took a sharp breath. He shook his head. "It.. just sounds right, kiddo.."

Mu blinked. Did that strike some sort of nerve? she felt a little bad, but this demon was also formerly a bad guy. So she didn't feel that bad. "So..?"

"You stay here," the demon gently instructed. "I'll find Mafia Boss."

The girl was about to protest, but the last time she did something herself she messed up and lost. So she crossed her arms. "Fine."

"Things will be okay, kid. I promise," he reassured her again before he flew out and off into town.

The blonde watched the demon ghost disappear pensively. Before she smirked a bit. Since when did she follow directions?

=========

Many interrogations and much Mafia fear later and Vin found himself in the lair. There was so much gold and jewelry here. He figured they were stolen goods from the people who used to live here. He floated down the halls, unknowingly being followed by a certain someone.

A powerful Russian voice bellowed through the halls, and Vin now knew exactly which way to go. A jar of fluids and eyes and a mustache sat on the throne, thick eyebrows furrowed constantly. "Foolish girls. Foolish time pieces. If time was set back to how things were, how did I not get my body back too?!"

"Mafia does not know, boss!" a goon fanning him replied.

"Sorry, boss!" another goon standing guard responded, bowing his head.

"Eh!" the jar hopped with anger. "It's that little girl's fault! I'd do anything to get my body back!"

"Anything?" a new voice resounded through the halls, and it froze every goon in earshot. They knew that voice.

"Oh?!" Mafia Boss raised an eyebrow, floating blue eyes glaring around. "Who goes there?!"

And that's when Vin started to materialize from the shadows on the floor, and that's when the goons nearby ran for their lives. The jar looked up and up and up as the dripping shadow formed into a purple demon with freckles. "Wh..who are you?"

"Your worst nightmare…" the demon scowled at Mafia Boss, those glowing golden eyes staring down at him.

"Are you the one who's been eating the souls of the Mafia?!" the jar's eyes widened, and so did a certain kid's. "Don't eat mine, please!"

That question and plea were like arrows to the heart and Vin flinched, losing his terrifying aura. "I.. didn't want to.."

Mustache Girl gazed at them from the shadows, silently gulping down fear. She didn't exactly fear Vin before, but that was when she was all-powerful. Now, though…

"Preposterous!" Mafia Boss yelled, backing farther into his throne. "You enjoyed every minute of it, you monster!"

The demon bit his lip, and his thick eyebrows furrowed. Oh, that really hurt. But he simply threw it right back. "And you're not a monster?"

The question made Mafia Boss jump slightly, those eyebrows rising in the liquid. Vin got a little closer. "You and your goons drove the true natives of this island off, and you don't consider yourself a monster?"

The jar blinked, before he scoffed. "No other island is as perfect as this for Mafia! the residents were weak!"

"And that gives you the right…?" Vin was up in his face now, snarling, and Mafia Boss immediately lost heart, thinking this would be the end. But he kept strong, and didn't bother to reply. The demon backed up a bit, crossing his fluffy arms. "Well, how about we work out a deal? I heard you want your body back. I could make it happen."

The jar tilted to the side, eyebrows rising higher. "What will you get out of it?"

"Nothing much, just for you to give the former residents their livelihoods back," the demon replied.

Somewhere in the room, Mu smiled.

Mafia Boss found himself shaking and sweating. That was impossible now. "Oh ho.. but that's a no can do! it's been hundreds of years and I'm afraid the residents who lived here are long gone probably! Mafia doesn't know where they went!"

Vin bit his lip, and scowled harder. "Then I guess you won't get your body back…"

He turned to leave, but was stopped by a frantic jar. "Wait! I'll try to find them! every single one of them! we'll search every nook and cranny just please let me get my body back!"

Vin glanced over, and smiled. It wasn't warm in any way though. "Glad you reconsidered. And you better find them."

A scroll popped up in front of the jar, detailing the exact terms and conditions. A contract. Mafia Boss didn't hesitate signing it with a purple quill that appeared by his side.

"There. I'll send boats and airships right now!" Mafia Boss nodded rapidly.

"Good," Vin bestowed magic on the jar, and a cloud overcame the jar. Next thing they knew, it disappeared, revealing a mustached human being, clothed and all. He saluted and shakily reached for a microphone, and then slowly stood up and headed for the curtains.

Vin sighed, drooping slightly. If only he could give Subcon Forest and himself a second chance at true life that way. The demon started floating away, head bowed. Time to go tell Mu what happened.

But the girl herself jumped out of her hiding spot, startling the fur off Vin. "Woah! kiddo.. didn't I tell you to stay-"

"There, I know, but how could I miss this?" she grinned, eyes sparkling. "You really showed that bad guy what for! now I can have my family and friends back!"

"Easy there, kiddo.." Vin found he couldn't be mad at Mu, and smiled sadly. He wanted to break the news to her, that her family and friends may not be found or even exist anymore. But that'd break her heart. So he'd just let her be happy for once. It was a good look on her.

And then he found himself in a hug. Mu hummed. "Mmmm, thank you so much, Vin!" The part about him eating souls didn't exactly matter to her anymore. All that mattered was that she'd finally be at peace.

The demon blinked, and smiled even wider, hugging back. "You're welcome, kiddo…"

And so they strolled out of the palace, and lo and behold airships and boats were lined up and ready to depart. Sure, Mu would be almost alone on this island for a while, but she was more than happy to have a break from the Mafia. After all, she had a prospect to look forward to, and Vin promised to come visit her again.

Now.. to find a proper home...

The End

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And there we go! I'll edit the master post soon and include the link in there! hope you enjoyed!

#long post #post ahit au #post ahit #post-ahit au #post-ahit #vin #au snatcher #my au snatcher #ahit au snatcher #ahit #a hat in time fanfiction #a hat in time au #a hat in time snatcher #ahit snatcher #ahit the snatcher #the snatcher ahit #the snatcher #snatcher #mafia boss #mustache girl #ahit mustache girl #ahit mafia boss #my fanfiction #my fanfic #ahit snatcher au #ahit fanfic #ahit fanfiction #my story #story #a hat in time fanfic

[looselucy]

Fight

“Maybe… Maybe you should put me down now.” I whispered after spending some time admiring the look of exhilaration that had clouded his usual bright eyes. “Shit, yeah, fuck, sorry.”

He distanced from me so that I could unwrap my legs from around his waist, shedding his body from mine. My feet slowly met the ground once again, my back still pressed against the wall beside his door, Harry keeping hold of me until the very last second, like he thought I may still fall over without his aid. I sort of felt the same way. We were slowly coming back to our senses, and it was leaving us both in a state where we weren’t quite sure what to say to one another. I was still rather breathless from the kiss, budging uncomfortably on my spot and staring up to him, seeing the way he still smiled, practically giddy. “Stop looking at me like that.” I blushed. “Sorry. Can’t help it.” “We’ve still got work to do, Styles.” He nodded, trying to bite back his smile, but I had instilled this ray of hope within him that was making him shine in ways that could not be darkened. “Okay, m’sorry.” He strained. “M’behaving.” I didn’t believe that for a second, but it was nice to feel so endeared by him rather than angry or frustrated or just overwhelmed by him and his actions. Desperate to escape his stares, I headed back through into the living room, letting him follow my lead. Through the doorway ahead of me, I spotted the broken mug that had shattered across the kitchen floor, my coffee seeping into and staining the wood. “Woah, Alf.” I heard Harry cry when he noticed my rapid approach toward the mess. “Please don’t. Let me sort that.” “For fuck sake, Harry.” I huffed as I crouched down on the ground and began carefully retrieving shards. “Please-” “Just help me.” Sighing so that he could make it clear he wasn’t impressed by how stubborn I was being, he retrieved a small dustpan and brush from the kitchen cupboard below his sink and then crouched down in front of me and got to work, managing to easily sweep up some of the larger pieces, the smaller ones trapped in dints and cracks. We were quiet for a while. “I’m sorry.” He muttered. “Why?” “I dunno why I do shit like this.” He nodded down to the shattered ceramic. He was frustrated with himself, ashamed about an outburst he’d had only moments earlier. I felt bad for him, in a way. I didn’t want him beating himself up over a mindless bit of rage that hadn’t really caused any harm. “I guess… emotions are running high today-” “That’s no excuse. I’ve still got stuff I need to work on, I know that.” He stopped what he was doing, looked right at me, so I looked at him. “There are still things about myself that I don’t like, and I want to be better. I need you to know that this isn’t… a reflection of me. This is all stuff I’m working on, Fee-Fee, I promise.” “I know.” I whispered warily. He nodded and dropped his head, got back to work. Harry had always been working on himself, trying to better himself. Always. It came as no surprise to me. He hadn’t needed to explain himself, but I could see why he had, especially after all the worries and emotions I had already expressed to him that morning. But I knew him and I knew that he’d always be making an effort to be the best version of himself; that’s just what Harry was like, successful or not. We were down to the final few pieces before he spoke again. “I’m sorry.” “You don’t need to keep apologising. It’s fine, honestly.” He simply shook his head, overthinking his actions, overthinking how I might be viewing his actions. He collected the final few pieces from the ground, standing back upright and heading to dispose of them as I stayed on the ground, watched him. “I’m not expecting you to be perfect, Harry.” I wanted to make that clear to him. If we were really going to try and make a go of things again, I didn’t want Harry to do so feeling like he had to be on his best behaviour, like he had to manage and alter himself to suit me. I had fallen in love with everything about him, not limited to his good attributes. “Okay.” He accepted through a sigh. “Then… tell me what you want.” I got to my feet, cautiously made my way over to him whilst he leaned against the kitchen counter, apprehensively awaiting my answer. “I can tell you what I don’t want.” I stopped a few inches ahead of him, noticing how the proximity affected him, made him tense and rattled in a rather charming way. “Tell me.” “I don’t want secrets. I don’t want to hide away, like we used to. I don’t want a relationship that’s locked indoors like we have something to hide. If you really want me back, we’re not just gunna pick things up where we left off. It’s something new, and it’s open.” “I want the same thing.” He whispered deeply. “And I don’t want to ever feel like I’m trying to… figure out what’s happening whilst you pull away from me. I want you to be open and honest, like you have been since you got back.” “I can do that.” He nodded. “And I’m not gunna pull away from you, Fee.” “You don’t know that.” “No, I do.” He fought. “You have to believe me. I… I don’t care what happens… You’re the one thing I’m certain of. No matter what changes around us, it’ll still be us. Just me and you.” He had said those very words to me so many times since he’d entered my life, claiming it was just me and him. I wanted to believe him. I wanted to believe him so badly. I took hold of his jumper with both hands, looking down as my fingers tugged and fiddled with the material. He covered my hands with his, touching me softly as I closed my eyes and shared what I believed was the most important thing that I didn’t want. “And I don’t want you to ever feel like you have to monitor yourself around me.” I told him timidly. “When you’re mad at me, be mad. When you’re feeling down, just feel it. I don’t ever want you to feel as though you can’t experience your emotions honestly because you might run the risk of losing me, because that’s not how it is, at all. I don’t want you to be perfect. I… I just want you.” When he didn’t respond to me, I lifted my head to look him in the eye, seeing the mystified look of adoration that cloaked his features, as though he couldn’t even believe what I had just said to him. He didn’t need to put on a show to win me back. He didn’t need to be faultless, because I wanted him with all his flaws, all the honest and raw love he had to offer. Our relationship beforehand had been shrouded in secrecy, and now all I wanted was a life of honesty with him. Tears began to fill his eyes, coming to terms for the first time with the fact that I wanted him, exactly how he was. I always had. “I love you so fucking much.” He gasped when the first tear fell.

“You’re fucking kidding. Tell me you’re kidding.” Harry gasped, sitting upright on the sofa. “I’m deadly serious.” “Chloe and Sam?” “Yep.” “Fuck off. What the fuck? I feel like you’re lying and you’re just seeing what I’ll fall for.” “I’m genuinely not lying, I promise.” I laughed. “They’re together.” “When? Why?” “For ages!” I cried. “Like… it was going on behind closed doors when we were going on behind closed doors.” “No fucking way. What the fuck is she thinking?” “They’re in love.” I shrugged, because there was truly no better explanation. “He seems to be loads better now, y’know. I think she’s the right person for him and now he’s like… the best version of himself. For her, because of her, I dunno. But… they’re really good together.” He seemed rather dubious, but Harry hated Sam more than I’d ever even had the energy to. But I knew I was right, and I remembered so clearly the time my dad had said that to me; that one day Sam would meet someone and all those wonderful things would just come naturally to him, and he would become the best version of himself when that day came. I truly believed Chloe was that person. “Well,” Harry sighed, focusing his gaze on his lap, where his fingers fiddled a fidgeted, a distraction from the obvious. “I get that. I think… I think you always made me the best version of myself, so… yeah. I get it.” The sun was beginning to set and the two of us were sat across from one another on his sofa, where we’d spent most of our day. Since my attempt and subsequent failure to leave, we had revisited his paintings, he’d spoken to me about them more, gave me a brush and tried to instil some knowledge upon me, teach me some techniques, the two of us painting together again, as we had that one time. In the afternoon, we had eaten together and been playful and spoken about absolutely nothing and yet everything, eventually moving our conversation to the sofa where we still sat. And we hadn’t kissed since that morning. That felt like a good thing, though difficult. Especially when he said things like that. I couldn’t keep my eyes off him. I had missed the simple pleasure of purely being around him; existing within his atmosphere and him existing within mine. I found that my most pensive and wistful moments were trapped inside his tiny movements, noises, his scent, his tone and mannerisms, the mundane tics of his that should have meant nothing that actually meant more than I’d ever realised. It felt incredible to just be around him. “What?” Harry sniggered. “Nothing!” “You’re staring. “M’not staring.” Clearly, I was lying. I didn’t cover it well and he certainly didn’t believe me, shaking his head and grinning wildly, mood lifting. The second I looked away from him, I felt the way he lifted his head and looked at me, blatantly obvious. It was no surprise he had noticed my stares. “Wanna hear the most unbelievable thing?” I asked him. “More unbelievable than Sam and Chloe?” “Mhm. By a mile.” “Hit me.” “Your mum knew my mum.” I lifted my eyes so I could see his immediate reaction. He went pale. Literally. The life drained from his skin as the knowledge I had shared settled in his mind, becoming so completely dumbstruck I wasn’t sure I’d ever get any words from him again. It was odd to have to catch him up on things such as Sam and Chloe, the way our mothers knew one another. He hadn’t even known that Louis and Libby were engaged. He’d missed out on so much since he had left, the little and large occurrences. Telling him had helped me to realise how much he cared, not just about me but about everything and everyone he had found in Rosebury. He'd missed it, I could tell. “When they were little, before your mum moved away.” I continued when I realised that he wouldn’t be able to form an answer. “Best friends, apparently. That’s kinda how me and your mum got talking. She came into my shop and she recognised my name, and then she mentioned the dog my mum had when she was little, and it clicked. Turns out they were pretty close.” “Holy shit.” He panted. “I know.” I’m not sure what I expected him to say. There wasn’t much to say, really, it was just incredible to think about. It had been almost a month since she had visited my shop and we had come to that astounding realisation, and it still hadn’t quite sunk in. It was such a wonderful thing. Somehow it made me feel more of a bond with my mother whilst also giving me more of a bond with Harry. It was a stunning sensation to experience. He shook his head, spoke breathily. “I… I don’t believe in fate, but shit. Meeting you makes me doubt myself.” “Turns out we go pretty far back.” I smiled. “And further forward, I hope.” The gentle optimism within his voice made me tremble, gazing down into my lap and failing to hide my smile. “Shit. I can’t believe they knew each other.” “Crazy, innit?” “S’weird. Makes me feel… even closer to you.” “I… I’ve missed being close with you.” I mumbled nervously. “I’ve missed everything about you, to be honest.” “I’ve missed you too.” His voice was quiet but confident, clear, rueful. “Just… this. Being around you. Talking to you. You were… everything whilst I was here. I guess I hadn’t realised just how much of a void there would be in my life without you.” “When you left… did you think that was it? Like… did you think that was the end? Or did you always want to… come back?” “I thought that was the end. But only because I thought things were better that way. That you’d be happier that way. I didn’t think your happiness could include me.” “Now you think… you’re my happiness?” “I think I could be.” He responded. “If you want me to be. If you let me. I could be a part of it, anyway. I know your friends and your life here is your happiness, I just wanna be a part of that again.” “I know what you mean, but… you had a life here too, Harry. You didn’t just come into mine. It was yours.” “Well then I want to live a life that’s ours.” He was being so incredibly forward, his endeavour clearly to make up for all those times where he hadn’t been upfront with me. But I knew that wasn’t the sole reason behind his earnest nature; I knew that he desired to be that way for himself. This was a new corner he had taken, and finally, he found strength in honesty, when all he had found before was weakness and pain. His truth was finally something that made him strong. I remained coy, still not giving him a certain answer whenever he had put himself and his wants out on a line for me to analyse. I just blushed, my stomach seeming to expand and shrink in quick succession as I tried to avoid his words. “Uh… It’s getting late.” I choked. “We should probably get some sleep.” “Spare room?” He asked. “Spare room.” I confirmed. He didn’t put up a fight, which I appreciated, but I didn’t miss the look of disappointment that danced over him, even if it was just for a split second. His shoulders dropped, his throat snagged, a gulp of air hitting the back of his throat before he nodded, his eyes looking anywhere other than at me. “Okay. You’re the boss.” He smiled. That didn’t help me, him saying that. Even more than him calling me boss, it was the simple fact that I knew he meant it. He wasn’t just saying it, he wasn’t secretly frustrated by where I wanted to spend my evening; I was the boss and it was totally up to me and he respected whatever my choice was. That made my decision to stay in the spare room even less appealing than it already was. Harry got up to his feet, offering his hand to me so that he could help me upwards. Placing my fingers between his set my whole body alight. Every fucking inch of it. I couldn’t believe it, but that simple touch we shared brought back so many feelings, ones I had spent that day with him trying to subdue and repress, ones I had tried to forget for the past year. I had wanted to talk with him and truly gather how I felt without the physical side of things, without my passions taking over, but then all I had to do was hold his hand and these undeniable emotions rushed over me. I could have cried it was so overwhelming, and all he’d done was take my fucking hand and it was as though I could see my future with him, map it all out and plan because I fucking trusted him. It didn’t matter what had happened, I trusted him and I knew I wouldn’t be a fool to open my heart back up to him once again. I just knew it. And all I’d done was hold his fucking hand. I withdrew my touch with speed, thanking him quietly for his assistance and then scuttling out of the room with my head down to the ground, deluded by thinking that may help me and my dire need to avoid both him and the feelings he was inflicting upon me by doing so little. I’d just wanted to be that bit stronger, a way of proving to him just how serious I was, just how much he’d hurt me. I had fooled myself into thinking that would be easy, that the infuriation and hurt that I had homed for the past year would be enough to stop me feeling fondly for him prematurely, before I’d fully made my point, before I’d reached my final conclusion. I was just drawn to him in ways I couldn’t deny. He was a few steps behind me as we made our way upstairs in silence for the second consecutive night, but unfortunately the fact it wasn’t the first time didn’t put me any more at ease. If anything, I was more tense than I had been the night before. “Thank you.” Harry said as I reached the doorway to the spare room, turning around so I could look at him. “For today. I’ve loved it.” It had been rather magnificent to spend so much time with him again. I hadn’t expected it to be quite as easy as it was, but being around him and talking to him had been as natural and wonderful as it always had been. He somehow managed to make me feel so relaxed, so myself. I’d loved it too. “Goodnight.” I smiled, beginning to close the door. “Night.” He returned. I shut him out as quickly as I could, then laying my forehead against the door and closing my eyes, fighting urges, taking a minute to myself before I ripped away and started undressing, pulling my t-shirt over my head as I wandered to the far side of the bed. I really wanted to snap out of it. I could feel my self-control slipping away as I undressed, begging me to stop being so stubborn and to face up to the fact that I should have been in the room next door. I should have been with Harry. I sat myself on the edge of the bed when I got down to my underwear, in two minds. I didn’t want love to have been the thing to shatter me. It had reached the stage where it was my decision, what love did, how it affected me, and I could either let it be something that drained me and caused pain, or I could let it consume me in the greatest way it could; with warmth and joy and devotion and desire and passion and every fucking thing he wanted to offer me. I made a split decision which side of my mind to follow. I decided how love would influence my life and command my soul. I got back to my feet, cursing beneath my breath as I stormed right back out of there, into the hall and knocking on his door as quickly as I could. He appeared within seconds, panting, he too stripped down to his underwear. “Please tell me you wanna stay in here.” He gasped, and I nodded. “Thank fuck, m’dying.” The relief physically poured from him, stepping aside to welcome me back into his bedroom fully as I giggled at his response to me, my eyes exploring the dimly lit space, the moonlight welcoming a murky glow into his stark room. My smile didn’t last long. “There’s no plants.” I mumbled as he closed the door. “No. I uh… I had to get rid of them when I left.” His room had always been a bare and barren place, but without those plants there was really nothing to it, just his low bed and unmade sheets and us. Nothing more than that. “It doesn’t feel right. Doesn’t feel like you.” I stated, staring down to the empty space where his plants had once been. “It does now you’re here.” My eyes drew back to him, seeing the solemn and serious look upon his face, marking just how much he had meant those words. He was somehow managing to make me so nervous, my stomach in knots, questioning how one person could make me feel so on edge and exhilarated whilst simultaneously being the embodiment of home. As much as I had missed him, I hadn’t necessarily missed what he could do to me, how weak he could make me. It was something I seemed to have a love / hate relationship with. It was both fascinating and infuriating. He must have noticed my uneasiness, my apparent inability to answer him. “C’mon. Let’s go to bed.” He suggested. We both walked around to what we knew were our subconsciously designated sides of the bed, Harry first quietly observing as I lay myself down and dragged the duvet upwards, and then he joined me, the two of us laying with a huge space between us in the centre, facing one another. I looked into his eyes for as long as I could stomach, seeing right into his soul. “This feels weird.” I hushed honestly. “I mean… it feels right, but weird.” “It feels right?” “Mm. I… For fuck sake.” I chuckled, hiding my face by dragging the duvet even higher. “Forget I said that. I’m embarrassing myself. Ignore me.” “I can’t ignore you, that’s my problem.” We had both tried to ignore each other, disregard that feeling the other inspired, but at that point I was sure that doing so would mean we were fighting a losing battle. Maybe it was better to surrender. He grasped the duvet, slowly easing it downwards so that he could see my face, then placing his fingers beneath my chin to gently nudge my head up, urging me to look at him once again. “I… I think it feels right because it is right.” He elaborated on my words. “There’s something about me and you, Alf. We’ve both tried to fight it but this is where we’ll end up, every time. Maybe we should stop fighting.” I had no fight left in me. Whatever it was I had been trying to dismiss, it wasn’t going to happen. It may have taken some time, but as I closed my eyes then, I felt I had accepted that within myself. I was making my peace with it, I just needed to sleep on it, and then it would be time to truly share that with him. I only opened my eyes again when I felt his touch move, the back of his fingers resting against my cheek whilst his thumb stroked sweetly back and forth beneath my eye. He had tears in his eyes. “Why’re you crying?” I asked with an ache in my gut. “I missed this.” He managed to smile, a tear rolling from his eye and hitting the pillow. “Even just seeing you like this. It’s fucking pathetic, but I… I’ve stared at the empty side of the bed for over a year, and now you’re actually here again and I… I can’t explain what it’s doing to me.” Whatever doubts I may have had when it came to Harry and his feelings towards me had been entirely demolished. Everything from the way he moved to the way he looked at me and the things he said, there was no way I could feel anxious or worry over the truth of his feelings; he lay himself totally bare for me. He was quiet, unbelievably beautiful and alluring even when he was in tears. I kept my eyes on him, my hand laying lightly on his chest. “Will you hold me?” I eventually asked. He nodded, still not quite able to believe that I was there with him, bewildered by my presence and how close I wanted us to be. And so leaned into him, placed the smallest and most delicate kiss I possibly could upon his lips, lingering within the moment a few breath-taking seconds before I pulled away, noticed the woozy look of bliss on his face before I turned myself to face away from him. His arms were around my waist within a second, pulling me back to him, breathing me in. I loved the way his body felt against mine, the strength he used to capture me and keep me as his own, kissing the back of my neck and keeping his snare secure, holding me as close as he could, tender yet intense. He handled me with care, compensating for the harm he had caused. Nothing felt better. I could have stayed there forever, knowing that I consumed every sense he had. “Goodnight.” I cooed once I felt totally settled, sleep only seconds away. “Goodnight, Fee-Fee.”

