#the daniel and depression video is very close to what i feel | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

angel-inrealtime · 4 months

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almost makes you wish

I have a terrible habit of finding all these prompt lists and never posting anything I write from them because I blank on like one or two of them, but I think?? I really liked this one

This is day 8 from Yeehawgust 2023: Patrolling the Mojave Little bit of always a girl!Daniel Maxiel circa Melbourne 2023

1170 words of (past)hurt/(present) comfort (TW: mental health discussion, medication)

They’ve had most of the day together, doing promotional videos in Melbourne, when Max texts her his hotel number like she hinted at.

“No dice Maxy, I am out of commission. It’s like patrolling the Mojave desert down there.” Daniel announces as she flops back onto his hotel bed, dramatic as ever.

Max sips his Red Bull and weighs up his options. She looks better for the time at home in the sun, not as gaunt and haunted as she had by the end of last year. Her smile comes easier again like all it needed to do was recharge in the Perth sun. Her hair is longer, curls fanned around her face and down past her shoulders.

A pillow hits him in the face. “Hey, space cadet.” Daniel is leaning up on her elbows, eyeing him almost suspiciously. “I can, like...I can go, if you don’t want to...if this was just for...”

Max tuts and rolls his eyes, tosses the pillow back at her. “I just wanted to see you.”

Her face does something weird as soon as he says it. In true Daniel fashion though, she deflects with humour. “Aw Maxy, lil old me? I’m flattered.”

Max throws her the tv remote and settles on the bed next to her – leaves space for her to decide if she wants to curl up against him. “You of course aren’t old, Daniel.”

“I’m decrepit, Max. A husk. Wasting away right in front of my own eyes.” She’s laughing as she carries on, finds a movie they can put on in the background. “Do I go towards the light?” She grabs his arm, short nails painted red stark again his pale arm.

Max (so fond of her it feels like he could choke on it, actually – because he finds he knows that means she’s testing the waters, seeing if he wants her close) uses her own hand to yank her off balance so she falls against his chest. “No thank you, I think actually that would be very bad.”

She stills for a moment and then it’s like she melts into the contact, nestling into the crook of his arm and throwing one leg over his, easily like they do this much more often than they do. “Yeah, then you’d have to do all of your media stuff by yourself.”

Max rolls his eyes again. “And I would be sad for you to be gone.” His breath stirs her hair as they settle close to each other.

Daniel goes as still as she ever does, and Max can practically hear the wheels in her head turning. Before she pushes herself up so she can look at his face, sitting heavy on his chest like one of the cats back home (Max wants to tell her that Sassy winds around his legs when they’re on the phone and she can hear Daniel’s disembodied voice, and she doesn’t do that for anyone else). “You mean that?”

“Yes, Daniel.” He keeps his voice light, schools his face open. He wants to roll his eyes and ask if she’s really that stupid, or if she really thinks so little of him, but he suspects it’s not the time.

Her lips quirk and she blinks until her eyes aren’t so glassy (Max is secretly glad; he doesn’t like it when she cries – no matter what he does it feels like the wrong thing). “S’good to know.” She says eventually, settling back down and tucking her head under his chin, closer than they were.

“Did…did you think differently?” He asks, hesitant before he decides it might be easier not looking at each other.

She shrugs, but he can feel her picking her thumb nail where the skin is already shredded to pieces. “Not...I mean...I know it in theory. Or...logically, let’s say. Just...sometimes it doesn’t...or didn’t, feel like it, you know? Not from you, just...depression brain, I guess.” She huffs a laugh which is more like a puff of air against his chest. “They make pills for that, though. Turns out.”

Max chews over different words in his head until it’s nearly been too long, he thinks. “You could have said, that it was so bad.” He settles on eventually.

Daniel tuts. “Kinda hard when you don’t even wanna say it to yourself.” She mutters, and then takes a deep breath. Max thinks she’s counting in her head, it’s so measured. “Sorry, I...I know I could have. Thank you. Of course I know.”

“Maybe you don’t, sometimes.” He ventures. “I think of course you are very tough and brave in racing, but you think all the time you have to be that way for everyone.” Max almost holds his breath, worried he’s said too much.

“Wow, exposed.” She mutters after a moment of silence that isn’t quite charged, but its weighty. “Nah you’re...” she rolls onto her stomach so she can look at him, hands on his chest again. “You’re right. I don’t...or, I didn’t always know that, though. I’ve been...working on it, I guess. In therapy and stuff. I’m...trying.”

Max can see something determined in her face that had gone missing, by the end of the last year, ground out of her. He reaches for the curl falling in front of her eyes and nudges it back with the rest. “You of course know there’s nothing wrong with you, though.”

Daniel snorts. “Debatable. That’s the whole...the antidepressants are why I can’t...like I can’t stress the Mojave desert enough.”

“I said already this was okay, Daniel.” Max narrows his eyes at her. “Unless that’s all you came for.”

It’s a calculated risk, to goad her into a response. He’s known her so much of his life, the whole time he’s been an adult. They’ve been doing some form of this for most of that time, too, around girlfriends and boyfriends and racing.

Daniel scowls at him, dark brows drawn together and pout on her full mouth. “Hey! That’s not fair, I just...I missed you, and...”

He grins, so wide it almost makes his cheeks hurt. “You missed me?”

Max has time to register the surprise on her face before she’s even more in his space, nose an inch away from his and her body draped over his chest (if he looked, he knows he’d see straight down the neckline of her shirt – he doesn’t, because it doesn’t feel appropriate, but he does think about it). “You’re a little shit, Verstappen.” Daniel declares, eyes dancing a bit.

His hands naturally fall to her hip and her waist and he tries to look innocent. “I of course learnt from you, so you only have yourself to blame.”

She laughs long and loud and close to his face, and he wakes up to her drooling onto his shirt hours later, TV switched itself to standby. He puts her phone on charge next to his and nudges her under the blankets even though she grumbles about it (but she throws a leg over his, murmurs thanks into the hollow of his throat).

#my fic #max/daniel #maxiel fic #idk for some reason this was so wholly girl!daniel and I couldn't make it otherwise #I like this Max voice tbh #I'm very scared about posting this so I'm rambling in the tags

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personthattoleratesme · 2 months

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tell me what the video Basically, I’m Gay means to you?

My answer will discuss suicide and death of a family member, so trigger warning for that

I feel like this might be a little trauma dump-y but also you asked and I want to give a genuine and honest answer, perhaps it's not what you were expecting/hoping to hear but my relationship with BIG is very unique and I do want to share it, so click keep reading if you want to hear it.

On June 6th 2019 my 24 year old cousin passed away due to suicide. He meant a lot to me, he was the only member of my family who was openly part of the lgbt community. We grew up very close - almost as siblings - so his death hit me incredibly hard, to this day it's the worst thing I've ever been through.

The weeks surrounding his death - when he was still in the hospital, and then afterwards the funeral arrangements - were extremely awful for me. My teachers at school were entirely unsympathetic towards what I was going through, none of my friends or peers really understood the grief I was feeling, and I essentially had no support system to help me through this time period. I felt so alone in so many ways.

I must've gone to bed early on June 13th, as the funeral was going to take place the very next day. I remember being in bed when the notification appeared on my phone. Daniel Howell. Basically I'm Gay. 45 minutes long.

You can probably imagine that considering the emotional roller coaster I was already going through at the time, this very notification - and with that the video - made me feel emotions so bizarre and complex that they're only visible to shrimp. I do think the whole dead cousin thing made me unable to truly appreciate watching that masterpiece the first time, and I am sad that I'll never be able to experience it for the first time again in better circumstances. But it did provide me with an interesting core memory.

The contents of the video hit incredibly close to home at the time. I remember being sad that I couldn't show it to him. That it was just a few days too late. That maybe he needed to see someone who made it, another queer man who had been where he was and has now gone to live a happy an unapologetic queer life.

I was mourning the end of my cousin's queer story, but also feeling pride because I was witnessing the beginning of Dan's. It was confusing and upsetting. It was the proof that queer stories can have happy endings, but my cousin would never be able to get his.

I feel many emotions when I think of the release of BIG. But I do think I am genuinely happy that it was uploaded when it was. It fucked with my brain in many ways, but it also gave me hope. It gave me a much needed light when I was spiraling deep into a depression in real time. Without it I would've felt even more hopeless.

I am genuinely very thankful that Dan has proved to me that there's hope and a light at the end of the tunnel. He's definitely saved my life a few times. And look at me, almost 5 years later I'm still here. And I'm not going anywhere. I'm sorry for my cousin, that he never got to find that light and have that happy ending. He deserved it just as much as Dan and myself. Which is why I'm living for the both of us now and holding onto any hope for dear life.

If you've made it this far, thank you for reading all of this. I hope it wasn't too sad. I'm kind of glad I got to vent about this I won't lie. Sorry about the length of it.

#anon ask #answered #tw suicide #dan and phil #daniel howell

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catboydan · 4 years

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my medication does work really well, but still every now and then i have an off day

so see you all tomorrow, i hope your night is better than mine. i’m gonna go take some melatonin and hope i wake up in a better state than i am right now

#tw depression #tw medication #val comes out of hiding #the daniel and depression video is very close to what i feel #i just kind of spiral down into a mood #thankfully nowadays they last a few hours to a day instead of like #a few days to a week #so overall definitely an improvement #tw mental health

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feelingofcontent · 2 years

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DNP Rewatch: Halloween Baking - Creepy Crispy Cakes CONJOINED CHALLENGE!

Date video was published: 10/30/2017 (X)

DNP Main Channel Rewatch: 362

This a video that I sometimes can’t believe actually exists. Just...what were they doing. (Not that I’m complaining!) This video is so long; I’m going to write way too much.

0:00 - the filming flat had a great kitchen setup for filming baking videos; it’s too bad they ended up only doing two there

0:05 - classic baking video slide-in with added danger, yikes

0:20 - clearly remembering the “wtf” feeling when this video first came out

0:31 - yeah the last baking attempt was...horrific, lol. I always forget that baking video and this one are from the same year...they feel like they’re in two different DNP eras to me

1:01 - this person must not have been able to believe it when this video actually happened

1:11 - from the shirts they wore for October in the dog calendar!

1:22 - of course they didn’t decide on a title beforehand...and then they changed it for the actual YouTube title

1:47 - this is definitely a moment where you can tell Phil is a younger brother and Dan is an older brother

1:55 - “Daniel” also, this is a much easier ingredient list than usual

2:09 - Dan why...and then Phil with a reference to the “butter glutton” thing from Dan’s collab with Louise

2:11 - of course they still have to do the classic ingredients presentation though

2:15 - Phil is not enjoying this so far...they are pretty equally matched but I imagine they’re both pretty strong if they throw their body weight around just because of how tall they both are

2:33 - very convenient that they both can have their dominant hands free, though it does put them on their not-usual sides for a video

2:35 - Phil is already cheating! love the “fail” noise Dan added for that. Phil doesn’t even know what he did 😂

2:56 - Dan has amazing facial expressions throughout this video in reaction to Phil

3:00 - close-ups are not going to be very common in this baking video; that might be the most challenging bit of this challenge, haha

3:04 - Phil tongue-thing!

3:20 - and again! Phil immediately looks guilty

3:27 - yes, definitely Dan’s fault. sure Phil

3:37 - I mean, it seems a little unnecessary to talk about the lack of personal space because of the theme of this video, but...what personal space

3:57 - they never have a big enough bowl

4:01 - did not need “soft and neat” from Dan. surprised he didn’t add an editing emphasis to that

4:03 - “you had to do a little twist at the end there” should not fill me with fear, and yet... I’m sorry.

4:16 - Phil is so excited about this realization

4:26 - Dan laughs immediately at that. also, Phil cleaning it up for YouTube but Dan just going with “fuck” anyway

4:37 - I feel like Dan told us way too much there 😳

4:49 - “I’m 26, I’m depressed, and I need edgy jokes to cope with my anxiety” is a very relatable-Dan quote

4:54 - yeah the choice to not wear t-shirts under that jumper was certainly something...

5:25 - another great Dan facial expression at “chunks”

5:47 - smiling at their reflections

6:24 - “buttered marshmallows” do not sound good at all actually

6:38 - Dan why. I mean, to make Phil laugh is why, but still

6:46 - “I really appreciate you trying to keep this spooky, whilst I try to keep it together” fantastic 😂

6:53 - yeah no thanks

7:02 - Dan is definitely cheating here, but Phil didn’t notice at all

7:36 - “cute dog, weird thing, meme...nsfw” is a very apt description of reddit

7:39 - I love the blurring out of the entire phone

7:54 - again, even less personal space then already being conjoined

8:16 - “we’re close...we’re close!” um 😳

8:19 - and even more Dan facial expression reactions

8:33 - they were not at all prepared for this, after telling everyone else to be

9:08 - constantly opening things with their teeth...again, not at all surprising that Phil tried it with glue

9:21 - “I’m left-handed, nothing ever works” 😂

9:28 - they are taking way too long to get back to the rapidly-cooling marshmallow

9:51 - Phil though he could get away with two hands here since we’d be looking at the close-up angle...nope!

10:10 - this is creating the biggest mess and they know it

10:15 - they are both using two hands here! Dan should have stayed zoomed in

10:28 - Dan finally realized he had had that hand out for ages

10:34 - and again for Phil! they have definitely failed the challenge part of this

10:49 - Dan really can’t talk at this point

11:26 - this is all so messy, but that makes the video much more entertaining. I really do think they’re having fun too

11:52 - “don’t call him ‘daddy’” too late Phil

12:28 - literally the ingredient he just read makes it pop, lol

13:05 - Phil handing over his phone no question to let Dan PUT IT IN HIS MOUTH. what even.

13:17 - okay that looks delicious

13:26 - Dan is so frustrated that Phil’s not reading his mind here

13:31 - zooming-in on the hand grab for some reason

14:19 - this cookie cutter is far to intricate for something so sticky (okay, Dan says this exact phrase at 15:42...I’ve seen this video too much, clearly)

14:50 - did they need to include this...tmi indeed

15:07 - okay, I think they included it for the “how long have we known each other...8 years” bit 🥺

15:14 - Phil is both thrilled that he managed a scare, and immediately has to touch Dan’s face with it

15:52 - Phil is CONSTANTLY using his other hand...I’ve never noticed how many times he does before

17:01 - giving up on the bain-marie thing finally

17:22 - they only have “baking video” utensils in that kitchen

17:46 - “dipple the tipple” Dan...no

18:01 - dramatic Dan

18:30 - have I mentioned how great Dan’s hair is in this video?

18:46 - the quiet “what” response to the furry ‘joke’ *cough* kills me

19:12 - “look, it could use some tooting” ...help 😳

19:44 - I think they must have cut the part where Dan told him not to do that

20:04 - “I’m a mini jazzie” I love it

20:13 - the very limited amount of personal space that was there before has gone completely out the window during the decoration part

20:31 - “sexy...everything about Frankenstein’s sexy” ...um. wtf Phil. Dan’s expression seems appropriate for that

21:07 - Dan is focusing very intently on the decoration

21:56 - did not need to know, Phil

22:03 - somehow not at all surprising. poor Phil 😂

22:07 - so much debate happened over whether Phil’s hidden arm was around Dan during this or bits of the decoration, but I’m pretty sure he just has it crossed in front of himself the whole time...not that they really needed to be any closer

22:32 - went all out with candles and cobwebs for the presentation

22:59 - to have a successful bake they just need to...not actually bake, lol

23:11 - “conjoined stage show” oooo, hinting at the Interactive Introverts announcement that’s coming soon!

23:32 - “I hope you paid for breakfast after” I’ve never heard/processed that line before! 😳

24:12 - I always forget that these baking videos are on Dan’s channel

24:26 - of course they would do this

25:02 - will never be over Dan labeling Phil’s channel bubble “the literal other half”

This is my favorite baking video, no question. I can’t watch it without smiling.

#dan and phil #dnp #dnpRewatch #daniel howell #amazingphil #danisnotonfire #phil lester #dan howell #daniel howell videos #Halloween Baking - Creepy Crispy Cakes CONJOINED CHALLENGE!#cw food

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mindninjax · 3 years

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The Way It Blooms

Pairing: Wakatoshi Ushijima x virgin!reader

Rating: M for the sex but it’s FLUFF

Warning: it’s fluffy smut, pure fluff.

Word Count: 3.4K

a/n: Do you remember the moment you fell in love with someone? The very first moment the two of you made love? This fic is kinda about that. Ushijima has quickly become one of my comfort characters as you will see in this soft ass shit.

This was used as inspiration and it’s beautiful. Also, you should listen to Get You by Daniel Caesar during the smut lol.

Dedicated to one @dymphnasprose for dropping so much Ushi content in my DMs and making me fall for him more and more and for this fucking adorable ass pet name that I will always use and associate with both you and Ushi. I love you babe!

Plucking the strings idly of your old acoustic guitar, you feel the familiar rush of calm wash over your body. You haven’t picked it up since your sophomore year of high school when you—embarrassingly— serenaded your boyfriend at the time with a dumb love song you wrote him after only dating for 3 months. It was Valentine’s day, you thought it’d be special. He broke up with you and called you “clingy”. And being the dramatic but valid—because that guy was a major asshole— teenager, you’d stopped playing.

As you got older, you’d forgotten about it, shifted your focus on getting into college, becoming a journalist like you’d planned. Something changed in you in the last few weeks though. You were braver, more confident, happier with who you were as a person.

It could be because the winter months were coming to an end, the sun was shining more, beating down into your dorm room and warming the cold dark depressing atmosphere you hidden yourself in for the past few months. Or it could be...him.

