future-journalist-adventures

[future-journalist-adventures]

most of my wips abuse italics but this is probably the worst one yet.

[future-journalist-adventures]

Inside my Head - A Collection of Short Stories

"Halloween"

experience or daydream: experience

characters: me, "him" (🥛), 🐴 (mentioned), my sister, other friends

setting: Halloween night; around 8pm; bonfire in a friend's backyard

content warnings: mental illness (implied)

The air was cool and crisp, fresh with an autumn breeze. The fire crackled gently, illuminating each one of our faces as we sat around it. My friends sang a soft melody on the karaoke machine, and I listened contently, allowing my thoughts to drift.

“This is the happiest I’ve been in a while,” I thought aloud.

“Good, I’m so glad to hear that,” he said gently in response; everyone else murmured their agreement.

“Well, I don’t know about you guys, but I wanna go on the swing set,” my sister proclaimed eagerly, making her way over to our friend’s little wooden play set as everyone else followed behind her.

Well, everyone else but one.

“Why’d you stay back here?” he inquired softly. His hand rested on my shoulder, startling me just slightly. “You should be over there, having fun with them.”

A thousand reasons ran through my head. I’m not good enough for them, I thought. I don’t deserve to enjoy myself.

“I don’t know.”

A small smile grew across his lips, his knowing gaze glimmering in the light of the fire. “That’s your whole response? All you’ve got to say is, ‘I don’t know’?”

There were so many things I wanted to say to him, but I couldn’t get the words to come out.

“Yeah,” I whispered, glancing in his direction before swiftly shifting my gaze back down to the ground.

A bout of silence washed over us, our shadows dancing in the flames behind. We breathed in sync, his hand following the rise and fall of my shoulders while my heartbeat quieted just for a moment, my eyes transfixed on our collective silhouette in the grass. My mind reeled through every meaningful interaction we’d had lately- every desperate ramble over text, every panic attack he’d knowingly or unknowingly helped me avoid, every smile from across a room, and every hug goodbye after a hangout. But mostly, I thought about how, in so many ways, it felt like he knew exactly what was going on in my head without me having to say anything at all.

I took one more deep breath, and all of this was enough.

His hand shifted a bit on my shoulder. “I get it. Observe from a distance. That’s always been my M.O.”

He laughed sympathetically, patting my shoulder once more before walking off, the smile lingering in his eyes threatening to cause me to burst into tears of joy; I’d cried out to the heavens for months now, insisting that all I’d ever wanted was to be loved, and for the first time since then, I finally felt like I had a friend who did.

[future-journalist-adventures]

Inside my Head - A Collection of Short Stories

"In-between"

experience or daydream: mix

characters: me, "them" (❤️‍🔥) ❄ (mentioned)

setting: early September; Friday afternoon; walking from school to a friend's house

content warnings: lots of swearing, emotionally sensitive relationship

“I’d never talk shit on you, though,” they continued, stomping on a red-brown leaf that made a satisfying crunching noise beneath their feet. “That’s just what people think.”

“Oh, yeah, I know,” I lied, raising a hand to shield the back of my neck from the sun beaming down on us. My eyes were fixed on the cracks between sidewalk tiles, each ebb and flow of the concrete occupying my mind so that I didn’t have to think about the fact that I was being lied to - not just in this moment, but almost daily.

They swiped their foot across the head of a blooming dandelion, the white seeds gently hovering above the grass before settling on the ground.

“I can’t believe it’s still so hot out,” I thought aloud. “I mean, it’s September; you’d think things would be starting to cool down by now, but instead, we’re just in this weird in-between state.”

“Yeah, well, global warming’s a bitch,” they replied with a suddenly irritable tone, scowling and speeding up for a moment before halting abruptly behind me. “Hey, watch, there’s a car!”

They reached out a hand and gripped my shoulder, thrusting me backward from where I was about to continue into the road as a car whizzed by.

“You good?” they inquired, brows slightly furrowed and their hand still touching my shoulder.

“Yeah, I just got distracted, I guess,” I replied, wide-eyed and still.

After a moment of ambiguous expression, a smile spread across their face, a giggle escaping their lips. “Well, Jesus fuck, Alex, you’ve gotta watch where you’re going,” they sighed, gently ushering me forward.

“Ooh, you know what, I forgot to tell you something! Guess who finally texted me the other day?”