July 20th Waking up hadn’t felt that good in months. The sun was bright, casting shadows of the woodland onto his bedroom floor. Harry’s arms were still around me, like we hadn’t moved a muscle since we’d slotted ourselves together the night before, as though our bodies had relished in their chance to merge into one once more. I got this immediate sense of peace, as soon as I opened my eyes, slowly blinking in the morning, hearing Harry breathing ever so gently behind me. I could hear a bird chirping just outside his window, feel the warmth of his body radiating against mine. I didn’t even want to wake him, I simply wanted to stay in that moment, embrace it in all its glory. It was quite some time before he stirred, inhaling both the morning and me, snuggling closer. “It wasn’t a dream then.” He grumbled. “Huh?” “You’re really here. You’re really in my bed with me.” “I am.” “Fucking mad how good it feels.” He chuckled as I unhinged from him just slightly, enough so that I could turn around and look at him, propping myself up with my elbows, Harry keeping me wrapped in his arms as much as he could. “You sleep okay?” “Really well.” This time, I wasn’t lying. “Did you?” “Yeah. Amazingly, actually. Like I used to.” He always looked so good in the morning, with his eyes still droopy, hair messy, voice docile and deep. Harry was at his absolute finest mere moments after stirring, it was implausible. “Thank you for letting me stay in here.” “Letting?” He sniggered. “It’s hardly like I’ve done you a favour.” “I guess not.” I laughed lightly. “I feel like if anything, I should be thanking you.” He smiled. “Even for… giving me a chance. I know I probably don’t deserve it, after everything.” “Harry-” “Y’know what, this might be a little too deep, a little too early. It’s a bit much.” He grinned sweetly. “Let’s have a relaxed morning. I’ll start my begging again later.” My cheeks were already hurting thanks to the size of my smile. I admired him in silence, stroking my thumb across his bottom lip, taking my time to silently worship each individual feature on his face, noticing that after a while of staring back at me he just closed his eyes, cherished my touch. We stayed that way for some time, quiet, calm. And then I shattered it. “I love you.” I gasped. His eyes bolted back open. Frankly, I was as stunned as he was. Not only was that the first time I had told him I loved him since he came back, but it was the first time that I was able to admit to myself that I loved him, that I’d always loved him. It had never stopped. It had never lessened or frozen or weakened; it had always been there, even when he wasn’t. He was right with what he’d said the night before, about us trying to ignore and fight our instincts; no matter how we tried, no matter how valiant our efforts, we would find our way back to each other every single time. We didn’t quite seem to function fully without the other. Tears created a mist that clouded his green eyes, lips parted, body shaking. “I don’t wanna fight it anymore.” I started crying too. “I’m so tired of fighting.” “Don’t fight it.” He shivered. “I love you.” I lay myself back down on my side of the bed like even saying it exhausted me, made me need to rest my body. “I really love you, I never stopped. And I want this. I want all the things you want, but I’ve just been so scared to admit this because I didn’t know if you really did love me or-” “Don’t.” He tried to stop my words of doubt. “But-” “Fee-Fee, I…” He was struggling to word how he felt. “I gave you my heart the second I told you about my family. I just didn’t know what it meant. And… I didn’t know that you’d keep it.” I suppose Harry hadn’t expected me to look after his heart in the way I had. Too often his life had revolved around times of hardship and losing those he loved, feeling as though his heart had been misused or abandoned, misunderstood and jilted. I wanted to prove to him that his heart was finally in safe hands. As long as he wanted to keep mine, I would keep his heart close and fill it with all the love he had missed out on in his loneliest years. “I love you, Harry.” “Fuck, I love you too.” I hadn’t even known where his hands were beforehand, but all of a sudden they were on the back of my head and weaving through my hair, pulling me closer to him so that he could close the gap and put his lips on mine, his hands grasping so his fingertips pressed heavy into my head, his hips winding forward until his body pushed restlessly against mine. I snaked my hands up to clasp at his neck, feeling the way his jaw moved when his mouth widened as his tongue teased my own, one hand of his leaving my hair and moving down my body so that he could yank my waist so that I was closer to him even still. I hung my leg over his hip, pushed my groin to his, heard him bleat bleakly in response, hardening and swelling through his boxers and I could feel it. His fingers went to my bra as mine went to find the band of his underwear, pulling them down as far as I could without breaking our kiss, leaving him to do the rest of the work once they were out of reach, kicking them off his legs as I took his dick in my hand, heard the way he groaned in response, so loud and raw that it was obvious just how long it had been since I had touched him that way, the power of what I was doing to him. “Fuck, Fee-” He grunted. “I want you.” He lost his patience quite quickly, moving so that he was above me and he could easily make his way down my body, kissing trails right from my neck and over my chest and my stomach whilst his fingers dug into either side of my knickers and gradually guided them downwards, meaning that within seconds the two of us were completely naked, and his mouth was an inch away from my clit. “Fuck.” I was already breathless, just feeling him breathe against me, my head lolling heavily into the pillow. He turned his head, kissed the inside of my thigh, his teeth teetering tenderly against my skin, harsh enough that I was forced to bite my lip. And then his tongue was on my clit, his hands clasping my legs and forcing them to widen, eyes burning me as he watched my reaction, which was one of astonishment. I’d almost forgotten how good he was, how good he made me feel. He’d barely started, but it was the fact it was him doing it that made it feel so utterly extraordinary. The way his mouth moved was wonderous, my fingers digging into the mattress whilst his tongue worked my clit, hardly able to hear the way he moaned thanks to my panting and whining, pushing a little closer to him. For a few moments, it was as though nothing had changed, as though we hadn’t lost all that time. I closed my eyes, and all those months rewound in my mind, back to before his brother had broken into his home, before I’d told him I loved him. I was back in those perfect months we had shared, where it seemed like he was my whole world, when nothing else had mattered except us and our relationship. I wanted that again. I wanted to be totally consumed by him in every single way I could be. But I knew that this time around we’d have an honesty we never had before, an openness, a chance to build something that felt real, something that would last. If I thought what we’d had before was perfect, it would pale in comparison to what we were about to create together. “Harry,” I gasped, my left hand resting over my breast and my fingers rubbing my nipple as my right hand reached down, my fingers clasping at his hair. “M’so close.” I gazed down my body and pulled at his hair, harsh enough that he had to stop for a second, his eyes like saucers and his wet lips forming a blissed-out smile, appreciating my taste and my tight grip. He went back in as soon as he could, his hand moving from my leg so that he could touch my heat, circling and then easing his thumb into me, the perfect addition to what his mouth was doing. I unravelled, practically screaming as I did, Harry still with his mouth right against me, devouring my orgasm before he started moving back up my body, his wet kisses marking his journey back up to my mouth. He kissed me, but I struggled to respond, like everything was just happening around me and I was too out of it to actually do anything myself. “I’ve missed hearing you scream like that.” He grunted, two of his fingers rubbing slowly between my folds. He'd always liked that, how loud I was. I could still remember everything about that time in his gym, the first time he’d touched me that way, covered my mouth with his hand to try and drown out my cries. “Make me scream again.” I requested breathlessly, biting my bottom lip. He smirked, positioned himself, looked down between our bodies to watch what he was doing as he slowly pushed himself into me, filling and stretching me out, both of us cursing in time with one another. Fuck it felt so good. Too good. “Holy shit, fuck.” He almost sounded angry as he moved and kissed my neck, every movement and every touch heavy and harsh. It was us, it Harry and me, and I think no matter the circumstances it would have been incredibly intense, but it had been so fucking long since we’d been together that way, and neither of us had been with anyone since. It had been seconds, he had barely moved, and yet it was so vivaciously powerful and overwhelming that it was almost like this sexual awakening I was experiencing. Maybe on some level I knew this was it, that he was the person I would play my days out with, that no one else would ever touch me that way again. I thought it would be a tender moment, but it seemed our bodies didn’t know how to make this delicate. There was too much power, too much passion behind every movement. There was too much depth for this moment to ever be light. I clawed at his back, his thrusts driving me into the bed with so much power I thought my imprint may remain in his mattress from that point onwards. His messy mouth moved from my neck to my lips, kissing me with everything he had. “I love you.” He whined. “I love you too.” I just about replied, my words shrouded in desire. His hands were on my waist, so forceful that it was almost painful, but in this strange way it was enjoyable. I knew I didn’t want him to let go. The bed moved as he did, and I was already so out of it with pleasure that I could barely comprehend what was happening, how big and commanding he was, how forceful his kiss. He told me he loved me again, gasped those three words I had waited so long to hear him say, and then he said them over and over again until it felt as though that was all I could hear. He surrounded me with the love he had finally learnt how to give, and I wanted him to do that forever. I started to cry. I wasn’t sure when it happened, and those tears were not derived from any pain or sadness. I just started crying, tears quietly streaming down my face, my chest juddering. Harry noticed, stopped kissing me. “Alf? What’s wrong?” “Nothing, it’s nothing.” I shuddered, smiled up to him. “It’s perfect, I promise.” I didn’t need to reassure him more than that, because he understood it. He understood the emotions I was experiencing and why they had stirred that reaction. I remembered how it used to be when we slept together. We’d always had that connection that made our sex magnificent, unlike anything I’d experienced before him; it had never been bad, but there had been times where it had felt empty. There had been times where he was like a stranger and I’d struggled to find that real bond with him. He had gotten so accustom to locking himself away from others and sharing nothing real that sometimes being intimate with him had been anything but. Being with him then was like I could see and feel everything, all of who he was, who he had been, who he wanted to be in his future, our future. There was nowhere to hide anymore. He kissed me until he physically couldn’t any longer, his orgasm building up and conquering his body. I could literally feel the heat rising through his frame, watching him intently. “Fuck, fuck.” He broke, jamming his forehead against mine as he finished. I grabbed his cheeks in my hands and kissed at his lips as he came back around, smiling as I planted tiny pecks upon him, able to feel his shakes. He looked so beautiful, so happy. His face was this picture of pure pleasure and joy, which was exactly why I wanted to kiss it over and over again. We’d both been sort of spaced-out all morning, not quite able to comprehend where we were and how we were feeling. “This can’t be real.” He whispered. Harry never expected the best. Even after therapy, and how much that had helped him and assisted when it came to him viewing things that little bit differently, it hadn’t quite done enough to alter that part of Harry’s mind that always expected the worst, because so often it was the worst he had gotten. “It’s real.” I told him. “You love me?” “I do. And I forgive you. I understand and I forgive you and I wanna move on and build a future with you. If that’s what you want.” “Of course that’s what I want.” He gasped. “It’s what I’ve always wanted.” We started kissing again, wrapping our arms around one another and writhing around on his bed, obsessed with each other. He took me with him as he rolled onto his back so that I was straddling him, my long hair falling all around us, our smiles an additional part of our kiss. We cooled, Harry biting his lip as he gazed up to me. “So… where do we go from here?” I asked. “Uh… I guess we need to tell everyone. Fuck.” “Louis knows.” “Of course Louis knows, you tell Louis everything.” He sniggered. I hit his chest playfully, deciding not to tell him that Lin had also figured out that something had been gone on with us. I knew what Harry was like, and I knew it was no time for me to be mentioning Lin. “And I’m gunna move back here. Back into this house.” He said. “What? You are?” Even with all the things he’d said to me, I had still expected him to up and leave, sell that house. There was a reason he’d bought that building in the first place, and it had fallen through. I thought it might hurt him too much to stay there. “I think I bought this house convinced that it was for my mum and that was all it could be, but maybe it should be mine. Maybe it wasn’t supposed to be about the past, but it’s supposed to be about the future. My future here, with you.” “I agree. I think you need to start putting yourself first, Harry.” “I wanna live here. I wanna be with you. That’s what I want. That’s me putting myself first. Being here is my happiness, I know it. You’re my happiness.” I had tears in my eyes. My heart was beating out of my fucking chest. “You’re coming home.” I quivered. “I’m coming home.” He confirmed, eyes misting over once more. My delight was so monopolizing, such a force to be reckoned with. Harry and the love we shared was my eschatology, proving that I had found what I needed and I no longer had anything to seek in order to make my life better. He was the finale, the end of it all, the highest form of heaven that I could reach. All my life, I had heard people say that love was blind, but being with him proved that to be untrue. Love is not blind, it is all-seeing, attuned, all-consuming, intuitive, omnipotent, almighty, observant, controlling and compelling. Love was not blind nor ugly, as I had always known it to be. It had changed completely. And I had Harry to thank for that.

#Happy Bloody Sunday #it's the last chapter 😭😭 #we're pretty much picking up where we left off #you might be waiting a longer than a week for the epilogue #so enjoy this #HBS49

[tinayoufatlarrdd]

She

Frankly, they didn’t start on the best term.

He met Y/N during a photoshoot for a certain famous magazine. She was assigned to grace the cover of said magazine with the photograph of the world’s most it couple, Harry Styles and the supermodel who gained the universal acclaim for ‘taming the baby Mick Jagger’.

It was all fun and pretty until Y/N accidentally stepped on the girlfriend’s polished toes.

“For fuck’s sake!” Harry screamed at Y/N as the supermodel girlfriend suddenly started limping her way to Harry, asking for some sort of first aid.

Y/N couldn’t stop muttering sorry, offering ice blocks, even kneeling next to the supermodel girlfriend begging for forgiveness. The creative director, the crew, the editors—the whole studio apologized countless times for the tiny slip as the girlfriend pouted, complaining about the unbearable pain, causing Harry to hit the ceiling.

He yelled at Y/N and refused to go on. Y/N, knowing her inferior position in the equation, could only look down as the apologies continuously rolled out of her tongue. To be fair, everyone in the studio (except the lovebirds, obviously) knew it wasn’t that big of a deal.

Y/N was capturing Harry’s solo session while the girlfriend fixed the hair and makeup. She was up next for her solo session and then it’s a wrap. Of course the photographer would move around; every supermodel should be aware of the fact that angles were plenty and it took treads to actually find the right ones. Y/N was constantly moving, camera on hand, eyes on the viewfinder, then suddenly the ‘big accident’ occurred.

Y/N was barefooted, she wouldn’t even be able to squeeze a hard turd if she ever stepped on one with that wonky heel of hers. There was no way she’d had caused the girlfriend that much pain. And nobody blamed Y/N as they all witnessed how the girlfriend walked on set with her eyes on the phone, hitting Y/N first. Nobody but the girlfriend and Harry Styles, of course. So they all just watched in silence as Harry cursed and threw a fit on innocent Y/N.

The power couple didn’t want to continue unless Y/N was replaced. The crew had to comply no matter how irrational the demand sounded. And on top of that, suddenly Y/N was plastered on the internet as the girl who assaulted the world’s biggest supermodel and Harry Styles.

She would never forget the overwhelming uneasiness caused by the sudden rave of negative reviews about her, all from people who endorsed and supported her in the first place but decided to be the footnote of the Hollywood sweethearts’ testimony: ‘awful to work with’, ‘nothing without the connection’, ‘a mediocre photographer who got lucky’, and ‘talentless’.

And she still couldn’t wrap her mind around that dreaded event. She had heard tremendous chivalry and gentlemanlike attitude when it came to Harry Styles yet somehow, he was nothing but a certified dick who put her job on the line that day. Some friends who remained loyal to her speculated that the girlfriend was the bad influence. Some even were convinced that he was voodooed. She didn’t care about either, all she believed was that he’s an absolute wretch with an extraordinarily thick mask. A media trained monkey was the term she occasionally used after a few tequila shots.

“That witch is his Yoko Ono, I tell ya,” the creative director told her during their final meeting—the meeting to let her go, of course.

She just shrugged. All she wanted was her old life back. And if Harry Styles and/or that supermodel got into some terrible misery in that comeback, that would definitely be her cherry on top.

She still got a few gigs, just not as much and definitely not with big profiles like she used to. For Pete’s sake, she was deemed a promising photographer by those fashion executives! She was only getting started. She would have never imagined that with just a short answer during a talk show’s truth or dare game—who’s the one person you’d never want to work with ever again?—the power couple could diminish her entire life’s worth of hard work.

Within the next few months, she’s back to square one. Every morning she tried to contact some old clients who would perhaps still deign to be affiliated with, according to the world’s biggest supermodel’s words on that talk show, ‘the rudest effin’ bitch I’ve ever seen in the industry’.

