#God knows we need all support we can get
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wistfulpoltergeist · 25 days ago
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I've never considered just seeing model renders of a game character would make me want to play the game, but here we are 😶‍🌫️
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Aww, you're welcome! I would definitely recommend you to play Sherlock Holmes Chapter One. It's fun and dramatic, entertaining, heartbreaking and gay ;D
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egophiliac · 9 months ago
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(almost) four years in, and I finally had time to draw something for the anniversary! woo! 🎉🎉🎉
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clowningcrows · 3 months ago
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it’s crazy how much having a safe place to be yourself and express your identity and personality and interests, both online and irl, can change your will to live. honestly.
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sesamestreep · 7 months ago
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Crozier/Fitzjames, fake amnesia
from this list of reverse tropes for fic writers. i told @firstelevens I wasn’t sure I had it in me to write fic for these two and then I went and washed my hair and while I did that, this idea popped into my head fully formed and I was bound by honor to write it down. Also it’s the first thing my brain has wanted to write in like two months, so I took that as a good sign?? Anyway, here’s…something. Kind of a Parks and Rec AU?? but also not in any serious way? It’s like…what if these dudes from The Terror worked in local government or whatever… don’t worry about logistics, I mostly wanted to write Blanky and Crozier being best friends and also talk about sobriety feelings a bunch. AND THEN I DID. only fits the prompt if you squint super hard but, regardless, please enjoy… on ao3 because why not
“So, you feel ready to go back to work tomorrow?”
Francis removes his gaze with considerable effort from the perfect red orb that is the sun sinking steadily under the horizon line across the lake and shifts it reluctantly back to Tom, who’s sitting back in his chair with his booted foot propped up on a milk crate that he got from God knows where. The sight of the boot that encases the lower half of his left leg does push a wave of guilty bile up the back of his throat but he’s already been told that if he apologizes for causing Tom to have need of it one more time, he’ll be drowned in the aforementioned lake, so he resists. Tom knows Francis is sorry about what happened and he’s chosen to forgive him, even if Francis still thinks it’s a stupid choice, second only to him befriending Francis in the first place all those years ago. Francis doesn’t know where he himself would have ended up if that hadn’t happened, though, so it all comes out in the wash he supposes.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Francis says, tracing a hairline fracture in his coffee mug with his thumbnail just for something to do. “If I take any more time off, I’ll just never go back, so it’s now or never, really.”
“Attaboy,” Tom says before taking a long, thoughtful drink from his own mug. Out of solidarity, or maybe sensitivity, he hadn’t had anything to drink tonight either, despite Francis’s assurances that it wouldn’t bother him and might even be a good idea, just for him to get used to it. It’s not like he could reasonably expect to go the rest of his life without ever seeing alcohol again. He’d seen four different ads for light beer alone this afternoon while watching reruns of ‘Bones’ on the couch and imagining every possible way his first day back in the office after rehab could go wrong and that hadn’t sent him into a tailspin, so he’d probably survive watching his best friend drink in his presence. Still, Tom had chosen to just drink decaf coffee with him after dinner like the ancient relics they are, because he is, without a doubt, the best person Francis has ever known. “You talk to anybody about it? I mean, besides me…”
“What, you mean like a therapist? Of course. I’ve got, what, six of them now, for Christ’s sake!”
“No, I mean, from the office. Have you talked to anyone about coming back?”
“Well, John, obviously.”
“I suppose you’d have to, yeah,” Tom says, running a ponderous hand over his chin. “Anything interesting from that quarter?”
“Just about what you’d expect,” Francis says, trying to be generous. John had been kind enough to let him keep his job, after all, despite how bad things got in the end, but Francis’s issues with the man remain, even with his newfound sobriety. Francis had sent him a long, downright obsequious email apologizing for the damage he’d done with his drunken theatrics both over the years and in the very recent past and explained in detail all the ways he was going to do better in the future, while expressing gratitude for the unprecedented amount of grace everyone, but particularly John, had shown him during this stressful time. It was, in no uncertain terms, the most embarrassing thing Francis has ever had to do, and he has, in his life, proposed to the same woman three separate times with absolutely no success, so it’s not like he’s lacking in options for that top spot.
John is, thankfully, the sort of man who likes to breeze past unpleasantness wherever he can and is also, more importantly, a deeply entrenched bureaucrat who’d just as soon do no work as do even a little work and therefore could not be bothered to hire a replacement for Francis. In fact, if he had to guess, John was probably clever enough to frame it as some sort of protection against a discrimination lawsuit somewhere down the line, despite the fact that several things Francis did at the staff Christmas party right before hitting rock bottom were definitely fireable offenses. John’s unflappable dedication to the status quo has worked in Francis’s favor for once, and while he certainly doesn’t deserve the break, he’s going to take it where he can get it on the off chance it never happens again.
“And the staff? Your team, I mean.”
“I got coffee with a few of them individually, just to clear the air and apologize, so that if anyone wanted to take a swing at me, they could do it outside of work,” Francis says, scuffing his shoe against the porch.
“Well, that’s considerate of you. Any of them try it?”
“No. The cowards,” Francis scoffs, which makes Tom laugh. “Jopson and Edward both seemed like they might be sick at the prospect of anyone in charge actually deigning to apologize to them, which was…humbling, to say the least. Then I got an extremely nervous monologue from Harry about the history and relative efficacy of Alcoholics Anonymous, which I think was his way of saying we’re square. And Silna told me if I tried to meet up with her outside of work hours again, she’d block my number and quit without notice, so...”
“She’s got the right of it,” Tom says, with a crooked grin.
“Yeah, that was my favorite of the lot,” Francis replies. “We’ll have a team meeting tomorrow and we’ll get someone in from HR so everyone can talk about feelings, God help us, but I think it might be okay. Which I could not have predicted when all this started, but here we are.”
“I could have,” Tom says. “You’ve made plenty of mistakes, I grant you, but you’ve also done right by these people in a lot of ways. They’re not going to forget that in a hurry. They’re a loyal bunch.”
Francis nods, looking out over the water again. The pinks and golds of the sunset a few moments ago have already faded into purples and blues as night creeps in. The nocturnal chorus of frogs croaking and insects trilling is rising in the nearby woods. He’s already said his piece about how absurd it is that they’re sitting comfortably outside on the porch after dinner—with jackets on and a fire going, sure, but still—and it’s only the beginning of March. Tom doesn’t need to hear any more ranting about global warming right now; it’s no fair repayment of his generosity. What Francis really should do is head for home soon and let his friend have some peace and quiet. He could use some of that himself, but he somehow doubts that he’ll get much rest once he’s home for the evening. At least he can panic about tomorrow properly there, though, by himself.
