#I am 45. I had none of those things. I was an adult for all of them.

[aprillikesthings]

Somewhere out there is the sapphic who grew up with seeing Korrasami hold hands at age 10

The Ruby/Sapphire wedding at age 14

The Catradora kiss at age 16

And Caitvi fucking at age 20

And they're a lucky, lucky bastard

[lovestuckyhatemarvel]

Okay, another hour and a half long episode.

1.) Brenner missed the sad CGI and also baby El was very good at sealing the upside down.

2.) Brenner should have been a tattoo artist instead. I mean, a tattoo artist for adults, not kids. He’s got very steady hands and can tattoo numbers very exactly.

3.) THIS IS MUSIC.

4.) Honestly so far the only one who’s been a snob about music is Robin. But also I still don’t think Eddie would like Taylor Swift.

5.) Henry really wants to villain monologue at you, Nancy. Take a seat for this cliche.

6.) Damn, the CGI on those restraints is…bad.

7.) These images are going way too fast.

8.) Damn, Steve. Your arms are nice.

9.).”Written and directed by the Duffer Brothers”. I Know. That’s the Problem.

10.) What’s the point of keeping Yuri quiet at this point?

11.) Hopper, we super had a funeral for you.

12.) El is actually doing really badly.

13.) Why is anyone surprised that demogorgons can climb? Look at those fuck off legs.

14.) DID NONE OF THESE GUARDS PAY ATTENTION TO HOPPER USING FIRE?

15.) Okay the soldiers can unload their clip into a demogorgon and nothing happens but Hopper can shoot a demodog once in the head like Ol Yeller and it works.

16.) Okay but for real, where are the Russians getting all these bastards? Fun tubes, but WHERE ARE THEY FROM? Are they from Hawkins? How did they transfer that shit?

17.) HOW’D THEY GET THE CGI DUST MONSTER TO RUSSIA?

18.) Okay she can lift a thing.

19.) Will, I’m so sorry, but I did not care about your speech to Mike.

20.) I still don’t understand how Henry survived El’s attack or why the upside down didn’t turn into anything for him or what the fuck he did for like a decade floating in a void.

21.) Why is everyone whispering

22.) El got to hear at least some of the plan, at least.

23.) The War Zone is a hilarious name for a shop.

24.) Eddie, you moron. Wearing a mask doesn’t help if you’re wearing a shirt emblazoned with your club.

25.) BIG BOY.

26.) My roommate pointed out the RV would have been hooked up to water and sewage so driving it off like that would have fucked up the ground and the vehicle.

27.) I do not understand why Henry is so powerful or why him killing people would give him their powers when it doesn’t do that for El.

28.) I still don’t want Steve and Nancy together. Also I don’t think he actually said he wanted her there.

29.) that helicopter is hilarious

30.) “The KGB will be listening to this call” Oh what a change. This time it’ll be agents of someone else’s government that will be listening in.

31.) Oh, okay, Steve got the jacket from War Zone. Where’s the vest though?

32.) Ah, the boyfriend reveal.

33.) I still hate Jason Carver. Also, buckshot has a pretty good range, dipshit.

34.) Tire tracks. Ah yes, the plot happened here.

35.) IDK why El told Sam to check Max’s place. The bit she heard did not make it seem like they were staying there. And so Sam asking that woman for that was kind of stupid.

36.) What? Brenner double crossed Sam Owens? Who could have predicted this twist? Surely only the greatest psychics.

37.) I am proud of El for saying to Brenner’s face that he’s a monster.

38.) Baby girl, kill Brenner anyway.

39.) YOU KNOW WHO WOULD LOVE TO KILL BRENNER? KALI. THE GIRL NO ONE IN THIS FACILITY TALKS ABOUT.

40.) Robin and Steve are sweet.

41.) goddamn it, brenner, just remove El’s collar.

42.) I am glad Brenner got shot so many times though.

43.) Oh shit, it’s the script.

44.) oh no the psychic child is using her psychic powers to stop your from badly shooting at her? Who could have predicted this?

45.) oh my god el, do something real already.

46.) the payoff wasn’t worth it.

47.) “Yeah, it’s cool, but it would have been better if it’d happened about 11 seconds earlier.” My roommate is hilarious.

48.) Brenner turned off the collar as a last act. Okay whatever.

49.) BRENNER SHUT THE FUCK UP AND DIE ALREADY.

50.) this heartfelt conversation makes no sense and was not earned.

51.) brenner you were shot like 5 times by a sniper rifle, how are you still talking, let alone alive?

52.) SHould have run over his corpse with the pizza van

53.) god they held on that brenner shot for way too long

54.) WHO’S GONN DIE????? Just say everyone.

55.) moody shots.

56.) LMAO THIS SONG. GOD. DUFFERS, STOP SUCKING YOUR OWN CODCKS FOR FIVE SECONDS.

Oh god I looked ahead and the season 4 finale is 2 and 22 minutes long. I hate the duffers.

[turnpage]

send me a ✐ for a random sentence starter from my muse (1-1500) — tw: profanity, mild nsfw, long list

generator here quotes compiled from here inspired by

feel free to change to fit your preferences as need.