And after countless unsuccessful attempts, she went back to the cafe she used to work at when she’s still starting her career, not to network like she used to but to pour some coffee for other people again. She’s back with the apron and the napkin and she couldn’t stop being cynical over some hopeful youngsters who got signed right in front of her eyes, on the table she just wiped.

Her cameras were laid unused on top of her rack and the mini darkroom she built in her apartment became a storage room. Believing she had failed miserably in life, she found herself no longer had hopes on anything. All she knew was to get by the day.

It was a cold December night. Everyone else went home to celebrate the holidays so she decided to do the shift. She’d be paid double plus she wouldn’t have to face her family, which would go eerie in this state of her life, so it was the better choice.

Having had just finished cleaning the whole cafe, she put on her coat. She was ready to come home to… nothing. Her mind raced back to this time last year, where she was fully booked and couldn’t wait to come home so she could recharge herself for an exciting tomorrow. Her life had become exceptionally dull and it was painful to go on.

An abrupt banging on the door halted her train of desperate thoughts.

“We’re closed. Can’t you see the time?! It’s almost midnight!” she snarked, back facing the intruder.

“S- Sorry, love…” the hoarse voice was paused with a couple of hiccups. “‘m just completely devastated…”

She rolled her eyes as she turned around and she almost had a heart attack. There stood the man who destroyed her life, terribly wasted out of his mind. He could barely stand straight without holding onto the doorknob.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” she rolled her eyes, asking some deity entity if there was ever one.

“Hey! I know yeh…” Harry tried to get to her but his legs just gave up.

Falling face first, Y/N really wanted to leave him on the street. But of course she had that little voice of reason inside her that constantly screamed, “If you abandon him, you’re nothing better than him!” She was a decent person and she really hated it this time.

“Come on up,” she pulled Harry up and lingered his arm around her shoulder to help him walk. “Where do you live?”

“I don’t k- know,” he giggled. “I can’t remember, love…”

“Try,” she slapped his arm when he almost fell off yet again.

The snow was pouring down and they stood by the empty crossroad. Harry wouldn’t even remember his own name by now and she didn’t know how to get to his house. There was no other choice than to bring him home to her place.

It was nothing short of hard work to carry a man twice her size to her house on foot since there was not even a single cab around. It was even harder to hear him tell a story about his first imaginary friend during that wobbly trip where he tumbled more than five times and she had to pick him up every time. But it was the hardest when she had to take off his shoes so it wouldn’t mess with her couch—he didn’t want to take it off, nagging her with numerous ‘Go away, Mum!’s.

When she finally got to lay on her bed, she was too tired to even think of what just happened. She literally did some cardio workout bringing Harry home safe so unlike her usual nights, she fell asleep quite fast this time.

It was around four in the morning when she felt a body of weight sunk into her side. She turned around to face his uninvited guest sound asleep, legs tangled over hers like a knot. She quietly removed her legs and tried to get up. She needed to move to the couch, or anywhere far away from this invader.

This is my fucking house, why am I the one sleeping outside, she thought to herself. Anger boiling at the top of her head as her movement was stopped by his strong hand.

“Stay here…” he slurs.

He didn’t seem conscious to her. Maybe he mistook her as his girlfriend.

“I’m not—“

“I know,” he cut her off while still sleeping. “Just stay here for a while. It’s cold out there.”

She sighed and laid back down. Stiff and uncomfortable, but obviously exhausted, she closed her eyes as Harry’s arm pulled her closer to him. She could only hope the night would soon end or better yet, this was all not real.

When Harry woke up, he found a sticky note on his forehead.

‘You were hammered last night, didn’t know where you live so I took you home. Nothing happened, you just sorta burst into where I work around midnight so I kind of had to not abandon you. Don’t make yourself at home because this is my home.’

He couldn’t remember anything. He remembered getting blind drunk after gulping those spirit shots but what happened after that was redacted. His surrounding was unfamiliar and there was no other sign of life other than him that morning.

After splashing his face with cold water, he looked around the apartment. It was modest but very personal. There were random film rolls hung by the ceiling as Harry made his way to the living room. He put on his shoes by the couch as he observed the vinyl shelf at the corner of the room. It was filled with 60s-70s biggest musicians, from Jimi Hendrix to Van Morrison—which grew his curiosity of the owner. There were books that he also read, and the series of psychedelic photographs framed by the doorway was the biggest tic that made him wonder: how did he end up in this hippie’s safe haven, one that he actually wanted to live in when he was young? Did he get so hammered that he traveled back in time? His head hurt too bad to even think of the possibilities, all he knew was there was something about the owner that felt familiar and he ought to know them. He had to.

Harry rushed to shower at his home and got some aspirin. After running some overdue errands, he immediately went back to the apartment. He knocked on the door a few times to no avail so he decided to wait by his car outside.

Y/N was relieved when there was no sign of Harry when she got home that night. She would be lying if she wasn’t a tad bit worried of him considering he could absolutely die that night if he went to the wrong place, but then again he was the guy who ended her career so she couldn’t care less.

She picked Nick Drake’s Pink Moon from her vinyl collection and put it on the turntable. Relaxing by the couch that still reeked of alcohol and him, she ignored the constant knock on the door. It was usually her crazy neighbor looking for his nonexistent cat.

It was the sixth track that she finally got up and opened the door, hoping to end the annoyance of her peaceful evening.

Her eyes bugged out when she saw the figure by her door. It was him again.

Harry, with his furrowed eyebrows and lanky feet, looked just as surprised as she was. He clearly remembered who she was and somehow, not even Nick Drake’s soothing voice could calm her down. Filled with rage, she slammed the door right in front of his face.

Harry was shocked to see her. He’d never thought in a million years that he’d ever meet her again, moreover lodged by her. He wanted to thank her but he knew she’d probably throw a glass of water to his face. But he could not just leave.

So he did the tackiest trick in the book. When the track from behind the closed door hit Free Ride, one of his favourites, he began singing along as loud as possible. Some neighbors shushed him, some even scolded him but he didn’t stop.

She heard him loud and clear. She ignored him at first, but then she received a noise complaint call from the super. Upset, she thumped her way towards the door.

“Stop it!” she gritted her teeth as she opened it.

He stopped. “May I come in?”

“What do you want?” she barked.

“Just wanted to say thanks,” he muttered low.

“You’re welcome. There,” she slammed the door again.

There was nothing he could do so he decided to leave for now.

He came again the next day, this time saying there was something he needed to give back to her.

“What now?” she wasn’t as upset as the day before, but was still unfriendly as they just stood by the door leaf.

Harry handed her the sticky note she left on his forehead the day before.

“You can keep it,” she said as she closed the door.

No slamming door. A progress, Harry thought.

He came back again two days after that, carrying a limited release Fleetwood Mac record signed by Stevie Nicks herself.

“Got Stevie to sign it. They don’t have this at the stores anymore,” he presented it as if he was doing some product placement scene.

“Look, Harry Styles,” she crossed her arms. “I don’t even know what the hell do you want from me but I really don’t want to have anything to do with you anymore. You’ve done enough.”

“Yes, about that…” Harry scratched his forehead. “’m sorry.”

“Whatever,” she pushed the door but Harry was quick to hold it open.

“I’d help you make things right again,” his green eyes were desperate for her answer.

She let out a heavy sigh and moved aside as if cuing him to enter her little bubble. Harry entered immediately, not wanting to waste any more time in the outside world.

She was listening to Neil Young’s Harvest Moon, to which Harry sang along gently. She could hate him all she wanted but he really sounded divine especially within close proximity.

“Shouldn’t you be somewhere else, anyway?” she sat on the far end of the couch.

He put the record on the coffee table. “Where, exactly?”

“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “Some talk show to say some shit about me with the girlfriend perhaps?”

“Look ‘m really sorry, I truly am,” he sighed. “And ‘m not with her anymore…”

He then explained everything. How he fell in love for the first time in his life with the supermodel who was perfect, beautiful, smart, and everything he’d ever dreamed of. How he was so sure of her but she didn’t feel the same so he tried to show it with everything he’s got—grand romantic gestures, going public (which was personally hard for him since he was a very private person), and siding with her on every kind of problem even if it meant hauling over an innocent photographer’s coals. He also explained how he felt awful most of the time since he’d changed so much for a person who didn’t even love him back and he began to feel lost. It all then culminated a couple nights ago when she decided that it was all still not enough and broke up with him over a phone call. That’s when he went crazy with the liquor and ended up wandering around.

She felt sorry for him and although she knew he could be lying, she could understand his pain. So, she decided to accept his apology. She knew it wouldn’t change anything for her but at least she wouldn’t have to carry around so much hatred in her life and he could also move on with his life, not haunted by the guilt.

He promised to help her gain her reputation back. The two planned to make some exclusive photoshoot of Harry himself.

They began meeting every now and then. At first, they would talk about all things professional and did photoshoots. She started receiving positive feedbacks especially after Harry gave her the shoutouts—it didn’t take a split second for his loyal fans to swarm her online profiles. With her raising popularity she started getting bigger gigs again, even bigger than her old gigs. She quit working at the cafe and her darkroom was occupied yet again.

Then, they would spend even more time together. He would make up excuses to meet with her, like he needed to see how she developed her rolls or coming by with a batch of eggs saying he was worried she ran out of eggs. Y/N knew Harry was just feeling lonely after the breakup so she always let him in. Nobody wants to hurt alone, she always thought.

He soon didn’t need any more excuses as he had become an extended roommate of hers. He always said he wanted to live in the 70s and her apartment was like a dream home for him. She just brushed it off, saying it’s because of her hidden interior designing talent. And with each passing day, as they grew closer, her hatred dissipated and was replaced with something strange yet pleasant inside her heart.

She learned the depths of him that no one else knew and it all became the little things only she understood. She felt privileged to gain the limited access.

Sometimes he’d show her the sneak peak of his newest song and she would give notes as she watered the many plants around her place. Sometimes they would play board games while discussing the possibility of living on Mars. Some other times, Harry would lay his head on her legs, not saying a word while Karen Dalton’s magnificent voice filled the air.

Her favourite moment with him had to be when they did the impromptu picnic under the stars. With a bottle of cheap wine, portable turntable, and shared blanket, they laid by the garden as they talked about their fears and desires. That was the first time in such a long time she could open up to someone and he said that made him feel so special.

Of course he was special to her. That’s why she still tiptoed around him from time to time, avoiding conversations like her love life because she didn’t want him to think that she’d like him when actually the growing feelings inside her heart had begun to suffocate her.

The way he spontaneously baked for her (and snobbishly told the infamous ‘I was a baker’ story), the way he laughed at her jokes, the way his eyes sparked when they were dancing around, the way he snored a little when he’s sleeping, the way he called her name—she wanted to just sink herself into his warmth and never let go.

Yet she couldn’t help but wonder whether he felt the same way too. The frequency of the supermodel’s name mentioned in their conversations has since reduced to almost never, but she still felt a sting in her heart as she knew she could never replace her. She was, after all, his first love. And don’t get her started on the physical prowess which she obviously lacked in compared to the supermodel. She didn’t dare to ask Harry whether he’s really forgotten about her, afraid that he’d find out her true feelings for him. So she remained the same. At least, he would be still by her side.

At least, there would never be any rejections.

The city was already blossoming when she realized that Harry had left traces of himself on every corner of her place. The hung film rolls were filled with his silly expressions, so was the polaroid collections stuck on her walls. He had installed a pile of pants by the corner of her living room so that he didn’t have to bring any change. And of course her bathroom now had a pair of tooth brushes. It rocketed her hopes but still, her doubts crept inside her mind every so often.

That lazy Saturday night, she went home from grocery shopping to find Harry asleep on her couch. He looked so soft and warm and she couldn’t help but to run her fingers through his smooth hair. She nervously came closer to his face and pressed a tender kiss on his forehead.

She got up immediately, afraid to wake him up. To her surprise, he suddenly grabbed her arm.

“What was that for, love?” he asked.

He didn’t even have the bed face he usually had, which led her to believe that he wasn’t really asleep.

“Were you pretending to be asleep?” she pulled away.

Harry stood up just as fast and within seconds, he wrapped her in his hug. He placed a kiss on top of her head and slowly traveled down to her forehead, her nose, her cheeks. His lips roamed over hers as he slowly pressed them. It wasn’t heated and full of lust but rather deep and passionate as if he was taking his time.

It didn’t take long before they made their way to the bedroom and undressed each other with no rush. There was no spoken words, no roughness, just two people tangled up in heated infatuation.

When she woke up, he was still there. And it was beautiful.

It was still beautiful the next few months when they became a couple. He was her world and everything else was just background noise. He made her feel like the only person that mattered, as if everything that happened before ‘them’ was unreal. That this was the only real thing and it was all too good to be true.

Y/N should know better though, that life came just like a full circle. She just didn’t expect to actually be put back into the circle so soon.

They were invited to an afterparty of a fashion line Harry was strongly tied to and Y/N was more than proud to be by his side when he was introduced to be the muse that season. He was having the time of his life and so was she. The two held hands the entire time as they talked to everyone.

The belle of the ball, Harry himself seemed overwhelmed with the amount of love he received. He occasionally pressed her hand a little tighter when he was nervous, to which she’d respond with stroking his hand with her thumb. The simplest gestures that they’d developed overtime as they grew accustomed to each other’s idiosyncrasies or as Harry said, the good stuff about you.

That was until he saw a glimpse of her in the middle of the crowd that he suddenly let go of Y/N’s hand as if he was afraid that she would see him with Y/N. It would have been a little over a year since she last saw the supermodel and almost a year since Harry last met her.

All this time, Harry constantly convinced her that her insecurities over his love was nothing, that he only wanted her. And yet, he never even said those three words to her.

She knew now why he never did.

All this time, it wasn’t doubt that kept haunting her. It was a hunch.

The music was blasting but for Y/N, everything was silence. It only took a few seconds before she realized the look in Harry’s eyes. As if it was never truly her his eyes set on. That she was just a company to pass time. That she was the one he wanted just never loved.

She was never the one.

She tried to grab his hand before he’d be gone for good, and could only let out a faint ‘Please, don’t.’

But he could only mutter a little ‘Sorry.’ as he let go of her grasp and made his way through the crowd, trying to get to her, while leaving Y/N drowning in the sea of human who celebrated the man that she loved.

Part two.

Part three.

#harry styles imagine #harry styles one shot #harry styles angst #tinayoufatlarrdd #harry styles fanfic

[brinesystem]

list, tw

I saw this on someone else’s blog (im not saying names cause idk if its okay to share that info? it was public but still) and it uh

It looked like a good way to kinda, like, have a bit less doubt? or a way to remind myself of whats happening and why i think i have this? idk

Might be triggering so like probs scroll past or something

‘the moods’ existed before i knew about did/osdd

I used to describe them as “it feels like half me, but also half somebody else”

I argue and talk with my own thoughts

Sometimes I talk/argue /aloud/ with my own thoughts

I have to actively fight to /convince/ Fae to talk to people, else he wont. and even when he does, its not how i want it to sound

I cant remember most of my childhood

The /bad/ middle school was when i was either 9 or 10

I knew too much about sex when i was much too young (7, 8)

I get ages wrong (i was 6 in cali, not 8. why do i think it was 8?)

I had a dream about getting raped when I was in elementary school. I didnt fight back. I didnt feel anything at all

I used to hide under desks

I hated my therapist. Its now fear. I dont remember what it was back then

I forget memories I recall, and if I force them back, everything hurts, even if theyre not traumatic

I often forget that I used to forget bad things that happened to me.

Other sex dreams from elementary school

The csa I /do/ remember (freshman). Why did i seek that out. Why did it seem like a good plan

I used to forget conversations daily

I drew myself (sebastian, older brother, nicer) before I knew i was trans. I dont have many memories from before I came out/knew i was trans. (am i an alter?)

Used to daydream for hours due to nerves. Disocciating?

The bathroom incident (middle school. 9 - 10)

How old are you? “16″ i reply this randomly when i am 23. when i was 21. Even when I know I am not

The HS trauma that happened right

I don’t have triggers for my trauma, except sometimes i /do/

Hypersexual, but only /sometimes/

I’m an adult! Except sometimes when my body is much too big and I am much too tall and I only want to curl up and be left /alone/. Except when i am small and fragile and want to have stuffed animals around me and play animal crossing. Except then.

Opinions keep changing, but to set differing ones. (Fashion sense, humor, hobbies, aesthetics)

Scared of dad! Not scared of dad. Pity dad. Could kill dad. Scared of dad! Not s-

Handwriting/Art/Writing style changes a lot (fluctuates between set stops)

Randomly gains accents and loses them. Only happens with two accents even though I know many

Stims change depending on Mood

Cant recognize myself in the mirror, but ideal keeps changing in set patterns (soft lumberjack, fae prince, cutesy, fashionable andro, suited devil)

Fave colors, songs, movies change in set patterns

Numb sensations to VERY INTENSE sensations. Cannot predict

Edible food changes depending on mood, even including safe foods (mac n cheese vs mussels vs ramen, etc)

What is this emotion? idk

Who am i? idk

I know I was bullied. Don’t remember why I know

Trying to think about my childhood makes me panic or get a headache

Super depressed after mental break ; Suddenly snapped out of it emotionally

That one time I slept for 3 days straight

Posture and walk cycle keeps changing

Gets songs stuck in my head that I’m not thinking about

Gets songs stuck in my head that i can’t even hear

Remembers things with no context given (the movie. “which movie” i dont know. “what was it about? who was in it? what was the title? what did it look like?” i dont know)

Bad sense of time, but like, days/hours can = months/years

“so mature for my age”

The Moods can be triggered into appearing, but not always by things I relate to them (ie; Kos and Fae)

Personality test results keep changing. All of them

False memories (the cliff, talking to the old woman about marriage, who knows what else)

Caught off guard by my own thoughts and even words I say (”sehb is gonna be mad at me for this, lol” “ACRRRRRYLICS”)

Most of my childhood memories are actually photos or stories ive heard

That dissociative test where I scored in the middle, but closer to DID than OSDD

Opinion on myself and my own looks varies

Opinion on my past varies

I dont recognize my own voice sometimes (is it changing? or is it my perception?)

Numb regarding pain, but then hypersensitive to it later

Numb regarding loss, skips straight to acceptance

Cant shiver normally, but sometimes can even when its not cold

Cant feel hunger normally, but sometimes can?

Favorite season and holidays change (summer, beach! autumn, cool air! halloween! no, valentines day!)

I dont feel connected to my family except my mum and maybe my youngest sister. These were /choices/ I made

Empathy? Dont know her. Except when I randomly start crying when others are sad, which always comes at different times but similar Moods

Cares about appearance one day, couldnt care less the next

Fave jacket: Green denim! Nope, today fave jacket: Grey hoodie! Nope, today f-

Headaches. So many headaches

More headaches when dealing with trauma

I doubt myself and worry I’m lying. Liars wouldnt do that, right?

Known to dissociate

Forget things mid sentence

Used ‘we’ when talking about myself at random before considering OSDD

Cant dream, except when I can and they dont feel like /mine/

Used to speak aloud with myself practicing words. Was I alone? idk

Loves animals. One of the Moods doesnt care at all about animals, even Wander

Loves video games. One of the moods detests video games

Loves horror games. Randomly feels intense fear from horror games

I know i was bullied, i know dad didnt come home on xmas, i know i moved a lot, i know i was in dc during 9/11, the ocean incident, the doctor incidents, I vaguely recall M(on base friend with older brother) and how she treated me (broke my glasses), i know i had a horrible time during that one year of middle school even though I only remember Two Moments (bathrooms, trailer) but I don’t necessarily have the memories of all of the things I know I dealt with

Memories are like snapshots or still moments, and dont continue

Memories I know effected me emotionally, I feel detached from now, except when i’m randomly Not (the koi, the caterpillar, not punching dad, etc)

Didn’t have friends until second year of middle school, those friends were bad, so were the hs friends

Ignored most things that happened but would randomly become enraged at smaller things that happened to me

The time on base I thought all adults driving by were pedophiles (i was 7. 8. why did i think that. why did i want to goad them? what was wrong with me??)

