#3.) Medicine (not in a druggie way- in a wanting to know medicine-)

[chronically-ill-psionipath]

List 5 things that make you happy, then put this in the askbox for the last 10 people who liked or reblogged something from you! Get to know your mutuals and followers!

Hmmm 5 things... :0 1.) ALVAR

2.) Reading

3.) Sleeping-

4.) The Neverseen

5.) uhhh... and Chaos >:)

[xmagicxshopx]

Spring Cleaning - Chapter 1

Genre: Fluff, Romance, Comedy Rating: PG Warnings: None at this time Pairing: personal assistant!jungkook x ceo!reader Notes: AU fic. Not idol!jungkook. Single quote marks ‘ ‘ are for thoughts and double “ “ are for talking. Additional Notes: It’s a slow start but trust me, things will get better. ;3 I’ve not proof read this so be warned.

Summary: Your mother built you to be a thriving business machine. However, in her old age, she’s growing soft and wants grand kids to spoil. Your home and yard are a mess due to your busy schedule. So your mother attempts to kill two birds with one stone.

chapter 2

A modest looking SUV slowly rounded the corner till it came to a soft halt in front of a gorgeous looking home. Checker patterned roof sparkled under the sun’s light as did the water from the outdoor pool. The surrounding trees helped keep the beautiful architecture hidden from the public eye. Good thing too because the woman stepping out of the SUV couldn’t help but scoff.

“Really, child?”

Mumbling to herself, the middle aged woman sporting a sundress with matching heels walked along the path that lead to the front door. The walk felt like it was taking forever as she had to endure the sight of overly tall grass and weeds along with trees that desperately needed trimmed. The pool clearly hadn’t been cleaned properly......was that scum in the water???

“Oh, my child......what have I done to you?”

Annoyance turned to guilt as the woman known to all as your mother suddenly started making her walk of shame up to your door. It had been no secret that you were being trained to be the successor of a grand cosmetics company; your mother’s company. Something she had built from the ground up. Something that she was proud of.

However, your mother was growing too old to properly lead the business. Naturally, that left you to take over. And take over you did. Good gravy, how your mother was so proud of you. You took control with no fear and handled yourself wonderfully in the face of struggle. You faced stock market crashes, losses and gains alike. You faced it all and you faced it with grace.

You had been trained well.

A little too well.

In becoming the greatest CEO in the cosmetics industry, you had also became heartless. Nearly void of emotions. Your own feelings were determination and the satisfaction that came with success. Aside from your mother, your only other love was work. Once a child who despised work and only wanted to play......had become a woman of all work and absolutely no play.

And your mother was to blame.

Ringing the doorbell, it came as no surprise to the older woman when you opened the door with a phone stuck to your ear. Phone tucked snugly between your ear and shoulder, you had put a tablet and matching stylus pen in one hand so you could open the door.

“Yes......Yes that’s perfect. Type that up and have it ready for Monday. I’ll have the proposal done in time for you to look it over before the meeting.......Alright. Sounds good. Talk to you later.”

“Working the weekend through, I see.”

You simply ignored your mother’s comment as you hung up the call with your second in command. His name was Jimin and he was amazing at what he did. He was the only other employee you could just to get things done even outside of work hours. He wanted to see this company thrive just as badly as you did. Jimin was in this for more than just the money and that pleased you greatly.

After letting your mother in and shutting the door behind her, you settled for letting out a soft sound of acknowledgement before asking casually while looking down at your tablet,

“Want something to drink, mother?”

“Oh it’s alright, my dear. I can get something myself.”

Receiving nothing but another hum of lazy acknowledgment, your mother sighed as she watched you retreat back to the living room. It was a beautiful, spring filled Saturday and your mother was feeling......things. She had been mulling over her life choices and thinking about what she wanted with this last half of her life. In her younger years, she had thrived just as you were now. But.......things were changing in your mother’s old age.

As your mother rummaged around for a glass to pour herself some water, she noticed your pantry was practically empty. You had more takeout boxes than you did dishes and your stove and oven looked untouched. Half afraid, she opened your refrigerator only to find a few bottles of water, a few condiments, and some left over takeout.

“Oh dear god.”

Quickly closing the door to the fridge and nearly slamming it shut, the older woman had to lean on the kitchen counter to try and collect herself. Her daughter, the beautiful young woman just in the other room, was working herself to death. Cooped up in this huge home void of love. Nothing but work. Work work work work. It was consuming you.

“Honey? Why don’t we head out to the back patio? There are some things I’d like to discuss.”

“Sure. Let me just grab my tablet and----”

“Oh you won’t need the tablet, honey.”

You stared at your mother in confusion with an arched eyebrow. Surly if your mother wanted to talk, notes would need to be taken. Clearing your throat, you spoke up softly but professionally,

“With all due respect, mother, I would like to take notes of the discussion.”

Oh how you were breaking your mother’s heart. You were so blinded and consumed with being a CEO, that you couldn’t even recognize an invitation to a normal, non-work related conversation when it was presented to you. Smiling sadly with what she hoped was apologetic eyes, your mother took both of your hands in her own and spoke softly,

“Come sit with me, my beautiful girl. We need to talk.”

Finally sitting out on the back patio, your mother took note of all the dead potted plants littered throughout the area. Apparently you had attempted to try and brighten up the place at one point. But due to your never ending work schedule, the plants had long been neglected and failed to be watered, resulting in them dying before they even got a chance to live.

Were you going to end up like that? Working your life away before you even got a chance to live? A chance to discover something exciting? Or perhaps.....someone exciting?

“I noticed your yard is looking a little rough around the edges.”

“Ah......Yeah........I need to cut the grass before nightfall. I’m just waiting for the weather to cool down a bit. It’s a lot of grass to cut.”

“Indeed it is.......this place is beautiful but it’s a lot for one person to take care of. Especially when they’re so busy with work. Don’t you think?”

You glanced over at your mother to see her flashing you a smile that you had never seen before. Were her eyes twinkling??? While you were over here fidgeting like a druggie going through withdrawals. Normally, your hands were busy with either your cell phone, work phone, or tablet and pen. Sometimes even a combination of the three. But right now all you could do was tap anxiously on the patio tabletop.

“Yeah but I’m managing.”

“Oh, honey. That’s the biggest lie you’ve ever told me. You were a far better liar as a child.”

Your head quickly spun to face your mother once more and this time, your mother was anything but impressed. This was so freaking awkward. Why was this conversation happening??? All you wanted to do was get back to work. A big meeting was coming up Monday and this was Saturday. Which meant you had only a day and a half left to work on this presentation. Well you were working on the proposal part of it but still.

“Wa-What?”

“You heard me. Look at this place. Look at yourself. Honey.......you’re working yourself to death. It’s causing you to neglect not only your home, but yourself.”

Before you could argue, your mother went on.

“Your grass is taller than the Amazon Rainforest, both your front yard pool and back yard pool look like swamps. These poor potted plants would have lasted longer at the store you bought them from. And while we’re at it, let’s discuss the inside of your house.”

Oh boy.

“You have absolutely no food in your kitchen. Your refrigerator looks like you just put it in yesterday. Your work clothes are all over the floor and it’s hard to tell how much laundry you have to do. I saw a good three inches of dust on your coffee table and it’s hard to tell how many spiderwebs I counted.”

Aaaannnddd she was still going.....

“And let’s discuss you. You have bags under your eyes that would put a panda bear to shame. You eat nothing but sloppy, greasy takeout food. You’ve been put on high blood pressure medicine and you’re way too young for that. And----”

“Okay, okay. I get it. I get it.”

After taking a couple breaths to get the oxygen back in her lungs, your mother found herself pouting a bit as she realized this was it. The moment she had been dreading but needed to get off her shoulders or the guilt was going to eat her alive.

“This is all my fault.”

Okay.....your mother was acting really weird today. With knitted eyebrows and orbs filled with confusion, you stared at the older woman across from you as you waited for an explanation.

“I did this to you. I turned you into this unhealthy workaholic. At the time, I was simply thinking about making sure the company I had worked so hard to build and make a success stayed a success. You were born to take my place. But now......things are changing and.......I’ve seen the error in my ways of thinking.”

Smiling sadly with......were those tears in her eyes?

“Instead of preserving my legacy.....I have been destroying it. I’ve been destroying you. My beautiful girl. My only child. I am so very sorry, my darling.”

“Mother......what’s gotten into you? You’re talking nonsense. I’m fine.”

You tried to put on a smile that you had hoped was reassuring, but dang it felt awkward. The only times you ever smiled was during business meetings when you needed to go in for the kill. Your smiles had always been extremely fake. And now here you were trying to soothe your own mother but didn’t know how.

“I just.......times have changed. Things have changed. My priorities are shifting, my dear. At first, I wanted a successor. But now......I just confess......You see.....”

Now as your mother was wiping away tears, she was turning quite bashful. You had rarely ever seen your mother turn shy for anything or anyone. Perhaps your father, when he was still around. Biting her lower lip in apparent nervousness, she finally admitted,

“I want grand kids, honey.”

Thank the good lord above you weren’t drinking anything, because you would have choked. Your eyes widened and you stared at your mother in complete and utter shock. Had you heard her right? She wanted what??? Swallowing hard and clearing your throat, you adjusted yourself in your patio chair and mumbled a bit stupidly,

“You want what???”

“Oh you heard me, child. I’m not getting any younger and neither are you. All the women at the cafe are talking about spending time with their grand kids and I’m stuck there feeling jealous. They talk about small feet and tiny toes and big round eyes.”

Your mother was flat out pouting like a child herself and you could see the jealousy radiating off of her. So that’s what this was really about. It wasn’t your house or yourself, this was about her. Your mother had always gotten everything she wanted because she was in a position to obtain it. But a grandchild......That was a little more difficult. Only you could give her that.

“Mother......I love you dearly. I really do. But........I can’t give you a grandchild. I can give you just about anything else your heart desires......but not that.”

It was deadly silent as you carefully stood up from your seat. The air of defeat surrounded your mother as she too slowly stood up; her head bent a little in disappointment. Clearing your throat, you spoke in your usual polite but professional tone,

“I’ll see you to the door.”

It had been a few weeks now since the awkward visit from your mother. In that amount of time, you had attempted to clean up your kitchen area and at least do a couple loads of laundry. The front yard was cut but the back had not been touched. You tossed all the potted plants in the huge dumpster. Eh. They had been pretty while they lasted.

You still hadn’t kicked your habit of takeout. It wasn’t like you had a choice, though. With your busy schedule, you didn’t have time to cook anything. Hell, you didn’t have time to grocery shop for the food to cook. It was far more convenient to just run in, grab food that was already cooked for you, and go. Of course you were no fool, you knew this food was horrible for your health but again......what choice did you have?

Work continued like usual without any contact from your mother. Usually she’d check in on you with either a text or phone call but these last two or three weeks, you had heard nothing. Was she mad at you? Probably. Then again.....Your mother was used to getting everything she wanted. Granted she had worked hard for everything she had, but this was something completely different.

“Got something on your mind?”

You looked up to see Jimin as he was in the middle of going over another proposal you had typed up yourself. Given the lack of sleep you were getting, you often didn’t trust yourself with spelling and grammar so you had Jimin look over your work before anyone else could lay eyes on it. Clearing your throat and adjusting your suit jacket, you shook your head and mumbled softly,

“No. Just tired, I suppose.”

Meetings, proposals, late nights, more meetings. It never ended. Emails coming and going. Playing phone tag with companies that were being hard to get along with. It was all just so frustrating. There were some days you just wanted to throw hands and walk out. However.....This was your mother’s pride and joy and you knew that wasn’t an option.

It was finally Saturday and you planned to sleep in......Okay......So you were going to sleep in till 8am. That was normal, right? Sighing heavily, you rolled over onto your side so that you could reach over for your personal phone only to see that your mother had sent you a text.

Mother: I’m coming over today for lunch. Please be presentable.

Be presentable? What the hell did that mean? You were always presentable. Scoffing, you rolled out of bed and decided to take a shower so you could be presentable. After scrubbing and washing yourself in annoyance, you dried yourself off and did your hair like you normally would for any other day of work. A tight and tidy bun with not a hair out of place.

You applied all the concealer you could to try and hide the bags that were under your eyes. Dear god they seemed to be getting worse. Why? You got plenty of sleep. Or at least that’s what you told yourself. After dressing in a simple blouse with a pencil skirt that came down to your knees, you adjusted your pantyhose and made just to wear a pair of heels that matched your business attire.

Upon looking in your kitchen, you had absolutely nothing to eat for your mother. Well......the two of you could always go out somewhere for lunch, right? Nothing wrong with having a lunch meeting out and about, right? Sighing heavily, you decided to wait by the front window and peeped out between the blinds just in time to see your mother’s familiar SUV parking in your front driveway.

What you didn’t expect.....was her to have company with her.

Oh dear god......Please no......Please please please please please pl----

And there the doorbell rang. Hands suddenly sweaty and clammy, you almost tripped on your own feet as you scrambled towards the door. Taking a second to collect yourself, you took a deep breath before finally opening the door and offering your classic fake smile. The one you use at business meetings. The only smile you knew how to make.

“Honey! You look radiant as always.”

There stood your mother holding a couple boxes that you could only guess contained food, judging from the smell, alongside a young man that had to be close to your age. He smiled warmly as he too was carrying a couple boxes full of food. The smell instantly made your stomach clench in pain as you were starving. However, you were too scared out of your mind to think about food right now.

“Be a dear and let us in. The food is going to get cold. Jungkookie, help me set the table, will you?”

“Of course, Mrs. Kwon.”

What the blazes was going on here?!?!?

You just stepped aside and let your mother and some stranger into your house like it was no big deal. Furthermore, said stranger was making himself at home and helping your mother set the table for lunch. Wait..........

Wait wait wait wait wait wait.......

“Mother----May I have a word with you?”

“Oh honey, just be patient. We can talk once we sit down to eat.”

“Mother---I meant in private.”

“Nonsense nonsense. Now come sit with us and enjoy some lunch. You’re practically skin and bones.”

Sighing heavily, you made a move to sit at the table but made sure to sit as far away from the mystery male as possible. Which put you sitting straight across from him. At least it wasn’t right next to him. Thankfully you had just enough bottles of water in your fridge and ice left in your ice making machine to produce three glasses of ice water for all of you.

“Darling, this is Jeon Jungkook. His family has a prestigious landscaping company and Jungkookie here just happens to be amazing at lawn care.”

“Mmm. I see.”

You really tried to appear respectful, but it was so dang hard when all you could think about was your mother’s true motives. You had been subconsciously stabbing the food on your plate ever since the three of you sat down to talk. It was more than obvious that the only male in the dining room was extremely nervous.

He looked super handsome. Almond shaped doe eyes and a slender nose. Rosy lips and a sharp jawline. You couldn’t help but notice his earrings. Was that a double helix he was sporting? Truth be told.....in your younger teens......you had always been a sucker for guys with earrings. And lots of them. Wait......did your mother know this too???

“Considering how Jungkookie is amazing with landscaping as well as cooking and cleaning, I’ve taken it upon myself to hire him as your personal assistant. Where he will take care of the things that you don’t have time for outside of work.”

It was dead silent at the dining table as you processed what your mother had just so casually explained. Personal assistant, huh? Yeah right. You knew better. As you gave the male sitting across from you a sharp and quizzical stare, you simply took a sip of your ice water before asking just as casually,

“So just how much is my mother paying you to knock me up?”

“Honey!”

It all happened so fast. Your mother looking appalled while you remained unfazed. Meanwhile, poor Jungkook was coughing as his food had went down the wrong pipe. He had been right in the middle of swallowing when you asked such a blunt question. Needless to say, it had taken him by surprise. Finally calming down with a few sips of water and your mother rubbing his back, he tried to gain his composure by quickly shaking his head and raising his hands in defense.

“I can assure you, Miss. Kwon, I mean nothing of the sort. I am strictly here to take care of your chores and errands that you otherwise cannot complete in your free time. I am here to serve and make your life less stressful. Less complicated.”

‘Such pretty words from a pretty mouth....’

Still looking bored and unimpressed, you simply nodded and took one last sip of your water before setting the glass down. With a heavy sigh, you simply stood and started to gather your half eaten lunch and spoke softly but firmly,

“Your services are not needed here, Mr. Jeon. I’m terribly sorry for my mother wasting your time.”

As you walked away to place your dishes on the kitchen counter, you could hear your mother speaking softly, no doubt with a hand on the boy’s knee.

“She’ll come around, Kookie. Just give her time.”

However, when your mother approached you in the kitchen and left the boy alone in the dining room, the older woman was anything but soft. A silent glaring match took place as you stood there facing your mother. The woman who took you under her wing and built you into the strong young woman you were today.

“My dearest child, you go in there and apologize to that poor young man. He’s absolutely mortified.”

“With all due respect, mother, I���m not going to apologize for asking a perfectly reasonable question. We both know why he’s really here. He’s the perfect age and ripe for giving you a grandchild. I’m not stupid.”

“I never said you were. Look----While I may have other motives behind hiring him......Your house is an absolute mess. Zoo animals are living better than you.”

You couldn’t help but scoff as that seemed to take a blow to your pride and ego. As you tried to sooth said pride, it was your mother’s turn to sigh heavily as she added in proposition,

“Look---Just give him a chance. Let him take care of the indoors and outdoors and if he sucks at his job, you can fire him. You don’t have to like him, just let him pick up the slack. He really is great at what he does. He’ll have this place looking beautiful again in no time.”

And that’s how you wound up with a personal assistant living with you. His name? Jeon Jungkook.

[gotatext]

claws my way out of the dirt like the goblin i am ..... hello thots, its nora, once again bringing you a revamped version of a muse i played yonks ago n some of u may have even written against... here is her pinterest.....

this is margaret greta, she’s a whole can of trauma spaghetti plastered over with a toothy grin and a lot of dad jokes. the only reason she’s in gifford really is bcos shes been put there as part of a witness protection program cos lots of police r monitoring livingstone so its deemed relatively safe.... haha... anyway she changes major all the time. she started off doing fine art but since then she’s done modules in architecture, film, bio-chemistry and is now dabbling in medicine. 

