#'i missed a few videos now anyway no need to keep up anymore'

[schnaf]

inkigayo 20240519

[woso-dreamzzz]

Call Up

Hardersson x Teen!Reader

Part of The Big Adventures Universe

Summary: You get called up

Your first senior call up happens when you're seventeen (nearly eighteen) and still playing at Arsenal.

You've got a day off before the derby against Chelsea so your mothers have flown out to support you and, somehow, you've ended up at Millie Bright's house.

You're surrounded by your Momma and Morsa's old teammates (and a few of the Arsenal girls who were on the team when you were very little). There aren't enough seats for everyone but you're happy to sit on the floor in front of Momma and let her slowly card her fingers through your hair.

It's one of the things you've missed about being in England. You miss the little things about Momma and Morsa like this. You know they miss you too because there's never a day where they rearrange your daily video calls or don't send Leah around to your apartment when they think you're feeling especially sad on the call.

You miss them. They miss you. But you all know that it's best for you to be here, in England. You're still the second choice keeper but you know that if you keep working hard then by your eighteenth birthday, you'll have managed to clinch the number one spot.

After the derby, it's international break and you know that, while the senior teams are calling everyone up this week, you need to wait a few more days until the Denmark youth team sends for you again.

You've settled in well in the under-nineteen squad and you know that there's a round of friendlies coming up soon that you're excited to be apart of.

"The third choice keeper broke her arm," You can hear Morsa complain about the Swedish team," It was such a freak accident. It was gory to even watch. I almost threw up."

You don't pay much attention though, leaning back easily into Momma's hands. You're not paying attention to anything actually because you almost miss the vibrating of your phone on your leg.

You don't recognise the number but you pick it up anyway.

"Hello?"

"Is this y/n?" A professional-sounding voice asks," The Arsenal keeper?"

"Yes? Who is this?"

"Excellent. I'm calling up on behalf of the Swedish Senior team. I'm sure you know by now but our usual third keeper has been injured. We're offering you the call up in her place."

"W-What?"

You must sound especially panicked because everyone in the room has turned to look at you in confusion.

"I understand that you usually play for Denmark's youth teams but we've had our eye on you for a while. We've got a round of three friendlies coming up, one for each keeper, and would love to have you with us."

You feel frozen in place, capable of nothing but blinking.

"I..."

"Sorry," The person says," I'm getting ahead of myself. I understand completely if you wish to stay with Denmark. You're such a talent. Forgive me for wanting to have it on my team. I understand if you need to discuss this with your mothers as well. Do you need some time to think about it?"

"No!" You say quickly.

You've never really thought about a senior team call up. You just kind of assumed that Denmark would be the obvious choice. You've spent so much time in a Denmark shirt that you just assumed Sweden didn't want you anymore.

"You've already come to a decision?"

Your feelings on this call up must have already been decided. It must have been decided for years in some deep, hidden away part of your brain because there's no need to even think about it. There's no need to even discuss it with Momma and Morsa.

Somehow, you think you've always known the decision you would come to.

"I'd love to join you for the friendlies."

You can hear the person's smile through the phone. "Excellent," They say," The details will be sent to your email as well as your agent's, who I'm sure will forward it to your mothers. Just in advance, what would you like on your jersey? Your name or Eriksson-Harder, like your Denmark jersey?"

You make eye contact with Momma, who looks increasingly worried the longer you stay on the phone. "Harder-Eriksson," You say," Please."

"You've got it. I'll see you very soon, y/n."

"Yeah, you too."

The call ends and you stare at your phone for several seconds.

"It's a bit early for the youth team call up," Morsa teases," You're changing your name? Does Eriksson-Harder not cut it anymore for Denmark?"

You blink. "More like Harder-Eriksson suits Sweden better."

"Sweden called you up?" Momma asks," That's strange. You've never had any problem rejecting their call if it came before Denmark's before."

You shake your head. "No, it wasn't the youth team. It was the senior team."

The room's quiet enough to hear a pin drop.

Morsa's voice goes hoarse. "What?"

You look at her. "I got called up for Sweden's senior team."

Someone else in the room, Leah, you think, says," Holy shit."

Momma pulls you into a hug. "Harder-Eriksson?" She asks, eyes glistening with tears.

You manage to shrug. "Morsa got Eriksson-Harder when I played for Denmark. You get Harder-Eriksson when I play for Sweden."

Morsa is still frozen in shock, looking much like how you feel. Her hands are shaking a little as she crushes you in her embrace. When she pulls away, she's crying too.

"Magda," Momma says," Why don't you call Frido? I'm sure she'd want to know."

Morsa nods robotically. "Right. Yes. Frido. Would want to know. Yes."

"And you," Momma says fondly, cupping your face and kissing your forehead," I think you should call a certain retired keeper, shouldn't you?"

You've already got Zećira's contact lined up on your phone.

[ovrour]

───〃★ I MISS YOU

୨୧⋆ SYNOPSIS─── TikTok’s Chris would post you to after you pass away.

୨୧⋆ PAIRING─── Chris sturniolo x deceased!gf reader

୨୧⋆ WARNINGS─── mentions of a lost loved one.

୨୧⋆ NOW PLAYING…─── (whatever you’d like too. Don’t have a song in mind.)

୨୧⋆ anyone else but you

Before you passed away, Your favorite movie to watch with Chris was ‘Juno’. Every night you would come home from work, asking to watch Juno. And every night you did. Chris didn’t care that it was the only movie you would ever watch. It was his favorite thing to do. Wait for his girl to come, eat snacks, watch Juno, and fall asleep in each other arms.

Chris wouldn’t have given that up for anyone or anything. It was the one thing he would look forward to every night.

Now, Chris doesn’t look forward to it at all. He can’t, not without his favorite girl being gone. Chris watched Juno every night, eating snacks and falling asleep. Alone. With his girl gone, nothing felt normal without you being there. He missed you more than anything.

Chris missed hearing you laugh when you were making snacks together, or when you would fall asleep on his chest, hearing your quiet snores. He missed it all.

So, when he saw the ‘Juno’ trend on TikTok. He had to make a little booklet and post it. It was your favorite movie how could he not? It made him think of you any time he saw it.

Chris took his time making the booklet making sure it looked beautiful. Just like you did. His most precious thing, his prized possession.

He posted the video, not knowing how much attention it would bring to you. Most people didn’t even know about your death, it was floating around the internet of course. But, it wasn’t very known.

When he went to look at the video and saw the amount of love you got even though you weren’t there to experience it anymore. He was happy that everyone saw you for the sweet girl you were. He didn’t want to change that for anything.

Chris walked over to your memorial table he had made for you a few months ago. He grabbed your picture frame, “You’re still remembered like the sweet girl you were, baby. I’m gonna keep it that way for you.”

୨୧⋆ I need to treat you better

When Chris first saw this trend, he knew he had to post you to it. You deserved all the recognition and more.

you were his baby, his lover, his best friend. He wanted to post you to anything he could. Show you off anyway he could. Chris wished he would’ve spent more time with you instead of cancelling so many dates for his stupid YouTube career. It took away the time you two had together.

now, he couldn’t plan dates with you, couldn’t ask to go on late night drives, couldn’t surprise you. He couldn’t do anything with his baby gone anymore.

He wished he could’ve atleast tried to make time, but he didn’t. His mind was always focused on YouTube. Every day and night. It never left his mind and now, he wished it did most of the time.

If he could, he would’ve changed anything and every choice he made without realizing how much it hurt you.

When Chris posted the video he captioned it, ‘I miss you sweet girl. You will always be remembered.’ Having it get tons and tons of views.

Chris wished he could spend more time with you.

୨୧⋆ I saw sparks.

Chris knew he had to post his beautiful girl to this trend. He had so many pictures of you smiling, you would think that's the only thing he had in his camera roll.

He missed you a lot. Life without you was different. He had to learn how to live without you for months. It took a toll on him a lot, without his beautiful girl life was boring. No more late night face times, or cooking. It just wasn't the same, and he hated it.

He posted you to let people see how happy you truly were as a person in such a cruel, cruel world. No matter what, you were always smiling or laughing. It's what he liked about you most.

He wanted everyone to know that even with his girl gone, he would never stop posting or talking about you. Ever. That was something he would never do.

He hated life without you.

He just wanted his beautiful girl back.

© OVROUR

A/n: I'm so sorry I haven't wrote in such a long time. I've genuinely been so exhausted, and I've been bed rotting heavy. But, I finally wrote a little something, which I loved writing ittt!! I would love love love to do a part 2 if you guys want me too!

lots of love, alondra🪷

taglist!! @bernardsbendystraws @flouvela @sturniolosarethebest @soupuurr @nickgetsmewetter @inkyray @042502 @luvs4matt @missmimii @conspiracy-ash (if you'd like to be added pls lmk!)

[dadbodbuck]

WE'RE BREAKING UP

WHY WOULD YOU SAY THIS TO ME.

WHY WOULD YOU TYPE THIS WORDS WITH YOUR FINGERS AND THEN PRESS POST.

GET AWAY FROM ME

hi jack unfortunately we got married when you weren't looking so you have to pay for an attorney :/

anyway

Buck texts him I need to talk to you and Christopher knows it’s going to be a bad day. He was actually thinking about coming home over Thanksgiving break—it’s not as clean as going back over Christmas, but he misses Denny (who’s been telling him a lot about his cool new sister during their nightly meme exchange), and he misses his school friends (even if they’re exhausting to be around sometimes), and worst of all he misses his family. He misses his dad, he misses Buck. He even misses Tommy—despite only having met him a few times, he knows he’s been good for Buck and for his dad. 

He liked seeing his dad smiling so much when he first started hanging out with Tommy, before her. He liked the way Tommy talked to him like an adult with his own thoughts and opinions. He liked the way Tommy talked about Buck, even though it was kind of gross seeing a grown man swoon that much.

But then. I need to talk to you. And it all comes crumbling down around him. Buck even has the nerve to follow it up with Can I call you? like some sort of therapist or school administrator. Chris opts for a video call, because he’s not eighty years old, and when Buck picks up, his eyes are bloodshot, his face is pale, and he’s nestled in his bed like a stereotypical teenager girl after she gets dumped.

Oh. Oh no. “What,” Chris says, and he kind of regrets the video call now, because Buck flinches back like he’s been physically hit.

“Uh, hey!” Buck says, trying to recover and failing miserably. The smile he plasters on his face looks so forced it’s painful, “How’s Texas in November treating you?”

Chris looks at Buck and decides to play nice. Just a little. “Not that I’m not happy to see you, but you sounded like you had something important to talk about.”

“You’re right,” Buck sighs, “I’m procrastinating. I just wanted to let you know that Tommy and I have decided not to see each other anymore.”

And, yeah, Chris is pretty sure he knew this was coming, but it still makes him want to cry, or bite something, or throw his phone into the lake. “What happened?”