Keep forgetting memories like 81, but when I remember them theyre hard to get out of my head

“you acted so differently as a kid, what happened”

The Tics in response to stress

Was good at the doctors and then suddenly wasnt at all. Now am afraid

Was fine with bugs and then suddenly wasnt. Now am afraid

The fact that I dont remember typing ‘at all’ on 85

Lost old friend. Didnt mourn, still get a queasy feeling when I think about her/am reminded of her, but not upset or sad usually

Can connect most of the Moods to triggers, traumas, or coping methods, including myself

Reaction to trauma changed literally overnight

Used to love being tickled, now makes me panic (fight/flight)

Can feel when the Moods take something they see into themselves (was told this is normal. i am not faking this, at the very least)

I dont like lying. Fae doesnt/cant lie. Luci /enjoys/ lying.

Used to think solely in images. Now think solely in words.

Can sometimes hear thoughts before i think them, but only my own

Randomly gets worse coordination in turns with moods, and then gains it back after

Too trusting, but then gets in a mood and doubts even my closest friends

People keep telling me what im describing sounds like osdd, even friends who have met some of the Moods

I have an easier time remembering some things when I’m in different Moods

Used to have more amnesia before I started recognizing the Moods (was that me switching out?)

#osdd #osdd1 #Moods

[hlupdate]

A hand­shake can quell polit­i­cal unrest and sti­fle impend­ing war. It can, with a bit of spit, val­i­date a gentleman’s agree­ment, end a years-long roman­tic rela­tion­ship or send a young heart rac­ing. But it all depends on the two par­ties involved.

Daisy, 21, felt a seis­mic jolt when Har­ry Styles, 25, wear­ing a striped jumper and rings on three of his five fin­gers, clutched her hand two days after this year’s Met Gala in New York, when she served him gela­to at the shop where she worked.

“He decid­ed on a small mint choco­late gela­to and I made his and the one for his friend and I said, ​‘Can I just say I absolute­ly loved your Met Gala look’ and he said ​‘Thank you very much! What’s your name?’ And I said, ​‘Daisy’ AND HE FUCK­ING EXTEND­ED HISHAND AND REACHED TO SHAKE MY HAND AND I ACTU­AL­LY FUCK­INGSHOOK HIS HAND WHAT THE FUCK,” she wrote on Insta­gram after The Shak­en­ing. ​“Like I didn’t even say any­thing to gas him up besides ​‘I loved your met gala look’ and his fine ass went and shook my hand! WHAT A BEAU­TI­FUL FUCK­ING HUMAN BEINGTHAT HE IS GOD BLESS HIM AND I HOPE HW [sic] LIVES FOREVER.”

For Har­ry Styles, a hand­shake can be a roman­tic ges­ture, con­jur­ing a potent rev­er­ence in its recip­i­ent, like the time he met Gucci’s cre­ative direc­tor Alessan­dro Michele. ​“He was as attrac­tive as James Dean and as per­sua­sive as Gre­ta Gar­bo. He was like a Luchi­no Vis­con­ti char­ac­ter, like an Apol­lo: at the same time sexy as a woman, as a kid, as a man,” Michele told me, has­ten­ing to add: ​“Of course, Har­ry is not aware of this.”

No, Styles has no idea the pow­er he wields. In per­son, he’s tow­er­ing, like some­one who is not that much taller but whose rep­u­ta­tion adds four inch­es. Styles has a seda­tive bari­tone, spo­ken in a rum­my north­ern Eng­lish accent, that tum­bles out so slow­ly you for­get the name of your first born, a swag­ger that has been nursed and per­fect­ed in myth­i­cal places with names like Pais­ley Park, or Abbey Road, or Grace­land. Makes com­plete sense that he would be up for the role of Elvis Pres­ley in Baz Luhrmann’s upcom­ing biopic. He was primed, nay, born to shake his hips, all but one but­ton on his shirt cling­ing for dear life around his tor­so. Then the part was award­ed to anoth­er actor, Austin Butler.

“[Elvis] was such an icon for me grow­ing up,” Styles tells me. ​“There was some­thing almost sacred about him, almost like I didn’t want to touch him. Then I end­ed up get­ting into [his life] a bit and I wasn’t dis­ap­point­ed,” he adds of his ini­tial research and prepa­ra­tions to play The King. He seems relaxed about los­ing the part to But­ler. ​“I feel like if I’m not the right per­son for the thing, then it’s best for both of us that I don’t do it, you know?”

Styles released his self-titled debut solo album in May 2017. The boy­band grad was clear­ly unin­ter­est­ed in hol­low­ing out the charts with more for­mu­la­ic meme pop. Instead, to the sur­prise of many, he dug his heels into retro-fetishist West Coast ​’70s rock. Some of the One Direc­tion fan-hordes might have been con­fused, but no mat­ter: Har­ry Styles sold one mil­lion copies.

Despite its com­mer­cial and crit­i­cal suc­cess, he didn’t tour the album right away. He want­ed to act in the Christo­pher Nolan film Dunkirk. To his cred­it, his por­tray­al of a British sol­dier cow­er­ing in a moored boat on the French beach­es as the Nazis advanced wasn’t skew­ered in the press like the movie debuts of, say, Madon­na or Justin Tim­ber­lake. Per­haps he was fol­low­ing advice giv­en by Elton John, who had urged him to diver­si­fy. ​“He was bril­liant in Dunkirk, which took a lot of peo­ple by sur­prise,” John writes in an email. ​“I love how he takes chances and risks.” Act­ing, unlike music, is a release for Styles; it’s the one time he can be not himself.

“Why do I want to act? It’s so dif­fer­ent to music for me,” he says, sud­den­ly ani­mat­ed. ​“They’re almost oppo­site for me. Music, you try and put so much of your­self into it; act­ing, you’re try­ing to total­ly dis­ap­pear in who­ev­er you’re being.”

Fol­low­ing the news that he missed out on Pres­ley, his name was float­ed for the role of Prince Eric in Disney’s live-action remake of The Lit­tle Mer­maid. How­ev­er, fans will have to wait a bit longer to see Styles on the big screen as that idea, too, has sunk. He won’t be The King or the Prince. ​“It was dis­cussed,” he acknow­ledges before swift­ly chang­ing the sub­ject. ​“I want to put music out and focus on that for a while. But every­one involved in it was amaz­ing, so I think it’s going to be great. I’ll enjoy watch­ing it, I’m sure.”

The new album is wrapped and the sin­gle is decid­ed upon. ​“It’s not like his last album,” his friend, rock ​‘n’ roll leg­end Ste­vie Nicks, told me recent­ly over the phone. ​“It’s not like any­thing One Direc­tion ever did. It’s pure Har­ry, as Har­ry would say. He’s made a very dif­fer­ent record and it’s spectacular.”

Beyond that, Styles is keep­ing his cards close to his chest as to his next musi­cal move. How­ev­er, the air is thick with rumours that his main wing­man for HS2 is Kid Har­poon, aka Tom Hull, who co-wrote debut album track Sweet Crea­ture. No less an author­i­ty than Liam Gal­lagher told us that both big band escapees were in the same stu­dio – RAK in north-west Lon­don – at the same time mak­ing their sec­ond solo albums. Styles played him a cou­ple of tracks, ​“and I tell you what, they’re good,” Gal­lagher enthused. ​“A bit like that Bon Iver. Is that his name?”

Har­ry Styles met Nicks at a Fleet­wood Mac con­cert in Los Ange­les in April 2015. Some­thing about him felt authen­tic to the leg­endary front­woman: ground­ed, like she’d known him for­ev­er, blessed with a win­ning moon­shot grin. A month lat­er, they met back­stage at anoth­er Mac gig, this time at the O2 in Lon­don. Styles brought a car­rot cake for Nicks’ birth­day, her name piped in icing on top. By her own admis­sion, Nicks doesn’t even cel­e­brate birth­days, so this was a sur­prise. ​“He was per­son­al­ly respon­si­ble for me actu­al­ly hav­ing to cel­e­brate my birth­day, which was very sweet,” she says.

Styles’ rela­tion­ship with Nicks is hard to define. Induct­ing her into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York as a solo artist ear­li­er this year, his speech hymned her as a ​“mag­i­cal gyp­sy god­moth­er who occu­pies the in-between”. She’s called him her ​“lovechild” with Mick Fleet­wood and the ​“son I nev­er had”. Both have moved past the pre­lim­i­nary chat acknowl­edg­ing each other’s unquan­tifi­able tal­ents and smooth­ly accel­er­at­ed towards play­ful cut-and-thrust ban­ter of a witch mom and her naughty child.

They per­form togeth­er – he sings The Chainand Stop Drag­gin’ My Heart Around; she sings the one alleged­ly writ­ten about Tay­lor Swift, Two Ghosts. One of those per­for­mances was at the Guc­ci Cruise after­par­ty in Rome in May, for ​“a lot of mon­ey”, Nicks tells me, in a ​“big kind of cas­tle place”. She has become his de fac­to men­tor – one phone call is all it takes to reach the Queen of Rock’n’Roll for advice on sequenc­ing (“She is real­ly good at track list­ing,” Styles admits) or just to hear each other’s voic­es… because, well, wouldn’t you?

Fol­low­ing anoth­er Fleet­wood Mac con­cert, at London’s Wem­b­ley Sta­di­um, in June, Nicks met Styles for a late (Indi­an) din­ner. He then invit­ed her back to his semi-detached Geor­gian man­sion in north Lon­don for a lis­ten­ing par­ty at mid­night. The album – HS2or what­ev­er it’ll be called – was fin­ished. Nicks, her assis­tant Karen, her make-up artist and her friends Jess and Mary crammed onto Styles’ liv­ing-room couch. They lis­tened to it once through in silence like a ​“bunch of edu­cat­ed monks or some­thing in this dark room”. Then once again, 15 or 16 tracks, this time each of his guests offer­ing live feed­back. It wrapped at 5am, just as the sun was bleed­ing through the curtains.

Even for a pop star of Styles’ stature, press­ing ​“play” on a deeply per­son­al work for your hero to digest, watch­ing her face react in real time to your new music, must be… what?

“It’s a dou­ble-edged thing,” he replies. ​“You’re always ner­vous when you are play­ing peo­ple music for the first time. You’ve heard it so much by this point, you for­get that peo­ple haven’t heard it before. It’s hard to not feel like you’ve done what you’ve set out to do. You are hap­py with some­thing and then some­one who you respect so much and look up to is, like: ​‘I real­ly like this.’ It feels like a large stamp [of approval]. It’s a big step towards feel­ing very com­fort­able with what­ev­er else hap­pens to it.”

Wad­ing through Styles’ back­ground info is exhaust­ing, since he was spanked by fame in the social media era where every god­dam blink of a kohl-rimmed eye has been doc­u­ment­ed from six angles. (And yes, he does some­times wear guyliner.)

Deep breath: born in Red­ditch, Worces­ter­shire, to par­ents Des and Anne, who divorced when he was sev­en. Grew up in Holmes Chapel in Cheshire with his sis­ter Gem­ma, mum and step­dad Robin Twist. Rode hors­es at a near­by sta­ble for free (“I was a bad rid­er, but I was a rid­er”). Stopped rid­ing, ​“got into dif­fer­ent stuff”. Formed a band, White Eski­mo, with school­mates. Aged 16, tried out for the 2010 run of The X Fac­torwith a stir­ring but aver­age ren­di­tion of Ste­vie Wonder’s Isn’t She Love­ly. Cut from the show and put into a boy band with four oth­ers, Louis Tom­lin­son, Liam Payne, Niall Horan and Zayn Malik, and called One Direc­tion. Became inter­na­tion­al­ly famous, toured the globe. Zayn quit to go solo. Toured some more. Dat­ed but maybe didn’t date Car­o­line Flack, Rita Ora and Tay­lor Swift – whom he report­ed­ly dumped in the British Vir­gin Islands. (This rela­tion­ship, if noth­ing else, yield­ed an icon­ic, can­did shot of Swift look­ing deject­ed, being motored back to shore on the back of a boat called the Fly­ing Ray.) One Direc­tion dis­cussed dis­band­ing in 2014, actu­al­ly dis­solved in 2015. They remain friend­ly, and Styles offi­cial­ly went solo in 2016.

It’s been two years since his epony­mous debut and lead sin­gle, Sign of the Times, shocked the world and Elton John with its swag­ger­ing, soft rock sound. ​“It came out of left field and I loved it,” John says.

After 89 are­na-packed shows across five con­ti­nents grossed him, the label, whomev­er, over $61 mil­lion, Styles had all but dis­ap­peared. He has emerged only inter­mit­tent­ly for pub­lic-fac­ing events – a Guc­ci after­par­ty per­for­mance here, a Met Gala co-chair­ing there. He relo­cat­ed from Los Ange­les back to Lon­don, sell­ing his Hol­ly­wood Hills house for $6mil­lion and ship­ping his Jaguar E-type across the Atlantic so he could take joyrides on the M25.

“I’m not over LA,” he insists when I ask about the move. ​“My rela­tion­ship with LAchanged a lot. What I want­ed from LA changed.”

A great escape, he would agree, is some­times nec­es­sary. He was in Tokyo for most of Jan­u­ary, hav­ing near­ly fin­ished his album. ​“I need­ed time to get out of that album frame-of-mind of: ​‘Is it fin­ished? Where am I at? What’s hap­pen­ing?’ I real­ly need­ed that time away from every­one. I was kind of just in Tokyo by myself.” His sab­bat­i­cal most­ly involved read­ing Haru­ki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chron­i­cle, singing Nir­vana at karaoke, writ­ing alone in his hotel room, lis­ten­ing to music and eaves­drop­ping on strangers in alien con­ver­sa­tion. ​“It was just a pos­i­tive time for my head and I think that impact­ed the album in a big way.”

Dur­ing this break he watched a lot of films, read a lot of books. Some­times he texts these rec­om­men­da­tions to his pal Michele at Guc­ci. He told Michele to watch the Ali Mac­graw film, Love Sto­ry. ​“We text what friends text about. He is the same [as me] in terms of he lives in his own world and he does his own thing. I love dress­ing up and he loves dress­ing up.”

Because he loves dress­ing up, Michele chose Styles to be the face of three Guc­ci Tai­lor­ing cam­paigns and of its new gen­der­less fra­grance, Mémoire d’une Odeur.

“The moment I met him, I imme­di­ate­ly under­stood there was some­thing strong around him,” Michele tells me. ​“I realised he was much more than a young singer. He was a young man, dressed in a thought­ful way, with uncombed hair and a beau­ti­ful voice. I thought he gath­ered with­in him­self the fem­i­nine and the masculine.”

Fash­ion, for Styles, is a play­ground. Some­thing he doesn’t take too seri­ous­ly. A cou­ple of years ago Har­ry Lam­bert, his styl­ist since 2015, acquired for him a pair of pink metal­lic Saint Lau­rent boots that he has nev­er been pho­tographed wear­ing. They are exceed­ing­ly rare – few pairs exist. Styles wears them ​“to get milk”. They are, in his words, ​“super-fun”. He’s not sure, but he has, ball­park, 50 pairs of shoes, as well as full clos­ets in at least three post­codes. He set­tles on an out­fit fair­ly quick­ly, maybe changes his T-shirt once before head­ing out, but most­ly knows what he likes.

What he may not ful­ly com­pre­hend is that sim­ply by being pho­tographed in a gar­ment he can spur the career of a design­er, as he has with Har­ris Reed, Palo­mo Spain, Charles Jef­frey, Alled-Martínez and a new favourite, Bode. Styles wore a SS16 Guc­ci flo­ral suit to the 2015 Amer­i­can Music Awards. When he was asked who made his suit on the red car­pet, Guc­ci began trend­ing world­wide on Twitter.

“It was one of the first times a male wore Alessandro’s run­way designs and, at the time, men were not tak­ing too many red car­pet risks,” says Lam­bert. ​“Who knows if it influ­enced oth­ers, but it was a spe­cial moment. Plus, it was fun see­ing the fans dress up in suits to come see Harry’s shows.”

Yet tra­di­tion­al gen­der codes of dress still have the minds of mid­dle Amer­i­ca in a choke­hold. Men can’t wear women’s clothes, say the online whingers, who have labelled him ​“trag­ic”, ​“a clown” and a Bowie wannabe. Styles doesn’t care. ​“What’s fem­i­nine and what’s mas­cu­line, what men are wear­ing and what women are wear­ing – it’s like there are no lines any more.”

Elton John agrees: ​“It worked for Marc Bolan, Bowie and Mick. Har­ry has the same qualities.”

Then there is the ques­tion of Styles’ sex­u­al­i­ty, some­thing he has admit­ted­ly ​“nev­er real­ly start­ed to label”, which will plague him until he does. Per­haps it’s part of his allure. He’s bran­dished a pride flag that read ​“Make Amer­i­ca Gay Again” on stage, and plant­ed a stake some­where left of cen­tre on sexuality’s rain­bow spectrum.

“In the posi­tion that he’s in, he can’t real­ly say a lot, but he chose a queer girl band to open for him and I think that speaks vol­umes,” Josette Maskin of the queer band MUNA told The Face ear­li­er this year.

“I get a lot of…” Styles trails off, wheels turn­ing on how he can dis­cuss sex­u­al­i­ty with­out real­ly answer­ing. ​“I’m not always super-out­spo­ken. But I think it’s very clear from choic­es that I make that I feel a cer­tain way about lots of things. I don’t know how to describe it. I guess I’m not…” He paus­es again, piv­ots. ​“I want every­one to feel wel­come at shows and online. They want to be loved and equal, you know? I’m nev­er unsup­port­ed, so it feels weird for me to over­think it for some­one else.”

Sex­u­al­i­ty aside, he must acknowl­edge that he has sex appeal. ​“The word ​‘sexy’ sounds so strange com­ing out of my mouth. So I would say that that’s prob­a­bly why I would not con­sid­er myself sexy.”

Har­ry Styles has emerged ful­ly-formed, an anachro­nis­tic rock star, vague in sen­si­bil­i­ty but des­tined to impress with a dis­arm­ing smile and a warm but firm handshake.

I recite to him a quote from Chrissie Hyn­de of The Pre­tenders about her time atop rock’s throne: ​“I nev­er got into this for the mon­ey or because I want­ed to join in the super­star sex around the swim­ming pools. I did it because the offer of a record con­tract came along and it seemed like it might be more fun than being a wait­ress. Now, I’m not so sure.”

Styles – who worked in a bak­ery in a small north­ern town some time before play­ing to 40,000 scream­ing fans in South Amer­i­can are­nas – must have wit­nessed some shit, been invit­ed to a few pool­side sex par­ties, in his time.

“I’ve seen a cou­ple of things,” he nods in agree­ment. ​“But I’m still young. I feel like there’s still stuff to see.”

#harry styles #the face #050919

[stylesnews]

The Face - Volume 4 . Issue 1

A hand­shake can quell polit­i­cal unrest and sti­fle impend­ing war. It can, with a bit of spit, val­i­date a gentleman’s agree­ment, end a years-long roman­tic rela­tion­ship or send a young heart rac­ing. But it all depends on the two par­ties involved.

Daisy, 21, felt a seis­mic jolt when Har­ry Styles, 25, wear­ing a striped jumper and rings on three of his five fin­gers, clutched her hand two days after this year’s Met Gala in New York, when she served him gela­to at the shop where she worked.

“He decid­ed on a small mint choco­late gela­to and I made his and the one for his friend and I said, ​‘Can I just say I absolute­ly loved your Met Gala look’ and he said ​‘Thank you very much! What’s your name?’ And I said, ​‘Daisy’ AND HE FUCK­ING EXTEND­ED HIS HAND AND REACHEDTO SHAKE MY HAND AND I ACTU­AL­LY FUCK­ING SHOOK HIS HAND WHAT THEFUCK,” she wrote on Insta­gram after The Shak­en­ing. ​“Like I didn’t even say any­thing to gas him up besides ​‘I loved your met gala look’ and his fine ass went and shook my hand! WHATA BEAU­TI­FUL FUCK­ING HUMAN BEING THAT HE IS GOD BLESS HIM AND I HOPE HW[sic] LIVES FOREVER.”

For Har­ry Styles, a hand­shake can be a roman­tic ges­ture, con­jur­ing a potent rev­er­ence in its recip­i­ent, like the time he met Gucci’s cre­ative direc­tor Alessan­dro Michele. ​“He was as attrac­tive as James Dean and as per­sua­sive as Gre­ta Gar­bo. He was like a Luchi­no Vis­con­ti char­ac­ter, like an Apol­lo: at the same time sexy as a woman, as a kid, as a man,” Michele told me, has­ten­ing to add: ​“Of course, Har­ry is not aware of this.”