❨1❩ ❛ They are dreams, but I’m too out of control, I lose myself in them, and I’ve already lost too much to let them take over. ❜
 ❨2❩ ❛ Sometimes human places create inhuman monsters. ❜ ❨3❩ ❛ I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just going to bash your brains in. ❜ ❨4❩ ❛ Monsters are real. Ghosts are too. They live inside of us, and sometimes, they win. ❜ ❨5❩ ❛ The world's a hard place. It doesn't care. It doesn't hate you and me, but it doesn't love us, either. ❜ ❨6❩ ❛ The tears that heal are also the tears that scald and scourge. ❜ ❨7❩ ❛ Pull your act together and just go on. ❜ ❨8❩ ❛ I had never dreamed there could be so much pain in a life when there is nothing physically wrong. I hurt all the time. ❜ ❨9❩ ❛ Tough old world, baby. If you're not bolted together tightly, you're gonna shake, rattle, and roll before you turn thirty. ❜ ❨10❩ ❛ Are you sure self-pity is a luxury you can afford? ❜ ❨11❩ ❛ Truth comes out. In the end it always comes out. ❜ ❨12❩ ❛ Living by your wits is always knowing where the wasps are. ❜ ❨13❩ ❛ No matter where you go, the same asshole gets off the plane. ❜ ❨14❩ ❛ We sometimes need to create unreal monsters and bogies to stand in for all the things we fear in our real lives. ❜ ❨15❩ ❛ That’s your job in this hard world, to keep your love alive and see that you get on, no matter what. ❜ ❨16❩ ❛ Human nature, baby. Grab it and growl. ❜ ❨17❩ ❛ God wiped snot out of his nose and that was you. ❜ ❨18❩ ❛ Run away. Quick. And remember how much I love you. ❜ ❨19❩ ❛ How many times, over how many years, have I—a grown adult—asked for the mercy of another chance? ❜ ❨20❩ ❛ I was suddenly so sick of myself, so revolted. ❜ ❨21❩ ❛ You listen to me. I’m going to talk to you about it this once and never again this same way. ❜ ❨22❩ ❛ But those pieces, they’ll never fit just the same way again. Never in this world. ❜ ❨23❩ ❛ Dying is a part of living. You have to keep tuning in to that if you expect to be a whole person. ❜ ❨24❩ ❛ Officious little prick. ❜ ❨25❩ ❛ I’ve been sleepwalking again, my dear. — The plants are moving under the rug. ❜ ❨26❩ ❛ How I wish you were fear. ❜ ❨27❩ ❛ But it was a dreadful kind of curiosity, the kind that makes you peek through your fingers during the scariest parts of a scary movie. ❜ ❨28❩ ❛ All we have is time, you know. An eternity of time. Or shall we end it? Might as well. After all, we're missing the party. ❜ ❨29❩ ❛ We all remember our pleasant dreams more clearly than the scary ones. ❜ ❨30❩ ❛ The way things should be and the way things are hardly ever get together. ❜ ❨31❩ ❛ Got to be regular if you want to be happy. ❜ ❨32❩ ❛ But in a solitary life, there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. ❜ ❨33❩ ❛ He showed me his scars, and in return he let me pretend that I had none. ❜ ❨34❩ ❛ Humbling women seems to me a chief pastime of poets. As if there can be no story unless we crawl and weep. ❜ ❨35❩ ❛ It is a common saying that women are delicate creatures, flowers, eggs, anything that may be crushed in a moment's carelessness.  ❜ ❨36❩ ❛ If I had ever believed it, I no longer do. ❜ ❨37❩ ❛ I thought once that gods are the opposite of death, but I see now they are more dead than anything, for they are unchanging, and can hold nothing in their hands. ❜ ❨38❩ ❛ I cannot bear this world a moment longer. ❜ ❨39❩ ❛ I have a better idea. I will do as I please. ❜ ❨40❩ ❛ All my life has been murk and depths, but I am not a part of that dark water. I am a creature within it. ❜ ❨41❩ ❛ You cannot know how frightened gods are of pain. There is nothing more foreign to them, and so nothing they ache more deeply to see. ❜ ❨42❩ ❛ When we are young, we think ourselves the first to have each feeling in the world. ❜ ❨43❩ ❛ When I was born, the word for what I was did not exist. ❜ ❨44❩ ❛ But perhaps no parent can truly see their child. When we look we see only the mirror of our own faults. ❜ ❨45❩ ❛ I will not be like a bird bred in a cage, too dull to fly even when the door stands open. ❜ ❨46❩ ❛ This is what it means to swim in the tide, to walk the earth and feel it touch your feet. This is what it means to be alive. ❜ ❨47❩ ❛ You threw me to the crows, but it turns out I prefer them to you. ❜ ❨48❩ ❛ Yet because I knew nothing, nothing was beneath me. ❜ ❨49❩ ❛ If now I am wise, it is only because I have been fool enough for a hundred lifetimes. ❜ ❨50❩ ❛ You can teach a viper to eat from your hands, but you cannot take away how much it likes to bite. ❜ ❨51❩ ❛ Give me the blade. Some things are worth spilling blood for. ❜ ❨52❩ ❛ I have been old and stern for so long, carved with regrets and years like a monolith. But that is only a shape I’ve been poured into. I do not have to keep it. ❜ ❨53❩ ❛ I wake sometimes in the dark terrified by my life's precariousness, its thready breath. ❜ ❨54❩ ❛ Understanding the world is a matter of keeping very still and showing no emotions, leaving room for others to reveal themselves. ❜ ❨55❩ ❛ Beneath the smooth, familiar face of things is another that waits to tear the world in two. ❜ ❨56❩ ❛ The truth is, men make terrible pigs. ❜ ❨57❩ ❛ My father has never been able to imagine the world without himself in it. ❜ ❨58❩ ❛ This is the grief that makes our kind choose to be stones and trees rather than flesh. ❜ ❨59❩ ❛ Witches are not so delicate. ❜ ❨60❩ ❛ Those who fight against prophecy only draw it more tightly around their throats. ❜ ❨61❩ ❛ I learned that I could bend the world to my will, as a bow is bent for an arrow. I would have done that toil a thousand times to keep such power in my hands. ❜ ❨62❩ ❛ There's the story, then there's the real story, then there's the story of how the story came to be told. Then there's what you leave out of the story. Which is part of the story too. ❜ ❨63❩ ❛ The best way of being kind to bears is not to be very close to them. ❜ ❨64❩ ❛ Life is warped. I'm just in sync. ❜ ❨65❩ ❛ Now it's a whisper from the past. ❜ ❨66❩ ❛ But hatred and viciousness are addictive. You can get high on them. Once you've had a little, you start shaking if you don't get more. ❜ ❨67❩ ❛ Why is it always such a surprise? The moon. Even though we know it's coming. Every time we see it, it makes us pause, and hush. ❜ ❨68❩ ❛ Perfection exacts a price, but it's the imperfect who pay it. ❜ ❨69❩ ❛ What is 'belief' but a willingness to suspend the negatives?  ❜ ❨70❩ ❛ I have scars, inside me. ❜ ❨71❩ ❛ The dead are not entirely dead but are alive in a different way; a paler way admittedly, and somewhat darker. ❜ ❨72❩ ❛ However dark, a darkness with voices in it is better than a silent void. ❜ ❨73❩ ❛ Amazing how quickly the past becomes idyllic. ❜ ❨74❩ ❛ It is another way of saying tough luck. To people you aren’t going to help out. ❜ ❨75❩ ❛ I'm waiting, far off in the future. ❜ ❨76❩ ❛ The only sure camouflage is unpredictability. ❜ ❨77❩ ❛ There are so many of them, and each one of them is doing part of the killing, whether they know it or not. ❜ ❨78❩ ❛ First rule: limit bloodshed by making sure that none of your own gets spilled. ❜ ❨79❩ ❛ I long to swim in liquid moonlight. ❜ ❨80❩ ❛ That's right, I don’t like to be summoned on trivial matters. ❜ ❨81❩ ❛ The part that really made me happy was that you wanted me to be happy. ❜ ❨82❩ ❛ Cut that part out of us: the grinning, elemental malice. Begin us anew. ❜ ❨83❩ ❛ Where there are wars, there will be crows, the carrion-fanciers. And ravens too, the warbirds, the eyeball gourmands. And vultures, the holy birds of yore, old connoisseurs of rot. ❜ ❨84❩ ❛ At last. It's you. ❜ ❨85❩ ❛ No, you will not be cooked on a fire when you die. Because you are not a fish. ❜ ❨86❩ ❛ Take what the moment offers. Don’t close doors. Be thankful. ❜ ❨87❩ ❛ How many others have stood in this place? Left behind, with all gone, all swept away. ❜ ❨88❩ ❛ Is it disapproval or extreme lust? With some men it’s hard to tell the difference. ❜ ❨89❩ ❛ My hair was driving me crazy, but then … I died. ❜ ❨90❩ ❛ Seek and ye shall find, eventually. And you found. You’re right, I don’t dispute that. Sorry. ❜ ❨91❩ ❛ Everything digests, and is digested. ❜ ❨92❩ ❛ My head was once a filing cabinet. Now it’s a flurry of papers, floating on a draft. ❜ ❨93❩ ❛ You cannot keep bumping your head against reality and saying it is not there. ❜ ❨94❩ ❛ I have a feeling that inside you somewhere, there’s something nobody knows about. ❜ ❨95❩ ❛ And if I don’t want to die, I’ve got to start living. ❜ ❨96❩ ❛ The world is a beautiful place. Don’t forget that. And don’t miss it. ❜ ❨97❩ ❛ I was fighting for my life. So I must not want to die. ❜ ❨98❩ ❛ Something’s happening to me, through me, something dangerous and new. ❜ ❨99❩ ❛ It’s taken root, a poison tree; it’s grown, fanning out, vines winding round my gut, my lungs, my heart. ❜ ❨100❩ ❛ We’re interpreters. We’re translators. ❜ ❨101❩ ❛ You’ll notice I’m not asking what made you this way. ❜ ❨102❩ ❛ No family, happy or unhappy, is quite like any other. Tolstoy was chock-fullo’shit. Remember that. ❜ ❨103❩ ❛ We lived in monochrome those nights. ❜ ❨104❩ ❛ You live in a dream. You’re a sleepwalker, blind. How do you know what the world is like? ❜ ❨105❩ ❛ Do you know, if you rip off the fronts of houses, you’d find swine? ❜ ❨106❩ ❛ I stand here in the dark: cold, utterly alone, full of fear and something that feels like longing. ❜ ❨107❩ ❛ The definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results. ❜ ❨108❩ ❛ Not to warm the flesh, but solely to please the eye. ❜ ❨109❩ ❛ Selective emotional detachment. ❜ ❨110❩ ❛ Not for me, or at least not today. ❜ ❨111❩ ❛ Dead but not gone, watching life surge forward around me, powerless to intervene. ❜ ❨112❩ ❛ Do I sound like a hillbilly saying that? ❜ ❨113❩ ❛ Remember, you’ve got your secret weapon. ❜ ❨114❩ ❛ The dream drains away like water. The memory, really. I try to scoop it up in my palms, but it’s gone. ❜ ❨115❩ ❛ My shadow stretches along the carpet, as though trying to detach itself from me. ❜ ❨116❩ ❛ It curls away from me, like blood in water. ❜ ❨117❩ ❛ It’s been so long since I felt the rain. Or wind—the caress of wind. ❜ ❨118❩ ❛ But snow I never want to feel again. ❜ ❨119❩ ❛ Through adversity to the stars. ❜ ❨120❩ ❛ No hero. No sleuth. I am locked in. I am locked out. ❜ ❨121❩ ❛ Thinking hasn't gotten me anywhere so far. ❜ ❨122❩ ❛ The face you give the world tells the world how to treat you. ❜ ❨123❩ ❛ Sometimes I think illness sits inside every woman, waiting for the right moment to bloom. ❜ ❨124❩ ❛ Women get consumed. ❜ ❨125❩ ❛ Sometimes if you let people do things to you, you're really doing it to them. ❜ ❨126❩ ❛ A child weaned on poison considers harm a comfort. ❜ ❨127❩ ❛ Safer to be feared than loved. ❜ ❨128❩ ❛ I ached once, hard, like a period typed at the end of a sentence. ❜ ❨129❩ ❛ It's impossible to compete with the dead. I wish I could stop trying. ❜ ❨130❩ ❛ I always feel sad for the girl that I was. ❜ ❨131❩ ❛ Every time people said I was pretty, I thought of everything ugly swarming beneath my clothes. ❜ ❨132❩ ❛ How do you keep safe when your whole day is as wide and empty as the sky? Anything could happen. ❜ ❨133❩ ❛ See, there I am. I told you I lived. I told you I was. ❜ ❨134❩ ❛ Sometimes I think I won't ever feel safe until I can count my last days on one hand. ❜ ❨135❩ ❛ To refuse has so many more consequences than submitting. ❜ ❨136❩ ❛ I'm here. I don't usually feel that I am. ❜ ❨137❩ ❛ I'm tired of dying. ❜ ❨138❩ ❛ What if you hurt because it feels so good? ❜ ❨139❩ ❛ How confusing to live in the shadow of a shadow. ❜ ❨140❩ ❛ Do you ever feel like bad things are going to happen, and you can’t stop them? You can’t do anything, you just have to wait? ❜ ❨141❩ ❛ Sometimes my scars have a mind of their own. ❜ ❨142❩ ❛ Everyone has their own version of a memory. ❜ ❨143❩ ❛ Isn’t a smile a girl’s best weapon? ❜ ❨144❩ ❛ My sense of weightlessness, I think, comes from the fact that I know so little about my past. ❜ ❨145❩ ❛ Do what I want; I might like you. ❜ ❨146❩ ❛ I feel sorry for Persephone because even when she’s back with the living, people are afraid of her because of where’s she’s been. ❜ ❨147❩ ❛ She has never told me she loved me, and I never assumed she did. ❜ ❨148❩ ❛ The sight of it actually does something to you, makes you less human. ❜ ❨149❩ ❛ It infects you. It ruined me. ❜ ❨150❩ ❛ Your health is not a debt you just cancel. The body collects. ❜ ❨151❩ ❛ Men love to put things inside women, don’t they? ❜ ❨152❩ ❛ We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom. ❜ ❨153❩ ❛ Nothing is so necessary for a young man as the company of intelligent women. ❜ ❨154❩ ❛ The strongest of all warriors are these two — time and patience. ❜ ❨155❩ ❛ If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war. ❜ ❨156❩ ❛ There is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness, and truth. ❜ ❨157❩ ❛ The whole world is divided for me into two parts: one is she, and there is all happiness, hope, light; the other is where she is not, and there is dejection and darkness. ❜ ❨158❩ ❛ Let the dead bury the dead, but while I'm alive, I must live and be happy. ❜ ❨159❩ ❛ It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong. ❜ ❨160❩ ❛ You can love a person dear to you with a human love, but an enemy can only be loved with divine love. ❜ ❨161❩ ❛ If we admit that human life can be ruled by reason, then all possibility of life is destroyed. ❜ ❨162❩ ❛ We are asleep until we fall in love! ❜ ❨163❩ ❛ I simply want to live; to cause no evil to anyone but myself. ❜ ❨164❩ ❛ Everything I know, I know because of love. ❜ ❨165❩ ❛ Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death. But to him who does not fear it, everything belongs. ❜ ❨166❩ ❛ If there was no suffering, man would not know his limits, would not know himself. ❜ ❨167❩ ❛ Yes, love, but not the love that loves for something, to gain something, or because of something, but that love that I felt for the first time, when dying, I saw my enemy and yet loved him. ❜ ❨168❩ ❛ How can one be well...when one suffers morally? ❜ ❨169❩ ❛ Kings are the slaves of history. ❜ ❨170❩ ❛ God is the same everywhere. ❜ ❨171❩ ❛ Pure and complete sorrow is as impossible as pure and complete joy. ❜ ❨172❩ ❛ One must be cunning and wicked in this world. ❜ ❨173❩ ❛ We love people not so much for the good they've done us, as for the good we've done them. ❜ ❨174❩ ❛ When one's head is gone one doesn't weep over one's hair! ❜ ❨175❩ ❛ For what, for whom, must I kill and be killed? ❜ ❨176❩ ❛ He did what heroes do after their work is accomplished; he died. ❜ ❨177❩ ❛ Life is too long to say anything definitely; always say perhaps. ❜ ❨178❩ ❛ Everything ends in death, everything. Death is terrible. ❜ ❨179❩ ❛ The distant and impossible suddenly became near, possible, and inevitable. ❜ ❨180❩ ❛ How often we sin, how much we deceive, and all for what? ❜ ❨181❩ ❛ The wolves should be fed and the sheep kept safe. ❜ ❨182❩ ❛ When I was a child, adults would tell me not to make things up, warning me of what would happen if I did. ❜ ❨183❩ ❛ My memory is a patchwork of occurrences, of discontinuous events roughly sewn together: the parts I remember, I remember precisely, whilst other sections seem to have vanished completely. ❜ ❨184❩ ❛ Would it be worse to love someone who is no longer there, or not to love someone who is? ❜ ❨185❩ ❛ Like mirrors stories prepare us for the day to come. They distract us from the things in darkness. ❜ ❨186❩ ❛ It is not that I was credulous, simply that I believed in all things dark and dangerous. ❜ ❨187❩ ❛ Sometimes you do things you regret, but there's nothing you can do about them. Times change. Doors close behind you. You move on. ❜ ❨188❩ ❛ Love will be an impulse that will inspire and ruin in equal measure. ❜ ❨189❩ ❛ He died alone. It don't matter a rat's ass whether there was anyone with him or not. He died alone. ❜ ❨190❩ ❛ It was love, I knew, and it tasted like champagne in my mind. ❜ ❨191❩ ❛ The end of the world is a strange concept. The world is always ending, and the end is always being averted, by love or foolishness or just plain old dumb luck. ❜ ❨192❩ ❛ She was my dream; and if you touch a dream it vanishes, like a soap bubble. ❜ ❨193❩ ❛ Daylight is always safe. ❜ ❨194❩ ❛ If not for death, they'd be content to simply exist, but with death, well, their lives will have meaning. ❜ ❨195❩ ❛ You want to know the future, love? Then wait. ❜ ❨196❩ ❛ There are things in the darkness beneath us that wish us harm. ❜ ❨197❩ ❛ Fairy tales are more than true. Not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be defeated ❜ ❨198❩ ❛ But sometimes you leave blood on your instruments. ❜ ❨199❩ ❛ I'd like to be a wolf. Not all the time. Just sometimes. In the dark. I would run through the forests. ❜ ❨200❩ ❛ You've seen them. They have mouths that twitch, and eyes that stare, and they babble and they mewl and they whimper. ❜ ❨201❩ ❛ They are not mad, or rather, the loss of their sanity is the lesser of their problems. ❜ ❨202❩ ❛ Good a reason for writing as I know: releasing demons, letting them fly. ❜ ❨203❩ ❛ That miserable state in which everything seems flat and of equal importance; when nothing matters, and in which reality seems scraped thin and threadbare. ❜ ❨204❩ ❛ Someone had scrawled graffiti in black marker on the metal: JUST DIE, it said. Like it is easy. ❜ ❨205❩ ❛ Winter started today. The sky turned grey and the snow began to fall and it did not stop falling until well after dark. ❜ ❨206❩ ❛ Memory is the great deceiver. ❜ ❨207❩ ❛ Silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way. ❜ ❨208❩ ❛ I may have lost my heart, but not my self-control.  ❜ ❨209❩ ❛ If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more. ❜ ❨210❩ ❛ I always deserve the best treatment because I never put up with any other. ❜ ❨211❩ ❛ But you know what I am. You hear nothing but truth from me. ❜ ❨212❩ ❛ I have blamed you, and lectured you, and you have borne it as no other would have borne it. ❜ ❨213❩ ❛ There are people, who the more you do for them, the less they will do for themselves. ❜ ❨214❩ ❛ One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other. ❜ ❨215❩ ❛ Better be without sense than misapply it as you do. ❜ ❨216❩ ❛ You must be the best judge of your own happiness. ❜ ❨217❩ ❛ Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing ; but I have never been in love ; it is not my way, or my nature ; and I do not think I ever shall. ❜ ❨218❩ ❛ Indeed, I am very sorry to be right in this instance. I would much rather have been merry than wise. ❜ ❨219❩ ❛ If I have not spoken, it is because I am afraid I will awaken myself from this dream. ❜ ❨220❩ ❛ If a woman doubts as to whether she should accept a man or not, she certainly ought to refuse him. ❜ ❨221❩ ❛ Faultless in spite of all her faults. ❜ ❨222❩ ❛ A heroine whom no one but myself will much like. ❜ ❨223❩ ❛ There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart. ❜ ❨224❩ ❛ Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, and waste its fragrance on the desert air. ❜ ❨225❩ ❛ I pity you. I thought you cleverer. ❜ ❨226❩ ❛ Evil to some is always good to others. ❜ ❨227❩ ❛ I certainly will not persuade myself to feel more than I do. ❜ ❨228❩ ❛ She is loveliness itself. ❜ ❨229❩ ❛ Time does not compose me. ❜ ❨230❩ ❛ A man always imagines a woman to be ready for anybody who asks her. ❜ ❨231❩ ❛ I do not find myself making any use of the word sacrifice. ❜ ❨232❩ ❛ I am quite enough in love. I should be sorry to be any more. ❜ ❨233❩ ❛ I must tell you what you will not ask, though I may wish it unsaid the next moment. ❜ ❨234❩ ❛ I examined my own heart. And there you were. Never, I fear, to be removed. ❜ ❨235❩ ❛ With all your little faults, you are an excellent creature. ❜ ❨236❩ ❛ You have another long walk before you. ❜ ❨237❩ ❛ The child's laughter is pure until he first laughs at a clown. ❜ ❨238❩ ❛ What is marriage but prostitution to one man instead of many? ❜ ❨239❩ ❛ Out of the frying pan into the fire! ❜ ❨240❩ ❛ We must all make do with the rags of love we find flapping on the scarecrow of humanity. ❜ ❨241❩ ❛ She sleeps. And now she wakes each day a little less. ❜ ❨242❩ ❛ And, oh, God . . . how frequently I weep! ❜ ❨243❩ ❛ From the coffin of your madness there is no escape. ❜ ❨244❩ ❛ I am feeling supernatural tonight. I want to eat diamonds. ❜ ❨245❩ ❛ All the same there is a chance that if we keep on shaking our chains, one day, some day, the clasps upon the shackles will part. ❜ ❨246❩ ❛ It was sad music fit to make you cut your throat. ❜ ❨247❩ ❛ Nothing is more boring than being forced to play. ❜ ❨248❩ ❛ Amongst the monsters, I am well hidden; who looks for a leaf in a forest? ❜ ❨249❩ ❛ Wherein does a woman’s honour reside? In her vagina or in her spirit? ❜ ❨250❩ ❛ Perhaps...I could not be content with mere contentment! ❜ ❨251❩ ❛ Have you ever stared stark failure in the face? The trick is to outstare it. ❜ ❨252❩ ❛ Sometimes it seems that the faces exist of themselves, in a disembodied somewhere, waiting for the one who will wear them, who will bring them to life. ❜ ❨253❩ ❛ I have the febrile gaiety of a being without a past, without a present, yet I exist. ❜ ❨254❩ ❛ I felt myself turning, willy-nilly, from a woman into an idea. ❜ ❨255❩ ❛ She looks wonderful, but she doesn't look right. ❜ ❨256❩ ❛ The one-eyed man will be King in the country of the blind. ❜ ❨257❩ ❛ I raised you up to fly to the heavens, not to brood over a clutch of eggs! ❜ ❨258❩ ❛ I love to hear my bones rattle. That’s how I know I’m alive. ❜ ❨259❩ ❛ I learnt, first, as the birds do, from the birds. ❜ ❨260❩ ❛ Inside and outside match exactly, but both are badly wrong. ❜ ❨261❩ ❛ During the less-than-blink of time it took the last chime to die, there came a vertiginous sensation. ❜ ❨262❩ ❛ I fear a wound not of the body but the soul, an irreconcilable division between myself and the rest of humankind. ❜ ❨263❩ ❛ I fear the proof of my own singularity. ❜ ❨264❩ ❛ Still nothing could calm the fearful storm in my erupting skin. ❜ ❨265❩ ❛ Petersburg, loveliest of all hallucinations. ❜ ❨266❩ ❛ A breathless second between black forest and the frozen sea. ❜ ❨267❩ ❛ I'm beginning to feel totally cut off from the world. ❜ ❨268❩ ❛ What does this all mean? Where are we? ❜ ❨269❩ ❛ Sometimes I bleed. ❜ ❨270❩ ❛ If you see a ghost, you say "hello". ❜ ❨271❩ ❛ The war is not over. ❜ ❨272❩ ❛ You're not going. You left us once already. ❜ ❨273❩ ❛ You can’t go! ❜ ❨274❩ ❛ I loved you, but that wasn't enough, was it? ❜ ❨275❩ ❛ If you're dead, then leave me in peace. ❜ ❨276❩ ❛ The only thing that moves here is the light, but it changes everything. ❜ ❨277❩ ❛ I won't ask for forgiveness for something I didn't do! ❜ ❨278❩ ❛ Sometimes the world of the living gets mixed up with the world of the dead. ❜ ❨279❩ ❛ Death of a loved one can lead people to do the strangest things. ❜ ❨280❩ ❛ Sooner or later, they will find you. ❜ ❨281❩ ❛ They're everywhere - they say this house is theirs. ❜ ❨282❩ ❛ You're always teasing me, and telling lies. I'm sick of it. ❜ ❨283❩ ❛ Others will come. Sometimes we'll sense them. Other times, we won't. ❜ ❨284❩ ❛ No crying now. No crying. Stop that. Here. Look what an awful face you've got when you cry. ❜ ❨285❩ ❛ You listen to me. I've seen them too. ❜ ❨286❩ ❛ You'll see. There are going to be some big surprises. There are going to be... changes. ❜ ❨287❩ ❛ Why did you go and fight that stupid war that had nothing to do with us? Why didn't you stay like the others did? ❜ ❨288❩ ❛ Your place was here with your family. ❜ ❨289❩ ❛ So you say you know this house well? ❜ ❨290❩ ❛ I wasn't expecting you so soon. ❜ ❨291❩ ❛ What's the matter? Has the cat got your tongue? ❜ ❨292❩ ❛ You mean they just vanished? Into thin air? ❜ ❨293❩ ❛ No door must be opened without the previous one being closed first. ❜ ❨294❩ ❛ Here, most of the time, you can hardly see your way. ❜ ❨295❩ ❛ Whatever you do, don't open the curtains. ❜ ❨296❩ ❛ Now, come on. Eyes closed. ❜ ❨297❩ ❛ We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. We realise that we’re all going to die, without really finding out the big answers. ❜ ❨298❩ ❛ By definition, you have to live until you die. Better to make that life as complete and enjoyable an experience as possible, in case death is shite, which I suspect it will be. ❜ ❨299❩ ❛ I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin’ else. ❜ ❨300❩ ❛ And the reasons? There are no reasons. ❜ ❨301❩ ❛ Love does not exist, it's like religion, made to control you. ❜ ❨302❩ ❛ After all, we're not fucking stupid. At least, we're not that fucking stupid. ❜ ❨303❩ ❛ You fucking knew that fucking cunt would fuck some cunt. ❜ ❨304❩ ❛ Everything in the street today seems soft focus. ❜ ❨305❩ ❛ What does that make us? The lowest of the low. ❜ ❨306❩ ❛ Take your best orgasm, multiply the feeling by twenty, and you're still fuckin’ miles off the pace. ❜ ❨307❩ ❛ It’s as if everything is a copy of what you knew before, similar, yet somehow lacking in its usual qualities, a bit like the way things are in a dream. ❜ ❨308❩ ❛ It’s all okay, it’s all beautiful; but I fear that this internal sea is going to subside soon, leaving this poisonous shite washed up, stranded up in my body. ❜ ❨309❩ ❛ It cuts me up. It confuses me. ❜ ❨310❩ ❛ It's not funny laughter. This is lynch mob laughter. ❜ ❨311❩ ❛ Protect me from those who wish to help us. ❜ ❨312❩ ❛ They mean well, and they mean well to me, but there's no way under the sun that they can appreciate what I feel, what I need. ❜ ❨313❩ ❛ The pit of melancholy is a bottomless one, and I am descending fast. ❜ ❨314❩ ❛ Living like this is a full-time business. ❜ ❨315❩ ❛ I’ll stand or fall alone. ❜ ❨316❩ ❛ We are no wiser now than at the start. ❜ ❨317❩ ❛ This is pathetic, and fucking boring. ❜ ❨318❩ ❛ Death is usually a process, rather than an event. ❜ ❨319❩ ❛ We're ruled by effete arseholes. What does that make us? ❜ ❨320❩ ❛ We are all acquaintances now. ❜ ❨321❩ ❛ The problem is that this beautiful ocean carries with it loads of poisonous flotsam and jetsam. ❜ ❨322❩ ❛ Life is beautiful. I'm going to enjoy it, and I'm going to have a long life. ❜ ❨323❩ ❛ The grim reality of impending death can be talked away by trying to invest in the present reality of life. ❜ ❨324❩ ❛ There must be more to life than this. ❜ ❨325❩ ❛ We all see what we want to see. ❜ ❨326❩ ❛ Statistically speaking, you're more likely to be killed by a member of your own family or a close friend, than by anyone else. ❜ ❨327❩ ❛ What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question. ❜ ❨328❩ ❛ Maybe that's what love is: it's being pissed off. ❜ ❨329❩ ❛ You can forget who you are if you're alone too much. ❜ ❨330❩ ❛ Any religion is a shadow of God. But the shadows of God are not God. ❜ ❨331❩ ❛ Human understanding is fallible, and we see through a glass, darkly.  ❜ ❨332❩ ❛ We must be a beacon of hope, because if you tell people there's nothing they can do, they will do worse than nothing. ❜ ❨333❩ ❛ Everyone wants to feel like a princess, and princesses are selfish and overbearing. ❜ ❨334❩ ❛ We shouldn't have been so scornful; we should have had compassion. But compassion takes work, and we were young. ❜ ❨335❩ ❛ How easy it is, treachery. You just slide into it. ❜ ❨336❩ ❛ Amazing how the heart clutches at anything familiar, whimpering: Mine! Mine! ❜ ❨337❩ ❛ All creatures know that some must die ; that all the rest may take and eat. ❜ ❨338❩ ❛ Is this the image of a god? My tooth for yours, your eye for mine? ❜ ❨339❩ ❛ Without the light, no chance; without the dark, no dance. ❜ ❨340❩ ❛ Why are we designed to see the world as supremely beautiful just as we're about to be snuffed? Do rabbits feel the same as the fox teeth bite down on their necks? Is it mercy? ❜ ❨341❩ ❛ Love is useless, it leads you into dumb exchanges in which you give too much away, and then you get bitter and mean. ❜ ❨342❩ ❛ Maybe sadness is a kind of hunger. Maybe the two go together. ❜ ❨343❩ ❛ Now I can see how that can happen. You can fall in love with anybody -- a fool, a criminal, a nothing. There are no good rules. ❜ ❨344❩ ❛ If you really want to stay the same age you are now forever and ever, try jumping off the roof: death's a sure-fire method for stopping time. ❜ ❨345❩ ❛ You couldn’t leave words lying around where our enemies might find them. ❜ ❨346❩ ❛ I'm fine, for the moment. And the moment is the only time we can be fine in. ❜ ❨347❩ ❛ Because if you can't wish, why bother? ❜ ❨348❩ ❛ It's better to hope than mope! ❜ ❨349❩ ❛ Reality has too much darkness in it. Too many crows. ❜ ❨350❩ ❛ In any case, time is not a thing that passes, it’s a sea on which you float. ❜ ❨351❩ ❛ I know I’m deceiving myself, but I prefer to deceive myself. I desperately need to believe such pure joy is still possible. ❜ ❨352❩ ❛ Too much God and you overdose. God needs to be filtered. ❜ ❨353❩ ❛ Behind my eyelids I saw an animal. It was golden colour, with gentle green eyes and canine teeth, and curly wool instead of fur. It opened its mouth, but it did not speak. Instead, it yawned. ❜ ❨354❩ ❛ ‘Why can't I believe?’ I asked the darkness. ❜ ❨355❩ ❛ Everyone’s too sad for everything. ❜ ❨356❩ ❛ If you can’t stop the waves, go sailing. ❜ ❨357❩ ❛ I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. I would like to be that unnoticed and that necessary. ❜ ❨358❩ ❛ Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them. ❜ ❨359❩ ❛ In the end, we'll all become stories. ❜ ❨360❩ ❛ I am inadequate and stupid, without worth. I might as well be dead. ❜ ❨361❩ ❛ If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew everything that was going to happen next—if you knew in advance the consequences of your own actions—you'd be doomed. You'd be ruined as God. ❜ ❨362❩ ❛ If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. ❜ ❨363❩ ❛ Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results. ❜ ❨364❩ ❛ Time in dreams is frozen. You can never get away from where you've been. ❜ ❨365❩ ❛ Male fantasies, male fantasies, is everything run by male fantasies? ❜ ❨366❩ ❛ We still think of a powerful man as a born leader and a powerful woman as an anomaly. ❜ ❨367❩ ❛ If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon? ❜ ❨368❩ ❛ You fit into me like a hook into an eye. ❜ ❨369❩ ❛ Knowing too much about other people puts you in their power, they have a claim on you, you are forced to understand their reasons for doing things and then you are weakened. ❜ ❨370❩ ❛ Farewells can be shattering, but returns are surely worse. ❜ ❨371❩ ❛ Women have curious ways of hurting someone else. ❜ ❨372❩ ❛ This is the one song everyone would like to learn: the song that is irresistible: the song that forces men to leap overboard in squadrons. ❜ ❨373❩ ❛ Get rid of death. Make it be spring. ❜ ❨374❩ ❛ You are innocent as a bathtub full of bullets. ❜ ❨375❩ ❛ I am the space you desecrate as you pass through. ❜ ❨376❩ ❛ Favour me and give me riches, destroy my enemies. Save me from death. ❜ ❨377❩ ❛ She is a raw voice loose in the rooms beneath me. ❜ ❨378❩ ❛ Isn't the moon warm enough for you, why do you need the blanket of another body? ❜ ❨379❩ ❛ This is a torch song. Touch me and you'll burn. ❜ ❨380❩ ❛ If you look long enough eventually you will see me. ❜ ❨381❩ ❛ I would like to sleep with you, to enter your sleep as its smooth dark wave slides over my head. ❜ ❨382❩ ❛ I would like to give you the silver branch, the small white flower, the one word that will protect you from the grief. ❜ ❨383❩ ❛ But some people can't tell where it hurts. They can't calm down. They can't ever stop howling. ❜ ❨384❩ ❛ How else can we live, these days, except in the midst of ruin? ❜ ❨385❩ ❛ What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question. ❜ ❨386❩ ❛ Gods always come in handy, they justify almost anything. ❜ ❨387❩ ❛ We loved with a love that was more than love. ❜ ❨388❩ ❛ Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ❜ ❨389❩ ❛ The boundaries which divide life from death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins? ❜ ❨390❩ ❛ There is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportion. ❜ ❨391❩ ❛ Never to suffer would never to have been blessed. ❜ ❨392❩ ❛ Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear. ❜ ❨393❩ ❛ And all I loved, I loved alone. ❜ ❨394❩ ❛ Years of love have been forgot, in the hatred of a minute. ❜ ❨395❩ ❛ The best things in life make you sweaty. ❜ ❨396❩ ❛ There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. ❜ ❨397❩ ❛ Anything is better than this agony. ❜ ❨398❩ ❛ You fancy me mad. ❜ ❨399❩ ❛ I hear all things in the heaven and in the earth. ❜ ❨400❩ ❛ Who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? ❜ ❨401❩ ❛ Leave my loneliness unbroken! ❜ ❨402❩ ❛ A more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrills every fibre of my frame. ❜ ❨403❩ ❛ The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. ❜ ❨404❩ ❛ Let my heart be still a moment. ❜ ❨405❩ ❛ You call it hope —  It is but agony of desire. ❜ ❨406❩ ❛ Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or silly action for no other reason than because he knows he should not? ❜ ❨407❩ ❛ To die laughing must be the most glorious of all glorious deaths! ❜ ❨408❩ ❛ The beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage. ❜ ❨409❩ ❛ Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive. ❜ ❨410❩ ❛ I have been happy, though in a dream. ❜ ❨411❩ ❛ Nevermore. ❜ ❨412❩ ❛ The truth is, I am heartily sick of this life. ❜ ❨413❩ ❛ I am convinced that every thing is going wrong. ❜ ❨414❩ ❛ The scariest monsters are the ones that lurk within our souls. ❜ ❨415❩ ❛ And if I died, at least I will have died for you! ❜ ❨416❩ ❛ It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night. ❜ ❨417❩ ❛ Hurt and humiliation — But this, I can not take. ❜ ❨418❩ ❛ The walls in there have ears. ❜ ❨419❩ ❛ This is for your ears only. ❜ ❨420❩ ❛ What is it? You have me scared. ❜ ❨421❩ ❛ Whoever isn’t for us, is against us. ❜ ❨422❩ ❛ You are just a body; to be dumped, disposed of like a carcass, left out for the birds to feed on. ❜ ❨423❩ ❛ The dead will have to forgive me. ❜ ❨424❩ ❛ From now on and no matter how your mind may I change, I will not accept your help. ❜ ❨425❩ ❛ If death comes, so be it. There will be glory in it. ❜ ❨426❩ ❛ Live, then; and live with your choice. ❜ ❨427❩ ❛ I am doing what has to be done. ❜ ❨428❩ ❛ Nothing is going to stop the ones that love you from keeping on loving you. ❜ ❨429❩ ❛ Worst is the man who has all the good advice, and then because his nerve fails, fails to act in accordance with it, as a leader should. ❜ ❨430❩ ❛ Only a loony would walk himself into this. ❜ ❨431❩ ❛ Why do you need such fences and defences? ❜ ❨432❩ ❛ Enough. Do not anger me. ❜ ❨433❩ ❛ The gods, you think, will side with the likes of him? ❜ ❨434❩ ❛ Watch it. You are over stepping. ❜ ❨435❩ ❛ I warn you. You should keep a civil tongue. ❜ ❨436❩ ❛ There is no such thing as an oath the can not be broken. ❜ ❨437❩ ❛ Every now and then, the things you’d hardly let yourself imagine, actually happen. ❜ ❨438❩ ❛ And you stand over this? This is the truth? ❜ ❨439❩ ❛ The bigger the resistance, the bigger the collapse. ❜ ❨440❩ ❛ Iron that’s forged the hardest, snaps the quickest. ❜ ❨441❩ ❛ Even the wildest horses come to heel when they are reined & bitted right. ❜ ❨442❩ ❛ That’s how guilt affects some people. They break and everything comes out. ❜ ❨443❩ ❛ Will it be enough for you? To see me executed? ❜ ❨444❩ ❛ So you know something no one else knows? ❜ ❨445❩ ❛ They know it too. They are just too afraid to say it. ❜ ❨446❩ ❛ If you die, how will I keep on living? ❜ ❨447❩ ❛ There was a star riding through clouds one night, & I said to the star, 'Consume me'. ❜ ❨448❩ ❛ How much better to sit by myself like the solitary sea-bird that opens its wings on the stake. ❜ ❨449❩ ❛ Alone, I often fall down into nothingness. I have to bang my head against some hard door to call myself back to the body. ❜ ❨450❩ ❛ I am made and remade continually. Different people draw different words from me. ❜ ❨451❩ ❛ For this moment, this one moment, we are together.  ❜ ❨452❩ ❛ Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. ❜ ❨453❩ ❛ I am as neat as a cat in my habits. ❜ ❨454❩ ❛ Everything falls in a tremendous shower, dissolving me. ❜ ❨455❩ ❛ I am the foam that sweeps and fills the uttermost rims of the rocks with whiteness; I am also a girl, here in this room. ❜ ❨456❩ ❛ We are cut, we are fallen. We are become part of that unfeeling universe ❨457❩ that sleeps when we are at our quickest and burns red when we lie ❨458❩ asleep. ❜ ❨459❩ ❛ These moments of escape are not to be despised. They come too seldom. ❜ ❨460❩ ❛ Up here my eyes are green leaves, unseeing. ❜ ❨461❩ ❛ The moment is all; the moment is enough. ❜ ❨462❩ ❛ I do not want to be admired. I want to give, to be given. ❜ ❨463❩ ❛ I am not one and simple, but complex and many. ❜ ❨464❩ ❛ And if you are dead, I shall weep. ❜ ❨465❩ ❛ But beauty must be broken daily to remain beautiful. ❜ ❨466❩ ❛ But our hatred is almost indistinguishable from our love. ❜ ❨467❩ ❛ I desired always to stretch the night and fill it fuller and fuller with dreams. ❜ ❨468❩ ❛ Life is a dream surely. ❜ ❨469❩ ❛ I think sometimes I am not a woman, but the light that falls on this gate, on this ground. I am the seasons, I think sometimes, January, May, November; the mud, the mist, the dawn. ❜ ❨470❩ ❛ Oh, I am in love with life! ❜ ❨471❩ ❛ I have been knotted; I have been torn apart. ❜ ❨472❩ ❛ There was no freedom in life, and certainly there was none in death. ❜ ❨473❩ ❛ I do not know. I do not know myself sometimes, or how to measure and name and count out the grains that make me what I am. ❜ ❨474❩ ❛ I ride rough waters, and shall sink with no one to save me. ❜ ❨475❩ ❛ I am above the earth now. I am no longer upright, to be knocked against and damaged. ❜ ❨476❩ ❛ I see it all. I feel it all. ❜ ❨477❩ ❛ Death is woven in with the violets. Death and again death. ❜ ❨478❩ ❛ We have been walking for hours it seems. But where? I cannot remember. ❜ ❨479❩ ❛ If we were all on trial for our thoughts, we would all be hanged. ❜ ❨480❩ ❛ When you are in the middle of a story it isn't a story at all, but only a confusion; a dark roaring, a blindness, a wreckage of shattered glass. ❜ ❨481❩ ❛ Murderess is a strong word to have attached to you. It has a smell to it, that word; - musky and oppressive, like dead flowers in a vase.  ❜ ❨482❩ ❛ Sometimes at night I whisper it over to myself: Murderess, murderess. It rustles, like a taffeta skirt across the floor. ❜ ❨483❩ ❛ If the world treats you well, you come to believe you are deserving of it. ❜ ❨484❩ ❛ If I am good enough and quiet enough, perhaps after all they will let me go. ❜ ❨485❩ ❛ It’s not easy being quiet and good, it’s like hanging on to the edge of a bridge when you’ve already fallen over; you don’t seem to be moving, just dangling there, and yet it is taking all your strength. ❜ ❨486❩ ❛ There is no fool like an educated fool. ❜ ❨487❩ ❛ There are many dangerous things that may take place in a bed. ❜ ❨488❩ ❛ I am afraid of falling into hopeless despair, over my wasted life, and I am still not sure how it happened. ❜ ❨489❩ ❛ Underneath it all is another feeling, a feeling of being wide-eyed awake and watchful. ❜ ❨490❩ ❛ And underneath all that is another feeling still, a feeling like being torn open; not like a body of flesh, it is not painful as such, but like a peach; and not even torn open, but ripe and splitting open of its own accord.  ❜ ❨491❩ ❛ The small details of life often hide a great significance. ❜ ❨492❩ ❛ Guilt comes to you not from the things you've done, but from the things that others have done to you. ❜ ❨493❩ ❛ I wonder, how can I be all of these different things at once? ❜ ❨494❩ ❛ It is always a mistake to curse back openly at those who are stronger than you unless there is a fence between. ❜ ❨495❩ ❛ Some call this "Eve's curse," but I think that is stupid because the real curse of Eve was having to put up with the nonsense of Adam. ❜ ❨496❩ ❛ I don't know why they are all so eager to be remembered. What good will it do them? There are some things that should be forgotten by everyone, and never spoken of again. ❜ ❨497❩ ❛ I would never blame a human creature for feeling lonely. ❜ ❨498❩ ❛ If they want a monster so badly they ought to be provided by one. ❜ ❨499❩ ❛ It’s as if I never existed, because no trace of me remains, I have left no marks. And that way I cannot be followed. It is almost the same as being innocent. ❜ ❨500❩ ❛ Today you wear your habitual expression of strained anxiety; you smell of violets. ❜ ❨501❩ ❛ Of course you have always been an idealist, and filled with your optimistic dreams; but reality must at some time obtrude. ❜ ❨502❩ ❛ I wonder what would become of me, and comfort myself that in a hundred years I will be dead and at peace. ❜ ❨503❩ ❛ For it is not always the one that strikes the blow that is the actual murderer. ❜ ❨504❩ ❛ There is a “do this” or “do that” with God, but not any “because”. ❜ ❨505❩ ❛ If you have a need and they find it out, they will use it against you. The best way is to stop from wanting anything. ❜ ❨506❩ ❛ They say, why don’t you ever smile or laugh, we never see you smiling, and I say I suppose I have gotten out of the way of it, my face won’t bend in that direction any more. ❜ ❨507❩ ❛ I was shut up inside that doll of myself, and my true voice could not get out. ❜ ❨508❩ ❛ I see what you’re after. You are a collector. You think all you have to do is give me an apple, and then you can collect me. ❜ ❨509❩ ❛ If you want to be an asshole, it's a free country. Millions before you have made the same life choice. ❜ ❨510❩ ❛ Then there's the future. Sheer vertigo. ❜ ❨511❩ ❛ Nature is to zoos as God is to churches. ❜ ❨512❩ ❛ After everything that's happened, how can the world still be so beautiful? ❜ ❨513❩ ❛ There's something to be said for hunger: at least it lets you know you're still alive. ❜ ❨514❩ ❛ These things sneak up on me for no reason, these flashes of irrational happiness. It's probably a vitamin deficiency. ❜ ❨515❩ ❛ Toast cannot be explained by any rational means. Toast is me. I am toast. ❜ ❨516❩ ❛ You can’t buy it, but it has a price. Everything has a price. ❜ ❨517❩ ❛ As a species were doomed by hope, then? You could call it hope. That, or desperation. ❜ ❨518❩ ❛ I am not my childhood. ❜ ❨519❩ ❛ Human beings hope they can stick their souls into someone else and live on forever. ❜ ❨520❩ ❛ “I'll make you mine”, lovers said in old books. They never said, “I'll make you me.” ❜ ❨521❩ ❛ How much is too much, how far is too far? ❜ ❨522❩ ❛ Expectation isn't the same as desire. ❜ ❨523❩ ❛ Why not cut to the chase? ❜ ❨524❩ ❛ Maybe there aren't any solutions. Human society, corpses and rubble. ❜ ❨525❩ ❛ I thought you didn’t believe in God. ❜ ❨526❩ ❛ I need at least the illusion of being understood. ❜ ❨527❩ ❛ What change would have altered the course of events? In the big picture, nothing. In the small picture, so much. ❜ ❨528❩ ❛ You are only looking at the dirt under your feet. It's not good for you. ❜ ❨529❩ ❛ I like to keep only the bright side of myself turned towards you.  ❜ ❨530❩ ❛ Grief in the face of inevitable death. The wish to stop time. The human condition. ❜ ❨531❩ ❛ So many crucial events take place behind people’s backs, when they aren’t in a position to watch: birth and death, for instance. ❜ ❨532❩ ❛ Would you kill someone you loved to spare them pain? ❜ ❨533❩ ❛ When the water’s moving faster than the boat, you can’t control a thing. ❜ ❨534❩ ❛ Don't be so fucking sentimental. ❜ ❨535❩ ❛ Wrong, as usual. ❜ ❨536❩ ❛ Why do you want to talk about ugly things? ❜ ❨537❩ ❛ I understand why serial killers send helpful clues to the police. ❜ ❨538❩ ❛ Take your time, leave mine alone. ❜ ❨539❩ ❛ You will hear thunder and remember me. ❜ ❨540❩ ❛ If you were music, I would listen to you ceaselessly. ❜ ❨541❩ ❛ I seem to myself an accidental guest in this dreadful body. ❜ ❨542❩ ❛ Call me a sinner, mock me maliciously. ❜ ❨543❩ ❛ I, from the very beginning, seemed to myself like someone's dream or delirium. Or a reflection in someone else's mirror. Without flesh, without meaning, without a name. ❜ ❨544❩ ❛ I knew the list of crimes that I was destined to commit. ❜ ❨545❩ ❛ The future ripens in the past, so the past rots in the future. ❜ ❨546❩ ❛ You are untranslatable into any one tongue. ❜ ❨547❩ ❛ I was hoping my silence would fit yours. ❜ ❨548❩ ❛ See, we were never about butterflies. All about us is unearthly and radiant. ❜ ❨549❩ ❛ You do not know just what you've been forgiven. ❜ ❨550❩ ❛ I need to slaughter my memory.  ❜ ❨551❩ ❛ Forgive me that I appeared to you in waking dreams. ❜ ❨552❩ ❛ I will condemn, I will forget, I will give comfort to the enemy. ❜ ❨553❩ ❛ I know beginnings, I know endings too, and life-in-death. ❜ ❨554❩ ❛ Wild honey smells of freedom. But gold smells of nothing. ❜ ❨555❩ ❛ You are three times more beautiful than angels. ❜ ❨556❩ ❛ I will kill you without spilling your blood on the ground, not touching you with my hand, not giving you one glance. ❜ ❨557❩ ❛ You invented me. There is no such earthly being. ❜ ❨558❩ ❛ You’re late. Way too late. I’m glad to see you, nonetheless. ❜ ❨559❩ ❛ Forgive me that I felt forsaken. Forgive me that I kept mistaking too many others for you. ❜ ❨560❩ ❛ Real tenderness can’t be confused, it’s quiet and can’t be heard. ❜ ❨561❩ ❛ What else lived in that house besides us? ❜ ❨562❩ ❛ How unhappy we are together! ❜ ❨563❩ ❛ I defend not my voice, but my silence. ❜ ❨564❩ ❛ Without love, I'm more at ease, I'm sure. ❜ ❨565❩ ❛ I've got no more tears or explanations. ❜ ❨566❩ ❛ I’m not complaining. Happiness is not for me. ❜ ❨567❩ ❛ Are you not the only tie between good and evil, earthly pits and paradise? ❜ ❨568❩ ❛ In the morning we shall find out who has died in the night. ❜ ❨569❩ ❛ I was not a lovable child, and I've grown into a deeply unlovable adult. ❜ ❨570❩ ❛ The truly frightening flaw in humanity is our capacity for cruelty - we all have it. ❜ ❨571❩ ❛ I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ. Slit me at my belly and it might slide out, meaty and dark. ❜ ❨572❩ ❛ I am not angry or sad or happy to see you. I could not give a shit. You don't even ripple. ❜ ❨573❩ ❛ I was raised feral, and I mostly stayed that way. ❜ ❨574❩ ❛ I can feel a better version of me somewhere in there - hidden behind a liver or attached to a bit of spleen. But the meanness usually wins out. ❜ ❨575❩ ❛ I felt something loosen in me, that shouldn't have loosened. A stitch come undone. ❜ ❨576❩ ❛ Everyone who keeps a secret, itches to tell it. ❜ ❨577❩ ❛ Coffee goes great with sudden death. ❜ ❨578❩ ❛ I should just listen to my gut and then do the opposite. ❜ ❨579❩ ❛ “Smile, it can't be that bad!” Yeah, actually, it can, jackwad. ❜ ❨580❩ ❛ Everything bad in the world already did happen. ❜ ❨581❩ ❛ You’re going to find peace? Like knowing is somehow going to fix you? ❜ ❨582❩ ❛ Instead of asking yourself what happened, just accept that it happened. ❜ ❨583❩ ❛ Homesick for a place I've never been. ❜ ❨584❩ ❛ Worries find you easily enough without inviting them. ❜ ❨585❩ ❛ It is always consoling to think of suicide. It's what gets one through many a bad night. ❜ ❨586❩ ❛ Do you understand this is serious? ❜ ❨587❩ ❛ Sometimes it feels good to fuck with something. Instead of always being fucked with. ❜ ❨588❩ ❛ How could you kill something you cared enough to name? ❜ ❨589❩ ❛ Draw a picture of my soul, and it’d be a scribble with fangs. ❜ ❨590❩ ❛ We have the same chemicals in our blood: shame, anger, greed. Unjustified nostalgia. ❜ ❨591❩ ❛ I appreciate a straightforward apology the way a tone-deaf person enjoys a fine piece of music. ❜ ❨592❩ ❛ The phrase fuck you may not rest on the tip of my tongue, but it’s near. Midtongue. ❜ ❨593❩ ❛ Nothing to it but to do it. ❜ ❨594❩ ❛ There are a lot of people who deserve a lesson, deserve to really understand, that nothing comes easy, that most things are going to go sour. ❜ ❨595❩ ❛ If ifs and buts were candies and nuts we’d all have a very Merry Christmas. ❜ ❨596❩ ❛ Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. ❜ ❨597❩ ❛ What does it do to a girl who knows her mother is a murderer? ❜ ❨598❩ ❛ That mean old bitch across the street bit it. ❜ ❨599❩ ❛ Survival is a talent. ❜ ❨600❩ ❛ Crazy isn't being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It’s you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever. ❜ ❨601❩ ❛ Who has the courage to burn themselves? ❜ ❨602❩ ❛ Is insanity just a matter of dropping the act? ❜ ❨603❩ ❛ Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? ❜ ❨604❩ ❛ You need to be well fed, clothed, and housed to have time for this much self-pity. ❜ ❨605❩ ❛ When I am supposed to be awake, I am asleep; when I am supposed to speak, I am silent. When a pleasure offers itself to me, I avoid it. ❜ ❨606❩ ❛ There is thought, and then there is thinking about thoughts, and they don't feel the same. ❜ ❨607❩ ❛ In a strange way we are free. We've reached the end of the line. We have nothing more to lose. ❜ ❨608❩ ❛ The world won’t stop because we aren’t in it anymore. ❜ ❨609❩ ❛ I can't answer the real question. All I can tell you is, it's easy. ❜ ❨610❩ ❛ I am lighter, airier than I’ve been in years. ❜ ❨611❩ ❛ I am not dead, yet something in me definitely is. ❜ ❨612❩ ❛ You meant that as an insult but I am taking it as a compliment. ❜ ❨613❩ ❛ What life can recover from that? ❜ ❨614❩ ❛ It's a fairly accurate portrait of me. It's accurate but it isn't profound. ❜ ❨615❩ ❛ Pull yourself together! There's nothing wrong with you. ❜ ❨616❩ ❛ It's quiet. It's like― I don't know. It's like falling off a cliff. ❜ ❨617❩ ❛ Once you start parsing a face, it's a peculiar item: squishy, pointy, with lots of air vents and wet spots. ❜ ❨618❩ ❛ I lost him. I did it on purpose. ❜ ❨619❩ ❛ It’s a mean world. There’s nobody to take care of you out there. ❜ ❨620❩ ❛ Reality is getting too dense. ❜ ❨621❩ ❛ I'm ambivalent. In fact that's my new favourite word. ❜ ❨622❩ ❛ I can't come up with reassuring answers to the terrible questions you raise. ❜ ❨623❩ ❛ A spring day, the sort that gives people hope: all soft winds and delicate smells of warm earth. Suicide weather. ❜ ❨624❩ ❛ Twenty-five chocolate chip cookies would be the perfect dinner. ❜ ❨625❩ ❛ A thought is a hard thing to control. ❜ ❨626❩ ❛ Life demands skills I don’t have. ❜ ❨627❩ ❛ Light like this does not exist, but we wish it did. We wish the sun could make us young and beautiful. Most of all, we wish that everyone we knew could be brightened simply by our looking at them. ❜ ❨628❩ ❛ It never stops, even at night, it’s my lullaby. ❜ ❨629❩ ❛ Love blurs your vision; but after it recedes, you can see more clearly than ever. ❜ ❨630❩ ❛ This is the kind of thing you see if you sit in the darkness with open eyes. ❜ ❨631❩ ❛ I have done something wrong, something so huge I can't even see it, something that's drowning me. ❜ ❨632❩ ❛ Whatever is happening to me is my own fault. ❜ ❨633❩ ❛ Hatred is easier. Hatred is clear, metallic, one-handed, unwavering; unlike love. ❜ ❨634❩ ❛ Potential has a shelf life. ❜ ❨635❩ ❛ Don’t move. Stay like that, let me have that. ❜ ❨636❩ ❛ I have come to the edge, of the land. I could get pushed over. ❜ ❨637❩ ❛ Never pray for justice, because you might get some. ❜ ❨638❩ ❛ It disturbs me to learn I have hurt someone unintentionally. I want all my hurts to be intentional. ❜ ❨639❩ ❛ We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat. That counts for something. ❜ ❨640❩ ❛ This is what I miss, not something that’s gone, but something that will never happen. ❜ ❨641❩ ❛ I am not good. I know too much to be good. I know myself. I know myself to be vengeful, greedy, secretive and sly. ❜ ❨642❩ ❛ You are amazing. Amazing and agonising and almost lethal. ❜ ❨643❩ ❛ In my dreams of this city I am always lost. ❜ ❨644❩ ❛ I don't know where these feelings have come from, I don’t know what I've done. ❜ ❨645❩ ❛ I am not the centre of your story, you are.  ❜ ❨646❩ ❛ I’m mad because you’re an asshole. ❜ ❨647❩ ❛ It's enormously pleasing to me, walking away. It's like being able to make people appear and vanish, at will. ❜ ❨648❩ ❛ There is never only one of anyone. ❜ ❨649❩ ❛ I can't do this without feeling I'm acting. ❜ ❨650❩ ❛ I am prepared for almost anything; except absence, except silence. ❜ ❨651❩ ❛ I’m losing my appetite for strangers. ❜ ❨652❩ ❛ You wear your cravings on the outside, like the suckers on a squid. You want it all. ❜ ❨653❩ ❛ Knowing too much about other people weakens you. You are forced to understand their reasons for doing things. ❜ ❨654❩ ❛ I have lost confidence: perhaps all I will ever be is what I am now. ❜ ❨655❩ ❛ Echoes of light, shining out of the midst of nothing. It's old light, and there's not much of it. But it's enough to see by. ❜ ❨656❩ ❛ Whoever cares the most will lose. ❜ ❨657❩ ❛ Young women need unfairness, it’s one of their few defences.  ❜ ❨658❩ ❛ Time has gone on without you. ❜ ❨659❩ ❛ Don't let the bastards grind you down. ❜ ❨660❩ ❛ Who can remember pain, once it’s over? Pain marks you, but too deep to see. Out of sight, out of mind. ❜ ❨661❩ ❛ Better never means better for everyone. It always means worse, for some. ❜ ❨662❩ ❛ There is more than one kind of freedom. Freedom to and freedom from. ❜ ❨663❩ ❛ Remember that forgiveness too is a power. ❜ ❨664❩ ❛ I am not your justification for existence. ❜ ❨665❩ ❛ I want to be valued, in ways that I am not; I want to be more than valuable. ❜ ❨666❩ ❛ If it's a story I'm telling, then I have control over the ending. ❜ ❨667❩ ❛ All you have to do is keep your mouth shut and look stupid. It shouldn't be that hard. ❜ ❨668❩ ❛ Truly amazing, what people can get used to, as long as there are a few compensations. ❜ ❨669❩ ❛ I want everything back, the way it was. ❜ ❨670❩ ❛ You can't help what you feel, but you can help how you behave. ❜ ❨671❩ ❛ Nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually heating bathtub you'd be boiled to death before you knew it. ❜ ❨672❩ ❛ To want is to have a weakness. ❜ ❨673❩ ❛ There isn't even an enemy you could put your finger on. ❜ ❨674❩ ❛ The past is a great darkness, filled with echoes. ❜ ❨675❩ ❛ Ordinary is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary. ❜ ❨676❩ ❛ I wish this story were different. I wish it were more civilised. I wish it showed me in a better light. ❜ ❨677❩ ❛ The night is mine, my own time, to do with it as I will, as long as I am quiet. As long as I don't move. As long as I lie still. ❜ ❨678❩ ❛ By telling you anything at all I'm at least believing in you. ❜ ❨679❩ ❛ Whatever is silenced will clamour to be heard. ❜ ❨680❩ ❛ Don't worry about forgiving me right now. There are more important things. ❜ ❨681❩ ❛ Keep the others safe. Don't let them suffer too much. If they have to die, let it be fast. ❜ ❨682❩ ❛ The body is so easily damaged, so easily disposed of, water and chemicals is all it is, hardly more to it than a jellyfish, drying on sand. ❜ ❨683❩ ❛ The world is full of weapons if you're looking for them. ❜ ❨684❩ ❛ Nobody's heart is perfect. ❜ ❨685❩ ❛ One false move and I'm dead. ❜ ❨686❩ ❛ Watch out. I've got my eye on you. ❜ ❨687❩ ❛ Fear is a powerful stimulant. ❜ ❨688❩ ❛ I couldn't afford to lose you. ❜ ❨689❩ ❛ Name one hero who was happy. ---- You can’t. ❜ ❨690❩ ❛ I feel like I could eat the world raw. ❜ ❨691❩ ❛ We are like gods at the dawning of the world. ❜ ❨692❩ ❛ I could recognise him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world. ❜ ❨693❩ ❛ There are no bargains between lion and men. I will kill you and eat you raw. ❜ ❨694❩ ❛ You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature. ❜ ❨695❩ ❛ He is a weapon, a killer. Do not forget it. ❜ ❨696❩ ❛ Some men gain glory after they die, others fade. ❜ ❨697❩ ❛ I am made of memories. ❜ ❨698❩ ❛ Will you come with me? ❜ ❨699❩ ❛ I wish I had let you all die. ❜ ❨700❩ ❛ It is right to seek peace for the dead. You and I both know there is no peace for those who live after. ❜ ❨701❩ ❛ Bury us. Let us be free. ❜ ❨702❩ ❛ Go. He waits for you. ❜ ❨703❩ ❛ Nothing could eclipse the stain of this dirty, mortal mediocrity. ❜ ❨704❩ ❛ I know I have told you of this. ❜ ❨705❩ ❛ I don't know how you remember them all. I swear they look the same to me. ❜ ❨706❩ ❛ Perhaps you should get some new stories, so I don’t fucking kill myself of boredom. ❜ ❨707❩ ❛ I yearn for the darkness and silence of the underworld, where I can rest. ❜ ❨708❩ ❛ There is no honour in betraying your friends. ❜ ❨709❩ ❛ There is no answer. Whichever you choose, you are wrong. ❜ ❨710❩ ❛ Divine blood flows differently. ❜ ❨711❩ ❛ How is there glory in taking life? We die so easily. ❜ ❨712❩ ❛ This is what I will miss, I think. I will kill myself rather than miss it. ❜ ❨713❩ ❛ How long do we have? ❜ ❨714❩ ❛ Do you think we fight hopeless wars? ❜ ❨715❩ ❛ There is no law that gods must be fair. ❜ ❨716❩ ❛ I do not fear ridicule. I never have. ❜ ❨717❩ ❛ You were always better with words than I. ❜ ❨718❩ ❛ Who can be ashamed to lose to such beauty? ❜ ❨719❩ ❛ When you see beauty in desolation it changes something inside you. ❜ ❨720❩ ❛ That's how the madness of the world tries to colonise you: from the outside in, forcing you to live in its reality. ❜ ❨721❩ ❛ The shadows of the abyss are like the petals of a monstrous flower that shall blossom within the skull and expand the mind beyond what any man can bear. ❜ ❨722❩ ❛ Silence creates violence. ❜ ❨723❩ ❛ Some questions will ruin you if you are denied the answer long enough. ❜ ❨724❩ ❛ There are certain kinds of connections that are so deep that when broken you feel the snap of it inside you. ❜ ❨725❩ ❛ Nothing that ever lived and breathed was truly objective—even in a vacuum, even if all that possessed the brain was a self-immolating desire for the truth. ❜ ❨726❩ ❛ We all live in a kind of continuous dream. ❜ ❨727❩ ❛ You can either waste time worrying about a death that might not come or concentrate on what’s left to you. ❜ ❨728❩ ❛ What can you do when your five senses are not enough? ❜ ❨729❩ ❛ We will neither be what we had been nor what we would become once we reach our destination. ❜ ❨730❩ ❛ Perhaps my only real expertise, my only talent, is to endure beyond the endurable. ❜ ❨731❩ ❛ When you are too close to the centre of a mystery there is no way to pull back. ❜ ❨732❩ ❛ I long ago stopped believing in promises. Biological imperatives, yes. Environmental factors, yes. Promises, no. ❜ ❨733❩ ❛ I look not for shooting stars but for fixed ones, and I try to imagine what kind of life lives in those celestial tidal pools so far from us. ❜ ❨734❩ ❛ I hesitated for just a moment. Some part of me wanted to see the creature, I think. If so, it was a very small part. I ran. ❜ ❨735❩ ❛ I don’t require any of this to have a deeper meaning. ❜ ❨736❩ ❛ All of this speculation is incomplete, inexact, inaccurate, useless. ❜ ❨737❩ ❛ We don’t have real answers, because we still don’t know what questions to ask. Our instruments are useless, our methodology broken, our motivations selfish. ❜ ❨738❩ ❛ This part I will do alone. Don’t follow. ❜ ❨739❩ ❛ People my entire life have told me I am too much in control, but that has never been the case. I have never truly been in control. ❜ ❨740❩ ❛ Has there always been someone like me to bury the bodies, to have regrets, to carry on after everyone else was dead? ❜ ❨741❩ ❛ I loved them, but I didn’t need them, and I thought that was the way it was supposed to be. ❜ ❨742❩ ❛ Places can impress themselves upon me, and I can become part of them with ease. ❜ ❨743❩ ❛ There is no one with me. I am all by myself. ❜ ❨744❩ ❛ Pretending often leads to becoming a reasonable facsimile of what you mimic. ❜ ❨745❩ ❛ I think you're confusing suicide with self-destruction, and they're very different. Almost none of us commit suicide, whereas almost all of us self-destruct. ❜ ❨746❩ ❛ What did you eat? You had rations for only two weeks. You were there for nearly four months. ❜ ❨747❩ ❛ Something here is making giant waves in the gene pool. ❜ ❨748❩ ❛ I need to know what’s inside. ❜ ❨749❩ ❛ These aren't decisions. They're impulses ❜ ❨750❩ ❛ What do you think I do when you’re away? Do you think I’m out in the garden pinning, looking up at the sky? ❜ ❨751❩ ❛ If I know what’s happened I can save their life. ❜ ❨752❩ ❛ They either went crazy or something in here killed them. ❜ ❨753❩ ❛ Something is coming through the fence! ❜ ❨754❩ ❛ Nothing is written in the stars. Not these stars, nor any others. No one controls your destiny. ❜ ❨755❩ ❛ People who claim that they're evil are usually no worse than the rest of us. ❜ ❨756❩ ❛ Happy endings are still endings. ❜ ❨757❩ ❛ We believe in all sorts of things that aren't true; -- we call it history. ❜ ❨758❩ ❛ Does the devil ever struggle to be good again, or if so is he not a devil? ❜ ❨759❩ ❛ In the lives of children, pumpkins turn into coaches, mice and rats turn into men. When we grow up, we realise it is far more common for men to turn into rats. ❜ ❨760❩ ❛ Girls need cold anger. They need the cold simmer, the ceaseless grudge, the talent to avoid forgiveness, the side stepping of compromise.  ❜ ❨761❩ ❛ Love makes hunters of us all. ❜ ❨762❩ ❛ There is much to hate in this world and way too much to love. ❜ ❨763❩ ❛ You confuse not speaking with not listening. ❜ ❨764❩ ❛ As long as people are going to call you a lunatic anyway, why not get the benefit of it? It liberates you from convention. ❜ ❨765❩ ❛ The eye is always caught by light, but shadows have more to say. ❜ ❨766❩ ❛ Not everyone is born a witch or a saint. Not everyone is born talented, or crooked, or blessed; some are born definite in no particular at all. ❜ ❨767❩ ❛ We are a fountain of shimmering contradictions, most of us. ❜ ❨768❩ ❛ The wickedness of men is that their power breeds stupidity and blindness. ❜ ❨769❩ ❛ I know you don't want to hear this but someone has to say it! You are out of control! ❜ ❨770❩ ❛ Even at the very worst - there is always choice. ❜ ❨771❩ ❛ Maybe the definition of home is the place where you are never forgiven. So you may always belong there, bound by guilt. And maybe the cost of belonging is worth it. ❜ ❨772❩ ❛ Cross a man and you struggle, one of you wins, you adjust and go on -- or you lie there dead. Cross a woman and the entire universe is changed. ❜ ❨773❩ ❛ That was such a wonderful time, even in its strangeness and sadness. Life isn't the same now. It's wonderful, but it isn't the same. ❜ ❨774❩ ❛ I don't care for approval, and I don't mind doing without. ❜ ❨775❩ ❛ It's where I live. A permanent state of bereavement. This is nothing new. ❜ ❨776❩ ❛ Always the bridesmaid, never the bride. Always the godfather, never the god. ❜ ❨777❩ ❛ The world unwraps itself to you, again and again as soon as you are ready to see it anew. ❜ ❨778❩ ❛ Evil is an act, not an appetite. Everyone has the appetite. If you give in to it, that act is evil. The appetite is normal. ❜ ❨779❩ ❛ How many haven't wanted to slash the throat of some boor across the dining room table?  ❜ ❨780❩ ❛ Even God used silence as a strategy. ❜ ❨781❩ ❛ I learned failure early and mastered it. ❜ ❨782❩ ❛ It isn't whether you do it well or ill, it's that you do it all. ❜ ❨783❩ ❛ This is why you shouldn't fall in love, it blinds you. Love is a very wicked distraction. ❜ ❨784❩ ❛ Wisdom is not the understanding of mystery. Wisdom is accepting that mystery is beyond understanding. That's what makes it mystery. ❜ ❨785❩ ❛ Wrong takes an awful long time to be proven, in my experience. ❜ ❨786❩ ❛ Such brightness, as you know, decays brilliantly. ❜ ❨787❩ ❛ I take responsibility only for the future, not the past. The past can't hurt you the way the future can. ❜ ❨788❩ ❛ Tell me to mind my own business, tell me to go fuck myself, to piss off, go on, say it, but don’t tell me nothing’s wrong. ❜ ❨789❩ ❛ The truth isn't a thing of fact or reason. It is simply what everyone agrees on. ❜ ❨790❩ ❛ One can't make peace with another by force. ❜ ❨791❩ ❛ I am a forgettable leaf on a tree. ❜ ❨792❩ ❛ That's all I want; --- to do no harm. ❜ ❨793❩ ❛ I only believe in the opposite of luck, whatever that is. ❜ ❨794❩ ❛ Human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves. ❜ ❨795❩ ❛ You’re too young to know that the heart's memory eliminates the bad and magnifies the good, and thanks to that we manage to endure the burden of the past. ❜ ❨796❩ ❛ Love, no matter what else it might be, is a natural talent. You are either born knowing how, or you never know. ❜ ❨797❩ ❛ Whatever you do, you will be sorry all the rest of your life. ❜ ❨798❩ ❛ There is no God worth worrying about. ❜ ❨799❩ ❛ The only regret I will have in dying is if it is not for love. ❜ ❨800❩ ❛ Wisdom comes to us when it can no longer do any good. ❜ ❨801❩ ❛ Think of love as a state of grace, not the means to anything, but the very end in itself. ❜ ❨802❩ ❛ Only God knows how much I love you. ❜ ❨803❩ ❛ There is no greater glory than to die for love. ❜ ❨804❩ ❛ Nothing resembles a person as much as the way he dies. ❜ ❨805❩ ❛ Take advantage of it now, while you are young, and suffer all you can, because these things don't last your whole life. ❜ ❨806❩ ❛ Today, when I saw you, I realised that what is between us is nothing more than an illusion. ❜ ❨807❩ ❛ I have waited for this opportunity for more than half a century. ❜ ❨808❩ ❛ I want to be myself again, to recover all that I was obliged to give up. ❜ ❨809❩ ❛ The only thing worse than bad health is a bad name. ❜ ❨810❩ ❛ This soup tastes like windows. ❜ ❨811❩ ❛ Why do you insist on talking about what does not exist? ❜ ❨812❩ ❛ One has to live a long time to know a man's true nature. ❜ ❨813❩ ❛ No, not rich, I am a poor man with money, which is not the same thing. ❜ ❨814❩ ❛ My heart has more rooms than a whorehouse. ❜ ❨815❩ ❛ That may be the reason he does so many things, so that he will not have to think. ❜ ❨816❩ ❛ Love if it exists, is something separate: another life. ❜ ❨817❩ ❛ Things did not go as badly for me as they would for you. ❜ ❨818❩ ❛ There are things you do only for love. ❜ ❨819❩ ❛ I’ll have plenty of time to rest when I die. ❜ ❨820❩ ❛ There is no innocence more dangerous than the innocence of age. ❜ ❨821❩ ❛ You treat me as if I were just anybody. ❜ ❨822❩ ❛ The symptoms of love are the same as those of cholera. ❜ ❨823❩ ❛ There is no law, human or divine, that you have not ignored. ❜ ❨824❩ ❛ Why is it that I feel I've known you so many years? ❜ ❨825❩ ❛ Stuff your eyes with wonder, live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It's more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories. ❜ ❨826❩ ❛ It doesn't matter what you do, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. ❜ ❨827❩ ❛ We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were really bothered? About something important, about something real? ❜ ❨828❩ ❛ There must be something, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing. ❜ ❨829❩ ❛ If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you'll never learn. ❜ ❨830❩ ❛ If you drown, at least die knowing you were heading for shore. ❜ ❨831❩ ❛ You can't make people listen. They have to come round in their own time, wondering what happened and why the world blew up around them. ❜ ❨832❩ ❛ It was a pleasure to burn. ❜ ❨833❩ ❛ I'm antisocial, they say. I don't mix. It's so strange. I'm very social indeed. It all depends on what you mean by social, doesn't it? ❜ ❨834❩ ❛ Being with people is nice. But I don't think it's social to get a bunch of people together and then not let them talk, do you? ❜ ❨835❩ ❛ Do you notice how people hurt each other nowadays? ❜ ❨836❩ ❛ Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man? ❜ ❨837❩ ❛ I don't talk things. I talk the meaning of things. ❜ ❨838❩ ❛ I'll hold on to the world tight some day. I've got one finger on it now; that's a beginning. ❜ ❨839❩ ❛ I just want someone to hear what I have to say. And maybe if I talk long enough it'll make sense. ❜ ❨840❩ ❛ That's the good part of dying; when you've nothing to lose, you run any risk you want. ❜ ❨841❩ ❛ Someday we'll build the biggest goddamn steamshovel in history and dig the biggest grave of all time and shove war in it and cover it up. ❜ ❨842❩ ❛ You're not like the others. I've seen a few; I know. When I talk, you look at me. ❜ ❨843❩ ❛ You're afraid of making mistakes. Don't be. Mistakes can be profited by. ❜ ❨844❩ ❛ When they give you lined paper, write the other way. ❜ ❨845❩ ❛ The sun burnt every day. It burnt time. ❜ ❨846❩ ❛ We have everything we need to be happy but we aren't happy. Something is missing. ❜ ❨847❩ ❛ I feel I'm doing what I should've done a lifetime ago. ❜ ❨848❩ ❛ I'm not afraid. Maybe it's because I'm doing the right thing at last. Maybe it's because I've done a rash thing and don't want to look the coward to you. ❜ ❨849❩ ❛ Good God, who were those men? I never saw them before in my life! ❜ ❨850❩ ❛ How do you get so empty? Who takes it out of you? ❜ ❨851❩ ❛ It must be right. It seems so right. ❜ ❨852❩ ❛ To everything there is a season. Yes. A time to break down, and a time to build up. A time to keep silence and a time to speak. ❜ ❨853❩ ❛ It's my game. And no one can help me. Not even you. ❜ ❨854❩ ❛ What makes earth feel like hell is our expectation that it should feel like heaven. Earth is earth. Dead is dead. You’ll find out for yourself soon enough. ❜ ❨855❩ ❛ Death is a long process. Your body is just the first part of you that croaks. Beyond that, your dreams have to die. Then your expectations. Your anger and memories must die. Your ego. Your pride and shame and ambition and hope. ❜ ❨856❩ ❛ Help me give up my addiction to hope. ❜ ❨857❩ ❛ Life is short, death is forever. ❜ ❨858❩ ❛ Hope is something really tough and tenacious you have to give up. It’s an addiction to break. ❜ ❨859❩ ❛ If the living are haunted by the dead, then the dead are haunted by their own mistakes. ❜ ❨860❩ ❛ We all wish to be pursued. We all long to be desired. ❜ ❨861❩ ❛ All the demons of hell formerly reigned as gods in previous cultures. No it's not fair, but one man's god is another man's devil. ❜ ❨862❩ ❛ I can become someone else, not out of pressure and desperation, but merely because a new life sounds fun or interesting or joyful. ❜ ❨863❩ ❛ It's my petty fear of personal rejection that allows so many true evils to exist. My cowardice enables atrocities. ❜ ❨864❩ ❛ You fucked up. Game over. So just relax. ❜ ❨865❩ ❛ The greatest weapon any warrior can carry into battle is absolute certainty of her eternal soul. ❜ ❨866❩ ❛ If killing you will end my existence as well, be it. Small loss. Such a life, as your puppet, is not worth living. ❜ ❨867❩ ❛ I might be a touch of a sadist and a little bit jejune but at least I'm not a victim, not any longer. I hope. ❜ ❨868❩ ❛ Dying seems like the greatest weakness, and in a world where people say you're lazy for not shaving your legs, then being dead seems like the ultimate character flaw. ❜ ❨869❩ ❛ Any concept of right versus wrong, is merely a cultural construct relative to one specific time and place. ❜ ❨870❩ ❛ To prove that I exist I must kill you. ❜ ❨871❩ ❛ I'd say that my life has been a way-too-long case history of chasing rainbows. ❜ ❨872❩ ❛ The world is a battle for attention, a war to be heard. ❜ ❨873❩ ❛ Every garden looks beautiful in May. ❜ ❨874❩ ❛ When we neglect to fear such brittle monstrosity, we render it powerless. ❜ ❨875❩ ❛ My taste for power continues to grow, as does my ability to accrue it. ❜ ❨876❩ ❛ Such language! Why don't you just take a dump in my ears? ❜ ❨877❩ ❛ You’d be foolish to count on people displaying high standards of honesty. ❜ ❨878❩ ❛ Depending on her mood, she can be more frightening than any demon or devil you might ever run across. ❜ ❨879❩ ❛ Cross your fingers! Maybe death won't happen to you. ❜ ❨880❩ ❛ Do not die while wearing cheap shoes. ❜ ❨881❩ ❛ Old habits die hard. ❜ ❨882❩ ❛ It's our attachments to a fixed identity that torture us. ❜ ❨883❩ ❛ What do I think I am? In a thousand words; I don't have a clue. ❨884❩ ❛ If I am to be saved it is because your love redeems me. ❜ ❨885❩ ❛ All I wanted was to be loved for myself. ❜ ❨886❩ ❛ I have tasted all the happiness the world can offer. ❜ ❨887❩ ❛ Shall we pity him? Shall we curse him? ❜ ❨888❩ ❛ You have a heart that can hold the entire empire of the world. ❜ ❨889❩ ❛ Look, I am not laughing now, crying, crying for you. ❜ ❨890❩ ❛ Tonight I gave you my soul, and I am dead. ❜ ❨891❩ ❛ You are afraid of me! And yet I am not really wicked. Love me and you shall see! ❜ ❨892❩ ❛ Are people so unhappy when they love? --- Yes, when they love and are not sure of being loved. ❜ ❨893❩ ❛ Your soul is a beautiful thing. No emperor received so fair a gift. The angels wept tonight. ❜ ❨894❩ ❛ Blood!...Blood!... That's a good thing! ❜ ❨895❩ ❛ Now I want to live like everybody else. I want to have a life like everybody else. ❜ ❨896❩ ❛ You will be the happiest of women. And we will sing, all by ourselves, till we swoon away with delight. ❜ ❨897❩ ❛ I should be as gentle as a lamb; and you could do anything with me that you pleased. ❜ ❨898❩ ❛ I am going to die of love, I am dying of love. That's how it is. I loved you so. I still love you so. ❜ ❨899❩ ❛ I am dying of love for her, I tell you! If only you knew how beautiful she was when she let me kiss her. ❜ ❨900❩ ❛ He fills me with horror but I do not hate him. How can I hate him? ❜ ❨901❩ ❛ Holy angel, in Heaven blessed, my spirit longs with thee to rest. ❜ ❨902❩ ❛ Nothing is colder or more dead than my heart. ❜ ❨903❩ ❛ I had loved an angel and now I despise a woman. ❜ ❨904❩ ❛ Our lives are one masked ball. ❜ ❨905❩ ❛ Why do you condemn a man whom you have never met, whom no one knows and about whom even you yourself know nothing? ❜ ❨906❩ ❛ He would commit murder for me. ❜ ❨907❩ ❛ If I don't save her from the hands of that humbug, she is lost. But I shall save her. ❜ ❨908❩ ❛ We will go from here together or die together. ❜ ❨909❩ ❛ Your fear, your terror, all of that is just love and love of the most exquisite kind, the kind which people do not admit even to themselves. The kind that gives you a thrill, when you think of it. ❜ ❨910❩ ❛ Destiny has chained you to me forever. ❜ ❨911❩ ❛ You must never ask me that. ❜ ❨912❩ ❛ Are you afraid that you will change your mind? ❜ ❨913❩ ❛ You must come and fetch me in my dressing room at midnight exactly. ❜ ❨914❩ ❛ The holes in your life are permanent. You have to grow around them, like tree roots around concrete; you mould yourself through the gaps. ❜ ❨915❩ ❛ I have never understood how people can blithely disregard the damage they do by following their hearts. ❜ ❨916❩ ❛ There’s something comforting about the sight of strangers safe at home. ❜ ❨917❩ ❛ I have lost control over everything, even the places in my head. ❜ ❨918❩ ❛ It’s possible to miss what you’ve never had, to even mourn for it. ❜ ❨919❩ ❛ There’s nothing so painful, so corrosive, as suspicion. ❜ ❨920❩ ❛ When did you become so weak? ❜ ❨921❩ ❛ I don’t know where that strength went, I don’t remember losing it. I think that over time it got chipped away, bit by bit, by life, by the living of it. ❜ ❨922❩ ❛ Let’s be honest: women are still only really valued for two things—their looks and their role as mothers. ❜ ❨923❩ ❛ Sadness gets boring after a while, for the sad person and for everyone around them. ❜ ❨924❩ ❛ I’m playing at real life instead of actually living it. ❜ ❨925❩ ❛ I’ve just got to let myself feel the pain, because if I don’t, if I keep numbing it, it’ll never really go away. ❜ ❨926❩ ❛ I am not the girl I used to be. I am no longer desirable, I’m off-putting in some way. It’s as if people can see the damage written all over me, can see it in my face, the way I hold myself, the way I move. ❜ ❨927❩ ❛ Who was it that said following your heart is a good thing? It is pure egotism, a selfishness to conquer all. ❜ ❨928❩ ❛ It’s impossible to resist the kindness of strangers. ❜ ❨929❩ ❛ Sometimes I catch myself trying to remember the last time I had meaningful physical contact with another person, just a hug or a heartfelt squeeze of my hand, and my heart twitches. ❜ ❨930❩ ❛ I have to find a way of making myself happy, I have to stop looking for happiness elsewhere. ❜ ❨931❩ ❛ How did I find myself here? I wonder where it started, my decline; I wonder at what point I could have halted it. Where did I take the wrong turn? ❜ ❨932❩ ❛ Now look -- Now look what you made me do. ❜ ❨933❩ ❛ It’s okay, whatever you did, whatever you’ve done: you suffered, you hurt, you deserve forgiveness. ❜ ❨934❩ ❛ They’re what I lost, they’re everything I want to be. ❜ ❨935❩ ❛ You broke me and I broke us. ❜ ❨936❩ ❛ I’ve been the fool. If he does it with you, he’ll do it to you. ❜ ❨937❩ ❛ I’d never realised, not until now, how shameful it is to be pitied. ❜ ❨938❩ ❛ Sometimes, I don’t want to go anywhere, I think I’ll be happy if I never have to set foot outside the house again. ❜ ❨939❩ ❛ I don’t believe in soul mates, but there’s an understanding between us that I just haven’t felt before, or at least, not for a long time. ❜ ❨940❩ ❛ There can be no greater agony, nothing can be more painful than the not knowing, which will never end. ❜ ❨941❩ ❛ Being the other woman is a huge turn-on, there’s no point in denying it: you’re the one he can’t help but betray his wife for, even though he loves her. That’s just how irresistible you are. ❜ ❨942❩ ❛ I feel a rush of gratitude so strong, it feels almost like love. ❜ ❨943❩ ❛ You don’t know how determined I can be. Once I’ve made my mind up, I’m a force to be reckoned with. ❜ ❨944❩ ❛ The more I want to be oblivious, the less I can be. Life and light will not let me be. ❜ ❨945❩ ❛ You don’t have to be afraid of being alone. It’s not the worst thing, is it? ❜ ❨946❩ ❛ I have felt this way before. On a larger scale, to a more intense degree, of course, but I remember the quality of the pain. You don’t forget it. ❜ ❨947❩ ❛ If he thinks I’m going to sit around crying, he’s got another thing coming. ❜ ❨948❩ ❛ I don’t like to lose. It’s not like me. None of this is like me. I don’t get rejected. I’m the one who walks away. ❜ ❨949❩ ❛ I don’t remember anger, raging fury. I remember fear. ❜ ❨950❩ ❛ I can’t sleep. I haven’t slept in days. I hate it, hate insomnia more than anything, just lying there, brain going round, tick, tick, tick, tick. ❜ ❨951❩ ❛ Maybe the courage I need has nothing to do with telling the truth and everything to do with walking away. ❜ ❨952❩ ❛ I’m not beautiful, and I can’t have kids, so what does that make me? Worthless. ❜ ❨953❩ ❛ Failure cloaked me like a mantle, it overwhelmed me, dragged me under and I gave up hope. ❜ ❨954❩ ❛ It’s an odd thing to say, but I think this all the time; I don’t feel bad enough. ❜ ❨955❩ ❛ Some battles aren’t worth fighting. ❜ ❨956❩ ❛ I never felt guilty. I pretended I did. I had to. ❜ ❨957❩ ❛ I never meant for any of this to happen, we fell in love, what could we do? ❜ ❨958❩ ❛ What bothers me most is that I haven’t got to the end of my story, and I can’t start over with someone else, it’s too hard. ❜ ❨959❩ ❛ A person is, among all else, a material thing, easily torn and not easily mended. ❜ ❨960❩ ❛ It isn’t only wickedness and scheming that make people unhappy, it is confusion and misunderstanding. ❜ ❨961❩ ❛ Falling in love can be achieved in a single word—a glance. ❜ ❨962❩ ❛ Though you think the world is at your feet, it can rise up and tread on you. ❜ ❨963❩ ❛ I’ve never had a moment’s doubt. I love you. I believe in you completely. You are my dearest one. My reason for life. ❜ ❨964❩ ❛ It might hurt, it is horribly inconvenient, no good might come of it, but it is what it is to be in love. ❜ ❨965❩ ❛ It was always an impossible task, and that was precisely the point. ❜ ❨966❩ ❛ Come back, come back to me. ❜ ❨967❩ ❛ In my thoughts I make love to you all day long. ❜ ❨968❩ ❛ The truth is I feel rather light headed and foolish in your presence and I don’t think I can blame the heat. ❜ ❨969❩ ❛ Beauty occupies a narrow band. Ugliness, on the other hand, has infinite variation. ❜ ❨970❩ ❛ Is there any meaning in my life that the inevitable death awaiting me does not destroy? ❜ ❨971❩ ❛ However, withered, I still feel myself to be exactly the same person I’ve always been. ❜ ❨972❩ ❛ Hate is a feeling as pure as love, but dispassionate and icily rational. ❜ ❨973❩ ❛ I’m going mad. Let me not be mad. ❜ ❨974❩ ❛ Is everyone really as alive as I am? ❜ ❨975❩ ❛ Every now and then, quite unintentionally, someone teaches you something about yourself. ❜ ❨976❩ ❛ Something has happened, hasn’t it? ❜ ❨977❩ ❛ I like to think that it isn’t weakness or evasion, but a final act of kindness. ❜ ❨978❩ ❛ Is it possible that I am, in the modern term, in denial? ❜ ❨979❩ ❛ How could anyone presume to know the world through the eyes of an insect? ❜ ❨980❩ ❛ Not everything has a cause. Some things are simply so. ❜ ❨981❩ ❛ I’ll be quite honest with you. I’m torn between breaking your neck here and throwing you down the stairs. ❜ ❨982❩ ❛ How old do you have to be before you know the difference between right and wrong? ❜ ❨983❩ ❛ It was never meant to be read. ❜ ❨984❩ ❛ If I fell in the river, would you save me? ❜ ❨985❩ ❛ That was an incredibly bloody stupid thing to do. ❜ ❨986❩ ❛ I want to thank you for saving my life. I’ll be eternally grateful to you. ❜ ❨987❩ ❛ I’m very, very sorry for the terrible distress that I have caused. I’m very, very sorry. ❜ ❨988❩ ❛ Don’t call me that! – Please don’t call me that. ❜ ❨989❩ ❛ It may be the wrong decision, but fuck it, it’s mine. ❜ ❨990❩ ❛ Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati. It does not mean to flow with exuberance. It means to suffer. ❜ ❨991❩ ❛ No one ever really gets used to nightmares. ❜ ❨992❩ ❛ I still get nightmares. In fact, I get them so often I should be used to them by now. I’m not. ❜ ❨993❩ ❛ Sublime is something you choke on after a shot of tequila. ❜ ❨994❩ ❛ Some people reflect light, some deflect it, you by some miracle, seem to collect it. ❜ ❨995❩ ❛ Beautiful women are always drawn to men they think will keep them beautiful. ❜ ❨996❩ ❛ The ruminations are mine, let the world be yours. ❜ ❨997❩ ❛ You will fulfil a promise I made years ago but failed to keep. ❜ ❨998❩ ❛ Darkness never satisfies. Especially if it takes something away which it almost always invariably does. ❜ ❨999❩ ❛ I want something else. I’m not even sure what to call it anymore. ❜ ❨1000❩ ❛ What can I say, I’m a sucker for abandoned stuff, misplaced stuff, forgotten stuff, any old stuff. ❜ ❨1001❩ ❛ Is it possible to love something so much, you imagine it wants to destroy you only because it has denied you? ❜ ❨1002❩ ❛ It’s just silent, no sound at all. It’s like something’s waiting. ❜ ❨1003❩ ❛ I guess I’m hoping the weapons will make me feel better, grant me some kind of fucking control. ❜ ❨1004❩ ❛ Oh and something else: – Fuck you. ❜ ❨1005❩ ❛ God I’ve never been afraid like this. ❜ ❨1006❩ ❛ I miss you. I love you. There’s no second I’ve lived that you can’t call your own. ❜ ❨1007❩ ❛ I’m so tired. Sleep’s been stalking me for too long to remember. Inevitable I suppose. ❜ ❨1008❩ ❛ Not seeing the rip doesn’t mean you automatically get to keep clear of the Hey-I’m-Bleeding part. ❜ ❨1009❩ ❛ These days fantasies flourish and die like summer flies. ❜ ❨1010❩ ❛ Yeah I know, I know. This shit’s getting ridiculous. ❜ ❨1011❩ ❛ ‘Fuck’ and 'fall for’ have very different meanings. The first one you do as much as you can. The second one you never ever, ever do. ❜ ❨1012❩ ❛ It’s a nice idea but it reeks of hope. False hope. ❜ ❨1013❩ ❛ It’s, well…one thing in two words: fucked up…very fucked up. Okay three words, four words, who the hell cares…very very fucked up. ❜ ❨1014❩ ❛ Do you think I could spend the night at your place?  ❜ ❨1015❩ ❛ Any fool can pray. ❜ ❨1016❩ ❛ I feel like I haven’t slept in months. My neighbours are scared of me. ❜ ❨1017❩ ❛ I’ve lost my mind? Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe I’m just really drunk. ❜ ❨1018❩ ❛ Perhaps by cleaning out my system I’ll come to a clearing where I can ease myself into peace. ❜ ❨1019❩ ❛ I should be dead. Why am I still here? ❜ ❨1020❩ ❛ Fuck if I know. Your guess is as good as mine. ❜ ❨1021❩ ❛ You are my flesh. You are my bones. I know you too well. I read you too perfectly. ❜ ❨1022❩ ❛ Not all complex problems have easy solutions. ❜ ❨1023❩ ❛ Do you believe in God? I don’t think I ever asked you that one. ❜ ❨1024❩ ❛ We all create stories to protect ourselves. ❜ ❨1025❩ ❛ Are you kidding me? This place is scary. ❜ ❨1026❩ ❛ These days the only thing that gets me outside is when I say: Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck you. Fuck me. Fuck this. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. ❜ ❨1027❩ ❛ You like that crap because it reminds you of you. ❜ ❨1028❩ ❛ You may suddenly realise things are not how you perceived them to be at all. ❜ ❨1029❩ ❛ The two hardest tests are the patience to wait for the right moment and the courage not to be disappointed with what we encounter. ❜ ❨1030❩ ❛ People never learn anything by being told, they have to find out for themselves. ❜ ❨1031❩ ❛ Be crazy! But learn how to be crazy without being the center of attention. Be brave enough to live different. ❜ ❨1032❩ ❛ You are someone who is different, but who wants to be the same as everyone else. And that in my view is a serious illness. ❜ ❨1033❩ ❛ God chose you to be different. ❜ ❨1034❩ ❛ Why are you disappointing God with this kind of attitude? ❜ ❨1035❩ ❛ You have two choices, to control your mind or to let your mind control you. ❜ ❨1036❩ ❛ Everyone is indeed crazy, but the craziest are the ones who don't know they're crazy; they just keep repeating what others tell them to. ❜ ❨1037❩ ❛ Haven't you learned anything, not even with the approach of death?  ❜ ❨1038❩ ❛ If people don't like it, they can complain. And if they don't have the courage to complain, that's their problem. ❜ ❨1039❩ ❛ Nothing in this world happens by chance. ❜ ❨1040❩ ❛ I want to continue living my life the way I dream it, and not the way the other people want it to be. ❜ ❨1041❩ ❛ Be like the fountain that overflows, not like the cistern that merely contains. ❜ ❨1042❩ ❛ Collective madness is called sanity. ❜ ❨1043❩ ❛ Consider each day a miracle - which indeed it is, when you consider the number of unexpected things that could happen in each second of our fragile existences. ❜ ❨1044❩ ❛ You say they create their own reality, but what is reality? ❜ ❨1045❩ ❛ Many people don't allow themselves to love because there are a lot of things at risk. A lot of future and a lot of past. ❜ ❨1046❩ ❛ Death frees from the fear of dying. ❜ ❨1047❩ ❛ The danger of an adventure is worth a thousand days of ease and comfort. ❜ ❨1048❩ ❛ The happier people can be, the unhappier they are. ❜ ❨1049❩ ❛ Life is always a matter of waiting for the right moment to act. ❜ ❨1050❩ ❛ It's best to accept life as it really is and not as you imagined it to be. ❜ ❨1051❩ ❛ You don't seem mad at all. ❜ ❨1052❩ ❛ We’re allowed to make a lot of mistakes in our lives, except the mistake that destroys us. ❜ ❨1053❩ ❛ You’re what you are, not what others make of you. ❜ ❨1054❩ ❛ Am I cured? ❜ ❨1055❩ ❛ Real love changes and grows with time and discovers new ways of expressing itself. ❜ ❨1056❩ ❛ A lot of people think something is right, and so that thing becomes right. Is that it? ❜ ❨1057❩ ❛ They think they're normal, because they all do the same thing. ❜ ❨1058❩ ❛ I didn't know that other ‘me’s existed inside me, ‘Me’s that I could love. ❜ ❨1059❩ ❛ I have no idea what's awaiting me. ❜ ❨1060❩ ❛ What will happen when this all ends? ❜ ❨1061❩ ❛ I know that you are capable of great deeds. ❜ ❨1062❩ ❛ A loveless world is a dead world, and always there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one's work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart. ❜ ❨1063❩ ❛ The truth is that everyone is bored. ❜ ❨1064❩ ❛ I feel more fellowship with the defeated than with saints. Heroism and sanctity don't really appeal to me, I imagine. ❜ ❨1065❩ ❛ If there is one thing one can always yearn for, and sometimes attain, it is human love. ❜ ❨1066❩ ❛ Who would dare to assert that eternal happiness can compensate for even a single moment's suffering? ❜ ❨1067❩ ❛ It's not easy. I've been thinking it over for years. ❜ ❨1068❩ ❛ While we loved each other we didn't need words to make ourselves understood. ❜ ❨1069❩ ❛ People are more often bad than good. ❜ ❨1070❩ ❛ I don't believe in heroism; I know it's easy and I've learned that it can be murderous. ❜ ❨1071❩ ❛ What interests me is living and dying for what one loves. ❜ ❨1072❩ ❛ In fact, nobody is capable of really thinking about anyone, even in the worst calamity. ❜ ❨1073❩ ❛ Nothing in the world is worth turning one's back on what one loves. ❜ ❨1074❩ ❛ Again and again there comes a time in history when the man who dares to say that two and two make four is punished with death. ❜ ❨1075❩ ❛ There are more things to admire in men then to despise. ❜ ❨1076❩ ❛ It is in the thick of calamity that one gets hardened to the truth - in other words, to silence. ❜ ❨1077❩ ❛ What on earth prompted you to take a hand in this? ❜ ❨1078❩ ❛ Your code of morals? What code, if I may ask? ❜ ❨1079❩ ❛ I'm fumbling in the dark, struggling to make something out. But I've long ceased finding anything. ❜ ❨1080❩ ❛ No doubt our love is still there, but quite simply it is unusable, heavy to carry, inert inside of us, sterile as crime or condemnation. ❜ ❨1081❩ ❛ I’m not happy to go, but one needn't be happy to make another start. ❜ ❨1082❩ ❛ I am incapable of suffering for a long time, or being happy for a long time. Which means that I am incapable of anything really worth while. ❜ ❨1083❩ ❛ I should have found the words to keep her with me. ❜ ❨1084❩ ❛ We can't stir a finger in this world without the risk of bringing death to somebody. ❜ ❨1085❩ ❛ The evil that is in the world comes out of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. ❜ ❨1086❩ ❛ There are always flies and itches. That’s why life is difficult to live. ❜ ❨1087❩ ❛ The best protection against anything is a good bottle of wine. ❜ ❨1088❩ ❛ There is no peace without hope. ❜ ❨1089❩ ❛ It's enough for me to be sure that you and I exist at this moment. ❜ ❨1090❩ ❛ There is always something left to love. ❜ ❨1091❩ ❛ A person doesn’t die when he should but when he can. ❜ ❨1092❩ ❛ Things have a life of their own. It's simply a matter of waking up their souls. ❜ ❨1093❩ ❛ Tell me something: why are you fighting? ❜ ❨1094❩ ❛ I've come to realise only just now that I'm fighting because of pride. ❜ ❨1095❩ ❛ One minute of reconciliation is worth more than a whole life of friendship. ❜ ❨1096❩ ❛ It's better than not knowing why you're fighting. Or fighting, like you, for something that doesn't have any meaning for anyone. ❜ ❨1097❩ ❛ Holy Mother of God! ❜ ❨1098❩ ❛ A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground. ❜ ❨1099❩ ❛ I was born a son of a bitch and I'm going to die a son of a bitch. ❜ ❨1100❩ ❛ Bad luck doesn't have any chinks in it. ❜ ❨1101❩ ❛ I plead youth as a mitigating circumstance. ❜ ❨1102❩ ❛ Get those bad thoughts out of your head. You're going to be happy. ❜ ❨1103❩ ❛ Children inherit their parents' madness. ❜ ❨1104❩ ❛ I'll turn to ashes in here but I won't give this miserable town the pleasure of seeing me weep. ❜ ❨1105❩ ❛ You would be good in a war. Where you put your eye, you put your bullet. ❜ ❨1106❩ ❛ Men demand much more than you think. ❜ ❨1107❩ ❛ Even the craziest and most persistent love is just a temporary truth. ❜ ❨1108❩ ❛ If we’re alone you can whisper in my ear any crap you can think of. ❜ ❨1109❩ ❛ You have taken this horrible game very seriously and you have done well because you are doing your duty. ❜ ❨1110❩ ❛ We have the right to pull down your pants and give you a whipping at the first sign of disrespect. ❜ ❨1111❩ ❛ What worries me is not your shooting me, because after all, for people like us it's a natural death. ❜ ❨1112❩ ❛ What worries me is that you've ended up as bad as they are. ❜ ❨1113❩ ❛ It is characteristic of men to deny hunger once their appetites are satisfied. ❜ ❨1114❩ ❛ Dying is much more difficult than one imagines. ❜ ❨1115❩ ❛ If you have to go crazy, please go crazy all by yourself! ❜ ❨1116❩ ❛ We have still not had a death. ❜ ❨1117❩ ❛ How awful, the way time passes. ❜ ❨1118❩ ❛ You may be in command of your war, but I'm in command of my house. ❜ ❨1119❩ ❛ I missed you every hour. ❜ ❨1120❩ ❛ You know what the worst part was? It caught me completely by surprise. ❜ ❨1121❩ ❛ I’ve risked my life for you. ❜ ❨1122❩ ❛ The problem with wanting is that it makes us weak. ❜ ❨1123❩ ❛ I love you, even the part of you that loved him. ❜ ❨1124❩ ❛ I’m sorry it took me so long to see you. ❜ ❨1125❩ ❛ I never really belonged anywhere. ❜ ❨1126❩ ❛ Thanks for being my best friend and making my life bearable.  ❜ ❨1127❩ ❛ Thanks for finding me. ❜ ❨1128❩ ❛ You and I are going to change the world. ❜ ❨1129❩ ❛ I’ve been waiting for you a long time. ❜ ❨1130❩ ❛ I’m not used to people trying to kill me. ❜ ❨1131❩ ❛ You’re shaking. ❜ ❨1132❩ ❛ There's nothing wrong with being a lizard. Unless you were born to be a hawk. ❜ ❨1133❩ ❛ Make me your villain. ❜ ❨1134❩ ❛ Just you and me. It’s always just you and me. ❜ ❨1135❩ ❛ Do you blame me for every mistake I made? For every dumb thing I’ve said? ❜ ❨1136❩ ❛ Well, if it gets too bad, give me a signal. ❜ ❨1137❩ ❛ Did you tell him what I showed you in the dark? ❜ ❨1138❩ ❛ Did you miss me when you were gone? ❜ ❨1139❩ ❛ What is infinite? The universe and the greed of men. ❜ ❨1140❩ ❛ You’re interfering with my plan. ❜ ❨1141❩ ❛ Too much champagne? ❜ ❨1142❩ ❛ I hope you don’t expect fairness from me. It isn’t one of my specialties. ❜ ❨1143❩ ❛ There is something more powerful than any army. Something strong enough to topple kings. Faith. ❜ ❨1144❩ ❛ All you said was that I had to kill you. You didn’t say how. ❜ ❨1145❩ ❛ What is she? She’s everything, you dumb son of a bitch. ❜ ❨1146❩ ❛ She’s an ugly little thing. No child should look like that. Pale and sour, like a glass of milk that’s turned. ❜ ❨1147❩ ❛ I wouldn’t make that mistake again. ❜ ❨1148❩ ❛ It’s a great honor, to save a life. You saved many. ❜ ❨1149❩ ❛ In this world, there are things you can only do alone. ❜ ❨1150❩ ❛ What seems like a reasonable distance to one person might feel too far to somebody else. ❜ ❨1151❩ ❛ If you really want to know something, you have to be willing to pay the price. ❜ ❨1152❩ ❛ Why should you be interested in me? ❜ ❨1153❩ ❛ I have been told I've got a darkish personality. A few times. ❜ ❨1154❩ ❛ It's not as if our lives are divided simply into light and dark. There's shadowy middle ground. ❜ ❨1155❩ ❛ I'll write to you. A super-long letter, like in an old-fashioned novel. ❜ ❨1156❩ ❛ The spotlight doesn't suit me. I'm more of a side dish. ❜ ❨1157❩ ❛ The ground we stand on looks solid enough, but if something happens it can drop right out from under you.  ❜ ❨1158❩ ❛ So once you're dead there's just nothing? ❜ ❨1159❩ ❛ If only I could fall sound asleep and wake up in my old reality. ❜ ❨1160❩ ❛ Is action merely the incidental product of thought, or is thought the consequential product of action? ❜ ❨1161❩ ❛ Nobody can shake off their own shadow. ❜ ❨1162❩ ❛ The silence is so deep it hurts. ❜ ❨1163❩ ❛ I may not look it, but I can be a very patient guy. ❜ ❨1164❩ ❛ Killing time is one of my specialities. ❜ ❨1165❩ ❛ You can't fight it. ❜ ❨1166❩ ❛ Tell me something,—do you believe in reincarnation? ❜ ❨1167❩ ❛ I can’t understand nothingness. I can’t understand it and I can’t imagine it. ❜ ❨1168❩ ❛ I can hardly breathe, and my whole body wants to shrink into a corner.  ❜ ❨1169❩ ❛ I do have a few things wrong with me, but those are strictly problems I keep inside. ❜ ❨1170❩ ❛ I can't take it any more, I can't go on any more. ❜ ❨1171❩ ❛ You don't really have it together. ❜ ❨1172❩ ❛ Is it against the law for me to know it? ❜ ❨1173❩ ❛ I keep having the same dream. ❜ ❨1174❩ ❛ Are you asking because you really want an answer? ❜ ❨1175❩ ❛ I hate this! I don't want to be changed this way! ❜ ❨1176❩ ❛ No contradictions, no irony. They do everything according to numerical formulas. ❜ ❨1177❩ ❛ Want to hear the rest? If you’re not interested, I can stop. ❜ ❨1178❩ ❛ If I didn’t have these memories inside me, I would’ve snapped a long time ago. I would’ve curled up in a ditch somewhere and died. ❜ ❨1179❩ ❛ I don’t know what you’re feeling. I won’t even pretend. ❜ ❨1180❩ ❛ What are you doing here, honey? ❜ ❨1181❩ ❛ You're not even old enough to know how bad life gets. ❜ ❨1182❩ ❛ You don't understand me. ❜ ❨1183❩ ❛ All wisdom ends in paradox. ❜ ❨1184❩ ❛ It is love that overthrows empire. Love that binds two hearts together, come hellfire & brimstone. ❜ ❨1185❩ ❛ I have lost my gift. ❜ ❨1186❩ ❛ Winter is the season of alcoholism and despair. ❜ ❨1187❩ ❛ The seeds of death get lost in the mess that God made us. ❜ ❨1188❩ ❛ They're just memories now. It’s time to forget. ❜ ❨1189❩ ❛ The time has to be right and the heart willing. ❜ ❨1190❩ ❛ The world, a tired performer, offers us another half-assed season. ❜ ❨1191❩ ❛ Capitalism has resulted in material well-being but spiritual bankruptcy. ❜ ❨1192❩ ❛ Grief is natural, overcoming it is a matter of choice. ❜ ❨1193❩ ❛ I want out of that decorating scheme. ❜ ❨1194❩ ❛ With most people suicide is like Russian roulette. Only one chamber has a bullet. ❜ ❨1195❩ ❛ You never get over it but you get where it doesn't bother you so much. ❜ ❨1196❩ ❛ Don't waste your time on life. ❜ ❨1197❩ ❛ I'm a teenager. I've got problems! ❜ ❨1198❩ ❛ Adolescents tend to seek love where they can find it. ❜ ❨1199❩ ❛ Obviously, you've never been a thirteen-year-old girl. ❜ ❨1200❩ ❛ It was a mistake. ❜ ❨1201❩ ❛ It seemed like we were supposed to feel sorry for everything that ever happened, ever. ❜ ❨1202❩ ❛ Buffeted but not broken. ❜ ❨1203❩ ❛ Shit. What have kids got to be worried about now? ❜ ❨1204❩ ❛ If they want trouble, they should go live in Bangladesh. ❜ ❨1205❩ ❛ I can't wait until I get out of here. ❜ ❨1206❩ ❛ When she jumped she probably thought she’d fly. ❜ ❨1207❩ ❛ I do not think the patient truly meant to end her life. Her act was a cry for help. ❜ ❨1208❩ ❛ You're a stone fox. ❜ ❨1209❩ ❛ It was love at first sight, at last sight, at ever and ever sight. ❜ ❨1210❩ ❛ Light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. ❜ ❨1211❩ ❛ He broke my heart. You merely broke my life. ❜ ❨1212❩ ❛ I'm sorry to have deceived you so much, but that's how life is. ❜ ❨1213❩ ❛ Words without experience are meaningless. ❜ ❨1214❩ ❛ I loved you. I was a monster, but I loved you. ❜ ❨1215❩ ❛ Come just as you are. ❜ ❨1216❩ ❛ If a violin string could ache, i would be that string. ❜ ❨1217❩ ❛ Perhaps, somewhere, some day, at a less miserable time, we may see each other again. ❜ ❨1218❩ ❛ What's so dreadful about dying is that you are completely on your own. ❜ ❨1219❩ ❛ Don't touch me; I'll die if you touch me. ❜ ❨1220❩ ❛ You took advantage of my disadvantage. ❜ ❨1221❩ ❛ I walk in a maze I cannot get out of. ❜ ❨1222❩ ❛ Life is just one small piece of light between two eternal darknesses. ❜ ❨1223❩ ❛ Imagine me; I shall not exist if you do not imagine me. ❜ ❨1224❩ ❛ There is no harm in smiling. ❜ ❨1225❩ ❛ There is no point in staying here. There is no point in staying anywhere. ❜ ❨1226❩ ❛ There is nothing more atrociously cruel than an adored child. ❜ ❨1227❩ ❛ I am so tired of being cynical. ❜ ❨1228❩ ❛ Come to live with me, and die with me, and everything with me. ❜ ❨1229❩ ❛ This is the only immortality that you and I may share. ❜ ❨1230❩ ❛ I loved her more than anything I had ever seen or imagined on earth, or hoped for anywhere else. ❜ ❨1231❩ ❛ I was despicable and brutal, and turpid, and everything, mais je t’aimais, je t’aimais! ❜ ❨1232❩ ❛ Years of secret suffering has taught me superhuman self-control. ❜ ❨1233❩ ❛ Solitude is corrupting me. I need company and care. ❜ ❨1234❩ ❛ I've missed you terribly. ❜ ❨1235❩ ❛ I've been revoltingly unfaithful to you. ❜ ❨1236❩ ❛ It doesn't matter a bit, because you've stopped caring anyway. ❜ ❨1237❩ ❛ What makes you say I've stopped caring for you? ❜ ❨1238❩ ❛ Nowadays you have to be a scientist if you want to be a killer. ❜ ❨1239❩ ❛ The sun climbs high in the sky, then starts down. People come, then go. ❜ ❨1240❩ ❛ Tell me, have you ever thought of killing me? ❜ ❨1241❩ ❛ I can not believe you are the same human being. ❜ ❨1242❩ ❛ Just how urgent is it? ❜ ❨1243❩ ❛ It is time for you to be going. ❜ ❨1244❩ ❛ How is it you know something like that? ❜ ❨1245❩ ❛ I don’t mind. Your mess is my mess. ❜ ❨1246❩ ❛ Everybody has one thing they do not want to lose. ❜ ❨1247❩ ❛ I’ll be late tonight, so don’t wait up for me. ❜ ❨1248❩ ❛ Nothing I’ve tried to do by myself has ever come off. ❜ ❨1249❩ ❛ I am not catching you in the middle of anything important, am I? ❜ ❨1250❩ ❛ Some things are forgotten, some things disappear, some things die. ❜ ❨1251❩ ❛ My biggest fault is that the faults I was born with grow bigger each year. ❜ ❨1252❩ ❛ To get irritated is to lose our way in life. ❜ ❨1253❩ ❛ A friend to kill time is a friend sublime. ❜ ❨1254❩ ❛ I don't really know if it's the right thing to do. ❜ ❨1255❩ ❛ Faster cars and more cats run over? Who needs it? ❜ ❨1256❩ ❛ Most of everything you think you know about me is nothing more than memories. ❜ ❨1257❩ ❛ Your fate is and will always be the fate of a dreamer. ❜ ❨1258❩ ❛ You’re loads better than you think you are. ❜ ❨1259❩ ❛ You’re only half-living, the other half is still untapped somewhere. ❜ ❨1260❩ ❛ The song is over. But the melody lingers on. ❜ ❨1261❩ ❛ You are extraordinary. ❜ ❨1262❩ ❛ We tend to fool ourselves into thinking that time is our size, but it really goes on and on. ❜ ❨1263❩ ❛ It could be five years or ten years or one month. It's all the same. ❜ ❨1264❩ ❛ I’m forever realising things too late. ❜ ❨1265❩ ❛ I’m not complaining when I say my life is boring. ❜ ❨1266❩ ❛ Weakness is something that rots in the body. ❜ ❨1267❩ ❛ Coming from your mouth, it has the ring of truth, but I doubt anyone would believe me if I told them. ❜ ❨1268❩ ❛ You can't expect something unreal to last anyway, can you? ❜ ❨1269❩ ❛ A wise man does not step betwixt the beast and his meat. ❜ ❨1270❩ ❛ So, kill me. Tell the others I attacked you so you killed me. ❜ ❨1271❩ ❛ Should never have come here. ❜ ❨1272❩ ❛ Hard to guess my tastes. ❜ ❨1273❩ ❛ Can’t it wait until the morning? ❜ ❨1274❩ ❛ You’ll find temper tantrums won’t help you here. ❜ ❨1275❩ ❛ It must have taken courage to return. ❜ ❨1276❩ ❛ It all sounds grimly dystopian. ❜ ❨1277❩ ❛ I am not afraid of you! ❜ ❨1278❩ ❛ All this could be avoided! ❜ ❨1279❩ ❛ You consider me a murderer? ❜ ❨1280❩ ❛ Gross way to die. ❜ ❨1281❩ ❛ What sparks wars? The will to power, the backbone of human nature. ❜ ❨1282❩ ❛ My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops? ❜ ❨1283❩ ❛ Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others. ❜ ❨1284❩ ❛ I believe there is another world waiting for us. A better world. And I'll be waiting for you there. ❜ ❨1285❩ ❛ You are allowed to feel messed up and inside out. It doesn't mean you're defective - it just means you're human. ❜ ❨1286❩ ❛ Power, time, gravity, love. The forces that really kick ass are all invisible. ❜ ❨1287❩ ❛ Unlimited power in the hands of limited people always leads to cruelty. ❜ ❨1288❩ ❛ Truth is singular. Its 'versions' are mistruths. ❜ ❨1289❩ ❛ Dreams are all I have ever truly owned. ❜ ❨1290❩ ❛ Your version of the truth is the only thing that matters. ❜ ❨1291❩ ❛ I believe death is only a door. One closes, and another opens. ❜ ❨1292❩ ❛ By each crime and every kindness, we birth our future. ❜ ❨1293❩ ❛ The healthy can't understand the emptied, the broken. ❜ ❨1294❩ ❛ Lying's wrong, but when the world spins backwards, a small wrong may be a big right. ❜ ❨1295❩ ❛ The weak are meat the strong do eat. ❜ ❨1296❩ ❛ Do whatever you can't not do. ❜ ❨1297❩ ❛ What precipitates outcomes? Vicious acts & virtuous acts. ❜ ❨1298❩ ❛ I remain thankful to God for all his mercies. ❜ ❨1299❩ ❛ You can maintain power over people, as long as you give them something. Rob a man of everything, and that man will no longer be in your power. ❜ ❨1300❩ ❛ Power. The ability to determine another man's luck. ❜ ❨1301❩ ❛ Pain is strong, aye - but friends' eyes, more strong. ❜ ❨1302❩ ❛ Perhaps those deprived of beauty perceive it most instinctively. ❜ ❨1303❩ ❛ Why ask a question whose answer would demand ten more questions? ❜ ❨1304❩ ❛ You can’t lie to your soul. ❜ ❨1305❩ ❛ Why would I want to do a thing like that? ❜ ❨1306❩ ❛ We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. ❜ ❨1307❩ ❛ Better to make life as complete and enjoyable an experience as possible, in case death is shite, which I suspect it will be. ❜ ❨1308❩ ❛ I’m not running away, I’m moving on. ❜ ❨1309❩ ❛ The reasons? There are no reasons. ❜ ❨1310❩ ❛ Some people are easier to love when you don’t have to be around them. ❜ ❨1311❩ ❛ Love does not exist. ❜ ❨1312❩ ❛ Fuck that ‘regrets’ bullshit. ❜ ❨1313❩ ❛ How does it make you feel? ❜ ❨1314❩ ❛ It’s horrible how we always die alone, but no worse than living alone. ❜ ❨1315❩ ❛ Choose us. Choose life. ❜ ❨1316❩ ❛ You fucking knew that fucking cunt would fuck some cunt. ❜ ❨1317❩ ❛ I’m more of a warrior than you’ll ever be. ❜ ❨1318❩ ❛ What does that make us? The lowest of the low, the scum of the earth. ❜ ❨1319❩ ❛ You don’t have to run away.  ❜ ❨1320❩ ❛ I tried to stop because it was only causing pain. I couldn’t. ❜ ❨1321❩ ❛ I’m not going to get crushed. ❜ ❨1322❩ ❛ I love doubt in a woman. It’s nearly as sexy as determination. ❜ ❨1323❩ ❛ Take your best orgasm, multiply the feeling by twenty. ❜ ❨1324❩ ❛ You’re a mess. ❜ ❨1325❩ ❛ I know that it’s never left you alone. ❜ ❨1326❩ ❛ Are you asking me or telling me? ❜ ❨1327❩ ❛ You just get used to all the shit. ❜ ❨1328❩ ❛ You can’t afford a conscience in this life. ❜ ❨1329❩ ❛ None of us are saints and scapegoats are always handy. ❜ ❨1330❩ ❛ Doing things doesn’t hurt you; you get hurt by avoiding them. ❜ ❨1331❩ ❛ What was that? ❜ ❨1332❩ ❛ Protect me from those who wish to help us. ❜ ❨1333❩ ❛ You can’t love yourself if you want to hurt things like that. ❜ ❨1334❩ ❛ What happens when people open their hearts? ❜ ❨1335❩ ❛ Nobody likes being alone that much. ❜ ❨1336❩ ❛ I don’t go out of my way to make friends, that’s all. It just leads to disappointment.” ❨1337❩ ❛ Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Only assholes do that. ❜ ❨1338❩ ❛ You need to grab whatever chance you have of happiness where you find it, and not worry about other people too much. ❜ ❨1339❩ ❛ I want you always to remember me. ❜ ❨1340❩ ❛ Despite your best efforts, people are going to be hurt when it’s time for them to be hurt. ❜ ❨1341❩ ❛ What stays in your heart will stay; keep them, and what vanishes will vanish. ❜ ❨1342❩ ❛ All I want in this world is you. ❜ ❨1343❩ ❛ I want the two of us to begin everything from the beginning. ❜ ❨1344❩ ❛ No truth can cure the sorrow we feel from losing a loved one. ❜ ❨1345❩ ❛ What a terrible thing it is to wound someone you really care for and to do it so unconsciously. ❜ ❨1346❩ ❛ If you’re in pitch blackness, all you can do is sit tight until your eyes get used to the dark. ❜ ❨1347❩ ❛ I’ve had enough hurt already in my life. More than enough. Now I want to be happy. ❜ ❨1348❩ ❛ People leave strange little memories of themselves behind when they die. ❜ ❨1349❩ ❛ Stop eating yourself up alive. Things will go where they’re supposed to go if you just let them take their natural course. ❜ ❨1350❩ ❛ When your feelings build up and harden and die inside, then you’re in big trouble. ❜ ❨1351❩ ❛ When you fall in love, the natural thing to do is give yourself to it. ❜ ❨1352❩ ❛ If I have left a wound inside you, it is not just your wound but mine as well. ❜ ❨1353❩ ❛ Hey, what is it with you? Why are you so spaced out? You still haven’t answered me. ❜ ❨1354❩ ❛ People are strange when you’re a stranger. ❜ ❨1355❩ ❛ The dead will always be dead, but we have to go on living. ❜ ❨1356❩ ❛ You don’t get it, do you? ❜ ❨1357❩ ❛ I am a flawed human being - a far more flawed human being than you ❨1358❩ realise. ❜ ❨1359❩ ❛ At least let me know whether or not I hurt you. ❜ ❨1360❩ ❛ All of us are imperfect human beings living in an imperfect world. ❜ ❨1361❩ ❛ I’ve never once thought about how I was going to die. ❜ ❨1362❩ ❛ So I’m not crazy after all! ❜ ❨1363❩ ❛ I miss you terribly sometimes, but in general I go on living with all the energy I can muster. ❜ ❨1364❩ ❛ Will you wait for me forever? ❜ ❨1365❩ ❛ I don’t want our relationship to end like this. ❜ ❨1366❩ ❛ When am I going to be able to talk to you? I want you to tell me that much, at least. ❜ ❨1367❩ ❛ It hurts not being able to see you. ❜ ❨1368❩ ❛ I’m not totally mad at you. I’m just sad. ❜ ❨1369❩ ❛ The world is an inherently unfair place. ❜ ❨1370❩ ❛ Life frightens me sometimes. I don’t happen to take that as the premise for everything else though. ❜ ❨1371❩ ❛ I’m a real bargain, don’t you think? If you don’t take me, I’ll end up going somewhere else. ❜ ❨1372❩ ❛ We’re all kind of weird and twisted and drowning. ❜ ❨1373❩ ❛ Don’t you think it would be wonderful to get rid of everything and everybody and just go some place where you don’t know a soul? ❜ ❨1374❩ ❛ You’re not telling me anything I don’t know already. ❜ ❨1375❩ ❛ He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past. ❜ ❨1376❩ ❛ If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself. ❜ ❨1377❩ ❛ We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness. ❜ ❨1378❩ ❛ Until they become conscious they will never rebel. ❜ ❨1379❩ ❛ Power is not a means; it is an end. ❜ ❨1380❩ ❛ They are not interested in the good of others; they are interested solely in power, pure power. ❜ ❨1381❩ ❛ Now you begin to understand me. ❜ ❨1382❩ ❛ In the face of pain there are no heroes. ❜ ❨1383❩ ❛ Big Brother is watching you. ❜ ❨1384❩ ❛ Power is tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing. ❜ ❨1385❩ ❛ It’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words. ❜ ❨1386❩ ❛ The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better. ❜ ❨1387❩ ❛ Your mind appeals to me. It resembles my own mind. ❜ ❨1388❩ ❛ Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else. ❜ ❨1389❩ ❛ We do not merely destroy our enemies; we change them. ❜ ❨1390❩ ❛ How can I help it? How can I help but see what is in front of my eyes? ❜ ❨1391❩ ❛ You must try harder. ❜ ❨1392❩ ❛ Confession is not betrayal. ❜ ❨1393❩ ❛ What you say or do doesn’t matter; only feelings matter. ❜ ❨1394❩ ❛ If they could make me stop loving you —- that would be the real betrayal. ❜ ❨1395❩ ❛ Of pain you can wish only one thing: that it should stop. ❜ ❨1396❩ ❛ To die hating them, that will be freedom. ❜ ❨1397❩ ❛ No one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. ❜ ❨1398❩ ❛ What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself? ❜ ❨1399❩ ❛ To keep them in control is not difficult. ❜ ❨1400❩ ❛ So long as they are not permitted to have standards of comparison, they never even become aware that they are oppressed. ❜ ❨1401❩ ❛ The consequences of every act are included in the act itself. ❜ ❨1402❩ ❛ The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. ❜ ❨1403❩ ❛ Stupidity is as necessary as intelligence, and as difficult to attain. ❜ ❨1404❩ ❛ I hate purity, I hate goodness! I don’t want virtue to exist anywhere. I want everyone to be corrupt to the bones. ❜ ❨1405❩ ❛ The past is dead, the future is unimaginable. ❜ ❨1406❩ ❛ You know the answer already. Everyone knows it. ❜ ❨1407❩ ❛ You don’t give a damn what they suffer. All you care is yourself. ❜ ❨1408❩ ❛ It is not easy to become sane. ❜ ❨1409❩ ❛ No emotion is pure anymore, because everything is mixed up with fear and hatred. ❜ ❨1410❩ ❛ They say that time heals all things —- they say you can always forget. ❜ ❨1411❩ ❛ The object of waging a war is always to be in a better position in which to wage another war. ❜ ❨1412❩ ❛ I sold you and you sold me. ❜ ❨1413❩ ❛ You do not exist. ❜ ❨1414❩ ❛ How does one man assert his power over another? By making him suffer. ❜ ❨1415❩ ❛ Obedience is not enough. Unless he is suffering, how can you be sure that he is obeying your will and not his own? ❜ ❨1416❩ ❛ Everything else we shall destroy – everything. ❜ ❨1417❩ ❛ Two and two makes five. ❜ ❨1418❩ ❛ Facts, at any rate, can not be kept hidden. ❜ ❨1419❩ ❛ The past is whatever the records and the memories agree upon. ❜ ❨1420❩ ❛ So long as human beings stay human, death and life are the same thing. ❜ ❨1421❩ ❛ If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable—what then? ❜ ❨1422❩ ❛ The lie became the truth. ❜ ❨1423❩ ❛ It is like swimming against a current that sweeps you backwards however hard you struggle. ❜ ❨1424❩ ❛ Turn round and go with the current instead of opposing it. ❜ ❨1425❩ ❛ It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything. ❜ ❨1426❩ ❛ I don’t want to die without any scars. ❜ ❨1427❩ ❛ This is your life and it’s ending one moment at a time. ❜ ❨1428❩ ❛ You know how they say you only hurt the ones you love? Well, it works both ways. ❜ ❨1429❩ ❛ You are not your job, you’re not how much money you have in the bank. You are not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet. ❜ ❨1430❩ ❛ You are not special. ❜ ❨1431❩ ❛ You’re not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You’re the same decaying organic matter as everything else. ❜ ❨1432❩ ❛ The things you used to own, now they own you. ❜ ❨1433❩ ❛ Today is the sort of day where the sun only comes up to humiliate you. ❜ ❨1434❩ ❛ Maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves. ❜ ❨1435❩ ❛ Only after disaster can we be resurrected. ❜ ❨1436❩ ❛ Everything is evolving, everything is falling apart. ❜ ❨1437❩ ❛ We’ve all been raised believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. ❜ ❨1438❩ ❛ Don’t you have other things to do? ❜ ❨1439❩ ❛ Prove you’re alive. If you don’t claim your humanity you will become a statistic. ❜ ❨1440❩ ❛ You have been warned. ❜ ❨1441❩ ❛ If you don’t know what you want, you end up with a lot you don’t. ❜ ❨1442❩ ❛ It’s not love or anything, but I think I like you, too. ❜ ❨1443❩ ❛ If I could wake up in a different place, at a different time, could I wake up as a different person? ❜ ❨1444❩ ❛ Why did I cause so much pain? ❜ ❨1445❩ ❛ The lower you fall, the higher you’ll fly. ❜ ❨1446❩ ❛ Maybe self-improvement isn’t the answer, maybe self-destruction is the answer. ❜ ❨1447❩ ❛ May I never be complete. May I never be content. May I never be perfect. ❜ ❨1448❩ ❛ Everyone smiles with that invisible gun to their head. ❜ ❨1449❩ ❛ We are not special. We are not crap or trash, either. We just are. We just are, and what happens just happens. ❜ ❨1450❩ ❛ The girl is infectious human waste. ❜ ❨1451❩ ❛ I want to destroy everything beautiful I’ll never have. ❜ ❨1452❩ ❛ On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero. ❜ ❨1453❩ ❛ If you could be either God’s worst enemy or nothing, which would you choose? ❜ ❨1454❩ ❛ It is like you’re never really awake; but you’re never really asleep. ❜ ❨1455❩ ❛ Worker bees can leave. Even drones can fly away. The Queen is their slave. ❜ ❨1456❩ ❛ A moment is the most you could ever expect from perfection. ❜ ❨1457❩ ❛ The people you’re trying to step on, we’re everyone you depend on. ❜ ❨1458❩ ❛ You have to give up! ❜ ❨1459❩ ❛ Reject the basic assumptions of civilisation, especially the importance of material possessions. ❜ ❨1460❩ ❛ Without pain, without sacrifice we would have nothing. ❜ ❨1461❩ ❛ You have to realise that someday you will die, Until you know that, you are useless. ❜ ❨1462❩ ❛ A tiger can smile. A snake will say it loves you. ❜ ❨1463❩ ❛ Lies make us evil. ❜ ❨1464❩ ❛ If you died right now, how would you feel about your life? ❜ ❨1465❩ ❛ You always kill the one you love. ❜ ❨1466❩ ❛ Maybe we should always assume the worst. ❜ ❨1467❩ ❛ Put a gun to my head and paint the wall with my brains. ❜ ❨1468❩ ❛ Which is worse? Hell or nothing? ❜ ❨1469❩ ❛ A minute of perfection is worth the effort. ❜ ❨1470❩ ❛ You’re going to die, tonight. You might die in one second or in one hour, you decide. ❜ ❨1471❩ ❛ Lie to me. Tell me the first thing off the top of your head. Make something up. ❜ ❨1472❩ ❛ I don’t give a shit. I have a gun. ❜ ❨1473❩ ❛ I know who you are. I know where you live. ❜ ❨1474❩ ❛ Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of your life. ❜ ❨1475❩ ❛ My philosophy of life is that I can die at any moment. And the tragedy of my life is that I do not. ❜ ❨1476❩ ❛ Everything is so far away, a copy of a copy of a copy. You can’t touch anything and nothing can touch you. ❜ ❨1477❩ ❛ There are a lot of things we don’t want to know about the people we love. ❜ ❨1478❩ ❛ We just had a near-life experience. ❜ ❨1479❩ ❛ If people think you are dying, they give you their full attention. They listen instead of just waiting for their turn to speak. ❜ ❨1480❩ ❛ I am nothing, and not even that. ❜ ❨1481❩ ❛ This isn’t really death. —- We’ll be legends. We won’t grow old. ❜ ❨1482❩ ❛ Stop trying to control everything and just let go. Let go. ❜ ❨1483❩ ❛ The amazing miracle of death, when one second you’re walking and talking, and the next second you’re an object. ❜ ❨1484❩ ❛ Only if we’re caught and punished can we be saved. ❜ ❨1485❩ ❛ I never thought about how important the sky was until I didn't have one. ❜ ❨1486❩ ❛ Dreams are like that: they go in and out of memories and scenes, but they're never real. They're never real, and I hate them because they aren't. ❜ ❨1487❩ ❛ Power isn’t control at all — power is strength, and giving that strength to others. ❜ ❨1488❩ ❛ A leader isn’t someone who forces others to make him stronger. ❜ ❨1489❩ ❛ A leader is someone willing to give his strength to others that they may have the strength to stand on their own. ❜ ❨1490❩ ❛ In the end, we are alone. ❜ ❨1491❩ ❛ It is like a piece of my soul is lost, empty. ❜ ❨1492❩ ❛ If my life on Earth must end, let it end with a promise. Let it end with hope. ❜ ❨1493❩ ❛ Sorry? Sorry isn't enough. ❜ ❨1494❩ ❛ Every single thing I ever loved is beyond my reach now. Everything I ever wanted. Everything I ever was. ❜ ❨1495❩ ❛ Will you stay with me? ❜ ❨1496❩ ❛ A leader doesn't make pawns - he makes people. ❜ ❨1497❩ ❛ Do you hear that? The pulse of life from your heart, the slow in-and-out from your lungs? Even when you are silent, even when you block out all noise, your body is still a cacophony of life. Mine is not. ❜ ❨1498❩ ❛ It is the silence that drives me mad. The silence that drives the nightmares to me. ❜ ❨1499❩ ❛ There is nothing between us but rain. There is nothing between us at all. ❜ ❨1500❩ ❛ I like a little chaos. ❜