“Well—uh—Chris, I don’t—the details really aren’t important,” Buck says, with a wince, “What is important is that I love you, and your dad loves you, and just because Tommy won’t be around doesn’t mean you won’t have our support. I’m really sorry, bud. I know you liked him.”

It blindsides Chris, and he doesn’t know why. He should’ve seen this coming a mile away. He shouldn’t have gotten attached. He never should have sat down to watch The Batman with his dad and Tommy and stolen Tommy’s popcorn and talked shit on Buck’s taste in Star Wars Prequels. 

“What did you do?” Chris asks, feeling a startling rage building in his throat. It’s familiar, now. He doesn’t know how he knows, but he knows this is Buck’s fault. Buck looks like a dog that pissed on the carpet and is waiting for you to step on the wet spot.

Buck clears his throat, and visibly weighs truth and comfort in his mind. “I asked him to move in with me. It was—it was too fast—”

“You asked him to move in with you?” Chris balks, “He has a house!”

“I wasn’t thinking!” Buck hisses, “Listen, I know I fu—messed up. I’m sorry. You have no idea how sorry I am, Chris. But it—it was the best decision for both of us.”

“You’re lying,” Chris seethes, because he knows so, so intimately the look of an adult lying to protect his innocence. “He made you happy. He made dad happy.”

Buck looks away, chin trembling, and Chris feels bad for all of three seconds before the rage consumes every other feeling in his chest. “Call me back when you find someone who wants to stay. Otherwise, keep your love life away from me. And maybe you stay away from me too.”

Chris ends the call, and two seconds later Buck is ringing him again. Chris doesn’t pick up, just sets his phone on his desk and buries his face in his arms. He doesn’t want to cry. He did too much of that after he got to El Paso the first time. But he’s going to miss Tommy. He’s going to miss seeing his dad smile like that. He’s going to miss the dopey lovesick way Buck moved through the world.

When Chris finally composes himself, he sees two more missed video calls from Buck, and a string of texts:

Love you, buddy. Sorry you’re upset. Call later to talk? Or call your therapist?

I really am sorry. I thought Tommy was going to stay too.

Text me pls? So I know you’re ok

Chris texts back: im fine. we’ll be fine. i need some time and gets a response almost immediately.

OK. Take the time you need. Your dad says if you decide to come back and you’re still mad you won’t have to see me if you don’t want to

Chris, always being left behind, feels a sick surge of satisfaction at the prospect. He could be the one who leaves. He can cut his losses before they’re fatal, he can amputate the limb before it goes septic. He texts Buck a single k back and does not examine the way something in the back of his head tells him, quite viciously, that this isn’t the first time that Buck’s been left this week.

[l5byrinth]

fortnight

“and i love you, it's ruining my life”

pairing: nikolas omilana x reader

summary: in which niko avoids you for a certain reason, and at some point you can’t take it any longer.

requested

a/n: hii everyone i’m back from the dead like i always am every few months!!! school has been draining, but one night i got this motivation and managed to write this, hope you like it <3 btw i know i should be finishing of the hunger games requests, but there are so little fics on here for the beta squad members and the motivation just got to me when watching a video.

also pleaseeeee start requesting more beta squad, not just niko because there aren’t many fics for these amazing men

NIKO never knew what it was like to be so infuriated by someone, it caused restless nights. To be so head over heels, that all your thoughts were consumed by only that person. That was until Niko met you. The way you had him wrapped around your finger, without you even noticing or trying, was something he never understood. But it was you, how could he not be?

The famous youtuber also didn’t know what it was like to love someone that wasn’t his. Someone not meant for him.

He had respect for your relationship, of course, he wasn’t one to mingle and make things worse. Especially since your boyfriend was one of the best ones you’ve had. However, the mere thought of you drove him absolutely insane and he wasn’t sure for how much longer he could bear it anymore.

You were happy, though, and he didn’t want to be the reason that would be ruined.

So he avoided you like the plague. Leaving every room you entered, switching the topic whenever you were mentioned, trying to keep his eyes from wandering off to where you were standing. It was killing him, but if it meant keeping you happy, he didn’t mind the torture one tiny bit.

Niko hadn’t told anyone about what he felt for you, he would take it to his grave, that’s for sure. Yet, he was more obvious than he thought he was, since he’s noticed the sympathetic looks his friends gave him whenever you were around. Numerous times. It didn’t matter, it’s not like you were ever going to find out and that’s all that really mattered.

After Niko had arrived back at his apartment, he was surprised to hear not a single sound being made. Knowing Aj, he would always either be gaming and yelling for the whole neighbourhood to hear or edit a video with the volume on to the max.

After checking a few rooms for where his roommate was, he got a call from Aj himself.

“Where are you, you rat?” Niko questioned, not even bothering to greet him. Aj let out a laugh on the other line, “Missing me now, are you? Giraffe.”

Niko rolled his eyes, but couldn’t help the smile forming on his face, “Ha ha, hilarious.”

“Anyway, I’m at Chunkz’ right now.”

And after conversing for a few minutes, discussing everything and nothing, they ended the call. The tall guy let out a loud sigh, as he sat down on the sofa, turning on the tv to watch anything that came up first. However, just when he was about to push the button of the remote, the doorbell rang.

Niko was confused to say the least, but didn’t expect much of it. It was probably one of his friends needing something from him.

When Niko opened the door, however, he wished he didn’t. His heart dropped to his stomach, his breath hitching in his throat. That was the effect you had on him. Your hair was messed up quite a bit, your lips forming a pout as you looked at him. Oh, how he had to restrain all the power in him not to kiss that pout away.

A soft call of your name left his lips, as if he was terrified it was just a hallucination. “Niko,” Your voice was stern, yet there was some kind of sadness to it. And without saying another word, you entered the apartment as if you owned the place.

When you walked past him, your scent wafted into his nostrils and he took it in. He closed his eyes, not wanting to lose control and confess the second he turned around and looked at you again. Niko closed the door, taking his sweet time going to you. You were pacing back and forth in the living space of the apartment, your eyebrows furrowed and face filled with worry.

“What’s wrong?” Niko questioned, earning a rather unbelievable scoff from you. When you stopped pacing and moved closer to him, Niko took back a step, making you even more frustrated than you were before. “You’re asking me what’s wrong? I should ask you!” You couldn’t comprehend why the closest friend you had ever had, wasn’t present in your life anymore. The minute your feet took a step closer to him, he backed away once more, “Look! What’s this? Why are you avoiding me?”

You were absolutely fuming to put it lightly. What was he doing?

His gaze fell down to the floor, because if he would look at you right now, he knew he would ruin things even more. “I don’t get it, Niko…” Your voice was dripping with desperation, but you couldn’t care less at the minute, only interested in whatever was going between the two of you.

Another step closer, but this time he didn’t budge, his eyes stuck to the ground. But when you said his name so sweetly, who could blame him when he averted his gaze to meet yours. The question that left your lips, made the guilt sink inside of him, “What did I do wrong?”

However he didn’t cave in. He couldn’t and he wouldn’t, no matter how tempting the thought of you being his seemed right now.

“Niko, please. Talk to me!”

Silence, once again.

“Nik-“

“I can’t talk, please don’t make me.” His whisper was barely audible, but still loud enough for you to hear. “Why not, huh? Are you just going to ignore me like you have done for the past couple of-“

“I have to! I never wanted for this to happen.”

The tone in his voice took you by surprise, your eyes searching his for a more clear answer, “What are you talking about?”

“You think I wanted for all of this to happen? Of course not!” He started, and he regretted everything he said after, “I couldn’t help it. Couldn’t help to feel at home with you, couldn’t help but feel as if you are the only one in this universe.”

His gaze was burning into yours, “I couldn’t help but fall in love with you.”

Something fluttered unwantedly in your chest, followed by your breath hitching in your throat. Niko’s in love with you?

“You… what?”

“I fell for you, hard and painfully so. I’m sorry, okay? It happened one way or another and now you’re the one consuming my thoughts and dreams. I care for you and love you so deeply, it hurts me to stay away from you. But I did what’s best and will continue doing so.” He rambled, never noticing how you were still hung up on the first sentence he uttered.

But when you met his gaze once more, and saw the spark in his eyes when he looked at you, you wondered how you could’ve been so blind. “Now, please, leave before I do something both of us will regret.” Niko warned firmly.

You were stood there absolutely speechless, but came back to earth quickly, when you realised your boyfriend was waiting for you outside.

[alexlwrites]

From my notes app: we can't be friends

This is heavily inspired by Ariana Grande's new music video so please go watch it. Anyway happy birthday yoongles sometimes i wish i could forget you so i could stop comparing normal men to you. All the love, my dude.

On the corner of a surgery room, a few doctors studied your box of belongings: a guitar pick, a half-empty bottle of perfume, scraps of paper and a white t-shirt. They lined up years and years of memory and scanned each of them, the room fading in front of you as each object went under the red light.

It didn’t take long for the first memory to appear, bright and shiny as the day you lived it: White cotton sheets covering your body, his beating heart all you could hear as you rested your head on his chest, long flushed fingers intertwined with yours. The whole world was encapsulated in that room and nothing else mattered as you and Yoongi breathed each other in a moment of quiet suspension, avoiding even blinking as to not miss a single moment of peace, mapping the shapes and planes of his face and swearing to never forget it.

Ultimately, that was the problem.

Lights flicked and suddenly you were in his studio as he bashfully showed you some unfinished tracked, callused fingers picking at his guitar strings as you held your breath until the melody finished. You clapped enthusiastically, stealing an embarrassed smile from your boyfriend. Even now, that song haunted you in dreams and followed you around your apartment. Every so often you’d catch yourself humming it and crumble to the ground as your weaponized amygdala worked against you, notes turning into a silent cry of pain.

The doctors moved into the scraps of paper, straightening them out. The surgery room faded once more as you were transported into another memory, brief recollections of all the moments he left behind notes with scribbled thoughts he could never say out loud, didn’t know how to, but still wanted you to know: how much he loved you, dimension and intensity, and how he carried your memory into every song he wrote and performed. Those papers carried the only evidence of all the music he made for you and for you only. The world could listen to them all, but never claim it.

“Please” you sobbed, shaking as the doctors rushed to restrain you “please let me keep that one. Just that one. He made it for me, I can’t forget it, please, please.”

But as you begged to keep that one moment in your heart, the machine moved on, projecting the one thing that drove you into this office and got you signing those documents. The reason why you need surgery and he didn’t - after all, he had no problem forgetting you.

“Maybe we can still be friends” he had said, as if that was all you were before. As if everything you lived together could be erased to the point where you could sit by each other and feel no urge to hold his hand. As if your existence in his life could be reduced to something else, washed out. As if one day he could wake up and be clean of you. 

He could, you came to find out. The problem was you couldn’t.

