#''Can we please get dopamine from this thing and not those other things? Please'' ''Lol''

[sysig]

Still normal don’t even worry about it (Patreon)

[thebibliosphere]

ADHD reward system? Please tell me your secret!

My therapist has been helping me find a reward system that works for me, and as it turns out, gold star stickers are really helpful for making me feel like a tangible goal was met, and helps give me that sweet, sweet dopamine release that comes with completing a task, something which us ADHD’ers really struggle to achieve and are already coming at from a disadvantage with our brains regularly not producing enough “happy” hormones as it is.

It was supposed to be “a sticker for every time you finish a chapter”, but after some revision, my therapist said that was too tall of a goal, and that I should pick something smaller. So instead I now get a star every time I finish a 500-word milestone, placing the sticker in my writing calendar/journal thing that I use to keep track of my writing, and ironically, I have started to produce more work than when I was stiving for one chapter a day.

To give you an idea of how staggeringly effective this has been for me, I’ve written over 30k of original fiction in the last week. (75k total if you include my social media and blog stuff, which I currently do not but likely should.)

So this is what it looked like when I was attempting to do a chapter of edits and revisions a day during the month of December 2019 (note: I was supposed to start this in Nov, so you can see how well that worked out for me lol):

ID: A calendar showing days of the month with a shiny star sticker showing a completed task.

And this is what my writing journal looks like now that I’m doing a star for every 500 words:

ID: an image of a handwritten journal with the dates mapped out, followed by a shiny star sticker for every completed 500-word milestone. There are 65 stars in total for the month of January 2020. It’s also tinged by a green light cause I’m doing a chronic pain experiment, so far with positive results!

So as of today, January 8th, with ever star = 500 words, then 65*500 = 32500 words totalled in 7 days. This does not include, like I said, my social media output where I am far more productive, this is just my fiction and some editing work for friends.

(Which side note: this is not to flex, or to say that others should be able to achieve this level of output. I am a professional writer, this is my main job and only source of income. And also, I was forged in the fires of understaffed editing hell where we would be expected to churn out 100k+ a week in edits and revisions to keep on track. I have the time and a learned skillset I have spent years amassing to be able to do this and am working towards a rigid deadline. I simply have not been healthy enough in a long time to manage it, and am finally working my way back up to speed after years of illness. Don’t look at this and think, “I’m not achieving enough”, every victory no matter how small is worth celebrating. And I say that with the utmost sincerity, as someone who spent most of the last 2-3 years unable to get out of bed.)

I’ve also started using it to help keep track of bills and chores around the home. So every time something gets done/done on time, whoever completed the task gets a star on the calendar. This includes Oppy the Not-A-Roomba, who does a very good job of taking care of the house on a daily basis:

ID: an image of a chore calendar denoting various tasks that have been marked off with a holographic silver star sticker, including our robot vacuum who does an excellent job and deserves all the stars. (Our names got blurred out cause ETD doesn’t want his real name out there in the world, so that’s what is blurry.)

This system is useful for several reasons, the primary one being a sense of achievement and continued motivation, and the second, to allow you to review each month to see where you are doing well, and where you might otherwise be struggling.

For example, if I have a bad day for writing or decide to take a day off, I write that down in the calendar rather than leaving it blank, so that I have a record of what went wrong (or right, if I am electing to self care that day and take a day off) and how my overall progress is doing.

In terms of house stuff, this has been especially useful for ETD and myself, as it shows us where we are managing to do a good job with the house, and where our executive dysnfunction issues really trip us up and where we need to make improvements. And I don’t just mean in an “I should try harder way”, I mean you have to actively sit down and be like “hey! What is preventing me from completing this thing” and trying to figure out effective ways to either get around it or resolve a larger issue at hand.

So for us, the biggest thing we tend to miss is doing dishes after dinner, meaning we get left with a pile-up of dishes to deal with first thing in the morning, and my ADHD can’t handle that. It won’t let me eat until I’ve cleared all the mess, but I usually don’t have the energy to clean up if I haven’t eaten, so it’s this awful cycle of ineptitude. We’re doing better with the star reward system, cause it’s showing us our progress loud and clear on the fridge door, but we are both usually so fatigued and exhausted by the end of dinner that doing dishes is just one thing too many for our mutual disorders. So, the solution for this would, of course, be a dishwasher, cause if we had one of those, we could load stuff in, turn it on, and let those dishes get done while we go to bed then put them away in the morning. We can’t afford to do that right now, and we have other appliances we need to buy/replace before we can do that (still don’t have a tumble dryer, or a washer I can access, rip) but it does give us a tangible goal to work toward, and also, the motivation to keep on top of things because it goes from “an endless task with no end in sight” to “there’s a solution for this, we can manage a while longer.”

Now you could be saying, but Joy, I’m an adult! Surely I shouldn’t expect rewards for completing every day tasks that I should be able to do?!

To which I say, neurotypical people get rewards all the time and get an unconscious dose of dopamine/serotonin from their brains every time they complete a task. They’re playing the game of life on easy mode, the gold star is your achievement for completing it daily on Nintendo 99 hard mode. IF THE STICKER WORKS, TAKE THE STICKER

YOU’VE EARNED IT.

[yournameoneverypage]

Black Butterflies

Shawn x reader. Word Count: ~3k Notes: 1) Two completed requests in nearly as many days! Whoa! But don't get used to it; I simply had a temporary burst of writing inspiration and drive/motivation after two weeks of not being able to write at all. 2) Lu and Anna, thank you for talking me through so much of this. 3) I think it's worth listening to the song exactly where it lands in the story before continuing to read. 4) If you aren’t aware of the meaning/symbolism of black butterflies, maybe check it out. 5) This might be my personal favorite thus far of all the requests I've done. Warnings: Language. Angst (because I know you're a hoe for it, LOL) to fluff.

~ * ~

She swung the door open without looking first through the peephole, which was a mistake. Damn him, standing there looking like he was, in those gray chinos that always made his ass look amazing and a white button-down, the first few buttons undone and the sleeves rolled up to mid-forearm.

It didn’t matter that Shawn was holding a small bouquet of red camellias, she still ripped into him. “Oh, hell no. You don’t get to show up here like nothing happened!” She instinctively stepped aside to let him in before she even realized she had.

She should’ve immediately closed the door in his face, but he was like a drug to her and she could never get enough, always chasing after that next fix. Fucking dopamine and oxytocin. Even when he was gone he was always what she was wanting and she hated that she knew she would always feel that way.

“We had a date, pet. Why aren’t you ready? Not that I’m complaining,” he purred, raking his eyes over her form, appreciating every little thing about her. “We can certainly stay in.”

She went from zero to a million when he placed his hand on her waist and trailed fingertips across her stomach beneath the shirt she was wearing, his, as he brushed past her. She was regretting that now too, wearing his shirt, because it just proved that she was his and the last thing she wanted right then was to validate that for him.

She scoffed. “You really thought we would still be going out tonight after the shit you pulled?” He handed her the flowers, which she very nearly didn’t accept. “This doesn’t change anything,” she declared.

“It should. You know I don’t get flowers for just anyone.”

“We have spectacular sex followed by a ridiculous argument that you initiate, then you exit.” Yes, spectacular. He knew precisely where and in which ways to touch her and how to please her. He brought her to heights she hadn’t ever experienced before him. “And then I don’t hear from you for four days and you think flowers are going to make up for that??”

Shawn dropped to his knees. “Look at me. I’m on my knees, in pants that are way too fucking tight.” Yes, she’d noticed. “Actually on my knees for a reason other than-”

“Don’t you dare try to make light of this or otherwise even attempt to turn me on,” she bristled.

“You’re already turned on.” He couldn’t hide his smirk. “Look at that flush.”

“I’m angry, Shawn,” she puffed out, exasperated. Yes, she was also turned on, but mostly she was angry. “I fucking hate you.”

“I know you don’t mean that.”

Of course she didn’t. In fact, she was pretty sure she was wildly, profoundly in love with him. “Fine. I’m trying to hate you. At least a little bit, in this moment.”

“Baby.”

The yearning in those two syllables almost had her caving completely. “You don’t get to call me ‘baby’ when we aren’t fucking.”

“Angel, darling, my sweet baboo...”

She was trying desperately not to give in and let him off the hook. “Stop.”

“I’m groveling. Begging for forgiveness.”

In a split second of incense she bit, “You haven’t even said the words ‘I’m sorry’ yet!”

“I’m sorry.” It was genuine. His apologies always were, but he rarely took responsibility for what it was he needed to apologize for.

As quickly as her anger had risen, it dispelled. She brought her arms across her body, tucked them beneath her breasts, narrowed her eyes at him, and huffed.

“I am earnestly, desperately, honest-to-God sorry,” he murmured, crawling closer to her, reaching out to wrap his large hands around the backs of her knees. “I’m so sorry I’ll even let you tie me up,” he grinned.

As annoyed with him as she was, she had to fight not to smirk back. “You love being tied up. Try again.”

His mirth abruptly dissipated. “I know I can be an asshole sometimes.”

“That’s an understatement.”

He inhaled. Exhaled. “You’re not going to make this easy on me, are you?”

“Not this time.”

If she could keep them talking she wouldn’t let her defenses down and drag him straight to her room. If they fell into bed she’d lose control of her senses. He’d have her flying and falling till four in the morning and there was too much at stake. They really needed to figure this out before it went any further, before the cycle could repeat, again, and hearts got shattered, hers especially.

“Can I at least get up off my knees?”

“You put yourself there,” she muttered.

Shawn stood and tugged smooth the legs of his pants. He reached out to entwine his hand with hers. When she didn’t pull away from him, he drew her into his arms for a hug, close and snug. When she relaxed in his embrace and wrapped her arms around his waist, he dropped his lips to the crook of her neck and breathed her in.

She tightened her arms around him and sighed. She was still upset, but in his arms was her favorite place to be. “Why do we always end up here?” she whispered. She eased away, met his eyes, and continued, “Things are good, really good, for a while. We have fun, practically cohabitate, friends with tremendous benefits, but then, out of nowhere, we fight about absurd, insignificant things and someone exits.” She didn’t add that it was usually him doing the exiting; it wasn’t necessary. “A few days, maybe a week, go by. We kiss, make up, fuck, and fuck again. Rinse, repeat. Aren’t you tired of it?”

“The fucking?” he grinned.

She placed her hand square on his chest and shoved. “If you can’t be serious for once, just leave.”

“I’m sorry,” he rasped, stepping away completely, running his hand through his curls.

“You’re so good at expressing yourself in your writing. I don’t understand how you can be so vulnerable with your lyrics but your words be inconsequential when it matters most. Enough with the foreplay and joking or teasing when real feelings get too close to the surface.” He drew a breath. She held her palm up between them. “It’s not just you, babe,” she added before he could interject, which she knew he had been ready to. “We both do it. I’m tired, Shawn. I can’t do it anymore.”

“Tell me what to do,” he whispered, rubbing the back of his neck.

She glanced around her kitchen and suddenly had an idea. “Write me a letter.”

His eyes widened. “What? Like, right now?” he asked anxiously.

“Yes. Right now.” She pulled the magnetized writing pad off her refrigerator and offered it to him, along with a pen. “What’s going on here?” she asked, gesturing to him and then herself. “Tell me how you feel about us. Is this all we’re ever going to be? Tell me what you want out of our relationship, what you want from me.”

He balked. “An ultimatum??”

“No, of course not,” she said, quickly setting aside the paper, which he hadn’t yet taken from her, cupping his face in her hands and kissing him softly. Before she could fall under the spell of his mouth against hers, she withdrew.

He tried to chase her lips. It’s what he knew best, it’s how they worked, it’s what made everything instantly better. But deep in his heart he knew that would only be another band aid over the same bullet wound. She was right, they always ended up here.

“Babe,” she nudged, seeing that he was beginning a descent into a rabbit hole of worry. “You know me too well to think I would ever do that. I’m not asking you to choose one extreme or another, to commit or never see me again.”

His heart constricted, chest tightening, and he almost couldn’t breathe with the thought of never again seeing her.

“Hey. Look at me,” she whispered, hooking her fingers in the front pockets of his chinos. “I just need to know where we stand.”

He sighed heavily, considerably, and swiped the notepad and pen from the countertop.

She leaned her bottom against the counter across from him as he settled into a stool at the kitchen island.

After glancing at her, his eyes pleading with her not to make him do this, his attention fell to the taunting blank lines while the tip of the pen top found itself between his teeth.

Time stretched before he decisively scratched a few things down on the notepad. Abruptly he ripped the page off and crumpled it in his hand. “This is ridiculous,” he grumbled, now refusing to look at her.

He began again. Even within the tension, she couldn’t help but watch the way his hand moved as he wrote. His hands were one of many of her weaknesses when it came to him. He sharply tore the second page from the pad, startling her out of her concentration, and balled it in his fist. “I can’t focus with you standing there,” he groused.

Following an unsuccessful third try and another frustrating crumple, he cried, voice wavering, “I can’t do this.” He punched the pen down and dropped his face into his hands, elbows on the granite, rubbing his eyes with his palms.

She shook her head in apology. “I never should have suggested it.” Her asking him to do that had inhibited him. “It was...wrong, and unfair. I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

In an instance, he found himself standing before her again, reaching for her. He tried once more, desperately, to draw her in and persuade her to take him to bed, where he best knew how to communicate, touching his lips to hers, encouraging her to open to him. He didn’t care if it was just one more band-aid; he couldn’t leave things like they were.

She instinctively responded before her head cleared enough for her to pull away. He pushed back, feverishly. She placed her hands against his chest to preserve the distance. Resting her forehead against his, touching the tip of his nose with hers, she whispered, “Go home, Shawn.”

“Baby, please,” he argued.

“Just go home.” She put more space between them and moved away from him.

“Give me the chance to fix this.”

“We’re not...broken.” Even though they were. But that’s not quite how she meant it. “We’re just...somewhere in between. I need some space, that’s all. And I think we both need some time.”

He dropped his eyes and then his head, dejectedly. He pressed past her, more forcefully than he meant to. It caused him to pause at the door, hand on the knob.

She thought he was going to say something and she held her breath with anticipation, but then he simply sighed, shook his head, and walked out.

///

It was the longest weekend of her life. Detox so far had sucked. All forty-six hours of it, not that she was counting. Okay, she was. Forty-six hours and neither of them had reached out to the other.

Yes, they had gone much longer without contact, and it had sucked then too, but she had always before stubbornly waited for Shawn to come to his senses after he had chosen to leave on his terms.

She could have texted or called him at any point, but she didn’t want to be that girl after she was the one who made him walk out this time. And there had been no argument leading up to it. Well, not the same sort of argument that had always separated them in the past. Somehow this just felt...different.

She had tried to stay busy, to keep her mind off him and them and what, if anything, might happen next.

Too much space, too much time, she felt the itch for him under her skin.

At this point she was nearly willing to accept him back in her bed, to go back to how things have always been, because when it was good between them, it was so damn good. Having him in any capacity was better than not having him at all.

A few more days. If she could just get through a few more days, maybe a week, she’d be fine, she’d be over it.

Who was she kidding? They’d been doing this dance for way too long now for her to get over him that quickly.

Oh God, she hoped it wasn’t another week before he came around again. She wasn’t sure she would survive it.

Before she knew it, she was reaching for her phone. Unexpectedly, right then, it chimed with a text message alert, startling her so badly she dropped it.

She nearly wept with relief when she retrieved it to see that the text was from Shawn.

Hey. I’m going to come by. If that’s alright?

She couldn’t move her fingers fast enough, causing too many errors. She forced herself to slow down, delete, and start over. She waited, for good measure, for almost two entire minutes before hitting send.

Of course it is.

It pleased her to no end that his reply was immediate.

You’re home then? Yes.

And here she was, about to relapse.

///

She knew exactly how long it took Shawn to get to her place from his. She stood before her door, waiting for the knock to come, one hand and forehead against the cool steel, eyes downcast.