The smile instantly vanished from their face, and I knew I had said the wrong thing. “You’re so unhealthily obsessed with her. She’s gonna get sick of you one of these days.”

I said nothing in response, my mouth hanging wide open.

“By the way, you’re opening the door when we get there!” they proclaimed singsongily, skipping ahead of me with a content smile returning to their lips once again.

I shook my head in bafflement, crushing another fallen leaf beneath my shoe. The duality of my conversations with them was inevitable, and yet it seemed to throw me for a loop every time. How could I be expected to understand a world that was filled with so many in-betweens?

As it seems, in a world where what happens today doesn’t dictate what will happen tomorrow, all one can do is wait for tomorrow to come.

[future-journalist-adventures]

[future-journalist-adventures]

I was not tagged for this but I'm gonna do it anyway cuz I feel like it 🕺

This is from Chapter 4 of my WIP, "Ollie's Home", which is about an autistic nonbinary child who is regarded as 'difficult' and 'disobedient' by their parents. This line is an excerpt from a lecture the kid's father is giving them.

"My father continued, 'Despite your mother and I’s continual attempts to raise a well-disciplined son, you have failed us, Maxwell. Congratulations on being a parasite in our life, boy. How does that make ya feel?' I felt confused, mostly, because I wasn’t sure why being a problem child prompted congratulations."

idk who to tag for this so it's an open tag for anyone who wants to share!!

favorite line tag!

@leahnardo-da-veggie got me for this one. I've been thinking about what Athena did to Brett all weekend LOL.

This is from Chapter 12 (the first October 1872 chapter) of Doom Metal Love Story. I've cut out Sullivan's ??? responses and given you the previous lines of dialogue for context.

"Sounds like something a man would say if he wanted to butter up the… fellow he was courting." "Are you buttered, First Sergeant?" "No, sir, I can't say that I am." "So I either failed," Royston slid closer, "or you're not a piece of bread." [several lines of back and forth of flirt vs. ??? until:] "You're not a piece, darling, you're the entire loaf."

I almost burst into flames when that exchange left my keyboard.

Tag! As much pressure as you want, baby, it's a Monday~

@lychhiker-writes @cowboybrunch @saturnine-saturneight @ashfordlabs @autism-purgatory

@noblebs @aintgonnatakethis @the-golden-comet @asablehart @mauvecatfic

@leahnardo-da-veggie @sableglass @gioiaalbanoart @words-after-midnight

@lavender-bloom @jev-urisk @wyked-ao3

[future-journalist-adventures]

plot twist- the thing that's haunting him is actually society itself, embodied by a different person who thinks that this situation is 'normal' each time

A gothic horror story where a gentleman from a good family gets haunted by something monstrous, which follows him around and keeps killing people around him at utter random, in cruel and horrifying ways. Specifically within circumstances where the protagonist has no alibi, and everything indicates that he committed the murders.

But the real horror is not that he would find himself accused of the murders, but that the people around him naturally assume that he did do it, but genuinely do not care, because the victims are never people that the society around him considers "important". The scullery maid of his household is found brutalised beyond recognition in a room where even the ceiling has been splattered with blood, and a constable of the local police brushes it off as a case of household discipline gone wrong, being horrifyingly casual with the assumption that the protagonist severely beat a girl in his service to death, and will dismiss it as an accident. The street urchin that the protagonist was seen talking with - wanting to help this poor little orphan - is found decapitated, severed head in the protagonist's fireplace. This, too, is calmly swept under the rug.

After every horrifying murder, the protagonist tries to seek help, to present the crime to authorities in hopes of getting some semblance of help, or at least clearing his own name of this, but every time it's brushed off. "These things do happen", he is reassured, like it's perfectly normal that a mansion of that size has a secret garden of unmarked graves in one shady corner.

The real horror is the ever-encompassing implication that this is perfectly normal.

[future-journalist-adventures]

Unloved (poem/rant)

I believe myself to be unloved.

At a stern gaze or a raised voice,

I assume hatred is the only intent.

I lose another friend or partner to misunderstanding,

and my belief deepens

with every ebb and flow of the waves of life.

As politicians declare their hatred of my kind,

and family gatherings become more stressful by the year,

my thoughts of being unloved seem logical.

The hatred carefully intertwined with every facet of our society

allows for each paper cut to feel like a fatal wound.

