#I CLOSED OUT OF DISCORD AND SPENT 2 HOURS WRITING THIS ALL

[collapsedglasshouses]

Like The Movies || Vinny Mauro x fem!Reader [Part 2]

SUMMARY: After the events on the couch, Y/n doesn't know how to talk to her best friend anymore and decides to call him late at night, with a different outcome than expected.

WARNINGS: smut, MDNI, phone sex, masturbation, mutual pining, friends to fwb sorta, …

TAGLIST: @measuredingold @cncohshit @circle-with-me @tearfallpixie @jilliemiw86 @dominuslunae

A/N: Whoa, so this took longer than I expected but here is the long awaited Part Two. I'm planing on writing a third final part but don't ask me when it will come out, idk yet sorry c: also this isnt proofread :c

You couldn’t even remember a time where Vinny and you hadn’t been best friends. In all those years you always had been each other’s comfort zone. Nothing ever had the power to separate the bond you two had created. Except the two of you yourself of course.

At the moment, you were nervously fidgeting with your fingers while waiting for Vinny to get into his car. You had spent the evening at Ricky’s house for a small birthday celebration and everything had seemed normal. You had walked there since the weather had been pretty good, but it had gotten pretty late, and nobody was comfortable with you walking home at this point, so Vinny, being your best friend and neighbor, had offered to drive you.

Nothing about this seemed out of the usual for the others, but you were almost shaking with nervousness. It had already been a week since the events on your couch and nobody had dared to say a word about it. It wasn’t like you hadn’t talked at all. Everything seemed normal, except the two of you tapping around the obvious elephant in the room. You felt like you were being tortured for seven days straight at this point. You didn’t know how Vinny could act so calm about the whole thing, while you were about to explode into a million pieces.

Your thoughts were consumed by him. It felt like your brain had been wired differently since that night. All you could think about was Vinny. It wasn’t only the sexual scene that happened literally in front of your eyes. It was everything. His voice, his smile, the way he made you laugh. Everything.

Once Vinny had said his goodbyes to everyone left and slipped inside his car, it was just the two of you left. You instantly felt how goosebumps started to form on your skin when you inhaled the faint smell of his perfume. You felt how your heart was racing just with him near you and you were sure you were about to go insane, rather sooner than later.

The car ride was quiet, the only sound coming from Vinny tapping along to the music on the steering wheel. You tried not to look to closely at his hands, since even that gave you a warm feeling in your stomach. Your mind wondered back to that night. After receiving that text from Vinny, you felt like you were on fire. You had tried to ignore it, but it was hard. Vinny had called you that night and you streamed one of this dinosaur documentaries as if nothing had happened. As if you hadn’t watched each other cum. You had decided after that, that you needed to push your feelings away even further.

You really tried not to think about it too much. You didn’t even know what to expect from that situation.

So now, a week later, you were sitting in your shared driveway and stared straight ahead. You had never been more unsure of anything in your life like you were right now, and it hurt you, because Vinny was the one stable thing in your existence, and you had collectively decided to ruin it because of the heat of the moment.

Right as Vinny took a breath to say something, you snapped out of your thoughts. “Thanks. Good night.”

With that you sprinted out of his car and into your house, fearing for a second, he would go after you.

Two hours later you sat on your bed and toyed with your phone in your hand. Your thoughts were eating you alive. You didn’t know what came over you when you opened the Discord App to check for the fifth time if he was still online.

“Fuck, he’s still Vinny. Don’t be so childish.” You mumbled to yourself before you touched the call button.

Almost instantly you heard his voice on the other end. “To what do I owe the honor?”

You felt like you were frozen into your place. His voice alone made you crumble into pieces.

“Hi.” You mumbled shyly.

“Hi back.” He answered you and mimicked your shy undertone. You weren’t sure if he was trying to mock you.

“So… What’s up?” Vinny asked again, now in a more relaxed tone while you felt stiffer than ever.

“I-… You know… I-…” You began to stumble over your words, regretting you hadn’t thought about what to say to him before calling.

“Yeees?” He teased you and you knew he was grinning slightly. You wanted nothing more than to walk over and slap it out of his pretty face.

“Don’t make this any harder than it already is, Vin!” You almost cried into your phone and ran a hand through your hair.

It was silent for a long time.

“Did you think about it?” He suddenly asked into the void.

“Think about what?” You breathed out, knowing exactly what he meant but not wanting to give it away.

“That night.”

Your eyes widened. Your heart felt like it was about to jump out of your body. You didn’t think the subject would turn this fast.

“You mean if I thought about you touching yourself in front of me?” You boldly asked, smiling slightly at your sudden and unexpected confidence.

“Uhm… Something like that.” Vinny almost stuttered, causing your smile to become even broader.

It was silent again.

“And?”

“Have you?” You asked him and leaned back on your bed.

“I asked first.” – “I asked second.”

You felt like your heart was going to explode out of your chest any second. Never in your entire life had you been more turned on simple by the tone of the voice of someone.

“I have.” Vinny answered after a short while, his voice way raspier than it was before.

“Me too.” You mumbled and immediately your mind snapped back to that night. You just couldn’t get this picture out of your head. Vinny, with his hand wrapped around his hard member, breathing out your name between slight moans.

“Did you touch yourself today?” Vinny than asked with slight hesitation in his voice.

“I haven’t…” You answered and immediately became bold again. “Yet.”

“Do you want to?” Vinny asked. You bit your lip for a second, trying to suppress the smile forming on your face.

“I plan to… Yeah.”

“You want any help?” He mumbled casually as if he was offering to help you clean your house or something.

“You can’t come over. I have to get up early tomorrow.” You answered him honestly and hoped you didn’t scare him away with your comment. You wanted him to come over, but you knew it would ruin the last bit of sleep you would get.

“Noone said anything about coming over.” He answered you and you could picture the grin that was plastered on his face in said moment. You wanted to scream into your pillow.

“What are you thinking about?” You whispered sweetly into your phone while settling deeper into your pillow.

“Did you mean it when you said you wanted me to touch you?” Vinny wanted to know, ignoring your question. Blood rushed in your ears as you remembered the moment, when you exclaimed you wanted it to be his fingers instead of yours.

You opened your legs beneath your blanket and let your hand ran down your body.

“Yes, I did mean it.” You breathed out. “Did you want me to touch you?”

“Fuck… Of course. Have you looked at yourself?” Vinny almost moaned out and you were sure he was touching himself at this point, so your hand started to travel between your thighs.

Your heart stutters at his low voice.

“I hoped you would say that.” You whispered into the phone. Vinny let out a low laugh. 

“If I’m being honest, the last couple of times weren’t the first time, I thought of you while masturbating but god… I can’t get you out of my mind anymore.” Vinny explained with so much honesty in his voice that you couldn’t help yourself but to touch your most sensitive spot.

“When you were thinking of me…what was I doing?” You asked him, realizing your voice became breathier at this point.

“If I’m being honest, it’s the little things. How you look in your favorite dress, how you look when you bend down, how your cheeks get red every time someone slightly compliments you.” He answered you and let out a small hum after that.

“Really? Just that?” You asked him, shocked about how just simple gestures could turn him on.

“No. Today I came so hard while thinking of you being under me. Moaning out my name.” He answered as you circled your clit a bit faster. Your cheeks reddened at the thought of him thinking about you while masturbating and then going to meet you right after that.

“Oh, Vinny.” You breathed out.

“That’s exactly what I mean.” He teased you. “What about you?”

“I thought about your hands.” You honestly exclaimed. “I mean… You play the drums like a fucking god. Can’t help myself thinking about how your fingers would feel inside of me.”

Another groan came from Vinny, and you let your finger swirl around your clit. 

“Oh yeah? Gosh, I wonder how your pussy feels like.” He said with a serious tone, but you can’t help but giggle.

“What?” – “That’s what the guy said in the porn, too.”

“As far as I can remember, you liked that pretty much.” He teased you.

“I wasn’t denying it.” You answered him with a smile on your face and let a finger sink into your hole.

“Are you touching yourself right now?” Vinny stumbled out shyly.

“Of course, I am and I know you’re doing it, too.” You moaned.

You heard some shuffling noises and couldn’t help but think about him sitting in front of his computer with his hand around his cock.

“If you keep making these noises, I will come over.” Vinny breathed out on the other line while your pace became faster.

“Maybe I want you to.” – “I value your sleep, darling.”

‘Darling’… He was driving you insane.

“I wish that was my hand on your cock right now.” You moaned into your phone.

“You have no fucking clue, do you? The effect you have on people.” His breathing was getting more prominent, and you felt your own pick up.

“Or my mouth.” You whispered after his statement and heard him moan. Tension started to form in your stomach, another finger sinking into you.

“Vinny.” You gasped and he moaned into your ear through the phone. Your fingers curled up onto the sweet spot you’d found while thinking of his hard cock. You wanted to feel him so bad.

“Please tell me you’re close, Y/n.” He almost whined out.

“I am.” You moaned into your phone, chasing your high.

“I want to feel you so bad.” Vinny whined, speaking out your own thoughts. “I can hear how wet you are for me.”

“Oh god.” You exhaled as your hips started to stutter. “Fuck, Vinny.”

“It’s like I had a taste of the forbidden fruit. I can’t get enough of you.” He groaned.

“Have me then.” You whine out, your voice weak and laced with unsaid words. Everything neither of you had dared to say before.

Your hips buck against your hand as you cried out. “God, Vinny!”

“Are you cumming?” His voice so determined and raw but all you could do was nod, though he couldn’t see you. Though, you didn’t have to say something. Your breaths revealed the truth.

“Fuck…that was…oh fuck,” you tried to answer him as you started to come down from your orgasm, still not in full control of your body functions. 

“You sound so fucking good. I just… Gosh, Y/n...” You could imagine how he started to thrust his hips slightly upwards, cum coating his hand.

You hear him shuffle again and breathe heavily into his microphone just as your head became clearer again.

It was silent for a longer period of time. Both of you trying to contain your thoughts.

Suddenly you began to feel nervous.

“That was-…” Vinny breathed out.

“Yeah.”

“Maybe you-…” – “Yeah, I should probably get some sleep.”

“See you tomorrow?” He quietly asked. “You could come over and we could watch a movie or something. Tomorrow night?”

Your heart started to beat heavily again. It would be the first time you would be around each other alone since the evening after he came back from tour, and you started to wonder how it would go.

“See you tomorrow, Vin.”

“Good night, darling.”

dividers by @saradika-graphics

[andheresthething]

I Got So Fucking Romantic, I Apologize

Summary: Cute lazy morning (afternoon) with Nightowl.

[No use of y/n] [Lazy Mornings] [But it's really 2 pm] [Cuddling & Snuggling] [Kissing] [Love Bites] [Pet Names] [Dorks in Love] [I cannot stress it enough you act like teenagers in love] [Implied Sexual Content] [You're smaller than him] [Established Relationship]

•·················•·················•

Notes:

I recently played Blooming Panic and absolutely fell HARD for Nightowl. This is the first time I've ever posted any of my writing and it's been a while since I've written at all so this will probably be rusty. I might write more (could make a spicy follow-up) if people like this one, though it might be delayed because carpal tunnel is a bitch.

Gender-neutral reader for yall :)

I wrote this while listening to my character playlist for him

Reposted from AO3

Also, I haven't used Tumblr since MIDDLE SCHOOL so I apologize for things being strange to the platform

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Rays of light shone through the drawn blinds of the bedroom you and Nightowl shared. The small beams laid across the two of you sleeping well into early afternoon. You slowly blink and let out a yawn, taking a moment to come into the conscious world.

Once your eyes adjusted you finally get a look at the blonde sleeping on his side next to you. His chest slowly rising and falling and an arm draped over you. Lips slightly apart, just enough to show a sliver of his front teeth, and his neck and collar bones covered in spots that ranged in shades of purple. Though a familiar sight for you to see each day, it never grew old. Each day, without fail, your heart would flutter the same way it did when you spent your first night together. You cracked a smile, just watching and waiting for your partner to wake.

Sometimes it was still baffling to you that clicking on a discord invite led to this. How fast everything moved between the two of you was unexpected, but not unwelcomed in the slightest. You recall all the nights the two of you would spend up, talking about anything and everything until you fell asleep. Nightowl would follow shortly after, but would never hang up the call. Some of the time right before he’d turn in as well, you were just conscious to hear him say, ‘I can’t wait until we can do this in person. Goodnight, Cutie. Sweet dreams.’

Your smile grew thinking about those early times of your relationship, though soon enough you were broken from the little daydream with the feeling of Nightowl lifting his arm off of you, stretching himself awake with a yawn.

“Mornin, sweetheart,” you said as he lowered his arm back to hold you. He sleepily smiled, then placed a light kiss on your forehead.

“Good morning, cutie,” he smiled, “Hope I didn’t keep you waiting too long.”

“Impossible, plus I lost myself in thought, so I doubt I would have noticed an hour going by.”

“Care to indulge me?” Nightowl asked while moving his hand to hold yours.

“I was just thinking about our old late-night calls before I got to move in with you and how sometimes when I was half asleep I’d hear you say how you couldn’t wait for this to happen for real and wished me goodnight”

Nightowl squeezed your hand, eyes lighting up slightly. Your little story seemed to help wake him up from his groggy state, “Awe, I love you getting all sappy and nostalgic on me first thing in the morning, cutie.”

 “I always felt all stupid and happy whenever I heard it.” 

“You know,” he scootched as close as he could be to you without being completely on top of you, “I did it every. Single. Night.” he hummed, peppering a kiss on your face between every word, and you giggled with each one.

“Really?”

He put on a serious face, sharply nodding, “Without fail. I still do actually. Granted, I’ve changed that first part a tiny bit considering you’re now actually here with me, in the flesh.”

“Awe, sweetheart, you’re literally the best. How’d I get so lucky?” you reached to hug him. Maybe a bit too enthusiastically, though, as you managed to push Nightowl over on his back and put yourself on top of him, burying your face in his neck in the process, “Seriously, I could have never imagined having someone who does stuff like that for me all to myself.”

“ You can’t believe you have me all to yourself?” Nightowl laughed, “I should be the one saying that. I was such a hungover ass to you after knowing you for, like, five days, and you still wanted to be with me after that night. You’re the one here that's the best,” he refuted, placing a kiss on the side of your head, “To have someone as precious as you makes me the lucky one here, darling.”

“Mmm, I’d have to disagree with you.”

  “Incorrect and unfactual statement.”

You lifted yourself enough to meet your eyes with his, “As much as I’d love to continue this to prove I’m, in fact, correct on this matter, I think I’m a little too tired to try.”

“So what you're saying is that I win?” he said with the biggest shit-eating grin. You groaned at his playful antic and started to push yourself up, now straddling his lap as he still laid underneath you, which also effectively pushed the blanket once covering the two of you off and behind you. 

“Sure, you win, dumbass. What shall your prize be?”

“Can it be anything?” he said excitedly.

You knew you might regret the answer you were going to give, but went through with it anyway, “Sure, anything you want, sweetheart,” with that, you sealed your fate.

