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warmau · 3 years

Text

not knowing what to say isn't a foreign feeling to you, yet when you come face to face with ten outside his apartment on this summer morning, you are almost too petrified to even string a sentence together

he's really just........leaving

ten shines a big smile and from the open door you hear kun's exasperated voice asking why in the world ten is packing up his entire existence for a program that's going to last two months

"you look nervous"

ten jokes first, running a hand through his dark hair which he's spent the colder months growing out

"im the one going to a different country and yet you look like you might turn green"

his laughter tickles you and you force yourself out of the weird, frozen feeling, for his sake

"im not nervous - it's just this is our first summer apart since what, highschool?"

ten leans against the frame of his door and lets kun scuttle past him with a scowl

yangyang and hendery bounce after him with ten's insane amount of luggage

"yeah but it's two months, not two decades. plus....you know how much ive always wanted to do this."

right. and here you are being selfish.

"of course, i mean it's literally the birthplace of ballet."

"technically that's italy, but france is a close second."

"i hate you"

ten pulls you into his arms before you register that this is your goodbye hug

"i'll miss you too."

kun drives everyone to the airport, he complains and cries the most.

sicheng gives you a knowing look when ten takes your wrist in his hand and tucks your arm between his.

you ignore the look, and focus on ten. on him. and then - when the switchboard pops up his flight info - he gives a bubbly and excited

"ive gotta go!"

and then summer starts, just as he's gone

"so when are you going to tell him you're in love with him."

sicheng brings the big gulp he stole from hendery up to his lips and you keep your eyes closed behind your sunglasses

"sorry, yukhei's not my type."

"you know im not talking about yukhei."

you dig your fingers into the sand beside your towel, the beach is already so noisy so you pretend you don't hear sicheng, but you still feel him looking.

you guess a part of it is true, you love ten. who doesn't?

is that the core of the issue then, that ten is so available and loveable and charming, that it makes him also unattainable?

or at least, unattainable to you.

you hear your phone buzz inside your bag and sicheng is being dragged into the water by the rowdy rest of your friend group

it could be a text from ten?

your mind excites, but you put out that fire

it's probably just spam.

ten does text and even video call the first two or so weeks while he's away

you get blurry photos of food at cafes and the eiffel tower, random fancy looking dogs being walked on the small, cramped streets

ten's connection is kind of bad - but he still gleams through the fuzzy facetime camera as he shows you around the room the dance academy has provided

pangs of his happiness and excitement seep into you

and then there's the first sign of worry comes knocking and twirling through his door

a group of other dancers, all beautiful and strong, asking ten - from the limited amount of french you catch - if he's done, they're waiting for him to go to a show with them

ten gives you a scattered, quick goodbye. he says he'll video call again.

all you get is an update text almost five days later that has no pictures attached just a;

im ok - by the way i totally miss eating hot chips with you at midnight. ive had like a banana smoothie and that's it.

sicheng and kun are the first to pick up on the shift, you are quietly withdrawing to yourself

nothing makes you laugh

ten doesn't reply to your question about what the paris metro looks like, actually he doesn't even read it

kun nearly tugs hendery's ear red when he shares a snap story of ten pressed cheek to cheek with his new dancer friends in front of the louvre when you're in the same room

the thing is you are not jealous of any of them.

you don't go around trying to find their facebooks, clicking on their instagram profiles, comparing you and them.

you are just sad to your bones that they will understand ten in such a way that no matter how long you two have been friends

you will never, truly know

"you're his best friend"

sicheng reasons on the phone as you stare up at the wall above your desk, littered in old pictures and clippings and your gaze catches on the ticket stub from ten's first-ever solo dance performance

it had been a talent show in highschool.

it had been the first time you saw ten perform outside the corner of his cramped bedroom or the glimpse you caught meeting up with him outside the dance academy

he's in paris, he's with people who love it so much more than i do - they love dancing like he loves dancing.

i cannot understand that.

"i think you were right sicheng."

"im always right."

i do love him. when am i going to tell him?

you hang up after sicheng has his i told you so moment and stare at your screen

a notification flashes across the screen and it's a text from ten

the trains here are blue. i miss you.

you want to reply right away, so you open the message and start typing

i miss you too. actually, i think i finally understand why people who are in love are so hurt when they're suddenly left without their other half and ten you are my o-

you delete the sentence and make a face

nice. i miss you too.

you don't send it - or at least you forget to because your fingers are shaking and you exit out of the messaging app before checking

abandoning your phone, you turn on your side and stretch your hand out to reach the edge of the bed

there's enough space between you and it for someone to fit, so you remember the countless times ten has laid there

smiling and laughing and tickling your face with his sleeping breath

you can't even recall a conversation because there have been hundreds

suddenly you feel a warmth creep up your skin

hundreds of opportunities to tell him - and each time i chose to be a coward.

"you should write him a letter."

"this isn't a movie, what - you think im going to write a letter and he'll jump on the first plane from france to come to my side?"

sicheng cocks an eyebrow as if to say it is a possibility

"no. im not writing a letter. i'll suck it up and confess when he comes back."

you somehow end up writing a letter.

maybe because you really do want to just send a long text spilling your mushy, soft, pink feelings

but you know that's just not what ten deserves

he deserves (and you do too, but you won't admit this) a face to face confession

so you start retelling the moments that flutter up in your heart whenever you think about him

how he makes the room brighter when he's in it, how he dances with every bone, joint, muscle in his body - how he approaches it with no inhibition and true devotion that paints its way across his face when he practices, how he fits perfectly into the hole that grows more massive every day you don't see him

standing there across the hall - coffee in hand, gym bag with his scuffed dance shoes

by the time you're finished - the letter is longer than you imagine. there are parts crossed and scribbled out, repetitive thoughts, and stupid little comments and metaphors that compare ten to flowers or clouds or anything else pretty in nature

you cringe at yourself, but you do feel better

it could be your outline for when the time to actually tell him comes.

you shove the papers into an envelope, write ten's name and the address of his parisian dance academy just for the irony

and then make the mistake of letting it sit on your desk

in a matter of days, it has been swallowed by a bunch of other papers and trinkets

and when you're rushing around your room trying to get ready for another adventure to the beach - sicheng clinks the lollipop against his teeth and fishes it out - curious at the stamp

"do you want me to mail this?"

he asks and you're trying to find those sunglasses you literally just bought and grumble that sure, whatever - you'll meet him out by kun's car.

halfway to the beach, you turn in horror from the passenger seat to look at sicheng in the back

your eyes like saucers and a tremor in a voice

"wait. what did you ask me back in my room?"

sicheng's big smile is red from the candy, "your letter to ten."

and there comes the second pang of dread and worry that takes the overwhelming shape of your summer

oh my god - oh my god - maybe the letter won't even make it. i mean it's a letter to france....it'll take at least a month to get there. wait - it probably didn't even have a stamp on it. oh god maybe the address was totally off and some poor stranger is about to be subjected to my very incoherent feelings.....

every day you look at your phone and there's no texts or emails or anything from ten

his social media has gone quiet too

you throw your dignity down a well and ask all your friends if they've heard from him and they all scratch their heads and say no, it's been maybe a week since they did

your stress then turns from your love letter to a possibility that ten is in trouble

he kind of thrives from attention so it is very weird that he's so off-grid

you decide finally, on the day that it's been exactly a month and one day since he was gone, to call

you hover over the facetime button - should i text him first?

with a yelp, you nearly drop and crack your screen when ten's name flashes across the screen

you settle your breathing and tell yourself he hasn't gotten the letter, there's no way - since when has snail mail been efficient?

you answer and are about to ask what's up when ten waves something into the camera

"i got your letter."

maybe you go into rigor. because ten's eyebrows knit and he asks if your connection is ok, you aren't saying anything

you don't know if it's just because you miss him so much that you're able to drag yourself back into consciousness or because you are curious, in the depths of your mind, what his reaction will be

"o-oh. right- i-"

ten frowns and you think it's coming. the rejection is coming.

"is that why you didn't answer my text? you sent the letter instead?"

"your text?"

"yeah, i said i missed you and you read it and never responded."

a peek of a smile stretches on his pretty, bare face

"i never thought you were so romantic to send a letter."

something burns on your skin but you just try to make sure your hand holding the phone doesn't shake

"im not - i just, it was dumb sicheng said i should write it because - i don't know. he's the romantic, blame him."

"you're the one that said i could make a shy tulip open its petals with my laughter."

"oh god"

that smile turns into a grin

"and that my dancing manages to cast a spell on you."

you hide your expression by turning your face

"are you going to re-read the whole thing to me?"

"should i, you're so poetic."

"don't make fun of me."

your voice is serious this time, small and huddled, because you mean it

worse than being told he doesn't feel the same is to be ridiculed for holding him in your heart like this for so long

"im not making fun of you, the letter is beautiful."

you still can't look at him, it's so ten to be kind before he's cruel

"i could never write something like that - so i thought i would just call you and say it."

you don't need to love song yourself into telling me you just see me as a friend

"i love you."

your head whips back so fast your phone drops and you curse and ten can't help but laugh

"sorry, sorry -what did you say?"

he runs a hand through his dark hair, the lighting in his room is dim and illuminates him perfectly

a large white t-shirt engulfs his slender shoulders as he sits up against the wall

"i love you. i know it's corny to confess over facetime, but im guessing it's more forgivable than text?"

a bubble bursts in your stomach and it makes you feel lightheaded and inhumanely blissful all at once

"i love you too."

"more then friends right, because your letter had this part about kissing im very interested in."

you bite back your lip and nod, both embarrassed that he'd bring that part up too but also seeing ten - your close friend, your secret love - talk about kissing you

makes some of the neurons in your body go haywire

"good, i seriously was scared you might have been pranking me with thi-"

"i would never. im not hendery."

"oh how are they, ive been super busy with the practice for a review so i haven't talked to anyone."

another thing you love about him, he keeps everyone in. he leaves none of his friends behind. he pretends like he couldn't have a care in the world, but he cares more than anyone else.

"he's ok, he almost crashed kun's car yesterday."

ten shrugs, "expected."

and like that - everything is still somehow the same. there is no awkward phase after you've talked about your feelings for each other at all.

because your love doesn't come as a one hit punch because ten is beautiful, although he is to an unfair degree

it comes from the experience of being around him. having so much of him. maybe even getting a little addicted.

you do talk more on the phone, no more long pauses even though ten's practices get more grueling and you tell him to take his time to rest

but he's sweaty on the practice room floor - texting you - telling you everything is sore but the thought of seeing you soon makes it all better

it's three days before ten is scheduled to fly back that he has his review and you are biting your fingernails waiting for him to tell you about it

when you get a youtube link at like three in the morning - you click it and someone has recorded ten's performance

somehow, he looks more graceful than you've ever seen him

a new text comes in when it's almost done

'i think i did well - can i get a reward?'

'you'll get a really good one when you're home'

he sends a winking emoji and you can't fall asleep after because you wonder what he's expecting, you'd meant a kiss - had he meant more?

you wouldn't mind that at all.

xiaojun is being pulled away from the conveyer belt by kun and hendery is asking sicheng for a sip of his starbucks as you all wait for ten's plane to land in the airport lobby

you two have not told anyone - mostly because you know there will be endless questions you won't have answers too and sicheng might literally never let you live it down

so you wait for ten to be here so you can suffer together

you see the gates from his flight open and sicheng mutters that you look like you're going to pop like a goddamn balloon

for once in your life, you don't snide back at him, folding your hands in front of you and tippy-toeing to see over the crowd

and then, like seeing him for the first time all the years ago when you first met, ten comes out

hendery and xiaojun try to go for a running jump, but the older members hold them back because everyone can sense whats coming

you dash toward him and ten doesn't stay still either - you two collide so hard it almost hurts, but you don't care at all

ten's duffel bag falls over his shoulder and your hands are wrapped around his neck before he can even say your name

it's a first kiss that couldn't be more characteristically fit for you

sweet, big smiles tasted on lips, and interrupted by none other than your group of friends gasping in a symphony of shock

except for sicheng - he knew

ten tastes like you imagine he would taste, maybe because in smaller ways you've already had doses of the sunshine that radiates off him before

he keeps his hands wrapped around your waist as he looks down into your eyes

"mon amour"

"is that really all you learned in france?"

"ummm yeah, i don't know how to say let's get out of here and back to my place even though im pretty sure someone said that to me at some point."

you pout, "don't try to make me jealous."

"never!"

ten chuckles as you press your face into his neck and hug him close

the only way you get pulled apart is because someone (kun) reminds you all you're still at the PUBLIC airport

the drive back is a frenzy and everyone wants to know everything and not about just you two - because you're "two" now - but about france and traveling and ten's dancing

like you'd sensed - nothing has really changed

just this time, your fingers are locked in tens. and the warmth you longed for in silence is suddenly all out in the open.

funnily enough, you and ten don't ever write letters to each other again.

ten just doesn't like writing - it takes too much sitting down

and you are horrified everytime he fishes your love confession out of the memory box and dangles it above your head as leverage

it's how he convinced you into adopting the first cat. now you two have three.

so when you and him are deciding the best way to let all your friends know about your upcoming event you cross out mailed invitations

"we can make an email list."

your legs are thrown over his thighs on the sofa and he's resting the laptop on you them

"let's just make an instagram post: wedding in our backyard on thursday - you're invited."

ten pinches his nose

"we are not having a backyard wedding. we could not fit everyone in my dance company into it anyway."

you play with your engagement band and sigh

"fine, fine. what about.....we just call everyone and tell them. if we call kun right now he'll let all of the world know by the end of the week."

ten agrees with a hum, but then starts typing and you lean over to see

"bulk wedding invites? you're giving in?"

he closes the laptop and tosses it to the side, easily and gently pushing you down onto your back to hover over you with a small content sound

"i am. but we don't even have to write the letters - some company will do it for us."

his lips are inches from yours and all of a sudden you're young again - waiting to kiss him for the first time at that airport

"you know we'll still have to write vows right."

he is about to kiss you, he's so close and your eyes are closing

"i'll just read your letter outl-"

"TEN NO!"

he laughs, laughs until he finally does kiss you and then laughs again when he pulls back - the overflowing amount of love that exists in that moment is potent

you tell him to get over that old thing, but he shakes his head

"never, when again in all the lives i live is someone going to say i could make a shy tulip open its petals with my laughter?"

#i know his bday was in february please im still working through them cries #ten au #ten imagines #ten scenarios #nct au #nct imagines #nct scenarios #wayv imagines #wayv au #wayv scenarios #sfw #nostolgic!au #ten #member: ten #im sicheng through all this

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pretend-writer · 3 years

Text

Demolition Lovers (Hargreeves x sibling!reader)

Summary: Klaus and Y/N helps their brother, Luther find a perfect date.

Title Reference: Demolition Lovers x My Chemical Romance

Word Count: 1.6k words

Warning: swearing, mention of sex

✤ · ✤ · ✤ · ✤ · ✤

It was a typical day at the Hargeeves mansion. Klaus and I hanging out as we lay across the couch next to each other, scrolling through our social media and sharing celebrity gossips that was trending that day.

Diego would then barge in, bothering us to get up and be productive but then end up eaves dropping and joining our conversation.

Then we'd have Vanya that'll feed us our daily snacks. She was like a mama bird; Hearing the rest of us complaining and bickering then feeds us the goodies to shut our mouth. It honestly worked every time and now I start to wonder if that was her trick all along.

After our snack was nap time, where Klaus and I would lay there for two to five hours, usually get up when the sun was down. Then we would plan our night, typically out for dinner or a night out if it was the weekend.

But our schedule, our precious paradise time was ruined by the one and only. Luther Hargreeves.

It wasn't supposed to be this way; Allison would go out to run errands, Ben worked all day like the responsible man that he was, and Five would just be Five, roaming town and doing God knows what. Luther would be home to research and dig through dad's old stuff.

Today however, wasn't the case.

He instead came in during mine and Klaus' precious nap time, groaning and yappin' about some girl on an app. Didn't know why he had to do this in the family room but there he was.

'Do you not see us sleeping here?' I complained as I lifted my head from the pillow, trying not to move a lot so that Klaus could stay asleep.

'Sorry, sorry. I didn't mean to be loud.' He apologized as he stared at his phone, depressed and upset.

Klaus rolled his eyes. 'Well you are and you're still here.'

Luther froze in place, continuing to stare at the screen. Klaus and I looked at each other, nudging one another to see who was going to talk to him first.

The both of us got up, sitting down side to side as we looked at Luther and back at each other. Klaus seemed like he was unbothered, so I sighed and broke the silence. 'What's wrong buddy?'

'Nothing.' Luther frowned.

Squinting my eyes, I grabbed the pillow from the couch and threw it on Luther's head. 'You bitch! You woke us up from our nap and you're going to say "nothing" is bothering you?'

'Ow!' Luther rubbed his head. 'Okay, okay. Damn. It's this girl on tinder, she doesn't want to go on a date with me.'

'Well, what did you tell her? Did you say something stupid?'

Luther got up, 'See. This is why I didn't want to tell you guys becau-'

'Sorry, sorry.' I stood up and pulled Luther back onto the couch. 'Mind if I see the conversation?'

His face immediately turned red, 'Uhm. Do you have to?'

'If you want me to figure out why she's turning you down, yeah.'

Hesitantly, he pulled up the messages he had with the girl and then passed me the phone. Scrolling through the messages, I shook my head. 'Luther, she's DTF.'

'Yeah, I know that's why I don't understand why she turned me down. She brought it up first.'

Klaus blinked, 'What do you think DTF stands for?'

By the look on Luther's face, I knew he was confused. He looked over at the ceiling, thinking for a while before he replied to Klaus. 'Don't tell me I was wrong this whole time.'

'So what do you think it says?'

'Uhm... Date This Friday?'

Klaus awed, shaking his head as he left my side and took a seat next to him. He wrapped his arms around Luther, 'Buddy. No. That's not what it stands for. But that's cute of you.'

'Wait, huh? So this whole time me and her were on the wrong page? What did she mean then?'

'She wanted to fuck you.' I blurted, I felt bad that Luther was so confused. 'It stands for Down To Fuck.'

It was a dead giveaway that he had no clue what his whole conversation really meant, his whole face turned redder than ever. He buried his face into his hands. 'Oh no.'

'I didn't think you were talking to girls, honestly.' Klaus chuckled. 'You clearly got game, your noggin is just a little... outdated.'

'I got what? Game? No, I just deleted Candy Crush, it was too addicting.'

Klaus kept his laugh in, curling his lips as he slowly nodded back at his brother. 'Oh my gosh.'

✤ · ✤ · ✤ · ✤ · ✤

It had been about two weeks, helping Luther get a dream girl that he deserved. Despite Luther being the annoying sibling, he had been there for me countless times and I wanted nothing but the best for him.

We've tried talking to the girls on the app, few weren't looking for anything serious, some trolling in the messages. After constant matching and messaging, Luther found someone he potentially saw a relationship with.

'Did you check your message from Claire yet?' Klaus asked.

'No. I'm kind of nervous, actually.' Luther laughed a little under his breath, shaking his legs as he gripped onto his phone.

Resting my hand on his shoulder, I reassured him. 'Don't be nervous, I'm sure she said yes to your date.'

Luther sighed, turning on his phone and scrolling through his messages. As his face lit up, he jumped off his seat. 'She said yes!'

Klaus got up and cheered, hugging Luther tightly. 'I knew it! So what time and where?'

'Ah- Uhm. Why... do you need to know?' Luther paused.

'Cause we're coming to watch.'

'No, no, no. I don't need you two spying on me. I'm already nervous as it is.'

'Yeah, Klaus let's just let him be. He's a big boy now.'

'But-'

'Let's give him the space he needs, Luther definitely needs his alone time with his girl.'

Klaus rolled his eyes, 'Okay. Have fun and tell me everything when you get home.'

A smile hasn't fade away since he saw the text; He was grinning widely than ever, never seen him this happy in my entire life. 'This is going to be so awesome!'

'Good luck buddy.' I smiled as I watch him do his little happy dance going up the stairs to get ready.

Klaus groaned, crossing his arms and pouting like a little child. 'Why can't we go spy on Luther?'

'But we are. I just wanted him to think we weren't.' I wanted nothing but the best for Luther, if it meant that he was going to have a perfect night with his perfect date, I was going to be protective of my brother.

'Perfect! I need to get my spy gear on.'

✤ · ✤ · ✤ · ✤ · ✤

With the binocular in my hands, I looked into the restaurant Luther picked for the both of them. 'Oh my gosh, he looks so cute with his little bow tie.'

Luther was blushing, talking nervously with Claire. It seemed like it was going well, no awkward moment or embarrassing moment between them.

