#(being her chaotic toddler self)

[a-hazbin-reader]

Hello!! I just loooooove how you write Alastor, this unhinged bastard 😂 anyway can I request Alastor with a lesbian, chaotic reader, who's always drooling over women (especially Alastor's friends)(read: Rosie). Toooootally not self-indulgent. Obv platonic pls!! Thank you in advance 🙇

- 🥀

Omg I love this SO MUCH

Alastor X Reader Headcanons

❌️Romantic

✅️Platonic

TW: TERRIBLE TREATMENT OF READER, reader being funny af, idk who is more unhinged, slight Mimzy X Reader, slight Rosie X Reader

Description: ☝️⬆️

First of all, he's gonna be your wingman NOT because he wants to help but because it's funny when you fail

Encourages your chaotic nature and uses it to his advantage, will not let you be caged

Someone beneath him wants to pick a fight with him??? Oh he'll give them a fight

*sets down an oversized pet carrier*

*feral animal sounds and vicious shaking*

Alastor opens the door and lets you wreak havoc on them, it's just too hilarious

All metaphorically of course

😳

They get you a toddler leash because you're always scampering off straight into trouble???

Alastor cuts it the first day Vaggie takes you out

*massive destructive explosive sounds in the distance*

"What the FUCK, ALASTOR!?"

Alastor: 😏

You're his favorite feral little ball of chaos

BACK TO BEING YOUR WINGMAN

It's amusing how quickly you change gears when it comes other women and how they enthrall you

He often gives you a handkerchief to clean up your drool, pushes your mouth shut when it's hanging open and grabs the back of your clothes to keep you upright

He does look out for you though

If Mimzy is currently in your sights then he won't let her take advantage of your attraction towards her

That greedy little thing will take you for every dime all while she flirts and toys with you

If you're feasting your eyes any of the overlords(*cough*Carmilla-*cough*Missi-*cough*Velvet-*cough*) then he'll straight up tell you no

Not him bonking your head sweetly with his staff before pushing you out of harm's way

Rosie is an exception tho

He knows she can fend you off herself if she really wants to but also that she won't really do any harm to you

Not that you're not very charming

Rosie just thinks you're adorable!! All the eager attention you're giving her! She could just eat you up!

No seriously...she could...you would taste sweet

No you're sweet

You're making her blush

And you're making her hungry

"Okay, time to go!"

So Alastor sticks around and looks out for you in those moments but he also thinks it's hilarious when you shoot your shot

Feeds you terrible pick up lines and almost dies of laughter when you actually use them

"Hey! Tie your shoes!! I don't want you falling for anyone else~"

"She actually went with that one?!"

Will properly fix your hair or clothes up before you go out on a date, he can't have you looking shabby

If you ask him for advice then he actually has some really good ideas for romance

It's just difficult to get him to give you a honest answer because it's so funny when you fumble a bad bitch

Actually, he does try to set you up with women he thinks could be good for you

"Fascinating, but have you met my good pal Y/N yet? She is QUITE a character!"

Alastor is your partner in crime and you're wingman but he's pretty terrible at both

Gah!! I hope you liked this one!! I wanted to really get the little gremlin vibes!!

[bunny-lily]

Tether Me - Chapter 2

Pairing(s): Geto/Gojo/Reader

Summary: “Hey! Didn’t keep you waitin’ too long, did we?”

“No, not long,” you assured, fighting hard to keep your eyes off his friend for however long possible, vainfully clinging to your sanity. You knew that as soon as you centered your vision on him, your ability for conscious thought would evaporate. 

You wanted to present yourself as at least marginally normal as a first impression, though you doubted you were achieving that by avoiding the obvious third presence. You were surely coming off as rude, you really should–

“This one's Geto Suguru,” Gojo introduced the noiret by his side, nipping your overthinking at the bud.

At last, your full attention was guided to him.

Oh.

Oh. That was a mistake.

CW: No y/n | polyamory | slow burn | slice of life | alt au - no curses | fluff | light angst | eventual smut | forgive me, there's internal monologues | I like using big words... | Gojo & Geto are whipped for you | emotionally constipated reader | (most of the tags have been condensed, you can find the full list on my ao3 here)

AN: there's a couple mentions of emotional eating (in thoughts). Degrading words towards self (slut, whore, etc) but not self-degrading. I think that's it? Lemme know if I missed something, it's 5:50 am at time of posting and I am eepy, so I'm sorry if I did ♥

Ch: Prologue | Ch: 1 | Ch: 2 | Ch: 3 | Ch: 4 | Ch: 5 - 1 | Ch: 5 - 2

WC: 12.9k

The scent of something marvelously delicious wafting through the air had you groggily rolling over from your stomach to your back in bed, stretching your arms above you and practically vibrating the way a cat would as you eased away any sleep-induced tension from your muscles.

You honestly hadn’t slept that well in a long while. You were bleary-eyed, sure, but refreshed. You didn’t have any heavy bags under your eyes, you didn’t experience any nightmares of being hunted. Just calm, good, dreamless sleep.

As much as you wanted to laze around in bed all day, though, the watering of your mouth couldn’t go ignored. Or the rumble in your stomach, for that matter.

With a sleepy groan and big, feline-like yawn to match your stretch, you shuffled out of bed and rubbed the crusties from your eyes as you pulled on some comfortable clothes. Hell if you knew what you were going to do for the day, you could figure that out after you sated your appetite.

You were downright drooling when you left your room to do your morning routine and groused like a toddler that didn’t want to brush her teeth before devouring her weight in breakfast. But you were a grown ass woman that quite preferred to have good hygiene, thank you very much. The intoxicating call of sustenance would have to wait until after you scrubbed your face and polished your teeth to perfection.

Catching sight of yourself in the mirror made you choke when you saw how chaotic the nest of hair on your head was. You felt like a cartoon character that got zapped, your tresses sticking in every direction. 

You must have slept really well, then.

You combed your fingers through the messy strands, trying to smooth the misbehaving locks. It took some effort to tame them into a somewhat presentable fashion, which was the most you cared to do when you were dying to eat already.

Your eyes flickered towards the remaining bottles you left on the sink countertop from last night and you nearly lost your shit.

Just what did Satoru put Ijichi through to get you high end skin products like these? And in such a short amount of time? You guessed the poor man broke a few speeding laws to get these in time for you to use. That, or maybe Satoru had informed him earlier, when you initially agreed to take him up on his offer to stay at his place. Or he already had them and was keeping them around for this kind of situation? Did he use the same brand?

Well, whatever. You were going to use those zealously, so help you god.

And, by the heavens above and seas below, they were fucking incredible. Your face was baby-skin soft. Lustrous, dewy, you were glowing, and certainly felt like it, too. You couldn’t stop touching your cheeks and forehead, they were just so smooth. 

No wonder rich people always had the clearest skin. If you had these while growing up, you never would have had to deal with getting acne in your teens and into your adulthood.

So fucking unfair.

Lamenting how Satoru was born with a silver spoon in his mouth while you were robbed by the universe, you followed the delectable wisps of the tasty aroma in the air like a drunk cupid with tiny wings and a dazed veneer on your face. There you found the man himself in the kitchen, humming an unfamiliar song to himself.

You continued to be baffled that he knew how to cook. It seemed almost unnatural, in a way. He was the prime example of a rich boy that you could find reclining on a poolside chair, hands behind his head as a servant hand fed him grapes. Yet here he was, cooking away, an apron tied around his neck and waist (with frills and little hearts, too, the flashy ass). You wouldn’t be surprised if it had ‘Kiss the Chef’ written across the front and oh, would you look at that, you were right.

“Goooood morning!” Satoru exclaimed, turning away from the stove to greet you. The apron was even flashier than you thought. For fuck’s sake, it had sequins on it. “How’d you– whoa. Nevermind, your hair answers that question.”

You subconsciously tried to flatten down your frizzy tangles once more, grumbling and pulling your gaze away from the atrocious fabric covering his chest that you would totally wear as well, gods, it was horrific. Your morning hair never liked to cooperate with you. “Morning.”

Yawning against the back of your hand, you climbed onto one of the barstools at the kitchen island and veered your body to the side, trying to see what he was cooking around his arm. It smelled sweet, the kind of sweet that was almost enough to make you nauseous, but wouldn’t actually cross that line. Kind of like dessert after you’ve filled yourself to bursting with dinner.

“What are you making? It smells really good,” you said.

“Pancakes!” He exclaimed, sliding an already finished plate to you, soufflé pancakes stacked high atop, drizzled in chocolate and syrup. He even added fruit slices in an arch around the back, just to make it extra fancy.

Someone had a sweet tooth, it seemed. That, and it was obvious he was trying to show off his culinary skills, having the perfect reason to do so now.

But who were you to point that out? You were getting free food, and not even for the first time! Of course you were going to stuff yourself sick with these. Because, honestly, they did look incredible. You would have felt bad about devouring such art if your stomach wasn’t going nuts. 

“Wow, these smell amazing,” you said, scooping up a bite with the fork he passed you. You admired it, tilting it a few degrees in the light, then chomped down on it. 

The noise you made was downright unholy. Straight to the Second Circle with you, don’t even think about looking at the pearly gates of Heaven.

“Fuuuuck,” you keened as you immediately shoved another piece into your mouth. You savored the delectable meal with chubby cheeks, letting the sugary and fluffy delight overtake your senses. “This is so fuckin’ good.”

He cackled at your reaction as he finished cooking and styling up his own plate, ditching the eye-bleedingly ugly apron, and you realized a trice too late that you just stroked his ego considerably. “I didn’t know you could make those kinds of sounds,” he quipped. The sunlight pouring through a nearby window caught the lenses of his glasses when he slid into the seat beside you, making them glint the same way his eyes would if you could see them unobstructed. “Makes me wonder what other noises you can make.”

You almost choked on the pancake you were greedily wolfing down.

Okay, he was not allowed to say things like that while you were eating. And especially not in that voice, the one that lowered a couple octaves and had you squirming in your seat. Barely 10 minutes into the morning and you were already struggling to keep your composure around him.

You swallowed down your food stiffly and patted your sternum with a wee cough. “You’re going to be the death of me.”

“I’m not opposed to that.”

“You promised you’d let me use your hot spring first.”

“I can be patient!” Exclaimed the man who very much could not be patient.

You deadpanned, but your lips quivered as you tried to restrain a grin. “Somehow, I doubt that.”

He moped like he was told he couldn’t go to the park today. “You’re so mean to me. How could you? And right after I graciously agreed to house you, too.” Wow, he wasn’t kidding about not letting you live that down.

To make up for it and bring the whiny baby back into a good mood, you let him have a few bites of your food, and he lit up like a damn firework, scarfing them down without a second thought. He had this sort of boyish charm that was difficult to resist in a way that made you want to tease and taunt him endlessly. His statuesque features certainly aided his charisma. 

“By the way,” Gojo began, speaking around a piece of syrup-covered strawberry from his own dish. “There’s someone I want to introduce to you later. You’ll like him.”

You gave him a sidelong glance. Was this the second ‘someone’ Granny mentioned the day before? You shuddered at the thought of dealing with two Satoru’s. You barely knew the first one, and he was already a handful and a menace. You chewed quickly and swallowed to answer.

“Is he anything like you?” You asked, doing your best to be ladylike and eat the way a normal person would. You weren’t really succeeding.

He grinned wide. “He’s the best! Second to me, of course.”

“That does not answer my question,” you pointed an accusatory fork at him.

“Pshh, don’t worry. He’s cool. Well, not as cool as me, but very close.”

That still didn’t answer your question. More so, it put you on edge. You were already mentally preparing to get acquainted with this potential twin, doppelgänger, and/or clone.

“Can you at least tell me his name?”

“Geto Suguru,” he responded.

Geto Suguru, huh?

Same initials as Gojo Satoru. Same amount of syllables, too.

You were so fucked, weren’t you? 

The thought of having two copies of the gremlin beside you had you preemptively putting your hands on your nape to ease the tension. Figuratively, but possibly literally, depending on if height was something they shared.

“Alright,” you said. “When do you want me to meet him?”

“Oh, the time will come, you shouldn’t worry your pretty little head.”

Well, if that wasn’t the most cryptic shit that definitely had you worrying your pretty little head. Asshole, he was doing that on purpose, confirmed by that cunning expression he had as he observed you with his temple resting on his fist, elbow on the counter. He liked toying with you.

You narrowed your eyes at him. “Don’t look at me like that.”

He raised his brows. “Like what?”

“Like you’re planning some shit.”

Satoru pressed his fingers to his chest, feigning innocence. “Why, I’d never!”

He was absolutely planning some shit. All you could really do now was brace yourself for whatever was to come, though you were certain that no amount of readying yourself would keep you from getting swept off your feet. “I’ve got my eye on you.”

That was the wrong thing to say, considering he fucking swooned and tipped over, resting his head on your shoulder and closing his eyes, sighing like a schoolgirl. “I knew you thought I was handsome.”

You gave a long-suffering exhale and poked his cheek. “I said no such thing.”

“Yeah, but you looked it.”

“The hell does that even mean?”

“Just keep your eyes on me, pretty baby,” he directed and sat back up, reaching for his fork. “What’s on the agenda for you today?” He asked as he scooped up the rest of the syrup on his plate with the last bite of his food.

You coughed to cover your blush, grateful for the topic change. “Well, I guess take stock of all I’ll need to do with my house. I got a job at Granny’s store, so I’ll start working there in a few days.”

“Shit, really?” He gaped at you. “That fast?”

You nodded around your final piece of pancake, closing your eyes to savor the sublime flavor. You’d have to make him teach you to cook like that sometime, too.

A ‘whooh’ sound left him. “Impressive.”

“It’s weird,” you said. “Everything’s worked out so far, and I’ve barely been here for two and a half days. I’m getting suspicious.”

“Why?”

Your shoulders lifted and dropped. “Seems too good to be true. Gotta stay on my toes, y’know?”

Satoru ruffled your hair as he stood to stack your empty plates into the dishwasher. “You think too much, sweetheart.”

You crossed your arms over your chest. “Let me be paranoid.”

“You’ll just give yourself worry lines like that,” he cautioned, returning to press his index finger between your brows, “riiiight here. You gotta relax, princess. Chill out, do something fun.”

It was hard to, after spending so many years escaping metaphorical ghosts. Old habits die hard, you supposed.

He was right, you could really use a break from non-stop wariness. This was supposed to be a fresh start, after all. You washed your slate, unmarked of everything on purpose, keeping next to nothing but your name and the clothes on your back. No contacts, nobody waiting for you somewhere, no responsibilities or obligations holding you back. Who knew how long you’d get the chance to let go like this? Might as well take advantage of it.

You weren’t sure what would qualify as ‘fun’ here, but you were a new sprout, after all. What better way than to learn firsthand?

“Alright,” you agreed. “Recommend anything?”

“Hmm,” he lolled his head side to side. “Go to the bakery. It’s not far from Granny’s store, a couple streets north. Hard to miss, it’s got a big sign. We saw it on the way to Granny’s yesterday.”

You scratched through your memory, trying to remember exactly where it was. You had a fuzzy idea, but the benefit of living in such a small locale was that it wouldn’t be too difficult to find. “Will do, thanks. I’ll go after I check out my place first. I’ll need the emotional support after that.”

“Fair enough, I saw why,” he chortled. Oh, the exterior was nothing compared to the interior, sweet summer child. “You want a ride there?”

You considered it, then shook your head. “Nah, it’d be better for me to walk there to get more familiar with the town.”

“You sure?” He raised a brow, a teasing, lazy smirk crawling up his lips. “Won’t get lost?”

“Probably,” you snorted, “but experience is the best teacher, eh?”

He chuckled low in his throat. “If you do get lost, don’t be afraid to call me. I’ll be your prince in shining armor.” 

You made a ‘pffft’ noise and glared at him. He just smiled back like the dork he was. “It’s knight in shining armor.”

“Prince is better. I’m not some lowly knight.”

Drama queen. “Alright, whatever you say, prince. I’ll see you–” In the midst of slipping off the stool to get ready to leave, you stopped, remembering a key piece of information. “Hey,” you spoke up, rotating to scrutinize him with a squint. “How did you know my back door doesn’t have a lock?”

He shrugged nonchalantly. “My friends and I would go there on dares when we were younger. Believed it was haunted, dumb kid shit, you know how it goes.”

Oh.

That– yeah, that sounded way more plausible and understandable than whatever ghost stories about kidnappers and serial killers you came up with. But he still could have phrased it better than he did, he didn’t have to go creepy-mode to convince you to stay with him for the time being.

“Why?” He chortled. “Thought I was gonna kidnap ya?”

“Yes,” you replied automatically, scratching the spot behind your ear sheepishly. “Sorry about that.”

He snickered at your expense, bending down and lowering his voice into a rumbling murmur. “You never know. Maybe I will.”

