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wandafiction · 3 months

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Princess - Just Us Chapter 72

Warnings: Little Bit of Hurt and Angst

Word Count: 3351

Series List | Chapter 71 | Chapter 73

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(Wanda PoV)

Nat left about 30 minutes ago meaning that it's been nearly 3 hours since I've heard from Y/n, not that I need to hear from her every second of every day. But now I know what day it is, I'm more worried than I was before. I need to stay here though in case she comes back, and her finds my friends is turned off so I don't even know where I would start looking if I did leave to find her.

I'm sitting on one of the stools at the island nursing a cup of tea, my leg bouncing uncontrollably as my eyes are locked onto the dark screen of my phone. Just waiting for a notification, anything that tells me she is at least alive. I'm allowed to worry.

I know I just went over with Nat that I would give her time and space, especially since I hurt her in the worst possible way the day before their anniversary. I don't even know where to start on apologising. No apology will fix that which I just broke more, I have to get her to believe I didn't mean it. I don't need the forgiveness this is about her needing to hear that I was wrong. That she does know what it's like to be a mother.

It doesn't matter if your child lives forever, dies at 2 months, if they don't even make it to birth. It doesn't matter if the child is from a previous relationship, or adopted, or even if you have raised the child of a family member. If you love, care for and show every day how proud you are and how loved they are by you. Well then you are a good mother. You become a mother the moment the stick says positive, and I all but stripped that title away from Y/n.

I don't know how to fix it. I don't know if I can. But I do know, if she allows me too, I will show her everyday how much she means to me and how much of a good mother she is. She is a mother to Evie. She is a mother figure to both the boys. She needs to know that, then she can ask me anything she needs to and I will try my best to answer them.

No, I won't try. I will answer them all.

I just need to be upfront with her about why I'm so closed off, she needs to know that it's going to take time but she can slowly start chipping away at my walls. She needs to know that she is loved.

I'm brought out of my inner monologue by my phone screen lighting up with her contact name. It's not a message though. She is calling me. I answer it as soon as I see her name pop up, but refrain myself from sounding excited that she is willing to talk to me.

Me: Hello

My voice is hesitant as the other end of the line crackles and pops with the sound of static, I'm not sure how she would have reacted if I called her baby so I refrained from using a pet name. The line continues to crackle and pop; I start to worry once again.

Me: Y/n are you there?

I hear a sharp breath from the end of the line.

Y/n: I'm here princess.

My heart soares as I hear her call me that name but don't let it take over my worry.

Me: Hi baby.

I hear her sigh, maybe the wind whistling in the background. So she is outside. I hear her sniffle and a small sob echoes down the line.

Me: What can I do baby? What do you need?

Y/n: You

She chokes out and my heart breaks at how emotional she sounds.

Me: I'm here baby. What do you need me to do?

Y/n: Can you come and pick me up? I can't leave by myself.

Me: Where are you?

Y/n: The Marble Cemetery.

I press my lips together to hold back my own sob, trying to keep my composure for her.

Me: I'm on my way.

Y/n: Can you stay?

Me: On the phone?

Y/n: Please.

Me: Of course I will. I'm on my way now. Do you need anything else before I leave?

Y/n: No. I just need you.

Me: Okay, I'm on my way.

Y/n: mhmm.

Me: Baby

Y/n: Yeah?

Me: I love you

Y/n: I love you too Princess.

Me: Right I'm just getting in the uber.

Y/n: Can you talk to me? It's too quiet here, I don't like it when it's quiet.

Me: What do you want to talk about?

Y/n: mmm, what have you got going on at work?

Me: Well me and Nat have a big meeting on Wednesday with some investors from Ukraine. They want to invest in certain aspects of the company, but in return want something like a welcome package. So we put a few ideas together last week, and are going to put them forward at the meeting.

Y/n: Am I allowed to know what is going to be in the welcome package?

Me: You can know that it's some medical stuff.

Y/n: That's all I get to know isn't it?

I smile when I hear a small giggle from her end and I let out a small laugh as I nod against the phone.

Me: It is. It's super confidential I'm afraid. What about you? What's going on at work for you?

Y/n: I, uh. I'm taking the rest of the week off. I think I need it. I just need a break from it all.

My mouth goes dry at her words. Does she mean us too? No stop Wanda, this isn't about me it's about her. And what she needs.

Me: We all deserve a break at some point. You, more than most people.

Y/n: Why because I'm so broken?

She scoffs and I close my eyes for a second stopping the tears from spilling, not that she can see them if they do.

Me: No not because of that. But you do need to escape for a while, just to help you organise yourself. Not put yourself back together as such, but just allow yourself to feel everything you've been harbouring.

Y/n: I'm sorry I didn't mean to snap, today is just a really tough day.

Me: It's okay baby, no need to apologise. I can't imagine how hard today is for you.

Y/n: You know what today is?

Me: I do, Nat told me.

Y/n: Wait Natasha knows?

Me: I will explain later, but yeah she does.

Y/n: Okay. You're not mad?

Me: Mad? Baby why would I be mad.

Y/n: For not telling you what day it was, or even where I was going.

Me: I'm far from mad Y/n. It's just good to hear your voice. I know it hasn't been long since you messaged me but I was a little worried just for your safety more than anything.

Y/n: Well I'm safe.

Me: But you're not okay.

My voice is unassuming and attentive. It wasn't a question but a fact and by the sounds of Y/n's sigh on the end of the line I'm correct.

Y/n: No.

Me: Anything I can do?

Y/n: Not while over the phone.

Me: Okay, I'm 5 minutes away okay.

Y/n: mkay.

Me: Hey baby.

Y/n: Yeah?

Me: Do you want me to come into the cemetery or do you want me to stand by the gates?

Y/n: oh, uhm. You can come in if you want.

Me: This isn't about what I want Y/n, it's about what you need. Now, do you need me to come in? Or do you need me to wait outside?

Y/n: I want to want you here, but just not today. Let me know when you're at the gates and I will come and meet you.

Me: Okay baby. I'm literally two minutes away. I will let you know when I'm at the gates but please don't rush what you need to do, I can wait outside as long as you need.

Y/n: It's okay, I've done and said everything I needed to today. I just couldn't get myself to leave, I wasn't strong enough.

Her voice cracks, filled with so many emotions and I know she is trying to keep it all in.

Me: It's okay to let go sometimes Y/n. You don't always have to be so strong, you have people around you that will hold you up while you fall.

Y/n: I can't, not in front of Evie.

Me: Y/n your daughter. Can I use her name?

I don't want to have to keep referring to her as daughter or child but I don't know how Y/n will react at this moment if her daughter's name leaves my lips. I hear a faint hum before she speaks.

Y/n: Yeah.

Me: Y/n. I can't speak for her. I know that, but from my own experience with the boys. And I know it's not the same. That being said, your children know when something is up, even if you hide it as best as you can. They always know, they just can be afraid to question it because they are afraid you're mad at them.

Y/n: So you're saying she thinks I'm mad at her?

Me: No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying there is no point in hiding from her because she already knows that there is something bothering you. It's like when you talk to me or if you talked to Sarah about your feelings. You're allowed to break down in front of Evie Y/n, she won't love you any less for doing so.

She doesn't say anything, she doesn't need to because I hear her sobbing down the line. She keeps saying sorry and I know she is talking to Evie, it breaks my heart to hear her like this.

I'm angry at myself for not picking up on some of the things Nat mentioned, how could I not see this? Looking back at all our interactions, I wonder how many times I've brushed off a change in her demeanour or tone, ignoring the change. Pretending it wasn't there. Or maybe I didn't notice the change, which makes it even worse. I should have been able to see these small changes in Y/n, and because I didn't she is now crying on the other end of the phone while sitting alone in the cemetery.

Me: Baby I'm just getting out of the car. I'm right outside the gate when you need me.

Y/n: Thank you for coming

Me: I will always come when you need me to. Always.

Y/n: I love you….

Me: But we have a lot to talk about.

Y/n: Yeah. I want you to know I want us to work, I don't want us to end. Is that something you want?

Me: I want the same thing as you Y/n but we have a lot to work on to get to a place where we are good.

Y/n: we got lost in the haze didn't we.

Me: We did, but we can get through this.

Y/n: I know we can. I don't want to do this over the phone, I'm on my way to you.

Me: Only if that's what you need right now.

Y/n: It's what I need. I can't stay here, anyway I'm freezing my ass off.

We both huff out a laugh, and hearing it brings me a small amount of hope and joy.

Me: Do you want me to stay on the phone till you get here?

Y/n: Please. Is it okay if I say bye to them while your still here

Me: It's more than okay baby, it's me who is intruding on the moment.

Y/n: It feels good having you here, you know. Even if it's just your voice. It's calming the storm that I've been battling all day.

Me: I will do whatever I can to help keep that storm at bay until we can find a way to rid you of it.

Y/n: Thank you.

I don't say anything as I hear rustling around on her end, and I can only assume she has moved to sit or kneel in front of her loved ones graves. I don't say anything, not wanting to ruin any sort of moment like this ever. I can hear the pain in her voice once she starts speaking.

Y/n: I love you, sweet dreams my beautiful angel. And my beautiful colubris I miss and love you so much. Amor vincit omnia, et nos cedamus amori.

I hear the tone in her voice change, it's less pained. It almost sounds happy, she seems to forget we are still on the phone, and her next words make my heart soar out of my chest with all the love in the world.

Y/n: I want you to meet Wanda one day. God you would have loved her. I know that because I love her, and you always loved what I loved, well apart from going to the gym. Now that you hated. I hope one day she will be up for meeting you, or that I will be ready to introduce her to you. She is important to me, just as you are and it's important to me that I introduce you to her. I don't know if it's something that she wants, and I would never force it on her, but I hope that if I bring her then I won't feel guilty anymore. I mean I don't feel guilty for moving on because I am allowed to do that, and I'm so glad it's Wanda I found. I just feel guilty because I love her just as much as I loved you and I never thought I'd feel that much love again.

She lets out a small giggle stopping herself from the ramble, that has caused tears to spring to my ears but a small smile is painted on her face. I took everything in. I will hold this close to my heart, but the thing that is making me smile is how she said one day. She still sees a future with me.

I've just got to support her through the guilt, and the loss and everything else that comes with loving someone who isn't your wife, children who aren't her daughter. I will be there every step of the way if she needs me to.

Y/n: Sleep tight my angel and my colubris.

There's a few moments of silence before I hear movement again.

Y/n: Thank you for being here with me Princess.

Me: Always my sweet girl.

Y/n: I like when you call me that.

Me: Then I won't ever stop.

Y/n: Good. I'm on my way to the gates now.

Me: Do you want me to stay on the phone till you get here?

Y/n: Please.

Me: Of course, sweet girl.

I can hear her footsteps against the ground, her breath a little laboured from being in the cold for so long. My eyes search in front of me, as my ears continue to listen to the phone call in case she needs me at any point. When I finally catch sight of her I chew my lip nervously, my eyes searching her figure and frown when I see her shivering. How long has she been out here? I can see from here that her lips are turning blue.

Y/n: Hey Princess.

Her voice in my ear makes me startle a little, completely forgetting we were on a phone call for a split second and I hear a soft laugh leave her lips.

Y/n: Sorry I didn't mean to scare you.

Me: It's okay, I forgot that we were on the phone to each other for a second.

Y/n: Ah, that makes sense. You look very comfy in those clothes but you look cold.

Me: So do you.

Y/n: I've been out here a couple hours, I am fucking frozen.

Me: I would scold you for staying out so long, but I know you needed it and I cannot scold you if there is no fault.

She stops a few meters away from me smiling at me with so much love my heart practically jumps out of my chest. I feel myself give her my fuzzy smile and her eyes light up at the sight. She still doesn't move though so I tilt my head in question, and she starts nibbling at her lips before speaking into her phone.

Y/n: Can I hug you?

Me: Please do.

I bounce excitedly on my tiptoes as she takes a few big steps and wraps her arms around my body pulling me closer. I move my arms to wrap around her waist and pull her more against me as I bury my head into her chest. I feel her kiss the top of my head a few times before resting her chin on it. Her big hands rubbing up and down my back as I hold on as tight as I possibly can to the back of her overcoat. Both our phones are still in our hands so I quickly hang up and stuff it in my pocket so I can hold her properly, y/n doing the same.

"I shouldn't have left the way I did last night."

"Don't apologise. You needed space and you communicated that, you didn't leave in any other way but for what you needed. And that is more than okay." She pulls away from me slightly, cupping my face with her gloved hands and tilting it so I'm looking at her.

"That's not what I meant, and I treasure the fact that you don't hate me for leaving. But I meant how I left after saying your name. I should have never left you like that, no matter what was happening. I should have said 'I will see you tomorrow princess'. Just because of what happened it does not mean I can treat you the way I did. Now I have a few things to get off my chest, that I need to tell you so that we can work on us."

"And I have some things I need to tell you too."

"I love you so much princess. We are going to be okay."

"I love you too, my sweet girl. You don't know how much that means to me to hear you say that."

"It's true, because we are going to talk. We are going to make a plan on how to deal with certain things. Then we are going to have dinner with the boys and have a nice quiet night in."

"Are you sure you're ready to do this today?" There must be so much going on in her head right now, and I can't in the right mind let her talk about us if she is not all present in the room.

"If I don't do it today, I don't think I will be able to until I lose control again."

"You lost control last night?" My eyes start to water when I realise just how tough her night would have been.

"I did a little. But I came here this morning and got some closure about a few things which has allowed me the strength to be able to talk with you."

"Okay. But can we please talk inside? I can't feel my toes" She laughs at me, her hot breath against my face bringing some relief to my cold skin.

"Of course. So yours or mine princess?"

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#wanda maximoff #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maxmoff x y/n #wanda x reader #wanda x you #just us series

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heosphoro-s · 3 years

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Middle of the Night - OM! Mammon

A/N: OKAY NOT TO BE K-POP ON MAIN BUT I KEEP THINKING ABOUT THIS SONG AND MAMMON SO HERE WE ARE. I didn’t want to make it angsty hehe so it’s another fun little fluff-whatever piece <3

Rating: PG I guess? Some kissing.

The song is Middle of the Night - Monsta X

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Nobody's ever done me like that

I thought I'd never ever need you

Now all I wanna do is see you

Mammon groaned turned his phone in his hands over and over again. The messaging app was open. He drafted message after message to send to MC only to delete the whole thing every time he typed something out.

You make me wanna run it all back

"Hey human. It's me, the Great Mammon!"

"YO YO YO HUMAN"

"You missin' me yet human?"

But he just can't seem to find the perfect thing to say. What should he say anyways? MC isn't THAT important to him, right? RIGHT?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Where you wanna go

Who you're taking home

'Cause I can't lose everything I know

I hate sleeping alone

I'm picking up the phone

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But who, I don't wanna know

"How ya holdin' up?"

"We all miss ya here at the house y'know?"

"Not me, of course, ya know how clingy my brothers are. I just worry about them that's all."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hey MC"

'Cause I can never wait for the morning to rise

We're kissing in the car underneath of the night

You've got me

Mammon's face grew hot as his anxieties about MC's feelings towards him dissipated. He knocked furiously on the door while shouting to MC that it's HIM, THE GREAT MAMMON IS HERE.

And I'll be on the way in the middle of night

What if MC has someone else over right now. What if... that's why they didn't reply to me? What if I'm not- they don't want- what if this was a mistake.

Mammon's phone buzzed loudly in his pocket startling his thoughts. Mammon unlocked his phone and check the notification.

"M, you know what? I've been afraid to admit it to myself but I missed you. I wish I could just walk down the hall and see you like old times."

MC bolted to the front door and unlocked everything in record time to pull Mammon inside.

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"MAMMON I HAVE NEIGHBORS. IT'S THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT." MC protested as they pulled Mammon inside.

And I'll be on the way in the middle of night

Mammon waited for a reply for all of 3 seconds before snapping his fingers and appearing at MC's front door. Mammon's hand hovered over the doorbell. He couldn't bring himself to ring it.

It's something in the way you've been running my mind

If you want me to stay for the rest of my life

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Mammon's heart was beating so loud he could barely hear himself think. This is it. He was standing in front of them after so long. Everything from MC's frazzled look, their scent, their-

"M, you okay?"

MC's hands cupped Mammon's face and pulled him close to them. Time stopped as MC get closer and closer to Mammon's lips. The heat returned once again but this time they both feel it. They feel it in their faces, their heart, their stomach, and their-

MC's voice brought him back to reality. He took a small step forward to close the distance between them. His hands grabbing MC's own. He pressed gentle kisses all over their hands. His blue and gold eyes seems to bore into MC's very soul.

You've got me

"I haven't been okay until now." Mammon whispered.

And then their lips met.

Mammon's lips was the answer to MC's prayers. Warmth enveloped them both as MC parted their lips and Mammon eagerly deepened the kiss. MC's fingers intertwined themselves in Mammon's white locks, holding him in place for fear of him disappearing from their life again. They cling to each other desperately hoping this moment would never end. When they finally separated, MC was seeing stars from the breath that they didn't know they were hold.

"Breathe, babes, breathe. I'm here," Mammon said in their ear as he held them close. "What do you say we go for a drive? Like old times? I saw a nice '73 Chevelle downstairs." Mammon wiggled his eyebrows.