“Hmm, what a tough decision to make,” Nightowl exaggeratedly pondered while pushing himself back slightly to be able to sit up with his arms supporting him from behind. You also moved so that you were sitting in his lap, legs wrapped around his bare lower waist, and brought your arms around his neck. Your arms sat on the soft fabric that was the straps of his crop top, “The possibilities are endless, cutie. How could I ever just choose one thing?”

You giggled at his complaint, “You better, the offer is going to expire soon. Then you just get bragging rights.”

“Oh, how cruel! How could you?” he moved his arms from behind him to hold your hips.

“I know, I’m such a horrible person,” you said, matching his sarcastic and playful tone.

The two of you stayed like that for a moment, you took the time to admire his face. The small beams of light highlighted his softer features. They made his messy hair shine and his brown eyes sparkle, revealing all the little flakes of different shades that resided in them.

The light also reflected off of his cartilage piercings. Nightowl had a bad habit of not taking out his earrings before bed. No matter how many times you reminded him, he always forgot. It wasn’t the end of the world that he didn’t, though. At least he remembered to take out his statement piece each night.

In that time, Nightowl did the same, soaking in the sight of you. Hair just as messy as his own, a stupid wide smile, and a pair of beaming eyes staring into his own. But your shirt, God it was killing him. It was one of his own that you’d steal regularly to wear almost anywhere. While purposefully somewhat oversized on him, you were swimming in it, allowing your neck and collar bones, covered in marks (courtesy of him), to be exposed. Maybe it was his somewhat possessive nature, but the mix of the shirt and hickies fogged his mind with a myriad of thoughts ranging from wholesome to extremely sexual.

“Have you made a decision yet?” your words snapped him out of his short, albeit very vivid, daydream, “Or are we just going to settle for bragging rights?”

“Nope! I’ve come up with my prize.”

“That would be?”

“One super lazy, stay-in-date day complete with stupid horror movies and possibly some more… intimate affairs later on,” he paused, “Please.”

You pretended to think it over, despite the arrangement of this prize. While you, of course, got tasked with a pile of work for the weekend, you couldn’t care less about it. Getting ripped by your boss on Monday would be worth it, especially with the not-at-all-subtle proposition for later in the day. Knowing Nightowl though, it would probably come way sooner than nightfall. “You, sir, have yourself a deal.”

You gave him a small peck, but Nightowl being Nightowl, was having none of that. He immediately put his lips back on yours, tightening his grip on your hips. While it took you slightly by surprise, you gladly accepted the act, kissing him back. Quickly things became heated, pulling each other closer, the movement of your lips becoming desperate. Your hands drifted to his hair, lightly grabbing at it, which Nightowl responded to by letting out a small moan into your mouth. That noise of his set you off, eager to continue the sudden act of intimacy. 

Unfortunately, as quickly as it picked up, it stopped. Nightowl pulled away and loosened his hold on you, causing you to let out a small whine of disappointment.

“As much as I don’t want to stop this right now, cutie, I’m starving for some actual food, not just you.” 

You let out a chuckle, arms going back down to rest on his shoulders, “You’re such a tease.”

“Says the one wearing nothing but my shirt,” he flirted, a shit-eating grin plastered on his face once again. “Looks great on you, by the way. Makes your ass and thighs look fantastic. Especially your thighs.”

“I do, in fact, have something on under, mister,” you retorted, “But if you’re that hungry, I guess we could go scrounge up something, but by we, I mean me. We both know you can't cook for shit.”

“Ouch, that one stung.”

“It’s not that bad if I like cooking and you like eating it. Plus, you get to stare at my thighs all you want while I do so.”

“A win is a win,” he lifted one hand off your hips to cup your cheek. “Shall we then?”

“To the kitchen!” you giggled. 

Nightowl gave you one last kiss on your forehead before putting his hand down, allowing you to get up off of him and the bed. He followed suit, loosely holding your hand. With that, you led the way out of the bedroom and into the kitchen to start your long date day at 2 pm.

[akookminsupporter]

Hey Rosie! Quite surprised that we had Jikook cooking and spending time together in Jimin's apartment shown in the docu. I knew the reason we have so many jikook moments the past years was bec they were always together, but this uptick in recent and upcoming (travel show) Jikook moments have been interesting.

Imagine the chaos that happened the past two to three years when people left and right have been shouting that they're not close/not spending anymore time together, that they're the only members not engaging on each other's social media posts, only to be proven for the thousandth time that, they're pretty much spending time together and that they're just not posting or broadcasting it.

Can you imagine how many Jikook hangouts we're not privy to?? Good for them. They're happy and inside their own bubble without an effing care about people trying to disprove their bond.

But God, imagine being together for the past decade, spending off-hours and rest days together, and still opting to enlist in the buddy system together, 24/7, for possibly 547 days? At this point, even I can't imagine how much they love being together to the point that they're so secure they won't get sick of each other's presence. I'm going to be so insufferable when their show comes out. I probably won't stop talking about it.

Hello, Anon! In your Ask, you mentioned several things that I'd like to comment on, so I'll go paragraph by paragraph if you don't mind.

I finished writing everything I had to say, and I realize it's quite lengthy, and the Ask is already long – I'm sorry!

Paragraph 1: This is interesting. I'm curious to know why this surprised you. If anything, it is consistent with everything we've seen from Jimin and Jungkook in this type of content. They spend a lot of time together, generating moments between them that don't involve other members or that other members don't have. As I mentioned in another Ask, I believe that's precisely why we can always count on various moments between them in official content. It's not that everything is scripted or fake; it's simply that their dynamic creates moments that can be captured. Regarding the increase in moments between them, it's not that unusual. When you spend so much time with another person, it's normal. They have confirmed this time and time again, in my opinion. As for the show/series/documentary they did, I do recognize that it surprised me that they did it, especially considering the timing. Regarding this, I can't say much because we don't have any information about it. We don't know what the focus of the show will be, if it has one, of course.

Paragraph 2: Something that many people don't seem to understand is that the day has 24 hours, and these men don't share absolutely everything that happens in their lives with us. Just because we don't see something doesn't mean it didn't happen. It also doesn't mean it happened, but it doesn't mean it didn't either. This is tied to all the recent or ongoing discord with the subgroup. But especially since last year; they've mocked endlessly that Jimin and Jungkook didn't spend time together, that they didn't talk, etc., but at the same time, Jimin and Jungkook let us know through comments in their own Wlives that they did see each other's Wlives. They almost always mentioned the other, or in Jungkook's case, he spent time watching Jimin's videos in his Vlives or listening to his songs. This argument also falls apart when we remember that Jimin and Jungkook applied together for a special system that would allow them to enlist together in the army. It's not a decision you make with someone you're not close to and with whom you don't have communication outside of work. This decision also involved constant communication between them to complete the application and all that it entailed. Pretending that Jimin and Jungkook made that decision overnight after not having contact with each other is absurd and ridiculous at best. Pretending that they made that decision without being close or having a close relationship is even more so, especially when they had other options. This argument has also crumbled many times when, after a while, Jimin and Jungkook tell us that they were together at a certain moment, that they did something together, or, as we saw in the documentary, they are recorded by the cameras. Not everyone has to believe that Jimin and Jungkook are a couple or that the possibility of them being one exists and is high, but to believe that they are not close, don't like spending time together, or don't get along is ridiculous.

Paragraphs 3 and 4: Jimin and Jungkook like spending time together. That's something that no one can really argue, although many obviously try to. That's why it was a bit surprising that they filmed a show/series/documentary together before enlisting. Before we knew about the buddy system, it made sense to us that they would decide to do something like this because they wouldn't be together for a long time. But after learning that they would spend that time together, many of us wondered why. Perhaps the simplest answer is that they wanted to do something together for us, and the company agreed because they know better than us that the two of them have very good chemistry, and anything they did together would be entertaining. But at the same time, it's not that simple because, despite sharing a lot with us, or so it seems, Jimin and Jungkook are quite reserved and private about their relationship or dynamics. And for that reason, it will be very interesting to see what they did together.

[anonymous-badger-238]

30 questions

I'm just gonna answer a few questions again. Found this from @nuklearis-sutotok at here.

Ok so here we go

1: What song makes you feel better?

Superhero by Guiano

2: What is your go-to comfort show?

Abbott Elementary probably. It's really funny.

3: Reading or writing? Why?

Huh that's hard I like both

4: What's your favorite feeling?

That feeling when you come home from a long day of school and swim practice, and after you shower you can just flop down on your bed and relax

5: How do you like to take care of yourself?

Idk I like brushing my hair and doing skincare and stuff, but in a "mental" kind of way it'd definitely be making covers and music videos.

6: What’s your favorite candle scent?

That pear one I bought for 20 dollars at a World Market because there was a huge Black Friday sale

7: Who do you feel most like yourself around?

My IRL friend group, and also these people in this one Discord server (there are like 4 of you who know what I'm talking about)

8: What's a fabric/texture that’s nostalgic for you?

Sequins. Reminds me of when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade and there was this whole trend where all the girls would show up in "flip shirts".

9: Best childhood moment?

Wow there are so many but it's hard to choose just 1. Probably when I rode Splash Mountain at Disney World for the first time. I was eight and me and my dad had to wait two hours but it was soooo worth it.

10: When was the last time you laughed so hard you cried? (or just felt really good afterwards)

This one time I was crying over something so my sister showed me funny pictures of politicians and then I laughed so hard I cried again.

11: Do you have a comfort item? Tell us about it!

This one infinity cube that I fidget with whenever I'm bored or doing homework.

12: What calms you down?

Just closing my eyes and resting on my bed on a Saturday morning and just not thinking about anything in particular. Of course there are those four months of the year where my relaxation will be interrupted by the sounds of the college football games on TV...

13: Bath or shower to relax?

My house doesn't even have a bathtub so I'm gonna have to go with showers. Particularly cold showers.

14: What's something upcoming that you’re excited for?

I'll be going on vacation soon.

15: Comfort food?

Fettuccine Alfredo with Costco's rotisserie chicken.

16: What's something you want to create soon?

I have a ridiculous amount of music videos I have to create. But I'm looking forward to doing the Alvarez/Mental Chainsaw one.

17: How do you feel best loved?

I don't know honestly.

18: What age in life do you think you’ll feel most yourself at?

Probably when I'm 30 or something.

19: Have you ever written or received a love letter?

LOL nope

20: Tell us about a memory you hold close to your heart.

The Splash Mountain one definitely but also that one time me and my family were going river tubing and then it started pouring so I vlogged it.

21: Tea, Coffee, or hot cocoa?

Coffee probably. My usual is a strawberry creme frappe from Starbucks. (Plus a donut.)

22: Name of your favorite playlist?

The Blaze-List. For reference, that is the one I created a really long time ago and I still update it to include my current favorite songs. No wonder.

23: Have you ever received flowers?

I don't remember.

24: Who is your best friend?

This one person I met in fourth grade, lost touch with, and then got back in touch with again

25: If your soul was a color, what would it be?

Honestly, I'm still trying to figure that out.

26: If you could live anywhere with anyone you want, where would it be and who would you bring?

I'd like to live in downtown Seattle with my sister. DC would be great too.

27: Do you like to garden? Have you ever grown something?

I just don't seem to have a green thumb LOL.

28: What are you proudest of?

This one paper I spent a really long time working on. Or my cover of Amanojaku which I'm really happy with the way it turned out.

29: Are you a kind person?

I don't know. I try to be kind to people whenever I can, though.

30: What do your hobbies look like?

Reading especially about WWII/Cold War history and nuclear chemistry, writing short stories, singing, making music videos, playing Pokemon, etc. etc. etc.

Anyways I guess I should ping someone but whatever

[st-just]

Opinions on the novel and novella categories excluding Elder Race?

Okay so, uh, 3 months late finally answering this (sorry - but I DID read Elder Race in the meantime!)

So, novels-

A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine The central metaphor of how an empire can only understand something by consuming/assimilating it into itself was imo well-done, one of the better uses of a hive mind alien I've seen in a while. Mahit and (especially) Three Seagrass continue to be delightful. The whole palace drama plot in the City leaned a biiiiiit too close to 'the Empress is just and good! Sadly scheming ministers and self-interested officials have attempted to mislead her for their own ends' for my tastes, which absolutely made me start rooting for scheming vizer guy out of spite. Still kind of confused what happened to the Judiciary Minister who vanished 2/3 of the way into the first book without comment. Excellent read, would recommend

The Galaxy, and the Ground Within by Becky Chambers Absolutely my favorite thing Chambers has written, but that is a very low bar. There were a few pages of actual interpersonal conflict that wasn't just a silly misunderstanding! (Even if they had apologized and agreed to disagree by the end of the next chapter). In principle I approve of any sci fi with no human characters in major roles. Aeleon demography continues to give me a headache (how do you spend so much time on worldbuilding and just mess up the basic math?) - though honestly Pei's whole conflict over the societal expectation to have a kid would have had a bit more tension/drama to it in a setting where her species was legitimately endangered and at risk of extinction (the sheer angst potential!) Anyway, yeah, well-executed but Not For Me.

Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki I did, uh, not much like this book. In a 'spent a couple hours cathartically ranting about it on discord after finishing it' sort of way. The central romance didn't work, every character arc was perfectly predictable, the whole incessantly hammered home bit about the magic and wonder of home-cooked food just makes me want to gag, I can kind of see what Aoki was going for with the sci fi half of the worldbuilding but it just didn't work at all, and so on. Still not entirely sure what to make of the fact that if you did the 0.5 degree shift necessary to turn the finale into a Christian morality play the quirky alien family plays an identical structural role to where the angels would be. The cursed/demonic-violin repair lady was fun, though.

A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark This was fun! Nothing hugely ground-breaking and extremely trope-ey, but in a good way? Like the process was clearly 'buddy cop story in into steampunk urban fantasy Cairo' more than anything that evolved naturally out of the characters or setting. But like, eh? The finale involved a giant robot controlled by enslaved ifrit and a mad sorceress trying to restore the British empire attacking the city, nuance and subtlety clearly weren't the goals here. The central mystery was barely a mystery, though. You could pick out the villain by the end of the first act like three or four different ways. Still, yeah, great time. Very pulpy.

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir If you don't know that this is by the The Martian guy going in, it will be extremely clear by the time you're 50 pages in. It's a writing style with a real personality bleeding through - if you don't like it, the book will I'm sure be torture. But anyway, I'm a sucker for first contact stories and properly weird but still sympathetic and agentic aliens, and that's the beating heart of the story so I mean, of course I enjoyed it. The science also all seemed plausible/not-obvious-bullshit to me, and Weir did a really good job of getting tension and drama without ever making anyone a villain, with all the threats being faced being natural/environmental. Fun read, assuming very high tolerance for technobabble and also magic amnesia that you don't apply anywhere near the standards of the rest of the books' science to.

