#Alcoholism Mention CW

[deluxewhump]

Cam, Alex, Zee: Guilt Rituals

CW: BBU, frat house, bloody nose, marijuana and nicotine, alcoholism mentioned, abuse mentioned, dysfunctional family dynamics mention, multiple whumper household, non sexual intimacy, Cam feels feelings, Alex and Zee do asmr

*Takes place back in the house, Alex’s senior year, Cam’s junior year.

Cameron was smoking less lately, but not out of some noble quest for sobriety. He was actually more convinced than ever that life would be completely unbearable without some sort of chemical buffer.

But there was a huge creeping problem with weed, and it was introspection. He’d switched to another strain, but the problem remained. Every time he’d get high, what should have been a quieter plane of existence slightly above the trench warfare that was his junior year of college turned into a nightmarish mano a mano with himself.

Alcohol was out of the question still. Having an alcoholic parent will ruin certain things for you, most commonly alcohol. He watched his peers get gloriously drunk every weekend with no introspection whatsoever, just shameless extroverted bad behavior, but couldn’t bring himself to touch the stuff. The smell alone made him curdle with disgust. And if he went into it feeling such contempt, such hate, it was surely not going to go anywhere he wanted it to.

But even with weed now, he felt wave after wave of highly specific guilt, overblown and looming beside him like a parade float. It would start with how things ended with his dad, never to be reconciled in death, then bleed into the way he’d treated his mom when she actually reached out to him. Eventually it would spread like the veins of a river delta into all the shit with the boxboy, and Alex, and Dominic.

He could get a hold of himself enough to say fuck Alex and Dominic, for sure, but the guilt about Z2 grew stronger every time, until the pathways in his brain that go to the dank basement of regret and anguish were so well worn it was like he could just slide right down them and end up at the bottom— faster every time. In fact, he’d hit the bottom a while ago and had since started digging.

He tried to asphyxiate it by smoking more, until his hideously loud thoughts melted to nothing and he fell asleep with his throat stuck together and his mouth parched for water, too unwilling to climb back up into consciousness to go get it.

Eventually though, it stayed his hand when he went to smoke. The thoughts were easy enough to keep at bay sober. He was busy with school and work and chapter meetings. Only when he was high did he not have the skill to escape them. He thought longingly of something stronger, but knew he couldn’t fall so far as to indulge in that. It wasn’t that he didn’t know who to ask. It was his resentment for his mother that pushed him away from the siren song of harder drugs, ever since highschool.

So he found himself sober, as on most weeknights now, studying extra for an exam or organizing recruitment workshops with his brothers. Tonight, he talked himself into a small hit. A little hit wouldn’t hurt. He just needed to stop smoking quite so much, his tolerance was too high. One pull would just take the worst of the edge off.

It did, until it didn’t. He abandoned his schoolwork, leaving his weed in the locked drawer of his desk so he wouldn’t be tempted to smoke more, and found himself wandering around the house. They’d implemented a new chore system that was going poorly, and the house was kind of dirty. Not the worst it had ever been, but not as nice as it was when they made Zee do most of the cleaning. That had eventually been voted out, because too many of them felt bad. Not that they were offering to pick up the slack, they just felt bad watching him try to keep up with their sloppiness.

He remembered that vote. Who had suggested it, Alex or Dominic? One of them. He’d voted against the motion, but that wasn’t one of the things that chased him around his own brain at night.

He didn’t realize he was looking for Zee until he found him, sitting on the counter of the bathroom sink holding a wad of toilet paper to his face. He was with Alex, and his nose was bleeding.

Cam paused in the hallway, but not before an old wooden floorboard creaked. Alex looked up into the medicine cabinet mirror and their eyes met. Zee didn’t look to see who it was. He closed his eyes.

“What happened?”

Alex swung the bathroom door wider so he could look at him directly, instead of his reflection. “Why, are you sorry you missed it?”

He was glad for the one hit he’d taken. Even a small chemical buffer was necessary for him to be around Alex Clair. He wasn’t going to get any answers from him, not if he was in a sour mood. But he and Zee had been doing better lately. They had a kind of truce working, only Alex probably didn’t know that. He knew Zee liked Alex better than him, obviously, but he thought maybe their working relationship had come far enough that Alex would see it, despite his near constant self-righteous indignation.

“Z2?” Cam asked, still a full step outside the doorway. “What’s goin’ on?”

Zee opened his eyes and tilted his head down enough to look at him. He grinned almost apologetically under the wad of tissue— alarmingly red in places with bright blood. “Nothing. I think I have allergies or something. Dry sinuses.”