[celestialgaea]

write a fic(nsfw or sfw its up to you) with Ezio and a teenage girl who fell in love with him(i’d want it nsfw if you’re fine with it)

I'd love to do that! It has been quite some time since I wrote a request, so i’m so excited! Enjoy :)

Pairings: Brotherhood!Ezio Auditore x Reader

Warnings: Mature content, smut, age gap

Disclaimer: Ezio is at the age of 45 at the beginning of the Brotherhood serie as the reader will be the age of 19, so if you are uncomfortable with age gaps then i’d advice you to scroll further. It is not wrong to have feelings for an older man, however, it is wrong if an older person would use it to manipulate you and hurt you intentionally. This was written for the mere entertainment of the AC fandom!

A/N: I am so sorry for letting the requester wait for weeks! I hate to keep people waiting, I swear. But I have been able to finish this piece and I'm so happy! Let it enjoy you, loves

Along the horizon a blemish of darkness formed and began to spread itself along the, what seemed, infinite edges of the earth. The orange sky set her intentions to flee and slowly vanished, causing the natural state of the heaven’s to occur right in front of your eyes. It felt lonely yet so calming.

‘You seem so dazed by the upcoming nightsky, mia signora.’ The grumbling undertone of Ezio’s voice was vibrating inside of his chest and could be felt against your back. It was as though the vibration was spreading from his breast towards your lower abdomen as a warm and tingling flow. 'It's just beautiful.' You said.

'Just beautiful?' You didn't need to face him to know that he'd raised an eyebrow saying that. It was a very typical gesture Ezio always made, even unknowingly, and that small signal was just enough for him to add a subtle layer of promiscuity to himself. Ezio simply wouldn't be 'Ezio' without a touch of promiscuity. That was the secret to his unexplainable aura that made you taste life whenever you were in his prescence and yet all the flavour would get drained from your tongue if he'd leave, as if the gate's of heaven closed abruptly in front of your eyes as his back was turned towards you. He carried temptation and desire with him, to wherever he goes, and even makes the strictly chaste women beg him for a brush against their thigh, an intense look from his smouldering eyes, a hot and lingering breath against their open mouth.

'Yes, just beautiful, Ezio.'

'And what makes it beautiful, bambini?'

'The calm and enigmatic scenery. It's dark and unknown, and yet it's the most intruiging thing i've ever observed. Reminds a bit of you, just a little bit.' Small spots of flaming skin freckled the whole width of your face and there would be no point in turning the other cheek as Ezio's overtowering head already noticed your reddish feature underneath his gaze. He emitted a breathless laugh, a grumbling grin. There was a tendency that whispered in Ezio's ear. This tendency told him to make a teasing remark about your blushing skin. It would've subconciously stretch out his ego, add a bit of empowerment to his pride knowing that even at the ripe age of 45 he'd still be able to make the early flourished flower allow her sweet nectar to be tasted by him, just a small taste of enlightening in return for enlightment.

'And, again, what makes me a bit like that?' Ezio asked, repeating to raise one eyebrow. You stayed quiet, not knowing what to say, and just kept listening to the constant rips and breaks of small twigs and dried up leaves getting crushed underneath the horse's hooves. 'Am I really that closed, huh? I thought the whole of Italia knew about my reputation from waltzing to one flower to the other.' He released a breathless laugh again. 'Yes, they do. But that is because it's the only part of you they see,' You paused to subtly sniff up the drippling liquid that ran down your left nostril just in time before it reached the open door to your philtrum. 'Truly, you are an open book, but written in a cryptic language.' It was troublesome to hide the breath-heaving excitement that hugged your chest tightly as Ezio's body rubbed itself against yours with every gallop and bumpy cantering the horse made. Wether it be his upper thighs softly caressing the backside of your thighs or the warmth of his sweaty robes clinging itself onto your back, it was enough for your mind to wander towards more bare skin.

'Bambini, there are more parts of me that they have seen. And besides, you are still too young to be putting your nose inside of my younger years.' You grinned softly. 'I don't find you that old.' 'Oh?' 'How old are you? 40?' You asked. 'I wish,' Ezio said, almost daydreaming. 'But alas, I am forty-five.' 'forty-five sounds...' 'Old? Don't be shy, mia signora, I won't bite.' The soft rumbly undertone of his voice was melodic. His talk was never mundane.

'Forty-five sounds ripe.' If you were able , or rather, if you dared to face Ezio you knew that he would be taken aback. You continued. 'A perfect age where experience, wisdom and vigor is combined. Well, it depends on the individual, but you have the right combination; You have a lot of vigor,' His arms slightly embraced you tighter. 'You have experience,' He tugged onto the reigns, expertly, causing the fleshy stallion to prance, exposing the strenght and beautiful anatomy of the animal. 'And wisdom.' And he stood halt in front of his mansion. The mansion where he inhabited the role of mentor, brother, son and lover.

'I feel honored, truly. You may be young, (Y/N), but your mind is beyond your years. I have a friend whom you may like to talk to. Nicollo Machiavelli. Do you know him?' You shook your head. 'I have never heard of messere Machiavelli.' 'Understandable,' Ezio handed the reigns over to the stable boy, a meager young man whose hands had more capacity than his head.

The night might have brought a serenity with her for those whom were able to seek it, but for you there was none to find. The only presence that kept you company, sadly enough, was a bird who kept on singing its weeping lullaby. You just wanted Ezio to be here in this guest room, only him and you. It musn't be moans and brushes and kisses and touches, that enigmatic warmth and intimidation that was present around him was more than enough. How you would've regretted it to wake up the next morning, if you had found the will to sleep, only for this place to be without any trace of Ezio's presence.

An onimous silence brooded. Ezio couldn't be asleep, not yet. And you knew that well enough. You had silent hopes on Ezio coming through your door when you took a porcelain oil lamp holder in your hands and hesitatingly threw it onto the floor. The split second of the oil lamp holder being afflicted by deepend cuts that spread itself rapidly all over the object until it shattered into a mess of piercing shrieks made you shiver as the next second was overflowed by the complete silence of the night. It took less than a minute when you heard heavy stomping coming nearer and nearer. The door opened and exposed Ezio, whose chest was heaving and sighs were heavy, in only his loosened chemise and -Oh, how daring- open breeches. He locked eyes with you before turning his gaze towards the sharp mess on the floor.

'(Y/N), oh dolce madre di Gesù. What did you do now, kid. You could've hurt yourself.' Kid. His vague thinking had spat out the truth of how he truly perceived you. A child. A naïve and stupid child.

'I'm sorry, I just wanted to write but I accidently pushed the lamp holder away with my arm.' You bit the inside of your cheek as you tried to hide the dispair that one word brought you.

Kid

'Well, don't let me interrupt your writing, then. And don't you make me worry like that again, understood? My old man's heart can't take that.' He grinned at his own words before silence took a hold again; for him it was a sign to walk away and so he did. He walked out, but you (Oh, you!) couldn't help but stay nailed to the ground, your eyes following the trails of wrinkles on the back of his chemise.

'Besides,' You said hesitantly, breaking the silence and breaking his steps. Ezio was not far from the door before heading back to you, awaiting your words at your door frame. He stood there and it was real. This all was real. You called him and now you were obliged to continue.

'I am not a kid. I am nineteen. I am an adult.' Ezio smiled -unknown if it was to laugh at you or to have pity on you-. soft rimples adorned the sides of his eyes. You had no idea of what to expect from him. And weird enough, Ezio came closer. 'I know. But you're still so naïve. Do not feel embaressed for being called a kid. Actually, forgive me, I should not have called you such. You are much more mature than a kid,' You didn't know how to respond, so you just nodded your head in acknowledgement, your lips curling into a faint smile.

'But do I look like a young girl? And I mean, like, a kid girl.' Ezio squinted his eyes faintly and his face was slightly angled to the side, mildly questioning you.

'In what context?'

'Physical appearances.' He couldn't help but laugh quietly, shaking his head. '(Y/N), Ragazza, Yes you look like a young girl, but not a kid,' Ezio paused in his words. And you couldn't help but stray your eyes away from his dilated pupils to the curvy pathway of thick eyelashes that hung like curtains underneath his bottom eyelids. 'Your skin is youthful and supple, your eyes look dull but they are filled with life. Why wouldn't you want these features while you still have them?' For some reason you couldn't fixate yourself on his words. At that moment you felt intoxicated by the subject and wanted to take it a step further. You yearned to fall into his arms for no reason but to feel him. If it was possible, you would've clung your body onto his. You weren't even able to process his words, your mind was to busy wandering towards sensing Ezio to the fullest.

'No. No, no, no,' You shook your head with every word, saying them vaguely and you felt like whining for comprehension. 'Not my skin nor my eyes nor my hair nor my ears. I meant my body. Does my body look mature?' Ezio's eyes seemed to hesitate, trembling, as if he feared to break an oath of chastity. He bit onto the soft tissue inside of his cheek, knowing that your gown was fairly see through; such was exposed by the protrusion of your soft nipples.

'You're wearing a loose nightgown so it's difficult for me to judge. Still I cannot judge from the formal dresses you wear, that would be perverse, (Y/N), you know that.' How willing you were to get an answer out of him. Just a comment on your hips or your soft breasts or the faint curvature from your elegant ankle. Nothing more. Allowing him to whisper it to your curves, letting the words embrace its soft skin.

You tugged onto the collar of your nightgown to push it down your shoulders. Ezio kept silent, unable to predict your actions, and yet, somehow, he was in awe. The cotton night dress slipped down from your body and the unexpected exposure of wind seared your skin. You noticed how he tried to quietly cover his breeches with his chemise. It brought you a sense of victory, knowing that his breath was unstable as he fought against his desire to hold you, to warm you, to love you. He nearly seemed frozen.

'(Y/N)...' Ezio pierced your eyes with an intensity of his. You took hold of his hand and unsurely cupped them around your breasts, insecure of his big hands not being delighted by the size -How silly it might've sounded to him-.

'Is my body mature? Please, Ezio, don't keep your thoughts to yourself.' You had to laugh while saying that, you didn't know wether it was to laugh away the scorching silence or your own slight embaressment of your impusliveness.

Ezio held the soft flesh underneath your breasts and tenderly touched them, sometimes his thumb caressed your nipples before replacing it with the soft touches of his incinerating breath and hunry lips. This feeling was new to you, new but welcoming. A heavy intoxication of his bodily warmth seared your skin, your veins, your blooming flower. Your womanhood was singing with passion, begging for him to make it reach her sweet melodious notes like the upper string of a lute. Ezio's lips traced across your collarbone and planting soft kisses with tenderness up to your neck. You instinctively opened your mouth for only a melodious heavy breath that whispered to Ezio for more.

'Your body is so mature, from your beautiful breast,' His handpalm enveloped your private part, slightly squeezing it before pressing two fingers against your humid crease and clit. 'To the carnal lust that hides inside of your fullgrown womanhood.' He whispered against the beginning of your cheekbone. With tender kisses he drew from your cheek to your lips, reddened and plumped by arousal. He sucked onto your bottom lip before taking all of you in. The meatiness from the kiss moved waves of heavily emotions inside of you. Before you'd know it you had your tongue caressing his. Ezio smothered a groan in your mouth. He tasted of wine, tons of glasses to drown the loneliness and create the illusion of a company that was just the two-sidedness of his tipsy subconciousness. His shirt was pulled over his head with an impatient tremble and you know how he slowly came to implode by all of the sensory goodness.

He carried you onto the bed. Ezio's body was fit for his age; broad, muscled an yet soft, but not that soft. His hands wandered towards the rim of his breeches to pull them of, but he came to a halt, leaking the trimmed hairs that led to his manhood. A realistion had hit him.

'Bella,' He spoke. 'You're a virgin, true? Pardon me if I'm incorrect.' You nibbled on your lip. 'Yes.' He hummed. The hum didn't seem one of desire nor out of regret. 'I don't want to put myself on display immediately because that would make you uncomfortable as it is your first time.' A warm sensation formed in your heart. He cared. He truly cared. It made you trust him even more and you were sure he wouldn't hurt you, not at all. His mouth opened, wanting to speak further.

'When was the last time you had your menstrual cycle?' He asked. You let out a breath as you thought about it. 'More than two weeks ago, why?' Oh, how limited your sexual knowledge was and how you were ashamed of it. 'To make sure you won't carry my child.'

Ezio came onto the bed to hover you. 'I'll make sure you never want to share the bed with no other man except for me.' He whispered. Ezio flowered blooming kisses onto your neck as his hand began playing with a single breast, giving love and affection to it. You expected the soft trails of his fingers to set its odyssey towards your womanhood, but he stopped, resting the palm of his hand onto your lower stomach. 'Calm down, bella, you are way to tense.' You didn't even realise how the muscles in your neck had moved against his mouth the lower his hand went or how your eyes counted every indivual speck of grayed out plasterwork that was spreaded across the ceiling as a way to escape the anxiety of the moment.

'I'm sorry,' You said with a breathless grin, trying to laugh away the strain that was poured upon your shoulders.

Ezio's fingers slowly slid down your stomach towards your womanhood as he murmered against you neck how it was okay to feel frightened by the idea of a man seeing her so bare and vulnerable. The first touch against your clitoris, so careful and feathery, had the small and swollen pearl craving for more of the sensational ecstacy. He began playing with it; rubbing, turning, licking and sucking. The closeness and scorching warmth of his mouth against your private part was as loving as it was undressing you from your shame. How you were so riled up that even the most repulsive persons could be seen as appealing if they'd stood in front of you as Ezio was making the tension inside of your folds build up. The warmth of his humid tongue against such an intimiate place felt unexplainable good, so good even, both to you as to him, that glistening streaks of Ezio's salive rolled down your fold onto the white bedsheets.

You gripped Ezio's hair. Your pelvis was raised and back was arched as you felt the sweetness of the upper snare of a lute being played on your womanhood. Your mouth opened and a long lasting moan emitted from deep down your throat as the shuddering sensation overwhelmed you.

Ezio's lips curled into a smirk. 'We are not done yet, ragazza,' He said mischievously. 'But firstly I will need to break your hymen, so it'll be easier for me to enter you.' And there was that small speck of anxiousness again, slowly growing. The flushed colour withdrew itself from your face. 'How will you do that?' You asked with a hint of concern in your voice. Ezio's body hovered yours again and he began sucking your neck with the moist of his mouth. '(Y/N),' he whispered against your skin. '(Y/N),' He whispered again. And again. And again. Ezio massaged your jaw with his hands and locked eyes with you. 'I will enter you with two of my fingers so your vagina will get used to penetration, then i'll slowly go in deeper until it will be a tad easier to enter you.' 'Will it hurt?' You asked, unsurely. 'It can feel a little bit uncomfortable, but not painful.' You gave an understanding nod. 'Do you feel ready, (Y/N)?' And You nodded again.

Ezio's torso embraced the side of your body as his lips found their way to the sweet spot at the end of your jaw and let it be overwhelmed by the humid heat of his mouth. You were pushed back on the crooked duvet with the utmost tenderness of his hand and you could feel how alive his erection was as it slightly sunk into the flesh of your thigh. Ticklish strokes were made by his fingers whom were slowly removed from the rounds of your breast to set its journey to bring itself in between your thighs. He opened them, slowly, and as soon as your womanhood was fully unveiled in front for his eyes -again- his warm hand squeezed your inner thigh before immediately cupping your bush.

Ezio's kisses kept growing onto your neck and breast as his other arm had been slithered underneath your back to embrace it, pushing your side closer against the heat of his body. Both his middle and index finger began to move across your slit, and he did that a few times, and then he twirled his fingers against your hot and naked flesh to cover them with your natural wetness. The sweetness of his kisses began to vanish as you were focusing more on the interaction of time and the distance of his fingers that slowly began to emerge into one puddle of subconscious fear and confusion -which you covered by an arbirtrary and unspontanious grin-. Ezio placed the tip of his fingers against your opening and slowly wiggled them not even half an inch inside of you. He looked at you. 'Are you hurt?' You shook your head, scared that an emitted word from your throat would ruin the state of false, but striking, serenity you were able to put yourself in. Ezio slowly pushed in deeper and wiggled his fingers slightly before taking them back to the beginning of your openening, but not out, to cover it with more lube that was the most present at your crease. And so he did that again and again until the feeling of pinched and uncomfortable skin had passed and his fingers had an open way towards the unknown depths of your body.

Ezio let his fingers return to the fresh air and kissed you passionatly on your lips. 'Good girl.' He whispered against them. And that was when it happened. Ezio stood up from the bed and began opening his breeches, the profits of plundered money slid down his toned legs and he pushed the trousers at his ankles of with his feet.

It was intimidating and...surreal. You had seen penisses before, but on statues which were a state of purity and modesty, but this. You were doubting if he was able to fit as the comparison of size between his fingers and his manhood was draconian. It stood erect and a few droplets of precum shone on top of his glans.

Ezio hovered you and his stubble tickled the skin around your mouth as he kissed you. His breath came in heavy and irregular parts through his nose and brushed your top lip as his hands had pressed you against his body. His erection was pressed against your body. Ezio gripped your inner thigh to place it over his back and you could see how his eyes were in a half open state of intoxication, his mouth -also- half open and forming a faint grimace. He took his penis in his hand and guided it towards your entrance and slowly put it inside of you, just a little bit. He used the same method as he did with his fingers until the uncomfortable pushes had vanished and he was able to enter you fully.

You felt filled, literally. At first, the slow thrusts were numb until your wetness had come much quicker and in a bigger amount which made the thrusts more rapid, rougher and painless. Ezio's mouth stood agape with soft grunts emitted from it.

And suddenly you felt it. A slow but emotionally overwhelming sensation of building up ecstacy was present the more he thrusted and the more the warmth and the nearness of his bare pelvis pushed against yours. You let yourself listen and observe the orders of your body and automatically widened your thighs for Ezio to thrust in deeper. He kept thrusting in, and with each thrust you gripped his thigh, underneath the fold of his buttocks, and tried to push him in deeper as the building up sensation became sweeter and sweeter and the private parts began to throb agressively. You felt that you were almost there and so did Ezio.

You arched your head back and the sweet sensation of Ezio's scorching body against yours, his lenght filling you and his face burried in your neck overwhelm you. You thought your womanhood was about to burst as so much power and energy came from it and you kept squeezing your eyes until Ezio's grunts vanished in your neck with the warm seed that had been spilled inside of you.

All of this was intense. Unbelievable even. You were in bed with an infamous murderer, the blood of tens and hundreds of people sticking in between his fingers and dried onto his armour, and yet he was naked and vulnerable and tired in your embrace. A man in his forties skin on skin with a sensitive youth. Both committed and so alive. You wondered if more days like this were going to come or if that would be an illusion for the pleasure of your mind and that this was just the only time Ezio was able to give in to your sensuality. But for the moment you didn't care. You were both naked, satisfied and intoxicated.

[stfucal]

In 2022, I began the year at about 198 pounds. As of January 1, 2023, I was 154.4 pounds. I did lose those 40 pounds in 100 days, as I joined a 100 day challenge with my mother and her friends. My mother convinced me by telling me it would not encourage ED behavior, yet I won $1200 by refusing to eat. as of yesterday, I got below 150 pounds, and I looked back on my last year, and noticed my facial shape change. None of my rings fit me anymore. I am currently wearing a shirt that used to be tight on me, but is now a pajama shirt due to how large is on me. I wonder why I am at about 150 pounds, yet I feel smaller than I was at 120 pounds. I remember being young and getting addicted to losing weight, as we all did, and thinking that 127 was too large. What I don’t remember, is what I actually looked like. I have no photos of my body or anything other than my collar bones or hands, or just a simple selfie of my face at that age, and I wonder if I looked emaciated. I don’t want to have looked emaciated, but I wonder if one day I will look back on this time in my life and think I was the same as always. I was never officially diagnosed with body dysmorphia, but I don’t believe I have to be in order to understand that I have no idea what I look like. It is the one thing I will allow myself to be self diagnosed with, because I genuinely don’t know the difference between what I looked like at 120 pounds vs. 198 pounds. All I know is that I’ve begun to get that familiar rush of endorphins when I forget to eat. I’ve had multiple father figures in my life tell me that they’ve noticed how small I’m getting, and I think often about what my best friend looks like. I worry about her, and I think about what it felt like to hug her last, and how I was worried that I would hug her so tightly that she would disappear. How is it not OK for her, but it’s encouraged in my own mind for myself? I do not want to become the monster I was when I was counting calories and counting food and counting steps. however, there’s something so addictive about trying to one-up yourself continuously. It’s making the same drive every day and trying to beat your time by one minute. Maybe today I will get there at 12:42 as opposed to 12:45. Going 75 down a 60 mph road is fine, as long as I win. I just have to win.

I wish I could formulate these into scenes and create art with what I am speaking right now. Instead, I am just getting drunk off of three beers because I haven’t eaten anything except for a coffee, a piece of a cookie, and a couple of potato chips. See what I mean? Even when I am not doing it on purpose, I count exactly every single thing that I eat. Will I ever get better? I don’t want to worry about what I’m putting into my body every single second of every single day, if I’m going to die anyway. all I think about is my mortality and my age, and the fact that every person I love will die, and a lot sooner than I think it will happen. Yet, somehow, I focus on my physical form, and use a vape because I need something in my mouth. I perpetuate the idea that vaping is OK, while the ringing in my ears daily is really the bad thing that probably will kill me. how can someone be a hypochondriac while also doing what feels good in the moment? It’s as if I hear young me telling me that nothing matters, and that I’m going to die anyway, so I might as well do the things I enjoy while I can, but also having adult me understand that I am doing a job that drains me, because I’ve never been offered something better. And what if I get nothing better? What if my art isn’t good, and I am just like every single other white girl, very basic and talking about my daddy issues that don’t matter. What if I quit the best job I’ll ever have, because I want something more, and I never get that more? What if everyone I love is better than me. I don’t want to compete, and I’m not competing, but I want to at least be in the race. I want to be involved with everyone I love, and I want to also be an artist, and I want to also feel the things that they feel. I feel like I am a robot, waking up too late, rushing through a shower, going to work, coming home, late, and then going to bed. What do I do to make myself feel anything? Cry on the way to pick up a child, so that they can see their fucked up parents? Is that who I am? Is that all that I am, just a chauffeur for a child to get traumatized?