Puzzled and distressed, I look to the heavens for answers.

For what could I have done to deserve a life in such unloveable flesh?

Clouds dance above my head, the breeze gently pulling me towards the answer.

The hatred of humanity is one that cannot not be solved, and I was foolish to believe that I could do so on my own.

But how, I now thought, could I not be loved,

when the sun kisses my skin,

the rain blesses my soul,

and the birds celebrate my company?

How could the love of the earth be compared to those of mortal flesh?

[future-journalist-adventures]

Inside my Head - A Collection of Short Stories

"Heart"

experience or daydream: experience

characters: me, "my friend" (🫚), "a third actor"

content warnings: none

Applause echoed through the theater and into my heart, which beat swiftly in my chest. I had to squint in the darkness to make out my friend’s silhouette, the feeling of her head slumped against my chest giving me a unique sense of comfort. I took a breath to take in my surroundings, the scent of popcorn drifting through the air and into my nose as the applause slowly died down and we scurried offstage.

After another song or two had passed and we had returned to our places backstage, I felt restless, my mind unable to focus on anything but the upcoming scene. In an attempt to contain my energy, I sat on the floor, taking a breath or two before standing up again, swaying from foot to foot for a moment only to sit back down again. A reassuring smile from my friend allowed my heartbeat to slow, just slightly for a moment, as she struggled to contain a laugh, her smile growing a bit wider before turning her head away from me and toward the stage. I followed her gaze to the black curtain strewn with designs made by the tech crew, the path of the markers’ ink barely visible when I squinted. With the curtain lifting and my friend skipping onstage ahead of me, I put on my best grumpy face to align with my character, a feat which was becoming increasingly difficult due to the opposition of my character’s mood to my own.

We recited our lines with ease, gliding across the stage intuitively as we conversed and sang. As a third actor entered the stage and we continued the scene, I finally allowed myself to smile as my role’s feelings aligned with mine. My heartbeat quickened with every passing moment, the moment I had awaited for so long drawing nearer. As I sang the final line of the song, I turned my head to my friend in anticipation, willing my voice to remain even as I recited her cue line.

Without a moment to spare, she flung her arms around me, my head instantly dropping to her shoulder as we embraced. With the amount of hugs I received in my life becoming few and far between, a moment of connection with someone I had grown to love so deeply was everything that I needed. As our arms wrapped tightly around one another, I no longer noticed how fast my heart was beating. I felt my feet ever so slightly lose contact with the floor as she lifted me off of the ground, allowing my body to fully sink into hers. As the music and applause began to die out once again, my heart ached at a thought I wasn’t quite ready to face.

‘I’m not ready for it to be over yet.’

[future-journalist-adventures]

Inside my Head - A Collection of Short Stories

"Nothing"

experience or daydream: experience

characters: me, "my friend" (🐴), 📃, "unidentified driver" (possibly 🎧)

setting: early June; afternoon; middle school parking lot

content warnings: none

The heat of the summer air washed over me as I stepped outside, the feeling of the sun radiating through my skin. The soreness of my cheeks worsened as I squinted in the sunlight, my preexisting smile growing a bit wider as I glanced across the parking lot to my friend, who waved to me before getting into her car and driving off.

My eyes followed her car the whole way out of the parking lot and down the street, my gaze lingering for a moment even after she was no longer visible. I blinked slowly, turning my head to scan the parking lot for my sister’s car. I spotted the bright blue car shimmering in the light and advanced towards it, thinking contently about how satisfied I was with the rehearsal that had just finished.

A flash of yellow caught my eye. I peered curiously at the front license plate of the car behind my sister’s, the block letter M tugging at a familiarity inside me that I couldn’t quite place. A flash of movement in my peripheral caused me to look up at the person driving the car. Through the tinted windshield, a darkened silhouette of a person could be seen, although their defining features were indiscernible. An elated smile and enthusiastic wave were all I could see through the glare of the sun, the object of their excitement unknown. I whirled around to see who they were so eager to see, but I found no one but myself standing in the area. As I returned to face the unidentified driver, I squinted as hard as I could muster, willing my vision to recognize who sat so passionately before me.

My heart fluttered as a thought entered my mind. Could it be… her?

I shook my head and scoffed at myself, amused at the near absurdity of the idea. After bearing 7 long months of not seeing her face, the chances of seeing her here, now, were quite slim. It certainly would have been nice to see her again, but I had given up hope long ago. I had already accepted that I would never see her again. In what world could it be her?