“Speaking of throwing punches,” Tom says, carefully, after they’ve been quiet a moment, “have you spoken to James at all?”
Francis winces with what feels like his entire body. “I haven’t had the chance,” he says, as lightly as he can manage.
It isn’t precisely true. If he found the time to contact everyone else who’d been affected by his spectacular fall from grace during his leave of absence, he could have found the time to reach out to James too, but he hadn’t. The apology he owes James Fitzjames is too big for an email, which he’d, in a truly cowardly fashion, gotten away with for almost everyone else, and the presumption and humiliation of asking for any of his free time as he’d done with some of his subordinates was a bridge too far. Besides, if they’d met up at a coffee shop to talk things out, Francis has no doubt James would have ordered his drink with oat milk or stevia instead of sugar or mentioned a cleanse he was on and Francis would have rolled his eyes and said something awful and then he probably would have had to go to rehab all over again, which would have defeated the point. Francis has been told by outside observers—professionals in the field, for what it’s worth—that he’s making progress, but he’s even more sure that he’s still, at his core, a miserable old bastard. He’s just less miserable than he was before, by a small margin. Unfortunately, he’s not any less old, though. In fact, he’s older, but that’s beside the point.
“You’ll have to face him sooner or later,” Tom says, not quite gently but not as bullying as he could be either.
“I know,” Francis says, covering his face with his hands. “I’ll do it tomorrow. I mean, if anyone’s entitled to an in-person apology, it’s James, surely.”
“After you punched him in front of everyone at the Christmas party and verbally berated him? Yeah, I think something more than a text message might be in order.”
“You accepted an apology text,” Francis says, scowling into his mug. “And I broke your leg. You needed surgery and everything. I don’t even think I broke James’s nose.”
“Only because your aim sucks when you’re wasted,” Tom replies, unbothered. “Gave him quite the shiner, though, if you want to compare wounds.”
Francis sighs. “I already said I’d talk to him. You have my word.”
“What am I? Your bloody father?”
“No, and I like you a great deal better for it.”
“Good, then what do I need your word for?”
“I was just trying to convey my sincerity.”
“I don’t doubt your sincerity, Francis. Never have. It’s everyone else you need to convince.”
“I don’t know what to say to James,” Francis says, into his hands. “I mean, with you at least, we’ve known each other for ages. We can bounce back from quite a lot, it turns out. James, he’s—I’ve never known how to talk to him in the first place. Now I’ve got to do it sober? I don’t know where to start.”
“How about, ‘James, I’m sorry for trying to knock your lights out with an audience present while I was drunk off my ass on the company dime’ to start?”
Francis closes his eyes and leans back in his chair, letting the shame wash over him like a wave and then, more importantly, letting it recede like waves do. He sighs loudly and shakes his head.
“You know, I’ve always regretted I wasn’t the sort of drunk who forgets what he does when he’s wasted. Feels like it might be easier, ultimately. Like, I could say, ‘oh, sorry for whatever I might have done to you, James. The trouble is I don’t remember any of it, but I’m sure it’s nothing I would have done sober, all the same.’”
“Feigning amnesia?” Tom barks, laughing and looking at him sideways. “What’s that? The thirteenth step?”
“Leave me alone,” Francis replies, waving him off but laughing himself despite his best efforts. “I’ve done a lot of owning up to things lately. Can’t I keep one petty grievance for myself?”
“You could probably get away with it, if you’d left it as a petty grievance rather than escalating to violence. And your resistance to dealing with James should tell you making amends there is your highest priority. Discomfort is a good thing here, a signal you’re heading in the right direction. If it were all easy, everyone would do it, you know.”
“That’s lovely, Tom. Will you be cross-stitching any of these aphorisms onto pillows to remind me to stay the course, or shall I just memorize them for when times get tough?”
“Fuck off, you dusty old prick,” Tom laughs. “Hey, what about this? ‘James, I’m ever so sorry for getting plastered and calling you out in front of everyone and then attempting to rearrange your pretty face with my fist! I do think some of the blame lies in you being so pretty and in me having some unresolved issues around my masculinity and my self-esteem, all of which you can blame on my waste of a father figure growing up, but in this case, I suppose I have to shoulder some of the responsibility for my actions myself. Forgive me?’”
“There’s no one else on earth who could get away with saying even half those things to me, you know,” Francis says, even as his blood doesn’t boil or even heat in the slightest hearing them. It rushes to his face instead, no doubt resulting in a fierce blush that the gathering darkness mercifully hides from view.
“I earned it the hard way, my friend,” Tom says, patting his boot.
“That you did,” Francis says, and rises from his seat. “I’d better be going, then. Much to do, after all: apologies to draft, laundry to fold, worst case scenarios to spin out.”
Tom gets up with effort, clunky and inelegant in his boot, but not so proud as to decline Francis’s hand when it’s offered. “I wasn’t trying to scare you off,” he says once he’s vertical.
“You didn’t. It’s like I said, I’ve a lot to do before the big day.”
Tom nods and, after a moment of deliberation, puts a hand on Francis’s shoulder. “You’re a good man, you know.”
“I’m not sure about that,” Francis replies, shifting away from the praise. “More of a bad man trying to be better.”
Tom gives him a long look at that and then shakes his head, smiling. “All that work on yourself and you still don’t get it,” he says, not unkindly. “What else do you think a good man is?”
Francis doesn’t know, but he spends the whole ride home and the rest of the night thinking about it all the same.
*
Francis’s plan of attack, such as it even exists, takes form more easily than he could have predicted. Once he starts thinking about how best to approach James at work and make amends on that front, he finds he knows a lot more about the man than he originally thought. A few years working together, however contentiously, has been enough to pick up on each other’s habits and quirks well enough that Francis can reasonably predict when he’ll be able to get a moment of James’s time without anyone else around. The fact that he can do this and yet never thought to do it before under any other circumstances is the cause of another wave of shame that passes less quickly than Francis would like.
Francis arrives at the City Planner’s office just before 8:30 in the morning with the certainty that he won’t run into John—the man has many flaws but his dedication to never showing up to work any earlier than he absolutely needs to is not one of them, in Francis’s opinion—but that he will, in all likelihood, find James already there and more than likely already working. He also arrives with the materials for a bribe, should that prove necessary.