Suddenly, an envelope was slid under the sill at her feet. He had done it after all. He had written her a letter. She crouched down to claim it. When she stood again, she looked through the door viewer, but he wasn’t there. Was he gone so quickly? Had he never planned to come in? Was this goodbye? Her heart constricted, chest tightening, and she almost couldn’t breathe with the thought of never seeing him again.

Don’t spiral before you even read what he may have written, she told herself.

She pivoted on the balls of her feet, fell back against the door with a sigh, and slid down to sit against it, pulling her knees up to her chest.

It took her a few moments and some steadying breaths before she could open the letter. The simple way he began was enough to bring tears to her eyes.

My everything,

I am so incredibly sorry. I never mean to purposely hurt you but I know I do every time I walk away. It isn’t fair to leave you to work through the aftermath of my idiocy on your own. I know we should be talking these things through, together. I know I have to learn how to share myself with you, all of myself, back up the honesty I’m always writing and singing about with action and allow myself to be vulnerable. Because love intensifies and is strengthened when you share your weaknesses. It’s easier for me to pick fights and walk away. Then I don’t have to face the fear of letting myself fall in love with you and, therefore, the terrifying possibility of someday losing you. I don't want to have to figure out how to learn to live without you. And what if you don’t feel the same? What if this is all just fun for you? What do I do then, as I hold my bleeding heart in my hands, thoroughly devastated? But letting you in, showing you the real me, everything I am, is worth the risk of getting hurt. I know it is, as much as it scares me. You are worth the risk. I’m starting to think you’re it, that you could be the one.

All my love, Shawn

She half-laughed, half-sobbed, letter clutched tenderly against her chest. Should she go to him? Should she call and beg him to come back?

Her phone chimed again then with another text from Shawn, as if he knew exactly how long it would take for her to read and absorb his words.

It was an audio link.

She was trembling, surging to her feet to swing the door open with an urgency she couldn’t define, a reflection of the song she had just listened to. She didn’t know Shawn had been sitting the same way as she had been on the other side of the door.

He was suddenly falling in, landing flat on his back across the threshold, looking up at her, stunned. “I love you,” gushed from his mouth.

With something between a laugh and a cry, she fell to her knees, just as he had earlier, and placed her hands on either side of his head.

“I love you too,” she breathed before lowering her lips to his, upside down, for a soul-searing, life-defining kiss.

His hand reached up, tangling in her hair to pull her closer, desperate to deepen their kiss. It still wasn’t enough. He parted from her only long enough to flip himself over and surge toward her, pulling her properly into his arms and onto his lap.

“I love you,” he gasped again before her mouth was again under his.

It may have been only a minute, it could have been an eternity, she no longer knew how time worked.

Between one breath and the next, because yes, breathing was essential, even while lip-locked with the love of your life, she could feel his grin against her lips.

“What?” she hummed, smiling reactively.

“Now, will you tie me up?”

She rippled with deep, dizzying laughter. He kissed her through it all, his happiness bubbling and overflowing.

It was inevitable. They were always going to end up in bed.

~ * ~

@mendesblurb @benito-mi-vida @shawn-is-my-giant-jellybean @silverswallow @weedangel-x @monikamendes @mendesficsxbombay (My taglist grew by two!)

[ahtsumu]

the mystery of love ; kuroo tetsurou

pairing: kuroo tetsurou x f!reader

synopsis: kuroo tetsurou does not believe in soulmates. he believes in science, himself, and sometimes other people. but that doesn’t mean he can’t believe in love.

tag(s): sweet summer lovin’, friends to lovers, inspired by call my by your name, university student!kuroo tetsurou, lab intern!kuroo tetsurou, so much pining lol, fluff, angst, slow burn ; warning(s): profanity, mentions of alcohol ingestion (it’s legal bc they’re in italy!), suggestive themes ; wc: 4.8k

a/n: happy birthday tetsu!! i hope you guys like this. i really enjoyed writing it ♡

Kuroo Tetsurou does not believe in soulmates. He believes in science, himself, and sometimes other people. At least, that’s what he tells you. Sometimes you treat this information as a source of hope; other times, you’re not sure what to make of it.

This, you realise with his shoulder pressed against yours and both your bodies sprawled across his wrinkled bed sheets, is one of those other times. You turn your face to look at his.

“What?” he asks, one side of his mouth curling up in a smile.

For a moment, you wonder what would happen if you just said it. You could blame the alcohol. Get away with it scot-free. While you mull the option over in the dead silence of his room, your brain suddenly registers the music still playing from the living room. The low bass reverberating through the walls. How close your lips are. The sound of his breaths.

“Earth to Y/N?”

And like that, the little what-if that rose in your mind falls back with its tail between its legs. You bite your lip, look around his room like the walls have a script printed on them. Unfortunately, they do not.

“I was just thinking about my shirt.” It’s not great, but it’s the best you can do while still feeling the vodka and orange juice burn in your stomach. And smelling it on yourself.

Kuroo’s laugh booms through the room and you can’t help but giggle along with him. “I said I was sorry!” he says, hazel eyes twinkling with mirth. He pauses and glances at his closet, then nods his head in its direction. “Take a hoodie. Your pick.”

A smile–– one you try to downplay but fail miserably to–– creeps up your face. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Kuroo replies. “You can also shower here if you want. It's the least I can do after spilling my drink all over you.”

When you emerge from Kuroo’s bathroom in one of his thinner hoodies, a lot soberer and drying your hair, he’s not on the bed anymore. Quietly, you step out of his room and look for him through the house. People are crashed everywhere–– on the sofa, over the kitchen counter, even propped up against walls. The floor is covered with plastic cups and mysterious pools of liquid. Wrinkling your nose, you try your best to step around the messes, looking in every corner in the house for the raven-haired boy.

You find him back in his room, actually. He’s back on his bed scrolling through his phone, the light illuminating his sharp features. When he hears you close the door behind you, he looks up, eyes immediately zeroing in on the black hoodie over your torso. The corner of his mouth twitches up.

“Where’d you go?” you both ask at the same time. He chuckles; you grin. Crawling back onto the bed, you tell him to go first.

“I went around to make sure nothing’s broken,” he explains. “Perks of being the only sober intern in the house, I guess.”

A beat passes.

This house is rented. You forgot about that. All his expenses are paid for by your mother’s lab. You forgot about that. He fits in your world so well, like maybe he’s always had a spot there, that you forgot that Kuroo Tetsurou is only here for the summer.

“Right.”

Kuroo raises a brow. “And you?”

“I went to look for you.”

He smiles and holds his hands out like a magician at the end of a trick. “Well, you found me.”

“Yeah,” you muse. “I guess I did.” Aren’t you lucky.

With that, something shifts in the air. A contemplative expression crosses Kuroo’s face. Maybe he’s realised how his words come out sometimes. Kuroo often says things that sound like they have more than one meaning and it used to throw you off, but now you just go with it. You’ve even picked up that habit yourself. “Do you ever wish that you’d met someone earlier? Maybe under different circumstances?” he asks.

Sighing, you fall back against his mattress and stare up at the ceiling. Telling the truth feels easier when you can’t see him. “Yeah. All the time.” A few seconds pass. “Do you think we would’ve been friends if we went to the same college?”

He also lies down. You’re both back in the same positions you were in an hour ago, but something’s changed. “No,” he admits. You’re not surprised–– that’s what you’d expected. “I’d be a junior and you’d be a freshman. We probably would’ve never met. And even if we had, I wouldn’t be caught dead hanging out with a… freshie.” He chuckles softly at the end. “And look at me now,” he adds softly, more to himself than you. You look over at his face. A contemplative smile rests on his lips.

That urge to just say it returns.

“Kuroo, I think––”

“You’re my favourite p–– oh, my bad. You first.”

And it goes away again.

“Um, uh,” you stutter, “how long do you have left here?”

Kuroo raises his brows. “On this planet? Hopefully a while, Y/N.” He sees your unamused expression and drops the front. “Three more weeks.”

Your eyes widen. Eight weeks have already passed. Blood rushes to your ears. Eight entire weeks have already passed, meaning that in three weeks, Kuroo Tetsurou will leave forever. And in four, you will, too. Except you’ll come back. You’ve done so every summer since you were born, probably will do until you die.

But this place will never be the same as it used to. Not after him.

“Y/N?” Once everything comes back into focus, you see the concern riddling his features. “Everything okay?”

“Hmm? Yeah.”

Say it.

“You didn’t have too much to drink, right?”

Say it.

“I just got buzzed. What about you?”

“The only drink I was planning on having all went to your shirt.”

Say it.

“Kuroo.”

“Yeah?”

Not yet.

“Let’s go on an adventure.”

At two AM, everything is different. The streets feel different, the villas look different, and you–– you can’t put your finger on it but Kuroo Tetsurou has changed, too. He sits behind the wheel of your father’s white 1953 Cadillac with the convertible roof down, unruly hair blown back by the breeze, a euphoric grin stretched over his face. In the passenger’s seat, you sit with an equally large beam and your hands raised into the dark sky.

“Where to, Miss?” he shouts over the wind.

“The stars,” you shout back with a laugh. Kuroo’s cat-like eyes briefly flit over to your side profile, lips curving to form a smaller, more tender smile. But you miss that–– your gaze falls on him just a second after his return to the road.

“I heard you say Jack’s,” he says, smirking.

The 24/7 diner sticks out like a sore thumb in the row of sun-baked stucco and stone buildings with its bold neon lights and shiny exterior. During the day, it seems gaudy, way too American for a small town in northern Italy. But at night, this place feels like home. You’ve been stumbling into Jack’s completely shit-faced since you were sixteen. Of course, all those other times had been with the kids of your mother’s coworkers. All those other times, you could hardly remember what you even ordered when you woke up hours later.

But this time, you walk in with Kuroo Tetsurou at half-past-two in the morning, the chemicals running through your bloodstream epinephrine and dopamine, not ethanol; if you’re drunk then it’s on a feeling and your only poison is the boy next to you. You study his face and consider that thought. No, he’s not poison. He’s the antidote.

“Y/N!” the server exclaims, rushing over with two menus. “And Kuroo! My two favourite customers, but together this time!” Giovanni ushers you two to a booth by the window and takes your orders, purely for show, of course. He knows your orders by heart: the Lorenzo for Kuroo and the Quentin for you.

“With fries on both, please,” Kuroo adds, throwing you a wink. “Aren’t I a gentleman?”

“You only did that to have more for yourself,” you reply drily. Having him over at your house for dinner every night made picking up his idiosyncrasies so unbelievably easy. You know them like they’re your own. You know him like he’s your own.

Kuroo clutches his chest and pretends to be offended, then changes the conversation to what happened at the lab today, or rather, yesterday. That your mother and the other researchers are so close to finding a cure for the strain of virus that’s recently hit crickets in southern Italy.

“You should drop by again sometime,” he says. “Last time you came around was, what, two weeks ago?”

Your face breaks in a grin. “Are you saying you’ve missed me? Chemistry getting boring?” you tease, drawing a loud laugh from him.

“Sodium hydrogen, you little shit.” Your mother’s used this one on you before, but hearing it from him makes you giggle anyway.

Giovanni comes back with two plates, each loaded with fries. You both say your thanks and he retreats to the kitchen again, but not before wiggling his eyebrows at your reddening faces. Wordlessly, you grab your fork and knife and transfer at least half of your fries onto Kuroo’s plate. Kuroo stares at you with the slightest smile. That look sends your stomach into flips.

“What?” you question nonchalantly, cutting into your burger.

“Nothing,” he says, mirroring your actions. “Nothing at all.”

It’s hard to imagine that after spending almost every day together for eight weeks straight that there’s still more to learn about each other, but there is. You tell him more about your real home. Your best friend who called you at 3 AM last night because of timezones. Stories from every summer before this one, when you were a different person in the same place you are now.

He tells you more about Kenma, his best friend from high school. How they played on one of the best volleyball teams in Japan. Stories from training camp, literature class, the metro ride home after school–– you listen to every single one in rapt attention. There’s not enough time in the world for all the things you want to know about Kuroo Tetsurou, so you take what you can get. If only you’d known him before you’d known him.

“If we’d met earlier here, do you think we would’ve been friends?” you ask after paging Giovanni for the check.

“No,” he replies, picking up a few remaining fries with his fork instead of his fingers. The corners of your mouth turn up. That’s your thing. He considers the scenario seriously. “I think we met right when we should have.”

“What about the future?” you press, leaning into the conversation. “Let’s say we meet in two years here, instead of now. Would we be friends?”

Kuroo sets his fork down, eyes you steadily. “What’s this about?”

You blink. “What?”

“What’s with all these hypotheticals today?” Perhaps worried that he came off too harshly, Kuroo adds, “I thought I was the scientist.”

“I just… it feels like I’ve known you since forever.” This feels like it was meant to be, you don’t say. And I want to know you forever.

A sigh–– fond, but still a sigh–– blows through his lips. “Don’t tell me you believe in soulmates,” he says with a wicked grin.

“Are you calling me your soulmate?” The question, shamelessly genuine, painfully hopeful, leaves your mouth without you intending it to and you regret it instantly. Because Kuroo Tetsurou has told you many times that he does not believe in soulmates.

Is it so bad to dream, though?

You watch him carefully but he doesn’t say anything, just continues smiling wryly like you’d intended to tease him. Like he knows that you know better. But you don’t.

“Are you?” he suddenly replies. Sharp eyes hold yours, daring you to respond. Do you dare?

At that moment, Giovanni returns with the check. “Who’s paying?” he asks, unaware of the tense exchange that just occurred across the table. Inaudibly, you sigh in relief. Kuroo is about to say that it’s on him when he catches himself in the middle of his sentence, looks your way, then back to Giovanni. He says you’ll go Dutch. You nod in approval.

“So,” Kuroo drawls once you’ve both paid for your meals. “Where do we go from here?”

Good question.

Kuroo Tetsurou has never been to an outdoor club period. And though he’s been clubbing, he has never once gone dancing in his lifetime. You tell him that’s about to change as he parks the car in a lot near the venue. Before him, all your summer nights were spent here.

“You’ve been here for two months and you haven’t been to an outdoor club yet?” you ask while unbuckling your seatbelt. That can’t be possible. If you’d been in his shoes… an attractive college student in a foreign country for the summer, you would have gone wild.

“Nope. I’ve been a little busy, y’know, spending my days in a lab, handling chemicals, studying viruses, washing lab equipment, writing up reports for your mother and her colleagues, working on my own research on the side… the usual.” He flashes you a bright, sarcastic smile.

“Poor baby,” you coo, ruffling his hair. Kuroo laughs while you continue messing with the dark locks. “Was your first full day here the only tourist-day you’ve had so far?” His weekends, you already know, are spent either lounging around cafés, pools, or the great outdoors with you or the interns. But you’d assumed he’d had time to do some exploring on his own.

Kuroo nods. “And my guide wasn’t even that great,” he mutters, shooting you a dark look. “She sped through every attraction and hardly spoke a word outside of the tour to me. I think she hated me.”

You giggle and open the door, letting the music from the outdoor speakers infiltrate the bubble inside your car. “Maybe she was just nervous!” you say as you get out. That’s a lie.

“About what?” Kuroo follows suit, the gravel crunching beneath his feet. “I was so friendly to you and you just brushed me off each time.” He pouts.

But you don’t reply. Instead, you just grab his hands and pull him towards the venue. As you step into the boundaries marked by fairy lights and rustic wooden fences, Kuroo stops in his tracks and tugs on your intertwined hands. You glance down before up, trying to memorise how his hand looks around yours in the few seconds you can steal.

“Y/N,” Kuroo says. The strobe lights paint his skin pink, blue, purple like it’s a canvas. “Tell me why you were nervous.” Grammatically, it’s a command. And yet it sounds like he’s begging.