But then again…

I recognized her license plate. And the specific way she smiled, and the funny way she waved. And the driver was wearing her same glasses, and put her hair up in the same way…

No. It couldn’t be.

I gave a quick, polite wave before hastily climbing into my sister’s car.

“What took you so long?” my sister inquired, giving me a puzzled look through the rearview mirror.

I sighed slowly, letting the cool air from my exhale spill over my thighs. I dropped my head to my chest, quickly shaking my head as thoughts overwhelmed my mind. In a whisper, I somehow managed to mumble a word that encompassed just about the opposite of how I was feeling.

“Nothing.”

[future-journalist-adventures]

"Unaligned"

You say I'm unaligned.

You see me, with my round face and raised chest; my cropped hair and boxy suit; and my headphones and flapping hands, and think, "What a shame they aren't like me."

And it is a shame.

It's a shame that a mirror showed a stranger; that a conversation became a puzzle; and that fun became fear.

I do feel unaligned.

Perhaps it's my body, or my mind,

but I think most of all,

it's you who pushed my body out of place.

You, who said, "Eyes up";

"Keep still";

"Quiet down".

You, who insisted on dresses and makeup and ballet.

So now, I say I am not unaligned.

For it is only you who unaligned me.

[future-journalist-adventures]

Inside my Head - A Collection of Short Stories

"Sleepover"

experience or daydream: experience

characters: me, "one of my friends" (🎭), ❄️ (mentioned)

setting: mid-May; Saturday at 3 A.M.; friend's bedroom

content warnings: mentions su!c!dal thoughts

I wanted that night to last forever.

Darkness seeped through the room, filling all but a few square feet, which glowed from the moonlight coming in from the windows. If I squinted hard enough, I could make out the rough outlines of my friends scattered about the floor, their chests rising and falling steadily with each breath. I sighed and looked over to one of my friends, contemplating what to talk about next. All but the two of us had fallen asleep; we sat next to each other on the floor, quietly observing the room. I wanted to start a conversation with her, but I couldn’t seem to find the words.

I let out a small sigh and checked the time on my phone. It read ‘2:53 AM’. I would have been shocked that we had managed to stay awake for this long if I hadn’t been too tired to think clearly.

I made the final decision to say something to her, but I chose my words carefully, speaking at a slow and deliberate pace.

“Have you ever…” I began, pausing for a moment to decide how to put my thoughts into words. “…felt really strong, um, platonic attraction to someone… and you talked about them so much that everyone thought you had a crush on them… or something like that?”

She nodded slowly and thoughtfully before responding: “Yes, actually. One time even I thought I had a crush on a guy before figuring it all out.”

A small bit of air escaped my lips in what resembled a laugh. “Well, I feel that way about someone right now.” I said her name. “I’m sure you’ve heard me talk about her before.”

“Oh yeah, I’ve seen her around! I’ve never really interacted with her personally, but she just… gives off good person vibes, y’know?”

We both let out a small laugh in unison.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea!” I exclaimed suddenly, pulling out my phone. “I reached out to her about a week ago to sort of recap the year and let her know what it all means to me; she hasn’t responded yet, but maybe that’ll give you an idea of what she’s like.”

After a moment or two of scrolling through my notes app, I found the message that I had written out to send to her and handed my phone to my friend.

I was too tired to remember that I had mentioned my struggles with suicidal thoughts in that letter.

The glow of my phone screen illuminated her face as she read; the warm, dry air from the heat of summer seeped through my friend’s bedroom walls, allowing a sleepy haze to wash over us. I glanced around in the darkness, listening contently to the whirring of the air conditioning and steady breaths of my sleeping friends, willing myself to stay awake for just a few more minutes. 

The sound of a quick, sharp inhale snapped me out of my daze. As my inattentive mind attempted to decipher the sound, my friend whispered shakily, “You’re gonna make me cry.” 

Although I knew she was half-joking, something inside me broke a little when she said that.

Due to my inability to fully process everything that was happening, all I could muster was a small laugh and a sympathetic smile as she continued to read quietly, the soft glow of my phone reflecting off of the tears plastered to her face.

After she finished reading, she silently set my phone on the floor between us, turning it off to leave us in complete darkness once again. Despite my lack of vision, I was constantly reminded with each sharp sound just how deeply I had affected her with those words.