Your face heats up and you pluck a sour note on the guitar as his face fills your mind. Piercing moss green eyes gaze into your subconscious and make a home there. Your heart flutters when you think about his voice, the last words he said to you, “I’ll be back to you soon, don’t worry”, before it becomes heavy with yearning and you remember he’s across an ocean right now playing an intense volleyball match you’re sure his team will win.

Wakatoshi pulled the deepest emotions from you, the deepest and most forgotten portions of your personality, the ones you used to enjoy the most before society squeezed it from you. He admired your creativity, and his blunt comments or questions always caught you by surprise, in a good way.

“God, I wish I could go up on stage and sing like that!” you’d said one date night while watching a woman perform karaoke.

“Why can’t you?” Toshi asked in a deadpan voice as he stroked the back of your hand. You blinked at him, not able to give him a clear reason of why you couldn’t go up on stage. It’d just felt natural to say, like you weren’t supposed to go. By the end of the night, you were on stage laughing and singing, full of joy as you watched him clap along to the music and his eyes followed you around on stage. It was the happiest you’d been in a while, and it was one the first few dates you’d gone on with him.

You strum a few chords, humming to yourself as you get caught up in the music. You’d forgotten how calming it was, how much strumming and humming helped you feel when you allowed yourself to just be you. It was strangely how you felt every single time you were around Wakatoshi, comfortable yet protected. You pick up your phone and check the time, an idea forming in your head. He’d be in the middle of the game right now so he won’t have his phone until it’s over.

You prop the phone up on a pillow with it facing you. Your face is bare with no makeup, your hair is a little messy from the wear and tear of the day and you were in the middle of getting ready for bed so you’re wearing an old cami and tiny shorts. You shrug, electing not to worry about your appearance, prop the guitar up on your leg, clear your throat, and press the record button on your phone.

You strum a simple tune, something that repeats where the beat can be easily kept. It’s a swaying melody, one that tiptoes up and down the score with light steps; like a soft lullaby intended to serenade and rock the listener into a dreamy slumber. You’re not nervous, you don’t worry about what anyone might think about you, you just close your eyes and think of Toshi and how much you miss him.

You focus on how much you want to feel his arms around you, how he makes your heart jump into your chest when his fingers lightly draw over your skin. You giggle when you think about his dry attempts at jokes just so he can see you smile and the way he will poke at where the dimple would be if you smiled when you're frowning. His own little silent gesture to say “smile little doe,” because he's not a man of many words.

You lose yourself in the melody, start to sing the words that sashay around your head and heart. You’re not sure if they make sense, or if they fit the tune, you only know you want him to know how you’re feeling and for some reason this feels like the perfect way to show him. You pour your heart into each word you sing, communicating in the most intimate way you know how to while he’s away, and it’s evident in the passionate way you float to each note.

Your voice wavers when you sing about how much you wish he was here with you, how much you want him to touch you and hold you and feel you, even going so far as to mention making love to him. You two haven’t been dating long a few months at most, and you’re astounded at just how much you crave him. Except that isn’t the word you want to use. The word you want to use scares you, so you’re hoping, praying that he will feel it when he hears this.

You end the song and stop the recording, softly and with purpose as if to solidify every feeling you’ve contained in this beautiful little song for him and before you become too afraid and erase it. No, he deserves to hear this song for him. A message in a bottle that you send across the ocean and with it, hope and comfort that there is someone out there in the world who understands him and sees him.

You type a quick message and attach the video quickly before you talk yourself out of it:

Toshi, here’s a little something to help you sleep! See you in two days! ❤️

You hit send and chew on your lip before tossing the phone aside and quickly finishing your night routine for bed.

“Get some rest Ushiwaka! You deserve it after the win you got us today!”

Wakatoshi waves off his teammates silently as he shuffles to his hotel room and pulls out the keycard. He sighs heavily when he hears the affirmative beep and the lock clicks. He’s exhausted, the long 5 set match finally done. The other team put up a great fight and he’s always appreciative of a team who has a fighting spirit, but he’s exhausted and hasn’t been able to see or hear from you all day. He collapses on his bed and digs through his bag for his phone. He turns it off before matches so he can keep his focus but he always sends a quick message to you before he does and he never turns it off until he gets a text back from you.

When the screen lights up and comes back alive he smiles to himself. It’s your face on his phone background. One that he took when you both visited the park near campus. You’d picked a huge sunflower and you were beaming. He’d had to move quickly and figure out how to open his camera to take it before you realized, but it came out stunning. You looked so happy, the dimple in your cheek deepening as you caught his love-filled gaze on you.

Your face smiles back at him on screen now and he frowns when he realizes how much he misses you. He wishes you were here with him. It’s very seldom that you aren’t at one of his games, cheering him on, watching his every movement, being his motivation. He plays harder when you’re watching, he wants to make you proud, although you’re always proud of him. But the way your eyes light up when he wins a match, how you jump on him and squeal when he leaves the court sweaty and still full of adrenaline from the match, makes the win all the more worth it.

Wakatoshi doesn’t know exactly what it is about you that he likes so much. He finds himself pondering it as he watches you do mundane tasks. When you twirl your pencil while you work on homework, the way you bite your cheek when you’re thinking of something, or the way you gravitate toward him when you’re sitting next to him, he finds it entertaining. He could watch you all day and never get bored, and that’s a first for him. It’s a first that anything other than volleyball has kept his attention and he’s not bothered by it.

He opens the message from you, swiping up to unlock his phone and his eyes grow a little wide when he sees you’ve sent him a video. He reads the message before getting up, grunting as he stands to go take a shower. If the video is to help him sleep, he figures he should get ready for bed before he watches, plus he likes the idea of your face being the last thing he sees before he drifts off to sleep.

When he’s showered and his muscles are relaxed and dripping from the shower, he pulls on his boxers, dries himself and climbs into the stiff hotel bed, wishing once again that he was climbing in next to you. He grabs his phone again as he lays on his back. He opens the message once again, smiling at your face—he misses so much—and plays the video.

The guitar strums surprise him, he didn’t know you could play guitar. It’s automatically soothing and he stores this fun fact in his brain, vowing to never forget it as it’s information on one of his favorite things. The tune you strum is simple yet beautiful, maybe because it’s you playing it or just that your fingers so meticulously strum the strings. He can tell this is your craft and you’re good at it.

He closes his eyes as he continues to listen to the repetitive melody and he’s immediately thankful that you sent him this. It will help him sleep and he can drift off knowing that even though you aren’t here, you’re still helping and supporting him from afar.

His eyes shoot open when you start to sing. Your voice is astounding. It is unlike anything Wakatoshi has ever heard before. It twinkles like a delicate little bell, rings loud and strong as the words continue and pierce his heart. It swirls, sways, rocks and swaddles him in all the love you project through these lyrics. Your voice is sweet, relieving, like ice cream on a very hot day after practice, and when you sing his name and about making love, he grunts in approval. It’s suddenly all he wants. His body, his heart aches for you and all he wants is to be with you again. When the song ends on a tender note, he plays the song again and again, hanging on every lilt of your voice and committing it to memory.

Right before he drifts off to sleep, he texts back a quick message to you, a vow he intends on keeping.

I am coming back to you soon little doe.

Your hair is brushed from your forehead and you sigh in contentment. You’re sure you're dreaming, it’s been the same recurring dream every night since Toshi has been gone. When you feel a hand cradle your face, your eyes shoot open to see him, sitting on the edge of your bed caressing your face in his large hand. Tears well in your eyes when you see him and you jump up to wrap your arms around his neck.

“Toshi!”

He pulls you into his lap and cradles your body against his. You can hear his gym bag slip from his shoulder and you peep over his shoulder to see his luggage in the corner of your room. His luggage. You pull back to look into his eyes.

“Toshi, did you come straight here when you got off the plane?” you ask looking concerned and trying to wipe the tears from your eyes. He’s faster than you, reaching a long finger out to catch a falling one and swipe it from your cheek.

“Yes. You don’t have to cry. It was no trouble,” The deep baritone rumbles his body and moves through you. It’s only been a few days since you two have seen each other, but his voice still sends a shiver up your spine whenever you hear it.

You shake your head in defiance, “Wakatoshi, you should’ve gone to your dorm. You need to rest,” you say furrowing your eyebrows and trying to be serious.

He stares at you with an intense stare and you’re momentarily worried. Wakatoshi has never looked at you this way before. This stare is usually intended for his teammates or a rival, when he’s serious and focused during a match.

“No. I needed to see you.”

You’re not sure what comes over you but his words ignite a fire in you and you kiss him, hard and passionate. Ever the prepared sportsman, he kisses you back matching your passion and groaning into your mouth. All the yearning the two of you shared over the last few days rushes out of you and into the kiss. It’s sloppy and you both have to pull back and catch your breath.

His hands fall to your hips as he pulls you closer against him. Your hands roam down his chest, up his broad shoulders and down his bulging back muscles. You breathe his name against his lips and he growls, picks you up and places you down on your back on the bed.

He crawls over you, fixating himself between your thighs. You’re both still clothed but the aching for each other is more than just the sex. You just want to be close to him, to feel him wrap his arms around you, to feel his lips against yours again. He bends down to your face and kisses you again. Softer this time, as if he’s afraid to hurt you or lose control. He kisses down your jaw, bites and sucks on your neck, marking you as his.

You hear him rumble into your neck, “Mine” before he bites down and makes another mark. You moan at the sensation and Wakatoshi momentarily stops to savor the sound. It’s almost as sweet as your lovely singing voice, and he’d give anything to hear you moan his name. You paw at the hem of his shirt as he continues to kiss your cheek and neck.

“I want to see you Toshi,” you whimper. He gazes into your eyes for a moment before removing his shirt and you marvel at his rippling muscles. He’s so big, his herculean frame always able to make your mouth water. He can see the pride of having him be yours in his eyes and he likes it.

He wants you to be proud to have him, the same way he’s proud to have you. He grabs the end of your shirt and slowly pulls it over your head. Large hands clumsily grasp the clasp of the bra He observes you like a work of art, committing every freckle and mole to memory.

“You’re beautiful,” he says and the way the word “beautiful” falls effortlessly from his lips when describing you makes your face grow hot. There’s nothing you want more than him, now. He removes his pants and underwear and slides yours down your legs as well. When you both are left staring at each other in awe, you pull him back down to kiss you again.

You can feel his engorged cock twitching against your thigh as he hovers on his elbows over you. It makes your breath catch in your throat, desperation escaping with your next exhale. He kisses down your chest, covering every inch of you with the sweetest embrace of his lips. He licks at your nipple, nips softly and when he hears you gasp he bites down a bit harder before licking to soothe the brisk pain.

Your heart beats faster with every kiss, this feeling inside of you overwhelms you and when you push your hips up to meet his, a silent plea, he pulls back to look at the exquisite fountain between your legs. He holds his weeping cock in one hand and for the first time you look at him nervously. Will it fit? What if it doesn’t? Will he still want to be with you? He reaches a large hand to caress your cheek and the tumbling storm in your chest calms with his sweet gesture. He stares into your eyes and that same intensity burns there, passionate and solicitous, like the sun.

“Don’t worry little doe, I’ll be gentle,” he says running a thumb over your cheek. The anxiety is gone instantly and you look at him with the utmost trust as he places the tip of his dick to your entrance. He rubs it against your slippery folds, slathering your slick over his copious length and preparing you for all his glory. You nod to him when he looks at you for permission to enter.

He pushes inside of you, moving slowly and passing the first ring of muscle. He grunts when the crown of his cock is sitting comfortably in your fluttering walls. You whimper as you become accustomed to how full you already feel. When your heaving chest slows down from the initial insertion, he continues to slide into you, hips moving closer to yours in a welcoming embrace. You stretch around him and it burns, but you clench as well, your body’s way of telling him not to stop.

When he’s fully sheathed inside of you he grunts and you moan in unadulterated pleasure. Your eyes are shut as you concentrate on how he feels inside of you. Despite the fullness and the stretch it doesn’t feel foreign as you expected. It feels like he belongs, like your body will mold to his because it knows it’s supposed to be him.

Little salty droplets bead at the corner of your eyes as you think about this, and when you open them Wakatoshi is staring with an unknown expression. The emotion, the love, grows inside of you like a sunflower reaching for the sun. It tumbles from your lips when he, while never severing your gaze, pulls his hips out ever so slightly and plunges back into you. A quick chaste “I love you” that you’re sure and are slightly thankful he doesn’t hear. The fear and insecurity bubbling and shielding the sun again.

You cry out instead, “Oh god Toshi!” He wraps his arms around your body, leaning his weight onto his arms to avoid putting it all on you but wanting to pull you closer to his body. Your arms wrap around his neck as he pulls out all the way and slowly plunges back inside you again, starting a slow sensual pace. He rocks his hips, latches his lips to your neck as you dig your hands into his hair and you lift your hips to feel more of him.

His pace quickens as he becomes lost in the passion of your warm velvety walls, what he assumes is heaven. You’re moaning his name over and over, tears now falling down your cheeks as your ecstasy creeps upon you. When you feel the coil inside you snap, you pull him closer, nails digging into his back as your thighs shake and wrap around his waist. You cry out again, no longer able to hold it in, “I love you! Toshi, I love you so much!”

The words tumble from your lips as his cum spills inside you and grunts your name loudly. He connects his lips with yours as the two of you ride out your orgasm together, as one. When you both come down from your high, he rubs his forehead against yours brushing his nose against yours before whispering in his deep baritone voice something you almost don’t make out. But when you do hear it, you wrap your arms around his neck again and hug him close, intent on never letting go.

“I love you, little doe.”

Thanks for Reading!!

tag list: @widow-nikki-smith @twicejynxed @love-lost-insecure-blog @hell-ninja13 @gabrann @hi-itsbonny @yunhosblackgf @animeboyscangetit @jessie9008 @halfsquat @4lfalfagarlic @memorieswithinmyeyes @chefakari @softiehawks @bnhathotty @irvingka @animemelanin @clever-username96 @kisskisskageyama @itsnotsoni @amillionfandoms-onlyoneme @lettytheletdown @brithedemonspawn @minninugget @starrygoblin @simpingovereveryanimeguy @simpingmaize @nit-sir-hc @isseisbbg @flairlust @dabilove27 @mistressoflight @bakugousmymassa @answer-the-sirens

#ushijima x reader #ushjima wakatoshi x reader #ushijima wakatoshi #Ushiwaka #marquie writes #this is sooooooo self indulgent #but listen to me when I say I fell head over heels in love with this man #people say he got a dry personality #i say I can see it ALL #I’ll give Ushi the loving he deserves

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Under the cut is the full transcript for The British Get Talking Podcast episode on October 8, 2020 with Dan!

[Interviewer:] Hello everyone! I'm Kylie Pentelow and here we are again. This is the second series of the "Britain Get Talking" podcast from ITV where I talk to some amazing people who open up about the mental well being. Today, Dan Howell is a YouTube star. He rose to fame through his comedy videos that have had more than a billion views. More recently, he's opened up on his YouTube channel about depression and his video "Basically I'm Gay" has had eleven million views. Dan is now writing a book about mental health and is an ambassador for YoungMinds. Dan is obviously funny, but he's also clever and sensitive. To me, it seems he's using his huge profile among young people to really make a difference. I loved talking to Dan and I hope you like listening to this podcast too. Dan, thanks so much for speaking to me today! How are you?

[Dan:] I am a big fan of saying "I'm fine." And that is the absolute worst, most British answer to that question that anyone can give. And it's what people say all the time. And, you know, for me, it's definitely- It's something that instantly says way too much. *laughs* Doesn't it? I mean, you can write a whole essay about "I'm fine" as an answer. "Oh, I don't want to inconvenience you. Oh, I don't want to bore you by talking about whatever I'm going through." And that's very me. I accept that one of my flaws is I don't want to put something on the other person. I don't want to start a whole thing that might bore them. I don't want to sound like I'm moaning, so I'll just go, "I'm fine!" And usually the tone in which I say "I'm fine" immediately betrays the fact that I'm- You know, might be clearly very stressed about something. *laughs*

[Interviewer:] Do you think your kind of friends would pick up or people you know would say, "Oh wait, you sure?" or would they delve deeper?

[Dan:] Everybody I know! They just look at me like, "Okay, Dan." *laughs* Cool, okay. So in ten minutes, we'll be talking about how you actually feel. We just need to get through the kind of ice breaking- Cause, you know, I'm that introvert and I'm quite socially awkward so it takes a while to melt the ice to get through to whatever's there.

[Interviewer:] You're hugely successful! You rose to fame with your YouTube videos. They are very funny!

[Dan:] Mhm. *laughs* Thank you!

[Interviewer:] But you have a few small serious ones in there recently. And you've spoken very openly about your depression. What prompted you to do it in the first place?

[Dan:] Yeah, so that was quite a journey. In case anyone doesn't know- Uh, hi, my name is Daniel Howell. *laughs* And as you say, I was mainly known for being somebody who uploaded comedy videos to YouTube. Which I think, Kylie, is something you and I have in common! I'm aware that you have some toes in the YouTube space.

[Interviewer:] Yeah! Oh my goodness. Back in the day, yeah.

[Dan:] Look at us! We got one toe in traditional media and the other in the Internet.