Alex gave Zee a leveling look and Zee returned his gaze to the ceiling to avoid it.

“To the pollen, or Mike and Tyler?” Cam asked

Alex turned his disapproval on him. “The class is missing their clown tonight, huh? Aren’t you usually leading the pack? All the most fucked up incidents I can remember around here were your brainchild. Even before he got here.”

This further confirmed Cam's suspicion that Alex had never liked him, even before they were at odds with the boxboy dilemma. The sting of rejection was familiar. It bothered him less than it used to, but it still added another tally mark somewhere in his head, another scratch in a long line of reasons justifying the nagging disdain he felt for everyone, even the people who are supposed to be his brothers. Supposed to give him a chance.

Alex raised his eyebrows at Cam’s unusual silence. “So, what’s it to you what happened to him this time?”

From his perch on the sink, Zee nudged Alex’s leg with his foot.

“What?” Alex hissed at him, though there was patience right behind the exasperation, a gentleness that did not exist two seconds ago when he was addressing Cam.

“I just wanted to check on you, Zee,” he said, deciding not to answer Alex at all. “Here.” He pushed past Alex and bundled fresh toilet paper into a wad, handing it to Zee. He took the bloodied one from him and threw it in the wastebasket, which was filthy and had not seen a plastic liner in months, if not longer than that.

Zee thanked him with a genuine smile— fleeting and secretive, like he didn’t want Alex to see it but was willing to risk it to make sure Cam did.

He didn’t know if it made it better or worse that Zee had been so receptive to his small changes of heart. It made him feel better on one hand, like if he could repair something as fucked as their relationship to each other he could tell himself it couldn’t have been that bad. On the other hand it made him feel worse. It was that bad. It definitely was. Zee was just short on allies, and possibly a bigger person than he was anyway. He was open to the grudging, embarrassed little kindnesses Cam was willing to offer and was too noble to hold his past actions against him. It made his past behavior look even uglier and smaller.

It made it worse that he’d been so deliberately, calculatedly cruel to him in the first place. Sometimes he wondered if he realized that Z2 was a person at first, and that boxies weren’t all some Frankenstein’s monster, some lobotomized AI in a flesh and blood package. But that wasn’t really true. Of course he knew. Everyone knows, deep down.

“C’mon,” Alex said, and helped Zee hop down off the counter. “You’re good now.”

“Will you do the thing?” Zee asked him.

“Yeah. Hell yeah. I could use it right now, too.”

“Use what?” he asked, following them.

“Get lost.”

“I have a right to know,” he said lamely, though he sort of did. He had pitched in for Zee, Alex had not. Alex was not, as they sometimes put it, a boxboy shareholder.

But Alex and Zee had history together that he and Zee did not. He knew that. Alex had always tried to protect him, sometimes locking him in his room for fourteen hours at a time and not letting anyone take him out. Cam had objected at first, but because Alex was Alex, everyone else just sort of let it ride. Another reason to hate Alex Clair.

“He can come if he’s quiet,” he overheard Zee.

“He’s not gonna be quiet. He’s incapable.”

“Shut up,” he said ineffectually as he followed them to Alex’s room.

Zee went inside first and sat down on the bed. Alex turned and held onto the door, deciding whether to let him in or not. Cam held two fingers up by his chest in a peace sign. “I’m not gonna be a dick, dude.”

He could tell Alex was skeptical, but shrugged and let him inside. Once he was in, they proceeded to completely ignore him. Alex turned off the light and switched on a blue lava lamp, just like the one Cams’s cousin had in his room growing up. Zee sat cross legged on the bed, watching Alex with trusting expectancy as he went to his laptop and started playing some weird ambient shit. He slid a disposable vape and a pencil off the desk into his hand and joined Zee on the bed.

Cam felt awkward standing, and helped himself to Alex’s computer chair. He spread his legs and swiveled back and forth a few inches, affecting casual comfort even though he’d never been in Alex’s room for more than a second, and never with the lights off.

The two of them sat facing each other on the bed. Zee was propped up by pillows behind him and Alex seemed satisfied without, his spine pin straight and his athletic shoulders relaxed.

“Four counts,” he said, hitting the vape and then handing it to Zee. Zee hit it and set it on his knee. Alex started them off on some breathing ritual; in four counts, hold for four, exhale, hold for four, and then begin again. Cam tried to copy them without them catching on, inhaling quietly when they inhaled and waiting for Alex to give the cue to exhale. It was immediately calming, like Alex had reached to the back of his neck and hit an override button in his brain. He didn’t like it.

“You two just come in here and breathe weird?”

“Another word and you’re out,” Alex warned.