No, Styles has no idea the pow­er he wields. In per­son, he’s tow­er­ing, like some­one who is not that much taller but whose rep­u­ta­tion adds four inch­es. Styles has a seda­tive bari­tone, spo­ken in a rum­my north­ern Eng­lish accent, that tum­bles out so slow­ly you for­get the name of your first born, a swag­ger that has been nursed and per­fect­ed in myth­i­cal places with names like Pais­ley Park, or Abbey Road, or Grace­land. Makes com­plete sense that he would be up for the role of Elvis Pres­ley in Baz Luhrmann’s upcom­ing biopic. He was primed, nay, born to shake his hips, all but one but­ton on his shirt cling­ing for dear life around his tor­so. Then the part was award­ed to anoth­er actor, Austin Butler.

“[Elvis] was such an icon for me grow­ing up,” Styles tells me. ​“There was some­thing almost sacred about him, almost like I didn’t want to touch him. Then I end­ed up get­ting into [his life] a bit and I wasn’t dis­ap­point­ed,” he adds of his ini­tial research and prepa­ra­tions to play The King. He seems relaxed about los­ing the part to But­ler. ​“I feel like if I’m not the right per­son for the thing, then it’s best for both of us that I don’t do it, you know?”

Styles released his self-titled debut solo album in May 2017. The boy­band grad was clear­ly unin­ter­est­ed in hol­low­ing out the charts with more for­mu­la­ic meme pop. Instead, to the sur­prise of many, he dug his heels into retro-fetishist West Coast ​’70s rock. Some of the One Direc­tion fan-hordes might have been con­fused, but no mat­ter: Har­ry Styles sold one mil­lion copies.

Despite its com­mer­cial and crit­i­cal suc­cess, he didn’t tour the album right away. He want­ed to act in the Christo­pher Nolan film Dunkirk. To his cred­it, his por­tray­al of a British sol­dier cow­er­ing in a moored boat on the French beach­es as the Nazis advanced wasn’t skew­ered in the press like the movie debuts of, say, Madon­na or Justin Tim­ber­lake. Per­haps he was fol­low­ing advice giv­en by Elton John, who had urged him to diver­si­fy. ​“He was bril­liant in Dunkirk, which took a lot of peo­ple by sur­prise,” John writes in an email. ​“I love how he takes chances and risks.” Act­ing, unlike music, is a release for Styles; it’s the one time he can be not himself.

“Why do I want to act? It’s so dif­fer­ent to music for me,” he says, sud­den­ly ani­mat­ed. ​“They’re almost oppo­site for me. Music, you try and put so much of your­self into it; act­ing, you’re try­ing to total­ly dis­ap­pear in who­ev­er you’re being.”

Fol­low­ing the news that he missed out on Pres­ley, his name was float­ed for the role of Prince Eric in Disney’s live-action remake of The Lit­tle Mer­maid. How­ev­er, fans will have to wait a bit longer to see Styles on the big screen as that idea, too, has sunk. He won’t be The King or the Prince. ​“It was dis­cussed,” he acknow­ledges before swift­ly chang­ing the sub­ject. ​“I want to put music out and focus on that for a while. But every­one involved in it was amaz­ing, so I think it’s going to be great. I’ll enjoy watch­ing it, I’m sure.”

The new album is wrapped and the sin­gle is decid­ed upon. ​“It’s not like his last album,” his friend, rock ​‘n’ roll leg­end Ste­vie Nicks, told me recent­ly over the phone. ​“It’s not like any­thing One Direc­tion ever did. It’s pure Har­ry, as Har­ry would say. He’s made a very dif­fer­ent record and it’s spectacular.”

Beyond that, Styles is keep­ing his cards close to his chest as to his next musi­cal move. How­ev­er, the air is thick with rumours that his main wing­man for HS2 is Kid Har­poon, aka Tom Hull, who co-wrote debut album track Sweet Crea­ture. No less an author­i­ty than Liam Gal­lagher told us that both big band escapees were in the same stu­dio – RAK in north-west Lon­don – at the same time mak­ing their sec­ond solo albums. Styles played him a cou­ple of tracks, ​“and I tell you what, they’re good,” Gal­lagher enthused. ​“A bit like that Bon Iver. Is that his name?”

Har­ry Styles met Nicks at a Fleet­wood Mac con­cert in Los Ange­les in April 2015. Some­thing about him felt authen­tic to the leg­endary front­woman: ground­ed, like she’d known him for­ev­er, blessed with a win­ning moon­shot grin. A month lat­er, they met back­stage at anoth­er Mac gig, this time at the O2 in Lon­don. Styles brought a car­rot cake for Nicks’ birth­day, her name piped in icing on top. By her own admis­sion, Nicks doesn’t even cel­e­brate birth­days, so this was a sur­prise. ​“He was per­son­al­ly respon­si­ble for me actu­al­ly hav­ing to cel­e­brate my birth­day, which was very sweet,” she says.

Styles’ rela­tion­ship with Nicks is hard to define. Induct­ing her into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York as a solo artist ear­li­er this year, his speech hymned her as a ​“mag­i­cal gyp­sy god­moth­er who occu­pies the in-between”. She’s called him her ​“lovechild” with Mick Fleet­wood and the ​“son I nev­er had”. Both have moved past the pre­lim­i­nary chat acknowl­edg­ing each other’s unquan­tifi­able tal­ents and smooth­ly accel­er­at­ed towards play­ful cut-and-thrust ban­ter of a witch mom and her naughty child.

They per­form togeth­er – he sings The Chain and Stop Drag­gin’ My Heart Around; she sings the one alleged­ly writ­ten about Tay­lor Swift, Two Ghosts. One of those per­for­mances was at the Guc­ci Cruise after­par­ty in Rome in May, for ​“a lot of mon­ey”, Nicks tells me, in a ​“big kind of cas­tle place”. She has become his de fac­to men­tor – one phone call is all it takes to reach the Queen of Rock’n’Roll for advice on sequenc­ing (“She is real­ly good at track list­ing,” Styles admits) or just to hear each other’s voic­es… because, well, wouldn’t you?

Fol­low­ing anoth­er Fleet­wood Mac con­cert, at London’s Wem­b­ley Sta­di­um, in June, Nicks met Styles for a late (Indi­an) din­ner. He then invit­ed her back to his semi-detached Geor­gian man­sion in north Lon­don for a lis­ten­ing par­ty at mid­night. The album – HS2or what­ev­er it’ll be called – was fin­ished. Nicks, her assis­tant Karen, her make-up artist and her friends Jess and Mary crammed onto Styles’ liv­ing-room couch. They lis­tened to it once through in silence like a ​“bunch of edu­cat­ed monks or some­thing in this dark room”. Then once again, 15 or 16 tracks, this time each of his guests offer­ing live feed­back. It wrapped at 5am, just as the sun was bleed­ing through the curtains.

Even for a pop star of Styles’ stature, press­ing ​“play” on a deeply per­son­al work for your hero to digest, watch­ing her face react in real time to your new music, must be… what?

“It’s a dou­ble-edged thing,” he replies. ​“You’re always ner­vous when you are play­ing peo­ple music for the first time. You’ve heard it so much by this point, you for­get that peo­ple haven’t heard it before. It’s hard to not feel like you’ve done what you’ve set out to do. You are hap­py with some­thing and then some­one who you respect so much and look up to is, like: ​‘I real­ly like this.’ It feels like a large stamp [of approval]. It’s a big step towards feel­ing very com­fort­able with what­ev­er else hap­pens to it.”

Wad­ing through Styles’ back­ground info is exhaust­ing, since he was spanked by fame in the social media era where every god­dam blink of a kohl-rimmed eye has been doc­u­ment­ed from six angles. (And yes, he does some­times wear guyliner.)

Deep breath: born in Red­ditch, Worces­ter­shire, to par­ents Des and Anne, who divorced when he was sev­en. Grew up in Holmes Chapel in Cheshire with his sis­ter Gem­ma, mum and step­dad Robin Twist. Rode hors­es at a near­by sta­ble for free (“I was a bad rid­er, but I was a rid­er”). Stopped rid­ing, ​“got into dif­fer­ent stuff”. Formed a band, White Eski­mo, with school­mates. Aged 16, tried out for the 2010 run of The X Fac­torwith a stir­ring but aver­age ren­di­tion of Ste­vie Wonder’s Isn’t She Love­ly. Cut from the show and put into a boy band with four oth­ers, Louis Tom­lin­son, Liam Payne, Niall Horan and Zayn Malik, and called One Direc­tion. Became inter­na­tion­al­ly famous, toured the globe. Zayn quit to go solo. Toured some more. Dat­ed but maybe didn’t date Car­o­line Flack, Rita Ora and Tay­lor Swift – whom he report­ed­ly dumped in the British Vir­gin Islands. (This rela­tion­ship, if noth­ing else, yield­ed an icon­ic, can­did shot of Swift look­ing deject­ed, being motored back to shore on the back of a boat called the Fly­ing Ray.) One Direc­tion dis­cussed dis­band­ing in 2014, actu­al­ly dis­solved in 2015. They remain friend­ly, and Styles offi­cial­ly went solo in 2016.

It’s been two years since his epony­mous debut and lead sin­gle, Sign of the Times, shocked the world and Elton John with its swag­ger­ing, soft rock sound. ​“It came out of left field and I loved it,” John says.

After 89 are­na-packed shows across five con­ti­nents grossed him, the label, whomev­er, over $61mil­lion, Styles had all but dis­ap­peared. He has emerged only inter­mit­tent­ly for pub­lic-fac­ing events – a Guc­ci after­par­ty per­for­mance here, a Met Gala co-chair­ing there. He relo­cat­ed from Los Ange­les back to Lon­don, sell­ing his Hol­ly­wood Hills house for $6 mil­lion and ship­ping his Jaguar E-type across the Atlantic so he could take joyrides on the M25.

“I’m not over LA,” he insists when I ask about the move. ​“My rela­tion­ship with LA changed a lot. What I want­ed from LA changed.”

A great escape, he would agree, is some­times nec­es­sary. He was in Tokyo for most of Jan­u­ary, hav­ing near­ly fin­ished his album. ​“I need­ed time to get out of that album frame-of-mind of: ​‘Is it fin­ished? Where am I at? What’s hap­pen­ing?’ I real­ly need­ed that time away from every­one. I was kind of just in Tokyo by myself.” His sab­bat­i­cal most­ly involved read­ing Haru­ki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chron­i­cle, singing Nir­vana at karaoke, writ­ing alone in his hotel room, lis­ten­ing to music and eaves­drop­ping on strangers in alien con­ver­sa­tion. ​“It was just a pos­i­tive time for my head and I think that impact­ed the album in a big way.”

Dur­ing this break he watched a lot of films, read a lot of books. Some­times he texts these rec­om­men­da­tions to his pal Michele at Guc­ci. He told Michele to watch the Ali Mac­graw film, Love Sto­ry. ​“We text what friends text about. He is the same [as me] in terms of he lives in his own world and he does his own thing. I love dress­ing up and he loves dress­ing up.”

Because he loves dress­ing up, Michele chose Styles to be the face of three Guc­ci Tai­lor­ing cam­paigns and of its new gen­der­less fra­grance, Mémoire d’une Odeur.

“The moment I met him, I imme­di­ate­ly under­stood there was some­thing strong around him,” Michele tells me. ​“I realised he was much more than a young singer. He was a young man, dressed in a thought­ful way, with uncombed hair and a beau­ti­ful voice. I thought he gath­ered with­in him­self the fem­i­nine and the masculine.”

Fash­ion, for Styles, is a play­ground. Some­thing he doesn’t take too seri­ous­ly. A cou­ple of years ago Har­ry Lam­bert, his styl­ist since 2015, acquired for him a pair of pink metal­lic Saint Lau­rent boots that he has nev­er been pho­tographed wear­ing. They are exceed­ing­ly rare – few pairs exist. Styles wears them ​“to get milk”. They are, in his words, ​“super-fun”. He’s not sure, but he has, ball­park, 50 pairs of shoes, as well as full clos­ets in at least three post­codes. He set­tles on an out­fit fair­ly quick­ly, maybe changes his T-shirt once before head­ing out, but most­ly knows what he likes.

What he may not ful­ly com­pre­hend is that sim­ply by being pho­tographed in a gar­ment he can spur the career of a design­er, as he has with Har­ris Reed, Palo­mo Spain, Charles Jef­frey, Alled-Martínez and a new favourite, Bode. Styles wore a SS16 Guc­ci flo­ral suit to the 2015 Amer­i­can Music Awards. When he was asked who made his suit on the red car­pet, Guc­ci began trend­ing world­wide on Twitter.

“It was one of the first times a male wore Alessandro’s run­way designs and, at the time, men were not tak­ing too many red car­pet risks,” says Lam­bert. ​“Who knows if it influ­enced oth­ers, but it was a spe­cial moment. Plus, it was fun see­ing the fans dress up in suits to come see Harry’s shows.”

Yet tra­di­tion­al gen­der codes of dress still have the minds of mid­dle Amer­i­ca in a choke­hold. Men can’t wear women’s clothes, say the online whingers, who have labelled him ​“trag­ic”, ​“a clown” and a Bowie wannabe. Styles doesn’t care. ​“What’s fem­i­nine and what’s mas­cu­line, what men are wear­ing and what women are wear­ing – it’s like there are no lines any more.”

Elton John agrees: ​“It worked for Marc Bolan, Bowie and Mick. Har­ry has the same qualities.”

Then there is the ques­tion of Styles’ sex­u­al­i­ty, some­thing he has admit­ted­ly ​“nev­er real­ly start­ed to label”, which will plague him until he does. Per­haps it’s part of his allure. He’s bran­dished a pride flag that read ​“Make Amer­i­ca Gay Again” on stage, and plant­ed a stake some­where left of cen­tre on sexuality’s rain­bow spectrum.

“In the posi­tion that he’s in, he can’t real­ly say a lot, but he chose a queer girl band to open for him and I think that speaks vol­umes,” Josette Maskin of the queer band MUNA told The Face ear­li­er this year.

“I get a lot of…” Styles trails off, wheels turn­ing on how he can dis­cuss sex­u­al­i­ty with­out real­ly answer­ing. ​“I’m not always super-out­spo­ken. But I think it’s very clear from choic­es that I make that I feel a cer­tain way about lots of things. I don’t know how to describe it. I guess I’m not…” He paus­es again, piv­ots. ​“I want every­one to feel wel­come at shows and online. They want to be loved and equal, you know? I’m nev­er unsup­port­ed, so it feels weird for me to over­think it for some­one else.”

Sex­u­al­i­ty aside, he must acknowl­edge that he has sex appeal. ​“The word ​‘sexy’ sounds so strange com­ing out of my mouth. So I would say that that’s prob­a­bly why I would not con­sid­er myself sexy.”

Har­ry Styles has emerged ful­ly-formed, an anachro­nis­tic rock star, vague in sen­si­bil­i­ty but des­tined to impress with a dis­arm­ing smile and a warm but firm handshake.

I recite to him a quote from Chrissie Hyn­de of The Pre­tenders about her time atop rock’s throne: ​“I nev­er got into this for the mon­ey or because I want­ed to join in the super­star sex around the swim­ming pools. I did it because the offer of a record con­tract came along and it seemed like it might be more fun than being a wait­ress. Now, I’m not so sure.”

Styles – who worked in a bak­ery in a small north­ern town some time before play­ing to 40,000scream­ing fans in South Amer­i­can are­nas – must have wit­nessed some shit, been invit­ed to a few pool­side sex par­ties, in his time.

“I’ve seen a cou­ple of things,” he nods in agree­ment. ​“But I’m still young. I feel like there’s still stuff to see.”

#theface19 #harry styles #sep19 #article

[bountyofbeads]

This expose` is an fascinating look at Joe Biden’s life growing up as a stutterer and the effects this disability had on his life, including in politics. It's long but well worth the read in light of his debate performances being questioned and whether he's up to the challenge of facing off against Trump.

Biden says his father taught him about “shouldering burdens with grace.” Specifically, he told his son, “Never complain. Never explain.”

What Joe Biden Can’t Bring Himself to Say

His verbal stumbles have voters worried about his mental fitness. Maybe they’d be more understanding if they knew he’s still fighting a stutter.

Photography Mark Peckmezian, Story by John Hendrickson

SPECIAL PREVIEW: JAN/FEB 2020 ISSUE

LISTEN TO ARTICLE ON WEBSITE

His eyes fall to the floor when I ask him to describe it. We’ve been tiptoeing toward it for 45 minutes, and so far, every time he seems close, he backs away, or leads us in a new direction. There are competing theories in the press, but Joe Biden has kept mum on the subject. I want to hear him explain it. I ask him to walk me through the night he appeared to lose control of his words onstage.

“I—um—I don’t remember,” Biden says. His voice has that familiar shake, the creak and the croak. “I’d have to see it. I-I-I don’t remember.”

We’re in Biden’s mostly vacant Washington, D.C., campaign office on an overcast Tuesday at the end of the summer. Since entering the Democratic presidential-primary race in April, Biden has largely avoided in-depth interviews. When I first reached out, in late June, his press person was polite but noncommittal: Was an interview really necessary for the story?

Then came the second debate, at the end of July, in Detroit. The first one, a month earlier, had been a disaster for Biden. He was unprepared when Senator Kamala Harris criticized both his past resistance to federally mandated busing and a recent speech in which he’d waxed fondly about collaborating with segregationist senators. Some of his answers that night had been meander­ing and difficult to parse, feeding into the narrative that he wasn’t just prone to verbal slipups—he’s called himself a “gaffe machine”—but that his age was a problem, that he was confused and out of touch.

Detroit was Biden’s chance to regain control of the narrative. And then something else happened. The candidates were talking about health care. At first, Biden sounded strong, confident, presidential: “My plan makes a limit of co-pay to be One. Thousand. Dollars. Because we—”

He stopped. He pinched his eyes closed. He lifted his hands and thrust them forward, as if trying to pull the missing sound from his mouth. “We f-f-f-f-further support—” He opened his eyes. “The uh-uh-uh-uh—” His chin dipped toward his chest. “The-uh, the ability to buy into the Obamacare plan.” Biden also stumbled when trying to say immune system.

Fox News edited these moments into a mini montage. Stifling laughter, the host Steve Hilton narrated: “As the right words struggled to make that perilous journey from Joe Biden’s brain to Joe Biden’s mouth, half the time he just seemed to give up with this somewhat tragic and limp admission of defeat.”

Several days later, Biden’s team got back in touch with me. One of his aides gingerly asked whether I’d noticed the former vice president stutter during the debate. Of course I had—I stutter, far worse than Biden. The aide said he was ready to talk about it. Last night, after Biden stumbled multiple times during the Atlanta debate, the topic became even more relevant.

“So how are you, man?”

Biden is in his usual white button-down and navy suit, a flag pin on the left lapel. Up close, he looks like he’s lost weight since leaving office in 2017. His height is commanding, but, as he approaches his 77th birthday, he doesn’t fill out his suit jacket like he used to.

I stutter as I begin to ask my first question. “I’ve only … told a few people I’m … d-doing this piece. Every time I … describe it, I get … caught on the w-word-uh stuh-tuh-tuh-tutter.”

“So did I,” Biden replies. “It doesn’t”—he interrupts himself—“can’t define who you are.”

Maybe you’ve heard Biden talk about his boyhood stutter. A non-stutterer might not notice when he appears to get caught on words as an adult, because he usually maneuvers out of those moments quickly and expertly. But on other occasions, like that night in Detroit, Biden’s lingering stutter is hard to miss. He stutters—­if slightly—on several sounds as we sit across from each other in his office. Before addressing the debate specifically, I mention what I’ve just heard. “I want to ask you, as, you know, a … stutterer to, uh, to a … stutterer. When you were … talking a couple minutes ago, it, it seemed to … my ear, my eye … did you have … trouble on s? Or on … m?”

Biden looks down. He pivots to the distant past, telling me that the letter s was hard when he was a kid. “But, you know, I haven’t stuttered in so long that it’s hhhhard for me to remember the specific—” He pauses. “What I do remember is the feeling.”

Istarted stuttering at age 4.

I still struggle to say my own name. When I called the gas company recently, the automated voice apologized for not being able to understand me. This happens a lot, so I try to say “representative,” but r’s are tough too. When I reach a human, I’m inevitably asked whether we have a poor connection. Busy bartenders will walk away and serve someone else when I take too long to say the name of a beer. Almost every deli guy chuckles as I fail to enunciate my order, despite the fact that I’ve cut it down to just six words: “Turkey club, white toast, easy mayo.” I used to just point at items on the menu.