I looked over at Klaus, who was being too quiet next to me in the passenger's seat. He had a rather thick file in his hand. 'What are you reading?'

'Claire's life.' Klaus chuckled. 'She's smart as hell, really pretty. I'd say we did a pretty good job helping Luther.'

'How did you get a file on her life?'

Klaus smiled innocently, 'Ah. I followed Diego into his ex's job and got Ben to steal it for me.'

'You what?' I leaned my head back, staring at the car ceiling as I sighed. 'Klaus, Eudora is my friend. If she finds out that you stole someone's files from the police department, she'd hate me.'

'My bad, Y/N. If it makes you feel better, Ben rejected me a bunch of times. I made a deal with him that he could take over my body for three hours for the files.'

'Whatever.' Looking through the binoculars again, I asked him another question. 'So you didn't ask Diego to get it for you?'

Klaus shook his head. 'Nah, if I ever told him I knew he'd want to come with us to stalk Luther. I wanted some Klaus Y/N alone time.'

'Aw.' I said but immediately stopped. 'Are you saying this to make me forgive you?'

'Is it working?'

'Depends how the night goes.' After a sarcastic smile, I snatched the file off of his hand. 'Why did you want to steal this anyway?'

'You ask so many questions.'

'I know.'

It was rare for Klaus to do "the responsible thing", that was more of a me, Allison or Five's criteria. I couldn't think of a possible reason why he'd go out of his way to take a file to investigate on this girl.

'It's Luther, you know. I wanted to make sure he was going out with someone that won't screw him over again.'

'That's the nicest thing you've ever said.'

'Luther better appreciate this because I'm not going to jail for this shit.'

I smiled at my brother. 'Don't worry. I gotchu.'

A loud scream came from the entrance of the restaurant, Luther approaching us quickly as he eyed the both of us.

'Duck!' I yelled at Klaus as we tried to hide ourselves from his sight.

'Don't bother. I saw you guys from the restaurant!' Luther said as he knocked on the window. 'Why are you guys here? You told me you wouldn't come.'

'I know, I know.' I rolled the window down and squealed as I reached for his bow tie. 'I just couldn't resist! You look so adorable, brother.'

He grunted, 'Stop. Guys go home, you're going to ruin this date with the woman that I love.'

'Woah! Love!?' Klaus and I said in sync.

Luther covered his mouth. He mumbled into his hand. 'Pretend I didn't say that!'

'Pretend?' I laughed, 'Luther. I can't pretend, I'm sorry. That was sort of funny. A little little little bit cute but mostly funny as hell.'

Klaus reached over me to grab onto his hand. 'Dude, you're already whipped but that's okay. But Y/N's right. It's a bit funny not going to lie.'

'I'm whipped?' Luther cocked his head. 'I don't do that sort of foreplay during se-'

'Luther, that's not what it means!'

#tua one shot #the umbrella academy oneshot #tua fanfic #tua fic #the umbrella academy fic #the umbrella academy fanfic #luther hargreeves x reader #klaus hargreeves x reader #hargreeves x sibling!reader #hargreeves x sister!reader

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vickylamore · 3 years

Text

Spilling The Toxic Tea | BBH | CHP 2.5

Social Media AU, Podcast AU, CEO AU

Pairing: Song (Y/n) x EXO (OT6), Song (Y/n) x Byun Baekhyun

Genre: Crack, Enemies To Lovers, Romance, Slice Of Life.

Prev // Next

"Do you think it was the best desicion?" Baekhyun listened as Junmyeon vented from his office. The tall building was buzzing with the media on the first floor, dozens of cars parked outside to catch a glimpse of the CEO or the man who just got his entire career and marriage destroyed in a matter of minutes.

Junmyeon was stressed, not because of the scandal. He couldn't care any less about the man who brought his own downfall. But it was that the man, Siwon, was still nowhere to be found after hours on hours of searching and phone calls. No one knew where he was, no one really cared just as long he isn't drowning in his own tears triggered by his overwhelming feelings or half the bottle of liquor he's probably downed in less than an hour.

"Of course it was the right desicion," Baekhyun answered almost immediately, he too in his own office working late hours. He stared out the tall windows, the sun already fallen and the night sky casting over the skyscraper. "At the end of the day, you saved your own ass as well as the company—"

"And my money."

"And our money," Baekhyun reiterated and turned around with a smirk, uncrossing his arms from his chest. "Either way, you'll get backlash for whatever decision you make. Because on one side, the media will be on your statement like a dog chewing a bone. On the other side, his fangirls will ignore everything and scatter around the company like a bunch of roaches."

Junmyeon sighed at this, his head hurt the more he thought about the outcome of what tomorrow will look like for himself and the company. All that mattered was that the statement was out, and nothing could change his mind about it.

A cough from Baekhyun pulled him back to the call. "Also, the statement was rudely harsh and cutthroat... good for you." He could basically hear the smirk tugging the younger lips.

And sure enough, Baekhyun had a mocking smirk on his lips, his hair blatantly falling over his eyes as he pushes it back. "And I quote; "we do not support a blah blah blah... and the company will not stand next to a man with no principles or morals for human decency." Theres so much more from where that came from."

Baekhyun chuckled under his breath and sat down back on his chair, "for what its worth, theres nothing else you could've said. You satisfied a lot of people with that quote."

Junmyeon paused for a second, looking at the now turned down picture of Siwon and the memory they shared at the party a few years back. He gritted his teeth, looking back at the moment with disdain for the man. If only he knew what kind of person he was. Junmyeon balled his first then unclenched it with a curt sigh.

He then whispered, "how much of everything do you think is true?"

"To be honest, if I hadn't learn it from Jongin and Sehun, I wouldve thought it was fake." Baekhyun replied, turning his chair from side to side, fingers rolling a pen between them. "I mean, come on; a internet tea blogger or whatever her name is, exposes one of the biggest artists of our industry? Its pretty hard to believe."

"Right, and those are some serious accusations." Junmyeon said, "but he sealed his fate as soon as he ran. No one has seen him since news broke out."

Baekhyun stopped what he was doing and sat up straight, quizzical eyebrow risen. "Is there some kind of prize to find him?"

"Of course not," scoffed Junmyeon, "even if there was, it wouldn't be your money to keep Baekhyun."

"Finders keepers, just in this case what I find, I will exchange it for a money prize." The business man shrugged his shoulders then glanced at his phone, a notification popping up. "Which one of you gave someone my number out... again?"

"Ask Sehun or Jongin, they probably sold your number on the internet just to spite you." Junmyeon chuckled softly, "and you never deleted your dating app accounts."

"Thats because I don't use the apps anymore," Baekhyun answered with a short scoff. "Anyways, I'll see what this person wants. I'll talk to you tomorrow."

"Alright, bye."

The line went dead, the hum of a ring left Baekhyun unmoving for a second before ending the call on his part and opening his notifications. It was from a number he didnt recognized.

It was late in the evening and all he wanted to do was to make money go home, but it still intrigued him seeing a number he hadn't seen before. Knowing that he wouldn't open it when he got home, either because of his own crippling exhaustion or because he finally grew a brain and knew better than to text people back, he opened the message.

A raised eyebrow tugged the side of his face. His night just got a whole 'lot interesting.

▪︎☆ Please send an ask or leave a comment if you want to be added to the tag list! ☆▪︎

Taglist - @stayarmytinyzenmoa-l @pocky-otp @itsyaapollochild @layzfeelit @vijjang98

Notes: so yeah, fck Siwon 🙄 Sehun and Jongin are 100% right and uh... Baekhyun got a date? Idfk 🧎🏾‍♀️😩

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fanfics-for-the-hockey-fan · 4 years

Text

My Treasure - William Nylander

Request: Can you do one where you are pregnant with William nylanders baby and getting hate and he makes you feel better

Getting pregnant at 24 was definitely not a part of my 5 year post college plan. Then again falling in love wasn't one of my bullet points either. But when my period was over a week late I knew that everything was about to change. William was thrilled when he saw the bolded word on the pregnancy test, immediately wanting to tell anyone he could. I was a little more hesitant to share the news.

I knew that I wanted children someday and those feelings intensified once my relationship with William became serious, I just figured we would be married and I would be a little more secure in my teaching job before we would add a baby to the mix. We told our families first and they were all excited and happy for us, same with friends and teammates. The real problem came when we started to share the news with the rest of the world. On William's social media everyone was happy for us and wishing us well, but mine is where all of the hate went.

She probably got knocked up so he couldn't leave her.

Hopefully you don't gain too much baby weight, you could already stand to lose a little.

You're not even pregnant with his kid I bet, just went to the guy with the biggest paycheck.

I did my best to delete the comments as soon as I saw them, hiding them from William so he wouldn’t get upset. Some people didn't get the hint after the first deleted comment and I would end up blocking them. Two weeks after announcing our pregnancy the nasty comments were outweighing the nice ones of my post. My pregnancy hormones went crazy one day when my pants didn't fit for the first time of the pregnancy and William was away on a road trip until the morning.

I canceled my plans to go get dinner with some friends and instead had a pity party in some of William's clothes with ice cream and reading through all the horrible things that were being said about me.

I can't believe he is still with her, she is not pretty enough for him.

Fat cow

You are going to ruin his career with the child.

I cried myself to sleep on the couch after midnight and didn't wake up until someone was brushing some hair out of my face. Slowly opening my eyes I saw a concerned William kneeling on the floor in front of me. "Ellie, what’s wrong? Were you crying?" I sat up, making room for William next to me before he pulled me into his lap. "Your friends texted me last night and told me you skipped on going to dinner with them. Is everything okay? Is the baby okay?"

"The baby is fine, I just couldn't find anything that fit comfortably with the bump. I had a pity party with ice cream and must have fallen asleep." Everything I said was true, I just left out one major thing.

"I'm sorry babe, but can I finally buy you some new maternity clothes? Please." He gave me puppy dog eyes as he begged, causing me to laugh and turn to face him more.

"You love shopping more than I do."

"Is that a yes? I'm taking that as a yes. Go get ready, shopping might take all day." With that he was carrying me down the hall, laughing the entire way. When he finally set me down I managed to find a t-shirt dress that wasn't too uncomfortable and proceeded to get ready.

***

After a full day of shopping William took me out to dinner at our favorite Spanish restaurant. I excused myself after we ordered a bunch of small plates to share to run to the bathroom and when I got back William was standing at the table with a large plastic bag and shaking hands with the owner. "What's going on?"

"I thought you might be more comfortable if we went home and ate. I've kept you busy most of the day so I know your feet must be bothering you." His tone was off but I brushed it off as we headed out. The drive home was a tense silence without even the radio playing.

I didn't say anything until we were in the apartment and William started slamming cabinet doors as he got plates. "What's wrong?"

"I just don't get why people spend so much time trying to make other people down! Like, what does it do for them?" He had a fire in his eyes I had only ever seen on the ice, and I wasn't sure what was causing it.

"I'm going to some more context here. Did something happen at the restaurant?"

"Before we left the last store I took a couple of pictures for our shopping day and posted them to Instagram. I thought it was no big deal, just sharing what I was up to on a day off. And then when you were in the bathroom your phone started buzzing like crazy so I thought someone was trying to call you. But all of your notifications were for Instagram, and I know I shouldn't have opened the app on your phone but I thought maybe it was your girlfriends' group chat and Sophie finally got engaged." I let out a small chuckle at that, we basically were taking bets on when her and her high school sweetheart would finally take the next step.

"I'm guessing that isn't what you saw." I knew what he was going to say next but I was hoping with every fiber of my being that I was wrong.

"No, I saw the worst of humanity in your DMs. I just- how can people be so cruel?" William slumped into the bar stool next to me at the island as I reached for my phone having to see what was sent to me now. "Ellie…" I ignored his worried warning as I opened up the app, going to my DMs.

Fat cow, you only got pregnant so that you could lock in some who is far too good for you. I hope he sees he could do so much better and kicks you out before that baby ruins his career and life!

So you are just using him for his money. I bet the baby isn’t even his, probably a teammate who makes less. Whore!

Bitch, why are you even with Willy? He is a literal hockey god and from what i can tell you are just some stupid high school math teacher. He can do so much better than you.

There were over 50 messages just like those, all sent within the last hour. I didn't even dare look at the comments on my latest post, even though it was a few days old the braver trolls put their nasty messages there for the whole world to see.

"How long has this been happening?" I had hopped off my stool, going to plate up the food we brought home and trying to avoid the conversation I knew we needed to have. "Ellie… Please talk to me. How long?"

"Honestly, since we started posting that we were dating. It's gotten worse since we posted that we are gonna be parents."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because part of me thought that if I just deleted the messages and comments that it wasn't real. That if I was the only one who knew that I could just pretend that it was all in my head. Then there is that stupid voice in my head that likes to play up my insecurities, that made me feel like if you saw what people were sending me that you would believe it. And I know that thinking that is stupid and unrealistic but it can sometimes be the loudest thing in there." William also got off his stool, coming to stand right in front of me. He kissed my forehead before cupping my cheeks and holding eye contact.

"Min skatt, never feel like you have to hide this from me. You are the one I am in love with and want to spend the rest of my life with. You are the only one that can make me smile and laugh when I am in a bad mood after a game. You are the only one I see myself growing old, and possibly bald with." I let out a gasp at the word bald, he was so protective about his hair.

"See, the rational part of me knows all that."

"Well, let me make it clear to every part of you. I love you with every fiber of my being and as soon as I meet with your father next week to ask for his blessing, I will be asking you to marry me."

"Will…"

"But I am going to need you to act surprised when I ask." That got a small chuckle out of me.

"I'll do my best." William's stomach growled then, making both laugh. "Let's eat before your stomach starts communicating with us again." William just nods, a thoughtful look on his face that I'm sure would cause problems later but right now I just wanted to live in the happy moment.

After reheating the food and settling at the kitchen island to eat, I went through and deleted all the DMs and comments. I barely registered what they said as I deleted. What I didn't know was Will was looking at the comments as I deleted before pulling out his own phone. It was only when my phone buzzed with another notification that I found out what he was doing.

@williamnylander tagged you in a post

The post was two pictures side by side; the first was from our first date at a Christmas market, all bundled up and snuggled into each other as we took the photo in a mirror. The other picture was a selfie he took of us at my last doctor's appointment for the pregnancy, both of us were all smiles as I sat on the exam table with a picture of the sonogram on the screen behind us.

Two pictures of the love of my life. One from our first date, where I was a clutz and spilt hot chocolate all over her light grey coat and she still agreed to a second date. The other from a few weeks ago when we got another look at our baby.

I can say without any doubt that having Ellie in my life has only made it better. She has become my sounding board for when I'm frustrated, my motivation to score more goals, and my ray of sunshine on any cloudy day.

I knew from that first date that Ellie was the one for me, no one can tell me otherwise. And now she is carrying our first child. My heart continues to grow and fall in love with this amazing, kind, dedicated, caring, loving, and perfect woman each day.

I am so lucky to spend time with you each day and anyone who says otherwise is wrong and jealous of what we have.

Min skat, I am so excited to watch our family grow and experience the joys and challenges of parenthood with you. Ellie I love you and can't wait to see where we go next.

Together.

The tears started flowing before I even read the caption, the pictures enough with my pregnancy hormones. But the words William managed to write push me over the edge, I was crying at the love he put into the words but also laughing at the not so subtle 'fuck you' to all the nasty people who sent you messages.

"Did I overstep? I don’t want to embarrass you."

"It's perfect. You're perfect. I love you."

"I love you too, and I plan on showing you that everyday. Even if it is something as simple as an Instagram post."

"It's not just the post, it's that you are saying to all the people who see your pictures and then come trash talk to me that you know about them. And that will probably stop some of them from doing it again. And anyone who doesn't get the message gets blocked."

"Good. Now, let go watch some TV and cuddle." Nodding grabbing my plate of food, following William to the couch before curling into his side.

As William pulled up the next episode of a show we were binging, I thought of something. "You never have told me what 'min skat' means."

"It means 'my treasure'. And it reminds me how lucky I am every day to have you in my life."

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calumrose · 4 years

Text

Trigger [Police/Gang!AU] Chapter 1 || C.H

A//N: I’m in two minds about holding back posting parts because I’m actually in the middle of working on chapter 9 currently, so I’m debating on waiting until I maybe get feedback to see if this is going anywhere, but at the same time I want to get it out as soon as I can so I can be satisfied that I’ve published a whole piece of work by me.

Chapters are going to get a little bit chunky so I hope that’s okay, I got carried away at certain points as you’ll find out as time goes on.

Hope you guys enjoy this even just a little bit.

Love you all!

btw: we meet Calum in this part so... we getting somewhere now.

Word Count: 8.1k

Summary: Eloise Gray and Calum Hood, not two people you would ever think to put together. What started as a ploy for power turned into a romance, resulting in the realisation that loving your enemy may not be such a bad thing after all.

Previous Chapters: Prologue

The loud screech of a horn invaded Eloise’s apartment, the barbaric noise ripping her from her peaceful slumber. It was her own fault for sleeping with the window open, every noise travelling into her bedroom from the streets. Her hand reached for her duvet, groaning softly as she hauled it up towards her head, wrapping herself in its warmth as she hid herself from the empty apartment that she called home.

Today of all days she had prayed for a lie in, for those few extra hours of bliss before she would have to get up and face the world. She didn’t sleep for long anyway but even just an hour or two extra would have been a treat for her, especially today. It would have been the best birthday gift anyone could have given her.

She released a single arm from the warmth of her duvet, grasping her mobile phone from her bedside table, removing the charging cable before tossing it to the floor and turning over so she faced the door of her bedroom. She unlocked her phone, being greeted with a few notifications from varied apps and a few text messages. Eloise couldn’t help but smile fondly at the happy birthday text from Scott, noting that it had been sent just moments after midnight. Obviously, he had to be the first one. She responded a quick ‘thank you’ text before opening her varied social media accounts, scrolling through the fake ‘happy birthday’ posts from people she no longer spoke to. She had contemplated deleting some of these apps but argued against it, guiltily enjoying watching drama unfold online in the comfort of her own home.

The sound of the phone ringing was too loud for Eloise first thing in the morning, sighing as she witnessed the name flash across the screen as his picture lit up with his big cheesy smile she hated to admit made her have one of the same emotion.

“What do you wan- “

“Happy birthday to my best friend! Oh, happy birthday to the one and only, Eloise Gray!” A loud voice sang through the phone, “Oh, she is twenty-one years old and is no longer underage today!”

“Are you done?” She laughed through the line.

“Not quite,” He clarified, clearing his throat before continuing with his made-up birthday song, “Miss Eloise Gray is an adult, she is legal! She can become black out with the best of them! She doesn’t need a fake ID anymore! She is fully legal to party!”

He dragged out that final note, his voice fading out to the sound of a scratched record, erupting a laugh from Eloise. He was always so over the top when it came to her birthday. No one could blame him. He always wanted to make it a day for her to cherish, a day full of fun memories that she could recall and laugh at. He put everything into making sure she had a fun birthday, throwing her a party every year with their friends, strictly confining the invitation list to those outside of the gang to allow Eloise to have a night off, a night where it was just her, Scott, and a bunch of their normal friends.

“Now I’m done,” He cleared his throat with a cough, the sound of his boots beneath him signalling that he was walking somewhere.

“Thank you,” She smiled helplessly, unable to get rid of the appreciative tone in her voice, “It’s a new one to add to the collection of birthday songs.”

“The best yet.”

“That’s debatable, Scott.”

She giggled at his fake offended gasp, smiling as she sat up in her bed, her back against the headboard as she listened into the background of his call. “Where are you? It sounds busy.” She stuck her leg out of the confinements of her duvet, feeling the cold fresh New York air constrict around her warm skin.

“On my way to get you,” He replied casually, “It’s your birthday, El, we have to celebrate like never before. And by that, I mean we need to go all out and have a full-blown party,”

“Isn’t that what we do every year?” She countered.

“Well, yes, but this time it’s going to be even better, you wanna know why?” He teased.

“I have a feeling you’re going to tell me anyway,” She smirked, hearing his frustrated groan through the line before hearing a creak of a door that echoed on the other end the phone.

“Can’t you just play along for once in your miserable life?” He sighed loudly, the sound of his feet being heard through the line getting louder, it sounded like he was walking up some stairs, the footsteps echoing as if he was in a stairwell.

“No because that’s no fun for me,” She laughed lightly, “But anyway, enlighten me on how this year is gonna be better?”