"MAMMON NO. WE ARE NOT STEALING MY NEIGHBOR'S CAR."

#obey me #obey me shall we date #obey me headcanons #obey me mammon #mammon x mc #mammon x reader #obey me fluff #obey swd #auri.writes #i love my stinky money boy #rub his uhhh for good luck at the casino ig #obey me mammon x mc #obey me mammon x reader #obey me mammon x you

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scribble-blog · 5 years

Text

Soulmate AU part 5!!

First • Previous • Here • Next

Tim growled as he kept searching. There were no messages sent from Paris in the last five years in the League’s database. There weren’t any mention of a Hawkmoth, a Ladybug, or a Chat Noir in any news site. As far as he could tell, the girl had been lying to him almost entirely.

Except that she was Damian’s soulmate. And there was no faking the sheer exhaustion in her eyes when she spoke about Paris being besieged for the last four years.

And his gut was telling him to keep looking.

After an hour, and switching his location so he appeared to be operating out of France, he finally found two leads- one, a juvenile blog that had some questionable information interspersed with straight up tabloid trash, and the other an app, which he eagerly downloaded to his phone, waiting.

Finally the app popped up, showing a little Ladybug icon, and he clicked it. LadyBugOut! Sprung to life on his screen, and he perused the small icons. Small and stylized animals, a ladybug, a black cat, a bee, a turtle, a fox, a snake, a dragon, a peacock, and a butterfly. From what he remembered of his chat with Marinette, one of the heroes was Ladybug, so he clicked it.

It showed him a long line of posts, mostly videos. The girl in them was short, with dark blue-black hair and bright blue eyes, and a glaringly red and black spotted suit and mask.

“Salut, Paris! Back again with an update and a few things to address regarding the recent akuma, Lady Silence.”

He flicked to the next one.

“Salut, Paris, I’m here with Reine Abeille today,” the camera moves to another hero in yellow and black, blond hair in a high bun as opposed to Ladybug’s pigtails. “You’ve all sent in quite a few questions, and we wanted to take the time to respond today!”

“Salut, Paris! Just a quick update, I know many of you have been wondering about the recent addition to our team, Viperion.”

“Salut, Paris. I’d like to start this video with a moment of silence and recognition for the 73 lives lost in the recent attack by-“

Tim pauses it. A team of four, possibly more heroes? Perhaps nine to match the icons? A publicly revered and loved hero, to the point where she does question and answers with them. A villain that caused a death toll of seventy three people less than a month ago.

How in the world could they have missed this?

“By Evilutionist. We ask that if you know one of these victims you reach out to them and offer a hand, a hug, or even just a smile as they go about their days.”

He leant back in his chair, bewildered. Lives lost, but still there to be comforted, and going about their lives?

He got up to go find another cup of coffee. He was starting to understand how long his night was going to be.

Before he started watching through the whole long list of posts, he checked the other tabs. The black cat had a map that was currently inactive, but also logs of past maps detailing a red line, a purple line, and a larger area shaded in grey. They were labeled accordingly, Ladybug’s Path, Akuma’s Path, and Area of Attack/Destruction.

There were hundreds of maps logged.

The Bee contained large organized lists of homes and businesses that had registered as safe shelters during akuma attacks, a compilation of helplines and websites where you could learn more about staying safe during an attack, how to stay prepared and aware, and what necessities to keep stocked in cases of longer term akuma attacks.

The Fox seemed open to the public, where they could present their own posts alongside Ladybug’s about good, happy things.

The Turtle was a series of videos and posts about relaxation, meditation, coping, and self-care that could build the emotional strength to resist akumas.

The Dragon was a series of videos featuring another superhero- he assumed it was the Dragon themed one- and Ladybug, demonstrating self defense techniques and other strategies for avoiding, outrunning, fighting, or otherwise protecting yourself from akumas.

The Snake was, to his surprise, just a series of playlists, seemingly cultivated by each hero.

The Peacock held another map, also inactive, until the app chimed loudly. As he watched, a notification popped up, similar to an Emergency Alert System notification, that said in all capitals, AKUMA ATTACK.

He pressed the X on it, and watched as the Black Cat symbol seemed to glow green. He switched back, and the map was now accessible, a purple dot glowing near the Eiffel Tower. It started moving, and the shaded grey filled in around it, following the dot. He turned back to his computer and started searching frantically for some sort of news coverage. After a minute, he found a Facebook profile and opened it, and someone’s livestream was rolling.

He looked back at his phone to see that the red Ladybug dot had appeared near the edge of the grey, closing in on the purple dot. The livestream drew him back. It showed an apartment view of the Seine, and the road of broken detritus that trailed behind the akuma’s path.

“-Quel connard ne passe pas une bonne nuit alors, je suppose, mais honnêtement, cela ne devrait pas être mon problème.” The camera flipped to the face of a tired woman. “J’ai du travail en quatre heures et je ne me suis endormi que trois heures plus tôt, mais un trou du cul supersonique fait voler en éclats les fenêtres de gauche et de droite.” The camera flipped again, showing not the view but the clearly broken window. “Baise ça, mec, j'essaye de DORMIR,”

-some asshole isnt having a good night then, i guess, but honestly that shouldnt be my problem. ive got work in four hours and i only fell asleep three hours ago but some supersonic asshole is shattering windows left and right. fuck this, dude, im trying to SLEEP,

The feed went silent as the akuma lunged back into view down by the water. It was a large red woman, with wires that sprouted from her and trailed along like muscles, enhancing what seemed to be the speakers that her body was made of.

He could see her open her mouth and roar, right as a smaller red figure bounded in, dodging the concentrated sound blast and grabbing something from around her neck and snapping it in half.

The woman on the street reverted in a flash of light to a more normal appearance, and Tim watched awestruck as Ladybug tossed her yo-yo into the air and shouted something.

The wave of light that spread outward was dazzling, lighting up Paris’ night sky. In front of the camera, as the light washed over the holder, their window was suddenly whole and unbroken again. The street beneath was clean.

“Merci, Ladybug,” the tired narrator muttered. “Bonne nuit.”

The camera shut off.

Tim stared, awestruck.

“She fixes it all,” he breathed. “That’s why she was talking about people being alive after they die, they come back to life. She fixes all the damage. It probably destroys most records of the damage as well.”

The app was accessible because of her direct part in making it, he would assume. He saved the video.

Time to get Bruce.

TAGLIST:

@the-fusionist @rebecarojas07 @lowandco @kotaleartzu @resignedcatservant @alenee13 @mystery-5-5 @ladybug-182 @actual-disaster-human @loysydark @rumbelle18 @magic-miraculous @vixen-uchiha @athena452 @mochegato @ash-amg @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @thestressmademedoit @sassakitty @doriebell @toodaloo-kangaroo @myazael @theatreandcomicfreak @mer-mel @dahjokester @northernbluetongue @abrx2002 @area51qt @jessigurl-design @renscorpio @cici-schnee @multplelifes @redscarlet95 @razzledazzle247 @rosep16 @emotionalsupportginger @kceedraws @tired-butterfly @kuroko26 @catthhay @moonystars14 @shamefullove @shreky-boi @imanerddealwith @chaosace @captainmac6 @purple-people-eaters-productions @crazylittlemunchkin @weird-pale-blonde-person @bigpicklebananatree

#maribat #daminette #daminette soulmates #soulmate au #fanfic

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brieflygorgeouss · 5 years

Text

for the prompts 41. i’ll keep you safe and 73. i missed you (the ask with those prompts miraculously disappeared from my inbox! i swear it was real lmao)

On Monday, Eliott comes home.

Lucas is there at the airport, waiting for him. He stands and waits and waits until people from the plane from New York start pouring in through the door. There are screaming kids and messy-haired women and guys in hoodies and sweatpants, all looking rough after such a long flight.

And then there’s Eliott.

Lucas’s field of vision narrows down to the sight of him the moment he as much as catches a glimpse. Eliott looks exactly the same Lucas remembers him, except maybe seems taller, which — that’s unfair. He’s looking around, searching, with a heavy-looking bag hanging from his shoulder and his hair mussed, and when he spots Lucas in the crowd, his face lights up with a smile brighter than any kind of constellation Lucas has ever seen.

Lucas doesn’t quite run to him, but it’s a near thing.

Hi, he wants to scream as he’s walking, as Eliott’s pushing past other people, too, hi, you asshole, welcome back to the country, hello, I can’t believe you’re here.

And then Eliott is right there, still smiling, and his eyes are so, so bright, and Lucas can’t really help the way he throws himself right into his arms, right there and then, amidst all of the noise and the commotion, amidst hundreds of other people. For him, there only matters one.

”Hi, Lu,” Eliott mutters right into Lucas’s hair, presses his face close, warm and real, and finally here, finally not hundreds of kilometres away, not only an image on Lucas’s computer screen or a notification on his phone. His embrace is strong and solid, and Lucas lets himself melt into it, imagines Eliott pressing them closer and closer until they merge together and just stay that way.

”Hi,” he says, not knowing if it’s happiness tightening his throat or something else, something bigger. ”I missed you.”

”Missed you, too,” Eliott says, presses a hand firmer to Lucas’s back. Lucas wonders, briefly, if he can feel just how quickly his heart is beating. Then, Eliott adds, in a slightly quieter voice, ”God, you have no idea.”

Lucas might, actually. If all the restless nights he spent rereading Eliott’s newest texts mean something, or FaceTime calls that are never enough, or staying up late despite the time difference, he actually might have an idea of what Eliott means. It’s the ache in his chest that never really goes away these days. The ache in his chest that slowly starts to dissipate now.

But he doesn’t say any of that. Instead, he lets himself lean a little bit heavier into Eliott for one, two, three more seconds, breathes him in and revels, just a little bit, in how reluctant Eliott seems to be to let him go when he, eventually, tries to moves away.

”Alright,” he says, only an inch away from Eliott’s chest because that’s everything Eliott allows him, and Lucas feels like that’s too much anyway. ”Let’s get you home.”

(The last time they were at the airport, Lucas kissed him.

Which wasn’t a mistake, but was not the right thing to do, either. It was stupid, is what it was. Eliott was going away for a long time, with his two giant suitcases and dreams waiting to be fulfilled somewhere else, and it was idiotic, to try and begin something, whatever this spark in Lucas’s heart was, here in the face of so many things coming to an end. But Lucas was teary-eyed and so, so sad, and his heart was breaking. So he kissed him.

It wasn’t, in hindsight, the best of choices, to show your best friend you’re in love with him mere minutes before said best friend gets on a plane and you don’t see each other for the next 6 months.)

On Tuesday, they catch up.

”So,” Lucas says as they’re sitting in the kitchen, Eliott properly at the table and Lucas at the kitchen counter with his legs dangling in the air, although it isn’t even, technically, his own house, ”how’s New York?”

Eliott rolls his eyes at him.

”You ask like you don’t know,” he says. He sounds fond. If Lucas were to describe it, that’s the word he would use. ”In case you forgot already, we call each other every other day.”

That’s true. Lucas’s messed up sleep schedule can attest to that, with how late he stays up sometimes, even when he has a test the next day or stares at the clock at 2 in the morning and already knows he won’t wake up in time to get to class but doesn’t go to sleep anyway. Eliott does things like that, too, and then texts Lucas stuff like, ”the professor yelled at me for falling asleep in class, but it was worth it for getting to talk to you yesterday,” and Lucas stares at the messages for longer than he should, every time. Sometimes it doesn’t work out, but they try — both of them. It’s nice, knowing Eliott doesn’t forget about him, all the way over there at the other end of the world, when they’re both trying as hard as they are.

But he still says, just because he can, ”So what?” and then, raising his eyebrows at Eliott, hoping it comes off as it feels — like a challenge, ”I still don’t really know. I’ve never been there. And whose fault is that, I wonder.”

Eliott smiles at that, but it’s a little crooked where it shouldn’t be, all of a sudden. Lucas wants to reach and straighten it out, smooth it out like creases on a sheet of paper. ”You know I’d take you there with me if I could.”

Lucas knows. They’d talked about it, time and time again, and Lucas even cried once, hoping Eliott couldn’t hear it in his voice as he pressed the phone harder against the side of his face, as if that could make Eliott sound like he was really here.

Couldn’t you go to film school somewhere closer, he’d told him then, knowing what he was saying was unfair but doing it anyway. Lucas is, you see, selfish like that. You’re so unfair, you asshole.

And Eliott had said, then, I know, and, always, always knowing what it really was that Lucas meant even when he didn’t say it explicitly, I wish you were here, too.

But Lucas can’t really leave, and Eliott can’t really stay. So here’s what they have — a week together, and then they’ll be off to lead their separate lifestyles again, far away, Lucas in Paris, Eliott in New York. That’s how it is.

Lucas thinks he should be used to it by now. And yet.

”I can’t afford the tickets anyway,” is what he says in response, hopes it’s good enough to mask the sudden notes of sadness creeping into his voice. ”And before you say anything, no, I’m not letting you buy them for me. You can spend your scholarship money in a better way.”

Eliott huffs, but he’s smiling. The last time they argued about this, they stayed up on FaceTime until 3 AM.

”There isn’t a better way to spend it,” Eliott says, but it’s only a weak jab, a reminder of their previous, much more heated argument, and Lucas can see it in his eyes that he brings it up again only to drop it a second later. Lucas swings his legs, kicks at the kitchen cupboards, lets a small smile slip onto his face.

”When you become a famous director,” he says, frames it like it’s a compromise of sorts, ”then you can buy me tickets. How about that?”

Eliott hums and then smiles adorably. Lucas could look at his smile for hours on end. ”I’ll hold you to that.”

(They’ve been toeing the line for so long that Lucas wonders, sometimes, if they’ll ever stop at all.

Or maybe it’ll be like this forever — Lucas trying not to read too much into all the things that Eliott is saying, and Eliott saying them anyway. Looking at each other like they’re more than they really are. Staying up all night talking, but not about what matters the most, not about what seems to always echo in the back of Lucas’s head once he hears Eliott’s voice. Kissing at the airport and then not mentioning it once.)

On Wednesday, Eliott drags Lucas out of his house and demands that he show him ”what’s new”.

”Nothing’s new,” Lucas tells him, trying to sound upset because Eliott woke him up at 7 am and then proceeded to drag him out of bed without even feeling sorry for it, but he’s not really succeeding much. They’re on the subway. It’s too crowded for Lucas’s liking, but he uses that as an excuse to press a bit closer to Eliott, to lean on him and to grip his shoulder every time they halt to a stop. ”I don’t know what I’m supposed to show you. You know this city just as well as I do.”

Eliott levels him with a look, but can’t hide the sparks of amusement in his voice. ”Lucas, something had to change since I’ve last been here.” He shrugs. Lucas grips his shoulder tighter. ”I just wanna see what.”

So they go. At 8 am, when it’s still a bit chilly here outside, they walk the streets, and Lucas tries to figure it out. They get a coffee at a cafe Eliott used to go to all the time back in high school that has now changed the owner, and Lucas shows him a bookstore they used to pass on their way to the bus station every day that now is not a bookstore anymore but a vegan chain restaurant.

Eliott tells him, when he sees it, ”I’m devastated.”

Lucas only barks out a laugh.

It’s good to see Eliott back around familiar corners again. A bit surreal, too, but Lucas doesn’t want to think about it too much. Eliott seems to take the city in like it’s his first time here, keeps looking around and smiling at people passing them by as they walk, but at the same time, he just— fits so well in here. He looks like he belongs because he really does. They see a cat at a curb at one point, and Eliott is immediately enchanted, goes over to pet it, and Lucas can’t look away from the picture that it makes.

He’s missed him so much that it hurts a little, even when Eliott’s already here.

They go to an art gallery, too. That is, Lucas guesses, also a part of the city that’s changed, although it barely really counts because it’s just how exhibitions work. But then again, Eliott’s eyes light up like the stars when Lucas suggests it, so. The answer to the question is obvious.

They pay for the tickets, and then Eliott spends at least 10 minutes in front of every single painting, looking and talking to Lucas in a hushed voice, and Lucas complains weakly about how much time Eliott’s taking but doesn’t move a step away.

There is a weird feeling in his chest that takes him a while to identify as relief.

He was worried, in a strange way, about bringing Eliott here. He was worried about many things. So much has changed, during those 6 months — the city, the weather, the weird void in Lucas’s ribcage whenever he thought of Eliott, going from sharply painful to only unpleasantly familiar — that he was afraid Eliott has changed, too. Became someone else, someone who wouldn’t fit in this scene — the art gallery, the fluorescent lights, their casual banter, standing shoulder to shoulder — and Lucas was not there to see. Was not there to catch up with the changes.

”What do you think this one is called?” Eliott asks, pointing at another art piece, one of many.

”It’s ’The Summer',” Lucas reads off of a metal nameplate under it, but Eliott’s already shaking his head.

”No, not the title, I mean,” he says, bumps his shoulder into Lucas’s like when they were kids, and he was trying to rope Lucas into doing something he considered fun, ”what would you call it? What do you think?”

And, see — Eliott hasn’t changed much at all.

They will be, Lucas thinks, just fine.

(Please, he’s thought to himself in the dark hours of the night so many times, staring up at his ceiling, please let us be fine.