CIS-FEMALE — ever hear people say GRETA O’DRISCOLL looks a lot like DIANA SILVERS? I think SHE is about 21, so it doesn’t really work. The MEDICINE major is a SOPHOMORE that is from DEADWOOD, SOUTH DAKOTA. They can be +CHARMING, but they can also be -EVASIVE. I think GEE might be SHEEP. They are living in YATES. ( nora. 23. gmt. she/her )

this bitch is the most restless creature u ever seen. before she came to livingstone, she’d lived in 8 different cities in 3 years. 

was adopted as an infant. had two foster moms and two older sisters so always surrounded by women. lived in a boarding house, very much like the one in 20th century women, with lodgers coming in and out all the time, mostly artsy young women because her gay moms were both high school teachers trying to set up their own arts collective. one of her moms left when she was 4, n she doesn’t really remember her.

while living with entirely women made her super into catlin moran and the guilty feminist, as a teenager she often let boys walk all over her bc she just craved male attention jst bcos she’d never really experienced it. saw it as something aspirational, like sitting in the back of chad’s second-hand truck while he drove you to macdonalds and offered you and his five friends with identical haircuts weed was the height of being cool to greta, she wanted to be their dream girl, even if it meant compromising her beliefs

bubbly bitch but also massive snake. metaphorically and literally, always shedding her skin. loyal to few, ruled by none, out for herself, babey!! every place she goes, she becomes a new character, someone who’s a figment of her imagination, as if each city is repertory theatre and she’s a character actress, so as a result som ppl think she’s called rita, some ppl know her as margot, she just flicks through identities like nobodies business.

goes through phases of being intensely feminist and tweeting “men are trash i don’t need them” before flipping into being lonely and needy n wanting male attention again. tends to gravitate towards men who are just pieces of shit tbh like her friends are always like hun.... pick a nice boy..... but no.... she’ll go for the boxer with several arrest records for gbh or the small-town drug dealer just trying to hook her onto pills for a little extra cash, or the reformed sinner who thinks he’s being protective by reading all her texts and always knowing where she is..... n she always finds a way to spin it so that they Just Care About Her and aren’t a p.o.s 

left school at 18 n didn’t go to uni, moved in w her boyfriend of the time instead, but soon got bored, n then went backpacking around the states making money in the casinos by being a shot girl (yeehaw) and trying to make it as a mysterious 1920s widow with a smoky voice, a dark secret n a heart of gold, looking for love in the big city. all she found was producers and acting agents who’d promise her stardom n actually just fuck her in a motel n then ignore her calls.

TW domestic violence, TW gun, her watershed moment came when she met luke in sioux falls while she was playing bass for a country n blues band. he was a few years older and had a car, and they kind of went from seeing each other to being that super intense couple who are just necking all the time. 

they got engaged like 3 months after they met n rented a flat together, much to her family’s annoyance but she was 19 so there wasn’t much they could do. their relationship was super super intense though, often really heightened and when they fought it could become quite violent, but she’d pass it off as just him being really passionate. 

one of their fights got really heated and greta threatened him with the gun he kept in the glove box of his vauxhall corsa, but the safety was off and she accidentally shot him. she pleaded self defence in the trial n cos of the amount of times she’d been hospitalised for various concussions n things like ‘fallling down the stairs’ the police were like yea... pretty watertight evidence that he was a bastard who [chicago voice] had it coming..... also this happened in 2017, he was mixed race and greta is white so naturally the police totally took her side. she’s now under witness protection, rehoused in livingstone as a sports-scholarship student, due to the amount of police involvement in the area, it would mean should one of luke’s family members try to track her down, she’d be relatively safe

 massive sports fanatic. plays tennis. on the cheer team. was a track superstar in her high school. honestly just that sporty bitch, you’ll see her doing lines at a party at half four and then on your way to your 9am lecture you see her running across the park like a fresh fucking daisy who is this bitch

pretty easy to get along with (provided you don’t anger, provoke or question her too much) because she WANTS your character to be enthralled by her and will do whatever it takes to win them over. she wants everyone to love her

is That Girl who always knows where the parties are, and is always there, on the sofa, talking about institutionalised racism and trying to coerce you into a game of beer pong that she’ll definitely win. doesn’t really have one solid group of friends, just kind of on good terms with everyone and social butterflies about

has changed her major so many times. decision? who is she. currently studying medicine, but doesn’t rlly enjoy it. she’s very unmotivated and lazy and probably wouldn’t ahve bothered going to uni if she hadn’t been placed in one by a witness protection program. will probably change on to history or gender studies soon n just make up the extra credits by volunteering

 massive feminist. low key quite scared of powerful men bcos of her ex. wants to start a female only lesbian commune bc she misses her childhood in a south dakota boarding house and has endless support for women. honestly annoyed that she is attracted to men, would so be 100% gay if it was a choice. cuffs her jeans and can’t drive. is That bisexual. skateboards. wears backwards caps.  i hate her

plays bass guitar, has a teal green fender and it is her BABY. it’s covered in stickers about saving the planet and ending fracking and going vegan. she’s in an all-female punk band w agnes (n mayb jade i think) n they play gigs every now n then in grotty club basements full of druggy sweaty college kids

PERSONALITY: easy-going, sociable, observant, blunt, amiable, nihilistic, self-serving, laid back, independent, unmotivated, charming, lazy, impulsive, alluring. ESTP and a leo

LIKES: art, music, john wayne movies, black mirror, philosophy,  cowboy chic culture, DC comics, arcade games, candyfloss, deep red lipstick, marijuana, dogs, karaoke, Kate Moss, late-night strolls, zip-lining, chemistry, suspenders, cigarettes, herbal tea, gallows humour, cold coffee, long showers, brown eyes, tchaikovsky, dr. seuss, boiler house DJ sets, magnolias, decorative lamps, worn-out furniture, twangy electric guitars.

DISLIKES: bananas, coffee, Woody Allen, mental mathematics, children, Trump, institutionalised misogyny, the imaginary future, french literature, Wes Anderson films, spoken word poetry, the general mentality of cheerleading squads (despite being on one)

aesthetics:

a bubble of pink gum on chapped lips, mom jeans, a beaten up pair of adidas, denim jackets, strawberry laces, knee-highs, chapped lips, peeling sticky plasters, split knuckles, bruises you try to cover with concealer, stick and poke tattoos, hot coffee, sleep caught in your eyes on a lazy afternoon, kissing girls, cigarette smoke shrouding you like a veil, alien conspiracy theories and sci-fi paperbacks, doc martens with fraying laces, the red string of a thong peaking out purposely from jeans, leonine arch of your back and that stellar smile that says ‘you have no idea who you’re dealing with’, a rucksack permanently packed for the move, a streak of red across your lips, roller blades, cut knees, not eating your greens, smiling with a mouthful of blood, and piercing your own ears with a safety pin when your mom wouldn’t take you, kate moss posters lining the walls of a teenage bedroom, his name scrawled in rage across the pages of a diary, thumb holes poked through the cuffs of your sleeves, a tennis racket you punched through in a fit of temper, feet pounding the earth until your soles bleed crimson, sleeping in a cherry lip balm and scrunchies to keep the wild locks from your eyes. 

wanted plots: since greta literally can’t differentiate between romantic and platonic love, she’s got off with so many of her mates, so i want awkward friendships where they nearly dated, or exes that have now just turned into weird friendships, and girls from the cheer team who she’s like, weirdly intimate with like the shower together but its not a Thing cos the other girls straight, and I want like, fellow medicine students who are like?? how is this bitch still passing?? i swear she goes out every night?? she works part time at a fast food restaurant, i want a mate that just goes and sits in there talking to her until her manager gets angry. ppl she did a few modules with before changing course and somehow sort of remaining in touch with, like she did a few art modules, a bit of film, n some architecture before switching to medicine, though she’ll probs switch course again soon. ppl who she runs track with. someone she’s trying to make a zine with. here’s a list of plots on her old blog if u want any of them w her.

would love plots of any type, throw them all at me please, i cnt wait to interact w all of u. like this if u want me to message you about connections / plots! xo

full biography if u can be bothered

trigger warnings: drugs, domestic abuse, gun.

you never meant for it to happen. you’d heard the stories, of girls who let their man walk all over them, and thought to yourself “i’ll never be one of those girls…” the kind that eat low-fat yoghurt and drink slim fast to shred a few extra pounds because he said she was getting round in the tummy, or the ones who spent their evenings tied to a kitchen sink drinking wine while him and the boys played poker, wishing god, if only I could get out of here. not you, not you raised by strong women, four bright shining beacons. single mother with her hard-as-nails attitude and her stony glares, elder sisters (twins) one ginger, one blonde, one doctor, one lawyer, both determined to take a bullet to the brain and a hammer to the patriarchy before they let a man touch them without asking. you were always so inferior, so insecure and small, like a bird (like a sparrow) with blonde plaits down your back sucking tropicana whilst your busom buds sucked dick, their lips permanently ripe with stories of their sexual exploits, fake tan and glittered nails whilst you sat in the unbroken egg of virginity wondering what it was like to be loved. one day you found out.

lily milligan’s parents gone and a free house for the night, bottles of ouzo and tequila swiped from your mother’s liquor cabinet thinking she wouldn’t know (she always knew) your legs, hardened from pep squad, slut dropping on a kitchen table because the boys thought it would be fun to get the quiet girl drunk. you’d never had a sip before that night. band t-shirts, denim shorts and the split soles of rotten converse that you refuse to let go of, you still clutched with both hands to your youth, but in a tube top now (borrowed from alice carmichael who had a sister in college) and a short tennis skirt, your feet not in trainers but in thigh-high boots. uncomfy as hell but lily said you needed to look sexy. you didn’t know if you wanted to be sexy. you didn’t know what kind of girl you were, if you were even a girl at all. but robbie looked at you like he knew exactly who you were, like he knew you better than you knew yourself, and his lips had the pink cupid’s bow of a movie star, and his hair was dark locks, curling like a mane. his hands were soft, and suddenly on your waist, and after three more shots his lips were on yours and his name was the only sound in your head and on your lips as you lost it in lily’s college sister’s bedroom beneath the glare of a T-Pain poster. you bled for what seemed like hours, his hand still in yours, kissing on the sofa as truth tellers and dare devils continued to spin a bottle of unprecedented youth. you thought it was love. robbie was the one. he loved you, you knew it, how else could someone be so soft? but soon he grew bored, scrunched up your paper heart and set it alight. then came the tears, the hatred, the ‘fuck robbie, in fact, fuck all boys.’ and that you did.

you were known for being easy. any boy could be yours for a night, as long as he promised to love you for those few short breaths and pants before you cried yourself to sleep. you felt poisoned, but poisonous as well, as if by ensnaring these young boys you were gaining power over them, and not the other way around. soon it started to work. they’d want more, but you’d deny them it, sick of sucking off silly schoolboys, they’d call you a tease, a vixen. maybe you were, but you couldn’t help but want older men. you got the history teacher first time, him bending you over his desk to sneak a hand up your tennis skirt as the after-school clubs carried on next door, unawares. love didn’t exist, not for you. it was nothing but a game for pretty young girls to play, bubble gum in their canines and a hand tugging at the hem of their cheer skirt.

there was so much anger inside of your small body, ‘beware of boys and their hook-like words’. hockey helped. there was something formidable about the feeling of a stick like a weapon in your hands and the thwack it made against thighs in the heat of a scrum - “slipped, sorry!” - you’d utter with a snakeskin smile, millicent quinn knowing that you’d hit her on purpose because she shagged robbie at that party last week. she couldn’t prove it, cobbled acne on her forehead turning green with disgust. ben came into your life like a car crash. two years your senior, with a baseball jacket and shoulders like a god. he became your personal hero. on the pitch, he was lethal. together, you could bring anyone to their ruin. each day after last period he’d be waiting in his car. you’d leap into his arms like a girl-half starved, love me, love me, love me, your heated kisses the envy of every junior girl. he was yours for three blissful years, utterly yours, and you were his, his star-spangled girl, and he was your knight - you were both the same, playing games, always difficult to predict. it was a shock to all when he proposed, high-school sweethearts find love in south dakota.

the engagement was a bittersweet affair; three months – you barely out of your gingham print skirts and into a graduation gown, him, a surly quarterback towering above your sisters, cigarette at his lips and a scowl like a fart in a lift. they hated him. so did you. but you were eighteen and in love, and he fitted the cookie cutter mould. everyone wanted him, and you had him. you had him and you were happy, happy, happy, and he loved you. he said he’d give you the world, anything you wanted hand-picked and given to you. instead, he gave you a jack russell terrier and a flat you couldn’t swing a cat in, wallpaper peeling like the rotten bits inside of you, the bits that only he knew. and you got tireder and tireder of the sad excuse of a life he’d picked out for you, him out doing god knows what to pay the bills, and you dancing on tables to pave your way to stardom, and this was love, this was real, until the shine wore off and your fresh-faced, dimple-cheeked cheerleader facade faded and the ugliness started to reveal itself, the whining, the petulance, the sharp-tempered cruelty, the mind games, the need to always win, win, win. he was dull, he was boring, he was nothing like the boy the girls had said he was and no chiselled six pack could hide his lack of anything remotely interesting, your patience wearing thin until it snapped like rubber, a rucksack on your back, running shoes on your feet and the joint bank account emptied into your eighth grade birthday wallet.

you built your small fortunes working the casinos of sioux falls, a crimson dress and an attitude to match. bookish archie with his little dipper freckles was fun for a month, before he became just as dull and dreary as the rest. a three hour bus and you were in minneapolis, bright eyed and bushy tailed, fresh meat ready for the pickings. a hostel here, a friendly co-worker’s sofa there as you made what you could by taking off your clothes and shaking your ass like you were back in pep squad, doing what you did best. you met your fair share of creeps, and soon it was back on the road to escape a wide-eyed stalker and a restless itch for more. milwaukee, chicago, you made the roads your own. log cabins and lodgings, and the occasional motel, a beaten up pick up truck purchased at a scrap merchants – you got a few miles out of it before it bit the dust, and when you finally set it alight after nights spent lounging across the driver’s seat, a parka tucked over you as a duvet, you were sad to see it go. you’re nomadic by fault, never attaching to place, people or things, creating a new personality in every place you go like a character actress; each town is a different repertory theatre, and you’re the star. a compulsive liar, you even fib about your own name, to some you’re ellen, nineteen, bookish, a law student who likes smoking and cosmos. to someone else you’re rita, you’re twenty five and look young for your age, like smoking, comics and fucking in public places.

in the bright lights of michigan, you found charlie, sweet charlie, too good for you, though you let him spoil you while he thought you were the small town girl of his dreams. next came abigail, who was fun until the jealously kicked in, and then luke, gorgeous luke, dangerous, exciting, who despite his temper, despite the fights, despite bruises down your spine and your teeth marks on his arms, loved you with the strength of a wild fire. there was destruction in your wishbones, a savageness from the field, from the pitch and now somehow in his arms, you were godly. he was cruel, he was careless, and he refused to fall at your feet like so many other boys had, which only you made you want him all the more. you were rage incarnate. you hated him so fiercely you thought you might kill him, so he played the only card you wouldn’t predict; proposed.

the house you shared was a backstreet flat in detroit, you making your name as a downtown singer while he footed the bill with pills. they had a drug for anything these days, to dull the senses, to pick them up, to drive you to insanity or pull you out of the madness hole. the two of you lived like criminals on the run (you never told him that you were, living out your days as the enigma he wanted you to be), you with your voice like caramel and fishnet legs. you were his and his alone until his hand was at your throat and the gun was in your hands screaming at him to stop, stop, stop, until a bullet stoppered his brain, crimson staining linoleum as you cast yourself out like lucifer. self defence was decreed the moment they saw your violet neck, black tears and headlight eyes and mind screaming red, red, red like the pom-poms you shook so willingly in school and the insides of his skull. you were gone, and “you” was born, renamed “greta”, boxed, shipped-out, and next-day delivered to livingstone where under witness protection you were a student, blank slate, fresh-faced in a place where no one knew your name, doing what you always did and starting again.

[theextraspoon]

As the second week of 2020 is coming to an end, its become very apparent that Illinois has no idea what it's doing when it comes to marijuana legalization, most likely because Illinois dispensaries don't care much about green they care more about just the money. Is patients over profits truly done better in the CBD industry than that of total legalization or is it just Illinois, as usual, dropping the ball on its civilians? Let's find out five major blunders having us asking, what the **** are they doing with all the money we've been giving them in medical taxes for the past 10 years gone to?

If you're at all familiar with Natural Healthy CBD you'll be familiar with the many helpful things they do for their local, national, and even international communities. From secret shopper missions, dispensary tours, data audits, disability advocacy and education, we don't shy away from a challenge. It's often hard to walk the line during this time of legalization because half of people will always think you're a rat, the other half won't quite know what the catch, if there is a catch. We feel our moral compass to guide us to the sick and the people who need a fair fight but aren't given even playing fields but still stand up to with a scream and try.

No one is on your side, my side, anyone's side because there are no sides. There are sick people and not sick people. We try to understand every side and have learned a lot over the years. We've always been patients, but we're not victims. We're a business but we're not greedy. We're in medicine, kinda, but not diagnosing and we're not paid a kickback every time we prescribe this over that. We're disabled with jobs. We love animals but not like that. We have service dogs that are still learning during laws and medical change, hell, world change. So when people decide they can't play nicely with one another it makes it hard for us to know who's in the right and who has more than enough playing field. That's why it's hard to step between business and patient when the government just give us these toys, and you broke them. You broke them Illinois. This is why we cant' have nice things, er laws, in illinois.

1. No One's checking These People

Illinois, specifically Chicago, is the criminal capital, illegal gun capital, drug capital, crime capital of the world.