[Interviewer:] I love this. *laughs*

[Dan:] So yeah, these videos- They were something that I started when I was a teenager and they were just kind of comedy videos about everyday things. So I had like rants about how annoying people are at the airport or what it's like going on public transport. And then I'd, you know, move onto talking about things that people were arguing about in TV shows. It was all very funny. It was all very relatable. And as time went on, I started to be a bit more personal with the stories I was telling. I was saying, "You know what? I'm actually going to tell you today about the time I got fired." It was an awful time in my life but usually the things that are really awful are very funny to laugh at. And people liked that because I was sharing something personal. It was intimate. It made it even funnier because it was real and it was awful. You know, comedy is just tragedy and someone saying you're allowed to laugh at it. And it was in 2017- I'd gone through a few years where I really started to think about my own mental health seriously for the first time. Because I had quite an upsetting childhood, as someone who grew up gay. And I had a lot of issues with depression and various things and really had just never thought about it in my life until any point. And it was only when I was in my mid-twenties that for the very first time, I stepped back and I was like, "You know what? I'm feeling like this and this is something. It's not right and I should do something about it. I came to terms with the fact that I really had been struggling with depression for a very long time. And this is something that's obviously- It's quite hard to firstly accept on a personal level and then to tell anyone about: your friends and family. And for me, I was in this strange place because I had this career as this comedian who was known for sharing these things from my life and being very open and having this great relationship with my audience. And yet, it felt like there was this huge, kind of big secret dark cloud in my life that people didn't know about. And it was especially strange for someone who performs on stage and you know, who did jobs like the one I did on Radio One. And it felt like all the time, I was acting very funny. I was acting very happy and really there was this whole other side to me. And I just decided that for several reasons really, I had to get it out there just so people would know this fundamental thing about me so they'd understand a bit more about my story. But also that I felt, even in 2017, there was so much misconception around discussing mental health and what depression is. And so many people out there that felt like they needed to have this conversation held in a public place. So it was absolutely terrifying for me. But I decided to make one of my typical, you know, comedy videos where I tell stories and I talk about my opinions. Except I opened up about my depression and it was an absolutely huge moment in my life. And I remember being terrified when I hit that upload button. And the response I got was just so much more positive and powerful than I could've ever imagined. Not only because people were saying, "This is so much more compelling because it's real and you're being honest. But so many people had never really had depression explained to them? They were like, "I have loved ones that go through this. I have friends and I've seen it and now I understand it more." And so many other people said, "This is me. I was sat watching this." So people were saying, "I've been struggling with this for years and I didn't know how to talk about it to my family." Other people were saying, "I didn't even know this was me. Now I'm seeing it for the first time." And that really- You know, it was a moment that changed my life in my career for sure.

[Interviewer:] The thing I think you do really well in it is explain the difference between feeling sad and feeling depressed. Can you just explain that?

[Dan:] Well, we all feel sad many times. You know, we can watch a Disney movie and feel sad. *laughs* If something sad happens. But depression is when you notice for a long time that things aren't right. If you're not enjoying the things you should be enjoying. If you're having a real struggle just maintaining the basic things you should be doing: getting out of bed, feeding yourself, opening the curtains. If you feel like you've sunken into a hole. If you're not enjoying the things that you're doing. If you just don't have the energy- You don't want to socialize anymore. Then it's not just that you're feeling sad because an event. It may be that you are depressed and this isn't something that may just blow over. It's something that you need to really acknowledge and then do something to fix.

[Interviewer:] You also talk about how it affects things like your diet as well. Like that was quite a surprise to me. Sometimes you might feel like you might not want to eat at all. Sometimes you eat to try to make yourself feel better.

[Dan:] Absolutely. Yeah, some people when they feel depressed, they just can't eat because you know- I mean, cooking's an effort. I'm one of those people that hates cooking. I mean, I love eating. I hate cooking. So yeah. *laughs*

[Interviewer:] I'm with you.

[Dan:] And this was me sometimes. I would just go, "I don't want to cook." And then I would lay in bed all day and I wouldn't eat. And then another day, I would be feeling, you know, so self indulgent, I'd be like, "I'm going to order just the most decadent, gross amount of pizza no human should be able to consume in one sitting." And then do that just to fill the hole inside my soul with carbohydrates. And that may make you feel good for about ten minutes and then when you're digesting it all the next day, you realize that it's actually just another kind of self destructive behavior.

[Interviewer:] You also talk about medication as well, which I think was really brave. Cause even though lots of people might talk about feeling depressed, they don't share that they're talking any medication for it. In fact, the other day, my close friend shared with me that she was taking antidepressants. And I've known her for a decade and she's never told me that. Actually, it was because she's been listening to this podcast, which is great that she felt that she could share that. But do you think that is important to get the whole kind of picture out there?

[Dan:] I think there's a big stigma around taking medication, which is strange as an absolutely huge amount of the population are taking medication for all kinds of things. And antidepressants are very common. And of course we're saying this knowing that anyone listening- You should always consult a professional. Go to your doctor. Speak to them. For some people, medication works. For some people, it doesn't. It's one of many options but it's definitely something that- It can have big effects on how you behave. On how you need to live day to day. And you shouldn't be afraid of telling people that. It doesn't mean that you're broken. *laughs* It means that you're taking a step to try and get help and be better. And it's brave to share that, so I would encourage anyone that feels bad about the fact that they take medication to try to be more casually open about it. Which I appreciate can be really difficult because it just has this knock on effect of making everyone less ashamed.

[Interviewer:] What was that, kind of, first step like for you? Was it speaking to your family? Or was it going to the doctor when you sought professional help?

[Dan:] Well, the first time I sought professional help I think was when I was at University. I was going through a really hard- Kind of quarter life crisis time where I was thinking, "Oh, what am I doing with my life? Why am I enjoying what I'm doing?" And I just realized that I wasn't functioning on a day to day level. *laughs* And I spoke to one of the counselors at University and this was a positive experience. You know, sometimes if people talk about their mental health at their work place or their University, you hear these horror stories. I had one of those good examples where there was this lovely lady and she said, "It sounds like you have depression and if you need to take some time out of school to do that, then that's the right thing to do." And then I went to the doctor and then you know, we spoke and he said, "Yes, it sounds like this." And that was the first time I acknowledged it. And the first time for the few years, I kind of acknowledged it but I didn't actively work on it that much. And as I said, it was a few years later, when I was in my mid-twenties, when I was like, "No. If this is my normal, this isn't right. And it's something I need to make an effort to pull myself out of."

[Interviewer:] You are writing a book at the moment about this, aren't you? I wonder how that's been because sometimes, it's great, isn't it? To talk about stuff and other times, you actually just wanna be a bit quiet and deal with things, you know, in your own way. But I wonder whether a book has kind of open more things up for you.

[Dan:] Yeah, I mean, you know- Talk about coming out of the closet. Which is something I also literally did. *laughs*

[Interviewer:] We'll talk about that in a sec. *laughs*

[Dan:] Yeah, so the book is called "You Will Get Through This Night" and it is coming out in May next year. So it's only around preorder now, but people can find it on Amazon if they're interested. And it's quite wild for someone like me to write it. The book is a hand book. It's a tool for people to understand their mental health and to make changes to their improve their lives. And the idea behind it is that we are all kind of in this state where as humans in our modern society, there's various things that we feel ashamed to talk about. There's a stigma approaching various things. If we do certain things, we're viewed as weak. We don't want to admit certain things to ourselves and this is about breaking down all of those things and going, "Actually, all of these behaviors that so many of us do day to day are self destructive. These attitudes we have towards these certain things are totally wrong. We need to change the way we think about these things. We need to forgive ourselves slightly more. We need to be more patient." And also just understanding how all the things you do on a day to day basis affect your mental health. Sleep, exercise, socializing. Every single time you have a thought, you need to check that thought and go, "Am I being completely unreasonable and putting myself in a position where I'm going to have a crazy amount of stress or if I'm going to make myself really anxious." And the hope is that with this book, a lot of people will realize, "Oh my god, I do all of these things day to day and I had no idea what profound effect all of these things had on my life." I'm spicing it up slightly by obviously sharing my personal journey- *laughs* With all of these things and as you say- That is quite, uh, a strange experience for me because I- It's obviously been extremely helpful. I mean, it's been blowing my mind just writing this book. The whole thing done in consultation with a qualified psychologist, so obviously I know what I'm talking about when I'm giving this advice. And when I was reading all of the theory for me to turn into this book, I was just sat there myself- *laughs* As I would hope people would be when they read it thinking, "Oh my god, I'm awful! I need to give myself a break. We do all of these things all the time? And I'm making myself feel like this for no reason? That's crazy!" And came to saying, "Right, on this topic, I'm going to share with you what my journey has been dealing with this. Here's my stories about it. It's been simultaneously quite cathartic and to be honest, quite difficult revisiting a lot of these things. Especially if you go through things when you're younger or if you feel that there's certain things that you've moved past from. Then it can be quite upsetting to revisit these things and whilst initially, it was quite a jump to get into that, it definitely makes you realize that confronting things with a clear head, with the best of intentions and some honesty looking at yourself- It really makes you feel a lot better on the other side.

[Interviewer:] How do you cope with doing what you do because the industry you've chosen to work in- Not only like putting yourself out there on YouTube, but also saying, "I'm funny. Look at me, I'm going to make you laugh." You know, that must put a lot of pressure on you. But also, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm guessing it can sometimes it can be a bit solitary as well? How do you deal with all of that going on?

[Dan:] Oh god, yeah. I picked as a complete introvert with crippling social anxiety and mild agoraphobia- I picked the absolute worst career possible. *laughs*

[Interviewer:] Yeah!

[Dan:] But maybe, that's why the material is so honest. *laughs* You know? That's why I have so much to work with. I think that, you know, there is an element of being forced to confront your demons that probably helps accelerate my internal growth process. And especially from the comedy perspective, there is a fine line between saying, "I'm going to open myself up for people to laugh at my stories and kind of appreciating that I need to save a bit vulnerability." And it- You know, it was crazy. I made a video called "Trying To Live My Truth" about the concept of authenticity and how in life, if generally, if we aren't being authentic- And this isn't just doing a career that we love. It may be being honest in the relationships that we have day to day in really being true to ourselves about what we want to be doing, where we want to be. If you kind of lie to yourself and go, "Oh, I'm just going to do this for a bit to do here. I'm only having a relationship with these people for now." Eventually, it'll get to you and it will wear you down. That was a really hard thing for me to talk about because I was saying, "There's so many aspects of my life where right now, I feel like I'm not being authentic and I'm realizing it's really taking a toll of me. So some people may have to appreciate that I'm going to have to tell them things and I may not be the person that they thought I was but this is something that I have to do if I need to be happier."

[Interviewer:] We talked earlier about how, you know, you've done some more serious videos. But actually, even your video about depression is really funny. And obviously it's really great to be talking about mental health but we need to not be too worthy about it, don't we? And just- I was watching that video feeling really connected to what you were saying and then a second later, I was laughing out loud and actually, it reminded me a bit of "After Life"- Ricky Gervais' show. I don't know if you watch that but.

[Dan:] *laughs* Yeah, definitely.

[Interviewer:] It's that very fine line that- You know, in one of his scenes, I remember when he was talking to his dad that I was crying and then literally the next second, I was laughing out loud. And I just felt- That's such a positive thing that you do and is that a real conscious thing that you do?

[Dan:] I mean, my default is to always kind of break the tension by making people laugh. And there's a side to that like, "Okay, we can laugh about it but eventually we're going to have to be a bit serious." So you need a bit of both but I think especially when talking about these difficult topics, just making it funny- It breaks that ice. And often by pointing out the silly things that happen as a result of these things, you know, I've been making fun of the fact that I'm depressed all day and my friend's just like pouring popcorn all over my head. Like, "Come on! Enjoy the things that you used to enjoy." It's like okay, that's really silly. That's really goofy. And it's like- But it kind of is silly, you know? And then me kind of taking a step back and realizing, "Yeah, me lounging around in bed all day. Yeah me being afraid to go outside for this reason or that." There are little things that are relatable. They're just a bit silly. And when you can laugh at that- I mean, just laughing or smiling once. We can talk about the health of people with depression. Sometimes putting on a bit of comedy and watching something can really save the day. So I think that there's a real benefit to even the most difficult topics, finding something to make people laugh. It makes it easier.

[Interviewer:] Let's talk about your video that's- I don't know how many millions of views it's got. "Basically I'm Gay." Tell me about that video and why that was important to make.

[Dan:] So that was essentially a coming out video. I mean, I would say it was the biggest moment of my life in a lot of ways. Because I've had a real struggle with sexuality my entire life. I think I've known, on some level, that I was some kind of gay since I was a small child. And I had an incredibly difficult time in school with bullying. I had difficult relationships with some of my family members and it was honestly- It was quite traumatic and I never really realized it because I got used to that state of just accepting that this is the way things are and getting on with it to survive. Kind of very extreme version of the British stiff upper lip to get -on with it. And it was only really when I reached kind of 27/28 when I was like, "Oh my god. No, this is awful! *laughs* I've got so much baggage. I've got a heathrow carousel in my cupboard over here." It was terrible. And I ran away from this entire subject of sexuality because it was just difficult. And there was so much wrapped up in it. And for any courage that it took me for me to talk about mental health or even just, you know, terrible things that happened to me that may be embarrassing when I'm on stage in a little routine or something. For me to not just talk publicly about my sexuality and everything that went into it but just to accept it myself was a huge journey. And you know, it's called internalized homophobia and it's basically from growing up in such a homophobic environment. I was brainwashed, really, to kind of hate myself and not accept the fact of who I was. And this was such a huge part of my mental health- My entire life. To the point where I only acknowledge it truly a few months before I made that video. I think when I was talking about that authenticity thing, I was just like, "I'm a sham." I was on a world tour with my friend. We did a stage show and went to eighteen countries. Think we met about fifty thousand people at these little meet and greets before the shows. And so many people would come up to me and they would be so honest. Some people would cry and they'd just say, "You opening up about depression gave me the strength to turn my life around." Or, "You talking about athenticity made me quit my job." There were other people that said, "I want to come out to my parents just because you talked about being authentic and about your mental health and these things." And I felt like a complete fraud because here I was- I was supposed to be this guy who made the funny videos but at the same time, I was talking about these topics and I was being open about myself. And I was just like, "The hugest thing is still completely hidden and it's something that I know I'm hiding from myself." And I just felt like I couldn't do it anymore. So I uploaded this video saying, "I really just need to think about how I can be more authentic because I felt like I've hit this road block in my life where I just can't continue. I've done it for too long. I've put it off and I just feel like in every aspect of my life, I've hit that wall. And until I break through it, I just can't do anything." And I basically disappeared from the Internet for about a year. And in that year, it was a complete journey where I said, I needed to acknowledge it for myself. I realized if I ever wanted to talk about this publicly, there's so many things I need to do. I need to come out to my family. I need to tell friends. I need to think about how it's going to affect my work life and I really just went on this complete crash course of a life wrecking in the start of 2019. *laughs* And it was a huge journey. As I said, I'm this huge socially awkward person so the idea of coming out to my family. Oh, I just couldn't do it. It was just awful. I remember it was Boxing Day 2018 and all my family were just sat watching "Chicken Run" or something. And I was like, "I'm gonna do it. I have to do it at some point, you know? I have to tell the family." And it's this awful thing coming out- It's like nobody wants it to be a big deal. *laughs* It's just because that we live in this world where people are presumed to be straight, it's not like gay people want to cause a big scene by coming out. They have to. Because no matter what, when you tell somebody, it's going to be a big surprise usually. So I'm the last person that wanted to make it all about me. God, I just want to blend into the background. I was thinking, "I'm going to have to completely blow up this Christmas." And I couldn't do it. So I thought that was the perfect opportunity and it's gone now. My family- For about two months, I was just like, "Aw, I ruined it. I ruined it. That was my one chance."

[Interviewer:] Oh gosh, that must have been so stressful! You're just carrying that around.

[Dan:] Oh, it was awful! Yeah and then I went for dinner with my mum. And I was like, "Okay, intimate. I'll do this." And then again, I was like, "I don't want to ruin my mum's birthday by making it all about me." *laughs* Then I left having failed to do it then and I went, "Right, this is getting stupid now." So you know what I did? I wrote an email to all of my family. Just CC'd them on an email and just said, "Hi. Basically I'm gay. Let me know if you want to talk about it. Bye!" And I just hit send and closed my laptop. That is very much- That is the Dan Howell strategy of throwing the hand grenade, closing the door, and going, "Whoops!" And then I got the phone calls and you know, thankfully I think that we're living in a much more kinder, accepting world than we did twenty years ago. I think that we can see when it comes to all kinds of things- The world is getting a lot more smarter and educated and just accepting and more kind. So the reception that I got from my family in 2019 was very kind and loving accepting. And it was really kind of wonderful. It felt like this huge, colossal weight had been lifted from me where I felt like there was this wall between me and my family my entire life, where there was just something that was unsaid. Something that would've explained so much. A fundamental part of who I was. It was so important to get that out there. And as you said earlier, just you know, as someone that as a public figure. As an entertainer who talks about myself for my career, getting this out there? I don't know. It was just absolutely profound so I spent months and months writing this video. And for people that don't know, you'd expect a YouTube video to be a twenty second video of a cat falling down the stairs or something. I ended up putting this forty five minute- *laughs* It was basically a stand up special that I filmed in my office. It was dense. I was like, "Look, if I'm going to talk about sexuality, I've got say strap yourselves in people." And yeah, the moment I hit go on that, it transformed my entire life. It was really just this feeling of this pressure lifting all around me and it felt like age 28, that I finally alive for the first time. And my life had only just begun. Because only now was I actually out there. People knew who I was and I could kind of begin living authentically in world where people actually knew who I was. And that's crazy.

[Interviewer:] Do you wished you'd done it earlier or do you think it was the right time?