“Har har,” you replied flatly. “Very funny.”

His lips curled further, eyes gleaming behind his shades. “Better keep your guard up, princess. Someone might just come and snatch you up when you least expect it.”

You scoffed as you swiveled and headed towards the front door. Satoru followed you in a way that reminded you of a puppy, or a mischievous cat, observing you as you tugged on your shoes. “I’m sure I’ll be fine. I can scream really loud.”

“And if they cover your mouth?”

“I bite,” you grinned toothily.

He crooned. “I’ll keep that in mind. You sure you don’t need a ride?”

“I’ll be fine,” you dismissed his uncertainty and double checked your purse as you put it on. “I’ll catch you later.”

“Ah, wait, before you go,” he halted you, reaching out to search through a bowl on the console table pushed up to the wall. After a second or two of digging around, he pulled out a key attached to a ring and held it out to you. “Here, in case nobody’s home when you get back.”

You took it from him and turned it over in your palm, evaluating its untarnished sheen. “Thanks,” you tucked it away safely into a pocket in your purse. “Is it new?”

“Just a spare,” he stuffed his hands into his pockets. “Put it to good use, yeah?”

“Sure,” you agreed.

He patted your head and you scowled at him. “I’ll be awaiting your call for when you need to be rescued.”

You stuck your tongue out at him as you opened the door and stepped out of it. “Dream on.”

His rolling laughter was the last thing you heard as you closed it behind you. The purity of the air awed you again. It was like a medium between you and nature, tickling every one of your senses. There was this certain liberating power in this valley, one that swelled behind your heart and spread out like hot tea on a cold winter morning.

It swirled in your stomach and radiated from your chest in time with your pulse, lulling and salving. Why had you never considered going to the countryside before? 

You were a city-hopper, bouncing from metropolitan hellscape to metropolitan hellscape, where the streets of downtown reeked of anything sickly, apartments were expensive to rent, and you only ever felt like a side character.

Restaurants there were always jam-packed, cafés were less of early day respites and more places of palpable depression. The bars were grimy and boozy, ear-piercingly loud and sweltering with the body heat of dozens of people pressed too tightly together, but at least they were good for one thing.

They were good for shutting down your brain. When it got too loud and too full, when the alcohol burned too much and the people were too touchy, that was when you went into autopilot and thrived in the bliss of silence created by the endless droning of the bass vibrating from your feet to your scalp. You hated liquor, just the thought of it made you queasy, but you craved the buzz it gave you back then.

You didn’t have that luxury now, but you didn’t need it. You hadn’t so much as thought about partaking in that vice since moving, actually. Had you known about the kind of life you could find here, you would have ditched the neon streets a long time ago.

The placidity of mostly untouched vegetation and of the tightly knit community provided a different kind of solace, one that distracted you with things far more interesting than paranoia and anxiety-driven overthinking.

You didn’t feel lost here. Not in the metaphorical sense. Literally had yet to be seen. It remained unfamiliar, but your panic had smoothed out from the first steps you had taken off the train. You could breathe without feeling like there were matches being held too close to your lungs, or needles aimed at your heart.

You didn’t hold onto hope, though. The pattern remained the same. Once you got used to this place, you’d hop on the next train and be on your less-than-merry way.

Will I ever stop running? You asked yourself frequently.

Nobody ever answered.

That’s alright. For now, you were okay. 

Choosing not to indulge in those ideologies, you followed the curving road back down the incline, noting that the car Ijichi had brought you in was gone. You’d need to find a way to thank him, as well as Granny. You didn’t like being indebted to people, especially if it put you at risk of getting tied down.

Satoru was a different problem entirely, since he was letting you live with him. Chores, rent, maybe another thing or two to keep the score level. You weren’t great on brainstorming ideas on how to return favors, but you’d figure it out. A good walk always helped make the creative juices flow.

You ruminated on who he wanted to introduce you to later, coming up with ideas about what he might be like. Hopefully a counterpart and not a duplicate, you weren’t sure how much you’d be able to handle if that was the case. 

If he was friends with Satoru, though, the likelihood of him driving you insane in one way or another was highly likely.

“I bet he’s disgustingly handsome, too,” you muttered cattily under your breath. “I’m gonna see him and the last brain cells I have are gonna explode.”

It didn’t help that you had no idea when you were going to meet this ‘Geto Suguru’. Would you have time to anchor yourself mentally? Would it be today, or a week from now? Could you even prepare at all?

Ugh.

Satoru was right, you thought too much.

As you roamed around, the shrine caught your eye once more, and you stopped to take it in. You hadn’t been to a shrine before – not this kind, anyway. The bigger ones in Tokyo didn’t count. You vaguely remembered how to pray, though you weren’t sure if you should. Paying respects, though, that was fine.

You nibbled on your bottom lip, debating. In the end, it wasn’t a hard choice. You would take any chance to procrastinate and delay facing the disaster awaiting you as much as you could. Except for the bakery Satoru recommended, you were saving that for after you made a plan for your house. You figured you’d want to stress eat afterwards to balm your troubled heart.

Besides, you weren’t sure if you’d have the time to visit after you got started on everything. You had a few days to use up, why not use them to check things out?

The trail leading up to it was easy to find, and though clearly well-traveled and requiring some exertion to traverse, it was clear that it was loved. The flowers on either side of the path were tended to with a compassionate hand, blooming and fragrant. You took a break on several occasions just to sniff a few, admiring them. 

Usually, you were picky about flowers. 

Most were less redolent and more bitterly pungent for you, such as roses. They were elegant, no doubt, but their scent always bordered on perfume-y in a way that reminded you more of an old folks’ home rather than pleasant and subtle beauty. Generally, florid notes made your face scrunch up like you ate something unexpectedly sour.

These flowers were just right, though. They still had those floral undertones, of course, but presented salubrious and fruity essences atop it. It made you mull over why every other flower you smelled before wasn’t palatable. 

Soon, the shrine entrance was in clear view. You traced your finger along the edge of a petal one last time before standing up from your squatting position and making your way over to it. The tower itself was mostly vertical in terms of size, decently small in contrast to the typically larger ones scattered about Japan, but it fit in perfectly with everything else here.

There were two stone benches on either side of the archway leading in, pressed up to the sturdy cobblestone foundation, and lanterns situated at the corners of both, reminding you of a few animated movies with similar designs you’d seen in the past. They were slightly shaded, turned a few degrees away from the sun, and you imagined it would be nice to read there and watch the sun fall asleep beyond the horizon.

The doors were open, guarded by dog-like statues, a bit crudely carved out. Satoru had mentioned it was a shrine dedicated to the wolves that used to roam the mountains, so the statues were likely meant to resemble them. You were curious about the interior, wanting to see the altar up close, since each place of prayer had their own uniquely made one, but the sight of a person clad in white and red kneeling in front of said altar within had you nixing that idea. You could do it another time.

She must have noticed your approach as her head lifted and she peeked partially over her shoulder. She rose up and rotated to face you, and you withheld your exasperation.

Right, this was just fucking ridiculous now, what the fuck.

Why was there another criminally attractive person in this godsforsaken valley? You got scammed, you wanted your money back. Everyone here was so out of your league, you felt like the dog that caught the baseball bat after it’s thrown rather than a player in the game. What, was there going to be an additional good-looking person, ready to knock the wind out of you?

Probably Geto.

If any of these people told you to get down on your knees and bark, you would have without question.

Seriously, why?

You should have been relishing existing in the presence of so many charming folks, but in reality, it just made you feel self conscious.

“Hello,” she greeted as she walked over to you, bringing you out of your internal raging monologue. “May I help you?”

“Oh,” you fluttered your lashes and stammered minutely, trying to recollect yourself. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to distract you. I just wanted to see the shrine.”

The shrine maiden’s lips tilted up politely. “You’re fine, don’t worry. Are you a tourist?”

“No,” you fidgeted with your thumb and index finger on your right hand. “I moved here recently. I’m checking around to get more acquainted with the area.”

Her brows rose a millimeter short of being comical. “Really? That’s surprising. Did one of the villagers leave that I didn’t know of?”

“Also no. I bought the house on the outskirts, uhh,” you twisted to scan behind you and pointed in the general direction of it. “That way.”

“That house? I thought they’d torn it down a long time ago. Why that one?”

You lowered your arm. “It was cheap. Gave me an excuse to move here properly.”

“I hope you’re not staying there, it’s dangerous,” she frowned, using a stern yet caring voice.

“I’m staying with Gojo Satoru while I fix it up.”

Immediately, the woman’s face twisted into a sneer of repulsion. Scorn shadowed over her honey-brown eyes, causing yours to widen as hers narrowed. “Run away while you still can,” she told you firmly. 

Well, that’s not worrisome at all.

What the hell did he do to her?

“What? Why?” Your brows furrowed.

She sighed as if the mere mention of Gojo had stripped a few years off her lifespan. “He’s the devil in disguise.”

Was anyone ever going to give you a straight answer about him? “Did he…do something?”

Her scorn turned to ire and agitation in a snap. “He’s so obnoxious! And arrogant, I can’t stand to be around him, he pisses me off to no end,” she downright snarled, heat rising to her cheeks from her anger. “He acts all high and mighty when he’s just a spoiled brat that refuses to respect his elders!”

“Oh–”

“Me!” She pointed harshly at herself. “I’m his elder! Well, I mean, not the only one, but still! He was raised like a golden child, given everything he wanted. He loooves getting on everyone’s nerves, especially mine. Get away from him or he’ll send you to an early grave, miss.”

You didn’t know what you were expecting when you came to view the shrine, but a rant from a peeved miko definitely wasn’t anywhere on your list of possibilities. His name alone sent her into a tailspin, and you would have regretted it if seeing her go off about the man wasn’t more entertaining than it had any right to be. You did feel bad, but madly interested, too.

“I…see,” you reacted stiltedly, stifling a laugh. “Are you, like, exes or something?”

She gaped at you as if you had informed her of her puppy’s passing. “What? No! Absolutely not! I– how could– never even mention–” She abruptly stopped herself, took a few intensely deep breaths to calm herself, then she was smiling kindly again as if nothing had happened. “Where are my manners? I’m Iori Utahime, a miko. It’s a pleasure to meet you. And you are?”

Left reeling from her unexpected 180 in demeanor, you stuttered out your own name in response, to which she nodded in approval.

“A lovely name. You said you moved here recently? How fun! What brought you to this valley?”

Satoru had several questions to answer for the next time you saw him. If you had a notepad and pen, you would have been writing them down like a P.I., bobbing your head with a solemn face as you asked Iori to recount her history of events.

“I came to study abroad in Tokyo a few years back, and fell in love with the country,” you said. “I’m not big on cities, though, so coming here seemed perfect.”

Maybe you were embellishing your story a bit, but in all fairness, you didn’t know her. Besides, clean slate; you had no story before this, why not paint one now that you had the freedom to?

You weren’t going to whip up some grand tale about how you were this astonishingly intelligent, leading programmer in your country that did impressive work for science (that was your mother), but it didn’t hurt to fib the truth a small amount. The part about studying abroad was true, anyway.

She appraised you with an interested visage. “I see, I see. Where are you originally from?”

Man, people loved asking that, huh?

It’s not like you could blame them, you’d do the same in their place. You were a foreigner, they were going to treat you like one.

“Ah,” you told her of your place of origin. “It’s nothing special. I mostly traveled.”

“Oh? How did you make money?”

“Freelance,” you answered. “Odd jobs here and there, enough to keep myself afloat. Have you traveled before, Iori-san?” 

You could see the overjoyed spark in her eyes that someone was finally respecting her. “Only within the country,” she responded, somewhat somber. “I’ve always wanted to see what it’s like outside Japan.”

You tilted your head back to see the sky and think of suggestions. What do the stars look like here? “Depends on where you go. Some places are very packed and have lots of things to do no matter where you go, like Europe. Other places are more sparse, like the States.”

“But the States have more people,” the woman pointed out.

“Yeah,” you confirmed, “but that country is massive and people there tend to group into major cities, rather than be spread out. California is technically bigger than the entirety of Japan, but has way less people.”

Her eyes bulged in surprise. “Really?”

“Yep. It’s why you might hear Westerners say ‘there’s nothing to do here’,” you glanced at the structure behind her. “You guys revere wolves here, right?”

Utahime clapped her hands twice eagerly. “That’s correct! How’d you know?”

Based on her reaction to you merely mentioning Satoru, you figured it’d be best if you didn’t tell her the source of your information. “I’ve heard about it. I was curious, I haven’t been to a smaller shrine like this one before. Only the bigger ones in Tokyo, but those were part of my assignments, rather than for leisure.”

“Oh, it’s not much,” she espied at it from over her shoulder, but you could see the pride in her eyes. It was well taken care of, with love and chariness. It easily passed off as something constructed more recently, given its meticulous maintenance.

“How long ago was it built?”

“Around the same time the settlers first came here.”

This time, your eyes were the ones that opened wide. It had to have been at least 350 years old in that case, based on a rough estimate. “That far back? Wow, it’s in seriously good shape.”

The woman puffed up her chest. “Though the wolves have long since died out here, we still honor them. They helped us with hunts and allowed this village to thrive when we needed it most. They protected us from cursed spirits, as well. It’s only right we treat them and the bounties they’ve given us with respect.”

Oh, there was that term again: cursed spirits. “Could you tell me more about cursed spirits?”

Enthusiasm bubbled up in her the way it would in a child about to tell their parents about the story they wrote up. She skipped over to one of the stone benches and plopped down onto it, patting the spot beside her. You slid onto it, a chill shooting up your spine from the cold temperature. Being shaded from the sun made the rock gelid, go figure.

“Now! Let’s start from the beginning as we know it,” she cleared her throat and took on the role of a teacher. “The origin of cursed spirits and jujutsu sorcery as a whole is largely unknown. It’s speculated that spirits have lived alongside humanity from the beginning of it, as cursed energy is formed by negative emotions, and cursed energy is what spirits are born from.”

She was very animated when teaching, you noticed. Lots of hand movements, facial expressions, and a bouncy attitude to boot. It made for a very entertaining show, and did well to keep you engaged.

“Curses were invisible to humans. Only a select few could see them, and even fewer could actively interact with them in some way or another,” she continued. “Smaller curses would typically leech off of people without them knowing it, feeding off their bad emotions. Stronger curses, however, could be incredibly powerful. Sometimes to the point of standard weapons being completely useless against them, which is why jujutsu sorcery came to fruition. We needed some way to fight back against the spirits, so we developed a way to do just that by manipulating the natural reserves of cursed energy we had within us.”

Folklore from other countries always captivated you. From the creator of mankind in some Chinese mythos named Nüwa, to the counterpart of the equivalent of Santa in Germany, the origin of Halloween and turnip lanterns – even the oddly terrifying ones without nefarious intentions, like Mari Lwyd.

You adored hearing about legends, stories, and tales passed down through oral and written history over the centuries of life existing in each respective land. To say she had you hooked would be an understatement.

What were curses like? Assuming they were real, of course, and that jujutsu sorcery didn’t follow the same ideology as hanging witches. Were they ugly? Bipedal? Humanoid at all? 

“Many natural disasters are blamed on curses, even to this day,” she began lifting her fingers as she counted off a few examples. “Earthquakes, tsunamis, droughts. Pretty much anything you can think of.”

“Were they kinda like demons?”

“Eh,” she tilted her hand side to side a few times. “Yes and no. Depends on who you ask, really. They could be different from demons of hell, or they could be one and the same.”

“I see,” you pinched your chin. “So, where’d they go, then?”

She grasped one of her pigtails, running her fingers through the open and loose portion at the top of it. “Nobody really knows. Some think that sorcerers were able to eradicate them at the source, and died off since they weren’t needed anymore. It could be that the curses have simply lost power due to the progression of mankind, and particularly therapy, though it’s…still kind of taboo. Some claim they’re still around, we just don’t notice because we aren’t able to see any of it.”

Satoru’s words on the matter echoed in your mind. ‘Even if they are real, there's no way they'd beat me.’

You bit your cheek to hold back an unwitting snicker. Leave it up to Satoru to say some brazen shit and have it pop up in your head at random.

“What about you? What do you think?” You asked.

Utahime flicked a piece of invisible dirt off the front of her hakama. “I believe they exist. It’s part of why I’m a miko, and one of the reasons I maintain this shrine. It’s my duty. Curses may not be the same now as they were back then, but that’s no reason for me to slack off. Complacency breeds contempt.”

It was heartwarming, in a way, to see someone still holding onto traditions like these, working to keep her friends, family, and home safe, upholding the rules within and outside places of prayer. You admired her for it.

Not that you would personally want to be a shrine maiden, but you held them in high esteem nonetheless.

“And you?” She peered at you. “Do you believe in the supernatural?”