She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan I mean the whole premise of 'mythic/low-fantasy retelling of the founding of the Ming dynasty but with lesbians' feels like what you'd get if you simmered down my reading consumption of the last year or two and poured out the reduction. So like, yeah, of course I liked it! Probably would have been my vote for winner, though not at all sad that Desolation got it instead. As a character type, I really, really love the whole 'arranges everything to work out perfectly through desperate, furious scheming, then absolutely never breaks character and insists it must be providence and they're but a simple monk/scholar/whatever" so Zhu's whole bit there was just catnip to me. The whole melodrama in the mongol court was great, too. And how can you not love a book that ends with the heroine murdering the messiah in cold blood?

novellas-

Across the Green Grass Fields by Seanan McGuire The only other thing I'd read by McGuire before this was Middlegame, which may have given me unrealistic expectations but, like, this was fine? Or, like, I get the sense that this is very much a YA/Middle-grade book, insofar as it really feels like the literary equivalent of a tv special you'd watch with your kid niece and nephew because hey, it's not painful for you or anything? Really funny that this exists entirely independently of the apparently-a-real-thing cartoon Centaurworld, though.

Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky This was fun classic sci fi. Like, really classic - I kind of thought 'fantasy setting that's secretly a post-apocalyptic sci fi setting where all the 'magic' and 'monsters' are just poorly understood hypertech' went of fashion with the millennium. Anyway I adore things that play with POV and have different people see the same events and process/interpret them radically differently, so the whole book was catnip that way, and it managed to authentically feel like just a small slice of a vaster, weirder universe, and both deuteragonists really work for me. Don't have a solid pick for my preferred winner but this is one of the two I'm torn between.

Fireheart Tiger by Aliette de Bodard First and so far only thing by de Bodard I've read, which I should probably fix given how big a name she is. Anyway, this was fun! Nothing too groundbreaking, but that is 100% down to my reading habits rather than, like, 'lesbian court drama in a fantasy analogue of an asian country under threat of colonization' is an over-filled niche, or anything (really the only surprising thing was that I hadn't read this already).

The Past Is Red by Catherynne M. Valente The other one I might have voted for. On the level of stories she's a bit hit and miss but on the sentence-to-sentence and paragraph-to-paragraph levels Valente is seriously one of my favorite writers working, and this was no exception. Just an absolute delight to read. Also, 'post-apocalyptic magical realism on the city-sized garbage heap floating in the ocean populated by a culture of survivors after the world drowned' is just a great premise. And my shriveled husk of a soul appreciates just committing to the character study and the ruin and the elegy without giving into the urge to make a grand redemptive quest of it all.

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers I, uh, liked this significantly less than Galaxy and the Ground Within. Utopias are basically necessarily didactic but, like, you really don't have to lean all the way into literally having the heart of the story be conversations between the protagonist and a sacred and innocent alien whose always correct about everything. Also the whole 'we 100% could be immortal but we chose not to because, like, nature or something. Aren't we so amazing?' thing with the robots is bullshit. Which, combined with the entire aesthetic of the world just left be feeling peevish and asking questions which really weren't the point (Where are the mines? The foundries? You can't make solar panels or modern antibiotics in a basement workshop! And you sure as hell can't cobble together and repair fully mobile and sapient robots in a cave with a box of scraps.)

A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. Harrow So it's not that this was bad, exactly. But, like, I feel like it should have come out sometime in the '90s? (Okay without the explicitly gay bits but that's a matter of a few sentences tbh). Like, the deadline for metafictional feminist retellings of classic fairtails being genuinely novel or subversive was sometime before Disney got in on the game, sorry. Also, like, I'm sure it's just down to me being a weird morbid kid, but the whole shocking revelation about how fucked up the original Sleeping Beauty myth is was, like, something I knew before I hit puberty? Only other thing of Harrow's I've read was the Ten Thousand Door's of January and I'm really, really disappointed comparing them, honestly. (Also, as a general rule I dislike anything where it's very clear whether you're supposed to like or trust a character from the scene they're introduced and this is never wrong)

In other categories L’Esprit de L’Escalier should obviously have one novelette, "Where Oaken Hearts Do Gather" short story, Terra Ignota series, and Monstress comic, based off the foolproof criteria of 'those are the ones I've read'

[ikatako38]

Hi

It’s… been a while. It’s long past time for (another) candid update about the future of TPWCH.

TL;DR: While I am grateful for everyone’s patience and understanding, I am very frustrated with myself about my upload schedule. On top of everything else, a recent, very difficult breakup is making it hard for me to find motivation for anything. That being said, I am still slowly working on Chapter #22.5 - 3, and the 2nd Anniversary Art.

Since this time last year, I’ve only uploaded 2/3 of a chapter of the main story. While my readers have been nothing but patient and understanding, for me personally that’s… soul-crushing.

I could speculate on and on about why that is. More irl friendships and relationships to juggle. Classes getting harder. Spending the entire school year giving my all into a relationship I rarely got anything back from. Worsening ADHD symptoms. An awkward class schedule.

I think in some ways, I had less need for the fic, too. I had friends to talk to about my feelings. I felt less lonely. I didn’t need the escape so desperately as I did last year. Or maybe the better reason is that the dark turn of the fic after the end of Part 2 meant that it was no longer a comforting place to escape to. I think that’s a big reason why I leaned so much into happier stories like the End-of-Part-2 Specials and Squidmas Special. While I genuinely consider Part 3 the most interesting part of the fic, the one which from the very beginning I was most excited to write, it’s hard to actively choose to spend so much time in such a dreary place. Especially when I could just mindlessly scroll through TikTok for a few hours instead.

Perhaps I’m being too hard on myself. Realistically, I wrote all of Part 1 and half of Part 2 while I was still a high-school senior with a half day. While of course I knew that college is hard, I just never expected it to be so time-consuming (hashtag gifted-kid burnout lol). Anniversary special and end-of-part-two special took about two months each. Squidmas special was another month. I spent a month on an art trade that was supposed to provide some content I was really excited to share with you all, but the trade never got returned. Those things add up. I can at least take solace in the fact that those who are most invested in the fic can reach me at any time through Tumblr asks and the Discord server (which, by the way, you should join if you haven’t already! Thing is, I haven’t really been receiving anything expressing interest in the fic or upload schedule, so I guess I can only assume I’m not really letting anyone down.

So… what now?

As if that wasn’t enough fun news, I just went through an extremely difficult breakup. We were very close, but it this person was and is extremely manipulative, so while I certainly feel betrayed, I mostly feel intense guilt and regret. I’m experiencing insomnia like I’ve never experienced before, and although I’m past the crying phase it’s very hard to find the motivation to do anything, especially something like writing that requires concentration without constant stimulation. On the bright side, I can tentatively say I’ve found some new meds that might actually help

I’m still working on the 2nd Anniversary art. I’m still working on Chapter #22 - 3. Just… slowly. On the other hand, I’m indefinitely pausing all crossposting so I can better focus on moving the story forward. I’ve taken down the content schedule; I kind of doubt that anyone is looking at it anyway.

I am eternally grateful for the community that’s built around the fic, and everything that the community has done to support the fic, especially near the beginning. That being said, it’s hard to overstate how discouraging it is to grapple with myself for months to finally get a new piece of the story out, only to be met with… pure silence. I know it’s my own fault for being inconsistent, but it also just kinda makes me wonder whether people are even reading what I write and seeing what I draw. That’s what motivates me, and the reason I post online is in the hopes that I’ll be able to find more motivation to work on my hobbies! Unfortunately right now, I’m stuck in a cycle of less content → less feedback → less content. I was hoping reposting on FFN and Wattpad would help break that cycle, but it just ended up adding more stress and distractions from what I really wanted to work on.

I’m also starting up a secret personal project, which will take up some of my time. I’m not sure it’ll ever be published, but it’ll hopefully help me work through some things that have been going on in my life.

Current Progress

I’ve known since the beginning that the majority of Chapter #22 wasn’t going to be exactly fun for reasons that are probably obvious, but I’m genuinely really excited to share Chapter #22 - 3 with everyone! I think you’ll really like it! It basically becomes a montage of the first few weeks in the Metro, flipping between Eight completing tests, and the memories he recovers. Those memories are going to drop a ton of lore about the Octarian Domes and Eight’s life before the Metro. That also means a couple new side characters will be introduced!

The chapter is currently sitting at around 2100 words, and it’ll likely end up somewhere around 5000. I’ll release another sneak peek next Monday! Beyond that, I can’t guarantee much. It took me almost a whole week just to write this… 🥲

But I’m not giving up hope, and hopefully I can have some more content out to you all soon! Thank you all for being the best reader community I could ask for!

[petri808]

Hey everyone I’m back for real finally 🤞 some of you know I’ve been going through a lot since about 2020 with my physical health, mental health, and some family bullshit.

Thank you everyone who’ve stuck around! Discord and Tumblr friends have been a HUGE support all these years even if we don’t talk much anymore. Maybe some day I’ll be able to start writing again, even if it’s just a little at a time 💜 love you guys!

Quick recap: Disowned my dad and his brother (now dead in fall 2020) for fucking over their mother and losing her home. Disowned dads sister for choosing her dog over taking care of her mother, so I cared for my grandma for a year then she took her mom and killed her in 6 months because of neglect. Keep in mind my grandma was in good health, could still care for herself and walked out my house. I blame my aunt for her dying to so quickly. Lost my grandma and mom in 2021. Disowned my half sister because it’s her fault my mom caught COVID cause she’s a trumpster who didn’t believe in COVID and refused to be careful. Now she’s refusing to send moms ashes home despite my moms request it be sent and sore as with her parents. I wanna go after her ass, but my moms sister doesn’t want us to and I don’t want to upset her.

On top of all this something medically was going on through all this that I’ve spent about $5k each year since 2020 dealing with. Needless to say in fall 2021 after 2 years of dealing with these toxic people and medical problems my mental health crashed, literally. Started on medications in December 2021, went through a few options and doctors/ therapist and finally feeling more normal. I think I’m also finally close to a diagnosis. It’s a neurological disorder that affects my muscles and other related systems. Causes pain which affects my cognition and makes me extremely exhausted. I can sleep 12 hours easily.

Despite all this I managed to stick out Uni. Graduated from undergrad in Dec 2021 and started grad school in July 2022 for forensic psychology. My therapist said my stubbornness is my savior lol.

[zurajanaizurakoda]

🍣 and 🍜

🍣 What helps you focus or get in the mood to write?

I'm not sure, it helps when i's a good day, and like I've mentioned before, if someone mentions something that gets me thinking about a fic I'll scramble to work on it for a while. Also going through the tabs and thinking about what I have open can get me started on one. For instance I never close Little Spoon because that would imply it's on hiatus but I know I have to deal with Katsura's Grandma sooner or later. Certain stories have theme songs and if they show up I'll get into that story. When Olivia Rodrigo's Bad Idea Right? was popular it always got me in the mood to work on the War Nurse behemoth. A great song to make bad decisions to. Music helps but I need some new music to add fresh blood to my playlists. It doesn't help that I have really strange taste in music. Weirdly, watching the series or reading other people's fanart tends to make me second guess myself and get discouraged, but discussing personalities and such is great. I spent like an hour and a half talking to someone on the Discord server about what Silent Hill would look like for Gin, Takasugi, and Katsura, and why, and it was amazing. We were polar opposites about Takasugi but like ridiculously in synch about Katsura (mostly the Silent Hill 2 mythos and the idea that Silent Hill is heavily influenced by the darkness you bring with you and your guilt and looks extremely different for different people)

🍜 Do you ever feel pressured to write?

Like, I don't think people are aggressive about it, and certainly no one has been rude to me. I don't feel like people have unnecessary expectations, I guess I mean. I feel a lot of pressure on myself because I'm not really doing anything productive and there's so much in my head but getting it out is such a pain. Executive function and the fact that Ii just get dizzy and nauseated all the time certainly don't help. But like most writers, I'm my biggest critic.

Again, Thank you so much for the ask! I wasn't expecting so many questions, I'm so spoiled. I want to find more lists to see if I can get more asks.

[ceruleanwarbler2]

 ii was thinking 

af3 completely ruins the character of cyalm

so

what if in af3, cyalm doesnt get revived?

and well

- tl;dr at bottom

- its under a read more because its LONG

- ‘dialogue’ will be in italics, but its not actually dialogue its just what they’d say in general

- i refer to the points as he/him because they/them is also used for plural and i do not have enough writing skills to not confuse you

- i also constantly switch between calling cy ‘celesteal’ and ‘cyalm’ dont mind that

AF3- but without celesteal getting revived!

the first thing that would change would be the corruption. firstly, cyalm wouldnt be corrupted. also, instead of corruption being caused because of celesteal’s death, they would be a result of celesteal manipulating reality while they were still alive.

since cyalm manipulated reality so much, it started having effects on the world, just like the corruption seen in af3. since this was royally screwing up the all the narratives cyalm was trying to make (it was implied that cyalm had more than just 1ss and 2ss i believe?), he decided to fix it. but it wasnt quite fixing it.

he took the corruption and made a point out of it. however, instead of just going ‘they will be the point of corruption’, he played them off as the point of something else so they wouldnt try to mess with reality. 

this resulted in voixer. cyalm pretended voix was the point of nothing so voixer wouldnt think highly of themselves.

however, after voixer vwooped into the void in af2, the corruption scattered.

at first it had no effect. however, after time passed, reality started unraveling. after a while, it ended up to where af3 happens. yawgate, who doesnt know squat about what voixer really is, thinks that reality’s falling apart as a result of mr. cyan buttface not being there. yawgate then grabs the shard savior, blah blah star sanctuary fell, gotta revive celesteal, etc. 

everything went normal. verfection kept trying (and failing) to stop the savior from reviving celesteal, ss met all the points and cured all the corruption, and it all was going good.

then, yknow, celesteal gets revived.

after the fight where cyalm restores reality, he goes ‘well, might as well finish this narrative here and now.’. celesteal claps his hands, and they’re both teleported to... somewhere in everi, it appears.

he challenges the shard savior to a duel.

winner takes all, including the other’s life.

celesteal pulls out his sword.

they’re about to fight, but then

celesteal gets hit sideways at approximately 500000000 mph by verfection, accompanied by voixer, because hooo boy is verfect pissed. like, ‘i could defeat god right now’ angry. 

not only is he angry at ss for not giving up after being repeatedly told that celesteal is bad, he’s angry at celesteal for... oh yeah! did i mention that verfection just shattered his symbol before rocketing at celesteal? yeah they did that.

verfect’s worked themselves into such a rage that they dont even bother to call in the af2 points. he furiously attacks celesteal by himself. ss helps too i guess, but get too close to verfect and they’re getting their face sliced off. 

eventually, the fight comes to a standstill. 

voixer starts monologuing at celesteal. voix brings up when they tried to fight 2ss in af2, and celesteal only laughs. cyalm takes the time to tell him that they werent the point of void, they were the point of corruption. that voice they heard, motivating them to kill 2ss? that was only voixer speaking to themselves. the reason voixer came back at all is because the corruption needed a form. 

voixer is devastated by this. voix was hurt enough by the realization that they were made out of a piece of celesteal- now theyre learning that was a lie, too!

but it’s not like they show any of this. they just got even more reason why their existence is pointless. but there is one thing they know they can do.

the reason celesteal was able to be revived was because of the corruption, twisting reality to make anything possible.

voixer is the point of corruption, so they are able to manipulate it.

so if voixer got rid of the corruption, then celesteal would die for real. voixer knows very well that if he did that, he would die too. but a pointless existence isnt really worth living, is it?