My head will shake on a really bad stutter. People have casually asked whether I have Parkinson’s. I curl my toes inside my shoes or tap my foot as a distraction to help me get out of it, a behavior that I’ve repeated so often, it’s become a tic. Sometimes I shuffle a pen between my hands. When I was little, I used to press my palm against my forehead in an effort to force the missing word out of my brain. Back then, my older brother would imitate this motion and the accompanying sound, a dull whine—something between a cow and a sheep. A kid at baseball camp, Michael, referred to me as “Stutter Boy.” He’d snap his fingers and repeat it as if calling a dog. “Stutter Boy! Stutter Boy!” In college, I applied for a job at a coffee shop. I stuttered horribly through the interview, and the owner told me he couldn’t hire me, because he wanted his café to be “a place where customers feel comfortable.”

Stuttering is a neurological disorder that affects roughly 70 million people, about 3 million of whom live in the United States. It has a strong genetic component: Two-thirds of stutterers have a family member who actively stutters or used to. Biden’s uncle on his mother’s side—“Uncle Boo-Boo,” as he was called—stuttered his whole life.

In the most basic sense, a stutter is a repetition, prolongation, or block in producing a sound. It typically presents between the ages of 2 and 4, in up to twice as many boys as girls, who also have a higher recovery rate. During the develop­mental years, some children’s stutter will disappear completely without intervention or with speech therapy. The longer someone stutters, however, the lower the chances of a full recovery—­perhaps due to the decreasing plasticity of the brain. Research suggests that no more than a quarter of people who still stutter at 10 will completely rid themselves of the affliction as adults.

“Mr. Buh-Buh-Buh-Biden, what’s that word?,” a nun asked Joe Biden in front of his seventh-grade classmates.

The cultural perception of stutterers is that they’re fearful, anxious people, or simply dumb, and that stuttering is the result. But it doesn’t work like that. Let’s say you’re in fourth grade and you have to stand up and recite state capitals. You know that Juneau is the capital of Alaska, but you also know that you almost always block on the j sound. You become intensely anxious not because you don’t know the answer, but because you do know the answer, and you know you’re going to stutter on it.

Stuttering can feel like a series of betrayals. Your body betrays you when it refuses to work in concert with your brain to produce smooth speech. Your brain betrays you when it fails to recall the solutions you practiced after school with a speech therapist, allegedly in private, later learning that your mom was on the other side of a mirror, watching in the dark like a detective. If you’re a lucky stutterer, you have friends and family who build you back up, but sometimes your protectors betray you too.

A Catholic nun betrayed Biden when he was in seventh grade. “I think I was No. 5 in alphabetical order,” Biden says. He points over my right shoulder and stares into the middle distance as the movie rolls in his mind. “We’d sit along the radiators by the window.”

The office we’re in is awash in framed memories: Biden and his family, Biden and Barack Obama, Biden in a denim shirt posing for InStyle. The shelf behind the desk features, among other books, Jon Meacham’s The Soul of America. It’s a phrase Biden has adopted for his campaign this time around, his third attempt at the presidency. In almost every speech, Biden warns potential voters that 2020 is not merely an election, but a battle “for the soul of America.” Sometimes he swaps in nation.

But now we’re back in middle school. The students are taking turns reading a book, one by one, up and down the rows. “I could count down how many paragraphs, and I’d memorize it, because I found it easier to memorize than look at the page and read the word. I’d pretend to be reading,” Biden says. “You learned early on who the hell the bullies were,” he tells me later. “You could tell by the look, couldn’t you?”

For most stutterers, reading out loud summons peak dread. A chunk of text that may take a fluent person roughly a minute to read could take a stutterer five or 10 times as long. Four kids away, three kids away. Your shoulders tighten. Two away. The back of your neck catches fire. One away. Then it happens, and the room fills with secondhand embarrassment. Someone breathes a heavy sigh. Someone else laughs. At least one kid mimics your stutter while you’re actively stuttering. You never talk about it. At night, you stare at the ceiling above your bed, reliving it.

“The paragraph I had to read was: ‘Sir Walter Raleigh was a gentleman. He laid his cloak upon the muddy road suh-suh-so the lady wouldn’t soil her shoes when she entered the carriage,’ ” Biden tells me, slightly and unintentionally tripping up on the word so. “And I said, ‘Sir Walter Raleigh was a gentle man who—’ and then the nun said, ‘Mr. Biden, what is that word?’ And it was gentleman that she wanted me to say, not gentle man. And she said, ‘Mr. Buh-Buh-Buh-Biden, what’s that word?’ ”

Biden says he rose from his desk and left the classroom in protest, then walked home. The family story is that his mother, Jean, drove him back to school and confronted the nun with the made-for-TV phrase “You do that again, I’ll knock your bonnet off your head!” I ask Biden what went through his mind as the nun mocked him.

“Anger, rage, humiliation,” he says. His speech becomes staccato. “A feeling of, uh—like I’m sure you’ve experienced—it just drops out of your chest, just, like, you feel … a void.” He lifts his hands up to his face like he did on the debate stage in July, to guide the v sound out of his mouth: void.

By all accounts, Biden was both popular and a strong athlete in high school. He was class president at Archmere Academy, in Claymont, Delaware. His nickname was “Dash”—not a reference to his speed on the football field, but rather another way to mock his stutter. “It was like Morse code—dot dot dot, dash dash dash dash,” Biden says. “Even though by that time I started to overcome it.”

I ask him to expand on the relationship between anger and humiliation, or shame.

“Shame is a big piece of it,” he says, then segues into a story about meeting a stutterer while campaigning.

I bring it back up a little later, this time more directly: “When have you felt shame?”

“Not for a long, long, long time. But especially when I was in grade school and high school. Because that’s the time when everything is, you know, it’s rough. They talk about ‘mean girls’? There’s mean boys, too.”

Bill Bowden had the locker next to Biden’s at Archmere. I called Bowden recently. “It was just kind of a funny thing, you know?” he told me. “Hopefully he wasn’t hurt by it.” Bob Markel, another high-school buddy of Biden’s, went a little further when we spoke: “ ‘H-H-H-H-Hey, J-J-J-J-J-Joe B-B-B-B-Biden’—that’s how he’d be addressed.” Markel said the Archmere guys called him “Stutterhead,” or “Hey, Stut !” for short. He fears that he himself may have made fun of Biden once or twice. “I never remember him being offended. He probably was,” Markel said. “I think one of his coping mechanisms was to not show it.” Bowden and Markel have remained friends with Biden to this day.

Before collecting from customers on his paper route, Biden would preplay conversations in his mind, banking lines—a tactic he still sometimes uses on the campaign trail, he says. “I knew the one guy loved the Phillies. And he’d asked me about them all the time. And I knew another person would ask me about my sister, so I would practice an answer.”

After trying and failing at speech therapy in kinder­garten, Biden waged a personal war on his stutter in his bedroom as a young teen. He’d hold a flashlight to his face in front of his bedroom mirror and recite Yeats and Emerson with attention to rhythm, searching for that elusive control. He still knows the lines by heart: “Meek young men grow up in libraries, believing it their duty to accept the views, which Cicero, which Locke, which Bacon, have given, forgetful that Cicero, Locke, and Bacon were only young men in libraries, when they wrote these books.”

Biden performs the passage for me with total fluency, knowing where and when to pause, knowing how many words he can say before needing a breath. This is what stutterers learn to do: reclaim control of their airflow; think in full phrases, not individual words. I ask Biden what his moment of dread used to be in that essay.

“Well, looking back on it, ‘Meek young men grow up in li-li-libraries,’ ” he begins again. “ ‘Li’—the l.”

“That kind of sound, the l sound, is like the … r sound,” I say.

“Yes.”

“Sometimes I’ve noticed, watching old clips, it looks like you do have a little trouble on the r. It’s your middle initial.”

“Yeah.”

“Like ‘ruh-ruh-ruh-remember,’ ” I say, intentionally stuttering on the r.

“Well, I may. I-I-I-I-I haven’t thought I have. But I-I-I-I don’t doubt there’s probably ways people could pick up that there’s something. But I don’t consciously think of it anymore.”

Biden says he hasn’t felt himself caught in a traditional stutter in several decades. “I mean, I can’t remember a time where I’ve ever worried before a crowd of 80,000 people or 800 people or 80 people—I haven’t had that feeling of dread since, I guess, speech class in college,” he says, referring to an under­graduate public-speaking course at the University of Delaware.

This is when I ask him what happened that night in Detroit.

After saying he doesn’t remember, Biden opines: “I’m everybody’s target; they have to take me down. And so, what I found is—not anymore—I’ve found that it’s difficult to deal with some of the criticism, based on the nature of the person directing the criticism. It’s awful hard to be, to respond the same way in a national debate—especially when you’re, you know, the guy who is characterized as the white-guy-of-­privilege kind of thing—to turn and say to someone who says, ‘I’m not saying you’re a racist, but …’ and know you’re being set up. So I have to admit to you, I found my mind going, What the hell? How do I respond to that? Because I know she’s being completely unfair.”

I eventually realize that he’s describing the moment from the first debate, when Harris criticized his record on race.

“These aren’t debates,” he continues. “These are one-minute assertions. And I don’t think there’s anybody who hasn’t been taking shots at me, which is okay. I’m a big boy, don’t get me wrong.”

Listening back to that part of the conversation after our interview made me feel dizzy. I can only speculate as to why Biden’s campaign agreed to this interview, but I assume the reasoning went something like this: If Biden disclosed to me, a person who stutters, that he himself still actively stutters, perhaps voters would cut him some slack when it comes to verbal misfires, as well as errors that seem more related to memory and cognition. But whenever I asked Biden about what appeared to be his present-day stuttering, the notably verbose candidate became clipped, or said he didn’t remember, or spun off to somewhere new.

I wondered if I reminded Biden of his old self, a ghost from his youth, the stutterer he used to be. He and I are about the same height. We happened to be wearing the exact same outfit that day: navy suit, white shirt, no tie. We both went to all-male prep schools, the sort of place where displaying any weakness is a liability.

As I listened to the recording of our interview, I remembered how I used to respond when people asked me about my stutter. I’d shut down. I’d try to change the subject. I’d almost always look away.

In early september, I got in touch with my high-school speech pathologist, Joseph Donaher, who practices at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. I hadn’t heard Donaher’s voice for almost 15 years. Immediately, I was transported back to the little window­less room in the hospital where we used to meet. Donaher was the first therapist—­really the first person—­who ever leveled with me. I can still see his face, the neutrality in his eyes on the day he looked at me square and said the sentence my friends and parents had avoided saying my entire life: You have a severe stutter.

Donaher and his colleagues try to help their patients open up about the shame and low self-worth that accompany stuttering. Instead of focusing solely on mechanics, or on the ability to communicate, they first build up the desire to communicate at all. They then share techniques such as elongating vowels and lightly approaching hard-consonant clusters, meaning just touching on the first sound in a word like stutter—the st—to keep the mouth and throat from tensing up and interfering with speech. The goal isn’t to be totally fluent but, simply put, to stutter better.

This evolution in treatment has been accompanied by a new movement to destigmatize the disorder, similar to the drive to view autism through a lens of “neuro­diversity” rather than as a pathology. The idea is to accept, even embrace, one’s stutter. There are practical reasons for this: Research shows, according to Donaher, that the simple disclosure “I stutter” benefits both the stutterer and the listener—the former gets to explain what’s happening and ease the awkward tension so the latter isn’t stuck wondering what’s “wrong” with this person. Saying those two words is harder than it seems. “I’m working with people who spend their whole lives and are never able to disclose it,” Donaher told me.

Biden says his father taught him about “shouldering burdens with grace.” Specifically, he told his son, “Never complain. Never explain.”

Eric S. Jackson, an assistant professor of communicative sciences and dis­orders at NYU, told me he believes that Biden’s eye movements—the blinks, the downward glances—are part of his ongoing efforts to manage his stutter. “As kids we figure out: Oh, if I move parts of my body not associated with the speech system, sometimes it helps me get through these blocks faster,” Jackson, a stutterer himself, explained. Jackson credits an intensive program at the American Institute for Stuttering, in Manhattan, with bringing him back from a “rock bottom” period in his mid-20s, when he says his stutter kept him from meeting women or speaking up enough to reach his professional goals. Afterward, Jackson went all in on disclosure: Every day for six months, he stood up during the subway ride to and from work and announced that he was a person who stutters. “I had this new relationship with my stuttering—I was like Hercules,” he told me. At 41, Jackson still stutters, but in conversation he confidently maintains eye contact and appears relaxed. He wishes Biden would be more transparent about his intermittent disfluency. “Running for president is essentially the biggest stage in the world. For him to come out and say ‘I still stutter and it’s fine’ would be an amazing, empowering message.”

Occasionally, Biden has used present-tense verbs when discussing his stutter. “I find myself, when I’m tired, cuh-cuh-­catching myself, like that,” he said during a 2016 American Institute for Stuttering speech. Biden has used the phrase we stutterers at times, but in most public appearances and interviews, Biden talks about how he overcame his speech problem, and how he believes others can too. You can watch videos posted by his campaign in which Biden meets young stutterers and encourages them to follow his lead. They’re sweet clips, even if the underlying message—­beat it or bust—is out of sync with the normalization movement.

Emma Alpern is a 32-year-old copy editor who co-leads the Brooklyn chapter of the National Stuttering Association and co-founded NYC Stutters, which puts on a day-long conference for stuttering de­stigmatization. Alpern told me that she’s on a group text with other stutterers who regularly discuss Biden, and that it’s been “frustrating” to watch the media portray Biden’s speech impediment as a sign of mental decline or dishonesty. “Biden allows that to happen by not naming it for what it is,” she said, though she’s not sure that his presidential candidacy would benefit if he were more forthcoming. “I think he’s dug himself into a hole of not saying that he still stutters for so long that it would strike people as a little weird.”

Biden has presented the same life story for decades. He’s that familiar face—Uncle Joe. He was born 11 months after Pearl Harbor and grew up in the last era of definitive “good guys” and “bad guys.” He’s the dependable guy, the tenacious guy, the aviators-and-crossed-arms guy. That guy doesn’t stutter; that guy used to stutter.

“My dad taught me the value of constancy, effort, and work, and he taught me about shouldering burdens with grace,” Biden writes in the first chapter of his 2007 memoir, Promises to Keep. “He used to quote Benjamin Disraeli: ‘Never complain. Never explain.’ ”

Stephen colbert launches across the Ed Sullivan Theater stage, as if from a pinball spring. It’s early September, and his Late Show taping is about to begin. To warm up, he takes a few questions from the studio audience. Someone asks what he’d want in a potential new president. “Empathy?” Colbert deadpans. “A soul?”

Colbert tapes in Midtown Manhattan on the same stage where the Beatles made their American television debut 55 years ago, when Joe Biden was a mere 22. Biden struts out to a standing ovation and throws up his hands in amazement: For me? A brief “Joe! Joe! Joe!” chant erupts.

At first, Colbert lobs softballs, and Biden touches on the key parts of his 2020 stump speech: Why voters must stand up to the existential threat of Trumpism and how the Charlottesville, Virginia, white-supremacist rally crystallized his decision to run. Then Colbert goes for it.

“In the last few weeks, you’ve confused New Hampshire for Vermont; said

Bobby Kennedy and MLK were assassinated in the late ’70s; assured us, ‘I am not going nuts.’ Follow-up question: Are you going nuts?”

“Look, the reason I came on the Jimmy Kimmel show was because—”

The audience howls. Biden flashes a flirty smile. Colbert adjusts his glasses, sticks his pen in his mouth, and nods in approval. The joke was probably canned, but Biden landed it.

Colbert continues to press him about accuracy issues in his storytelling. The studio audience is silent; I’m watching from the balcony and can hear the theater’s air-conditioning humming overhead.

“I-I-I-I-I don’t get wrong things like, uh, ya know, there is a, we, we should lock kids up in cages at the border. I mean, I don’t—” People applaud before Biden can finish.

When the interview is over, Biden receives a second standing ovation. He peers up toward the rafters, using his hand as a visor against the bright lights. A white spotlight follows him offstage. Several minutes later, he glides through the stage door and out onto West 53rd Street. People call to him from the sidewalk. “Joe! Joe Biden!” He climbs into the back of an idling black SUV, and the doors

clunk close.

I follow Biden for a couple of days while he campaigns in New Hampshire. His town halls have a distinctly Norman Rockwell vibe. One takes place in the middle of the day on the third floor of a former textile mill, another on a stretch of grass as the wind whips off the Piscataqua River. His crowds are predominantly older, filled with people who stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and wait patiently to ask questions. After he speaks, Biden typically walks offstage to Bruce Springsteen’s “We Take Care of Our Own,” then saunters down the rope line for handshakes and hugs and selfies. One voter after another tells me they’re unaware of Biden’s stutter. “Knowing that he has had something like that to deal with and overcame it, as well as other really sad things that have happened—­­it just makes me like him more,” says 70-year-old Grace Payne.

Back in New York, I start to wonder if I’m forcing Biden into a box where he doesn’t belong. My box. Could I be jealous that his present stutter is less obvious than mine? That he can go sentences at a time without a single block or repetition? Even the way I’m writing this piece—­keeping Biden’s stammers, his ums and pauses, on the page—seems hypocritical. Here I am highlighting the glitches in his speech, when the journalistic courtesy, convention even, is to edit them out.

I spend weeks watching Biden more than listening to him, trying to “catch him in the act” of stuttering on camera. There’s one. There’s one. That was a bad one. Also, I start stuttering more.

In September, before the third Democratic debate, in Houston, I called Michael Sheehan, a Washington, D.C.–area communications coach whose company website boasts clients ranging from Nike to the Treasury Department. Sheehan worked with President Bill Clinton while he was in office and began consulting on and off for Biden in 2002, when he was in the Senate. On the day we spoke, he was in Wilmington, Delaware, doing debate prep with Biden.

Sheehan and I traded stories of daily indignities—­­he stutters too. “I remember exactly where the deli was; it was on 71st and First Avenue,” he said with an ache in his voice. He lamented the interventionists, the people who volunteer, “ ‘You know, why don’t you speak more slowly?’ I always want to say ‘Holy shit! Why didn’t I think of that? Thank you!’ ”

Sheehan’s own stutter improved, but didn’t fully go away, when he took up speech and debate in high school. This eventually led him to the theater, which is a common, if surprising, place where some stutterers find that they’re able to speak with relative ease. Taking on a character, another voice, the theory goes, relies on a different neural pathway from the one used in conversation. Many successful actors have battled stutters—Samuel L. Jackson, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, James Earl Jones. In 2014, Jones, whose muscular baritone is the bedrock of one of the most quoted lines in film history, told NPR that he doesn’t use the word cured to describe his apparent fluency. “I just work with it,” he said.

At an August town hall, Biden briefly blocked on Obama, before subbing in my boss. The headlines afterward? “Biden Forgets Obama’s Name.”

Sheehan was extremely careful with the language he used to describe Biden’s speech patterns—“I can’t say it’s a stutter”—­though he noted his friend’s habit of abruptly changing directions mid-sentence. “I do hear those little pauses, but I really don’t hear the stuff that you would hear from me or I would hear from you,” he said. A few minutes into our conversation, he choked up while discussing Biden’s tender­ness toward young stutterers. “Sometimes I feel when he goes a little long on a speech, he’s just making up for lost time, you know?”

Sheehan told me about a night when he came home with his wife and saw the answering-­machine light blinking: “Hey, Michael, it’s Joe Biden. I just was watching The King’s Speech with my granddaughter, and I just thought I’d give you a call, because it made me think of you. Goodbye!” He says the message felt like a secret fraternity handshake: “You and I have both been there, and only people in that society know what that is about.”

In Biden’s office, the first time I bring up his current stuttering, he asks me whether I’ve seen The King’s Speech. He speaks almost mystically about the award-winning 2010 film. “When King George VI, when he stood up in 1939, everyone knew he stuttered, and they knew what courage it took for him to stand up at that stadium and try to speak—and it gave them courage … I could feel that. It was that sinking feeling, like—oh my God, I remember how you felt. You feel like, I don’t know … almost like you’re being sucked into a black hole.”

Presidential candidates usually don’t speak about their bleakest moments, certainly not this viscerally. It resembles the way Biden writes in his memoir about the aftermath of the 1972 car accident that killed his first wife and young daughter and critically injured his two sons, Beau and Hunter: “I could not speak, only felt this hollow core grow in my chest, like I was going to be sucked inside a black hole.”