“What’s it mean to you?” you ask, feeling your heartbeat speed up in your chest. So what if you just… said it? What would happen?

“Everything?” he replies with a cheeky smile. The odds that he seriously means that are slim. But… they’re there. You shake that possibility out of your mind. That’s just the hope talking.

“Depends how convincingly you say it.” You tug on his arm. “C’mon. Let’s dance.” But he doesn’t budge–– he just continues to stand by the entrance of the club with an expectant look on his face. People are starting to stare.

“Fine,” you say with an eye roll. “I’ll tell you." Kuroo smirks, something self-congratulatory ready to leave his mouth, but then you let go of his hand and dance backwards into the throng of moving bodies. “But first, you’re gonna have to dance with me!” 

You allow yourself to be swallowed by the lively music, the people, the moment. Seconds later you’re deep enough into the crowd that you lose sight of Kuroo. Something in you says that he’ll show up soon, though. For now, you let yourself breathe. Forget about the heaviness of what-if’s, the itch to confess, the dread of the aftermath. Feelings are a lot like gravity. Sometimes they keep you grounded, other times, they weigh you down. This is one of those other times.

You dance up to a friendly-looking group of teens your age. Three guys and two girls. You shout your name and follow up with how it’s nice to meet them, hoping one of them finds you nice enough to keep around. Dancing alone in a club is one of the worst things that can ever happen to someone. Luckily, one of the girls–– the one wearing a purple wig–– pulls you in for a hug, drunkenly shouting back, “Bianca!” Bianca pushes you into their circle next to one of the guys and, just like that, you two start moving to the beat, feeling it in your feet, shoulders, hips. At one point, you turn around and take a good look at his face. The guy’s cute enough, but he’s not Kuroo. Still, you say nothing as he moves closer to you and grabs your hand, lifting it up and motioning for you to twirl.

Suddenly, a pair of hands grip firmly onto your waist and pull you out of the circle. “Hey!” You look down, suddenly realising they’re Kuroo’s. A shiver runs down your spine. He spins you around to face him. His lips are set in a firm line, eyes completely devoid of humour, nostrils slightly flared.

“Hi,” you say quietly, testing the waters.

“Hi,” he replies curtly. His hands are still on your waist. Selfishly, you choose not to point that out. Instead, you try to defuse the situation with a light question. Playful tone.

“Where were you this whole time?”

“Looking for you.”

“Well… you found me.” You flash him a sheepish grin. A peace offering of some sort.

“I did.” He doesn’t take it.

“Lucky you.”

Irritation finally seeps through his features. “You just left me on the dance floor!” he snaps. “And then when I find you after searching the entire venue, you’re dancing up on some random guy!”

“It was in good fun!” you retort, wriggling out of his grip. “And I wasn’t dancing up on him.” You want to ask if he’s jealous so badly, but you take a good look at his face and decide against that.

“Fun?” he asks incredulously. “Worrying about losing you, worrying about myself getting lost, then having to worry about that guy after finding you isn’t very fucking fun to me, Y/N!” The words fly out of his mouth like daggers without pause. Once finished, he looks at you with a disappointed gaze, shaking his head lightly, chest rising and falling with each heavy breath.

“I’m sorry,” you say, looking down at your shoes. It doesn’t matter if you disagree with him–– a sort of shame drills itself so deeply into your conscience that all you can think about is making things right again. “I didn’t think my actions through.”

A second passes. You wonder what he’s thinking.

“Hey, look at me.” Kuroo lifts your chin up with an index finger. Your wide eyes meet his narrow ones. Just as a pink beam glides over his face, his gaze softens, falls down to your lips. And then you feel his thumb on your chin, barely grazing the skin of your bottom lip. His Adam’s apple bobs up and down. The revelry in the background fades to dull beats against your eardrums. Suddenly, you register that he smells of, as usual, blackcurrant and amber.

But now you also smell of blackcurrant and amber.

You’re wearing his clothes. You smell of him.

Kuroo’s eyes crawl back up to yours, wide like he’s just been caught in the middle of a crime. You blink expectantly, ignoring the furious way your heart pounds in your chest. Shallow breaths puff through your slightly parted mouth.

“I am.” It comes out barely a whisper. C’mon. Kiss me. Kiss me. Kiss me kiss me kiss me kiss me kiss me kiss me––

You gently touch the hand he has on your chin. Kuroo jolts back like he’s been burned. “I’ll, uhm, I’ll be in the car,” he stutters, looking away from your face. He pushes through the sea of people, leaving you all alone on the dance floor, body doused in blue light, fingers touching the area his thumb had been as if preserving its print.

Kuroo hardly notices you slip into the passenger’s seat minutes later. He’s got his forearms hanging over the steering wheel and gaze fixed ahead into the darkness, mind probably running off to a place he wishes his body was, too.

As soon as you’ve buckled yourself in, Kuroo starts the car.

The entire drive home is silent.

Once Kuroo pulls into your courtyard and parks, he turns off the engine, unbuckles his seatbelt, and steps out of the car. Wordlessly, you follow his actions and meet him by the stairs to your door.

“Hi,” you say quietly. He doesn’t look at you.

“Hey.”

The two of you stand outside your front door in silence as you both consider what to say next. This can’t be the way it ends.

“I shouldn’t have… done that,” Kuroo says first.

“Done what?” You choose to play dumb. Call it selfish, but you want to hear him say it. Maybe then it’ll feel as real as it had been. Kuroo sighs and leans his shoulder against the stone wall, crossing his arms over his chest. There’s no way he can dance around what happened. Perhaps the past two months can be summed up as the development of a strong friendship with skilled doublespeak and metaphors and just enough artistic licence, but this can’t. And Kuroo knows that. He can’t feed you an alternative truth like he’s done so many times before. What’s more, he can’t lie to himself anymore. So maybe it’s better just to not speak at all.

Your eyes burn holes into the side of his face. Fine. You’ll concede first. “I was never nervous.”

Kuroo blinks, turns his head around to look at you. “What?”

“I was never nervous. I was playing it cool because I didn’t want to risk befriending you and getting attached.” I’m still playing it cool, you don’t say. And I’m already attached. “Guess I just came off as a bitch instead.” You laugh. “But can you blame me? You were this cute, older guy. Smart, too, since you were interning with my mom. You were my dream guy.”

An amused breath blows out of his nose. “Were?” he questions, grinning, only remembering the fragility of your platonic relationship a second later. “Um––”

“Are.” It slips out of your mouth without you realising. Fuck. Kuroo stills. It’s too late to take back your words now, so you might as well just keep going. “You still are my dream guy.”

Seconds pass and neither of you says anything. Sweat gathers in the palms of your hands. You start to feel your heartbeat through your neck. The buzz of the cicadas grows louder. Oppressive. Behind Kuroo, the sky is starting to turn pale blue and pink in the horizon. That means it’s almost sunrise. The night is almost over, and, hopefully, so is this awful conversation.

“And… you don’t feel the same.” Funnily, you feel like you’re lying. You’re telling Kuroo how he feels and you think you’re lying. Does that make sense? None of this night even feels real. God, you hope this has all just been a dream. Mustering a soft smile, you say, “That’s okay. Thank you for the party. And the adventure.” It was fun while it lasted. You feel the house key in your pocket and turn to unlock the door. “I hope this doesn’t change anything between us, Kuroo. Can we still be friends?” The words leave your mouth feeling like barbed wire. You know damn well you can’t still be friends.

And suddenly, you feel his calloused hands around your cheeks. Suddenly, his hot breath fans over your face.

“Can I kiss you?” he murmurs.

Your eyes close instantly. “Yes, please.”

And suddenly, his soft lips are on yours.

Kuroo breaks the kiss seconds later. “Fuck,” he whispers, resting his forehead against yours, touching the tips of your noses together. “Y/N, I don’t want to be friends. Fuck.” A dry chuckle leaves his mouth. He pauses to collect his thoughts but decides that that can wait. Instead, he presses another kiss to your lips so fervently that he backs you up against the wall with no space between your bodies. You wonder if he can feel your heartbeat like this, chest to chest. Kuroo’s hands travel down your waist and rest on your hips. His tongue runs across your tongue, your teeth, the insides of your mouth. You gently suck on it, drawing a satisfied moan from him. When the kiss ends, you see that his lips are red and cheeks are swollen. A warm feeling spreads through your chest. “I thought I could be happy just being friends with you but I can’t. I want you so bad it hurts. Not to mention, when I saw you in my hoodie?” His fingers pinch the material. “I thought God was testing me or some shit.”

“Sure didn’t feel like you wanted me that way,” you retort, still breathless.

“In my defence,” Kuroo says, thumbs tracing your cheekbones, “I was very scared.”

“Of what?”

It looks like he’s about to tell you, but he changes his mind and doesn’t answer. He grabs your hand and pulls you back to the car with a cheeky grin. “I’ll tell you only if you tell me where we can watch the sunrise.”

Kuroo holds your hand, stroking your thumb the entire drive there.

After a short hike, you plop down on the grassy hillside, supporting your body with outstretched arms in the back. Kuroo sits down beside you with one of his hands covering yours, fingers intertwined like a honeysuckle vine around a hazel tree. You tell him that you grew up running along this hill with your parents. It used to be your playground. Maybe, you think, it’s time to make new memories here.

“Beautiful,” Kuroo breathes, a wonderstruck look in his eyes. The sun’s just risen halfway above the pink and blue horizon, the saturated orange casting the entire city below gold. It’s not just the city, though. He’s also gold. He’s just as beautiful. You watch him with a soft smile on your lips, noting how his wide eyes and slack jaw return to normal as he stares off into the distance. After resting your head on his shoulder, you fix your eyes on the sunrise ahead. You wonder what he’s thinking so quietly about.

“Penny for your thoughts?” you finally ask once the sun has finished revealing itself.

Kuroo blinks, returning to reality, but continues to stare straight ahead. “I was just thinking about… soulmates.”

You lift your head off his shoulder. “Don’t tell me you believe in soulmates now,” you tease.

“Hmm.” He turns to look at you, the sun turning his hazel eyes the colour of honey. That same wry smirk from Jack’s returns to his face.

“You wanna know why I was so scared?”

“Pray tell.”

“Because I’ve never felt this way towards anyone.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“No,” Kuroo laughs, laying his head down in your lap, looking up into your eyes. “I’m serious. I used to purposely stay away from girls in high school. Same in college. Same all the way until you somehow wormed your way into my life. That’s why we wouldn’t have been friends.” You cock your head to the side.

“Why?” you ask, running your fingers through his hair.

Kuroo’s eyelids flutter shut. He inhales deeply before talking. “My parents are divorced. The years before the divorce were… very ugly.” 

(He spares you the details of the midnight arguments, the smashed plates, the holes in the walls. He spares you the details of how he only ever knew how to fall asleep with his head sandwiched between two pillows, how he hasn’t seen his sister in a decade, how he’ll curse and snap but never yell because he always feels like a child again around the noise. That’s for another time, if you’ll have any.) 

“I still remember all the fighting and yelling. For the longest time, that’s all I knew about marriage and relationships.”

“Did you think all relationships were like that? Fighting and yelling?” you ask.

“For a while, yeah. I’m still a little scared of that, to be honest. Ending up in a relationship where all you do is fight.” Kuroo sighs. “But that’s not the only thing. I thought I wouldn’t know how to love someone, growing up like that.” At that, your fingers pause in his hair.

“Wait,” you say, furrowing your brows. A wave of immense sadness (not for yourself, for him) washes over you. “You think you wouldn’t know how to love someone else?”

“Thought.” Kuroo cracks open his eyes and smiles up at you. “I’m in the process of changing my mind.”

[jerek]

alright. bonus lore time. i literally never thought anyone was cringe if i ever had a problem w u it was ALWAYS about wrathion.

since fall 2021 ive developed a new talent which is my cortisol randomly spiking and making my stomach too acidic which can and has made me vomit 10 times in a day and put me in ER-level pain and i think it has something to do with the lil polycule of rpers i was with back then.

roster was, iirc (at the time)

26 y/o male / nb

38 y/o female

mid 20s male

mid 20s nb

early 20s female

19 y/o me

18 year old nb

26 year old was the one who made the discord, roleplayed anduin, the rest of us were literally self shippers with ocs. (except me i played sylvanas)

was a SHIT ton of wranduin in there!!! i'm not evil though so i put up with it. i asked once can they please stop putting wrathion porn in there, they were like "thats cool bro i respect your triggers" and put it in a different channel still accessible for the girlies who love to trigger themselves.

so like. heres where the mysterious food poisoning came in. when i say 'dissociative' i may not mean DID as diagnosed by a trained professional after 15-20 tests but like. i couldnt even express to a therapist how shit i felt bc i was not consistently the same type of person between appointments. if you make me come in every week, next week i will not remember why i felt the way i felt last week. i'll vaguely remember what i said, but she's not me anymore lol.

and sometimes it's THAT, the true saint norman experience, sometimes it's possession (thinking other people's thoughts) and sometimes it's dreaming but girl SOMETIMES it manifests as like.

Imagine going up to norman bates and telling him he cares too much about his sick, declining, codependent mom.

Me but when you smack Wrathion I feel it. He's a metaphor for me. I think in his voice. I damn near pray to him ig, being a mormon I can tell you he is the only reason ive ever felt 'the spirit.'

Cringe? Yes!!!!! Out of my control? Yeah 😭

There is no center to my being. i dont identify as anything. i'm not the name my parents gave me, but i am the characters i use to puppet out whatever emotions. Internet sexting for so long has eaten away at my boundaries so much there is no longer any reason for her (who i was born as) to exist or for me to relate to her.

Rping in that group gave me so much dopamine I couldn't sleep, consistently had the feeling that my stomach muscles were splitting down the center, migraines. Literal food poisoning symptoms. It was really fun still!!!!!

And then when the wrathion shit happened like. Whispers of nzoth in the back of my brain started tickling my self defense instincts for no reason. No reason bc I had put up with literally everything including the wrathion shit, the only difference was I personally didn't enjoy wrathion porn.

I knew I was irrational. Not liking a certain type of porn is one thing, I was fighting off the old gods trying not to start some shit.

Prob shoulda communicated! Communicating last time gave me a trigger myself button though. Literally the [triggered] meme.

Eventually you get the feeling that shit is going down the drain whether you like it or not. The rp's stopped, everyone's switched to FF and your laptop can't run it. It's all just kinks, someone posting once or twice a day with "imagine li-li stormstout [redacted]" getting reacted with 😏 emojis.

So I posted screenshots bc I knew the other half of the world, the one with everyone else in it, would feel as alienated as I did. I'm back in 2015 as a 13 y/o dominatrix prude and I want the feeling of 'we know what's wrong' I got from the ER. Literally went to sleep 5 minutes later because I knew I'd be guillotined.

I wake up and I have no idea why I did that. It's been years since I tore off the chunk of me that will do literally anything to be included, those two halves don't communicate anymore.

But shit's fucked now!!

It was always about wrathion. Literally always about my shitass fixation on blizzard's favorite 7 year old to unbutton the shirt on. Girl why

[katytheinspiredworkaholic]

KATY KATY KATY!!! Congrats again on 200 you deserve it okay??? ILY!! May I please have 🎵 with just my name (Sarah) so you don't have to come up with a ton of songs lol. And also ✏ with Hotchreid and the prompt: “If I could, I would kiss away all of your scars.” pls and thank you ILY <3333

Thank you so much Sarah!!! You are so sweet and so supportive of me ILY too!! <3

I was 100% prepared to do your whole username xD It was harder trying to choose just ONE song that starts with S! But I ended up getting a romantic/pining theme going here so hope you like it love <3

S - Someone New - Birds At Night

A - Anywhere But Here - Safetysuit

R - Right Here - Betty Who

A - A Fateful Meeting - James Newton Howard

H - Hello, I’m in Delaware - City and Colour

-

HotchReid blurb, “If I could, I would kiss away all of your scars”.  Mildly NSFW so it’s below the cut. CW: scar wounds, body image issues

SEXY ANGST HERE WE GO. Hope you like it dear <3333

-

It's not until the third or fourth time they fall into bed together that Spencer notices Hotch doesn't take his shirt off all the way. 