[Dan:] *sighs* I do wish I did it earlier. What I would say to anybody- You may be somebody queer in the closet thinking about doing this or you may just be someone who wants to open up to your loved ones about the fact that you may be depressed. Or you just want to be honest about the things in your life saying, "You know what? I really hate my job and it's ruining my life." Or something about the relationships in the life or the friendships. They're just not working. You cannot sit on these things forever. Confronting them an be so difficult. I mean, look at me. I basically went into a cave for a year- *laughs* And had the most socially awkward time ever dealing with it. And it was so difficult but I cannot tell you how free it felt afterwards. So that's definitely something I want everybody listening to this to take away.

[Interviewer:] Did you look at the comments on the video? And if you did, what were they like?

[Dan:] Yeah. I mean, I try not to- *laughs* You know, see what people are saying about me too much but I did. It was all very nice and as I say, you know, I wish I would've done it earlier in my life but I don't think I could've done it earlier in my life. And I didn't. And that was for a reason. I just couldn't have. I just wasn't in the place to. I did it when I did and thankfully we're in a world now that's so much better. And my audience that I have is so kind and loving and accepting. Because you know, I cultivated a following of people that liked me being open about mental health and sharing the most awkward, stupid stories from my life. So when I shared the biggest thing, what was there waiting for me was a community of people that were there to be supportive. And that was just- You know, I feel so lucky that I had that really positive experience. So just like the depression video, people were saying, "I feel seen by this." Or, "I now finally understand what it's like for gay people in a way that I didn't before. I can talk to my mum. I can show my mum this. I'm straight and I had no idea. This is amazing." And just to see that a byproduct of me being honest about myself managed to help people- It really, you know, it helps! *laughs* Cause it's safe to say that I've struggled a lot. I'm someone that is very, very good at beating myself up. I don't ever taking a win. People always say that about me. If something goes very well, they'll be like, "How'd it go Dan?" And I was like, "Yeah, yeah. It was alright." "What do you mean? It went great?" And I was like, "Yeah, yeah! It's fine." *laughs* So yeah definitely, I feel very lucky it's gone as well as it did.

[Interviewer:] You're an ambassador for YoungMinds as well and you know, you're obviously speaking out, "Hey!" And for your YouTube videos. Do you think there is still a stigma particularly attached to young people and mental health?

[Dan:] I think that definitely young people- When you get into teenage years, everyone's very defensive and they're very aggressive. And I think that a lot of people go into- Especially the school environment feeling scared. They don't want to be judged by other people. They don't want to seem weak. They're proactively feeling scared and defensive and aggressive to protect themselves from being harmed by people cause you're just so scared. So definitely. People don't want to admit that they have anxiety. I think that young queer people might not feel like you know, "I can't do this now. It's not worth the risk." And I think that the YoungMinds charity, which is part of the Royal Foundation that Harry and Will support, does such amazing jobs cause they not only create material to help young people understand, "If you're feeling like this, you might have anxiety. That's not normal. And here's how to help." But they also reach out to parents to say, "This is how you can observe these things that may be happening in your family and realize it may be silent. It may not be talking about it. It may be this huge issue happening right in front of you." And as well, they're helping the schools cause I think it's definitely safe to say that schools could do it a lot better in protecting mental health of the young people that go to them. So it's definitely one of the off shoots of me opening up about depression. Being apart of this amazing charity that does such great work. It helps me sleep at night.

[Interviewer:] And we'll hear, um, about an appeal actually to raise money for mental health including Mind and YoungMinds in a minute. It's so important, isn't it? That they exist. That they're even out there for us.

[Dan:] It's a lifeline for people because I think that anyone who struggled with any mental health issue listening to this would know that that one conversation- That first conversation. First olive branch that you get reaching out to you. That could be what saves your life. So it may feel like, "Oh, we've talked about this enough. Doesn't everyone know about mental health right now?" And there may be someone listening to this that's going, "You know what? That's me. I've got that thing that I haven't shared yet. I need to have that conversation. I need to have that one moment where someone listens to me, acknowledges how I feel." And definitely, it's just such a huge part of everyone's life. And it's completely silent. There's still so much more to do.

[Interviewer:] I hate this word, Dan, but I'm gonna say it. It sounds like you've been on a real journey. *laughs* I can't think of a better word.

[Dan:] *laughs* Oh no. I've been full hobbit there and back again, yeah. It's been a real around the world adventure. And you can watch it all on the internet, god.

[Interviewer:] I wonder if you could talk about kind of just the lowest point but then the kind of real highs. Cause then, at the moment, it sounds like you're in a really good place.

[Dan:] I mean, I'm definitely in a better place. I think that none of us should ever feel like we've solved all our issues and we're fine. You know, that was me, age 22. I was like, "Cool! Apparently I've got depression. That's fine. I know what to do it." It's like no, you need to- You need to make an effort. You need to really think about all the things in your life. You need to talk to a doctor. I think that, you know, for me- My lowest point was definitely when I was teenager. There was a point where I actually tried to take my own life because the struggles that I had with my sexuality were just so extreme within my friend group and school and everything that I was hearing from the world. I just really felt like, "I'm broken. This is not right." I looked at the world around me and I thought, "There's nowhere to go. There's nowhere else. I know everything." So it was that impulse impulse is what I think people in this situation feel. Where they just think, "This isn't about anyone and this isn't a rational decision, but I just feel like there's nowhere to go. And I need to hit the escape hatch." And I was so wrong because as I got older and time progressed, I just realized that the world is so big. And even if you feel like you're trapped in a situation, time can change everything. And if I just knew how much the world would change. How much my life would change. Not just with my career, but just moving to a different city. Meeting new people. I wasn't stuck. There was nothing like that and that was definitely the lowest point. And I feel so glad that I managed to make through that time. And the fact that you know, I made it through all these years and- *laughs* This journey that I went on. Kind of very publicly. Going from like- I think I even made a YouTube video just before I got a job at Radio One saying, "I'm going to drop out of Law School to try to make it as an entertainer." And everyone at the time was like, "You're an idiot. What are you doing? What?!" *laughs* Cause this before anyone had a career on the internet, you know? They were like, "Okay,so the BBC wants to give you this job. That's kind of cool. But are you sure you don't want to be a lawyer? That seems cool." My granddad was not happy.

[Interviewer:] I'm bet. *laughs*

[Dan:] You can see this whole journey and you know, from doing everything I did with Radio One to writing a book and to end up in a position where me just going on the journey that I need to go on personally ends up being shared with the world- That can do something for other people is just a bonus that makes me feel just really happy. Not just personally, but for the state that the world is in.

[Interviewer:] Aw Dan, it's been so nice chatting to you today. Thank you so much for your time.

[Dan:] It's been really nice. It's been like a therapy session. It's very cathartic! [Interviewer:] That's good! I'm for me. Great! Dan, thanks so much.

[Dan:] Thank you very much. Have a nice day, everyone.

#dan and phil #daniel howell #danisnotonfire #dan howell

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The six actresses also candidly discuss what outsiders get wrong about acting, juggling work and family and how #MeToo has changed the culture for the next generation: "We're getting all the bad stuff out of the way."

A fiesta grandmother. A persecuted jazz icon. A grieving mother. A sexual assault avenger. A pioneering scientist. A girlfriend scorned.

On a mid-December morning, six actresses behind some of the year's most dynamic performances came together for The Hollywood Reporter's Actress Roundtable: Hillbilly Elegy's Glenn Close, The United States vs. Billie Holiday's Andra Day, Pieces of a Woman's Vanessa Kirby, Promising Young Woman's Carey Mulligan, Ammonite's Kate Winslet and Malcolm & Marie's Zendaya. The group, who gathered via video conference from homes and sets in L.A., Montana, Atlanta and the U.K., discussed the business side of acting, their weirdest pandemic habits, the dangerous Hollywood misconception about creative genius — and the fact that "how women's voices are being received [is] the biggest thing that has shifted."

Let's dive in. What's the most surprising thing you learned about yourself during the pandemic?

VANESSA KIRBY I learned a lot about silence. I hadn't realized quite how much "doing" I was doing. Somehow I hadn't quite realized that, when you're still, it's just as present, you know what I mean? And I think it's taught me to do less. I don't think anything else would have taught me that in the way this year has done.

KATE WINSLET I became, and still am, actually, utterly obsessed with sweeping my kitchen floor. But down to the point where if there's just even dog hair, and our dog is a golden retriever, so it's blond hair, but I've got this microscopic vision where I can see the dog hair gathering in tiny little cracks, between the dishwasher and the sink, and I'll be like, "There's dog hair, somebody, quick, get me the broom." I've just become obsessed. And I didn't really care about things like that particularly before. Don't get me wrong, I like to run a nice home, but sweeping the kitchen floor? I mean, who cares about that? So I've become a bit strange about the kitchen floor.

ZENDAYA For me, it's that I never really got to know who I was without work. I've always been working. I started working when I was so young, and I've always just had a consistent thing happening in my life. I just had never spent that much time with myself. I was like, "What makes me happy? What do I like to do other than work? Do I have any hobbies?" I basically get to do my hobby for a living. So it's like, "What else do I even like?" Facing that was interesting for sure.

What is something people often get wrong about acting?

WINSLET I've been doing this job now for, I realize, 27 years or something. I can't quite believe that, but I do find myself getting almost agitated when I feel I have to explain just how hard the job truly is … I don't think people understand that preparation can take up to four, five, sometimes even six months depending on the kind of role you're playing. And also how absent, I think, you are from your family. Even if they might physically be with you — which, in my case is nine times out of 10, I'm fortunate that they are — but emotionally I know that I'm gone. I'm just not there, I'm not just Mummy, I'm not just Ned [Smith]'s wife — suddenly, I'm this other being. And I do find that part quite upsetting sometimes, and I wish I had more of a balance with that.

CAREY MULLIGAN There's a bit of an idea, and maybe more even within the industry, that to make something great, people have permission to behave badly, the idea of someone being a creative genius … that they are so inspired, there's a required level of darkness or unpleasantness that goes along with that, that you need to put up with. And I think people get away with bad behavior because of those reasons. In my experience, some of the most incredible people I've worked with have just been also the most delightful. So that's kind of a common misconception, that there are people who have to behave badly to psych themselves up at work, or that the process is just sort of utterly miserable. I think you can work really hard, but ultimately … the attitude on set should be one of warmth.

ZENDAYA It also is a business, which is something I've had to learn as a young person. Because often you get into it just because you love it, and you just want to be creative, and you just want to do the fun stuff, but it is also a business. There are contracts involved and a lot of things that don't necessarily contribute to the creativity or contribute to this idea of the freedom you think you'll have. I have been learning that as I grow up that there are bigger entities involved … money people … I often encourage young people who do want to do this to read your contracts, be aware, have those conversations, ask as many questions as you can, try to get advice from people, because it's easy to get stuck in a bad situation. And having that knowledge is really, really important.

GLENN CLOSE A lot of people think that anyone can do it. And of course, there have been documentaries and even some movies of people who are not trained as actors — I think that can happen in movies. I really take my craft seriously, and I think people don't know what they're talking about when they think that anyone could do it. I once had a brain surgeon who was the father of one of my daughter's middle school friends … He asked if he could come over and pick my brain about something. And so I said, "Sure," and he came over and he said, "I find being a brain surgeon depressing, I really want to be an actor."

WINSLET Oh my God.

CLOSE And it was all I could do to not throw him out of my house. He said, "But I have to make a living, so how do I do it?" It was astounding to me that he would have such an ignorant idea of what acting was. So I think, for longevity, it is a craft, and I take great pride. There's always something new to learn every day, but it is something that really does count. When you task yourself with becoming, looking through the eyes of another person and telling a story that will have emotional impact, that is craft.

Andra, how did you go about finding the voice of Billie Holiday?

ANDRA DAY Well, first she is very familiar to me just because she is my foremost musical inspiration. I worked with this amazing dialect coach, Thom Jones … Through the breath, that was a huge thing. I remember him always talking about, "Where it is coming from? How is she breathing?" And the emotional part of it as well, too. I look at Billie Holiday's voice as a scroll. And on her voice is written her entire history, every time she had been raped, every time she had been hit, every time she had victoriously sang "Strange Fruit," every time she smoked a cigarette and every time she slammed heroin or did a speedball. Everything is written onto her voice. It was also important for me not to do an impersonation. And that's something [director] Lee [Daniels] spoke to me about, too, we don't want to impersonate her, but sort of bring me through her. … I feel the same way about acting, that not everyone can do it. To be honest with you, I did not think that I could do it, and I'm still a little on the fence about it.

I don't think after seeing this film anyone will have any question about whether you can do it. Let's talk a bit about physical transformation for a character. Glenn, in Hillbilly Elegy, you're physically transformed. How did finding the look of that character help you?

CLOSE I began personally not wanting to be distracted by my own face. I wanted to have very subtle differences so that it was an experience, that you get into the full hair and makeup and costume, and there she is, because she's very different from who I was. But we started with a portrait of Mamaw and just the glasses, the hair, the ears, I changed my nose a little bit. And it was very, very finessed work to make it subtle enough that it wasn't me, but not so … I didn't want people to say, "Oh, there's Glenn Close with a really bad nose." That took a lot of wonderful collaboration coming up with that. We had video, we talked to members of her family who were incredibly generous in talking about her. And I asked just very specific questions: "How did she walk, how did she hold her cigarette? How did she sit? What did she wear?" which is basically what you see in the movie. She was very much a larger-than-life character. "What was her atmosphere when she came into a room?" I mean, all those kinds of things that just was a slow buildup [from] the moment you walk on for hair and makeup, and you feel that there she is.

MULLIGAN With Promising Young Woman, [director] Emerald [Fennell] is very intentional about building a world that felt very enticing. You wanted to build a film that you wanted to see, not something you needed to or should see. Part of the way that Emerald first presented the film to me was this Candyland environment that you're in and that Cassie lived in that in the way that she clothes herself. She's somebody who is very practiced at living with her rage and her sadness and her grief. She's figured out that hiding in plain sight and looking like someone who's functioning, people tend to leave her alone. It's very deliberate that she has candy-colored nails and blond hair. First of all, she looks very unthreatening, so no one would ever suspect that she's about to destroy a life, but also she's someone that you don't need to check on. You can leave her alone … Her main everyday look was just a way of saying, "I'm absolutely fine. You don't need to look at me because I'm just generic, and a girl, and you don't need to take me seriously." Because we so often trivialize the way girls and women clothe themselves. It was just a very easy way of putting up a boundary between her and the rest of the world.

WINSLET Everything about [Ammonite subject, paleontologist] Mary Anning is so, so held and so internalized. I had to learn how to do quite a lot of acting with my posture, or the back of head, or the backs of my hands, or just sometimes my eyeballs. I had to really find a different rhythm for myself, because I'm a very animated person … The longer that you do this, the more familiar audiences become with your mannerisms and how you are or how you sound. I just try to remove everything of myself, and there were days when I would think, "Well, did I do anything or did I just do nothing today?" And it would be really disconcerting, but just finding a completely quiet, physical stillness and heaviness to Mary came hand in hand with the costuming of her and the look of her and making her hair a little bit gray and having no makeup.

Vanessa, you have a harrowing, more than 20-minute childbirth sequence in your film. Can you talk about what that was like to shoot and how you prepared for that?

KIRBY It was kind of terrifying, because I haven't given birth or been pregnant before. We have seen so many deaths onscreen, we've rarely seen birth … I ended up writing to a lot of obstetricians asking if they'd let me come in and shadow them. One said yes, so I went to a hospital in North London and was on the labor ward for many days, which was quite unbelievable for me. I learned a lot from the midwives about what the whole birthing experience is like. One afternoon, my very last afternoon at hospital, one of the midwives came round and said, "Oh, a woman's just come in and she's 9 centimeters dilated. And I'm going to ask if she'd mind you watching." I just thought, "There's no way in hell she's ever going to agree to have some random person sit in and watch this really sacred moment of her life." But she did, she said yes, and so I got to sit with her and watch her go through six hours of … I mean, it was just probably the most profound afternoon of my life. I never, ever could have acted it without watching her, because I saw her go on this unbelievable journey, and I saw the animal in her take over. And it was only because of that, really, that I then felt like maybe I had a chance at attempting it. When we came to it … it was so physical and it was such a primal body thing. We did four takes the first day, two the second, and I think the fourth one is the one in the movie. It was a bit like doing a play, really, where once you're on, you're on, and you can't stop. And there was something magic about that, because you couldn't spend any time doubting yourself, you just have to do it.

Zendaya, when you were making Malcolm & Marie, it was really in the height of the pandemic. Can you talk about how working in that environment shaped how you worked and how the set functioned?

ZENDAYA Obviously, we wanted to do everything as safely as possible, so we created a bubble. I was putting my own money into it, as was everyone else. We were living in a hotel that was empty. It was just us, because everything was shut down. We were in the middle of Carmel, and we shot in this home that was in the middle of nowhere. We weren't allowed to leave for obvious reasons, and in that time of quarantining together, we were allowed the time to work on the material. When we got there, the script was only about 70 pages, and there wasn't a third act. Through that process of every day just being together, sometimes in a parking lot, just working through every moment and having these really long discussions about ourselves, our characters, relationships … Being able to have that time, that space with each other to figure it out, was really, really helpful. And really not having any other distraction, just being in it every single day.

We only had two actors, a very small, small crew. So we're all doing like four different jobs. I'm doing my hair and makeup and using some of my clothes, trying to remember my continuity because we don't have any ADs or scripties [script supervisors] or anything.

Vanessa, you've been shooting the Mission: Impossible sequel. Is there a lot of pressure to maintain safety on these big sets? How does it feel different?