After a few seconds of silence, all she could think of to say was, “Can I hug you now?”.

“Yeah,” I breathed, watching my beloved friend’s arms reach out and wrap around my shoulders.

She took a few shaky breaths, quietly hugging me in the darkness. There was something about this moment that made me feel like we were in a movie.

And just as I expected her to pull away, she muttered a few words that made me never want to let her go.

“I’m so glad you’re still here.”

[future-journalist-adventures]

"A warm breeze caressed my face as the glow of the setting sun welcomed me into the peace of nature. I tumbled to the ground, the earth seeming to invite me closer to its surface. Now I lay on my back among the company of cool blades of grass which gently tickled my thighs. A dewy, warm layer of soil with an unmistakable earthy scent supported my weight, calming my raging senses. Somewhere in the distance, an owl sitting on a tree branch cooed a sweet lullaby, filling my ears with a soft appreciation for life. And though the chaos of the inside could never escape my mind, still I lay peacefully, succumbing to the joy and simplicity of the world that I lay enveloped in."

i don't rlly know any writers on here so just anyone who wants to can reblog ig lol

Six Sentence Someday Tag

i was tagged by @frostedlemonwriter here to share six lines from a WIP. i'm not sure who to tag so i'll just leave this as an open tag for anyone that wants to share!

so here are six sentences of a dragon taking flight from the POV of a woman watching from the ground <3

He flies up like an arrow, wings tucked in, his head pointing straight up and his tail pointed towards the ground. After a few seconds of upward flight, he pitches in the air so that he’s parallel to the ground and his wings snap out.  Then he's soaring easily through the air. The moonlight filters through his wings that are now spread wide, looking more purple and red than black. She can now see the outline of his entire silhouette, all of his massive beauty. He flies around above them, coasting low over the trees behind them, but then he circles back around and drops even lower to fly just above the surface of one of the rivers, following the curve of it as it snakes across the land. 

[future-journalist-adventures]

Inside my Head - A Collection of Short Stories

"Funk"

experience or daydream: experience

characters: me, ❄️

setting: mid-December; holiday break; bedroom

content warnings: mental illness (implied)

The light coming from my phone warmed my hands and face as my thumb moved repeatedly across the screen, scrolling indefinitely. The weight of my blanket on my body felt familiar, yet unsatisfying. I wasn’t comfortable, but I made no efforts to fix it; I was there, but I wasn’t really there. I just sat, simply existing, in the same way I had every day after school for years now. 

The past three years of my life had felt numb and puzzling. It began with a peculiar feeling that arose one day: a feeling of loneliness and dissatisfaction. It felt unsettling and new; it invited an uncomfortable sense of vulnerability into me that I wasn’t ready to face. So, in an attempt to ignore the feeling in hopes it would go away, I followed the same routine every day- I got up, went to school, came home, and mindlessly scrolled through social media. This ensured that I would have no time to think about anything else. If my friends were going out somewhere and asked me to come, I declined by default. It seemed that each day dragged on for longer and longer until a definite numbness washed over me, ensuring that I never felt anything about anything at all.

My loved ones were worried. I pretended to ignore my friends’ cautious glances and concerned inquiries about my well-being, but I knew something wasn’t right. Everyone who’d known me prior to my ‘funk’ had known me as an easily excitable, passionate person. At my core, I felt things deeply and loved with all my heart. And as the ones who truly understood me watched as my light slipped away, they knew as well as I did that I wasn’t me anymore.

I sat my phone down in front of me, sighing in dissatisfaction. The heaviness growing in my chest became steadily stronger, a feeling I was used to by now, and I resisted the urge to ignore it by picking up my phone once again. I felt purposeless and numb; I had been okay with existing, but not living, for far too long. Something snapped inside me, and I knew I couldn’t live like this anymore. I had to do something.

I picked up my phone and typed out a message.

I wasn’t sure why I had chosen this particular person to reach out to. We weren’t close at all; I didn’t even have her phone number, so I had to message her through Instagram. I’d seen her around, in the halls and at band every morning, but we had only spoken in person once or twice at this point. But there was just… something. Something about the way she talked to people, and the way she cared so much about everyone. She was the kind of person who actively avoided drama and did everything she could to help people. I had somehow observed these things despite very rarely having interacted with her, but somehow, she was one of the only genuine people I knew at this point.