“Please” you begged, but by then you didn’t even know what you were begging for. That was just all you knew how to do these past months - begging him to stay, then begging for the radio to stop playing him, begging the TV to stop showing him, begging every corner of your life to stop being so thoroughly stained by his presence in it. 

Begging to forget. Begging to remember. Begging to forget again when your heart shatters and pierces you from the inside out. You couldn’t handle it anymore, being the sole vessel of all these memories, carrier of a whole universe of moments only you seemed to care about. You couldn’t take it anymore, so please, please…

The lights flicker. One of the doctors hands you a guitar pick but you don’t play, so you’re not sure what they want you to do with that. Then he gives you a little pile of scribbled paper, but the words don’t make much sense to you. You crumble them and shove them in your back pocket, where they will be destroyed by the machine once you do your laundry.

In the hospital reception, there’s an idol on the TV. He plays a song about his first love and you listen to it for a couple seconds before leaving. Every so often, you catch yourself humming the melody and smiling.

[faffreux]

can you tell us about when you fell in love with fawful? :)

Yep. In fact, I'll write a whole mini essay for you so I can add it to the FAQ section of my website coming up shortly LMAO (SINCE I NEED TO FULLY ANSWER THIS QUESTION FOR THERE ANYWAY, RIGHT???) CLICK UNDER THE READ MORE TO SEE IT BECAUSE THIS IS GOING TO BE THE LONGEST THING I'VE EVER POSTED HERE, LMAO.

To preface, I have been a fan of the M&L games going back to the early-mid 2000s when I was a kid. I had no involvement with fandom or anything of the sort back then but I used to hop on my mom's bulky computer and look up fanart and other related content as early as 2004/5 and as a result, ended up captivated by the characters long before I knew who they actually were. (As a result of this, I have the names and art styles of various old M&L fandom creators permanently ingrained in my head and often wonder where they are today since a good deal of them vanished..!) It wasn't until 2006 that I got my first handheld console (DS Lite) and of course, what did I do? Immediately begged my mom to order me a used GBA copy of Superstar Saga. 

When I finally had the game in my hands it was like coming home to a colorful world that I'd been captivated by for so long but never gotten the chance to actually explore until now. The characters felt like old friends and the Beanbean Kingdom as a location felt familiar and comforting to me. (As a side note, Popple quickly became my favorite. Shocker, right?)

I used to sketch various beans in my notebooks as well as on printer paper we had lying around the house. Long story short, I finished Superstar Saga and then a few years later in 2010 I picked up Bowser’s Inside Story and THAT’S WHEN THINGS SHIFTED–

BIS brought Fawful and his personality to life in a way that captivated my imagination like nothing else had prior. He quickly overtook Popple as my favorite character from then on forward… and that’s where it ends! Or.. is it?

Nah, that’s where it gets funky. Life got a little chaotic after that and not only did I stop playing video games altogether for many years, but I also almost completely gave up on art - the one thing I was most passionate about above all and thought I would make a career out of someday. A series of depressing events caused me to lose all hope and motivation for anything I created and the spark I’d kept inside of me for so long all but died out as a result.

We’re going to timeskip again, this time to late 2019. I’d just moved away from home permanently for the first time and had been getting settled in and no matter what I did to make my new apartment a cozy place it always felt like something was missing. My mind would keep wandering to the fact that I never made art anymore despite it having been such a key part of my life when I was younger. I so desperately wanted to change this and over the next few months the frustration only kept growing until on January 1st, 2020, I sat down in the living room with a pencil and paper in my hand and shut my eyes tightly before saying under my breath:

“I do not care what it is, I don’t care how it comes. Just please… PLEASE send me something to bring my art back. Anything… anything at all. I don’t care what I draw, I just want to be drawing again.” And with that, I placed the lead onto the paper and began to sketch…

And from there… a familiar face appeared!

(Now I could ramble to you about how much I do NOT like this drawing and how off model it is from how Fawful actually looks… but I’ll forgive myself since I hadn’t touched the M&L games in over a decade at this point and had forgotten most of Fawful’s character. And yet?? Here he was.)

How else can I explain it except that in that moment it felt like the pencil in my hand had suddenly become one of these:

A joy that I hadn’t felt in SO long suddenly filled my entire being and without wasting another second, I immediately went online and ordered both Superstar Saga and Bowser’s Inside Story to replay again. In the time waiting for the games to arrive I had started drawing daily again - sketching out various old characters of mine with dozens of doodles of the bean man stacked in between them all.

There he was… always smiling, always happy to see me, and oftentimes with his arms outstretched as if to give an encouraging hug. When the games arrived I worked through them quicker than I ever had prior - finishing up Superstar Saga in less than a week and subsequently moving onto Bowser’s Inside Story with a LOT of excitement built up for it. 

It was my first day playing and I was having the time of my life! The way Fawful looked in his little grey cloak with that enormous, charming grin of his as he bamboozled Bowser into eating the Vaccuum Shroom had me giggling with joy while words repeated in my brain over and over of: “I need to draw this later, I NEED to draw this later!!!” I WAS EXCITED ABOUT ART AGAIN… AFTER ALL THESE YEARS. I was practically hopping in my seat from the happiness I felt in my heart and chest every time Fawful appeared at this point!

This was how it felt until the moment I arrived at the Fawful Theatre and watched as he began dancing on the stage floor. THIS time.. something different came over me. If you’ve felt it before, then you’ll know what I mean when I say that it was like my entire body turned warm all at once, like some sort of flame had been lit inside. I’d never felt it for anything or anyone prior to then, and that's partly why it hit me as hard as it did. I was practically sweating.

Heck, I was so absorbed in my feelings that I had forgotten there was anyone else in the room with me! That is.. Until my roommate at the time spoke up: 

Her: Are you alright? Me: Uhhh… yeah, why? Her: You’re red as a beet. Are you sure you’re okay?

By this time I had realized what was really going on so I reassured her I was fine, grabbed my 3DS, and ran to my room to finish the playthrough on my own so I wouldn’t embarrass myself any further, hahaha.

In the days, weeks, and months following that moment I became dedicated to drawing the best art of Fawful I could possibly create! What started as a challenge to myself to ‘give back’ to the person who’d given me back the ability to create again turned into someone I genuinely could not stop drawing for how much fun I was having doing it. The desire to make better and better art in order to honor him drove me to improve at a speed I never had prior, and soon thereafter I created Jolligig as a way for me to be in this colorful world with him and to express the deepening affection I was feeling for him with every day that passed by.

By some miracle, my prayer had been answered and here it was in the form of a grinning lima bean.

[End of Part 1. Interested in the rest? Yes… there’s more, I’m sorry. Please let me know in the comments. This took a while to write so I thought splitting it up would be best if folks are interested, LOL.]

[princesspastel8]

Chapter 68

Third POV

Slenderman surprisingly gives in to Luna's request to a meeting after a bit of begging from Toby's end. Once it was decided, Jeff and Eboni aren't allowed to attend - mostly due to Slenderman still failing to get under Eboni's skin. One annoying pesk was manageable, but two? The faceless creature has a headache just thinking about it.

As everyone leaves towards Slenderman's office, Eboni & Jeff go into the kitchen. The smiling killer sits at the table as he watches his girl beginning to cook him dinner. She turns to him with a smile.

"Anything in particular you want?"

"Whateber scraps we got that you can turn into a meal is fine with me." He shrugs, still watching her.

"Mhm, I'll see what I can do."

Eboni isn't working with much. All she managed to find is shrimp- that's still fresh, rice, and canned curry. She also sees a few seasonings to help add flavor to the canned curry & shrimp. She grabs two pots and a skillet to pan fry the shrimp. Once the rice and curry are placed on to cook, Eboni looks into the refrigerator- noticing some juice and rum.

"Did they throw a New years party or?"

"Nah. They do that shit towards the end of the month. Gives everyone time to steal something for the party, and a excuse for me to get drunk off my ass."

Eboni rolls her eyes, suddenly uneasy. She hasn't noticed it til now, but the poor girl fears parties. The loud music, the smell of alcohol & musk, the flashing lights, all of it makes her heart fill with anxiety. Jeff notices her sudden shift in demeanor. He waves her over, making her sit on his lap.

He moves to rest his head against her breast, arms wrapping around her waist. "Or, we can have our own little party in my room." He grins.

Eboni giggles, shaking her head. "No, no, it's ok. You tried to hide it, but I can tell from your tone. You're looking forward to this party."

He frowns, huffing. "Ugh...fuck I can't hide shit from you anymore."

Eboni giggles, leaning down to shower his face with kisses. Neither of them seem to notice the pair of blue eyes staring at them. The male holds a sketchbook and pencil in hand. He moves to sit on the couch, closes to the kitchen, and begins drawing the scene before him. The Male's been lacking inspiration lately, so he's surprised to suddenly feel the need to draw them after witnessing the public display of affection.

Soon though, Eboni removes herself from Jeff's lap- going to the curry and begins seasoning it as the rice continues to cook. "I'll be fine on my own, Jeff. I'll keep smile dog with me."

"I rather not have you up there by yourself, princess."

"And I won't let you miss out on the party."

Jeff stares at her, clicking his tongue. That's what he gets for being nice, granted he's going to go anyways whether Eboni was alright with it or not. That's just who Jeff is, selfish yet spares less of his selfishness when with Eboni. The girl is aware of this, however. Truly, she doesn't mind being to herself for a few hours. She'll just play video games or spend more time with Sally.

She moves to put two servings of shrimp onto the pan after putting butter in it. As it begins cooking, she seasons it so the flavors will cook into the sea food. BEN then suddenly appears next to Eboni, floating over her.

"I knew you were cooking! Only your food smells this good!" He said, mouth salivating.

Jeff reaches up, grabbing the link look-a-like ankle with a mischievous smile on his face. "And you ain't eating any of it!" He laughs, tossing the floating demon onto the wall.

BEN glitches, falling onto the ground with a thud - a groan following afterward. "Fuuuuucking asshole!"

The smiling killer shrugs, moving next to Eboni, hovering over her. She gets a teaspoon and dips it into the curry, giving herself a taste test. She nods her head in approval, reaching up to grab two plates. Struggling though, Jeff chuckles- reaching over her and grabs two plates. He gives her a quick kiss before moving to sit back down at the table.

Eboni makes Jeff's plate, placing a few scoops of curry on one end of the plate, rice on the other side, and shrimp on top. She does the same with hers, placing both plates on the table. Eboni grabs herself a can of Sprite & a bottle of Jack Daniel's for the smiling killer.

When Eboni is seated, Jeff takes his spoon- scooping one of everything into it. He takes a bite, eyes rolling and body slumping. He doesn't bother wasting anymore time on savoring it, quickly devouring every last bite - going so far as to lick his plate clean.

He takes a quick swig of his drink to swallow it all down before speaking, "Hooooooly shit princess, that was so damn good!"