KIRBY My sister's an AD. She started on a movie in the summer, so I kind of learned from her what the new parameters would be and how to navigate. And I was so hopeful when she went back, actually, because it was a funny feeling, I think, for everybody suddenly seeing cinemas closed. All the people that you love and you work with are unable to work in so many different capacities, including my sister. It gave me a lot of faith. But, I mean, you get used to it. There are obviously many guidelines, there are masks and lots of testing and things like that. But it gives me faith in the resilience, actually. And I feel like we will get through it — I can't wait for the day when cinemas are going to open again.

I was skeptical when the #MeToo movement began that there would be any kind of lasting change for women in Hollywood. But now we have more female directors, we have intimacy coordinators, Harvey Weinstein is in prison. Some things that I thought I would not see have come to pass. I'm curious, what has been the biggest change for you, personally, since the #MeToo movement started?

WINSLET The thing that is shifting in ways that will absolutely be long lasting is how women's voices are being received. There is a space that has been created for a younger generation that is going to be safe. My daughter is 20, and she just came into the industry about a year and a half ago. And what's wonderful for me, as her mum, is just watching her have a courage of conviction and self-belief that is just unwavering, because she's entering a time when we're clearing the shit away from them, these girls. These girls are going to change the world, and they're going to be strong, and they're going to be powerful, and they're going to be fucking amazing. And that is because we're getting all the bad stuff out of the way for them and all they will know is to use their voice in positive, powerful ways, to lead with compassion, to be strong role models and friends. And that, to me, is the biggest thing that has shifted.

This is the decade of women championing and supporting other women without judgment. This is happening right now, and that has come as a result of the mass united swell that has emerged from #MeToo. We've all come together, everyone is holding hands and walking in the same direction. And, for me, that is the single most exciting thing that is coming out of the awfulness of the past five years and those extraordinary women coming forward and sharing their painful, awful stories, and the horrendous Harvey Weinstein. The time now is about leading in a different way. Young women being able to lead with courage — in a way that I feel I certainly didn't have, that sense of courage and companionship with my peers, in a way that I think #MeToo has done for this generation of women.

This year, we saw the explosion of the Black Lives Matter movement globally. And at the time it happened, a lot of media companies were issuing statements, making large donations. Do you think there will be lasting changes from that movement as well? Three years from now, will we be talking the way we're talking now about #MeToo in terms of concrete things changing?

DAY My hope is yes. And I hope that it spawns lasting change that moves faster than it has moved in the past. I'm hoping that this is an uprooting of this idea of, "OK, pace yourself, we need to make sure we make people comfortable." That's really not how you achieve lasting change. We can't survive like this, we will not survive. It ends in what? Our destruction, it ends in war, it ends in just unrest.

That was one of the things even on set, there were a few moments that were really quite disturbing, for the cast and me. We were shooting a movie that takes place in the '40s and in the '50s. And there were moments on set that we realized, "Oh, wow, that has not changed." It may have transformed, it may look a little different, lynching looks different, but it's not changed. Truth is going to be a huge, huge, huge factor in seeing lasting change, and sustaining, and transforming, and changing a generation.

As Kate talked about, with the younger generation, I think they have such a need for transparency that will actually be very helpful. Part of doing the movie, the Billie Holiday story, was that the truth of her story had never been told, because the truth of her story was intentionally kept from the public. The respinning of narratives for people of color, or for marginalized people, or for women, has been a constant technique of oppression. And I think that's going to be hugely important moving forward: We have to pop the top off of these things. And we have to tell the truth about them, and understand the scope of certain groups of people, people of color, why the scope of their pain has been minimized or retold.

The retelling of these stories also has to do with telling the truth, some of the gritty, ugly truth about maybe some of our heroes. We have to say, "OK, this isn't for the purpose of destroying people, but we need to know these truths so we can actually move forward and not repeat them."

CLOSE I just have to say I'm sitting here and I'm so inspired by what everyone has been saying. It's quite overwhelming, it's so articulate and so beautiful what everyone has said.

WINSLET Well, we've got you to look up to, Glenn.

CLOSE I can't tell you, it's very moving to me to hear all this. I've been an actress for 46 years, and when I think of the change, the monumental changes that in my short time that I have witnessed, the expectation is going to be phenomenal when we finally can get back to doing what we are here to do. I think there's going to be an overwhelming amount of stories and new ways of telling stories.

What will you do differently in 2021?

MULLIGAN The first thing that came into my mind was that I'm going to go to the theater as much as I can, and the cinema. As soon as we can, I'm going to sit around people and watch something together with them. It just shocked me how much I missed that. I watched a medley of musical theater on television a couple of weeks ago, and it just made me cry. I just want to be a part of that. So it sounds quite trivial, but I think that is something I'm looking most forward to.

WINSLET You know, I never give time to myself at all, really, I don't. People will so often say to me, "Oh, you need to get a massage." And I think, "What? Don't got time for that." So actually, I just have enjoyed, quite honestly, just going really easy on myself. If I had a week where I think, "Oh, I've probably had too much toast. Oh, well." Or, "Oh, well, maybe I should do some more exercise. Oh, maybe I'll do that next week." I'm just kind of learning to go, "Oh, it doesn't matter." It doesn't matter. Life's too short, just enjoy this time, and it doesn't matter about all that crap. I think I'd like to hang on to a bit of that, actually. Because it's easy in this job to have to live by certain disciplines, whether it's just sleep patterns or times that you eat, for example. And actually just letting go of all of that has been really such a joy. Not enforcing any degree of sort of stress or structure on stuff. I've loved all that. So I hopefully I'll carry that on.

CLOSE I came here where I live now [Montana] because my three siblings are here, and I had spent my whole adult life away from them. And we're now in the same town. So, for me, work is so I can come back home. It's kind of changed things, it's not like I'm waiting at home until I go to work. It's really, really valuing the work, because it means that I'll be able to come home.

Interview edited for length and clarity.

#Vanessa Kirby #Pieces of a Woman #Glenn Close #Kate Winslet #Carey Mulligan #Interviews #Roundtable #Videos

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detroit-become-human-analyze · 4 years

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Is Daniel/Simon (PL600) a sexual companion like North or a Traci?

Analyzing the game again, a controversy has sparked because of this picture, so let’s take a look at how much of “canon” (real game canon) might or not be behind it:

Now, we see this PL-500 picture that clearly states that, although “romantic mode” is optional, the PL-500 is intended as a intimate (sexual) partner, and if one thing we’ve notice from the androids in this game is that the first two letters usually determine “the category” (just like RK are military/police, or the YK are children). And there are two major characters on the game that are later versions of this “PL-500”, and that is the PL-600 Daniel and Simon, that although are described as “household/caretakers/companions”, it’s never specified up to what point.., and possibly the fact that they can cook meals and care for your kids is actually the NEW feature, as PLs where originally sexual/romantic companions on previous models.

This is never actually “explicit” but it’s weirdly hinted during the entire game. - So, we mostly see Daniel, a PL-600 android during the chapter “The Hostage” (witch is also the demo of the game) and maybe a bit of him (depending on what you do) at the end on the chapter “Last Chance Connor”, but we can all conclude that Daniel life was at the house of the Phillips.

At first glance everything was good at the Phillips house, and, there’s even this very nice picture of them as soon as you get off the elevator with Connor.

Connor is given very little time to determinate the best approach to rescue the hostage (Emma) from their now deviant android Daniel.

One of the first interesting things I’ve noticed, despite the fact that the Phillips are actually quite rich to be living in such an apartment (during such rough economic times in Detroit, as Kara sees it on the trip at the beginning, on Todd car), is that the mother never, EVER says ANYTHING about her dead husband. Never laments or screams or even mentions it (her husband is right there dead on the living-room, I mean...), Caroline Phillips (little Emma’s mother) is only focus on saving her daughter, and spitefully says “keep that thing away from my daughter” referring Connor, but we all assume her hate is shared to all androids (witch it’s odd, she owns one that even plays with her daughter).

This very vaguely hints the mother of the house has a quarrel with androids (for some reason) from BEFORE the incident at hand, and when you go see Captain Allen, you walk into the main bedroom.

One thing that caught my eye is that, despite having a household android, it’s nighttime and the incident has being occurring -since one hour- before Connor arrival (meaning an hour ago wasn’t the morning either, you see this on the news on the fridge area), AND, for some reason, the bed sheets are all messed up on the parent’s bedroom.

If you (Connor) analyze/re-construct where Daniel got the gun of the father, you see he never touches the bed when he goes for the gun.

I doubt Captain Allen is letting his SWAT team fool around in the bed, so that’s discarded.

The father of the family (the now “late” John Phillips) has being watching TV and using the tablet to order another android... so... why are the sheets on the parent’s bedroom undone?

If the wife was suffering depression or simply “in bed”, she would have seen Daniel go into the room in panic and get/load the gun right in front of her.

This indicates that possibly the mother was either out of the house at the moment of the event, or somewhere else (the bathroom, etc).

If you examine Emma’s room you will see that she was listening to music, as Connor concludes that this is why Emma didn’t heard the shooting, again, the mother must have being out, if not, she would have heart the entire thing... but there is a darker twist as to why Emma might have being with her music full on... Yes, there is a high provability that John Phillips, “dear old dad”, was having sex with Daniel in the bedroom next door, and there is a grater chance that obviously this was “a regular thing”. Therefore a broken relationship with his wife and that “rich people perfect family photo” was just a charade, thus, also, why “mom was out of the house”. - Even if all evidence is circumstantial, it just fits right in too fast and too perfectly to ignore in a game that pays so much attention to details and talks so much about abusive relationships and dysfunctional families.

Connor can reconstruct events but not “audio”, if you examine the late John Phillips body, you will see that Daniel stood up behind him and they actually had “a talk” BEFORE Daniel starts shooting.

By the food that was left overcooking in the kitchen, the bet is that “dad” had it with Daniel at the main bedroom (maybe even realizing at that point that having sex with the same android was “getting boring”, thus, since they obviously have the money, start considering buying another “sex android toy”).

Then Daniel went to do dinner, oversaw the same men that just had sex with him ordering another “replacement” android, got pissed off like a lover would (this is very common actually, a couple or sexual/romantic partner shooting the other if they know that they’ll being left for “someone else”), run to the bedroom, takes the gun, confronts John (his lover) verbally, Daniel finally snaps, shots him to death, and then runs (like a mother would), to get Emma.

Possibly THAT was the moment where Caroline Phillips returned to the apartment and Daniel saw/heard the elevator blocked, so he head outside.

Now, another interesting thing is that Daniel has a very close relationship with Emma (the little girl), almost “motherly like”, up to the point in witch after shooting the dad, the first thing he can think of is taking Emma (much like Kara when shooting Todd and gets Alice).

Sure, then in desperation and confusion, is shoot by the first cop that arrives and everything escalates “pretty quickly”, but any mother would tell you that after a traumatic event, the first thing you get with you is your kids.

This talks a lot about how Daniel at least “felt” he was indeed one of Emma’s parents, he has a mother instinct until Emma starts to reject him due to the situation and he realized that the girl doesn’t see him the way “he sees her”, feeling all the more betrayed.

* On a side note:

If you see where Daniel and Emma video (tablet, Emma’s room) was taken, you will see the background well enough to realize it’s the same park that Markus cross every time he goes to get paintings for Carl Manfred. - As we established before, Markus is a “patient zero” regarding deviancy.

Markus has the “virus” of deviancy (possibly implanted by Kamski itself before giving him as a “gift” to Carl Manfred), and unaware of it, spreads it to any android near him (remember the “androids are constantly shearing information, and during Freedom March, when Markus becomes aware of his ability, he can turn deviants from almost a couple blocks away from his location).

Then, if the infected android gets into a traumatic or emotional event, the “symptoms” of deviation occur. - Thus, there is a high chance that Markus infected Daniel with deviancy without even noticing when crossing the park one day, and the detonating stressful emotional trauma was later on when Daniel saw, what he obviously considered “his family” replacing him.

Simon, being also a PL-600, has also relevant behaviors to that matter, especially regarding Markus.

For instance, it’s only him and North the only ones who can “give Markus their heart” (source of power, AKA “battery”) if Markus gets wounded during the violent final protest. - This is interesting because while North might or not have an “intimate relationship” with Markus at that point, and Simon validates his point by “if you (Markus) die, our cause dies with you” kind of thing, he does seems a lot emotionally involved, and, plus... Why isn’t there a scene where, let’s say, equally important character like Josh, offers to sacrifice himself too for the good of the cause??? (let’s say you never develop a relationship with North, you let Simon die at some point, and, North being an egocentric psycho-maniac that only wants to “kill and burn”, I guess Josh would have had more chances to give his life for “the cause”).

* By the way, North has NO excuse, I’ve already explained this before, she killed (strangled) the human that “rent her” (so her immediate abuser is already dead), but also she wants to kill all other humans as well, AND!, she is quickly to say “let’s kill androids too”, so... other androids are North “victims” too, either it’s because she wants to fight and they’re being slaughter, or because “Shoot Simon!” (when, there where a lot other options).

By the way, this scene where Simon gets shot at the roof is one that makes you wonder, developers (as it’s obvious in the EdenClub chapter and Hank later reflections over it, as if it was a future where all sexuality is embraced as normal), have no issue regarding the sexual orientation of any character (if per-se’ androids are genderless and only assigned a gender to look like humans making interactions more comfortable). - If you take the gun and follow North “orders” to shoot Simon on the roof, you’ll be given a second chance to reconsider things, as Simon reminds you that “there is always another way”, but it’s up to you (Markus). - If you decide to put the gun down (disappointing North lust for blood of any color), next time this two characters meet, they hug each other very warmly, ...witch isn’t odd given that Markus thought that Simon was death and left behind... but still, quite an emotional response, because this isn’t Kara and Alice “hugging all the time”.

Add to this, during the Freedom March, Simon, being basically “the coward” throughout the whole game and avoiding conflict, if Markus gets shot (and you don’t have any other androids that came with you from the where house of Cyberlife), jumps into the fight like crazy and even dies for Markus at that point. - This goes basically against every fiber of Simon good judgment and behavior traits from the star, he is always scared and passive, even pessimistic regarding the android revolution although it supports it.

Conclusions:

Overall there aren’t hard evidence, there isn’t a “fools-proof” signature telling you any of this things, but when too many circumstantial evidence piles up, you also have a case...

The entirety of the situation with Daniel might be interpreted differently, if you stretch things up, to a more “innocent like” explanation (that I personally don’t see how could fit at this point). And trust me, this blog is for analyzing the main canon of the official game, if there was any other feeling or evidence, I would point it out... but some things are beyond any explaining, like why the bed is all messed up at night if you have a domestic android just to take care of stuff like that (even Kara makes Todd’s bed).

So, for me, the first chapter (or “demo”) sums up the end of an abusive relationship on a love triangle that torn apart a marriage and a family (like even Magazines during the game indicate, that because of “sex androids” couples where getting divorced).

But tell me what you think or if you have found any other evidence that points out otherwise!

#dbh daniel #dbh simon #dbh sex android #dbh headcanons #dbh cannon #pl500 #pl600 #simon #daniel #the hostage

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365days365movies · 3 years

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March 5, 2021: The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2013) (Part Two)

Am I going to watch Kaguya-sama again after this?

It is a funny show, so I’m probably gonna watch a compilation or something. Anyway, where was I? OH RIGHT! The Tale of Princess Kaguya, Recap Part Two! This movie is beautiful so far, and I’m enjoying this adaptation of the classic story reinterpreted. Told the girlfriend about this, and she mentioned one of her favorite games: Okami.

It’s based quite heavily on Japanese mythology, and also has a similar aesthetic to this movie. Rumors persist that they’ll be rebooting this, so fingers crossed! Anyway, let’s get back to the movie! First part of the Recap is right here!

Recap (2/3)

After the dream/return to the palace, Hime seems to accept her fate as Princess Kaguya, and is no longer the rebellious and rambunctious kid she was before. And yes, I’ll be referring to her as Kaguya from now on...until the time is right. She studies (and suffers) in silence, clearly unhappy and depressed.

Miyatsuki either doesn’t understand it, or is completely ignorant of her suffering. He brings her a pet bird to keep, which she somewhat brushes off. However, she lets the bird go, as if wishing she could fly away with it.

But time once again passes, and Kaguya grows more beautiful, and the rumors of this beauty spread. People gather outside to palace to get a glimpse of her, and Miyatsuki has made sure to never show her face publicly. Her servant, Me no Warawa (Hynden Walch) is accosted outside of the palace, with a pile of messages and letters for her. She also brings cherry blossoms to the essentially captive Kaguya, for which she is thankful.

Words of her beauty and bamboo-based origins are also spread by Akita to a group of five suitors, all of whom are completely entranced. These five suitors are a classic part of the story, and are also represented in the recent anime based upon it (Kaguya-sama: Love is War).

The five suitors LITERALLY race there, spurred on by Akita’s...really horny speech,not gonna lie, dude says that this (13-year old) girl got his “juices flowing”, real fuckin’ quote there. Guuuh. Anyway, Miyatsuki and Sagami are overjoyed, as marrying any of these dudes is a guarantee for a happy and prosperous life. But Kaguya...is honestly surprised that she’s supposed to be happy. FUCK, MAN.

She’s SUPER not interested in these guys, but they are ridiculously interested in her. She meets them in honor of her father, but not on her own behalf. They present their proposals to her, and I’ll introduce them in order! First up, Prince Kuramochi (Beau Bridges), an older man of great wealth who basically compares her to a jeweled tree branch on the mountain of Hourai. Cool? In the anime, he’s translated into the best character in the series, game and ramen lover Fujiwara Chika.

Second is Prince Ishidzukuri no Miko (James Marsden), who’s already completely fucked because James Marsden is voicing him, and he basically only plays characters destined to be cucked. Check out my recap of The Notebook for more on that. He pledges to worship her, and compares her to the Stone Begging Bowl of Buddha. In the anime, he’s translated into uptight rules-follower Miko Iino.