You closed your eyes for a moment, stretching your legs in front of you and idling back on your hands. “I’m agnostic, neither here nor there. I respect spaces that are considered sacred, I’d rather not get hexed, but I don’t go out of my way to hunt down, let’s say, ghosts.”

“I commend you, many could stand to learn a thing or two from you,” as she spoke, she stood up and brushed off the back of her kosode. “You are good company, though I fear I should get back to work soon.”

“Ah,” you got up as well and bowed to her. “Thank you for sharing your stories with me, Iori-san. I’m sorry for disturbing you.”

She waved her hand. “You didn’t, don’t worry. Come visit me again soon, okay? I’d love to hear stories of your travels as well.”

“Sure,” promised easily, more than content to exchange tales with her. “Stay safe.”

“Likewise,” the noirette disappeared back into the shrine with a final word of parting, leaving you to your devices.

While you didn’t get to see the altar inside, you considered the visit worthwhile, and got a new acquaintance out of it, too. You could come back to check it out another day.

Having burned through all the reasonable amount of procrastination time you allowed yourself, you voyaged back down the path, appreciating the blooms the whole way down the same way you had when you went the other way. You had to ask Utahime if she was the one tending to them next time you saw her.

You were proud to say that you only got lost twice. But you did find the bakery on the way, and memorized where it was once you located the path home. Not bad, not bad at all. You managed to find your way around, and you didn’t need to embarrass yourself by calling Satoru to come to your rescue.

It’s sad how low your standards for happiness had fallen, but you’d take any crumb of serotonin you could find.

You noticed the trip to your house was shorter whenever you actively didn’t want to go there, as if it was a living creature that purposefully made you arrive faster, just so you had to give it attention.

It stood, looming, mocking you. Taunting you, the monstrosity. What an asshole.

The outside matters came first, the less time you had to spend inside, the better. You pulled up the notes app on your phone and began the task of drafting everything you needed to deal with, denoting it as the ‘Outdoor’ section in your native tongue.

Fence, you typed down, scribbling sporadic thoughts as you went. Tear down? Repair? Replace?

You checked the ends and noted that the fence only went back about halfway into your property, leaving the back uncovered. Covers only front. Built like that? Collapsed/removed in the back? 

You felt the stalks of yellow-ish green leafage with your palm, the tips reaching your hips. Cut down grass and weeds. You should plant pollinator flowers if the yard was ever cleared out well enough. It’d be nice to have some butterflies and bees around to help everything grow nice and healthy. 

You lightly nudged a piece of a busted plant pot with the toe of your shoe. Dispose of broken pots. A slight stumble had you leering down to see a strangely shaped tile. You tilted your head in confusion, then peered up at the edge of the roof, deducing it was a shingle that had fallen off. You stepped further away from the roof, just in case. And fallen & loose shingles.

Rounding the side, you waded through the overgrown flora, poring over the condition of the rundown house’s environment. Remove ivy from walls. Set up trellises. Lattices to form a backyard/patio/garden/thing?

Angling your chin up, you placed your hand over your forehead and assessed the roof. From on the ground, you wouldn’t be able to completely acknowledge the damage done to it over the years it sat untouched, but you were reluctant to climb on it to see first hand. You didn’t have a ladder, for starters, and you liked having unbroken bones and working shins. 

Get a ladder.

The back of the estate was in the same condition as everything else. Which is to say, disheartening. 

“What’ve I got myself into…” You muttered.

You spotted a narrow garden plot built into the back of the house. Overgrown, yes, but it’d be perfect for planting stuff when you got it all cleared up.

It wasn’t a question of ‘if’, unfortunately. You had no other real choice besides mending what was left in your hands.

You were still miffed at the real estate agent. You likely wouldn’t have purchased this piece of land had you known what was ahead. Or if you were in a better state of mind, honestly, rather than being in the middle of your fight-or-flight phase of living.

“No good dwelling on the past,” you whispered to yourself as you circled back to the front. “Can’t change it now.”

You took a deep, long, full breath, enjoying the fresh and crisp air while you still could. You savored the temperate hints of nature and the clement weather, treating it like it would be your last time experiencing such comfort. You didn’t know if your nostrils (or you) would survive the excursion into hell you were about to go on, so you weren’t risking taking the breeze for granted.

Exhaling all in one big puff, you steeled your shoulders and pushed open your front door, your free hand covering your nose in anticipation. Replace hinges and/or front door.

It managed to punch you in the gut regardless. 

New section in your notes open, you got to work typing. The most obvious issues came first, such as the floors, the peeling walls, and exposed boning and pipes. A lot would possibly need to be replaced, such as the counters in the kitchen, cupboards…

Floor rotted(?) and sticky. Wash?

Spackle for holes in walls? New drywall instead?

Check insulation.

Your spirits fell more and more with each additional item of note you wrote onto the list. Could any of this be salvaged? Were you better off tearing it down?

Remove tatami. Replace? Don’t?

Stepping into what you assumed was the master bedroom, you made your way over to the sleeping bag you left behind and cautiously rolled it up, maneuvering around the grime stuck to it, and placed it against a corner. You’d toss it when you got the chance to.

M-bed closet missing doors and shelf.

Seeing the window, you tip-toed to it, hoping to open it to air out the room. Your nose formed bunny lines at the cobwebs littering the sill and edges. While there weren’t any spiders – as far as you could see – you still did not enjoy touching them in the slightest.

Pushing up from the center of the window proved to be futile, the frame wasn’t going to be budging anytime soon.

Windows stuck.

Remove spider webs.

There was litter here and there – torn pieces of paper, a ripped open baggie, fabric – that you decided to leave as is. Along with not having gloves to pry them off the ground, you didn’t have anything to throw them away into. They got to live another day.

Toss out trash.

The shower and bathroom had a cupboard tucked off to the side, but opening it showed the middle platform separating the top and bottom within was crumbly and would break if you put any weight on it.  Replace shelf in bathroom cupboard.

The tiles were all fucked up, too. Some were chipped, others were outright broken or missing. Rust had gathered around the tap and drain in the tub, likely from years of having a leaky faucet before it ran out of water to drip.

Clean out rust in bath/pipes. Throw away broken floor tiles. Replace.

You pulled the left handle of the sink faucet and waited for a few seconds to see if the plumbing was functional.

Which was a big, fat no.

Plumbing. Faucets.

Limescale on shower head, wall tiles.

You scrolled through what notes you had already created and chewed on the corner of your bottom lip, thinking of what else you might have needed to write down. You fixated blankly on the wall in front of you as you went over everything, then quickly typed out a few more things.

Electricity.

Check for asbestos, lead in paint.

You figured the tasks you needed to do would pop up as you went along, considering your notes to be a simple skeleton outline. You could jot down other things as needed, and work through them one by one.

Having done as much as possible while staying inside for as long as you could tolerate, you walked back outside and dug around in your purse for the piece of paper Granny had given you, the one with names and numbers of people that could help you in this endeavor.

To say you were beginning to panic would be an understatement. You already bought the damn thing, and doubted you’d be able to resell it and get all your money back. You also didn’t want to subject anyone to repairing the thing when it was both a health hazard and an embarrassment. 

You had some reserve money, but it wasn’t a whole lot, so you required that job Granny gave you.

Gojo said you could stay with him for however long you needed, but that was with the expectation that you’d leave once your house was fixed up. Given the village’s size, it was unlikely that you would find another place within it to live in, even after saving up some money working for Granny. You didn’t want to piggy-back off anyone and be an imposition; the only reason you felt less guilty about staying with the moon-haired idiot was due to the sheer amount of space he had in his mansion.

You were swiftly running out of options.

Your lips paled as you pressed them tightly together, trying to wrack your mind for ideas. You couldn’t sell it, and you didn’t want to deal with the humiliation of having strangers work for you. In such a small town, word spread like fire on a dry wick. Who knows what they would say about you?

Realistically, it wasn’t your fault, you knew this. The house hadn’t been built under your name and, hell, was likely older than you by at least a decade or two. It didn’t fall to ruin because of you, but you were the owner of this house now, the responsibility rested on your shoulders.

You read through the list of handymen under your thumb, the paper shaking slightly from the death grip you had on it.

Repairing it on your own was technically an option, but you would be basically begging for severe injuries or even death by attempting that. You wouldn’t even know where to start. Foundation? Floors? Structure? Roof? You didn’t fucking know how to do any of that shit!

…Or you could just burn the damn eyesore to the ground ‘til there was naught but ashes left.

No, that was a stupid idea, but you were out of any good ones.

The thought you had previously of tearing it down and buying a garden shed to reside in was feeling more and more tempting by the hour. It was unreasonable, you knew, you simply…didn’t know what you were supposed to do.

You were used to doing things alone. You relied solely on yourself, trusted only your own words and intentions. Letting people in was not something you did for many reasons. Maybe you did crave closeness and camaraderie at some point in the distant past, but the concept was out of the question entirely now. It made uncomfortable butterflies sit heavy in your stomach, the urge to vanish into the treelines and never be seen again increasing with each extraneous person you invited into your life.

You sighed. “I should have just moved into the woods and turned into a witch,” you grumbled low, then scoffed sardonically. “Right, as if I wouldn’t accidentally poison myself with a weird mushroom on day three and die a horrible, painful, slow death.”

The two lists you had remained in your somewhat reluctant hands. You knew you were way in over your head, and you’d probably unintentionally curse the house sooner than you managed to make a positive change, but…you weren’t used to asking for help. Always the type to manage shit on your own, get things done yourself, be independent. Could you really be faulted for having a hard time reaching out to anyone else?

Especially since you hadn’t even met any of them yet. That would be disconcerting, asking folks you’d never seen – let alone spoken to – before to work for you.

Your phone singed your fingers. You did know someone, and knew that he was just a phone call away, but did you really want to deal with him of all people? He would take this chance to rub it all in your face and then some.

You carefully weighed your choices.

Rebuild the house yourself with no former experience with anything beyond shitty popsicle stick bird huts.

Call someone on the list, explain your situation, and ask for help.

Call the prick.

…By the gods, you really hated making calls to people you didn’t know.

Shamefully carping to yourself, you dialed Satoru’s number, trying to ignore the contact name he had set up for himself. It was so glitzy, the ✨❤️ Satoru ❤️✨ sitting at the top of the call screen making you stifle a short laugh, ironically lifting your spirits. “Here goes nothing…”

He answered within three rings. “Yo, been a while, princess” Satoru purred as if you hadn’t seen him that morning, and you rolled your eyes, despite not being there in person for him to see.

“You greet every girl like that?”

“Nope, just you,” you could hear his grin. “Whatcha need?”

Now came the part where you set aside your pride and voiced what you very much did not want to. Again. You’d known this man for barely 24 hours and he already had several wins over you. In…whatever game you decided you were losing. “Look, I…I need your help.”

“Oho? What’s this? Is the princess finally admitting how much she misses me?” 

Smug dick.

“I did not say that,” you immediately berated him.

He simply hummed, unaffected. “Same thing.”

You ran your hand down your face, already exasperated just 30 seconds into the call. “You– ugh, just, can you help me or not?”

“Depends on what you need, sugar plum. Did ya get lost already?”

This man was going to be the cause of your madness. The bridge of your nose ached where you pinched it. “Granny gave me a list of people to call to help me with my house and I really don’t want to call any of them.”

“Then don’t.” 

“And, what, do everything by myself?”

You could envision him shrugging. “Why not? I could help you.”

“Satoru, I trust a wild forest fire more than I trust you with a hammer.”

“Ouch,” he sucked air through his teeth, faux whimpering. “You’re such a bully. Fine, I’ll help you with contacting everyone.”

Oh, that took less fighting and groveling than you expected. You exhaled in relief. “Thank you–”

“On,” he interrupted you, “one condition.”

There it is.

Your skin began to sting as you dug your nails harder into it, leaving curved indents between your eyes. “Y’know what, I think I’ll be fine–”

“Ah-ah-ah, hang on a second there, pretty girl. Hear me out.”

Conceding, you sighed and urged him to make his request. “Fine, what is it?”

"Cook something for me,” he requested. “Consider it evening the score.”

Your face scrunched up into a question mark. “Wait, that’s it?

“What, do you want it to be more?”

“No, no, I can do that,” you quickly declined, biting on the edge of your thumbnail as you tried to think of something to prepare for him. “Do you have any preferences?”

“Sweets.”

Sweet stuff. Okay, you could work with that. You could bake some pretty killer macarons. You didn't know what ingredients he had at home, or how to operate his oven, but you'd just figure it out, right?

“Alright, I can do that,” you answered.

“We have a deal, then?”

You took a moment to consider. You could back out, but your introverted personality made that notion null. It was only baking, too, rather than the ghastly demand you were expecting him to make. Baking it is. “Deal.”

“Great! We’ll be over in a flash!~”

“Okay–” wait. “‘We’–?”

He hung up before you could ask. You groaned and contemplated smashing your phone against the ground, but decided against it. You needed the thing, unfortunately.

Since you had to wait for however long, you chose to add in some thoughts to what you’d already written down, brainstorming how you wanted to proceed. It was difficult to tell at this stage, before you started on anything. But you could pick out what you might want to plant; flowers, vegetables, a fruit tree or two. So what if you were fantasizing? It helped keep you calm. Escapism was a valid coping mechanism.

It was too hard to picture anything given the state of the house, though. You’d need to snip down the field first and go from there, when you could see everything clearly.

How much did contractor services cost in Japan? What about the people Granny knew, how much did they charge? What kind of services did they provide? Your toe tapped repeatedly as you stepped outside your fence, trying not to pace.

Would you need one, or multiple? Were you going to have to get materials from the nearby city by yourself, or would they do that? If the former, how?

“I need an adult,” you lamented, your shoulders slouching and arms folding over your chest. “I wanna die. I’m not mature enough for this shit.”

You recalled what your mother told you often when you were younger: ‘not everything at once.’

Easier said than done. Sleep on it, one step at a time, break it down into shorter tasks, nothing was taking the edge off your stress.

“I’ll just start with the grass,” you muttered, eventually succumbing to the need to pace. “I have to start somewhere, and I’ll need to get rid of that before anything else can be done. Oh, but, fuck, there’s so much of it…not to mention debris, rocks…do they still make scythes? Can’t launch a pebble with a scythe. No, wait, that’d be so much more effort and take more time…”

A flicker of alabaster down the road caught your eye, halting your hurried back-and-forth roving and hushed bleating.

Satoru was always easy to spot from a distance. It was hard not to see him when his hair redirected the sun like a mirror, blinding anyone who saw him from the wrong angle. He was the angel on your shoulder with the personality of the devil, urging you to dive into your most heinous and blasphemous thoughts. The light bouncing off his head created a glowing aura around it, resembling a silver halo, further pushing that deceptive angel motif.

Would the halo turn gold in the light of the crimson rays of fading day?

You uncrossed your arms, ready to greet him, only to notice the man beside him. They were conversing, and the latter must have said something funny, as the former guffawed hysterically. It echoed off the mountains on either side of the valley, reaching you with no concern for distance. 

Did such bellows reach across the entire settlement, or was it localized, feeling louder than it actually was due to an echo chamber effect?

Gojo’s cachinnation dissipated when the pair were close enough to you, at which point he waved his hand high in the air to greet you avidly, like you weren’t only 20 feet from them.

“Hey! Didn’t keep ya waitin’ too long, did we?”

Truthfully, the fifteen or so minutes you had been waiting for them had gone by in a flash when you were so deeply buried in your spiraling thoughts while remembering dumb shit sprinkled into your internal ranting. The only evidence of your anticipation for their arrival being the barely present ache in your heels from where you rested most of your weight on them.

“No, not long,” you assured, fighting hard to keep your eyes off his friend for however long possible, vainfully clinging to your sanity. You knew that as soon as you centered your vision on him, your ability for conscious thought would evaporate. 

You wanted to present yourself as at least marginally normal as a first impression, though you doubted you were achieving that by avoiding the obvious third presence. You were surely coming off as rude, you really should–

“This one's Geto Suguru,” Gojo introduced the noiret by his side, nipping your overthinking at the bud.

At last, your full attention was guided to him.

Oh.

Oh. That was a mistake.

‘This one’ was breathtaking.

His midnight hair caught the sunlight in a scintillating iridescence that shifted between the deepest phthalo blue you’d ever seen and a mesmerizing sheen of violet when the light caught it just right, like the feathers of a raven. It struck you how glossy and luxuriously silky it was, and you wanted to pull it out of the high bun he kept it in to run your fingers through it endlessly. That one loose section of his bangs that hovered over his eye was just so cute, your digits itched to tug on it.

And, speaking of, those eyes. 

Sharp enough to cut diamonds and make you stand straighter. Heat rose to your cheeks as he observed you, head cocked to the side with a smooth and sweet smile that absolutely melted your insides like soft-serve ice cream, lily-livered and defenseless against the blazing sun incarnate in the form of a man.