He fucked up, you see. Lucas is aware of that. They both are, really, because Eliott is the smartest guy he knows, and there’s no way in hell he just forgot about it all. And even if he is kind enough to not mention the kiss — just as he was kind enough to kiss Lucas back, briefly, there by the gates, before he turned around and stepped out of sight — they still both know it happened.

Lucas goes through periodical stages of either wanting to erase the kiss from his memory entirely or thinking about it non-stop for days on end.

He knows Eliott only kissed him back because he didn’t want to make a scene, or because he didn’t want to break Lucas’s heart further since it was falling apart already anyway. Lucas knows that. That’s the only explanation that makes sense, really, and he is okay with that. It’s what he eventually gave into, after hours and hours spent on thinking about it, replaying the act of it in his mind until it felt like just another thing he’s made up, until his lips throbbed with the memory.

He’d have to be stupid to hope for Eliott to love him back. He doesn’t. Eliott has never given him any real reason to believe in it, never promised him a thing.

Eliott doesn’t love him back. If he did, a small, more naive part of Lucas’s mind reminds him from time to time, when he gets a bit too hopeful, when he focuses on the what-if scenarios too much, he would have said something. He would have said, wait for me, maybe, or do it again, or something equally earth-shattering, and wouldn’t have left Lucas at this goddamn airport with only a weak smile and a promise of a phone call.

They’ve talked so, so many times, for hours and hours on end, and he never said a thing. Not once.

Lucas can recognise a dismissal when he sees one, is the thing. It’s clear enough.)

On Thursday, Eliott is stolen away.

”Sorry,” he says when Lucas calls him, asking for the plan for the day, ”my family’s coming over today. I tried to get out of it, but…you know how my parents are. We’re having a big dinner, and all.”

For what it’s worth, he doesn’t really sound pleased with it. It still does very little to dilute the heavy feeling suddenly there in Lucas’s gut.

”Oh,” Lucas says. ”Okay. I mean—”

It’s the kind of sentence that starts somewhere but ends nowhere. Lucas cuts himself off, and the awkwardness of it hangs in the air, stretches thin over the distance between Eliott and him.

He isn’t upset. He isn’t. But he was excited about the day, maybe, about another couple of hours they’d get to spend together, the prospect of having Eliott within reach where he’s sure to stay, sure to stick around. They didn’t make any plans, but Lucas was hoping something would just fall into their hands like it always did, and that they would take it and make the best of it, anyway.

But he’s forgotten, maybe, somewhere in the whirlwind of it all, about other people. Of course Eliott’s family wants to spend some time with him, too. Of course. It’s a given when Eliott is so easy to love, and by so, so many people, too.

Lucas has been selfish, he realises, for thinking he can have Eliott only to himself.

”Have fun, then,” he says. His voice is suddenly something stuck between strung-too-tight and forcefully nonchalant, but over the phone, it doesn’t carry. ”Say hi to your parents from me.”

Eliott huffs.

”Sure,” he says, and it sounds like he’s smiling. Lucas imagines it, and it makes him feel a little better. ”I’ll keep you posted on all the most exciting stuff that’s happening.”

”Like what kind of cake your mom made, you mean.”

”And what my grandma is wearing,” Eliott adds, and Lucas can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of him, then. On the other end of the line, Eliott chuckles, too, like he’s pleased. Like making Lucas laugh has been his plan all along, perhaps.

”You’re fucking impossible,” Lucas tells him, the stiffness gone from his voice just like that, and then, ”Okay.”

He spends the day in front of the TV, pretending to watch some talk show that Mika likes and in reality waiting for whatever message Eliott sends him next. It’s nice. His whole family seems to be there for him, grandparents and aunts and cousins, and god knows who else, and Eliott is grinning from ear to ear in every single photo he sends him.

That’s good, Lucas thinks. It’s what Eliott deserves — all this love, all the affection. So many people missing him when he’s away, being so happy when he’s finally home.

A lot of people love him. Lucas is, in the end, only one of many.

(He doesn’t know when it happened. It’s as if Lucas blinked, forgot to pay attention for just a second, and there it was already, this feeling.

Or maybe there was never a specific moment at all. Maybe it happened somewhere between when they were kids, then scrawny teenagers, and then more. Between taking Eliott’s hand for the first time and never wanting to let it go, later. Eliott was the one to talk Lucas into riding his bike down the hill and the one to wipe his tears away afterwards, laughing a little. He was the person who showed him the stars, lay on the grass during hot, enveloping summer nights, mapping constellations out in the sky, and didn’t make fun of how childishly fascinated Lucas was by it. He was the person who snuck into closed playgrounds in the middle of the night with him, just for the thrill of it, and who later got grounded for it alongside. Eliott was the person who told him that there was nothing wrong about girls kissing other girls and boys kissing other boys. He was the first person to openly call Lucas’s father a fucking asshole when he left them, and was there to wipe Lucas’s tears away this time around as well.

Maybe that’s what did it. All those things, all at once.

But a small part of Lucas still wishes someone had told him, impossibly, before it happened — watch out, be careful, in a second, you’re going to fall in love.)

On Friday, they end up celebrating.

It is, to say the truth, Idriss’s idea. He comes over in the afternoon, with Yann and Sofiane in tow, and instead of a hello says, ”Eliott, we need to get drunk together,” and it all goes downhill from there. Their group is chaotic democracy at its finest, and it shows — Lucas’s weak attempts of refusal go unnoticed, and instead, a bottle of cheap wine gets pushed into his hand, someone makes drinks, someone else puts on some music, and that’s how it goes.

Lucas, honestly, doesn’t drink much. It’s a Friday night, and all his friends are here, and he’s having a good time, but then, there’s also this — he wouldn’t want to miss the way Eliott’s eyes shine in the lights of the party, wouldn’t want to miss the way he pushes his hair away from his forehead or how he throws his head back when he laughs. It’s Friday. On Sunday, Eliott is leaving.

Lucas doesn’t want to miss a second of him still being here. He wants to remember it all.

It laces his thoughts with a weird sense of urgency, this sudden awareness of time. He finds a spot in the corner of the living room and just sits and looks, and his chest fills with something heavy, stinging. We have two days, he thinks as he swirls his overly sweet drink around in the plastic cup, amidst the heavy beat of music flooding the room, amidst the laughter and the clinking of glasses fitting right beside it, two days and then he leaves me again.

It’s not fair to think this way. Lucas knows. It’s not like he’s the only one who misses Eliott, or like Eliott doesn’t miss him in return just as much. But he lets himself give in to it, just for a second — missing Eliott already, even when he’s still here, right across the room talking to Arthur, his hair a mess, a bottle of beer in his hand. Lucas doesn’t know what he’ll do when he has to, inevitably, watch Eliott leave again. Stand there at another fucking airport, with their history coming full circle, with his heart breaking again, just like the first time around.

Their eyes lock, then, over the crowd. Eliott smiles at him, his grin wide and genuine and happy, and Lucas tries to smile back in the same manner, wipe away whatever stupid feelings have surfaced on his face, maybe, but he doesn’t think he’s quick enough. Eliott’s smile gets weaker. Something like worry creeps up into his features, etches itself in between his eyebrows.

Lucas gets up from his seat before Eliott can make his way over to him, pushes his way to the bathroom and locks the door, stares at himself in the mirror for a long time, presses his palms to his face when his eyes start to sting.

(He wants Eliott to stay.

He wants a miracle to happen. He wants Eliott to be here, to be close, wants to be able to see him every day, the lines of his smile when he’s happy and the downturn of his mouth then he’s sad, he wants him to be here tomorrow, and the week after that, and later, and later. Lucas wants it all.

He is a selfish person. He knows that. That’s why he kissed Eliott back then in the first place. Sometimes, when he can’t sleep, when he’s sick with sadness and the hollow feeling in his chest, he thinks about asking Eliott to come back. Asking Eliott not to go. All the things he’s never going to say out loud because they would only make matters worse, would only make Eliott hurt. Lucas knows he is happy over there in New York. But it doesn’t stop him from thinking about clutching his hand and saying, please, please just stay. For me.

At least in his own imagination, he’s enough for Eliott to stay. It doesn’t exactly make anything better, but it’s all he has.)

On Saturday, something between them shifts.

Lucas misses the exact moment it happens, to tell the truth. He is busy with other things.

Eliott comes over around noon, with tiredness from last night still written into the lines of his face but with his eyes sparkling and with a small smile on his lips. The weather is kind of shitty, he tells Lucas, running a hand through his hair as he steps into the apartment, and Lucas notices then that his hair is a little wet like it’s raining outside, or just starting to. It sticks to his forehead a bit. Lucas fights the urge to reach out and brush the stands away, bites on his lip, and only turns his eyes away when Eliott, shrugging off his jacket and kicking down his shoes, raises his eyebrows in a silent question.

Lucas doesn’t want to answer it. Instead, he says the first thing that comes to his head. ”Wanna watch something, then?”

Eliott says yes because of course he does, and then it goes like this — they sprawl out on the couch and fight over the blanket just a little, and Lucas lets Eliott pick the movie. The rain is playing an uneven rhythm on the windows, one-two-three, irregular and barely there. He leans into Eliott a little more than he has to but not as much as he really wants to, and Eliott only hums quietly, doesn’t turn his eyes away from the screen. His arm winds around Lucas’s waist, firm, bring them close together where Eliott runs warm, from shoulder to hip.

Lucas keeps thinking, this is our last day.

It’s not a bad way to spend it. Somewhere in a small, quiet corner of his heart, Lucas is grateful for it. It’s nice, almost unfairly so, to be able to lean into Eliott and share his warmth, make sure he’s still right here, listen to his voice when he says, from time to time, ”Look at this scene, Lu,” or, ”Now, now, pay attention.”

Lucas is. Not to the movie, really, but to everything else — the way Eliott smells like the rain and fresh air and cheap cologne Lucas bought him last year for his birthday. The way he sounds like he always does. The way the fabric of his shirt folds over his collar bones and how shadows settle in the hollow of his throat.

There are very few things in the world that Lucas would want more than he wants this.

And when it gets dark — after they’ve watched another movie and stuffed their faces with pizza and after Mika and Lisa came home and joined them in the living room, after they argued over Eliott’s terrible music taste and laughed over how familiar it was, too, it’s time for Eliott to go home.

Lucas is scared of it, like a child. He is scared of opening the door and letting Eliott go and letting the world happen to him, a world Lucas is barely present in, a world somewhere far away. But then Eliott is already getting up from the couch and saying his goodbyes to Lisa, letting Mika hug him, and Lucas trails behind him and watches it, then watches him put on his shoes and jacket and get ready to walk out just like that.

”So,” he says, and if his throat suddenly feels too tight, nobody has to know, ”I’ll see you tomorrow?”

It’s all they have left. They both know that because it’s not like it’s a secret, really. The whole day today, they haven’t spoken a word about Eliott leaving tomorrow, but they both know what is going to happen — Lucas will go to the airport with him, say his goodbyes, try not to cry too much and probably fail, and Eliott will smile at him with his stupid, unbelievable, gorgeous smile and hug him like he never wants to let him go even though it is not true and then leave.

In the doorway, Eliott hesitates.

Maybe it’s because too many of Lucas’s thoughts are showing on his face. Maybe it’s easier to read him than it usually is, than it was yesterday in the lights of the party. Lucas waits for an answer, but it doesn’t come, and there’s a suddenly tension-heavy moment that passes between them. Eliott just keeps looking at him. Lucas doesn’t know what to do about it.

And then, Eliott says, ”Do you want to walk me home?”

Lucas hears Mika laugh from the living room where he and Lisa are still watching something on TV. The rain is still drumming on the windows, a staccato. Outside, it’s probably cold and windy, and if he goes with Eliott, he won’t be back for another two hours, probably. They both have to get up early tomorrow. It’s very late.

”Sure,” Lucas says, grabbing his own jacket from the hanger. ”Let’s go.”

They walk in relative silence for about 2 minutes, when Eliott suddenly grabs Lucas’s hand and pulls him in a different direction and onto a road that, Lucas is pretty sure, doesn’t lead to Eliott’s apartment.

”Hey,” Lucas says, almost stumbling over the cobblestones of the dark street, ”what are you doing?”

Eliott’s hand is warm in his, and firm, and his grip is strong. He laces their fingers together. Lucas tells himself that it is not the reason his heart does something weird in his chest, that it’s because of the dark, because of the late hour.

”I wanna show you something,” Eliott says, pulls him along, rounds a street corner. ”Come on, it’s not far.”

”Weren’t you going back home?”

”I don’t want to go back home.” The words have a weird quality to them. Lucas wants to ask, but then Eliott adds, a bit quieter, ”not yet.”

So they go. How could Lucas complain, really, if he gets to hang around Eliott for just a while longer, have him all to himself, selfishly and privately, hold his hand and let himself get involved in another one of Eliott’s strange ideas like it’s the old times, still? So Lucas lets Eliott drag him along, only grips his hand tighter and doesn’t say a word.

It’s Eliott’s last evening here, and somehow, he chose to spend it with Lucas, with Lucas alone. Whatever it means, Lucas will take it.

Eliott brings him, apparently, to a closed playground.

”Wait,” Lucas says as he stands in front of it, as Eliott finally lets go of his hand in favour of wrestling with the lock on the gate instead, fighting it until it gives up and the door squeaks open, ”Eliott, seriously?”

”What?” Eliott says and just steps inside. He sounds like he’s smiling. ”You scared? It’s just a playground, Lu.”

”This is illegal,” Lucas informs him but goes in anyway, closes the door with the smallest sound. Apart from that, and their whispers, everything is very quiet. ”Just so you know.”

Eliott chuckles, ”I’m aware,” and then, walking backwards, when the light of the streetlamp catches in his eyes and sets his gaze on fire, he says, ”Don’t worry. I’ll keep you safe.”

And whatever response Lucas could make, it dies on his tongue, just like that. Maybe it’s, he thinks with his heart hammering a bit too quickly against his ribcage, actually for the better.

They find a pair of swings that aren’t, miraculously, wet from the rain somehow, and sit down there. For a second, Lucas feels like he’s in a movie of sorts, the kind that Eliott likes to watch best. It doesn’t feel real, between one beat of his heart and the next, this whole scene — the rain, the fresh air, the stars in the sky. How the streetlamp casts a faint light that doesn’t reach quite to where they are. How he’s allowed, somehow, to sit here with Eliott, the same beautiful, unbelievable person he’s known his whole life.

He asks, ”Why are we here?”

”Do you remember,” Eliott says in response, and when Lucas looks over at him, he’s watching the starts, his fingers wrapped around the chain of the swing, ”when we came here when we were kids? When you were, like, twelve?”

Lucas remembers. It is the same place, he realises suddenly, now when he properly thinks about it and pays attention. The three big oaks to his right are still here, and the fence seems to still be painted the same jarring, chipping-off red, or at least that’s what it looks like in the light of the streetlamp. They used to come here sometimes, when they were younger. Once, Lucas took his dad’s pocket knife and carved an ”L+E” into the wood the fence was made of, not really understanding what the action meant, back then.

”Is this where you took me at midnight that one time and then we both got grounded for the next five years?” Lucas asks, and doesn’t expect it when Eliott laughs, doesn’t expect the way it rings in the night and falls into it, makes the stars seem a little brighter.

”Yeah,” Eliott tells him, ”yeah, that’s the place.”

He sounds happy. He sounds genuine. He sounds like everything is alright, like it’s just another night spent hanging around with a friend, like it’s one of so many nights they spent together ad not much more, and Lucas suddenly…can’t take it. It’s like a wave that sweeps him up and drags him under, and he can’t do it. Something blooms in his chest and makes it too tight to breathe properly. He looks away from Eliott’s profile, feels like he’ll break if he doesn’t.

A moment passes. Lucas feels like his lungs are filled with lead.

And then, quietly, Eliott says, ”I don’t want tomorrow to happen.”

Lucas snaps his head back up, surprised. For a second, he thinks he imagined it. With how quiet it was, and how stray, that wouldn’t be impossible, he thinks. But then Eliott turns his face away from the sky and looks at Lucas instead, and even if he did sound happy just minutes ago, he doesn’t look like it now.

”That’s why I didn’t want to go back home yet,” he tells Lucas, like a confession. There’s something muted in his eyes. ”I don’t want tomorrow to come.”

Lucas swallows.

”What,” he tries, forces a corner of his mouth to lift in a desperate attempt at covering up the tremor in his voice, ”aren’t you excited to go back to New York?”

It’s only half a joke and half a genuine question. Eliott answers it with a shrug that looks heavy.

”Not really. I mean,” he says, and Lucas expects him to backtrack, then, just maybe, for only a second. Start talking about how New York isn’t that bad after all. About how much he’s learning, about how it’s just difficult, is all. But then he says, ”it’s great, but. There’s someone at home I’m going to miss a lot.”

Something in Lucas’s chest quivers. He tries to smother it. ”Idriss, I bet.”

Eliott smiles at that, softly. His eyes crinkle at the corners.

”You,” he says. ”You.”

And, see — Lucas knew that. He’s known.

It doesn’t make anything easier.

He turns his eyes away. He wants to say, me too, me too, I’m going to miss you, too. He wants to say, then don’t go, please don’t go, please just stay. He wants to stand up and take the two steps that separate them and wrap Eliott in his arms and don’t let him go, stay with him right here until the rain stops and the sun rises. He wants to kiss him, like back then. Lucas wants so, so much.