I wish I could control other people, and not in a God sense, but in a savior sense. I’m not naïve enough to think that I could save the world, but if I could save this one woman from getting murdered this one long weekend, maybe it would be worth it. She’s a wonderful mother, and I genuinely believe that she could have her child back very soon, if the father was not in the picture. Is that my own trauma coming through? Possibly, but I genuinely believe that my life would have been better with no father figures in it at all. I still would have had daddy issues, but they would be ABANDONMENT daddy issues. I am lucky enough to get all different types of fatherless trauma: one from a dad who abused/neglected me, and then later abandoned me; one from a father who lingered my whole life and refuses to let me go, as I am pretty much, the whole reason he’s alive. He refuses to listen to me speak, and only wants to speak of his suicide attempt (which was definitely reaching for attention), even though I have made it clear that a was pretty traumatized by that experience. He continues to ask me for money, and tell me that my mother is a bitch for not accepting his mental illness (the same exact illness that I have) as a disability. How is it OK for me to work two jobs in order to pay for his TV and booze habit, but he is unable to work because “being bipolar is hard”. Every day I wake up with my brain deciding for me, how well my day is going to go. it always has to go well enough that my father will get what he wants out of me. Sometimes I think that he stayed with my mother for so long and he is unaware of how to find another young woman to pay his bills, so he went to me as the next youngest woman he knew. He knows I am my mothers child, and that I will pay the bills and get the job done, and he knows that I will overwork myself to death. Because of this, he knows that he can come to me for money, and he uses the words and terminology that he knows will get him what he wants.

All I am is a servant for everyone I care about. I was created in my mothers womb as an excuse for her to leave my father, and every day since then has been about what I can give other people. if I ever have the audacity to bring up my own thoughts and emotions, I am called selfish and rude and needy.

No one has ever loved me as much as I love them. 

[pascalscenarios]

HOW TO LOVE (Marcus Pike x Reader)

HOW TO LOVE

Marcus Pike x Reader  

Summary: After a year being broken up with your ex, you move into a studio appartment just outside of Washington D.C. for a fresh start. You best friend gets your a job at the prestigious art museum he runs, and you have an encounter with someone you recognize.

Warning: None

Words: 3471

Author's Note: Surprise!!! AHH first chapter for How To Love! I’m excited for this one! I hope you guys in enjoy it! Let me know if you want to be on the tag list for this or the on main! Also if you asked and I didn’t put you in, I’m sorry, please remind me!

- K 

Chapter 1

“Alright, this was the last one in the truck,” Your father says as he sets the container on the ground next to the others. Your father had helped you pack up and move your belongings from your hometown in Virginia to an apartment complex that was just outside of Washington D.C.  

“Thanks, Dad.” You were grateful for his help.

“Do you want me to stay and help you unpack?” He was looking at the large boxes and containers piled on top of each other in the middle of your small studio apartment.

“No, that’s okay. I got it.” You smile slightly.

“You gonna be alright?” He says stuffing his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

You sigh, “I think so…” you turn your head to look around your small apartment. “I’m a little nervous, but I needed to do this...you know, move away from town and start fresh.”

“I know you do. If you ever need anything, your mother and I are a call away and a 45-minute drive.” He reassures you.

“Thank you, Dad. I love you.” You walk towards him, hugging him.

Your father wraps his arms around you, planting a kiss on your head. “I love you too. Call me if you need anything, yeah” He says, pulling away from you. You nod at him.

You both walk over to your front door. He opens it, stepping outside.

“Bye, Dad! Drive safe!” You call out as he walks down the steps and onto the walkway. You stand by the second-floor railing, looking down as he walks to his truck. He turns his body, looking up at you, giving you a wave. You watch him get into his truck, he honks, signaling a goodbye as he drives out of the parking lot.

You go back into your apartment shutting the door. You lean back against it, taking everything in. It was your first time truly living alone. You had spent years living with your ex in your hometown. He treated you terribly. You were constantly on-again, off-again with him. He had cheated on you a few times. You tried your hardest to make things work with him.

One day he decided that he was done with you, breaking things off and kicking you out of your shared apartment. You being a grown adult had to move back in with your parents. You spent a year in a tough place mentally, you decided you needed to get out of town and move somewhere else, have a fresh start, a clean slate. You needed more than what your hometown gave you.

Your best friend Elliot lived in D.C. working as a museum director at a prestigious art museum. He had offered you a job at the museum and even helped set you up with an apartment. You were nervous being on your own, but you knew you needed this time to grow as an individual.

You pushed yourself off the door, walking further into the open space. You stand there staring at all the boxes and containers. Your apartment was small. Only livable for two people, but it was perfect, and it was yours.

“Alright, let’s get to it.”

You had spent several hours getting things unpacked and organizing. You had managed to build your bed frame and set up your bed near the long and large windows. You placed your clothes into the narrow closet, set up your toiletries in the bathroom, and put kitchen appliances away. You needed to stock up your cabinets and fridge with food, so you decided to head to the grocery store.

You headed to the store in your pj’s. After your dad left, you had changed into something comfortable. You wore a worn-out Star Wars t-shirt, sweatpants, and your pink bunny slippers. You didn’t care if you rolled up to the grocery store like this. No one knew you and you knew one.

As you enter the grocery store and grab a shopping cart, your phone rings. You set your bag in the child seat, pulling out your phone. You looked at the caller ID, it was Elliot. You pick up the call, placing your phone against your ear, your other hand grabbing a hold of the cart’s handle.

“Hello?” you said, as you maneuver your cart around and in through the aisle.

“Hey! How’s it going? Do you make it to your apartment okay?” Elliot greets you.

“Hi, El…” you smile, “Yeah I did. My dad helped me out. We piled all my crap in the back of his truck. He drove it down, while I drove my car with the rest of my crap in it. I’m grocery shopping right now. The apartment is great by the way! Thank you for everything. Helping me get this apartment and setting me up with a job. I appreciate it. I can’t thank you enough” you say, picking up several Cup Noodles, tossing them into the cart.

“Of course! Don’t worry about it. That piece of shit put you through so much, you deserve to start fresh and to thrive! Maybe in D.C., you’ll find yourself a new guy…”

You scrunch up your face at what he said “Ehhh I don’t know about that…'' You traveled down the aisle picking up different snacks, foods, and drinks off the shelf.

He tries to encourage you, “You’ve been single for a while now. You should try to put yourself out there, meet some people.”

“I don’t know… I just don’t think I’m ready yet. He messed me up pretty bad, Elliot. I’m scared to get back into dating, you know?” you say sadly.

“And you have every right to feel that way, but not everyone is going to be like him. You’ll find the right person for you. It doesn’t hurt to try, but wherever you’re ready, I say go for it. Who knows, maybe you’ll run into someone in the grocery store.”

“Haha very funny, '' you say sarcastically, but you could help but laugh.

“Alright, I gotta run. I just wanted to check up on you. I’ll let you get back into shopping, but just a reminder, you to start work Monday, bright and early at 7:00 AM sharp.”

“Okay, I’ll see you then, love you.”

“I love you too! Bye!”

“Bye” you pull the phone away from your face, hanging up, and placing it back in your bag. You continued to shop. The majority of your cart was filled with your comfort junk foods, a few fruits and vegetables, and canned foods.

You knew the change of living in a new area and apartment was going to be different and a bit of getting used to. You wanted to have your favorite things to bring you some sense of joy and ease...and alcohol. Yes, you need to get a bottle.

You were turning the corner into an aisle with the alcohol when your cart collided with another person's cart that was leaving the aisle.

“Oh my gosh, I’m sorry!” You gasp at the man in surprise. He was a little bit taller than you. He wore a plain t-shirt, jeans, and shoes. Short brown hair, brown eyes, and he rocked a mustache and beard. You couldn’t lie, the man was handsome.

“It’s alright! I should be apologizing too, I bumped into you as well!” he chuckled. His eyes took notice of your outfit of choice.

Suddenly you felt shy and self-conscious about our outfit. You began to feel insecure that he was somewhat checking you out. I mean you wore PJs to the store, of course, you knew some people would stare and secretly judge you.

His gaze landed at your feet. He cocked his head to the side and smiled “Nice bunny slippers.”

“T-thanks..” you stuttered.

He must have noticed you were growing uncomfortable because he tried to lighten the mood. “I really should get myself a pair, they look comfy…I could see myself rocking some bunny kicks,” he joked.

You nod your head “Well make sure to wear them at home and not at the grocery store... along with your pj’s.. make sure you wear those at home as well because then you’ll end up going to the grocery store looking like a fool...” you mentally cringed. You didn’t mean to say your thoughts out loud. You were making this interaction more awkward than it needs to be. You just wanted to get your bottle of wine and leave.

You grab a hold of your cart, moving it into the space beside him to get into the aisle.

“I don’t think you look like a fool, it's a look. Matter of fact, I would kill to be in some Pj’s and bunny slippers all day. I live in work suits for my job. I hate it.”

“I say start a petition for pajama day at your work.”

He laughs. “I might just do that… I’m Mar-”

“Well, hopefully, that goes well for you. Good luck.” You gave him a small and quickly made your way down the aisle. Your heart was beating against your chest. You had to get out there. You picked up a bottle of red wine off the shelf and put it in the cart. You looked back to see the man, but he was gone.

…

You spent the rest of your weekend setting up and organizing the rest of your apartment. You had a few things left to do like setting up your tv, but other than that your apartment was done.

It was 5:00 AM, Monday morning, you woke up super early to get ready for work. You didn't want to be late. You took a shower, did your hair, and got dressed. You looked out yourself in the bathroom mirror after you finished getting ready. You were dressed professionally. You felt a little silly, but you were going to be working at a fancy art museum. You spent the past year living in pj’s, shirt and shorts. It’s been a while since you had to dress up.  

Leaving your bathroom, you walk over to your kitchen grabbing your reusable tumbler cup filled with ice coffee. You head over the door, slipping on your flats, grabbing your keeps and bag off the hook, and heading out to your car.

By the time you made it into the city, it was almost 7. The traffic wasn’t too bad. You managed to find street parking, putting in a bunch of coins into the meter.

Walking up to the building you were in awe. It was a wide building with tall and long glass windows in the front. You walk up to the stairs, opening the glass door. The lobby was a large space There was an information desk a few feet off to the side of the entrance, along with stairs leading upstairs. Benches and few art sculptures on display throughout the room. Bathrooms and elevators are located on the middle far back wall. Exhibits were down the halls on the left and right side of the bathroom and elevators, and upstairs.

Workers and custodians traveled around the room, preparing to open the museum in about an hour.

You hear Elliot call after you. You look up noticing Elliot coming down the stairs.

“El!” You smiled walking towards him.

“Ah! I can’t believe you’re here!” He embraced you into a hug. “I’m so happy you’re here in D.C. with me. We"ll get to hang out all the time now."

You laugh. “I'm excited! Thanks again for getting me a job. I feel kinda bad though. Like technically I skipped the whole interview phase and got the job. Isn’t that kind of abuse to your position?”

“Seriously it’s fine and I’m the Museum Director, I call the shots around here.”

“Elliot…” You say under your breath.

Elliot rolled his eyes, “Come on, you know what you mean. I’m responsible for the operation of the whole place and I know you better than anyone, I trust you.”

You still couldn’t believe Elliot was in charge of this whole museum.

“Come on, I'll give you a tour of Clemonte!”

...

Elliot gave you a tour of the Museum’s exhibits and even behind the scene things that the public doesn’t get to see. The museum had such beautiful pieces of artwork. This place was amazing. You loved it. There was so much more you wanted to see, but you only had enough time to see part of it. Maybe during your free time, you’d look around to discover the rest.

“So, what do you think?”

“Wow, this place is stunning” you stay as you both make it back to the lobby.

“So, how are you feeling?”

“I’m alright. I’m a bit nervous I’m not going to lie.” You pull away.

“Nothing to be nervous about, you’ll be fine.” He reassures you.

“So do I have to call you Mr. Regan, boss man?” you giggled.

“Pff, no one calls me that. I feel so old when people call me that. Everyone just calls me Elliot.”

“So” he claps his hands together. “You’re going to be working at the Visitors Information desk.” He says pointing to the large and round information desk near the stairs.

“El, I just got here I don’t know anything!” Your eyes widen.

“You’ll be fine, and besides you’ll be working with Ms. Laurie, she’s been here for years. She’ll teach you everything you’ll need to know. And don’t worry, we have a list and maps where everything is you can refer to.’’

“Come on” his head points in the direction of the desk.

“Hi, Ms. Laurie!” He smiles brightly at the woman. She looked about to be in her late 60’s.

“Good Morning, Elliot!” she beams.

He introduces you to Laurie. “This is my friend, the one I was telling you about. She’s going to be working with you.”

“Ah yes! Hello dear! It’s lovely to meet you! I’m so glad you’re working with me!” She holds out your hand to take.

You take her hand. “It’s nice to meet you too! I’m excited.”

“Alright well, She’s yours now, Ms. Laurie, let her have it. This is for you,” Elliot hands you your ID badge.

“Where the hell did you get this photo?” You say scrunching your face at this old and outdated photo of you.

“I pulled it off your mom facebook- Also, The FBI are coming it today-”

“My mom’s Facebook- Wait, the FBI? Why what happened?” You furrow your eyebrows.

“The FBI has a specific bureau that deals with international art theft, the Art crime team or they call himself the Art Squad. Sometimes they come in here to do research, sting operations, stuff like that, so don’t worry if you see a bunch of them waltz in here. They come around a lot.”

“Oh..o-okay.”

“Alright, I gotta go, I have a ton of meetings today, but have a good day, love you, if you need anything let me know!” He shouted quickly as he speeds walked off.

“We’re going to be opening in about half an hour, I better get started with teaching you the basics” Laurie announced. “Come dear, you can put your things over here.” She pushes open the short desk door that came up to about your hips, letting your step into the desk area.

Laurie gave you a rundown on the layout of the museum and most frequently asked areas such as where the most popular art exhibits, bathrooms, and the gift shop.

“You got everything?” Laurie asked you.

“I think so. Just a lot of stuff to memorize.” “I know hun, but once you get the hang of it, it’s going to be a breeze! You’ll know it like the back of your hand!” She chuckles. “You’ll get it in no time, if you need any help, I’m here, or you can use the maps and lists we have sprawled all around here.” She motions to the piles of paper around the desk.

“Thank you so much, Ms. Laurie.” You smiled.

…

Once the museum is open, you have a bunch of people come to the visitor's information center asking you questions. Some you were able to answer, others you had to ask Laurie or use the resources you had.

It was noon. Nothing happened, a few people came to stop by, many of the families with young children were leaving, probably headed to see multiple other museums. You noticed a group of men and women walk in. They were all wearing suits. You assumed that it was the FBI agents. They all stood in the middle of the lobby, one man stood in front of the group, giving them instructions.

The group disbanded, pairs of agents headed towards different areas and wings of the museum. You went back to filling out an information form. An Elementary school had called wanting to have a field trip. You filled out the information on the form for the school, and It had to be sent up to Elliot later to get approval.

“Do you happen to know where I can get some bunny slippers?”

“Excuse m-” You quickly lift your head from the form. Standing in front of you was the guy from the grocery store, learning to gain the counter.

He smiles at you. “I see you aren’t wearing pj’s today and no bunny slippers, damn” he joked.

You chuckled slightly. “W-well I’m working. I have to dress professionally. Guess your petition for pj’s fell through, huh?”

“Yeah, no one was down for it, but I still want some bunny slippers. Where’d you get yours?”

“um...Amazon..”

“Alright, I’ll make a mental note...I saw you when I came in. I didn’t know you worked here. How come I’ve never seen you before?” He asked.

“I-I’m new, I just started today actually…” you fiddled with the pencil in your hand. You were growing nervous.

“Well, I guess we’ll be seeing a lot of each other then…”

You swallowed hard. What was he getting at? “Oh, are we now-” You looked down at his ID badge that was clipped to his outer suit pocket that had the FBI in bold letters.

“Special Agent Pike” you read his name badge.

“Marcus” he held out his hand

You don’t take it. You were nervous. You had no idea what the Marcus guy wanted with you, and you weren’t looking for anything right now. Marcus Pike may seem all cute and harmless, but the next thing you know, he’ll be breaking your heart into two. He was probably trying to play nice to get in your pants.

After everything that happened with your boyfriend, you guarded yourself, bordering your heart with thick walls. You weren’t gonna let just anyone in. You had to protect your heart from things that hurt you in the past. You didn’t want to go through that pain again so it was better to keep walls up. You didn’t want to let anyone new into your life.

He moves his hand to scratch behind his head.

“So you gonna tell me your name?”

“No”

“No?”

“Why should I tell you my name?”

“I don’t know, because that’s what you do when you meet someone you new and you know what to call them by?” he furrowed his eyebrows at you.

“Well, you’re an FBI agent. If you wanna know, use your investigation skills and figure it out.” With that picked up paper, turning around in your hair, and walking over to the fax machine.

Marcus stood there confused. You were being nice, but then switched on a dime? Was it sometimes he said? He didn’t know what happened, but if you weren’t going to tell him, he just had to figure it out.

Out the corner of your eye, you see him walk off to the elevators. You sign in relief.

“I see you were talking to Marcus Pike.” Laurie chimed in coming out from your guy's office. “He’s a really nice guy.”

“Is he really or is that just a front to get into people's pants?” You asked, continuing to stare at him.

Laurie gasped in surprise, “Marcus Pike? No! He's such a sweetheart and very well mannered, ask anyone here, they'll tell you that.”

You sigh, now you felt kinda bad, you switched and judged him too quickly. You had trust issues that you needed to work on. You sign rubbing your face. You might have screwed up.

“I know he may be a little cocky and comes off a bit strong, but he’s a great guy once you get to know him.”

He gets in the elevator turning around. You two lock eyes, but you quickly look away back down to the fax machine.

You look back up noticing the elevator doors have closed.

“We’ll see about you, Agent Pike…”

Main Tag: @icanbeyourjedi @sara-alonso 

[develation]

A Lifeguard's preach- please read

Okay, hi, welcome to my Ted talk. So surprise for some of you but I work as a lifeguard, and I have some things to say about my experience for the 2 years I've worked as one.

A lot of people have decided it's okay to crap on first responders lately, which is a subject I will lightly touch on. But pool lifeguards have been under-appreciated for a very long time. The pool I work at is like a mini-waterpark. We have slides, basketball hoops, a water playground, a lazy river (with tubes), an obstacle course, and concessions. Were not just your neighborhood pool, which means there are more dangers to look out for. Because you can tell yourself that things never happen, but that's a lie. Every day, things always happen.

So today I was walking my stand (grazing stands there called because you walk back and forth for 20 mins straight and then move to the next stand to do it all over again for another 20 mins. repeat that process for 2 hours on lazy river rotation). And this lady decided to sit right in the middle of where I'm walking. Now in lifeguarding, we have to keep a 10/20, which means 10 seconds to see someone and 20 seconds to get to them. And the zone I'm on is SCS which is the little kid playground, y'know, with TODDLERS AND BABIES EVERYWHERE. So in order to properly scan my zone and make sure none of these babies start choking on water, I ask her to move. And she looks at me and goes, "well you should have a sign there that says that." She moves, but did this lady seriously tell me that we should have a sign that says- "Please don't sit in the Lifeguards way. They are trying to make sure you and your child don't die." Like what?!

It's not just her, I alone have been disrespected so much on this job, it's stupid. I've had moms tell me to LEAVE MY ZONE and go get their kid because it will be my fault if they drown when the mother herself is on the other side of the lazy river. I've saved a boy and the mother said, "He was fine. I'm not filling out the paperwork, I just want to enjoy my last ten minutes here." Like, YOUR FUCKING WELCOME.

I am so sick of this. Do people don't even know the amount of training we do just to even work? I have at least 200 hours of training, and I don't even work the full year's cuz of school. It's not just CPR y'know? I know how to and train to handle Rescue-Breathing, seizures, chest compressions (yes, that is different from CRP), allergic reactions, heat stroke, burns, chemical burns (mostly for employees because we work with that stuff), Heimlich, Spinals (head, neck, and back injuries), eye trauma, and more. I, WE, may be no police officer or EMT, but we know our shit.

For working in general, while you're sitting in that cool water enjoying life. Where sitting there (or even worse, walking) in 2-hour rotations sweating our asses off. You can talk about those umbrellas we get on sitting stands all day BUT THEY DON'T DO CRAP. Because the sun MOVES in the sky. And most shifts are from 10:45 to 6:30, open to close. I have only worked 3 shifts that haven't been 7 or 8 hours long.

"What about lunch breaks?" well guess what, we don't get one! Every 2 hours we get 17 min breaks (15 guards on stand and 3 in break room at all times, that's how our rotation works) that could be interrupted at any moment because people don't drown on a schedule. My water bottle is broken (it leaks) from how many times I've thrown that thing when a long whistle goes off.

Just imagine, you're sitting there eating your well-deserved sandwich, slipping some water from your water bottle, chatting it up with the other guards. And then out of fucking nowhere- BRRRRRRRRRRRRR- *Hi this is adrenaline, I'm gonna turn all the way up now* "OH SHIT SOMEONE'S DROWNING FUCK FUCK FUCK-." And now you, your boss, and other 2 break guards are sprinting full speed across the pool deck trying not to trip over your own equipment. With your food and water bottle forgotten on the concrete of the guard-room floor. [It was a very sad day. I had ordered Jimmy Johns just for that...]

I have saved 8 people, all of them children. And every day, there are at least 2 saves, which means someone is drowning and a lifeguard has to jump in for them. Realistically though? There have been too many days for me to count where there were 8 or if not more saves. People take pool safety for granted, there fucking idiots who think that just because they're tall enough to go down the slide they can swim in the 12-foot deep catch pool. They think that they can go in the lazy river without a tube. Or that they don't need a lifejacket. Parents are idiots, who don't watch their children. In one of my saves, I watched a kid disappear underwater in front of me. One second they were above water and the next, just gone. It's not like the movies guys, there's no screaming or splashing. There's the weird doggy paddle, and then they stop making distance and are weirdly treading, and then they're gone. And then you have to pick out from the kids who are floating with their backs on the surface, the kids who pretend to drown for fun, and the adults who think it's okay to "test" the lifeguards.

Just today, within the first 20 mins of open we have a lady pass out. There's something horrifying about holding someone's limp body in your hands and them not waking up. Last year we had a lifeguard pass out from the heat on the lazy river. Just flop straight onto the pavement. In years past we had a woman have a heart attack on the deck. We kept her alive until EMS arrived but she died in the hospital 3 days later. There was another lady who busted her knee open and bled everywhere. Stuff always happens.

I make $10.86 an hour to save people's lives and get shit on while doing it. It's not everybody, I meet those parents who say, "Don't worry, I'll yell at them." Those kids whole actually put their tubes back and put back the tubes that everybody left right next to the corral. That one dude who filled up my water bottle with his water because, "I looked like I was melting and needed something good today". Those girls who say I'm pretty despite all my scaring and me having short hair (yes I have gotten judged for being a girl and having short hair). But most of the time, we are ignored and looked down upon.

Trust me, we don't mind small talk. Or making jokes, telling stories. We just want to be appreciated. And I just don't feel that most of the time. My bosses have been amazing to me, and they are one of the only reasons I come to work with a smile on my face. But above all that, I just want to fulfill the childhood-old dream of being a hero. Of saving a life. I know I'm not quite suited out for firefighting or EMT's or policing.

But I'm still doing it. And I would like for others to just see me, instead of yelling at me for saving their child's life.

[nblesbianbenhanscom]

43+45 for kaspbroughzier or streddie

anon! hello! a million years later, and your fic is ready! are you even still here? i hope so ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

*

i had to go with the kasproughzier cause i love those goofs and also sonia is the perfect no, really you don’t want to meet my family.

the prompts were ‘trust me, you don’t want to meet my family’ + ‘you may technically be an adult, but you are still my child.’

***

read it on ao3

Little Dashes of Doom

“Eh-Eddie, your phone is r-ringing,” Bill says. It’s the tenth time in the last half hour.

“Just turn it off, Bill. I’m not going to answer it.” Eddie doesn’t look up from his computer.

“Buh-But it’s your ma.”

“I know, Bill. I already told her when I was coming home. She can chill.” He sounds tired, and Bill just wants to wrap him up in a blanket and make him relax between him and Richie. This semester had really kicked all of their asses.

Bill watches the phone as it stops ringing. It dings a moment later with a voicemail. Bill picks it up and turns it off. He kisses Eddie’s hair as he sits it on the table next to him.

“H-How’s the puh-aper coming?” Bill asks as he opens up the fridge. Bill himself had just finished his own last final just a few hours before.

“I hate fucking Shakespeare,” Eddie growls.

“Th-That good, eh?”

Eddie doesn't respond while Bill looks through the fridge. He finds a beer and heads to the couch where Richie is playing on their shared Switch. His legs are spread awkwardly, one up and over the back of the couch, the other hanging down by the floor. Bill sits in between his legs, pulling Richie’s leg into his lap.

“Hey, babycakes, you ok?” Richie asks without looking up.

“I’m ok.” Bill takes a sip of his beer. “You ok?”

“Yeah, fine. Why wouldn’t I be? Shit! I just fucking died!” He sighs and lets the Switch fall to his chest. “What are we doing for food?”

“We have l-leftover p-pizza,” Bill says.

Groaning, Richie sits up and tugs himself closer to Bill with his legs. He leans close and kisses Bill’s neck.

“I am so tired of pizza.” Richie scrapes his teeth against Bill’s chin. “Maybe I’ll just have you for dinner. How does that sound?” They giggle and Eddie huffs from the kitchen.

“Ugh, rude of you to start without me,” Eddie grouses, but there’s no real heat to his words.

Bill and Richie giggle again.

“S-Sorry, E-Eddie!”

“We were just discussing dinner.” Richie kisses Bill’s neck again.

Giggling, Bill pushes him away. “Shhh… St-Stop.”

Richie just pulls him closer and they giggle again.

“If I fail my final, it will be all your faults!” Eddie yells.

“Wh-What d-do you want for d-dinner?” Bill asks.

Eddie is silent for a minute. “Surprise me.”

Bill turns and kisses Richie. “We’re guh–nna go p-pick up dinner.”

“We are?” Richie asks. Bill nods. He holds his hand out and Richie takes it. They go to the door, tug on their coats and boots. It’s cold outside, but Bill just holds tightly to Richie’s hand.

“Where to, Big B?” Richie asks after they’ve climbed in the car.

Bill shrugs. “I don’t care.” He thinks for a minute. “Wh-Where do you—”

“I already told you what I wanted.” Richie winks.

Leaning back against the passenger seat headrest, Bill smiles at him. “Ok, b-but like a-actual food, Richie.”

“Ugh, you’re no fun,” Richie says. They talk for a few more minutes and end up going to the local diner. They get pancakes, fries, salad, and pie. Sometimes Eddie has trouble eating when he’s stressed, and they want to make sure to get him something he’ll eat.

When they get back, Eddie’s computer and his books are in a neat stack. The bathroom door is closed and they can hear him screaming at someone.

“I am working on my finals, mommy!” Eddie screams. Richie and Bill hesitate in the doorway. They look at each other but creep in. It’s been a while since Eddie had gone off like this. When they’d first met him a few years back, he’d yelled a lot more. Richie liked to tease that he was a feral chihuahua until Eddie’d absolutely lost it and tried to beat Richie up. It hadn’t gone well; Richie was so much taller than him and he had just pulled him into a hug, apologies sliding off his tongue. He promised to never do it again. After that, there were less and less explosions until there were none.

“No! No! You listen! I’m doing my work. I’ll be home in three days. Three! You have my–” Eddie pauses. “Please, would you just–”

Richie puts the food on the table and Bill clears away Eddie’s school work.

“God damnit, mom! They are not my roommates, they are my boyfriends. We have been over and over–” Another pause. “Well maybe I won’t come home then!” There’s another pause followed by a loud banging sound and then Eddie begins to sob.

Bill and Richie look at each other as they sit there listening to Eddie cry and yell at himself. Bill can’t quite make out everything he’s saying, but he knows it’s not good. He hears things like pussy, and coward, and little bitch. Things that he’d been told his whole life. Things Bill had thought he’d worked through.

Bill had apparently been wrong.

“I’m gonna go get him,” Richie says, and gets up. Bill catches his hand, and shakes his head. They sigh.

“Wuh–ne m-more m-minute.” He swallows hard. Richie sits back down slowly. Bill hates this just as much as Richie, but he doesn’t want to push Eddie too hard.

Slowly, Eddie’s sobs lessen. Bill wants to get up and go to him, but still he hesitates. Richie leans into his space and rests his head on Bill’s shoulder.

“Can we go get him now?” Richie asks.

Bill licks his lips. He’s about to say yes when they hear the bathroom door open, and Eddie sees them as soon as he looks up.

“Oh,” he says softly. His eyes are red and puffy. He swallows hard several times. “I-I–” And then tears fill his eyes, and his face crumbles, and Richie and Bill go to him, pull him close and let him cling to them as he cries.

“It’s ok, Eddie, we’ve got you,” Richie murmurs into his hair. “We’ve got you.”

“L-Let it out, b-baby,” Bill whispers.

Eddie’s fingers dig into Bill’s shirt as he sobs. His whole body is shaking and Bill wishes he could find Sonia Kaspbrak and give her a piece of his mind, but he tries to push these thoughts away as he kisses Eddie’s hair.

They sit on the couch, and it takes a long time for Eddie to calm down. Even after he’s stopped crying, he still clings to them. He whines when Richie pulls away.

“I’ll be back, my love, just going to get you some water,” Richie says as Eddie grips his shirt hem.

“But I–” Eddie’s hoarse, and Bill can’t help but feel sorry for him.

“I-It w-will help,” Bill says. He reaches out and pulls Eddie’s hand free. “It will help.” Slowly, Eddie lets go and lets Bill lace their fingers together. He leans back into Bill and closes his eyes.

After Eddie drinks his water, he looks around at them with heavy sad eyes. He’s cradled between them, both of them pushing into his space.

“I’m–I’m sorry,” Eddie says.

“What for, love?” Richie asks. He strokes Eddie’s hair, kisses his temple.

“Because I–Because I’m such a freaking mess,” Eddie whispers.

“Yo-You’re n-not a m-mess.” Bill kisses Eddie behind his ear and Eddie’s eyelashes flutter a little.

“Your mom is a fucking cunt,” Richie says.

Bill frowns at him. Eddie usually freaks whenever someone says something bad about his mom.

“Yeah, she is,” Eddie says. 

Bill and Richie make shocked noises. Bill squeezes him.

“I’m just so tired of her. She’s...” His voice waivers and takes a deep breath. “I have to use the bathroom.” Eddie gives them each a kiss before he gets up.

Once the door is closed, Richie looks at Bill, scowling.

“What the fuck is that bitch’s problem?” Richie growls.

“I d-don’t kn-know.” Bill sighs. He scoots closer to Richie. “I h-hate her so much. It’s been s-such a l-long t-time si-since–”

“Yeah, he’s been doing so good.” Richie huffs. “I just wish I could meet that bitch just one time so I could–”

“Trust me, you don’t want to meet my mom,” Eddie says. Richie and Bill jump, neither of them had heard the toilet flush. “C’mon. I’m hungry.”

Sharing glances, Richie and Bill get up and follow Eddie into the kitchen. He’s sitting at the table, pulling the food out of the bag and frowns at the fries.