He’s so worked up, going through everything he’s planning to say one last time in his mind before he actually sees James, that he doesn’t think to knock on the outer door, which is sitting half-open anyway, and just barges in instead. It’s not a great start, he realizes a second after it’s too late to do anything else, and it’s made even worse by the fact that James is there, as expected, and he’s only partially in his shirt, which is not so expected. Francis stops and gapes for a moment with all the grace of someone who’s been tased.
“God, sorry,” he says, and tries to step back, only to collide with the door jamb. “I should’ve—”
“Francis, it’s—good morning, I—this isn’t—I’m the—I’m sorry,” James says, managing to sound crisp and self-possessed even when he’s stammering his way through an apology. “I don’t normally…do this…in the office, I mean.”
“No, of course not,” Francis says, behaving like a teenager in a romantic comedy for some reason and averting his eyes, even though there’s nothing to see. James was in the process of buttoning his shirt when he came in, so it’s really the sight of his clavicle that’s made Francis so uncomfortable. Was he always this much of a ninny? Is that why he started drinking, to cover it up? It’s the only explanation that makes any sense now.
“I went for a run this morning and I neglected to pack a shirt with my work clothes, so I had to use the spare I keep in my desk for emergencies.”
The old Francis (of several weeks and easily a thousand group sessions ago) would have rolled his eyes at any number of things in that small explanation: running to work, keeping a spare shirt in one’s desk, referring to anything related to fashion as an ‘emergency’ and meaning it. Now, he nods thoughtfully and tries to think of it all as part and parcel of what he respects and admires about James: his dedication and planning, his ability to anticipate and address future challenges. The fact that he looks nice in blue. Whatever. It turns out it’s easier to do than he imagined it would be.
“I don’t think you have a habit of undressing in the office for fun, James,” Francis says, instead of any of those nice things. “Don’t worry.”
“Right,” James says, lightly, even as his shoulders remain tense. He does up the last few buttons and his clavicle disappears under the taut poplin fabric of his dress shirt. “Well, what can I do for you, Francis?”
Francis has heard—and, in turn, mocked—James on any number of occasions start conversations with a smooth, ‘to what do I owe the pleasure of your company?’, which is not an expression Francis himself has been treated to in a long time and for good reason. He doesn’t know why he thinks of it now, except that he’d take even a sarcastic reference to the pleasure of his company (of which there is none and never has been for James in particular, he thinks) over the idea that James should do anything for him, at this point.
“You’re training, then?” Francis asks, skirting gracelessly around the question James actually posed. “For another one of the what-do-ya-call-em’s? Not a marathon. The thing you did last year…?”
“The Ironman,” James suggests, looking slightly pained. “It’s a triathlon.”
“Yeah, that sounds right. Another one of those?”
“God, no,” James replies, nose wrinkling slightly before he seems to catch himself doing it and intentionally blanks his expression. “I’m not likely to do another one of those. I already have my bragging rights, after all. Today’s run was just for health.”
“Oh, sure,” Francis says, tapping a fingertip nervously against the cardboard sleeve of his coffee cup. “I’m meant to be doing that now.”
“Running?” James asks, betraying some surprise, which is fair enough.
“Exercising. For my health. To keep me…”
“Fit?”
“Well, distracted,” Francis replies, with a shrug. “There seems to be some thought of it helping to keep me away from drink, though I’m not sure what the logic is there. But I’m meant to be thinking of something I’d enjoy, anyway.”
“Not running, then,” James says, brow crinkling like he’s giving the matter serious thought. James is a fixer by nature—and by profession, of course, being paid mostly to follow John around and make sure the grand promises that flow from his mouth actually happen somehow. He thrives with a problem to solve. If Francis were even marginally less stupid and less proud, he might have thought to come to James sooner. He’s nothing if not several very large problems wrapped in a trench coat. Or a wind breaker, in actuality. The point is, Francis could use all the fixing he can get his hands on.
“Not likely. Never enjoyed it, really. Hard on the ankles, I’ve found.”
“Yes, it can be quite stressful on the joints. You’ve got to take all sorts of precautions,” James says, in the tone he gets when he’s working his way up to a long treatise of some kind, but he stops abruptly and his face betrays that he’s seemingly caught himself. He clears his throat. “So, it’s not for everyone. I understand.”
“Yes, well, my sponsor was saying that I might try tennis or racquetball, but then I’d have to find a regular partner or group, and I’m not sure I have it in me.”
“There’s a club nearby, actually, and they could help you arrange—” James pauses and shakes his head, once again stopping himself from expounding on the different options available the way he normally would. It’s an uncharacteristic amount of restraint coming from James, who loves recommending things to other people almost as much as he loves the sound of his own voice. Francis sees some of his own handiwork in this new display of shame and feels the need to make amends even more keenly than before because of it. “Well, you can Google it, I imagine, and it would be faster than listening to me. It is, uh—it’s in Eagleton, however, so I suppose that won’t do.”
“No,” Francis replies, frowning. “Thanks all the same, though. I imagine I’ll end up doing water aerobics with the rest of the senior citizens at the community center and call it a day.”
“You’re not a—you’re barely fifty, Francis!”
“I’m fifty-two, actually.”
“Oh, well, in that case, I hope you have your affairs in order,” James gripes, as he messes with something entirely unnecessarily on his desk. Francis smiles at the strange comfort of annoying him, which should not be reassuring to him at all but he’s a messed up sort of fellow even on his best days. The smile grows when James clears his throat again and adds, like he can’t quite stop himself, “Swimming’s rather good for the joints, actually.”
“Swimming?” Francis asks.
“Yes, swimming. As in, laps…in a pool. Something else the community center offers, if you were interested. It’s solitary—meditative, even—and good exercise. In—that is, in case you were wondering.”
“If this is you trying to talk me into a triathlon, James—”
James sniffs, more performatively haughty than genuinely haughty, Francis suspects. “I’d never,” he says. “I was merely recommending an activity that you might enjoy more than water aerobics, and that might spare the elderly of our community from dealing your obvious personality disorder early in the morning, when those classes tend to be held.”
Francis, much to James’s surprise from the look on his face, laughs at that. “I’ll take that under advisement,” he says, while James continues to regard him like he’s wild animal exhibiting signs of rabies who’s suddenly appeared in his path, which is maybe a common occurrence in town, depending on who you ask. “Thank you.”
James nods, distracted. “Sure.”