He'll roll his sleeves up to his elbows, exposing strong forearms and pulling the fabric taut around his biceps. Outlining the width of his shoulders so enticingly. He'll unfasten the top few buttons, revealing dark chest hair and sharp collarbones and faded tan lines from running every morning. If the room is dark Hotch seems to have no problem ripping the fabric over his head and pressing Spencer heavily into the bed, miles of warm, soft skin above him and against him. Spencer has shamelessly mapped out every curve and dip of muscle and bone he can reach -- every single time -- so, to be fair, his IQ being sliced in half by Aaron's hard body over him can really be to blame here. 

But then, one evening only a few weeks into the physical aspect of their relationship, his wandering hands slip beneath the hem of the causal sweater Hotch is wearing as the other man kisses Spencer breathless. Skin thrumming, fingertips alight with firing neurons and dopamine practically dripping down his spinal cord as Hotch does something impressively sensual with his tongue. Everything is buzzing and warm and on a timed delay. He barely notices that his hands aren't just tracing over the musculature he wants to taste so badly his mouth waters at the thought, but they also skim over what can only be rough, raised scar tissue and -- just like that -- it all clicks into place. A rapid fire sequence that connects dots Spencer hadn't even considered warning signs until that very moment.

There's nine of them, that he knows of. Nine that were put there by George Foyet, and the physical reminders don't just remain healed within his body -- but they also litter Hotch's skin. He doesn't want to look at them. He doesn't want Spencer to look at them. It all makes sense now…

And Spencer has stalled far too long as he realizes all of this. 

Hotch has stopped kissing at his neck, his hands -- ever steady, patient, purposeful -- take hold of Spencer's wrist and pull his hand out from under his sweater. Spencer doesn't know if he's going to stop them altogether, which would be a damn shame with the direction they had just been heading as they made out just inside his front door, or if Hotch was planning on redirecting Spencer's attention elsewhere. But either way… Spencer decides he isn't having it. 

He drops to his knees. His hands go back to where the hem of that sweater meets the waistline of the older man’s jeans, and he looks up at Hotch just in time to see those dark eyes go black as his pupils dilate in shock and arousal. 

"I can close my eyes, if you want me to," Spencer tells him, knowing it's the seeing as much as the feeling. But as he plans on kissing every inch of skin along the man's stomach and strong core muscles, feeling them was going to be a given.

Hotch shakes his head, like the question is ridiculous. As if Spencer is needlessly coddling him. "It's not -- you don't have to do that. It's fine. They just... aren't very pretty to look at."

Now that sounds ridiculous, to Spencer’s ears, because he can’t think of one single thing about Hotch that isn’t breath-taking in its own right. He almost says as much, lips parted around the words, but at the resigned look on Hotch’s face he goes for a more practical approach.

He pushes the sweater up the long line of the man’s body, exposing a dark trail of hair from his navel to his waistline, strong hips and hard planes of muscle from years of cardio and field work. And the first of the nine scars, pierced through the very meat of his internal oblique muscle, parallel to his inguinal ligament -- the V shape of the pelvis that Garcia always raves about on Morgan’s physique. While Hotch’s isn’t as prominently ‘cut’, it’s still there, and Spencer finds himself nosing at it as he presses a kiss to the scarred knife wound. Slow, profound, and the intake of breath above him is as audible as it is soft.

“If I could, I would kiss away all of your scars.”

Because he knows they are reminders of the worst day of Hotch’s life. How much he hates them, that they must mock him constantly as they itch beneath whatever fabric he wears, but Spencer doesn’t want him to feel he has to hide them. Not from him. He mouths at the gnarled skin, slow and wet and heated and Hotch’s breath goes ragged.

“I wouldn't mind you trying,” Hotch tries to tease, but it sounds winded, and that just pulls a smile at one side of Spencer’s lips. “Just to see what happens.”

The smile spreads wider, Hotch has to be able to feel it pressed into the skin of his stomach as Spencer sits up a little straighter, travels to the next abdominal scar -- along the linea alba, the very center of his abs -- and he nearly speaks against it as he pushes the sweater even higher up Hotch’s chest. “I know exactly what will happen.” 

It wouldn’t remove the scars, in any physical way, but to erase them from Hotch’s mind for a few moments would be well worth the effort.

With a carefully controlled pause, catching Spencer’s lust-hazed eyes, Hotch considers him for a moment -- and then slowly peels off the offending fabric the rest of the way. Leaving him bare-chested, heaving lightly, and awaiting a reaction that apparently is written all over Spencer’s face because the man can barely contain a smirk as he answers.

“Do it, anyway.” 

[onlyhereforangst]

2020 IN WRITING

tagged by @indestinatus 💕

tagging whoever wants to go thru this journey with me & see their accomplishments in this terrible terrible year!

1. List of works published this year:

Oh god there’s a lot, like 70 total in just 2020. I’ll try to categorize them so this doesn’t get too long 😅but here’s a cut for aesthetic on your dash.

Sequels/Partner Fics: Risk It All (for @hellokaelyn), Finally Home (to Come Back), They Always Do & Could She?, Lucky Day & Completely Yours, Fiery Trance (Two Can Play series), Obsessed (Particular Taste), Soul (to Ignited)

Smut: My Turn (sequel to My Pleasure), Worth It, Maybe We Should, Make it a Double (also a fic request), Shall We (AU)

Fic Requests: Coffee Run, Hold Still, Typical, Deal, Needed It, I’m Home, For Science, Cry Me A River, From Your Dreams (AU), Crystal Clear, Tempt Me, Your Fault, Prove It, Silent Proclamation, A Hundred Suns (angst smut), Duly Noted

Stand Alones: No More, Never Let Her Go, Life is Fragile, Pandemics & Peach Drinks, To Need and Be Needed, Never Let Go, Coming Home, Priceless, Behind The Mask, Need a Hand?

Angst: My Daisy, Status Quo, Can I Stay, I Refuse, Deal

Series/Multi-chaptered: Back Off (Better Apart, Missed The Mark, Change Her Mind, But You Do, Layered Love), Electrified (Don’t Stop (Senorita)), Here By Faith, Forgive & Forget, Angstober ‘20 (Never Has & Never Will, Only In My Head, Long, Long Gone, Do Something, Take Care, Waiting to Burn, Survive the Hell, Find Her, Never Ended Well, At All Costs, One Thing Right, Stay Away, Echoed Back, Smart Man, Not Interested, Flake Again, Release, Slipping Away)

2. Work you are most proud of (and why):

Here By Faith mainly because of the topic. Pregnancy & Infant loss has been such a taboo topic for so long and something I have personal experience with so writing this was very therapeutic. 

3. Work you are least proud of (and why):

Shall We and only because I truly wanted way more plot in this and it turned out to be essentially just straight smut with a tiny bit of plot. But it is what it is 🤷🏻‍♀️

4. A favorite excerpt of your writing:

Ok I had 70 fics to choose from not breaking down chapters so I’m sure I’m missing something, BUT I do love - omg typing this out I realized it’s from a fic in 2019 so I can’t use iiiiiit 😩 ok so here’s a couple excerpts. I loved typing out this stream of conscious partner fics (They Always Do & Could She?):

They Always Do:

Yet this time, this time she didn’t have the chance to rebuild. Like a Trojan horse, he waltzed right up to her and slowly dismantled her defense. Joke by joke, smirk by smirk—Nick took each brick down with care. The worst part? It was so subtle, so thoughtfully done, she didn’t even notice it was happening. Didn’t see her chest being pried open, beating heart on display for him to see, and take. Never realized her greatest defenses were missing until it was too late.

That love- precious, fragile, delicate love- had managed to grow again. In her desolate, cold heart, Nick managed to bring to life an emotion she had long given up on. An emotion she was too afraid to ever feel again. Because with it came agony.

They leave, and you’re abandoned- picking up the pieces of a shattered heart.

When you love, you lose. Always.

Could She?:

But-

Even if that was love, even if he loved Ellie with his whole heart, his entire being. Was that enough? Was Nick enough? Was he deserving?

A resounding no clanged around his skull like a church bell in a Southern town on Sunday morning. He wanted to silence it, stop the shrill metal sound that started any time he pictured forever. Any time he truly thought he might deserve to love, even after all he’d done. After all the unimaginable things he’d done, the horrors he’d seen, the pain he’d caused. That bell sounded, loud and clear.

How did he deserve love when he couldn’t bear to love himself?

[...]

Could she love him despite all his misgivings? Could she love him even when he didn’t love himself? Could she love him when there was a risk he’d be taken from her too soon?

Could she?

Please love me.

But please be sure.

There’s been a couple of other inner monologues that I have absolutely loved (I like to think it’s semi my speciality? But maybe that’s super arrogant of myself?) but that’s a different post for another time.

5. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

I said it recently but I *love* when people pick out specific line(s) from my fic and choose to comment on those. More often than not it’s a line I was so proud of either prose-wise or foreshadowing-wise or whatever and I get literally giddy with excitement that someone not only noticed it but also loved it enough to comment on it 🥰but truly any kind of comment is dopamine-inducing 😉

6. A time when writing was really, really hard:

As some people may have noticed (& maybe not because I did still semi-run the other main ellick blog despite it) I was somewhat absent for most of the summer/fall. I struggled for the first time in my life with mental health issues, borderline depression after being in a shit work environment, an essential worker with a company that claimed to “care” about us, a community that I once loved but showed their true colors in the midst of the pandemic & election, add in a rough pregnancy & it was a recipe for disaster. I didn’t want to even move from the couch most days let alone write. 

7. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

I had a lot of fun writing short excerpts from different characters’ perspectives (Jimmy, Kasie, McGee & Gibbs) in my Angstober series & honestly wouldn’t mind doing that again!

8. How did you grow as a writer this year:

Honestly not sure, I think I’ve just generally grown as a writer - better descriptions & descriptors, better dialogue, better plots. But that could all be me seeing things 😂

9. How do you hope to grow next year:

I’d love to look into writing more seriously. My husband is convinced I could write an episode script or a novel, so I may look into trying my hand at that (even though I feel I’d be god-awful at it 😅)

10. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

Hmmmm I always appreciate the support I’ve gotten from the ellick fandom despite it being rough this year for us, wonderful people like @erinchristmaselvis, @thekeyboardninja, @hellokaelyn & @wanna-be-bold are always there to either hear me vent or cheer me on ☺️

11. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:

Haaaaah yes. Lots of it (but I bet you can’t tell because I only add mini snippets so have fun finding those easter eggs 😏)

12. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

Always, always, always write for YOU. Not for anyone else, the kudos, hits, comments, none of it. Write for YOU. And I say this as a reminder to myself as well, it’s so hard to get bogged down in that dopamine-induced craze we search for in recognition but it’s so important to not externally validate yourself rather internally validate yourself on baby steps of growth & accomplishment. 

13. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

LOL how about all my WIPs? All of those stories I started forever ago that people call me out on not finishing months later when I swear they’ve forgotten about them 😬

14. If you could recommend only one work from yourself published this year:

Hmmmm lemme pick one from each category because I’m indecisive 😉

Sequel/Partner Fics: Lucky Day & Completely Yours (the aaaaangst)

Smut: a tie between Maybe We Should & Make it a Double

Fic Request: A Hundred Suns (because I love me some angst smut)

Stand Alones: Pandemics & Peach Drinks (hahahaha because this was in an Insider news article at the start of the pandemic hahaha so on brand #2020)

Angst: My Daisy (I looooooove this one, but also all of the angst category lol)

Series/Multi-chaptered: literally not one of these is finished and they’re all heavy angst so take your pick 😂

15. Year word count: 103,050 in 2020 which seems like so little 😅

Here’s to 2021 being the year I finish WIPs! she says knowing she’s lying

[beerecordings]

What if one of the boys got amnesia? -Bird anon

oh my gosh i’ve actually thought about amnesiac Marvin a lot lol i think i started a fic once about Jameson like getting into his dreams and trying to make him remember. but yes that’s a really interesting idea!! like imagine Jackie slams his head one night while he’s out on patrol and when he wakes up he’s just - no memory. nothing. doesn’t know his own name. and he’s standing in this abandoned warehouse wondering what the hell is going on, so concussed he can barely stand up straight, desperately trying to remember anything.

he’d probably get his phone out and call whoever he texted last, someone call JJ. they pick up but there’s nothing but silence on the other end and he just starts crying so hard JJ knows something is wrong and hurries off to find him and help. it would throw their family into complete disarray - Jackie is the leader, and in some ways the strongest of all of them, and now he just doesn’t remember?? any of them?? anything?? doesn’t even know who Anti is???? it’s stressful to Jackie. he knows they expect something from him, but doesn’t even remember the person they want him to be.

Marvin would be dangerous without his memory, freaked the hell out and seeing enemies on every side. someone must have done this to him, right? his emotions run wild and he’s forgotten how to control his magic - he’s screaming and casting without meaning to, and then a stranger in a red hood is grabbing him to pin him down, and a doctor in a mask shoves a needle into his neck, and then he’s drifting. it would take him days to come to trust them again and everyone, Marv included, would be distraught. he’s quite proud and he’d be so humiliated by having lost everything he used to know and having to rely on everyone around him to tell him everything. but he grows very fond of Chase and JJ very quickly, which helps.

Henrik I can imagine losing his memory to protect himself from trauma, and it just leaves him so fucking numb. maybe he’s even dissociated enough to lose track of what’s going on for a while before, but then one night he’s just out with Chase or something and gets triggered and his exhausted brain just goes “nope” and blocks everything out. Chase looks over and suddenly Henrik doesn’t know him anymore - he’s just sitting there staring at him, his face white, terrified but unable to even respond properly. Chase drags him home, trying to be very very gentle with him, reassuring him his memories will come back soon - they have to, don’t they? everything Henrik knows and loves can’t just be wiped away, right? - but  they just... don’t. he doesn’t know him.

Meanwhile Chase I think we just go missing for a few days and the others would be losing it with worry. did Anti kidnap him? or someone else, thinking he was Jack? or maybe he just couldn’t keep going anymore and he’s already gone? and then THANK GOD after days of patrolling for him Jackie finds him just wandering the streets, phone and wallet missing, beat to shit and exhausted and too terrified to go to the hospital. he bursts into tears as soon as he sees Jackie because he thinks he’s his twin and he lets him bring him home and wrap him up in a blanket and take care of him for a while. but Chase is just in hysterics and so low on dopamine he’s sleeping like fifteen hours a day. but Marvin’s got a good idea!! you know what’s most likely to make him remember in all the world? they call Stacy up and fifteen minutes later Chase is staring at these two little kids he doesn’t even recognize. And Izzy crawls up on his chest - he’s too exhausted to even sit up, but he reaches out to hold her steady - and she lies down to snuggle with him and whispers “I missed you, Daddy,” but he doesn’t even know who she is and he feels so much guilt he can’t even look at them and he locks himself in the bathroom for the rest of the day, throwing up and trying to find medicine to take too much of. he would not handle it well, but his brothers would all spoil him rotten, for what it’s worth.

Jamie, meanwhile, Jamie would switch between being absolutely ferocious and completely “please fucking protect me” terrified. he has spent his whole life being manipulated and he kind of wants to bite anyone who tries to touch him, but he can TELL that something is missing, that he should remember somebody, that there was somebody friendly and warm nearby and he wants them back but there is also someone dangerous and he knows it. so one day he threatens to melon-scoop Chase’s eyes off and goes sprinting off to hide with Marvin, but then the next day he’s sure Marvin’s going to kill him and he won’t let go of Jackie’s hand. I think he would respond really well to Jack himself - Jameson really likes his energy cause Jack isn’t as freaked out by this as the others (he’s walked all of them through waking up with no memory, he can do this too and he’s very calm even when Jameson’s angry) so maybe he goes to live with Jack for a while and the space really helps him. eventually Jackie starts taking him out to get in fights and it helps Jameson’s brain assign good guys and bad guys more easily, so he gets the chance to trust the others again.