Eboni giggles, still taking her time to finish her meal. "Thank you." She gushes over the praise.

After a few minutes, Eboni finishes her meal- leaving just a bit for BEN since he wouldn't stop whining for a taste. It's late into the evening by the time the two make it back into Jeff's room. She takes his cap off, walking him towards his build in bathroom. The two strip down bare, stepping into the shower after running the water to warmth.

Eboni gently washes the remaining dye out of Jeff's hair while he moves to wash her body. When done with his hair, Eboni does the same with him - littering kisses against his bare wet skin. Jeff fully relaxes under her soft touch, his eyes growing heavy.

The two finish their shower, drying themselves off. Eboni wraps her towel around herself as Jeff sits down, allowing Eboni to blow dry his hair. He relishes this treatment. It's so odd, a crazed serial killer growing fond of such gently touches and small acts of affection. Jeff never once thought this could be him, growing to love someone's company so much. So much so that it scares him a bit. All his life, he's grown used to being alone, yet now he's used to Eboni's company. Thinking back, he questions how he could be alright living life in solitude. That is no longer an option, not anymore.

Once his hair is dry, Eboni begins her nightly routine along with Jeff. The two brush their teeth, Jeff taking Eboni's shower cap off and putting her curly fluffy hair into braids- placing her bonnet on once done. The girl quickly moisturizes her skin with strawberry scented shea butter as well as lip bomb to keep her lips soft during the night.

The two dress in their nightwear, Eboni in a pink silk tank top with matching shorts- Jeff shirtless and in black sweatpants. She is the first to crawl into bed, Jeff following suit, but a nip at his ankle stops him. The killer jumps, glancing down.

"The fuck smile dog?"

The demonic German Shepherd does it again, letting out a whine. Jeff is about to shoo him away until Eboni leans over the bed to look at the dog. She smiles, patting the bed. "Someone seems jealous. Wanna come up here smiles?"

The dog darks happily, jumping onto the bed before Jeff could protest. The pet circles at the foot of the bed, curling up and plopping down once comfortable. The smiling killer rolls his eyes, scoffing once settled onto the bed.

"Tch. Should've let him sleep on the floor. This bed ain't big enough."

"It can be." She whispers, pulling Jeff close and allowing his face to rest against her chest.

"The fuck? I didn't agree to....damn that feels good." He grumbles.

The girl had begun running her fingers through his hair, scratching his scalp lightly in between. The action makes Jeff pull her closer, arms clutching her waist. The motions make Eboni giggle. "See? Now your bed has plenty of room with us this close."

"Fuck you.." he spat sleepily, Eboni kisses his forehead as he drifts off to sleep.

It takes Eboni awhile to try and let sleep come over her, but it seems sleep didn't want her. She can't stop her mind from running a mile a minute. She wanted to be apart of that meeting. She needs to know what was said, how it was said, and the conclusion reached. She needs to know every. Single. Detail.

But by the time sleep begins to take her, Eboni feels the sudden need for water. She checks her phone, the time stating 1am. The girl tries to wiggle out of Jeff's embrace, but his grip tightens more. He grumbles, cracking open his eyes to look up at her.

"The fuck you going?" He questions, voice low- lace from sleep.

Eboni quickly has to get her mind out of the gutter. Jeff's voice has always been enough to get her needy. She smiles, "Just need some water." She whispers sweetly.

"Mhm...bring me some." He said, releasing her from his grip- positioning himself on his stomach.

"Will do." She hums, moving out of bed slowly- slipping on her house shoes.

She grabs her robe, placing it on while on her way out of Jeff's room. She gently closes the door behind herself, tying the robe strings firmly around her waist before making her descent down the stairs. Around this time, within the mansion, most proxies are out on missions or up in their rooms sleeping the night away- so Eboni's chances of running into someone is next to none.

But once she reaches the end of the stairs, time seems to slow for her. Wild blonde hair, swiftly moving up the stairs with someone leading the way. It's too dark for the two to notice Eboni, but she sees them clearly. A male with chocolate brown hair, side burns - dressed in an orange trench coat & a white mask. The female is dressed in nothing but mini blue jean shorts and an orange crop top. It's still freezing outside, yet she's dressed like the sun is setting the earth on fire. Typical for trailer park trash.

Eboni isn't sure what came over her. The sight of the messy blonde hair seems to set her body ablaze. She can feel her blood begin to boil, nails digging into her palms, and a metallic taste lingering on her tongue. Rage. How long has it been since she's raged out so blindly? And why does this feel so different? So....oddly good?

Before Taylor can reach the top of the stairs, Eboni reaches out- grabbing her hair and yanks her backward. She quickly moves out of the way, watching the blonde tumble down the stairs. Hearing this, Masky turns- grabbing his crowbar that's mounted onto his back and moves to strike Eboni.

"You crazy bi-"

Masky never stood a chance - not against a raging Eboni. She dodges his swing, grabbing the tip of the curved crowbar, and yanks it out of his grip. The girl smiles madly, raising the weapon and swings it with every once of strength she possesses. The metal rod connects to his mask with so much force that it's enough to crack his porcelain mask & knock him to the ground at the top of the staircase- disorientating him for a few minutes.

Eboni drops the crowbar, eyes locked on the girl still slump at the bottom of the stairs. Her smile stretches more as a loud buzz fills her brain, her vision clouding with pure white hot fiery. This must be how Jeff felt, so angry yet so free. Nothing else around her matters, except for beating the life out of this bitch. Eboni is sticking true to her word. It's on sight.

"E...Eboni?"

"In the flesh. Man...the table really have turned huh? Now you're the one that looks like complete shit."

"Ya..ya don't know shit!" She shouts, moving to stand up.

"I know you killed your mom. It's about time, right? I'm sure Masky helped you in that department. You are a coward, after all. Hiding in a brush to try and kill my man, and what for? Because I scoured the better one? Or is it -"

Taylor punches Eboni in her nose, knocking the girl back. The blonde snatches the crowbar from her hand and hits her in her ribcage. Eboni cries out, her rage building even more yet somehow chilling her to the bone - it isn't until Taylor opens her mouth that Eboni allows the rage to fully take control.

Taylor leans forward, face itches away. "I ain't try to off him. It was'em'. They all wanted him dead- but I wanted yo sorry ass dead. I hated ya' the moment ya' started school. I had all the boys wrapped 'round meh fingers - but ya'...ya came and ruined all I had built! Alex nevea' shut the fuck up 'bout you! I knew he was full of shit- I knew what he planned to do. It...was perfect. The fucka' destroys ya'...and I get my place back. I knew he raped ya. I knew he drugged ya. I knew all that shit- I just ain't give two fucks. It was eithea' ya' become meh bitch like Iris, or I end you. Jeff saved ya ass the first time, but I ain't gonna let that fucka' save ya' a second time. Them bullets wa' ment fa' ya'. But seein' that fucka' fall" she pulls back, laughing loudly. "If he dies then ya' off ya'self. It's a win win!"

Strange. This feels so strange.

Eboni stumbles back a bit, placing her hands on her head as she begins to cry - the rage bubbling. She can feel it gurgling through her eyes as the pounding pressure against her skull grows. She cared about Taylor. Eboni related to her in a few ways. She would've done anything to keep her safe as she would with Iris. That's how much she valued their friendship at the time, her very first friends-

And to think, Taylor envied her. Jeff warned her. He knew from the moment he laid eyes on her that she's full of shit, yet she defended her - up until that night, her life changed. That piece of trauma will never leave her. Just because Alex is dead doesn't mean the trauma goes with him.

Her body suddenly feels cold, and the pain in her ribcage seems to fade. Her pupils begin to dilate, panting heavily tears streaming freely, yet her lips stretch into a smile, fits of laughter leaving her. For a moment, Taylor almost regretted spilling how she truly felt- but now is the chance to prove that she isn't a coward.

So Taylor moves to swing the crowbar again, but Eboni dodges effortlessly. Taylor swings again and again, Eboni moving too fast for her to land a hit. The girl feels so light on her feet, letting the malice guide her. She's going to make this bitch pay.

Taylor is going to pay for trying to manipulate her.

Taylor is going to pay for trying to control her.

Taylor is going to pay for lying to her.

Taylor is going to pay for trying to kill Jeff.

Taylor is going to pay -

In blood.

Taylor got to close, giving Eboni the chance to headbutt the girl in her nose. She takes the crowbar, tossing it towards the window- glass shattering. Eboni would've taken a piece of glass to slit the girl's throat, but she wants this to last. She wants Taylor to feel every ounce of emotional pain she caused her. She wants to feel the life drain from her with her bare hands.

The blonde falls to the ground, struggling to regain her senses from the blow to her nose. Eboni moves towards her, beginning to kick her randomly. Taylor tries to reach for Eboni's ankle, but the girl stomps on her hand- applying pressure until she hears a few cracks.

"Not enough... not enough.." Eboni mumbles.

But before Eboni moves onto Taylor, a firm hand grips her shoulder- Bloody Painter, standing over her, knife firmly in hand and mask resting on the top of his head. He opens his mouth to say something but is met with a punch to his nose - breaking it.

"Stay the fuck...out of my way." She warns, her smile still there as well as her tears.

Meanwhile, Jeff finds it odd that it's taking Eboni this song to grab two bottles of water- but he's to groggy to process just how long she's been gone, plus- he's so comfortable....that was until he hears a loud crash that sounds like glass shattering from downstairs.

He jumps up, as did Smile Dog. They both share a look and quickly rush out of his room. Jeff races down the stairs, taken aback at the scene before him. Bloody Painter is knocked out cold, Masky is behind Eboni with his crowbar raised while his girl is on top of Taylor - beating the shit out of her. The smiling killer grins, running towards Masky and tackling him to the ground. He pins him down, snatching the mask off his face and forces him to watch Eboni destroy his bitch.

"No...no you don't get to step in. I got my get back- time for my girl to get hers. Fuck, she looks so hot...with her hands covered in blood- the blood of your pathetic blonde bimbo. Honestly Tim, thought you had better taste in women." Jeff mocks, using all his strength to keep Masky down though it's becoming harder to do so.

"Get off! Get the fuck off!" He shouts, tears building in his eyes as he watches Taylor loose conscious. "She'll kill her!"

"That's the point. That whore messed with the wrong one." Jeff laughs, feeling a sense of pride swell in his chest as he continues to watch Eboni beat that bitch, that caused both of their lives hell, to death.

Each punch gives Eboni a sense of euphoria. The once painful rage has turned into one of tasty malignity. Just seeing the girl that has always been all bark and no bite slowly die with each hit is filling Eboni with a high she never knew she could reach. Just a few more....just a few more, and she'll finally have her reven -

A black tendril wraps around Eboni's wrist, yanking the girl off of Taylor and sending flying to the broken window. She can't feel the glass pierce into her skin, the rage still blinding her from everything except her target. Jeff curses, releasing Masky and rushing to Eboni's side. He knows, he knows she's going to do excatly what he did - attack slenderman.