I'm sure from out of state it sounds like the law is easy here to get away from, that's not it either. We have, or had in marijuana for as long as I'm willing to tell you I've been in the industry, self regulated crime. I know that's not a good start but just listen for a moment and understand the we're nearing the end of prohibition. The end. Have you met someone that hasn't tried marijuana? Not very many. Self regulation. We all did our own little thing in our own little areas and we share what we can and mellow out, man.

That's why I can tell you other than collecting the money and stamping the licenses there's no one checking these places. They heard we're pretty gangster over there in California and Colorado, so who's going to tell on the weed man? We will. Most of us with medical licenses were treated like druggies with a fix and still are in many instances. Just to give all that away would be against the point, no?

The first day marijuana was legalized, there were lines around the block, venders with felonies, and the weed magically grew, was cut, dried, packaged, and delivered overnight because there was a lot of it. A lot of it is now gone again, even with those legal limits.Unless you're a patient, then what weed? Ha ha, there was never any weed!

2. Laws for thee! I have money!

These dispensaries aren't used to patients fighting back, not in Illinois it seems. That or they must think all of us are fat, lazy, stupid people that can't work because even though I hold a position of CEO even the lowest level bud tenders have shown me disrespect, as a paying customer AND patient. They make sure that you know about the lines they have to cross to provide... for you. Aww!

Thing is, every time we've seen cresco or revolution buy a place the service AND product goes INSTANTLY downhill. Every time and I've witnessed them buy out 3 now. Maybe they should spend more money on their seeds or something. We know they can because they don't spend it on background checks. We'd say this was a law thing, but it's not. You still can't work in a dispensary having just walked out of prison but wouldn't you know it.

Now, all of you know that I come off a little harsh, especially when pushed into a corner by people who do it to intimidate me. Maybe it's because I work and industry from a city littered with criminals that have learned intimidation or maybe my relationship with my dad I don't know. What I do know is when online want to be celebs attempt to gaslight and stalk me, I gaslight and stalk back. Call it a defense mechanism, or maybe horrible trait but need when it comes to getting into the mind of real scumbags like the kind that buy no-tested product to sell as product from another place or those selling stuff illegally made because they didn't know there was more than one kind of oil or when they join a dispensary to set it up for a robbery, or when people start dying from bad vape carts and mold maybe the powers that control that kinda thing will take care of it.

Now, I'm not a journalist and I don't share identities, I just think they should invest in background checks in 2020 if they don't want to invest in lawsuits. Looking at you Mindful. Earthmed... you're next.

3. Lawsuits

Lawsuits! There's already three of them! Ones even a class action!

Now, I've been in the industry a while and while I really, honestly tried to knock some sense into these people having worked with their parent companies for years now, or the industry, or patient advocacy and medical, or service dog law or literally any of the many hats I fill my time with (...thanks to CBD) or I've warned dispensaries I have to go to of what I do, they'll still do whatever they want because you don't have money. You're sick and you're a cripple, okay? You don't have real people money. At least it might as well sound that way with the way they've stacked up on the lawsuits. In fact, people started reporting to me thinking I knew to go about obtaining one.

Now, it wouldn't be fair transparency if we didn't mention one of them to be ours. Sadly, that's all I really can say because a lot of people have been coming forward and I think I'm going to stay quiet for a little bit. However, our friend Service Dog Paws doesn't have to stay quiet about the screencaps that were posted by Service Dog Headquarters posted from Mindful Dispensary to our Service Dog Training Log for Gotham and that is just the start of the bullshit I've gone through since people found out I was successful in CBD distribution and in fact, we've been informed they've been threatening our friends, but again... I'd like to stay quiet for a moment while I collect more information.

Gee thanks, Dom!

Say, did I also mention how I work in media and know about the websites being used by these kinds of people? I didn't?! We'll you see, the owner of these sites has been having people harass me for months but because we're unsure if he still works for or owns one of the dispensaries under investigation we'll say that pretending to be people isn't nice and threatening that people better never come to Chicago, when they aren't afraid of you and live here, also not a good idea.

4. Harboring Medicine from Patients

I know the look of a dispensary about to sell out. Everything goes away and becomes one brand for a little bit. That's how it happened with 3C and now Aurora with Mindful, IL in Addison and even our current site of investigation, EarthMED. We knew about the limit they've placed on their customers claiming it to be the cultivators who I've spoken to, all of them, there's no shortage. In fact, the only place with that two concentrate cap... is EarthMED.

That's why I find it so weird that they have products from October since our shortage started in Novemeber. Could it be to sell to recreational people at a higher price or maybe its because they're selling it illegally? I'll get back to you. I'm literally STILL taking in complaints.

Check out the public post about it. This is me, because I don't want you to threaten and intimidate sick people anymore courtesy of your family owned dispensary.

View this post on Instagram

"We're out of weed for medical patients," they said. "Only two medical products, *they said. "We're almost out, totally low on product," they said. How are #recreational #customers that pay 33% more getting this Today if you've been out of stock or low in stock for #illinoismedicalcannabis #patients since December? @earthmed (this is not my picture but I don't want to tag who's it is because I don't want to dox them or get them penalized for reporting to @vigilantecannabis)

A post shared by Kimber Kush CBD (@thekimberkush) on Jan 7, 2020 at 9:32pm PST

It's not the cultivators, but we feel like it's odd how long the owners of EarthMED have been harboring medicine, most likely to sell to recreational patients, who spend on average $33 more than medical patients.

We'll be sure to keep you up to date on legal dispensaries, behaving well for the right reasons and doing the right thing with real labs and honest people and you concentrate on getting better. We can't fix all these problems ourselves. For now if you've been intimidated by remember how their intimidation of people not only is just words, and it's done happening.

5. Shane Gentry and Vincent Nicotra

Vincent Nicotra is a problem. 

Grab your tinfoil hats for a moment with me because this one's a doozy. Over the past six months I've been on an audit to a case I detailed for the FTC regarding Google's wrongful ban of legal hemp ads. Much like the Hemp Industry Association did with their Timesquares ad to catch the attention of Facebook admins, it's much hard to grab their attention if their email and social media is guarded by their new hire, untrained pet dog owner, Vincent Nicotra. 

It's bad enough he threatened and harassed me, but he used my own family. He got into my friends list, made fake

profiles, fake companies, fake profiles, all to set others up with friend, Angel "Janis." It wouldn't be a problem if I wasn't forced to listen to twitch, discord voice chats, youtube videos and livestreams. Furthermore, because he'd studied me and my friends list, I was forced to listen to them mock me with personalized insults about my weight, my seizures, being raped, having my children taken, past abuse, a trusted flagger admit to gaslighting and stalking, a dispensary worker admitting to finding and running someone's debit card without their permission, doxxing paypal users, harassing porn stars and how they were going to frame people for it. 

I've seen people other than me suffer far worse. I've overheard it as a hunt for mental illness which, check. Others claim a legion, a group of people set to out people for making false allegations... unless the allegation of the allegation is false. I actually went to someone in this legion, someone I once held a lot of respect for. I sent him pictures of being threatened of being doxed and projecting... a lot. See Vincent likes to use the same couple insults like Lazy and if you show people he'll claim libel or slander. While Shane Gentry aka Spaceboy was playing character Norm, someone who suffers from a seizure disorder, Vincent was also playing in my information. Vincent got a job at a dispensary, my dispensary, Mindful dispensary where he continued to dig through my personal friends and attempt to sell them PLANTBASED or oneplant cbd, CBD products that never passed inspection and we do not sell due to failed labs in some weird MLM type of deal that I'm getting accused of but should ask Shane about. 

So, Vincent was feeding all my information back to a bunch of strangers on the internet to use against me for god knows what but I wasn't alone. If you've applied for a business license in hemp or cannabis, or you've ever purchased it, he's got you too. 

This man attempted to ruin careers like Petty Paige and Nick Schneider, in fact pitting us all against each other. He mass flags, scams, and lies then accuses others for it. I've been told that they'll use CBD Piggy to get in, whatever that means and not only told I've cost someone money and will never work in the industry again by Tommy C, but they threatened others as well in an effort to control the creative space. They're even threatening me using the name of my own father because they're to pathetic to use their own, but that is something for another time. I'm not sure what that has to do with medical or moral benefit. I've witnessed people become suicidal, relapse, I've lost friends, was mocked for my federal service dog rights, I was banned from my dispensary for having a service animal, threatened by to shut the fuck up, kept up countless nights, had my ex abuser contacted and then stalked by a legion I didn't know existed of people I respected. When I went to protect them and tell them what was happening, I was asked for proof of where some other dude asked to touch me 2 years ago because they don't associate with false allegations, of which there are none, because people who don't expect to accuse people of thing don't have every time they've rejected sex on video. This is worth two years of stalking from someone you sponsored. This sort of feels like you're going after sexual assault victims or women who speak up to force them to change their story. Classy.

That said, it concerns me that this lunatic has total access to the biotrak system with everyone's private information of which they're using to find, neigh set up pedophiles, for Chris Hansen.

I know, that's the crazy part. This man who mocked everything from my seizures to getting "throat fucked" is in charge of children that are victim of sexual predators. This man, has all your personal information and has been threatening and doxing celebrities and youtubers for god knows how long, the guy mocking and harassing sexual assault is in charge of the child victims on Hansen vs Predator. 

Don't take my word for it, I'm just going to let trusted creators of the Youtube space and the city of Chicago explain it to you.

Not to mention he dug through my friends, their friends, your friends, we're friends at this point. We all said and did some stupid stuff in the name of protecting ourselves and for that, I take responsibility and am truly sorry for my part. I'm very protective of my business and the partnerships, I've made and this guy has come between that, I have half a mind to wonder if there's anything else illegal being done at Mindful since Vincent works there and they hire felons. I'll keep you updated on that, and the current investigation and dispensary secret shop mission, now that I know Vincent won't manipulate it. I leave you with this video by Baked Salmon once again about this criminal working for Mindful and Chris Hansen because it was his channel that first was wrongfully flagged and taken down during the audit. I'm sorry it took me so long to see what was going on.

Please support each other and if you stream, don't be an asshole. Maybe you're not getting sponsors because you think it's funny to talk about their rape and throatfucking them and how abusive that must be for them mentally because you don't know who really is listening on that audit. 

If I can say one last thing out of court, I hope Nick and Paige wipe the fucking floor with you, because I'm going to.

For real products by real people or to sell yours, you know the place.

For ada law visit our new infopage here.

via Natural Healthy: Latest News

[alittleoptimistic]

Renaissance of the Mind: Chapter 3

Chapter 1  Chapter 2  Chapter 3 Chapter 4

Summary: Senator Thomas Jackson has spent the better part of his career swaying the public opinion to the belief that old souls are villainous. Everyone knows only people who screwed up royally in their previous life come back for another chance. They are criminals and should be imprisoned the moment they are discovered. But after a chance meeting with a strangely familiar young man, Thomas’s worst fears are animated. A lifetime of his own forgotten memories in his unwieldy hands, Thomas is faced with a decision.

His headache wasn’t going away.

In the last hour, he’d consumed four ibuprofen pills, half a bottle of aspirin, and copious amounts of alcohol.

This was turning out to be a poor decision.

A headache had started just after his speech and had yet to let up. His entire head throbbed and pulsed with every heartbeat. He was alone at home and taking one of the very few sick days he could, and he was distantly aware that he should probably call a doctor at this point. Two days of a migraine wasn’t normal. Right? Maybe?

He couldn’t hold onto a thought long enough to really consider it anyhow.

But he did know now that medicine overdose along with alcohol was a bad plan. Very bad.

He’d been puking in the toilet in the dark in his bathroom for the last twenty minutes.

And all the while his head continued to pound.

This was just some kind of flu. Something he’d caught. But man it was bad.

After what felt like an eternity, his stomach settled slightly. Thomas dropped onto the floor, exhausted, and stayed there with his eyes shut. After a while he had the presence of mind to flush the toilet, but after that, he just sat, trying not to think about anything. Everything hurt. He wiped his mouth with a growl of frustration and got to his feet shakily.

He’d need water and food after that, some part of him supplied. Or he’d faint. Slowly, he stumbled out of the bathroom, down the hall to his immaculate, very seldom used kitchen. All the curtains in the house had been drawn, and every light turned off. So naturally, he tripped over just about everything in his stumbling way to the fridge.

Once reaching the fridge, he kept his eyes shut as he opened it and cool light spilled out. He groped for something to eat and landed on a stick of butter.

Whatever. He’d take it.

His brain buzzed and whizzed around and the next he knew, he was on his couch, the stick of butter in hand, staring blankly at the swirling pattern on his ceiling.

“This sucks,” he croaked. “This is a big ol’ pile of cow dung, Jeff.” He frowned. “Jack… son.” Pathetic, really. Honestly, he couldn’t even say his name right.

He ate a piece of butter from a trembling hand and cursed the empty house in a general sort of way.

It was then, of course, that his cell phone buzzed. Light flooded the room like laser beams and he groaned, turning his head away.

But it kept on buzzing on the coffee table just a few feet away.

Muttering, he forced himself to sit up, and grab it.

“What?”

A shocked pause. “Oh.” It was Maria. “Goodness, you really are sick.”

Thomas would have rolled his eyes if that wouldn’t have hurt enough to send him to his knees. Instead, he blinked slowly. “Yup. What’s wrong?”

She sighed. “Ah, well, I was calling because I’ve been able to handle all of your responsibilities today thus far, but after that speech, if you disappear for too long-”

“They’ll forget about it.” She was right. They would. They needed to ride this wave of media presence if they wanted to get somewhere.

“Exactly. They need to keep seeing you. So… when can you come in?”

Thomas exhaled tiredly. “Uh, as soon as I can.”

“We really need you here, Mr. Jackson. I understand but-”

“Don’t worry,” he interrupted. “I want this just as much as the rest of you. I’ll be in tomorrow.”

He could hear her smile in her voice. “Great! Awesome. Thank you, sir! Please feel better. I will see you tomorrow, then!”

“Tomorrow.”

He hung up.

And tossed the phone sloppily across the room.

He’d think about everything... tomorrow.

From the outside, Alex’s record shop looked like one of those crappy corner stores where you buy lottery tickets and cigarettes and people hang to cause trouble. There were bars on the windows and the door needed new paint. It got stuck every time Alex opened it, and he had to shove his shoulder into it get it to work properly.

But Alex didn’t care.

He’d poured his heart and soul into this little shop and if his heart and soul looked like a crappy corner store, so be it.

That said, on the inside, he had done everything he could to fix it to exactly his liking. Records of all sorts were stacked in boxes and on the walls and on shelves, and large posters were framed on the walls. There was a semblance of order. It went like this: new stuff, front of the shop, old stuff, back of the shop. And it worked just fine for him. If anyone needed help, they’d ask and he could find them the record in less than thirty seconds. He and his roommate/best friend Jack ran the place and Alex wouldn’t have it any other way.

Alex, per usual, shoved open the door. The smell of coffee and warm leather greeted him. There wouldn’t actually be any coffee yet, but he’d brewed so much of it inside the tiny shop, the smell was sort of ingrained in the walls. He flicked on the lights and smiled.

In the back of the shop, he’d set up the pay counter, and he had dozens of record players to use. He’d choose a style for the day, usually, and Jack would probably complain about it, but that was okay. He swerved around the randomly placed shelves of records. He did pretty well with this shop. Especially since records were coming back as ‘retro’ and ‘cool’. Whatever. He liked the music and he liked being able to see the music as it spun. He liked the way it sounded and he loved searching for songs. Forgotten songs. Lost songs. Songs so rare, no one had listened to them in decades. He’d dig like some kind of treasure hunter in people’s garage sales, obscure auctions, pawn shops, for more music.

And then, if he felt like it, he’d sell his findings.

Before, Alex hadn’t had enough time to appreciate such things like music. He’d been so hurried, so desperate to make something of himself, he’d been solely devoted to writing and politics. They were everything.

He didn’t have his writings or his political career now. They weren’t ‘his’ anymore.

And funny enough, that was okay. The world would keep on spinning whether or not Alexander Miranda chose to step into the public eye.

However, he would like to make it clear, that he could. He could become all that he was in the 1700s. After all, back then he’d started with absolutely nothing. Even at his lowest moments in this life, he had far more than he had as the young, scrappy, and hungry kid that stumbled off a burning ship into New York without a single friend in the world and nothing but the clothes on his back.

Yeah, if he wanted, Alex could do it again. It would take some luck, but he’d pull it off like he always had.

But, man, he really kinda liked music. And he realized now, he wasn’t the type of person that could multi-task. He couldn’t listen to music and drink in a bar and dance with pretty girls and- and live if he was constantly waiting to get back to his ‘real’ life of writing and politics.

So whatever. Yeah, he didn’t have much money, yeah he lived in an area that was burgled every other night and drug busted at least once a week, but he didn’t mind.

People were as kind as they were bitter, and music had a way of soothing people, making them happier for just a moment. He’d never figured out how to do that as a politician or a soldier.

He’d thought it was just one of those gifts some people had.

Like Eliza. She’d been able to make anyone smile the moment they walked into a room.

And Alex had just assumed he couldn’t do that. It occurred to him maybe he hadn’t really tried.

He plugged in his favorite player and thumbed through a few of his favorite records. He wasn’t a hard core Beetle fan, but they were alright if he was in the mood.

Eh. He wasn’t today.

He was still debating between a classical Bach or Kansas when the bell on the front door rang. Kinda. The bell had a tendency to get drowned out by the shoving and pushing and scraping that it took to open the door.

Alex sat down in a swivel chair, hands behind his head, and spun in a circle. “If I look at you, and you look high, Jack, you’re going home.”

Jack, the roommate, stuck a ruffled head through the door and huffed. “Uh, for your information, I am clean.”

Alex glanced at him and snorted. “Clean.”

The redhead, almost-former druggie looked down at his wrinkled t-shirt and jeans and shut the door behind him. “In the substance sense.”

“That’s nice. Physically clean would be nice too.”

Jack glared at him, straightened his jacket with an eye roll, and stomped past him. “I’ll wash my face in the sink.” He opened the back door and left it open behind him.