He laughed. “Understood.”

“Try it,” Zee whispered, opening his eyes just long enough to glance over at him.

“I’m good,” he answered, but something in Zee’s eyes made him think he already knew he had been, a moment ago.

“Hands first?” Alex asked.

Zee held out his hands palm up and Alex took them in his, a gesture so intimate but casual that it shocked him more than if Alex had slapped their boxboy in the face.

He held each of Zee’s hands in his as if warming them, rubbing over a wide surface area at first, followed by slower, massaging sweeps of his thumbs over the open palms. He spread each finger and rubbed the length of it, rubbing circles on the finger pads and back down over each knuckle til he reached old callouses, all the way to his wrists. He watched with growing agitation as Zee relaxed visibly.

When he decided he was done, Alex turned Zee’s palms down on his plaid comforter and picked the vape off Zee’s knee, hitting it before placing it between Zee’s lips for him. Zee took a drag without bothering to ever open his eyes.

He then picked up the pencil he’d brought from his desk and Cam made a face, wondering what in the fuck he was possibly going to do with a pencil and also feeling the agitation in his lower belly grow into an ache in his chest, a tingling of his scalp.

“Eyes closed,” Alex said gently, though Zee’s eyes were closed already. He meant it as a reminder to keep them closed, Cam knew instinctively. To stay still. He took the pencil and used it to draw along Zee’s face, using the soft pink eraser on his skin. Cam’s breath caught strangely in his chest. It looked gentle as tracing, light and maybe ticklish but also satisfying. He traced slow ovals around Zee’s face, over his cheeks and up to his hairline, down again beneath his chin. Zee breathed serenely, a grin pulling the corners of his mouth now and then. Alex lifted the eraser tip to do four points instead, tapping down oh so gently on his cheeks, forehead, chin, in first a predictable pattern and then an unpredictable one.

He felt soothed by proxy, an even more so than with the rhythmic breathing. Yet he was uncomfortable, almost alarmingly so, because it felt like Alex was the author of it, and he couldn't stand Alex, but watching him with Zee was intoxicating. They’d clearly done this little ritual before. If Zee was in half a trance, Alex seemed to be enjoying himself just as much, eyes low and a small smile on his face as he tapped and traced and tapped. Cam thought he would probably be able to hear his own heartbeat if it wasn’t for that music that was playing in the background. He was grateful for it now.

Alex finally stopped, drawing the eraser tip down the sloping bridge of Zee’s nose a few times before taking the pencil away. He squeezed Zee’s left hand, which seemed to tell Zee it was safe to open his eyes. He looked almost drugged, happy, eyes shining and low.

“I could sleep,” he said to Alex, who nodded.

“Go ahead.”

But he turned those glassy eyes toward him instead, knowing and cunning despite their alleged innocence. “You wanna try it, Cameron?”

“I don’t even know what I just watched.”

“You never did anything like that?” Alex asked, uncrossing his legs and stretching over his left hamstring. “It’s just made-up whatever. But if you add the box breathing, it’s pretty powerful. I had to think of some way to calm him down when he first got here. You guys were relentless. He was in fight or flight constantly. It was really bad.”

Cam set his teeth against the accusation, but didn’t drop his eyes from Alex’s level blue gaze. He knew it was bad. He held out his hand for the vape. Alex gave it to him and he pulled deep, lungs filling with candy flavored nicotine. Almost immediately, he felt the head buzz that came with it.

“You mean you want me to do it to you, Zee?”

Zee was nestled in a pile of Alex’s pillows like a housepet. “If you wanted. Or Alex can show you.”

Cam laughed reflexively. He glanced at Alex, who was giving Zee a funny look. “I’ll pass.”

“Yeah, me too, thanks,” Alex said dryly.

“You sure you’re gonna let me near him with a pencil? Or is that considered a weapon?”

“If he wants you to do it,” Alex shrugged, and handed him the pencil. “Whatever.”

Now that it was actually happening, he felt strange. His heart was pounding lightly, like it always did the first time a girl he’d never had before started getting undressed. It’s Z2, he told himself. Get it together. But it was Alex, too, and he was in their space, doing their weird thing. He sat close to Zee as Alex had and felt awkward that he didn’t have a plan for a preamble, like Alex did with the breathing and the hand thing.

“Wanna hold your hand out first?”

Zee did. He started there but with the pencil, tracing the eraser tip lightly over the lines of his palm. Zee smiled and squirmed on an exhale like it was a lot of sensation, and Cam paused. “No?”

“No, yeah,” Zee said, looking at him more directly than he had in the past, whenever Cam was being antagonistic. “It’s good.”