"Princess. Eboni don't even -"

Mind still in its buzzing state of malice, she punches Jeff right in his jaw- catching him off guard. He stumbles back, giving Eboni the chance to charge at the faceless man. The creature sighs, sending a dozen tendrils her way - thinking this would be easy. He's both pleasantly & horrifyingly surprised.

Eboni manages to dodge each tendril, her body bending in angles he wasn't aware a human body could. The girl has a knife in hand, one that she took from Bloody Painter. She dashes towards Slenderman, stabbing the tall creature in his lower abdomen - twisting the blade.

He underestimated her - that much is clear, but at this point, he's fed up with her disobedience and defiance. He should kill her before she gets more out of hand. So he manages to cage her body with several tendrils, slowly squeezing her body. She cries out, struggling to break herself free - but she doesn't back down, biting at the tendril covering her mouth.

"LET HER GO!" Jeff shouts, his rage quickly getting the best of him as he grabs a large shard of glass.

This....is getting out of control.

Luna steps from behind Slenderman, eyes & hair glowing their bright shades of blue. She holds her hands up, freezing both Jeff & Slenderman. The witch looks at the faceless man, the two sharing a quiet conversation. After a minute of unsettling silence, the creature gives in motioning for Toby to inject Eboni with a sedative.

"This will not go unpunished. Masky, take Taylor to Nurse Ann. Toby, take Bloody Painter to X virus."

The two do as told, Toby giving Luna a look before carrying Bloody Painter away - Masky following behind. The smiling killer glares at the witch, waiting for her to release her hold on him - but she doesn't.

"I swear to god, you voodoo bitch, if you don't let me go I'll-"

"You'll do no such thing if you value this girl's life." Slenderman warns.

"The fuck you plan on doing with her huh!?" Jeff shouts, growing anxious. Eboni clearly needs medical attention too.

"As I stated, this will not go unpunished. I believe it's time for Eboni Brown to visit the white room."

[carcarcraziiv2]

Hi! Oh, it's so good that I came across your blog! I would like to make a request. Kayn & Younger Sister!Reader. And the situation is like this. Reader is a teenager of sixteen and she has already graduated from high school. She's enrolled in college, but she'll have to move into a dorm. She begins to worry wildly, because she is afraid that she will not be accepted by completely new people for her, and also that she will be lonely and bored because Kayn is not around. You can even add scenes where Reader already lives in a dorm and communicates with Kayn via video link (for Kayn, this is a means to make sure that his sister is okay). Thank you very much!

Yay! I'm glad you came across my blog too!

I love this idea. I feel like Kayn would be an exceptional big brother 🥹. Lowkey winging it cuz I am an oooonly child hehe.

Here we go! I hope you enjoy!

P.S. Sorry it's kind of short, but I hope you like it anyway!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The days just keep getting more stressful.

At least that's what you thought- you hadn't even began packing for your move in date to the university dorms. At only sixteen you were going to be the youngest one in the sorority, and you weren't sure how the other girls were going to react to you.

As you walked into your room with a few empty boxes in hand, you sighed at the mess on the floor. You had been so busy with celebrating your graduation from high school and your scholarship that you hadn't had time to do anything- much less clean.

You were grateful that your big brother was home for the holidays, as he was helping a lot with the upkeep of the house while your parents were constantly off working.

Feeling defeated, you let yourself crumple to the floor, landing hard on your knees which only made you feel more frustrated. You tossed the boxes blindly, causing them to crash into a few items on your bookshelf- of course it did.

Reaching up to cover your eyes, you let out a pathetic sob before completely falling into belligerence. You were a heaving, snotty mess on the floor with no hope as to how to ease the anxiety coursing through your veins.

What if the girls don't like me?

What if the professors think I'm too young to be in college?

What about Kayn? Will he miss me? Will we even get to hangout anymore?

You trembled at the thought of not being able to see your brother. He was your rock, especially in tough situations. Even now, he was so busy with his band all of the time you hardly got to see him. With you going to college, you were certain there was no hope at all.

Soft footsteps patting towards you caused you to jerk your head up and quickly wipe away your tears and running nose.

"Oh, hey Kayn. I had something in my eye," you blurt out, smiling slightly as you quickly avert your gaze from his prying one. He leaned down in a squat to your level, grabbing your chin with his fingers and forcing you to look at him.

"What's wrong? Do I need to kick someone's ass?" He says, studying your face. You sniffle and shake your head slightly in response, trying really hard not to cry again. "Then what's wrong, kid?"

"I- I'm just really worried about going to school. What if people don't like me? What if I fail or what if the professors don't think I am good enough?"

"What?! You? Not enough?! And there is literally no way that people aren't going to like you. Either way, I'm always one call away from coming to back you up. You know that, right?" Kayn smiles at you kindly, standing and reaching his hand out for you to take to stand.

"Thanks, Kayn. Love you."

"Love you too sis."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Three Weeks Later~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hi, I'm Y/N," You sheepishly reach out your hand toward your new dorm mate while tucking a piece of hair behind your ear.

"Hi! I'm Sarah. It's great to meet you! I am so excited to be your roommate!" Sarah, the short red headed girl in front of you, grabs your hand and pulls you in for a hug. "I think we are going to have a lot of fun together. Come in, let's compare classes!"

The first week was a breeze, meeting a lot of new people and luckily finding your professors eager to have a younger student in their midst.

This particular day was a Friday, and during your last class your roommate texted you.

Hey, Y/N! Come to the rec center after class, I wanna show you something!

You raised your brow in confusion, texting her back hesitantly.

Should I be worried?

Hahaha, of course not! See you theeeere!

The rest of the class was hard to focus on, as your thoughts kept drifting back to whatever your roommate could possibly be doing. She has been very nice to you since the beginning, but you couldn't help but to worry that she was doing something shady.

After class you quickly dropped your books off at your room and headed to the rec hall. It wasn't too far, about a fifteen-minute walk from the building you lived in.

The door to the hall was closed, which was unusual especially for a Friday. You quickly looked at your phone to make sure this is in fact the place that she said to go to, and after confirming you reached forward and slowly pushed open the door.

You would hit with a sudden burst of light, then a loud booming sound. You flinched, throwing your hands in front of your face.

"What the..." You started but were quickly interrupted by a group of shouting people.

"SUPRISEEEE!"

You jumped back, staring at the crowd in front of you while trying to make sense of it all.

Before you the tables were all decorated, multicolor balloons drifting from their tops. Above it all, ribbons hung from the ceiling, a big white banner in the center reading "Congratulations Y/N!".

Amidst it all you saw Kayn, his band, your mom and dad, and your roommate Sarah.

Your burst into tears.

In the short time you had been in college, you hadn't had any time to think about how much you truly missed all of them. Kayn, especially, as you hadn't had time to even consider grabbing your phone and calling them.

"Hey, hey now," You hear Kayn's voice beside you, a gentle hand rubbing your back. "Surprised?"

You nodded and lifted your head, wiping away your tears as you gripped him in a tight hug. "What the hell are you guys doing here?"

"Well, we realized we never really gave you an 'officially started college' party and thought we should probably do that. Plus, I missed my little sister!" He smiled, pulling away and dragging you towards everyone else.

Smiling, you enjoyed your evening, grateful for the best brother in the world. He always reminded you that everything was going to be okay, and he was always right.

[takumaswife]

My Prayer - Hokuto Yoshino Pt. 3

Word count: 1779+

A/N: Damn I kinda like cliffhangers. So part 4 will happen lmaoo

>Part 1<

Hokuto sat down the phone, trying to figure out what the hell was going on. One of his friends were lying, and he absolutely didn't want to believe it was you. He knew it wasn't you, you would never lie to him. But neither would Itsuki. He sat there for a moment before getting up and running out of his room. He slid on his shoes and was quickly out the door, on his way to your place.

He knew it was too late to catch a bus so he ran. It took a good twenty minutes before he arrived to your apartment complex. Hokuto took the elevator up, catching his breath. "Take it easy, Kuto.. you aren't sixteen anymore." He spoke to himself as his heartrate started to slow down. As soon as the elevator doors opened, he quickly stepped out and walked to your door. He hesitated knocking. What if Itsuki was there? What if he would get yelled at by both of his friends? Shaking his head, Hokuto knocked on your door.

You were still waiting for a call from Hokuto, biting your nails as you waited. Your nerves were getting the best of you, making you become sick to your stomach. Hearing the knock on your apartment door, you got up from bed and walked to the front door. You had made sure to lock the safety lock, that way Itsuki couldn't come waltzing in with some pathetic apology. Looking through the peep hole, expecting to see Itsuki looking apologetic, you saw Hokuto. He had changed since the last time you saw him about six months ago. His hair was now a dark brown instead of blonde, and it seemed like he had been going to the gym more as his shoulders were more broad.

Opening the door slowly, you looked at Hokuto, confused. "Hi.." You spoke softly. You couldn't take your eyes off of him. God, you missed him. "Hey.. uh, can I come in?" He asked, making you nod and step aside. Hokuto walked in and looked around with a hum. "So this is where y'all moved. Seems cozy." He spoke, trying to make the air less awkward. You just nodded, not knowing what to say. "So, anyways. I talked to Ryu. He was hanging out with Taka and Shohei on the video games, so no. No one had plans tonight." He spoke as he took out his phone and went to his call log. "I called him and asked him to hang out, and he told me he has been with you all night." He then handed you the phone, and you grew angry.

Your husband was lying to you and his friends.

Lying to you.. his wife. The one he promised to always be faithful to even when you two were dating.

Handing the phone back to Hokuto, you looked at the boy, a tear falling down your cheek. Just as you went to speak, you heard your phone ring tone going off. Taking the device from your pocket, you saw your wedding picture along with 'Hubby♡' on the screen. Holding your finger to your lips to tell Hokuto to keep quiet, you answered the phone as calmly as you could.

"Yes, Mr. No-Show and No Call to tell my wife I won't be home?" You had a little bit of annoyance in your voice but also tried to sound playful. "Oh, baby, I'm so sorry. After I was hanging with the boys, my mom called me, and I had to rush over. Some things were going on with our family, and I needed to be there. I'm so sorry, baby." Itsuki spoke with a small whine. "I promise I will make it up to you." You rolled your eyes and put the phone on speaker. "So, are you coming home tonight?" You asked. Itsuki immediately spoke, "No, I have to deal with a few more things in the morning, then I'll be home tomorrow afternoon." Hokuto looked at your phone in disgust. "Okay.. love you." You spoke, crossing your arms. "Love you too." Itsuki spoke, immediately ending the call on you.