They were dark, yet warm; a rich chocolate in hue that you could swear had flecks of gold within and rings of wisteria coiling around his abyssal pupils.

He was tall and foreboding, just like Satoru, but in a completely different fashion. He was the radiant Sol, pacifying and precious heat licking at your skin, soothing away the frostbite of winters long past. 

Beside him stood the Moon, reflective and brilliant and so goddamn cocky that it made your cheeks hurt – whether from biting the insides of them to hide back a smile, or to prevent yourself from smacking that shameless attitude out of him, you didn’t know. It didn’t matter. 

Satoru’s pearly locks contrasted sharply with Suguru’s obsidian lace, providing a striking visual. These godly beings towered over you, imposing and otherworldly and too good to be true, yet you knew your imagination could never come up with men like them.

And you?

You poor, dear, sweet, dumb little lamb. A pathetic speck caught in the gravity they created. Two black holes, eager to suck you in and rip you to shreds, and you were tempted to let them, practically falling into them without their overwhelming influence affecting you.

Their presence, their power, their very existence that demanded you drop to your knees to worship and beg like the tragic whore you were dominated your consciousness, filling it with fantasies you hadn’t experienced in…gods, ever. Nobody exuded the same aura they did, nobody made you weak-kneed and left you aching between your thighs, not like this. They created a desire in you that you wanted to have fulfilled – needed, even.

The pop of your knuckle in your fist that you had subconsciously created managed to snap you from your revere and back into the present, reminding you that, perhaps, you should do something, rather than drool like an idiot. 

You’ve gone fucking crazy. That was it, the last straw, the last hauntingly magnificent person. Why, oh, why did you move here?

With no small amount of embarrassment at the realization that your panties were a bit more damp than they were a minute ago, you clenched your jaw hard enough to anchor yourself, and made a mental note to get rid of the problem between your legs as soon as you were alone and could succumb to the pleasure, the yearning, you hadn’t experienced in ages.

As well as pretend it wasn’t caused by them, the iconic duo that had you in a mental fit.

Hoping you hadn’t made a total fool of yourself, you turned and bowed respectfully, saying your name in return as you stared at the ground in an attempt to clear your mind of the filth it created on its own, unprompted. “It's a pleasure to meet you, Geto-san.”

Suguru studied you for a few seconds (don’t look at me like that, please, I’m begging you, spare me), then faced the male beside him with an amused expression. “Are you sure this is the same girl you were telling me about? The brat?”

Oh, heavens, that voice.

Fire exploded across your cheeks and pooled deep in the lower pits of your stomach when you heard him say that word; enunciate it clearly, croon it in that damned tone that had electricity jolting up your spine.

Not now, slut. Focus.

It was significantly easier to ignore the unholy fantasies plaguing your sanity when you centered all that pent up energy into being annoyed at Satoru, questioning your already questionable friendship when you learned of what he called you in private. Your eyes narrowed into an icy glare, primed and deadly. To your agitation and further chagrin, he only smirked boyishly at you.

“That’s the one,” he replied with a widening grin as he tucked his hands into the pockets of his pants.

“She's far too polite,” Geto countered.

Satoru snorted. “Trust me, she's a spitfire.”

“Is that so…” The onyx-haired man bent down to come closer to your face, and your breath hitched in your throat, refusing to come out properly. His scent embraced you. Mild, pleasant, like warm chai and jasmine, making your muscles instinctively loosen.

His eyes softened into closed curves as he beamed at you. You really hoped he couldn't read your mind. There was nothing holy or sane in there.

“Your name is lovely as is,” he murmured as his voice lowered into a roguish octave, “but I think I have a better one in mind.”

“W-What?” Your own vocal cords strained just to get the one word out in a wimpy squeak, and of course you just had to stutter. Whereas the air Satoru emitted naturally made you want to tackle him to the ground, Suguru’s wrapped around you like wisps of incense smoke, soothing and gently demanding your obsession with its fragrance. It inexplicably made you want to thaw into a puddle, to give him your full and undivided focus.

His canines peeked through from the way his lips curled further, entertained by your sudden timidness. He remained quiet, merely viewing your reactions as he lifted a hand to loop a strand of your hair around his finger and by the gods, don’t look at his fingers and how long and big they are and how perfect they’d feel–

“Angel,” the man said, practically cooing it at you.

You stifled a croak, verbally cuffed out of your totally, positively, very wholesome thoughts. “What?”

If you could die from embarrassment and be let out of this hell hole, you’d keel over on the spot when he simpered. “Angel,” he so graciously repeated for you. “I believe it suits you quite well. Wouldn’t you say so, Satoru?”

Satoru was having the time of his life, you were sure of it. You could feel him staring into you, see that stupid sexy fucking smile on his face from the corner of your eye as he teased you and, shit, why were you in the middle of this? Had you committed some heinous sin? Was this your punishment? 

“I don’t know,” he hummed in deliberation. “I prefer bunny. Or mochi.” 

“Mochi?” You and Suguru questioned at the same time, swiveling to regard the alabaster man.

Gojo nodded. “Small, probably tastes sweet, squishy.”

“Squishy?” You gaped incredulously, relocating your befuddled scrutiny to Geto when he burst out into laughter.

“I can see it,” Suguru coincided, earning himself a pretty nasty glare, too.

You groaned and tilted your face up, pleading with the sky to give you strength. “Don’t you start, too. One Satoru is enough, thanks.”

He hummed and smirked, something mischievous twinkling in his eyes. You didn't like that countenance. Not one bit. “Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you, too,” he bowed his head towards you, changing the subject. Thank fuck. “You moved here recently, yes?”

“Yeah,” you affirmed, molling the racing of your heart that was just a few beats short of being uncomfortable. “Technically the night before yesterday.”

“You had a safe trip, then, I hope?”

You sent the stone stepping path partially hidden by the overgrown grass a particularly scathing grimace. “I almost ate shit and died on my own porch, but I did, yes.”

His husky laugh was messing up your insides. “Glad you’re in one piece. It was the stepping stones, wasn’t it?”

“Yes, oh, my god. They’re out to kill me, I swear.”

“They’ve gotten me a couple times, too. It’s good to see this house will finally be getting some love.”

“I think you’re the only person that’s been positive about this so far,” you scratched your cheek with your index finger. “Everyone else has told me it’s grossly dangerous. Wish I’d known that before I skimped out on finding a place to stay for the first night…”

Suguru’s browline furrowed in disquietude. “You slept in there?”

You exhaled harshly and hung your head. “Don’t remind me.”

“You aren’t feeling sick, are you?”

You shook your head and patted his arm reassuringly. “No, just humiliated.”

His expression relaxed, the hardness in his deep maroon eyes tempering. “That’s good. If you do feel ill, don’t brush it off. Excess activity can worsen your health and prolong sicknesses.”

Aww, a mother hen? He was in your good books now, you felt all fluffy, being cared for by him. “I’ll keep that in mind, thank you.”

Satoru pushed his way between you two, resting one arm on Suguru’s shoulder and the other on your head, coveting your attention. “So, what’s the plan, mochi?”

“Good question,” you said.

There was a brief pause, as if you were all waiting for someone else to speak, before he leaned down towards you. “Well?”

“What?”

“The plan? What’s the plan?” He lifted a brow. 

“Oh,” you darted your eyes between them. “Oh, no, I don’t have one. I just said it’s a good question.”

Suguru frowned. “Nothing at all?”

You pulled up your notes app and scrolled through it. “I guess cut the lawn, and call up the folks on Granny’s list for starters.”

“Can I see her list?”

“Mm,” you held out the paper to him, cringing when you saw how your fingers wrinkled the corner of it out of stress.

A crease in his forehead formed, deepening the more names he read, making you nervous. On top of how nervous you were already feeling. You were nervous-squared now.

“What is it?” You asked.

“It’s nothing. Just…I don’t think any of these guys will have enough free time to help you out. Not for a while, anyway,” he returned the sheet to you. “However, I grew up assisting them, so I know a thing or two. Mind if I go inside?”

Well, if that wasn’t soul crushing. “If you have a gas mask, go ahead. The smell inside could knock out a grown man. I don’t want to trouble you, though.”

“It’s no trouble at all. I’ve been needing something to do these days, this could be the perfect excuse for me,” he assured you. “I’ll be quick.”

“Oh– hang on, there might be asbestos in there,” you warned.

“There isn’t,” he assured confidently.

Satoru narrowed his eyes. “How do you know? Huh? Were you there when this house was built? Didn’t think so.”

Suguru leveled him with a vacant lour. “Asbestos wasn’t used in the construction of any houses here. Besides being expensive to import, our village was constructed with traditional methods. This building was Western inspired, but it wasn’t built with Western methods.”

You crossed your arms over your chest, nervously picking at a spot on your forearm. “Who built it?”

“From what I know, it was someone from either Kobe or Osaka that visited a state in America on vacation and fell in love with the architecture. First thing they did when they came back was buy this plot of land and build an imitation house on it,” he answered.

“Why’d they leave?”

He raised a hand, then dropped it in a half-shrug. “Any number of reasons. Some of the older folks say that their spouse fell ill, and they had to return to the city. My mom says they moved out because they got sick of driving an hour and a half one way to get to work every day. Dad says their sister gave birth and they had to return and assist her since she worked full time. Who knows.”

“Eh?” Satoru’s expression twisted into one of confusion. “I thought the owner just died or something. Hence why the house is haunted.”

“The house isn’t haunted, Satoru. Don’t scare her.”

You cracked your knuckles one-by-one. “If it is haunted, I’m gonna give that realtor hell. He promised it wasn’t. He also promised it hadn’t been touched in only ten years, so he’s already on my list,” you growled, then deflated and wilted. “I suppose I’m not in any rush, I’ll need to save up anyway. I’m bumming off Satoru for now, but I don’t wanna prolong that.”

“I already told you,” he patted your upper back. “Stay as long as you need.”

“Thanks, Satoru. I really owe you,” you said. I hate owing people. “Oh– be careful, Geto-san.”

He gave a pacifying hand wave as he pushed past your open gate, heading towards your house. Satoru hopped up and hurried after him. “Oi, wait up! I wanna see, too!” 

“Satoru, you’ve already been in there before,” Suguru reminded him as you followed them about halfway, wanting to steer clear of the inside for a while.

Satoru twisted the door knob and pushed inwards. “Yeah, when we were kids. Imagine how much it’s changed!”

“I doubt it’s changed much,” their voices grew muffled and eventually silent to you as they disappeared into your home.

You began counting in your head. If they were gone for more than two minutes, you were going to assume they died. Then you could officially label the house as haunted and hunt that realtor’s ass down. After you set up a prayer altar for the boys who so bravely sacrificed their lives for you, obviously, they deserved that at the very least.

You’d have to check with the villagers to see if either of them practiced any particular faith to ensure you provided the correct funeral services for them, and to know if you needed to follow any specific spiritual rules when it came to the deceased.

Should you leave their bodies in there? Probably not, no, but it wasn’t going to be you fishing them out. You were tiny compared to them, you wouldn’t be able to drag them out yourself, even if you wanted to and tried really hard.

Your peculiar funeral fantasies were cut off when Suguru came back outside, still very much alive and well – from what you could tell.

“You lived,” you congratulated him.

“That I did,” he affirmed and stopped beside you, turning to face the house as his arms folded neatly.

“Is he still alive?”

“Last I checked, he was. I’m surprised he didn’t leave as soon as he went in. I think he’s trying to out-man me and impress you,” he teased, making you laugh.

Out came Satoru right then, dusting his hands off, acting like he did anything more than recce. “Alright, I’ve got good news and bad news. Which d’ya want first?”

“Good news,” you requested apprehensively.

He clapped his palms together. “Good news, the interior condition isn’t as bad as it seems.”

Well, that was good news. But you were wary to celebrate. “And the bad news…?”

“There are, indeed, a shit ton of spiders.”

You squealed, racing to hide behind Suguru’s tall frame. The man himself chuckled at your reaction, his arms still crossed over his chest as he tilted his head back to peer at you from over his shoulder, way too relaxed for the situation. “Not a fan of spiders?”

“Fuck no!” You cried out, clutching the back of his shirt in tight fists as you buried your face against his spine. “Fuck that! Burn the damn thing down!”

Gojo grinned darkly, eyes lighting up with mischief. “All you had to say, princess.”

The noiret (the only reasonable one among you) sighed and shook his head. “No, we’re not burning her house down.”

“Boo,” Satoru whined. “You’re no fun.”

“You aren't afraid of spiders?” You peeked around Suguru's arm to leer up at him, still using him as your shield.

“Nope.”

“You monster,” you hissed.

His best friend snorted. “Look on the bright side. It means he can get rid of spiders for you.”

You paused to consider his words, squinting up at the poised man you hadn’t let go of.

“Okay, nevermind, I take it back,” you declared, doing a complete flip in behavior, “you're my god, now, Geto-san.”

He showed you that shut-eyes smile that had hummingbirds dancing the tango in your stomach. “Don’t worry, angel. I’ll protect you.”

Blush dusted your cheeks at his pledge and you averted your eyes. Having either of them in your field of view for too long was not good for your heart.

Satoru wouldn’t be Satoru if he didn’t go and embarrass you further. “Aww, she’s blushing!”

“I am not!” You barked back.

“I think it’s cute,” Geto’s cheek dimpled and you were flashbanged by the faces of not one, but two ethereal beings.

Mama, you thought, if you can hear me, send help. I don’t think I’m making it out of this one.

You gulped, the noise far too loud in your ears, and tried to subtly cover your face with your hand to retain some dignity while releasing Suguru’s shirt from your death grip. “A-Anyways, uh…should probably start calling people.”

“I’ll handle the calls,” Suguru announced, already pulling out his phone and dialing numbers. “I know these guys well. I’ll try to work something out with them.”

“Oh, you really don’t–” and there he went. You knew you asked for help, but you felt bad inconveniencing Suguru. Satoru, not so much.

“What’d I say about worrying?” Speak of the devil, the milk-haired boy bent down to your height and nudged his pointer finger between your brows. “Relaaaax, princess. It’ll work out.”

You worried your bottom lip as you watched the other man chatting some distance away. Detaching yourself from your perpetual anxiety was…difficult, to describe it in the least amount of words possible. Your guard was stuck to you, pinned, screwed, and soldered into place over time. Letting it go meant undoing years of work. 

It was there to shield you. You needed it to hold your untempered heart and keep it safe. If it got hurt, you weren’t sure you knew how to recover.

But you weren’t really letting them in by allowing them to help you, right?

Yet, as you sized up the small incline and the shack falling apart on top of it, you couldn’t shake the impression that the world was about to tilt on its axis. The tides were receding, tectonic pressure was increasing, the winds were stirring, and you were in the middle of it all. Mama, you reached out one last time. I think it’s too late.

banner by cafekitsune ♥

[sweet-evie]

Head empty... Just having thoughts of an AU centered around Apartment Ghost!Gojo... 👻👻👻 So take my imagines...

✨ masterlist ✨

»» Ghost!Gojo = Casper the Friendly Ghost... It doesn't stop him from being a fucking menace day in and day out though.

»» Ghost!Gojo has been dead and buried for 6 months.

»» Ghost!Gojo haunts an apartment occupied by a single mom with two kids: one elementary kid and a toddler.

»» Imagine how fucking creepy and unsettling it is to find your toddler talking to empty air, and when you ask them, they look back at you with big innocent eyes and that big cheeky grin, and they start babbling about their "imaginary friend".

»» Creepy, but the mom dismisses it at first, chalking it up to childish imagination running wild, but when the older sibling casually asks about a tall white-haired man hanging around the apartment living room at dinner, Mom is starting to get concerned. Couple this with the fact that her toddler is giggling at odd hours during the night, while the room is empty. 

»» Eventually, Ghost!Gojo makes his presence known to the mom... And he's all smiles and being his usual goofy self while he's waving -- as if it isn't unsettling to have a dead fucking person hanging out in your home.

»» It took a while, but I like to think, the mom warms up to Ghost!Gojo being around after a couple of months. He doesn't show himself frequently to Mom because he freaks her out, but it doesn't stop Ghost!Gojo from being her toddler's playmate and her older kid's study buddy.

»» As time passed, they got so comfortable living with the ghost that mom and her kids forget that Ghost!Gojo is not actually alive and he doesn't show himself to other people, except for them.

»» After they get so used to him and comfortable with him being around, think of Ghost!Gojo as a very very friendly and chaotic poltergeist. He doesn't destroy things (at least when he does, he doesn't mean to). He's very nice... He just does annoying shit. For instance...

»» Ghost!Gojo likes to dig around the kitchen cupboards for candy and leaves the doors open just to annoy the older sibling and leave the mom exasperated. They leave out a bowl of candy for him in the living room after that, hoping it would discourage his behavior, but nope... It's still Gojo, and he does what he wants.