“Isn’t it obvious? You’re twenty-one, we can go out into bars and clubs now without having to worry if you’re gonna get caught out with a fake ID,” He spoke with an obvious tone, speaking to Eloise as if she was stupid, “Which means we need to go out tonight and make sure that we remember absolutely nothing by tomorrow morning, so all that we can remember is what we can piece together by the numerous photographs and embarrassing videos that we will use to torment each other for the foreseeable future.”

“Are you still mad about that video of you dancing to Beyoncé that went slightly viral?” Eloise queried with a knowing tone, unable to stop the smirk spreading across her face at the memory of her birthday two years ago.

They had thrown a house party for her birthday, their friends all piling into her apartment as they spent hours together drinking, singing karaoke, and playing a hopeless amount of drunk board and card games. It was definitely a highlight of her birthday, one that she didn’t ever forget; mainly resulting in many embarrassing videos that never failed to make them smile over the years.

“Only slightly,” He said, a door slamming behind his words as he continued to move.

“You really need to get over that, it was two years ago, and it was funny,” Eloise couldn’t hold back her laugh, “You should lighten up, Scott.”

“And you should get dressed.”

Eloise looked up at the sudden voice that spoke both through her phone but also from the body that stood in her bedroom. She hadn’t even heard her door open and close when Scott entered, finding him stood in front of her as he held the phone by his ear still. Eloise lowered the phone, hanging up the call as she kept her eyes focused on the blonde boy who stood present, “What on earth are you doing here? What happened to ringing a doorbell or even better: telling me that you’re outside?”

“Eh that’s no fun,” He shrugged, smirking as he wandered over to Eloise’s wardrobe before opening it and searching through her clothes, “Also, a quick heads up that you need to look good tonight. By ‘good’ I mean the kind where even I would look at you and go ‘holy shit I want to take her home with me’.”

“You mean you don’t think that anyway?” She teased, winking at his tall stature as he glanced over his shoulder to where she sat on her bed.

“Dear god no,” He scrunched up his face, “I can’t think of anything worse; it would be like having sex with my sister.”

Eloise couldn’t hold back the snort that left her at his remark. He wasn’t wrong. The relationship the two of them shared was very much one of a brother/sister rather than friends. They hid nothing from one another and loved each other as if they really were siblings. He was the big brother that Eloise never had.

“What would you class as ‘good’ then?” She asked, rolling her eyes as she lifted herself out of her bed, moving across the room so she was stood behind him as he searched her wardrobe.

“Wasn’t my explanation before a perfect representation of what it means?” He asked, his eyes focusing on hauling different fabrics out of the cupboard.

“Not really.” She said straight, hearing him let out a short sigh as he continued his search. “Are you seriously going through my clothes right now to pick out an outfit for me?” She rolled her eyes as she witnessed the expression on his face, the corners of her lips turned up ever so slightly at the determination in his eyes.

He didn’t say anything else in the moment as he removed a number of tops from her wardrobe and placed them down on her bed. He returned to the wardrobe to do the same with bottoms and shoes. He would have chosen her underwear as well, but he assumed that was probably going too far.

Eloise confirmed, that was definitely going too far.

“These are your options,” He said, pointing at the variety of clothes spread against her bed, “I’ve expertly sifted through your clothes and pulled out these items that will work with each other regardless of your combination which will make you look gorgeous tonight,” He smiled at her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders as he pulled her into a side hug, “Like I said, tonight we are going all out and you are going to have the time of your life, even if it kills me. You are going to look stunning when you walk into the bar and you will have every single man in said bar desperate to dance with you, I promise.”

“I don’t know if I should be flattered or concerned at the amount of effort that you’re putting into this.” She spoke wearily.

“Can you just shut up and appreciate that I’m trying to do something nice for you?” He exaggerated his sigh and glared down at her, his arm lightly squeezing her as he pressed a loving kiss to the top of her head, “You deserve it for once, El, to just enjoy your night as you and not have to worry about anything else.”

“Is it hurting you to be this nice to me?” She raised an eyebrow.

“Very.” He nodded, trying to hold a serious expression.

Eloise couldn’t hold back her laugh as she turned to fully envelope Scott in a hug, wrapping her arms around him as she smiled. As much as he joked with her about how it killed him to be nice to her, she knew that it was all he ever was towards her. He was the best.

“Now can you hurry up and pick an outfit, I’m hungry,” He grumbled, releasing her, and gently pushing her towards her bed so she could piece together an outfit for her to wear tonight.

She stopped in her tracks halfway between Scott and her bed, turning in place to face him yet again, “Wait, why am I picking so early anyway?” She turned back to him, “If we’re going out tonight, I shouldn’t need to worry about what I’m wearing until later. Also, Scott, it’s not even 10am, why are we planning this now? Why not this afternoon?”

“Because you and I both have a free day, so I’m taking advantage,” He sighed as if it was obvious, “If we do this now, then we’ve got more time for our annual birthday breakfast as well as a few extra surprises I have in store for you.” He noted the small smile that spread along Eloise’s face, unable to hold back his own at the knowledge that it was genuine.

He lived for seeing his best friend smile, knowing she never had much to smile about. It warmed him to know he could do this for her on her birthday of all days.

*****

Eloise’s head slammed against the table in embarrassment as numerous employees of the café walked out from the staff door at the far side of the pastel coloured dining room, an eruption of voices singing happy birthday as they carried over a stack on pancakes to her table and set them down in front of her. Her eyes glared at Scott as he laughed, joining in with the song as he watched Eloise’s cheeks light up a bright shade of pink.

“I am going to kill you.” She grumbled over the voices that sang to her, her eyes unable to find a focal point as she felt the stares and smiles of strangers on her back who watched as the festivity continued around her.

After what felt like forever, the elderly employee wished Eloise happy birthday with a genuine smile spread across her face as she and the other employees disbursed and went back to work. The strangers around them also went back to their own food, socialising with those who sat opposite them in their booths. Eloise could slowly feel the eyes that were previously on her begin to dissipate, the burning sensation that rose on the back of her neck simmering down gently.

“You are so lucky that I have pancakes in front of me,” She warned, “If it were anything else, I swear I would throw it across the table at you.”

“’Thank you, Scott, that was so lovely and thoughtful of you’,” He mimicked her in a high pitched voice, “Oh no worries, El, just trying to do my part to make sure your birthday is a memorable one.”

She couldn’t help the goofy smile that graced her face as she looked at him. He was really trying to make this a day to remember. She appreciated the thought - although not the embarrassment - but the kindness behind the gesture that took place was one that made her smile with genuine thanks.

“You’re such an idiot,” She laughed as she cut into her food, shaking her head, “You would kill me if I did this for your birthday.”

“Exactly, which is why I can do it for you,” He shrugged, “But also the fact that I like my birthday is the reason why I would kill you for pulling a stunt like this, you on the other hand, despise the day so I pull out as many stops as I like to make it a day you can enjoy. And it looks like I am succeeding yet again for another year.”

It was sickening how lovely and thoughtful Scott could be when he tried. It was a polar opposite side to him compared to when he was tied up in the gang. The same could be said for Eloise, both of them acting almost completely different when in that situation.

The mood of breakfast subtly shifted while they ate; the change being noticed by Scott rather quickly as he watched while Eloise picked at her food. “What’s on your mind?” He asked, lifting a piece of toast to his mouth as he took a bite.

“It’s nothing,” She shook her head, smiling up at him, “Just thinking about how I’m going to finish these pancakes.”

“And what else?” He raised an eyebrow, watching as her breath hitched in her throat ever so slightly.

Usually when something bugged her and she brushed him off, he let it slide. He wouldn’t pester her, knowing that if it got bad then she would usually talk to him. But he knew she was vulnerable especially right now, her birthdays typically rolling with the same routine where she had a low moment or two before they were replaced with fun and adrenaline later on in the night.

“Honestly, it’s nothing.”

“El, please- “

“I said it was nothing so drop it!” She warned, glaring at him from across the table. She sighed deeply as she dropped her fork and placed her head in her hands, knowing she was just letting things get on top of her as she usually did on this day each year. She knew she would move past it and be fine in a few hours, but she couldn’t help but dwell on the maybes that circled her mind.

“You know you can always vis- “

“I’m not doing that,” She shook her head, not even looking at Scott as she cut him off, “There’s no way in hell I’m going there, especially today.”

“As much as it hurts, you’re going to have to do it one day,” Scott sighed as he leaned back in his chair, “Whether you want to or not, El, because you need to.”

“Go to hell.” She muttered, pushing her plate away from her, her stomach suddenly becoming sick at the thought of the pancakes that sat in front of her.

“Unfortunately for you I don’t think they’re quite ready for me yet,” Scott joked, “Maybe tomorrow if you’re lucky.”

He could sense the roll of her eyes from beneath her hands, a soft sigh building in his chest as he watched his best friend dwell on the memories that followed her with every step that she took in life. He did ask himself if one day she would get the closure she didn’t know she needed, if one day she would find the happiness she craved; not the happiness that she felt when she was having a good time with friends but instead a happiness where she could wake up in the morning and look at her life and love every moment she breathed. He wanted that for her more than most.

*****

She couldn’t stop staring at the clothes that were laid out for her on the bed, her eyes scanning over the different materials as she pieced them together in her mind. Was she crazy for being so bold? Well, most people wouldn’t call her outfit of choice for the nigh bold but for Eloise, this was definitely a step out of her comfort zone.

“You better be getting ready!” A voice called through the closed door of her room.

“Yeah.” She responded, fake conviction in her tone as she kept her eyes plastered on the mesh long-sleeved top that was staring back at her, as if playing an intimidation game.

Maybe she would feel better if she just got dressed, yeah maybe that would fix her nerves. Nerves? Is that what they were? She never feared a night out before so why was tonight any different?

Her fingers trailed over the blue denim skirt on her bed, sighing as she remembered the day that she had bought it. Well, the day it had been bought for her. She couldn’t fight the underlying twitch in her heart as she remembered the woman who bought her this skirt, remembering her almost as well as her own mother. Scott’s parents always looked out for her, and always bought her nice things for her birthday every year when she stayed with them, celebrating the day with great joy and treasuring the sentimental value that they carried with all celebrations. The denim skirt was the last thing Scott’s mother had bought for her before she left, it being found in a thrift store on one of her monthly escapades, seeing it and instantly thinking of Eloise. It was simple yet intricate, much the opposite of the girl who wore it.

Eloise, get over yourself and just get dressed for crying out loud! She scolded herself as she sighed, rubbing her face with her hands before she began to get dressed, silently trying to convince herself that she would feel better in a few hours.

Scott had pieced together their entire night, the birthday celebrations estimating to last until the early hours of the next morning as per usual on their nights out. Eloise couldn’t deny she was just a little bit excited about tonight, the buzz gently floating around in her stomach at the thought of spending time with her friends, allowing herself to feel like a normal girl living in the Big Apple.

She couldn’t stop her eyes from drifting to herself in the mirror as she stood in her bedroom, the minimal décor suddenly making her feel as if she was out of place, as if to feel unwelcome as the colours of her outfit contrasted against the neutral theme of her room. Her eyes followed the outline of her outfit, biting the inside of her cheek as she looked at where the skirt ended midthigh, the waistline of the denim material blending into the black mesh top she wore where her offending dark green lace bralette could be seen through the thin material.

Her choice of outfit was bold tonight when it came to her usual taste in clothes. She knew teasing comments would be made tonight by her friends, awaiting the joking remarks they would make in response to her somewhat bold choices. She would blame Scott for the decision, like she always did.

The sound of her bedroom door opening tore her eyes from the mirror, meeting her tall friend as he stood in the doorway and watched as the dark-haired beauty in front of him nit-picked at herself.

“Not too shabby,” He smirked, admiring his best friend as she stood in front of him, “Is that some colour I see?”

“Shut up,” She rolled her eyes, moving to walk past him and nudging past his shoulder as she walked out into her hallway, making her way into the kitchen to pour herself a drink. He always made her feel good, made her feel confident, and she appreciated it when she didn’t have the energy to do it herself. She didn’t usually doubt how she looked, it typically being one of the last things on her mind as she travelled around in her staple black jeans, white t-shirt, and rugged leather jacket with her classic combat boots. “Drink?” She called out to Scott.

She reached onto the kitchen island, grasping hold of the first bottle neck that caught her attention, her eyes scanned the label. Yeah, that would do. She poured some of the copper liquid into one of the plastic cups she kept stored for nights like these, reaching over and grabbing the nearest soda she could find, pouring it into the cup, and creating the alcoholic concoction that she prayed would give her the buzz she so desperately desired. She then followed the same recipe for the mixture as she poured it into another cup and handed it to Scott, placing it in his hands before knocking her cup against his in a ‘cheers’ notion, lifting the cup to her lips as she took a large gulp of the bitter drink.

She scrunched her face up at the sharp taste, shaking her head once as if to adjust to the aftershock and slight burn that settled in the back of her throat.

“Are you not going to let me do a birthday toast to kick your birthday off in style?” Scott asked, his eyes furrowed slightly as he watched Eloise take another drink.

“Considering how bad your rendition of happy birthday was this morning,” She smirked, “I think I’ll pass. I would prefer if we focused on getting as tipsy as possible before the others arrive so we can head out and paint the town.”

“For once in your life, you’ve actually had a good idea.”

“Dickhead.” She mumbled under her breath, clinking her plastic cup with Scott’s as they continued to drink, preparing for the night ahead.

*****

Her body vibrated with the beat of the music as it erupted throughout Moxi’s. She could barely hear herself think as she moved to the music with her friends, unable to stop the smile that spread across her face, her cheeks aching pleasantly at the people around her.

Unable to fight the buzz that took over her mind and body as she moved around the floor, grasping the hand of her friend, Paige, as she helplessly – and terribly – danced around the glowing floor. Eloise had lost count of how long she had been dancing more, never mind how long she had been at the club for. She witnessed the bodies around her, depicting each one as her friends as they surrounded her, each one in their own world as they danced around, smiles across their faces while they lived in the moment.

It was times like this she lived for, the moments where she was surrounded by the people who she loved more than life itself.

“Have you noticed that guy at the bar?” The voice she deciphered belonging to her friend, Mia, spoke loudly to her. Eloise’s eyes drifted over to the bar to her right, the neon lights along the top of the bar and scattered along the back wall in different phrases and patterns catching her attention initially before she admired the crowd that spread along that side of the club. Her eyes searched as people were dispersed along the bar, many of them shouting out with a glimmer of hope to catch the attention of one of the few bar staff that were littered along the bar before they stopped on him. Eloise let her eyes settle on him for a moment, feeling Mia’s body stood beside her but the heat that radiated from the excited brunette beside her was the last thing on her mind. “He’s been watching you since you got up to dance.”

“Has he?” Eloise felt her lips turn up at the thought of being watched by an attractive stranger, “What if he was just- “

“El, he was staring at you. By staring, I mean the ‘I want to take her home and fuck her senseless’ kind of stare,” She blurted, “In the least creepy way possible if you can even do that.”

Eloise just let a simple hum slip pass her lips as her eyes met the stranger’s, unable to decipher much about him due to the distance between them, but the one thing she could work out was that he was hot.

The heat of a hand on her wrist tore her eyes from the stranger at the bar, the brown of her irises turning around to be met with the olive green ones of Roman, another one of her friends who had come out to celebrate her birthday. She couldn’t help the smile that stayed on her face as he dragged her further into the dance floor, bodies surrounding them as they danced. Although her smile never faltered, Eloise couldn’t help but feel the small seed of disappointment that settled in her stomach due to her short lived, silent interaction with the handsome stranger.

“Where’s Scott?” She leaned into Roman’s ear to talk, realising that she hadn’t seen the blond for a while, the music around them seeming to increase in volume the further into the dance floor they travelled.

“Last I saw him, he was kissing some girl outside the bathroom,” He responded loudly as he held one of Eloise’s hands, spinning her in place.

“That’s my Scotty!” She erupted into laughter, clapping her hands briefly together before they were grabbed again by the summer-eyed boy in front of her as the dance moves got more exaggerated and more chaotic.

Eloise knew she was going to be in pain by the morning, her feet already slightly burning at the heels she had been forced to wear out tonight by Paige but especially because the movements her body was eliciting were not ones her body was made for. God, she was going to regret this, but in the best way possible.

The night continued on as the music did, shifting from numerous electronica tracks to the few well-known classics that caused the club to erupt into cheers as people sang along drunkenly to the words that they swore they knew. Eloise couldn’t deny that her mind wandered on more than one occasion throughout the night, the handsome stranger filling her drunk brain as she sat at a table with her group of friends.

The smile on her face was a drunk one, but one of fun. She was having a blast, something that she always knew she had when the celebrations got truly under way every year. Scott had outdone himself yet again in making this a birthday she enjoyed. Her mind was distracted from the puzzles and memories that usually haunted her, instead filling it with a fairy-like haze as the alcohol settled in her system, her body radiating a gentle heat as she sat surrounded by the people who mattered. Even if one of them was an estranged young lady with bleached red hair.

“So, Scotty, who’s your friend?” Jackson smirked, head nodding towards the red head who made herself present on their friend’s lap. It couldn’t be faulted that she was pretty but definitely too drunk to know who’s lap she was perched on.

“This is Lydia,” Scott spoke, his voice deep as his eyes scanned down her body before slowly meeting her eyes once again, a filthy smirk creasing his lips as his eyes practically undressed her in the public building.

“Pig.” Eloise coughed, keeping her voice quiet as she teasingly smirked at her friend across the table.

What happened to tonight being the night where Eloise would find someone to take home? But as per usual, Scott beat her to it.

Or did he?

“Move.” She muttered suddenly, her knee nudging Jackson’s jean covered leg as she tried to make her way out of the booth, her hand shoving his shoulder to hurry him along.

“How charming,” He rolled his eyes, “What happened to saying please?”

“Just move. I gotta pee.” She groaned, shoving him a bit harder this time.

Small outbursts of chuckles and smiles were exchanged around the table as Eloise made her way out of the booth, gathering her balance as she walked through the club, her eyes finding the toilet door just to the right at the far side of the bar. Her heeled feet carried her steadily through the crowds, walking along the makeshift path made by the gap between the people stood along the bar and those on the higher tables above the dance floor.

Eloise couldn’t stop herself as she allowed her eyes to travel subtly along the bar, keeping an eye out for a certain individual, wondering if he was still around for her to catch a knowing glance. Realisation struck her as she reached the bathroom door, her mind stopping the disappointment in its tracks before it had the chance to settle. She didn’t need to feel that right now. So what? A handsome stranger caught her attention then vanished? It wouldn’t be the first time.

She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror when she exited the stall, noting the way her hair fell down her shoulders, the way her pupils were enlarged slightly due to the buzz of the alcohol she had consumed throughout the night, the way her makeup was slightly smudged due to the sweaty atmosphere of the bar. She didn’t care enough to fix it, in a way admiring how it still looked presentable. Although she wasn’t sure if that was genuine or if her vision was just playing tricks on her.

Eloise couldn’t help but smile as the thin arms of Paige appeared around her torso as she was squeezed into an awkward hug from behind. “How’re you doing?” Paige smiled, her bleached blonde hair curling perfectly around her thin face.

“Why does everyone ask me that?” Eloise sighed, the smile disappearing as she looked at the reflections of the mirror. Paige noted the way Eloise’s body tensed, her shoulders squaring and her breath catching as she met her chocolate eyes in the mirror, her arms remaining comfortably around her friend as she rested her cheek against Eloise’s back.

“Because we know that you’re hiding something,” She spoke quietly, “El, we know things are bad, but you’ve got us, you need to talk to us about stuff.”

“I’d prefer not to,” She spat, “No offence but you guys don’t know anything so stop pestering and just let me enjoy my night.”

“And how do you expect to do that when you can’t get out of your own head?”

“You’ll see.” She told her, standing up straight before looking towards the door of the bathroom.

She was going to find that stranger and show her friends exactly how she wasn’t in her own head. She was going to make tonight her night.

Paige slowly released Eloise from her grip, turning the girl in her arms and looking into her oak-coloured eyes, smiling sweetly at her before she nodded towards the door, “Let’s make this a night to remember then,” She cared for Eloise as much as they all did, she saw her as a little sister like they all did; each of them feeling this urge to protect her and look out for her even though they knew she was more than capable of doing it on her own. They just couldn’t fight their primal urges.

Eloise’s feet could barely keep up as Paige dragged her back out into the loud atmosphere, the lights flashing around her as she led her back out onto the dance floor, her hands linking with the blonde’s as they began to dance; hips swinging and heels clicking as they moved to the beat of the music. The upbeat thumping of the current electronic track began to fade out, the smooth scratch of a familiar track beginning to take its place as it blasted throughout the club speakers. Laughter was held back by Eloise at her friend’s ecstatic expression, eyes the size of her head, her hands gripping those of the tall brunette as she pulled her further into the middle of the dance floor, her hips turning sultrier by the second as her movements slowed down to match the beat of the music.