“There are a washcloth and some spare clothes back there too, I think.” Alex had put some in there when he wasn’t sure whether he’d be able to keep up his half of the apartment rent. He grinned and used his legs to push the swivel chair halfway off the ground. He could just see Jack enter the bathroom. “You’re the best!” He added with cheeriness he knew Jack would find extremely grating.

“You’re the worst,” came his muffled reply.

Alex chuckled and went back to searching through his stack of records. He liked old music as much as he liked new music. And when he said old music, he meant like, the stuff people tended to just lump together as either ‘hymn church stuff’ or ‘classic ugh so boring’ as well as the music made in the early twentieth century.

He chose something at random and clicked it in place.

Mozart. Piano softly washed over the room. Now that kid been something of a phenomenon. Jefferson had detested him if he remembered correctly. Wouldn’t play any of his music. Alex had no idea why, just that Jefferson had always been very irritated whenever someone attempted to play it. Alex chewed his lip. See, this was the thing about old music. It was flypaper for memories. Even now, if he played the song he and Eliza had first danced to, he’d be thrown back to that hot summer night and the feeling of the blue silk dress beneath his sweaty fingers. Her light touch on his shoulder and his equally gentle touch on the small of her back. It had been humid and the hosts ran out of punch halfway through the night, he recalled. But it had been some kind of magical time anyhow.

He was usually very careful about which old music he played, just in case it was too much for him that day.

With a sigh, Alex pushed himself out of the chair, stretched his back, and started the coffee machine beneath the counter. He didn’t actually like coffee, but the caffeine was too large of an asset. He needed caffeine.

Once enough for a cup had brewed, Alex quickly removed the pot, poured the coffee into his cup, and hastily thrust it back under the hot stream. There was probably a reason the coffee machine was stained brown. He smirked, wrapped his hands around the hot mug, took a sip, and bent under the counter to continue his never-ending task of sorting. He’d come back yesterday from a day of hunting with a dozen new records that needed a home in the shop.

He’d done this for a few minutes when someone shoved on the door. Alex frowned. That was unusual. People were not often here this early.

With an armful of records in one arm and his coffee cup in the other hand, he struggled to stand.

“Oh, gosh, I’m sorry. Here, let me help you.”

The records slipped, but suddenly someone was there, taking hold of a bunch and setting them down on the counter. Alex smiled. “Thanks,”

“You are very welcome. Pardon me, but are you, Alex or Jack, sir? The sign outside said Alex and Jack’s Records and I… I… Are you alright?”

Alex stared, horrified. He had gotten very good at recognizing people. Mia had been right. It was in the eyes. He couldn't do it every time, but sometimes...

And there was no way he would ever forget the eyes looking at him right now.

“B-Burr?”

The man frowned, confused. He was a dark-skinned, smartly dressed man with close cut hair and a very familiar cautious, concerned smile. “It’s Barron, actually.”

The coffee cup slipped from Alex’s fingers, and the moment broke. Alex cursed and jumped back from the hot liquid. “Oh jeez, S-sorry, sir. I- no, I’m, this is fine. I’ll just clean it up.”

“Here, I’ll help.”

Burr- Barron- whatever, leaned forward and Alex jerked back as if burned. “No. Really. I have a cloth right here.”

Which he did. He was always spilling coffee it seemed.

He bent beneath the counter, and once he was hidden, waves of terror crashed through him.

Terrified wasn’t exactly what he thought he’d feel like if he ever ran into him. But here they were. His hands shook as he scooped up the coffee and deposited the broken ceramic into a small trash can.

Good enough.

It was obvious Burr didn’t remember. Otherwise, he would have reacted when Alex said his name. So… there was nothing to do. Nothing but serve him as he would serve any other customer. It wouldn’t be fair to him otherwise.

When did his life get so complicated?

Taking a deep breath, Alex wiped his hands on his jeans and stood up. He forced a smile. “Sorry about that. And, I’m Alex.”

Burr laughed easily and shrugged. “Nice to meet you. And don’t sweat it. We all have days like that.”

“I tend to have quite a lot of them.” Alex laughed nervously.

Look at him. Small talking with his freaking murderer.

“So,” Alex gestured at the records around them. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Looking for something specific.” Please say no.

“Actually I am. I’m,” He smiled sheepishly. Burr, being sheepish. What the actual heck. “I’m a history teacher, and, I swear this is relevant, there’s a piece of music that was composed during the eighteenth century that I heard about at some point. And anyway, I thought it would be interesting to show it to the students. But, I can’t for the life of me find it anywhere. I asked around and, long story short, they said you were my best bet for rare music.”

Alex bobbed his head. Probably too many times. “So, you’re teaching like, world history?”

“American. Revolutionary War, actually.”

Alex’s voice cracked. “Oh.”

There was an awkward pause. Alex cleared his throat. “So, do you know the name of the song? The composer? Year it was made?”

Burr chewed his lip. “I… I remember learning that Thomas Jefferson, the president, I mean, was fond of it. He was there when it was composed. A friend of his was the composer.”

Alex racked his brain, wondering where he’d picked up something so obscure, but shook his head. Alex hadn’t exactly been on speaking terms with Jefferson. “Sorry, man. I’d need more information than that.”

Burr sighed. “It was a long shot anyhow. Do you have anything from that time period?”

Oh did he.

He forced himself to think. A businessman. He was being a businessman. “Uh, um, I know Thomas Jefferson liked Bach. A lot.”

Jefferson used to hum it obnoxiously loud when Alex was trying to speak.

Burr’s eyes lit up. “Anything you can think of. That would be great.”

Okay. Alright.

He could find some Bach. Scurrying, Alex got to the back of the room and flipped through several of his classical pieces. He was having a hard time gripping things. Everything kept slipping through his sweaty fingers. Bach. “Here we are.” Alex lifted a record. Nearly dropped it. “I don’t know how much you know about music-”

“Very little.”

Alex did that strange nervous laugh again, fully aware that it would seem profoundly weird to Burr. Barron. Ugh. “Well, anyway, this is great. I read in a history book once that he’d often hum it when he was trying to concentrate, or uh, trying to derail other people’s concentration.”

Burr laughed. “Alright. That is certainly interesting.”

Alex handed him the record. “It’s rare, so I doubt you’ll find it this old. It was recorded early twentieth century. More authentic, people say.”

Shrugging, Burr walked to the counter. Alex scurried after him. “Sounds good.”

Alex named his price and Burr paid without complaint. He caught a glimpse into his wallet, and Alex mentally rolled his eyes. Of course, Burr would end up rich. Again. He must have some other source of income. Unless history teachers were usually carrying that much cash these days.

As Burr folded his wallet, Alex couldn’t bear the silence. It would eat him up inside. “So, um, Revolutionary War. You know a lot about it. That’s like, Founding Fathers, right? Alexander Hamilton and stuff?”

He kicked himself.

Why did he say that? Why the heck did he say that?!

Burr’s eyes lit up again. It was strange, so very strange to see him this way. Something had happened after the war. He’d lost that light. And now it was back. “Hamilton. That’s not usually one people name. He’s a particular favorite of mine.”

Alex’s stomach fell to his converse. Right. Of course, he was.

“Bit of a prat, but a financial genius. No one ever argued that. And a brilliant lawyer. Did you know he defended one of the first suspects of a murder conviction once America was a nation?”

Yeah. He did.

Alex shook his head. “No. That’s pretty cool, though.”

Barron stared at something Alex couldn’t see but suddenly shook himself. He smiled that sheepish smile once more. “My apologies. I do not mean to give you a history lesson.”

Alex tried to keep smiling. “Well, I hope your students enjoy the music. And- and you yourself, sir.”

Burr dipped his head. “Thank you for assisting me. Have a good day.”

“You too.”

With that, he tucked the record under an arm, forced open the door, and exited into the city morning.

Everything froze.

And

Alex fell backward, landing perfectly in his swivel chair. He held up his hands to his face and watched them shake in a detached horror.

“Yo, anyone tell you your clothes look like a Grandad's? Uh, what’s up? You look like you saw a ghost.” Jack poked his head through the back door, a toothbrush still in his mouth.

Alex laughed, slightly hysterically. “I just sold an antique record to Aaron Burr.”

Jack wrinkled his nose, thinking. “Wait, like, the wig and red coat guy in the duel?”

Sure.

Alex was frozen, staring at the place Burr had been standing. He needed composure.

“He told you?”

“Hmm?” Alex forced his eyes away. “Uh. Yeah.”

Jack gave him a seriously? look. “And you just let him walk away? Alex, he’s a murder! You should have called the police!”

What? Why? “He didn’t… he didn’t do anything to me, Jack. He just wanted a record to show to his students.”

“But, dude, he’s killed, someone!”

Alex blinked, crossed his arms and turned his swivel chair to face Jack totally. “More than two hundred years ago. In an entirely different life.”

Jack shook his head. “No, no, man. You gotta get out more. They’re saying old souls are stuck in loops. They just do the same things they did in their first lives. That’s why they’re dangerous. He’ll kill again if he hasn’t already.” He cocked his head. “Actually, nevermind. Don’t call the police. I think I still have some weed in one of your lockers.”

It took Alex a second to register that. He was already thrown by Jack’s worldview. “What? Dude! You can’t just leave weed in the store!”

Jack shrugged. “Sorry?”

Alex sighed and scrubbed his face with his hands.

He was going to need more coffee.

[steamishot]

Homeless Swing

Starting the day off with writing a few things. Work isn’t too busy so I’m taking my tasks slow. I’m also trying to be less distracted at work. I think I can do my job well enough on the surface level, but to prevent myself from being bored, I want to actively be more organized and increase my expertise on the subjects I handle. It will definitely help me see my work as more purposeful as I learn things to do tasks with intent and not just with the purpose of completing them.

Last week, I had lunch with a floor mate, C. She normally eats at her desk. We decided to go to in n out on this day. It was my first time eating out with her. We’ve had lunch (food brought from home) together a few times before. After in n out, I decided I wanted to go pick up a small snack/drink at Trader Joes. As we were crossing the street on Westwood/Weyburn (C was walking to the left of me), this semi hobo/druggie looking white guy who was walking opposite of us, quickly walked towards C and swung his fist towards her face. Luckily she was able to dodge his fist, but he scraped her neck with his skin. She ended up tearing up because it was so random and terrifying. It didn’t occur to me to really look at the suspect so that we could report him later. I just kinda pulled her away and walked away fast because I was more scared he was gonna come back and try to attack her/us some more. A few strangers came up to her and asked “What was that about? Are you okay?” She also mentioned how it wasn’t the first time it happened to her. As a college student, she was once walking up Bruinwalk and a hobo swung his bag at her. I thought it was kinda strange, like she was a magnet for these crazy people. Anyway, we walked to TJ and I wasn’t sure how to comfort her. “Do you want anything? I’ll get it for you.” But she declined. When we got back to our floor, I told my supervisor and colleague what had happened. I normally don’t initiate conversation but I actually had something to say that day. “Something weird happened during lunch” I announced to I, L and student worker S. They advised that she tell the HR director so he can request some patrol officers to be in that area. We later called UCPD together over the phone and tried to describe what the suspect looked like. She remembered a pink shirt, I remembered green for some reason. She remembered shades, I didn’t. She remembered a ponytail, I remembered dreadlocks. Memory is a hard thing to rely on. Because at the moment, you’re more terrified than anything. It made me think of rape/crime when sometimes a victims story wouldn’t add up and they are dismissed as lying. A police officer later came by to see her in person and said that this same person was reported by someone else, and he indeed was wearing a pink shirt! I don’t wear my glasses normally so my eyesight is not crisp most of the time. I feel like this could be hazardous if an event like this happened again and I don’t even remember what the person looked like. When I told my mom the story later, she said I am so lucky because the guy targeted her and not me.

On Saturday, I hung out with a former coworker (a social worker at my last two jobs). She is 48 years old, a single mother, and has twins who are currently going to separate colleges. I hadn’t seen her for at least a year and a half. She used to live in the 626 area but decided to buy a home in Lytle Creek (middle of nowhere, 20 minute drive up the mountain lol). I drove us to yoga, and she mentioned how I sound different- that my voice is stronger/less meek. I said ah, I didn’t realize it but it’s probably a product of working in an American environment versus Chinese. I probably became more fake and overly energetic as well LOL. I didn’t tell her this but it took me a while to get used to her voice and accent again. B is a spunky person who DGAF lol. She reminded me of who I used to be. Staying true to herself. She lives isolated in the woods. Has an art studio. Is doing social work and is studying for a Psy.D. Her boyfriend is a 66 year old Japanese American detective who worked on the OJ Simpson case. I got to meet him for lunch after yoga. He lives in little Tokyo, a 15 minute walk to his work. We went to a random Japanese restaurant around that area. I thought we were an odd bunch- a 66 year old male, 48 year old female, and a 27 year old me. My friend joked that we could pass as his daughter and granddaughter lol. But, he looked good for his age. He actually grew up in the LA area too, in the neighborhood next to mine. He went to my rival high school, which he said at the time was about half Asian, half Latino, and a sprinkle of blacks. During my time I think it was like 90% Latino. All the Japanese Americans had moved away by that point. I asked him a little about crime- he says the majority of perpetrators are homeless people- killing and hurting strangers in broad daylight. Not sure if his statistics are correct, as he’s more of a detective than a police officer, but it was interesting he mentioned that after the incident that happened to my friend. He told me that just last week, a homeless stabbed/killed a 70 year old man in little Tokyo from behind at like 4:30pm. Anyway, I thought it was pretty awesome to have had the opportunity to meet him. When we got to the restaurant, he was all “order whatever you like”, but I felt a little weird having someone I didn’t know pay for me. I just looked him up on transparent California, and it seems he is a Deputy Attorney General and makes about $150k, so I shouldn’t feel too bad lol. He probably would feel emasculated and weird if a young girl like me ended up paying for my own meal. From what my friend told me previously, he is married and has kids, and my friend is like the other woman. He also acts as a father figure to my friends daughter (helping around the house, helping daughters move to college, etc). I was curious but didn’t want to ask him about his other family.  

 I made a macramé plant hanger for the first time with L. It was really nice to check out her DTLA apartment, although I admit I was a little bummed at first about having to pay $6 for parking to visit her lol. The amenities are super nice and it was definitely worth going to. We talked about career, friendships, and relationships. She instinctively acts as an older sister/mentor. I like it because she doesn’t come off as a know it all or overbearing and is a good listener. I found inspiration from her to keep working hard and to carve a career path for myself. She has had many years of doing LDR as well (at least 4). She told me that she has friends who similarly just started LDR, and come off as very confident that they will last. She noted that I/Matt seem to be more realistic and humbled regarding the distance, which is why she thinks we’re more solid and can work out.  

It's officially 2 months since he moved away. I was feeling quite sad over the weekend (not sure which part of my menstrual cycle that was on), but now I’m back to being more okay. Although I do share the sentiments as he said last time, that I don’t feel complete without him. I forgot what physical intimacy, kissing, and sex feel like. So in a sense, it’s good because I’m not thirsty haha. I’ve gotten over the initial wave of celibacy. Recently he asked me about what I want to do in life to try to help me with achieving my goals. I had trouble answering, as I feel my life isn’t very intentional. The only thing that came to mind was living abroad (outside of hobbies I can do with my current lifestyle). I told him I don’t really care what I do as long as it allows me a cushy lifestyle and abundant PTO lol. I told him that maybe I should’ve been a good Asian and just followed through with a specialized field like pharmacy or optometry. He then rebutted saying that I’d probably be unhappy and live life like I’m always pushing a boulder up a hill. Because that’s kind of how he feels, as he was pressured to go into medicine. He says he has no identity, which I think may partly be the case for me too, as we live more for our families/communities. 

Yesterday, he asked me about my goal income and age of achieving it. Then asked what my ideal household income is. This made me feel insecure because I know I’ll never hold the prestige or financial potential as that of a doctor. I know he has quite expensive taste (lol) so I started thinking, wouldn’t it be easier for him just to date someone of similar status so he will for sure reach his household income goal of 300k? In hindsight, I realize he is asking because he wants me to be the best version of myself, and he doesn’t like seeing wasted potential. He does the same thing to one of his best friends (who he says ignores him during these pep talks lol). He also sees it as a practical way for me to spend my time while he’s in residency. So that we both will be working hard towards our career during a period of time when he won’t have the capabilities of being an excellent partner. During our phone conversation, I asked him, “what happens if Connie can’t reach her financial goals?” He said, “she will be banned from life”. Then I said, “Mattay is gonna ban her from being with him”. Then he said, “you think so?” I said “yeah”. Then he gave me a serious “no” lol. I think what he means is that I’ll be losing in life because I’m not trying or giving my all, so, I’m not living life completely. At the end of our facetime call yesterday, he made goals for me in order of importance: 1. Get fit/strong by work out 45 min a day 2. Carve out a career goal and plan 3. Work on hobbies 4. Cultivate friendships and said I have to take care of myself before I can do anything else hence the importance of number 1. Anyway, I realized at the end of the day we were thinking about different things. I was honed in on my insecurities about not being able to offer enough in terms of social and financial status and worries about him not finding me ambitious or good enough. On his end, I think he was more concerned about me being bored and sad- and wanted to push me into doing something productive. These topics of discussion are uncomfortable but they are vital for growth. (Thanks Suze for helping me see this!)

[avalindin]

Second Chance

Future Tom fic

Chapter 7: Numb

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Previous Chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6

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Evelyn looked down to her eggs. They were beautiful and fluffy. She was sure the minute they hit her stomach, she would get sick and it would anger Dom. She used her shaky hand to grab the fork to shovel the food down her throat. She flinched as Dom appeared with more food and kissed her on the side of the brow.

“Why do you always jump,” he laughed.

Evelyn glared at him, disgusted at him as she swallowed.

Please let me throw up again…

It was a whole day or so she thought since she was brought to her room, to where Dom was keeping her. There were too many things running through her head to focus on Dom taking her hand into his as he rubbed his thumb to her knuckle.