»» Ghost!Gojo also pranks the mom and moves things around in the kitchen to confuse her. The first time he did it, she got scared. A few more times, she got so annoyed. But after like the umpteenth time, the mom just rolls her eyes, like, "Haha, very funny, Satoru! I'm getting stuff from the laundry room, and this kitchen better be sorted when I get back."

»» Mom has definitely threatened to call 'ghostbusters' on Satoru's ass multiple times, and Gojo thinks it's hilarious. She never actually does anything to drive him away. To be honest, she quite likes the fact that her kids have a babysitter when she has to work late... Even if said babysitter is a wandering spirit.

»» On that note, Ghost!Gojo takes his babysitting duties seriously, and proclaims himself the best babysitter ever!

»» Ghost!Gojo does all the typical things people do to entertain toddlers. He talks to her toddler, entertains them, makes them laugh, tickles them, slips candies in their lap, picks up toys and disappears from view to give the toddler a fun puppet show -- with all the floating toys and shit.

»» The older sibling actually saw him doing this one time when they slipped into their younger sibling's room, and they just had to laugh, because who would have thought their family of three would be lucky enough to move into an apartment haunted by a very friendly ghost.

»» Ghost!Gojo helps mom cook sometimes, fetching her ingredients from the pantry and stuff. If a normal person were in that kitchen, all they would see are floating ingredients. It's enough to give anyone a heart attack, but for mom and her 2 kids, it's just Satoru.

»» One time, the older sibling invited their friends over and one of their friends got the idea to play with a Ouija board after the older sibling joked about the apartment being haunted.

»» They play with the ouija board, and Satoru plays into it for fun. Pre-teen kid's friends are terrified, but the pre-teen kid is amused as hell, because they know it's just Gojo.

»» When the friends go home, they tell the pre-teen kid about how much fun they had, and pre-teen kid thanks Ghost!Gojo for being kind enough to play along.

»» Ghost!Gojo has a habit of collecting coins.

»» Ghost!Gojo has never actually tried leaving the confines of the apartment before, but the pre-teen kid asks and they actually figure it out together.

»» They had so much fun doing it too... Ghost!Gojo figures out a way to possess random objects so the pre-teen kid can take him anywhere.

»» That being said, Ghost!Gojo has possessed the most ridiculous things. Think Ghost!Gojo possessing laundry detergent, the coffee table, the toilet paper, etc. He possessed the oven once and it broke, and the mom got so mad, so Ghost!Gojo steers clear of possessing electronic devices from then on.

»» Ghost!Gojo helps the kids surprise their mom during holidays... e.g., Mother's Day, Christmas, etc. For obvious reason, the family starts loving Halloween, because Ghost!Gojo loves it so much.

»» The toddler starts calling Ghost!Gojo 'Papa'.

»» It warms moms heart and hurts her at the same time. 

»» Because Satoru Gojo would have made a wonderful father.

»» Ghost!Gojo sometimes wishes he was still alive so he could court mom properly...

»» And since he can't do anything about the fact that he's dead (a ghost for practically one year now), all he can do now is watch over them and make them as happy as possible...

»» Ghost!Gojo promises to stay for as long as he can, for as long as he is permitted.

»» Ghost!Gojo gets to see the kids grow up, move out, and he gets to see mom grow old too...

»» It breaks his heart to watch the people he's grown to care about grow old, while he stays frozen in time, haunting this little apartment forever.

»» Eventually, mom had to say 'goodbye', deciding she wanted to move to the countryside. It wasn't an easy decision...

»» The kids, now adults, return to their childhood apartment to help mom move away, and although Ghost!Gojo rarely shows himself these days, he appears one last time.

»» Unsurprisingly, leaving the place behind is hard. Every time they look back on their childhood, it's undeniably brighter and more colorful, and it's all because of the beloved ghost who made their lives so much brighter because of his presence.

»» Ghost!Gojo was their 'Dad,' 'Older Brother', 'Fun Uncle', and 'Annoying Roommate'. He's worn so many hats as the kids grew up.

»» Satoru doesn't stop them from moving away, only thanking them for showing him what it would have been like for him if he had been lucky enough to grow old with kids of his own. He never had that in his life, but he's glad that he got to have that even after he'd died.

»» He doesn't know how long he's sentenced to wander the earthly plains, but he promises to see them around.

»» The younger sibling actually cries and wishes that he was their dad for real.

»» The mom, now old but still sweet and kind, thanks Ghost!Gojo for being part of their family.

It was goodbye...

Gojo: I'm sad and forever bound to an apartment building.

Also Gojo: I will terrorize the next dweller if they're a dick.

The next occupant is an asshole who cheats on his significant other... Ghost!Gojo is making their life hell.

I kind of want to write a fic about this now 🥴

[graveyardcuddles]

Okay I've talked about chaotic girl dad Astarion, BUT imagine this: girl dad Wyll with a tiefling daughter. 💕

We all know Wyll would be an incredible father, but I felt like if he had a little tiefling daughter, it would be especially precious. He looks at her and remembers all the little tiefling kids he helped train and protect in the grove all those years ago. Maybe he keeps in touch with some of the kids in Baulder's Gate and they become like big siblings to Wyll's daughter.

I imagine tiefling babies/toddlers go through a phase similar to teething when their horns are first growing in. Their little horn buds on their forehead become sore and inflamed. Wyll spends hours holding a cool washcloth to his daughter's forehead to soothe her, as well as learning how to make topical ointments to help. As he holds and comforts her she wraps her little tail around his wrist. ❤️

As she gets older Wyll teaches her proper horn care, like how to make them shine with a bit of oil. Wyll always making sure she feels like the little beauty she is. He learns all sorts of fancy hairstyles that curl and twist around her horns like elegant vines.

Duke Ravengard makes up for being a less-than-stellar father to Wyll by becoming the softest, biggest pushover of a grandpa you've EVER seen. Spoils that little girl to no end. Wyll has literally never seen this side of his dad and is both baffled and highly amused. Definitely teases his dad about "going soft."

Her growing up and never once feeling self-conscious playing around the human or elven children in the upper city because her horns are just like her daddy's. 💕

[steddieas-shegoes]

So I have this one scene in my head, that won't go away unless someone writes it😅

So it's like 10 years after season 4. Everybody is "grown up" , moved away, married, have kids, etc. They have a reunion at the park in Hawkins/Indy Idk?

Eddie is watching the kids. Suddenly a woman comes up to him saying his kid hit/pushed her kid. Eddie who saw the whole thing, says his kid was just defending them self from her kids bullying. The woman asks Eddie, if the kids mother would agree to this behavior. Cue Eddie calling out Honey! And then introducing Steve as their kids mother🤣

Its not much to go on plot vice, but I'm hoping your amazing brain can fill in the blanks😅

I am a Steve secretly likes being called mom truther. Sorry to everyone who isn't. I full believe Eddie started it as a joke, but he noticed the blush on Steve's face and kept doing it, and then the kids just naturally picked up on it and refer to him as both mom and dad depending on the situation. Imagine the confusion on a teacher's face when their troublemaker tells the principal "my mom is gonna be so mad that someone pushed me" and in walks a raging Steve. It's giving comedic relief. I didn't really include a whole lot of everyone in this, just mentioned it was a reunion and had a few moments with the Party. Hope that's okay, it's just difficult to include EVERYONE in a short ficlet. - Mickala ❤️

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

They came back to Hawkins as often as they could to visit Wayne, especially once they adopted Hannah. Shortly after Nancy offered to be a surrogate for them, they ended up adopting Hannah’s baby sister, Lucy. In case that wasn’t enough, they still decided to take Nancy up on her offer, and they ended up with twins (“can’t do anything halfway, can you?” was Robin’s reaction) Ben and Molly.

Everything happened so quickly, all within two years, that Steve and Eddie turned to Wayne often as their calming presence.

At six years old, Hannah was a spitfire. She had Eddie’s personality despite not being theirs until she was four: unapologetically herself, loud, dramatic, and so fucking smart it scared them both. Lucy, at two (and a half!), was already well on her way to being the same way.

But this visit to Hawkins was different.

Everyone was back.

All the kids, who were far from kids now, and their significant others and kids decided to have a reunion over Labor Day weekend.

Eddie just got off a tour a few weeks earlier, a tour that proved to be quite chaotic when he insisted his entire family join him for two months on the road. Steve argued that it wasn’t necessary, that they would be fine for two months as long as he called every day, but Eddie wasn’t having it.

They took up a whole tour bus by themselves, but the rest of his band loved the kids. They brought Hannah on stage for soundcheck, they even had special headphones made just for her to be able to watch and play the instruments.

Steve usually used soundcheck time to walk with Lucy, find a place where she can run around and let loose all that toddler energy. Most venues they stopped at had a large backstage parking area for the buses and equipment vans, so while Lucy would run around and find weird bugs and sticks, Steve would push Ben and Molly in the double stroller so they could get some fresh air.

Once the doors opened, Eddie brought Hannah back to him and they went back to the bus so Steve could make them all their dinner, give them their baths, and put them to bed. They’d converted the bottom bunk spaces of the bus to a crib space for the twins and Lucy, and made the top bunk more kid friendly for Hannah.

It worked, and it was fun, and it was an experience that they all were happy to have together, but it was exhausting for all of them.

Being back in Hawkins was almost like a vacation.

Compared to the rush, rush, rush environment of tour, Hawkins was sit back, relax, enjoy the breeze.

Especially because everyone wanted their turn holding and playing with the kids. There were some points in the day that Eddie didn’t even know which adult his kids were with, but he was fine with it because Steve was sitting in his lap, more relaxed than he’d been in close to a year.

“Love you, Stevie,” Eddie mumbled against his hair, smiling as Steve curled further into his chest.

“Love you, too, baby.”

“Well aren’t you two just adorable,” Wayne said as he took the seat next to them, Ben asleep in his arms.

“When did he fall asleep?” Steve asked, voice low so he wouldn’t startle Ben.

“About 20 minutes ago.”

“You can go set him in the pack and play.”

“Nah. I wanna get as much time with these kiddos as I can,” Wayne said as he smiled down at Ben.

“Is Molly sleeping anywhere?” Eddie asked.

“Last I saw, Max was trying to get her to crawl in the living room, but I don’t think Molly is very interested.” Wayne started rocking back and forth slightly, like he did anytime he held a baby, whether they were asleep or not. “I heard Hannah ask if she could go to the park. If you wanna take her and Luce, we can keep the babies here for a bit.”

Eddie patted Steve’s back, silently asking him to let him up.

“I can take them. Stevie, you can stay here and get some rest.”

“No, I’ll come. Lucy will want someone to push her on the swings the whole time and Hannah won’t want to even look at the swings. It takes two with them.”

They made their way into the house to collect Hannah and Lucy, smiling at the way Max and Will were trying to bribe Molly to crawl with toys.

There was only one actual park in Hawkins, and the playground had only been added about five years ago as more people started moving back into town. It wasn’t impressive, especially compared to their Chicago parks and playgrounds, but Hannah and Lucy weren’t picky.

As expected, Lucy ran straight to the swings, yelling “Ma! Push me on swings please!”

Steve rolled his eyes fondly, but followed her over to them, preparing himself for the next 30 minutes of pushing her back and forth.

Hannah, well, she was a wild child. Literally, Eddie has had to drag her out of a hole she dug in their backyard once because she thought it could be her new bedroom. She cried when she thought that the bugs would hate her for leaving them. She found fun in any outdoor environment, which was good because the playground didn’t have a whole lot to offer other than one slide, a small set of monkey bars, and one tube to run through.

There were only a few other kids playing, all the parents standing off to the side or sitting on the bench.

All moms who would probably not want to talk to Eddie, especially if they recognized him and had been living in Hawkins during the whole, well, thing.

He stood away from everyone, just keeping an eye on Hannah, but occasionally looking over to Steve and Lucy. Lucy was ecstatic, he could hear her yelling “High! Up! High!” and Steve smiling as he pushed her just a tiny bit higher.

It was during one of those moments that he heard a yell and then heard someone walking over to him.

He turned to see a woman, probably pretty close to his age, coming up to him with a stern look on her face.

Oh boy.

He sighed as she stopped in front of him, her arms crossing over her chest.

He glanced at Hannah, who was being shoved by a boy maybe a year or two older than her. Hannah just raised her brow and shoved him back.

He looked back at the mom in front of him, assuming she was the boy’s parent.

“May I help you?”

“You may. Your daughter just pushed my son!”

“Is your son the one I just watched shove her?”

“If he did, it was to defend himself.”

“Hm.” Eddie glanced back up to see the boy crying and Hannah walking towards him. “Maybe your son should keep his hands to himself if he doesn’t like being pushed.”

“Maybe your daughter should learn to move out of the way.”

Eddie smirked as Hannah came up next to him.

“Hannah, wanna tell me what just happened?”

“He told me that I was too fat to go on the slide so I told him I would show him that I wasn’t. And then he tried to pull me away and I didn’t let him so he said that he was going to push me off the top. He tried to, but I’m strong, so he couldn’t. I pushed him back.”

Eddie nodded.

It’s not that he thought his kids were perfect. Far from it.

He got calls frequently from Hannah’s school that she was being too rough with the kids, and he had to remind her that a lot of kids don’t play that way. She never had bad intentions, she just didn’t know how strong she was. Kind of like a large breed dog thinking he can still sit in your lap when he’s fully grown.

But he also knew that because she had never had bad intentions, there was no way she did anything that wasn’t in defense of herself.

“It sounds like your son was rude and put his hands on her first,” Eddie said to the woman, who was turning a violent shade of red.

“There is no way her mother would allow her to act like this. This is inappropriate for young girls.”

Even Hannah knew that was the wrong thing to say.

She covered her face and shook her head and Eddie couldn’t hold back a laugh.

“What is so funny?” the woman asked angrily.

“Her mother is the one who taught her how to defend herself, but if you’d like to talk…” Eddie turned to the swings, where Steve was focused on Lucy. “Sweetheart! Can you come here for a second?”

Steve looked over to him with a frown, grabbing Lucy from the swing and mumbling something to her when she looked disappointed that they were done.

“What’s going on?” Steve asked as he looked down at Hannah, who was patiently waiting to see what Steve was about to do to this woman.

Eddie absolutely loved his children equally, he really did. But Hannah was something else entirely. He felt connected to her in ways that he hadn’t expected when they first met her. If it were possible, he would think she was his biologically with how similar they were in personality, how they both had the same dark curls, brown eyes, loud laugh, and smirk.

The woman seemed surprised to see Steve come over, but quickly went back to the angered demeanor of a moment ago.

“Your daughter tried to hurt my son.”

This woman was not going to convince Steve of that even if she somehow managed to record it on camera.

“What did your son do?”

“I beg your pardon! He didn’t do anything except try to take a turn on the slide.”

“Right.” Steve looked at Eddie, who gave a small shake of his head, then down at Hannah who did the same. “My sources seem to remember things differently.”

“Ma, he said I was too fat and then tried to pull me away!” Hannah was getting more upset now, not because she was in trouble, but because it was interrupting her playtime.

“Which one is your son?” Steve asked.

Oh no. That was the bitchy tone.

Eddie loved where this was going.

“The one getting off the slide,” the woman pointed, but immediately tried to start arguing. “She had no right to push him no matter what he may or may not have said.”

“The kid who is currently pushing another girl out of his way?”

The woman looked over and gritted her teeth together.

“Daddy, Ma, he’s mean!” Lucy yelled as she held Hannah’s hand.

“Yes, baby, he is being mean. That’s why we taught you and your sister to stand up for yourselves when someone is bullying you,” Eddie said pointedly.

“Kids like that grow up to be mean adults who don’t have friends and raise their own kids to be mean,” Steve added with a glare at the mom.

“We all have to take turns on the slide,” Hannah nodded in agreement.

“Ma! Ma! Swing again!” Lucy suddenly yelled, totally over the way this conversation was taking away from her valuable swinging time.

“Sure, baby.” Steve turned to the seething woman in front of them. “Are we done here or do I have to go on about how your son is going to peak in high school just like you did?”

She stormed off without another word, no match for Steve when he was in Mama Bear Mode.

It was so fucking hot.

Steve sighed.

“I’m proud of you Hannah Banana. You okay?” Steve knelt down so he was eye level with her, and pulled her into a hug.

“Can we go to another park, Ma?”

“Sorry, baby, this is the only one here. We can go back to Papa Wayne’s house, though.”

“Can I swing with Lucy?” Hannah asked.

“Of course. How about we swing for another ten minutes and then we get some ice cream?”

Eddie perked up at that.

“Ice cream!”

“You’re worse than the children,” Steve smirked at Eddie.

“Ice cream!” Lucy yelled.

“Can I have strawberry?” Hannah asked excitedly.

“Sure,” Steve ruffled her hair. “Strawberry’s my favorite, too.”

“Brownie!” Lucy yelled, eyes wide.