To hell with it, Eloise thought. She grinned widely as she joined in, her hips matching Paige’s rhythm as she stood opposite her, both of them fully losing themselves in the song that surrounded them, their eyes focused on each other when they weren’t closed as they embraced the alcoholic buzz. She couldn’t deny that she enjoyed the feeling of multiple pairs of eyes on her. She could feel them burning through the fabric of her thin top as well as her skirt as the fabric rode up ever so slightly on her thighs.

Her lips parted slightly as she softly sang the words along with the music, swaying her hips to the rhythm. They were soon joined by Roman who found them on the dance floor, his hands finding Paige’s waist as he swayed with her from behind.

Eloise couldn’t deny the subtle feeling of dread when Roman showed up, enjoying it before when it was just her and Paige dancing. When he came into the picture, it just felt as if she was a third wheel to their relationship, a spare part in the project. She didn’t want to feel as though she was perceived as selfish for feeling that way, but she couldn’t help it.

“I’m gonna go and get another drink,” She called to Paige, brushing her hand with her own before slipping away from the crowd and heading over to the bar. Her aching feet carried her through the club, each heavy bassline of the song playing rattled through the place which Eloise felt with every step she took. Maybe another drink would help, she thought.

She found a perfectly timed space at the bar, slotting herself between the underage drinker to her left and the toy-boy to her right as she leaned against the bar, looking out to see where the nearest member of staff was stood along the bar. Her blunt nails tapped rapidly against the skin of her cheek while her head in her hand, her eyes absently reading the neon signs that were scattered around as she waited to give her request. This was the one downside about separating from your group on a night out; having to actually go and wait at the bar to order your own drink. Typically, their group would order in bulks so one person would buy for everyone to save multiple trips every time that someone wanted a drink.

Before she knew it, a bright yet tired smile greeted her from behind the bar, a young man with shaggy auburn hair stood at the till and asked her for her order. It took a moment to register that it was her chance, her throat catching for a second before clearing and allowing her to speak.

“Just a vodka and lemonade please.” She smiled sweetly, trying to somehow ease the tension in her ankles from her heels and she shifted her weight between both feet.

“Single or double?” He asked, pressing a couple of buttons on the black machine before his eyes met her own once again, “Or is that a stupid question?”

“Surprise me.” She winked, letting out a small laugh as she reached into her bag and pulled out her card.

Thankfully, the barman didn’t long to make her concoction, allowing her to get back to her friends as soon as possible, being reunited with the familiar faces she was spending the night with. She made her back to the booth where her friends sat, perching herself on the edge of one of the seats as she sipped her sweet drink. She caught the end of a conversation – more like an argument – between Jackson and Mia, the situation seeming to be get heated between them as Mia looked to be close to tears.

“What the fuck is going here?” Eloise cried out, spotting her friend with glassy eyes leaning forward as she pointed an accusing finger towards the broad man sat on the opposite side of the booth. Her eyes shot between the two young adults, confusion clouding her brain as she tried to figure out what happened, the drunk state she was currently in not helping the situation much.

She made a silent note of Scott’s absence, already knowing that Paige and Roman were dancing, her eyes glancing around for the blond friend who she knew would be with the red head she met previously. No sign of them… Great.

She tried to concentrate as her two friends continued to argue over the table of the booth, hopeless slurs being thrown at each other as they yelled. Eloise really didn’t understand what was going on, nor did she care in all honesty, but she still had to be the good friend who would break up the argument and restore peace to the friendship. She really didn’t want to have to share a taxi back with them if they were still arguing.

“How did this even start?” She groaned, throwing her head back dramatically as she rolled her eyes, looking back up at her friends before she waited for the rushed explanations to begin. As much as she loved Mia dearly, she knew she was one for starting arguments when she drunk, it was what she was known for. There wasn’t a night that involved alcohol where there wasn’t a fight that had to be defused due to her.

Long story short, Jackson made a comment about a girl’s dress and Mia took it upon herself to assume he was being rude, and accusing said girl of having ill intentions of her night out. Which, of course, is ridiculous and Mia would have known had she not been numerous double mixers into her night.

Eloise couldn’t hold back her frustrated sigh as she glared at Mia who could barely sit up right in the booth. She needed to be taken home. For a gang banger who put up with a more brutal situations in her daily life, it was a drunken friend that drove her to her limit. “Take her home, Jack,” She sighed, keeping her eyes firmly planted on the brunette who swayed in place, “She’s had too much to drink and the last thing we need is her being kicked out of here alone.”

Eloise assisted her friends in her own drunken state, the alcohol leaving her with a gentle buzz as she sipped her drinks throughout the night, lifting Mia up from her seat and helping her walk towards the door of the club, patting Jackson’s shoulder as he led their friend outside and into a taxi.

Two down, three to go…

She took a deep breath as she made her way back over to her table, silently begging that nobody had claimed it as their own while she walked her friends out, hoping that even in a drunk state, people would see jackets and bags and realise that people were sitting there. Who was she kidding, that never happened. Which is why she wasn’t surprised when she found someone sitting at her table when she returned, her heels clicking against the floor as she made her way over, ready to make the intruder aware that the table was already taken.

Well, she was about to until he looked up, his face causing her breath to hitch in her throat. She felt her mouth suddenly dry up as her eyes froze on his calm expression as he looked at up her, sensing her presence without her speaking a word. She couldn’t ignore the beauty that his face held, the tanned skin that she could make out beneath the flashing lights of the club, the deep dark eyes that met her own as they stayed in silence.

It was him. The handsome stranger.

“You’ve got some moves by the way,” His voice spoke out, his eyes remaining connected with hers, his tongue running along the inside of his bottom lip. He noted her shallow breath that she attempted to take without being noticed, unable to hide the shaking in her throat as she exhaled. “Something that I’m sure gets a lot of attention.”

“Your point is?” She spoke up, her voice surprisingly strong although her breathing was not.

She couldn’t help the lump that formed in her throat when she saw his smile, a teasing strip show was less erotic than that goddamn smile. She felt the effects of that charming smile knock her for six.

“Just saying there must a lucky guy who gets to see that later in all its glory,” He smirked, his posture straightening as he reached for her glass of vodka lemonade, lifting it to his lips and taking a small sip.

Eloise could only dream of being that glass in that moment. What was happening to her? What happened to the tough exterior she usually put on; the one that typically made boys fall at her knees? This time she was the one who was crumbling at the feet of a man she didn’t even know.

“And what if there isn’t?” She straightened her back, attempting to regain her confidence, erasing the previous rush of butterflies as she resumed back to her placid stance, allowing for her feet to carry her the rest of the way to the table, comfortably leaning against the edge as she stood just metres away from the man who easily claimed her attention. Who would have thought a stranger would have so much control in such little time?

Eloise was sure it happened all of the time, unable to deny how handsome he was, how pretty he was. He must have had numerous women falling at his feet for a chance with him, and Eloise was no different than the rest of them. But she didn’t want him to know that.

“Then that would be shame,” He teased, moving along the booth so he sat right at the edge, his eyes never breaking contact with hers, “A true utter shame.”

She noted how his voice slowed down, his annunciation of each word made clear through his mixed accent. It sounded American but there was a twang in there, she couldn’t pinpoint from where exactly. “And why is it such a shame? It’s not as if it affects you.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, doll,” He stood to his feet, the muscles beneath his leather jacket bulging as he leaned an arm against the table and turned to face her, “It wouldn’t be very gentlemen like of me to allow a young lady like yourself to travel home alone in your state.”

She couldn’t help the smirk itching her face, rethinking the amount of drinks she had consumed over the course of the night, the buzz still filling her with a warmth as her brain gently felt like a slow-motion volleyball being tossed back and forth inside her head. She had to admit to herself that for such a gorgeous man he had poor game. Although she couldn’t deny the nickname elicited an excitement inside her she didn’t know existed, causing something inside of her desperate to hear it once more. With the distance between them closed further, she noticed his beauty only grew as did his height. He was more beautiful than she already thought, or maybe it was just the alcohol taking over again. She noticed how plump and soft his lips looked, how his cheeks were full and supple, while his eyes were dark like hers but seemed to hold a vortex beneath them; a vortex which she wanted to explore.

“I think I’ll manage just fine on my own,” She leaned against the table, her hand resting on her hip as she admired his sculpted face.

“Doll,” He spoke, his voice merely above a whisper yet she could hear it perfectly clear, “Why can’t you just take a hint that I’m interested? And I can tell that you are too.”

“I think you’re overestimating your game,” She teased, although the effect the name had on her wasn’t hidden, “You’re pretty but your game is shit.”

“Oh, but I can assure you, my mouth can do more than just talk a shit game,” He licked the corner of his bottom lip, the edge of his tongue poking out as he watched her eyes flicker.

She hated that she was so turned on by the sound of that. Eloise could always fake emotions pretty well but in this situation, the attempt at hiding how she felt was futile. God, what was she doing? Was she actually considering disappearing with this man and getting up to goodness knows what? Yes, she was.

Before Eloise could begin to comprehend what was happening, she was in the back of a cab, her lips attached to his as his large hands roamed along her thighs, hips, and torso as she straddled him. The apology for the taxi driver being the last thing on her mind, her subconscious aware that they were probably used to these sights in the unsociable hours after a Saturday night.

She couldn’t help but make a mental note of how soft his lips were against her own, how large his hands were as they slid down her body and cupped her behind, the grip against her skin through her denim skirt sent heat to multiple areas of her body, his touch erupting a fire within her.

She panted for breath as he detached his lips from hers, his plump ones creating a path as they trailed along her jaw and down her neck, his teeth coming into the mix as he gently nipped at her soft skin, working his way to leave a mark; a brand that marked her as his for the short amount of time that they would spend together.

“I didn’t…” She panted; her voice weak as her eyes closed at the sensation his mouth evoked within her. She tilted her head to the right, allowing him greater access to paint her skin with various shades of blue and purple as her hands found his hair, “I didn’t even catch your name.”

She felt the vibration of his hum travel through her, the noise was deep yet symphonic much like the tone of his voice as he spoke, “The name’s Calum, sweetheart, but you can call me whatever you want.”

His voice sounded exasperated, as if it was lost and he was searching for the air to breath, his lips reattaching to her neck as they travelled back up her body, reattaching with her own pink ones as he placed a long, sucking kiss to them that he never wanted to end. “And what should I call you?”

“Eloise,” She whispered, her lips lightly brushing his as she spoke, her voice so quiet it could barely be heard, “But you can call me El.”

And by god he did. Repeatedly.

---

Tag List: @steviemae

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thatscalledtoughlove · 4 years

Text

Didn’t Want to Fall in Love - 3: Mr. Handsome Makes a Reappearance

“For the millionth time, I am fine!” Tony shot me a glare from the bar-stool he sat on, swatting my arms away when I tried to hug him. “If you tell anyone about what happened, I’ll kill you.”

I sighed, setting a plate of French toast down in front of him. He stabbed it with his fork. I sighed again.

“Look, if you want to talk about it, I’m here for you. You’re my platonic life-partner, remember?”

His lips twitched, and I could tell he was trying his best not to smile. “Have you ever considered the two of us? Together? As in, an actual couple? Not that being your platonic life-partner isn’t amazing.”

“Us? A couple? That would mean sharing a bed with you, and you hog the sheets. It would also require us to kiss and stuff. Ew.” He shoved me, and I laughed. “In all seriousness though, nah. I don’t even know why we kissed all those years ago.”

“I’ve just been terrified at the thought of what happened to my uncle ever since I heard about the accident.” Tony’s playful grin faded away and he glanced at me. Some of his hair fell into his eyes and I pushed it back. “It’s crazy to think about how much one accident can change someone’s life. And now he’s got a granddaughter and he can’t even really play with her because of his condition and—I don’t know, it just weighs down on me.”

I stood from my seat, pausing beside him, resting a hand on his bicep. “I’m sure good ole Uncle Will doesn’t want you to mourn over him all the time. Why don’t you give your cousin a call and see how things are going? I’m sure he’d like to have a conversation with you.”

Tony shook his head, still poking at the food I’d made him instead of eating it. “I haven’t spoken to Mike since Ella was born almost three years ago. And with another one on the way, I’m sure he doesn’t have time to sit around and talk.”

“Well, while you sit around and contemplate life, I’m off to school. Don’t skip your Asia Pacific Political Systems course again, do you hear me? You better not be here when I get back, Mr. International Business Major.”

I patted him on the back, smiling at the annoyed look he shot my way. He shoved a piece of French toast in his mouth, speaking to me with his mouth still full. “Whatever you say, Mom. I could give you a ride if you want.”

Unlike most people, I preferred to take public transportation. It gave me an opportunity to sit and think about life, daydream, or catch up on reading whenever I could. “It’s fine, I can take the bus. Text me when you’re leaving, okay? We can meet up after class and go to that café where the girl always is.”

The bus was already packed full when I stepped on, forcing me to stand near the front for the entire half hour trip. I thanked the driver when I hit my stop, gripping the straps of my backpack as I walked from the bus stop to the entrance of my college. After my only class of the day, the sociology club had a meeting. It would be the first one I attended in months.

My class focused on criminology. I found myself distracted during the lecture, aimlessly scrolling through social media news feeds. A local BookTuber I’d followed years ago popped up. He was now published, while also still having quite a bit of influence on YouTube. I’d even met him once in passing and hated to admit I’d fangirled a bit inside. Funny enough, he was also the best friend of Tony’s cousin’s wife. It really was a small world.

An elbow nudged me in the ribs and I frowned, looking up from my phone to the front of the classroom, where Professor Jameson had her eyes trained on me. Without a word, she went back to teaching the lecture. Words weren’t necessary. I felt embarrassed enough from the look. The girl who sat beside me gave an apologetic smile for the earlier jab.

As soon as Professor Jameson dismissed us, I ran from the room to the college cafeteria, where the sociology club meeting would take place. I almost had a heart attack when I saw the one person who sat at the meeting table. He’d never attended any meetings before.

Mr. Handsome—Justin—shifted in his seat when our eyes met. I approached with caution, cursing myself for being over-dramatic at the banquet a few nights earlier. No doubt he would call me out on my behavior.

“Hello, Isabelle. It’s nice to see you again.” He spoke with formality, iciness lacing his voice.

I forced a smile. “Hi, Justin. How’ve you been?”

“All right. What happened to you at the banquet?”

Great. Straight to the point. I both admired and despised him for it.

“Um, something came up. I had to run home. Quite literally.” Surprisingly, he smiled at this.

Justin had a wonderful smile. Far more wonderful than Paul, who I still despised for making fun of my father’s decision to take my mother’s surname. He had messaged me on Tinder later that night, but I didn’t bother to answer. I deleted the app without hesitation.

“It’s fine, I shouldn’t have asked you to leave the party with me. But I have to let you know that I wasn’t planning on making any moves. Honestly, it would be nice to have a friend instead of a relationship. I’m more focused on school right now.”

Could it be? Had I ruined a potential friendship by running away?

I finally took a seat beside him, the smile I gave genuine. And nervous. During my three years at college, I’d encountered plenty of people, though none of them ended up as permanent friends. Just classroom friendships. The same went for Tony, but he still kept in touch with our high school friends as well.

“Would it be too late to consider being friends? I’m sorry I ran away from you.” Heat rushed to my face when he grinned, a light chuckle falling from his lips. I continued. “Honestly, the idea of love kind of puts me off. But I would love to be friends with you! The woman I saw in the bathroom said you were a perfect gentleman.”

He grimaced. “That was actually my aunt. Well, we aren’t related by blood, but she’s been my mother’s best friend since childhood. Can I ask why you’re put off by the idea of love? You don’t have to answer, of course.”

“No, no, it’s fine! I had this massive crush on a guy in high school, around my sophomore year, actually, and he turned out to be a total tool. Not only did he reject me hardcore when I gathered up the courage to admit that I loved him, but he also bullied my best friend all throughout high school. It only got worse when he found out we’d had a moment at a school dance.”

Justin looked genuinely interested. “Seriously? Hmm. And what exactly does a moment mean? Is this best friend a guy?”

“You would be correct, he’s a guy. Tony. And by moment, I mean we kind of kissed in front of a bunch of people. Well, no, not really. It was in a corner of the room. No one—Why are you looking at me like that?” I realized a second later that I’d divulged way too much information to him.

Judging from the red in his cheeks, I guessed he wanted to laugh. “You aren’t the type of person who thrives on small talk, are you?”

“Sorry, I’ve always preferred long conversations. Asking someone about the weather has never really excited me.”

“I think that’s great. Hey, since we’ve decided to become friends, do you think you can tell me what your dream job is now?”

I’d almost forgotten about that conversation. “Painter,” I said. “An art gallery owner if I can’t sell my own paintings. What about you?”

He laughed. “I knew you weren’t paying attention on Saturday! My deepest secret is actually that I play violin. I wanted to be a famous violinist when I was younger. Clearly that never happened. I was by no means a child prodigy.”

“You should let me hear your music sometime. I’m sure you’re great.” Considering I couldn’t even sing, let alone play a musical instrument, anyone would probably sound beautiful to my untrained ears. Still, the image of Mr. Handsome also being extremely gifted at music somehow fit.

A deep blush stained his entire face, and Justin glanced around the room before leaning in closer. The rest of the sociology club would be here any minute now. “I have some recordings on my phone if you’d like to hear them. Promise you’ll keep this a secret between us?”

I looked at him with wide eyes, nodding enthusiastically. The violin had always been one of my favorite instruments, right after the harp. He blushed even more, a grin spreading across his face as he pulled a pair of old-school headphones from his bag and plugged them into his phone. The sounds of the other people in the cafeteria faded away, replaced by a violin version of “Amazing Grace.”

As the song drew to a close, I almost had to wipe away a few tears. Justin rolled his eyes when he saw that, but I could tell it meant a lot to him that I’d enjoyed listening.

“What do ya think?” he asked, winding the headphones cord around his left hand. “Was it okay?”

“Okay? That was amazing! No pun intended.” He chuckled, avoiding meeting my eyes. I leaned back in my chair. “Seriously, have you considered uploading yourself to YouTube? That’s the best way to get famous nowadays. The beauty of social media.”

A few people I recognized from other meetings took a seat at the table, greeting us with toothy grins. I smiled back before turning my attention back to Justin. He seemed like a different person, shy and reserved instead of the confident and relaxed man he’d appeared to be at the banquet.

“No, I’ve never thought of that. I’m not exactly the kind of guy people want to stare at on a screen for any amount of time.” He whispered this, eyeing the two girls who sat across from us.

The idea that someone I’d called Mr. Handsome would think himself unattractive was ridiculous. “Trust me, a lot of girls would love to stare at you on a screen.”

Before he could say anything else, the president of our club appeared. She spent the next forty-five minutes discussing volunteer opportunities with the members, urging anyone who had free time to dedicate it to helping out the community. We did all want to dedicate the next few decades of our lives to the people, after all. After the meeting ended, I jumped out of my seat and threw on my backpack. I had to run home and drop off my stuff before meeting Tony at the café.

“Isabelle, wait!” Justin jogged to catch up to me, his honey-blond hair bouncing with every step he took. He was already gasping for air when he reached me. Kind of sad, considering we’d only crossed the one building, but I kept that thought to myself. “Would it be okay if we exchanged numbers? Sorry if I’m being a little straightforward, I just don’t know how else we’d keep in touch.”

It always surprised me when someone asked for my number. “Yeah, sure. We should hang out some time. I actually think I really like you, Justin.”

He smiled again. God, that smile must get him any girl he wanted. “Why thank you, Isabelle. I like you too. Enough to even forgive you for climbing out of a bathroom window to avoid me. I’m kidding,” he added when heat rushed to my face.

“I promise I won’t run away like that again. You aren’t so bad, Mr. Handsome.”

“Mr. Handsome?” But I’d already walked away. He called out to me and I laughed, turning around to face him but continuing to increase the distance between us. “What’s that supposed to mean, Isabelle?”

A few people stared at us. “You’ll find out someday! And just call me Izzy!”

“Until next time, Izzy!”

I waved goodbye, the grin plastered on my face almost painful. After three years, I had finally made a friend. The happiness remained the rest of the day, growing when I met Tony outside of the main building. He gave a surprised laugh when I launched myself into his arms, wrapping my arms so tight around his neck he told me to stop before he suffocated.

“Why are you so happy? Did you sneak off to the bar instead of going to class? If I have to go, then so do you, Iz.”

“Oh, shut up! I made a new friend! Isn’t that great? And you’ll never guess who it is either.”