voixer decides to do it. in destroying any remnant of themselves, reality would be safe. they didn’t just fade away. they tore out their essence, making the corruption disappear. it became nothing, the thing voixer thought they were based around for so long.

voix watches celesteal disappear from reality. celesteal's a little disappointed that their story didnt end with the ‘protagonist’ defeating the ‘antagonist’, but they still thought it was a wonderful story. so as they fade away, all cyalm does is smile at the trio.

voixer turns to the two saviors, knowing very well that he didnt have much time to talk before he died. he thanks them. he tells them both what he just did. but verfection points out something.

wait, wouldn’t you and celesteal have died at the exact same time? why did you get an extra minute?

verf ends up slightly rambling- i mean, not that it’s a bad thing, i did like talking to you and all- but the truth was that voixer didn’t know either. voixer tells them as much.

they kind of... awkwardly sit around until voixer fades away. but the thing is- voixer doesnt fade away. they’re still alive, even after destroying the very thing that made them exist at all.

voixer says, yeah i... don’t feel like i’m dying.

then the shard savior pipes up. well, you arent actually the corruption, right? you were just a point made out of it that controlled it. so getting rid of it wouldnt kill you, because youre more than just ‘the point of corruption’.

verfection seems to like this idea.

voixer... isnt certain, but after a while of the two saviors discussing it, voix had to realize that they really werent going to die.

so then voix teleported them back to the sanctuary, now back in everi due to voix getting rid of the corruption! wait would verf and ss just be lost if voixer actually died?

after anshine and strat get the situation explained them, the two star gays run over to verfection and panic over them for a fair bit. please can we have a star savior that doesnt go missing??

but celesteal’s gone from their reality! that’s good... right?

but though theyre gone from their reality, celesteal’s power still remains over other dimensions. 

so, shard savior and voixer, along with yawgate’s help, travel across different dimensions to get rid of celesteal’s influence.

as time goes on, everything goes back to normal.

reality is no longer constantly on the verge of breaking.

voixer is doing great, making friends after a couple centuries of believing they were literally nothing.

yawgate is pretty embarrassed over thinking all of that was because of cyalm being dead.

stratosfear and anshine get married and adopt the other two saviors.

and they all got their happily ever after.

tl;dr: 

A. cyalm isnt corrupted, he’s just that narrative-obsessed guy all the time

B. voixer is disguised as the point of void but it turns out theyre actually the point of corruption and even they didnt know that. 

C. celesteal, after getting revived, teleports the savior to somewhere away from the sanctuary to fight. but then verf (with their symbol shattered) and voixer burst in to fight celesteal too

D. voixer, after cyalm tells them that theyre the point of corruption, destroys the corruption, which kills cyalm

E. after D, voixer 100% thought that they were going to die too, but due to them being more than just a point of corruption, they didnt. aka they didnt die due to the POWER OF FRIENDSHIP

F. i linked tower of heaven music to the last sentence of the actual explanation go listen

[hidiingplace]

psa: where i’ve been.

ooc. hellooo. this is a long over due update on things going on. some of you probably noticed that i’m just simply not active right now. my queue is running out and my desire to write is simply not there. this isn’t a bad thing though!

i go through these periods of time where I want nothing to do with writing or my muses. I’m currently in one of those periods. I think for most people it’s a bad thing, but often times for me it’s actually a good thing.

writing is my coping mechanism when things become stressful. i disassociated from the major problems in my life with writing and have done so for as long as i can remember. in the last few months not only have i gotten more balanced on my ADHD medication, but disconnecting from writing and tumblr has had a fantastic affect on my mental health in other ways as well. 

the bad. Over the last few months, while things have been incredibly stressful and hard, I can confidently say that I’ve handled things very well. For those who don’t know, exactly a week ago my family and I had to put down my childhood dog, Ginger. She was 13 and dying of a tumor on her spleen. She died with all 4 of us around her (a miracle considering my sister lives 2 hours away and just happened to be visiting for 2 days). She went peacefully and was very ready to go after a full life of being adored by us all. I’m handling it well, despite my sadness, knowing that death is just something that happens and happens a lot –– especially with animals. 

the good. But in other news, my stress with Sassy has begun to plateau. Be it the medication or simply finding that I am enjoying being an owner of a Special Needs and incredibly brave and strong horse again is yet to be decided lol. Regardless, I feel a surge of desire to be with her as often as possible, even missing her just hours after having spent 2 hours at a time with her. Her weight is being better managed as we’ve found something that seems to be working with her weight that she can do long term WITHOUT affecting her symptoms of her severe Cushings disease. This is a huge win for us after a battle to keep her weight on for almost 3 years. 

I’ve also found incredible value, pride, and happiness in my job over these last few months. I feel valued and appreciated and I’ve actually secured a permanent position with them –– something that is relatively impossible in my line of work. I work for a Tribunal who’s funding depends highly on the political party running it. Being on term/contract employment for the last 3 years has caused undue stress as every 6 months it was possible there would be no funding to keep me on –– no matter how much they wanted to. I am the first employee in the National Division I work for on Refugee affairs in about 5 years to be given a permanent position. What’s even better is that I’ve never enjoyed my job more than right now. I am the lead on a National Project which assists in providing Refugees Access to Justice. It’s a small step in the direction of assisting people –– something I’ve wanted to do since I was very little –– and it feels amazing to have this job and be referred to so glowingly by the people who’ve worked with me for 3 and a half years. 

what happens now? well, simply put, I’m more connected to the world outside of my screen at the moment. This is something that happens rarely and when it does I try and spend as much time living this way as I possibly can. In other words, I’m officially on a bit of a hiatus until I find the desire and want to be writing and creating again. This isn’t a bad thing, this is a good thing and I really do not want people to fret about me. 

where can you find me? discord is your best bet as that’s what i feel comfortable sharing to all my followers: ✧･ﾟbrei.#8843 

those I’m close with are welcome to have my instagram as well, though I don’t post much on it, I’m in DMs and doing things on there a bunch. 

To those who I haven’t spoken to in a while who I normally do; apologies! I’m rooted in other things right now, but I love you and think about you often. while I may not be in the mood to talk about character, RP, or muse related things at the moment, I love talking to you all and would love if you would share about your life with me. I’ll try and do the same to my mutuals who are receptive to this, but i know many people would rather keep conversations to the creative and struggle to want to talk to people about their every day lives when for so much of us the creative is an escape from it. 

I love you guys! and you certainly haven’t seen the last of me. i’ll return to this blog when the inspiration strikes me!

- Brei (June 15 2022)

[citrineghost]

Avoiding Scams on Freelancing Sites

Hi there! I almost just got scammed today, and I’m going to take the LITTANY of red flags from this interaction and use it to teach you all about how to avoid scams.

I am not making very much money right now. I just lost one of the accounts I was writing for, so I am not not even making enough to pay my rent. So I am desperately looking for work. And, like many people desperately looking for work, my panicking subconscious is willing to see a red flag and brush it under the rug because

“I’m probably being paranoid.”

So, to all of my lovely artists, writers, editors, and other types of freelancers who are desperately looking for work, I would like to create a comprehensive list of things that you should NOT FUCKING IGNORE while looking for a job. Actually, the list will be formatted as things you should expect from your employer/interviewer and if these things are missing, get the fuck out of there.

1. Reputable Platforms

The first thing you should be expecting is to use reputable platforms. If you’re being asked for a virtual interview, you should expect your interviewer to invite you via Skype, Discord, (Maybe slack if they’re middle-aged), perhaps Whatsapp, or whatever website you’re using to find your job.

DO NOT go for interviews on Telegram. This app has been reported as very commonly being associated with scams. This is where my recent experience took place.

2. Willingness to Verify Legitimacy

The first thing you should do when being in contact with an interviewer or HR is ask them to verify their identity. 

This may not be necessary if doing a video call with someone pictured on an official company website, receiving emails or texts from addresses/numbers that are listed on an official company website, or if the job you’re being interviewed for was applied to directly on the company website. In these cases, you are not likely to be scammed, as you’re working with verifiably information.

If you meet someone on Indeed, Fiverr, Upwork, or any other freelancing/job site, keep your contact within the website’s chat system, email system, or whatever. This is how you remain protected under the hiring site’s TOS/Legal whatever. If you get scammed because you took your hiring process elsewhere, they will not help you.

That being said, if you DO take your interview off the site, it should be somewhere reputable and you should ask for your interviewer to verify their identity before doing literally anything else. The best way to get them to verify their identity is to ask them to email or text you from an address or phone number listed clearly on the official company website, by asking them to show you their state ID and checking it for photoshop influence, or by asking to do a video call for the interview and seeing for yourself that you’re being interviewed by someone who is pictured on the official company website as an employee.

3. Clear and Professional Procedures

Any professional working as an interviewer or human resources personnel will have a skillset related to communication and organization. When being interviewed you should expect a number of questions about your skills and how you’re valuable to the company, etc. However, this is easy to fake, as a scammer. What you need to look out for is that they show a clear amount of structure.

If you’re asked for an interview, no real company will demand you be quick about responding. If they’re interested in an interview, a legitimate company is not likely to ask you to do the interview immediately. They will ask you to schedule an interview time with them. They may ask if you have availabilities that day, but they will not just start interviewing you immediately.

After the interview, any professional company will tell you that they will get back to you when they’ve made a decision about your interview. No professional company will tell you to wait for an indefinite amount of time while they talk to HR peers. If a company Does want you to wait, because they intend to make a quick decision, they will give you an expected wait time, as that is the courteous and professional thing to do. They will not expect you to be on-call for this period of time. A time projection is simply to give you an idea of what to expect. For example, “I’ll be in touch within the next 1-3 hours about the results of your interview. Thank you for your time.”

Furthermore, if you are accepted for a job, any professional company will make a clear outline of exactly how they plan to introduce you into company life. They will respect your time and ask you to schedule things with them. For example, “Is there a period of 2-3 hours within the next few days where you would be available for an orientation?” 

No professional company will demand you do anything at any particular time. That is not how legitimate professionals treat new employees. You will be asked to schedule things with them. Even when you’re assigned work hours, if the exact hours you’re applying for are not listed in the job description you applied for, they will ask you to fill out some kind of time sheet to outline your availabilities, then schedule you for times within that outline.

4. Doesn’t Show Signs of Money Scamming

There are two major red flags when it comes to money scams. Your interviewer should never ask you what bank you use and your interviewer should never ever tell you they’re going to send you a check, unless they send your paycheck as a check.

One of the more common scams at the moment is run by people pretending to be members of legitimate companies, hiring freelancers for things like proofreading and editing. These remote positions may require home office hardware, right? The interviewer will tell you you’re missing some hardware and software that are required for the job. Then they’ll tell you that they will send a check that you can cash and use to buy the required materials.

This is even sketchier if they email you front and back images of the check and tell you to print it and then deposit it through mobile banking. The way this works is that, if you cash the check successfully, you will then buy the list of software, which is usually completely unrelated to the job you’re being hired for, then they will cancel the check, which hasn’t cleared completely. That leaves you with ~$2k dollars less in your bank and their money right back where it started in theirs. Presumably, the scammers are the ones selling the software. So, that $2k dollars you just spent is also going into their bank account.

Professional companies will never offer to send you checks to buy products. If they have official hardware or software that they want you to use, they will buy it themselves and then send it to you. There is never a reason why a new hire should buy hardware or software out of their own bank, whether they have been given money for it or not.

Furthermore, a legitimate company will never ever pay you before you have signed and sent your contract to them. One of the obvious giveaways of the scam I was almost caught in was that I was sent the contract last night and I asked if I could send it in today, since it was getting late. The interviewer agreed. I signed it in the morning and then asked him if I should send it in a reply to the email I got the original contract from or if there’s another email I need to send it to. He completely ignored my question, asked me how I was doing, and then went into the check-related information so I could buy software.

The issue was bothering me ALL DAY. I knew there was something extremely weird about that, so I asked again a few hours later. His response? “You have nothing to worry about.” ?????? I was aghast. I wasn’t worried at all! I just wanted an answer! If he had simply told me to respond to the email I’d gotten the contract from, I might have fallen for his scam! What a terrible scammer smdh

A Non-Exhaustive List of Other Red Flags

Your interviewer shows a poor grasp on the language

If your interviewer is making frequent grammatical errors that are glaringly obvious to any native speaker, that is a huge red flag. HR reps and interviewers are hired because of their communication skills. It is highly unlikely that someone who makes non-native-like errors is legitimate unless they are actually openly non-native, in which case, it’s not so alarming.

Your interviewer is showing impatience or demanding you at certain times

If your interviewer is telling you to “report back by 8am tomorrow” without any kind of prior agreement that this is an acceptable time for you to meet, that is extremely unprofessional and shows a lack of patience. Scammers want to get to the meat of their scam quickly and will use an air of professional superiority and authority to scare you into moving faster than necessary.

Your interviewer shows a lack of opening and closing statements

Along the lines of the clear processes that I mentioned above anybody who is initiating you in the job you’re taking should show clear opening and closing statements. What I mean by this is: professionals in human resources or management positions will not keep you as a social hostage. If you’ve been discussing how you’ll begin training or somesuch, they will not just leave you hanging. You should have a dedicated time slot where you will have your discussion and, at the end of it, your supervisor should make a closing statement. For example, “It looks like our time is running out for today. What would be a good time to pick this up tomorrow?”

If you feel like you are “on-call” and unable to leave the room because the interviewer or supervisor keeps messaging, has not outlined a time slot for you to talk in, won’t seem to let you go, or shows no indication of stopping, that is a really bad sign. Either the company is legitimate and TERRIBLE at professionalism (a great sign you should run anyway), or this is a scammer intent on getting you to follow their instructions as soon as they can.

Your interviewer ignores time zones or gets them wrong

When I was contacted about doing an interview yesterday, it was 4:30pm. I did the interview and was told I got the job. Immediately after, without asking if I was free, he began listing off instructions and things I was to expect. It wasn’t until 7:30pm that he sent me the contract and asked me to review it, sign it, and send it back that I finally asked if I could do that tomorrow. The interviewer was supposedly on the west coast and knew that I was on the east coast. He agreed by saying “Alright” and then told me to report to him “by 8am your time.”

There are 3 things about this that are weird. The first is that he demanded I show up at 8am to continue where we left off. Any professional would have asked when I’m available the next day to continue. the second is that he said “your time” instead of saying EST, as most professionals in the US would be apt to do. And, lastly, I showed up at 7:50am, ready to continue, because I’m that desperate that I’m willing to be pushed around, and he showed up at 9am on the dot. He had gotten the time wrong. Nobody who works professionally on the west coast is incapable of adding 3 hours to their time. It was a rookie mistake, or a mistake made by someone in a completely different time zone than they say they are.

When asked to verify their identity, your interviewer attempts to reassure you or refuses

When I finally was fed up and knew this must be a scam, I politely asked my interviewer to verify his identity by either showing me his US ID or by contacting me from his email or phone number listed on the official company website. He sent me a photoshopped nametag with a completely different person’s name and photo on it and said it was the company ID of the HR director. 