Cam had a sudden, bright memory of holding a fistful of his reddish brown hair as he buzzed the other half off in the bathroom sink. He continued with the pencil tip, like a feather.

Alex flipped onto his back on his bed, casual and composed as always, belonging everywhere he set foot— never awkward, or disliked, or challenged. He watched the two of them serenely as he hit the yellow vape. “Who knew you could act like a normal human being, Cameron?” was his only snipe. It was said in a quiet enough voice that Cam felt he could let it go unchallenged.

“Close your eyes,” he said, ready to trace Zee’s face.

Zee gave him a steady, head-on glance before doing as he asked.

[lifeinpoetry]

I know, from here on out, this beast I lured & wrangled to shore, the fight is mine alone.

— Alexandra Regalado, from "A Family History of Alcoholism," Relinquenda

[thr4shit]

I'm tired. Have a Metal Family headcannon that I don't know how it formed:

(headcannon and rambling below cut.)

cw for mentions of abuse, alcohol/alcoholism.

So... yeah, Gustav's a bad guy. We all know that.

And I have no idea why, but recently my brain just went: "What if he was also abused by his dad, but didn't have the guts to run / abandon his family like Glam did so he was just stuck in that situation" and stuff of that caliber, how because it's how he grew up it's how he ended up treating his kids and his wife.

And that the only reason Mary stayed was because they grew up together or something (and were good friends) so she still wanted to hold onto the sort of hope that he could still be the boy she'd been friends with all those years ago. (with this idea, I just get the feeling they were an arranged marriage, with his parents not KNOWING how close they were as kids.)

And honestly. Fuck, I want some content of that. I don't know why, it's just so... interesting to me? To think about young Gustav, and why he is the way he is now. To get that sort of INSIDE view of his mind.

Also, with this train of thought, he tends to drink to cope. Trying to forget what his father did, despite it being so ingrained in him that he does the same to his own kids.

And honestly, I can see Mary being a real anchor for him, trying to keep him grounded (I could see him being VERY lost without her. emotionally and mentally. because she's the only one who's bothered to stay or something of that sort. everyone else sort of stopped trying to deal with his "bs" and decided he "wasn't worth it" anymore. so she's basically keeping him as stable as she can. still clinging to that little hope and keeping a tiny bit alive in him.)

I can also see some sort of Mary trying to comfort/coax him out of drinking for the night when he's in a calmer mood. (reminding him of previous "hey, it'll be alright" type moments between them.)

etc, etc.

I don't know where this came from, or how, or why.

It sort of got screamed at me by my brain... and now it won't leave, and I am clinging to it now. (not trying to justify Gustav's behavior, or say Gustav isn't still a piece of shit father and husband. just saying this is now something imprinted on my brain. IDK why this was what my brain screamed at me this time, only that it happened and now it's just here.)

Honestly, kinda interesting having HCs about them, seeing as how little screen time they get.

(I mean... the HC is mostly about Gustav... but, still.)

[toprayarc]

CHARACTERIZATION AND BACKGROUND NOTES: A COMPREHENSIVE LIST OF DETAILS REGARDING MARI THROUGHOUT DIFFERENT ERAS. CANON CRAFTED IN AFFILIATION WITH @TOCOOK, @METHEMPIRE, AND @GUSTAVOS. CONTENT WARNINGS ARE AS FOLLOWS— MENTIONS OF DRUG USE, MENTIONS OF ALCOHOLISM, WEAPONS, MURDER, DEATH, VIOLENCE.

REGARDING   …   LIVING CONDITIONS.   previous to being on the run, mari lives in a open-format apartment, extremely cluttered and full of art. there are not a lot of personal details other than that, absolutely no photographs of others, and plenty of weaponry stashed away. once on the run, she is in between living out of motels, and sometimes sleeping in the car, but very rarely. she takes a small amount of items with her (against her better judgement) due to sentimental value, but a majority of old journals and art pieces are burned or thrown out. her wardrobe dials down to essentials, but she does take as much weaponry and equipment as possible.

REGARDING   …   VEHICLE AND DRIVING HABITS.   in her initial time in albuquerque, she arrives with no car and no real plan. through a decently short amount of time of conning, as well as then being hired onto gustavo fring’s payroll, she obtains 1972 black chevrolet chevelle. her driving habits on her own time are relatively reckless and careless, often racing other individuals (both in impromptu settings and in underground racing settings) and rarely abiding by traffic laws. in work scenarios she is much more careful, and does tread with significantly more caution, and when mari transitions into the era of being on the run, she carries more of those cautious habits rather than anything else. the risk level is higher in that timeline, and she tends to be more careful in how she proceeds on the road. she abandons her car before she runs, and obtains a 2005 chevrolet express passenger to drive throughout the travels that her and jesse embark on.