“Well, I—I…listen, I didn’t come here to talk about exercise regimes, which I figure you could have guessed,” Francis says, in a rush, because anything less than a headlong dive into the subject they need to discuss will hurt much worse than just getting it over with, he suspects. “And I don’t want to presume anything about your life, but I also figure there’s a non-zero chance that you’re already familiar with the famous 12 step program, maybe just through cultural osmosis, and I don’t want to over explain any of it to you, but, well, there’s a pretty important part about identifying people you’ve wronged through your addiction and the resulting behavior and making direct amends to said try people and—”
“I’m familiar,” James interrupts, softly. “Not directly, of course, or, um, anything like that—I don’t want to detract—but—”
Francis waves him off. “No need to explain. I just—well, obviously, that list of people, for me, had to include you, because of what transpired between us at the end of last year and how I behaved. The things I said to you, then—how I’ve always spoken to you, really—and of course, I—God, I’m so sorry. It feels absurd to say out loud but I’m sorry for lashing out at you and hitting you, I should never have—”
“It’s fine, Francis,” James says, starchily. He’s got a nervous hand pressed to his ribcage, so intently that it’s almost shocking to look and see no actual knife sticking out from there, somehow. With that, it’s hard to believe the breeziness of his words. “Really, this isn’t necessary.”
“And I’m telling you it is,” Francis explains, as carefully as he can manage. “Maybe it isn’t for you, I don’t know, but it’s necessary for me. Do you—can you understand that?”
“Yes, I’m sorry,” James says, after a deep breath. “Of course. Is there…more?”
“You tell me. Is there any other ways my drinking harmed you that I haven’t thought of?”
“No, I wasn’t—”
Francis holds up a hand to stop him. “That probably read as very sarcastic, given our…history, let’s say, but it was a genuine question. I think I’ve raked myself over the coals for every possible slight I can imagine but if there’s anything I did that I can address for you now, I’d have you tell me.”
“No, it’s fine, really,” James replies, shakily. “I only meant, I don’t really know what goes into all this. Is amends just an apology or is there more to it? I don’t need there to be, I was just curious. That’s all.”
“Well, you’re meant to endeavor to show you’ve changed your ways, I suppose. To indicate that you won’t be perpetuating the same harm in the future. Which, in this case, is tough, because…well, I mean, all I can give you is my word I won’t try to knock you out at work ever again.”
“Outside of work hours, however…” James muses, with a small, mirthless smile.
Francis winces, but otherwise doesn’t react. “I’ll never behave that way towards you again. On my honor, for whatever that’s worth.”
James folds his arms over his chest and looks down at the carpet, appearing like a sullen youth for a brief moment before he raises his gaze and becomes a grown man once more. Francis remembers when he’d shown up with John that first time, how he’d called James an infant to Tom when they finished their initial meeting with him about the town’s budget crisis all those years ago. Tom had laughed at him, wheezing ‘he’s a decade younger than us, if he’s anything, Francis. He’s our bloody peer now, and if you don’t see it, you’re cracked!’ Francis thought—still thinks—Tom is the one who’s cracked, in this case. James looked young, then; he looks young now, everywhere except the eyes, which contain a stormy sea’s worth of disappointment. Francis can be self-centered with the best of them but he knows he’s not the one who put that feeling there in the first place. He’s not that important. For the first time, however, he feels protective of the man in front of him because of it and takes it as his very solemn duty to never be the cause of his disappointment again, so long as it can be helped. All that and it’s not even 9 in the morning yet.
“It’s worth plenty,” James says, eventually, clearly just as uncomfortable with this much emotion so early in the day as Francis is and eager to be done with it. “Thank you, Francis.”
“Yes, well, I won’t take up any more of your time, I’ve been nuisance enough for one morning, but if there’s ever anything you want to discuss or clear up between us, my door’s always open. To you, that is. Well, to anyone, but just in case your particular welcome was unclear, I mean, you should—”
James sweeps a hand out wide in a graceful gesture like he’s literally clearing the air. “Understood,” he says, sincerely, “and appreciated.”
“Great,” Francis says, too cheerily and then winces again. “I mean, uh—right, I’ll just be going then.”
As he pivots back towards the door, the sloshing noise of the ice shifting in one of the cups he’d forgotten he was holding draws his attention. Christ, right. The whole point was—Francis really is starting to lose his mind. He contemplates just leaving anyway, like nothing’s amiss, but he’ll have to explain the two drinks to his team, absolutely none of whom will buy that the iced chai is for him. He’s gone on too many rants about how coffee shouldn’t be iced and tea only on certain occasions. He’s the type to drink hot, black coffee even on the most brutal summer days, though his sponsor did warn him that a lot of alcoholics do turn to sweets as a coping mechanism for replacing alcohol in their daily lives and not to be surprised if he found himself needing additional sweetener in his morning coffee as a result. Francis hadn’t credited it at the time, but he had found himself momentarily tempted at the coffee shop this morning by a sign advertising something called a ‘death by chocolate latte’ as the daily special before he’d gotten a hold of himself, so maybe there’s some truth to it. The point is, dragging this extra drink back to his office will be more humiliating than turning around and giving it to James like he originally planned, no matter how awkward it feels right now.
“Okay,” he says, turning back, “I promise this is the last thing and then I will let you get back to work. There’s, uh—it’s not a bribe, mind you, just an extension of the apology for what happened and for the fact that you’ll have to continue working with me for the foreseeable future and—you don’t have to forgive me, you don’t owe me that, I just thought—”
James looks at him, utterly perplexed, fingertips gently steepled on the top of the desk like he’d already been going back to whatever he was working on when Francis interrupted again. “What is it?” he asks, somehow still not betraying any annoyance at the interruption, hiding it well under an open tone of curiosity.
“The—this,” Francis finally spits out with considerable effort, holding the cup out towards James, rather than try to explain himself further. “It’s for you.”
“Oh,” James replies, with an expression like Francis is trying to hand him a live gerbil and not an upsettingly overpriced beverage like the ones he’s seen James drink on dozens of occasions. “I, uh—that’s really not necessary.”
“You must take it, James. Please. I said you’re not obligated to forgive me, I’m not trying to sway you, really. It just felt wrong to show up empty handed, after everything.”
“I understand, but, really—”
“You’re not on another one of your cleanses, are you? Giving up sugar or…calories before noon or something?” Francis ventures, imbuing his tone with more patience than he normally would, even though he still feels very little towards this thing in particular.
James is already so annoyingly healthy and brisk and handsome, it does take extraordinary amounts of patience to tolerate his talk of intermittent fasting and green juice with the goal of making himself even more annoyingly perfect. Surely, there’s got to be a limit to that sort of thing, but Francis doesn’t know; he’s on the opposite end of the spectrum it seems, having to re-learn the fundamentals of barely looking after himself in middle age without the aid of alcohol. It’s pretty grim, if he’s being honest. It really is no wonder that James has been so consistently earning the gold medal spot in the competitive sport of getting on Francis’s nerves, with that in mind.