I have never seen a facade fall so pathetically. Why would literally any even remotely legitimate person do such a thing? It was sad, really. He deleted the message in less than a minute - no doubt to keep me from looking at it long enough to see how badly it was photoshopped - and then aggressively reassured me that the company meant me no harm and would pay for everything, etc. Any real professional would have simply sent me an email from the legitimate address, stating that they’re legitimate, and then continued on with the initiation process.

Learn from My Mistakes

I hope some of this was helpful for all of you lovely freelancers trying to find work. I thought I would know a scam when I saw one, and I did have a Bad Feeling about this whole thing, because it did feel too good to be true, but I was desperate enough that my judgement was heavily clouded, and that could happen to anyone.

Don’t ignore red flags - especially these ones. Stick up for yourself. Avoid confirmation bias. I looked things up repeatedly to confirm that the company was legitimate and that it’s normal to do things like mobile deposit a printed check and so on. Every time, I found an explanation that suited me. I even tried to cash the check. The only reason it didn’t work was because there was an error with the name on the check because I recently legally changed my name and PayPal was having some kind of issue updating in some areas of its website. It was after that that I realized this was all crashing down and I needed to reassess it all. Don’t let yourself get that deep into it.

[imjusttpeachy]

she's a rae of sunshine (c.h.)

okay so this was a request but i completely read it wrong so i’m gonna write it again but i finished this one anyway so here take it

so sorry to the anon who requested it bc u were so fuckin sweet i’ll have it up asap i promise

playlist

ralph castelli - morning sex

crumb - bones

jorja smith - teenage fantasy

summary: balancing college life and wanting to support your best friends online endeavors was difficult, but reader regrets trying a little harder when she finally meets one of her newer stream-mates

word count: 2, 828

WARNINGS: she/her pronouns used, coarse language, lowkey OOC Corpse, that needs its own warning i’m sorry,

•••

“Look you knew I had to stream before I said you could come over ya fuckin idiot.”

“Yea I knowwwww, I just wanted to spend more time with my super-hot best friend forever.”

Being the best friend of an online personality had its perks— the amazing trips you got to hitch a ride on, the adoring fans that seemed to latch on to you as well, the sponsorships that would always send you something along with the original PR package, and especially the way she was able to choose their own work hours.

Well... mostly.

As much as you adored spending time together during the day, whether it be shopping or going out for brunch, those late nights that always seemed to hold the most memories you held so dear were few and far between. Of course, you couldn’t blame her; responsibilities were responsibilities, and fuck if you’d let your selfish wants override the way she chooses to get her work done. You really couldn’t be one to judge either-- having to call off dates because you’d underestimated the time you needed to complete a school paper, or when a last-minute lab was called in and you’d have to leave her sitting alone in those cafes with your half-finished mocha and a promise to Venmo her the money to cover it later. What left you feeling the most guilty, though, was the fact that you weren’t able to watch her content as much as you’d like to. Sure, you’d catch a few minutes of a stream here and there but any time you spent apart was usually spent with your head buried in a book, mind bleary with countless espresso shots trying to keep your tired eyes focused on the seemingly unending work in front of you.

But, a distraction every now and then couldn’t hurt. Right?

Having had enough of your current assignment, any coherent thought was long gone, you’d decided to pay your favourite person a little visit. You knew she’d probably be busy as she hadn’t replied to your previous text for a few hours, but knowing her presence alone and any passing comments would lift the heaviness that had found its home in your head and chest, you shot her a message to let her know that her office couch would be occupied by you for the next few hours. Normally, you’d just show up so you knew she wouldn’t have a problem with it; so when that fateful message popped up on your phone giving you the go-ahead you completely ignored the warning of her work schedule and drove right over.

So now here you were, sprawled haphazardly on her couch clad in sweats and a sports bra scrolling through your phone as you watched her finish her final touches so she could start her stream.

“You’re gonna be in the background of my face cam if you wanna sit there y’know.” Groaning in response to her warning not wanting to move from the comfy spot you just found, you looked over at her with the best puppy eyes you could muster. She chuckled softly, raising her hands in surrender as she turned back to her setup. “Hey I really don’t care, just warning ya bug. The thirst comments and screenshots are outta my hands.”

Scoffing under your breath at her comment, you turned your head back to your phone as a Twitter notification popped up at the top of your screen.

Corpse Husband: streaming among us in a few mins, join in on youtube

Heartbeat picking up slightly, you scrambled for the purse you’d thrown at the base of the couch for your headphones. Ever since you’d found this handsome-voiced stranger’s channel on your late night horror binges, you had fallen completely in love. While you weren’t typically the type to watch video game commentary outside of Rae, his voice got you completely hooked and you couldn’t get enough of it. Yeah, maybe you were a bit of a simp, but that sweet and genuine personality that hid behind that gravelly tone had you melting completely into his clutches. You tried to convince yourself to get over it, you didn’t even know what he looked like. But, y’know, a little crush wouldn’t hurt anybody right?

“Going live in T-minus 30 seconds babe.” Jumping slightly as Rae’s voice knocked you out of dreamland, you mumbled out a small “got it” as you once again got focused on getting your headphones connected to your phone. You’d never been able to watch one of his lives before, his horror commentary videos usually playing as background noise as you did schoolwork or while you were falling asleep. Practically shaking with excitement, you opened your YouTube app seeing the live at the very top and tapping on it immediately only to be met with that sweet laugh ringing through your headphones like music to your ears. You grinned to yourself, grabbing the throw pillow you had previously tossed to the floor and hugging it to your chest while your eyes remained glued to your phone screen, completely forgetting what was happening around you as you zeroed in on the gravelly tone you’d fallen oh-so in love with.

“Hey (Y/N) wave hi.” You startled slightly as the faint voice of your friend sounded from across the room. Glancing up from your phone, you pulled an earbud from your ear and furrowed your brows at her before slowly processing what she said, lifting a hand in greeting to her watchers. She laughed at your confusing antics, turning slightly in her chair to look over at you. “What the hell are you so smiley about?”

“…Nothing..” You grinned widely as her laugh once again resounded around the room, shaking her head at you before turning back to her screen with a scoff, muttering something under her breath so only her watchers could hear. Smile still plastered across your lips, you settled back down into the comfiness of the couch and popped your earbud back in, zeroing in again on the screen in front of you. Watching as Corpse moved his character around the lobby as he waited for his friends to join, a small giggle escaped from under your breath; trying your best to be mindful of Rae’s stream but not being able to hold back the flustered feeling welling up in your chest, mind giddy with the thought of finally being able to see one of his famous live streams, well, live. It had only been a few seconds later when you heard Rae’s voice once again, only this time, not as muffled as before.

“What’s up motherfuckers.” Brows furrowing in confusion, you lifted your hand to your earbud and pulled it from your ear once again, hearing her voice from across the room but from your other earbud as well. No, there was no fucking way. All your questions were answered, though, as you glanced back down at your phone screen seeing a red character move around the game lobby along with Corpse’s, the gamer tag ‘Valkyrae’ floating just above it. Blinking hard at your screen trying to convince yourself that your eyes were lying to you, you slowly pulled your hand to cover your mouth in shock. How… How could you possibly not know they knew each other? With the way they spoke to each other in sarcastic comments, poking fun at the other it sounded like they were close too. Body finally catching up with your thoughts, you scrambled at your phone, shaky hands moving as quickly as they could to pull up your texts with Rae. Your fingers tapped furiously at the screen, anxious to get back to the live stream to listen in more but also needing to know what the fuck was going on.

TO my rae of sunshine: care to explain what the fuck is going on??! how the fuck do you know corpse husband?????!??!

“Oops sorry guys, guess I forgot to turn off my phone ringer-“ Staring up at the back of her head helplessly, you watched as she picked up her phone seeming to read out the text before bursting into a peal of laughter. Tossing a look at you over her shoulder, you looked back down at your phone bashfully, seeing the three loading dots in your message thread indicating that she was messaging you back.

my rae of sunshine: lol what about it? you gotta crush on him or something?

TO my rae of sunshine: …no

Hitting send you rushed back to the stream, anxious to see what Corpse was saying in response to Rae’s absence, not thinking anything about your brief conversation and thinking you would discuss it after she had logged off for the night. Though, as you heard her phone chime again from across the room followed by another bark of laughter, you knew you weren’t getting off that easy.

“What are you laughing about?” Corpse’s honeyed voice sounded from your earbud, hearing Rae’s giggles from what you presumed to be their discord voice chat. Glancing anxiously between his stream and the reflection of Rae’s face cam in one of her monitors, your heart began to sink as you watched that familiar mischievous grin tugging at the edge of her lips.

“Oh just my friend (Y/n) sent me a funny meme”

“Wait, is she the one in some of your Instagram posts?” You swear your heart stopped beating at that moment, eyes glued to the screen in front of you as you tried helplessly to process the conversation happening right in front of you. He knew who you were? You thought you’d always be lost among the hundreds of thousands of his new adoring fans, left in the anonymity of your Twitter tag in his subtweets, or just another subscriber that fawned over him silently behind a keyboard. Knowing that he’d actually seen your face you could feel your own beginning to heat at that moment; you brought your hands your mouth again, unknowingly curling your body tighter around the pillow in your lap as you tried to hide your face behind it as you become more and more flustered from the words nonchalantly escaping his mouth.

“Yea that’s her, pretty thing isn’t she? She’s my absolute favourite.”

That’s it, you were gonna fucking kill her.

“I mean, yeah... I guess..” The timid words followed by a soft awkward chuckle had your breath hitching in your throat. There was no fucking way this was happening. This had to be a dream, that was the only possible explanation. You were just about to pinch yourself when Rae’s voice startled you from your thoughts.

“She’s actually over right now. She insisted on getting wine drunk later tonight because her professor’s been on her ass lately. I’ll get her to come say hi.” Rae had barely turned around in her chair when she was met with your wide-eyed gaze, panic painted across your features as you shook your head wildly. You were in no state to be talking to your long-time internet crush in such a casual setting. But with the look Rae shot you from her chair as she started to plug another headset into her PC, you knew you had no choice and begrudgingly pulled yourself from the couch almost tripping over your own feet as you shakily walked over to Rae. Shooting her another pleading look, she only shoved the headset in your direction in return as she grinned up at you. Finally biting the bullet, you pulled on the headset and leaned down toward the mic.

“Hi, how’s it going?” Cursing at yourself for how quiet and shaky your words came out, you barely had any time to think it over before a chorus of greetings sounded through the headset. A small giggle escaped your lips as you watched the different Discord icons appear and disappear from the top of the screen. You knew most of these people already which made you even more confused as to how you managed to miss that voice from all the discord chats and voice calls. Well, knowing them was a bit of an overstatement anyway; you knew /of/ them, and they knew /of/ you in the other times you popped up in the background or in passing conversation during Rae’s streams. They did know you well enough, though, to know this was not the way you usually spoke around them.

“No way, that can’t be the (Y/N) I know!” The voice you recognize as Sean echoes through your headset, another chorus of knowing laughter following quickly after. Taking a deep breath you managed to force out a few words that would get them off your case.

“…Shut the fuck up”

“There she is!!” As the group erupted in laughter yet again, all you could focus on was the faint deep chuckle that resounded through your headset. Feeling your face start to heat up, you covered your wide grin with your hand as butterflies burst through your stomach; you could listen to that laugh all day. Before you were able to speak again, though, that heavenly voice piped up and wiped all train of thought from your mind.

“Nice to meet you (Y/N).”

“It’s nice to meet you too Corpse. I gotta be honest ‘n say I’m a pretty big fan of your no-sleep work.” And... there’s the word vomit. Fuck, you could feel your cheeks starting to heat up with the ongoing realization of who you were talking to.

“Aha thank you, I uh really appreciate that. I’m sure you just heard, but I guess you could say I’m a fan of yours also.”

No.

No, there’s no fucking way.

Is he...

Flirting with you?

Before you could even think about what to reply to that with, the rest of the group beat you to it.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what is happening.”

“CORPSE! You SIMP!”

“Is- Is Corpse really shooting his shot right now?”

You didn’t realize you were frozen in place until you felt Rae’s hand on your elbow, snapping you out of your bewildered trance as you tried to comprehend what was happening yourself. As your thoughts finally caught up to the present, you could feel your cheeks start to burn; pulling your hand up to cover your face you stepped out of the view of the face cam. Rae’s laughter filled the room as she watched your flustered antics, shooting you a sly grin as she started scanning the monitor displaying her live chat.

“Wait, wait, chats telling me (y/n)’s blushing right now?” Sean’s voice echoed through the discord chat, only making you flush further as you tried desperately to find a way out of this.

“Okay, okay, leave her alone.” Corpse’s voice finally piped up amid all of the chaos causing everyone to immediately pipe down. God, you didn’t even want to begin to think of the mess this has already made, you just needed to get out of there before you caused any more damage.

“Yeah, I uh- see- see that the lobby’s full so I’ll just uh- leave you guys to it.” Quietly thanking the stars that Corpse finally got you out of this mess, you went to pull the headset off your ears when that fateful voice piped up again.

“Wait, don’t let these nerds make you leave. You should stay- I mean, only to help Rae y'know? She needs it.”

“I do not!”

“I- I mean yea sure, as long as I’m not intruding,” Cursing yourself again for stuttering before forcing yourself to swallow the knot in your throat, “I mean, she really does need the help.”

“Okay just because you want to flirt some more doesn’t mean you can bully me-“

“Okay, I’m starting the round!” The booming accented voice cut off everyone else in the call as you all stared as the screen began to count down to the game, and before anyone had the chance to say anything else a chorus of laughs resounded, and then the lobby fell into silence.

•••

And it went on like that, the not-so-subtle flirting followed by relentless jabs from the group immediately after. The game was almost forgotten with how much of each lobby was taken up by teasing words and endless laughter, but every audience was just eating it up. You didn’t even want to think about the mess social media was going to be after this stream but right now you were having fun with your friends and that’s all that mattered. The grin was practically plastered on your face as you laughed along with Rae the chat during the gameplay portions and you knew everything from this moment on was gonna be different, but you couldn’t find a single thing within you to care.

Especially when you logged onto Twitter right after the stream and saw that little message right at the top of your requests.

@.corpsehusband: wanna hear some of that no sleep work in person?

•••

beep bop here u go,

[changebydjo]

IMPORTANT - PLEASE READ

 so i’ve put off writing this for a long, long time, and it’ll be painful for me to make this post but at this point i feel like it needs to be done. someone within the liz fandom has been lying, gaslighting and manipulating me as well as many others, both online and offline, and after getting proof on everything (plus their lack of remorse) has prompted me to write this.

this is about gil perez, aka @unrated-g, and one of his irl friends, kim @kimbus-the-whimbus, to a lesser extent, but mostly gil. since 2016 - nearly 5 years now - he’s been lying that he’s best friends with liz gillies. i’m gonna put a read more because it’s a long, insane, and ridiculous thing that happened, but please read all of it and know how serious this is, as well as all the damage this man has done.