Here, I found a snippet from that old wip about amnesiac Marvin! never going to finish it so you can check it out if you want

Blue dreams in halves and segments and slivers, looking at the sun through his fingers, scared to get burned.

He is magic more than mortal and he remembers it in his sleep, when joy surrounds him as an aurora the earth, and he sees the others before him, haloed in gold. He doesn't remember their names anymore, but still he knows them, knows their eyes, knows the joy in their faces. The word “family” is imprinted deep, deep on his heart, though it has been deeply scared over.

His master saw to that.

Still, in dreams in halves and segments and slivers, slivers, slivers of the man he used to be, he sees them.

There are four of them who are both familiar and unfamiliar, but only the three of them sit around him. Sometimes he cannot make out their faces, but there are flashes – the scarred smile of the head of the table, a hood drawn over his shadowed eyes, the worn, steady fingers of a man with icy blue eyes but warmth in the curve of his mouth, the dappling of freckles across the face and shoulders of the younger one, perhaps older than Silver, but not by much. He is the one who speaks, rapid and loud, a smile on his mouth most days, though sometimes the exhaustion that sits on his body is so heavy he seems to be an old man.

“One year older,” he says tonight. “Blow out the candles, dude!”

Blue blinks and adjusts in his seat, looking down to find a cake set in front of him, decorated with a single candle, flickering like a wave on its tiny wick.

He blows out the candles.

“What did you wish for?” asks the younger man.

“Oh,” says Blue. “I forgot to wish.”

Across from him, the other head of the table has slumped over onto the table. Tears run down onto the wood.

“I can't find him!” he cries. “I can't find him! Where has my brother gone?”

“Well, that was stupid,” laughs the younger man, still looking at Blue. He doesn't notice the weeping at his side. “Come on, you got to have some wish. It's your birthday – ”

He tries to say a name, but the word comes out distorted, as though it were spoken underwater, and Blue can't make it out.

Doctor blinks his cold blue eyes, adjusting his glasses and staring too intensely at Blue, who squirms under his gaze. He knows, somehow, that he's a healer, but there is very little else he remembers about him. Sometimes he catches a whiff of coffee off his clothes or looks over to see terror in his face or, at the sight of him, feels his chest flood with affection, but he does not know his name or what he means.

He just misses him.

You are not allowed to miss them, you are not allowed to think of them, look me in the eyes and listen, no one is looking for either of you!

“I hate these dreams,” he says, as the loud one continues to speak and the hooded one continues to cry and the doctor continues to look at him. “I always forget everything as soon as I wake up anyway.”

He gets to his feet and his vision flickers, revealing halves and segments and slivers: the flowers outside the house that he somehow knows are forget-me-nots, the bed upstairs that he somehow knows has constellation-patterned covers and sheets, a bracelet on the wrist of the boy in the hood that he somehow knows he gave him –

He isn't allowed to think about this. He isn't allowed to remember, no matter how much he wants to. He has to wake up. Steeling himself, he recognizes that the dream is a dream and he tries to wake himself up, distancing himself from the figures at the table around him as he always does, drifting back towards the darkness –

Silver grabs his shoulders. Blue screams.

Silver is the apparition that appears only at the very edges of awakeness, where the monster does not wander. Silver is always black and white, always clutching a clock in his hand, but the only thing Blue can ever see of his face are those two grey eyes, glowing with power, alive with determination.

Releasing his shoulders, Silver strikes three fingers against the palm of his other hand and touches his thumb and –

And Blue wakes up.

Panting.

Clutching at his heart with one hand.

At his hair, chopped short, with the other.

“Oh,” he whispers to himself, trying not to cry.

Banish the memories. Forget them. Stop trying to remember. There's no one looking for you anyway.

“Anti!” he calls, dragging himself to his feet. “I had another dream!”

His brother's voice drifts from the other room. “Of the strangers holding you captive?”

“Yes, please make it go away!”

The monster appears before him, mostly human today, though not quite. Its hands are wrong and it is losing a great deal of blood, enough that a mortal thing would be dead, or at least bothered.

“Don't worry,” says Anti, falling to its knees – knees, are those knees? Why are there so many joints? – beside him. “I'll make it all go away. Of course I will. I'll make sure the bad men never find you, little one.”

He kisses Blue gently on the mouth and drags him back under his spell, resisting the urge to murder the little nuisance before he gets out of hand.

No, he needs Marvin for a minute longer. Just a little while longer. Just a little while longer.

[miraculousmidnightreviews]

There will definitely be an explanation for my review of reputation

Album: reputation 

Artist: Taylor Swift Rating: 5/5 stars

I would first like to preface this review with one fact: reputation is my favorite album by Taylor Swift. It should be noted that I did not rate this album based on the average of each individual song rating. (If I did, the actual album rating would be 4.5 stars.) But I felt that this album deserved more. So much more.

What I admire most about reputation is its honest introspectiveness. I think it’s safe to say that no one predicted this album to be The Next Taylor Swift Album. The lead single is distinctly not like previous Swift singles, providing an unexpectedly darker side to Swift. And the album cover is devoid of Swift’s usual bright or pastel colors. Yet what people brushed off as a risky and failed move designed to turn around Swift’s career, her reputation, became the most truthful album of her discography. 

At this point, whether you’re a fan of Swift or not, you can’t doubt her abilities. She knows how to create chart-topping hits; she knows how to pen heart-wrenching ballads; she’s done it before. And she’ll continue to do so for the rest of her career. But reputation was never meant to be the next 1989, the next record-breaking financial success (although it was to some extent). This album was meant to be something else entirely: an admittedly risky exploration that only Swift could pull off. 

And I respect that immensely. This album is honest, and it’s brave. It might not be her most sonically cohesive or lyrically complex album, but it wins anyways. I love that the songs are in chronological order as they pertain to Swift’s life, and while that means it can be hard to listen to the songs without skipping around, the album itself is a journey through Swift’s year of solitude, through her mind space and blossoming relationship, through her life away from the eyes of the public and the media. To me, it’s clear Swift wrote reputation not because she needed to stick to her schedule of releasing an album every other year, but because she just needed to cope with events in her life. I appreciate that maybe even more than the honesty: that Swift wrote this album because she needed it; she wrote it for herself and no one else.

In anticipation of Lover coming out on Aug. 23, I will be reviewing each of Swift’s albums up until the forthcoming album’s release. I can’t wait to listen to new TS music, and I hope these reviews will provide a wistful and refreshing glance at past eras as we look forward to a brand new one.

Continue reading below for my review of each individual song.

1) ...Ready For it?

Rating: 4/5 stars

*clears throat*

At first listen, I was unsure of the mix of rap and singing. But it’s now one of the songs from this album that I play when I’m in That Mood™.

Did I mention Taylor raps?!?

The pre-chorus is so “Wildest Dreams”-esque that I can’t. I just can’t. (Also, sexy!)

That Elizabeth Taylor reference!!! I love it when artists make pop culture references in their works. It gives me a dopamine rush.

As always, it’s nice to hear Swift play with the perception of herself. She’s just so great at turning her reputation as portrayed by the media into a clever and witty line or song.

i’M So vERy TAme nOW (Sarcasm on point. She did that.)

2) End Game (feat. Future & Ed Sheeran)

4/5 stars

Taylor raps! Pt. 2

BIG REPUTATION

I love the features on this one, and I’m very surprised by Future. But that’s Taylor Swift, keeping us on our toes.

This song includes the first of many references to alcohol from this album. A first for Swift, but all those who are surprised need to grow the fuck up. Because Swift certainly did.

Also, notice “End Game” has the first mention of gold, a motif that will continue throughout the album.

3) I Did Something Bad

Rating: 5/5 stars

Probably my favorite song from this album. The live performance was also my favorite of hers. 

badass vibes all the way

IF A MAN TALKS SHIT THEN I OWE HIM NOTHING

I am absolutely in love with the feminist-y witch metaphor in the bridge. Iconic.

Also cool that Swift was inspired by Game of Thrones for this and other songs from this album.

4) Don’t Blame Me

Rating: 5/5 stars

All the gospel feels

TAKE ME TO CHURCH, TAYLOR!!!

THAT high note

Once again, the honesty

5) Delicate

Rating: 5/5 stars

When the album first came out, this was the song that I immediately played the most and connected to. I just adore how she was able to take these universal feelings and put them into a song that anyone just starting a relationship can relate to.

The music video is so underrated. It’s so cute and happy and I just love it and her so much.

1 2 3, LET’S GO BITCH!!!!!!

The repetition of “isn’t it?” to reflect anxiety is, once again, an example of Swift’s lyrical genius.

6) Look What You Made Me Do

Rating: 4/5 stars

YOU’LL ALL GET YOURS

A lot of people did not like this song when it first came out and some still don’t. I happen to like it a lot. While the chorus is not my favorite, the verses bite with amazing zingers and that’s what hooks me.

I think when everyone first heard this song, we assumed the rest of the album would sound similarly: dark and filled with vengeance. But with the exception of a few songs, I would consider reputation to be one of Swift’s happiest albums. There are certainly dark overtones, but at its heart, reputation is an album about love and acceptance in the aftermath of Swift’s metaphorical death. If you consider 1989 for comparison, the composition of its songs (and even the album cover) present a romantic and hopeful facade, when actually, many songs have depressing lyrics about the fate of romantic relationships.

The bridge is so reminiscent of the bridge from Blank Space in a way. They give me similar vibes, except LWYMMD’s is the follow-up to that of Blank Space.

This song has one of my favorite music videos ever. I love when artists tell stories through their music videos, and Swift never fails at storytelling. (Also, a fantastic lyric video!)

7) So It Goes…

Rating: 2.5/5 stars

I feel like this song embodies what everyone expected from this album at first glance: dark, techno pop.

This one doesn’t really do much for me, but I enjoy the extended metaphor of the magician. 

Too much techno, in my opinion.

But sexyyy—“scratches down your back”

8) Gorgeous

Rating: 3.5/5 stars

This song gives me old Taylor vibes, just with a new production.

“Gorgeous” does such an excellent job at conveying the thoughts and feelings surrounding first attraction between two people.

“I guess I’ll just stumble on home to my cats.” Relatable.

Give the original lyrics a listen from Swift’s the making of a song video. They’re heartbreaking.

9) Getaway Car

Rating: 5/5 stars

Now this bitch is DEFINITELY old Taylor storytelling at its finest.

That Tale of Two Cities reference!

THat BRidGE!!!

“And a circus ain’t a love story. And now we’re both sorry.”

Just the complexity of feelings portrayed in this song is utter perfection.

Bonnie & Clyde!!!

This is one of those classic Taylor songs that you turn all the way up while driving down the highway at 70 miles per hour, screaming at the top of your lungs. GO GO GO!!

(not that I’ve ever done that. I follow all speed limits :))

10) King of My Heart

Rating: 4.5/5 stars

The only reason this song doesn’t get 5 stars is because I could have done without the added production (less techno plz).

The beginning always gets me. This and “Call it What You Want” have the saddest beginning lines on the album.

Overall, this is just cute af. Pure fluff.

“jAguARs”

The drums on tour were a wonderful bonus.

Also, the bridge. Swift writes some damn good bridges on this album and just in general.

11) Dancing With Our Hands Tied

Rating: 2.5/5 stars

This song, like “So it Goes…,” doesn’t really do much for me, even though it seems to be a fan favorite. I really preferred the acoustic version of this that she played on tour.

But I appreciate the versatility of her song topics as well as her voice.

12) Dress

Rating: 5/5 stars

First reaction while listening to this song: OMG TAYLOR!!! sexyyyyyy

Her voice *heart eyes*

The pre-chorus is so much fun to sing!!!

“I’m spilling wine in the bathtub” gives me high school party vibes for some reason lol

13) This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things

Rating: 4/5 stars

I really love everything about this song, except for the chorus. It just wasn’t as fun to sing along to as the rest of the song. (Although purposefully making it sound childish was an effective way to get her point across).

 That Gatsby reference!

love Love LOVE the tongue-in-cheek attitude

She missed the parties :(

14) Call It What You Want

Rating: 5/5 stars

so soft & pure

A recovery song is what we really deserve. I love that Taylot took this time for herself.

My heart just bursts when I hear this song. 

That feminist bridge tho—a mature and fulfilling continuation of “Love Story” in a way

15) New Year’s Day

5/5 stars

Bittersweet—the perfect closing song to this album

This song perfectly showcases Swift’s heartachingly beautiful songwriting talent. 

“please don’t ever become stranger whose laugh I recognize anywhere” really gets me.

With this conclusive song, I can say that Taylor Swift is truly happy and okay. And I’m so proud.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this review! Check out other reviews here!

[bendthekneejon]

My self-care routine for the Jonerys fam

I’ve had anons and private messages of people telling me they feel physically sick from this whole Jonerys situation or that they’re falling into depression. Fear is consuming many people here. So I wanna give out some advice for your mental health.

It hasn’t even been a week and the wait has been torturous. So we got 10 more days to endure this. I’d rather spend them hopeful, EVEN if it’s wishful thinking (I don’t think it is, but well). Because when I’m hopeful, I’m in a good mood. And when I’m in a good mood, I have more energy and vitality, I feel better, I sleep better, I can focus on other things in life. So yes, I’d rather be hopeful and spend this following week and a half in a healthy way. If GOT ends tragically, I’ll cry on May 19th (and beyond), but why should I start torturing myself with pessimism from now? Am I gonna change anything by doing so?

Now, about self-care. My mental health used to be a fucking mess, I was medicated and wasn’t getting better. But I have changed my way of life to get better, and it’s working really, really well. Some things about this may sound weird to some of you (especially for the Westerns), like energetic healing and stuff like that. But give it a try. I believe in it 100% when I used to think it was bs just some years ago. Try to trust it--you lose nothing and can gain much. 

My tips:

Take care of what you eat. This is always my #1 advice. Eat plenty of fruit and vegetables. They are excellent to detox the body, which you need to do if you have fear and stress stored inside. Try not to eat red meat at least for these days. If you can afford organic foods, go buy ‘em. Watch out for coffee, it can increase your anxiety. Eat one bar of dark chocolate a week (minimum 75% cacao) for the serotonin, preferably one without milk. Try to consume vitamins C and D (for D, let the sun rays embrace you! for C, consume citric but if you have the chance to get a vit C shot in your area, go for it, it’s vitalizing as hell and lasts for a month). PLEASE no fast foods no shit foods they are terrible for emotional balance!

Work out. Guys, this one is a MUST. I’ve always been sedentary as fuck. Picture a lion chasing a zebra. If the zebra runs away and saves itself, it will start shaking—this is nature’s way to take out all the emotions of fear and stress that are stored inside an animal’s body. But when we human beings get scared, we freeze, which is exactly the opposite of what we must do lol. We gotta take those toxins out and the best way to do so is by moving the body. Dance, run, do some hot yoga, but you gotta SWEAT. Every day. Our bodies generate toxins EVERY DAY.

If you do yoga, try to do balance poses, they help with your actual inner emotional balance as well.

Shower more than once a day: morning and night. If you can in the afternoon, do so as well (my apologies to planet earth). Water is extremely purifying. The water should be preferably cold, at most, a little warm. If you loooove to shower with hot water, when you’re done, let one COLD water jet fall on the center of your head. Yes, it’s not fun, but it helps to neutralize emotions marvelously. Also, do NOT get into bed without showering first. You’re carrying a shitload of toxins and negative energy from the people outside and getting them into your most personal place. Again, at least for these stressful days, try to believe in energies if you don’t.