Tony had to pry me off him, holding me at an arms distance with a raised eyebrow. “Who?”

“The guy I ran away from at the banquet. I know, I know!” I frowned at the incredulous look he shot me. “Turns out he just wanted a friend, too. Ooh, and he’s also a violinist! I’m going to try to convince him to post a video to YouTube.”

“Sounds like you had a rather eventful afternoon.” We started to walk down the sidewalk toward the parking lot, the horrible yellow Taurus standing out amongst the neutral shades of the surrounding vehicles.

I shrugged, scratching my left arm. “Not really, just that one thing. How about you? Are you feeling better now?”

He grunted as a response, sliding into the driver’s seat. I pursed my lips, wondering why the problem was now, but ignored it and climbed into the passenger seat.

“Actually, no, I’m not feeling better,” Tony said as he started the car. “I hate what I’m studying with a passion. If I felt even a fraction of love for business instead of the passionate hate I feel for it, I would be unstoppable. But no, I would rather work at Starbucks than pursue business.”

“Hey, don’t hate on the poor baristas! That job offers tons of benefits, you know.” He realized why I’d taken insult and looked over at me, a nervous grin pasted on his face. I’d been a barista for three years, only quitting my job a little more than a year and a half ago in favor of a summer receptionist job at my father’s own business.

We were at the same spot Tony had almost hit Zack the Waiter when he spoke again. “So, what does this girl you mentioned look like? Is she there every single time?”

“She has light brown hair, and yes, she is. She also checks you out every single time.” It wasn’t a lie, I’d seen her staring at his back whenever he ordered or glancing at his face whenever he walked by. A person would have to be blind not to see she had a massive crush.

“Okay, time to keep up my end of the bargain.” Tony looked like he would rather retreat back to the apartment and check out his matches on the apps, but he still walked into the café without heading straight to the counter like usual.

The girl sat in the corner of the room with a laptop on the table in front of her. She looked up when Tony and I entered, and their eyes locked for five whole seconds. I counted. Of course, she looked away first, the furious blush on her face making Justin’s look like a slight flush.

Because Tony was…well, himself, he didn’t approach her. He decided to go and order his usual chilled hot chocolate instead, glancing at the girl while he waited for his drink. I tried not to snort. I ordered the same drink as Tony, smiling when he chose to take a seat close to this dreamer.

We sat and talked for a bit before deciding it was time to head home. I met Tony’s eyes, silently yelling at him to talk to the girl, who also watched him. He shook his head, the movement so slight I just caught it. Sighing, I stood from my chair and headed to the exit.

The unnamed girl watched us go, a flicker of disappointment shining in her eyes. She noticed me watching and her lips curved up in a subtle smile. I returned the smile, cursing Tony for deciding now was the time he would bail out on our deal.

At least she seemed to forget about us a few seconds later, looking back at her computer and beginning to type away.

“Are you serious?” I resisted the urge to smack him in the head when we got to the car. “Did you not see that? She was waiting for you to talk to her!”

“She probably thinks we’re together, Izzy! Besides, why does the guy always have to make the first move? That’s bullshit.” He started the car, which sounded like it wouldn’t last much longer.

I took a deep breath and released it in a long sigh. He did have a point, as much as I hated to admit it. Girls shouldn’t be afraid to strike up a conversation.

“Let’s just go home and watch a movie or something. I’ll make dinner this time.” I didn’t want to make him feel worse than he already did. “What would you like to eat? Spaghetti? Tacos? A microwave dinner because that’s probably the best chance you have at getting a full meal?”

His mood lifted, and he looked at me with a new grin. “Let’s go for tacos. No offense but your spaghetti sucks.”

“Saying ‘no offense’ does not make it less offensive.”

Tony shrugged, and we spent the rest of the ride home listening to violin covers of popular music. I set to work on dinner when we arrived at home while Tony walked around with his camera and took pictures of random areas of the apartment. He stopped a few feet away from me and told me to smile. I stuck my tongue out instead.

“Are we going to watch another horror? I’m thinking Evil Dead. Not the original, but the remake. The one that actually attempts to be scary. Not that I don’t love the original.” He took his usual spot at the kitchen island, flipped through the pictures on his digital camera.

“Yeah, sure.” I looked down at my phone on the counter beside the stove when a text came in. It was from Justin, asking if I planned on volunteering for any events for the sociology club.

Tony raised an eyebrow when I turned back to him. “What’s that look for?”

“Oh, nothing. I’m just happy that I made a new friend.”

“Mhhm. Are you sure this isn’t going to develop into something more? You did tell me you called him Mr. Handsome.”

“Positive.” He didn’t look like he believed me, but he left it alone.

Tony could think whatever he wanted, I had no intention of developing any romantic feelings for Justin. He would be a new friend, and that was it. I texted back that I was considering it. Justin answered minutes later. For the first time in weeks, I feel asleep looking forward to going to school the next day.

The only concern I had on my mind was Tony and the girl who had a crush at him from the café. But that could wait for another day. First thing was first: I had to delete all the dating apps from my phone without telling Tony. Then, I would do everything I could to get my best friend the relationship he deserved.

#my writing #original writing #writblr #writers on tumblr #original story #q #DWTFIL

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maddietheshark-blog · 5 years

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Madeline Videtto

[email protected]

Social Media Usage

I decided to take away social media for a week. After this week, I didn’t realize how much time I spent on social media, and relied on it for fun, to pass time, and to talk to people. Fortunately, I was able to pick up shifts and I had a bunch of homework to finish, so I didn’t really have any free time to sit on my phone. On my breaks at work, I wanted to take it to the next level, and only used my phone to reply to messages rather than sitting on social media. This forced me to talk to my coworkers and actually have a conversation with them instead of just the basic “hey, what's up” conversation. I actually enjoyed this because as I get older, I find myself really bored with social media after a while, so I would clean, read my books, or do homework instead of scrolling through instagram. I go through phases of wanting to keep my social media and be really active on it, and give out my insta/youtube/twitter/snapchat to everyone and make as many friends as I can and interact with anyone and everyone. Other times, I want to delete everything and live life in the moment as much as possible without worrying about taking the perfect picture or thinking of the best caption for a picture. In a way, I kind of missed having social media as a backup if I got bored, but I think it was a good thing for me to not worry about who’s posting what, or who’s where. Throughout the week, I noticed whenever I already checked on social media for the day (I limited myself to an hour each day), I would get antsy and almost anxious. I read that people can develop depression and anxiety because of social media. (https://adaa.org/social-media-obsession). I’m a full-time college student, and a part-time associate, so I already tend to be pretty busy, but the times I have nothing going on, or if I’m simply waiting in line for a coffee, I’m always checking my phone to see what everyone’s up to. Without social media, I would look around and honestly got annoyed as seeing everyone on their phones. I saw people with friends, family, grandparents, and kids, and everyone had a phone in their face. It makes me wonder what it was like before social media and how people interacted in person with strangers, if they just went up to them in a random coffee shop, or give them a note. Out of curiosity, I searched people’s stories to see what it was like socializing before apps. I wanted to get people’s opinions other than family members or unnecessary comments from strangers when they see you check your phone once. In https://medium.com/art-for-lunch/what-was-life-like-before-social-media-8c4d745be1a9 , people share what life was social media took over the world. I’m not sure what other people my age think about social media. I know half of my friends have completely deactivated it and don’t plan on making new accounts anytime soon. The other half are completely for social media and still try desperately to get as many likes as possible. I think I’m at that weird age where people really hate social media or are addicted to it. I was definitely more on the addicted side. I would spend hours at night and I lost hours of sleep because I stayed on twitter for too long. This week for the assignment, I plugged my phone in on the other side of the room so I wouldn’t be tempted to check on it throughout the night. Not going to lie, it was pretty tough just laying in bed staring at nothing, but I fell asleep quick and got a good nights rest. I didn’t feel as dead as I usually do when I wake up. Apparently it’s the new generation to not get any sleep and to spend all night on social media. According to https://bigthink.com/david-ryan-polgar/are-tech-saturated-bedrooms-leading-to-poor-performing-sleepy-students, over a third of young people wake up to check/respond to messages. I really enjoyed this assignment, and the nights rest I’ve been getting.

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eleanor-writes-stuff · 6 years

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i miss the thought of a forever you and me [one-shot]

Kylo Ren has spent what seems to be the entirety of his adult life working towards a partnership in Snoke's firm. Now that future is finally within reach, and only one thing stands in his way.

So maybe he hasn't spoken to Rey in eight years. And maybe he's still not quite over her. But getting in touch with his ex-girlfriend to have her take down their old webcam videos shouldn't be an issue... right?

This is far from my best work, but I haven’t posted anything in nearly a month so here, have a two-tropes-in-one fic: exes getting back together and ‘we were young and broke and webcam porn seemed like a good idea’. Is that last one even a trope? Who knows. I wrote it anyway. If a bunch of fluff and pining sounds like a good idea, this might be the fic for you.

Also available on AO3.

Kylo Ren has been working towards this moment for the entirety of his adult life.

“If all goes as planned,” Snoke finally says after a long, roundabout conversation about legacies and partnerships and apprentices becoming equals, “the announcement will be made this Monday.”

The announcement – the one that will cement his place as a partner of the firm, the one that will ensure his name lives on forever, the one that will overshadow anything and everything that has come before. “Sir, this is–”

Snoke holds up a hand, all paper-thin skin and arthritis-curled fingers; it’s a wonder, really, that the man is still alive at all, let alone sharp enough to continue running his firm. Some will see this announcement as a sign of weakness, as the beginning of a transition of power – and perhaps they’ll be right. Two years ago, Kylo would have entertained the thought in the back of his mind, might even have come up with the outline of a plan to begin the process of supplanting Snoke entirely.

As it is, he can barely even muster the energy to fake excitement at the news.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself just yet, boy,” Snoke warns him. “Once the announcement goes out, it won’t take long for everyone to start looking you up. While I trust that Kylo Ren has been nothing but professional, I cannot say the same of Ben Solo – and I refuse to have another Hux situation.”

Just last week, Hux had been his sole competitor for this very partnership – until a quick Google search by Snoke’s assistant had yielded pictures of Hux in a Nazi costume plastered all over the Internet. The idiot had worn the costume not one, not two, but five Halloweens in a row, and any effort on his part to contain the damage would have been hopeless.

He was fired that very day.

“I assure you, sir,” Kylo speaks firmly, with all the confidence of someone who was born into the spotlight and has almost never done anything stupid, “that will not happen.”

Snoke pins him with a look that might have been intimidating once, back when he still cared about the man’s opinion and approval. “See that it doesn’t. Take the rest of the week to get your affairs in order.”

He’s dismissed with a limp wave of Snoke’s hand – has he really grown that frail in just a handful of years, or was Kylo simply too blinded by his promises of greatness to notice before?

Kylo thinks he sees that same blind loyalty in Mitaka as he walks past the assistant’s desk. The man is terrified of him and had been just as scared of Hux, but that hadn’t stopped Mitaka from bringing his findings to Snoke anyway, even at the cost of making a lifelong enemy out of Hux.

Maybe someday, Kylo thinks as he returns Mitaka’s curious gaze with a curt nod, you’ll wake up too. You’ll realize that the voice whispering in the darkness is filling you with empty promises, that greatness and power mean nothing without all the other things he’ll make you sacrifice first.

But then what? Kylo himself came to that realization years ago, and here he is anyway because what else is there? Maybe that’s the truly frightful thing about Snoke – even if he can’t deceive you forever, he’ll make sure that there’s nothing else left for you, that there’s no reason to break free of his trap.

Maybe once there would have been a reason, a person–

But that was years ago. Now there’s no one else, and nowhere else, so he might as well just stay and keep going down this path strewn with material comfort and little else.

Kylo returns to his office and settles in to retrace every single step he’s ever taken online. There’s nothing left of pre-college Ben Solo – he’d made sure of that the summer after high school in a foolish attempt to present himself with a clean slate for college, as if his last name and his parentage didn’t cast a longer shadow than anything his idiot fourteen-year-old self could have said on Myspace. After college there was no more Ben Solo, only Kylo Ren, and an intensive Google search (he’s on the seventh page of search results by the time he clicks away) reveals nothing but a handful of professional profiles used for networking and the occasional write-up about him or his cases.

Which leaves him with one last concern: college Ben Solo.

College Ben Solo has a Facebook account that he never posted on, one he used only to interact with his classmates and lecturers. He has a Twitter account with zero tweets, and an Instagram account with zero posts but a hundred or so tagged photos.

That was the only reason he’d signed up for Instagram in the first place: to see what kind of pictures his friends were posting of him, to see (and like) everything Rey tagged him in.

He would have deleted his Facebook account years ago, but he’s a sentimental fool and that was where he and Rey first got to know each other, really, when she chose to write to him instead of the literal dozens of others in their class for help. (It’s Rey from poli sci. I wasn’t in class today. Did I miss anything?)

He should have deleted his Twitter account the day he graduated, but sometimes he scrolls through all of his Favorites and their relationship plays like a movie in his head, each milestone – no matter how tiny – recorded for posterity in 140 characters. (The summer before their third year, a picture of her rolling her eyes at the camera and him talking to a realtor in the background: house-hunting with the pickiest guy in the world. I swear to god, @Ben_Solo, if you don’t pick an apartment by today I will kill you.)

And Instagram… Instagram is an exercise in masochism. Pictures of them in class, when Holdo was running late and she was bored. Pictures of them hanging out at parties Hux dragged him to and Finn dragged her to. Pictures of her tucked into his side on movie night, of him turning his face away from her camera while he made them breakfast, of the two of them building an entire life together. (A caption to accompany the last picture of them she ever posted, her head on his shoulder and his arm around her waist: Who needs a space heater when you’ve got this guy? #lifehacks #savingafortuneonheatingthiswinter #agirlcouldgetusedtothis)

It’s painful to look back on, every single bit of it, but there’s nothing here that would actually have a negative impact on his reputation. His Twitter account is already private and his Facebook reveals nothing but a string of perfunctory, impersonal birthday messages from former classmates. He double-checks that his Instagram account is locked, and then he looks up her account too – just to be safe.

Rey Niima | Cali Full-time software engineer, part-time app developer, occasionally an actual human with a social life.

The bio’s changed since he last saw it a year ago – I almost never post but don’t worry, I’m (probably) not dead – but the account’s still locked, which should mean no one can see her pictures of him. He’ll have to check with someone who’s more familiar with social media – maybe Phasma, who’s gotten surprisingly good at this stuff since she started developing a social media presence for her gym – but Kylo’s pretty sure this means he can keep all of his shrines to the past without exposing himself as a lovesick fool to the public.

All except one, that is.

Kylo exits Instagram, sets his phone aside, and reluctantly turns to his laptop. He types a URL into the box – one he visits far more than he’d like to admit – and watches as a few dozen thumbnails for corresponding videos begin to appear.

Because while college Ben Solo had maintained a minimal, barely-there presence on social media, there’s one particular corner of the web where he had been very, very active.

There’s a reason he waited until he was safely locked away in his own house to conduct this online purge, and the revealing thumbnails make him glad he did – limbs splayed wide open and miles upon miles of bare skin but no faces, never any faces, they were always so careful about that. It’s probably the only reason no one’s ever found out about this.

He’s never forgotten about it – having sex with your girlfriend in front of a live online audience isn’t exactly something you can just forget about – but Kylo’s felt fairly confident in their anonymity for the past few years. No names, no faces, shitty audio that completely distorted their voices – they’d thought of everything, discussed it all at length when she first approached him with the idea. But now… now he can’t risk it any longer. So as much as he’s going to miss being able to watch these whenever he really, really misses her–

It’s time to call Rey up and ask her to take down all of their videos.

“Hello,” she says distractedly – he can picture her pressing the phone between her ear and shoulder, her hands busy at work and her mind half-focused on a dozen different things. The image is so vivid it hurts, and her voice – the voice he used to wake up to a lifetime ago – isn’t helping.

He takes a deep breath. “Um, hey. It’s…” Not Ben, not for a long time now, but would she even remember Kylo Ren? The name he only adopted towards the end of their time together, the name she laughed at once or twice before telling him to stop being an idiot, Ben Solo is a perfectly good name–

Over the phone, Rey makes an almost imperceptible sound – a gasp, maybe, or a sharp inhale. “Ben,” she breathes, not even the slightest hint of a question in her voice after all these years.

He was always Ben to her, even right up until the end. It doesn’t feel right to change that now. “Yeah, it’s me. Sorry to just call you up like this–”

“It’s okay,” Rey cuts him off, her words tumbling out in a rush. Maybe he should’ve asked if this is a good time to talk. “Really, it’s fine. What’s… what’s up?”

“I’m… this is going to sound weird, but I’m in town and I need to talk to you about something… private,” he grimaces as it finally hits him how ridiculous this all is, how pathetic and see-through his excuse is. They could’ve had this phone call even on opposite ends of the world; he could’ve checked the website after to make sure she’d gone through with it. There’s absolutely no reason for him to have flown across the country just for this.

But here he is anyway.

Rey is quiet for the longest while. “Oh,” she finally says. “I… um. Okay, I guess. Do you want to tell me what this is about or would you rather–”

“I’d rather tell you in person,” Kylo says quickly, before he can lose his nerve and fly back without ever laying eyes on her. “Can I- are you free now?”

“Now?” she echoes questioningly. “I’m kinda at work right now, Ben.”

Because of course she’s at work, of course she has a routine and a life and none of it is going to stop just because he’s unceremoniously dropped himself back into her existence. His life in New York feels so distant now, almost like a dream, but it’s unfair of him to expect her to drop everything and rush to him the way he’s rushed to her.

“Of course,” he mutters. “I’m sorry, I forgot that–”

“But my lunch break is in two hours, if you’d like to drop by then,” Rey offers haltingly, her tone somewhere between a suggestion and a question.

“Yes,” the word tumbles past his lips without a moment’s thought. “Yes. Great. That’d be great.” He clears his throat to shut himself up and stop rambling at Rey.

“Great!” she agrees brightly, her cheery tone the slightest bit hysteria-tinged. “So I’ll just text you the address?”

He could easily look it up himself, of course, but he’ll take any form of contact with her – Kylo’s not above admitting that to himself. “Yeah, sure. Thanks. See you in a bit, Rey,” he makes himself say, because who knows how long he’ll keep her on the phone otherwise, keep her voice in his ear and her presence in his life.

When Rey speaks, he likes to think he can hear a smile in her voice. “See you, Ben,” she says quietly, and a moment later her voice is gone and his phone is buzzing with a message containing directions to Resistance Tech.

The company sounds vaguely familiar – he must’ve read about her getting a job there at some point, maybe gleaned it from one of her bios or a congratulatory post on Finn’s Facebook account. There’s so little about her that he actually knows, but the bits and pieces stored in the back of his mind are still more than he should have, more than he’s entitled to, given that they haven’t spoken in eight years.

He wonders when she stopped working with Skywalker, and why; wonders if she still hates coffee and chugs way too much Coke in the mornings to get her caffeine hit instead; wonders if she ever reaches out across the bed at night only to remember there’s no one there anymore, the way he still does.

Thirty minutes later he hops into an Uber and stares out the window at the bright sun and the swaying trees, thinks of how much Rey must love this place, all her favorite parts about her desert home and their rainy college town rolled into one city.

The car pulls up to Resistance Tech more than an hour later, and his Uber driver tells him that’s considered good time given that it’s the middle of the day and they made their way here all the way from the airport. He thanks the guy, shoulders his weekend bag, and opens the door to a beautiful, sprawling, horribly familiar sight.

Rey never stopped working with Skywalker, Kylo realizes belatedly. Resistance Tech is just the new name his mother had chosen for the company when she decided to quit politics and partner up with her brother.

The receptionist calls for someone to escort him upstairs when she recognizes his name, and Kylo finds himself deposited in an empty conference room on the seventeenth floor shortly after.

The hallway outside is barely lit, and the entire floor seems abandoned for now. He sits down for a bit, re-reads Rey’s message a couple of times before he takes to restlessly pacing the length of the conference room and then parting the blinds to look at the courtyard below.

Benches and picnic tables dot the open space, and food carts begin to appear seemingly out of nowhere as lunch hour draws near. He thinks he spots Finn amongst the throng of employees spilling out of the building, accompanied by a man and a woman, and idly wonders if maybe he’ll catch a glimpse of Rey rushing to get a bite before she comes up to meet him.

An achingly familiar voice draws him away from the window.

“Hello, Ben.”

She’s eight years older but somehow still exactly as he remembers her, all thin sweater slipping off one shoulder and loose hair framing her face and a soft little smile on her lips. He’s seen her like this a thousand times, in memories and dreams that always leave him wanting.