A few weeks later, I ask Jill Biden what she remembers about sitting next to her husband during the movie. “It was one of those moments in a marriage where you just sort of understand without words being spoken,” she says.

As he watched The King’s Speech, Biden accurately guessed that the screenwriter, David Seidler, was a stutterer. “He showed me a copy of a speech they found in an attic that the king had actually used, where he marks his—it’s exactly what I do!” Biden tells me, his voice lifting. “My staff, when I have them put something on a prompter—I wish I had something to show you.”

He pulls out a legal pad and begins drawing diagonal lines a few inches apart, as if diagramming invisible sentences: x words, breath, y words, breath. “Because it’s just the way I have—the, the best way for me to read a, um, a speech. I mean, when I saw The King’s Speech, and the speech—I didn’t know anybody who did that!”

Biden is running for president on a simple message: America is not Trump. I’m not Trump. I’ll lead us out of this. With every new debate, with every new “gaffe,” the media continue to ask whether Biden has the stamina for the job. And with every passing month, his competitors—namely Senator Elizabeth Warren and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg—have gained on him in the polls.

A stutter does not get worse as a person ages, but trying to keep it at bay can take immense physical and mental energy. Biden talks all day to audiences both small and large. In addition to periodically stuttering or blocking on certain sounds, he appears to intentionally not stutter by switching to an alternative word—a technique called “circumlocution”—­which can yield mangled syntax. I’ve been following practically everything he’s said for months now, and sometimes what is quickly characterized as a memory lapse is indeed a stutter. As Eric Jackson, the speech pathologist, pointed out to me, during a town hall in August Biden briefly blocked on Obama, before quickly subbing in my boss. The headlines after the event? “Biden Forgets Obama’s Name.” Other times when Biden fudges a detail or loses his train of thought, it seems unrelated to stuttering, like he’s just making a mistake. The kind of mistake other candidates make too, though less frequently than he does.

During his 2016 address at the American Institute for Stuttering, Biden told the room that he’d turned down an invitation to speak at a dinner organized by the group years earlier. “I was afraid if people knew I stuttered,” he said, “they would have thought something was wrong with me.”

Yet even when sharing these old, hard stories, Biden regularly characterizes stuttering as “the best thing that ever happened” to him. “Stuttering gave me an insight I don’t think I ever would have had into other people’s pain,” he says. I admire his empathy, even if I disagree with his strict adherence to a tidy redemption narrative.

In Biden’s office, as my time is about to run out, I bring up the fact that Trump crudely mocked a disabled New York Times reporter during the 2016 campaign. “So far, he’s called you ‘Sleepy Joe.’ Is ‘St-St-St-Stuttering Joe’ next?”

“I don’t think so,” Biden says, “because if you ask the polls ‘Does Biden stutter? Has he ever stuttered?,’ you’d have 80 to 95 percent of people say no.” If Trump goes there, Biden adds, “it’ll just expose him for what he is.”

I ask Biden something else we’ve been circling: whether he worries that people would pity him if they thought he still stuttered.

He scratches his chin, his fingers trembling slightly. “Well, I guess, um, it’s kind of hard to pity a vice president. It’s kind of hard to pity a senator who’s gotten six zillion awards. It’s kind of hard to pity someone who has had, you know, a decent family. I-I-I-I don’t think if, now, if someone sits and says, ‘Well, you know, the kid, when he was a stutterer, he must have been really basically stupid,’ I-I-I don’t think it’s hard to—I’ve never thought of that. I mean, there’s nobody in the last, I don’t know, 55 years, has ever said anything like that to me.”

He slips back into politician mode, safe mode, Uncle Joe mode: “I hope what they see is: Be mindful of people who are in situations where their difficulties do not define their character, their intellect. Because that’s what I tell stutterers. You can’t let it define you.” He leans across the desk. “And you haven’t.” He’s in my face now. “You can’t let it define you. You’re a really bright guy.”

He’s telling me, in essence, that my stutter doesn’t matter, which is what I want to tell him right back. But here’s the thing: Most of the time, Biden speaks smoothly, and perhaps he sincerely does not believe that he still stutters at all. Or maybe Biden is simply telling me the story he’s told himself for several decades, the one he’s memorized, the one he can comfortably express. I don’t want to hear Biden say “I still stutter” to prove some grand point; I want to hear him say it because doing so as a presidential candidate would mean that stuttering truly doesn’t matter—for him, for me, or for our 10-year-old selves.

Now his aide is knocking, trying to get him out of the room. I push out one more question, asking what he saw reflected in that bedroom mirror as a kid.

He goes off into a different boyhood story about standing against a stone wall and talking with pebbles in his mouth, some oddball way to MacGyver fluency. I do the thing stutterers hate most: I cut him off. “What did that person look like?”

Biden stops. “He looked happy,” he says. “You know, I just think it looked like he’s

in control.”

This article will appear in the January/February 2020 print edition with the headline “Why Won’t He Just Say It?”

🍁☕🍂🍞🍁☕🍂🍞🍁☕🍂🍞🍁☕

#politics and government #us politics #political science #politics #democratic debate #democratic party #democrats #democrat #2020 election #2020 candidates #2020 presidential election #joe biden #2020 presidential candidates #u.s. presidential elections #presidential elections #elections #u.s. news #u.s. government #u.s. senate #senate

[imissthefire]

I need to get this out. It’s been something on my mind for the past while, and I feel like I need to just let it out - even if it’s to whoever stops to read it.

TW: suicidal ideation/mention, talk of depression & anxiety and mental illness in general

Before I get into this, I just wanna say that y’all have absolutely zero obligation to read through this, I don’t want anyone to feel guilted into reading this. I’m posting this for me, I need to talk about it, and even if it’s just a shout into the void of the depths of tumblr, that’s okay.

I turn eighteen in just over a week, I graduate high school in just over a month, and I’m terrified. Ever since I was in the sixth grade, I thought that I would die before I graduated. When I was in the ninth grade, I was sure that I would kill myself before I graduated. But now, here I am, so close to a future that I never thought I would see. I’ve struggled with severe depression and anxiety for years that went undiagnosed until I was in grade 8 and finally told my mum that I something was wrong with me and that I wanted to kill myself. When I started high school in grade eight, I was sure that I would kill myself before I turned 15 because I was so done with being alive and I couldn’t take it. In grade nine and ten, it only got worse. I had been waitlisted for physical health treatment, and ever day that passed was another nightmare.

It just felt like there would be no end to my pain, and I was so tired of being alive. I remember in a class we had to write down where we see ourself on the day of our graduation, and the teacher would share what we wrote (we didn’t write out names, it was all anonymous) and I wrote that I would be dead by then. In the same class later on in the year, we had to write on slips of paper things that stress us out, and on other slips write how we cope. I won’t forget the people who laughed at one of the things I wrote that stress me out, I wrote an abbreviated term for it as I was too afraid someone would recognise my hand writing. We wrote what the slips said on the board and these few guys were laughing “what does [redacted] mean?” “probably some dumb kid shit”

It was the first time I had ever “publically” opened up about that event having happened to me, and I never will again. I only told three people in my life about what happened, and two of those people no longer see me in a positive light and I live in crippling fear that one of them will say something about it.

When they wrote how we cope, there was a fair amount of people that said “weed/smoking/edibles/drugs” and then some other healthier coping mechanisms along with those. Then there was mine. About half of the class knew it was me, but they daren’t say a word. One of the kids who joked about my past trauma laughed at my coping mechanism, commenting that it was such a drama queen thing.

That was the last time I ever talked to any of my friends about my addiction. I was too afraid that they would ridicule me like the other kid had, and I still am afraid that someone will point it out.

By the end of grade 10, I was so surprised that I survived. I was 16, I had finally recieved the medical treatment/therapy for my physical health issue, and for the first time, things actually started to look up.

Despite those years of hell, I’ve made it to here. In grade nine, I lost one of my best friends to suicide, and another had cut me off (I was so toxic, this was completely on me). In grade ten, I lost another one of my closest friend to suicide. But in grade eleven, my grades started going up (they fluccuated, but it was okay). Now I’m nearing the end of grade twelve and I only now and realising how unprepared I am to live the future I was so certain I would never live to.

Now, I’m feeling the ghosts of all my past mistakes catching up with me. My mental and physical health took a huge drop this year as my tic disorder had worsened severely. I’m starting to have bad memory loss, my focus is completely gone some days, and I can’t think right. I’ve fallen back into my oldest addiction that I was so sure I would be rid of forever. I broke my clean of what was probably over a year a few months ago but realised my mistake immediately. I stopped again for awhile, but within the past week, I picked it up again and I can’t stop thinking about it.

I’m terrified to live my life, I’m terrified to leave my house because I’m afraid I might try to kill myself on an impulse because of all the stress. I’m scared to tell my counsellor that I keep thinking about dying because she’s legally obligated to alert my mum and I can’t face my mum if she knows that I don’t want to be alive. She will be so sad, she’ll completely breakdown and blame herself. I’m lucky enough to have a mum that loves me, but it’s so hard to see her upset, especially when it’s because of me.

I can’t sleep anymore. I’m having terrifying dreams that make me exhausted when I wake. I have dreams where I can’t remember anything, but I wake up unable to breathe. I have dreams that leave me feeling on the verge of an anxiety attack or a seizure (I have a weird tic disorder that gets triggered when I have anxiety attacks amongst other factors).

I’m so lost and afraid. I don’t know what to do. I’m too afraid to live, but I don’t want to hurt people around me by killing myself. I need so much help, I need to figure my life out, but I’m so overwhelmed by everything that I can’t even think.

#long post #gabe rants #gabe has the big sads #like #big big sads #nqp #gabe rambles #tw suicide #tw self injury #tw depression #p.e.rs.o.n.a.l

[todays-jeremy-heere]

Recap Post

So I’ve had a couple requests for what the fuck has happened so far from newer people to our dandy set of blogs, here it is! Keep in mind this is all mostly improv so if it’s a bit all over the place then oops lol rip. (Older people and other today blogs, feel free to yell at me if I miss anything.) 

NOW INCLUDING LINKS TO CERTAIN IMPORTANT THREADS

The three not main characters in the bmc group are:

Madeline, Thalia (George’s character from Smartphone Hour), and Dustin Kropp

Let’s start at the beginning, a very good place to start :)

So the first activity of these blogs is nothing special, just silly conversations, teasing each other, and because no one is together yet, flirting. But eventually, people pair up so those people are...

Brooke x Rich, Michael x Jake and Dustin x Jeremy

Thalia asks Jeremy and Mr Heere if she can move into their house because she has an abusive father she wants to get away from, they say yes and now she lives with them. Sometime after this Thalia pairs up with Madeline. 

Jake and Chloe keep having childish arguments because they are both still salty about thier past relationships. Jake brings up how Chloe sexually assaulted Jeremy at the Halloween party last year. Tension happens between Chloe and Jeremy where they both think the other hates them.

After a bit Thalia and Madeline break up, this causes Thalia to spiral and she gets a Squip. She is very clearly not ok and whenever anyone tries to reason with her she says she doesn’t need help because she’s perfect. Then, of course, it goes wrong because it always does and she starts threatening to murder Jeremy, whenever Dustin tries to scare her off she does the same to him. There’s a massive completely improvised fight scene at Jeremy’s house (we were all freaking out on the mod discord lol), in which Chloe gets a concussion, Rich nearly gets murdered and Thalia tries to force feed Jeremy Mountain Dew Green...

When everyone wakes up the next day you have some cute shipping junk between some of the couples since their SO was nearly killed. Chloe and Jeremy realise they both don’t hate each other because they actually TALK TO EACH OTHER TO FIGURE SHIT OUT.

Meanwhile, Chloe and Madeline have clear romantic chemistry and everyone can see it but them, they ‘fake’ flirt and go on ‘fake’ dates while saying ‘I cAn’T POsSibLY sEE HoW ShE cOUld LIkE mE’. It’s cute, we all love it.

But it goes wrong when Chloe says that Madeline should keep some distance from her because she’s scared of whatever’s going on between them and that obviously hurts Madeline because they have become really close friends since the blogs started. Madeline spirals like Thalia did and gets a squip, but this time only Chloe is there to help her. Dustin was going to help but Jeremy keeps saying that he can’t go and he’s scared and he doesn’t want ‘this’ so being a good boyfriend, Dustin tries to help him. Jeremy just tells him there’s nothing wrong and Dustin should go help, Chloe. Dustin doesn’t like being left in the dark so he goes (unhappily) but he doesn't get there in time to help Chloe (I SWEAR THIS IS IMPORTANT LATER, https://todays-jeremy-heere.tumblr.com/post/179026525980/jeremy-whats-going-on-why-are-people-saying-i). So Chloe and Madeline have a fight scene and Squip!Madeline loses. (https://todays-chloe-valentine.tumblr.com/post/179030653474/listen-up-you-tic-tac-bitch-chloe)

When Maddie is in the hospital with her you get some really cute lesbian time with Chloe talking to a sleeping Madeline and what not its cute. https://todays-chloe-valentine.tumblr.com/post/179068636659/14102018

Eventually, the two of them (FINALLY) get together <3

Meanwhile, Jeremy’s mental state is getting obviously worse (posts with crossed out text, talking to ‘himself’, stuttering more, ect ect.) but whenever anyone tries to see what’s wrong he gets very defensive to the point of being kinda rude.

Dustin tries to get him to open up one final time, Jeremy says some stuff he shouldn’t have and Dustin breaks up with him, https://todays-jeremy-heere.tumblr.com/post/179194061640/101818 (Note, Dustin was completely justified and not an asshole, Jeremy was hurting both of them. https://todays-dustin-kropp.tumblr.com/post/179194994713/seriously) This sends both of them into a bad place where Dustin is pretty empty and Jeremy is panicky and defensive (and it's very obvious his squip has reactivated, https://todays-jeremy-heere.tumblr.com/post/179216021025/this-is-your-fault-n-no-he-deserves-better-than ).

Chloe and Dustin are good friends so she and him help each other out with their shit its sweet.

Whenever people try to help Jeremy he lashes out and gets very defensive. It’s very obvious at this point that during the fight with Thalia he was squipped, he talks to himself and flinches at nothing, but whenever anyone accuses him of that he adamantly denies it. He refuses to drink mountain dew red.

Chloe tries to talk to him but he yells at her and when she calls him out he starts stuttering an apology and she goes ‘Jesus stop stuttering like that.' This is the wrong thing to say to someone who spent almost a year of their life shocked whenever the speech impediment that they cannot control showed itself. Jeremy gets fucking pissed, obviously. (https://todays-jeremy-heere.tumblr.com/post/179285070845/hey-uh-ive-checked-up-on-dustin-but-how)

Madeline sends him a ‘not so friendly suggestion’ to not shout at her girlfriend. When Jeremy says how she commented on his stuttering Madeline mocks him with a fake stutter and is no help whatsoever. She says she’s sorry that they care enough to ask him what’s wrong. Jeremy has asked multiple times that they treat him like they usually do, even when he’s going through a bad time because he wants one constant thing so he says ‘If you cared about me you’d leave me alone.’ (https://todays-madeline-monroe.tumblr.com/post/179286238797/hey-unfriendly-demand-dont-fucking-yell-at-my)

Jeremy gets worse, anons try giving him an intervention, doesn't work. Chloe tries apologizing but she accidentally makes Jeremy have a mental breakdown which is always fun.

Meanwhile, Thalia finds out that a guy from her English and PE classes got her pregnant. Her mum also died, Chloe is very supportive to her and lends her a dress for the funeral. She generally isn’t having a very good time right now but everyone she knows is being so nice to her and she’s very grateful. (https://todays-thalia-mcarthy.tumblr.com/post/179404119923/hey-i-need-to-borrow-a-dress-for-my-mothers)

In preparation for Jake’s party, Dustin lets Jake know that he’s allergic to red food dye so that it isn’t in any of the food and Dustin doesn’t need to go to the HOSPITAL.

Jeremy and Chloe made up, Jeremy apologises for yelling and Chloe apologises for commenting on his stutter. They end up hugging and Chloe lets him know that even though he wants to be left alone she’s still there for him, when Jeremy starts replying with an explanation of why he can't really talk about it his squip shocks him. Rather than freaking out Chloe calmly deals with it and Jeremy indirectly confirms that he does indeed have a squip. They establish a code so that they can talk about it, green = its talking, yellow = it shocked me, and red = help. Madeline (who acted a lot worse) still hasn’t apologised and Jeremy is still mad at her. This is the post where this goes down >>> (https://todays-chloe-valentine.tumblr.com/post/179403825299/h-hey-i-im-sorry-for-s-shouting-at-you)

Chloe finally gets Dustin to open up about how he’s feeling because up until this point Dustin has just been taking care of everyone but himself. Dustin accidentally implies he’s a murderer to get Chloe to not call him an ‘egg’ but they resolve it. He isn't a murderer (probably). Chloe is everyone’s mother. (https://todays-chloe-valentine.tumblr.com/post/179437193524/someones-been-anonymously-flirting-with-your-ex)

Chloe encourages Dustin to talk to Jeremy and sort their shit out but it goes wrong when Dustin kisses Jeremy twice and Jeremy, who did not consent to that, yeets outta there because he was not ready to do anything like that with Dust bin again and he goes to Chloe’s house and he is obviously upset and he says he feels ‘gross’.

Chloe mother is having none of that shit so she goes to yell at Dustin, she told him to talk to jeremy not to kiss him. Chloe is very mad and not thinking straight (me neither chlo) so she kisses him to try and do a tase of your own medicine type thing but Dustin is just like ‘ew im gay’. Everyone is annoyed at Chloe for this because WHAT THE FUCK CHLOE DO NOT KISS A GAY GUY WHEN YOU ARE A GIRL ESPECIALLY WITHOUT CONSENT.

Madeline, her gf, says that she is terrified of how easily Chloe can hurt people like that and she breaks up with Chloe.

So now Chloe is kinda spiraling but she doesnt get a squip because she’s not AN IDIOT.

Jeremy and Dustin kinda make up, Dustin is obviously extremely sorry and Jeremy gets the circumstances and is way too forgiving in general but yeah. It’s unspoken that they are ok with eachother but they boht kinda silently agree to forget that ever happened and to move past it.

Thalia in general isn’t very mentally ok and she tries to kill herself by jumping off a bridge but Dustin saves her.

AND THAT’S WHERE WE ARE NOW FUCKERS HAVE A NICE DAY.

#yell at me if i miss something #recap post #i will update this as the story goes on #original recap post

[carry-on-my-wayward-shadowhunter]

Blue on Black

This is the start (rough!) of a story im working on. Eventually Drarry, Good Malfoys. I love both of those together. Sue me lol

Lucius Malfoy bid the Minister a good day, and watched him retreat towards where Harry Potter’s trial would be taking place. Utter nonsense, he thought. Fudge is off his rocker to think Harry Potter would cause trouble over nothing and make up stories about The Dark Lord returning...and about the Diggory boy...he shuddered a little, knowing he would lose his mind if anything of the sort happened to Draco. Lucius started to make his way back to the elevator. He didn’t really relish being so close to the Department of Mysteries...he sighed while adjusting his collar, a nervous tic he had had since he was a boy.

“How long do you think you can keep this up?” A voice came round the corner. Lucius smiled a little as he turned towards it.

“I cannot believe they are having a full criminal trial over this. Honestly, the nerve.” Lucius replied to Arthur Weasley. “But, in regards to your earlier question, I don’t know. Cissy says it’s wearing me down. Not like I have much of a choice, now do I?”

Arthur shook his head, knowing Lucius was right. “While I understand your reasoning, you know Severus keeps a close eye on his godson.”

“You’d do the same if it were any of your children.” Arthur nodded in agreement. “Besides, you don’t know the children in his House like I do. I have to be careful. Draco is my only son. Nothing can happen to him.” Lucius firmly stated, with a hint of finality on the subject.

“I understand, I do. Narcissa has been writing to Molly worried, is all. We all are,”

“Too right. As we all should be. I never thought I’d have to wear this mask again, but hopefully soon...I won’t have to,” Lucius’ eyes flashed with determination, making Arthur smile at his friend.

“Here, here.” Arthur agreed.

“You know I tried talking old Fudge out of this, right? Merlin, you would think Harry killed someone, the rate they are going!” Lucius exclaimed, as they walked down the hallway.

“No one wants to admit he’s back, Lucius. It’s a hard pill to swallow.” Arthur admitted.