“Perhaps we can walk about later.”

“You said I would die if I went outside this room.”

“The rest of this floor is clear. I had some help from the druggies to fix up this space. It’s not much but they’ll do anything for another hit. I know it’s too soon but I want to choose a color for the rooms that’ll belong to the kids.”

“I’m not giving you shit.”

Evelyn got up from the table and sat by herself on the single seated couch near the wall as Dom ignored her.

“You need to get over that muck and look forward to a bright future. There is always time to grieve later.”

“I think you need to get over my foot in your ass.”

“I was thinking how back before everything happened how boys were color coated as blue and the girls were pink. I think it will be a marvelous idea, there is so much space here and they can have their own playroom…”

Evelyn moaned as the pain in her hip was nearly tolerable.

“Justine?”

“Use my name.”

“How’s your hip?”

“Are you really asking me that right now,” she snapped.

If she had the strength, she would have gotten to her feet and broken on the flower filled vases over his head and sliced his throat with the leftover pieces. Dom grabbed his medical supplies and hurried to Evelyn as her head started to spin. She didn’t fight him as she suddenly slumped over the side of the couch.

Dom was quick to pull the side of her pants down as he lifted the bandage and curse to himself. Evelyn was weak, looking to her heavily bruised hip as a dark liquid that wasn’t blood flow from the cut.

“Justine?”

Her vision started to blur as she saw her mother rush to her side and lift her from the couch. Over the years in the three hospitals she worked, her mother was the best out of all the nurses, a regular Nurse Jackie without the addiction.

“Stay with me, Justine!”

Her skin had grown clammy in a matter of minutes as she lurched over in his arms in pain. Dom ran from the room to find a same doctor in the mix of the colony. Bribing was the best way to find what he was looking for. He armed himself with a weapon, a simple necessity as he pulled on a jacket and headed to one of the lower floors of the buildings of the cluster colony that was now his and his Justine’s new home. He had stolen a great amount of medicine for himself and more for a lone floor all to himself from the habitants of the colony in a matter of hours but he figured the Ovan wouldn’t need it now that she was dead.

The doors to the elevator opened as he stepped inside and prayed that he didn’t cause anything internal to happen to her.

-

Thomas woke looking around the room as the curtain shielded him from the voices.

“Evel…”

He couched, trying to find air as he sat up and moaned. His head pounded as he pushed off the blanket to the bed. Emma flung back the curtains and rushed to his side.

“Stop it, Thomas. You need to lay back down.”

“No!”

“Yes,” said Marren as she appeared donning a pair of gloves.

She looked so different from what she normally looked like. Her jacket was off and her sleeves were rolled up her arms. Her long hair was twisted up into a bun and her steady hands injected Tom with a sedative to ease him as he fell back to the bed.

“Ple…”

He groaned as he did everything he could to fight the sedative.

“I’m sorry, Tom…”

Her strong voice hummed and echoed in the back of his mind. He took a breath in and tried not to see his mother into her place as she smoothed back his sweating blonde curls.

“Just rest for now,” she turned up as her blonde hair darkened completely with a smile but look of worry to her eye, “He’s going into cardiac arrest. Get the next available chemist!”

“Not him, not him…”

“You’ll get off your ass if you want another hit. NOW MOVE!”

Dom grabbed the collar of one of the runaway doctors that fled to the Echo colony when he tried to traffic drugs for extra units. When he was caught, he took everything he could and fled to the untouchable patch of land a day’s ride from any of the colonies. Now Dom was like him but he knew he’d never be strung out on drugs. He would never do that to Justine.

If she would live through the night, she would need a few days to heal properly and then… Then she would be his. He wouldn’t think of it as forcing her if she had nothing else to lose. He tapped his foot impatiently as the elevator went higher up into the buildings. He swiped his card and punched in the code only he knew for his floor.

The cab shifted sideways as it sped faster to its destination.

“Come on. Come on.”

“Look, mate. You may as well tell me what you did now.”

“Too late, we’re here.”

Dom rushed from the hall and into the furnished foyer to Justine’s room. He scanned his card again to Justine’s room as he was jerked to a stop. The door had only opened part of the way as a bit of brown hair with blonde streaks showed.

“Shit…”

He heaved the door in, sending Justine’s unconscious body down to the floor hard. There was blood mixing in with the dark matter drenching the side of her white pant leg. The doctor rushed inside with his jaw to the floor as he dropped his things and punched Dom in the jaw.

“What the hell did you do to her?!”

“I took out the implant.”

“How long since she had it?”

“Just a few days.”

“You fucking idiot.”

The doctor scooped up Evelyn and laid her out on the dinner table. Dom dropped the stolen supplies he procured and stepped back before he got hit again. He was not a doctor and didn’t want to do anything to further the jeopardy of Evelyn’s health. The doctor injected her with an IV of his own blood. He was careful not to step over the lines between him and the lines keeping Evelyn alive.

“You stupid fucking moron. She’s one of the ones that woke, isn’t she?”

“Why?”

“You are obviously your own brother and you chose a fighter. I heard she walked outside without a mask. I don’t know why she is still alive.”

“Well. This one is 100%,” he boasted.

“Maybe not now.”

“What?”

“You taking out the implant may have fucked up her genetic coding. Good job on waiting, you fucking gearhead.”

“But you can fix this, right?”

The Doctor looked up with his twitching eyes obviously strung out from all the drugs in his system.

“There is a wonderful possibility, a Russian roulette of a chance that she’ll be able to have a child now that you were too stupid to get a doctor.”

“No…”

“Act like a bitch, get slapped like a bitch!”

There were so many needles sterilized, filled and poked into Evelyn’s skin as she moaned in pain. There was so much pain.

“Tom…”

None of this could be happening. If she was asleep in his arms, she would wake up to find him there. If she was back at the apartment, she would welcome little Henry with open arms and let Tom know how she felt the minute he returned. Even if she was still under, waiting to wake up still naked and hooked up to feeding tubes, she would be there to seeing him again for the first time.

Evelyn…

She turned to the sound of Tom’s voice as he sank to his knees gasping for air. She ran to him, doing everything in her power to reach him before she woke. Tom could feel his head spinning as he looked up to Evelyn running for her life.

Thomas!

He tried to stand to his feet, unable from the pain in his chest as he felt a prick in the side of his chest. There was a trickle of blood running down his side as it glistened. He looked up as her shape began to disappear but not before he saw the side of her hip dripping with blood.

Clear!

Tom’s whole body thumped against the bed as he was brought back to life. He flailed, coughing and calling out for Evelyn as Marren held him down to the bed.

“Breathe, Hiddleston, breathe! You’re no good to me dead.”

He steadied his breathing as he looked down to the blood draining from the straw that was placed in his chest.

“He should be fine now.”

Tom turned to the old man at the side of his bed as he was injected with a mild sedative to make the pain in him go away.

“Father?”

The man was silent as he checked the machine that Tom was hooked up to.

“He’ll be fine after some rest,” the man stated, ignoring Tom, “Tubes can be taken out tomorrow.”

He looked down with sadness in his eyes as he smoothed his son’s hair back.

“What happens now?”

“Nothing, Edward. Echo colony is way out of my jurisdiction. Evelyn is gone and she’s not coming back. We’re limited as it is and more abductions happen every day. Perhaps we should have screened your wife’s workers. No one ever comes back from Echo.”

“Perhaps you shouldn’t be insulting her in her memory. It was your dog that killed her in the first place.”

“If you leave, if any of you leave this colony, I will make your lives hell as you rot on the outskirts!”

Marren snapped off her gloves and tossed them into the nearest bin. The man sat next to Tom’s bed as Tom tried to speak.

“Look, boy. I know it’s been 15 years but you need someone with you right now. Your sister’s are handling matters of your mum. She can’t be a donor as she wanted. Her organs were too damaged.”

“H-How?”

His voice wasn’t close to understandable but it was enough.

“There was a wound on the back of her head. He must have knocked her out and reset the windows manually. There was a fair amount of clotting in her brain. She wouldn’t have woken up even if she could. I’m sorry.”

Tom kept his eyes to the ceiling as his father smoothed back the hair on his grown son’s hair. He could feel something tucked under his pillow as he met his father’s eyes.

“Come find me tomorrow when you are better, boy.”

Tom rolled his eyes, not ready to make nice with his father after all this time. His father lowered himself to his ear to make sure that he was heard.

“You man up and find me tomorrow, Thomas. You are going to fight like hell for Evelyn, understand me?”

He kept his sinking eyes to the wall as his father walked from the room and left him to his silence.

-

“One foot in front of the other.”

Tom attempted to sleep but was woken at the chime of his mother’s screen. It was strange for her to not be alive anymore. No more. He turned his head into his pillow, moaning as he willed his lungs to strengthen. He curled up into a ball, trying to come up with a plan to try and save Evelyn from Dom and how he was going to kill him. Bringing him back alive was no longer an option to Tom.

Eye for an eye but it would never justify for the death of his mother…

Tom ran his hand under his pillow, feeling a temporary security badge. He sat up, looking to the plastic, knowing his side of the colony didn’t use the badges. Tom’s brow frowned in confusion as he carefully got to his feet and found his lab coat with his own badge missing.

“This is a bloody mistake,” he whispered to himself.

He dressed as quickly as he could and left the trashed lab behind him before the first set of nurses arrived for him. If he hadn’t left, Marren would have him under 24 hour lock down with no chance to find Evelyn. He hurried down the back corridors of the science buildings, keeping his face down to the floor so that no one and no cameras could identify him.

Tom stopped at the set of doors he promised never to enter since the day his father left his mother. He took a deep breath and clutched the temp badge in his hand, pressing it to the panel and giving him access inside. A hand shot out from the shadowed corridors, startling Tom as he nearly stumbled over his feet.

“Calm down, boy, follow me.”

Tom was confused, hurrying behind his father as he was led through the dimly lit labs and testing areas.

“Where are we going?”

His father grabbed him by the front of his shirt and yanked him along as his anger filled his every vein. Tom swatted at his father, failing to stop him as he was pulled along to hidden doors of one of the dock out of commission for simple matters. Tom stopped as he looked to the group of men loading a few duffle bags worth of supplies and guns loaded with ammunition. The strong hand at his shoulder made him turn to his father as tears fell down his wrinkled face.

“I have always been one for protocol all of my life. Evelyn is the reason I met your mother. She was as strong as I’d ever imagined and I wager that she is too.”

“I-I don’t understand. What have you done?”

“I have known that Dom wasn’t right in the head for the longest. Him and his brother are monsters and need to be stopped. He is not here anymore. He’s smuggled himself and Evelyn to the Echo colony.”

Tom’s blood ran completely cold as the words of the lone, wretched colony met his ears. If Evelyn was there, she wouldn’t be able to survive there long.

“I have to get her!”

“I know, my boy. Your mother was the one to talk to me after all this time and tell me of her. At first, I didn’t believe her but I saw Evelyn myself. I know you love her as I once loved your mother. She is a miracle. You get her back. There is much that we have lost in these dark times and now we must fight like hell.”

The old man reached up and cupped his aged hands around his youngest kid’s face as tears spilled through his fingers.

“You get her back. I will deal with Marren and keep her off your trail for as long as I can. You fight like hell and bring Evelyn home!”

“I-I will.”

A loud bang made everyone in earshot jump as Edward pushed his son toward the two transporters that were rushed to being loaded with what could be brought. Tom watched his father pulled a switch from his pocket as he backed towards the doors. His instinct made him reach for the edge of the closing transport doors as the men around him pulled him back. Edward pulled a mask over his face as light flooded the dock.

Tom banged both of his hands on the transport doors, yelling for his father as he saw the charging explosives plastered around the walls. He opened his mouth and roared, letting the severity of the situation ahead of him as the lights on the explosives beeped faster. The last thing he remembered was his father taking shelter and closing his eyes as his thumb pressed on his trigger. The doors to the lab areas opened a fraction as the transporter sped clear of the blast.

Tom was numbed as his eyes followed the flow of dark smoke as it rose to the sky. He could feel the small prick of the sedative one of the men injected him with.

Good thing, he thought to himself.

If he hadn’t been put down, he would have turned back for his father and ruined his chance to save the woman he loved, if she was still alive. His eyes sank shut as he forced himself to see her smiling face and listen to the strong note of the violin as they danced.

-

Dom sat by himself, feeling his longing for Evelyn hurt him. She was out for a greater part of the night and now he was to blame if he could not have a child with her. He was there spying on all of Evelyn’s charts. She was healthy and fully able to reproduce. That was top prize in the world that he knew and far more than valuable to the world below his feet.

He ignored the shrieks and the smashing pots in the bedroom behind him as he ran his fingers through his hair. He was disappointed to not taking the approach that he wanted with Evelyn. He gave up calling her Justine but she would still be treated as such, though it was time that she learned her place. Dom pushed through the pain in his cock as he clothed himself and attached his weapon to his belt and turned for the bedroom.

Evelyn turned with fury in her eyes as the door opened. Dom smiled and pressed his watch as her polished silver wrists shot behind her back. Her surprise let him overtake her as he tied a chain around her neck. Evelyn fought and kicked with all her might, feeling a sharp but dull pain shoot through her body as she stopped flailing for a moment. She crashed against Dom’s chest as his strong arm drug her to the doors.

“You know, Evelyn, you need to understand this a little better.”

Her head hung as he picked her up before the voltage in her wrists lessened. As she found her footing, he laced his fingers into her streaked hair and pushed her out of the apartment altogether and into the narrow hall leading straight to an elevator. She looked down to the pad that required his fingerprint to access. The sliding doors opened as he pushed them both into the cramped elevator as Evelyn crashed her hip into the metal railing. She cried out in pain as her entire pelvis pulsed in pain.

Dom only smiled as he pushed a button and crossed his arms.

“What am I not understanding?”

“I am trying. I am really trying but you are not making this any easier. So I’m showing you why I’m doing what I do.”

“Go straight to hell,” she hissed through her teeth.

The ding above her head haunted her ears as a smile crossed Dom’s face.

“Wish granted.”

He wrapped his chain around his hand and guided Evelyn forward to the stench of the top ground floor as voices filled her ears.

“I’ll let you think about it but if you do not wish to stay with me then we’ll find someone else to take care of you.”

Dom brought his boot up and kicked open a set of doors as they were greeted with the smell of natural flesh and moans. Evelyn was paralyzed as her eyes surfed over the naked and clothed bodies that writhed and spanned out as far as she could see. Her feet stumbled underneath her as she tried not to get sick on herself. Men and women were everywhere, clawing at one another as Dom pulled her along.

There were a few that turned and looked her in the eye as they smiled toothlessly and licked their lips to her. Dom showed his weapon making them turn for the nearest woman bent over a flat surface. She screamed at the feel of a woman’s hand on her waist, wanting to pull her down to the pit of others they passed. Dom kicked his foot across her face as the rest of the pit laughed and groped at the woman moaning in pain.

Evelyn was lifted from her feet and pulled up into a set of seats easily unreachable by anyone else underneath her. A new set of laughter and moans made her turn to men sitting in leather seats as they pawed their women. Her dark eyes looked to each of the women, obviously drugged and in a stupor as they turned back and grinded themselves harder. Dom pulled her chains back as she choked and crashed to his lap.

His hand yanked her hair back as his other forced its way down the front of her pants. He pinched her healing side as the pain got worse.

“Which one do you want inside of you,” he mockingly whispered into her ear, “I’m sure they’ll try and be gentle with you but they may change when I tell them all who you are.”

He smiled as she tried to fight him through the pain. Both turned to the cheers and the sudden movement of the crowd below.

“Look,” shouted one of the men next to them, “That one’s made it.”

Evelyn felt tears falling from the sides of her face as she saw a heavily pregnant woman being led away by a group of aged women as her clothes and a clear puddle was left behind. The warehouse around them filled with cheers as Dom pulled her higher on his lap. Everything, her hip, her neck, her wrists hurt worse than she could imagine as she fought less. There was no more waking up, this was now an unrealistic nightmare made real.

“Just think. That could be you.”

Evelyn shook her head, unable to speak from the pain as Dom pulled her head back harder.

“I’m sorry. I was wrong. That will be you.”

“Fuck you!”

Her hair slipped from his fingers as she headbutted his face with the back of her head. Dom howled in pain as Evelyn launched herself into the sea of people below her. She was lucky and only lucky when she was pulled to her feet. Hands grabbed at her, pulling her in every direction. She could only ram into the nearest person and pray that they were distracted with one another which did work until a shot was fired into the crowd.

She looked over her shoulder to Dom jumping into the crowd behind her and gave chase. Evelyn ran as fast as her feet would allow her as she ventured deeper and deeper into the warehouse. She found cover the farther she went. A hand wrapped around her chain as she was yanked to the floor and surrounded by the cleanest looking men apart from everyone else.

“Lookie, boys! We got us a fresh fish. Let’s put her with the others.”

She was pulled along as she turned her head up to the rows of women, all whom she knew didn’t belong as they hung naked from the ceiling with various men between their legs as they fought the best they could, begging for them to stop and to be let free. Her feet stomped into the concrete floor to try and stop herself from being pulled forward and hung like a piece of fresh meat. Something popped beside her ear made her head spin as she felt blood on the side of her face.

Dom shot the men that touched her with stray bullets killing a few of the women and pulled Evelyn over his shoulders. The aching pain of her body blurred her vision as Dom fought his way back to the elevators. He fired more, killing his way back with none of the others caring as they continued with one another. Sweat poured from his head as the doors closed behind him. His fingers dug into Evelyn’s leg as he braced himself on the back wall.

His thumb flew for the pad and sent them upward to the safety of their floor. Dom carried her back to the apartment, locking each of the deadbolts behind him. His heart pumped from his chest as he hurled Evelyn into the nearest table as it creaked underneath her. He crashed over her, burying his face into her neck with the images of the warehouse fueling his veins with lust and possession. They had touched her, the men that subdued the women that were brought in daily all with hopes of making babies. That’s all they wanted.