“That’s my girl! We’ll get brownie ice cream,” Eddie said as he lifted her up into his arms and walked her over to the swings.

The rest of the afternoon was uneventful, which is exactly how they liked it.

[natolesims]

OC Deep Dive Questionnaire Tag

Thank you for the tag @windslar!! Our favourite blonde is going to be in the eye of the hurricane for the next days, so let's get to get to know Lottie a bit better :D

1. What uncommon/common fear do they have?

She's afraid of thunderstorms! And also, death. She lost her mom at a very young age, so an early demise is something Lottie feels uneasy about.

2. Do they have any pet peeves?

People who talk too much about themselves. Ironic, huh?

3. What are 3 items you can find in their bedroom?

Expensive perfume bottles, at least one bouquet of fresh flowers and a manicure set.

4. What do they notice first in a person?

Their general hygiene. Lottie won't judge you about your clothing and style (maybe a little), but uneccesary messiness? Bad smells? Dirty teeth? Ew, no thanks.

5. On a scale of 1 to 10, how high is their pain tolerance?

Oh no, a complete 0. She'll cry rivers for the smallest, non-visible scratch anytime. She's a terrible patient whenever she's really hurt or sick.

6. Do they go into fight or flight mode when under pressure?

Lottie will choose violence whenever she feels the lightest pressure on her glamourous and delicate self, thank you very much.

7. Do they come from a big family/are they a family person?

No and yes! Her family has been always her and her dad since she was a toddler, and she always grew apart from other relatives or acquaitances. On the other hand, being close to Tiana made Lottie become included by the whole White bunch in their chaotic family antics, what shaped her into a a very familiar person. That's one of the main reasons she would love to have a big family of her own!

8. What animal represents them best?

A very much spoiled angora cat, of course.

9. What is a smell that they dislike?

Artificial strawberry, specially on cosmetics.

10. Have they broken any bones?

Nope! And let's hope things stay that way!

11. How would a stranger likely describe them?

It would depend on her mood, since she can be your best friend or ignore you completely if she feels like it. In general, people often say she's elegant, well-educated, pretentious and too loud.

12. Are they a night owl or a morning bird?

Her? A night owl? She won't interrupt her beauty sleep even if her life depends on it. Lottie prefers to wake up early and get things done with a freshly rested face.

13. What is a flavor they hate and a flavor they love?

Hate: coconut / Love: vanilla!

14. Do they have any hobbies?

I don't know if it counts as a hobby, but wellness is her main thing. From doing yoga and meditating to research crystal properties, Lottie is very passionate about it!

15. Boom, surprise birthday party!How do they react to surprises?

Oh, she LOVES surprises! Only if they reach her standards, what's a bit troublesome. But anything that makes her feel like the main character is a yes, thank you.

16. Do they like to wear jewelry?

It's not a preference, it's a sport. And she's the national champion.

17. Do they have neat or messy handwriting?

Of course it's neat! She wouldn't dare to leave elegant handwritten and scented notes to people with an horrendous one. Fun fact: she even took calligraphy classes to improve her style at some point.

18. What are two emotions they feel the most?

Flirty (of course) and confident (of course x2).

19. Do they have a favorite fabric?

Silk! So fresh, smooth and flattering. And expensive, as usual.

20. What kind of accent do they have?

US English, rich girl edition.

I tag @payte @goldoradove @samssims @pixel-bloom @zosa95 @akitasimblr @duusheen @marcishaun @nitrozem @micrathene-w and @bakersimmer! Feel free to ignoreee

[danganronpasurvivoraskblog]

Number 5, roast celes and junko

Ah! An easy one!

Taka, wait. Before you do this, remember, the challenge is specifically to "roast" them.

Not lecture the open air about their behavior, to insult them in a hilarious way, and NOT hold back. You got it?

I will do my best.

Alright! Junko, self-proclaimed queen of despair, but let’s be honest, her sense of fashion is as chaotic as your personality. Is she trying to be a model, or a walking wardrobe malfunction? I can’t tell.

She thinks being unpredictable makes ger interesting, but honestly, it’s just exhausting. Half the time, I can’t tell if she's about to monologue about nihilism or suggest we play rock-paper-scissors to the death. She needs to pick a damn lane!

Yeah! You tell 'em!

Do Celeste next! Celeste!

Ah, right, Celestia Ludenberg...no, wait, that’s not her real name, is it!? Her entire identity is faker than that stupid French accent! I’ve seen better lies from toddlers caught with cookie crumbs on their faces.

She thinks she's so elegant and refined, but all that Gothic Lolita styling can’t hide the fact that she'd sell out anyone in her little puddle of terrorists the moment it benefitted her. She calls it pragmatism, but I call it being about as trustworthy as a politician during election season!

*Everybody applauds Taka as he sits back down.

Hoo...Feels like I needed to get that off my chest...

Well fucking done bro!

Yeah, I honestly didn't think you'd have it in you.

It wasn't that difficult. They're both utterly deplorable that it's hard to run out of mean-spirited things to say about them.

[geekthefreakout]

Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves was great, y'all: A Review

Spoiler Free: This movie was utterly sincere, and that was refreshing as anything. No meta-humor, no self-referential nonsense that would make it feel like it was embarrassed to be what it was. The characters were great and stand-out. The party as a whole struck the perfect balance that made it feel as chaotic as an actual DnD campaign would be. The humor hits pretty much all of the time, with several laugh-out-loud moments and many more little chuckles and smiles.

The story is simple, but feels true to a campaign as well. You have the main quest and the side quests. The rules around magic are fairly well defined. Their are a couple of elements regarding character arcs and story that could have been tweaked or added in that might have made it feel more complete or satisfying, but nothing huge. I found it to be emotionally satisfying, at the very least.

You can tell that there was a lot of love put into this movie. The cast are all having the time of their lives, and it's important (to me) to note that the VFX team never skimp on any character/species detail. The halflings are appropriately proportioned to the world and people around them. The tiefling (though a little tame looking for a tiefling) maintains having a tail in every scene, without them making a big deal about the fact that she has one.

This is a great movie for DnD fans. If you are not familiar with Dungeons and Dragons or TTRPGs in general, however, I still don't feel you will be missing much. It's an adventure fantasy, and a very accessible one at that, with found family and the power of self-respect and love driving its core.

8.5/10 for me.

Spoilers under the cut- and it's LONG, so be ready for that.

SPOILER TIME BABYYYYYY. This will be a breakdown of the movie's plot with my own insights- sometimes I will use DnD terminology as in my head I was imagining each roll of the dice. Scroll down to the end if you just want to see what I would have changed about the movie.

The way we are introduced to our two primary main characters, Edgin and Holga, is very fun. We meet them in a prison as they acquire a burly new cellmate, who they each deal with in ways that make it very clear who and what they are- Edgin being a smooth-talking, rakish Bard with a devil-may-care attitude, and Holga is a blunt yet loyal Barbarian with a love of potatoes who was exiled from her clan for falling in love with an outsider. We quickly segue into their escape from prison at their pardon-hearing, where we get to learn their back story: Edgin was once an honorable man and a Harper (an order who fights against evil while asking for nothing in return) who lost his wife to a Red Wizard attack and decided to cast aside his oath and honor both to become a thief.

He has a daughter who survived that attack, and Holga has helped him to raise her. Refreshingly, there is absolutely zero sexual or romantic tension between Edgin and Holga, who he refers to explicitly as being like a sister to him. They wound up in jail when on a quest to rob a vault which contained a Tablet of Reawakening, which Edgin planned to use to return his wife to life. They were betrayed by the witch Sofina (played with maximum menace by Daisy Head), who captured them in a time stop. Edgin entrusted the tablet and care of his daughter to his friend and party-member, Forge the rogue and con.

They escape on the wings of an unfortunate judge named Jonathan, who is an Aarakorca, despite the fact that Edgin totally passed the charisma check and the panel of judges were actually swayed to approve the pardon. This is when I knew I would love this movie.

Holga and Edgin set out to reunite with Kira (Chloe Coleman, who does great but is noticeably much lighter skinned than the actresses who played her as a baby and toddler), Edgin's daughter. Their daughter, really. They find her with Forge (played with delightful charm and sliminess by Hugh Grant), who has risen to become Lord of Neverwinter. She is angry with Edgin for abandoning her, because it turns out the Forge has been feeding her quite a different story for what the primary objective of that fateful quest was: she thinks they went after a Tablet of Riches. Edwig tries to explain himself, but Kira (who is happy enough to see Holga, at least) won't listen, saying that the bigger problem is that Edwig keeps speaking like it wasn't his fault. Forge, still in league with Sofina, has betrayed them, and secretly sends them to be executed, at which point Holga does that which Barbarians do so well and they escape, now with a new mission: to take down Forge and Sofina and rescue Kira from their clutches.

They set out to build their party, first picking up their friend Simon the Sorcerer (played adorably by Justice Smith), a half-elf whose self-doubt and bumbling ways often inhibit his ability to do more than cantrips reliably. He was also betrayed by Forge, but managed to escape and has been in hiding. He helps lead them to their next party member, a Tiefling Druid named Doric (awesome job, Sophia Lillis), who is also a wildshape. She distrusts humans, who have always let her down, but is loyal to the wood elves who took her in and whose lands have been under attack by Forge. Simon explains that he had once attempted to court her, but she said that his lack of self-esteem just made her sad. Thankfully, this romantic subplot, should it count as that, takes up very little space in the narrative, which is part of why it works so well.

Using Doric's wildshape abilities, they are able to learn that Forge has revived a kind of gladiatorial game intended to bring the city (and the city's riches) together, and that the vault which presumably holds the Tablet of Reawakening is protected by magic that is far too powerful for Simon to counter without the Helm of Disjunction. We also get more glimpses of Sofina's power here- she is able to sense Doric and nearly captures and kills her on a fast-paced chase through the city where Doric changes from fly to mouse to cat to bird to deer in order to escape. Finally, the viewers get to see (though the party doesn't) that Sofina isn't just a witch- she is a Red Wizard and Thayan too, and she plans to turn Neverwinter's people into members of the Red Wizard's undead army.

Simon doesn't think think that taking down Sofina is possible, as he wasn't able to match her magic before and doesn't feel that he's improved. He insists that magic cannot be used to solve every problem, his own magic least of all. Attuning to the Helm alone might take them years, even if they do manage to find it. Edwig insists that Simon is underestimating himself, and advises him not to tell the party of his doubts to keep up morale.

After an amusing diversion to Holga's ex-husband, Marlamin the Halfling (played by Bradley Cooper) and then to a sacred burial ground of her people to discover the fate of the Helm (DnD magic rules are used to great effect here), the party learns that they must seek out a Thayan named Xenk Yendar (played by a hilariously sincere and smoking hot Rege-Jean Page), a renowned Paladin that everyone except a disgruntled Edgin has heard of. Xenk runs a vibe check on Edgin, and apparently detects a Good alignment. He agrees to help them get the Helm, on the condition that Edgin swears to redistribute the wealth in Forge's vault to the people of Neverwinter and that he holds on to the Harper book- a book which Edgin had thrown onto his wife's funeral pyre after he forsook his vows as one. "You may have forsaken your oath, but your oath has not forsaken you." Xenk says to a stubborn Edgin.

We also learn that Xenk escaped the Red Wizard's take over of the Thayan's by the skin of his teeth as a child and lost his parents to it. This flashback helps the viewer (and the party, though they don't quite figure it out until later) what Sofina is planning for Neverwinter- releasing the red blight of death (honestly I cannot remember the real name, but it's an evil red cloud that turns people into red wizard zombies). We see here that the Blight has an area of effect, and that managing to get just outside of it is what saved Xenk from his parents' fate.

While retrieving the Helm, the party runs in with Sofina's cronies. Xenk takes them out in a fantastic display of badassery, but it cannot last long- it takes more power than what Xenk has to kill that which is already dead, and they begin to rise. However, they quickly cease being the primary threat, as their chaos has awoken a dragon. Hilariously, this is not the dragon seen in so much of the promotional material, but rather a very pudgy one, who still manages to wreak quite a bit of destruction with its large body and fire breath. Here we get to see some uses of the Hither-Thither staff, which Holga had believed was a walking stick she'd taken for her ex-husband. It allows Simon to open portals, as long as the destination is within 500 meters and a place that he can see. Edgin's brains are put to good use as well, as the party escapes the dragon with the helm.

At this point, Xenk leaves the party despite many requests for him to stay because he is much more capable than they are, telling them that it is not his quest, but theirs. There is a very funny moment as they watch him walk away, where Edgin notes that he walks in an unnaturally straight line and wonders if he will alter it to go around a rock in his path. He doesn't- he walks straight over the rock. That's paladin symbolism for you. Simon attempts to attune to the Helm while the party takes a break on the beach, but finds he is consistently repelled by a vision of his ancestor, who was a great Wizard and tells Simon that he is not worthy of wielding the helm's power. Edgin urges him to keep trying, but after several attempts where the Helm literally blasts itself off of him, Simon turns on Edgin and rants that he told him from the outset that he couldn't do it and that it wouldn't work, but Edgin refused to listen, and that Edgin is doing what he always does- making plans that don't work and then blaming other people for it. While Holga takes this in stride, Doric and Simon are both very angry. I was afraid for a moment that this would be one of those times where they split the party for Drama, a trope that I *hate*... but I needn't have worried.

Edgin then makes a compelling speech about how they are all failing in some way, and that they have to keep failing, because the moment that they fail and give up is when they really fail. He gives several examples about the rest of the party, and when Simon presses him about his own failures, he calls himself the King of Failures. He's failed as a father, as a husband, as a leader. He reveals that the Red Wizards that killed his wife were only able to find her because of a treasure he took while he was a Harper, not knowing that the treasures had tracking spells on them. It was his fault that his wife was killed in the first place. But Edgin can't give up, he says, because if he does then it will have all been for nothing. He then sits down to think of a new plan. Charisma check passes, because the party rallies behind him.

The party plans to use the Hither-Thither staff to get into the vault, figuring that if they leave a portal open on a piece of treasure, it will go into the vault and they will be able to get in that way. Edgin also suggests that they take the Helm as well and that Simon try again, saying that he actually does believe Simon can do it, because when it's do or die he always comes through. "You're at your strongest when you think you're at your weakest" he tells Simon.

They get into the citadel with a great scene wherein Edgin seems to distract the guards with a song on his lute- an excellent use of your bard and a chance for Chris Pine to show off his vocal charming chops. It turns out to be an illusion cast by Simon, however, who looses hold of it as he gets his foot stuck in a pothole. The way the illusion starts to skip like a broken record and then distort in disturbingly cartoonish ways is done very well by the actors and the VFX team, and certainly got a laugh in the theater.

After running through Plan C (which is the same as Plan A, but plan A has a stink on it) and Plan D (the same as plan B, but plan B has a stink on it), the party almost succeeds, but Sofina and Forge outwit them. Anyone who has ever played DnD or any TTRPG for that matter will be very familiar with how these plans come together, fall apart, and then come together again. The portal doesn't let Doric into the vault, but under the arena, where the treasures are being loaded onto a boat. She is knocked out and captured.

Simon manages to get to the vault and, faced with death should he fail, he puts on the helm and stands up to the vision of his ancestor, saying that he IS worthy of the power and he's sick of being told he is not. The vision turns into one of Simon himself and congratulates him- he has attuned successfully. He uses the Helm to cancel out the magic on the vault and to repel the guards attacking him, only to find that the vault is empty. He and Holga are captured.

Edgin finds Kira and explains to her that Forge has been lying, that he wants her to come away with him. He makes a pretty perfect apology, acknowledging that the Tablet of Reawakening was about getting back his wife rather than Kira's mom, as Kira had never known her. Unfortunately, this apology is wasted, as he is actually talking to a disguised Sofina, who captures him. Forge assures him that Kira is safe and will continue to be, as Forge really does care for her as if she were his own, but that Edgin has to die. Edgin asks that rather than being executed, the party be allowed to participate in the games that will be beginning shortly, to give them a chance. Forge is reluctant, saying that it would be kinder to just kill them now, but Sofina insists on granting that request, presumably so that she can take them into her undead army when she unleashes the blight.

The party enters the maze in the arena where the games are taking place, with Simon and Doric inhibited by magic-suppressing cuffs. They face monsters and other traps, but with each of them playing to their strengths and with Doric managing to lose her cuff, they make it to the center. Edgin finally makes a successful Detect Trap and recognizes that they won't be safe there, and Doric is able to get them out with some clever shape shifting and modest risk taking.