REGARDING   …    FINANCES AND OCCUPATION.   mari is initially working as an enforcer and hired gun for gustavo fring, making quite a bit of money that splits between a savings for a contingency plan, and a bank account that keeps her well sustained in her daily living. once fring empire falls, she falls back onto savings, and once on the run, she’s still sustaining a varied level of income through conning and stealing. she had buried a portion of her cash out in the desert when she initially had started making a significant amount of money working for gus, and does dig it up to take with her on the road as well. while on the road, she only carries cash, but divides hiding spaces and does not keep all of it in one place. if possible, she won’t pay for anything at all. lying is an art form to mari, and she prides herself on nothing more than her skill in it getting her where she wants to be. she’s supporting both her and jesse during this time, although she may pull him into cons at points in smaller capacities. once she settles down, she works at a dojo teaching tai-jutsu and jujutsu to children (specifically ages 5-7) and occasionally will run a con here or there if the opportunity presents itself.

REGARDING   …   WARDROBE.   her wardrobe is expansive in the initial fring-empire timeline, housing a large collection of different styles for the use of shifting between looks for manipulative purposes, as she does believe first impressions can allow quite a bit of preconceived notions to occur. when we move into the time period of her being on the run, her wardrobe downsizes considerably, and she primarily is seen in what her personal style was beforehand  —  light wash denim jeans (usually baggy, and either straight-cut or boot-cut), ribbed white tank tops (occasionally black tank tops will make it into the mix as well), a mixture of odd/ironic oversized t-shirts, minimal to no jewelry (with the exception of a silver cross necklace and her father’s rings on a chain), decorative belt buckles, et cetera. she does keep a small selection of other outfit choices available for conning purposes, such as midi or maxi length bodycon dresses and a few select choices of jewelry, but otherwise rids of the rest. her daily wear also becomes sourced from jesse’s wardrobe as well, often times stealing beanies or shirts, and at times, even his jeans.

REGARDING   …   NOTABLE PHYSICAL TRAITS.   both in the fring-empire era and the initial year of the on the run timeline, she has her same tattoos and piercings (daith piercing on her left ear, two lobe piercings on each side, a tattoo of a rose behind her left ear, a butterfly and knife piece on her sternum, a dragon piece on the right side of her ribcage, and a cross on her spine with 愛梨 in the middle) as well as the same scarring she has verse-wide (prominent scarring above and below her left eye, faint scarring above and on the right side of her upper lip, very visible scarring along her torso and on her back, some scarring on her arms, forearms, and across her knuckles). in the later days of the on the run timeline, she obtains a borneo scorpion tattoo on the left side of her ribcage in symmetrical sizing to the dragon piece on the right side, and has gained a few more scars here and there along her torso and arms. about a year or so after she is settled down, she also obtains a septum piercing and a bellybutton piercing.

REGARDING   …   WEAPONRY, EQUIPMENT, AND ARSENAL.   mari’s main weapon of choice is always knives, and this doesn’t change here. she mainly owns semi-automatic pistols, finding little need for rifles or shotguns. she does, however, keep baseball bats and golf clubs tucked away for more personal ventures, but otherwise depends on her hand-to-hand combat skill. while she does keep an amount of weaponry with her while on the run, her collection of weapons is dialed back significantly. being caught with an excessive amount of firearms or questionable weaponry isn’t something she believes is a worthwhile risk, especially due to her skillset in hand-to-hand combat, and she tends to avoid conflict as much as possible, in a complete contrast to how she behaved previous to this time period.

REGARDING   …   MISCELLANEOUS PORTRAYAL DETAILS.   the most significant amount of changes happen once she is on the run, first and foremost starting with her cutting her hair. previously to leaving, she does have her hair at a pretty long length, ending below her hips, but as that isn’t necessarily a very commonplace trait to find, she does cut it closer to a little below her shoulders. she doesn’t change very much appearance wise, as she knows the most defining traits about her are not things she is capable of changing (her height, her scarring, and her stutter) and focuses more on limiting any interactions, as well as shifting through acts in whatever interactions she does hold. mike does give mari a small list of contacts to reference in terms of weapons dealers or things she may need, however it is something that is used in extreme caution due to circumstances. the consistency in which she drinks does drop down once they are on the run, and her drug use is pretty much cut down to nothing as she has no real way to obtain it, and to try to source outward is a risk. the first two weeks she is on the road will be the most difficult with this. she only uses a burner phone in her on the run era, cutting as many ties as possible to any source of consistency or traceability. with her excessive contingency plans in mind, she does have a small amount of fake i.d’s that were obtained beforehand, and also eventually obtains jesse ones as well  — but it must be clarified that the fake i.d’s do not amount to entirely new identities themselves. with the amount of things that mari does leave behind or completely abandons, she only keeps a few select journals/sketchbooks, one or two of her encapsulated butterflies, none of her scrapbooks, and mainly takes her favorite books with her. she also takes the burned cd jesse gave her, mark’s blockbuster card that she’d stolen from him as a child, a charm bracelet from her mother, her ipod + headphones, her rice cooker, and her reading glasses. everything else is either burned, thrown away, given away, or discarded of. 