“Rey,” he whispers, curling his hands around the back of a chair to anchor himself. The urge to wrap his arms around her, to sweep her off her feet and pick her up the way he used to, the way that never failed to make her laugh in delight, is overwhelming. “You look… the same. Beautiful, I mean,” he adds in a hurry before she can wonder whether that’s a good thing. “You look beautiful. That’s all.”

“Um, thanks. I like your hair,” Rey replies in kind as she steps into the room and shuts the door behind her. He resists the urge to run a hand through his hair self-consciously; he hasn’t worn it short-short since he was a teenager, grew it out to hide his ears even when they were together, but now it’s shorter than it ever was in college, only half of his ears hidden underneath black waves.

She used to run her hands through it absent-mindedly, coo at how soft it was and lament that there wasn’t more of it for her to braid. He wants nothing more than to feel her blunt nails scratching down his scalp again, her fingers tangled in his hair to hold him close.

“Sorry to make you come all the way up here,” Rey says as she takes a seat and motions for him to do the same. “It’s just… I know you and Leia still aren’t talking that much, and you never know where she’ll be during lunch hour. I thought this would be the safest option.”

Leia. Back in college she used to call his mom Mrs. Organa, and they’d met all of two times when Leia dropped by campus unannounced to confront him about the growing rift between them. Now she knows his mom well enough to be on a first-name basis, has probably spent more time with her in the past year than he has in the past decade.

Kylo slowly takes a seat opposite her. “Thanks. That’s… very considerate of you.”

Rey simply nods in acknowledgement, and they stare at each other across the wide conference table until–

“Why are you here, Ben?” she asks softly, no hint of hostility or frustration in her voice. Maybe the years have mellowed her out, maybe more than a decade of not having to fight for survival on a daily basis has drained her of the hardened, confrontational nature he remembers from their earliest interactions and allowed her true personality to emerge - the one he’d begun to see glimpses of during their last year together, the one he used to think he’d have the rest of his life to get to know.

“I…” he can’t help but drop his eyes down to the table, finds himself focusing on the way she fidgets with a bracelet around her wrist as he speaks. “I’m being promoted, next week. Snoke’s making me a partner.”

Her hand stops moving at the mention of his boss. “Oh. Um, congratulations,” Rey offers weakly.

Kylo forces himself to look at her. “Thanks. But… that’s why I’m here, basically. Snoke demands that all of us carry ourselves in a manner befitting of the firm’s reputation, which means no hidden skeletons or potential scandals. And now that he’s about to announce me as a partner…”

“You’re worried people out there might do some digging,” she fills in, nodding in comprehension.

There’s no need to talk about what exactly people might find, what kind of scandal they’d have on their hands. There’s only that one thing.

“Do you still have the login information?” he asks bluntly.

“I…” Rey pauses, and the slightest furrow emerges between her brows; he wants to lean across the table and smooth it out, wants to tuck her hair behind her ear and– “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I still remember everything. But um,” she gives him an apologetic smile, one marred by a wince. “I’m not that comfortable logging in here at work, so maybe…?”

Kylo nods. “Right, of course. I completely understand.”

“I’ll do it as soon as I get home, I promise,” she assures him. “Really, I should’ve done it years ago. It just… slipped my mind, I guess.” The casual shrug, the light tone – none of it is the least bit convincing. This isn’t the kind of thing that just slips your mind.

He plays along anyway, just as guilty as her of… whatever this is. Keeping a shrine to the past? Getting off to your own homemade porn? Holding on to memories of the happiest time in your life? “Yeah, same.”

Rey moves as if to get out of the chair, as if to leave, and he panics, grasps desperately at straws for something to say–

“How long are you in town for, by the way?” she asks, getting to her feet but making no move to leave.

“I… I don’t know,” Kylo realizes out loud. “I just packed a bag and hopped on a plane. Fuck, I haven’t even gotten a hotel.”

She studies him, head the slightest bit tilted to one side in suspicion. “Ben, did you fly all the way here just for this?”

He can’t exactly admit that his brain had short-circuited at even the slightest possibility of seeing her again, that he’d fly halfway across the damn world if it meant getting to be in the same room with her for five minutes. “No,” Kylo croaks, clears his throat and aims for nonchalance. “No, definitely not. That’d be… that’d be ridiculous. I just. Work’s about to change in a big way and I needed some time to myself, you know?”

Rey simply stares at him for the longest while. “Right,” she finally says. “Of course.” After a moment’s consideration, she adds, “This might be weird but we did part on good terms and all, and you just said you haven’t found a hotel yet so… I mean. I have a spare room. That you can stay in, if you’d like.”

It takes him a second too long to process what’s happening here, to understand that Rey is inviting him into her home for the night. “Yes!” he blurts out when it looks like she’s starting to regret the offer. “I mean, yes. I’d love to. If it’s okay with you.”

“I wouldn’t have offered otherwise,” Rey smiles. “So I’ll just send you the address and let you know when I’m home?”

“That sounds good,” Kylo nods, following her lead as she moves out of the room. “Thanks, by the way. I know this is all really unexpected and–”

She turns in the doorway, places a hand on his arm. “It’s no problem, Ben. Really, I don’t mind.”

It burns where she touches him, in the best way possible.

But Rey drops her hand as if she’s been singed, and quickly leads him out of the room and down the darkened hallway. “I’d walk you out, but then people might stop us to talk to me and who knows if they’ll recognize you.”

“It’s okay,” he says as they wait for the elevator. “I know my way around.” After all, he used to spend entire summers exploring this place as a child. “Hey, what happened to Skywalker, anyway? Why the name change?”

They get into the elevator and Rey presses two buttons – twelfth floor for her office, he can’t help but note. “Luke disappeared on some kind of soul-searching mission shortly after Leia retired from politics and came here to join him,” she explains. “So your m- so Leia said that if he was going to make her do all the work of running the company, she might as well make the company her own. Gave it a total overhaul, rebranded and everything.”

Twelfth floor, an automated voice chimes before he can voice the thought that that sounds entirely like something Leia would do.

“Well, this is me,” Rey says as the doors begin to slide open. “I’ll see you at home?”

It feels like a dream to hear her say that again after all these years. Rey realizes her slip-up the second she steps off the elevator, and her eyes grow wide as she frantically shakes her head. “I mean, at my home. Which you don’t share. Because you’ve never been there. Because we–”

Kylo smiles, braces one hand against the door while the other reaches out to finally, finally tuck a lock of hair behind her ear. “See you later, Rey.”

Her eyes close when his fingers graze her jaw, and he thinks she even leans into his touch. But then there’s a voice from down the hall, an awfully familiar one, and their eyes meet in a moment of total panic.

“Rey, is that you? I was wondering where you’d gone! Would you like to have lunch together?”

Leia’s voice grows dangerously close.

“Go,” Rey urges, and Kylo turns his back on her to conceal himself while he frantically jabs at the button to close the doors.

He finds himself in a café five minutes away from Rey’s office for the rest of the afternoon, scrolling through Instagram and Twitter despite his better judgement.

But the way she said see you at home, the way she sighed and leaned into his hand–

At five, his walk down memory lane is abruptly cut short when his phone lights up with a text.

Leaving work now, home in twenty. Come over whenever.

Kylo makes himself sit still for another ten minutes, even if it’s the hardest thing he’s done in recent memory. And then he calls for an Uber and promptly gets stuck in traffic.

Rey opens the door nearly an hour later and laughs at the sight of his disgruntled face. “You called for a car, didn’t you?”

“Mistakes were made,” he acknowledges, stepping into her apartment. For a moment there it’s almost like he’s stepped back in time, like he’s walked into their old home again.

But her plants are in proper pots now, not chipped mugs and emptied-out jars of food with the labels still on them. And the furniture is significantly nicer, not a single piece rescued from the curb and given a total makeover. It still screams Rey though, at the very heart of it, and he instantly feels more comfortable here than he has anywhere else since they moved out.

“That’s why I bike everywhere,” Rey says as she closes the door behind them, oblivious to his reaction to her home. “Have you eaten? I was thinking of calling for Thai. There’s this great place–” her voice carries as she heads for the kitchen, and he follows her once he’s successfully snapped himself out of it.

“Thai sounds great,” he tells her, watching her retrieve the menu from a drawer stuffed to the brim with brightly colored flyers. The genie drawer, Rey used to call it back in their kitchen, even put up a nice little chalkboard label proclaiming it as such. Like so many other things about her, it had been both endearing and heartbreaking to see how excited she would get about something as mundane as being able to simply place a call and know for sure that your next meal was taken care of, that you wouldn’t have to starve that day.

They settle on their orders, and Rey heads into the living room to get her phone and make the call. He looks out her kitchen window while waiting for her, pictures her standing in this very spot every morning, quietly cradling a mug of tea in a stolen moment of peace before the day ahead. It’s what she used to do, at least, back when their kitchen was barely functional and the view from their window was just a dirty alley.

“Hey,” Rey says as she returns to the kitchen, and when he turns around she has her laptop in hand. “I thought we might as well get it done with, while we’re waiting for food to arrive,” she explains, her smile too tight and close-lipped to be anything but nervous.

“Good idea,” he nods, and moves away from the window to join Rey at the kitchen island. There are two small barstools tucked under one end, and he follows her lead when she slides into one and logs into her laptop.

Rey types in the URL. “So,” she says a little too loudly as they wait for the page to load. “Excited about your promotion?”

“Not really,” Kylo mumbles as thumbnails begin to pop up.

They’re… well, as explicit as you’d expect them to be. But nestled amidst all of that is the occasional image of them just wrapped up in each other, Rey’s arms around his neck and his hair falling forward to obscure them from view as they kiss.

And always, always the slightest hint of a smile on her barely-visible face. He’s beginning to forget what it felt like, to have Rey smile into a kiss. Because for all the tiny details that furnish his longing dreams, there are just as many that have started to slip through his fingers – and he hates it, hates the way each missing detail feels like a fresh cut over a barely-healed wound, hates that time is chipping away at his most precious memories, hates that they’ve been apart for so long, that they’ve been apart at all.

Kylo sighs. “What happened to us?” he murmurs unthinkingly, and from the corner of his eye he catches movement – a flinch?

“Life,” Rey says easily, suddenly fascinated by her own hands. “We went down different paths, grew apart… it happens. People change. You changed,” she shrugs.

She’s never said so before, ended their relationship with a casual looks like we’ll be going to opposite ends of the country, let’s keep in touch rather than any complaints about him changing. He inhales sharply, snaps his head up to look at her. “What do you mean I changed?” His voice is too sharp, too demanding and accusatory, but it’s too late to take it back now.

Rey looks him in the eye, doesn’t falter or hesitate as she confronts him. “When I met you, you said you’d never go into politics because you wanted to actually make a difference, and you knew you wouldn’t be able to do that from within the government,” she reminds him. “And then the next thing I knew, you were working with Snoke and defending the very people you used to rail against, the ones who stood in the way of the change you used to want.”

Kylo takes a deep breath, counts to ten and pays close attention to his tone before he speaks. “I grew up, Rey,” he tells her stiffly, evenly. “That boy – he was naïve and idealistic and he would’ve starved to death working pro bono for every sob story he came across,” or so Snoke has said a hundred times, whenever he feels Kylo is in need of a reminder and some gratitude. “Snoke saw my potential and rescued me from that.” It feels wrong to parrot his mentor’s words back at Rey, especially when he himself stopped believing in them a long time ago. But what else is there to say?

“He didn’t rescue you,” Rey spits bitterly. “He hollowed you out and destroyed everything that made you you! He stripped away your morals and your beliefs and filled the void with a fuckton of money to hide it from you.”

“I’m not– Rey, I’m still me!” He gets to his feet so abruptly that the force of it sends his stool skittering across the floor. “I’m still the same person you knew, I’m still the man who took a job he couldn’t care less about because I wanted a roof over our heads, because I wanted to give you everything–”

Rey shakes her head at him. “I never asked you for everything, Ben. I was happy with what we had, I was happy with you.”

What they had? What they had was a tiny apartment and a mountain of overdue bills and a barely-defined thing between them because Rey never asked for anything but she never let him ask for anything either, never agreed to a proper date or labels or anything real, anything that would have given him the power to hurt her.

“I wasn’t!” Kylo snaps, running a rough hand through his hair, tugging at a tangle in frustration. “God, how do you think I felt, Rey, knowing that other people were getting off to my girlfriend just so that we could pay rent? The things they said about you–”

“Hold on,” Rey stands up, raises a hand in protest. “I was never your girlfriend, we were just–”

“Just what, Rey?” he snarls. “Just living together? Sleeping together? Talking about our future together? I don’t know about you, sweetheart, but that sounds like a relationship to me.”

Rey’s breathing hard and glaring at him and out of nowhere it occurs to him that this is their first fight, that they dated for three years and have been broken up for eight but somehow this is the first time he’s ever raised his voice at her.

“The only reason,” she says slowly, deliberately, bites off each word with thinly-veiled anger and coats it in false calm, “we were living together was because neither of us could afford to pay rent separately. You said so yourself, when you suggested it.”

“For fuck’s sake, Rey,” he sighs, brings a hand up to pinch at the bridge of his nose where he can already feel a headache coming on. “Did you really think that was… I mean, come on. If all I wanted was a roommate, I would’ve just asked fucking Hux. He would’ve had a bigger budget. He would’ve had his share of the rent on time every month.”

And this cannot be news to Rey, but still uncertainty casts a shadow over her features as she asks, “Then why…?”

Kylo shakes his head, closes his eyes and runs a heavy hand down his face. “Because I wanted to be with you,” he whispers, something so obvious he’s always just assumed Rey – and the whole wide world, really – must’ve seen it from the very start. “Because I loved you.”

Rey makes a tiny sound – he can’t tell if she’s choking or gasping, not with the doorbell drowning her out so that all he can see is the way her lips part infinitesimally in shock.

“I’ll get it,” Kylo sighs when the bell rings again, reaching for the wallet in his back pocket. The fact that Rey doesn’t even react when normally she’d be fighting to split the bill makes him wonder if he’s broken her.

Did she really not know? How? God, the way he’d look at her, the way he’d hold her close and sigh her name – wasn’t any of it obvious enough? Wasn’t it written in big red letters across his forehead that he had been a fucking goner for her from the very start?

When he comes back into the kitchen, Rey is still standing in the exact same spot. He leaves her be, busies himself with taking plastic containers of food out of the bags and setting them out on her countertop.

“Ben?”

He turns around to find her hugging herself, arms wrapped around her waist and shoulders hunched in on herself so that she looks even tinier than usual, lost and scared and–

“Did you mean it? That you loved me back then?”

Kylo brings his hands behind his back, wedges them between his body and the kitchen counter to subdue the urge to cross the room and hold her. Rey stares at him unblinkingly, even as her arms grows tighter and she grows smaller, even as she sinks her nails into the soft flesh of her waist.

It hurts, to see her like this. Eight years and still all he wants is to always be there for her, to make her feel happy and safe all the time.

“I think I still do,” he admits quietly.

Rey makes that sound again – it’s a sob, he can hear it clearly now – and runs into his arms.

The food grows cold, forgotten on the countertop as they stumble into the living room.

After, snuggled up together on her tiny couch that’s so small she has to sprawl out on top of him rather than beside him, he gives voice to a dream he buried long ago.

“I thought I was going to marry you.”

Rey lifts her head from his chest, props herself up with her palms braced just above his shoulders. “What?”

“Back in college,” he explains, one hand drawing circles into her hip while the other brushes her hair out of her face. “Back when we… I’d look at you, sometimes, and out of nowhere I’d think, I’m going to marry her someday.”

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?” Rey asks gently, leaning in to brush the lightest of kisses against his lips.

“Didn’t want to scare you off, at first,” Kylo shrugs. “And then everything else happened so fast and we’d already made plans to move to opposite ends of the country. You know what’s crazy?” he asks, exhaling a short, bitter laugh. “Even then I thought we’d make it. I thought maybe I'd work with Snoke for a couple of years, save up enough for us to be okay while I looked for a better job where you were. Or maybe you'd hate it with my uncle and decide to fly out and find something closer to me. But then…”

But then there was talk of keeping in touch, a request to just text me once in a while, Ben, it won’t kill you to stay social, and with it came the heartbreaking realization that they weren’t anything worth holding on to, not to Rey.

He tears himself away from the memory. Just minutes ago she had hidden an endless string of I love yous in the crook of his neck, and that’s enough for him now. That has be to enough, because it’s already more than he’s ever dared to so much as daydream of.

“You never said anything,” Rey murmurs now, dropping her head back onto his chest. “I thought…”

“I wish I had,” he whispers into the silence, shifts slightly to nuzzle her temple.

Rey pushes against his chest, moves until they’re both sitting on the couch facing each other. “But…” she pauses, takes a deep breath as if to brace herself. “But things are different now, right? I mean, you’ve got everything you wanted now, what with the promotion and–”

He laughs bitterly, anguished enough for Rey to fall silent and stare at him wide-eyed. “Rey, you are everything I wanted. The rest was just… I don’t even know anymore,” he admits in defeat, can’t think of a single reason he left her behind for such a hollow life. “I hate it, all of it. I hate my job, I hate my apartment, I hate my life.”

She stares at him thoughtfully, nibbling on her bottom lip as she considers the situation at hand. The shirt he’d scooped up from the ground to drape around her shoulders is dangerously close to falling off as she shrugs and says, “Then quit.”

Oh, how he wants to. But – “And then what?”

Rey shuffles closer on her knees, climbs into his lap and plays with the hair at the nape of his neck. “Then come here,” she suggests easily. “Look for a job.” And then, after the slightest pause– “Marry me.”

His ears are ringing. He can’t possibly have heard that right, because Rey is still giving him that nonchalant look, still absentmindedly playing with his hair. “What?”

“That was your original plan, right?” Rey reminds him. “Quit after a few years with Snoke, move here to find a job, marry me someday,” she says it so softly, so lovingly, and in her eyes he sees all of it, sees that life he gave up on years ago. “I know it’s been a while, Ben, but… it’s not too late, if you still want it. If you still want us.”

“I– of course I still–” The idea that he might not is impossible to even wrap his head around. “But… Rey, are you serious? I know what I said, and I meant it, but you don’t have to… I mean, we can take it slow, if you want.” They’ve already wasted eight years, after all. What’s a few more so long as it means he gets to be with her, wife or not?

Rey shakes her head, surges up to kiss him all desperate and needy and so, so sure in her actions, her suggestions. “I’ve spent every single day of the last eight years,” she confesses against his lips, “trying to pretend that there isn’t a giant you-shaped hole in my life. So yes,” Rey gives him one last peck before she pulls away, “yes, I’m serious. Come back to me, Ben. It’ll be different this time, I promise.”

Her eyes are wide and earnest, and of course he knows exactly what she’s talking about, feels his heart get stuck in his throat at such a promise. “I feel like I should be the one asking to come back,” Kylo mumbles, thinking of how he left her behind all those years ago, of how much Rey has always hated being left behind and sure, this time it was different, it was just a day before she left for a new life of her own, but still. Maybe if he’d fought harder then, if he’d been willing to make sacrifices… “Feel like I should’ve been the one to ask you to marry me, too.”

“And you will,” Rey smiles, taking his words as a yes. “This isn’t a real proposal, Ben Solo,” she warns him playfully, jabs one finger at his chest. “You’re still going to have to gather up the nerve to ask me properly, some day. But for now... for now it’s a plan.”

She looks at him expectantly, as if there’s any world out there where he would say no to this. “It’s a good plan,” he tells her, pulls her in for a lingering kiss and rests his forehead against hers. “I like it.”

“Good,” Rey murmurs against his lips, and they don’t talk again for a good long while.

“We should probably still take those videos down though, right?” she asks the next morning, right after he hangs up on a puzzled Mitaka who’s still struggling to process his resignation.

Ben chucks his phone far, far away before Snoke can start to bombard him with calls and angry emails, pulls Rey into his arms and drags her back down under the covers. “I guess,” he sighs mournfully, dotting kisses along her bare shoulder.

“Babe,” Rey laughs, squirms in his arms when he focuses on a particularly ticklish spot under her ear and turns to face him. “You do realize that I have backup copies, right?”

He had not, in fact, realized that.

“God, I love you.”

Anything Reylo is usually soothing to my soul so I'm posting this in the hopes that at least some of you will enjoy this silly, tame take on the 'we were young and broke and needed the money, plus we were already having sex anyway so why not?' trope. (Seriously though, is that a trope? I don't know anymore.)

As always, I hope you guys enjoyed this even the tiniest bit. If you did, please don’t hesitate to like/reblog/leave a comment/scream at me in the tags.