His intentional gentleness does seem to pay off in this case, though, since James smiles at him in only mild embarrassment. “Uh, no, I’m not. I just—you’re not obliged to—”
“I know, but—listen, James, I already committed my penance by having to say the phrase ‘dirty chai’ with a straight face to a college student with a lip piercing at eight in the morning, okay? The damage is done. You might as well enjoy the spoils of my humiliation.”
James’s smile widens at that, looking for all the world like he can’t really stop himself. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but that mental image might be worth more to me than the entirety of your apology.”
“No offense taken,” Francis says, finally succeeding in handing off the cup, slick with condensation by now, into James’s care. “I hope it will sustain you for a while yet.”
“Oh, it shall,” James says, placing the cup gingerly onto his desk.
“Right, well,” Francis replies, “that’s all, then. I’ll see you…later, I suppose.”
James nods. “We have a meeting set for Tuesday—tomorrow. It should be on your calendar. Thomas said he—”
“If Jopson says it’s there, it’s there.”
“Great,” James says, easily. “Until then.”
“Yes. ‘Til tomorrow.”
Mission completed, Francis turns once more towards the door and is only interrupted in leaving by the sound of James clearing his throat behind him. He pauses, and looks over his shoulder, raising his eyebrows in question when he meets James’s eye.
“It’s only—forgive me if this is the wrong thing to say, under the circumstances,” James offers, fidgeting with the edge of the notepad lying open on his desk, “but you do—that is, you look well, Francis.”
Francis doesn’t allow himself the liberty of moving even an inch, not to fiddle with his collar or brush back his hair or otherwise indicate he gives so much as one singular damn about his appearance. “Do I?” he asks, tone purposely vague, like James has just told him the weather forecast and it’s only interesting to him in theory, really.
“Yes, very well,” James says, putting his hand flat on the desk very deliberately, like it was giving him away before. At what, who knows, but he’s got it under control now. “This change, it suits you.”
“Well, thank you, I guess.”
James now looks at his computer screen, absently. The next words he says might be something he was reading off of there, if they were anything else. “You look good, is what I meant.”
“How—?” Francis pauses, feeling immense pressure to say this right, somehow. “Sorry, but how would that be the wrong thing to say?”
“I wouldn’t want you to think, well—” James interrupts himself by laughing, just a little and rather joylessly. “It’s not that you didn’t look good before.”
“Oh, right,” Francis says, even as those words continue to make no sense to him in that particular order coming from this particular person. “Wait, you’re saying—I did?”
James meets his eye again, finally, but only to give him the most impatient, long-suffering look in human history. “Is it too much to hope that one of the twelve steps involves learning to take a compliment?” he asks, sounding depleted by the effort. “Because it is one of your most exhausting qualities that you can’t do so without endless interrogation first.”
“And it’s got a lot of competition,” Francis replies, feeling himself smile and choosing to do nothing to stop it, “what with all my other exhausting qualities.”
“You’re really only proving my point here, you know.”
“Thank you, James,” Francis says, dutifully. “It’s very kind of you to say. Better?”
“Much,” James sighs. “You’re showing remarkable improvement already.”
Francis leaves him, then, because to stay any longer would just be exposing himself to further ridicule and he’d absolutely deserve it, what with the stupid smile he now can’t seem to get rid of.
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unproduciblesmackdown · 3 months ago
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omgg lol [guy who won't stop going "more like scapeGOATED" voice] now hold! on!! lmao [same guy just saw encanto voice] Hold on!!!
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#& [it might be 5am but i'll still see if i can draw some] trackpad homemade reacts. inhales & hands to head/face x9 then walking off#site giving pretty random Suggested assortment there where i was like oh right sure. prob not tumblr keywords captures lmaooo#(plus happened to have it open in firefox) but my god Not the scapegoated literal seers lmfao. whoooo. my god#also it was just really good anyways like right nice. damn#the (queerrr) seerrr the perceiverrr the truth tellerrr the ruinerrr the scapegoat be-errr the internalizerrr the neurodivergerrr#& now i Know there is 0% chance ppl weren't putting ''always a gay cousin or it's you (avuncular edition)'' in that thing#family tree design not even leaving space for the hypothetical kids of this relative we mostly pretend is nonexistent hmm#also that necessarily. it's giving all intents & purposes Disability abt a dozen ways & it's saying [accept that] vs [we'd better fix him]#you don't cite said [it's giving disability] as part of the We All Hate The Horrible Little Freak scapegoating justification & then be like#''actually we don't have to do that anymore b/c he's sooo normal :)'' or not if you're serious about [don't scapegoat your family] anyways#which like oh ok they Are serious so The Weirdo's scapegoating / casting out / lack of support Isn't justified#so he's still weird & you just gotta get over that b/c otherwise. bye. having a natural rat affinity is such a slay btw#& we've all been there like ''you NEVER want two scapegoats talking it's Over if they do'' + littlest kid is like um. they're the best#plankton voice Correct! inhale i'm so impressed like. getting to go ''finally someone Normal'' (serious abt letting someone Be Weird(tm))#which also always counts as like mm hard time suggesting someone's Not queer & also autistic for a start lmao. an award#adding in suggested layers like talking to oneself; talking Oddly / w difficulty; physical uncoordination; rituals ; acting; animal friend#the layer of ''& all that's fine? like?'' again rather than him ever suppressing or even changing it so far as it's suggested#besides that it's observed as Weird like but so? or else what? nonrhetorical: hostility / rescinded support & driving someone off is what?#& that Truth like the [worse treatment / exclusion / scapegoat] oft recipe for someone giving the support they're not getting themself#again Never let the [ppl both experiencing this] talk oh it's So over. or the child who's all i like family support & kindness actuallyy...#obviously also like the complete opposite of billions. knowing what they're about & letting this Just As Beloved crucial guy be So Weird#but billions Also [hmm feels right for our scapegoated guy to Perceive / Tell Truths / openly want/need & then be hurt] now get his ass#anyway [guy who could always go way on could go way on but only has thirty tags & it's 6am & i still mean to try some drawing] voice#remarkable amt of So True & ''it feels like ppl on the same page w/exactly what they're doing are all behind this''#remarkable amount of concentrated My God That Is So A Slay located in bruno all at once. what a gift#sticking to ''sometimes someone In Your Group is Weird. Disabled. deal'' firmly enough there's no ;) oh u can bet we'll Fix Him in the end#everyone always assumes the worst so....me when i'm [always as a kid yearning for Living In Secret Passages]. emile gtmpota?#oh congrats to whatever rando who will be having his dramatic gay reunion w/bruno just out of frame obviously. i perceive#now imagine if That rando was....emile gtmpota! what a crossover event. haunting4haunting. do i have enough tags for this lmao. yea#& having 1 more tag to say: as though the [endless serving] isn't enough bruno's also as close to gender envy as it gets. incl rats; sure
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infinitelystrangemachinex · 7 months ago
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Mel for the unhinged character bingo!