Ishidzukuri’s comparison is mocked by number three, Abe no Miushi, Lord Minister of the Right (Oliver Platt), a corpulent man that compares her to...a robe of fire-rat fur. You’re comparing her...to rat hair clothes? Um...wow, dude, that’s legit insulting. No wonder you don’t have a counterpart in the anime yet.

Suitor number four, Grand Counselor Ootomo no Miyuki (Daniel Dae Kim) agrees with me that that’s a SHITTY comparison, and instead compares her to the Five-Colored Jewel around a Dragon’s Neck. His counterpart in the anime is the main love interest, Miyuki Shirogane. Yeah, sort of rigged in his favor in the show. It’s based on it, not a true adaptation.

And lastly is the sullen Middle Counselor Isonokami no Maro (John Cho), who compares her to a cowry shell from a swallow’s nest, which ensures safety in childbirth. And his counterpart is the equally sullen and video-game loving Yu Ishigami, another one of the best characters in the series.

OK, enough about the anime, yeah? Sorry, I just...I just really like it. Anyway, the suitors’ comparisons give Kaguya an idea. She plays the koto for the men, which entrances them (and me, it’s a gorgeous sound), and she thanks them for the sentiment. However, for her hand in marriage, they will need to bring her each of the treasures they compared her to. After all, they compared her to rare treasures, meaning that she is also not easy to obtain. By doing this, they show that they are worthy of that treasure. NICE.

The men leave, noting that it was quite impossible to get these treasures, and that Kaguya is a rare jewel that no one will capture. Objectifying, but OK. When they leave, everybody around the castle leaves as well. Which, to be fair, was exactly what Hime wanted.

Sagami is PIIIIIIIIIIISED, and quits. Miyatsuki’s not exactly chuffed either. But Hime’s finally free, and goes out of the palace with her mother and Warawa to see the city and the cherry blossom trees. Good for her. ‘Bout time she had some fun and joy in her life.

It’s cut off VERY fast, however, when she encounters a family of commoners, who only recognize her as nobility and nothing further. Realizing how separate she now is from them as they bow to her, she breaks a little. And they leave to go back to the city. While getting back there, though, who should she run into but Sutemaru, who’s just stolen a chicken. She calls to him, and he stops and recognize her...but they leave and he’s caught. And Hime cries.

Time passes. Three years, to be specific, as they actually tell us this time. Hime’s still close to her mother, as they still garden together in the back. However, relationships with her father are less great. He comes in and tells her that the first suitor, Kuramochi, has come back with the jeweled branch after all this time. Hime can’t believe it.

Kuramochi comes in with the jeweled branch, which dazzles brilliantly. Kaguya asks how he found it. He weaves a dramatic tale of happening upon the mountain and the branch. As this takes place, though, a local craftsman comes by to collect his fee for...making the branch. And now that he’s made, the cheap-ass Prince takes the fuck off.

Next up is Abe, the rat skin guy, with fire-rat robe in hand. Kaguya calls his bluff, though, and tells him to drop that shit in the fire. If it’s real, then it won’t burn, and the two will marry forthwith. And that shit BURNS. Which sucks, because dude thought it was real, and spent literally ALL of his money on it.

Afterwards, in a conversation between Hime and Waraka, it’s revealed that Miyuki’s actually going to get the Dragon Pearl, and we see that in a gorgeous sequence. It doesn’t go well.

Meanwhile, Ishidzukuri drops by, having brought something for Kaguya. It’s not the bowl promised to her, but is instead a sweet little flower. He admits that he went searching for the bowl, filled with love for Kaguya. Instead, he found a treasure of nature, the flower, and was meant to represent his devotion and the depth of his feelings for her.

And that’s actually very sweet. But he’s James Marsden, so he’s FUCKED. But she definitely seems entranced by his offer to take her some place natural and beautiful and far away. Impassioned and full of love, he lifts open the blinds and sees...his wife. GODDAMN IT JAMES MARSDEN. The cuckee becomes the cucker.

Which sucks, because she actually did fall for him there for a second. We next hear of the Counselor, sent to fetch the cowry shell. However, he tragically dies in the attempt. This knowledge shatters Hime, who rips up her private garden in absolute sorrow. Her mom, who’s genuinely the best mom, tells her not to blame herself.

Meanwhile, as all of this is happening, Princess Kaguya has the ear of the Emperor, the Mikado (Dean Cain). He wishes for Kaguya to become one of his brides, and will make her father a member of the court. Miyatsuki, ever tone-deaf to his daughter’s desires, is thrilled. But Hime refuses, to which her father says that refusal of the Emperor’s wishes is impossible. And Hime says that she will do it to make her father happy, and then she’ll kill herself immediately after the wedding.

Um...fuck. I...I think I’m giving this one a Part Three. See you there!

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axemetaphor · 3 years

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wwwhats up its 430am I cant sleep and I dont think I've ever done an annoying headcanon ramble for jdate on here so here we fuckin goooo I'm on mobile but I'm gonna try my damnedest to do a read more and if it doesnt work and looks stupid well sue me

amy is the one routinely awake before the other two. I dont mean shes always the first one to wake up, but her back pain is more likely to have her up in the early hours of the morning. shes also the only one who has anything thay resembles q sleeping schedule of the three as john is just like, completely fucked in that department and Dave's insomnia/depression-sleeping fucks him over sometimes. basically amy Has A Brain and also lost likely schedules it so that she can be falling asleep as her pain pills take effect.

amy also is the one who's like fairly into self care stuff like fuckinuhhh face masks and shit—look, I dont inow jackshit about self care, but I mean amy strikes me as the kind of person to actually maintain her appearance in a fairly regular manner. john will just like "forget" to take care of himself and then just Be Decadent for a week and then "forget" again (either going on a bender or just actually being normal for once) and all dave knows of self care is "when I get the urge to eat an entire pie, and give into that urge, That is self care"

anyways Partially because of that I headcanon Dave gets acne like Pretty Much All The Time and hes just kinda stopped caring about it. amy gets acne Sometimes because it just like Happens. john is that one lucky motherfucker who just is somehow naturally immune. perpetually clear skin on this man. I hate him

also dave Kind Of strikes me as the kind of guy fuckign "3 in 1" shampoo is targeted towards the man just Does Not Care. other girlfriends have tried to get him into actually using different kinds of soaps and not just defaulting to "3 in 1 wherever I think soap should go" but its amy who actually succeeds in breaking this terrible habit hes had.

also I think that Despite his hair being described as frizzy and all that, John actually takes care of his hair. except for times when hes Less Than Functional. and also yknow when the world is fuckin ending but I doubt anyone really has time for a haircare routine when they gotta be fighting monsters and shit

amy again is just a normal person about hair. but shes the only one who can actually cut hair and tbqh I think she does it Pretty Well! shes no professional but shes not john either that's for sure (if you let john close to your head with scissors, well— it's your funeral, man)

this is completely projecting and also like totally Useless but I just think it would be funny if Dave has exploding head syndrome. if you donf know what that is it's a phenomenon-or-something where right when you're dropping off to sleep your brain just liek idk gets bored I guess? and comes up with some phantom Loud Noises to startle the shit out of you. it's great! and by 'great' I mean terribly annoying! but in general I think Dave is a Very restless sleeper so him suddenly flinching himself awake isnt exactly Abnormal.

amy sleeps like a normal human being Mostly, I think she Might be one of those sorts who likes to sleep curled up in the fetal position which is so very valid. she gets night terrors sometimes though because ✨trauma✨. the best way to comfort her with that is a tight hug cause I feel like her Main fear would be that shes all alone again and a hug sure does help people feel less alone I think,

john either starfishes out when he sleeps (also I headcanon he likes to sleep at least Partially on top of Dave and Dave only pretends to hate it) or grabs hold of something and clings to it tightly. hes a very light sleeper, though, and snaps awake at any loud noise or especially if he gets bumped into too strongly. this doesn't always play well with Dave's restlessness and tendency to Sleep Fight but they manage.

I feel like its fairly common to Assume john has tattoos but specifically I feel like a lot of his tattoos are things he or his friends have drawn, I wrote about it Once Or Twice but maybe not here so I'll just like say it again, I think he asks his friends to draw shit on him then goes and gets it tattooed later (or, hell, right then and there lmao) and it's like a Mark of Friendship. he claims Dave has drawn the most on him because Dave's his best friend but whether or not that's true, who knows. the first one was from Dave, though, and john did it himself stick-and-poke style the night of. that happened while they were still in high school and Dave was actually Slightly Embarrassed because what he doodled was just like really stupid looking and fuckin hell john now you're gonna have that on you forever what the hell man? but the rest of John's tattoos, if not done by friends they're either things he drew (I maintain he still draws in his downtime I love the idea of artistically talented john so much-) or weird shit he found online.

I honestly didnt think Dave would really get tattoos because he does state hes afraid of needles BUT as someone Also afraid of needles who paradoxically wants tattoos .. he could probably power through it and get like A Few. one of them is from John (stick-and-poke style, again,) and I am Not actually sure how many hed have but definitely less than John. amy only has that one tattoo that I keep forgetting when I draw her godfuckendammit-

John is the one who makes the most Food Monstrosities (Dave barely even bothers to cook) and he does this by making just the worst decisions both technical-wise (as in, hes Definitely the "just turn the oven temperature up to speedrun cooking" kind of guy) and taste-wise. dave on the other hand is likely to make terrible drinks like jack daniels + mountain dew which my buddy Ben so fantastically dubbed "jack and piss." the sheer Concept of jack daniels + mtn dew tho is thanks to that one kurtis conner video about becoming a country boy which is entirely unrelated but everyone needs to know. ANYWAY.

john and Amy like playing pranks on each other (and dave). they're in an ongoing low-key prank war and Dave is Mostly just spectating but sometiems they Conspire to commit mischief against him. it's annoying sometimes but ultimately more endearing than it is annoying so he never gets Too mad.

john and Amy absolutely have Gaming Nights(tm) that sometimes include dave as well unless they wanna play some like fps game, I'm fairly sure hes said he doesnt really like those. but they also can get Competetive which, dave tends to act as a bit of a buffer to keep them from getting Too into it ... but sometimes he gets a little competitive too. what I'm trying to say is them playing mario kart is absolute chaos and also an event i woudl buy tickets to

john has a youtube channel for sure. he is So obnoxious. he hardly has any audience because let's be honest his videos kind of suck— they're all either kinda boring vlogs or him recording the cases he and Dave go on (when he can convince Dave to let him) which are almost always declared Fake by the commenters. amy is subscribed to him. dave probably doesnt even have/use his own YouTube channel so he was not subscribed until john stole his phone and did it for him. (he never watches the videos) the videos are not edited much, I dont think any of them really knows too much about video editing shit.

dave cant fuckin do math.

John and Dave do Not know how to handle crying. like Dave's learned what helps Amy, in specific, but anybody else? clueless. Dave also just does not cry very often in general (shut up lemme project again LMAO-) and tends to just refrain from doing it even if he wants to/probably should, rarely ever actually breaking down and letting it all out; he'll stop himself from getting there/even crying much in the first place. he doesn't exactly have a Reason for it or at least not one he can recite (it's the bullying. we dont get details of how that was beyond The Locker Room Incident which I wont go into but I'm just going to project the rest of it was similar to shit I went through, It's The Bullying). John also kinda Doesn't Cry and actually hes even more restrained about it than Dave, because he won't even cry around either of them if he can avoid it and if it happens he 1) will Not address it, 2) prefers no one else acknowledge it, and 3) will Run The Fuck Away if it's acknowledged. they both try Really Really Hard to help amy when shes crying though, if shes crying for a Big Reason, cause they both also understand she just cries easily and doesnt always need or want comfort.

that,s all for now BUT if I come up with mroe. there will be a reblog. also these are not all like "I am the only one who's ever tho ig ht this" or w/e a lot of them are from me talking with other people or Absorbing much older posts on here because I read Everuthing I can find.

I sure hope I can sleep soon, this is probably mostly incoherent. gnight

#jdate #john dies at the end #not sonic #rambles.txt #do i dare ? i do indeed csuse several dave headcanins here are projection #kin

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danielhowell · 6 years

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Have the courage to exist.

Hello internet.

Today, October 10th, is World Mental Health Day and as a cause very close to my heart I am releasing a new range of merch where all proceeds will go to the charity I represent - Young Minds, to help fight for young people's mental health.

In 2014 I made the video 'Existential Crisis' where I dropped the surprisingly profound quote 'Embrace the void and have the courage to exist'. This was a message that in a universe that won't give you the answers, it's up to you give your life meaning in whatever way makes you happy.

In the years since uploading this video, I've spoken to many people who have told me how those words resonated with them and inspired actions, art (and even a few tattoos) so I thought this would be the perfect way to put some goodness back into the world and give you courage when you need it.

As of now the quote is available as both a simple black (of course) t-shirt:

And a flag for you to pin up on a wall like a poster, raise on a pole ..or just wear like a cape if you feel like it:

shop.danielhowell.com

When it comes to mental health I know all too well how difficult it can be just to exist, but days like this where people come together to show support for each other and raise awareness show that none of us are alone. A year on since I posted ‘Daniel and Depression’, where I was open about my struggles with mental health, I feel so much support from people around the world and pride that what I did may have helped others. I encourage anyone reading this who sympathises not to struggle in silence and otherwise to reach out to the ones you love and tell them you are there, it could make all the difference.

I hope that you like the sentiment and please get involved to support a wonderful charity, and as I said in a recent live show - if I can make it through life to this point, so can you.

Thanks Dan

#daniel howell #world mental health day #young minds #hello yellow

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eeveemasters · 4 years

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hey, all you lovely people! full disclosure i talk a lot and i have thought about this character thoroughly when you look under that read more... oh boy... just a heads up. anywho... guess i’m the last here i see, well, that’s typical. I’m late to literally everything, although this time I do have a good excuse. i’d tell you what it is but you don’t really wanna read about me gettin’ it in all weekend and drew is my bro -like literally. we share blood. we came outta the same womb. 26 hours of labor. 19 minutes apart. our poor mother- so he def doesn’t wanna read about it and that is a swill of information about me before ya even know my name which says a lot, doesn’t it? inst-y-ways, I’m maddie and I’m Jewish, you’ll figure out why i’m putting that out there now. also hello again. i hope y’all are ready to get this party started, cause this is where it’s at! look below & hit that read more and I will tell you all about my baby girl, Eevee.

TW: DEATH, DEPRESSION, STALKER, MURDER, KIDNAPPING

★ ━ ( candice patton, cis-female, she/her ) ━ ★ just to be clear, ya didn’t get this information from me. The person you’re lookin’ for is EVELYN LUCIA MASTERS. also known as EEVEE. Last I heard she was born on APRIL 7TH, 1988 in SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS, but she’s been livin’ in RICHMOND, for about EIGHT MONTHS. Word around the districts is, this doll, EEVEE can be VENGEFUL, SELF-RIGHTEOUS, & A KNOW-IT-ALL, but i gotta tell, ya, alls I seen is good things, like the fact that she’s RESILIENT, CHARISMATIC, & ENERGETIC. I guess that depends on how well ya know ‘em, though. the last thing ya need to know is that she works as an A-LIST ACTRESS & CO-OWNER OF EXCALIBUR COMICS. I don’t know much about what that’s all about but I do know that’s all I can tell ya the rest you gotta find out on ya, own. ━ ( ooc: maddie, pst, 28, she/her )

Evelyn Lucia Masters.

the irony of her name is that it means “wished for child”

she was definitely not.

hence why she goes by...

Eevee.

Yes, like the Pokemon.

No, it’s not a stage name or a gimmick.

She legally changed her name.

It’s on her credit card. ( so are kittens! )

Born in San Antonio Texas.

Jewish, Bisexual & Very Proud.

Collette Rivers

Her mother.

One of the first and few Black, Soap Opera stars.

Had a wildly popular sitcom for a hot minute.

Career was on fire in the 80′s & 90′s.

Transitioned to clothing designer and eventually a reality tv real housewife when she couldn’t get jobs anymore.

Joseph Masters.

Her Father.

a former actor

was very well known for CSI.

was on broadway.

became a sought after director.

it’s a whole family in the biz, so of course...

@ two years of age, Eevee became an Actress™

baby diaper commercials with her mom.

then singing lessons.

then dance lessons.

then pageants.

more commercials.

a bit of child modeling.

more commercials.

reoccurring kid on sesame street.

then a reoccurring (but not staring) role on Gullah Gullah Island.

1998. She’s 10.

lands a role on Broadway opposite Leon Thomas III as Nala in The Lion King.

this is the jumping-off point of her career. where it really shot off

but ignoring that for a minute...

Eevee has 5 other siblings.

4 of them are alive.

when Eevee was 15 she’d just gotten season 1st ( and eventually only ) season of her Disney show renewed and she had a stalker. on her 16th birthday, the stalker snuck into her sweet 16, cornered her when she and her older, brother Elias were alone, stabbed Elias, and kidnapped Eevee. Elias was rushed to the hospital when they found him but died shortly after. They found Eevee, recovered her from the stalker unharmed, but when she asked about Elias... shortly after Eevee sunk deeper into her depression, and also suffered from survivors’ guilt and eventually had to stay in a mental hospital and was released a year later, a few days after her 17th birthday. being in the real world was hard for her and in a few weeks time, became legally emancipated from her parents because her father had taken control of monitoring her finances, her decisions, and became too controlling of her schedule and time out of his concern for her and her mother acted like none of it happened and expected Eevee to pick up where she left off and to get more jobs and keep working. It was an environment detrimental to her health and sanity so she had to get out of that and got her own place and moved away from her parents and unfortunately, her twin sister and younger brother.