"What do I do?" You asked, frowning at your bestfriend. "My opinion, I'd leave him.." He saw the hurt in your eyes from those words. You did love Itsuki, that's one of the reasons you said yes to his marriage proposal. He then quickly spoke again, "but maybe just give it a few days. Maybe he really is with his parents." He tried to smile, pulling you into his arms for a hug. "Don't overthink." Hokuto spoke. However, you were overwhelmed with the thoughts. Why is his location off if he was at his parents? Why did he tell Hokuto he was with you? Why did the others say he didn't ask to hang out with them?

"Here, go get in bed and I'll see myself out. If you need anything or want to talk tomorrow, call me and I'll come here or meet you somewhere, okay?" Hokuto told you, making you smile a bit and nod. "Goodnight, y/n." He smiled as he walked to the door, waving as he left the apartment. "By, Kuto.." you whispered with the biggest smile on your face. You locked the doors and walked back up to your room, getting into bed. Turning off the lights, you closed your eyes, hoping everything would make sense tomorrow.

It had been a few weeks now, almost a whole month that Itsuki was spending the night over half a week at his parents. So far for this month, he had only been home nine days total. You had asked if you could help somehow, but he refused because it was harder than you thought. He wouldn't even tell you what was going on.

Today you felt like taking a trip to the grocery store to get some snacks. You thought maybe inviting Hokuto over and just having a movie night because you knew you would be alone. Itsuki had texted you at about 8am that morning saying he wouldn't be home tonight.

While walking through the aisles, grabbing random snacks, and throwing them in the buggy, you weren't paying attention and ran into someone. "I'm so sorr- oh, Mrs. Fujiwara!" You spoke, your mother-in-law looking at you as if she's seen a ghost. "Oh, honey. How are you.. I see you're shopping." She spoke nervously. You nodded and tilted your head, confused by her vibe. "Itsuki told me some things were going on that he's been staying with you. Is everything alright?" You asked, watching her look anywhere but at you. "Yes, honey. He's been at our house helping out with some family stuff. I hope it isn't bothering you." She spoke, this time her eyes meeting yours. "Oh, no ma'am, I just-" "Oh well, I have to be going, darling. See you later." Mrs. Fujiwara spoke before quickly passing you and leaving the aisle.

The interaction was so strange. You already had doubts about your husband, and now it seemed your mother in law was hiding something from you. The entire drive home was quiet as your thoughts were overwhelming your brain. You were pulled from your thoughts when you pulled up to your apartment complex to see Hokuto sitting on the stairs, waiting for you. Parking in your normal spot, you got out and smiled over to Hokuto who was walking your way. "Need some help?" He asked, opening the trunk of your car before you could answer. "Thank you, such a gentleman." You replied as you walked over to help. Grabbing some bags, your thoughts went back to the incident at the grocery store. "I ran into his mom at the store.. I feel like she's hiding something.. Itsuki isn't there.. I just know he isn't." You spoke as you closed the trunk and locked it before leading your friend up to the elevator.

Finally walking into your apartment, you brought the grocery bags to the kitchen and sat them down on the counter. You stopped for a moment and looked at Hokuto. "Put the groceries in the fridge? I have to make a phone call.." You spoke as you grabbed your phone and called Itsuki. Stepping out of the kitchen, you waited for the man to pick up. "Oh, y/n. Is everything okay?" You heard your husbands voice after the second ring. "Yeah, I was just missing you. I was wondering what you were doing. I've missed you a lot." You heard a small hum and a chuckle on the other end of the line. "I'm sorry, baby. I know so much is going on right now, but I promise soon I'll take you somewhere special." You didn't believe him for a second. He had to be lying. "Baby, I can't talk much, but I'll call you later." He spoke, quickly adding an "I love you" before hanging up.

Hokuto came out of the kitchen as you put your phone away and frowned. "I'm sorry this is happening. Come on, you go change and I'll set up the living room." Kuto offered. You smiled and nodded, going to your bedroom and changing. Hokuto had sat up the living room with blankets layering the floor, lots of pillows and all the snacks you bought at the store. You quickly changed into your pajamas and went to leave the room when you grabbed your laptop off your desk and walked downstairs.

Your eyes soften as you saw your best friend sitting down, dressed in his pajamas, just waiting for you. "Looks cozy." You spoke as you sat down beside Hokuto and sat the laptop down. "What's the for?" He asked as he looked at the device. "Oh, Itsuki has a subscription that allows him to watch any movie ever made." You replied as you turned on the device. The screen popped up and you logged into his account, going to the app he used to watch his shows. As you went to click the app, you saw a notification pop up in the corner of the screen showing Itsuki recieved a message.

"Yes, she was at the store...I tried my best to leave quickly!"

It was a message from his mom. Why would she be texting him instead of just talking to him. "Tell me it's a bad idea to snoop." You spoke as you hovered the mouse over the imessage app. Hokuto ignored your question, pressing against the mouse pad and opening the app. The message log was filled with messages from the boys, his family, and a name you didn't recognize. "Who the hell is Asuka?" You and Hokuto asked at the same time.

[ghostflowerdreams]

The Lost Boys are a bunch of hoarders. I can see each of them having a massive collection of things from over the years and from their victims.

If they see something they like, they will take it. For example, if their latest victim has a nice leather jacket that looks like it'll fit them, well, it's theirs now because it never hurts to have a spare -- or twenty more. It's the same thing with jewelry and any cash in wallets.

That's not to say they'll keep everything. What they don't want will most likely be pawned off. Some things they like and actively collect, while other things they will get because of necessity, like candles. Vampires have better eyesight in the night than normal humans, but that doesn't mean they can see in total darkness. This is most likely why they had all those candles lit in the cave.

The cash taken from their victims isn't only used for food, but towards candles, batteries, gasoline, and other things that aren't easily found on their victims or on the boardwalk.

Most of the time they steal shit. They don't even need to use their hypnosis-compel ability or illusions to get want they want. Though I can definitely see them doing things the old fashion way just for the fun of the challenge it brings. Other times they avoid stealing if it'll be something that draws too much attention after a while. After all, the more often something goes missing, the easier it is for unwanted eyes (like vampire hunters) to catch on and make the connection.

Would they even need to worry about being caught on camera or video? One of the points in the film was that vampires don't have reflection in mirrors. We saw this with Michael's reflection being transparent because he was only half-turned, but what if that wasn't the norm anymore (as it could've just been an old mirror)?

Vampires traditionally couldn't be captured in mirrors because they were made with silver, and thus old timey cameras which used silver nitrate plates also couldn't capture the vampire's image. However, modern mirrors are made with aluminum and advances in technology has made it so film/(digital) cameras can do a lot, even capture vampires just fine, well, that's the theory anyway.

I suppose it'll be up to the fans and writers to decide if the boys can be capture or not. Will they be invisible no matter what? Or did that vampirism aspect only apply in the past (because silver was used and is typically a weakness for most monsters), but they can now be caught on cameras? If so, will they look like normal people? Will their eyes give off a weird reflective glare like most animals do in photographs? Or will their imagine be super blurry no matter what anyone does to try to "enhance" it, while everything else in the photo (or video) stays super clear and normal?

I digress. The point is that I can totally see them having piles of stuff scatter around their hotel-cave.

Each one will have a pile of clothes. I wouldn't be surprise if some of it is out of style too. They either forgot about it or still keep it around to help feed the fire because why else do they have those drum barrels around?

They also got a lot of books, vinyl records and cassette tapes. I imagine on slower days or late at night when everything is closed they find ways to entertain themselves, be it by reading, listening to music or the radio. If not, they probably have a collection of various games too like darts, playing cards, monopoly, charades, chess, etc.

As for what does each one personally collect?

Hmm, I guess Marko with the state of his jacket he probably collects patches and pins. Maybe even owns a few sewing thread sets with other art and craft supplies.

In the cave there were some seashell mobile or wind chimes hanging around. I think Dwayne is the one to make it (or one of the boys got it from the souvenir shop, knowing it'd be something he'd like). He might like collecting seashells. I can also see him collecting some books, animal bones, antique keys, sea glass, ammonites, pretty or interesting looking rocks, etc.

Paul is probably the one to expand the collection of music and games. Batteries too, though I wouldn't be surprise if all the boys add onto it and make sure their stockpile of batteries never runs too low. Maybe movies and concert ticket stubs? I don't see him paying for it, though, so he probably snatches them from others. He might even collect or make his own guitar picks too.

As for David...I don't actually know. Probably books, oh, maybe cool looking zippo lighters? He does smoke, so that would make sense. Oh, what if he has a collection of pocket and folding knives? It certainly wouldn't be hard to come by. I imagine there's been plenty of times of people thinking they can take him on with just a knife (this of course is before he reveals he's a vampire). He would probably find it amusing and be like 'oh, how nice' if it's something he doesn't have already. He'll be picky about it, though. No shitty quality knives unless it's aesthetically pleasing.

Other possibilities are watches, badges, matchbooks, dice, shot glasses or keychains from states/countries they've been to (though this might be more of a Marko and Paul thing) and coins.

[thefirstknife]

I think a lot of what's happening is that many players are legitimately burning out because of the way bungie models the game (people don't call it FOMO: the game for no reason, there's definitely a truth to that feeling), increasing prices putting further strains on wallets as people continue to struggle financially (getting priced out of a beloved hobby is painful), and various genuine harmful choices over the life of the series, etc. but all of that's being co-opted by bad faith actors who are looking for a reason to tear Bungie down--I think you're at least partially right that there's a lot of anti-LGBTQIA+ people targeting them for being visible allies (and members of our various communities!) and just just hollow rainbow capitalists. And there's probably people who just want to stir up drama because they find it fun. So they're all distorting the actual complaints and making it so hard to have a frank discussion about good and bad practices. The real stuff gets drowned out and people tired of the BS shut down genuine complaints without realizing because it's hard to sort through it all. I think the technical term for the current situation is "clusterfuck"

For real. Burnout is a real problem that very few people recognise and often they just refuse to recognise it when it hits them personally. And like, burnout isn't just "I'm a little bored of this," continuous burnout can lead to actual health problems.

I always tell people that if you log into a game and you're not feeling it, you're only there to mark a checklist and you're annoyed by every moment spent playing, please take a break. FOMO stuff is also a real issue, but I also always tell people to just try and think about it from a broader perspective. Will you miss out on stuff? Probably. Will this matter to you, truly, if you have no interest in the game anymore? Like, if you think about it, missing out on content from a game that doesn't bring you joy should not be that big of a deal. You're not enjoying it anyway, so who cares if you miss things that you don't enjoy?

FOMO design is really awful and it's unfortunately everywhere and it takes so much energy to get yourself out of thinking that everything around you is super urgent and you have to latch onto it NOW or else.... In truth, this is just a sneaky method to keep people hooked. It's not real, you're not really missing out on anything. Even if you are, I promise that it's better to "miss out" than fall into burnout. You're the only one who can break your own FOMO.