Try to be around people. Don’t lock yourself away. Try to laugh with them to release serotonin and dopamine and all that. Try to hug as many people as you can. Go to a friend and fucking HUG THEM. You have no idea how healing hugs are, even physically (dopamine and all that stuff). Cuddle with your partner if you have one (or with your mom, brother, etc), tell each other I love you. LOVE. IS. HEALING. AS. FUCK.

Now this is gonna sound cheesy as fuck (but believe me, it’s important): try not to have casual sex with someone you don’t love, much less with someone who isn’t close to you and you don’t know too well. If you really want to have sex, I strongly advise for you to make love with your partner (yes sex in general is great to chill the fuck out but trust me with this one).

Get a plant, preferably a bonsai, and take care of it. Caring for another being is extremely healing. If you have pets, give ‘em some love as well.

Keep your room clean with very very few things in it. Yes, Marie Kondo was right. That shit is healing as fuck. Tidiness and organization in your personal space give you a sense of internal organization and balance as well.

Try not to watch the news nor any violent movie/tv show (YES EXACTLY AVOID GOT, at least when it’s not a sunday night lmao)

Write your feelings down. All of them. Discharge them. If you bottle them up, they will leak through your day through exhaustion and bad mood.

During panic attacks, like when you’re afraid your characters will die, make an attempt for reason to overcome emotions. eg. Read a list of reasons why they would survive (i literally made my jonerys list to read it to myself during these moments of despair).

Keep your mind busy. Try not to have many moments without doing anything. This way, your mind will focus more on your real life and the activity you’re doing than on the fictional characters in your mind.

Avoid alcohol, tobacco, drugs in general.

And the most valuable advice I can give you: LOG THE FUCK OUT OF TUMBLR. LOG OUT. DUDE. WHY ARE YOU TORTURING YOURSELF LIKE THIS. LEAVE THIS FUCKING HELLSITE. Look, I’m here only to answer my friends’ messages, not even looking at my dash (i’m only using tumblr for desktop, i deleted the app) bc I KNOW others’ pessimism will intoxicate me. Now, if you really want to stay here to look for more evidence on why the leaks are FALSE to calm yourself down, then that’s completely valid but please be careful, eg. unfollow and block the pessimistic blogs or try to only look at the ones who share the reasons why the leaks are false (this is not marketing for my own blog i swear lol, it’s def gonna help you to only follow the optimistic ones). AND LOG OUT OF REDDIT TOO BISHES FUCKING YEET THAT SHIT AWAY.

And if you STILL feel like shit at night, take a sleeping pill (last resort…try to keep your body free from chemicals for now).

Anyway, if I remember more I’ll add them. If someone has more tips, you’re more than welcome to share them.

PS: For these things to actually make a difference in you, you gotta be constant and disciplined. It’s not just about going out for a run once or drinking an orange juice once. It has to become part of your daily life to change your mindset and the way you see the world and yourself.

[the-evil-twin]

Headcanon Doug Aesthetic: His Diagnosis / College Years Trauma 

Okay, this headcanoned post is centered solely around him coming down with his disease, namely: paranoid schizophrenia. In the second image is after it went from only one voice, to an entire crowd of voices in his head, questioning things and screaming and warning him about things -- all day, as he’s trying to study and attend classes and seminars as a normal functioning student; and all night long, when he is trying to sleep. 

In the fourth image, he is absolutely terrified with paranoia that he keeps calling her at 3am because his delusions keep telling him that an intruder is entering her room -- and she has no idea why this keeps happening; and so he finally has to tell confess his disease, to her absolute horror, resulting in the immediate end of their relationship. 

In the fifth image, he is desperately trying to will away his illness as much as he possibly can; but it is simply not working. He finally sees a psychiatrist, which results in the first of many of hospitalizations, and in the sixth image, we see that he has gotten his first antipsychotic prescription.  In the seventh image, we see that he has begun to form a nicotine dependency through cigarettes because of how the nicotine actually affects the dopamine levels, which can relieve symptoms of schizophrenia (you can read about it in detail here) -- and it’s actually why he avoids marijuana, because it actually has the direct opposite effect on him, and actually makes his schizophrenia and paranoia worse. I also headcanon that this was only for a few years, while he was still inconsistent with his medication because he disliked at first how numb it made him feel, and how it resulted in sexual dysfunction -- but later on, he decided that he didn’t much care for those things anymore at all, and that they were small prices to pay for his clarity of mind; and by the time he entered the corporate world, he had quit smoking, and had taken his medication seriously. (The more I research what real schizophrenic people have to go through, I come across thing of this nature, and so I do my best to make him seem like a real person going through this disease; and also, I wrote about all of this is another aesthetic post, so I apologize for the redundancy, lol)  The eighth image is a reference to something I mentioned in my story; that when he had a psychotic break on campus, word about his illness spread rapidly and he became the target of both verbal and physical assault.  By the ninth image, he is learning that best safety, for him, is in being alone; which quickly leads to learning to be self-reliant -- and is essentially doing the same by the tenth image. 

FULL DISCLAIMER: None of these photos are mine. I am providing full credit to all of the photographers; but if you see your photo here and you would like it taken down regardless, then please message me and I will remove your image for you. That all being said – below are all of the photo sources:  Image 1: Click here (via GifMage)   Image 2: Click here (via Gifer) -- EPILEPSY/SEIZURE WARNING  Image 3: Click here  (via Giphy)  Image 4: Click here (via Gfycat)   Image 5: Click here (via Favim)   Image 6: Click here (via Synthetic Picturehaus) -- These are the people that did the Lab Ratt, Shadows, and A Triumph of Science film shorts! -- in addition to a cute few others with Susan Tiemann -- but oh man, I love them so much for all of their Portal fandom contributions (most of all for their Doug-centric ones, because very obviously, I’m very in love him) :D ♥  Image 7: Click here (via Giphy)  Image 8: Click here (via Pinterest / Teen Wolf)  Image 9: Click here (via Rebloggy / Perks of Being A Wallflower)  Image 10: Click here (via Rebloggy / The Art of Getting By)

[forever-yoongis]

My Chemistry Of Love

Summary: When two different worlds clash and leads to something that no one ever imagined... While certain science students have never experienced the true taste of love, and idols never get the spare time to commit to a relationship...what happens when music and science mix together?

Ships: Yoongi x reader, Namjoon x reader, jungkook x reader...

Author's note: It's not the same character for each person mind it 😂. There are three different readers and three different stories all in one fic.

Warnings: None except this fic will be long, like real long. So please bear with me 😂

Love.

Neuroscientists like us like to believe that it is a side-effect of a release of the hormones Dopamine and Oxytocin, the same two hormones released when a guy starving for ages gets something to eat and when a terribly screaming and suffering woman holds the being she pushed out of her body for the first time in her arms.

We try to ignore beliefs like "love can conquer anything" coz we like many other professions, believe in science.

We don't believe those superstitions where if a man diagnosed with tumor starts loving his life, he'll be magically healed of his fatal illness. No, we smile and nod at the patient, congratulate his family and walk away because we know it was the chemo therapy and the gamma rays we shined into his thoracic cavity that killed all the cancer cells.

But aside from love, a reason why the medical field has the third highest divorce rates in the world is because we doctors are professional line-drawers.

We draw lines for our living. Not like the plastic surgeon,sharpie-a-line-over-your-boob kinda line,but a physical,mental and a spiritual line. There's always the line,that lies between a dead patient and a living one. There's always the line you mustn't cross with the people on your surgical table, a line between a bleeding aorta nicked by the slip of the hand wielding the scalpel and a healthy one. And then there's always the line you draw with those you love. Whether or not they're sitting on your table,brain flapped open for you to probe,you must draw lines. You can't operate on someone who's close or related to you.You can't waive fees for someone whom you once respected back in high school. You can't be in a relationship with your patients, friendly or sexual.

Being a professional neurosurgeon meant that I knew my ways, where I must draw lines,where to begin and where to stop mingling with someone. Yet little did I know someone would break into the barriers I had built around myself for years and finally convince me to do the one thing I've never done in my last four years of being in the medical profession..

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

"Room no 206 for you Ann", the receptionist smiled at me while handing me the prescriptions. Raising my eyebrow, "a case of head injury caused by a music-box?" "This one's an idol. The music box fell on his head during a concert. It's all over the headlines! You didn't see it?" the receptionist was looked genuinely confused.

"Whatever. I'm going in. Thanks for everything" I practically waved her off and started up the stairs...checking his prescriptions and such. "Who gets hit by a mucic box?" I sighed and closed the file as I reached the door. 206. I entered without knocking.

"Hi. I'm your appointed doctor. Just call me Ann...your condition isn't that serious,so there's nothing to worry! With me here and the nurses, you'll be taken well care of" I smiled kindly at the man lying under the white covers of the hospital bed.

Are all idols this good-looking? His eyes seemed to bore into mine with a look as if trying to see if I'm someone worthy to treat him. What a snob. I huffed in annoyance. I'll show him his place if he tries anything lol. My natural defence mechanism kicked into action as I had seldom operated or treated VIP patients before. The experience was hardly enjoyable. At least, his condition isn't severe. That's a relief.

"Let's get you checked up...er...uh...Min..Yoongi" I squinted hard at the letters in my prescription file. Guess I'll never get used to Korean names.

"You don't know BTS? Billboard singer? You've never heard of Min Suga?" I saw a challenging glint in his eyes and looked as if I had just committed the most unforgiving sin. "Sorry you'll have to excuse me, I'm not Korean by origin and I really didn't have the time to listen to KPop." I tried to speak as kindly as possible, shit might get ugly if I lost my temper especially with the VIPs.

"Oh" he nods in understanding and suddenly clutched his head,wincing in pain. All the exertion from the talking probably was the cause. I rushed to his side, slowly helping him lay down and asked for the nurses. His head had already been stitches by one of the nurses, but I saw that he's been injured pretty badly. Might leave a scar, I thought sadly. Quickly giving him some sedatives, I asked him to take a bit of rest.

Sitting there by his side in case his head started paining again, I watched as he fell asleep. A nurse came in..." 2.00pm Anna, it's time for the surgery." "Yeah call Dr. Yoon to the ER, I'll be right there". Keeping the papers on the table by his side, I left quickly.

It was a case of a brain tumor. First stage. Easily manageable. But the operation in the ER took over 4 hours.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Its done." I smiled at the surgeon next to me as I finished the final stitch. Pulling out my surgical gloves, I walked out of the ER to see the nurse in charge of Room 206 waiting anxiously for me. "Did he wake up?" I asked him while wiping my hands. "Yes,and he keeps asking for 'the doctor who doesn't know BTS' " , she shuffled nervously. I chuckled. "Snobs will always be snobs. I'll go see him right away. Ask Dr.Yoon to finish up the rest, and inform the patients that the surgery has been successful.

I walked past the patient's family, smiling politely at them, pointing towards the ER that the other surgeon will inform them about everything. I entered my snobby VIP patient's room thinking what awaited me. I saw him sitting on the bed with a dazed look on his face.. "How are you feeling?" I asked cheerily.

He ignored my question and kept staring at my face. Confused, I shook my head and opened my white lab coat. I was sweaty from the four hours of that complex operation. Humming softly to myself while searching and wondering where the hell did the nurses put his meds, I kept myself too engrossed with random thoughts to even notice that Min Yoongi aka the idol sitting on the hospital bed was swaying his almost drunk-with-sedatives body with my tune, and making weird purring noises with his mouth. "Aha found it!" I turned around lifting the strip of tablets to show it to him and stopped mid-way for it was not everyday I saw a mature grown-up man, an idol at that, turn into a cute lil drunk meow-meow, nodding his head and making weird noises (that sounded dangerously close to purrs) all to himself, while staring at me.

I wouldn't deny the fact that my heart literally did a double-flip in my chest and started beating erratically inside my thoracic cavity as if panting from the double-flip it did. I was dangerously close to clutching my heart and go uwu, gawking at this man-turned-kitten creature sitting right in front of me.

"Yoongii...." even I was surprised at my unbelievably gentle voice as I tried to show him his meds when he suddenly lifted his head, tilted it a bit, still in a daze and spoke the words that almost made me drop dead to the floor.

Lifting his fingers to his chin as if thinking very deeply he commented still in a trance, "My doctor doesn't know BTS but she's still very cute, huh?"

"WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!"

[ksbwnotes]

Chapter 6

*looks out into the distance* welp.

1. It is rather strange

As we later see in this chapter, Bum logically knows that this is not the type of relationship he wants to be in. But Sangwoo did things that Bum could’ve only dreamed of having--and Sangwoo takes advantage of that. Both, as a control mechanism and a way for Sangwoo to receive the love he wants just as desperately as Bum (they both just have different ways of going at it). 

But still, the way Bum reacts to the sexual aspects. He becomes a person entirely uninhibited and unable to control his desires. He’s super weak to pleasure (or, in other words, he’s so desperate for a dopamine release and sex can give him a dump of that shit), which is why he is the hypersexual one in the relationship, while Sangwoo just seems to use it as a weapon. 

2. Like...I get it...I GET IT...

If this was real life, then it would just be Bum not paying attention, made worse by the environment he’s trapped in, and him touching a fucking boiling pot without checking the temperature or using a towel wouldn’t be his fault. 

But ever since the whole rat poison thing, I’m unable to look at this in anything but a fictional way. Because it’s like Bum is testing Sangwoo himself here as well, but using a disconnect between thoughts vs reality as a way to hide behind excuses and just generally remain self-unaware. 

Because he knows that, usually, if he drops shit, Sangwoo will be there to beat the fucking shit out of him. 

But...what about now?

3. Honestly, Bum, I’m confused too lol

Sangwoo has this thing of just...not thinking about things. He also has this disconnect that allows him to just respond to his environment without having to think too deeply about its significance. So long as he can separate the emotion from it, Sangwoo takes things moment by moment. I think that’s just to keep himself from getting overwhelmed because he already is running on overflow due to his PTSD.

So, I think the new rush of feelings Bum is bringing for within him is making him see his environment in a new way. Less cluttered. Less...trapped in his memories. His trauma. Which means it will take more for him to be triggered into harming Bum (i.e., Bum trying to leave him and take away this newfound peace with him). 

4. *makes a what the hell motion*

...I...why though??

5. It is interesting because now...

...Instead of reacting with pain whenever Bum shows hesitance and anxiety, Sangwoo is trying a different tactic. Now that Bum has shown him that, in a way, he does genuinely have...some sort of feelings for Sangwoo, Sangwoo wants to keep that feeling.

6. Trading ice

Ahhhh this is such a good scene. Koogi delivers such an amazing representation of why battered partners stay. This scary ass bastard breaks Bum’s legs and beats him up, but with this scene of Sangwoo making out with Bum so they can swap the ice between their mouths...those are the parts that make a part of me root for them. What makes it worse is that Sangwoo is so good-looking and he sweetly calls Bum cutie, so like...if you just take in this scene and leave out the rest, that’s the part of me that wants moments like these to continue. 

7. Lol, yep

Oof, classic of any and every abuser. And, honestly, any normal person. Though, I do think Bum’s mode of ‘separating’ these two is due to Bum’s mental issues as well. I think his susceptibility to psychosis and derealization makes him more prone to thinking as the same reality as two different realities. 

And really, it’s not that Sangwoo has two completely different personalities. No human can maintain the same personality in every single situation.

Also, one thing I find interesting about Sangwoo’s reaction to Bum is that I don’t think these parts are part of his plan. I think these are all new additions, not actual strategies he has consciously come up with to keep Bum with him. Because no one has ever made it as far as Bum, so while he could only imagine someone getting this far with him, he has never actually entertained it until now--when he is being given the chance to.

8. oisjrgio;srejg;oiesrjgio;esjgi gdi

Honestly, this makes me very impressed with Bum. Because no matter how desperate Bum is for love, he doesn’t actually fall for the stockholm syndrome completely. Not in the beginning. I started on the chapters where he already had, so seeing how he’s fighting back against it right now gives insight to how gradual his descent was. 