Took a break from acting to finish high school.

had to have private tutors

excelled at the school aspect of her life.

had very few friends but she did have a girlfriend.

eventually, Eevee broke up with her

to seize her 5 minutes of fame she outted Eevee as a lesbian to TMZ.

It didn’t take long for Eevee to speak out.

At 17, in 2005, Eevee came out publically as Bisexual.

as a Black 17-year-old girl she was proud of herself.

but it did not go well for her in the media or in magazines.

didn’t help what little career she had left.

but she also kinda didn’t care

Became known for outspoken activism for LGBTQ+ youth.

Started her own charity and outreach program to finance and help struggling youth in the LGBTQ+ community by providing them with shelter, food, and treatment for health issues both mental and physical.

went to college...

Northwestern State University.

joined the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority

double-majored in theater and business

got married to one of her best friends at one point to help him out with his financial situation.

graduated with degrees.

and real friends in and out of her sorority.

WORKED HER ASS OFF TO GET HER CAREER BACK ON TRACK.

it took a lot of hard work.

a lot of mediocre jobs.

a lot of auditions.

a lot of shmoozing & playing the long game.

she pulled every single string

cashed every single favor

ate a lot of shit.

including going to her mother whom she hadn’t spoken to in six years.

EVENTUALLY ROSE BACK TO THE A-LIST WITH A VENGENCE.

Several Independent Films.

Supporting roles in TV shows.

Supporting roles in a few movies.

Starring roles in a number of pilots that never got greenlit.

Starring roles in 2 tv shows.

one was canceled the first season.

the other had THREE SEASONS.

won an Emmy

Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series

landed a few ad campaigns

Eevee went back to Broadway a few times over the years.

Bring It On: The Musical

played Danielle

won a tony

Best Featured Actress in a Musical.

Newsies: The Musical

played Katherine.

dream come true.

Hadestown

played Eurydice.

nominated for a Tony.

The Lion King

played adult Nala.

life coming full circle.

Currently stars in her own Netflix show.

season 2 just finished filming which is why she has moved to Portland.

PERSONALITY:

very much a complete dork. loves video games, loves comic books, has a lot of memorabilia all through her house, it’s practically a dork museum, always telling puns. always joking. always been an adorable ray of sunshine. she really likes to be a light and enforce positivity for her friends and others.

talks far too much for her own good especially when she’s nervous.

very kind, generous, and loving, always willing to help a friend.

always willing to cook for someone as a way to comfort them. She’s a well-versed home chef and an excellent baker.

she’s in-between the vodka aunt and the mom friend. she’s the first to suggest doing shots and getting fucked up, but she’ll also make sure everyone’s okay and be responsible.

She’s that friend who if you fuck with one of her friends in any way she will go into protective mamma bear mode and straight-up end that person for you. if you need someone to back you up in a fight, literally, and have your back she is your girl.

she isn’t great at flirting or really being around anyone she finds attractive, she turns into a rambling, nonstop talking, pile of adorable.

up until the end of December last year, she was a virgin. She’s only ever slept with one person so she’s not really the sleep around kind of girl but respects those who do, you do you boo, but also please don’t mistake her for a relationship type girl either. she’s neither. she’s great at fooling around and hookups that usually stop before they get to the sex part. she’s actually just very awkward when it comes to intimacy and feelings and getting close to people in that way. It fucks with her anxiety so she just needs someone who can get her out of her head and that is very hard to find for her.

She’s a feminist and believes women should be there to support each other, but also is aware that feminism isn’t always equal and some women don’t include her as a woman to support because she is a woman of color and because she’s Black and will call someone out on their white feminist or anti-black bullshit.

she’s kind but is in no way a pushover. she’s very opinionated and steadfast and isn’t afraid to reason with someone and argue with them and stand up for herself.

POSSIBLE CONNECTIONS:

Friends: people who can put up with her non-stop chatter and find it endearing.

Fake Friends: people who are using her for fame, recognition and what her name can do for them.

Crushes: could be one-sided, could be both-sided, let’s talk about it.

Boxing Friendship: sparing partners, or someone who sees her at the boxing gym in her workout outfits that include but is not limited to color-coordinated custom gloves, that match both her outfit, her shoes, her gym bag and the giant cheerleading bow on the top of her high ponytail, but has never actually stuck around to see her box so don’t believe she can throw an actual punch because they can’t take that seriously, because she’s just a pretty little celebrity what can she actually do, but then one day end up in an argument with her and challenge her to a sparring match and to their surprise kicks their ass and they become sparring partners. I don’t know, clearly I haven’t given that plot much thought.

Step-family member: Eevee doesn’t have a relationship with her mom, but she is aware the woman got married to another woman who has kids when Eevee was 19 or so. She’s never met any of them. Never spoken to any of them. Never been invited to family functions. Knows full well they exist and they know full well she exists and they have actually hung out with other members of her family, just not her. So that sounds like awkward and traumatic fun for all involved right?? Bring the angst.

Fellow Actors: They could be real friends, could be fake friends, could have worked together, could just know of each other, could be a publicity friendship, dude, I don’t know.

Fans / Haters: like her work or don’t like her work???????????? I don’t know I’m just throwing stuff out there at this point.

I don’t know we’ll figure something out, I AM PUMPED AND EXCITED!!

#pb:intro #pb:ooc #death tw #depression tw #murder tw #stalker tw #kidnapping tw

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agentnico · 4 years

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Top 10 Best Movies of 2019

Disclaimer: I have not seen the films 1917 and Bombshell upon releasing this list, so they have missed out on this list due to that factor. Otherwise, there’s a chance both of them would have been on here.

It’s that time of year again when I decide what were some of the greatest films that graced us on the big screen (or small screen in light of Netflix’s ever-growing presence). 2019 was not a bad year for movies, though it’s interesting to note that the highest score I gave to a film this year is an 8/10, not higher. Maybe that’s a detriment to 2019′s film quality, or more so to me becoming more stricter with my opinion. The latter is more likely to be honest since I had problems with Detective Pikachu. I know, how dare I judge that little cute yellow furry Deadpool-sounding Pokemon! Though I am proud to note that this is the most international Top 10 list I’ve ever done, managing to sneak in film picks that weren’t just made in Britain or America. I really branched out this year. Does that make me a professional critic? Probably not, but in feeling I am, and that is what counts. Anyway, without much further ado, here are my favourite films in 2019...

HONORABLE MENTIONS:

Glass

Joker

One Cut of the Dead

The Lighthouse

Zombieland: Double Tap

Burning

Always Be My Maybe

The Peanut Butter Falcon

10) JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 3 - PARABELLUM - 2019 was arguably the year of Keanu Reeves. From his self parodying roles in Toy Story 4 and Always Be My Maybe (easily the best cameo of the year) to announcements of his participation in the upcoming video game Cyberpunk 2077 as well as returning for a third Bill & Ted film, and of course, there’s John Wick 3, a non-stop action romp that gives the Raid movies and Mad Max: Fury Road a run for their money. The weak ending does cause the film to fall short from perfection, but it still makes my Top 10, and deservedly so.

9) AVENGERS: ENDGAME - I hated Infinity War. I said it once and I’ll say it again. So it was much to my dismay that I really enjoyed Endgame. It’s a culmination and celebration of the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe, and though I may have problems with the franchise as a whole, I do respect them for how far they have managed to come.

8) KLAUS - Netflix’s first animated movie is an absolute delight. A callback to a time when films were much simpler, with a truly good message, beautiful animation that blends 3D computer animation with old-school 2D animation and some great humour. A very sincere and well-paced production with an engaging story (for the whole family!) that doesn’t rely upon ironic jokes to tie in the adults, or on the integration of modern technology to hold the kids’ interest (like so many modern animated features do). It just tells a story. Klaus is destined to become a Christmas classic.

7) DEERSKIN - Leave it to the French to provide us with one of the weirdest motion pictures on this list. A tale of a man’s obsession with his coat (a good looking coat no less!) that leads him to some hilariously dark places. In style and theme Deerskin reminds me of another film I really love, The Voices starring Ryan Reynolds, in that it is strange, horrifying, awkwardly funny and overall weird. You’ll either love it or hate it, but Deerskin is certainly worth seeking out.

6) UNION OF SALVATION - Having been displeased with modern Russian cinema as of late, Union of Salvation surprised me to a major extent. A large scale historical study that describes some of the more difficult pages of the history of the Russian Empire. The revolt of the Decembrists in 1825 had to show the emperor that the old rules and laws were no longer able to restrain the empire from collapse, and although the rebellion was suppressed, it became a special precedent that brought the country under global historical changes. Crisply filmed, and directed in a way that leaves it to the audience to interpret who was right and who was wrong, this is a historical epic that leaves an impact.

5) KNIVES OUT - “I suspect foul play.” I will forever be grateful to Knives Out for gifting us Daniel Craig with a Southern accent, something I never thought I wanted but now that we have it, I would not want it any other way. Director Rian Johnson has crafted a truly original whodunnit, that mixes classic elements of the murder mystery genre whilst adding an interesting modern spin to it. Also, talk about a star-studded cast (with a stand out performance from Ana de Armas)! I hear a sequel is already in the works, and I say bring it on!

4) ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD - Quentin Tarantino’s love letter to old school Hollywood is a visual and narrative feast, pairing Hollywood legends Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt as they traverse the colorful streets of Los Angeles in 1969. Tarantino was already one of my favourite film directors, and here he fully displays why he’s a true artist of his genre (that’s right, the man has his own genre!). I might disagree with the movie’s ending, but the rest of the film is such a fascinating experience and easily one of the most memorable films to come out of 2019.

3) MARRIAGE STORY - Such a depressing movie. Yet such a great depressing movie. Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson give career-best performances as a couple going through a divorce, and the way the movie is grounded in realism makes the whole thing a painful experience to go through, however one worth taking. Marriage Story is depressing, yes, but also truly incredible.

2) PAIN AND GLORY - The French give us the weirdest film of the year and leave it to the Spanish to give us the most personal one. Director Pedro Almodovar semi-autobiographical film takes a close look at how one deals with acceptance, being forgotten, symptoms of depression and generally all fairly negative attributes, but delivered in such an honest and profound way that there is a strange lightness that emerges from it all. Antonio Banderas is uncannily vulnerable in the lead role, delivering such an earnest performance that shows a man that is filled with melancholic regret who seeks his own form of redemption.

1) PARASITE - The winner of the Palme d’Or (the main prize at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival) is also the winner amongst my favourite films of the year, not that those two are comparable. In any case, Parasite is easily the most original and surprising piece of film-making that I discovered this year, managing to subvert expectations and blend together so many different genres so naturally. To spoil any narrative element of this movie would be a sin, like this one in particular works best when not knowing anything about it. That’s how I watched it, and now it’s my number 1 film of 2019.

And now also for my No 1 WORST film of the year, which goes to...

WORST FILM OF 2019 - CATS. Obviously. What else did you think I was going to say? When I saw it I thought it was poop, and to this moment all I see is poop. Cats is poop. The end.

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fourteenacross · 4 years

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end of 2019

I've done this survey every year since like, 2006 and then missed it last year because I was on a social media break. Whoops! My shitty memory makes it fairly important as a way to track the passage of time, so I'm back on the horse this year.

What did you do in 2019 that you’d never done before? I'm sure there's some specific thing, but nothing's coming to me immediately. Oh, I guess I started cross stitching? Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I'm not sure what my resolutions were for last year because I did not write them anywhere because I did not do this meme /o\ Next year: + Set up some kind of writing schedule + Finish my mg novel + Survive moving + Get a new job + Go on more dates

eta: Outside of these sort of concrete, 2do-list type goals, I set some more nebulous personal goals on Twitter: - See my local friends outside of the BFC more often - Do weird, dumb shit - Be nicer to myself - Fix my meds - Bake something fancy(Okay, that last one is kind of 2do-listy.) Did anyone close to you give birth? YES!! @caphairdadbeard had a baby and he's perfect and I love him and it kills me that he's so far away and I only get to see him a few times a year, even more so than it usually kills me having Sarah so far away. Did anyone close to you die? My former roommate's father. I did a lot of family stuff with her over the decade that we lived together and spent a lot of time with her parents and he was super loved and admired by his community. A real shitty loss all around. What countries did you visit? Just the US, but I visited Seattle and Mississippi for the first time! What would you like to have in 2020 that you lacked in 2019? ~*~Financial security~*~ What dates from 2019 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? I'm so terrible with actual dates. May 9 was Max's birthday, so there's that? We did a lovely, successful live show on April 18. OH we went to Rent Live and had our wild weekend in LA on January 26. We watched a lot of wild movie musicals at Grace and Jesse's in July. I saw Blair Witch in the woods. I went down to the city to see Octet and Hadestown. Lisa moved in with me. Moby-Dick happened. Now I'm just listing events and not dates, but there you go. What was your biggest achievement of the year? God, do I even have one? I'm not dead, so that's probably something. Oh, I guess we had a really good WBS month where we were interviewed by Forbes.com, had one of our crossovers with IDEOTV, guest edited TBD, and had our live show. That was a really satisfying few weeks. What was your biggest failure? I'm haunted by this work thing I fucked up, even though everyone has told me it wasn't a big deal. I really crash and burned out for NaNo because SAD hit me way harder and faster this year than it has in the past. Did you suffer illness or injury? Lots of brain stuff, as per usual. A couple minor colds. My FAMILY on the other hand.... What was the best thing you bought? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Tickets to Octet, maybe. It was probably my favorite show of the year. The new chair/loveseat is also very good. Whose behavior merited celebration? Some of my friends. A lot of excellent activists. Sarah's baby (he's very good). Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Like, the whole government? Where did most of your money go? Grown-up type stuff (rent, utilities, groceries), cons, and travel. What did you get really, really, really excited about? LA, Octet, Max, DragonCon, Moby-Dick. Galentine's! What song will always remind you of 2019? Probably music from Octet? I don't like.....listen to the radio. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? Probably about the same? Maybe more stressed out by family stuff going on and money stuff. b) thinner or fatter? Same. Also, I hate this question. 2020 Kaitlyn, delete it plz. c) richer or poorer? About to be poorer. What do you wish you’d done more of? Writing. Sleeping. Going on dates. Hanging out with people. What do you wish you’d done less of? Being depressed. Being stressed. Did you fall in love in 2019? Nope. What was your favorite TV program? If we're talking "currently airing" and not "things I bingewatch that are very old," probably The Good Place--OH I almost forgot Good Omens was this year!!! Also that! And I started watching Schitt's Creek and watched all of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Oh, and I started watching some videos on the Bon Appetit YouTube channel, mostly Gourmet Makes and Making Perfect and Reverse Engineering. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? Mostly just like...........people I don't actually know who are terrible humans. What was the best book you read? Coming soon to a podcast feed near you! What was your greatest musical discovery? Probably Octet? I don't think I listened to a lot of new music this year. OH WAIT, The Highwomen!!! What a good album!!! (Also in doing the theatre section I just remembered Six was this year too!) What did you want and get? Mostly material things--clothes, cons, travel, seeing people, tickets to things, etc. Impeachment. Got that. That was nice. What did you want and not get? Financial security. A new job. Emotional stability. A relationship. More sleep. What was your favorite film of this year? Captain Marvel, although Us, Charlie's Angels, and The Wind were very good too. What was your favorite theatrical event of the year? Probably Octet! The broadway version of Hadestown was kind of disappointing compared to the 2016 NYTW version and Moby-Dick is great fun, but still pretty rough in places. Octet is just.....very good. Oh, or SIX, that was great too! Octet or Six. Oh, and, jesus, this year was a hundred years long, I totally forgot we saw Denee as Eliza this year!! She was very good!! And I got to see Daniel Breaker as Burr again and I fucking love him. What was your favorite podcast of the year? The Empty Bowl, a meditative podcast about cereal. It is so good for zoning out and being calm. TAZ has been killing it with the one-shots and the Amnesty arc, too, and this was the first year I listened to MBMBaM weekly and also I mainlined all of Sawbones after listening to half of it, then not listening to any for six months, then deciding to start from the beginning again. Unwell is a really good show that I recommend, and Mabel. The Magnus Archives killed it with season four, which was tailored to my exact narrative tastes. MFM and Criminal are perpetual faves. American Hysteria was super interesting to go through and Bear Brook and In the Dark both obviously had fucking fantastic years. Oh, and Who the Hell is Hamish? that was fun too. And I’ll stop now.

I.....listen to a lot of podcasts. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I turned 34! On the day, I went out for dinner and drinks with some friends. That weekend, I bought a bunch of children's Captain Marvel birthday supplies and we played Jackbox games and ate cake! What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? Any sort of fix to our current political mess. And/or financial stability. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2019? The "Whimsical" section on eShakti. What kept you sane? Friends! Podcasts! Anti-depressants! Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Brie Larson and Starr Busby are the first that spring to mind. What political issue stirred you the most? It’s hard to pick just one when the whole country is on fire. Who did you miss? Pretty much everyone when they are not right next to me. Sarah Bay, a lot, but I feel weird singling one person out. [This is exactly what I wrote for the last four years, but I’m keeping it because it’s still true.] Who was the best new person you met? Did I meet new people this year? I know I internet-met a couple people, but I'm not sure if I in-person made any new friends? We hung out with this girl Jenn at con a bunch, she was pretty cool! edit: oh my god MAX I met MAX this year because he did not exist last year!!! Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2019: Do not invite folks to sit on a panel unless you know they'll stick to the goddamn topic agreed on in advance. Quote a song that sums up your year: And no one grew into anything new / we just became the worse of what we were

(I think this is the third year in a row that Dave Malloy has been my lyric of the year.)