I'm planning to participate in the Reylo AU Week happening later this month, so... see you guys then. In the meantime, thanks for reading!

#reylo #rey/ben solo #rey/kylo ren #kylo ren/rey #ben solo/rey #modern au #star wars #rey #ben solo #kylo ren #fic: a forever you and me #fic archive #my fics

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clublogo470 · 3 years

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Facebook Dating Review Reddit

Facebook’s dating app, which was announced at the corporation’s F8 Conference in May, 2018, has just rolled out to all of the U.S.For those who are currently swimming around in the dating pool.

Tinder, the largest dating app on the market right now, has about 5 million users. “In theory, given that so many people use Facebook, they could harness that population in an advantageous way. ThaiCupid website is one of the best examples of online social media and networking platforms worldwide to find the Siamese quickly. The website is easy to use and free for everyone to find other users and chat with them endlessly. However, you would need a little time to find a perfect match in the sea of profiles.

I used to find it frustrating when people blamed dating apps for how bad dating is.

Facebook’s NPE Team is testing an app called Sparked that’ll put people into a video speed dating event. The app hasn’t launched in any app stores yet but is available through the web. BookofMatches is a trustworthy internet dating website that has been working since 2002. For more than 15 years, this service makes its clients amazingly glad and fulfilled. There is something for everybody here, beginning from individuals with straight sexual direction to gays, lesbians, and transsexuals.

“What’s the alternative?” I would ask when a friend complained about the chore of swiping and starting a conversation. “Standing in a bar for six hours a night?” But I said this more often when I was in a relationship that had started on Tinder, and I say it much less often now that I’ve spent eight months back in the world of grainy boat-trip photos and “looking for the Pam to my Jim.”

People who have never used Tinder often frame it as an abundance of choice, when in reality, the experience of swiping through those hundreds of thousands of options has the effect of making every option look exactly the same. You can accrue two dozen matches named Matt in the time it takes to finish one glass of wine and throw the glass at the wall. Tinder doesn’t make it feel easy to go, as they say, “on to the next!” Tinder makes it feel like the next will be just like the last, which will be just like every other one, forever. The plentitude of fish in the proverbial sea is actually an apt metaphor, because what kind of lunatic could actually specify an individual fish they’d be interested in catching? They’re all fish.

Enter Facebook Dating, which seems to be differentiating itself at least partly on sheer numbers: Three-quarters of Americans are on Facebook. Tinder, the largest dating app on the market right now, has about 5 million users.

“In theory, given that so many people use Facebook, they could harness that population in an advantageous way,” says Kevin Lewis, a sociologist at UC San Diego who has studied both Facebook and online dating. “Will everyone sign up for it? If everyone did, this would be by far the biggest dating site there ever was.” Great, an even bigger sea.

Facebook’s motivations to get into the dating game are somewhat obvious. Analysts expect dating apps to be a $12 billion business by the end of next year. Advertising, premium accounts, and other paid features on Tinder bring in the lion’s share of revenue for its parent company, Match Group, which just reported a $498 million quarter and also owns Hinge, Plenty of Fish, Match.com, OkCupid, and dozens of smaller dating-related businesses. It’s understandable why Facebook would want a piece of that market, especially because teens and Millennials are abandoning the social network in droves.

To use Facebook Dating—and this is billed explicitly as one of the benefits—you don’t need to download another dating app. You enroll within the Facebook app, which I assume is still installed on your phone. Just kidding: Though a sizable majority of all Americans under 65 still have Facebook accounts, 44 percent of users ages 18 to 29 deleted the app from their phones in 2018. (Just imagine an army of horny 20-somethings scrubbing their furious #DeleteFacebook tweets in service of their love life.) Facebook Dating is free and doesn’t include any advertising, and the company says it never will. But it does pull users back into Facebook’s ecosystem, creating a new and very compelling reason for people—especially young people—to use an app they may have deserted.

And, of course, it could be that Facebook picked this moment to get into dating because everyone else already is. Even if thousands of Tinder bios still read, cloyingly, “Let’s lie about where we met,” conversational laziness often leads people to gesture at a stigma that isn’t really there, or express discomfort with things that they’re actually fine with—such as dating apps, and such as downloading another dating app after they’ve become jaded with the first dating app, their continued ability to return to the App Store serving as a tiny sign that their heart is still beating and they’re still looking for it.

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The irrepressibly genteel New York Times weddings section regularlyname-checksTinder. The presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg met his husband on Hinge. The latest Pew Research Center data, from 2016, showed that 22 percent of Americans ages 25 to 34, and 27 percent of Americans ages 18 to 24, had dated online. Eighty percent of the people who had done so said it was a good way to meet someone, and 46 percent of college graduates said they could personally name someone for whom online dating had resulted in a marriage or long-term partnership. Those numbers were all drastically higher than they had been when Pew looked into the matter just three years earlier. It’s probably safe to assume that they’re even higher now. Online dating has become sufficiently mainstream to be part of the most mainstream website of all time.

If you ask Facebook, the company is getting into dating because its leaders think they can actually improve it. A recent study conducted by Edelman and commissioned by Facebook showed that 40 percent of people who currently use dating apps aren’t happy with the experience, Facebook Dating’s product manager, Charmaine Hung, told me.

“We hope that those people will give Facebook Dating a try,” she says. “We’re also hoping that people who have never tried dating apps before will try Facebook Dating because of the safety features we put in, as well as really activating your community and the interests you share with people.”

To celebrate the surprise launch of Facebook Dating in the U.S. (after a year of testing in smaller markets), Facebook invited a bunch of tech journalists and a few dozen influencers to a breakfast meeting at a hip all-cement venue more or less on the edge of the Hudson River in Manhattan. The subject of the event was kept mostly a secret until attendees were escorted to the basement, where a product manager, Nathan Sharp, gave a quick introduction to the app. He got in a quick dig at the competition by explaining that Facebook doesn’t believe in keeping “the best features behind a paywall,” and that its version of dating doesn’t involve any swiping—a reference to the baseball-card dating paradigm popularized by Tinder starting in 2012.

The message was clear: For Facebook, facilitating love is not a joke; it’s a public service.

The next point was even clearer: Facebook is aware that people are already using its products to hook up. Its executives have heard the phrase slide into the DMs. We did not get an opportunity to hear a Facebook spokesperson say this phrase aloud, but Sharp did invite the Modern Family star Sarah Hyland and the former Bachelorette contestant Wells Adams to come onstage and explain how they met: through the direct-messaging feature on Instagram.

Hyland and Adams, who are engaged, gave a 45-minute presentation explaining how one should go about inviting another person to get tacos, how to say “I love you,” how to propose marriage. (You might argue that this presentation was wildly hostile toward single people, who are having trouble finding someone to ask to get tacos—not because they are confused about how to use Facebook’s suite of networking products, but because most people just aren’t that fun to hang out with—and who, even if they aren’t exercising the muscles at this exact moment, do in fact know how to express their thoughts and feelings. Or you may not be as sensitive as I am.) When Adams and Hyland were finished talking about their perfect lives, curtains all around the room dropped to the floor, and it was revealed that the presentation area was surrounded by a ring of brand activations: a pen of puppies wearing Facebook Dating bandannas, a pop-up coffee shop serving romantic desserts, a florist giving out elaborate bouquets.

On display in the basement’s gallery section were works of art inspired by love and Facebook and famous dorm posters. Rodin’s Thinker was hunched over, pondering his options—“heart” or “X”—against a magenta backdrop. Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam was remixed in purple and pink, the pointer fingers of God himself and the first man reaching toward a Facebook Dating icon. I have to admit, this is the shit I live for. Did it tell me anything new about why Facebook is suddenly interested in operating a dating app? Not exactly, but it did tell me what Facebook thinks about daters as a cohort: that we want to live in a romantic comedy, and that we are easily charmed.

Visually, Facebook Dating is similar to Hinge, which, in its initial version, suggested matches exclusively from users’ mutual Facebook friends. (Hinge also takes a hard stance against swiping and has long advertised itself as “the relationship app,” in opposition to Tinder’s notorious hookup culture. It was acquired by Tinder’s parent company earlier this year.) Functionally, the app is also similar to Hinge—you scroll through profiles, send a like, send a message. You can see people who have already liked you—a feature that is also available on Hinge. (On Tinder, something similar requires a monthly subscription fee, which I have paid many times.) It’s not exactly groundbreaking.

“Facebook has a history of this,” Brendan Griffiths, an assistant professor of interaction design at the New School, told me, citing Instagram’s rip-off of Snapchat’s signature Stories feature in 2016. “It’s clear that they aped features (from Hinge and Tinder) pretty directly. I would say that’s where the vast majority of their inspirations come from.” (Facebook did not respond to a request for comment on these similarities.)

Griffiths does not care for Dating’s purple color scheme and calls it “pretty infantilizing.” Overall, “it doesn’t feel like they were going for anything specific other than to capture a market that they understand to be potentially valuable.”

“The purple color is awful,” echoes Barbara deWilde, executive creative director of products and design at The New York Times. “But Facebook is not known for its stunning visual design.”

Facebook Dating’s one innovative feature is called Secret Crush, and it’s what it sounds like. If you have a secret crush on any of your Facebook friends or Instagram followers, you can add them to a list of secret crushes and wait to see if they add you to theirs. The Edelman survey that Facebook commissioned found that 53 percent of online daters have a crush on someone they already know, but they’re afraid to admit it (sure), to which I say, lucky them? Having a crush is an amazing feeling, and life without a crush is an extremely boring trudge toward deadened nerves and spinal erosion.

Though the profile you set up in Facebook Dating is independent of your main Facebook profile (a smart choice, given that the Facebook profiles of most of the people I know consist of dozens of photo albums from 2009 with titles such as “seniorrrrsss” and “myrtle beach <3”), Dating is still able to suggest matches based on the information you’ve provided the main app. These could, for example, be people who belong to the same Facebook groups you do, or have attended the same events. The enterprising Facebook dater could even stage a meet-cute! Hook up sites for seniors. It would be pretty easy. You could pretend the internet wasn’t involved at all. It’s just a wingman, pointing you to the right bookstore in the right sweater, or a seltzer enthusiasts’ meet-up in the park, during the golden hour.

This is genuinely exciting for anyone overwhelmed by the randomness of other dating apps. As my colleague Ashley Fetters wrote recently, Facebook Dating is explicitly designed “to inject some of the more human aspects back into online dating through features that mimic the ways in which people used to meet-cute before the Tinder age.” Meet-cutes, though they sometimes involve flopping down in the middle of the street or walking around with a balloon stuck to your butt, do not feel as existentially degrading as sifting through thousands of photos of men with four friends and two facial expressions, followed by dozens of identical conversations about how it’s a shame that summer is over. The more time you spend on Tinder, the lower the bar gets for perceived compatibility—has listened to a song I’ve heard, works at a restaurant I’ve walked past, went to the beach one time, sure. You start looking—no more, no less—for evidence that the person exists at all.

“Everyone’s always asking, ‘Is this person real, and who is this person really?’” Hung tells me, repeating a line that was used at the press event. “In Facebook Dating, we have a lot of really unique features so you can feel confident that this person is a real person. It can help give a more authentic view of a person. We want to help you find love through what you like.” This is Facebook’s “really great superpower,” she says.

Obviously, I signed up for Facebook Dating as soon as I got home from the official launch, downloading the Facebook app onto my phone for the first time ever.

For the first week, there was literally nobody there to match with. (Understandable.) In the second, the list was short and strange, populated mainly by people named “Meme,” or “C, like the letter of the alphabet. People call me Philip.” The default geographic range was 200 miles, so many of my initial suggested matches lived in Pennsylvania or deep New Jersey, hours away from my home in New York. I was excited to open the list of suggested matches sourced specifically from events I’ve attended, thinking it not at all unreasonable to expect that at least one cutie had gone to see my friend’s band a few weeks before, or had been at the early-summer book launch at which I got so emotional, I slid off my chair (would have been a good meet-cute!). But all the suggestions were people who attended the 2017 Women’s March—half of Brooklyn?—or an apple festival in my college town three years ago, or a free Grace Potter concert in 2015.

Most of the Facebook groups I belong to are useless for dating purposes: a high-school friend’s bridal party, a space for mall food-court coffee-shop employees to trade shifts. An alumni group, my God. This is not Facebook’s fault; this is my fault. Good Facebook Dating users will first be good Facebook users—as in active Facebook users, diligently logging each time they go someplace where eligible people might be lurking, scrolling through their phone, too. If that doesn’t work, an ambitious dater could start joining more groups. It’s a better idea for how to meet people who actually move in the same real-world spaces you do, but it requires regularly documenting your real-world movements and interests on Facebook.

Relatedly, the easiest way to populate your profile is by filling it with your Instagram photos. Later this year, Facebook Dating users will be able to cross-post their Instagram Stories to their dating profiles. When I asked Hung whether part of the goal of Facebook Dating was to bring young people over from Instagram to the flagship app, she said, “We’re always looking for opportunities where we can see where people like to share. Do people like to share on Facebook? Do people like to share on Instagram? And we want to meet people where they’re already sharing. We’re really excited that we’re bringing Instagram into that.”

I don’t know what that means on a sentence level, but I think probably it’s a yes, generally.

If you’re already good at sharing, and posting, and RSVP-ing, and projecting an authentic self that’s appealing to others online, Facebook Dating might feel, as intended, like a “superpower.” But I am a bad Facebook user, and so I am a bad Facebook dater. At the end of my two-week trial, I had eight matches and two messages: One was “Hey kaitlyn,” and the other was “Sup I’m only here for hookups and memes,” with a laugh-crying emoji. The notifications showed up in my main notifications tab, next to the information that I’d been tagged in photos from my cousin’s wedding.

Even so, Facebook Dating will likely help lots of people find love, for free. Hung repeats that Facebook has no plans to monetize Dating, ever, in any way—no fees, no ads. She even seems annoyed with me for asking. “Yup, there’s no advertising in Facebook Dating, and nothing you do will be shared to advertisers,” she says. “Nothing you do on Facebook Dating will be shared to advertisers.”

The cost of an actually good, useful, dignified dating app is more activity, more engagement, more personal information. When Facebook spokespeople talk about entwining Instagram Stories and Facebook Dating, they speak energetically of how it will make profiles more “authentic”—a word that has been bled of all meaning not by Tinder, but by Instagram itself over the course of the past eight years.

Facebook Dating Review Reddit 2020

Never mind the fact that Facebook is currently the subject of an antitrust investigation; here’s another market it can enter and immediately claim a competitive edge in simply by slamming down the trump card of an unparalleled network graph. Forget that Facebook doesn’t need dating revenue, and won’t collect any; it still thinks of its users as dopey enough not to look for another motive.

Facebook Dating Review Reddit Free

“Facebook knows so much about us, not just how we self-describe,” Kevin Lewis says, trying to riddle out whether its dating experiment will succeed. Facebook has a more intimate understanding of its users than Tinder ever will. But more than 60 percent of Americans don’t trust Facebook with their personal information anymore, if they ever really did. “Facebook is a little late with this. There’s a lot of distrust these days around Facebook,” he says, going back and forth on it. “I could see this leading to a resurgence in Facebook activity and working out quite well; I could see this totally tanking. I think it’ll be one or the other.”

I don’t know—it already worked on me.

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sodadesire4 · 4 years

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Never Presume all Social Websites Apps Are Built the Same

It's absolutely cool to find a teenager's point of view on the acceptance of each unique social media app. Presents a distinct interpretation from the stats associated with each application use and exactly how is being utilized every single day. This document will not reduce the objective of each social websites app, it just provides a specific point of view, an adolescent daily use guideline, should you will. Clicking Here It is my view, the best way to tackle this would be to separate by social network and the findings and opinions I have gathered year after year. Facebook Overall, Facebook is ancient for many teenagers. Facebook is an app most of us got in middle school because it was cool however now is seen seeing that a clumsy relative social gathering we can not really abandon. It's odd and will even end up being frustrating to possess Facebook at times. That being said, if you don't have Facebook, that is a lot more weird and irritating. Weird because of the social pressure and frustrating because you'll have to reply that to just about everybody in classes you meet who makes an effort to friend you or discover you on there. Facebook is frequently used by us generally for its group efficiency. I know a lot of classmates who only go on Facebook to check on the groups they may be part of and promptly sign off. In this component Facebook shines-groups do not have the same convoluted rules behind them that the news headlines feed does. It is very easy to simply see the fresh information posted around the group without having to sift through a great deal of content and advertising you do not really value. Messages on Facebook can be popular among our age group, mainly because they provide the means to speak with those people who you weren't really more comfortable with requesting their amount but relaxed enough to send out them a pal request. Facebook is usually the jumping-off point for many people to try to get you online, simply because everyone around us has it. Whenever I found you one time at some special event, I'm not really going to make an effort to check Instagram or Twitter to learn who you happen to be. In its place, many choose the ease of Facebook and the highly effective search functionality that provides you results of individuals who you truly have a chance of understanding (unlike Instagram, whose search features, although it improved slightly in the last update, leaves very much to become desired). Snapchat Snapchat is in a short time growing to be the most utilized social websites app, specifically using the development of attaching your Snaps to a brief history feed. If perhaps I could break down a party for you personally in social media terms, here is how it could pan out: You upload yourself preparing for the dance, heading to the special event, having a great time at the dance, leaving by the end of the party, and getting up in the morning after the party on Snapchat. On Facebook you post the sweet, posed images you took with your close friends on the party (definitely no alcohol in these pics). On Instagram you choose the cutest one of the bunch to create to your network. Snapchat is where we are able to really end up being ourselves while getting attached to our social identification. With no constant social pressure of a follower count or Facebook friends, I am not continuously having these random people shoved before me. Rather, Snapchat is normally a somewhat personal network of friends who I don't treatment if they find me at a celebration having a great time. No other social media (besides Twitter possibly) it really is appropriate post a bored image besides Snapchat. Generally there aren't likes you must worry about or comments, it's all taken away. Snapchat includes a great deal less sociable pressure attached to it in comparison to almost every other popular social media marketing network out now there. This is what makes it therefore addictive and free. If I do not get any likes on my Instagram image or Facebook post within 15 minutes, I am going to delete it. Snapchat isn't like this at all and really targets creating the storyplot of a day time in your daily life, not some filtered, altered, handpicked showcase. It is the true you. One more quick apart about Snapchat, I only know a small number of customers (myself included) that believe Snapchat will erase your pics. Everybody else I understand thinks that Snapchat has some top secret data source someplace with all of your images in it. Although I'll save that controversy for a later date, it is safe and sound to say that whenever photos are expose or when there might be controversy about protection over the app, we honestly do not really worry. https://www.cio.com/article/2406217/china-unicom-to-release-new-smartphone-line-this-month.html We are not mailing images of our credit cards here; we are sending selfies and photographs with us having five chins. Twitter To be honest, a lot of us merely don't realize the point of Twitter. There's always a core group at just about every high school that works with it very frequently to tweet and one more clique that would make use of it to merely view or retweet, but besides that lots of avoid it. In addition, it isn't extremely no problem finding friends on the site and many just utilize it to complain about college in a environment in which their parents or family members (not necessarily managers) tend not to see it. Twitter is a location to check out or be accompanied by a couple of arbitrary strangers, but still have your identity end up being attached to it, this difference can be valuable afterwards on. Your tweets may also be conveniently searchable on Twitter which is good but not great if you want to be yourself and not have it follow you around when you're trying to property a job. Thus, to others Twitter is used like Facebook, you post with the assumption that your company will see it one day. You will find after that three main sets of Twitter users: the types who utilize it to nitpick and go to town, the ones who tweet with the presumption that their potential recruiter will eventually see anything they are saying, and those who simply look at other Tweets and do the occasional retweet. Instagram Instagram is by far the most used social application venue for young adults. Please be aware the terminology right here, it is the most used social networking application venue. Meaning that, even though most people are on Facebook, we in fact share more on Instagram. It is always fascinating if you ask me to see a friend with hundreds of friends on Facebook only get 25 wants on a photo nevertheless on Instagram (where this lady has eight-hundred followers) she acquires 274. I have a few ideas as to why this may come up. I am not afraid whenever I love something on Instagram that it will arrive in somebody's history and they will possibly screenshot which i liked it or reference it afterwards. And the same goes for participating. I am not as pushed to follow anyone back in Instagram, that implies that my feed is obviously made up of content I really need to experience. That being said, I'll keep coming back and browse through an application which has content I like instead of those where I need to find the casual diamond in wait. That content on Instagram is consistently of superior level of quality. Persons take time to modify their photos with filters, use different brightness and contrast configurations (it's even one of the methods to submitting an image), etcetera., to help make the photos look the best they are able to. This translates to the content material on Instagram is generally a lot better (graphic-wise), therefore i am much more likely to go back to the application form. Instagram was not flooded using the older generation yet (not many people owns an Instagram) meaning its new and sweet to younger crowd. But, it really is popular enough that if you have a phone it's nearly unheard of for you personally not to possess Instagram, if not to take photos, but to at least tag users in pics. One additional benefit: tagging. I don't have to constantly open Instagram to be sure I was not tagged in any shameful or bad photographs. That is simply because you can't very easily find them within your feed, making the whole experience appear far more private.