Evelyn failed at trying to turn away as Dom tore the side of her pants and shoved his hand down the front. She was unable to close her legs in time as Dom pressed his fingers to her clit. Everything hurt worse. His teeth dug into her neck and his fingers pushed their way into her as she sobbed.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen. They weren’t supposed to touch you like that. I never would have let that happen.”

He slowed his hand for her, trying to make her calm as he dragged his tongue up her neck. Evelyn could only drown him out and pray for Tom.

“I was wrong about what I said,” he panted, “That will be you. No matter what you choose. You are 100% and will earn your keep. I think I’ll keep you though. You won’t be like them. You’ll be taken care of. No drugs. No reps. No one else but me and the doctors to make sure you carry properly. You’ll carry clean and not like that.”

He slowed his hand, feeling his fingers wet as he looked down to her. Her face was dotted red from the tears she’d shed and he’d let her continue as she stopped kicking. Her whole body was trembling and it was all because of him, giving him some confidence that she wouldn’t try to run.

“All I want is a boy,” he admitted as he began to pull his hand back, “but have all the ti…”

He spotted at the sight and smell of her blood on his fingertips. His eyes saw the obvious stain of her menstruation as she tried to catch her breath. His demeanor changed as he gathered Evelyn in his arms and headed for the bathroom. He turned at the old knobs to let the rusted water run clean. She felt her restraints let go as her arms fell weak to her side. She had no more strength to fight as Dom pulled off her clothes and held her under the water as the blood fell down the drain. He was generous to wrap and rough towel around her for her decency as he rocked her back and forth through her pain.

“Hush now, Justine. Just let me take care of you.”

She ignored his words as she felt the sting of whatever sedative he used to make her unconscious. The only thing she could count as luck was that her bleeding would give her a few days to try and find a way to escape or kill Dom before she would be used like any of the women floors below her, willing or not.

It wasn’t what she and Tom had. It wasn’t what they felt for one another. He would never be Dom. She could feel in her bones that Tom was alive and out looking for her in the apocalyptic shit storm. He was coming for her and she would be waiting.

-

Tom opened his eyes, feeling stiff but restful as the group of men around him were kept busy. His head hurt as one of the men helped him up.

“Morning, drama queen.”

The rather large man held out a bit of rations for Tom. His teeth dug into the dull bar and eat until he licked at the wrapper. Water was set into his lap as he emptied it in seconds, fighting to not get sick in the same moment.

“Hey, hey. Take it slow, son.”

“What happened?”

“Your daddy is fine. The charges were his idea. He’s safe. He only wanted to make sure that Marren wasn’t after us.”

“W-Who are all of you?”

“We were on the same squad on Dom. We’re helping you get Evelyn home.”

“Why?”

“You don’t understand, lad. Evelyn is like that Guadalupe. She’s a beacon for us, special that one is.”

“She is to me, more than you know.”

“We know, son. That’s why we’re here. That and to clear our status from that horseshit. Your daddy brought us up to speed. When the time comes,” he said placing a loaded gun into Tom’s hand, “we won’t stand in your way.”

Tom calmly handed the weapon, checking the magazine like he was taught when he was younger.

“Good.”

“We’re a few days out. The blast damaged one of the thrusters so we got to stay on the ground for the time being. When we get close, we’ll have to make it quick. Don’t touch any supplies marked. We gotta trade ‘em for parts but we’ll be as quick as we can.”

“Is that as far of the plan that you got?”

“For now, but is I said, we have a day or two.”

Tom felt the timid doctor he was raised to be disappear as the transport drove nearer to their destination. The blast would have put the colony for at least two days to make sure everything was sealed off for efficiency sake. His mother was gone, his family mourning and his father stepping up for the first time in his life. His heavy eyes looked up to the willing men at his disposal. He was going to get Evelyn back and put Dom down like the dog that he was.

“Good,” he said with the cock of his gun, “what have you got so far?”

-

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[sending-the-message]

Coral Pink Sand Doom by oddblonde

I have 3 siblings. I am not particularly close to any of them. My younger sister moved to New York City with her boyfriend when she was 18. My younger brother got into drugs when he was 13 and any relationship we'd previously had disintegrated.

My older sister is 10 years older than me and she moved 200 miles away when I was still a kid so she has never been a big part of my life. Not to mention I think she resents me and my other siblings. She had been an only child for ten years when suddenly our parents had 3 kids in rapid succession. It always struck me as odd how she shared so many memories with my parents that me and my younger siblings couldn't relate to. My mom used to say that she was their parenting test dummy. It was just a joke, but sometimes it felt like us younger kids were part of a whole different family. Despite the fact that I wasn't very close with any of my siblings, I have always been close with my parents, and my siblings have too (even my druggie brother, sigh). This is the reason I moved in with my oldest sister, Sarah.

My mom called me on a Monday morning at 5am. She told me that my 3 month old nephew, Sarah's son, had died. I was sad and stunned, I hadn't even had a chance to meet my new nephew yet. I was upset, but my mom was much more so. She was horribly worried for Sarah and she decided that me, her, and my dad had to visit right away. It sounds, cold, but I wasn't too keen on the idea. Sarah's husband, Mark, was an outdoor enthusiast and they lived in southern Utah. Its a beautiful, wild place to visit even if you aren't that into nature (which I'm not), but staying there under the circumstances combined with making the long drive didn't leave me thrilled. I do all my work from my laptop so I didn't have the excuse of trying to get time off work. Down to the coral pink sand dunes I went.

Those few days we were there were uneventful. Mark and Sarah were both devastated, Sarah more so, which I thought seemed typical. Their other two children were still pretty young so they were somewhere between fine and oblivious. I stayed as far away from the emotional stuff as I could and put my efforts towards making sure the house was stocked with groceries and that the funeral went off without a hitch. The day we were set to leave my mom dropped a bomb on me. Mark was leaving Sarah. I had stayed out of the fray, but I was surprised that I hadn't seen any signs. He was taking the kids too. My mom wanted me to live with Sarah, just for a little while. I knew there were things my mom wasn't telling me but we were all worn out and we needed to reserve our energy for the drive home.

I guess at this point it is worth mentioning that the medical examiner wasn't sure why my nephew died. He seemed healthy in every way, but sometimes babies just die. Its called SIDS, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Its about as unsatisfactory an answer as any grieving parent can get for why their new baby just drops dead. To be honest, I didn't ponder this fact at all. In fact, I didn't even dwell too much on Mark leaving. Selfishly, I was bemoaning the fact that I had to pack up my life in the city to move down to the primordial desert. I remember thinking to myself that its so different out there in the sand and shrubs, its like another dimension... If only it had been so benign!

A few days later, I was packed and ready for an extended stay with my distraught sister. Before I left, I went to my parents house to pick up a few things and receive a debriefing from my mom. She laid it out for me. Mark was freaked out. Sarah had been acting weird since she got pregnant with my late nephew. Near the end of the pregnancy she had broken down and said she was so scared for the child to come into the world, she hoped he would be born dead. Now, Mark isn't the brightest crayon in the pack. He's fine when it comes to white water rafting or rock climbing, but medicine and rationality are not his strong suits. When their baby died, he didn't buy the whole SIDS thing. He really thought Sarah had done something to the baby. At this point I was enraged. It was obvious to me that my sister was experiencing some sort of major depression. To think that she would harm her own child; it was ludicrous. My apathy vanished and I got ready to haul my sister to the nearest mental health facility the second I got there.

I arrived and Sarah's personality was as flat as a pancake. I was still full of righteous indignation at Mark's stupidity so I informed Sarah that I was taking her to a hospital. If not right then and there, then tomorrow at the absolute latest. She looked at me stunned and started to cry. It's pathetic, but we were so distant I wasn't even sure I should give her a hug.

Before I could figure myself out, she began to walk away from me sobbing about no one understanding and that a hospital couldn't fix what was wrong. I thought she was referring to the fact that her son had passed. Sigh.

I left Sarah alone the rest of the night. I had let her know what was happening tomorrow and that I did not intend to deviate from that plan. I went to bed in my niece's old bedroom. As I started to fall asleep the stress of the whole situation finally got to me and I began to cry. It wasn't fair that my nephew had died, that Mark had left, and that I was the only person willing or able to help Sarah. She had only a baby three months ago but she was as skinny as a rail, thinner than I had ever seen her. It was winter, but she was so sickly pale. She had dark bags under her eyes. I couldn't blame her, she'd lost her whole family in one fell swoop. Eventually I stopped crying but I couldn't fall asleep, I could hear Sarah wandering around the kitchen and she was making a lot of noise. In my moment of sappiness I decided to go into the kitchen and give her a big hug and tell her everything was going to be ok. None of the kitchen lights were on, but I could tell she was moving around in there.

“Sarah?”

I called out. No reply.

“Sarah, I know things have been really, really bad, but I'm here for you right now, ok?”

Still no reply. I could see her standing next to the counter, she had stopped moving. I went in to give her a hug. The second I wrapped my arms around her I realized it wasn't Sarah. I felt like I had dived head first into a pool of freezing, dark oil. There was a rushing noise in my ears, the kitchen had been dark, but now it was pitch black, I couldn't see a thing. I thought I was going to throw up, faint, have a heart attack, and then drown. It was the most disorienting, sickening feeling I had ever experienced. Suddenly, the frigid blackness lifted. I fell to the kitchen floor gasping for breath. I think I might have screamed, but I don't remember.

The next thing I know, the light turned on and Sarah was standing above me.

“Did you bump into something? You can turn on the light you know.”

“What? No. Weren't you just...? Whats wrong with your kitchen?!” was all I could manage to say. She looked at me cockeyed. For a second, I thought she might even laugh, but her face took on its look of supreme exasperation and without saying another word, she left the room.

If it had been anyone else, in any other situation, I would have been shaking them by the shoulders and yelling about demons and ghosts and all that jazz, but I figured Sarah really didn't need to hear about it in her state. I went back to my bedroom, but I knew I wouldn't sleep that night. I almost considered calling my mom, or one of my friends, or even my drug addict brother just for moral support, but what would I say? I had some weird panic attack in the middle of the night and I didn't even know how to talk to my own sister? I decided against it and waited for the sun to rise. Let me tell you, it took it's good sweet time. At the first hint of sunlight I jumped out of bed and took a shower. I went into Sarah's room and started packing a bag for her. I didn't know what she'd need at a mental hospital, or if I was even going to end up getting her to stay in one, but I needed her to know I was serious.

“Hey Sarah, do you want to take a shower? I'm taking you to the hospital today, remember?”

“There is nothing a hospital can do for me.”

I expected this reaction. It was not going to deter me.

“Look Sarah, I know this is all horrible, and freaky, and, ugh, I don't even know, but I think this will really help everything.”

“Just give me a couple more days. Please.”

I was afraid to push her. I relented. I wished I hadn't. She didn't want to a few days to get the used to the idea of getting sent to the loony bin. She wanted to keep me in the house long enough to witness what had made her wish her child was dead. She didn't have to wait long.

[batterymonster2021]

Lessons from the Mental Hospital | Glennon Doyle Melton | TEDxTraverseCity

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/lessons-from-the-mental-hospital-glennon-doyle-melton-tedxtraversecity-3/

Lessons from the Mental Hospital | Glennon Doyle Melton | TEDxTraverseCity

Translator: Tijana Mihajlovi Reviewer: Denise RQ hi. I’ve been trying to weasel my method out of being on this stage for weeks. (Laughter) i am terrified. However a few month in the past, I was up early, panicking about this, and that i watched an old TED speak that Bren Brown did on vulnerability. Dr. Brown is one of my heroes. She is a shame researcher, and i am a convalescing bulimic, alcoholic, and drug consumer. So i’m kind of a shame researcher, too. (Laughter) it is just that most of my work is completed out within the field. (Laughter) And Dr. Brown defined courage like this. She stated, "braveness is to tell the story of who you might be together with your entire heart." That bought me fascinated with a different one among my heroes, Georgia O’Keeffe, and the way she stated, "whether or not you prevail or not is beside the point. There is not any such thing. Making the unknown recognized is what is principal." So, right here i’m to inform you the story of who i am with my whole heart, and to make some unknowns known.When I used to be eight years historic, I started to feel uncovered, and that i started to consider very, very awkward. Every day, I was pushed out of my condo and into college, all oily, and pudgy, and conspicuous, and to me the other ladies gave the impression so cool, and together, and handy, and i started to feel like a loser in a global that favored superheroes. So I made my possess capes, and that i tied them tight around me. My capes were pretending and dependancy. But all of us have our own superhero capes, do not we? Perfectionism, and overworking, snarkiness, and apathy; they’re all superhero capes. Our capes are what we put over our actual selves, in order that our real tender selves do not ought to be noticeable and can’t be damage. Our superhero capes are what keep us from having to suppose much at all, because every good and dangerous factor is deflected off of them.So, for 18 years, my capes of addiction and pretending stored me reliable and hidden. Men and women think of us, addicts, as insensitive liars, however we don’t start out that way. We begin out as highly touchy truth-tellers. We think a lot anguish and a lot love, and we sense that the arena does not need us to believe that a lot, and does not need to want as much alleviation as we’d like, so we pretending.We attempt to fake like we’re the people that we think we’re presupposed to be. We numb, and we cover, and we fake, and that pretending does finally change into a lifetime of lies, but to be reasonable, we thought we have been imagined to be lying. They tell us when you consider that have been little that once any one asks us how we’re doing, the one right answer is, "great. And also you?" however the thing is that the folks are actuality-tellers.We’re born to make our unknown identified. We will be able to to find somewhere to do it. So in confidential, with the booze, or the overshopping, or the alcohol, or the meals, we inform the reality. We say, "surely, i am now not satisfactory." on the grounds that we do not believe riskless telling that reality in the actual world, we make our possess little world, and that’s addiction. That is whatever cape you put on. So what occurs is anyone grow to be living in these little, teeny, controllable, predictable, dark worlds rather of all together in the large, brilliant, messy one. I binged and purged for the first time after I used to be eight, and that i persisted each day for the next 18 years.Seems natural to me, however you’re amazed. (Laughter) each single time that I acquired anxious, or worried, or indignant, I concept whatever was improper with me. So I took that worried power to the kitchen and i stuffed all of it down with food, and then I panicked, and that i purged, and in any case of that, I was once laid out on the lavatory ground, and that i was once so exhausted and so numb that I not ever had to go back and handle whatever it was once that had made me uncomfortable in the first position, and that is what I desired. I didn’t need to care for the pain and messiness of being a person. So, once I was once a senior in excessive college, I in the end determined to inform the truth in the real world. I walked in my guidance counselor’s place of business and that i mentioned, "really, i am no longer quality. Someone support me." and that i used to be sent to a mental clinic. Within the intellectual sanatorium, for the first time in my existence, I found myself in a world that made sense to me. In excessive tuition, we needed to care about geometry when our hearts have been breaking given that we have been simply bullied within the hallway, or no one would sit down with us at lunch, and we needed to care about historical Rome when all we quite wanted to do used to be be taught how to make and hold a real friend.We had to behave hard once we felt scared, and we had to behave positive once we felt really stressed. Appearing, pretending, was a matter of survival. High institution is sort of like the true world normally, however within the mental hospital, there was once no pretending. The gig was once up. (Laughter) We had classes about the best way to express how we really felt by way of song, and artwork, and writing. We had lessons about easy methods to be a good listener, and how you can be courageous enough to inform our own story at the same time being style ample not to tell anyone else’s. We held every different’s hands often, simply considering that we felt like we needed to. Nobody was once ever allowed to be left out. Everybody was priceless – that was the guideline – just considering she existed. So in there, we were courageous sufficient to take off our capes. All I ever wanted to know, I discovered in the intellectual health center. (Laughter) I don’t forget this sandy-haired lady, who was so gorgeous, and he or she told the truth on her fingers.I held her hand one day even as she was once crying, and i saw that her arms have been just sliced up like precut hams. In there, people wore their scars on the external, so that you knew where they stood, and they informed the truth, so that you knew why they stood there. So I graduated from high tuition, and that i went on to tuition, which used to be means crazier than the mental health center. (Laughter) In school, I introduced on the capes of alcoholism and drug use. The sun rose day-to-day, and that i began binging and purging, after which when the solar set, I drank myself silly. The dawn is ordinarily men and women’s signal to stand up, but it was my signal daily to come back down – to come back down from the booze, and the boys, and the medicinal drugs, and i could now not come down. That was once to be avoided at all expenses, so I hated the dawn. I might close the blinds, and i would put the pillow over my head, at the same time my spinning mind would torture me in regards to the individuals who were going out into their day, into the sunshine, to make relationships, and pursue their dreams, and have a day.And that i had no day; I only had night. Nowadays, I like to believe of hope as that dawn. It comes out day by day to shine on all people equally. It comes out to shine on the sinners, and the saints, and the druggies, and the cheerleaders. It never withholds. It does not judge. In case you’ve spent your complete existence at nighttime, and then one day simply decide to come back out, it’ll be there, ready for you, simply ready to warm you.You recognize, all those years, I concept of that sunrise as shopping, and accusatory, and judgmental, but it wasn’t. It used to be simply hope’s day-to-day invitation to me to come again to life. I consider if you nonetheless have a day, if you’re still alive, you are nonetheless invited. I actually graduated from school – which makes me both grateful to and incredibly suspicious of my Alma Mater – (Laughter) and i located myself type of in the real world, and kind of no longer. On mother’s Day 2002, – i am not good at years, we’ll simply say on mom’s Day – I had spun deeper and deeper. I wasn’t even Glennon anymore. I was once simply bulimia. I used to be just alcoholism. I used to be just a pile of capes. However on mom’s Day, one mother’s Day, I determined myself on the cold rest room floor, hungover, shaking, and retaining a optimistic pregnancy experiment. As I sat there with my again actually towards a wall, shaking, an understanding washed over me.In that second, on the lavatory ground, I understood that even in my state, even mendacity on the ground, that anyone in the market had deemed me important of an invite to an awfully, very main event. So, that day on the bathroom flooring, I determined to show up, just to exhibit up, to climb out of my darkish, person, controllable world, and out into the tremendous, excellent, messy one.I didn’t recognize how you can be a sober character, or learn how to be a mother, or how you can be a pal, so I simply promised myself that i would show up and i would do the following right thing. "simply exhibit up, Glennon, despite the fact that you are scared, simply do the next proper thing, even when you’re shaking." So I stood up. What they don’t inform you about getting sober, about peeling off your capes, is that it will get a hell of loads worse earlier than it will get better.Getting sober is like getting better from frostbite. It can be all of these emotions that you’ve got numbed for goodbye, now they’re there, and they are present. To start with, it simply feels style of tingly and uncomfortable, but then, these feelings start to feel like daggers. The soreness, the loss, the guilt, the shame – it is all piled on high of you with nowhere to run. However what I learned during that time is that sitting with the ache and the enjoyment of being a person while refusing to run for any exits is the only approach to turn out to be a real person. So, this present day, i am not a superhero, and i’m not a superb human being, but i am completely person, and i’m so happy with that.I am, fortunately and frustratingly, still precisely the identical individual as I was when I was 20, and 16, and eight years old. I still consider scared all the time, anxious at all times, oily always. I nonetheless get very high and very low in lifestyles, daily, but I in the end authorized the truth that sensitive is solely how I was made, that i don’t need to conceal it, and i don’t must fix it. I’m not broken. I’ve without a doubt started to wonder if perhaps you are sensitive, too. Possibly you suppose high-quality soreness and deep pleasure, however you just don’t suppose riskless speaking about it in the actual world.So now, as an alternative of seeking to make myself more difficult, I write and that i serve folks to support create a world where sensitive persons don’t want superhero capes, where we can all simply come out into the massive, bright, messy world, and tell the truth, and forgive each different for being human, and admit collectively that yes, existence is fairly difficult, but in addition insist that collectively we are able to do rough things. You understand, maybe it can be good enough to assert, "in reality, today i am not high-quality." possibly it can be alright to do not forget that we’re human beings, and to discontinue doing lengthy sufficient to believe, and to like, and to share, and to listen. This weekend was mother’s Day, which marked the eleven-year anniversary of the day I determined to show up, and that i spent the day on the seaside with my three youngsters, and my two dogs, and my one husband (Laughter) my long-struggling husband.That you would be able to only assume. Life is stunning and life is brutal. Existence is brutaful at all times and every day. Just one thing has made the change for me, and that is this: I used to numb my feelings and conceal, and now I believe my feelings and that i share. That is the one difference in my existence nowadays. I’m not petrified of my feelings anymore. I do know they may be able to come, and so they will not kill me, and they are able to take over for somewhat even as, in the event that they need to, however on the finish of the day, what they are is particularly just publications. They are simply publications to inform me what’s the subsequent correct thing for me to do.Loneliness, it leads us to reference to different individuals, and jealousy, it courses us to what we’re supposed to do next, and soreness guides us to support different individuals, and being overwhelmed, it guides us to ask for help. So I’ve realized that if I honor my feelings as my own private prophets, and alternatively of running I simply be still, that there are prizes to be gained. These prizes are peace, and dignity, and friendship. So I got an email final week, and it can be now taped to my computer at house. It just stated, "expensive Glennon, it’s braver to be Clark Kent than it’s to be Superman. Raise on, warrior." (Laughter) So at present, i would say to you that we don’t want any further superheroes.We simply need awkward, oily, honest human beings out in the vivid, gigantic, messy world. And i’ll see you there. (Applause) .