“Aww, fuck, they’re cold.” Eddie’s lip trembles a little. “I’m sorry. I should have waited to call. I just finished my final and I–”

“N-No, b-baby. It’s ok. Th-The fries w–ill heat up,” Bill says.

“Yeah,” Richie agrees. “That’s why God invented microwaves, right?” He picks up the container and throws it in, pushing buttons quickly. “See? It’s fine.”

Sniffling, Eddie wrinkles his nose. “Nuked fries taste so gross.”

“I think we got some cheese and Ranch. That will help.” Richie goes to the fridge as Eddie looks at the rest of the food and looks up at Bill.

“You two are the best, do you know that?” Eddie asks. Richie kisses his hair as he wraps his arms around Eddie’s shoulders.

“N-No you,” Bill says.

Wrapping his fingers around Richie’s forearms, Eddie kisses his inner arm. “I love you both so much.”

“We love you, too.” Richie pulls away as the microwave beeps.

After they eat, they curl up on the couch to watch TV. They’re all crossed limbs and elbows in stomachs and pulled hair, but they don’t really care. Eddie just lets the others hold him close, pet his hair, kiss him.

“Are you doing better?” Richie asks after a bit. Eddie shrugs.

“Wh-What happened?” Bill asks.

Eddie shrugs again. “Just the usual. I finished my paper like right after you left, so I decided to call her before she called the police like she did that one time, and she said since I was done with my finals that I needed to come home right away. When I said I want to stay with you two, that my ticket is nonrefundable or exchangeable, she said she didn’t care about the cost, that she’d pay and…” He sighs. “She just wouldn’t listen. She kept saying, ‘You may be an adult, but you’re still my child.’” He huffs. “I’ve been financially independent from that old bag for over a year. She has no right to say shit like that to me any more.”

“N-No, she doesn’t,” Bill agrees.

“Honestly, she never should have talked to you that way, ever,” Richie says. Eddie leans a little closer to him. He plays with the strings on Bill’s hoodie.

“I know,” Eddie whispers.

Bill can hardly believe what he’s hearing. His heart fills with pride and he pulls Eddie’s legs into his lap and cups Eddie’s face in his hands before kissing him so, so gently. When they pull apart, Bill pushes his forehead into Eddie’s forehead. 

“L-Love you,” Bill whispers. When he pulls back, Richie presses his own kiss into Eddie’s temple.

“You know, you don’t have to go,” Richie says. “You can come home with us.”

“O-Or we c-could go wi-with you,” Bill says.

Eddie shakes his head. “It will be ok.”

Sighing, Richie shakes his head, no. “You shouldn’t have to deal with her alone. Let us come with you.”

“I couldn’t ask you to do that,” Eddie murmurs.

“Y-You d–idn’t. We’re t-telling you. We’re coming wi–th you,” Bill says. Richie smiles at Bill.

“You really don’t–”

“Eds, you may as well give it up. We’re coming with you, and if your mom can’t deal, well, fuck her, and we’ll leave early.” Richie pauses. “In fact, plan on it. We’ll all have to change our tickets, call our families, but we’ll split up the break evenly. It will be fun.”

“We can’t afford that!” Eddie protests.

“Y-Yes we c-can! I just got p-paid for th–at piece I wrote a why-while back,” Bill says.

“No, Bill, you were going to use that for a new computer!” Eddie says.

“I’ll j-just st-steal yours.” Bill strokes his arm.

“You’re ridiculous,” Eddie murmurs, but there’s a small smile on my face. He sighs and leans into Richie. “You guys are the best, do you know that?”

“N-No, you.” Bill laces their fingers together.

“Yeah, spaghetti, you’re the best.” Richie kisses his hair.

Eddie closes his eyes, and settles back.

“We d-don’t have to m-make any d-decisions tonight,” Bill says. “W-We can t-talk t-tomorrow.”

“Ok,” Eddie says. He sighs again and sits up. “You guys wanna do something?”

“Like what?” Richie asks.

“Play Mario Kart?”

“Only if you don't cry when I kick your butt!" Richie says as he pulls himself free and gets up to set up the Switch. Eddie scoots around and leans into Bill's side.

"Yeah, we'll see who cries, Tozier!" Eddie teases.

Bill knows it is a toss-up between the two; they are both really good. It's Bill that's going to be the loser, but he doesn't really care. He's terrible at video games, but he loves being with his boyfriends. 

He sits there listening to them argue about who is the worst player and waits to be handed a controller. He loves listening to them bicker like this, and he knows Eddie bickering is a good sign. Licking his lips, Bill leans into Eddie, eyes closed for a moment. 

"You ok, Bill?" Eddie asks as Richie's attention falters. He's fighting with the cords and cursing under his breath.

"Yeah, I'm good." Bill takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. "Love you so much."

Eddie squeezes his hand. "Love you."

"Got it!" Richie says triumphantly. He tosses a couple of controllers at them and sits near the TV. "You two losers ready?"

"Shut up, buttmunch," Eddie says. "Get ready to eat my dust!"

"Bring it!" Richie says. 

Bill struggles with his controller and gets settled. He knows the next couple of weeks are going to be hard. Eddie had agreed tonight that they would change their winter break plans, but that doesn't mean that it isn't going to be a struggle. He knows Eddie wants to break free, but Bill knows it isn’t easy; Sonia has a firm grip on her son.

Bill is not looking forward to the back and forth that is inevitably coming, but he decides there is no point in worrying about that now. Right now, Eddie is happy, Eddie is safe, and the three of them are going to have a good night. Tomorrow is future Bill’s problem, and tonight all he has to worry about is not driving the wrong way on the track. He knows everything will be ok.

[sanghyukstattoos]

Along the way

Characters: Kim Seokwoo I Rowoon x Reader

Genre: Fluff, angst 

Words:1789

Summary: At a house party or a so-called dreaded 'family gathering', you detest the situation, how you feel and everything. That is until Seokwoo picks you up and is there for you all the way home.

A/N: Pictures from DailyRowoon 

Thank you to the anon who requested this! When I was writing this, I slipped into a little daze and I was at my best writing this so I do hope that you love it! Personally, when things get hard for me, I am that person who plans it all out in her head. I’ll speak myself through it including why I have been feeling or why I feel in a particular way and how to solve the problem so a little bit of that is incorporated into this fic!

You were at your family’s house, sitting on the sofa and holding your breath, waiting for the right time to jump into the conversation. They were feuding about something and while no one was screaming, you could feel how tense the room was. 

They make a big deal about everything, you thought but stayed quiet. Nothing good would come from you pointing out their obvious mistakes. It was right there and you felt a sudden surge of anger. You didn’t know where it came from either- there were so any sources.

You didn’t know how riled up you were getting but you did know not to get angry because apparently, that came to you pretty easily. Just because someone told you to control yourself didn’t mean you didn’t feel it. 

Your felt the dull ache in your temple become something more as your family snapped their heads in your direction when you spoke while nodding your head in the direction , ‘’It’s right there’’.

There was a small hum floating from your family members as they considered what you were saying but then it all went to shit. To them, it was something else but it mattered to you- wasn’t what you wanted also important?

The room grew more hot as they dismissed your statement, some feeling annoyed while others gave you small, pitiful smiles as they all went back to what they were doing. 

You stayed quiet and laid low for the next few minutes, contemplating how you spoke just a few moments ago. You wavered when you spoke, especially towards the end. 

Maybe it was obvious, that’s why they gave you those smiles. You looked around to see everyone smiling, automatically nodding and giving a bright smile to a family member who raised their eyebrows at you, presumably in concern.

They just picked whatever they wanted, dismissing the rest as, ‘’it’s okay, how important could it be?’’. Knowing that somewhere in the future you wouldn’t be here made you cautious but for now you were stuck in this place.

Forced to endure this because it was social of you to do so, you couldn’t possibly have a problem with your family- after all, they were your family. Your family member next to you, turned to you saying, ‘’Why do they sound like that when they fight?’’ making you look over and laugh as well.

You felt guilty for laughing for none of it showed on your face, laughing along with the person beside you. Not even a couple of seconds had passed till they spoke up, pointing in the direction mentioned while saying, ‘’See? It’s right there’’

From there on, recognition pandered onto their faces and you slumped, recognising that you should have just pointed it look like your family member. Some faces looked at you too and you nodded saying, ‘’I said that!’’

‘‘We know..’‘, ‘‘Something about the way you explained...’‘ was all that you heard before you heard the sound of your phone buzzing. Your head was spinning and there wasn’t much room to breathe but you couldn’t have been more happy that it was Ro on the other end. 

Standing up, you ignored the looks you got from your family members and headed to the exit to take the call. ‘’Hey, you doing okay?’’ was the very first thing you heard and you genuinely smiled, replying, ‘’Hey, I’m doing good’’.

‘‘What time do you want me to pick you up?’‘ Seokwoo asked, having just finished work. 

‘‘Uh’‘ you started out, searching the area for any of your family members to hide what you were going to say next. Your eyes didn’t leave the direction that you were looking towards as you hurriedly whispered, ‘‘A little earlier than planned’‘

Fearing that he would ask for the time, you calmed down when he asked, ‘’8:30?’’. Leaning away to check the time on your phone, you shook your head in disagreement as you responded with, ‘’no’’.

‘‘7:45?’‘ he asked, this time hitting the mark. You agreed, exclaiming, ‘‘yes!’‘ and he agreed as well. In the background, you could hear the car starting as he came to pick you up. 

There wasn’t exactly an end to family gatherings, they all just left when everyone agreed to leave. It also wasn’t easy to shove so many people out of the door and knowing that they had the opportunity, they would all stay till midnight. 

You felt victorious yet juvenile as you walked back to the living room to tell your parents the good news. Looking at your family member, you envied how she was able to thrive in such a harsh environment. 

Now, all that was remaining was for you to break it to them and that mattered. How you broke the news to them was important. Pulling your other family member close to you, the concern on her face almost broke you in two.

‘‘I have to go since we are both busy tomorrow’’ you said pouting, carefully watching how she reacted. She hummed before asking, ‘‘Is Seokwoo coming to pick you up?’‘ to which you slightly nodded to replying, ‘‘In 15 minutes’‘. 

You kept yourself from smiling out and after spilling it to your other family members, you would have wished to see the spoils of joy on their faces but instead got into Seokwoo’s car. 

This time your entrance was different and a whole lot better. It felt good to be back as you gave him a quick peck on his cheek. You reflected his wide smile, leaning your head on the headrest.

"How was it?" he asked, inquisitive but careful at the same time knowing that your family had a given history of making you feel like an outsider whenever they all came around. You hummed, dismissing the answer and instead looking at him and shrugging your shoulders, clearly exhausted.

"Don't stress about it a lot" he cautioned, hand on the steering wheel while one slipped into yours, wanting to be close to you in your time of pure distress. Gripping his hand tighter, you replied, "It's tiring, but I can make it" nodding as you said the latter, hoping to convince yourself that you could hold on.

It all sounded like fireworks to you but a part of you hoped that Seokwoo bought it because he was worried. You were an adult and if anything, they were people out there going through worse. It was a reminder that you didn't have to worry about something so small.

Whatever you thought to try and show that it wasn’t that big of a deal, there were always your own original thoughts at the back of your mind, trying to breach the surface. You had spoken to your family about how you felt, delivering in soft blows rather than directly and their response dismissed how you felt.

They had managed to convince you that the problem was now over, now that you had spoken to them but you felt as if no real change occurred. Truth to be told, you didn't have a proper explanation for this or anything like it but you did try your best.

Then again, what counted as a proper explanation?

"Hey" Seokwoo softly spoke, looking over at you in concern to see that you were looking out of the window with a look of despair on your face. It was at times like these that your real emotions would pour through, at times when you were stressed but tried to control how you truly felt.

You gave him a small smile and looked away, blinking the tears back. You felt hypervigilant now, also noticing how tightly you were gripping his hand. And then you felt grateful realising that he knew but gave you your space anyways.

You could show someone an example of what feeling like an outsider felt like in your family but individually, the single events did not count. On the other hand, a culmination or tyrannical combination of all these events made much more sense to your point.

They could point out how you were exaggerating the reality of the situation much like your family or at least how you thought they would react but Seokwoo and you knew the truth. Even before Seokwoo, you would live in your own mind, gradually moving away from the negativity.

Although the problem persisted, you once called into question your thoughts about yourself, the world and your future- the negative triad. It was simply a triad but you did know that you had negative thoughts regarding all three, making it your negative triad.

At present, you were content with yourself and the life you built that didn't involve a complete involvement of your family. Somehow, your problem with your family became your world and on a whole you were not angry at the world but you weren't angry at your family either. You couldn't change their actions and words towards you but you could change how you reacted towards them. As per the future, you didn't want to focus on that right now for your present work, relationship with Seokwoo and friends held so much more worth.

Taking a breath in, you released a shaky one, swallowing your tears and smiling. Hearing you, Seokwoo scrunched his nose in delight, happy that you were okay. You were also strong in every right for it made him plenty strong too. It was unfair to say that you shouldn't have felt terrible as others had bigger problems because you could acknowledge that fact but this was still your problem.

He didn't meet you like this and neither did you let this affect you in any way outside of your family home. Once it was over, you would be close to tears but it would hardly take you that same amount of time each time to pack your bags and move on.

Neither did he step in to defend you from your family because they were not your enemies. To them, they had the best intentions but drastically different ways of expressing it and Seokwoo supported you through it. You healed and went on to be your best self, knowing that you were surrounded by those that loved you because love came in different forms.

"I'm okay" you spoke, a lot more happier this time whilst looking at him. A smile slowly made its way to his face as he heard your words, rubbing circles onto your loosened grip on his hand. Resting on the headrest, you sighed in relief, all the stress and disbelief floating out of your system. Giving once last caring look at you, Seokwoo drove home where the two of you laid in each other’s arms, drifting off to blissful sleep. 

[randomcookieaddict]

1. What tends to feel better for you, sex or masturbation? Sex obvii, but tbh sometimes you don't have the energy for the effort so your hand will do

2. Your 5 favorite spots to be stimulated? Left side of my neck, right side of my neck

3. Have you ever had an orgasm from anywhere other than your genitals? Nope. BUT I do have major erogenouse zones outwith there ((hint hint kiss/bite my neck you sexy vampire))

4. Do you prefer clitoral or vaginal stimulation? Clitoral is easier because I am a man

5. Can you touch your clitoris directly, or does that hurt? No, because I'm a man and do not have one.

6. Are you well-acquainted with your G-spot? I have heard of it but have not had it stimulated because I am a hetero dude

7. Do you like having your anus touched? Yes. But, as a dude, the in-out motion feels weird. Just touch the outside or shove it up and stay up ffs

8. Have you ever been fisted? 4/5ths of the way there I believe

9. Do you like mild roughness (scratching, spanking, hair-pulling, etc.)? Yes yes yes

10. Are you into anything under the BDSM umbrella? Umbrella? I am in to a lot of things under the BDSM canopy lol

11. Have you had sex in the shower or bath? Yeah. Shower was better tbh. Bath makes a mess of the floor tbh

12. Do you like being naked? Yes

13. Do you sleep partially/fully naked? Fully for preference

14. How many sexual partners have you had? 2/3 fully, 4/5 depending on your definition

15. What kind of underwear do you normally wear? Since lockdown, none tbh.

16. Do you ever go commando? All the time <3

17. Have you ever orgasmed in your sleep? Nope. I just wake up horny

18. What are you more into, boobs or butts? Hmmm, butts in pictures tbh, but sex and sexy contact in general irl

19. What do you do with your pubic hair (shave, trim, wax, nothing, etc.)? Shave

20. Do you care/have a preference what partners do with their pubic hair? Nope. I will dive into the hairiest or the barest muff there is.

21. Do you have or want any genital piercings? No no no no no

22. Do your orgasms tend to be full-body, or crotch-centric? Mostly crotch-centric, BUT I have had some full-body ones and just <3 That is the dream we look to acheive

23. Have your ever squirted? I am biologically male so every orgasm I have is a squirt lol

24. Have you ever had sex in a public place? Yes

25. Have you ever been caught masturbating/having sex? Yes/no.

26. Have you masturbated for or with someone via webcam? Most definitely

27. Have you had phone sex? Indeed I have

28. Do you often imagine people naked? My imaginations not that good. I will look at you and wish you were naked but my imagination will have it all wrong lol

29. Have you ever made your partner orgasm using only your hands? Indeedy

30. Have you ever had anal sex? Yes. Yes I have.

31. Have you ever tried scissoring? I have tried that position, but it involved penetration cause I'm a heterosexual dude.

32. How old were you when you lost your virginity? 19

33. What's the weirdest thing you've masturbated with? My gfs mums vibrator...

34. How would you feel about taking someones virginity? Partly honoured at given the chance, but also I wouldn't turn it down because if they wanna lose it thats their decision and I'd respect their choice and try to make it as much fun as possible.

35. Would you rather be a pornstar or a prostitute? Pornstar. They have more control over their partners, get paid more(?) and it'd be hot knowing randomers are getting off onto me

36. Have you ever cheated on someone? No. I most certainly have not. Not in any way that matters.

37. Are you dominate or submissive? More dominant but I do have some submissive tendancies tbh.

38. Your biggest turn ons? Neck biting, neck liking, neck kissing neck everything.

39. Would you ever fool around in a movie theater? Have, would again.

40. Do you like it rough or sensual? Both. Ha. Idk at this time I'd just like it.

41. If you could sleep with anyone, who would it be? Someone who I have not spoke to for a while but for a long time she was my only friend and we flirted and she knew I was more interested and she lead me on and she provoked me and she said I had a chance and then the last time we met she got engaged to someone else the same day and didnt bother her arse to tell me until I found out from her facebook so short answer is I'd sleep with someone who is beautiful and sexy but also not deserving of my attentions, I just Cant Get THem OUt OF MY HEAD/FANTASIES

42. Would you ever have sex with a transgender person? I think I would yeah. I've never had the chance but my type has always been those interested in me so why not?

43. When was the last time you had sex? last week

44. What are your turn offs? Tickling. Can't stand it tbh. More likely to knee you in the face!

45. First type of porn you have ever watched? (straight, lesbian, gay, etc) Television X or Adult Channel on sky channels 25/58 after 11pm...

46. Have you ever had any one night stands? Nope.

47. Does anyone know you masturbate? Did you have to tell them? I haven't told anyone but my gf and my mother have washed my clothes so I think the secret is not so secret

48. When you first lost your virginity, was it intended or spontanious? Intended.

49. Do you prefer giving or receiving oral sex? Either/or. [[Both. Both Is Good gif here]]

50. Would you have sex with your best friend? Yes, and I would, but they wouldn't so convince her, not me.

51. Would you ever consider being a stripper? I would consider it for like 2 mins and be like "Nah I'm ugly and cant dance" and that would be the end of that.

[peachfaeryy]

Hi 🌙

It's my birthday right now. I'm 26 now.

1. What is my fondest childhood memory?

My fondest childhood memories definitely consist of the lovely people who I grew up with and derived my sense of humor/silliness from: my cousins Anna & Emily, Savannah -- my childhood best friend, and Kaleb, my eternal crush. These memories consist of them in elementary school, camp, and my grandma's house in San Antonio.

2. What is my favorite comfort food?

Probably nachos/chips/chips & queso.

3. What’s my favorite way to exercise?

Uh...DANCE.

4. Am I a morning person or a night owl?

I lean more towards night owl but I try to avoid both.

5. If I could have any superpower, what would it be?

The currency of youth.

6. Do I prefer cooking, baking, or neither?

I love both cooking and baking :) I find both extremely rewarding and cathartic.

7. Am I an introvert or an extrovert?

Ambivert strongly introvert-leaning.

8. What superhero do I find most relatable?

None, I detest all superheroes.

9. What is my favorite season of the year — and what do I love most about it?

Winter because it provides me with the most amount of physical comfort. I love sleeping in a very cold room, opening my windows with no AC on. Sitting in my car listening to music/eating with engine off. Less humidity. Food is tastier. Style is better.

10. Do I believe in the existence of angels?

Not particularly? Well, yes but I believe they have absolutely no role or effect on our world.

11. What are my favorite TV series?

American Crime Story (OJ & Versace), Fleabag, Atlanta...90 Day Fiance, Game of Thrones

12. What was the last movie I watched (or the last movie I enjoyed)?

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (let's gooOoo)

13. Am I a tidy person or a messy one?

I used to be very messy but not I'd consider myself pretty tidy. My nature is messy though.

14. Am I afraid of the dark?

Nah.

15. Am I more of a coffee person or a tea person?

Mostly coffee.

16. What talents do I possess that I’m proud of?

I don't have any natural-born talents but I suppose my ability to teach myself a new skill over time.

17. Do (or did) I like school?

I loved school and literally work at a school.

18. Did I go to the prom?

Unfortunately, yes.

19. What is my idea of a perfect date?

Definitely grabbing pizza at a nice restaurant.

20. Do I enjoy DIY or crafts?

Not at all, sounds awful, lol.

21. Do I forgive others easily?

Yes. But not so much anymore now that I'm older and more experienced. My instinct/nature is very forgiving.

22. Do I have a nickname — or did I ever have one?

None.

23. Do I have any phobias?

I'm scared of most anything anything everything...I'd say my daily fear is mistaking my razor for my toothbrush in the shower.

24. Have I ever met one of my heroes? If yes, who was it, and how did it go?

No?

25. Do I speak any other languages?

No, but I told myself I would learn Spanish before I die.

26. Have I ever traveled outside my native country?

Yes! I have been the Mexico and Ireland.

27. If money were no object, what would I want for my next birthday?

Maybe a trip to South Korea/Germany/Rhode Island

28. Have I ever been addicted to something?

Yes. But as far as substances? I'm addicted to Nsaid.

29. When I was a kid, what did I want to be when I grew up?

I wanted to be a wildlife photographer when I was a kid-kid.

30. Have I ever won something?

$75 with scratch offs

31. Have I ever narrowly escaped death (or serious injury)?

I'd say so, yes.

32. Do I prefer baths or showers?

Showers.

33. How am I feeling right now?

Changed.

34. Have I ever played any sports?

Soccer, Basketball, and cross-country

35. Do I prefer the beach or the mountains?

Beach, but I feel connected to both.

36. Do I prefer a Mac or a PC?

Uh...PC?

37. Do I prefer dogs or cats (or some other pet)?

Cats...I honestly do not like dogs at all.

38. Do I have any piercings or tattoos? Would I like to get any?

I have three tattoos: three rune, a sword, and a butterfly. All of which are on my arms.

39. Do I have kids?

Not right now.

40. Do I have siblings?

None.

41. What do I do on a typical Friday night?

Same thing I usually do: practice dance/choreo for a couple of hours. Read, cook, watch Youtube. If I’m going out, I’ll maybe grab dinner/hang with my friends. I MAY go to ~the club~ in a blue moon.

42. If I could go anywhere in the world with unlimited funds, where would I go?

SOUTH KOREA

43. What do I do to relax?

Shower, listen to music. Do my makeup for fun.

44. What do I do to wake up or boost my energy levels?

Blast Stray Kids

45. Would I rather have unlimited energy or unlimited money?

Unlimited money

46. Am I a collector of anything? If yes, how big is my collection?

I collect Kpop bullshit...(albums, photo cards, posters, etc.) essentially merch from my favorite artists.

47. What sort of gift would I want from my significant other on Valentine’s Day or on my birthday?

JUST flowers. All I care about it getting flowers on both of those days.

48. Which would I rather avoid — excess heat or extreme cold?

Excess heat.

49. Would movie genre would I rather watch: action, romance, fantasy, or horror?

Of those choices: horror. I also like a solid journey story.

50. Have I ever been on a diet? If yes, how did it go?

More like a mini eating disorder, lol? I went through phases where I only consumed 1500 calories.

51. If I could live anywhere for a month with whomever I choose, where would that be?

Greece with I suppose...someone I get along with.

52. Have I ever gone camping? Or do you look at a tent and think, “I feel like that’s the wonton wrapper, and I’m the filling.”

Yes, several times. I actually thoroughly enjoy camping.

53. What’s the last song I listened to?

Ribs -- Lorde

54. What’s my current obsession, and how much have I spent on it?

Anything kpop...hours. I’m talking hours and hours.

55. What’s a favorite book of mine?

We Need to Talk About Kevin

56. What should I be doing right now?

Sleeping.

57. What’s my best feature?

Physically? Boobs.

Personality? I would say kindness but that’s basic. Witty? Self-discipline.  

58. What’s the most expensive article of clothing (or shoes) that I own?

Damn...shoes...? $100?

59. What is one thing I could not live without?

Music. My one coping mechanism and literally the reason I’m alive and functional.

60. What’s one thing I can’t leave the house without (other than keys and my wallet)?

Phone... BC packet?

61. What’s one of my pet peeves?

Slow walkers

62. What wild animal would I love to have for a pet (as long as it didn’t eat anyone)?

Maybe like...a toucan?

63. What’s my favorite drink?

An ICE COLD fizzy SODA boiii

64. What’s my spirit animal, and do I own anything featuring that animal?

I guess I’m very cat-like. I used to have a lot of cat stuff, but not anymore...

65. What’s my favorite restaurant, and what’s my favorite splurge order?

I like basically any fast food joint. I’m also a sucker for Chili’s. I’m really basic. A splurge order for me would be ordering a margarita with my meal.

66. What’s my favorite movie — or the best one I’ve seen in the last three years?

I’ve been obsessed with We Need to Talk About Kevin, Pirates of the Caribbean...I’ve been wanting to rewatch Little Miss Sunshine

67. What’s a favorite hobby of mine?

Dancing :)

68. What’s my favorite go-to snack?

Health-wise: apples and peanut butter. But if I don’t care: chips

69. What are my must-haves for watching a movie in a theater?

True interest in the film

70. What’s my favorite kind of competition to watch (sports, cooking, etc.)?

Not really into competition shows.

71. Would I rather get an electric shock or get an intramuscular shot (tetanus, etc.)?

Electric shock?

72. What’s my dream car?

Bella’s shitty red truck let’s gooooo

73. What are the must-haves in the home of my dreams?

LOTS of open space, sunlight, heated bathroom floor

74. What’s my favorite sandwich?

Chicken salad, BLT, plain peanut butter

75. What’s my favorite kind of dinner? (comfort food, four-course, take-out Chinese…)

Comfort food

76. If I could change my eye and hair color, what color/s would I choose?

I would DEF change my eye color to a warm brown and my hair to very dark brown. I’m growing my natural hair out. I’m going dye-free right now.

77. Who is my favorite fictional character (or one of them)?

Jack Sparrow

78. What’s my longest relationship so far (other than family)?

4 years...

79. What is my star sign — or do I usually avoid that question?

I DO NOT care about this but I’m a Leo

80. What is my lucky number, or what is a favorite number of mine?

Uh? N/A

81. What city do I live in now, and what’s my favorite thing about it?

I still live in Denton and I detest it.

82. What state do I live in now, and what do I love about it?

Texas, its diversity.

83. If I had to move to a different state, where would I rather go?

New Mexico

84. Have I ever colored my hair? If yes, what’s my favorite hair color experiment so far?

Yes, most of my teen and adult life. But my “crazy” hair experiment right now is going dye-free and wearing my natural color.

85. Whom do I miss right now?

My 14-year-old self

86. Have I ever made a mistake that someone else refused to forgive me for?

Apparently.

87. Do I have a celebrity crush? If yes, who is it?

JOHNNY DEPP and all of Stray Kids lol. Jungkook?

88. If I could meet any celebrity for coffee/tea and a chat, who would it be?

Marina Diamandis

89. As desserts go, would I rather have ice cream or cheesecake?

Ice Cream

90. Would I rather live in a house or an apartment, and why?

A small house.

91. Would I rather live in a treehouse, a cave, or a submarine?

Treehouse

92. What is one big goal that I want to accomplish this year?

Move out of D*nton.

93. What do I want to do for a living?

I’m happy being a teacher, but ultimately I’d like to counsel kids.

94. When I feel sick, where do I usually feel it first or most noticeably?

My head.

95. What sort of smartphone do I use, and what made me choose it?

Uh? Android?

96. What’s one movie that I’ve watched repeatedly? What do I love about it?

I watch signs pretty frequently. Midsommar? I connect with its characters because they seem like real actual people? I’ve been wanting to rewatch the Lovely Bones.

100. If I could afford one, would I rather hire a chef, a personal assistant, or a housekeeper?

Housekeeper!

97. What is one food that I refuse to eat?

Liver

98. What exotic food would I be willing to try?

I’d be open to trying most any food.

99. What is one item on my bucket list, and what made me choose it?

I’m kind of working on it now. I want to put a few years in while I’m young and able to become a very good dancer. I know that to obtain that it IS going to take years. It’s something that’s really important to me because I’ve always wanted that for myself but never made actual steps to obtain/execute it. And ultimately, I want it because it allows me to feel like my true self.

[hexandbalances]

Visiting Salem

A few years ago I traveled to Salem for Halloween week. It was a fun trip but not at all the quaint town I had expected. And it was busy. Salem eagerly leans into its witch history and new age spiritualism, sporting many psychic readings and occult shops. To be honest, a large part of my stay was spent walking, shopping, and eating so I didn’t get to visit as quite as many museums as I would have liked. I’ve included a brief review of some of the places I stopped in at while I was there:

Jolie Tea - this was tucked away from the Essex Street pedestrian mall, which made it the perfect place to escape the crowds and blustery wind. They had a selection of seasonal tea blends made in shop. I stopped in several times and took several pounds of tea back as a visiting gift for my aunt. I know it’s an odd compliment but I’m in love with their upholstery and the wallpaper in their restroom. Very limited seating (only 3 tables, one of which only seats two people), but quiet enough at the times I went as to not be a problem.

Count Orlok’s Nightmare Gallery - located on Essex street (the main thoroughfare, foot traffic only) this gallery houses memorabilia and trivia from classic and modern horror cinema. I recommend it if you fancy yourself a horror movie buff. Tickets were $9 for adults and did not need to be purchased in advance. The tour is self guided, walk in any time.

O'Neill’s Pub & Restaurant - honestly I popped in here just intending to use the facilities and get off my feet for a bit but they sell the best pumpkin ale I’ve had to date. The rim is dusted with cinnamon sugar and the head is dusted with a crescent moon of spice. I enthusiastically returned twice a day for the duration of the trip (I was on holiday after all). Their shepherd’s pie was quite good and the waitresses were happy to share insider advice on the best places to park, how to avoid traffic, etc.

Howard Street Cemetery - I visited this cemetery under the impression that the headstone for Giles Corey was there. It wasn’t. There was a memorial at one time but it was toppled by a vandal in 2015. Nevertheless it was a nice, quiet place to stop and take a breather from the crowds.

The Witch House - this is a bit of a misnomer as the house belonged to Jonathan Corwin, one of the judges of the trials. The house is the only structure left in the city that has direct ties to the trials and gives a much more authentic impression of daily life. The tour is self guided but there are volunteers stationed throughout ready to talk about particular items or history of the individuals that resided there. They have a limited capacity they’re required to stick to because of the house’s age so you may be in for a bit of a wait if you catch it during a busy hour. Tickets are about $10 for adults, sold in the gift shop.

Salem Witch Museum - They start the tour by seating visitors in a dark theatre. A recording plays, lighting up vignettes at scheduled points. These vignettes are maybe roughly 9 feet up from where you will be seated, not in sequential order, and cover a full 360° so swiveling your head up and around to find it is necessary. The recording and displays are rather dated; my guess is that they haven’t been changed since the museum’s founding in 1972 (to be honest I was rather expecting Vincent Prince to narrate). After this the group is lead into a small gallery with various placards and pop culture and news printouts. A guide will deliver a brief monologue and then you are free to view the gallery or filter into the gift shop. 

I was rather perturbed that the museum spent effort linking hysteria of the Salem witch trials to McCarthyism (and any other time the American media described a thing as a “witch hunt”) but did not give but the briefest lip service to the misogyny that drove the witch trials and the selection of its victims. Anxiety about attacks from indigenous people were mentioned, but nothing of the political tension of territory and property lines, the disputes between Salem and its many pastors, or the institution of witchcraft as a prosecutable offense in a court of common law by King James. For a museum on the trials it was very light on the details. I found more information available in the gift shop’s surprisingly thorough selection of books. You do have to buy tickets ($21 adults) somewhat in advance for tours that rotate on (I think) 45 minute intervals. 