REGARDING   …   MILESTONES AND AGE.   mike and mari meet when she is sixteen, she moves out to albuquerque at twenty-two, jesse and mari meet when she is twenty-four, she goes on the run when she is twenty-five, and gets together with jesse around twenty-six. they settle down sometime in their late twenties.

[planetbeanie]

Exerts from a collection of stories curated by Pam Knapp for her book

‘Heartfelt Stories About Beanie Babies and Those Who Collect Them’

Which includes hundreds of self submitted stories about how Beanie Babies changed peoples lives

Published in 1999

[deputy-rabies]

Headcanon Dump #1 : Childhood and Adolescence

Potentially triggering topics ahead:

Shane and Rick originally began to hang out because their mom's were best friends. As they grew older, they grew inseparable. Shane idolized Rick in every way possible, to the point he genuinely believed Rick could do no wrong. Rick easily and quickly became his best friend and brother.

Shane's mom passed away when he was young (probably around the age of 13). He'd often times spend his nights and weekends at the Grimes' household so he didn't have to go home.

While Shane's dad wasn't frequently abusive, he was a drunk. Throughout his youth, Shane'd do stupid shit to try and get his attention, and often times, the attention was violent when it came. Still, Shane took it because at least it's some time with his Pa. Shane's father also got aggressive with him whenever he acted or spoke any "less than a man should", leading to a lot of internalized homophobia and misogyny.

to be continued

[stories-of-the-multiverse]

No, let him speak-

"ALCOHOLIC PARENTS ARE ABSOLUTE CLOWNS IS MY POINT-"

Sun. Please-

[boatdriinks]

aaaand part 3 of the ex-spouse series

Let's talk about Louise

After the unremarkable marriage that was his relationship with North, Kerry went back to his old ways for a time. Having fun, dating and sleeping around, while trying to be a present-enough father figure for his daughter.

For over 20 years, he went through several relationships. Some were serious, but most left him with a bad taste in his mouth and a resentment toward the other person.

He would meet and start dating Louise Nordin in 2054 while she was working as a model in Denmark. They dated long distance for two years and Kerry would invite Louise to move in with him on their third anniversary. He could see this was going places, and he was cautiously looking forward to taking things further.

He loved Louise's similar boisterous energy to his own. They could party, they could make all jaws drop in formal events for each other's careers, and they could talk to each other about anything. Kerry genuinely believed he'd met his one. He was able to talk to her about Johnny, about Derry. About how he hadn't treated his first wife that well, and Louise provided insight of how Zoh might've been feeling.

Despite what she heard, though, she didn't turn away. Kerry valued that. Not everyone could even begin to handle the trucktons of baggage that came with Kerry Eurodyne.

After 5 years of dating, they married in 2059. They lived blissfully alone together until April 28th, 2063 when their son, Theodore Nordin Eurodyne was born. Kerry's only son. And things were still good, but cracks would begin to form soon enough.

Drugs and alcohol took hold again during a particularly bad pass of the anniversary of Derry's, and then Johnny's, death. Kerry was spending more time away from home after Louise reluctantly retired for the sake of raising their son, because she and Kerry both hated the idea of their children being primarily raised by nannies.

In the midst of the conflict, the arguing, and trying to fix things, Kerry and Louise's daughter was born. Kimberly Nordin Eurodyne was born on December 1st, 2069. Kerry tried to clean up his act for the sake of his kids, but found that was far easier said than put into actions.

Kerry would catch Louise cheating in mid-2070, and that really sent him off on a war path. He'd cheat on her in return, out of revenge more than anything concrete. Kerry and Louise "patched things up," but he had a feeling she was still cheating after that point. He'd never question whether Kim was his. Whether she was actually or not, she was always going to be his.