​

i met gil through tumblr in 2018 - he had been replying my posts since before that, but early 2018 is when i followed him and started chatting with him casually. over time, i noticed that he would reblog posts about liz and in the tags he would seem to be talking to her or referencing her, but not by her name - instead he would call her “goblin”. he would mention things that “goblin” liked or behind the scenes on dynasty stuff, and after a few weeks of noticing this and chatting with him about dynasty/liz, i ended up asking him if he was friends with liz/knew her personally because of the way he spoke about her. he confirmed to me that he knew her, she was one of his best friends, and he “didn’t expect” anyone to pick up on it. he told me to keep it private and i agreed, obviously, because i had no reason to not trust him, and i know that liz values her privacy.

it’s important to note that liz does NOT follow him or any of his accounts from her verified twitter or instagram accounts - instead, he said she had an “extremely private” encrypted tumblr account that could only be seen by people she follows/white listed. he was one of them. her blog would not show up for anyone else, and they met through tumblr in 2016 (even though he said she followed him back in 2010 and he didn’t realize until 6 years later) through their mutual love for uncharted, and bonded over playing uncharted 4 multiplayer together. it’s also important to note that liz has had 2 tumblr accounts since 2010, both of which she has abandoned, and he said that her private tumblr is separate from those two. she also was friends with him (according to him) through PSN, where they would play ps4 games together, and all of his text convos with her are from that app:

(^ “liz’s” PSN account)

throughout all of 2018, we would text on a regular basis and started becoming good friends. he was extremely kind, always willing to be there for me, and listened to me about not only fandom stuff but also my irl problems. he also became friends with my friend group, who were also in the liz fandom, and it was really nice for a while. in october of 2018, gil said he went to HHN with liz and matt in LA, and for xmas of 2018, he said he spent it with liz - both in LA and in NJ, which is what she typically does to spend her holidays with her family and friends. her pale blue eyes cover was also for him, according to gil, because he asked for her to cover it specifically and she did just for him.

gil would also occasionally stream for friends, and sometimes liz would show up:

beginning of 2019 is when gil and i started getting much closer - we started playing games together (mostly mario kart, at the beginning) and talking through voice chat. he would talk about liz and personal things about her/her life or dynasty, and he always willingly supplied that information himself - i never asked for it, i wasn’t friends with him to get information on liz or have an “in” with her. chatting with him made me feel good and happy and important to him, and i realized i started having feelings for him - which i told him about in april 2019. he said he wasn’t sure exactly how he felt but he thought he might feel the same, the only really complicated part (besides the fact that this was long distance/not irl) was that he also had a really deep crush on liz, someone who was his best friend/ultimate celeb crush. he was really like in love with her, even though he said he tried to suppress it. anyways, after me admitting that to him, our friendship started to develop into something more. we weren’t ever in an official relationship, but things were definitely not strictly platonic with us. we went from chatting once every week or two to almost every single night for 3-6 hours per night for MONTHS. throughout that time, our relationship became sexual, too, and my feelings for him just continued to get deeper and deeper.

this continues throughout the rest of 2019, and then new years 2020, everything just...goes to shit asap. gil got really distant with me with no explanation, i felt like all the affection he was showing me and the kind things he would say to me, as well as our bonding time when we would chat together, was just ripped away unexpectedly. i constantly asked what was wrong and what was happening, and told him how i feel, and i got no real response besides just being tired/non-sociable, etc. (which, for the record, is completely understandable, but it was such a huge 180 in behavior that it worried me and things never went back to normal after that). in addition to that, kim (who was mentioned at the beginning of this post) is one of his best friends irl, as well as his on again/off again ex (according to him). anyways, there were posts that she had made that indicated to them not being exes and instead still together - or at the very least not platonic - which crushed me when i found out, because until that point i had no reason not to trust him. i told him about it though, and how it hurt me because my feelings were so deep for him at that point i felt that i loved him, and he told me they weren’t together. this isn’t really necessary for the liz stuff of this post, but it’s important for context for how hurt and on edge i was already feeling before things got worse.

we would still chat maybe a few times a week, but nothing like it used to be, and i was happy we would even chat at all, even though things felt so weird and different and off, and no matter what i did, i couldn’t fix it. as 2020 started going on, and this continued, his friendship with liz started making me feel extremely uncomfortable. knowing that he had the weird boundaries with his ex, plus whatever was going on with me and him, AND that he was in love with liz?? it was unsettling. i felt like i couldn’t compare, because it’s *liz gillies*, someone i obviously love and idolize and look up to. and she was up on a pedestal for him, even though he said that he never tried to treat liz differently than his other close friends just bc of who she was, but that wasn’t true. anything that she said or did, he agreed with 100%, and would defend it. when he and i would chat, and i would mention something about dynasty that bothered me, he would talk about what liz’s thoughts were on it and how she felt and that she was right to feel that way and it made me feel awful. this happened on multiple occasions throughout various topics, from dynasty to fandom stuff to liz’s friendships/relationships, etc. no matter what, to gil, liz was always right and he always had an explanation for anything that happened. the way he would describe liz and the thing he said about her made me see her in a completely different light - she was not the same liz that she presented herself as, at least in gil’s eyes. 

he would always talk about how amazing liz was to him and how she did so much for him, such as buying him gifts, supporting his art, etc. this was hurtful to hear because i was doing the exact same things for him, as well as our group of friends: we had been buying his art (not only the art prints but the ACTUAL original copies), sending him gifts or money for gifts, supporting him and his art on social media, as well as just being a genuine friend to him. he never appreciated or thanked us the way that he thanked liz; none of us ever compared to her, even though we were doing the exact same thing for him that he said liz was doing, as well. it made me feel like no matter what i did, or how supportive i was, i was never enough.

we also had a discord with gil, that involved him, me, and my friends sarah, hope, amanda, and dom. within this discord, it’s worth noting that gil was the only man there, and would talk about liz and his friendship with her there, unprompted. we never asked for info, he volunteered everything willingly, and we all kind of glossed over it at the time because we weren’t friends with him for liz or any of that.

(the screenshot gil linked in the gc is what “liz’s” private encrypted blog looks like on his dash. please note the edit post button in the bottom right of the screenshot.)

another important thing about his friendship with liz/being in love with her: he has this specific kink (which i don’t want to say what it is for privacy reasons) and he said that liz was engaging in this kink herself, and that he was jealous of liz’s bf/wishes he could engage in it with liz, etc. i wasn’t into this kink before talking to him but because i had liked him so much at the time, and i was slightly jealous that he wanted it with liz, i thought that i could indulge in it for him. it was something that i was not physically or mentally prepared for/able to make happen, and it really caused an impact on me, and he just...didn’t care. at all.

anyways: this stuff continues, then around summer 2020, my friend sarah reached out to him. she (and my friends, along with me) were starting to distrust the things gil was saying about liz, since it went completely against what liz would say herself. she would say she only plays the sims 3 on her computer - he would say she was a huge gamer and played the sims 4 on ps4, along with minecraft, uncharted, the last of us, horizon zero dawn, etc. he would say that liz and maddison brown (her dynasty co-star) played ACNH with him and quickly got to 5 stars - liz said in a zach sang interview that she didn’t play animal crossing. every time something didn’t add up, his excuse was that liz was lying for her privacy. she didn’t follow gil on any verified social media accounts in case “people harassed him” over being friends with her. so sarah texted him that she needed to talk to him about the liz stuff, because there was evidence it wasn’t true, and he denied all of it. he firmly stuck to his story, and sarah gave him multiple chances over several days to come clean and he wouldn’t. she asked for simple pieces of proof that he could give her, and he wouldn’t besides fake screenshots of her “private blog”:

 he told me afterwards that if it comes between his friendship with liz or sarah’s, he’s picking liz - end of story. his and sarah’s friendship was done after that because of his decision. he blamed sarah for “ruining” liz and maddison’s friendship because of her asking for proof, and made her out to be the bad one in that situation. he ended up deleting the discord gc after this happened, with all of his screenshots/”info” as liz as well (we got screenshots of things before he deleted it though, much more that’s shown in this post).

about a month later, my friend léa also confronted him about it. gil had told her some things about liz’s “reaction” to meeting léa in paris, and at the time, it had made the experience more special for her. once she realized it was all lies, though, it really hurt her - he altered that special experience for her and twisted it into something that wasn’t real. he had the same reaction to léa’s conversation as he did to sarah’s, and he refused to tell the truth. their friendship was done with after, as well, along with a few other people from the liz fandom. i was the only one who stayed friends with him after that, and that was because i was closest with him and still trying to see if i could fix things with him. i was still naively believing that he would treat me okay again, he would make me feel important instead of always a backup option, that he wanted me again. 

but of course that never happened. he continued to ignore me, talk to me less and less, and would subtweet me on his private account. after he stopped being friends with sarah and léa and everyone blocked him except for me, i was the only follower on his private account, as well as being the only person he followed there. gil, though, kept saying that liz had a “private twitter” where she would talk to him on his private account. he also said that he had “merged twitter accounts” into one, which was his private, which messed up his account and wouldn’t show who he was replying to, quote rts, or that he was following them, which - if you have a twitter, you KNOW none of that can actually happen. but it was his excuse to constantly subtweet me and my friends for not believing him, to maintain his story, AND to have convos with “liz” on there that only i could see, where he made it sound like he was talking shit about me to her. it was extremely manipulative and served no purpose except to fuck with me, because he knew that i was the only one seeing those tweets and knew i was already struggling with not knowing what to believe. here’s some of them:

(you can very clearly see that i’m the only follower/following on that account, the number is at literally 1, and he STILL was acting like he was talking to someone else and that other people were following him.)

now comes jan. 2021!! WE GOT DEFINITE PROOF THAT IT WAS ALL LIES. from multiple people. one of liz’s close best friends (that gil included in his stories about her, saying that he met them) said that they don’t know who gil is, have never met him, and it’s best for us all to block him for our own safety. a co-worker of liz’s (who was, again, included in gil’s lies, that he hung out with them multiple times, played games with them online, and bought him gifts) said that not only had they never met gil, but EVERYTHING he said about them was untrue. they even listed the inaccuracies he would say about them, such as gil taking photos of them at things like the SWT, and they confirmed who actually took the photo. they said that “none of it is fucking true” and that gil is a narcissistic liar, and also encouraged us to block him for our own safety. 

i confronted gil myself about this a few weeks ago, and he continued to maintain his story that everyone’s lying to protect his privacy - even though we know for sure that wasn’t the case. he FINALLY owned up to it to me only once he saw i had proof and he was caught, and his reason for doing it was “he was bored”. he said he was sorry but he wasn’t truly apologetic - he either didn’t fully realize the scope of how hurtful his lies and manipulations were, or he just didn’t care, but the bottom line is that he always chose his fantasy of liz over his actual friends. around this time, once he knew he was caught, he also deactivated his private account, but brought it back a week or so later, with all of the subtweets and tweets about liz being deleted. all of the unverified accounts that were supposed to be liz - the tumblr account, psn, twitch, etc. - were all fake and made by him, so he could make it seem more real.

even if he WAS telling the truth about being friends with liz, he still would have completely violated her privacy by the amount of “secret” things he told all of us - from her kinks/sex life, to work life, to very personal things that he claims happened to her. knowing it’s all fake though, and he made up an entire personality and life for liz that doesn’t exist??? it’s insane.

now the part with kim - she’s known gil irl for over 10 years, and has tweeted about liz all the time, about how “good” liz is to her because of gil, and that she’s the one who encouraged him to talk to her. she brags about it constantly, even though none of it is real. she also tweeted multiple times throughout 2018-2019 about how gil “finally deserves to meet liz in person”, even though gil said he met liz irl back in 2017 or so - AND that she came to texas, where he lives, to meet him and his friends. when asked about her tweets, he said that kim’s account was “messed up” and her tweets weren’t “tweeted at the right time”. one of my friends reached out to tell her and show her the proof of gil lying, because gil has been lying to her and other people irl too, and instead she mocked us, belittled us, and chose not to believe a group of women coming to her about a 30 year old (!!) man manipulating us. gil said that kim was “aware of it all being a lie for years now” to me, but i think that was another lie, that he’s STILL lying to her about it. if not, then that means that kim was also lying for many years about knowing liz too, and used it to make us all the butt of her joke, so. so much for her being an “empath” and wanting to help people but anyways!!

the last screenshot is of her subtweeting us and implying that everyone involved with liz is lying for her and gil’s privacy, even though we have proof that that simply isn’t true.

i’m sorry for how long this is, but i need people to understand how serious this is. he’s been lying for 5 YEARS now about knowing liz - about her “accidentally sending nudes” to him, that gil is one of her best friends and he would’ve been at her wedding, that she’s a huge gamer who plays with him - all of it. it’s all lies. he created a fantasy version of liz that doesn’t exist, and incorporated into his real life, his friendships both online and off, and made it his entire personality. he’s not sorry about what he’s done - as i’m writing this, he’s still on tumblr, talking in the tags to “liz” again, because he’d rather uphold his fantasy life where he’s best friends with liz when in reality, she has no idea he even exists. and if she did, i’m certain that she would be disgusted with what he’s done. he lied about her, oversexualized her, used his kinks on her which was brought onto me - someone he knew that was vulnerable and had feelings for him, manipulated people into trying to believe his lies, gaslit people to make them unable to tell what was true and what was fake, and had absolutely zero respect for any of us. he even listened to me cry to him on the phone MULTIPLE times about how insecure and worthless i felt to him compared to liz, and he didn’t do ANYTHING about it. he sat there and listened to me cry, knowing he could own up to his lie, and he chose not to. he’s not sorry about what he’s done, and he’s going to continue to spread his lies. please block him. i can’t express how much he’s hurt me, the therapy that i need to have because of him, how much he’s hurt my friends and how little he respects women in general tbh. he always tried to come off as “one of the good guys” but now i know he’s harmful and not to be trusted. he even tried to separate me from my friends, and make it seem like they’re the ones making this situation even harder for him. i’ve tried so, so many times to get through to him, waiting to see if he’d change or show some remorse or anything, but after over a year of this i don’t think he will, and it genuinely hurts me to know that. BLOCK HIM.

[imonthinice]

The Criminal Psychology Majors, Jason Todd x Fem!Reader Part 12/?

Word Count: 4.4k

Author’s Note: Y/N - Your Name, A/N - Any Name (Your Best friend’s name)

God idk what i’m doing with this but i’m liking it lmao

next one might honestly be smut idk

Warnings: Violence, Swearing, Description of Blood, Gets heated, hints at trauma, no beta bitch we die like Jason Todd

(Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3) (Part 4) (Part 5) (Part 6) (Part 7) (Part 8) (Part 9) (Part 10) (Part 11) (Part 12) (Part 13) (Part 14) (Part 15) (Part 16) (Part 17) (Part 18) (Part 19) (Part 20)

Y/N walked through the streets of Gotham, which were once bustling with people, but now were quiet with the occasional hooker, she had caught the city as an unlively hour, where it seemed to sleep the night away while the vigilantes of the area watched it like their lives depended on it. In some ways it did, the stories they would tell when being interviewed were horrific sometimes, but Y/N figured a decent amount of it was for dramatization, to keep the people of Gotham off of the streets to protect them all from it.

The question was always protect them from what, and they never answered. So, it never kept the people of Gotham at bay from the streets at night, and had Y/N’s car not been towed, she would have been driving home in the safe, secluded area of her car, not the vast wilderness of the streets of Gotham.