It burns in his chest like embers of a fire that should have died long ago. Maybe that’s why he says, ”We’re not going to talk about it, then?”

A pause. ”About what?”

”Me and you,” Lucas replies, then swallows. He takes a breath, tries to steady himself, and then finally says, ”That I kissed you, back then. At the airport.” And when Eliott doesn’t say anything to that, Lucas adds, quieter, ”I think we should talk about it.”

His throat is tight. He’s clutching the chains of the swing so forcefully that they’re digging into his palm.

Me and you, he said, but there is no such thing, really. That’s what Eliott is going to tell him. No ”L+E” even though it’s carved somewhere into the playground fence, even though the hope of it is etched into Lucas’s stupid heart. He’s sick of hoping for things that will never be true, tired of making so many mistakes, but he can’t help it. He can’t help it.

Eliott is silent. Lucas is afraid of what he’d see if he looks at him, so he just keeps his eyes where they are. He keeps staring at his own shoes, barely visible against the dark background of the grass under his feet. They weren’t supposed to bring it up, he knows. They were supposed to brush it off as inconsequential, lock it somewhere in the corner of their minds and not revisit, pretend it never happened, forget entirely. Maybe that’s what Eliott did, after all. Perhaps the memory of it got pushed to the side, with so many other things going on in his life, with so many different people, new places, better things to pay attention to than Lucas and his stupidity.

For a second, shame burns in his veins like a flame.

Then, Eliott stands up.

He’s going to go, Lucas’s mind says, and suddenly his breathing needs two tries before it goes anywhere. He’s going to say, don’t come to the airport tomorrow, and he’s going to go. You used up your time. You should have stayed quiet.

It’s true. It’s all true.

Except Eliott doesn’t leave.

He takes two steps, instead, and then crouches in front of Lucas, and before Lucas can register what’s happening, through his loud mind and aching heart, Eliott is unwrapping Lucas’s fingers from around the swing chains and taking his hands in his own. His grip is tight. His hands are warm.

”Lucas,” he’s saying, ”tell me why you did it. Tell me why you kissed me.”

It doesn’t make sense, but in response, he says, ”You remember, then,” and it comes out weak.

Eliott’s hands tremble in his, minutely, but it’s so slight it might as well only be his imagination. That’s what Lucas writes it off as.

”Of course I remember,” Eliott says. ”Of course.” And then, brushing Lucas’s knuckles with his thumbs in a gesture that is probably meant to be consoling, he repeats, ”Why?”

For a moment, Lucas doesn’t say anything.

He’s thought about it so many times. So many times, it was right there on his tongue, and he always kept it in. All his I love you’s, all the things he couldn’t let Eliott hear because it was just Lucas and his stupid, naive heart talking, because it would ruin the best thing he’s ever had. Lucas is not ready to lose it now. He’s not.

But if Eliott’s tight grip is anything to go by, or the way he intertwines their fingers, or the way he doesn’t take his eyes off Lucas at all, then maybe he knows already. Maybe he knows. Lucas isn’t sure what to believe anymore, and it hardly matters anyway, right, hardly matters when Eliott’s going to leave tomorrow anyway, fuck off for another 6 months or so, and Lucas will have to pick his broken heart back up and piece it together nevertheless, just like last time.

It’s a heartbreak either way, no matter the reason.

”You know why,” he finally says. It feels like a confession, but of a different sort. ”You know why, Eliott.”

Eliott brushes his knuckles again. ”Tell me.”

And just like that — Lucas closes his eyes and says it.

”Because I’m in love with you,” he says. It feels so raw on his tongue that he feels weak with it. And then again, ”I’m in love with you. I have been in love with you for ages. I loved you when we were kids, and I love you now, and I will love you tomorrow when you get on that fucking plane and leave, and that’s just what it is, Eliott, I’m really—” A breath. ”I love you. I’m so sorry.”

He keeps looking at his shoes, still, at the same patch of grass. His inhale, the exhale, then inhale again, are all shaky.

”I kissed you because you were leaving, and I didn’t know when I would see you again,” Lucas continues, a little despite himself, but once the words are out there, there’s nothing he can do. ”I kissed you because you were still here, and I missed you already. And because I love you.” He swallows. His throat feels tight. ”That was the main reason.”

They weren’t supposed to talk about it, but here it is. No take-backs; game over. Eliott knows, now. That’s okay. Lucas will get through it, somehow, like he got through many other things. It’s what he tells himself, biting down on his lip so that it stops quivering, listening to the rush of blood in his head and the too-quick beating of his heart. Eliott isn’t saying anything, but Lucas doesn’t expect him to. There’s not much left to say, really.

And then, a shift.

”Lucas,” Eliott is muttering in the next second, and he’s pulling Lucas’s hands closer to himself, closer to his face, and then Lucas watches, dazed, as he presses his lips to Lucas’s knuckles, once, twice, then, again and again, a kiss after a kiss. ”I thought you— I didn’t—”

It has stopped raining, Lucas notes with a tiny part of his mind. He has, suddenly, no idea what’s happening.

”I thought you didn’t say anything because—” Eliott tries and gets stuck, and in the meager light, he looks…unlike himself, a little. Wide-eyed, breathless, with a few damp strands of his hair stuck to his forehead. His gaze is suddenly so intense it is almost a physical thing. ”You never—” And then like he can’t help himself, Eliott asks, voice caving in, ”Please say it again.”

Lucas blinks at him. He feels like the world has stopped, somehow. Like the time is frozen. ”What?”

”Say it again,” Eliott repeats, and something in his voice changes, then. He’s looking straight at Lucas, with his eyes bright. They’re still holding hands. ”Why you kissed me.”

”I love you,” Lucas tells him, again, just as true as before. His heart is beating too fast.

And Eliott just closes his eyes and presses the back of Lucas’s hand to his lips again, warm and unexpected, and then, when he smiles, Lucas feels the curve of it right against his skin.

”God,” Eliott whispers, barely audible. ”Fuck.”

And then, before Lucas can say anything, Eliott is suddenly untangling their fingers and something passes in his eyes, a notion, and then he’s reaching over and he’s cupping Lucas’s face in his hands, right there at the playground, in the middle of the night and—

When Eliott kisses him, it feels like coming home.

It’s warm and sweet and the angle is a little off, and it’s nothing like the first time but it’s also exactly like the first time, and Lucas melts into it and he’s kissing Eliott. He’s kissing Eliott. Eliott is kissing him — slow and shy at first, then growing comfortable, and then Lucas is parting his lips and lets Eliott deepen the kiss, lets the thrill of it push all the air out of his lungs. He curls his fingers into the fabric of his jeans when Eliott angles his head. They’re kissing — slow and unhurried and like they have all the time they need, even when they don’t, really. But here, in the dark, with the warmth of Eliott’s lips and the burn of hope coiling in Lucas’s chest, it’s easier to believe.

And then, when they part, Eliott is smiling wider than Lucas ever remembers him to.

”I thought you didn’t say anything because— I thought it was an impulse, then,” he tells him, leans his forehead against Lucas’s, and his eyes are closed. His hands slide down to Lucas’s neck, and he traces the line of Lucas’s jaw with his thumb, gentle. ”That you did it because you didn’t want me to go. That you thought it would make me stay.”

There is a question hiding somewhere in the sentence. Lucas answers it, feeling dazed. Feeling breathless.

”I did want you to stay,” he says, and then, ”I do. But the kiss wasn’t meant to be a bargaining card.”

Eliott huffs out a laugh. His eyes are still closed. ”Why didn’t you say anything, then?”

”Why didn’t you?”

And then Eliott does open his eyes, and even after knowing him for practically his whole life and loving him for almost equally as long, Lucas is not ready for what he sees — all the blinding happiness. All the breathtaking storm of something he’s almost afraid to name.

”If I did, and you told me what you did just now,” he says, ”I would’ve come back here on the next plane.”

Eliott’s still tracing the line of his jaw. For a heartbeat, Lucas just looks at him. ”Why?”

”Because I love you,” Eliott says, smiles that blinding smile again, leans into Lucas like he can’t help it, like he can’t wait, kisses his temple, his cheekbone, the corner of his mouth. ”Because I love you, too.”

(Later, they will go. Leave the playground and close the gate behind, unnoticed and unseen, like they were never there in the first place, like nothing ever happened. They will hold hands and pull each other along the empty streets, then kiss on the doorstep of Eliott’s apartment building where Eliott will push Lucas against the cold brick wall and angle his chin up and kiss him again, again until Lucas loses track of time. Later, they will say ”goodnight” and Eliott will complain, just a little, about how he still needs to pack, and Lucas will laugh at him quietly, laugh until Eliott kisses the smile off his face.

But now, it’s this —

”I would stay,” Eliott tells him, still clutching his hands like it’s a lifeline, ”if you asked me to.”

For a second, Lucas wants to. The possibility of it is blinding — how he could just say two words, and Eliott would stay for him, right there, easy as that. He can taste the words on his tongue. No heartbreak, he thinks, but the opposite of it, for once.

But in the end, he says, ”I won’t ask you to.” That’s all.

Because, you see — it wouldn’t be fair. Lucas is selfish, but he’s not cruel. He knows how much New York means to Eliott. He can’t ask Eliott to give it up, his future and his dreams and all the bright ideas he has, just because he’s going to miss him, because this is not how love works. And Lucas is no expert, really, but he is learning something new about love every day, it seems like, and tonight, dizzy with relief and throbbing with how thoroughly kissed he’s just been, he learns his — love is not selfish. Love is not painless. Sometimes, love means letting someone go and hoping they will come back.

”I won’t ask you,” he repeats when Eliott doesn’t say anything, only looks. ”But I will wait if you want me to.”

Something passes over Eliott’s face. Like understanding. His gaze softens, warms up.

”Thank you,” he says, and it’s enough of an answer.)

On Sunday, Eliott leaves.

Lucas goes to the airport with him, stands there amongst the crowd of people, and only has eyes for Eliott anyway. Eliott, with his heavy suitcases packed in a hurry, with his hair messy and his eyes a little tired and his smile a little crooked. They are, at least in this aspect, mirror reflections of each other — it’s the same, the way they look at each other, the way they hold hands, the way Eliott wraps him in a hug, bone-crushing, and Lucas melts into it and just holds Eliott for a second, wishes for the time to slow down for just a moment. Just a while.

”I’ll miss you,” Eliott says, presses the words into Lucas’s temple, ”so fucking much, you have no idea.”

And Lucas smiles so that he doesn’t cry. ”I do,” he says. ”I do, actually.”

Eliott kisses him goodbye, and the kisses are all like punctuation marks between him saying, I’ll call you when I get there, and I’ll see you soon, I promise, and I love you. His voice quivers a bit as he says it all. Lucas thinks, unreasonably, about ”L+E” carved somewhere into a wooden fence.

And then Eliott goes. It will be a while before they see each other again, but it’s okay.

Lucas can wait for him.

#skam france #elu #elu fic #skamfr #elu fanfic #my writing #here it is my dudes i hope you enjoy #have u noticed that i love parentheses

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salesna21ahsgov · 4 years

Text

California Proposition Assessment

Proposition #4 : Waiting period and parental notification before termination of minor’s pregnancy (2008)

This proposition wouldn’t allow minors to have an abortion until 48 hours after their parents or guardian has been notified. There are exceptions if there’s a medical emergency or if the minor can appear in court and prove their maturity. The proposition also mandates reporting requirements and insures that abortion is done only with the minor’s consent.

Fiscal Impact: There is an unknown net state cost but could cost several million dollars annually for health and social services programs, court administration, and state health agency administration combined.

Election Results: The election results voted no on the proposition. I was not surprised by the election results but surprised how close it was.

Proposition Supporters:

The Friends of Sarah, the Parental or Alternative Family Member Notification Act was the official ballot committee

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger

Dr. Joseph R. Zanga, M.D., FFAP, Past President American Academy of Pediatrics

Barbara Alby, Author, California's "Megan's Law" Child Protection Legislation

Mary L. Davenport, M.D., Fellow American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

Thomas Murphy Goodwin, M.D., FAAP, FACOG, Professor Of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Pediatrics Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California

The Honorable Rod Pacheco, J.D., District Attorney, Riverside County

The Honorable Tony Rackauckas, J.D., District Attorney, Orange County

The Honorable Bob Brooks, Sheriff, Ventura County

The Honorable Dennis Downum, Sheriff, Calaveras County

Frank Lee, President, Organization for Justice & Equality

Dr. Kenneth Williams, School Board Member, Orange County

Donors:

James E. Holman (He is a publisher of the San Diego reader who also donated large sums of money supporting past propositions 85 and 73 which both failed to pass. He seems to be very dedicated to his cause but all three propositions have not passed.)

Don Sebastiani (He was one of the chief bankers for the proposition and worked alongside James Holman.)

Knihgts of Columbus (This is a Catholic fraternal service order and being Catholic, may have a biased opinion on abortion.)

Mary Jane Creamer

Lenawee Trust

Caster Family Trust

The supporters and donors don’t all have an abundance or similarities or are in one political group. Most of them come from various backgrounds, and many of the supporters in California are from Southern California while those who oppose the proposition are from Northern California which I found was interesting.

Arguments for and against:

PRO: When a minor gets an abortion without notifying their family there could be health issues that are dismissed and that may cause trouble after the abortion or if there are complications. Also, if the minor needed an abortion because of sexual abuse they may not notify anyone because if the parent knew it would be more likely to be reported. Without parental notification, abuse can be repeated and the victim may be less likely to get help.

CON: No law should be able to mandate parental communication and those type of laws don’t work. The minor may not have a good relationship with their parents, and they may be suffering from home abuse and notification might cause them to get kicked out, beaten, etc. Also, minors may decide to perform at home abortions to avoid the parental notification which are dangerous. They may also consider suicide or delay medical care.

How I would vote: I would have voted NO on this proposition because if I was a young girl living in a household without a solid parental relationship, or even a victim of abuse at home who needed an abortion, I couldn’t begin to imagine how much stress the parental notification would cause me. Not all parents are supportive of abortion even if it is their own child and the notification could possibly put her more at danger than if there were to be an abortion related medical issue. Especially today since so many young people struggle with mental illnesses and how much suicide rates have increased, this would just negatively affect that even more.

Fun Fact: One thing I found interesting from the ballot website was how Planned Parenthood had donated so much money against this proposition and how almost 3 times the amount of money was spent against it.

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whiskeytangofrogman · 7 years

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Magic AU. Bitty is a baker who really messed up this maybe-not-recipe. Jack is a powerful but quiet demon who isn't sure what's going on, but there's pie.

Okay you sent this a literal year ago, but it’s finally done. Also, it’s 5k.

I will post another, more refined version on ao3 (with betaing, even) in December, after NaNo, but please enjoy!

“Aaand… done.” Bitty shuts the oven firmly, and claps flour off his hands. He picks up the yellowed piece of paper from the counter, and scans his eyes over the recipe. He’d had to buy a few… weirder ingredients from the internet to get it done, but as long as it came out of the oven correctly, he’d get an A on his project, meaning that he would be officially done with his Bachelor’s degree in American Studies.

Now, to wait. The recipe said an hour, but Bitty’s oven was, obviously, better (though not by much) than a simple fireplace stove, and so he’d set it for thirty minutes, which was just enough time to finish that new movie he’d been watching.

Thirty minutes later, he pulls out a steaming pie, and grins. The crust is a beautiful golden brown (and all the symbols the recipe said were necessary stood out nicely, a darker, richer brown than the rest of the crust, unexpected but pleasant). “Perfect,” he mumbles to himself, setting it on the counter. He was tempted, all of a sudden, to cut into it. But it needed to be perfect for his professor, and she was a renowned stickler. He’d fail if it wasn’t perfect, and he didn’t have the money to buy the ingredients for another try. There were only so many places one could get rat tails for cheap.

He grabs a towel and throws it over the top, and the temptation goes away. He nods then, satisfied, and pulls out his phone. “Final project for history and culture: done. On to studying French.” He tweets, adding a nauseated-looking emoji at the end. He casts one last proud look at the pie, and leaves the room.

There was one slice left of the pie, and only a day left until it was going to spoil. Bitty had forgotten about it completely, between finishing his finals week, cleaning his house, and baking for the holiday season. When he’d finally gotten around to being able to rest, the last thing he wanted to do was eat more pie.

But he also wasn’t one to let such an expensive thing go to waste. “Oh well,” Bitty mutters under his breath, foregoing a plate and grabbing a fork. “I’ll just have to double down on that New Year’s resolution to exercise more, I guess.”

Bitty works his way through the now slightly stale slice while flipping through the channels on his small tv. There was nothing on, as per usual, and so he settled in to catch the tail end of a hockey game.

He’d played hockey in high school, but had stopped after his senior year. There wasn’t much of a place on college teams for someone so… slight. He sighed, shoving the last bite into his mouth and swallowing, hard. If only, if only. He frequently found himself wishing it was still something he did, this exact moment included. He’d loved it so much despite how mediocre he’d been.

At that exact moment, post-swallow and mid-reminisce, his tv began to smoke. “Shit,” he muttered, getting up. It was a cheap one, an old vacuum tube set he’d bought off Craigslist midway through fall semester when his last roommate had moved out and taken his nice flatscreen with him.