“I rebelled against my family, almost lost my inheritance, almost disparaged the Malfoy name because my Father was a right bastard...all to wear this ridiculous front all the time. Because of HIM.” Lucius muttered, darkly. “I often don’t agree with Sirius, but we need to act sooner, rather than later. All this waiting around is getting us nowhere. You know He isn’t resting.”

“The Order, as a whole, agreed we need more information. You know this,” Arthur stopped suddenly when he heard voices around the corner. “See you later.”

“See you,” Lucius whispered, watching Arthur walk away quickly. This is getting old and quick, he thought to himself. No wonder Draco is so angry all the time...he has to pretend to be friends with those goons at school to keep mouths from running, and suspicion raised.

As he made his way through the MoM, he fell more and more into a state of irritation, before apparating back to he Manor. He nearly crashed into his wife upon entering in a huff. “I’m sorry, my love.” As he checked to make sure he didn’t harm her.

“Bad day, sweetheart?” Narcissa brushed him off, kissing his cheek.

“Upon leaving and entering the Ministry, I ran into no less than twelve people I hate, and twelve people I have no idea what their names were, but whom I’m expected to know anyway. All the small talk, I wanted to ram my head into the nearest wall! Tiresome people...why are we acquainted with them again?” Lucius dropped his cloak off in the front on the hook, following his wife into the lounge for a drink. It was early in the day, but he needed one.

“I honestly have no good answers for that, dear,” Narcissa chuckled, while she fixed her husband a strong drink. “Any news on Harry’s hearing?”

“No, but I’m sure they won’t find anything on him. He wouldn’t cast that spell for no reason. According to Arthur, he even saved that lump of a cousin of his.”

“Even if he does get cleared, we haven’t heard the end of this. You know how stubborn Fudge is. His mind won’t be changed.” Narcissa commented, handing her husband the glass. “The Prophet has been dragging both Harry’s and Dumbledore’s names through the muck.”

“I don’t read that rubbish anymore. All they are after is a story, no matter who they hurt. This is all so absurd.” Lucius sighed, taking a drink.

“What’s absurd?” A voice came through around the corner. Draco kissed his mum on the cheek and sat across from his father in the study.

“Potter’s hearing today.” Lucius explained.

Draco’s heart did a flip flop. “And?”

“Waiting for word on their decision.”

“Ah. Have you heard back from Severus? He was going over the potions required for OWLs this year.” Draco changed the subject before his treacherous mouth could blurt out something akin to caring about Potter’s wellbeing. Even though Draco did care, he couldn’t let it show. Not yet...he thought.

“He’s gathering as much information as he can. These are dangerous times, son. I need you to promise me to be careful this year.” Lucius was serious, and it showed on his face. His mother nodded in agreement.

Draco smiled. “Aren’t I always?” He said, trying to lighten the mood.

“No, hence why I said it,” Lucius chuckled.

“I promise to watch my back, Dad. I swear. You can’t really help but to have your own back in my House. No one else does,” Draco shrugged, even though he felt anything but nonchalant about it. He envied Harry in that way; to have friends that you could count on in a heartbeat, no questions asked.

“Are you finished packing, my dragon?” Narcissa asked him.

“I believe so. Although...I think I am missing something...” Draco slowly got up from his seat, looking at his mother slyly.

Narcissa narrowed her eyes, smiling. “Don’t you touch my chocolate from Switzerland, young man...”

Draco shrugged, and shot a quick wink to his Father, dashed out of the room, with Narcissa on his heels.

“Draco! Get back here!” She called though the Manor. Lucius openly laughed. It felt good to relax around his family, even though they all knew what was coming around the bend. Lucius knew this would happen one day, but he didn’t think it would be so soon.

“Lucius.” Came a voice out of nowhere, making the man in question jump a little.

“Merlin’s beard, nose and eyebrows, Sirius...don’t DO that.” Lucius looked toward the fireplace to see Sirius’ head floating in the fire.

“Just wanted to let you know, Harry is cleared of all charges.” Sirius smiled happily at the news. “He shouldn’t have been there to begin with, but at least this is over for the time being.”

“Fudge on the warpath is never a good thing. He’s blinded by fear. Which I get, but he will not see reason! It’s infuriating!”

“We just need to keep doing what we’re doing. Harry is safe, and that’s all that matters.” Lucius could sense the worry coming from his voice about his godson.

“Yes, just tell him to keep his friends close this year. He’s better off with Ron and Hermione around. Draco tells me they would battle the Dark Lord himself if he tried to attack Harry.” Lucius said, trying to ease his mind somewhat.

“They are as close as James and I and Remus were in school. By the way, how much longer are we going to have to discuss things through Floo? It’s getting annoying, you know.” Sirius raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, I know. Not too much longer, I hope. I have my fingers in a lot of pies so hopefully they give me some information sooner, rather than later. What?” Lucius furrowed his brow at Sirius’ giggling.

“That phrase...it’s very muggle, isn’t it?”

“Heard it on a show Draco showed me. It makes sense, I suppose. Although the imagery is quite disgusting.” Lucius smirked, making Sirius laugh more. “I have some business I need to attend to. Make sure to keep me and Narcissa updated as much as you can.”

“Will do.” Sirius said, and closed the Floo call.

#drarry #good malfoys #fanfic #my writing #rough draft #harry potter

[pettigrw]

whats up fellas, its bee again, bringing to You my son peter pettigrew !! i am , ,... v v soft for this boi, i have been writing him for .. over 4 years now ?? wow ???? and im super super excited to bring him to you so !! please love him ( & me ) and without further Ado find out more under the cut  

the trees unloose their soft arms from around ( peter pettigrew ) — ( he ) reminds me of ( laughter breaking the stillness of a suburban summer night, coughing on whiskey and cigarettes, running a restless hand through messy blond hair, the soft ticking of a grandfather clock, bruised knuckles stuffed in the pockets of scuffed jeans. the golden rays of the late afternoon sun. quick glances seeking approval, a cheeky grin once it’s been earned. dog eared comic books in a cardboard box under your bed, feet dangling over the edge of the roof, staring down the stars, wanting to be a hero but not quite knowing how ). a ( seventh ) year ( gryffindor ), the ( escapist ) is known for being being ( intuitive ) & ( facetious ), however ( foolhardy ) & ( self-doubting ). rumour has it that the ( seventeen ) year old ( tarjei sandvik moe ) doppleganger is seizing their moment by siding with the ( order ).

pinterest board !!

character insp includes xander harris ( btvs ), adam parrish ( the raven cycle ), peter parker ( mcu ), ron weasley ( am i using a harry potter character as inspiration for another harry potter character? maybe )

peter pettigrew. born in sheffield, england to a muggle father and a magical mother. he lived in a small brick house with old fashioned furniture. his family has always been catholic so he dressed up and went to church every sunday. he was an only child, and it showed – his parents adored him and coddled him from the moment he was born.

perhaps because of this, or perhaps because he was a wizard, he didn’t really click with the muggle kids in his neighbourhood. he was more a mama’s boy, helping his mother dust and vacuum and fold the laundry and set the table for supper every day. his parents were worried that he wasn’t a very social child, and that he wouldn’t make many friends at hogwarts. they even considered holding him back a year, but ultimately decided against it.

but lo and behold, when he went to hogwarts he made friends! remus, sirius and james to be specific. and it was gr8 and they brought out this whole other side of him that he’d never shown before

this mischievous, snarky boy who’ll “yes ma’am” and “no ma’am” your mum to her face but just as soon make a “your mom” joke when she’s out of earshot. his smile is either shy and endearing or the cheekiest lil shit-eating grin you’ve ever seen. he’ll laugh at the worst of jokes. fluent in sarcasm. he’s great at seeming more innocent than he is ( a power used for pranks now, but much darker things later ). and yeah, he’s an enabler - his friends do stupid stuff and he doesn’t stop them. but so what? he’s a teenage boy.

his room is surprisingly neat. would never admit it but he kind of likes cheesy cliches ( he’s watched gone with the wind with his mum enough times he can quote it off by heart ). he wants to be a dashing hero like in the dog eared comic books he still has in a box under his bed. wants to sweep a girl off her feet. wants to be something more than the sidekick, at least once. sometimes he’s trying just a bit too hard to impress other people because he cares a lot more about what other people think of him than he likes to let on. slightly self conscious because he had a growth spurt over the summer – he used to be really short but now he’s all long limbs and stupid grins and dimples and tousled blond hair and he’s grown quite attractive but doesn’t realize it thank god. and hey – that’s just part of his charm. because he is charming. he just doesn’t realise it compared to james and sirius.

he compares himself to james and sirius a lot. peter has always been prone to insecure thoughts and nervous tics – during exam season his nails are always bitten down to stubs and his skin breaks out. and in the times he’s feeling particularly unhappy with himself he looks to his friends. and this can go either one of two ways – either they make him better and build him up. and really he should be able to do that himself but he’s always been dependent on other people. always. first his parents, then the marauders. or he’s feeling insecure and he looks to his friends and sees how much better they are than him. how unattainable their status is. and he feels like a useless burden, dragging them down. those are his bad days. but they’re relatively infrequent – at least for now.

he has ways to dispel these thoughts. for one, he drinks. not the best coping mechanism, granted, but whiskey burns his throat and the inside of his chest like the fire he always wished he had burning inside of him, and it makes him feel stronger and it makes him feel braver and his friends are drinking with him and soon they’re all laughing and doing stupid shit together and then the alcohol washes away any doubts peter has. and it’s good.

and sometimes he gets into fist fights. he’s gotten better at it over the years, ever since sirius taught him that your thumb isn’t supposed to go inside your fist. he feels strong when he fights, he feels a reckless sort of freedom that’s as close to confidence as he’ll ever get. and sometimes he picks fights he knows he can’t win, but hey, that’s part of the thrill, right? because he also knows that his friends can bail him out, and he also knows that the black eye he’s going to have in the morning will make him look tougher, and people will fuss over him and ask questions. and it’s good.

if you asked peter what the most important thing in the world is to him, he would say his friends. and he would say his family. not once would it ever occur to him to say himself, or his own health or happiness. and i’ll get into this more later, but when the war begins, peter doesn’t betray his friends for himself, at least not at first. in a weird, twisted, misguided way, he does it for them. but again – i’ll get into that later.

he puts a lot of value on interpersonal relationships. and sometimes, that’s a good thing because he values those relationships and cherishes them, and he’s a wonderful friend and very intuitive. he can always tell if someone’s upset, and he’s a great listener. but also sometimes it’s a bad thing how much value he puts on those relationships. because he builds his own personal value off of them, and off how much people like him and support him. like i said – he’s always been dependent. he doesn’t know any way else to be.

and deep down, peter is an optimist. it’s his fatal flaw. how? because no matter how badly things are going, he thinks to himself that it’ll all turn out fine, in the end. something will happen, in the end. someone will save him, in the end. for instance – he has no idea what he wants to do after hogwarts. and sometimes that worries him, but most of the time he pushes it to the back of his mind. he can think about that later. it’ll turn out fine. and when the war starts, and he gets deeper and deeper involved with the death eaters, he refuses to admit how much it scares him and how big of a problem it’s becoming. because in the end, it’ll turn out fine. it always does for the good guys. he never considers that he may not be one of the good guys.

this probably won’t happen in the course of this rp ( and honestly ??? maybe hopefully never happens -- who knows, its an au rp .. ,,,... ... ) but he gets involved with the death eaters when it’s looking darkest for the order. and victory is looking certain for the death eaters. so he joins them because he has this stupid, stupid, naive hope that if he joins the death eaters, he can convince them to spare his friends when they inevitably win. he does it for them. and deep down, he knows that that’s not gonna happen, but he pushes it to the back of his mind. because it’ll all turn out fine.

[ TW CANCER, DEATH ] this year is the year his insecurity complex starts to come into play – when everything starts to unravel. it’s a slow process, and it begins with peter’s father. see, peter’s father is dying, but he doesn’t know it yet. no one does. it’s during a doctor’s appointment, a month from now, that william pettigrew will be diagnosed with stage ii pancreatic cancer. he won’t make it. he will die before peter graduates from hogwarts.

peter’s mother will not deal with it well. she will retreat into herself, mourning the death of her husband, and peter will be forced to spend most of the summer after his last year caring for her, while struggling with his own grief. suddenly, peter will go from the doting, loving support of both parents to the support of neither.

so he’ll turn to his friends, desperate, seeking validation and support, but they’re each starting their own lives. there’s a war starting, they’re all beginning their own independent lives but peter – remember, peter has always been dependent. and suddenly, his insecurities are making a surprise comeback. the golden years at hogwarts, what peter will later realize were the best years of his life, are gone, and so is the carefree boy peter used to be.

but anyway. that’s the canon future. like i said, au rp, who knows what’ll happen?? could order!peter emerge???? will peter be able to deal with his growing insecurity complex in a healthy way??? stay tuned folks

either way though, right now peter is just a normal teenage boy, impulsive and goofy and self-conscious 

#mmnt.intro

[pcttigrew]

its bee back again with the ball of insecurities and sass that is peter pettigrew wyd 

did someone just say they saw KEIYNAN LONSDALE on the hogwarts express ?? never mind — it’s just that SEVENTH year GRYFFINDOR, PETER PETTIGREW. he’s pretty INTUITIVE + FACETIOUS, but one of the portraits whispered to me that he’s also FOOLHARDY + SELF-DOUBTING. anyways, i hear they PLAN ON entering the tournament!

(    laughter breaking the stillness of a suburban summer night, coughing on whiskey and cigarettes, running a restless hand over close-cropped hair, the soft ticking of a grandfather clock, bruised knuckles stuffed in the pockets of scuffed jeans. the golden rays of the late afternoon sun. quick glances seeking approval, a cheeky grin once it’s been earned. dog eared comic books in a cardboard box under your bed, feet dangling over the edge of the roof, staring down the stars, wanting to be a hero but not quite knowing how.   )

PINTEREST BOARD ! 

been playing pete for over 4 years now but this is my first time playing him with a keiynan fc so be gentle sjflkdsjf

PETER PETTIGREW. born in sheffield, england to a muggle father and a magical mother. he lived in a small brick house with old fashioned furniture. his family has always been catholic so he dressed up and went to church every sunday. he was an only child, and it showed – his parents adored him and coddled him from the moment he was born.

perhaps because of this, or perhaps because he was a wizard, he didn’t really click with the muggle kids in his neighbourhood. he was more a mama’s boy, helping his mother dust and vacuum and fold the laundry and set the table for supper every day. his parents were worried that he wasn’t a very social child, and that he wouldn’t make many friends at hogwarts. they even considered holding him back a year, but ultimately decided against it.

but lo and behold, when he went to hogwarts he made friends! remus, sirius and james to be specific. and it was gr8 and they brought out this whole other side of him that he’d never shown before

this mischievous, snarky boy who’ll “yes ma’am” and “no ma’am” your mum to her face but just as soon make a “your mom” joke when she’s out of earshot. his smile is either shy and endearing or the cheekiest lil shit-eating grin you’ve ever seen. he’ll laugh at the worst of jokes. fluent in sarcasm. he’s great at seeming more innocent than he is ( a power used for pranks now, but much darker things later ). and yeah, he’s an enabler - his friends do stupid stuff and he doesn’t stop them. but so what? he’s a teenage boy.

his room is surprisingly neat. would never admit it but he kind of likes cheesy cliches ( he’s watched gone with the wind with his mum enough times he can quote it off by heart ). he wants to be a dashing hero like in the dog eared comic books he still has in a box under his bed. wants to sweep a girl off her feet. wants to be something more than the sidekick, at least once. sometimes he’s trying just a bit too hard to impress other people because he cares a lot more about what other people think of him than he likes to let on. slightly self conscious because he had a growth spurt over the summer – he used to be really short but now he’s all long limbs and stupid grins and dimples and he’s grown quite attractive but doesn’t realize it thank god. and hey – that’s just part of his charm. because he is charming. he just doesn’t realise it compared to james and sirius.

he compares himself to james and sirius a lot. peter has always been prone to insecure thoughts and nervous tics – during exam season his nails are always bitten down to stubs and his skin breaks out. and in the times he’s feeling particularly unhappy with himself he looks to his friends. and this can go either one of two ways – either they make him better and build him up. and really he should be able to do that himself but he’s always been dependent on other people. always. first his parents, then the marauders. OR he’s feeling insecure and he looks to his friends and sees how much better they are than him. how unattainable their status is. and he feels like a useless burden, dragging them down. those are his bad days. but they’re relatively infrequent – at least for now.

he has ways to dispel these thoughts. for one, he drinks. not the best coping mechanism, granted, but whiskey burns his throat and the inside of his chest like the fire he always wished he had burning inside of him, and it makes him feel stronger and it makes him feel braver and his friends are drinking with him and soon they’re all laughing and doing stupid shit together and then the alcohol washes away any doubts peter has. and it’s good.

and sometimes he gets into fist fights. he’s gotten better at it over the years, ever since sirius taught him that your thumb isn’t supposed to go inside your fist. he feels strong when he fights, he feels a reckless sort of freedom that’s as close to confidence as he’ll ever get. and sometimes he picks fights he knows he can’t win, but hey, that’s part of the thrill, right? because he also knows that his friends can bail him out, and he also knows that the black eye he’s going to have in the morning will make him look tougher, and people will fuss over him and ask questions. and it’s good.

if you asked peter what the most important thing in the world is to him, he would say his friends. and he would say his family. not once would it ever occur to him to say himself, or his own health or happiness. and i’ll get into this more later, but when the war begins, peter doesn’t betray his friends for himself, at least not at first. in a weird, twisted, misguided way, he does it for them. but again – i’ll get into that later.

he puts a lot of value on interpersonal relationships. and sometimes, that’s a good thing because he values those relationships and cherishes them, and he’s a wonderful friend and very intuitive. he can always tell if someone’s upset, and he’s a great listener. but also sometimes it’s a bad thing how much value he puts on those relationships. because he builds his own personal value off of them, and off how much people like him and support him. like i said – he’s always been dependent. he doesn’t know any way else to be.

and deep down, peter is an optimist. it’s his fatal flaw. how? because no matter how badly things are going, he thinks to himself that it’ll all turn out fine, in the end. something will happen, in the end. someone will save him, in the end. for instance – he has no idea what he wants to do after hogwarts. and sometimes that worries him, but most of the time he pushes it to the back of his mind. he can think about that later. it’ll turn out fine. and when the war starts, and he gets deeper and deeper involved with the death eaters, he refuses to admit how much it scares him and how big of a problem it’s becoming. because in the end, it’ll turn out fine. it always does for the good guys. he never considers that he may not be one of the good guys.

this is far far in the future and almost definitely wont happen in this rp but just to talk abt the motivation behind his betrayal --- he gets involved with the death eaters when it’s looking darkest for the order. and victory is looking certain for the death eaters. so he joins them because he has this stupid, stupid, naive hope that if he joins the death eaters, he can convince them to spare his friends when they inevitably win. he does it for them. and deep down, he knows that that’s not gonna happen, but he pushes it to the back of his mind. because it’ll all turn out fine.

[ TW CANCER, DEATH ] this year is the year his insecurity complex starts to come into play – when everything starts to unravel. it’s a slow process, and it begins with peter’s father. see, peter’s father is dying, but he doesn’t know it yet. no one does. it’s during a doctor’s appointment, a month from now, that william pettigrew will be diagnosed with stage ii pancreatic cancer. he won’t make it. he will die before peter graduates from hogwarts.

peter’s mother will not deal with it well. she will retreat into herself, mourning the death of her husband, and peter will be forced to spend most of the summer after his last year caring for her, while struggling with his own grief. suddenly, peter will go from the doting, loving support of both parents to the support of neither.

so he’ll turn to his friends, desperate, seeking validation and support, but they’re each starting their own lives. there’s a war starting, they’re all beginning their own independent lives but peter – remember, peter has always been dependent. and suddenly, his insecurities are making a surprise comeback. the golden years at hogwarts, what peter will later realize were the best years of his life, are gone, and so is the carefree boy peter used to be.

but anyway. that’s the canon future. but like, au rp, triwizard tournament, who knows what’ll happen?? could order!peter emerge???? will peter be able to deal with his growing insecurity complex in a healthy way??? stay tuned folks

either way though, right now peter is just a normal teenage boy, impulsive and goofy and self-conscious, excited about the tournament like the rest of the school, dreaming of glory and adventure

#tournamentintro #( ooc. ) #have this recycled ass intro