9. Ohh?

Wait, Sangwoo is sleeping downstairs with Bum??  So that he doesn’t have to lock Bum up in the basement, he’s compensating for that by sleeping in the same bed with Bum instead??  I can see Sangwoo’s line of thinking after Bum crosses that line: “I treat a loser homo like you nicely and sleep in the same bed as you so that you don’t have to be in the basement, and this is how you treat me instead?”

10. I have this headcanon

That Sangwoo makes sure not to sleep before Bum does. Since Bum is unchained, the risk of having Bum escape is really high, so to make sure that doesn’t happen, he only lets himself relax once Bum is asleep. Their position in bed here also makes it so that it’s very difficult for Bum to get out of the room without waking him.

Also, I do think Sangwoo has been woken up multiple times by his mom’s molestation. So he also probably automatically wakes up whenever someone touches him in his sleep. Which is why, in later panels, he responds by completing the sexual advances himself--because why else would someone touch him in his sleep?  At least this way, he’s in control of the advances and it’s with someone he has...sorta chosen.

11. *screams into hands*

Sangwoo--and you know what, even you Bum, for being horny instead of disturbed--I’m begging you, PLEASE NO. 

But really though...Bum’s response to not actually respond to Sangwoo’s Oepidal commentary...it shows how, while alleviating Sangwoo’s pain in the short run, does stagnate Sangwoo in his trauma in the long run.

Ughhhserhgiulheriuhguieshg i am so scared to scroooollllllll lije;osirgjoise

Okay you know what, before I scroll, one last thing: Again, Sangwoo’s comment does drive home to how...this was the only time he ever felt safe and loved. He can’t remember anything positive in his childhood that it was the time before he was born that gives him fond memories, even though he obviously can’t possibly remember that. He’s not frkkn Ray from Neverland.

ACTUALLY WAIT. Sangwoo has probably said stupid shit like this with the other girls he has been with right!?!??!  Obviously any sane/average person would be disturbed by this, so they probably would chew Sangwoo out. One thing he said about the CEO’s daughter was that “this bitch thought she was better than me”. 

Sangwoo’s tests for the women he dates must be different than Bum’s tests. Obviously no “don’t cross the line” shit. So while sleeping with them, he starts showing his creepy side, the thoughts that plague his mind as a way to keep him from completely losing it. And the moment he does, he sees the disgust in their faces and the way they try to get away from him, which is when he responds by...uh throwing them in the basement, I guess lol.

Omg I am trying so hard to prolong having to continue reading. 😂

12. Oh O_O

Okay so Sangwoo is now fine with it??  

Ohp never mind, finally made it through the whole scene and nope, he doesn’t seem to be lol. Him having oral-based trauma seems more and more likely now. He pulled Bum off him right before he came and as you can see here, it’s like he’s...nervous. In pain. Something along those lines, either way, it’s not so much “lost in pleasure” rather than “lost in painful memories”. 

I don’t think Sangwoo is allowing Bum to blow him because he wants it--it’s because he knows Bum wants it. And he’s trying to reward Bum for behaving himself and not crossing the line. 

So I don’t even think Bum being a guy is even the issue here. I don’t think Sangwoo has ever finished inside any woman, whether their mouth or vagina. Because even though Sangwoo is saying things as if he does sexually love his mom, in reality, he’s so disgusted by it that he can’t function in his daily life.

I like that Koogi didn’t draw Sangwoo’s eyes here--just like how, in a flashback, we could see Eunsoo’s mouth but not her eyes. In a way, during these moments Sangwoo doesn’t feel human. Just like whenever his mom molested him, he wasn’t her son or a person during that time, just a thing for her gratification. 

13. So, this is probably one representation why Bum tried to escape

Other than the obvious of NOT BEING ABLE TO SEE THE OUTSIDE WORLD AT ALL (omg, regular people rioted just one week into the frggn shutdown during a PANDEMIC, of course Bum would want to go the fuck outside), I think Bum also sees the disconnect between Sangwoo’s actions.

Bum has probably asked if he could swallow Sangwoo’s cum, but to no avail, and that Sangwoo seems to have a underlying reason lurking there that he refuses to explain and Bum is unable to understand. 

Even though he wishes otherwise, he gets that Sangwoo doesn’t actually love him and, thus, can snap and kill him at any time. Sangwoo is keeping him only because Bum is obeying his rules. Otherwise, he’s meaningless to Sangwoo. He’s not a human or a person to Sangwoo. He is a thing for Sangwoo’s gratification.

14. “Can yOU gO bAck TO thE BasEMEnt BUM???”

Hmmmn, okay, so there was a vague time lapse here. Does that mean Sangwoo has been continuously putting Bum back into the basement every time he leaves??  

The way Sangwoo is asking implies that he hasn’t, but Sangwoo is also a piece of shit, so maybe that isn’t a question at all.  Thing is, the way Sangwoo says “ah, you’re angry?” at the end might mean something. 

Anyways, if Bum really hasn’t been going down to the basement, the thing is he still isn’t letting Bum outside and it’s making Bum go stir crazy. He literally hasn’t probably seen the outside world in a week or two. And Sangwoo notices that. He sees how Bum has been slowly mentally and emotionally deteriorating due to being locked up inside. 

So him going outside to meet someone might have been him setting up a test for Bum. 

It really is interesting to see how tightly Sangwoo is clinging onto Bum. He’s not a serial killer just for the sake of the murder itself, he’s actually trying to find someone he who can love him...while making it impossible for them to love him lol.

15. Damp?

I wonder if the basement being too damp has something to do with why we saw Sangwoo’s hands dripping earlier, leaving that wet spot on Bum’s clothes.

16. *wheeze*

Ah, when your man whispers sweet nothings in your ear aojeroi;aje :’)

17. ...gdi, don’t make me feel bad for you

oof Koogi expertly catches the anxiety and low key desperation on Sangwoo’s face. Seriously. He has set up the test for Bum, saying he’ll be back around 7pm and all he’s doing is just waiting outside to catch him. He’s begging Bum not to cross the line. He wants Bum to prove his loyalty, earn his trust so badly. 

Which is bullshit, but whatever. It still does make me wonder what kind of reward Sangwoo would’ve given Bum had he stayed and not tried to escape. How much leeway would he have given Bum afterwards?  It’s an interesting what-if.

18. Bum’s expression is also interesting here

Bum’s expression is interesting here too. Koogi’s choice to do her signature red haze in the panel does suggest that he’s planning something that WILL get him beaten to death by Sangwoo too. 

[ofcloudsandstars]

I was a witch, I practiced for over 5 years, and honestly I realized it was all fake. Spells don't work, crystals are just rocks, idk I had a major crisis of faith and I feel like I wasted all those years of my life. How do you keep faith doing it?

this is so sad lol :(I mean you are the biggest magical tool, like you are the main instrument stringing along the energy, crystals just help amplify, candles help focus, actually physical tools are just crutches to help focus certain energy but you are the main conductor. Once you feel like it’s all fake it becomes useless because you are essentially the source and it’s dependent on you. 

Depression and anxiety can become challenges when dealing with magic because your energy is dependent on how strong your intent is and how much power you give out and those two things can hinder your power and can make you lose faith cause suddenly you feel like your spells aren’t working and maybe its all fake but really its your negativity talking and your fear and or apathy weakening your energy that you put out. I don’t know you of course cause you are an anon but I deal with these issues myself and sometimes I have low moments because I am trying to battle my own anxiety. 

I mean did you accomplish anything amazing in those 5 years? I’ve honestly have had insane things happen to me and have experienced crazy unbelievable things because of my will power and magic so even when I am in those moments of doubt or even thinking that I am probably some wack ass weak witch I think about the list of things I have accomplished or done for other people that have worked even if it was by eerie coincidence, I still wanted something and it happened. Sometimes I assure myself when I am in these negative mindsets that even if its ‘fake’ and all coincidence- the fact still stands that the coincidences STILL keep happening. So whether its me making up stuff or if it’s truly a power I have that’s out there connecting me with everything it doesn’t matter cause the results remain the same. Its just negativity really can be a massive wet mop to manifesting things to take form (unless if you are cursing).

Also there is this idea of how witches should be like and I have been technically practicing since I was nearing 13 years old but I never called myself a witch until I was in the middle of college at like.. 21? Actually tbh I never called myself a witch OTHER people started calling me a witch lol and I was like ok so if the shoe fits then whatever. But my point saying that everyone goes about their practice their own way cause as I said before you are your own magical instrument and everyone is unique and has their own pace. I mean I like witchy aesthetics cause I was the HP generation influenced by JKRowling’s books so its cute but I never started out that way and the only reason why I like the aesthetics now is for childhood nostalgia reasons. But because what I was doing before, though it worked powerfully, it was not aesthetically or typically witchy, I didn’t think I was qualified to be a witch or label myself so until other people saw me as such and started addressing me by it. That being said you might be pressuring yourself to perform a certain way and you are probably disappointed that you are not getting some type of results you feel like you should be getting because what works for you doesn’t match others expectations of how a witch should perform or what expectations you are trying to meet does not work for you especially if you are going about it in a way that someone else says you should and not by your own means. 

To be honest (and please no shade to like no one here, it’s a personal thing) the majority of spells I see on this site I ignore because its like strongly not the way I do magic and some that get too materialistic or vocal are like a massive waste of time to how I visualize and project my energy or can even be distracting. I also don’t really post my own spells cause they are so abstract and energy based that it might make no fucking sense to the next witch, like I usually post pictures of visual grids that help me focus energy cause people can visually get it, but for the most part my magic makes sense to me and it works for me and that’s what matters. 

 Anyway you don’t need to even touch or look at any of the magical tools most witches use to do magic and you don’t need to do any classical spells or popular spells here because if it doesn’t resonate with you it really will not work. What will help you with finding true spells is something that you make for yourself that will make you feel right after you cast your energy. Don’t worry if what worked for you before is far from the expectations of what people regularly think witches should do or how they should perform. Don’t worry if some spells here don’t work for you. Don’t worry if you don’t resonate with crystals cause fyi they ARE just rocks and yes some do vibrate energy but its on a small scale. And also guess what? A lot of witchcraft goes hand in hand with science or daily crafts so even if what you did made you happy you can do it in a logical way that does not have to necessarily need to slap a magic label on it. Herbal medicines have schools you can attend classes in. Learning aromatherapy and making your own bath mixtures that are good for your skin is a skill. You can practice kitchen magic and learn basic nutrition and see the correlation of how certain foods are natural aphrodisiacs or how they can release dopamine and see how certain herbs and foods have correspondences for love or happiness because of it. (For example I see blueberries as very cerebral and psychic fruits but blueberries really help the brain and give it nutrients and it also helps that it has a deep blueish indigo color like the third eye energy pool so it fits with half logic half spiritual shit). European witches in the old days just knew how to heal people with herbs and that was enough to get the church to want to burn them on the stake cause they were salty they could deliver children without childbirth pain and churches hated women so fucking much they couldn’t deal with that. Maybe one day in the future the things what we are doing could be explained- maybe there will be a science as to how our energy can manipulate things, but for now there are a lot of magics that go hand in hand with science so you don’t have to feel like its all completely made up. I mean in ancient times we thought lightning was caused by the gods and now we know how lightning works. There are many mysteries in the world and the science we know now is not finite knowledge to the universe. 

Lastly, from my own experiences, doubt won’t deter your magic, but apathy will and same with fear like anxieties. If you feel like those last two are your obstacles maybe take some time to do some self reflection and figure out where the root of these sentiments are coming from. Another thing that can really stress some people out is the fear that they don’t want to come off as delusional or something- which, is an anxiety, but honestly just keep your practice to yourself and view it as a religious/spiritual thing and people should respect that. If I live in a country where the majority of people are in a religion that they feel so justified in taking away people’s healthcare and dictate who we should marry then people can take a seat if it upsets them to know someone believes we have energy that can influence our surroundings. But also treat it like a religious/spiritual thing as in don’t talk to it with others unless they are genuinely interested or else its going to be an uncomfortable conversation. 

[mikazukikannagisjourney]

The “Other Epidemics” that Affect Everyone Else (not what you might expect)

Disclaimer: The following are just the author’s personal opinions and do not reflect the ideas and beliefs of the spiritual community, or of the society at large. Inasmuch as the effects of the COVID-19 are deemed as dangerous by the WHO, this post exists to remind people that even if the pandemic never occurred, there are still other epidemics that are still proliferating elsewhere, and that these only seem to be intensified due to extended quarantine periods. Lastly, I post this out of love, not because I want to shame everybody. I am just another person, who may be walking the path of personal development yet also has a shameless Fujoshi side every now and then. I am not immune to these epidemics myself, but at least I have this much guts to put this out there. I don’t think this information has been out, even within the spiritual community so I’m putting this here, regardless if some influencer already beat me to it.

Abstract: It appears that despite the pandemic occuring right now (as of writing, September 4, 2020), there are other epidemics that have been lying under the surface for even longer periods that haven’t been addressed, and yet are still wreaking havoc among people. These are, but not limited to: LONELINESS, ISOLATION, DISCONNECTION, and DISTRACTION. What are the implications of such unaddressed epidemics, especially in terms of the ascension process? Not much, except that as long as the people living in this planet keeps looking outside of themselves to fill in the void inside, then no matter how much the world burns, this emptiness cannot be filled. But this also creates great opportunities for those who wish to get more out of life, albeit at the cost of being scorned by society. But then again, in the greater scheme of things, which one should be deemed more important: what society says, or what the heart and soul truly believes in?

Introduction

(Honestly this whole thing is just my opinion, a combination of what I have been experiencing first-hand, as well as what I have been observing so far, on the world that I have been looking at through other people’s eyes. Also how people have been acting ever since the “pandemic” started became amplified, and even though I don’t want to call it as it is, well for someone who doesn’t give a rat’s ass like me, I’d call a spade a SPADE.)

The title isn’t exactly a click-bait, but if I simply put NO SIMP SEPTEMBER in there, my blog might get blocked by people who go tl;dr because apparently that’s an actual thing? Tsk tsk tsk

OK, so here’s the gist, if you’re still reading this...

A lot of hate has been given to simping lately, and even though I live under a rock, I know what simping means, and no, it doesn’t even mean Squirrels in my Pants-ing (one of Candace’s best hits lolol). To put it in bluntly, it’s the act of uhm, giving, because apparently, people throw money at anything, and lately ANYONE that they deem enjoyable. Name it, you have it. But the simp thing gets pretty complicated when the ANYONE (whoever those would be, not naming anyone lol) demands the viewers to pay, even resorting to violent or verbally abusive tactics just for that to happen, even though originally the whole idea on the payment thing was an extra, a gift, not exactly a requirement. And, well, let’s just say that things can escalate quickly, thus the creation of a phenomenon that not only leads to decrease in self-esteem from the givers aka the simp due to being shamed by many people for giving probably a bit too much, because people can be like that, but this also has the potential to hurt the real-life relationships of said people, not to mention drain their accounts. Again, I am putting this out here not to shame but to release information, because honestly, such phenomenon do have probable causes, and I’m about to lay those out here, so please hear me out before you block me out.

Loneliness and Isolation leads to Disconnection and Distraction,  Possible Causes - Esoterically-Speaking

So if you’re going to ask me, under the assumption that you just couldn’t get it, why would some people throw money at other people, even to the point of leaving almost nothing for themselves just to give to other people that “make them happy”? Simple really, it’s like a drug, the other person probably makes the other person feel better about themselves, which is in essence a disconnection from the self, because in reality, a healthy person would have enough know-how to do self-care aka look inside themselves to find out what makes them feel low and then do something about it. But if you feel lost, afraid, having no sense of direction, not knowing what else is there, yeah, I feel you fam. That’s scary as heck, I too was lost for a very, very long time before I ended up awakening consciously. Don’t worry, you’ll get there somehow, you’re already on the way. =)

But what if the giver of donations has a high self-esteem but still does it anyway?