She looked up at the sky to see one of the virgate boys using a grappling hook to fly to the other building, which was such a sight to behold for someone who never witnessed a superhero beyond Superman at home. She wished and longed to know more about the vigilante, but didn’t dwell or dote on that man, because she didn’t need to.

Something told her that he was watching though, tracing every step she made to make sure she got home in one piece. She thought she was crazy, her life didnt matter more than anyone else in Gotham. He’s not following me, why would he? she thought, Even though I’m dating Jason Todd, they probably don’t know Jason, so my life doesn’t mean much more to them than any one of the hookers along this street. I’m overthinking it.

The walk home took two hours, she left Jason’s at 4am just to find herself back home at 6am, bright and early as the sun rose, ready to greet the day and all it had in store for everyone. But the things it had in store for Y/N was a class and if she was lucky, cuddling with Jason. Nothing more, nothing less.

She would open her front door, unscathed from the journey home, except maybe for a few callouses on her feet, it was the last time she wouldn't pay for more than a day of parking, that’s for sure. Heels were not the shoes you wanted for a two-hour walk home in the Autumn cold, but they were what she had.

She thought about what she was going to do next, and the first thought she had was to shower. Not because she needed to, but because she wanted to nurse the terrible headache she had and to think some things through. What she normally did in the shower.

She wanted so much more from so much of her life. the main offender of seemingly not being enough for her was Jason. Not because she didn’t want more, but because she craved more from him. He was injured, so she wouldn’t get much more rom him for the time being, and it stung a little for her. She just wanted him, maybe sexually, maybe in a more romantic setting or maybe just on her couch on a Thursday afternoon. It was all three of those options and she knew it.

She pulled out of the shower and looked at the time, 6:50am. Okay, she thought, little more time than I wanted to spend in the shower, but I guess the universe had different plans for me today. What else do you have for me, universe? And how much of you plan involves Jason?

She would open her phone after quickly getting dressed. While she still cared for her appearance, she didn’t want to dress like she owned a law firm every day, so she didn’t. Just black jeans and a black top and she felt like a million bucks. 

Just some quick outfit inspo. I like doing these a lot. I think fashion is funky :))

Artemis had sent her a message asking where she was at around 4am, she wondered why the time, but she then remembered that Artemis’ boyfriend worked with Dick Grayson, who was Jason’s brother, who worked most nights until radical hours of the night. The chances that he saw her on her two-hour walk home was high, but the chances that that had also made it back to Jason was higher. She knew she was in for it.

Hey sorry, I was at Jason’s. Fell asleep in his arms the whole shebang. And yeah, that was me who screamed the yo momma joke at the press. It was super childish, I know, but I don’t care. Those fucks are sucking my life force out of me and harassing my boyfriend, even your boyfriend.

She would then look at the articles calling her a gold digger and worth-nothing childish insulter of the press. She laughed. If the press wanted a fight from her, she was more than willing to oblige and load the canons. 

She didn’t know how to fight back that well, since it was a mainly verbal fight, and she barely even knew how to  fight physically, hence all the running and non-confrontational arguments she had had to the press.

And like fucking clockwork, Jason texted her.

Did you walk home alone or are my brothers lying bastards?

I walked. I knew someone saw me, fuck.

Why did you walk home? I thought you drove here?

I did, but we spent more than 12 hours together Jason. I didn’t buy enough hours, suddenly my car was being towed.

You could have asked for a ride home from Alfred! He would have in a heartbeat.

I was going to! But  I got distracted and it all became a blur and suddenly I was part of the way home in the dark by myself!

What if you had gotten hurt?

Well, I saw one of the vigilantes of the city on the rooftops, I’m sure if I screamed they would have seen me. They always do see that stuff.

So, your car got towed huh?

Yeah, I don’t know when I’ll be able to pay it off. It’s not exactly like money my parents give me should go to my car getting towed because I got fucked over by seeing my boyfriend. 

You’ll figure it out. Sorry about the car, that’s got to suck fucking ass.

You think? I’m stuck taking the fuckin’ subway till I get my car back. I hate the subway, too many people. Far too many people. Too many eyes. It gets stressful really quickly. Might just walk every where honestly, I can’t deal with the eyes of strangers.

But you’re a C-list celebrity.

Internet is different. I can just block the bad eyes and move on with my life, you should see my block list now that some people are connecting my name to the girl who flipped off the press, thank god Twitter has a fuckin block feature.

You should really just meet my family so you don’t have to run away before they get home, would probably cause you a lot less financial stress, Y/N.

I’ll think about it.

You should think a little harder about it. I don’t want you to get your car impounded ‘cause you’re seeing me, why did you even park in pay-to-park?

Did you not see the massive mob trying to get to you? It was impossible for me to even try to pull into the driveway. Hence why I’m being insulted, you know, ‘cause I yelled at the press to get them to leave me alone. I fucking hate the press, you’re stabbed, severely injured last time they got information, and they’re harassing me, asking me what I like to do on the weekends.

Fucking vultures. Yeah, I’ve seen that. I’ve read the articles. But that’s the press for you, absolute trash and spitting bullshit in everyway.

Fucking hate the press, that’s for damn sure. Despise them. I won’t ever change that, even if, knock on wood, we break up.

Praying we don’t break up so I can see you lose your shit at the press when you’re bored.

She would get up to go make some coffee, since it was closer to 7:20am and if her roommate woke up, she could just tell her to get up anyway.

The press can suck my dick. she said.

You have a dick?

Oh yeah. Massive. 20ft long. It probably won’t even fit all the vultures.

Oh my god, that’s not as big as mine.

lmfao is it now?

Oh yeah.

Nice.

Anyway, my brothers are staying home from school today,  I think they’re making me play Resident Evil 8 with them? You know that game?

Of course. Everyone in that game is infinitely hot.

Are you bi? 

I don’t know. Haven't thought that far ahead to actually label myself. I just like people. Sometimes it’s men, sometimes it’s women. But you have to agree when you see them all. That game came out when I was still in  high school, so I’ve played the entire thing. My phone background is actually one of the characters.

Which one?

I’ll show you if I come over tonight.

My brothers might be in my room, though.

Okay, but, RE8 is an amazing game. So, worth it.

You won’t meet them normally but I pull out a game you love and you’re down?

I’m very easy to convince.

You still have notes to write when you come over though.

Oh yeah, I was probably going to have to come over both ways, just because I need those notes and you do too.

Do you not own a printer?

I barely even own a laptop, I’m waiting for my old one to come in the mail. 

How do you even manage?

With a whole lot of will and spite, anything is possible.

And that’s when her discord group chat @’ed her. She was on Do Not Disturb because she was Jason, and apparently they missed her.

Y/N! C’mere. One said.

Yes? Whatduhya want nerds?

We’ve decided to hold a fake internet wedding between you and Christopher. Another said.

A what.

We’re getting married!

Sometimes I wish I never left Metropolis and then I remember you fucks live there. Why are we doing this? You do know I have a boyfriend right? She asked them.

I don’t know, we’re bored and we miss you. We can have a bachelorette party in Gotham, if you want.

I’m this close to going back on DND.

The group chat was made way back when they had all first met in grade 9 and had been active ever since. They all had stayed in the city when they graduated though, but since Y/N received a scholarship, fully paid for, she took the opportunity and jumped.

They were some of her closest friends, even if they lived in a different city to her now, even if they were all busy with school, even if she was busy with school and a boyfriend, A lot of her life wouldn’t be complete without her crack friends in her hometown.

They had all ben partying like crazy while she was gone, and if she wasn’t so hung up in her own life, she’d probably be down there with them. 

Before you do, can you please explain why you’re screaming at the press, lmao.

Because fuck the press, dude. Why else? 

What did they do to you?

Have you seen the recent articles?

That’s true.

She laughed and finished her coffee. Jason had not responded yet, she assumed his brothers were either checking on him or they had started the game. It was around 8am when A/N finally left her room.

“I thought you were staying with Jason?”

“I was, but then I remembered he has like 9 siblings and I’m not about to meet them all. Then I walked home.”

“You walked?”

“Car got towed.”

“Fuck, can you afford the bill? I can’t.”

“Nope.”

“Guess we’re going to take the subway for a while, huh.”

She sighed and put her cup in the sink, “At least you don’t have school to go to and your lover comes to meet you, I have shit to do and places to be,” she frowned, “Inconvenient.”

“Could you borrow money from Jason’s dad?”

“I don’t borrow money from family, it’s hard enough for me to accept the money my parents send me.”

“I know it is, when’s your class?”

“3pm, I’ll be leaving at 12pm though, because the subway is unreliable.”

“This is going to be a hard hit for us.”

“Well, it’s not like it’s fucking your credit. Mine’s tanking.”

“You’ll pull through it.”

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

She got onto the subway at 12:30pm. She really hated the way it was running. The people, the faces, the staring eyes of unwanted attention. People knew who she was and she hated it. She didn’t like the attention, she just liked the fucking with people. She wanted to get off the subway the minute she got on.

She eventually couldn’t take it and got off a few stops away, there was still a substantial walk towards the college, but she knew it would be. She even brought a leather jacket with her so that she could walk if she couldn’t take it anymore.

And there she was, in the busy streets of Gotham, walking to her college. Barely aware of the people who did stare at her, because she just kept walking, lost in her thought but aware of the people in her trail, the cross walks and the lights she was waiting for occasionally. She just kept walking until Artemis met up with her,

“Hey! I didn’t know you were walking to school today,” Artemis said.

“Oh! I didn’t want to, my car got towed though.”

“Your car got towed? That sucks so much. Well, we’re going the same way, so I’ve decided I’m going to walk with you, you get no say.”

“Of course. I was going to ask if you wanted to,” she laughed, “It’s more fun with a friend anyway, Art.”

“So, how are things with you and Jason, I’m legally obliged to ask as one of his friends.”

“Well, we made it official if that’s the kind of thing you want to hear,” she laughed again, “I’m sure it’s the answer Dick will eat up.”

“You’re right about that one. Dick’s a sucker for a romantic story, you should write one, since you write. He’d probably read it all.”

“Well, that would be fun, but I still don’t have my laptop.”

“You could use Jason’s?” Artemis suggested..

“Nah. It’ll be fine,” she said, “I’ll manage.”

“Aren’t you collecting notes for him for your psychology class?”

“I am, it’s not like he can go anywhere. I actually told him he’d need to walk eventually so that it’s not a learning curve when he’s healed.”

“That’s what all of us are telling him too, he’s a stubborn man, good luck with that one,” Artemis laughed, “He’s always been the stubborn friend. Worse than Will, actually, and Will is really bad with being stubborn.”

“It’s fine,” she laughed, “If you asked any of my Metropolis friends they’d say the same about me.”

“I bet you were quite the wild child in your heyday back in your city,” Artemis laughed, “I hate Metropolis.”

“Who doesn’t? It’s so crowded.”

“Uh, Clark doesn’t. He thrives there, no idea why, he grew up in Smallville. If anyone should be uncomfortable with Metropolis it should be the small-city country boy, but I guess it’s his thing.”

“I forget you know everyone.”

“We know a lot of people, are you’re slowly being let into our massive circle of very well-known people. Welcome to the group, I guess,” she laughed, “You'll either hate or love the fame that comes from this.”

“Well, if its paparazzi and press, I think I’ll hate it.”

“I can promise you right now that it’s not all paparazzi and press, we haven’t been bothered today, probably because we are on the move.”

“You shouldn’t say that, you’ll jinx it.”

“I know a lot about not jinxing it, but that’s a story for another time,” Y/N noticed that when Artemis said this her eyes glazed over and she looked upset.

“You don’t ever have to talk to me about something you’re not ready to talk about,” Y/N reassured her.

“Hey, the trauma makes me funny.”

“Two can play that game.”

They would ramble on for the rest of the walk to their college. Nothing really of substance, just getting to know each other further. She was glad she found a friend in Artemis, it would have sucked if the two of them didn’t get along, but with each word they exchanged, they had so much fun.

She even told Artemis about that time she played Katherine Howard in her school’s budget play of Six - The Musical. She was proud of the riffs she was able to do, but she didn’t talk about it often. She was never the type of brag about her achievements, no matter how amazing they were.

But Artemis and Y/N parted ways and Y/N went to her class and wrote the same, boring, scribbly and barely legible notes. She figured eventually she’d need nicer handwriting, but did she want to work on it? No.

When she finished, she saw Artemis and who she could only assume to be Wally, at Artemis’ class doors. She waved to Artemis, before Artemis called her over.

“Y/N! Hey, I would ask how class is, but this is Wally,” she gestured to the red-head boy beside her, and Y/N held out her hand to shake Wally’s.

“Hi, Wally.”

“Y/N. It’s nice to meet you since Jason can’t shut up about you and my girlfriend likes you a lot.”

“Well that's sweet of you Artemis. You’re just so in love with me,” Y/N joked.

“Girl. You know it,” Artemis joked back.

“You two already have a close bond? That’s impressive,” Wally said, “Never seen anyone win over any of my friends this quickly,” he muttered.

They joked for a little while longer, just getting to know Wally before she had to go, she had to get to Jason’s.

The walk was a while away, so she went and sat on a park bench for a minute to check her phone, Jason had texted her.

Hey baby, are you coming over?

I am, yes. I actually just met Wally.

You met Wally and I wasn’t there to see it? C’mon.

Artemis introduced us! Go yell at her.

Oh. Never mind. I won’t do that.

Ha! Scared of her?

Maybe a little, she can be scary, okay?

You can’t tell but I’m laughing at you.

Dhmu.

That’s fine, I’ll just go hang out with Alfred and not you. He seems like he would be spiteful like me.

That’s unfair.

I thought you said don’t hit me up?

Fuck.

Checkmate.

I am upset.

No you’re not.

No I’m not.

She would walk down the street further, maybe within a couple steps to reach the Manor, when a man dragged her into an alleyway. She yelped.

“Uh, hello? Can I help you?” she asked, pretending she wasn’t terrified.

“How much would Bruce give me for you?” the attacker mumbled before he tried to knock her to the ground, but she had another plan.

He grabbed her, put his face close to hers, and she head-butted him, he would stumble back, and she started running to the Manor.

“Come here you fucking bitch!” he screamed. She could feel her nose bleeding as she ran and ran, the security saw her and pulled her into the gateway before drawing their guns and urging her to run to the steps of the Manor.

And she ran. The security at the door saw her and let her in, and yelled for Alfred.

“What is this nonsense, oh,” Alfred paused when he saw the blood running out of Y/N’s nose, “Miss Y/N, what happened to you?” he asked before grabbing her hand and pulling her into the entry-way bathroom and opening a first-aid kit.

“Okay so, what happened was I was walking to the Manor because my car got towed right? And this fucking bastard dude pops out from an alleyway and pulls me into it, asks some bullshit about how much Bruce would pay for me, when he grabbed me and tried to knock me down, when I head-butted him and started running,” she said, completely unphased.

Alfred didn’t respond to her and started to stop the bleeding when Bruce called for him, “In the entry-way bathroom, Master Wayne!” he answered.