yessss YEEEESSSSSSSSS
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#ask me#so Mel is in the unenviable position of being a very strong character whose rights I support and whose wrongs I also fully support#BUT the way she's treated broadly in the fandom is so pervasive and so consistent and so frustrating to me that#I am in full -must protect my blorbo- mode with her at all times#-Mel's story is over so the only thing left for her to do is die-#-if Mel dies then J can get together with V and they will appreciate her for her sacrifice bc she died a hero who rejected Ambessa-#enough! enough I say!#what about proving to ambessa that she can take the throne for herself? what about the angst of defying her mother and her home country#and opposing those in Piltover who DO want war and want to raze the undercity#what about the magic that she's heavily foreshadowed to have and how it's different from hextech#and how it directly opposes but also parallels what is happening to Viktor#what about her -friends- abroad and the plot Mel was cooking through all of season 1 that has not been revealed yet#there's so much potential for her to have to confront the fact that J was slowly becoming a monster through season 1#and that she can't ignore the undercity forever#also what if whoever Ambessa says killed her brother comes after Mel too!#it is very frustrating to see Mel get dismissed as dead or evil or irredeemable or whatever when she is consistently#the most interesting person in the room in every single scene she's in and the character who shows the most conviction and change#so yeah i will take a bullet for her she is my blorbo I will despise any character who hurts her#and I would cradle her in my arms if she gave me a chance - which she would never! - but a girl can dream#however I also enjoy leaning into the idea that Mel is perceived as being a devil from the outside - Mel leans into it too when it serves#but it's in direct opposition to her ironclad values and the personality that she keeps hidden a layer down#I genuinely think that Mel will have a happy ending - or at least as happy an ending that an Arcane character can get lol#like I fully believe she will take the throne (Piltover) in the end but I can only guess at this point what that will cost her#I love putting Mel in situations but mainly to play with both how creative she can get and also how fucking far she will go to win#which is ANOTHER thing we know is probably true about Mel but has not been put on display yet#also Mel has already done a great job at separating what she wants for herself as a person from just being Ambessa's daughter#but Mel still deserves to get plenty of great therapy for that situation because OH GOD THAT CHILDHOOD FLASHBACK#also Kino is dead? maybe dead?? at least Mel fully believes he's dead so she needs therapy and hugs for that too#I am super normal about her can you tell
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loumauve · 2 months ago
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I snapped today at work, and by snapped I mean I politely commented on a help desk ticket by summing up an mess of an (type of) issue that's come up for at least the fourth time in the 2+ months I've been managing user accounts, and asked the person responsible to fix it (himself for once) because last time I fixed his mess-up it took me two whole days to work out the details with at least four other colleagues from different departments and I really don't want to do it again. there's other shit that needs doing, I've been working 10+ hour days for most of this week already, so I need to cut down not add on more.
(good thing tho - at least we managed to fix the issue where the dataset of a newer employee got mixed up with another one of the same name and therefore wasn't able to apply for any of the access/accounts she needed. technically not entirely my area but it does impact us not being allowed to create an account for her so I figured I might as well track that issue down. took three days and at least three other people, but hey - it should all work out now. yay for that)
#been feeling anxious af ever since bc it's the first time I've been this firm in a reply and idk how they'll take it#there's underlying issues in inter-departmental communication that need fixing that cause these issues to happen again and again#but my boss is on parental leave and his substitute is sick not that she cares or is up for doing her job where communication is concerned#so there's no real sense in addressing that rn esp by me who's only been there since June. but it does frustrate me a lot#anyway. I'm sure I'll get over this too. but yeah.. ppl not thinking things through for the two mins it takes to create an account#or the twenty seconds it takes to check if one already exists before creating a new one#or the minute it takes to check if folks still have an active contract past their time working in your department before deleting an accoun#just jfc. put in a smidge of effort and five mins total and save the rest of us from spending half a day to fix your mistake#oh well. if I get a pissy response I'll just blame it on being new as an intern and being too motivated and idealistic I guess#god forbid I expect people to do their jobs thoroughly or with at least a singular thought..#anyway. I feel like I'm allowed to be grumpy abt this since we are the folks who end up having to fix this shit#and by we I mean pretty much mostly me at this point bc one colleague is sick atm. my boss barely has time for this and is on leave#and my other colleague only works half time so I'm the one who's been handling most of these over the past month or so#which.. is still insane considering how I'm a goddamn intern who shouldn't even have admin rights tbh#but without them I couldn't do anything at all lol so here I am. nice that they trust and believe in me I suppose#that's why I try to do my best. (who am I kidding that's always the case anyway)#but yeah. definitely a 50% staff support job and only 50% of the other important things that need doing rn it's more like 90/10#and it's funny how I still dread my two hours of hotline. but every time the line is too busy I still jump in#we are also only 6 people atm out of 10 and three of us are still in training. and one of the trained folks had to come back in mid time of#next week we'll likely be 4#depending on if our substitute boss lady is back.. not that I'd look forward to it. she's a mess and she's been horrible to deal with latel#sure. she's stressed. but she's either snapping at me when I ask abt shit I can't know yet or she's ignoring me. great basis for team work.#so honestly I'd rather she not return on Monday. esp not if she's gonna spread her germs everywhere#but now sleep. sorry for the rant. it's certainly been quite the month since I returned from my own wisdom tooth rated sick leave..#gotta be up again in 6.5 hrs so I can be at work at 6 to let the electrician in. I'm gonna sleep so hard over the weekend I stg#a day in the life of..
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catgirlcrisis · 10 months ago
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whoopsie-daisie hit reblog too fast
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solipseismic · 4 months ago
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"the dems are pro-genocide" "harris is just as supportive of genocide as biden" and what. do you think. the republicans think. of american imperialism and genocide? please. do let me know.