[airoasis]

Lessons from the Mental Hospital | Glennon Doyle Melton | TEDxTraverseCity

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/lessons-from-the-mental-hospital-glennon-doyle-melton-tedxtraversecity-3/

Lessons from the Mental Hospital | Glennon Doyle Melton | TEDxTraverseCity

Translator: Tijana Mihajlovi Reviewer: Denise RQ hi. I’ve been trying to weasel my method out of being on this stage for weeks. (Laughter) i am terrified. However a few month in the past, I was up early, panicking about this, and that i watched an old TED speak that Bren Brown did on vulnerability. Dr. Brown is one of my heroes. She is a shame researcher, and i am a convalescing bulimic, alcoholic, and drug consumer. So i’m kind of a shame researcher, too. (Laughter) it is just that most of my work is completed out within the field. (Laughter) And Dr. Brown defined courage like this. She stated, "braveness is to tell the story of who you might be together with your entire heart." That bought me fascinated with a different one among my heroes, Georgia O’Keeffe, and the way she stated, "whether or not you prevail or not is beside the point. There is not any such thing. Making the unknown recognized is what is principal." So, right here i’m to inform you the story of who i am with my whole heart, and to make some unknowns known.When I used to be eight years historic, I started to feel uncovered, and that i started to consider very, very awkward. Every day, I was pushed out of my condo and into college, all oily, and pudgy, and conspicuous, and to me the other ladies gave the impression so cool, and together, and handy, and i started to feel like a loser in a global that favored superheroes. So I made my possess capes, and that i tied them tight around me. My capes were pretending and dependancy. But all of us have our own superhero capes, do not we? Perfectionism, and overworking, snarkiness, and apathy; they’re all superhero capes. Our capes are what we put over our actual selves, in order that our real tender selves do not ought to be noticeable and can’t be damage. Our superhero capes are what keep us from having to suppose much at all, because every good and dangerous factor is deflected off of them.So, for 18 years, my capes of addiction and pretending stored me reliable and hidden. Men and women think of us, addicts, as insensitive liars, however we don’t start out that way. We begin out as highly touchy truth-tellers. We think a lot anguish and a lot love, and we sense that the arena does not need us to believe that a lot, and does not need to want as much alleviation as we’d like, so we pretending.We attempt to fake like we’re the people that we think we’re presupposed to be. We numb, and we cover, and we fake, and that pretending does finally change into a lifetime of lies, but to be reasonable, we thought we have been imagined to be lying. They tell us when you consider that have been little that once any one asks us how we’re doing, the one right answer is, "great. And also you?" however the thing is that the folks are actuality-tellers.We’re born to make our unknown identified. We will be able to to find somewhere to do it. So in confidential, with the booze, or the overshopping, or the alcohol, or the meals, we inform the reality. We say, "surely, i am now not satisfactory." on the grounds that we do not believe riskless telling that reality in the actual world, we make our possess little world, and that’s addiction. That is whatever cape you put on. So what occurs is anyone grow to be living in these little, teeny, controllable, predictable, dark worlds rather of all together in the large, brilliant, messy one. I binged and purged for the first time after I used to be eight, and that i persisted each day for the next 18 years.Seems natural to me, however you’re amazed. (Laughter) each single time that I acquired anxious, or worried, or indignant, I concept whatever was improper with me. So I took that worried power to the kitchen and i stuffed all of it down with food, and then I panicked, and that i purged, and in any case of that, I was once laid out on the lavatory ground, and that i was once so exhausted and so numb that I not ever had to go back and handle whatever it was once that had made me uncomfortable in the first position, and that is what I desired. I didn’t need to care for the pain and messiness of being a person. So, once I was once a senior in excessive college, I in the end determined to inform the truth in the real world. I walked in my guidance counselor’s place of business and that i mentioned, "really, i am no longer quality. Someone support me." and that i used to be sent to a mental clinic. Within the intellectual sanatorium, for the first time in my existence, I found myself in a world that made sense to me. In excessive tuition, we needed to care about geometry when our hearts have been breaking given that we have been simply bullied within the hallway, or no one would sit down with us at lunch, and we needed to care about historical Rome when all we quite wanted to do used to be be taught how to make and hold a real friend.We had to behave hard once we felt scared, and we had to behave positive once we felt really stressed. Appearing, pretending, was a matter of survival. High institution is sort of like the true world normally, however within the mental hospital, there was once no pretending. The gig was once up. (Laughter) We had classes about the best way to express how we really felt by way of song, and artwork, and writing. We had lessons about easy methods to be a good listener, and how you can be courageous enough to inform our own story at the same time being style ample not to tell anyone else’s. We held every different’s hands often, simply considering that we felt like we needed to. Nobody was once ever allowed to be left out. Everybody was priceless – that was the guideline – just considering she existed. So in there, we were courageous sufficient to take off our capes. All I ever wanted to know, I discovered in the intellectual health center. (Laughter) I don’t forget this sandy-haired lady, who was so gorgeous, and he or she told the truth on her fingers.I held her hand one day even as she was once crying, and i saw that her arms have been just sliced up like precut hams. In there, people wore their scars on the external, so that you knew where they stood, and they informed the truth, so that you knew why they stood there. So I graduated from high tuition, and that i went on to tuition, which used to be means crazier than the mental health center. (Laughter) In school, I introduced on the capes of alcoholism and drug use. The sun rose day-to-day, and that i began binging and purging, after which when the solar set, I drank myself silly. The dawn is ordinarily men and women’s signal to stand up, but it was my signal daily to come back down – to come back down from the booze, and the boys, and the medicinal drugs, and i could now not come down. That was once to be avoided at all expenses, so I hated the dawn. I might close the blinds, and i would put the pillow over my head, at the same time my spinning mind would torture me in regards to the individuals who were going out into their day, into the sunshine, to make relationships, and pursue their dreams, and have a day.And that i had no day; I only had night. Nowadays, I like to believe of hope as that dawn. It comes out day by day to shine on all people equally. It comes out to shine on the sinners, and the saints, and the druggies, and the cheerleaders. It never withholds. It does not judge. In case you’ve spent your complete existence at nighttime, and then one day simply decide to come back out, it’ll be there, ready for you, simply ready to warm you.You recognize, all those years, I concept of that sunrise as shopping, and accusatory, and judgmental, but it wasn’t. It used to be simply hope’s day-to-day invitation to me to come again to life. I consider if you nonetheless have a day, if you’re still alive, you are nonetheless invited. I actually graduated from school – which makes me both grateful to and incredibly suspicious of my Alma Mater – (Laughter) and i located myself type of in the real world, and kind of no longer. On mother’s Day 2002, – i am not good at years, we’ll simply say on mom’s Day – I had spun deeper and deeper. I wasn’t even Glennon anymore. I was once simply bulimia. I used to be just alcoholism. I used to be just a pile of capes. However on mom’s Day, one mother’s Day, I determined myself on the cold rest room floor, hungover, shaking, and retaining a optimistic pregnancy experiment. As I sat there with my again actually towards a wall, shaking, an understanding washed over me.In that second, on the lavatory ground, I understood that even in my state, even mendacity on the ground, that anyone in the market had deemed me important of an invite to an awfully, very main event. So, that day on the bathroom flooring, I determined to show up, just to exhibit up, to climb out of my darkish, person, controllable world, and out into the tremendous, excellent, messy one.I didn’t recognize how you can be a sober character, or learn how to be a mother, or how you can be a pal, so I simply promised myself that i would show up and i would do the following right thing. "simply exhibit up, Glennon, despite the fact that you are scared, simply do the next proper thing, even when you’re shaking." So I stood up. What they don’t inform you about getting sober, about peeling off your capes, is that it will get a hell of loads worse earlier than it will get better.Getting sober is like getting better from frostbite. It can be all of these emotions that you’ve got numbed for goodbye, now they’re there, and they are present. To start with, it simply feels style of tingly and uncomfortable, but then, these feelings start to feel like daggers. The soreness, the loss, the guilt, the shame – it is all piled on high of you with nowhere to run. However what I learned during that time is that sitting with the ache and the enjoyment of being a person while refusing to run for any exits is the only approach to turn out to be a real person. So, this present day, i am not a superhero, and i’m not a superb human being, but i am completely person, and i’m so happy with that.I am, fortunately and frustratingly, still precisely the identical individual as I was when I was 20, and 16, and eight years old. I still consider scared all the time, anxious at all times, oily always. I nonetheless get very high and very low in lifestyles, daily, but I in the end authorized the truth that sensitive is solely how I was made, that i don’t need to conceal it, and i don’t must fix it. I’m not broken. I’ve without a doubt started to wonder if perhaps you are sensitive, too. Possibly you suppose high-quality soreness and deep pleasure, however you just don’t suppose riskless speaking about it in the actual world.So now, as an alternative of seeking to make myself more difficult, I write and that i serve folks to support create a world where sensitive persons don’t want superhero capes, where we can all simply come out into the massive, bright, messy world, and tell the truth, and forgive each different for being human, and admit collectively that yes, existence is fairly difficult, but in addition insist that collectively we are able to do rough things. You understand, maybe it can be good enough to assert, "in reality, today i am not high-quality." possibly it can be alright to do not forget that we’re human beings, and to discontinue doing lengthy sufficient to believe, and to like, and to share, and to listen. This weekend was mother’s Day, which marked the eleven-year anniversary of the day I determined to show up, and that i spent the day on the seaside with my three youngsters, and my two dogs, and my one husband (Laughter) my long-struggling husband.That you would be able to only assume. Life is stunning and life is brutal. Existence is brutaful at all times and every day. Just one thing has made the change for me, and that is this: I used to numb my feelings and conceal, and now I believe my feelings and that i share. That is the one difference in my existence nowadays. I’m not petrified of my feelings anymore. I do know they may be able to come, and so they will not kill me, and they are able to take over for somewhat even as, in the event that they need to, however on the finish of the day, what they are is particularly just publications. They are simply publications to inform me what’s the subsequent correct thing for me to do.Loneliness, it leads us to reference to different individuals, and jealousy, it courses us to what we’re supposed to do next, and soreness guides us to support different individuals, and being overwhelmed, it guides us to ask for help. So I’ve realized that if I honor my feelings as my own private prophets, and alternatively of running I simply be still, that there are prizes to be gained. These prizes are peace, and dignity, and friendship. So I got an email final week, and it can be now taped to my computer at house. It just stated, "expensive Glennon, it’s braver to be Clark Kent than it’s to be Superman. Raise on, warrior." (Laughter) So at present, i would say to you that we don’t want any further superheroes.We simply need awkward, oily, honest human beings out in the vivid, gigantic, messy world. And i’ll see you there. (Applause) .

[kartiavelino]

Kurt Cobain’s manager details rock icon’s downward spiral

Twenty-five years in the past this week, Kurt Cobain took his personal life. The tragedy felt earth-shaking to Gen X music followers who linked strongly to Nirvana’s melodically blasting songs of angst and alienation. All too clearly, Cobain sang from the center. Strung-out and despondent, the 27-year-old rocker shot himself within the head, with a newly bought rifle, on April 5, 1994. He pulled the set off in a pool-house behind the Seattle house that had been not too long ago bought with spouse Courtney Love. Cobain’s bloodied physique was found by an electrician who had no concept of the rock star’s notoriety. Danny Goldberg rode together with Cobain whereas Nirvana loved a meteoric rise, starting in 1991. As associated in his ebook “Serving the Servant: Remembering Kurt Cobain” (Ecco), out Tuesday, Goldberg liked Cobain, who, in flip, seen Goldberg as a father determine. Goldberg managed the band from 1990 till ‘92 and the pair stayed shut ‘til the tip. “I felt linked to Kurt and thought of him a buddy,” Goldberg instructed The Submit. “You’re employed with lots of people and that occurs solely often.” Danny Goldberg’s new ebook is out Tuesday.ECCO Although Goldberg might have been near Cobain, he was not initially aware about his shopper’s internal demons. They turned overwhelmingly obvious in January 1992. That was when Goldberg flew to New York to attend Nirvana’s first “Saturday Evening Dwell” look. It was an enormous occasion, following the discharge of “Nevermind,” Nirvana’s debut chart-topping album. “I bought to the resort and faxes of two articles awaited me,” recalled Goldberg who presently owns a administration firm referred to as Gold Village Leisure. “They each referred to Kurt’s drug drawback.” One described a sallow-skinned Cobain nodding out, with eyelids closing on dilated pupils. “There was an incredible shock and disappointment. Once I bought to ‘SNL,’ it was clear that Kurt was stoned. [His heroin use] went from being a rumor to one thing we had been satisfied was true.” The presence of a father determine didn’t quell Cobain’s druggy urge for food. Later in 1992, a then-pregnant Love shockingly instructed Vainness Honest, “We went all the way down to Alphabet Metropolis … and copped some dope. Then we bought excessive and went to ‘SNL.’” By the following yr, issues had solely deteriorated. Again in New York for a follow-up look on “SNL,” Nirvana was staying at Omni Berkshire Place Resort on East 52nd Avenue. Photographer Jesse Frohman had been assigned to shoot the group for a canopy story in London Observer Sunday Journal. In preparation, he arrange a collection of elaborate photographs on the streets of Manhattan and in Central Park. Frohman walked into the resort at 11 a.m., the agreed upon assembly time. He acquired an disagreeable shock. “Nirvana’s manager instructed me I needed to shoot them within the basement of the resort,” mentioned Frohman. “It was ‘take it or go away it.’” Whereas ready three-and-a-half hours for Cobain to seem, Frohman turned the basement right into a makeshift studio, full with lights and a white seamless backdrop. “Kurt confirmed up along with his head hanging down as if his physique was on a hanger,” Frohman continued. “He needed to know if I had a bucket. I requested why he wanted a bucket. He instructed him that he may have to puke. Kurt was positively excessive and a buddy later instructed me that he had OD’ed the day earlier than [apparently, he came out of it and did not require hospitalization]. I believed I had a catastrophe on my fingers” — carrying a searching cap and bug-eye sun shades, Cobain smoked, drooled, spat water and possibly revealed extra of himself than he meant — “however it turned out to be an genuine file and one of many all-time nice rock ‘n’ roll photograph shoots.” Photographs from the session had been compiled for a ebook entitled “Kurt Cobain: The Final Session.” Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain with child Francis Bean in 1993.FilmMagic Issues plaguing Cobain neared a crescendo on the evening of March 3, 1994. Probably the most incandescent rock star of the day, he was convalescing in a Rome resort room, making an attempt to get better from a sore throat that necessitated Nirvana canceling its European tour. Love was with him; the couple loved room-service dinner and a bottle of classic champagne earlier than dozing off. Close to daybreak the following morning, Love discovered her husband on the ground and unconscious. Later claiming that he downed “50 f—ing [Rohypnol] drugs,” Love has maintained that the OD was no accident. She believes it was a suicide try and has claimed {that a} be aware advised as a lot. By the point she positioned a panicky name to Goldberg, her lank-haired husband was comatose at Umberto Polyclinic Hospital in Rome. “Clearly, I used to be freaked out,” mentioned Goldberg, who steeled himself for Kurt’s demise. “Courtney was devastated. She and I prayed on the cellphone. Then I hung up and prayed that he would survive and be secure and are available out of it.” He did, and there was hope that the star could be scared straight. Again within the US, following an unsuccessful stab at rehab — after a single day at Exodus clinic in Los Angeles, Cobain jumped a six-foot wall and escaped — Cobain satisfied a so-called buddy to purchase him a rifle. “If I knew about that, I’d have mentioned it was a fairly horrible concept,” mentioned Goldberg. “Drug issues and weapons are a nasty mixture. Being vulnerable to despair just isn’t nice for weapons both.” Goldberg’s last in-person encounter with Cobain was at a last-ditch Seattle intervention that went from dangerous to worse. Arriving noon, Goldberg encountered a clutch of shut mates on the home the place Kurt and Courtney lived with their 1-and-a-half-year-old daughter Frances Bean. Cobain sat on the ground alongside a fellow drug person — “If you’re a junky, you get junky mates,” Goldberg mentioned — and so they each seemed to be out of it on smack. “It was awkward and in no way snug to indicate up for one thing like this in somebody’s house.” Danny Goldberg and Kurt Cobain on the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards.FilmMagic, Inc Mates begged Cobain to get off of medicine and Cobain felt “ganged up on.” Issues hit a nadir when Janet Billig, one among Nirvana’s managers, took issues into her personal fingers. “She went upstairs and started throwing away Kurt’s medicine [flushing them down the toilet],” mentioned Goldberg, describing Cobain as feeling “violated” and Billig as being “mortified” upon discovery. “The second was heartbreaking. However Janet was simply throwing away issues she thought had been poisonous. She meant effectively. He was upset. I puzzled learn how to get by the following 30 seconds.” Over the fast brief time period, Goldberg managed. However, quickly after, when Cobain lofted the thought of being a lifetime junky and utilizing William S. Burroughs as a task mannequin for his ongoing plan, Goldberg realized that he would slightly be house in LA along with his spouse and daughter. He left for the airport and hoped for the perfect. The perfect by no means got here. Inside every week, Cobain died at his personal hand. Moreover 5 albums value of nice music, Goldberg has mementos from his rocker buddy. One is a photograph of them taken backstage at th MTV Video Music Awards. Each males look pleased and exude affection with arms round one another. “I take into consideration Kurt daily since he died,” mentioned Goldberg. “I have a look at footage of us collectively, see Kurt smiling and smile again.” Share this: https://nypost.com/2019/04/01/kurt-cobains-manager-details-rock-icons-downward-spiral/ The post Kurt Cobain’s manager details rock icon’s downward spiral appeared first on My style by Kartia. https://kartiavelino.com/2019/04/kurt-cobains-manager-details-rock-icons-downward-spiral.html