Peabody Essex Museum - The Peabody Essex Museum is huge and hosts art and history exhibits. When I visited they had an exhibit on Qing Dynasty empresses and had just finished reconstructing brick by brick, tile by tile, a real Qing Dynasty ancestral home imported from Huizhou, China, Salem’s sister city. General admission is $20 for adults.

The Hocus Pocus House - The house used for the exterior of Max and Dani’s in the 1993 movie is a popular stop but it is quite a long walk away from the main tourist hub. I’m sure there are bus tours that would take you there, but like the spendthrift I am, I hoofed it. You can’t enter the house as it is a private residence so taking photos from across the street is the best you can get. The benefit of walking are the scenic views (at last! The quaint town I had imagined!) and meeting a neighbor a few doors down. She had fashioned a hedge from seashells and had delightful watchdog whose name escapes me, save that it was compound and started with “Sir.” I caught her outside gardening - or rather she caught me - and had a chat about the house, tourists, and living in Salem.

Witch City Mall - free multi-story parking! Get there early.

The Coven’s Cottage - Tools, ingredients, books, and more with an exclusive focus on Asatru.

HausWitch Home + Healing - prime example of the self-care industry meets new age spiritualism.

Artemisia Botanicals - Every powdered or raw ingredient you could likely hope for. I saw advertisements for their tea reading service but none was offered when I visited.

Hex Old World Witchery - a sister store to the one in New Orleans. It sells tools, spell ingredients, enchanted candles, jewelry, and some very jaunty pointed hats for ladies and gents.

Life Alive Organic Cafe - Organic vegan cafe. It has the Sanderson Sisters painted as vegetables on their window.

Opus - A fusion restaurant. The food was amazing and the service was great. They have live shows in their basement level. A perfect place for cocktails.

Adriatic Restaurant - Mediterranean and Italian fare. Decent, but pricey.

Caramel Pasteries & Macarons - Easily the best macarons in town. They also sell ice cream and a limited selection of coffee and tea.

The Satanic Temple Headquarters - Baphomet had just returned from his extended stay in Arkansas. The connected Salem Art Gallery and library was also open, and there were some rather striking vine and wicker sculpture work to greet you. And as expected, the people were quite friendly and helpful with recommendations for what else to do and see in Salem. The only downside is that it is a bit of a hike from downtown, but a much shorter one than the Hocus Pocus house. Self-guided tour is $15 for adults.

Street vendors - there are many of these out and about close to Halloween. You can buy whole bags (and whole bags only) of apple cider donuts and other goodies. Not something I normally go for but it was enjoyable. Bring cash.

Additional notes

There are loads of people in costume days before Halloween. If you are shyly deliberating on whether or not to pack a costume, you needn’t think on it further. Do it and have fun, my darling. 

However, I should warn you that if you are one of those that plans to wave a movie replica wand at traffic while shouting bad Latin, I can assure you that you aren’t the first to attempt this and the drivers will not be patient with you. Better to hustle along.

Salem has a noise ordinance that goes into affect at 10 PM on Halloween night. According to the local waitresses most folks don't begin to trickle into town until 10 AM or so that day. 

Essex street is cobbled, please wear comfortable shoes. 

Shop around! There are many shops selling largely the same merchandise. By and large you'll see the same prices but if you've got a sharp enough eye you can save yourself a bit of cash. 

Reserve your stay, wherever it is, AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. I reserved in January and still had to book a room 20 minutes away, which required a car rental. 

Speaking of which, if you're driving in from outside Salem, the lanes merge and disappear frequently and it can be a little stressful. Most of the drive into Salem is single lane through neighborhoods - school bus traffic included.

The temperature in late October is mild but the wind chill coming off the sea makes it feel at least 10°F cooler. And it’s quite windy - wear your hair up. Preferably add a hat lest you show up on someone’s doorstep looking like Sadako, as I did.

[hazard-and-friends]

i watched the first episode of canine intervention tonight, here’s some uncensored liveblogging featuring my spicey dog training takes:

“my dog training system is known all over the world" mhmm. lemme google this guy.

by clicking through his in person training site to his online remote training course, i found a whole lot of big red flags: "Establish pack leadership" dogs don't have pack leaders. anyone who wants to make you a leader is not using a good understanding of dog behavior "Time your praise and corrections" the times when i use corrections are when i'm the least on my game. my goal is NEVER to use corrections/positive punishment. why should i? it's concerning that he uses it as a core part of his method. "Exercise and reinforce your leadership as a way of life" more leadership bullshit.

fancy letters are not the end-all-be-all, and there are trainers i seriously respect who have none of them. but they don't talk about leadership and corrections. it's concerning that he talks about his sports team as a kid, where he went to high school, and his celebrity clients, but not his mentors and education in training.

back to the show

why does his facility have enough dogs to keep them in kennels? how does that teach aggressive dogs how to be safe in a home environment?

not all of the dogs in the first shot of a class (~1:38) have two collars on but a lot do. that's not a red flag (i worked sydney in two collars [her flat collar and a martingale, because syd was very gear smart and it was nice to tell her that we were doing heeling now]) but with what i saw on his website? it's quite likely that one of those is the dog's normal flat collar with tags, and the other is a prong, choke chain, or electric collar

also: "I help the dogs that no one else will" is a flat out lie

if you're willing to take on any human aggression cases, generally you’re willing to take on all of them. now, some of these cases may generally lead to a recommendation of euthanasia. but that's in the best interests of the dog and owner

oop class shot where it's clear that they're wearing prongs

here's two points not about this guy specifically: 1) it is hard (impossible?) to do humane, ethical dog training in a 45 minute episode slot. it's not good tv. it's slow as hell. there's no drama. the aggression trainers i know? have never been bitten. many have never been CLOSE to being bitten. no tv value. 2) the positive dog training community is OVERWHELMINGLY white and middle class.

it's also full of racists.

"Nearly a million dogs are euthanized yearly and over 40% of them are pit bulls" i've calculated that first statistic myself, but it's important to put it in context: this is USA specific, and that's down from 3-4 million 20 years ago. the second one, i would love to see his source.

he's right that it's important to understand where aggression comes from

anyway back to those two points, at the same time that it's really, really hard to do compelling TV with ethical dog trainers, it's also really REALLY important that the positive dog training community be working on being anti-racist. and it's really, really important that low income dog owners and people of color are getting good dog training.

alright first case! he's had her 3 months, 3 bites in that time. 10 attempted attacks. she's a young adult bully breed mix who had one front leg amputated after being shot. owner walks her in a muzzle which is a) too small and b) not bite proof.

"I see what we're working with" he says, after approaching a dog in her crate. hazard responds similarly to someone coming in, but he's not a bite risk. that's not a good evaluation.

he is correct about lady macbeth's motivations: this is a dog who's scared as hell and making herself really big and scary so that everyone leaves her alone.

okay he's also right that playing with her around strangers is really, really good for fear aggression

"frenzied just chaotic state" yeah no

reality check for y'all: i am not an aggression specialist and i have seen more freaked out dogs

she was on edge! she was unhappy! but holy shit was she not even remotely close to what dogs are capable of

"she just bit me!" she nipped your cheek, not breaking skin. that's a level 1 or 2 (of 6). that's not NOTHING but it's well within normal for a dog who's being restrained when she wants to be somewhere else.

[note that at no point in the episode was the owner ever given any sort of indication that lady macbeth is not this horribly aggressive Pit Bull TM. nor was there any discussion of a bite scale.]

"The only option we're gonna have is to [board and train] for 3 weeks" "I have no choice but to take her back to my facility back in San Jose and work daily with her" no!!!!!

[15 minute break]

lmao sorry i had to go yell at gf about how much this board and train is not necessary and in the process penny decided to cause Drama again

ANYWAY, the b&t is not necessary because all of those aggressive incidents bar the first could have been avoided if the owner was on the ball. this is not JUST a lady macbeth issue, this is ALSO an owner issue. both of them need to relearn how to handle new people.

as a bonus, lady macbeth needs to learn to trust her owner, which she categorically cannot do in a b&t

"The box is an important training tool to teaching new behaviors. It's also a first step in establishing pack leadership" ok this is new to me

and new is not a good thing here

text: Obedience depends on a dog's trust and respect for their pack leader calculus depends on your trust and respect for your math teacher! if you respect them a lot you will magically be able to do calc!

I WAS HOPING. I WAS TRYING.

i was HOPING that his training for her fear aggression would be based in toy play.

instead he's got a fake arm and he keeps reaching out to poke her, and the owner says "no!" and does a leash pop (leash wrapped around her neck) every time she tries to bite.

"She doesn't know it's not his hand" it smells like plastic what would she THINK it is

also funky that we're 19 minutes into the episode about an aggressive bully breed mix and the trainer's childhood bully breed mix who killed a dog, and like. not a single mention of what these dogs were bred for.

let's go back to "how are you teaching aggressive dogs to live nicely in a home, if they are spending most of the day in a wire kennel"

for shits take, high school doesn't teach you how to handle your emotions! why should obedience class teach your dog the same?

and then like, every time she breaks the down he yells NOPE and leans over her??????

dude you're scaring her into being obedient. while you're talking about how it's important to treat her fear.

text: Fear based aggression can be reduced by desensitizing the dog to strangers you're right! it sure can! THAT'S NOT WHAT YOU'RE DOING HERE

you've got a dog on her side with one hand over her, the other on a skinny check chain on her neck. every time she does anything but lay flat, the leash is popped and you say no. you are flooding this dog and creating learned helplessness.

jo summed it up well with this: he's good at seeing the behavior, he knows what he's looking at, he just can't change it. he only knows one method.

jo and i are now trying to figure out if "dog training but marie kondo not cesar milan" is a viable tv show

jas correctly stops the friend and changes how he approaches the dog, that's a good response

i'm laughing bc after a 3 week board and train which is not going to be less than $4k, he's giving the exact same "how to meet new people" directions that i would give to a similar client--at the start of our time! not at the end!

"I can't imagine imagine a dog having it too much worse than she did, the fact that she took a gunshot, the fact that she had no security for years of her life" alright dude a) think worse, this PALES to abuse cases b) let's not? shittalk? the care that people without reliable housing give to their dogs (and occasional cat!)?? because what they do for their pets is incredible, and it isn't necessarily connected to her opinions on strangers

so yeah still laughing bc like. that "happy ending" would be my first session with a client. that's how you START handling stranger danger. and for this the owner paid thousands.

[rosesvioletshardy]

life as we know it - b.h. prologue

okay this is my first ben fic and i’m sorry if it’s not as good as others so yeah

also this is sort of based off of the movie with the same title but it’s a lot different when it comes to some of the chapters.

this is also going to start off in 2016 and i haven’t decided if it’s also going to take place in present time but it’s going to be built up over the years

*note: i am american and i don’t know that much about england or the uk in general so i will try my best and research and make sure things are accurate. i also imagined lennon as hayley williams and christian as robert pattinson

also another note i’m really sorry if it’s terrible i haven’t really written a fanfic in a long time and i’m trying to get back into it rather than just reading it 

masterlist

summary: when their two best friends die, it’s up to ben and y/n to take care of their goddaughter and face the challenges that come with it

# of words: 2029 

warnings: none really

(not proofread) 

February 2016 

there were better things y/n could be doing on a saturday night which included watching netflix, drinking wine, and cleaning. this saturday night wasn't going to be that way for her. Now she was getting ready for a date her best friend lennon set her up on. lennon and y/n  have been best friends since they can remember and they've had their ups and downs but now since they're adults they deal with it like adults should. 

lennon worked as an elementary teacher and her boyfriend christian worked as a lawyer and a successful one too, at least he wasn't one of the stuck up ones and was just one just trying to help people out. when lennon found out y/n had broken up with her boyfriend of 2 years and spent months not going out and trying to find someone new or getting laid, she told christian because she thought christian's best friend ben, would be a great guy for her. 

now here she was, in her bedroom of her tiny apartment getting ready for a blind date she wasn't entirely too excited for, but she knew she had to go out someday for the sake of lennon

"when i said that i owe you one, this isn't exactly what i meant you know" y/n said to lennon as she strapped on her heels before picking her phone back up and taking it off speaker 

"yes, but when was the last time you went on a date, and i'm talking like a real date and one that didn't involve staying indoors and not getting laid?" lennon told y/n  knowing that she was right since the last time she went on a date was the night she found out her ex cheated on her while she waited at a restaurant alone.

it's not like her ex was that bad, it's just he didn't put enough into their relationship in order to make any of them that happy. y/n knew her best friend was right and she didn't want to disappoint her since it was christian's friend lennon was setting her up with. ben wasn't a bad guy from what lennon gathered off of christian and y/n wasn't a bad girl. they both had great paying jobs, they're both good looking and they both love their best friends and their own families.

from what y/n gathered, ben was an actor and was soon to star in more things since leaving EastEnders. she never really watched the show because she didn’t understand the hype about the soap opera even though she had been living in the uk since she was 20. her grandparents on the other hand did enjoy it so she would see it every now and then before she moved out from their house.

"you know i hate it when you're right, right?'' y/n told her as she took another look in the mirror and checking her makeup making sure nothing is messed up too badly

"and also he's 45 minutes late. i thought you said he was punctual." she added as she looked at the clock in her living room

"okay those were christian's words not mine, and don't worry maybe he had something quick to do before coming over?" lennon said hoping that she was right

"Yeah, maybe. I don't know maybe it's just the nerves talking. I mean, I don't really know him as a person but I have seen a few of his stuff so hopefully he's like what people have described him as." y/n said taking one last look in the mirror before hearing her doorbell ring

"okay i think he's here. got to go, and i'll talk you later about how it goes" she said

"tell me everything and don't leave out a single thing. i mean it. love you!" lennon told her

"love you too."

as soon as y/n hung up, she took a deep breath and walked over to her door to see ben

"he's not bad looking in real life" she thought

but the only thing that was throwing her off was for the fact that he was an hour late and wearing jeans and a t-shirt. completely opposite of what she had on, which was a little fancier

"are you y/n? lennon's best friend and the one her and christian set up on a date with me?" ben asked as the two awkwardly stood there

"yeah i am. you must be ben then. it's nice to finally meet you." y/n asked trying hard not to blush

"am i late?" he then asked. 

he really needed to ask you that wow

"only by an hour, but who's keeping time, i was just finishing up." she said

"oh okay."

the two stood there for a few more minutes before finally deciding to leave. y/n locked up her apartment before turning back to him and leaving. as the two walked through the complex to the parking lot, y/n decided to spark up a conversation

"so, how long have you known christian?" she curiously asked

"um, we've been friends since we were kids, 10, i think, after we got into a fight over the stupidest thing" ben laugh at the memory

"really? what was it? if you don't mind me asking." 

"it was over the last copy of a cd at a record store. they almost ended up kicking us out until the stock guy brought out more copies." ben said smiling before reaching for the gate and opening it for y/n

"i've known lennon since we were 8 and we've been irreplaceable ever since. where's your car?" y/n asked looking around and not seeing one

"right here" ben told her pointing to the motorcycle

"oh" she said with a shock on her face 

"here you go." ben said while handing her a helmet into her hands

"c'mon, it doesn't bite." he continued when he saw her still standing there 

"i'm just not really dressed for 40 mile an hour-" y/n started as she tried to talk over the engine of the bike in front of her

"what" ben asked then cutting the engine off

"i'm not dressed for 40 mile an hour winds. i'm sorry" she said before continuing

"i don't think i could get my leg up over it in this dress. but my car is right there and it's new and i do love driving it." she finished pointing to the small red car  "wow, um. okay." ben said completely shocked at the tiny car hoping it'll be able to fit the two adults

y/n unlocked her car and got right into the driver's seat, whilst ben opened the passengers door and got in, looking around and hoping that no one would see them. as he got in he immediately regretted not taking his car and taking his bike instead and now he was cramped into a tiny car he wasn't even sure was meant for more than one person

"okay. um, where are we going?" ben asked her

"i thought you said you were going to make reservations?" y/n asked as she looked into his green eyes

"oh" ben said as the color drained from face forgetting to do the one thing he said he was going to

"you didn't make them?" she questioned him confused

"i said that?" ben answered her knowing damn well he was supposed to do that

"it's fine. it's fine really. whatever" y/n said sitting there not knowing what to do now

"well we can go somewhere else. you can pick wherever you want." ben asked her thinking that it'll solve everything

"um, we can go to cafe five? my friend from culinary school actually the-" y/n began to talk before she got interrupted from ben's phone ringing

"i'm really sorry"

"no it's okay, go ahead. you can answer it if you-" she said before ben talked again

"no, no, it's fine. i'll let it go to voicemail." ben told her all attention going back to her

"like i was saying. my friend from culinary school is actually the-" y/n tried to say but ben's phone just kept ringing

"you know, just answer it. i can wait" she told him already getting annoyed but not showing it 

ben whispers a slight "sorry" and pulled his phone out from his back pocket

"hey. well you know me. i'm always in the middle of something, always busy. 11? yeah, okay. i'll be there. wait actually, let's make it 10:30." ben said whispering the last part thinking that she wouldn't hear him

"okay. seen you later then. bye" ben finished and he hung up and put his phone back into his pocket. he turns to her and begins to talk again

"i'm really sorry about that. it's um, it's a sick friend. sorry." ben told her, completely lying his ass off 

"you know, we...we don't have to do this"

"really?" ben questioned as she gave a slight chuckle

"okay." he continued as he started to unbuckle his seat belt and get ready to leave the car

"oh my god. are you serious?" y/n asked not believing what was happening

"let's be honest adults here. you knew the moment you saw me, you didn't like me."

"no, but our mutual friends set this up, so i think that we owe it to them to-" y/n said before ben interrupted her

"to what?" he asked

"spend a few hours faking small talk? look, the best case for us is that we get drunk and possibly hook up." he finished

"what kind of an asshole are you? whenever lennon and christian talked about you, they always made it seem like you were this super nice and sweet guy. but i guess i thought wrong." she said not believing him over what he's doing at the moment

"look it's a saturday night. i just want to have some fun before i end up going back to film something. i can go see my sick friend and you can go do whatever it is you like to do on a saturday night." ben told her hesitating on that last sentence about his "sick" friend

"you can go read a book? you look like you read books" ben continued

y/n looked at him and was shocked, mad that he would say something like that. "maybe all men are pieces of shit" she thought, except for christian because she saw the way he looked and loved lennon like she was the only person in the world

"okay. if you wanted to ensure that this wasn't gonna be a lousy night, here's a tip- don't show up an hour late, and don't take a booty call in front of me." she basically yelled at him

"she's sick" ben argued back

"oh, yes. were you going to heal her with your magic penis?" y/n asked tired of his shit already

"okay. fine. if you want to go out and have some dinner-"

"oh my god, i can't believe what i'm hearing right now. i'm not going to go out with you now! are you crazy?!" she said as she took the key out of the ignition and getting out of her car

"and get out of my car." she finished

"i have no idea what lennon and christian were thinking. i don't know what i was thinking."

"yeah me neither" ben agreed 

as y/n was walking back to her apartment, and ben starting up his bike again, she called lennon

"y/n! that was quick, did everything go alright? are you going to get some?" lennon asked praying everything worked out alright

"no. he got a booty call right in front of me and was acting like a dick. the only way you are going to make this up for me is if you promise that i never have to see him again.

"you know that won't be possible. how about i come over to yours and we'll spend it together?" 

"fine" she said 

for ben on the other hand, he called christian and told him the exact same thing y//n told lennon, but little did they know it was never going to happen.

[harlem82themovie]

All the multiples of 3, please :)

Wow, okay...

3. Do you really think there is somebody for everybody?

Yes and no, I don't think there's one somebody for everybody. But I do think everybody can find somebody that fits them

6. Are your platonic relationships just as valuable as romantic or family ones?

Absolutely! Romantic relationships are special that intimacy is so fulfilling but a platonic relationship..? someone you chose and that chose you and is there before and after those romantic relationships that is the most valuable.

9. Would you be happy with a life without romance?

No. There are lots of kinds of love but I don't think humans are meant to live without romantic love.

12. Do you have the feeling you’ve lost something you might have had in another life - whether it be a person, a place, a world, a language, etc.?

I don't think so I definitely feel like I'm learning everything for the first time in this life.

15. Do you think you’re special, or just another person amongst billions? Can you be both?

Definitely both, I am just one person among billions but we are all so special.

18. Are you religious? Do you think your religion is ‘correct’?

I am an atheist. I have no idea what's "correct". All I know is I try to love all my brothers and sisters on this planet and I have no idea what happens when we die.

21. Do you have somebody, whether it be a friend or stranger, who you think you could have loved if the circumstances were different?

I do. There is someone who I believed I had a connection with. She gave me one of the kindest compliments that any has ever given me.

24. Do you think you really understand your gender and sexuality?

Yes, I think gender and sexuality are a spectrum and I understand my wants and needs.

27. Are you afraid of growing old?

I'm not afraid of growing old or dying, but I am afraid I won't find happiness again before I die.

30. Are your choices fated or of your own free will?

Definitely free will. But that doesn't mean we have control. Everyone else's choices affect us as well.

33. How old do you have to be to be considered an adult?

I'm not sure it's based on age more so on how much responsibility you have.

36. Have you ever met someone who had a very similar personality to your own? Did you get along?

No, I'm a giant weirdo. I've never met anyone who's personality was particularly similar.

39. Do you know what you want out of life?

I thought I did but I lost it. Now I need to learn to want something else.

42. Is freewill an illusion?

Maybe, but if it is an illusion it doesn't change how we experience it.

45. Do you want to be remembered after your death? What for?

I hope I am remembered. For loving, for teaching and for helping to create some positive change.

48. Are you free? Will you ever be? Can anyone be truly free?

I am not. Under capitalism only the rich have any real freedom. If we work together as a society maybe we can all be free one day.

51. What question could you ask to find out the most about a person?

"What are you passionate about"? Is a good start.

54. Can human really understand the complete nature of the universe, space and time?

Probably not. We can't even see most light wavelengths.

57. Do you thinks humans are obsessed with escapism (books, video games, movies, etc.)? Are you looking for an escape? Do you think that’s a bad thing?

I love all of those things. I think humans are naturally creative and dreamers it's our nature.

60. What do you think the next era of fashion will be like?

More gender fluid.

63. How confident are you, really?

It really depends. I have terribly low self esteem but some times I'm just feeling myself and I can hold court in any space.

66. How do you feel about the idea ‘an eye for an eye’?

I don't think revenge is productive.

69. Can you be in love with someone and still fall in love with someone else?

I've only ever been in love once I don't know if it will happen again.

72. Should people be prosecuted for crimes that weren’t considered crimes at the time?

I guess it depends on the crime. No one should be allowed to hurt other people.

75. Do we have a moral obligation to care for others? To what extent?

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs"  - Karl Marx

78. Are you ever going to be satisfied?

I have been. I hope I will be again.

81. Would you marry a friend if they needed you to (e.g. for citizenship)?

If I could help someone I probably would.

84. Are you who people think you are?

I don't have any idea who people think I am. But I am honest (at least I think I am).

87. Do you anger easily?

No, I've become very even temperd as I've gotten older.

90. Given the chance to reset your life (with none of the knowledge you currently have), would you take it?

There was a lot of pain. And some real happiness but I'd keep moving forward.

93. Do you draw meaning from your dreams, or do you disregard them?

I seldom remember my dreams but the ones I remember tend to be prophetic. I heed their warnings as best I can.

96. Is your perception of yourself similar or the same to how others perceive you?

I sometimes wish I Kew how other people perceive me.

99. Do you believe in magic? Are you superstitious?

I've never seen any evidence of magic.

[mintypineapple]

dw ask game 1-36 and 38-100 DON'T ANSWER NUMBER 37 I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT CRYING

DaThanks, anon who is probably @truestoriesaboutme!

CHILDHOOD

1. Did you like DW as a child?

Depends. What do you consider a child? I saw Doctor Who for the first time when I was 16 or 17. Does that count? Let’s say that it does. I did enjoy it.

2. Your age at the time of the revival?

16.

3. First DW episode you ever saw?

An Unearthly Child. I wanted to watch it all in order! Still do! My first New Who episode was “Blink,” as forced upon me by @raisegrate. I did enjoy it.

4. Did you have any of the toys?

I didn’t at the time, but I do now. I have a couple of screwdrivers, a Fourth Doctor, an Ice Warrior, and not-quite-Legos of Doctors 1-11. (-WD)

5. Which DW character did you play on the playground?

N/A.

6. Monster(s) that scared you most as a child?

N/A. Nothing scares me.

7. Joke/story you didn’t get as a kid?

N/A. I get all jokes/stories.

8. DW opinion that has changed since you were a kid?

That the only way to watch it was from the very beginning. I eventually gave in and watched New Who before finishing Classic Who.

9. Who introduced you to DW?

Pretty sure I heard about it initially on a forum I went to called The Douglas Adams Continuum. That’s when I started watching the First Doctor. Again, @raisegrate showed me my first New Who. Eventually, I started watching New Who in its entirety with @catastrofries and they started watching Classic Who with me for @rassilonwatchathon.

10. Did you like Sarah Jane Adventures as a child?

Didn’t even know it existed as a child. But I liked it as an adult.

Read more under the cut. There’s a lot!

DOCTOR

11. Who is your Doctor?

One. He’s the first I saw and I’ve went through some of his more than once, due to the podcast, so he has a special place in my heart.

12. Your favourite Doctor?

It varies depending on the day. I quite like Two, Eleven, and Twelve, though.

13. Least favourite Doctor?

Possibly 5 or 13? More because they don’t get a whole lot to do, than them being bad.

14. Best regeneration?

Technically speaking, there’s something about that first one that is still so good. Emotionally speaking, Two’s regeneration is terrifying and I quite like Twelve’s speech before regenerating.

15. Do you like “Doctor-Lite” episodes?

Yeah! They’re all pretty good! Even “Love and Monsters!” Yeah, I said it! (The end is bad, but the rest is good.)

16. Who is the most human Doctor?

One calls himself human a handful of times. Does that count? If not, definitely Five. He seems the most like a regular guy in a weird situation out of all of them.

17. Best multi-Doctor story?

The Day of the Doctor, for sure.

18. Best Doctor monologue?

Eleven’s speech to young Amy in “The Big Bang.” That episode is just solid all around.

19. What do you think TenToo/MetaCrisis Doctor is doing now?

He’s definitely fucked off somewhere and abandoned Rose. He runs a cat cafe that is definitely a front for something, but no one can quite figure out what.

20. Best Doctor/companion pairing?

One/Barbara, Two/Jamie, Three/Jo, Four/Leela, Five/Tegan, (haven’t seen enough of Six, any of Seven, and I honestly don’t remember the companion for Eight), Nine/Rose (that’s the only option!), Ten/Donna, Eleven/Amy-Rory, Twelve/Clara, Ruth/Thirteen.

COMPANIONS

21. Favourite companion?

Classic Who: This is hard. Jamie? Sarah Jane? Leela? New Who: Donna Noble.

22. Favourite secondary companion?

Not sure what this means exactly... My second favorite? If so, I gave three for favorite Classic Who, so one of them. New Who: Rory.

23. Least favourite companion?

Classic: Ben Jackson or Peri. New: Ryan.

24. Best TARDIS Team?

Classic: Two, Jamie, and Zoe. New: Eleven, Amy, and Rory.

25. Most underrated companion?

I love Steven Taylor. I feel like he doesn’t get mentioned enough.

26. Most overrated companion?

Probably gonna get some hate for this, but Romana II. She’s good and I like her, but I was expecting a lot more. I honestly prefer Romana I.

27. Favourite companion’s family?

I love Rory’s dad.

28. Who should have been a companion but wasn’t?

Kamelion. AM I RIGHT? But seriously, Amelia Rumford from “The Stones of Blood.”

29. Favourite (canon or non-canon) DW universe relationship?

Amy/Rory.

30. Who did you not used to like, but really like now?

I hated Tegan when she first came on, but now I love her.

EPISODES

31. Favourite episode ever?

“Heaven Sent.”

32. Least favourite episode?

“Time-Flight” gave me a literal headache.

33. Which episodes do you skip?

NONE. Of course, I’ve not done any rewatches. YET.

34. Best two-parter?

“The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances” are the first New Who episodes that fully sold me on the show.

35. Historical, present day or futuristic episodes?

Give me the future and make it weird!

36. Episode that will always make you smile?

“The Myth Makers.”

37 HAS BEEN REDACTED.

38. Best run of episodes?

“Vincent and the Doctor” through “Day of the Moon” is pretty solid.

39. Best cliffhanger?

“Vengeance on Varos.” Hands fucking down.

40. Favourite Christmas special?

The answer to question 37. “A Christmas Carol.”

SERIES

41. Classic Who or New Who?

Yes please! (Though New Who will take this a little just because the pace is generally a lot better.)

42. Favourite series?

I’m not sure about Classic (I have a harder time thinking of them as different series), but New is definitely 5.

43. Least favourite series?

11.

44. Which series do you skip?

See 33.

45. Favourite series opening?

“The Eleventh Hour.” It’s just a lot of fun.

46. Favourite series finale?

“The Big Bang.” IT’S A GOOD SERIES.

47. Best series arc?

So I don’t sound repetitive and say Series 5 again, Clara’s arc in her last season is great.

48. Thoughts on series 11/12?

I find it largely boring and not well-written. Though there are some things I like! I love Ruth a bunch.

49. How much of Classic Who have you seen?

I’ve seen from “An Unearthly Child” to “The Two Doctors.” And the movie.

50. Who should have had another series?

Doctor: Nine. Or Eight. Or Ruth. Companion: Kamelion, but done better.

MONSTERS

51. Favourite monster/villain?

I love them Fuzzy Chicken Nuggets. (The Yeti.)

52. Most creative monster?

The Silence are an interesting concept.

53. Monster(s) that scares you most?

OAK AND QUILL from “Fury From the Deep.” Fuck those guys.

54. Monster you think is too easy to defeat?

I hate power level questions. Next.

55. Least favourite monster/villain?

I get really tired of the Daleks sometimes, y’all.

56. Monster you want to return?

Chumblies or quarks.

57. In your opinion, what makes a monster good?

The writing. You can do great things with most of them. Even the ones you dislike. Like, I hate the farting aliens, but they are occasionally used well.

58. Daleks, Cybermen or Weeping Angels?

If I had to pick, I’d say... Cybermen. Daleks are very samey and loud. Weeping Angels get less interesting every time they are used. But there’s a human element to the Cybermen that, when utilized, can be very effective and unsettling.

59. Best Dalek story?

The one where Two rides around on ones he made nice.

60. Best one time villain/monster?

I don’t know what it is, but whatever it is in “Midnight.”

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL

61. Torchwood or Sarah Jane Adventures?

SJA is more consistent, but the highs of Torchwood are higher.

62. Favourite Torchwood Team member?

Owen. But like... not season one Owen.

63. Which Torchwood death made you saddest?

See 62.

64. Do you rewatch COE or MD?

I haven’t rewatched anything yet. But I would rewatch COE before MD.

65. Favourite SJA Team member?

Clyde.

66. Mr Smith or K-9?

Mr. Smith is way more interesting. He had a villain arc!

67. Maria or Rani?

Rani.

68. Do you read the comics/novels or listen to Big Finish?

Some. I’m doing them as Patreon bonus episodes for @rassilonwatchathon​. I haven’t done much though.

69. If you do, your favourite additional stories?

“The Chimes of Midnight.” I’ve listened to it twice.

70. Do you like DW analysis (video essays, fan theories, etc)?

I do DW analysis for @rassilonwatchathon AND The Dipp. So yes. My fave is TARDIS Eruditorum, though.

I’LL ANSWER THE REST AT A LATER TIME. I MUST BE WITH MY PEOPLE NOW.