Well, glad you asked.

It is also possible that people resort to simping (there, I freaking said it, zero regrets) because they feel lonely, and wanted some sort of connection to others. Of course, in a perfect world this is easier done, but again, these are trying times, and because humans are genetically-wired to connect to their tribe, then no matter how many times they’re told to do social distancing, they’ll still find a way to be in a crowd. I still stand by following precautions, but I also understand the need to be with other people, on an energetic level. As an empath, even though it sucks to feel other people’s emotions, based on my own experiences, whenever I go out and do some window-shopping, it feels nice to be around people who are calm and enjoying themselves. I’d rather have that than watch anything depressing. But again, the world’s on a lockdown so apart from losing mobility, people are also feeling a sense of loss, which leads to some levels of isolation, thus ending up lonely.

This loneliness can lead to either a decrease in self-esteem leading to seek joys outside the self, in essence a distraction from the reality that the person is in. I mean, when you think about it, nearly everything that is labeled as “entertainment” is a form of distraction. News, TV, music, heck even books and other educational entertainment are simply distractions to what really needs to be solved. 

But really, what are we distracting ourselves from?

Many things, actually. It can range from experiencing the apparent reality for what it is, to having to deal with things in the real world that aren’t exactly fun and entertaining. But more than that, these are distractions from facing who we truly are. These are distractions from finding out our true selves. And the harshest one yet: these are distractions from finding and befriending the demons in our head (cue in Gurenge because you can’t stop me now lolololol).

I mean really, who would want to do adulting? Who would wanna enjoy finding the deepest, darkest parts of ourselves? Who actually enjoys just sitting down and drinking tea/coffee and doing ABSOLUTELY NOTHING OTHER THAN THAT?

Yes indeed.

Modern society has conditioned people to keep working their butts off, anyone who doesn’t is deemed lazy, and shamed to be even more busy even though their bodies aren’t capable of doing more work. So when the stimuli of having to work gruelly suddenly stops, despite the fact that it gives people a chance to recuperate, the need to do something in order to be “productive” remains, thus causing anxiety to most people. Anxiety due to the extra time. Extra cash. Extra loneliness, extra emotions because for f***’s sake why am I having these jitters and nervousness I gotta get these out but I don’t know how...

And then, cue in the instant-gratification gravy train.

Choose your poison:

Games (I am guilty of this but I am doing my best to curb the need to get at least top 10 in Tetris)

Videos/Movies (I’m on an anime-boy detox right now so judge me however you want I don’t care lol)

Social-media drowning (some simps are probably here)

Watching other people do stuff (simps are here somewhere lol sorry this also includes Vtubers so...)

Doing more work as humanly as possible, no matter how mundane

Comfort-eating (I eat junk as needed so yeah, guilty)

Learning new skills just for the sake of it. Includes webinars

Books/reading materials just to while away the time

Meditating/Zoning out more than the usual (because spiritual communities aren’t truly immune to this shit 100%, those who say they aren’t affected by it are either lying or don’t know what Spiritual By-passing means, yeah I have the guts to call people out, and yes I have been doing  spiritual by-passing myself for sometime so I KNOW it’s an actual thing)

Anything that instantly brings a dopamine rush to the brain, however that works for you. Especially the not-so-wholesome activities. (No judgment though, we’re all humans with needs. See comfort-eating)

But really... What do we really need in these precarious times?

I hate to break this to you and admit this myself but.. The reality of this is that these are the times to find our way back into ourselves.... To find out who we truly are, and own that. To be free from the shackles that the brain holds us in. To go further, beyond what we think we can do. 

More than that, the entire world is crying out to have real, authentic, unconditional connections. Yes, there, I said it. I mean, really, why would simps throw tens, hundreds, probably even thousands of dollars to someone that they don’t even fully know? Because maybe, just maybe, deep inside, these people are craving to connect to someone, something, anything, to feel whole again. To feel complete. To feel like they have some place to belong to. I am not immune to such feelings. I used to waste time translating chat streams, moderating even though I’m not an official moderator, and not getting anything from it other than seeing other people saying thank you for translating/moderating. I can’t throw money so I throw my time instead lol

But there came a point where I just threw my hands up in the air and just left these groups cold-turkey. I mean really, I suddenly regained some form of self-esteem, and instead of throwing my time onto people who already have been receiving a lot of love from others, it suddenly hit me hard: Why can’t I do that shit to myself? I felt so angry, wasting my time when I could have just tended to my own issues. So I did, even though I have some degree of self-hate because of the time I wasted, I still did my best to come back to myself. Because I deserve it. Even if I can’t do much other than find my inner demons and befriend them one by one, if it means that I can love myself better later then that’s it. Slowly but surely, I found myself again, and even though the time wasted has been gone, at the very least, I felt more hopeful, more open to what the universe can bring.

Yeah, sure, it feels lonely at first, I felt re-isolated again, I wanted to talk to anybody, just to feel heard.. BUt then I realized that I had this blog so, instead of spreading toxicity elsewhere, I just contained it here, at least I can write as much as I want without the huge potential of being flagged/flamed/doxed lol hence the start of the monthly moon posts in here. Yeah, sure, they aren’t a lot but at least I have something to ground myself every so often. I re-read the stuff I write here myself, to remind me that at least, somewhere in time, I gave away my love and it comes back to me somehow. So if you felt that in some of my posts, thank you. =)

It sounds stupid but at least it’s something that helps me become less toxic, as if the world needs more of that now lol

Although I will say, every now and then I still get distracted, but at least I don’t drown myself for hours trying to beat the b******s that prevent me from getting tetris maximus like srsly give the dog a bone why won’t you lololol Also thank goodness this household never got hold of Fall Guys because I might do the same x_x And having sucky internet connection for now does have some perks, right now I am planning my drawing-comeback (I’ll start posting again in my main, soon) so I guess in a way, the universe still gives me some sort of entertainment. Also apparently my channeling got stronger, it only got tested after I isolated myself for a while. Scary, like riding a coaster scary.

But hey, these are just some of my suggestions I’m not a twat sitting on a cloud, I live under a rock in the middle of a rice field lolol

If you’re still reading this, then CONGRATULATIONS! I hope you can get through all of the text. You’re almost done! Don’t stop now lol

Possible Solutions - No Guarantees but at least it’s a possible start

Going within is one option. This just means finding all the hidden issues within yourself, and address them one by one. You can use the following questions to help yourself get started:

What am I distracting myself from?

What am I afraid to face?/What is my greatest fear?

When did this fear happen?

How could I have faced this differently?/ How could this have been a better situation?

What can I do to move past this?

You can either do this exercise alone, or with someone, but don’t exchange judgments, just be supportive of one another. And if you can call on someone like a counselor or a shrink, then feel free to do so. Only masochists like myself do shit like these alone, not recommended unless you want more pain in your life.

If you’re not on the spiritual journey yet, and you found this blog and you related to whatever the heck I wrote here, then good job, that’s one possible option for you. Or if you’re already on the journey but you got distracted like me, don’t worry, you can only go forward, I support you on that. Just go back to the basics of however you founded your spiritual practices on. I just rewatch the stuff that helped me awaken during my dark night of the soul. I also re-read some articles, or just search for updated ones. As always, treat yourself with loving kindness and patience. Only you can do that for you.

If you’ve done whatever you can, and already did everything, and yet you still want to simp, well, then do whatever the heck feels right and good and shameless for you. As long as you don’t hurt anyone, including yourself, and your checking account, then simp as much as you want lol I mean in the end, who am I to tell you what to do? I’m just here to give some suggestions...

Summary, Conclusion, Recommendation

Flu is not the only epidemic there is, aside from diabetes there’s also the invisible epidemic of distraction, brought upon by factors such as loneliness, isolation, and disconnection from the self. It’s easier to look for answers outside of the self, thus many people resort to throwing money at other people aka simping, hoping to fill in the empty feelings inside. But if these same people threw that money or time into their own selves, to find out what the missing pieces in their lives were, then maybe things could get better from there, and while simping will probably remain a thing, as it has been, at least, the simps would be doing that from a better standpoint. 

Honestly I am too tired to even think of a concluding statement as well as recommendations so I’ll go directly to disclaimer instead lol

Disclaimer, again: OK I am not against simping in the most wholesome sense, but heck this was posted on No Simp September so maybe this can provide some information to those who need it? I am not exactly the one making the rules here but hey, it’s my blog so do I look like I even care lololol

OK I’m just playing, feel free to do whatever you want, as long as you don’t hurt anybody, including yourself. 

Cheers to your well-being, fam.

Offering you my free hugs and love, while wishing you all the best that life has to offer, I remain your friend,

Mikazuki

PS. If you found the information in this post to be very helpful, insightful, and of great value to you and your own personal journey, please feel free to reblog, share and heart/like, or if you feel super-generous, energetic exchanges are welcomed! Please click here and use this email address: may_chan_otaku@yahoo.com

Thank you so much and be blessed!

PSS. If you’re interested to get a personal card and energetic reading, for inquires please send an email or an anonymous ask in this page. Thank you! =)

PSSS. I don’t want to put this here due to embarrassment, but my sempai friend probably won’t know this anyway so I’m gonna put it here lol I dedicate this post to tomo-sempai who inspired me to make more posts, even if I don’t have a dedicated fanbase lol ok I’m probably gonna cry after this, like Zen-itsu because NEZUKO-CHAAAAAAAN~ you can’t stop me nowwwwww

[twinflamming]

Twin Flame Story?

Long Story, as short as I can make it: So, we met at the end of 2015, I even can pinpoint the date.  I remember how our first encounter went, through work friends who I never really hung out with. He came off as a man-about-town, which intimidates me and I try to stay away from men like that. He just came up from FL with his ex-fiance to Philly. I'm from Jersey. I thought for at least a year, he had something for my co-worker friend and she had for him too. Turns out they didn't. Well, least she didn't. A Christmas party happened a year later at the end of '16, he had just broken up with his ex-fiance who he moved up with. He's always kind of been in my face like a hurricane, but this time, he let me know he was interested in me. Again, I felt as though maybe he was looking for a rebound, not serious. Again, very man-about-town, came from a rich family. I came from poverty and two heroine addict parents, I just of brushed him off. I did let him know I thought he was cute, and he was. In my mind, I'm just careful. A few days later, I get a friend request, he starts messaging me. I don't answer. Almost as if he's the chaser. Starts asking my friends questions, why aren't I answering him. I'm scared to be honest. Not to mention, I bought a house with my now fiance in '15. (I've been with my boyfriend, recent fiance since '14.   I did end up chatting with him a bit one day on almost everything, aspirations and life and things I liked. I don't even really remember everything because it was so long ago and I deleted it. He did make it clear he rather have me than a friend I could try and set him up with. Didn't hear from him after that, so I let it die. Then as I'd come in the office, I'd run into my TF and we'd chat a little bit, I wasn't really good at it, I was intimidated. Somehow, I found myself slowly becoming the chaser, asking him maybe we should get a drink.  If we got a drink, I'd warm up to him, get to know him, we even even exchanged numbers at some point. After I realized I started chasing a little bit and we never got a drink, I let it die. I was busy with my boyfriend, right?  The day came, he offered me to come swing by his place for something us young youths like to do recreationally, and he bought it for me lol. Really nice of him, I felt a little closer to him, we didn't really hang out because he has to go golfing. Haha. Really, I'm talking and wanting to date a guy who golfs? Okay. So then again, it died down a little bit. The Oct 2, 2017. I made an excuse to come see him. I really had a late job and his place was diagonal from where my job was. Perfect opportunity to say hi. He even has chicken cooked when I got there and offered and poured me a glass of wine, right when I went in. I mean, he really is a salesman, that's his job. lol. He even was showing me a little skin. it was cute. We definitely hit it off, I loved every minute being with him until it got pretty late and I had to go home to my boyfriend.. We texted not a whole lot back and forth and the only time he texted me was for a favor, but said he'd pay me back. I couldn't because it was going behind our work's back on what the favor was. I didn't want to risk my job. Somehow later again, I found myself chasing him a little bit through text, and he'd of course always come find me in the office and give me those huge dilated pupil eyes, but that was the extent of it for a while, until I told him I started feeling for him. I even sent him lingerie pics of myself. He liked it. So, the night came, a night that would turn my whole world UPSIDE DOWN. Christmas party '17. We talked but I pretended not to be concerned and all in his business all over him. The times we were together, we had lots of fun, even at one point, he wanted to do something, but I got nervous and ran and needed my friend. Drank more, everything was okay. The night ended waaaay too early. I ended up walking with him back to his place and.......... we did it. It wasn't right. my boyfriend was about to propose to me, him and I were drunk so it wasn't the greatest sex and I got scared because I still wasn't sure about him and whether he was just looking for a good time. So I flipped out on him afterwards. Cried a little. I was an emotional train wreck. The next day, we can into each other, just waved, we both had that guilty pressured smile look on our face. Days after was the most depressing time of my life, but somehow I felt like I loved him. Something came over me. Was it the attachment of sex? I mean, the sex wasn't bad, it was the fact I freaked out towards the end. We didn't hear from each other for a couple of days, then I asked him. If I wasn't involved, you wouldn't date me, right, because of work? And then he says, yes, we couldn't because of work. That very same night, my fiance proposed and it was on FB of course, so my "TF" definitely saw it. Afterwards, I did try again just to make sure, and he said he couldn't, and congratulated me. but we should try to be friends. I said, all right. I can do it. I'm adult and strong enough. a month goes by, nothing. So then I ask him for a favor, he then tells me he's been dying to text me but didn't want to because it would have felt good to, but then we'd both feel bad afterwards. Urgh.. I had a crazy sickness to my stomach.. I told him, please don't string me along, I don't want to hate you. I really liked you. I really want to be friends. So we tried. And then, of course because he said that. I went after him a little again, he said no. But within that week, I saw him twice, we were both googly eyed at each other, very intense flirting and within either that day or two days of seeing him and intense interaction, he resigned. Started his own company.. INSANITY. I prolly wasn't going to see him ever again? Wrong.  I tried again because work isn't an excuse anymore. Still shot me down. All throughout the winter to spring period we've been very back and forth. Me being more so the chaser and him ghosting me from time to time, but it's not because he was a girlfriend and now lives with her, which was very quick. I'm even pretty sure he was seeing her the night we did it, but no one knew. Wasn't "official" until Feb. After he let me know it was official, I let him be another month until I texted him asking how business is going. Chatted normally until we fell into flirting again a little and even met me for lunch to "pick my brain" about work.  Afterwards, I asked, are you sure you don't like me? He said he can't it's not right. which I get it. But I let him know I really wanted him and maybe we can take it slow. We got to a point where we were even sexting, making plans on when to text each other, hopefully going to see each other again and maybe have sex one more time just to see. I told him I liked the chase, big mistake. so, the perfect time came for us to meet and have sex and to let him know what's going on with work a little because he was being sued. I wanted to let him know I could be on his side. I'm very much in limbo on my feelings for him, I want to help him but I'm still unsure on the kind of man he is. So, we were supposed to meet and he ghosts me.. blocked me for a month. I went CRAZY. Not on him, but on myself. Major depression. I was a walking calamity.  All I wanted to do was sleep and research on what's happening to me and is it common. And Here's where I found out about TFs. The chasing, the on and off, the gut feelings you get when you're separated. and the INTENSE LOVE I feel when we're talking again. I know there's scientific reasons on dopamine and reward systems, but I'd like to think it's so much more than that. Well, we're finally talking again presently.. This time I let him know how much I felt for him from the first time I met him until now and my perspective. The last time he ghosted me, I did pin him up against a wall pressuring him into sex, and I completely understand why he did it. Now, I'm just unsure what to do about all of this. Last thing I asked him was if he liked Frank Zappa, doubt it though, he's such a little pretty college boy.