#the machine is working as intended. i cannot stress to you all enough. this is what america does.#this is what america did in korea. this is what america did in vietnam. this is what america does in the caribbean.#this is really and truly just what american imperialism does. this is not an aha gotcha moment.#this is the core of american politics. this is the intent and purpose of american imperialism. this is not new.#this is not new information. ok? i need everyone to understand this. it is not new information that american politicians#support american imperialism and by extension american-funded and -fueled genocide.#acting as though whoa if we vote harris into office she'll just continue the genocide!!! and what do you think trump will do?#what do we all think trump will do if he is in office? trump? the guy who is notorious for loving brown people?#especially those in other countries? right. right. right. ok. right.#yes absolutely be aware of the pitfalls and issues with american politics/politicians/the democratic party but ohhhh my god#genuinely really and truly sick of people going 'this is who you're voting for!!1!1! she's no better than genocide joe!!1!1!!'#IT'S HARRIS OR TRUMP BABY. AND AMERICAN POLITICIANS HAVE BEEN ENACTING GENOCIDE IN EVERY CORNER OF THE WORLD. FOR DECADES.#quite frankly not only is it fucking tiring for people to be acting as though there's some nuanced unproblematic third option#but it's just as fucking tiring to be acting like this is new. or somehow a revelation. jesus christ.#we still don't know how many korean civilains us soldiers massacred during the korean war. the number is in the tens of thousands.#conservatively. 30-40.000.#but we just don't know. but oh of course! of course this is new information that america commits atrocities in other countries!#of course this is new information that is only relevant now!!!!!#get the fuck out of here.#we just have to pick the better option and hope that we can slowly change one step forward at a time. there is no way to vote that#somehow changes or erases the fact that this is what american imperialism does.#fucking tiring that some ppl have the privilege of pretending otherwise.#jesus christ. how naive. how hopeless. how cruel. the families of nogun-ri are still lobbying for reparation.#and americans will act as though it's new information that american imperialism is a machine that chews countries up and spits them out#for the imf and foreign (american) corps to profit from.#god.#2024#croidhe#the death loop
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boygirlctommy · 9 months ago
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man i want to make an animatic about my ocs so bad
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kiras-monkey-bum-face · 11 months ago
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being a TA helping the class gain confidence, learn from their mistakes, build bonds and help educational progress:
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being a TA that has no choice in having to do whatever the fuck an off timetable child wants to do, who's guardian said "good luck" as soon as they drop them off in a violent mood
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transbee · 1 year ago
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having did and being online in any capacity is so fucking exhausting because you literally can't go anywhere without seeing the most heinous takes about your existence or validity it's like. can we be normal. can we please be normal and Chill for like two seconds.
#HEADS UP: this accidentally turned into a huge rant/vent feel free to get the hell out el oh el#i try reallly hard not to talk about it too much here because you can. offhandedly mention the mere concept of did or osdd or any#dissociative disorder and its like. people will not shut up about how its not real or how its people being delusional or kids being cringe#like. can we go. two seconds without treating people with mental disorders like a spectacle. please. you dont have to have a ''take'' on it#idk and i also avoid online did communities bc theyre the most exhausting spaces you can ever be in and theres constant fighting about#literally anything and everything. like. maybe i would like to find a space to meet other people with similar experiences to my own.#and we dont get that!! we literally cannot get that. and this goes for a lot of mental health related stuff but like my god#and im very lucky to have other people i know in real life who also have did so i can in some amount have that support system (hah.)#but it is EXHAUSTINGG that people cannot go literally a day without saying something stupid about systems#or i can be following someone for years and unprompted they will saysomething heinous thing about did and hide it behind something like#get a load of how weird and cringey kids are getting online these days.#and CHRISTT thats a whole OTHER issue i REALLY dont wanna talk about because it has its own whole set of nuances but like jeeeesus#is it really so hard for people to grasp that brains when exposed to traumas at a young age will be affected by it in weird ways.#idk man ive been seeing a lot of offhanded disregard for systems recently and it's so normalized and it's starting to get to me i guess#i wish people could just go well this is something i dont understand and dont need to have an opinion on and move on with their lives.#what the hell ever this is all to say having did has impacted my life in a lot of complicated and intricate and hard to explain ways and it#sometimes painful and awful but other times is an incredible experience and ALSO. most IMPORTANTLY !#i should be able to make jokes about BEING FRIENDS with SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG!! in REAL LIFE!!!#and not have to deal with SUICIDE BAIT IN MY INBOXX BECAUSE OF IT!!!#WHATEVERRR !!! RANT OVARRR I HAVE NOODLES TO MAKE AND EAT#.... WITH my friend SHADOW!!!#.txt#and btw this isnt about anyone ik here so dont worry im not upset with any mutuals etc etc and all that.#in fact i love getting the chance to chat about it n it can be fun to teach stuff to people who know how to like...be normal about it LOL#<3
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loremonster · 4 months ago
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I'd say the children of people who shouldn't have had kids.
Still, fully agreed.
we are the daughters of parents who should not have had kids
#my parents were abused like all hell#then gave into the pressure to have children despite having no plan on how to NOT DO THAT#the society they lived in demanded they have children to Be Good People#and then when their first kid overwhelmed them? ... they found a church#that taught them all humans are inherently sinful and we're just running out the clock till judgement day#MA'S PARENTS DIDN'T RAISE HER IN ANY FAITH BECAUSE THEY DISAGREED AND DIDN'T WANNA FIGHT ABOUT IT#grandpa is catholic grandma is lutheran#dad was raised Missori Synod#which is as close as you can get to Roman Catholic while calling yourself a lutheran#they still did corporal pinishment i.e hitting kids in Sunday School#so when mom's mental health got even more difficult to manage with a CHILD TO RAISE and the HORMONAL HELL after delivery#and dad decided the way to fix it was to introduce her to jesus#and then both of them just defaulted into Do As We Say Not As We Do#expecting us to be Glorious Savants in everything we did and NEVER giving us any credit#expecting us to THANK GOD that we met expectations instead of our parents recognizing our efforts#while all wrongdoing was ALWAYS fully OUR fault#no one elses#and misunderstandings got us screamed at for lying#while Ma listened to Rush Limbah on the radio every day from before I was born to the day that hateful fuckwit died#my parents had a chance to break the cycle and heal#and didn't#and passed their traumas on to their kids through NEGLECT and failure to ENGAGE WITH THEIR OWN CIRCUMATANCES AND DO BETTER#inflicted poverty trauma on us despite us being well off by screaming at us whenever we asked for something we didn't capital N Need#but casually financing a fancy new boat for them to go fishing Because They Earned It#inflicted generational trauma by making the same demands as their parents despite telling us exactly how those demands did them harm#enforced gender roles despite ma being the most “traditionally masculine” human being I know#and dad's happy place being in the home cooking and cleaning and supporting the family unit#but dad had the good job so he didn't get to be where he was happy#and ma being denied work and decent wages and blaming it on immigrants instead of grappling with Sexism Still Being A Thing#like... yall got SO close
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ayamohammed2024 · 2 months ago
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Hello
my name is Aya, I am 26 years old, currently living in the northern part of Gaza City, and I am a mother of two children. My oldest is my daughter, Sana'a, who is 5 years old, and my youngest is my son, Wasfi, who is 3.