Bruce came around the corner and saw Alfred was already tending to Y/N, “Well, this is the event where I meet my son’s girlfriend, when she is bleeding and running from a strange man in an alleyway.”

“Heh, sorry,” she said and outstretched her hand to shake his, “It’s nice to finally meet you, Bruce.”

“I can tell you’re going to be quite the addition to this household,” he said as he took her hand and shook it, “As long as you’re okay.”

“I’m okay.”

“That’s good. I guess you can’t get mad at Jase for being a reckless man now.”

“I really can’t.”

“Alright, you should be good, Miss Y/N.”

“Thank you, Alfred. But you really didn’t have to.”

“I’ve been taking care of 5 boys and 3 girls since most of them were little, Miss Y/N. A little blood is really no big deal for me to handle.”

“That’s obvious.”

“You can go see the boys now, they’re going to ask you though,” Bruce said.

“I know.”

She walked to Jason’s room, hoping that he wouldn’t have all of his siblings in the room, he did though.

“Hey, Y/N- what the fuck happened to you?” Jason exclaimed when she opened the door.

“Oh great, all your siblings are here. Anyway, I guess,” she paused, taking in a big breath so she could run through the events quickly, “So I was walking here ‘cause my car got towed, right? When some fucking bastard man grabs me and yanks me into an alleyway and starts going off about how much Bruce will pay him to get me back or something,” she paused again, “And when he tried to knock me down by getting really close and personal to my face, like an idiot I should add, I head-butted him.”

“You did what?’

“I’m not done yet, met your dad when I actually had blood running out of my nose because that's just my fucking luck. Okay, now you can be disappointed in me,” she joked.

“I will say again, you did what?”

“Something stupid?” she said.

“You could say that again, my god, what went through your head?”

“Uh, nothing. Just survival. Fight or flight but I head-butted a man, and hi, everyone.”

“Hi, Y/N, I’m Dick,” Dick said, “You clearly are meant for Jason,” he joked, “That's something he would do.”

“Don’t encourage her, Dick!”

Stephanie got up and greeted her, “You know, Y/N, I always wanted a crazy sister,” she joked, “I’m Stephanie, the black-haired girl is Cass, and the red-head is Barbara.”

“Me too,” Cass hopped onto the joke.

“It’s something else when you meet the girl your brother is dating after she head-butted a man, apparently,” Y/N laughed, “I know it’s far-fetched-”

“Not really,” Tim cut her off, “You know Jason protected Will when they were attacked?”

“That’s Tim, by the way,” Dick said.

“So you can’t yell at me for head-butting a man!” Y/N joked at Jason while going to sit beside him, he slinged an arm around her shoulder and leant his head into her head.

“Well, you seem like a nice enough girl,” Barbara said, “Take away the reckless behavior, and you are lovely.”

“That is valid, to be honest. Not exactly the way you want to meet your brother’s girlfriend.”

“You think?” Jason asked, sarcastically.

“Ha ha.”

“See, she thinks I’m funny, why can’t you fucks?”

Y/N laughed and then asked Dick, who was playing RE8 at the time, staring at the photo of Donna Bentiveno, “She’s cute, isn’t she, Dick?”

“Have I been staring?”

“Let’s just say Angie is probably very pissed at you.”

“Oh! Whoops. There’s a point to this, I forgot.”

“I don’t blame you, I remember forgetting there was a point and the little bitch devil doll would attack you.”

“Language.”

“Oh no, you’re lame. Gross.”

“Excuse me?” Dick asked as the rest of the room erupted in laughter.

“Do you guys see why I like her now?” Jason asked.

“Uh no, she’s mean,” Dick said.

“You’re going to die if you don’t start paying attention, Dick,” Y/N said.

“Oh!” and he died.

“And that kids, is why we listen to the person who’s 100%’ed the game.”

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

Y/N and Jason would spend hours with his brothers and sisters until the sun started to set and they all scattered to their own rooms to  do their own things. you can’t keep a lot of kids in one room for so long.

Once everyone left, Y/N placed her hands on Jason and kissed him, she was actually able to be laid on his pillow, he was able to pin her to the bed. And they did just that. He was on top of her, using his one arm to prop himself up and using his other hand to touch her face.

Her hands found their way into his hair like they always did, she found a lot of joy in playing with his hair. Their tongues danced together, they never fought or anything, they just enjoyed each other when Jason let out a small moan and she let out a small laugh.

“Keep it in your pants, Tiger,” she joked, “You’re not fully healed.”

“You literally smashed your face into another man but I can’t moan when I kiss you?”

“Because I know you want more.”

“Hell yeah I do,” he said as he went back for more, actually using his strength to keep her to the bed, but she didn’t protest this time.

[peace-for-levi]

owo congrats on 300 followers :) mm i’d love a matchup-letter thingy if u don’t mind.

physically, i’m 5’7 (170cm) and i go by they/it pronouns. green eyes, if that matters?? my mbti is intj and 4w5. i really like to write if that’s not obvious.. i’m a super quiet person! hating to get in others’ ways but somehow i manage to be obnoxious and commandeering anyway. but i enjoy sewing, listening to music a lot. i love just observing ppl, watching a show or consuming a piece of media and thinking on it for a long time. i’m very introspective i guess u could say. i read a ton too (or as often as i can anyway) + scrapbooking and collecting little knickknacks. i’m not much of a risk taker (at all) - and much prefer my safe spaces. tho when smth/someone gets me talking i go a million miles an hour sometimes.

i’m sure u know who i would be happy with 😭 male or female is fine - tho i have a preference towards the male characters lol

IDEAL DATES.. mm i hate to go out to loud, crazy places. i’d love to be taken somewhere w/ a beautiful view, just time taken to talk and get to know each other ya know?? i’m happy to just grab some food and chill at home watching movies. me in a relationship means: way too many gifts. i get flustered so damn easily it’s a bit silly - but also my main method of flirting is minor bullying and little touches, like flopping my head on their shoulder or smth 😭🙏 any time is time well spent with an SO - often, but i don’t like to make a big deal out of jus hangin out. i like to fall asleep on discord calls, stay at home with drinks or baking together💔

mm i’ve never bought into marriage. it’s a cute idea tho - if i got married i’d like to have a very small little ceremony and not have it recognized legally lmao. too complicated. it just means a lot. v special, but practical too! i always imagined getting married in spring, nowhere big but a little place v special to me and my SO. hell i’d say over and over that it’s not a big deal, to not have it as a huge ceremony, but it lowkey kills me if a ton of effort is put into *anything* like that for just me.

i would also love to claim a letter👀👀 if that’s okay. from levi. duh.

this is in canonverse/precanonverse, and i always liked the idea of working in the mental health side of the scouts 😭😭 almost purely bc that’s not at all explored in canon and god knows they need it; i assume this position would be very unpopular, and probably working close to hange in some way.

hurt/comfort (!!!!!!!) say: i’ve been relegated to the Garrison for a while out of demand for my work. and i’ve known levi a long time u know? i wanna tell u to see my day6 of kinktober as a reference bc story wise that’s what id like lol. he cares a lot, misses me since i’ve been gone for just over 2 weeks now.

so he’s like: fuck it. i’ll write a long appreciation letter to get out all these mushy feelings and incentivize them to convince their superior to allow them back to the scouts sooner, rather than later. levi is the type to take soo long with these things - but despite being bad with speaking his emotions, he uses straightforward and yet super meaningful ways to tell you that things are much gloomier without you there, the smell of u in the sheets/clothes are fading away, and he needs u back right away.

thank you again uwu ✨

Hi dearest, based on all this, I have decided to match you with…

…Erwin Smith!

(would you believe it was @levi-my-beloved   that helped me with some of this matchup? She’s so reliable, ily bb. Once she gave her opinions, this flowed out so much easier) 

You had me at how introverted you are! I feel like Erwin is someone who can feign extrovertedness but is a big softie who needs his down time in the evening. He can be so confident but he’d always need your loving arms to come home to once all is said and done. I feel like he’d appreciate your quietness. In a modern au, he’d be reading over files or documents and he’d have his fingers lightly scratching your hair or touching you ever so softly as you do your own thing - be it reading, writing, on your phone, etc. Or in canonverse, maybe he’s exhausted after dealing with the brass all day. He might have his head lolled back against the comforter of the sofa and he’s tracing circles into your hands. 

I do hope you consider sewing or making him a scarf or something, because he WILL wear it everywhere. Will boast about it to his friends too. “So, my partner made me this scarf–” “Erwin I didn’t fucking ask about–” “...and it is just so cozy and warm, haven’t caught a cold whenever I wear it.” He won’t stfu. 

I think Erwin really admires your scrapbooking hobby. He might get you a new one, or always have some hidden somewhere so that you never have to spend your own money on them. Or if he’s passing by a stationery store, he might pop in after seeing something in the window. “Mm, yes, this looks cute/(insert adjective)/this matches what they are scrapbooking at the moment.” I am not sure what you scrapbook, but perhaps he might buy you a polaroid camera for one of your birthdays so you don’t have to go out and print or develop your photos.

Speaking of polaroids, you both have polaroid photos in the back of your phone case and in your wallet/purse. Sometimes when he’s working, he leaves the phone facing downwards so that he can see your face and be reminded that everything he does, he does for you and it motivates him when procrastination sets in.

Date wise, I do picture Erwin wanting to pull out all the stops, but he’d consider your need for quieter places. He will book a reservation in a fancy restaurant on special occasions, and perhaps request a booth table, so that you two have your privacy away from the prying eyes of other people. He’s also down for coffee dates too, perhaps on his lunch break! Or maybe you’d pick up a meal-kit while he is working and tell him you’re going to cook for dinner and he helps out, and he might pick up a bottle of wine (if you like alcohol) or your favourite dessert on the way home and then chill in front of the fire and watch a movie. He doesn’t like watching shows and movies in bed, though. Everything done in the bedroom must be separate for what is done throughout the rest of the house. So if you end up falling asleep on him, that’s it. Date over, but he’s carrying you to the bedroom though and tucking you in and tidying up after the two of you downstairs while you try to get warm. 

If you marry him - should you two decide to - he’s happy to follow along on whatever you do. I feel Erwin is down with anything as long as he gets to marry his S/O, but he DOES want the honeymoon after. That’s a non-negotiable for him. He needs you all to himself for that week (two weeks? idk) And he’d take you somewhere tropical-ish. I do see him wanting to go to the Maldives or any place with a beach. He loves to surf and if you’re up for it, he’d definitely teach you. So Hawaii is another place on his mind. 

here is your moodboard!

and here, is your letter from levi!

[hglog]

SECRET JACKALOPE 2022

Secret Jackalope is an event in the OSR discord server where we each write a prompt, and then are randomly assigned each other's prompts to write a full blog post about.

My prompt came from discord user Dread Pirate Swagmaster#2135, who asked for 5 classic magical items, and twists/curses for each of them.

I was a little unsure about how to select my items, since if you're running an OSR game then most "classic" dnd items will already have compatible rules for them. Instead, I pulled magical items and artifacts from a variety of non-ttrpg sources.

These cursed items range from strict downgrades to perfectly usable items in their own right (that could hopefully still mess an unsuspecting adventurer up if they're expecting it to work like the original). I wrote 4 variants of each item, for a total of 25 magic items. I did my best to make them system neutral.

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1. Ancient Elven Dagger

Same stats as a +1 dagger, or a +1 short sword if wielded by a small creature such as a halfling, goblin or gnome.

The dagger glows when near goblins. Starting with a barely perceptible light at about half a mile away, it can get as bright as a torch when within a few feet.

1d4 twists/curses:

The maximum brightness of the dagger is greatly increased, getting as bright as a torch 100 feet away and being so bright within 25 feet as to cause disadvantage on all rolls that rely on vision (including attack rolls).

Instead of glowing, the dagger causes nearby goblins to glow.

The dagger is actually an ancient Goblin sword, which glows to signify a worthy wielder. Goblins will want to steal it from its wielder, and the sword grants them advantage when rolling to do so. (Or gives the wielder disadvantage when trying to stop them.) Roll an additional magical sword effect (on whatever table you can find) which can only be accessed by goblins.

Casts a field of magical darkness instead of light.

---

2. Black Lotus

An incredibly rare flower that can be consumed when casting a spell to increase the result of every die rolled for it by 3 (even past the usual maximum face of the die).

1d4 twists/curses:

When consumed, it expends all spell slots/spells/MD/mana/whatever. Basically once consumed the caster can't use any more magic until they do whatever it is in your system that replenishes spent magic.

When consumed, it appears to have no effect. Instead, the bonus is applied to the first spell its user casts tomorrow.

Releases a cloud of pollen which sends anyone who inhales it into a death-like sleep for 2d12 hours.

Reduces the result of every die rolled by 3 instead.

---

3. Green Sash

The person wearing this sash is unable to be killed by direct violence - they can be reduced to zero hit points (or whatever the moment before death is in your system) but will not die. Limbs and heads can be reattached if necessary.

1d4 twists/curses:

Any physical harm or wounds caused by the wearer will be dealt back to them in exactly a year and one day. This can kill them even if they're still wearing the sash.

The wearer must agree when challenged to a contest or duel.

The wearer must keep the sash a secret, and loses its effects of anyone finds out about it.

Instead, the sash protects the wearer from death by any cause other than direct violence.

---

4. Blinker Stone

A gemstone that fits in the palm of a hand. Allows its owner to close their eyes and look at at the stone's immediate surroundings at any time, though inanimate objects appear hazy and colorless. The stone's owner can teleport it back to their hand at any time.

1d4 twists/curses:

The stone's owner can cast spells from the location of the stone, however they can't retrieve it as they could a normal Blinker Stone.

Instead of revealing its surroundings in the same plane, the stone is tied to another plane.

The stone is cracked. If its owner attempts to retrieve it, there's a 50% chance they teleport to its location instead.

Something is watching you through it.

---

5. Compliant Staff

This staff can expand to the size of a pillar, approximately one foot in diameter. Its height (maximum 50 feet) stays proportional to its width when out in the open but otherwise won't exceed the space available to it (so no punching through ceilings).

1d4 twists and curses:

Instead of growing, the staff shrinks down to the size of a needle.

Its weight hardly increases with it, leaving it extremely light and easy to be knocked over or broken in its larger state.

The staff's default state is its larger one, and it will grow to that size if left unattended.

The staff only grows in diameter, staying the same length.

---

The Ancient Elven Dagger is based on Sting from The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. The Black Lotus is based on the one from Magic: the Gathering, with curse #3 being the Black Lotus from Conan the Barbarian. The Green Sash is based on the sash/girdle Sir Gawain gets in the story of Gawain and the Green Knight. The Blinker Stone is from Gunnerkrigg Court. The Compliant Staff is based on the one Sun Wukong had (and the one Goku had in Dragon Ball).

I was a little worried about the Blinker Stone being too powerful - it’s basically like a 5e familiar (you can see through its eyes and cast spells from its location, two things ad&d familiars couldn’t do) with the downside of it being a rock. If you need a downside, I didn’t include this in its description, but in the source material the user creates sort of a projection of themselves when looking through it that can be seen or even “physically” attacked by ghosts and magical creatures and such.