[strigoithing]

To the “bros” in my life

Guys,

when I get my little check every month it goes to my rent and providing my life, I can not feed a child.

I do not have a son. I do not have any kids. I do not want kids or need kids. I have fibro. I can not just “put it away now” and “get it together” and be a Parent. I am going through menopause and at the very latest late peri because I rarely have a heavy bleed during a month no more than a few drops, but unlike most women I am Pagan and my moon shed is not embarassing it is something I celebrate.

I will never have a mother’s body. I will not have leaky boobs. I will not have cellulite on my thighs and hips. I will not have strange pain in my toes and my feet from birthing children.

Because I already had it. My daughter died, she would have been 17 this march 27th. Tornado. Don’t need to try again. Don’t want too, can not anyway. I do not ovulate to bleed, to have a child, do not have basal body temp anymore do not get aroused around the time of ovulation..man you men are stupid. My child ended up going to dfacs. Father had a drug problem long story short abusive relationship, dfacs took her away. I do not feel like a failure. I am ascended, sometimes it feels good to fail. I knew my daughter would not be alive always and knew, she needed to go elsewhere in the world that me and the father could not take her. Vampire children too this means my daughter was also strigoi. Took her father’s energy at nine months old at a dfacs meeting. Funny. From what I understood she tried to later bite the family cat... haha.

Men just want to trap and cage women and our choices. I am Pro choice. I always will be. My body was racked with emotions and items I did not want..you can’t just whisk away milk from the breast if you don’t want it there. You literally become a dripping cow. It is gross and you smell and you have to shower all the time, and you never have a moment’s peace between your body and the child and the father. Cause you either are oozing, or taking care of the baby or the father’s trying to have sex with you when you are trying to get what little sleep you can get, because you are up every three hours for a diaper change or a feeding.

I am not having a hysterectomy or having my tubes tied because I am a natural pagan woman who wants to keep all her parts, even though I have endometriosis and adenomyosis which is not cancer causing. Hysterectomies are recommended for women like myself because of the  adenomyosis which is gas in the vagina, and cervix, so see, having kids is not something I should be putting my body through. If I had a kid right now, he or she would not survive and would probably not be born alive, not because I am unhealthy but because my body is strigoi morte and it is not recommended for people like me to have kids. Not only this but mentally I have enough problems with life and just myself, not to mention a kid. I have been through the body change as my kind requires, spirit and mental and so on. Kids is not something I will be having, nor will I be a surrogate mom, I do NOT WANT ANY KIDS IN ANY ADOPTIVE OR ANY NATURAL WAY. I can not afford children and I do not want this kind of deal to be with some man in any way shape or form. If it won’t work with a woman its not working with a man either.

What is adenomyosis in the uterus? Adenomyosis is a condition in which the inner lining of the uterus (the endometrium) breaks through the muscle wall of the uterus (the myometrium).Adenomyosis can cause menstrual cramps, lower abdominal pressure, and bloating before menstrual periods and can result in heavy periods.Dec 3, 2018Adenomyosis: Symptoms, Causes, and Treatments - WebMD https://www.webmd.com/women/guide/adenomyosis-symptoms-causes-treatments

Not only this but the price of having a kid in today’s society has skyrocketed, was at the store with a friend’s friend and baby formula today costs about 28.00 a can and I would not breast feed my kid because it is really painful and not fun to go through. Women of low income rely on ebt and wic, and wic alone pays for an infants food for the first yr. A formula voucher is at least $80.00 16 yrs ago and now is at least 135.00. Not to mention clothing, other foods, medicine, and diapers, school meals and school materials, and so on....no thanks I only get $771 a month in ssi and can not work mentally or physically. I also live in transitional housing and am trying to move but it will then be pubic housing.

I also get food stamps and its only 154 a month.

Many men or children in my life - Tim, Chris, Kevin etc people from louise lane think I will want to care about a child and raise a child and be a mom and a “winner”, and they can control my life and my money and how I spend it and where I spend it, and who I spend it on. This is a form of terrorism and I have to choose for me. My choices for me shape who I am as a woman, a woman who manages her “shit” well. I can not burden myself any more than I have ever been burdened.

I am not motherly. I was adopted, and I am strigoi, my parents are strigoi and gave me up because it can be mentally draining on a woman who is strigoi to raise children, people always say moms have a bond with their children, no they don’t. I did not come to this planet to get pregnant and get knocked up by some man who swears he is a man and not a kid. It takes more than juice in the fridge and a big bank account to be a mom or a dad.

All the men in this thing think having a family will erase their bad child hood and it will not, some void will be filled because they are a father. It won’t. you will only wreck more lives. You can’t build a life on a lie. They are still kids themselves mentally. It won’t force you into being a man or a father or a role model or a masterful husband or something. Being that mentor for YOU begins with how you treat your own self and live your own life well and not like a druggie or a dope head. You are not fooling me or anyone. I know you are not family material or husband material. Oh btw I don’t want to get married either....

Can’t if I am going to get the survivor’s pension. Can’t marry at all. Not that anyone is trying to love me in a justful manner, they just want to be a controlling manipulative twit bastard.

Thanks again for trying to ruin my life but no thank you,

Ana Massien

PS. I am quite grown and quite a winner already seeing I don’t like dick butt men try to ruin and run my life. You guys need to grow the fuck up while I hang out with my friends some more and shop online and buy tunics which is why I “need my money controlled” *rolls eyes* Jealous little shit and no woman is gonna look at you and think you need her for more than a surrogate mom to make me jealous with and I don’t even care, tim.

[kitemist]

switched at birth season 5 episode 8 thoughts with spoilers

live reactions included

Overall, what a mess. People are wrong and they knew it. How come no one can just take the blame like SOMEONE did, and make up for it?

Alright, so we got past the whole drama about the organ transplant and everyone seems to have settled down with Alie. We sort of gave her a second chance (well they did, not me) and they seem to accept her as her own person and the only free pass they’re granting her into their family is how much she connected to Angelo coincidentally through that prism thing. The religion dispute has been settled on a non-forceful identity, the two racists have been expelled, and somehow Daphne will end up with Chris Walker because reasons after severing ties with Mingo(who doesn’t deserve anything at all tbh). Dad yelled at Bay in the preview, and Daphne found out something at the health center. So. Let’s do this.

Chris Walker has not gotten much screentime besides him getting racist treatment and him being a baseball player. After being pretty rude to Travis, we haven’t seen who he is as a PERSON. He’s from a lower class family, needs a good future since he doesn’t seem to have anyone left, and...what?

Alie wasted mac and cheese!!! I CAN’T EXCUSE THAT!!! THIS IS THE MOST INFURIATING THING ALL SEASON!!!! I HATE HER, CONFIRMED!!!!!!!

The simcom has either gotten worse or more unnatural. Because Bay, even though after 4 seasons (or she’s confirmed to be different from whatever I watched from day 1) is talking robotically.

If Daphne said “then we can’t do this” then why does she bother checking Mingo? There’s nothing interesting in his life now! He’s seen as a crazy maniac, or a racist, or just someone not really focused on school at all and just wants to fuck around, literally. With him being a total fuckboy, how did he ever land that second girlfriend!?

“I’m not looking to start a new relationship right now.” I bet within this episode, that will be broken. Or the next one. Because this series doesn’t have much episodes left.

Bay signs “start” without her finger touching the inside of her other hand. Really.

Bay knows of her pretty high share of rent but not her bills and utilities for her own place. Did she assume that Regina would pay for it somehow, since she owns the place it’s right next to? And how would she expect Daphne to read her sign in the dark?!

“The Bank of Kennish is closed for business.” Assuming from that other financial situation last season, or two seasons ago, was it ever open? That huge money spending spree was Angelo’s 5 million dollars.

Dad’s smile here is sure the older generation sneering at the millennials for being poor. Also, I barely remember Bay treasuring her car. You would think it would be seen more if it was treasured, much like Emmett’s motorcycle, which was even named Ripley.

A double date with Regina and Luca. Seeing how you sneered at him about your broken dick, Dad, this would not go well, just as Bay’s ex was invited to your house. Remember that? Me neither.

Bay is hopeless with asking favors of any kind and we didn’t need another season to confirm it.

Working at the cracked mug is probable. It’s literally right next to home, so no gas money needed. Even if you stay late, it’s not a long way back home either. So why not?

A C+ and an A- without the minimum page count. I am pretty damn sure that Luca pulled strings. He always thinks he has a good reason to lie. It’s been there all season.

This is the most accurate professor ever. I never had one like her, but seeing my teacher’s expectations with attendance, this is probable. 100% probable.

Daphne literally asked for this detention for checking Mingo’s instagram. That’s your own dumb ass. Also, you couldn’t hear your professor chastising you for it because you’re deaf.

Bay, it’s not your responsibility. Can you just catch a break? It’s Daphne’s place too!

And that sneer in Chris Walker’s eyes. Yeah. Totally checking her out. And from behind? Sigh.

So a solution to Mingo, a fuckboy, is Chris Walker, a player?! And also, Bay, you dated Nyle Dimarco, who Daphne ALSO said was a total player. Is the receipt pulling over? Fuck.

Getting a tattoo while you’re in a relationship to sort of solidify that relationship, with a name ACROSS YOUR CHEST? Well then. In real life, that’s a mistake, but there’s deadass someone out there with the cash me outside girl, “chicken noodle soup”, and “capable”.

Why are you taking moneymaking advice from someone who abused their previous heart with drugs bought with a ton of money.

WELL HELLO SIMONE. UM. WHY ARE YOU HERE? IS YOUR CHLAMYDIA MAGICALLY CURED? FROM WHEN YOU HOOKED UP WITH EMMETT AND CRASHED BEMMETT, WHICH I WOULD LIKE TO BOTH THANK AND HATE YOU FOR?

Bay is totally forcing a smile because of that one time with emmett, isn’t she? Also, I forgot everything about Simone. Who is she again, besides Toby’s first girlfriend?

Bay’s forced smile is every face in retail.

This conversation makes no sense to me.

The only reason they supported you is because of your magical lipreading. If you were as deaf and as nonlipreading as Travis and literally everyone else is, then it would be completely out the window.

“I’m not cocky, I’m confident.” Weird how the two blur with you, Chris Walker.

Random bleeding, because you need the girl to care about the guy suddenly for some reason for a relationship to happen. This not only happened in this show, but also in Nerve, San Andreas, Max, and every other movie with unnecessary romance.

Simone took one look because down syndrome has an instant facial giveaway. She’s sure rude to him.

“I am so sorry.” okay, even more rude than before.

“It got upgraded when I bled on you.” Oh my god what the fuck...what....wha

You can’t lie to a pre med, Chris Walker.

Also, how many times has that pitching arm been banged up? All of that CANNOT be from he was slammed to the ground.

And Toby is hanging along with that lying trope.

At least Toby is coming back to the main spotlight after his sudden loss of screentime.

“It’s a common place to inject steroids.” WOW.

OKAY, DAPHNE HAS NOW RUN INTO TWO DRUGGIES. WHAT THE HELL.

Bay is having Simone-itis just as Daphne is having Mingo-itis, what a hypocrite.

T SHIRT GUY? FUCK HIM! BUT AT LEAST THE MONEY HELPED. FUCK OFF.

Vanessa Marano can’t take jello shots in real life, this is hilarious.

Bay’s explosion of this was just as forceful as Travis’s glare at the mention of him. “So you’re not with him?” After that hook up? NO!

This is very awkward....

Travis just excused himself.

“She’s always talking like an american in the movies!” And Daphne talks like a deaf person in this show, but talks flawlessly in real life!

Miley cyrus from “tongue pants ball”? That’s obviously wrecking ball. And her latest picture trend with her tongue.

And Luca’s cheating on Regina with the TA that gave her a C+ huh.

At this rate, with your broken dick your pride will heal in probably 1-2 YEARS.

This is the setting where Chris Walker and Daphne kiss. This was even in the first preview of season 5!!!

And how can Daphne read any lips. It’s a dark party.

Random kiss without any logic. Thought so.

“That’s the problem, I actually like you.” You’ve known him for TWO FUCKING DAYS, DAPHNE. TWO DAYS! YOU’RE JUST AS FAST AS YOUR MOM WITH THE MOTORCYCLE LIGHT.

Sigh.

“Why is that a problem?” “Because I’m worried about you.” That’s what happens in love, right? Even this show’s relationships know this.

And Cocky Chris has to prove that he’s right even though Daphne’s right. Why is he even arguing with a pre med.

“by some girl i’ve been on ONE DATE with.” even cocky chris is sick of this fast love bullshit.

okay a convo with the r word. But I’m not even surprised that it has the same guy that stole art because of “fair use”. Why not call his mom again?

I’m actually backing Travis on this. FUCK OFF.

You said it before Carlton but you aren’t offended until now because of Carlton.

“I think most people are trying to say the right thing. They just don’t know how.”

This is the first deaf-deaf conversation i’ve ever seen between Daphne and Travis since...they dated. Well then.

Fire Dad or let Cocky Chris get away with drugs. Well, Dad can barely afford his own lifestyle as it is. Let’s give him a taste of his own medicine.

“This photo will be saved to your favorites” what kind of social media site lets you do that without clear indication of what you’re doing??

What you’re doing, Regina, is exposing him. Fuck Luca.

Oh my god, why are you taking advice from Mom?

“Can I give you advice as a person who’s been married longer than that TA’s been alive?” HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

THE WRITERS MUST BE HAVING A BLAST BECAUSE I SURE AM, FOR REAL THIS TIME

You’re going to break all the cups, aren’t you?

Yup. Why did you ever give him that ball since he was drunk.

A small party blew up because you thought your pride with Simone was more important than your PROMISE!

Another financial burden Bay can’t fix.

yeah bay you are a disaster.

So basically Simone has Mom’s job.

“Why are we so competitive?” so your rivalry was forced because girl on girl hate is trending.

And that health center thing was cocky chris’s steroids. Yeah.

Luca calling Regina out, right when Regina was about to call him out for dating the TA.

So the grade deduction was real.

“What have I ever done to make you think I’d cheat?” Well. your convo with Daphne about her possible ptsd.

Why are you reiterating word for word what his dad said.

Now that’s how you introduce Carlton. :3

Cocky Chris.

Get the fuck out of my face.

Also, they would have found out anyway, you dumbass. Drug tests are under way all the time by the time you would get to the royals. Maybe if you stopped, you wouldn’t have to worry about a thing.

Ah Zarra. Your only girlfriend. </3

“The funky artist who can pay her bills.” Yeah.

Goodbye to being a kid? Hmm.

Thanks Dad.

So Chris is mad at Daphne because she’s right, Luca makes up for himself somehow because reasons, Toby makes up with Simone, and Bay sells her car. That “someone” up there was Bay. She at least is taking action for what she did, and everyone else who is guilty of something, such as Cocky Chris and Luca, are trying to find a way around it because reasons.