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Since the morning of October 7th, 2023, our lives have been turned upside down. We have lived through the hardest days of our lives, facing displacement and homelessness. We have been forced to leave our home more than ten times since the war began. We would leave without knowing where to go.
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We sought refuge in schools and relatives' homes, hoping we could return home and that this nightmare would end. But our house was bombed, and our dreams were destroyed. We became homeless and displaced.
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Every day, we wake up to the sound of bombs and rockets. I lived in constant fear and terror with my children, especially when my family's house was bombed while we were taking shelter there.
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We are experiencing a real famine in Gaza. I’ve gone to bed with my children many nights without dinner because there is no food available. We have had to eat animal and bird feed due to the high cost of flour just to fill the hunger of my young children. Even after eating it, we all suffered from diarrhea and severe stomach pain. My children developed rashes on their bodies due to the spread of viruses and the accumulation of garbage. There is also a severe shortage of water, and even when we find it, it's not safe to drink.
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My children cry, asking for vegetables, fruits, and eggs, but we can’t afford them because we have no income. The gas shortage has forced us to use fire for everything—cooking and baking—using plastic and pipes because firewood is so hard to find.
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My children also developed jaundice, and I struggled a lot to get them better because there was no access to vegetables, fruits, or medicine. I even feared that my son might have developed polio because he already had leg problems before the war, and they worsened due to malnutrition.
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Winter is coming, and we have nothing for it. I need clothes and shoes for my children to keep them warm, but I can’t buy them because they are so expensive.
For this reason, I beg of you and hope that you can support me, even with the smallest contribution, so I can provide my children with the most basic necessities of life.
I was displaced with my children to my family's house, tears in my eyes. On the way, Salah Al-Din Street was bombed, and the Israeli occupation committed horrific massacres. By the grace of God, we survived for the first time. We lived in terror and fear. A few days later, my family's house was bombed, and we were pulled out from under the rubble, miraculously surviving for the second time.
When my husband heard the news that we had died, he came to bid us farewell, only to find us alive by God's grace. We returned with him, but as the situation worsened and the fire belts in our area increased, we started to flee again and again, not knowing where to go next.
I beg of you to share my story and help me continue to live.
✅️Vetted by @gazavetters, my number verified on the list is ( #230 )✅️
Vetted by butterfly nu #1133
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desperatecheesecubes · 5 months ago
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Not to self: you should probably stop saying 'yeah yeah let me swallow first' before answering the phone at work. But also people should stop calling when I'm eating my granola bar c'mon now.
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northwest-cryptid · 2 years ago
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Long hair enbies exist, I understand you’re talking more mainstream media and the like where enbies are never really portrayed hardly at all, but the problem isn’t that long hair can’t be enbie/gender neutral. it’s that people associate androgyny with nonbinary. That’s now how it works. I am nonbinary, I have a very good friend who’s nonbinary; I look very much masculine and they look very much feminine. If you ask either of us what the most troublesome aspect of our identity is, it’s literally even other LGBT individuals who use the words “androgynous” and “nonbinary” interchangeably and practically demand we adhere to their standards of what an enbie needs to look like in order to be respected. I have finally come to terms with how I look, and some days I even think I actually look good; and you know the only reason I often strive to be more androgynous at all? It’s because I just want to be respected, because I am tired of being told I “don’t look enbie” or that I’m “too masculine to pass”
Until people understand that “nonbinary” or “enbie” doesn’t have to look a certain way this sort of thing is always going to happen. While I don’t know when this post was made, I will say that there are plenty of long haired men and women in media, if you pay attention they’re out there. Truth is, having a post say “give me long haired enbies” feels like one of those cases of meaning well but accidentally demanding someone fit your desires. I know it was very likely not meant to read that way but as an enbie who has been told how to dress, how to do my hair, how to act, etc. since I had come out as nonbinary it’s a situation where my only real comment is this:
You want long haired enbies? Cool, that’s fantastic; do it then. Do it yourself. Be the change. People make enough demands of us as it is. Design your own characters, make it happen. However please never tell me how I need to look or be in order to appease other people.
start normalizing long hair as androgynous. long hair can be gender-neutral too.
#If my comment makes you angry you can reblog it from the source#but boy I feel strongly on this topic#My comment is not meant to be rude or angry in any way#I just want people to understand that as a N/B individual this post really rubs me the wrong way#and like don't get me wrong! I understand the core message behind this#I really do understand the concept they're trying to say here#but it falls kinda flat when you consider that long hair is normalized as being gender neutral#If you're not someone who understands that I'd argue that you're part of the problem perpetuating the idea that it isn't.#When movie stars or musicians or celebrities in the mainstream media can all have long or short hair without it being considered gendered#and you still think ''oh but long hair is for women and short hair is for men'' maybe you're part of the problem#which I don't say to upset you I say that in hopes it might make you realize that this is a lot more normal than you think#and denying that isn't going to help progress us any#I've had long hair all my life and I've ANNOYINGLY never been seen as anything other than a man#but dear god please let N/B individuals just present how they fucking want to#do not tell them they have to break the mold or be something different than who or what they are#if you can't see why that's a problem there's a problem in your logic#If you're a N/B and you want short neon dyed hair fuckin' go for it mate! Live your best life!#and if you want to present femininely I want you to feel just as fucking valid and supported for it#If you're N/B and you really like your beard and you think your hair looks good short then I hope you know you're no less N/B for it#Nonbinary individuals do not owe you androgyny I thought we've been over this already#and we don't need to make something andro just so it can ''fit for N/Bs'' or something#Especially not something that is already very gender neutral#Believe it or not I'm actually kinda scared to say this shit because I'm no stranger to angry anons telling me I need to change myself#funny that ain't it. How someone who is a thing will speak up about the suffering those people go through and others will become upset#rather than actually paying any mind to it or listening or giving it a moment of thought#I know there's roughly 24k other people out there who saw this post and went ''oh fuck yeah absolutely agree with this'' and honestly#the bulk of them are probably N/B people#and that's fine but I think we also need to address this topic when we're saying such a cut and dry statement here#You want to change something? Do it. Do it your fucking self. Do not make demands of me. I'm frankly#very fucking tired of people making demands of me.
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