Anyway, that’s 2019 for me. I can’t say I’m sorry to see it go. The last half, in particular, was super rough. Hell, the last week was super rough--guess how many members of my family have been in the hospital in December! If you guessed “six” you would be correct!! (Everyone is more or less fine.)

But, hey, it also brought me my tiny nephew and two Dave Malloy musicals, so it wasn’t all bad!

I hope 2020 treats you all well, friends!

#stuff about me #2019 #meme

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ecto-american · 4 years

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October Nights C5

Ectober fanfiction || Day One | Day Two | Day Three | Day Four || On AO3

Summary: Danny may have died, but he is certainly not gone. And he refuses to be forgotten.

Day 5: Scarecrow & Grave Robber

Tucker had missed that day. He had finally texted her back at eight that morning when Sam was already anxiously waiting at the steps of the school. He said that he simply felt too depressed to go that day, and that his mom was letting him take a mental health day. Boy, could she ever relate. Sam had to rely on her grandma to motivate her out of bed that morning, and it was not an easy task to do.

But she had to force herself to go to school that day. It was the last place she wanted to be, but at least she'd be surrounded by people. At least he would be attached to her and here, instead of at home with her vulnerable grandmother and parents. Being in a crowd would also make it much harder for him to catch her alone and do anything. Her dad had driven her there, cheerfully talking about nothing and being oblivious to the cold air that had origins in the ghost that sat invisible in the back seat. Sam almost found it comical how her dad missed that Danny, even as a haunting full ghost specter, had buckled his seat belt. Tucker still agreed to meet her at the cemetery after school, then give her a ride home. Especially after she was able to spit out part of what had happened. She spared him some of the details for now, but she did warn him to wear his specter deflector to their hang out. Just in case.

Because she knew that this figure would absolutely not leave her alone that easily. And once Tucker was fully in the loop, she was afraid that he'd be a target next. Sam merely prolonged the inevitable obsession from continuing to escalate.

The feeling of being watched was mild all that school day, but it served as a reminder of his constant looming threat. He was keeping his distance, cautious and unsure of what she had planned after her freak out against him. Sam wore the specter deflector under Danny's oversized NASA sweatshirt as a precaution and kept a blaster strapped to her thigh underneath her knee length skirt as a warning.

Her eyes watched the rows of houses, desperately assuring herself that she had some kind of comfort and help within their walls. She spied a few people home in the windows, a few scarce people in their driveways as they returned home from work or some errand, several people driving past her. Kids' screams of excitement filled some sections of the neighborhood as they played in their yards. It put her at some sort of ease, that, in theory, somebody would be a witness to that looming presence that was following her. She could feel it, his gaze. He had to be invisible, but he was close.

A scarecrow caught her eye as she began to approach the shopping district. It smiled cutely as it stood propped up in the flower bed, leaning on the shop's sign. The scarecrow was just another part of that shop, Aloe There!, and their regular fall decorations. It was one of Sam's favorite shops, a small family owned business that had been around for as long as she could remember. She found herself stopping in front of it.

The small local greenhouse and store that she always got her supplies at, where she'd drag Danny and Tucker to. Just three days before he died, Danny had taken her there to get some new lighting for a special plant she had bought. Her boyfriend had dorkily brought her a mint plant during his silent fit of boredom while she shopped, expressing how they were mint-to be. At the time, she had rolled her eyes, telling that idiot to put the plant back where he found it.

Now she'd give anything to hear another stupid pun.

She stared at the scarecrow. That stupid smile reminded her so much of Danny. The adorable charm, the bright blue buttons shining. It reminded her of that plant. Her fingers grasped her backpack straps. She absolutely needed that mint plant.

Sam made her way into the shop, hearing the familiar bell ring. The store was a bit too warm, as always, but it was like it melted away her grief and troubles. If only for a short while. The shop owner, a plump grandmotherly figure, brightened the second she saw her. She stopped stocking shelves to brush her dark green apron. As usual, the shopowner's bored fifteen year old granddaughter was behind the counter, watching videos on a smartphone and only mumbled out a half-hearted greeting.

"Hello, Sam!" the owner greeted warmly.

"Hello, Mrs. Addison!" she replied cheerfully.

"Do you need any help, dear?"

"No, ma'am!"

"Alrighty, hon. Just call if you need me."

"I will!"

Sam knew where everything was. She had visited this shop countless times, and she knew exactly where to find the plant. A tiny, unimpressive plant. It wasn't a good idea to plant it now. But she knew it'd survive the cold weather. Mint, like Danny, was very strong and stubborn. It'd just remain dormant for the winter.

Regardless, she picked up the cheap plastic pot that held it, hugging it tightly to her. She also found a cheap hand shovel, and she brought them to the counter. The bored teen put down her phone and began to ring up her items.

"Will that be all for you, Sam?" she questioned.

"Yeah. No bag or receipt, and debit card please," Sam answered before it could even be asked. The teen simply nodded, swiping the card and handing it back. Sam put her wallet and the shovel into her backpack. The receipt printed, and the teen tossed it in a trash can behind the counter.

"Have a good day," she told her, and the teen immediately returned her attention back to her phone. Sam hummed in return, picking up the plant and holding it to her chest.

After a brief goodbye, she continued on her way. The now distinct coldly feel intensified around her, and she scowled. Sam didn't break her pace.

"Go away. Cold air's bad for the plants," she grumbled.

"...You bought the mint." The invisible voice sounded surprised and a bit confused. Sam stared down at the dormant plant.

"...I did." There was no hiding her impulse buy. Not that she had any doubts that he had watched her pick it out and purchase it anyway.

Sam could feel the air shift near her arm, as if he was going to grab her. Only to stop suddenly.

"...You really did miss me."

Sam bit her lip, and she refused to reply. She picked up speed, continuing to walk quickly towards the iron gates of the Amity Park Cemetery. It was still so hard to believe...only weeks prior, she watched Danny be buried in his final spot. The last place she truly saw him, the real him.

Sam shivered as she felt the faintest ice cold air gently hit her back, and the forced breathing became very audible to her. Not this...thing that kept following her.

Tucker's car was already parked in the lot, but he wasn't there. Sam didn't bother breaking her stride, going up to the gate and just pushing it open to slip inside. She made her way through the rows and rows of headstones, absentmindedly taking note of the odder names of those buried anywhere from hundreds of years ago to barely a week ago.

The cemetery was sorrowfully beautiful, always so well landscaped and made for the perfect spooky setting. The woods that sat just behind it held fond memories of her and her friends exploring them as kids. The leaves were becoming bare as autumn had continued, leaving scarce to the imagination of what was hidden there. Danny used to tell them that the woods were haunted and full of ghosts when they were little. Of course, Sam believed him. He was from the ghost hunter family after all, and even though Jazz had always scowled and insisted at the time ghosts didn't exist, the irony of those memories made Sam smile sadly. A painful ache and the cold that followed her made her, despite all the wonderful memories they made for her, silently wish that ghosts were truly just a myth.

As Sam walked deeper into the cemetery, she saw the familiar outline of her best friend sitting next to a headstone. Relief washed over her at knowing that she would not be alone much longer, and she broke into a jog towards him. Tucker paid her no mind, staring at the headstone: DANIEL JAMES FENTON, BELOVED SON AND BROTHER. He was muttering softly to it, and she could tell that he had been crying. He also clutched some tissues in a shaking hand. To her relief, he had heeded the warning she gave him when they were agreeing to meet up. He, too, was wearing a specter deflector.

"Hey Tucker," she greeted him quietly. Sam set the plant next to him before she wrapped her arms around his shoulders from behind. She squeezed him tightly, resting her cheek on the top of his head as she felt his arm grab her arm to squeeze. Sam stared at the headstone with him as they fell into silence.

The trio was back together again.

Sam gave a deep shaky sigh. She could feel him nearby. A rush of cold air passed her, and she shook a bit. Her arms wrapped tighter around Tucker in light fear before letting go to sit next to him. She dug through her backpack to pull out the shovel.

Tucker said nothing as Sam dug a small hole next to the headstone. With an expert ease, she replanted the mint into the ground. Pushing the dirt around it and patting it down, she spoke quietly to the plant. About how lovely he was, that she knew he was dormant now but that come spring he'd be so handsome. In her mind, she already had named him. His name was Dean. The name Danny always brought up wanting to name any son they'd have in the future. A name she always jokingly teased him for, because she honestly loved the name too.

"So, wanna give me the deets on what's been going on?" Tucker finally spoke up when Sam had shifted to sit back next to her. Sam said nothing for a moment, staring at the plant. He took her hand, and she finally began to talk.

With every word, Tucker got noticeably more and more disturbed at what she had to say. His grip on her hand would tighten as she recounted her night of horror. She tried to focus on Tucker, but she could still...god that watched feeling. Sam knew it was an icy hot glare of anger as she told the story. As she neared the end of her explanation, she could see Tucker violently shiver with her as an unbearably cold and unnatural wind hit them.

"Sammy," his voice finally spoke up, and she saw Tucker freeze upon hearing it. He didn't have to say it. She could see the look plastered on his face to know that the mere voice was terrible to him as well. His hold on her hand was firm.

Again, her free hand went to her hip to make sure the precious specter deflector was on. It was. Cold breath blew against her cheek, but she kept her focus on Tucker. His face paled, and she could see his eyes widen. She knew why. This thing made itself visible to them, and she could see out of the corner of her eye his hand. It moved as if he was going to cup her cheek, but keeping his distance for his own safety.

"The gang's back together," he said, and Sam almost felt bad at how...happy he sounded. She turned to glare at him as she let go of Tucker. She shifted to stand up.

"No, the gang is not," she replied coldly. Those red eyes darkened at her. "The gang involves Tucker Foley, Sam Manson, and Danny Fenton. You are not Danny Fenton."

"Why are you so angry at me?" he frowned. "Sam, I love you. You love me, remember?"

"No I don't!" Sam snapped. Tucker got to his feet as well. "I loved Danny Fenton! You're not him! You're somebody entirely different! Something that won't leave me alone! That's obsessed! You need to go away! I don't love you because you're not Danny Fenton!

A deep, angry chattering noise and it moved a few feet back in an angry jerk. His eyes glared at them both, glowing brighter and brighter as he raised his fists.

"Is this the fucking thanks I get for saving you all these years!?" the voice shrieked with a soul piercing tone that struck immediate fear into her core. The haunting echo was bad, and it only amplified the terror. "I fucking died to protect this ungrateful town! I did everything to be a good boyfriend and friend! I love you, Sammy! I died doing what I could to protect you, to make sure no ghost ever came to harm you, and I'll be damned if I be forced to leave you again!"

"Dude, you need to leave her alone!" Tucker shouted, scrambling to stand closer to Sam. He grabbed her hand again protectively, half-standing in front of her. "You were Danny Fenton once, but not anymore! You gotta go!"

"Tucker, you better fucking move before I end you!" it snarled.

"No!"

A blast hit the ground two feet in front of them, causing them both to fumble back in fear. Sam's free hand grasped the back of Tucker's shirt. This was the first time this...this thing actively used an attack against her. She could tell that it was a warning shot, but it was still so close. She could smell the grass as it smoldered from the blast. He was escalating. Fast. She swallowed hard, and she lightly pushed Tucker to the side so she could properly face her spectral stalker.

"You're not Danny Fenton!" Sam screamed. "Danny Fenton would never hurt his best friends!"

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" The figure slapped his hands over his ears, closing his eyes tightly and roared in anger. "I AM Danny Fenton!"

"NO! YOU! AREN'T!" Sam stomped her foot with every scream as her hand ripped out of Tuckers so she could fling her arms wildly to emphasis. His eyes snapped open and gave her the coldest look she had ever received. Her knees nearly buckled.

"I'll prove it," he hissed.

The figure shot into the ground, and Sam's heart continued to race as she stared. It wasn't over. It couldn't be over. It couldn't be the end.

A hand shot out of the ground, akin to the start of a cliche zombie movie. Sam felt all the color drain from her face as she grew so, so cold. Soon, an entire body began to emerge from the ground, along with a horrific smell that instantly hit her. Despite having never truly smelled it before, Sam had a very good guess as to what it was. Death.

"Oh god," Tucker's voice came out in barely a whisper of horror. She felt him wrap an arm around her shoulders, pulling her to him as a hand clamped over her eyes before she could truly see anything. Sam was too numb to stop him, and she didn't want to. Sam could feel Tucker shake as he clung to her tightly. "Sam, don't look."

Sam could hear an odd rattling and lots of cracking, with terrible groaning and wheezing. The smell was overwhelming. She fumbled a bit as Tucker took a step back, but she was quickly able to walk back with him. Her best friend's breathing was short and fast. Nearly a panic attack.

"...Is it bad?" she dared herself to ask. Her fingers began to cling to his shirt. Tucker swallowed hard.

"...Just keep your eyes closed," he practically begged. He took another step back, and Sam fumbled to follow. That smell was either getting closer, or it was getting immensely worse. Either could be true. Sam felt Tucker's breath on her ear, as he desperately whispered, "Sam, reach into my pocket and pull out the thermos. Trap this thing."

Sam's hands immediately began to pat Tucker down blindly. She soon was able to locate his pocket, feeling the familiar metal container. Grabbing it, she pulled it out and uncapped it with shaky hands. Straight ahead, she heard angry, breathless groans. Something came towards them. She could feel the grass and leaves being trampled. Tucker forced them both to take another step back.

"Sam!" Tucker's voice was full of panic.

Sam fumbled with the thermos, letting the cap fall to the ground as she held it up. Tucker's hold on her loosened so she could properly aim, but she was still aiming blindly. She pressed the single button of the thermos, and the familiar jerk of the invention working. Her ears strained for the familiar noise of a ghost being sucked in. Their angry screams, the invention powering down. But none of it came. It just kept going, and Sam gestured the invention around. Maybe she wasn't aiming right.

"It's not working!" Tucker seemed more panicked, and it caused Sam's heart to thud hard. "It's not sucking him in!"

But it worked on ghosts...and Danny was a ghost...It never worked on him when he was in his human form but he was a full-Oh god.

Part of her had already guessed, but the subtly confirmed reality petrified her. Her free hand grabbed Tucker's shirt, grasping it tightly in her first.

"What do we do?" she asked. Tucker made them step back once more.

"Stay BACK!" Tucker barked, causing Sam to jump. In her ear, he whispered, "Do you have anything?" Sam perked up.

"Yes!" she replied eagerly. She pulled her skirt up a bit to grab the blaster, and she handed it to Tucker. He accepted it.

"I have the Fenton Fisher in my glove box and some towels and blankets in the trunk," Tucker told her quietly. "Please get them."

Sam felt him turn her around, and he took his hand off her eyes. She blinked as she faced the parking lot, her vision adjusting to being able to see again. Tucker's hand slipped into hers, giving her his set of keys. She glanced down at them, and she clutched them tightly in her hand.

"Don't look back at us," Tucker told her. His voice soon became distressed, but angry. "I told you to stay BACK!"

An angry wheezing and stomps on the leaves, more horrible cracking and snapping. Sam didn't stick around, and she quickly made her way to the parking lot. Her mind raced as she half-jogged down the path to the gate of the cemetery. She quickly opened it and slipped out, hurrying to Tucker's car. She retrieved the Fenton Fisher and opened the truck. She draped a large, worn blanket over her arm before shutting the car and locking it.

She heard the blaster fire. She snapped her attention to the hill in worry. There was no screaming or noises from Tucker or...him, that she could hear. Sam quickly raced her way back up towards her friend.

Tucker glanced behind him as Sam approached, and he motioned for her to come as he shifted to be in the way. So she couldn't see. And she kept it that way, primarily watching the ground as she stepped forward. While she rationally knew what was there, pretending that she didn't made her feel better.

She looked up to watch Tucker as he grabbed the Fenton Fisher from her. He handed her the blaster, and she traded with him. His other hand grabbed the blanket, and he began to walk away from her towards the figure. He tossed the blanket onto the figure, covering his face and upper body.

For the first time, Sam let herself look, and she felt sick. The figure was not in the jumpsuit as she tried to convince herself. Instead he sported the dark gray suit that they had buried her boyfriend in. The skin of the hands was a sickly and bruised color, the fingers distorted as they jerked to try and remove the cover. The corpse moved slowly and with that sickening cracking accompanying every gesture as the figure overshadowing it forced activity despite the rigor mortis. It had stupidly trapped itself, stubbornly refusing to leave to save itself. Thankfully it allowed Tucker to quickly wrap it in the Fenton Fisher before it could do anything.

Once wrapped, Tucker tied it off the best he could. He took a step back, unraveling the line a bit. They both stared silently at the figure as it continued to move and crack. To Sam's relief, when Tucker wrapped the line around him, he unintentionally made it to where the blanket wouldn't slide off. Sam didn't know the extent of Danny's injuries before his death...but based on Tucker's reaction, it wasn't a sight she wanted to see anytime soon.

"We need to get him out," Sam finally spoke up. Tucker stared at her, his eyes occasionally flickering back to the covered form as it jerked violently against him. He kept a firm hold onto the line.

"How?" he questioned.

Sam stared off at the woods, thinking for a moment. She pointed to them.

"I have an idea. Let's go there, more private," she said. Tucker glanced behind him to where she pointed, and he shot her an odd look, but complied.

He made a clicking noise, tugging on the pole. The form reluctantly took a step forward, the cracking making Sam's stomach churn. She reluctantly turned her belt off, and she got behind the figure to give it a push. It would be a slow process to get to the woods.

#danny phantom #tucker foley #sam manson #ectober #ectoberweek19 #phics #my phics #october nights

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