Bitty gets up and bangs his hand against the side, trying to get the fuzz to go away. The tv hisses, and then snaps back to clarity once more. He sighs, relieved, and turns around.

And comes face to face with a tall stranger, standing in the middle of his living room, smelling of sulfur and campfire burn.

He screams.

Half an hour later, one and a half beers, and a considerable amount of questions had calmed him down. Or, calmed him as much as he could be calmed.

Because this man? Was a demon, apparently, summoned through a mixture of Bitty’s pie (an old witch recipe) and his wishing. The recipe, the demon said, was notoriously difficult, and this anyone who managed to pull it off was entitled to three wishes.

Bitty was now entitled to three wishes. Because he’d accidentally summoned a demon.

“Do I have to sell you my soul?” The demon’s eyebrows twitch, and he sighs, dragging a hand down his face and looking altogether way too human for something apparently hellish in origin.

“For the third time, no. That’s part of the recipe.”

Bitty swigs down another gulp of now-warm beer (clutching a glass bottle in one’s hand so tightly one’s knuckles turned white wasn’t necessarily conducive to properly chilled alcohol) and tugs on the ends of his hair. “And I get three wishes? Just for baking a pie?”

The demon looks agitated. “Yes. Like I’ve explained three, no, four times now, it’s an old clause in the rule book, one we haven’t had to uphold in near half a millennium, and one we’ve been meaning to get rid of. His highness just hasn’t seen the need to,” the demon says, adding a glare. “Until now, of course.”

Bitty giggles, high pitched and sharp. This can’t be happening. I’m dreaming, he thinks. “Well then, fuck it.” He chugs the rest of the beer down, and slams it on the table. “I want to pass my class.”

The demon frowns. “You’ll need to be more specific.”

“CUL 458. I want to pass it with at least a B.”

The demon stares for a second, and then rolls his eyes. “You’ll pass it.”

“Cool, so two more wishes-”

“No, that’s not a wish. I already know you’ll pass it.”

Bitty flashed the demon a confused look. “Are you omnipotent? Like god?”

The demon winces. “No. I just have slight… sight, for these sorts of things.”

Bitty shrugs. “Okay. Well, then I want to pass French.”

The demon nods, closes his eyes for a few seconds, and then opens them up once more. They’re glowing a pallid yellow, and he blinks a few times, the color draining back into black as he does. “Done. That one you wouldn’t have passed. How are you so bad?”

“Hey!” Bitty points an accusatory finger. “French is hard.”

The demon mutters something like not that hard, and opens his palm. “Your next two wishes?”

Bitty thinks for a second, and then frowns. “I don’t know.”

The demon groans, and stands. “I’ll give you a week.”

Bitty nods, and watches as the demon disappears as fast as he’d come, leaving the room smelling faintly still of sulfur, and now of ozone.

“Fuck,” Bitty mutters.

He wakes up the next morning, draped over the couch with his phone making indents on his cheek. The ”ping!” of his notifications had woken him up. Blearily, he sits up and unlocks the screen. He recalls the weird dream as he scrolls through Twitter, and snorts. “Musta been somethin’ in that pie. That’ll teach me to treat old recipes like they can store the same,” he says to himself.

There’s an email from his French professor, probably one letting him know that in order to pass, he’ll need to do the last minute extra credit paper, something he’d been prepared for since his final earlier that week. This was his last semester of the two year language requirement, and he’d been in danger of failing all semester.

He opens the email, and reads it over.

And then stares, and reads again. And again.

Somehow, he’d passed the final with enough points to land him at a respectable 73% in the class, just enough to pass.

The dream (or maybe it hadn’t been a dream at all?) came flooding back to him. There was no way in hell.

Bitty closes his email, and begins gathering the remnants of the previous night’s boozing to toss in the trashcan, the fuzzy edges of his dream twisting and fading until he’d finally convinced himself that it was a dream indeed, one born of stress and too much beer, and that the final grade he’d received was based not on a demonic encounter but on the ten straight hours of review he’d done the night before the test.

By the end of the week, he’d forgotten all about his weird dream. His last final had come and gone, and he was well into prepping the baked goods he’d promised his mom for his short trip back to Georgia before his last semester. His final batch of cookies was almost done when the one thing he’d convinced himself wouldn’t happen, did.

The demon came back.

Bitty didn’t scream this time, but only just. The demon looked much the same: human enough to seem normal until closer inspection, tall, brooding, and altogether much too handsome to be a creature from hell.

“Have you thought of your next wish, yet?”

Bitty groans, and slouches against the counter. “I thought I made you up.”

The demon stares at him. “Obviously not.”

Bitty clicks his phone off, and buries his face in his hands. “Look, I-” He sighs, and peeks through his fingers. The demon was watching him intently, eyebrows cocked. “I don’t know what I want, and I don’t want to die, so please don’t kill me for bein’ indecisive.”

The demon huffs. “I’m not going to kill you.”

The oven dings, and Bitty moves the demon out of the way, bodily. “Hang on.” He dons oven mitts, and pulls the tray out. The cookies, despite all of the work he’d put into making sure ol’ Betsy wouldn’t fritz out on him for this, are burnt.

Beyond repair.

Bitty resists the urge to screech. Instead, he slams his mitts down, and clicks the oven off. “I wish this damn thing wouldn’t burn anything. I don’t know how many times a week-”

“Done.”

Bitty stops mid-rant, and looks at the demon. “What?”

“Your wish. It’s done. Your oven won’t burn anything anymore.”

Bitty frowns, and looks down at Betsy. He stares for a moment, pondering, and then looks back up. “That wasn’t going to be my wish-”

“It’s too late to take back.” The demon interrupts.

“But.” Bitty glares. “I’m not mad.”

“So-”

“But I also don’t have a third wish.”

The demon looks even more cross now, eyebrows folded as far down his forehead as they’ll go, the inky black of his eyes only barely visible through his squint. “You’re incredibly annoying.”

Bitty’s protest fall on nothing but his kitchen appliances, as the demon disappears once more.

He sighs, and begins mixing a new batch of cookies, despite his flight leaving in less than four hours. If the universe was gonna give him an oven that never burns, like hell he’s gonna wait another week and half to try it out.

And, true to the demon’s word, the cookies come out a beautiful golden brown, the likes of which he’s only made once on his moomaw’s oven back home.

“Well, sure as shit,” he says, hands resting on his hips. Guess I can’t pretend it’s a dream any more, he thinks, picking up a perfectly crisped cookie and biting into it, letting the chocolate melt over his tongue while he thinks about what else he could possibly wish for.

The demon comes back a few days later, and Bitty’s sick of referring to him as the demon. “What’s your name?” Bitty hands him a plate and sits across from him across his island bar.

The demon looks puzzled. “Why?”

“Because I feed people,” Bitty says, taking a bite from his own plate. The recipe was an old family one he’d been playing with on and off since he got to college, but never had the oven to get the temperature just right.

Until now, that is.

The demon sets the plate on the counter, and delicately sits down, as if he’d never been in a chair before. “No, my name. Why does it matter?”

Bitty rolls his eyes. “Because I like to know who I’m working with.”

“You won’t know how to pronounce it.” The demon picks up a fork, and jabs it into the pie, the crust giving the smallest of satisfying crunching noises.

“Try me,” Bitty says, setting down his own fork onto a now-empty plate.

The demon utters a noise that makes Bitty lean back in his chair, and wiggle a finger in his ear, trying to get out a ringing that isn’t there. “Uh.”

The demon settles a look on him, cool blue eyes, normally void of any emotion, now showing a hint of smugness. “I told you.”

Bitty sighs, and stands up. “Fine. So what do I call you?”

The demon falls quiet, and when Bitty looks at him, he looks deep in thought. Bitty waits, quietly cleaning up the results of his latest test in the meantime. “Jack.”

Bitty rolls it over his tongue, mouths it quietly to himself. “Why Jack?”

“My name is equivalent to that in English, in terms of how common they both are.” The demon — Jack — shrugs. “Plus, I like the way it sounds.”

Bitty hums. “Fair enough, Jack.”

“Do you know-”

Bitty interrupts Jack before he can continue. “I don’t know what I want to wish for, yet. Sorry.” He feels only slightly guilty.

Jack’s gone before Bitty can even finish the sentence.

Jack comes back, again and again, every time with the same question: Has Bitty figured out his third wish?

And every time, Bitty gives him a slice of pie, or a cookie, or something. Eventually, Jack starts eating them too. And Bitty stalls for as long as possible, asking Jack relentless questions to make him stay.

Do you have horns? “No, not usually.”

Why aren’t you red? “I can be, if you want,” Jack says, his skin tone rapidly changing to match that of a particularly vibrant strawberry. And then back, because Bitty won’t stop laughing at him.

What did you go to hell for? “What do you mean?” Aren’t demons all sinners that went to hell? “No, I was born there, like you were born on Earth.”

Jack’s answers are reluctant to come at first, he grumbles about how he shouldn’t be answering any of this, and then answers them anyway. He starts to stay longer each time before he asks Bitty if he’s figured out his third wish, and lingers before disappearing.

Bitty, for all he’s been trying not to, is liking Jack more and more by the day.

On the fourth, maybe fifth time Jack appears, Bitty’s back home in Georgia. It’s Christmas Eve, and he’s nervous for tomorrow. All his relatives come over to the house, and though they love him, they don’t understand him.

It’s “the gay thing,” as his mom’s uncle calls it. “Hate the sin, love the sinner” is a motto in their family, when applied to him. They don’t understand it, and he still gets asked about a hundred times every Christmas if he’d found a girlfriend yet, despite the fact that he’d been out for half a decade now., as if one day he’s just going to decide he’s not gay anymore.

He thinks he hates Christmas.

He’s in the kitchen, kneading dough brutally, when Jack appears beside him. Bitty tries to smother a shriek.

“Have you-”

Bitty throws a towel at him. “Be quiet,” he hisses, glaring. Jack looks taken aback, but he stays quiet.

Bitty sets the dough to rise until morning, and tiptoes back to the guest room, gesturing for Jack to follow.

Jack does, footsteps not even making the wood of the old house creak in the slightest, something Bitty had only achieved after years of living here and sneaking out at night, a practiced sort of silence. Bitty’s almost jealous.

Bitty shuts the door behind him as silently as he can, and wheels around to face Jack. “What are you doing here?”

Jack looks confused. “The same thing I always am?”

“How do you know where I live, though?” Bitty folds his arms across his chest.

Jack’s confusion grows, visibly. “What? It’s you.”

Bitty makes a noise in the back of his throat that prompts Jack to continue. “I don’t need your address. I just find you, and go there.”

Bitty frowns. “Oh.”

Jack looks around the room, and then sits on the bed. He looks… worn, in a way that he usually doesn’t. It’s only been a few weeks, but Jack looks five years older, and tired. Bitty sits next to him. “Are you okay?”

Jack’s eyes settle on Bitty’s own. “No,” he answers, blunt.

Bitty takes in the rings around Jack’s eyes, how rumpled he looks. He looks… human. “What’s wrong?”

Jack drops his eyes, and fiddles with the edge of his suit jacket. He always wears the same thing, a gray suit over a light blue shirt and black tie. It brings out the blue in his eyes, Bitty notes, and then promptly tries to forget. “Demons shouldn’t… be on earth. This long.”

Bitty’s concerned frown gets deeper. “Why?”

“We’re not meant to take this long. I’m supposed to get what I need from you, and then go back for the rest of my life.” Jack meets Bitty’s stare again. “We only get one contract in our lives, and it’s never supposed to take this long.”

Bitty feels guilt sink in his gut, twisting his insides ragged. “Oh.” He settles a hand on Jack’s cheek, and rubs a finger under Jack’s eye, as if he can smudge the circles out. “You should have told me.”

“I didn’t want to pressure you.” Jack’s eyelids flutter closed, and he lets out the smallest of sighs. “The magic won’t work right if it’s not something you want.”

Bitty gnaws at his bottom lip, thinks. He still doesn’t have an idea for a wish, and it only makes the guilt worse. “I’m sorry.”

Jack opens his eyes, but doesn’t lean away, doesn’t push Bitty’s hand away. “Don’t be,” he whispers.

Bitty feels like they’re on the edge of a precipice. He leans in.

Jack meets him halfway, and they’re kissing, soft, slow. Jack’s hand finds Bitty’s hip, slides up under his shirt. Bitty cups Jack’s face, fingers curling through the strands of Jack’s hair.

And then it’s over. Jack pulls back, looking startled. He stands. “I have to go.”

Bitty reaches out a hand. “Wait-”

Jack’s gone, with an audible pop, and the air is sucked out the room, leaving Bitty alone. He presses his fingertips to his lips, and thinks.

Jack doesn’t come back until the day before the new semester, almost two weeks after Bitty gets back from Georgia. He looks even worse now.

“Hi,” Bitty says, and hands him a plate. “Try this.”

Jack is silent, but takes the plate and sits down. He makes a noise of approval at the spongy cake, uniced but dusted with powdered sugar. “S’good.”

Bitty smiles. “Thanks.”

Jack finishes the cake, not offering up anything more until he finishes. He opens his mouth to speak, and Bitty holds up a hand. “Wait.”

Jack frowns, but lets him continue. “I’ve been thinking. About my wish.”

Bitty’s fingers tap against the edge of the counter. Truthfully, he hasn’t stopped thinking about it since Jack left last time, running through his mind all of the possibilities. He could wish for anything in the world, and Jack would give it to him.

“Do you like hell?”

Jack lifts an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Just answer it.”

Jack shrugs. “It’s alright. Cold.”

Bitty hums. “I want-”

Jack interrupts him this time. “You don’t.”

Bitty gives him a look, frustration creeping in. “What?”

“Whatever you’re about to wish for, you’re doing it because you feel guilty.” Jack stands, and meets him on the other side of the counter. Bitty had known Jack stood over him since the first time they met, but he hadn’t realized how severe the height difference was until now. Jack towers. “Don’t say what you’re about to say.”

Bitty steps closer, angry now. “You can’t stop me from wishing for what I want.”

Jack leans down. Over the course of the several months since Bitty’s pie incident, Jack had gone from emotionless, robotic, to something more, something emotive and less and less other. He looks angry now, and Bitty’s never seen this one. “I can’t, but I’m asking you don’t.”

Bitty huffs, and pulls him down. Jack meets him easily, submitting to Bitty’s angry kiss. Bitty pulls away. “Fine.”

Jack’s lips twitch into the smallest of smiles. “Good,” he says, and leans back in.

Jack stays for the longest time yet, before he says he has to go. It’s been almost an hour of talking mixed with more, and Bitty doesn’t know what to with their newfound closeness.

Jack disappears, leaving Bitty sitting on his kitchen counter, dazed, confused, and a little bit in love.

Jack comes back, again and again, but he stops asking Bitty if he has his wish. He spends longer at Bitty’s side each time, learning how to bake, watching movies.

He looks worse every day, by small increments.

Jack doesn’t seem to mind, but Bitty’s guilt only grows. He can’t think of a third wish, and he’s too selfish to try, because if he does, Jack will be gone, forever. He’s told Bitty he goes back to hell, and “gets unmade,” which Jack makes sound boring. His purpose, Jack says, once filled, makes him useless, and so he’ll disappear. “It’s the way demons are,” he says, false cheer in his voice.

Bitty’s terrified by the idea.

Jack stays over more and more, and falls asleep despite telling Bitty demons don’t technically need to. He looks like he does, though, dark circles under his eyes almost purple, clothing in disarray, though different every time, now. Jack shows up in t-shirts more often now, and Bitty comes to find he has terrible fashion sense.

It’s three in the morning the first time Bitty realizes he’s in love with Jack. Jack’s arm is curled around his middle, skin warm against Bitty’s bare chest, soft breath making the back of his neck tingle.

“Shit,” Bitty whispers, frozen. He’s in love with jack. He loves Jack.

Jack, who can’t lattice a pie for shit, who thinks yellow running shoes and green shorts are acceptable as an outfit. Jack, who’s laugh sounds halfway between a high pitched giggle and goose honk and is still endearing anyway.

Jack, a demon who will disappear once Bitty gives him his third wish.

Bitty starts to shake, anxiety building and choking him. He doesn’t know what he wants, he can’t want anything because what he wants is Jack, here, alive, and for the rest of his life.

Jack stirs beside him. “Bits?” His voice is sleep rough. He props himself up on an elbow. “Y’okay?”

Bitty nods, fighting back tears. “Bad dream,” he mumbles, squeezing his eyes tight and trying to make his internal chant of Jack is going to disappear and you’ll never see him again stop.

Jack leans down, and presses a soft kiss on Bitty’s temple. “M’sorry.”

Bitty turns in his arms, pulls him into a real kiss, and tries to put all the feeling he can into it. “It’s okay.” he whispers back, stroking a thumb down Jack’s cheek. “It’ll be okay,” he says, trying to convince himself of something he knows he can’t.

Bitty withdraws. He can’t do this anymore, can’t hurt Jack like he has been. The longer Jack’s on Earth, the more ragged he becomes., the more sleep he needs, the more food he eats. It makes him better temporarily, but Bitty knows it’s only a band-aid. He has to make a decision.