A lot of gamers don't get it and don't even try to get it and actually get super defensive when you tell them that they're exhibiting symptoms of burnout. This is also another way that people try to deflect criticism. Sometimes someone will incessantly shit on a video game and you'll tell them "you have burnout bro, you need to take a break for your own sake" and they'll insist that you're just saying that because you're bootlicking a company or whatever.

On the other hand, sometimes you will criticise something legitimate and people will try to shut you down with claims that you're just burned out. Differentiating between these two is super difficult, especially when the community is acting like the Destiny community is acting like now. As you said, we're dealing with a clusterfuck. There's legitimately burned out people hateplaying the game who refuse to recognise it and there's people who want to talk about genuine problems and the former are making this an incredibly difficult conversation to have.

Two other related asks under:

It's utterly bizarre. The cynicism is so high that people are literally ignoring easily verifiable facts they can find with one google click away because it means they get to join their pitchforks against Bungie. And like, you can hate a company all you want but at least hate the real things they've done? The Bungie Foundation is legitimate work that helps people all over the world. This one aint' it chief.

This is the reddit thread where people were having a meltdown over the post about the foundation stuff for Bungie Day to the point that a moderator had to make a pinned post about this and there's one other most upvoted post about it just beneath. A lot of the shitty comments have been deleted and some are still there but downvoted, but people for real showed up to say crap about Bungie and lie on a call for charity.

It happened on twitter too (link if you're brave enough to go into replies and quote tweets, I don't recommend it), because of course it did. People are largely upset that some of the bigger goals have an emblem and shader as a reward and now they're calling it the "100k $ shader." And like. It's not for you. You don't need these two items. They're not here for you to buy. They're here to incentivise donations to charity. Bungie isn't getting rich from this; they will literally not see this money. It's going to charity.

I could bet my entire ass that the same people crying about this shader being unobtainable (we don't even know what it looks like btw) are the same people who are standing by their favourite streamer when they say that some in-game activities and rewards shouldn't be obtainable to the majority of the players. It's baby behaviour, and worse now because the post about Bungie announcing a charity is littered with comments from ghouls who think that THIS is the right moment to stick it to the big corpos (and ask to "fix servers").

LMAO! Literally though. I, unfortunately, play a Blizzard game and like. I'm sorry but you will not convince me that Destiny has worse monetisation than Overwatch. Like, maybe you can convince people who don't play anything else, but I do.

And honestly, if some other game is better to someone? Please feel free to play that then. I do my absolute best to limit the amount of money I will ever again give Blizzard to as close to 0 as possible, but if Blizzard's monetisation and morals are fine to you, go wild I guess. Applies to any other company for that matter. I personally find it baffling that we've spent YEARS learning about all the ways Activision is actually being led by demons from hell and that they deal with lawsuits every few months and treat their employees like crap, but we're totally fine hyping up Diablo 4 (and I guess we forgot all controversies from before about Diablo 3 and Diablo Immortal and everything). But to each their own. I'm not on Diablo twitter posting about this. It's not my problem. Hell, I'm not even engaging with Overwatch stuff because I know that I will just be negative about every aspect of it, even though I'm still playing here and there. I disagree with what they're doing so I play less and don't buy stuff and then I'm not angry about a video game every day of my life. Life hack.

[gelo-p]

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ Rank 26! ✧ﾟ･: *ヽ(◕ヮ◕ヽ)

I did say last year that I might T100 MyGO. 😋

I'm gonna skip the part where everyone bitched about everything being delayed AF in ENdori - but for better or for worse, when MyGO finally arrived last week, I had amassed 57500 free stars, and quite a number of in-game energy drinks.

...And then immediately lost 40000 stars (and some tickets) just trying to roll for all of them. I had* to spark for Soyo, but whatever, I got all of them! I could start tiering!

(I don't remember how I had 27000 stars for tiering. 57500 - 40000 = 17500, so clearly, I got a bunch of bonus stars. Anyway)

I wanted to aim for T20, but it was immediately made apparent that I do not have the time for it. I had to drive a lot during this event, especially during the 1st few days, so it was impossible for me to even try and build a lead for maintaining T20. There was also a question mark hanging over my number of stars left; I think I could still make it, but it was a very tight fit. And so, with these in mind, I resigned myself early to just T30.

In the beginning, I did what any sane(?) solo tierer does: spam the Grand Room! The Legendary Room was empty AF, and the Standard Room was hit or miss whether the folks you'll get could help you sustain a high-enough average for tiering. That meant staying in the Grand Room, where I was often paired with other tierers (names I would later recognize as T10 hopefuls).

...

Did I mention the connection sucks?

It took forever (not Legendary Room forever, but forever enough) to get paired with other tierers in the Grand Room. Also, there was a really good chance of being disconnected. All in all, I was averaging just 544k points an hour.

So I friggin' tried Free Lives. The average? 657k points an hour. There was minimal risk of being disconnected, plus, there was no mental pain of having to wait for people to get paired with you! The downside of course is that Free Lives cost more stars to get to the same points compared to Multi Lives, but that's fine. It's my last event. I'm retiring after this. I don't need whatever leftover stars I'd have left.

:')

It was difficult listening to EXIST and SAVIOR OF SONG over and over again, but you know who isn't tiring to listen to?

Adam Ragusea, the sponsor of this T30 attempt!

...

Of course he didn't sponsor me. But it was mentally exhausting listening to the same 2 songs over and over again, so at some point I decided to listen to music while playing in silent. Beatles made for the perfect tiering music, oddly. Then I switched to Scary Interesting. Did you know that if you never stick yourself into really tight spaces, you'd most likely never die of being stuck in really tight spaces? After that, I listened to Biographics, and now I'm an expert in plagues. During the final days of tiering, I rediscovered Adam Ragusea's videos (found his channel during Covid - hey, remember Covid?), and the rest is history.

I ended up parking at 28,000,077 points a day before the event ends, because it's hella difficult to park during Mission Lives, and so I was fine with that. I was keeping an eye out for T30 / T31 (I was T25 at this point), to see if they might move, but it really didn't seem they wouldn't anymore.

...

OWO, what's this? ENdori fucked up the gacha rates for this event during the 1st few hours? So now they're refunding all the stars and tickets - everything!! - that you might have spent during those first few hours?? Hey remember having to spark for Soyo?? They say that was it!!

Suddenly, I found myself at 23000 stars again.

And I had to assume that sooooo did eeeeeverybody else.

When I woke up this morning - the final day - everybody has moved, as expected. Not by too much, no - but enough that T30 could still mathematically overtake me. I had to leave the event 4 hours early (driving duties), so I wanted to be sure that there was nothing they could do to take T30 away from me. I broke my park, somehow found myself with the opportunity to re-park at a flat 29M, and the rest is... is it history again?

And so I left the event at T25, with 29M points.

When I came back to see the final results, my final rank was T26.

Someone really wanted T25 huh. ^_^;

...

...

My Bandori phone is dead. LITERALLY, it can't survive more than 3 minutes away from a charger. It's perpetually being charged. The battery is now at 67% capacity - capacity!! not charge!! - and iOS really thinks I should get it serviced. I think so too.

...

I'm tired. I don't think I can play Bandori anymore. I'm mentally checked out of the game. I'm happy I was able to get Popipa and Roselia to Level 50, and with all the members of Popipa to Rank 100.

...

Will I be back for Ave Mujica? I don't know. I might not be back for anything on January. Last December 2021 I decided to stop drinking alcohol, and this December, to commemorate 3 years of sobriety, I kinda want to celebrate by dying of alcohol poisoning. I'm only half joking. I sobered up to be normal, but it didn't fucking work! 🤣 So! If I stop retweeting stuff during December, then yes, consider me dead.

BUT HEY! I GOT T26 FOR MYGO EVENT!

THANK YOU ENDORI!

THANK YOU GARUPA!

おつ！

またね！♪

😙

[mirrortouchedsea]

Everyone tells me to just stay the same (but it's not like that)

Word count: 1640

Summary: Hinata finally decides to tell Rinne about his past at Yumenosaki. CW for Setsubun mentions, identity issues, and mentions of abuse

Read on AO3

---

Hinata isn’t entirely sure what compels him to send a message to the leader of Crazy:B. Rinne Amagi had a habit of doting on him and treating him like another younger brother, which he knew Yuta wasn’t a big fan of. Yuta would often call Rinne a bad influence on Hinata, but Rinne was also one of the only people who treated him like a normal kid. 

It was kind of addicting in a way. It wasn’t just Rinne who had treated him like that either. The rest of Crazy:B had taken him in as one of their juniors (despite the fact that Kohaku was younger than Hinata) and Alkaloid, or at least Hiiro, had taken a liking to him as well. He treasured those nights that he spent with Niki and Hiiro playing video games and snacking on homemade sweets late into the night. 

Maybe it shouldn’t have been surprising that the first person he texted was Rinne on the anniversary of Setsubun. It had only been a year and yet it felt so much longer than that. He was grateful that the year since then had been filled with smiles and warmth, much more than years previous had been. The Amagi brothers were partially responsible for that change in his life. 

Rinne responded quickly and asked if he’s alright since he doesn’t normally send cryptic messages like this in the middle of the day. He said he’ll be there in 15 minutes after debriefing with his unit. 

Hinata didn’t bother replying to that, instead opting to just tell Rinne everything when he gets to the rooftop garden with him. He needed to figure out exactly what he wanted to tell Rinne anyway. It’s not in the older man’s nature to judge people based on things they can’t control, and he would understand a lot of Hinata’s own problems…probably. Rinne also wasn’t fond of showing weakness in front of other people. 

Hinata sat at the edge of the garden, towards the back. Being so high up reminded him of that day, but this was almost cathartic in a way. He was in a better place now, with people who didn’t know about that incident at all and cared for him as his own person. As much as he knew Yuta didn’t like the nickname Rinne gave him, it was a comfort for Hinata. 

Hina, such a simple nickname and yet it was a breath of fresh air, a new start, and here he was about to change everything. He just hoped that Rinne wouldn’t change how he talked with Hinata afterwards. 

Hinata was dangling his feet over the edge, looking down at the bustling street below when Rinne finally sat beside him. 

“What’s up, Hina? Somethin’ on your mind?” Rinne’s voice was gentle today, soft and even. Such a strange contrast to the Rinne most people knew. 

“Mmm, you could say that,” he replied, not looking at the older man. “Rinne, have you ever felt like…people don’t see you for you?” 

Rinne chuckled. “Every damn day Hina. Even back home…” he trailed off. Hinata knew not to push that topic. 

The two of them were like peas in a pod in that sense. 

Hinata laughed too. “Yeah, I knew you’d get it.” 

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Rinne waiting patiently for Hinata to keep going and Hinata searching for the words to say. But just having someone else there helped keep him from spiraling too much. 