Combining their information, the party realizes both what Sofina is planning and what Forge is planning. Forge doesn't intend to stay in Neverwinter- he plans to let Sofina do her evil thing while he makes off with Kira and the treasure, which is why it was stored at the docks under the arena rather than in the vault. Interestingly enough, Sofina is completely aware of this, but has no interest in stopping him. In fact, she is so annoyed by him that she just wants him to get on his boat and leave. This is a rare example of two villains who have completely different motivations and goals, but whose plans align just enough to have them work together. There is no betrayal between them-- they each act exactly as the other expects them to, and they aren't bothered by it. The only problem is that it leads to there being two climaxes, and one is more rushed than the other.

The party is able to stop Forge at his boat, where he immediately threatens Kira's life if the party doesn't give him his treasure. This speeds Kira along to realizing that he has been the bad guy and to forgiving her father. They overpower Forge and seem to be making a getaway when they notice the signs of Sofina beginning the Blight. Edgin remembers his promise to Xenk, and has Simon use the Hither-Thither spell to send all the treasure on the boat to come spilling out of a hot air balloon, thus redistributing it to the people and sending the citizens of Neverwinter out of the arena to catch the falling treasure, and therefore outside of the Blight's area of effect. Forge regains access to the boat just in time to see all of his loot falling away from it, leaving him in despair.

That's the first climax, and at this point everyone's character arcs are mostly resolved. Simon is more confident, Kira is happy to be with Holga and Edgin again, and Edgin kept his promise. They have thwarted Sofina's plans. But, Sofina's still alive and kicking and we haven't had that boss battle yet, so time for Climax #2!

As Sofina rages, Edgin tells Kira to use a pendant that Holga had stolen for her when she was younger to stay invisible, hidden, and safe during the fight. Sofina rains fire down on the party, but Simon has Taken a Level in Badass and is able to match her for a short time. Doric transforms into an Owlbear to act as the Hulk of the group, and Holga proves herself proficient with several weapons. Edgin, who isn't much of a fighter, does get a few hits in with his lute (love that for him, though). It's a fast-paced fight, with every member of the party contributing, and which thankfully DOESN'T adhere to DnD rules (combat system not good for narrative storytelling). However, Sofina goes down pretty easily. For just a moment, it looks like all is lost as Sofina uses her time-stop, which Simon says he is still unable to counter... except it's all fine. Kira (little rogue in training that she is), manages to slap a magic-suppressing cuff onto Sofina while she's invisible, because as it turns out Simon WAS able to counter the time-stop. Owlbear!Doric then Hulksmashes Sofina to death (I murmured "puny god" to myself in the theater) and the day is saved... except that Holga has been mortally wounded.

If you're like my brother and I, you probably called back when they first confirmed that the Tablet of Reawakening still existed that one of the party was going to die and that they would use the Tablet (one use only) on that party member rather than on Edgin's wife. You might have even called it being Holga, which I did around the time that she mentions having dreamed of being buried in a sacred burial ground with her tribesmen, despite having been exiled. It's very predictable- but that's not always a bad thing.

Edgin and Holga sing a drinking song as she dies, with Kira sobbing and holding her, saying that she needs her. Holga tells them not to mourn, because she's happy to die a hero- that's her character arc, minimal though it has been. Edgin pulls out the tablet and reminds his daughter that they can only use it once- and of course she nods, because to her Holga is the mother she's known. The tablet returns her to life, and everyone is happy and it's very heartwarming.

From there, it's a quick wrap-up. The former Lord of Neverwinter, who was kept in a coma by Sofina, wakes up and grants legal protection to Doric's people and their lands. The party all receive medals. Doric acknowledges that humans are not all bad, and also agrees to let Simon have another shot at courting her now that he's got more confidence. Forge, holding on to the one piece of treasure he hadn't lost, is captured by Xenk, and we end on him trying to convince the same judges at the same prison Edgin and Holga were at in the beginning that all turned out for the best, and he's done a lot of reflection and so should really be pardoned.

He does NOT pass the charisma check. And that's it, really, aside from a funny mid-credits tag.

So, I think I went over most of the things that I loved already. Here is WHAT I WOULD CHANGE:

I think Forge turning on Kira happened very quickly and didn't fully make sense, outside of being a vehicle for getting her to trust her dad again very quickly. I would have preferred for Kira to be more of a character with more agency. To this end, I would have had her use her invisibility pendant (which she has the whole time and says that she often uses to sneak around the castle) earlier. She could have realized that Sofina was a Red Wizard, or overheard some pieces of the puzzle that may not have clarified everything for her, but at least sewn the seeds of doubt. That, or had her flat out not believe that Holga and Edgin would leave her a second time, even if she is still angry at Edgin.

I might also try and consolidate the climaxes a bit more- while I think Forge was a fun villain, thwarting him and Sofina so separately makes the fight with Sofina seem a little extraneous, though the movie's fast pacing helps with this.

Doric is mostly a static character- she's a lot of fun and I enjoy her, but she doesn't really have much of an arc. She has a goal when she joins the party, and at the end of the movie that goal is achieved.

Holga's arc gets less attention than it should- she doesn't really change throughout the movie either. I would have liked to see either someone for her tribe or her ex-husband there at the end when everyone was getting their awards, so that she could have made good on showing them what she was worth. (That said, I thought it was great that there weren't any bad feelings between her and Marlamin, who has moved on from her but genuinely wishes her happiness).

Finally, my brother noted (though I myself didn't really have this problem) that Simon's Badass Level Up at the 11th hour felt disengenous, because it's one thing to say that he has trouble with big magic because of his poor self-esteem, and quite another for him to suddenly be able to match Sofina's might. His spells are not as impressive as hers, but he does hold his own, with the party also serving as distractions to her.

And... that's the review. Hope you liked it.

[theflyindutchwoman]

Oh also… follow up to my last chaotic unhinged ask.

How many kids do we think they’ll have one day? I don’t remember where the 3 came from but everyone seems to think they’ll have 3.

And Tim gives off such Girl Dad™️ vibes. Imagine him being such a sweet dad to them, wearing a crown for their tea parties but also teaching them self defense and making sure they get to do whatever they want. 😭

I kinda HC they have 3, two girls and a boy. Tim coaches all their sports 😂 softball, baseball.

What do you think?

I'm not 100% sure, but I think that the number 3 came from Tim's original plans : 'pop out three kids, watch them grow up, have kids of their own' (4.05).

You know, I don't really have a preference in that regard… As much as I love the idea of Lucy and Tim having kids, I'm also in no hurry to see it happen - especially since we already have two babies and a toddler on the show. This may be an unpopular opinion, but for the moment, I'm more interested in watching them build a life together, settle in their career a little, maybe travel… and simply enjoy their time just the two of them (or four of them, with Tamara and Kojo). So as a result, I never really thought much about the details, like how many children, etc… I just enjoy reading fics and the different headcanons people have.

Although I have to admit that I was always partial to the idea of Lucy and Tim adopting a child/teenager (besides Tamara). And I can totally picture them coaching their kids' teams, with Lucy still being her competitive self… I also would love for her to tell them bedtime stories in Cantonese… Tim would definitely be a Girl Dad (and if she's a mini-Lucy, it's over for him)… And they would be so supportive, making sure that their kids know how much they are loved!

I'm sorry, I feel like I didn't really answer your question. But I'm curious to read everybody's headcanons!

[tryslora]

Self Help & Writing Advice

I don’t like self-help books. Which means I often don’t like writing advice books.

Which sucks because I really want to like both of them. I am positive there are things I could learn from them.

I understand that a lot of this is my own personal psychology. If I’m reading a book about how to fix a Thing (that I do, or lack, or whatever), then my handling of that Thing must be broken. Therefore, I am broken. And hearing about how I am doing something Wrong (and how I should be doing it instead) feels accusatory.

Yeah, I know. It’s not. I fully recognize that that is not the intention of the writers of these books.

But at the same time, it’s very easy to internalize case studies of bad practice as “well, if you do this, you are a bad person” and promptly fall into a guilt spiral. Or the “but I can’t do it right” spiral or the “but I tried it your way and it didn’t work” spiral. 

Those are a lot of negative spirals, and I think I’ve been in all of them at one time or another. The most recent one I tried was talking about how to accept interruptions with grace because some things are more important than productivity. True! But at the same time, I look back on my own frustrations—and the clash between available time and the ability obtain focus in the first place—and how I handled them when my kids were small… and yep, there’s the spiral sucking me down.

The best way out of this is to push myself out of my comfort zone. To stop the reaction where I dig in my heels, yell “NO!” really loudly, like a toddler, and refuse to listen.

I try this, sometimes. Or at least, I do my damnedest to internalize the good advice. Especially where writing is concerned. But sometimes with writing advice, it feels very much like… if a writer doesn’t do things in the way people say, they’ll never make it. 

So instead, I try to take what works. 

I acknowledge that some of it isn’t for me. Write every day at the same time in the same place? Hah, yeah, no. My life is way too chaotic for that. For the last two weeks I’ve been trying to scrape together 30 minutes of focus a day, and sometimes that’s spread out over three 10 minute quickie sessions of getting information or doing something quickly. Jotting notes. Creating a space. Doing ten minutes of research. I’m working on the every day, but at the same time, I’m giving myself grace to recognize that it doesn’t always work that way.

Editing advice, and story structure advice, in particular kind of kill my brain. I’ve started planning some things, but doing analysis on my own work reminds me of being in high school. Sure, something might be symbolic, but it was probably my subconscious that came up with it, not something I planned consciously. And yes, analyzing that might be helpful, but I struggle to DO it, and again… spiral. Whoops.

Anyway. There was a point here.

The point is—not all advice is for everyone.

And that’s really important to learn. Figure out what helps you and what doesn’t. Figure out what triggers you into a spiral, and what helps lift you up to be more productive. Adapt. Adjust. Move forward.

Side note here, let me call out a couple of books that DID work for me (see, there are a few).

On the self-help side, I loved How to Keep House While Drowning: A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing by KC Davis. I probably liked it in part because it came from the point of view of depression and ADHD. I definitely liked it in part because it wrapped around things I already do, and expanded on those.

On the writing advice side, Steering the Craft by Ursula K. Le Guin was a good book. I didn’t do all the exercises (something else I struggle with—I am hunting for the perfect journal prompt book) but I very much enjoyed how she approached writing in her examples.

I’m still looking for good books. My frustration hasn’t stopped me from signing up for giveaways on Goodreads when I see something that sounds like it might work for my brain. It hasn’t stopped me from borrowing a book from the library based on a recommendation from a friend (and yes, I buy the ones that work for me).

I’m definitely interested in recommendations, too. As long as no one is insulted when something doesn’t work with my brain.

[natelia-aldelliz]

With your Toddler AU, I love the idea that once Ghost is back to his normal self Mama MacTavish starts sending him all of the skeleton punk stuff she can find. Like she knows people that make the best quality stuff and has it made especially for him. He doesn't plan on wearing the skeleton pajamas because that's a bit much... but the fabric feels so good against his skin and it has matching skeletal feet socks and it was a gift and... yeah he's going to wear it. (Soap and Roach absolutely make sure mom gets a picture of him wearing them.)

Simon is definitely going to be her little angel forever, child or adult. He's very embarrassed by that externally, but it makes him very warm inside.

She looks at all her and her husband's old stuff, then back up at mister 6'4'' like "ok, that might be a little small for you"

Ooh what if the skeleton pyjamas glow slightly in the dark and it acts like a nightlight, and he's never going to admit it but he's still scared of the dark (not really when he's awake, just the idea of being asleep and defenseless in the dark) (and she knew bc he was terrified of the dark when he was a child)

(She also loves Roach, bc she was the same kind of chaotic when she was a child, but Simon is definitely her favourite. Like even out of her biological kids lmao)

[jirachoochooo-sims]

Generation 10: Blue

Sapphire Berry[Werewolf]: Perfectionist, Romantic, Family Oriented

Nikko Berry: Good, Foodie, Romantic

Hunter Price-Soo: Noncommittal, Self Assured, Romantic

Snow Berry[Dormant Werewolf]: Perfectionist,Music Lover

Cloud Berry[Werewolf]: Self Assured, Foodie

Luna Berry[Dormant Werewolf]: Music Lover

Opal Berry[Werewolf]: Cheerful

Dove Berry[Dormant Werewolf]: Clingy(Little Singer, Loves being Held, Hates Wake Up Time)

Angel Berry[Werewolf]: Angelic(Hates being Held, Little Singer, Messy Eater)

— — — — —

Sapphire Berry is complicated woman who has it all. Having graduated high school early she entered university with a full ride to get a distinguished degree in the Culinary Arts. She maintained straight As in university all while being in a committed relationship with her neighbor, turned boyfriend Nikko…and her other boyfriend, Hunter. She always knew Nikko was the one for her, but in before she graduated early she met Hunter and the 2 instantly clicked. What started as a one time fling turned into an almost everyday hookup. Eventually Sapphire graduated and quickly became engaged to Nikko. They got married and Sapphire, being a creature of habit, went for her usual hook up with Hunter. However this hookup would be the one to get her pregnant with her twins, Snow and Cloud. Despite having the being busy with the twins and and other little ones, Sapphire managed to have and maintain a successful career as a Critic. She quickly rose through the ranks and became the top of her career thanks to max level in Cooking, Writing, and Gourmet Cooking. Despite how complicated her relationships are she’s incredibly happy with both her husband and long term boyfriend. She loves being a mom and is excited to have her family grow.

Nikko is a bit down on his luck at the moment. He’s burnt out from his job as a chef and he constantly feels like he’s dropping the ball as a dad. And although he is incredibly proud of his wife for achieving a high status at her job, he does feel a bit embarrassed that he’s stagnant at his job. On top of all that, he’s having a hard time connecting to his kids. He wants to be the best dad he can be but that seems to be increasingly more difficult when his kids won’t even call him dad. His wife reassures him that it’s just because they’re still young and learning, but it’s incredibly disheartening to him. Still he’s trying his best to be an amazing father and husband to his amazing wife.

Hunter doesn’t know what he wants out of life. He comes from rich parents and a big family. Growing up whenever he asked his parents for something, he got it no hesitation. And that was all fine and dandy until Sapphire told him she was pregnant with his twins. Having originally planned living off his parents money, he now had to face the reality of fatherhood and providing for his kids. Currently he’s between jobs and is trying to find his true passion in life. Whenever Nikko is away at work, Sapphire will call him over to spend time with the kids. Hunter is fully aware of the complicated situationship he’s in with Sapphire (and in turn her husband without him knowing), but honestly it doesn’t bother him at all. Being Non-Committal he’s fully content with being a long time boyfriend and father to his kids. He never thought he would enjoy fatherhood as much as he has been, but he loves spending any time he can with his kids. Often time when he comes over he brings gifts for the kids and helps out around the house.

Snow and Cloud are both in their chaotic toddler phase. Constantly running around and making messes is what they’re best at. Whenever Hunter comes and visits Snow is basically is his shadow. She is a daddy’s girl at her core, and loves spending as much time as she can with him. Recently she has gotten into reading books to her dad and baby sisters. Cloud on the other hand can’t sit still to save his life. Being a werewolf he already is feeling the effects of his powers despite his age. He constantly is running around and looking through cabinets. Much like his twin sister he loves when his dad comes around. One of his favorite things to do is roughhouse play with him and also have his dad teach him flash cards.

Luna is constantly laughing. She loves spending time with her big brother and sister. Recently she started crawling which spells trouble for her parents. Opal on the other hand is a calm, quiet baby. She’s still getting the hang of sitting and only just recently did she learn to scoot. Both girls like spending time with their older siblings and their mom.

[my-gf-is-kazuichi-soda]

Kind of a drabble about adding Miu to my romantic f/os

I've never been so indecisive about adding a (romantic) f/o.

like. I even used to selfship with Wario (even though I never blogged about it. that was one of my earliest selfships).

but...

like...

nggh! on the one hand, Miu is mean, and gross. on the other hand, she's lonely and self-destructive, and I want to make sure she's alright. she's already our friend that we check up on a lot, and got Mikan and Shuichi and Kaede to check up on her too, and we all ended up peer pressuring her to stop turning to drugs or other self-destructive tendencies because she couldn't stop picturing our "sad little faces" (I was touched when Kaz told me she said that. I hadn't asked her to stop doing drugs, the topic makes me feel too awkward, but the others had and I guess with how worried we all were about her, it made her want to work on herself.) But she still seems lonely, and also jealous of a lot of her friends dating each other, especially me and Kaz and Tenko.

so uh, maybe we could fix her with kisses.

(or maybe she'd make us worse? lol)

also, the chaotic potential of adding Miu to the group is hilarious. (in hindsight, the anon that asked me about adding Toko to the group was almost prophesizing 👀).

I've...already got headcanons for her with our kids... I think I trapped myself with this...

like, of all the things to push me to this brink...

(this is so random) have you ever seen Defunctland: The Awful Wiggles Dark Ride?

I found myself thinking about me, Kaz, and Tenko bringing our three kids when they're all still little on this ride (let's pretend it's still in operation, or maybe it got abandoned but it's still there and Kazuichi could get it in working order. So could Miu tbh.)