But for Bitty to end that, he’ll also be ending Jack entirely. Jack begins to notice when Bitty withdraws, begins only visiting every other day, and then once a week.

Bitty makes it to finals week before he breaks. Jack’s visiting for the first time that week, and he’s pale. His hands shake, and he sounds like he has bronchitis, voice scratchy and a cough constantly lodged in the back of his throat.

Bitty breaks down, tears flooding down his cheek as he curls into a ball. Jack looks alarmed, tries to soothe Bitty in between coughs. “Jack, Jack stop.”

Jack pulls back.

Bitty wipes his cheek. “We need to talk about my wish.”

Jack sighs, and folds his hands in his lap. He looks resigned. “I know.”

Bitty draws a shaky breath inward. “I don’t know what I want, but I need to want something.”

Jack nods. “I know.”

Bitty scoots closer, and twines their fingers together. “Please, tell me what to do.”

Jack shakes his head, smothers another cough. “I can’t. I can’t influence you like that.”

Bitty pushes Jack’s hair from his forehead, locks their eyes. His skin is clammy. “I wish you could stay.”

It’s like the room freezes. Jack sucks in a breath.

It’s then Bitty realizes what he’s said. “Oh, no.” He’s panicking. “That doesn’t count, does it?”

Jack stares at him, and then gulps. “It can. If you want it too.”

Bitty stares back, mulling it over. “What would that mean for you?” He can’t believe he hasn’t thought of this possibility, of using his wish to make Jack whole again. “Will you be sent back?”

Jack frowns. “I… don’t know. No one’s ever done that. No one’s ever taken this long.”

Bitty squeezes his hand. “Please, tell me it would work.”

“I don’t know.” Jack pulls his hand back. “I have to go. I’ll… I’ll be back.” To the sound of Bitty’s protests, he disappears.

Bitty barely makes it through finals. His grades aren’t amazing, but he graduates. His parents come up for the ceremony, but he can’t even muster up enough cheer to enjoy it. He answers every question about campus, about the football team, all in a voice void of any emotion. His mom gives him worried looks all throughout, and finally pulls him aside after what’s supposed to be a celebration dinner, but feels more like a funeral.

“Honey, what’s wrong?” She looks concerned, in a way only a mom can. “You just graduated, aren’t you happy.”

He shrugs. “Yeah. I’m just tired, I guess.”

She smiles, sadly. “You upset it’s over?”

Bitty winces. He’s not upset school is over. He probably killed Jack with a careless word, and there’s nothing he can do to get him back. “Yeah,” he lies.

She pulls him into a hug. “It’ll feel better eventually. You got that job at the bakery lined up, don’t you?”

He nods in agreement, but doesn’t think it’ll ever feel better.

He pulls up a list of romantic comedies a friend from one of his economics classes had given him a while ago. Adam had said it was his “cheer up” list, and Bitty finds himself, if not feeling better, at least distracted.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t at your ceremony.” Bitty yelps, pauses the TV, and turns around. Jack’s there, behind him, dressed in another suit.

He looks the worst he’s seen yet. His skin is pallid, and he looks starved. Bitty’s eyes burn with unshed tears just looking at him.

“Jack?”

Jack smiles at him, a wide smile Bitty’s never seen before, still tired, but alive. “I’m sorry I took so long. I had to do some research.”

Bitty hops off the couch, and wraps him in a tight hug, which Jack returns happily. He’s lost weight, and Jack’s arms around him return his hug weakly.

“I can’t believe you’re here.” He looks up at Jack. “How long do you have?”

Jack’s face drops into confusion. “What do you mean?”

Bitty looks away. “You have to go back, right?”

Jack puts a hand under Bitty’s chin, and tilts it upward. “Tell me your last wish.”

Bitty shakes his head, eyes refusing to meet Jack’s. “I can’t. You’ll be gone.”

Jack repeats himself, more forcefully. “Tell me your last wish.”

Bitty shoves backward. “No! Jack, if I do, you’ll be gone.” He leans against the back of the couch, and folds his arms across his chest.

Jack kneels, and forces Bitty to look at him. His blue eyes are wide, pleading. “Bitty. Bits.” He grabs Bitty’s hand. “Eric. Please.”

Bitty gives up. He can’t do this anymore, can’t cause Jack any more pain. “I wish you could stay.”

Jack grins. Before Bitty’s eyes, Jack’s skin flushes back to a healthy tone. The exhaustion he’d been wearing like a cloak for the last few months falls off his shoulders. In less than a minute, he looks like the Jack from the first time Bitty saw him.

Bitty drops to his knees as well, takes Jack’s face in his hands. “How?”

Jack pulls Bitty into a kiss, and if Bitty wasn’t already on the ground, the sheer force of emotion wafting off Jack would have put him there. “Your wish.”

Tears spring to Bitty’s eyes, happy this time. “You can stay?”

Jack stares at him for a second, and then nods. “For as long as you’ll have me.”

Bitty pulls him in. “Forever,” he whispers.

Jack explains to him that he’d had to search through records of previous deals. There had only been one wish made before, asking for a demon to stay on Earth, after much the same situation had happened as Jack and Bitty’s. “There was precedent for it,” Jack says to him, after telling him the story. “All I had to do was ask.”

Apparently, not many demons fell in love with humanity (with a human, to be more specific) the way Jack had.

Jack gets more and more human as the days pass. One day he wakes up, and the faint rings of etchings into his skin, the marks that made him demon, have completely faded. Bitty hadn’t been able to see them, but Jack knew what this meant. Bitty’s wish had come true.

Next Christmas, he brings Jack home, and when his aunt asks where Bitty found such a good man, they share a small, secret smile. “I wished for him,” Bitty says, and leaves it at that.

#zimbits #omgcp #omgcheckplease #kylie writes #jesus this is 2k longer than i expected it to be #asks #Anonymous #dont mind my editing i fucking screwed up a saying RIP

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cryptocoinguides · 3 years

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Why is Nigeria Creating its Own Cryptocurrency?

I just read now that 1 dollar is now, 410 Naira officially all the way from 393 and from 485 to 495 on the black market. Almost 500 Naira to a dollar whew. The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria in an article according to Nairametrics is said to have stated that Nigeria will have its own Digital Currency. The statement reads We are committed to the CBN and I can assure everybody that Digital Currency will come to life even in Nigeria Does this mean that Nigeria will have its own coin, NGNT, Nigerian Naira Tetherhmmm I wonder where we’ve heard that one before.

But what do you think, would you use a coin issued by the Central Bank of Nigeria, drop a comment below.

I’m also going to talk about the new Dollar Limit in this video and of course, the new Naira rate as well. How’s it going guys, its Fisayo here and welcome to another Finance Friday episode, that’s coming not on a Friday this time. If you’re new, welcome if you’re returning, welcome back. Please hit that like button so more people can see the analysis were about to share here and of course, if this video is useful to you at all, just tap that like button.

Without further ado, let’s jump right into the video.

Okay, first things first, Is Nigeria going to be issuing a digital currency of its own. That is a huge deal if that goes through. One major country that is testing the waters in China. The idea of the Chinese digital currency is that it’s issued by their Central Bank. The major thing this will create is that China now has the ability to monitor the economy to a tee and, well you guessed it, monitor the people.

This is everything that Bitcoin stands against. It’s however not shocking to many analysts because of what is usually termed the Great Digital Firewall of China. Western Social Media apps like Twitter and many others don’t work there and to reroute it and use is even illegal. They have their own version of most services so it only makes sense that they went this route. Its also fascinating that China has according to unofficial statistics, about 70% of the virtual currency mining space or crypto mining.

This is also why the prices of these currencies shift drastically when something happens in China like bitcoin bans or mining crackdowns and of. Course Elon Musk. This even makes the volatility that cryptocurrencies have even more.

Nigeria famously banned bitcoin, I’ve mentioned it countless times in the series and I made a 2-part video about it which I’ll link below. Now, just slightly over 2 months later, we see that the Central Bank is saying that Nigeria should have a digital currency of its own.

I took to Twitter to ask what you guys thought and the feedback was quite interesting. The majority of the people mentioned that they wouldn’t want that especially considering they could be tracked and some people think that it would help since we can trace nearly all transactions. We can even trace government transactions but while that seems like a good thing, we don’t know for sure that this Digital overhaul is possible especially considering the statistics of people in the country that is banked or the number of active bank accounts in Nigeria being as much as 111 million.

Keep in mind that this isn’t 111 million people but 111 million bank accounts. The estimate from 2019 puts it that 73 million people had bank accounts then but of course, because of the surge in accounts being opened in 2020 due to the pandemic, it’s safe to say that its most likely close to 100 million or according to Guardian, 49% of Nigerians having bank account meaning 1 in every 2 people in Nigeria have a bank account.

The statistics even looks a little more out of place for a digital currency happening in Nigeria when you consider that again, only 40% of the Nigeria population can access the internet via a mobile phone, and let’s not even talk about proper smartphone penetration in Nigeria or how many people have access or would willingly be open up to a system like this. The implications for a digital currency in Nigeria can seriously help the Nigerian economy in a way that there’s transparency but the adverse effect or the disadvantage can come from the very top if it’s heavily centralized and people are penalized for using money.

It will be very easy for the central bank to block a person’s account that it doesn’t like. Also if the central bank is issuing digital currencies or better still if one entity is issuing it and it can go from there directly to the customer, the role of commercial banks might be affected but that’s an extreme case. Speaking of extreme cases, it could also widen the gap between rich and poor, good old inequality and at the same time it could have serious effects on the exchange rate and there would be crazier pump and dump schemes.

But I want to know what your thoughts are about the whole thing guys, let me know just leave a comment below if you think you’d love a Digital Naira and also if it even makes sense to consider.

If you’re finding this video useful so far, alike would really be appreciated as well. Speaking of the exchange rate. The Naira is now officially 410 Naira to $1, it was 393 before, and now, food prices have skyrocketed like crazy in Nigeria, restaurants have added 100 to as much as 500 Naira on almost every single food item. I bought one tiny piece of meat for 500 Naira.

A dollar pretty much. *Face Palm* Hey guys, it’s Fisayo here andOn a much lighter note. One of the leading banks in Nigeria, First Bank has launched its new website. I’m a designer and I thought it would only make sense to share. It actually looks visually appealing both on mobile and even on the web.

I’m on the go a lot, I frequently use my phone and the experience with the website is more modern and super easy on the eyes with different micro-interactions here and there.

You can, of course, log in and do your online banking, and the new website even lets you browse in your own preferred language and you can see a drop-down regardless of the platform. Whether it’s personal banking, business banking, and even private banking, all the functionality is right at your fingertips and easy to access. Do check out the new website displayed right here or with the link in the description of this video. Also, drop a comment below if you’re a first bank user.

I’d love to know what your thought are. Thank you for watching, I’ll see you at the next one. Alright back to the video. If you’ve been following my Finance Friday series, you would see that I’ve covered inflation in Nigeria and how we got to this point where now we’re almost at 500 Naira to 1 dollar. It’s a good watch and I recommend you check out that video, I also talked about some things you can do to stay on top of saving and investing considering how everything seems to be shifting.

One of the things I recommended a lot to people who were considering saving in a currency like a dollar or pounds for instance was to open a domiciliary account. A domiciliary account is basically an account of a foreign currency that exists or is domiciled in your home country. So you can walk into a bank that you have an existing account with, open a dollar, pounds, or euro account. What you’ll need are 2 references who also have current accounts in other banks or better still the same bank? There are many functions of an account like that and one thing it can help you with is if you want to pay school fees for instance, or if you travel and you want to use a card that is dollar-based and not has to worry about the currency rate.

The CBN silently has put out a policy that you cannot deposit more than $5,000 to your own domiciliary bank account in a month over the counter. Why? The main reason according to analysts for this move is that it would help the Naira currency so that people that are speculating on the dollar and putting pressure on the Naira would stop.

You see right now in Nigeria, there are 2 markets for our currency. There’s the bank rate at 410 and the parallel market aka black market rate at 495.

This means there’s a huge 80 Naira gap in between. So for instance, if someone got a dollar, let’s say 1,000 dollars at 410,000 at the bank and they want to change it to Naira at the black market, they sell at 495,000 making a total of 80,000 of course this is next to impossible because banks don’t give ordinary people at that anyway.

It’s reserved for school fees, travelers, and the likes and there’s even a limit to how much you can get for travelers I believe it’s $4,000. Although not many people use Domiciliary accounts, the few who do have complained that it’s hindering a lot and it is because to imagine if you’re a small business and you have to buy somethings abroad. The Naira cards already have little hope because the limit is $100 per month so you can’t do anything, now the limit for your dollar is $5,000 to even deposit to your account to pay and you would have to wait for a whole month before that limit expires.

It would definitely hinder someone like that however, it’s a policy, and in the long run, it’s generally for the benefit of the entire economy. But again Id loves to know your thoughts on this. Do you have a domiciliary account? Are you bothered by the $5,000 limit or do you think it’s a good thing that they’ve done? If you found this video useful so far, do hit that like button and also hit that subscribe button alongside the bell icon beside it to turn on notifications so you’ll be the first to know when we drop a new video.

Read More: Ripple XRP To $10,000 Post SEC Lawsuit!

via Why is Nigeria Creating its Own Cryptocurrency?

#bitcoin news #ethereum news #xrp news #cardano news #crypto news #best cryptocurrency to buy #best crypt

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ohshutupgray · 7 years

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Rules: Answer these 85 statements about yourself, then tag 20 people.

@spiffydolan @idk-dolans @roadtripdolan thanks for tagging me💞

I tag @notanotherdolantwinsblog @eteewetee2014 @dolantwins-1999 @dolantreehisser @tidsoptlmist @ethxndolan @laneswervingdolan @mintdolans @california-grethan @rockstardolan @stfudolan and everyone who wants to do it💓I know pretty much everyone has already done this but I’ve been stuck with homework and school and ya I’m pretty late sorry:))😊

Last:

1. Drink - Water

2. Phone call - My best friend to tell me to answer her text

3. Text message - My best friend

4. Song you listened to - H.E.R.-Avenue

5. Time you cried - I was watching If I stay for the tenth time on Saturday and still cried

Ever:

6. Dated someone twice? - No

7. Kissed someone and you regretted it-it was more of a “oh fuck now each time I see I gotta act like this never happened”

8. Been cheated on - No

9. Lost someone special - thankfully no

10. Been depressed - Happy to say that I’ve never been

11. Gotten drunk and thrown up - Nope

Favorite Colors:

12. Burgundy

13. Every pastel color you could think of

14. And black because yeah I think black is a color

In the last year have you:

15. Made new friends - YEESSS

16. Fallen out of love - Never been in love so I couldn’t fall out of it

17. Laughed until you cried - Too many times😂

18. Found out someone was talking about you - Yup

19. Met someone who changed you - Yes

20. Found out who your friends are - Pretty much

21. Kissed someone on your Facebook friends list - I haven’t used Facebook in a while so no

General:

22. How many of your Facebook friends do you know irl - Well I should know all of them

23. Do you have any pets - I have a parrot and let’s say we’re not best friends:))I really want a dog tho

24. Do you want to change your name - I love actually love my name cause I’ve never met someone with the same name

25. What did you do for your last birthday - Party with my friends

26. What time did you wake up today - 7:00am Kill me already

27. What were you doing at midnight last night - Watching Lie to me because apparently I think I can survive with 4 hours of sleep per night☺️

28. What is something you can’t wait for - I have to take a really important exam so I can’t wait for that ti be over

29. What are you listening to right now - H.E.R.-Avenue*yeah I have it on repeat because why not listen it till I can’t stand it anymore”:))

30. Have you ever talked to a person named Tom - I haven’t

31. Something that’s getting on your nerves - When I talk to someone and they don’t pay attention

32. Most visited website - Youtube and Tumblr

33. Hair color - Dark brown

34. Long or short hair - Quite long

35. Do you have a crush on someone - Everyone knows the answer to this question I mean if I didn’t have a crush on the twins I wouldn’t be writing this rn:))

36. What do you like about yourself - The fact that I don’t really care what others think about me

37. Want any piercings - Needles kinda scare me so

38. Blood type - I have no idea

39. Nicknames - They’re embarassing so let’s not get into that😂

40. Relationship status - Well today is Valentine’s day and I am still single yup

41. Zodiac - Pisces

42. Pronouns - She/Her

43. Favorite TV show - I don’t knooow rn I have a mini obsession with Lie to me so I guess that one

44. Tattoos - I don’t have any

45. Right or left handed - Right

47. Ever had surgery - Nope

48. Piercings - My ears

49. Sport - I am literaly the least active person

50. Vacation - I love going to the beach

51. Trainers - Idk

More general:

52. Eating - Pizza

53. Drinking - Water

54. I am about to watch - I just took a break from writing this because I got a notification about the Dolan twins’ video sooo

55. Waiting for - Next Tuesday😂

56. Want - I want a lot of things

57. Get married - Maybe after 10 more years:))

58. Career - Law/Psychology

Which is better:

59. Hugs or kisses - Depends

60. Lips or eyes - EYES

61. Shorter or taller - Taller

62. Older or younger - Older

63. Nice arms or stomach - Hard decision

64. Hookup or relationship - Relationship

65. Troublemaker or hesitant - A little bit of both

Have you ever:

66. Kissed a stranger - No

67. Drank hard liquor - I don’t drink

68. Lost glasses - YES and the wort part is that you need your glasses to find your glasses

69. Turned someone down - I don’t like doing it but yes

70. Sex on first date - No

71. Broken someones heart - I don’t think so

72. Had your heart broken - No

73. Been arrested - Almost:))

74. Cried when someone died - No one close to me has ever died and I’m grateful

75. Fallen for a friend - Had a crush

Do you believe in:

76. Yourself - If you don’t believe in yourself than in who?

77. Miracle - They happen

78. Love at first sight - not love, attraction yes

79. Santa Claus - Never really believed in him as a child even though my parents tried to convince me he’s real

80. Kiss on a first date - Depends on the person

81. Angels - Why not

Other:

82. Best friend name: Can’t really say it on here

83. Eye color - Brown *boring ik*

84. Favorite movie - Depends on my mood cause sometimes I like to cry sometimes I like to laugh can’t choose one

85. Favorite actor- young Leonardo DiCaprio I mean how can you not love him

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chill-that-ur-inmyhead · 4 years

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1. Who was the last person you held hands with? yao

2. Are you outgoing or shy? depends how I feel and the situation usually lean towards outgoing but I have my moments of shyness

3. Who are you looking forward to seeing? my friends and my mum

4. Are you easy to get along with? I like to think so

5. If you were drunk would the person you like take care of you? I don’t like anyone but I’m sure my friends would

6. What kind of people are you attracted to? charming and witty

7. Do you think you’ll be in a relationship two months from now? doubt it

8. Who from the opposite gender is on your mind? Jesus......???? haha no one

9. Does talking about sex make you uncomfortable? nah it is perfectly natural

10. Who was the last person you had a deep conversation with? yao

11. What does the most recent text that you sent say? “Yeah it’s insane”

12. What are your 5 favourite songs right now? Taylor Swift - betty Taylor Swift - The last great american dynasty The Heads and the Heart - Rivers and Roads Rusted Root - Send Me On My Way Machine Gun Kelly & Halsey - forget me too

13. Do you like it when people play with your hair? eh sometimes it can be nice sometimes I can only think about dirty hands on my hair

14. Do you believe in luck and miracles? yeah sure

15. What good thing happened this summer? I finally started my driving lessons and overcame my fear

16. Would you kiss the last person you kissed again? eh if it happens it happens but if not I’ll live

17. Do you think there is life on other planets? I hope so

18. Do you still talk to your first crush? nope

19. Do you like bubble baths? yep

20. Do you like your neighbours? yep they’re chill

21. What are your bad habits? nosiness

22. Where would you like to travel? Hawaii, Japan, China, Vietnam, Philippines, Australia, America, Canada literally EVERYWHERE!!!

23. Do you have trust issues? ehhhh I have issues but idk if trust is my main one

24. Favourite part of your daily routine? making lunch and a smoothie yum

25. What part of your body are you most uncomfortable with? my hips and thighs like why are you so big!!!!

26. What do you do when you wake up? check my phone for the time

27. Do you wish your skin was lighter or darker? just a lil tan wouldn’t hurt... a nice golden glow yenno

28. Who are you most comfortable around? myself

29. Have any of your ex’s told you they regret breaking up? nope! whoops haha

30. Do you ever want to get married? possibly

31. Is your hair long enough for a pony tail? yes 32. Which celebrities would you have a threesome with? Saoirse Ronan and Timothee Chalamet

33. Spell your name with your chin. bnzrerejketr (no where near)

34. Do you play sports? What sports? netball

35. Would you rather live without TV or music? surprisingly tv... music has been a solace in the pandemic and can’t give it up

36. Have you ever liked someone and never told them? ofc

37. What do you say during awkward silences? nothing just let the awkwardness seep in

38. Describe your dream girl/guy? thinks I am witty and charming ahah

39. What are your favorite stores to shop in? asos... I guess I shop on instead of in

40. What do you want to do after high school? go to uni. check! now what? who knows

41. Do you believe everyone deserves a second chance? depends if there are people waiting for their first

42. If you’re being extremely quiet what does it mean? I’m daydreaming

43. Do you smile at strangers? more like I try to have a neutral face

44. Trip to outer space or bottom of the ocean? ocean forever

45. What makes you get out of bed in the morning? daylight

46. What are you paranoid about? being boring

47. Have you ever been high? yep

48. Have you ever been drunk? yep

49. Have you done anything recently that you hope nobody finds out about? no???

50. What was the colour of the last hoodie you wore? pink

51. Ever wished you were someone else? Jane Fonda

52. One thing you wish you could change about yourself? my metabolism, it is so slow

53. Favourite makeup brand? nars and urban decay

54. Favourite store? asos

55. Favourite blog? ?????

56. Favourite colour? red

57. Favourite food? chinese

58. Last thing you ate? chocolate covered raisins

59. First thing you ate this morning? fish finger wrap

60. Ever won a competition? For what? yes!!! I won tickets to see hamilton in 2018 for my friend and I (!!!!!!) when I got the notification that I won I was shaking with excitement

61. Been suspended/expelled? For what? nope

62. Been arrested? For what? nope

63. Ever been in love? I have loved, but in love? who knows

64. Tell us the story of your first kiss? I don’t remember it tbh haha

65. Are you hungry right now? I’m chilling

66. Do you like your tumblr friends more than your real friends? nope

67. Facebook or Twitter? Twitter

68. Twitter or Tumblr? Twitter

69. Are you watching tv right now? nope

70. Names of your pets (If any)? used to have rabbits called, bonnie, pip and Barnaby but the first two past away and we had to re house the latter

71. Craving something? What? nah

72. What colour are your towels? sandy brown and pink

72. How many pillows do you sleep with? uno

73. Do you sleep with stuffed animals? nope

74. How many stuffed animals do you think you have? i used to have around 20 but now they’re down to 5 kept in a memory box

75. Favourite animal? dolphin

76. What colour is your underwear? black

77. Chocolate or Vanilla? chocolate

78. Favourite ice cream flavour? coffee

79. What colour shirt are you wearing? pink

80. What colour pants? navy blue

81. Favourite tv show? gilmore girls, grace and frankie and the office (us)

82. Favourite movie? Bridget Jones’s Diary

83. Mean Girls or Mean Girls 2? Mean Girls

84. Mean Girls or 21 Jump Street? Mean Girls

85. Favourite character from Mean Girls? Kevin G haha

86. Favourite character from Finding Nemo? Bruce

87. First person you talked to today? padre

88. Last person you talked to today? padre

89. Name a person you hate? my old estate agent

90. Name a person you love? family

91. Is there anyone you want to punch in the face right now? nope

92. In a fight with someone? nope

93. How many sweatpants do you have? one purple pair and they’re so baggy and comfy I love them

94. How many sweaters/hoodies do you have? 2 - first is pink from glossier and the second is purple from hilfiger

95. Last movie you watched? easy a

96. Favourite actress? saoirse ronan

97. Favourite actor? timothee chalamet

98. Do you tan a lot? not as much as I’d like

99. Have any pets? only fish

100. How are you feeling? sleepy

101. Do you type fast? ish

102. Do you regret anything from your past? that I didn’t learn to drive at 17

103. Can you spell well? I like to think so

104. Do you miss anyone from your past? nah

105. Ever been to a bonfire party? hmmm don’t think so

106. Ever broken someone’s heart? maybe

107. Have you ever been on a horse? yes

108. What should you be doing? sleeping

109. Is something irritating you right now? my back

110. Have you ever liked someone so much it hurt? yes

111. Do you have a full length mirror in your room? yes

112. Who was the last person you cried in front of? my family probably

113. What was your childhood nickname? H

114. Have you ever been out of your province/state? yep

115. Do you play the Wii? not anymore

116. Are you listening to music right now? yep - Taylor Swift, the archer

117. Do you like chicken noodle soup? yep

118. Do you like Chinese food? love

119. Favourite book? Ian McEwan Atonement

120. Are you afraid of the dark? not anymore

121. Are you mean? I try not to be

122. Is cheating ever okay? nah

123. Can you keep white shoes clean? yep

124. Do you believe in love at first sight? no more like lust at first sight

125. Do you believe in true love? for sure

126. Are you currently bored? ofc

127. What makes you happy? socialising, shopping, drinking

128. Would you change your name? probably not

129. What your zodiac sign? aquarius

130. Do you like subway? yep

131. Your bestfriend of the opposite sex likes you, what do you do? he wouldn’t, he is 110% gay

132. Who’s the last person you called? Betty but she didn’t answer

133. Favourite lyrics right now? “I’m only 17, I don’t know anything but I know I miss you” - betty, Taylor Swift

134. Can you count to one million? nope and I wouldn’t care to try

135. Dumbest lie you ever told? that I owned a horse, no I didn’t, I just went riding

136. Do you sleep with your doors open or closed? closed

137. How tall are you? 5′5

138. Curly or Straight hair? wavy

139. Brunette or Blonde? blonde

140. Summer or Winter? winter

141. Night or Day? night

142. Favourite month? september

143. Are you a vegetarian? nope

144. Dark, milk or white chocolate? dark

145. Tea or Coffee? tea

146. Was today a good day? it was average

147. Mars or Snickers? snickers

148. What’s your favourite quote? “Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay then it’s not the end” - Best Exotic Marigold Hotel movie

149. Do you believe in ghosts? nah

150. Get the closest book next to you, open it to page 42, what’s the first line on that page? “Two years later, in spite of her doctor’s warnings, mother took a final stab at having a son” My Life So Far, Jane Fonda

0 notes

lil-red-panda · 7 years

Note

Do 1-100 and I’ll send booty pics

1: Is there a boy/girl in your life?

You can say that

2: Think of the last person who hurt you; do you forgive them?

Forgive but never forget

3: What do you think of when you hear the word “meow?”

Cats?

4: What’s something you really want right now?

To stop feeling the way I do, I guess

5: Are you afraid of falling in love?

Its the falling out part usually

6: Do you like the beach?

Yes

7: Have you ever slept on a couch with someone else?

Yea

8: What’s the background on your cell?

My crush, so its not super weird, she knows and is 100% okay with it

9: Name the last four beds you were sat on?

,Mine, Shawns, technically Eulissas, and um and my old studios one

10: Do you like your phone?

It does me well so far, but I do want to upgrade

11: Honestly, are things going the way you planned?

Its only day 6 into this new year, so the plan was just made

12: Who was the last person whose phone number you added to your contacts?

My friend’s new number

13: Would you rather have a poodle or a Rottweiler?

Im okay with a poodle.

14: Which hurts the most, physical or emotional pain?

Emotional

15: Would you rather visit a zoo or an art museum?

Art Museum

16: Are you tired?

Fucking always

17: How long have you known your 1st phone contact?

12 years now

18: Are they a relative?

Nope, but he’s definitely closer than most of my family

19: Would you ever consider getting back together with any of your exes?

Yikes in my Nikes! Nah

20: When did you last talk to the last person you shared a kiss with?

A couple of days ago

21: If you knew you had the right person, would you marry them today?

I’d wait for her to be ready first, marriage is a big thing

22: Would you kiss the last person you kissed again?

23: How many bracelets do you have on your wrists right now?

None

24: Is there a certain quote you live by?

Not that I can think of a t the moment

25: What’s on your mind?

Alot but usually her :D

26: Do you have any tattoos?

Two, a lotus on my calf and a backpack on my forearm

27: What is your favorite color?

Purple

28: Next time you will kiss someone on the lips?

Im not sure but I have a hunch

29: Who are you texting?

My friend whom I call, Bubblegum

30: Think to the last person you kissed, have you ever kissed them on a couch?

Stop this, yes lol

31: Have you ever had the feeling something bad was going to happen and you were right?

I asked you stop asking about exes haha

32: Do you have a friend of the opposite sex you can talk to?

Most of them?

33: Do you think anyone has feelings for you?

I think so, but dat virgo moon doe

34: Has anyone ever told you you have pretty eyes?

I think so?

35: Say the last person you kissed was kissing someone right in front of you?

Ok?

36: Were you single on Valentines Day?

Most likely going to be

37: Are you friends with the last person you kissed?

Nope

38: What do your friends call you?

Mostly by name, but some call me Panda

39: Has anyone upset you in the last week?

When theres Emotions and Alcohol mixed, it happens

40: Have you ever cried over a text?

Yee

41: Where’s your last bruise located?

Fuck if I remember

42: What is it from?

N/A

43: Last time you wanted to be away from somewhere really bad?

Like two days ago

44: Who was the last person you were on the phone with?

My mother

45: Do you have a favourite pair of shoes?

No, I get one pair and just stick to them

46: Do you wear hats if your having a bad hair day?

Sometimes

47: Would you ever go bald if it was the style?

48: Do you make supper for your family?

49: Does your bedroom have a door?

Yes

50: Top 3 web-pages?

Im just gunna go with the top 3 used, Youtube, Twitch, Tumblr

51: Do you know anyone who hates shopping?

52: Does anything on your body hurt?

My knee tbh haha

53: Are goodbyes hard for you?

Usually

54: What was the last beverage you spilled on yourself?

An alcoholic orange soda

55: How is your hair?

Hair-y?

56: What do you usually do first in the morning?

Hate myself?

57: Do you think two people can last forever?

Yes

58: Think back to January 2007, were you single?

Yes

59: Green or purple grapes?

Puple

60: When’s the next time you will give someone a BIG hug?

Look at #28

61: Do you wish you were somewhere else right now?

Yea

62: When will be the next time you text someone?

I know for a fact in a few hours lol

63: Where will you be 5 hours from now?

Hanging with the person Id be texting in #62

64: What were you doing at 8 this morning.

Getting a ride home

65: This time last year, can you remember who you liked?

This time last year, umm, I dont remember

66: Is there one person in your life that can always make you smile?

Yea

67: Did you kiss or hug anyone today?

68: What was your last thought before you went to bed last night?

I dont rmemeber

69: Have you ever tried your hardest and then gotten disappointed in the end?

Yea

70: How many windows are open on your computer?

! window, 2 tabs

71: How many fingers do you have?

All 10

72: What is your ringtone?

For The Damaged Coda by Blonde Redhead, but my notification tone is Cuccos from Link to the Past

73: How old will you be in 5 months?

Nobody likes you when youre 23

74: Where is your Mum right now?

In the Kitchen

75: Why aren’t you with the person you were first in love with or almost in love?

She deiced my friend was a better choice

76: Have you held hands with somebody in the past three days?

77: Are you friends with the people you were friends with two years ago?

Most of them

78: Do you remember who you had a crush on in year 7?

God there were two friends, Katie and Ari

79: Is there anyone you know with the name Mike?

A few lol

80: Have you ever fallen asleep in someones arms?

Yes

81: How many people have you liked in the past three months?

One

82: Has anyone seen you in your underwear in the last 3 days?

83: Will you talk to the person you like tonight?

Most likely

84: You’re drunk and yelling at hot guys/girls out of your car window, you’re with?

Noone becasue I dont

85: If your BF/GF was into drugs would you care?

I would, but on the other hand, depends what it is?

86: What was the most eventful thing that happened last time you went to see a movie?

My friend went to Northern Lights before hand, Im just cant remeber what they bought

87: Who was your last received call from?

My mom

88: If someone gave you $1,000 to burn a butterfly over a candle, would you?

Probs

89: What is something you wish you had more of?

Yes

90: Have you ever trusted someone too much?

Yes

91: Do you sleep with your window open?

Its 4F, its cold enough with it closed

92: Do you get along with girls?

Yea

93: Are you keeping a secret from someone who needs to know the truth?

Not that I know of

94: Does sex mean love?

Not all the time

95: You’re locked in a room with the last person you kissed, is that a problem?

Yikeis in my Nikes!

96: Have you ever kissed anyone with a lip ring?

97: Did you sleep alone this week?

Yes

98: Everybody has somebody that makes them happy, do you?

I think so

99: Do you believe in love at first sight?

I mean, if the story works out that way, one can hope

100: Who was the last person that you pinky promise?

I’m not sure

8 notes · View notes

velvetroom--imagines · 7 years

Note

May I be pampered with a little drabble? 73 + Yusuke? ❤

73 (”Is there a reason you’re naked in my bed?”) + Yusuke

Slightly Dirty

Yusuke came home a little bit late than usual. He was held back by classmates and teachers asking him about his latest masterpiece. He had gotten much more famous since the Phantom Thieves had made their final heist. His art had finally began to reach it’s blooming point.

Fame always did interfere with the relationship, not to an extreme extent however. It kept him out late for dates and events, often leaving you stranded in a restaurant or a theater. It did upset you of course, but you understood that your partner was busy. However, it did annoy you how he’d make you wait to surprise him.

You have been lying bare in his sheets since the sun came down, and your lover hasn’t returned. He seemed to have forgotten that it was a planned night, and completely ignored the message you sent him. It has been hours, and you have already spent most of the night watching a terribly filmed sitcom. Just as you received no response from Yusuke, you didn’t plan on acting on your plans that night.

The clock strikes at 11 o’clock when the door opens, revealing a calm violet haired man. His eyes were closed, unable to notice the bare body on his sheets. “I’m home, love--” As soon as he closed the door, he opened his eyes. His body is frozen in surprise as he began to blink innocently.