Am I seeking weird in an image you put up? Who cares. I may just get rid of the label if I actually am that annoyed about any of it without dread that my close friends from another social group (who no longer follow you) are certain to get to it first. I understand Facebook has the capacity to enable you to check each and every image tagged of you before it appears on your own account, but some individuals I know don't have that enabled or are aware it even exists. People usually do not publish 10000 times per day on Instagram. Lots of people are a lot more considerate about publishing, sometimes doing once a day, several times a week, etc. This means that there isn't any continuous supply of content becoming pushed down my throat each and every time I open the app, and it is possible to be swept up with my Instagram newsfeed. There are no hyperlinks on Instagram, which means I am not being frequently spammed from the same ads, awful gossip news article, or news story about the "twenty-eight Ingenious Products for Your Dog You Had No Idea You Wished For". Those are a handful of points why quite a few people my age are likely to use Instagram more than they truly utilize Facebook. Everything about the application helps it be significantly less commercial and more devoted to this content, meaning more young adults are inclined to take note. When we can visit the software, it is a much more delightful encounter so we are more predisposed to Like and connect to the threads even more. This boosts our connections with the software, meaning we will use it a bit more. Facebook gets every single one of the images we took, the very good one, and the poor one, while Instagram just gets one that essentially summed up the event we visited. It is much more selective, and truthfully users spend additional time within the captions to create them ideal or cute. On Facebook we simply provide all kinds of things we got so people can label one another and show our family and friends that we're still functioning. A lot of those younger than myself (9-16 years old) who I've spoken to concerning this situation don't have even a Facebook account. Instagram is everything that they really want. The Rest Outlined below are other social networking that some adolescents employ still that may not really require a full length debate. LinkedIn: We should grab it, therefore we got it. Most of us wait until college to understand this (because they most likely should, it isn't for this target market anyways). Pinterest: It's mainly women-centric and it is for people who have an artsy or hipster concentrate. Not too many people talk about it. Kik: Is essentially a messaging application that is largely used for messaging users on Twitter, I assume? I have no idea any individual who makes use of it. WhatsApp: Users download it when you are out of the country, you use it there for a bit before going back again to Facebook Messenger and iMessage, then you get rid of it. I know a lot of people who use it to communicate with good friends they had in another country, but I feel like Messenger can be beginning to surpass it. For worldwide students, however, WhatsApp is definitely a pivotal tool that I've heard is in fact useful. GroupMe: Actually the most used group messaging program in university. Everyone has one, would make use of it and loves it. GIF support, the capability to like others messages, even trivial items such as being able to change your moniker between group talks all get this to both a useful and delightful application. GroupMe also functions for actually any telephone or system like a laptop, iPhone, Google Android, and can easily work over text as well for individuals who may not have a cellphone.

#tech

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oakjoke41 · 4 years

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Choosing the Right Meaning for Each Social Websites Software

I read technology content quite often and realize numerous authors make an effort to explain or identify the adolescent target audience, specifically in regards to social networking. Then again, I have still to visit a teen bring their voice to that debate. I am highly excited about social media's function in our culture as well mainly because how it really is currently innovating. Thus, the information originate from observation of not merely my own habits but my peers' habits too. Let us check out each of the most favorite social websites, and their stronger virtues, and inadequate deficits to better appreciate their function in our teens. Facebook In short, Facebook is outdated for most adolescents. Facebook is a thing we all got in high school because it was cool but now sometimes appears while an awkward family dinner party we can't realistically leave. It is weird and will even end up being exasperating to have Facebook at times. That said, if you don't have Facebook, that's a lot more weird and infuriating. Weird because of the sociable pressure and irritating because you need to solution that to just about everybody in classes you fulfill who makes an effort to be your friend or discover you on Facebook. Facebook is frequently utilized by us primarily because of its group functionality. I trust a lot of classmates who only continue Facebook to check on the groups they may be part of and then so quickly log off. In this component Facebook stands out-groups do not have the same sophisticated algorithms behind them that the news feed does. It's very easy to just see the brand-new information posted on the group without having to sift through tons of articles and advertising you don't really care about. Messages on Facebook can be extremely popular among our age group, generally because they offer the means to speak with those people who you weren't really more comfortable with asking for their number but comfy enough to send out them a pal request. Facebook is often the jumping-off point for many individuals to attempt to come across you on-line, simply because everyone around us has it. If perhaps I met you one time at some party, I'm not going to make an effort to check Twitter to find out who you are. Preferably, many opt for the ease of Facebook and the highly effective search feature that gives you results of individuals who you truly have a potential for understanding (unlike Twitter, whose search features, though it improved somewhat within the last update, leaves much to become desired). Snapchat Snapchat is rather quickly becoming the most used social websites app, especially using the introduction of merging your Snaps to a history feed. Whenever I can break down a party for you personally in social media terms, here is how it would pan out: You upload yourself planning for the dance, going to the special event, having a great time at the special event, leaving by the end from the special event, and waking up in the morning after the special event on Snapchat. On Facebook you put up the cute, posed images you took with your close friends at the party (definitely no alcoholic beverages in these photographs). On Instagram you select the prettiest one of the bunch to publish to your account.

Snapchat is where we are able to really end up being ourselves while being attached to our social identification. With no constant sociable pressure of a follower count number or Facebook close friends, I am not constantly having these random people shoved before me. Instead, Snapchat can be a somewhat romantic network of friends who I don't treatment if they observe me at a celebration having fun. No other social apps (besides Twitter probably) it is tolerable post a uninterested image besides Snapchat. There aren't likes you must worry about or feedback, it's almost all taken away. Snapchat includes a great deal less public pressure attached to it compared to every other popular social media marketing network out there. This is exactly what makes it therefore addicting and free. If I don't get any upvotes on my Instagram picture or Facebook post within quarter-hour, I'll get rid of it. Snapchat isn't like this in any way and really targets creating the Story of a time in your life, not some filtered, altered, handpicked highlight. It's the genuine you. One more quick aside about Snapchat, I only know a small number of customers (myself included) that believe Snapchat does eliminate your photos. Almost everyone else I understand believes that Snapchat has some top secret database someplace with all your photographs on it. While I'll save that issue for another day, it is safe and sound to say that whenever photos are leaked or in the event that there may be controversy about protection around the app, we truthfully do not really worry. We aren't sending images of our cards here; we are sharing selfies and photographs with us having 5 chins. Twitter In all honesty, a lot of us simply do not understand the idea of Twitter. There is always a core clique at nearly every high school that make use of it extremely frequently to tweet and a second clique that make use of it to basically watch or retweet, but besides that lots of avoid it. In addition, it isn't extremely easy to find friends on the website and many just utilize it to complain about college in a setting where their father and mother or family (not necessarily employers) tend to not find it. Twitter is a place to check out or be followed by a bunch of random strangers, yet still have got your identity be attached to this, this difference can be essential later on on. Your tweets are also conveniently searchable on Twitter which is great but not good if you want to be yourself and not have it follow you around when you're trying to land a job. Hence, to others Twitter can be used like Facebook, you post with the assumption that your company might find it someday. There are then three main sets of Twitter users: the ones who use it to complain and express themselves, the types who tweet using the presumption that their possible hiring manager will ultimately see anything they say, and the ones who merely look at other Tweets and do the casual retweet. Instagram Instagram is by far the most used social app outlet for teenagers. Please be aware the vocabulary there, it is the most used social networking application outlet. Meaning that, however the many people are on Facebook, we actually post more on Instagram. It is often captivating to me to see a friend with hundreds of friends on Facebook only get twenty six wants on an image but on Instagram (where this lady has 800 fans) she acquires 274. I have a few pointers as to the causes this may come up. I'm not really fearful everytime I love a post on Instagram that it will arrive in anyone's newsfeed and they'll possibly screenshot which i liked it or research it later on. The same applies to writing comments. I am much less required to follow another person back on Instagram, this means my news are normally contains articles I really need to look at. That said, I'm going to return and browse through a program which has articles I prefer rather than those where I need to look for the unique gemstone disguising. That content on Instagram is routinely of superior level of quality. Lots of people take time to update their shots with filters, make use of varied brightness and contrast settings (it's also among the measures to sharing an image), etcetera., to help make the photos seem the best they are able to. That translates to the content material on Instagram is generally a lot better (photography-wise), so I am much more likely to return to the application. Instagram hasn't been flooded with the older generation yet (not everyone has an Instagram profile) which implies its fresh and amazing to the younger group. On the other hand, it is popular enough that when you have a cell phone it's almost unheard of for you not to have Instagram, if never to take images, though to perhaps tag users in pics. One additional feature: tagging. I don't have to constantly check Instagram to be sure I wasn't tagged in virtually any upsetting or terrible images. That's mainly because you cannot very easily see any of them inside your newsfeed, implementing the whole experience look way more private. Am I looking weird in a photo you put up? Who cares. I may simply delete the tag if I actually am that upset about any of it without dread that my friends from another friendly group (who do not follow you) are certain to get to it first. I am aware Facebook has the capability to enable you to check every single image labeled of you before it appears on your profile, however a number of people I know do not have that enabled or know it even exists. People mostly do not post thousands of times a day on Instagram. Everybody is a lot more courteous about posting, sometimes doing daily, a few times weekly, etc. Which means that there isn't any constant flow of content material becoming jammed down my throat each time I open up the application, which is possible to be swept up with my Instagram feed. You can find no links on Instagram, which means I am not really being constantly spammed from the same advertisements, horrific gossip news article, or news posting about the "35 Amazing Things for Your Pet You Had No Clue You Wanted". All those are a variety of points why many people my age tend to use Instagram more than they actually use Facebook. Every thing about the app helps it be less commercial and more dedicated to the content, resulting in more young adults tend to take note. Once we can visit the program, it is a much more exciting experience therefore we are more predisposed to Like and connect to the posts even more. That raises our discussion with the software, meaning we will use it even more. Facebook grabs all of the photographs we shot, the nice one, and the bad one, while Instagram just gets the one that really sums up the event we went to. It is a lot more selective, and frankly people spend additional time for the captions to create them ideal or laid-back. On Facebook we simply provide all sorts of things we got so users can tag one another and display our loved ones that we are still functioning. Many of those younger than myself (12-16 years of age) who I've spoken to concerning this matter don't have even a Facebook account. Instagram is everything that they want. The Ok Ones The following are other social media that some teens work with still that may not actually demand a full length debate. LinkedIn: We have to get it, therefore we got it. Nearly everybody wait until university to understand this (as they most likely should, it isn't for this target market anyhow). Pinterest: It's pretty much female-centric and is for those who have an artistic type or folksy focus. Not too many people mention it. Kik: It's a messaging program that is largely used for chatting with people on Twitter, I assume? I don't know anyone who works with this kind of application. WhatsApp: You will download it when you are out of the country, you utilize it there for a little bit before going back again to iMessage and Facebook Messenger, you then erase it. I understand a lot of people who use it to communicate with close friends they formed in another country, but I feel like Messenger can be beginning to surpass it. For international students, however, WhatsApp is usually a pivotal device that I've heard is truly useful. GroupMe: By far the most used group messaging app in college. Absolutely everyone has got one, make use of it and enjoys it. GIF support, the capability to like others messages, even superficial items such as being able to replace your identity between group chats all get this to both a good and exciting app. GroupMe also functions for actually any phone or system such as a computer system, iPhone, Google Android, and can certainly function over text aswell for individuals who may not have got a phone.

#smartphones

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pailnose6 · 4 years

Text

Not Every Social Networking Apps Are Designed Alike

I read technology content regularly and discover quite a lot of freelance writers attempt to dissect or identify the teen target audience, specifically when it comes to social networking. Even so, I've still to visit a teenager bring their tone of voice to this debate. I'm extremely enthusiastic about social media's part in our culture as well mainly because how it is currently evolving. Therefore, the information originate from monitoring with fascination of not only my own behaviors but my peers' behaviors as well. Why don't we focus on each one of the most popular social networking, and their stronger virtues, and inadequate failures to understand their part with our younger people. Facebook In a nutshell, Facebook is ancient news for most young adults. Facebook is a thing most of us got in high school since it was great however now sometimes appears while an awkward relative social gathering we can not realistically abandon. It is odd and may even end up being frustrating to have Facebook at times. That being said, unless you have Facebook, that's a lot more weird and annoying. Strange because of the cultural pressure and irritating because you'll have to response that to just about everyone in classes you satisfy who makes an effort to friend you or discover you on Facebook. Facebook is often used by us generally because of its group features. I trust a lot of classmates who just go on Facebook to check on the groups these are part of and so quickly sign off. In this part Facebook stands out-groups do not have the same sophisticated algorithms behind them that the news headlines feed does. It's very easy to just see the new information posted around the group without having to sift through tons of posts and advertising you do not really care about. Messages on Facebook is also popular among our generation, mainly because they offer the methods to speak with those people who you were not really comfortable with asking for their number but comfortable enough to send out them a pal request. Facebook is often the jumping-off stage for many individuals to try to find you on-line, simply because everyone all around us offers it. If I met you one time at some type of party, I'm not really going to make an effort to check Instagram or Twitter to find out who you are.

In its place, many opt for the simple Facebook as well as the highly effective search functionality that provides you results of people who you truly have a potential for knowing (unlike Twitter, whose search functionality, although it improved slightly in the last update, leaves very much to become desired). Snapchat Snapchat is rapidly transforming into the most utilized social app, specifically with the development of merging your Snaps to a brief history feed. If I could breakdown a party for you in social media conditions, here is how it could pan out: You update yourself planning for the party, heading to the party, having fun on the dance, leaving by the end of the special event, and waking up in the morning following the dance on Snapchat. On Facebook you put up the cute, posed pictures you took together with your close friends in the party (definitely no alcoholic beverages in these images). On Instagram you choose the cutest among the bunch to publish to your profile. Snapchat is where we are able to really end up being ourselves while being attached to our social identification. With no constant interpersonal pressure of the follower count or Facebook close friends, I am not continuously having these random people shoved in front of me. Rather, Snapchat is normally a somewhat close network of friends who I don't care if they see me at a celebration enjoying yourself. No other social networking (except Twitter perhaps) it is acceptable post a uninterested image besides Snapchat. Right now there aren't likes you have to stress about or feedback, it's all taken away. Snapchat includes a lot less public pressure attached to it in comparison to almost every other popular social networking network out generally there. This is what makes it so addicting and free. If I do not get any upvotes on my Instagram image or Facebook post within a quarter-hour, I am going to delete it. Snapchat isn't like that in any way and really focuses on creating the Story of a time in your daily life, not some filtered, transformed, handpicked high light. It is the real you. Another quick apart about Snapchat, We only know a small number of customers (myself included) that consider Snapchat will erase your photographs. Almost everyone else I understand is convinced that Snapchat offers some underground database somewhere with all your pics in it. Even though I'll save that controversy for another day, it is safe to say that when photos are expose or when there may be controversy about protection for the app, we truthfully do not really worry. We are not sending pictures of our cards here; we are sending selfies and photographs around having four chins. Twitter In all honesty, most of us basically do not understand the point of Twitter. There's always a key audience at every single school that uses it very religiously to tweet and a second group that works with it to simply view or retweet, but besides that many don't use it. It also isn't exceptionally easy to find friends on the webpage and many simply utilize it to complain about school in a environment in which their parents or family (not necessarily bosses) tend never to find it. Twitter is a location to check out or be followed by a couple of random visitors, yet still have your identity be attached to it, this distinction will be significant afterwards on. Your tweets are also efficiently searchable on Twitter which is great but not great if you wish to be yourself rather than own it follow you around if you are trying to property a job. Thus, to others Twitter is used like Facebook, users post with the assumption that your employer will find it some day. You will discover after that three main groups of Twitter users: the ones who use it to make a complaint and go to town, the types who tweet using the assumption that their prospective recruiter will ultimately see anything they are saying, and those who merely look at other Tweets and do the occasional retweet. Instagram Instagram is by far the most used social media application venue for teens. Please be aware the verbiage right here, it is the most used social media application venue. Meaning that, even though the many people are on Facebook, we in fact post more on Instagram. It positively is interesting to me to visit a friend with fifteen hundred close friends on Facebook only get 24 loves on a photo nevertheless on Instagram (where she's got six hundred supporters) she draws 274. I got one or two suggestions as to the reasons this could show up. I am not really afraid any time I love a post on Instagram that it'll arrive in anyone's news feed and they are going to either screenshot that I liked it or guide it later. And the same goes for writing comments. I am much less urged to follow somebody back on Instagram, meaning that my news are actually contains articles I really need to find. That said, Let me keep coming back and slide through the application that has content I love instead of one where I must look for the infrequent precious stone hiding. This kind of articles on Instagram is routinely of improved quality. Persons take the time to revise their pics with many filters, employ different lighting and contrast settings (it is often one of the measures to submitting an image), etcetera., to help make the images seem the best they are able to. This suggests that this post on Instagram is normally considerably better (graphic-wise), therefore i am much more likely to return to the application. Instagram hasn't been flooded using the older era yet (not everybody has an Instagram profile) meaning its new and fascinating to younger masses. However, it really is well-known enough that when you have a phone it's almost unheard of for you not to have Instagram, if never to take images, though to at least tag people in photographs. An additional point: tagging. I don't have to continuously open Instagram to be sure I wasn’t tagged in any awkward or negative shots. That's mainly because you cannot easily see them in your feed, making the full experience look a lot more reserved. Am I looking weird in an image you put up? Who cares. I can simply delete the label if I really am that upset about it without dread that my friends from another social circle (who don't follow you) will get to it initially. I do know Facebook is able to enable you to check every single picture tagged of you just before it comes up on your profile, but many people I know do not have that enabled or know it actually exists. Users do not post 10000 times per day on Instagram. Most people are much more polite about posting, either doing daily, a few times a week, etc. This means that there isn't a consistent flow of content becoming jammed down my throat each time I open up the app, which is possible to be caught up with my Instagram feed. There are no hyperlinks on Instagram, which means I'm not really being regularly spammed with the same ads, awful gossip updates, or Buzzfeed story about the "30 Innovative Accessories for Your Family Pet You Had Not a Clue You Needed". All those are a few reasons why most individuals my age usually tend to use Instagram more than they are doing Facebook. Every thing about the application makes it not as much commercial and more focused on this content, signifying more teenagers tend to check it out. Once we do check out the app, it is a much more enchanting experience therefore we are even more inclined to Like and connect to the topics more. This boosts our connection with the application, which means we will use it much more. Facebook grabs all the photos we shot, the very good one, and the weak one, whilst Instagram just gets the one that genuinely summed up the happening we went to. It is a lot more selective, and to be truthful people spend more time within the captions to make them focused or enjoyable. In Facebook we just provide all the things we got therefore people can tag each other and show our friends and family that we're still aboveground. A lot of those younger than me (11-17 years of age) who I have spoken to about this matter don't have even a Facebook profile. Instagram is all that they really want. The Others Let us discuss other social websites that some teens employ still that do not actually demand a full-length discussion. LinkedIn: We will need to obtain it, so we got it. Plenty of people wait until university to understand this (because they most likely should, it isn't for this target market anyways). Pinterest: It's mainly female-centric and is for people who have an art type or hipster concentrate. Not too many persons speak about it. Kik: It's a messaging program that is generally utilized for talking with people in Twitter, I assume? I don't know anyone who uses this type of app. WhatsApp: Users download it when you are abroad, you utilize it there for a bit before going back to iMessage and Facebook Messenger, you then delete it. I know plenty of people who utilize it to talk to friends they made out of the country, but Personally i think like Messenger is definitely starting to dominate it. For international students, however, WhatsApp is certainly a pivotal tool that I've heard is totally useful. GroupMe: The most used group messaging app in college. Almost everyone has got one, make use of it and loves it. GIF support, the ability to like others messages, even unimportant factors such as having the ability to switch your identity between group talks all get this to both a useful and exciting app. GroupMe also functions for literally any telephone or system such as a home pc, iPhone, Google Android, and should work over text aswell for those who may not possess a smartphone.

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