It all came to a head, however, when Kerry was arrested for drug possession, assaulting a police officer, and public indecency in 2071. He was sentenced to 15 months in prison, where Kerry would only receive one visit from Louise and their children before being served divorce papers.

Ever since Kerry got out of prison, things have been shit with Louise. She got some of his cars, his home in Tokyo, and worst of all: full custody of the kids. He guessed he couldn't blame her there. Kerry was unstable, and honestly? He didn't want the kids to see him while his mental health was deteriorating. It sure as hell wouldn't help when Louise would occasionally dangle the kids in front of his face in her worst moments, but Kerry rarely had the fight left in him to argue with her too much about it.

And yet, despite all of the bullshit since they finalized the divorce in 2072, Kerry still loved her. If he hadn't fucked it all up, he felt like he could've been with her for the rest of his days.

[fiinalgiirls]

@demottcm​​ -- ❛ It’s their world. We’re just living in it. ❜  

there were so few people, before or after the end of the world, that made nadja feel deferential. she’d always bucked at any sense of authority, but some people had something in ‘em that went beyond a badge and a gun or a tie and a pink slip. kafka was like that. nadja didn’t know much about them, and couldn’t really put a finger on why, but they had a presence. it didn’t make her nervous, but it made her think a little more before she spoke. it made her give a little more of a fuck. and, maybe subconsciously, made nadja stand up just a little straighter too—rolling her shoulders back in her leather jacket, which stuck to her like a second skin with cold sweat on nights like these.

unless she was talking shit or drunk, she wasn’t a big talker. people who knew her, back when knowing her was worth something, would’ve argued. that was just because she was always drunk. it had only gotten worse once she’d gotten a little blood on her hands and her flight to china had been delayed. but when the world ended and she kept waking up--ears ringing, hands shaking--eventually she had to cut it back if she wanted to live. and, hell, maybe there was no hope of ever seeing nainai again, but the hopes of finding someone with a plane kept her going at least. more than any self-preservation had. she’d learned a lot from being sober and everything she’d ever known ending. all the shit she liked was tied to civilization and it was all gone. fuck. 

being paired with kafka was preferential than anyone else she could’ve been stuck running supplies with, but at least with any of those idiots she didn’t care so much what they thought of her. she kept quiet as the walked, speaking up finally to gesture to a group of shambling dead bumping into abandoned cars in the costco parking lot. had to already be picked over, right? when she said as much, kafka said something philosophical and nadja couldn’t help but snort. “that’s fucking bleak. like sartre bleak.” she didn’t really remember if that was the right reference, but it sounded like something she remembered from one of the less boring night classes she’d barely passed at the community college. “you think the costco’s worth picking over or should we move on?” she was a true scavenger, too much work for a potentially little reward wasn’t her style, but the dead circled the parking lot like carrion and the payoff could really go either way.

[roseguided]

𝐇𝐀𝐘𝐌𝐈𝐓𝐂𝐇 𝐇𝐀𝐃 𝐂𝐀𝐔𝐆𝐇𝐓 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐎𝐍 𝐀 𝐁𝐀𝐃 𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆. 𝐖𝐀𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐔𝐏 𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐌 𝐀 𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐄, void of peeta at her side, & then she wasn't able to catch anything that morning. the entire start of the day, like her week, had been shit & katniss finds herself somewhat more irritated when the smallest things don't work out. she was like this before, but since her first games ... it seems to be slightly worse. now, she sees why haymitch was so grumpy all the time. why he was so prone to irritation, to shutting down. she understood now, but she didn't like that she understood. ( the games change you, she knew this was something that couldn't be avoided. but, she had to win for her family. to save prim. a question remains, something which brings a pang of guilt, was it really worth it ? )

@balisongz said, " ADMIT IT--IT HELPS HAVING ME AROUND. "

she'd walked into his house with purpose, already with an attitude, only to see him sitting at the kitchen table. not dressed, a flask in his hand to which katniss is quick to snatch from his grasp. she smells it, just as she expected ... who the hell is providing him with so much alcohol ? wasn't her, can't be peeta, & effy ... effy wouldn't either. she dislikes his drinking as much as katniss. ❛ yeah, when you aren't fuckin' drunk at ten in t'morning. ❜ sneers katniss walking to the sink to pour the gulp or two left out. she sets the flask down. crossing arms over her chest, she returns to him, ❛ really, haymitch, do you think this is funny ? ❜

[bamsara]

Local chaos god gets humbled, creates chaos over it. His aim still needs some work though

I really need to stop drawing Drunken Gods chapter stuff and actually finish the damn chapter lmao

[felsicveins]

The road to forgiveness is paved with miles of bullying

[roseguided]

𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐊𝐄𝐑 𝐇𝐀𝐃 𝐀𝐋𝐖𝐀𝐘𝐒 𝐁𝐄𝐄𝐍 𝐀 𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐋𝐄 𝐃𝐈𝐅𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐔𝐋𝐓 𝐓𝐎 𝐅𝐈𝐆𝐔𝐑𝐄 𝐎𝐔𝐓, 𝐁𝐔𝐓 𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐒𝐄 𝐏𝐀𝐒𝐓 few years. when he grew more distant, when he started missing things & amelia took the wool off her own eyes to see it more clearly. he presses him because she's tired of not getting answers, because at the very least she deserves an answer for why he's peeled himself away from her. away from sonny or even as a family. it hurt her to see, some part of it always will, but it pissed her off much more ! it made her, for once in her life, want to actually hit him. or yell at him. or kick him out of the house, if even for the night. something to take control of the situation, to actually give parker consequences she's withheld for his shitty, dodgy behavior. when did she just decide that was acceptable, that she should just live with it ? ( that's also never been who she is. amelia was always good at sticking up for herself yet, it being someone she wanted so desperately to love & to be happy with something inside her began lacking. ) it wasn't all him she's willing to admit, but it she wasn't the problem. parker is, parker & his insecurity & his drinking problem.

eyes widen even more when @agentnash gives her answer. or more like a half-assed answer. one she wasn't satisfied with. then, however he continued to bring up their shotgun wedding & their pregnancy. to which, in the way he spoke about, made her heart hurt anymore.

quickly, though, she shushes him aggressively with his loud his voice was getting: ❛ keep your voice down, sonny's sleeping ! ❜ says amelia being moving onto her next point. arms unfurl from her side, hand raising to point a finger toward parker. expression keeps its angered expression, losing some of the sadness prickling the back of her eyes. though, he could still see it in her furrowed brows. ❛ if you remember, parker, i told you we didn't have to get married because we were havin' a kid. ❜ she counters, ❛ i told you you didn't have to be involved if you didn't want to, if you weren't ready for it. but, we both agreed to it. WE agreed to give it a shot for our fuckin' kid. 'cause we loved each other. ❜ or thought we did, her mind echos. at the mention of a drink, amelia's nostrils flare & she takes a step toward him. ❛ the drinking. did you think i just didn't notice ? ❜ purposefully, she's started keeping alcohol out of the house.

if parker was a more insightful or self aware man, he might have been able to see the signs of self sabotage paved across his shitty choices. never had he fully acknowledged the self loathing parts of himself that insisted, albeit silently, that he needed to be punished for simply existing. guilt was toxic enough to melt his insides, but parker knew he was made to suffer much more for what he thought he had done ( allowing his parents to die while he hid in the laundry room cupboard caused enough grief to last the rest of parker's life ). so it made sense that he was ruining any chance he had at having a good and even normal life. it was just too bad amelia and sonny had to be caught in the fall out.

amelia had always been better at lowering her voice, at keeping her composure, than parker was. another difference between them. the big part of parker that hated himself wished amelia would yell at him. having his wife hate him would be a lot easier than witnessing how often she got hurt by parker's inability to open up emotionally. anything would be better than her pleading with him, or asking him when he decided to give up on his family. 'i don't know! okay?! i don't know...' words were louder than intended, the man closing his eyes and taking another deep breath. he should say he wasn't giving up on them - on this, on their life, their marriage, their daughter. but parker supposed he had lied enough over the last few years, and decided that, if nothing else, amelia deserved an out, if she wanted one.

'maybe i was never meant to be a husband, or father of the fuckin' year - ever think about that? huh? ever think about how fucking fast we rushed into this because we were having a baby?' parker pushed away from the counter, running palms over his features again, the man looking anywhere but at his wife, in that moment. the accidental pregnancy and shotgun wedding was just as much his fault as it was amelia's ( if not more ), but parker didn't want to admit that, right now. 'i mean, shit, amelia - you're really gonna stand there and try and fight about something we both know isn't fucking working? like you don't already know know how this turns out?' parker wouldn't leave first, but someone had to ( someone always had to ). eyes land on amelia for a brief moment. there were so many things he wanted to say - i'm sorry, i love you, i'll be better. instead, he shook his head and began rummaging through the cupboards of the kitchen. 'i need a drink,'

[jayevrd]

hes gettin a little silly

[daily-crabbys]

This Friday's meme is: you always do this

[indigo-art]

Narrator had wine once (1) now that he has a physical form and immediately became a wine mom cougar. Stanley is @mr-parable's cute man who Arthur is obsessed with.