“Is there a reason you are naked in my bed?” You could’ve sworn that your eye twitched. Your lips curled up into a scowl as you send the man a glare. “Oh, I wonder why?” You retorted back in a fiery tone, immediately taking the covers and shielding yourself from his eyes. It was evident that you were angry with his clueless thoughts. A sigh left your lips as you turn on your side, facing the balcony.

It suddenly hits Yusuke as soon as he checks that extra notification on his phone, a message stating that you were waiting for him at home. His calm demeanor doesn’t falter as he quietly crept to your side, slipping under the covers. The cold aura radiating off your body scares him, reminding him of the times he met Makoto’s wrath. “I apologize for taking up your time.” He said in an apologetic tone.

That alone was enough to make your heart simmer, but it wasn’t enough to make you forgive him entirely. “It’s fine.” You replied halfheartedly, rather disappointed that your efforts had gone to waste. Suddenly, you feel a shuffling of cloth until you discover that the sheets that covered your body had been pulled off.

“Forgive me, my love. I had tested your patience far too many times.” You looked down to find Yusuke laying kisses all over your abdomen, making their way up your torso.

“Please, let me take care of you.”

#persona 5 imagines #persona 5 headcanons #p5 imagines #p5 headcanons #drabble #drabbles #yusuke kitagawa

75 notes · View notes

runesandfaes · 7 years

Text

85 Question Tag

Rules: you must answer these 85 statements and tag 20 people

tagged by: @tog-trash 💕💕 Thank you babe!

I’m tagging : @cassiancalore @catastrophicallyinlovewithbooks @nessiansmut @highladyofnorta @dr-woodsprite @highladyofdreamcourt @throne-of-omg-the-feels @aelin-and-feyre @paperbacktrash @feysandsmut @azuremirwae@lovely-starfall @ablackbirdsinging @readinglikewildfire @wingsofanillyrian@dirtyhandsnet @modernbookfae @lronteeth @illyriangoddess @highlady-casandra

The last …

1. Drink: Water 2. Phone call: My Boyfriend 3. Text message: My best friend I think? 4. Song you listened to: Ties by Years & Years 5. Time you cried: Pretty sure last night while I was watching something, my memory’s super hazy right now

6. Dated someone twice: Yes

7. Kissed someone and regretted it: Eh..Kind of? In the sense that it wasn’t that great of a kiss

8. Been cheated on: Nope 9. Lost someone special: No 10. Been depressed: Gotten close, but no 11. Gotten drunk and thrown up: Nah

In the last year have you …

15. Made new friends: Yes 16. Fallen out of love: Yep 17. Laughed until you cried: Definitely 18. Found out someone was talking about you: Yes 19. Met someone who changed you: More like...enhanced me. In a good way. 20. Found out who your friends are: Yep 21. Kissed someone on your Facebook list: Yes 22. How many of your Facebook friends do you know in real life: Maximum of them 23. Do you have any pets: No 24. Do you want to change your name: Probably not 25. What did you do for your last birthday: Went out with my friends to a burger joint and I’m not spilling the rest here xD 26. What time did you wake up: 1:45 pm 27. What were you doing at midnight last night: Probably talking to the girls and watching Jane the Virgin 28. Name something you can’t wait for: MY BOYFRIEND TO BE HOME IN 2 DAYS YAYY!! 29. When was the last time you saw your mom: 5 hours ago-ish? 31. What are you listening to right now: The sounds of my Whatsapp notifications 32. Have you ever talked to a person named Tom: No 33. Something that is getting on your nerves: Nothing, currently. 34. Most visited website: Tumblr and Facebook 35. Hair colour: Black 36. Long or short hair: Medium? 37. Do you have a crush on someone: Do fictional people count? Then plenty.

38. What do you like about yourself: My "looks like they could kill you but is actually a cinnamon roll” personality......most of the time. 39. Piercings: One on each ear. HOLY SHIT THIS REMINDS ME, I WAS SUPPOSED TO GET MY NOSE PIERCED 40. Blood type: O+ 41. Nickname: Technically, Labonno is my nickname. But Bonbon, Ibti, Lab etc 42. Relationship status: In a Relationship 43. Zodiac: Sagittarius 44. Pronouns: She/Her 45. Favourite TV Show: F.R.I.E.N.D.S 46. Tattoos: Nope 48. Surgery: No 49. Piercing: Ears (See above) 50. Sport: I’m not a sports-y person. But if I had to choose, Football to watch, Basketball to play 51. Vacation: So many places in Europe 52. Pair of trainers: I don’t think I own one 53. Eating: I just really want cheesecake right now. 54. Drinking: I want tea 55. I’m about to: Hopefully grab some food 57. Want: TO EAT 58. Get married: Someday 59. Career: Still a student but either a Psychologist, Author or work in editing and publishing 60. Hugs or Kisses: Both 61. Lips or Eyes: Eyes 62. Shorter or Taller: Taller 63. Older or Younger: Older 64. Nice arms or Nice stomach: Nice arms 65. Hook up or Relationship: Both works, depending on what I want 66. Troublemaker or Hesitant: A good mix of both 67. Kissed a stranger: Nope 68. Drank hard liquor: Yeah, like, once. 69. Lost glasses/contact lenses: Yes 70. Turned someone down: Yep 72. Broken someone’s heart: Yeah 73. Had your heart broken: With books, everyday. Irl, nah. 74. Been arrested: No 75. Cried when someone died: Yes 76. Fallen for a friend: No

Do you believe in …

77. Yourself: Yes 78. Miracles: Depends on the day 79. Love at first sight: Not even a bit 80. Santa Claus: No 81. Kiss on the first date: Depends on the date 82. Angels: Occasionally?

Other

83. Current best friend’s name: Oriha ( @azuremirwae ) and Luiza ( @cassiancalore ) <33 84. Eye colour: Dark brown 85. Favourite movie: I have no idea honestly

#Well that took fucking forever #but I had fun #tag games #labonno does tags

15 notes · View notes

batterymonster2021 · 5 years

Text

Is Social Media Hurting Your Mental Health? | Bailey Parnell | TEDxRyersonU

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/is-social-media-hurting-your-mental-health-bailey-parnell-tedxryersonu-4/

Is Social Media Hurting Your Mental Health? | Bailey Parnell | TEDxRyersonU

Translator: MARIA TIAKA Reviewer: Peter van de Ven i am fat. Wow, i’m fats. She’s best nineteen years historic, what am I doing with my existence? Good day! Two likes! Exceptional. Do i admire this photo? Does she relatively want extra likes? I hope i’m going to be invited to the marriage ceremony. Another like, exceptional! Welcome to the inner monologue of a average social media scroll. A monologue that so many people have day-to-day, however we do not believe about it, we do not talk about it.In fact, many of us cannot even respect it going down. I’m Bailey Parnell, and i will speak about the unintended consequences social media is having for your intellectual wellness. I will exhibit you what is stressing you out day-to-day, what it is doing to you, and how you can craft a better expertise for yourself on-line. Simply over a 12 months ago, my sister and i took a 4-day trip to Jasper, Alberta. This was the primary no-work trip I had taken in 4 years. On this trip, I used to be going dark. I was turning on airplane mode, no e-mail and no social media. The primary day there, I was once still experiencing phantom vibration syndrome. That’s the place you suppose your phone went off, and you determine and it didn’t.I was checking often. I used to be distracted in dialog. I was seeing these beautiful points of interest Jasper needed to present, and my first response used to be to take out my telephone and post it on social. But of direction it wasn’t there. The 2d day was somewhat bit less difficult. You probably pondering i’m ridiculous, however I hadn’t been totally disconnected in over 4 years. This was close to a brand new expertise again. It wasn’t unless the fourth day I used to be there that I used to be sooner or later comfortable with out my mobilephone. I was once sitting with my sister, literally on the side of this mountain, once I started thinking to myself: "what’s social media doing to me? What’s it doing to my peers?" That was once most effective 4 days, and it was anxiety-inducing, it was traumatic and it resulted in withdrawals. That is once I began to ask questions and have due to the fact started my grasp’s study into this discipline. I’ve worked in social marketing particularly in bigger education for many of my career. That suggests I work with plenty of 18- to 24-yr-olds, which additionally happens to be essentially the most active demographic on social media.The other thing you have got to know about me is that i am young sufficient to have grown up with social media, but just ancient sufficient to be able to seriously interact with it in a method that twelve-year-old me most often couldn’t. My life is social media: individually, professionally and academically. If it used to be doing this to me, what used to be it doing to each person else? I immediately discovered I wasn’t on my own.The core for collegiate mental health found that the highest three diagnoses on school campuses are anxiety, melancholy and stress. Numerous stories from the USA, Canada, the united kingdom, you title it, have linked this excessive social media use with these excessive stages of anxiety and depression. However the frightening factor is that top social media use is nearly everyone i know: my buddies, my family, my colleagues. 90% of 18- to 29-yr-olds are on social media. We spend on average two hours a day there. We do not even eat for 2 hours a day. 70% of the Canadian populace is on social media.Our voter turnout is not even 70%. Something we do that traditionally is valuable of primary observation. Some thing we spend this much time doing has lasting effects on us. So let me introduce you to 4 of the most common stressors on social media, that if go unchecked have talents to grow to be full-blown mental wellbeing problems, and that is not ever an exhaustive list. Number one: the highlight Reel. Identical to in sporting events, the spotlight reel is a group of the great and brightest moments.Social media is our individual spotlight reel. It’s where we put up our wins, or when we look best, or when we are out with pals and family. However we battle with insecurity due to the fact we evaluate our in the back of-the-scenes with every person else’s spotlight reels. We are consistently comparing ourselves to others. Yes, this was happening before social media, with television and famous person, however now it’s going down all the time, and it’s directly linked to you. A ideal example I came across in preparation for this talk is my friend on trip: ‘brb, nap …’ (Laughter) ‘Wait, why cannot I afford a trip? Why am I just sitting here in my PJ’s observing Netflix? I wish to be on a seashore.’ here is the thing, i do know her very well.I knew this was once out of the usual for her. I knew she was by and large drowning in schoolwork. But we believe, ‘Who wishes to look that?’ The highlights are what persons wish to see. Correctly, when your highlights do good, you encounter the 2d stressor on social media. Which is quantity two: Social forex. Identical to the greenback, a forex is actually something we use to attribute value to a just right or service. In social media, these likes, the comments, the shares have end up this form of social currency in which we attribute worth to anything. In marketing, we call it the ‘economic climate of awareness’. Everything is competing in your concentration, and while you provide anything a like or a section of that finite awareness, it becomes a recorded transaction attributing value.Which is high-quality if you are selling albums or apparel. The trouble is that in our social media, we’re letting others attribute value to us. You already know any one or are anyone that has taken down a picture seeing that it did not take as many likes as you idea it will. I’m going to admit, i’ve been proper there with you. We took our product off the shelf on account that it wasn’t promoting speedy sufficient. That is altering our sense of identification. We’re tying up our self-valued at of what others consider about us and then we are quantifying it for every body to see. And we are obsessed. We have got to get that selfie simply right, and we will take 300 photographs to be certain. Then we will wait for the perfect time to put up. We’re so obsessed we now have biological responses after we are not able to take part.Which leads me to the third stressor on social media. Quantity three: F.O.M.O. It can be a mild phrase we now have all thrown around. F.O.M.O., or the ‘fear of missing out’, is an actual social anxiousness from the fear that you’re lacking a potential connection, occasion, or opportunity. A collection of Canadian Universities found that 7/10 scholars mentioned they’d eliminate their social networking debts if it were not for fear of being left ‘out of the loop’.Out of curiosity, what number of persons here have, or have regarded deactivating your social. That is nearly everyone. That F.O.M.O. You believe, the spotlight reels, the social foreign money, those are all results of a slightly ‘natural’ social media expertise. But what if occurring social daily was once a terrifying experience? Where you now not simply question your self-worth but you question your defense? Possibly the worst stressor on social media is quantity 4: online Harassment. 40% of online adults have skilled on-line harassment. 73% have witnessed it. The unlucky truth is that it is so much worse and much more likely in case you are a lady, LGBTQ, a man or woman of color, muslim – I consider you get the point. The difficulty is that within the information we are seeing these gigantic reviews: The 18-year-ancient Tyler Clementi, who took his life after his roommate secretly filmed him kissing one more man and outed him on Twitter. We see women like Anita Sarkeesian being virtually shamed of the internet and sent death and rape threats for sharing their feminism. We see these stories as soon as it’s too late. What concerning the day-to-day online harassment? What about that unpleasant snapchat you despatched your pal with the intention of it being private, and now it is up on facebook? ‘And so? It is just one photo, it is funny.’ ‘just one mean remark, no longer a tremendous deal.’ but when these micro moments happen again and again, over time, that is when we’ve a macro challenge.We must recognize these daily circumstances as good. Because if they go unchecked and the consequences unnoticed, we’re going to have many more Tyler Clementis. The effects are not continuously handy to recognize. How many of you’ve observed the notifications at the prime of my display? How many of you, like me, are stricken that they’re now not checked? Adequate, let me check them for you. (Sighs) ok! Just one small instance of what this may do to you. Probably you quite simply can not focus on account that your notifications are going off the manage, and also you must determine. That need, eventually turns into dependancy. Related to social media, we’re already experiencing impairment similar to substance dependencies. With each like, you get a shot of that feel-just right chemical, dopamine. You obtain extra of that social currency. So what will we do to think just right? We verify likes – simply another time.We publish – simply another time. We’re anxious if we shouldn’t have entry. Doesn’t that sound like every drug you could have ever heard of? Yeah! So when that grows, when your social media use goes unconfronted overtime, that’s after we see the rising stages of nervousness and melancholy: the F.O.M.O. The distractions, the highlight reels, the comparisons; it is quite a bit, and it is always! The Canadian organization of mental well being observed that grades 7-12 pupils who spent two hours a day on social media stated better phases of nervousness, melancholy and suicidal ideas. For those of you doing the math, that is as younger as twelve years historical. Right here is the article, i love social media. I do, I find it irresistible. Hearing what I’ve stated in these days might make you consider i would like you to get off of it. However i don’t. I do not suppose it’s going at any place, so i’m no longer going to waste my time telling you to spend less time on social media. Frankly, i do not believe absence is an choice anymore.However that doesn’t mean you can’t practice ‘trustworthy social’. Everything i’ve talked about in these days has nothing and the whole lot to do with social media. I mean, social media is neither excellent nor unhealthy. It can be just the most contemporary instrument we use to do what we’ve got perpetually achieved: inform stories and communicate with every other. You would not blame Samsung tv for a nasty tv show. Twitter doesn’t make persons write hateful posts. Once we talk about this dark part of social media, what we really speak about is the darkish side of people. That dark side that makes harassers harass; that insecurity that makes you are taking down a photograph you have been excited to share. That dark facet that looks at a snapshot of a glad loved ones and wonders why yours does no longer seem like that.In order mother and father, as educators, as friends, as bosses this dark facet is what we must center of attention on. We want preventative tactics and coping tactics so that you probably have your low days – considering you will – when you are questioning your self-worth, you under no circumstances get as little as Tyler Clementi – and the various others like him. ‘ok, Bailey, how do you in finding social media well being?’ here’s the good news: Recognising a hindrance is the first step to fixing it. So hearing this talk is simply that, the 1st step: recognise the concern. You know the vigor of advice, when any individual tells you about some thing and also you seeing it all over. That is why awareness is vital. Considering that now you’ll at the least be better able to understand these effects if and after they occur to you. The 2nd factor you will do is audit your social media eating regimen. The equal means we screen what goes into our mouth, reveal something goes into your head and coronary heart.Ask your self: ‘Did that fb scroll make me feel better or worse off?’ ‘How regularly do I definitely examine likes?’ ‘Why am I responding this method to that photo?’ Then ask your self if you are joyful with the outcome. You probably and that’s adequate! But when you’re now not, transfer on to step three. Create a better on-line experience. After my associate did his audit, he realised his self-valued at was too tied up in social media, but principally celebrities reminding him of the things he did not have. So he unfollowed all manufacturers and all celebrities. That labored for him. But it could now not be celebrities for you. For me, I needed to purge different folks off my timeline. Let me let you know a secret. You do not ought to follow your ‘associates’.In actual fact that often our associates, or the persons now we have on facebook as a courtesy, they simply suck on-line! You find yourself on this passive-aggressive reputation battle you didn’t even comprehend used to be happening. Or you might be watching at 50 images of the equal live performance from the equal attitude. (Laughter) if you wish to follow artists, or comedians, or cats, you are able to do that. The last factor you’re going to do is mannequin just right behaviour. Offline we’re taught to not bully different kids within the playground. We’re taught to appreciate others and treat them how they deserve. We are taught not to kick others when they’re down, or have the benefit of their downfalls. Social media is a software. A tool that can be used for just right, for more confident companies, for revolutions, for placing grumpy cat in Disney films.(Laughs) internet is a bizarre position. Is social media hurting your intellectual well being? The reply is: it doesn’t ought to. Social can tear you down, yes, or it might elevate you up, where you depart feeling at an advantage, or have an specific snicker-out-loud. Finally, i have 24 hours in a day, if I spend two of those hours on social media, then i would like my experiences to be filled with thought, laughs, motivation, and a whole lot of grumpy cat in Disney films. Thank you.(Applause) .

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