I couldn't picture us riding this without Miu there as well. We would all enjoy it, mostly because of the kids (I feel like Miu would have the most childlike wonder about it and Kazuichi would still be rambling about the technical stuff an hour later. Especially if it was the broken version where the tvs or rooms would be on/off at the wrong times. Tenko would be the least likely to enjoy the ride itself (which is like me as well, but I've at least got a little nostalgia for the Wiggles), but she's got an excited toddler bouncing on her lap, so she's pretty focused on that.

So after imagining that, I ended up coming up with headcanons about Miu with our kids.

When the first baby (Ren) is born, Miu is the clingiest out of all of us to this baby and keeps saying they're "the spittin' image of me!" (meaning herself). This is false, the baby's bio parents are me and Kaz and they very much look like a combination of us two. Still, we know this is Miu's way of saying she adores this baby. We're not worried about her being unhealthily attached though; she's still pretty busy with invention ideas and always hands the baby back to one of us when she needs to go work on those, or when we ask her to (but only me, Kaz, and Tenko. She glares at anyone else who asks to hold the baby, lol.)

(Pregnancy, and specifically fictional trans woman pregnancy mentioned in next paragraph. Not sure if anyone needs that as a trigger warning, but just in case. I know pregnancy in general can bring up complicated feelings for people).

I was pregnant with the first baby and picked out the name Ren (who later came out as nonbinary). Tenko was pregnant with the second baby, a girl, and picked out the name Aimi. Miu was able to transfer the third pregnancy to herself and become one of the first pregnant trans women in the world (I feel like it is pretty in-character for her to not only try this but end up being successful. Let me dream okay?) She also had a baby girl. We all asked Miu first if she had a name in mind, but Miu didn't want to pick a name and likes most of the names we suggest anyway. Kazuichi picked the name Yoshi. So our kids are Ren, Aimi, and Yoshi.

Not sure when/if I'll draw fanart and write stories for all of this (maybe the Wiggles car ride though), I feel weird about selfshipping with Miu and Tenko even though I'm still writing the fanfic about just me and Kaz (and that fanfic will definitely take a while). But I'm holding myself to ridiculous standards. I can ship with them just because. I also worry about being unfair by focusing on Kazuichi the most, but I know it's okay to have a main f/o.

[agerefandom]

ABC ask game: A, C, and D for Muffet from Undertale?

(no more abc headcanons! just catching up on previous asks <3)

Age- What is their regression age range?

Little baby spider! She's just a little thing. (Her aesthetic is very much baby regression, but she's more of an age dreamer than an age regressor, so she sometimes chooses more toddler/kiddo activities, but still identifies as a baby)

Caregiver- Do they have a caregiver? Do they want one?

I think Muffet is happy by herself, but she would get along well with Shyren ^-^

Difference- What changes about them from being their usual self to regressed self?

She's a little bit more proper when she's regressing! As an adult, she's a very chaotic and creative baker, but when she's little, she does everything juuust right.

[carry-on-my-wayward-hobbit]

I mean it’s kinda been a while since I’ve been properly active on here whoops. But I’ve still but skulking about quietly cultivating my silly little hyperfixations and writing my silly little stories about them and it’s gotten to the point where I may finally have something new to put on AO3 so I figured I would indulge in WIP Wednesday to really put the pressure on.

It has been two years since I’ve posted a fic and this is a Christmas fic so she still has a few months of proofing and fine tuning ahead - but it intends to be very wolfstar turning hallmark movie featuring single-dad/bookstore owner Remus; fancy business Sirius learning to let himself appreciate to little things in life; James being his usual chaotic-Christmas obsessed self; toddle Harry and Teddy being best friends/partners in crime/unintentional matchmakers; and a little side of domestic Jily

It’s strange being back in Hogsmeade. Sirius notes as he makes his way down the winding street, that the small town really hasn’t changed at all since he was last here almost ten years ago. In fact, if anything it somehow seems even smaller and quieter than it was when he used to visit during his high school days. Frankly, he finds it ridiculous that James would ever want to give up the excitement and buzz of city life for a town whose under-fifty population could probably be counted on two hands. And yes, logically it does make sense - Lily started a new job at their old high school in September and it’s probably a good place to raise a kid (not that Sirius knows much about good parenting but he feels like quaint countryside is supposed to be good.) But regardless of that, at the end of the day, Sirius is still just a smidge annoyed that his best friends up and moved to the other end of the country when there are plenty of good schools in London for Lily to teach at and Harry to enrol in.

However, any mild resentment that has quietly brewed over the last couple of months is quickly replaced by excitement when he finally reaches the last cottage at the of the street and pushes open the red garden gate. The front door is open before Sirius if even halfway up the path. There’s a delightful squeal and Sirius barely has time to register what’s happening before a tiny toddler slams into his leg at a speed that no three-year-old should be able to reach.

He leans down to scoop up Harry, lifting him high into the air and holding him above his head. Harry shrieks with glee, making tiny grabby hands at Sirius’ face.

“Hello Hazza, how’s my favourite little Prongslet?” He asks as he gives Harry one more bounce in the air before bringing him down to balance on his hip.

“Pads!” is all Harry has to say with an unwipable grin plastered on his face.

“He’s been watching through the window all day,” another voice calls and Sirius glances up to find Lily leaning up in the open doorway, an equally big smile as her son.

It only takes a few strides for Sirius to make it to the porch and as soon as he’s in arms reach, he pulls Lily into a tight hug. “Hey, Lils,” he says, face pressed into her soft curls. God he’s missed this.

“How was the journey up?” She asks as pulls away from the hug and leads him inside.

He is hot immediately by the warmth and the smell of baking. It immediately reminds him of visiting the Potters over Christmas as a teenager - Effie and Monty had somehow always made him feel more welcome and more at home than he ever did with his actual parents.

“Long,” he says as he shucks his shoes off. It’s a careful balancing act as he refuses to put Harry down. “I can’t believe we used to do that trip multiple times a year without complaint.”

Lily hums in agreement. “I know. Now imagine it that little nightmare,” she says, the last part more of a coo than actual talking and Harry is giggling again as she ruffles his dark hair.

“Aw, you’re not a nightmare, are you Harry?”

“Yeah!” Harry cheers in agreement.

“You wouldn’t disagree after a ten-hour road trip with him.”

Sirius shudders at the thought.

[cl0udpup]

Sibling trauma

TW: addiction, severe mental illness, hospitalization, relational abuse, self-harm, disability

I just got a handful of paragraphs of texts from my estranged sibling. They send me into immediate anxiety every time I hear from or about them.

Everything feels urgent, like an emergency, with them. They exude chaos. They are an addict, and have hurt me badly many times.

Growing up

We were never very close growing up. We had fun as toddlers and elementary school age, but also fought violently.

They expressed their discomforts loudly, required a lot of support from my mom, and most of the family’s energy and attention was focused on them. I had chaotic meltdowns as well, but mostly turned my pain inward and attempted to take care of myself.

Things were relatively calm for them in middle school, while this became a time of deep struggle for me. Again, I kept it all to myself. My mom had no idea I was struggling immensely with self-harm until a friend found out in 8th grade and urged me to tell her. My dad was nowhere to be found during all this other than to yell at me for hurting myself and take my bedroom door off it’s hinges.

Late high school was when we really realized something was going on with them. They did zero self-care like taking showers, grooming, wearing clothes besides pajamas. They were always exhausted, eyes barely open, falling asleep at the dinner table. I found out years later they were actually nodding off from heroin.

It was hard to know how to support them, or even recognize what was going on, because the majority of interaction with them was them destroying shit around the house, screaming at people, being abusive.

I was dealing with severe mental illness, substance use, trouble at school, and with law enforcement, I literally did not have the capacity for even beginning to know how to help.

My parents were way over their heads. They both had severe addiction in their families, and (again, I didn’t realize until much later,) my dad was abusing alcohol as well. My mom is an incredibly naive person who grew up horrendously sheltered and totally unprepared for these types of life challenges. She also doesn’t struggle with mental illness of any kind beyond a bit of anxiety, so this was all fully out of her realm of knowledge.

In our 20′s, I tried to reach out, to be as good an older sibling I could be. I did my best, but I mostly only saw them when they were in crisis. Multiple times I helped them detox at home, urged them to seek help, tried to connect them with resources. They were hardly responsive, and abusive, scary, and exhausting when using.

Things always came to a standstill because ultimately they feel totally powerless, and see themself as a victim of circumstance. There is a strong disconnect when it comes to being able to take any level of responsibility for their health, their life, or quite frankly anything.

Even when I tried to lead by example and share how helpful certain things like therapy and medication have been for me, that I know it’s hard but I’m here to help and it’s worth it to try to have an open mind. I think they weren’t ready to let go of the identity they formed in their mind of being persecuted.

Reconnecting

At the beginning of the pandemic, they got sober, I got sober, and we actually became best friends. I taught them so much, helped them realize things about life, about their identity, how to survive. They were actually able to be receptive to my friendship.

They practically lived with me for about 6 months. We even discussed trying to clear out space for them to move in.

I was SO happy, I felt like I had a real sibling for the first time, like how I thought the bond between siblings was supposed to be. I don't really have family (beyond chosen-family) besides my parents, and my grandma (who just passed away a few weeks ago.)

Then, one day, they decided it would be okay for them to do drugs and drink sometimes. I urged them not to, as they were less than a year into their sobriety. Things were still SO fragile. Instead of taking my advice, or flat out saying they disagree, they lied to me about it, and asked others to lie to me for them. 

Of course, our friends would not in fact lie to me for them. They didn’t realize this, and somehow had the ability to keep a straight face, look me in the eyes, and talk shit. This gave me chills. It makes me feel sick to think about.

Once this began, it called into question every conversation we'd had in the past year. I wondered if all the closeness we shared, and trust we had before had been genuine, or if they were putting on an act then, too.

It hurt so much, but I truly had no idea how bad it was about to get.

Catastrophe

After they started using again, all hell broke loose. They went full on self-destruct, practically overnight. They took every stride they had made in getting their life together, and threw it in the trash. They quit their job, spent all their savings, bailed on their apartment, and isolated all their friends.

My parents and I spent about six months with them at the center of our worlds. They became the only thing any of us were able to think about, focus on, or put energy into.

The three of us, plus my four closest friends (who had recently become their friends) dropped everything to do all we could to support them. We all severely overextended our abilities because we were so worried.

Their response to all our attempts at love, understanding, immeasurable patience, calm, kindness, loyalty, was to be horribly abusive, say the worst, most hurtful things, and honestly make me afraid for my safety. 

It all came to a head when they went to my parents house one day, and refused to leave. When I say refused to leave, I mean they destroyed part of the house, built a barricade to the ceiling, and stayed behind it for weeks.

My mom called me every day crying. We truly thought they were going to die. I was afraid for my parents safety, as my sibling was paranoid, and carrying a knife when leaving the barricade to go to the bathroom. My parents had to stay in a hotel because it was too much.

They were putting weird signs in the window, and I was so afraid a neighbor or passerby was going to call the cops and get my sibling killed killed.

I called every resource I could find in our area. I brought social workers to the house to try to talk to them, called hotlines and handed them the phone, sent them links to online support chats. But they were so manic, they could hardly hold a conversation.

They just screamed, yelled, sobbed, broke things, banged on and tore open the wall, blasted music. It was so overwhelming. We all felt helpless. Obviously they did, too.

Diversion

I realized the only way they were coming out of there was when they made themself sick enough to need medical care. They've had to be hospitalized for alcohol related emergencies before, and sure enough, that's what finally resolved this chapter.

They drank so much, they got violently ill. They called and asked me to drive them to the hospital. We all left work, rushed over, got them in the car, and bolted to the ER.

After dropping them off, I called the inpatient addiction treatment facility I’d been in contact throughout this, and just barely convinced them to try. They informed me they wouldn’t have an opening in the program for about a week, but if my sibling called, they could process the intake over the phone.

With that partially taken care of, I rushed to my parents house to begin cleaning up. As I said, the area they had been barricaded was fucked. When they finally came out that morning before going to the ER, they destroyed the barricade, throwing everything out into the surrounding part of the house.

Broken glass, furniture in pieces, cat litter and food everywhere (they kept their cat in the barricade with them,) piles of trash, and when I went to grab a broom and trashcan, I found the (tall kitchen) trash can full of their vomit.

It was so, so awful. It literally looked like our childhood home had been damaged by a storm. They wrote manic and paranoid rantings all over every inch of the walls with permanent marker. I just cried. I couldn’t look at it, didn’t want to know what kind of things they wrote.

Dissociation took over, and I powered through, separating things I knew they would need, and throwing everything else in garbage bags. I cleaned and cleaned, as fast as possible. It hurt me to deal with, but I couldn’t bare the thought of my parents having to do it.

My mom was a nervous wreck, and my dad, who rarely shows strong emotion beyond anger and irritability, had apparently had a severe panic attack the night before.

I felt it was my responsibility to take care of everyone until I collapsed with exhaustion.

The chaos after

Obviously, this whole experience left me severely burnt out. I had spent most of the last six months totally dissociated, feeling as though it was my role to be the strong and dependable one to my parents and sibling.

I had no idea what a toll it was taking on me.

A few weeks after all this, my health took a nosedive. I’ll save the details for another time, but to make a long story short, I ended up in the ER myself multiple times, in and out of the hospital, countless tests, on a slew of new medications, and a new routine of appointments I had to maintain for the foreseeable future.

After this point, my life as it was before ceased to exist. My entire experience became wholly focused on my health, and dealing with becoming more disabled than ever. I lost the ability to work, to do hobbies, to take care of any responsibilities outside of medical appointments.

This has been my life, from the end of 2021 to now. It’s become impossible to relate to others who aren’t disabled. Just trying to keep in touch and have conversation feels impossible. It’s almost laughable when I’d be asked something like “what are you doing this weekend?” because obviously I’m staying home and trying to survive, just like every other day. Existence becomes a blur. It’s like I’m living in a different world. And there’s so, so, so much grief.

Gaslighting

My sibling stayed in rehab for a month, and seemed to enjoy the experience.

They texted me a few times, talking about themself, their life, what they’re up to. They never asked how I’m doing. They gave one sentence of apology over text (after being prompted to by my mom,) then immediately asked me for a favor.

I just couldn’t. That’s all I can say. There’s nothing there. I’m empty. Totally drained. I’m gone.

I told them I’m happy for them, and gave neutral responses to everything else. They had no sense of reality as to how traumatic this was for everyone. How hurtful the things they said and did were. Just as it’s always been with them, they were ready to just brush it all under the rug as if everything was fine.

This is the exact same kind of gaslighting my abusive ex used to do to me. He was an alcoholic, too, and would get drunk, abuse me, then pretend like nothing happened the next day. It was infuriating, and made me feel totally off balance.I just cannot tolerate ever being treated like that again. That experience in itself fucked me up for four years. I was only less than two years into healing when all this last event with my sibling began. I just can’t deal with it.

I didn’t see them at all after taking them to the hospital, until my family gathered at my grandma’s deathbed a few weeks ago. I wasn’t worried about seeing them, as all I cared about was grandma. I didn’t have the mental space to care about anything else.

Regardless, their presence made me cringe anyway. They walked in, obviously intoxicated, talking about frivolous things about themself while my parents and I were crying and gathered around my unconscious grandma. I tried so hard not to react, but I was so scared they would ruin this moment. The rest of us had been there all day, and it was obvious she was at her final minutes. My sibling stayed briefly, then left the room to “go do something,” and this is when grandma passed.

It reminded me of when I was 20, and our childhood dog started having seizures that wouldn’t stop. I had to make the decision to put him down. My sibling didn’t even spend time with him in his last moments, or come to the animal hospital to say goodbye. I just don’t understand their apparent lack of ability to be there for anyone else.

Now

This morning, they texted me, and I was instantly filled with dread. A couple days ago, they asked if they could stop by as they were in the area. In that moment, I was working, and having mental health struggles of my own. Plus, I have always made it clear to anyone who knows me, I don’t do anything spontaneously. People “just dropping by” has been something I’ve been wildly uncomfortable with my entire life.

I didn’t respond. In my mind, not responding instantly is not only consistent with my communication style, but also how they communicate, too. It takes them days to respond to any texts or calls.

Yet, they apparently took offense to this. They sent accusations of how unfair I was being, how I never gave them a chance, that I was wrong for banning them from ever seeing my dogs again (I’ve never mentioned any rules regarding my dogs whatsoever, although I have had intrusive thoughts about them kidnapping them.)

I’m just so exhausted. I’ve had multiple nightmares about them recently, about them physically hurting and threatening me and my parents. Each time I’ve had one of these dreams, my mom calls me within hours of me waking up, crying because something just happened with my sibling.

I just can’t. It’s damaging my psyche, my body, my life. I’m so sad.