With one last deep breath, I hit send.

Almost immediately, three dots popped up at the bottom of the screen, signaling that she was typing. I waited in anxious anticipation as each second passed by, my eyes fixed on those dots as if I could will her fingers to move faster across the keyboard.

The first message sent. I read it enthusiastically, clinging desperately to each word. And as the heaviness in my chest became almost unbearable, I felt as if I might snap in two. She sent another message, and another, until she had sent me no less than ten paragraphs of advice. The feeling inside me burst, and suddenly the numbness vanished.

The feeling wasn’t exactly pleasant. In the wake of the messages, I began to recall memories I would have rathered forgotten. Typically, this kind of feeling would have me shoving my thoughts back into my chest, yet somehow, I didn’t mind it. All I knew was that I was feeling again, and somehow that made it all okay.

My fingers, shaking wildly, typed out a response. 

My whole body trembled as our conversation continued; each word I read from her gave me a fraction of hope. As I read, I wondered how a person could be so kind to someone like me- someone who, at this point in my life, spent my days complaining about trivial things and scrolling through Instagram as if it was a hobby. Although most of the people in my life at this point didn’t really seem to care, this person actually wanted to help me. That was a radical concept to me at this point, considering that I had spent the past few years of my life trying to convince myself that nobody cared at all.

So as I shook and typed and read, I let a smile seep through my lips. For the first time in years, someone actually noticed me. Not only that, but she cared enough to send someone she barely knew a full ten paragraphs of comfort and guidance. And so, for the rest of that year, I spent my time making sure that she knew this much: although I had survived each and every one of those horrible days in my life, this was the first time in years that I truly felt alive.

[future-journalist-adventures]

Ollie's Home announcement!

First off, I apologize for taking so long to put out new content. I've been very busy and haven't had much time to write lately. But that's beside the point- I have been thinking for a while now about what my plan for the finished novel, whenever it ends up being completed, is going to be, and after realizing the limit on articles in my free world anvil account, I have come to a decision. The first four chapters, plus the prologue, will always be available on my world anvil account for readers to get a 'preview' of the story. However, anyone who wants to read more than that will have to buy the completed novel once it is finished. I'm not quite sure how expensive I will make it just yet, but I don't think it should be any less than 10-12 US dollars (ish). As for right now, I am working on chapter 5 and am excited to share the rest of the novel with you when it is finished. Happy reading!!

[future-journalist-adventures]

Being a writer your brain is either

A) STUFFED TO BURSTING with ideas you have no clue what to do with or how to make them make sense

or

B) It's a black hole that devours every inkling of creativity in your cells and you are just hoping it'll consume you too

THERE IS NO IN BETWEEN

[future-journalist-adventures]

to anyone wondering why i've been slow with writing recently:

i'm working on things, i promise!! For a while I was having a bit of writer's block but now I have plenty of ideas; I've just been super busy so I haven't had any time to write. Ollie's Home has been especially difficult lately because I have the main plot points planned but there's a lot of unoccupied time in between major events so I've been trying to fill those in the most productive ways possible. I am also planning another short story currently, so stay tuned for that!! I hope yall are enjoying what I've written on this semi-new sideblog so far, and I hope you'll continue to stick around to see what else I've got planned! 🫶

[future-journalist-adventures]

show, don't tell:

anticipation - bouncing legs - darting eyes - breathing deeply - useless / mindless tasks - eyes on the clock - checking and re-checking

frustration - grumbling - heavy footsteps - hot flush - narrowed eyes - pointing fingers - pacing / stomping

sadness - eyes filling up with tears - blinking quickly - hiccuped breaths - face turned away - red / burning cheeks - short sentences with gulps

happiness - smiling / cheeks hurting - animated - chest hurts from laughing - rapid movements - eye contact - quick speaking

boredom - complaining - sighing - grumbling - pacing - leg bouncing - picking at nails

fear - quick heartbeat - shaking / clammy hands - pinching self - tuck away - closing eyes - clenched hands

disappointment - no eye contact - hard swallow - clenched hands - tears, occasionally - mhm-hmm

tiredness - spacing out - eyes closing - nodding head absently - long sighs - no eye contact - grim smile

confidence - prolonged eye contact - appreciates instead of apologizing - active listening - shoulders back - micro reactions