“I just…feel like people wouldn’t miss me if I was gone, because they see me and Yuta-kun as the same person. It hurts a lot but I don’t know what to do about it because…I feel the same way. Like Yuta-kun and I are one person in two, but that’s not true anymore. I try to keep telling myself that we’re different but it’s hard to change how you think when it’s all you’ve ever known.  

Yuta-kun has so many friends and is always laughing and smiling with them and I want to be like that too, but after ah…” 

“After what, Hina?” 

“After Setsubun fes, people started treating me like I would break at any moment. I’m not grandma’s fine china or anything that will break if you handle it too roughly! But everyone at Yumenosaki can’t seem to get past that video.” 

Hinata still couldn’t look at Rinne, but he knew Rinne was confused. He hadn’t known about Setsubun at all. Of course he hadn’t, he didn’t go to school with them and was much too old to have been there at the same time as Hinata even if he had. It’s why he was drawn to him in the first place, along with his roommates, Niki and Hiiro. 

“Ah, sorry. You don’t have any idea what I’m talking about, do you?” 

“Not a clue.” 

“Long story short, I had a mental breakdown on the roof of the school last year and…it was filmed and everyone at the school saw it. It’s not like I had much of a choice in the distribution either, so everyone was just watching me like I wasn’t a real person.” 

Rinne moved a hand to Hinata’s back and began rubbing gentle circles between his shoulder blades. There were damp spots on Hinata’s cheeks. He rubbed his eyes with his hands balled up in fists. Why did his lowest moment have to be broadcast to everyone he knew? Why was it made to seem like a spectacle for people to watch and not do anything to help? Even after his monologue to his brother making it clear that he didn’t want to be treated like the same person anymore and not knowing how to distinguish himself without just moving into the background, nobody offered him help. 

He was drowning in the unknown and it took the creation of ES and Crazy:B for him to find a lighthouse to guide him to somewhere safe. Even when Crazy:B was against the entire world, hated by everyone, Rinne and the other members never once hurt 2wink. After their collaboration at the nightclub Rinne had taken a liking to Hinata. He was there for him to lean on when he wasn’t sure about the direction of his unit or how to be a big brother or a good senior to the new first years or just how to navigate life. 

At some point, Rinne had pulled Hinata into a side hug and just let him cry into his side. Hinata leaned into the touch and allowed himself to let it all out. 

Rinne’s hugs were always warm. 

It took several minutes of crying before Hinata ran out of tears. His sobs turned to sniffles and he pulled his legs to his chest. 

“You didn’t deserve any of that, Hina.” Rinne’s voice was serious, but not cold. It was a warm honey-sweetened tea on a rainy day. 

Another stretch of silence. Hinata’s head was spinning and numb and full of cotton. 

“But…I know how it feels. When I was younger, I had to keep my emotions in check, especially in front of other people. Any sign of weakness was always punished by my father. ‘A good leader doesn’t cry’ he would tell me. 

When my mom died, I was…eight or nine. I couldn’t cry at her funeral and when we returned home I just couldn’t hold it in anymore. I’ll spare you the details but he punished me severely. I never wanted Hiiro-kun to see me like that again and I made myself stop feeling. It felt like I was just there to be the next leader of the village, never allowed to be myself. 

What I’m tryin’ to say here is that I get it. I know how it feels for people to try and put you in a box that doesn’t fit, and how they treat you when you finally break. It’s okay to be frustrated and angry that it happened, but you can’t let it consume you. Show the world that Hinata Aoi is his own person, that you aren’t just that video and that you’re here to stay.” 

Hinata sniffled and leaned more into Rinne’s touch. 

“Thanks, Rinne-senpai. It means a lot, heh. I guess we all have our own burdens to carry.” 

“Yeah. Life is about learning to carry them and not let them drag you down. If it gets too heavy, I’ll be there to pick you back up and carry it for you.” 

“You don’t have to go that far, Rinne-senpai. How will I learn to carry my burdens if you take them for yourself? Wouldn’t that just make it heavier on you?” 

“I’ll take on everyone’s burdens if it means they get to smile just for one moment. I’ll fight fate itself if that’s what it takes.” 

“I’m not sure why, but I believe that you would find a way to do that, even though most people would say it’s impossible.” 

“Thanks for believing in me, Hina.” 

Hinata laughed, Rinne lightened the mood just enough that he felt like everything was at peace for the moment. His cheeks were stained with tears and his eyes would be puffy and red when he returned to the dorm, but at least he’d be smiling. 

Even if the world was against them, Hinata could count on Rinne at least being in their corner no matter what. Rinne was a lighthouse to people like Hinata, a steady light in the rocky ocean saying that someone is there, watching out for you. 

Despite the front that he put up and how he had a bad habit of pushing people away, Rinne was always there when it mattered. 

Hinata fell asleep curled up on the rooftop as Rinne hummed a gentle melody from his hometown. And everything was right with the world. 

[therealcocoshady]

By all means if he wants to step away from music go ahead. I support him and I think he should be able to do as he pleases career wise. He shouldn’t be tied down to one thing forever. All artists grow and flourish. For example Rihanna and its Fenty beauty and Savage lingerie. Beyoncé with hair care and clothing. Lizzo with workout gear. 50 with movies and shows. I think he should be able to move in and do other and possibly bigger things that he sees for weather that be Moms spaghetti, production, or merch. But if he wants to do merch he needs to step it tf up. Because it’s all the same and it’s getting boring. Do a real menswear like. Do some new hat brand. Or focus on expanding his Resturant or team up with 50 for moves and shows or even put MORE energy into his record label because it could use it if he wants to do producing and not necessarily rapping on the mic.

And yea, he should hear his fans out. They are a big pet as to why he’s here and thriving. And no offense but especially the younger ones now. He had a whole new generation listening to him. He can either use it to his advantage and make another album or not. But to be putting merch out every week is crazy. Because who is keep that man in business? 🤨

As for footnote, I heard that Paul wanted him to do it because Paul’s SON plays the game and he got the idea from that so they r ached out to fortnite… but Paul isn’t Marshall. Why does he have to collab with Fortnite because of your son and you think it’s a good money maker? Marshall doesn’t belong in a kids game period. If anything they should’ve tried to get him to voice in GTA6 or have his music in the game somehow… that would been HUGE for him considering the gta situation with him from back in the day.

And I feel like he’s gonna lose that lawsuit. And tbh I HOPE he does. It’s stupid. I get you wanna go hard for your daughter but babes… they were a podcast first. They been around for a while. No one is confusing the two. Plus, if Hailie cares so much then she needs to be a big girl and sue them herself. Oh wait she can’t because she doesn’t even have permission to use the term shade by legality. Oop- and we all know he wouldn’t sue his own daughter. But I digress.

I feel like all of it is just Paul getting in his ear and it’s bad. The lawsuit is ruining his reputation and he’s just doing things no one cares about anymore. Like get it together please.

YES. I absolutely agree. Eminem has had an incredible career and if he wanted to stop, he should. By all means. If he wants to bless us with more music, I'm here for it too, obviously. But I feel like maybe there should be a proper way to do it. Like, if you want to stop, maybe announce it and quit keeping people on their toes ?

Also I LOVE the examples you have chosen, when it comes to artists expanding and doing something else successfully. Also... Shady Records COULD use some more energy. I think I saw something from Paul saying it was never meant to be a big thing anyway, but... If you're signing people, maybe put some actual energy into their projects ? Because you're not doing them a favor by pretending the musical industry works the same as the 90s and disregarding digital promotion. Just sayin...

I hate that they seem to be disregarding the newer generation of hip hop fans too. Like "your opinion doesn't matter, we've been here long enough". Like... Yeah but they're still the consumer base and even though they shouldn't tell you what rap is all about... Maybe just acknowledge that it is changing ? Also, these people do keep you afloat 😂

Em in GTA6 would have been perfect. And I'm digressing but I think not having him do voice actor work on some occasions (like some animated series or a video game) is a MISSED opportunity. Because very few people modulate their voice the way he does his.

[alo-piss-trancy]

Btw even if I don't check in here as often as I used to, I really do appreciate all of you who stick with this blog anyways c': Especially since I barely post anything 'kinky' myself anymore. So this is mostly just a gaming/media rant and personal blog now oops

In some ways I'm definitely better off than I was a few years ago, but I've also been dealing with a lot of chaos in my life and household and it doesn't look like it's gonna get fixed very soon. Mix of financial, physical health of me and family I've been heavily assisting, house things in desperate need of repair...

On top of that I've been starting to realize I might actually have developed some form of Agoraphobia from all that time I was housebound before... and other stuff, but I think that was probably the main contributor. I'm still looking into it but with how a lot of the other things I've tried to cope haven't helped, meds don't seem to touch it much, and it seems to be getting worse, it's looking more and more likely than I'd like to admit. Which sucks bc it's also going to be hard af to keep up with working to treat it with Exposure or smth if I'm buried in all the above stuff/have limited transport/places to even go. It's really freaking hard when I do rarely go out and the anxiety/illness makes it so much worse. There've been times I've had to give up and go back early after like, an hour bc I was vomiting/crippled with pain/on the verge of fainting... and that's been happening more often. Like 1 in every 3 times, and I may only get out 3 times a month at the worst points.

Idk. I'm trying. I'm keeping up with the bare minimum rn and that's all I can really say lol

Also the only problem that's actually relevant to kink blog: my drive is still at 0 or even the negatives bc I can't get my medication sorted out bc my appointments got pushed back AGAIN ☠️ So yeah. That's why there has been no writing or hc posts and will not probably be for a WHILE. On God, it's about as appealing to me as eating dry cardboard 😔 Trying to write or draw anything fun is like pulling teeth and if I won't enjoy the end result then I'm not gonna bother RIP. When I get that sorted out maybe I can finally touch my poor WIP pile again 😭

Uh yeah so. That's why I've been so absent for like... forever. I do miss checking in here but I also get in my own head sometimes about posting when I'm not 'providing' anything this blog was intended for. Which I realise is dumb bc it's MY blog and if I want to rant about video games only for like a year straight then I'm allowed to. But brains are Fun like that 🥲

For what it's worth I'm not in like, a fullblown mental crisis so please don't worry about that! I'm not in any immediate danger or smth! I do have some other hobbies I've been keeping up with and socialising in other spaces. And I've been reading. So I promise I'm not in a complete isolated depression pit 💛 Life could definitely be better and I def have some rough days, but I have been trying to take some baby steps to either fix things or keep myself sane at least lol

Idk I just felt like I should explain why I've been mostly gone for ages off and on. I do lurk here sometimes to peek at things even if I don't have the energy to show myself. But I do really appreciate anyone who sends asks or comments on my ao3 or just reads my ramblings lol 💛 Even when I can't respond immediately I still treasure the gesture and it makes me happy to see some of the same names around in my notifs/dash c': So thank you~