#I’m a mature grown woman and it wasn’t even that bad a video and I shouldn’t need to feel embarrassed

[snizx]

.

[thefanficmonster]

Matured

Corpse Husband & Little Sister Reader (Female)

Warnings: Swearing

Genre: Sibling Fluff, Humor, RPF (Real Person Fic)

Summary: Corpse’s search for a roommate ends shortly after his little sister calls him, telling him she’s moving out of her high school dorm in the suburbs following her graduation to attend college in San Francisco.

Requested by @bugger2002  Hi darling! Thank you so much for this adorable request, I had such a fun time turning it into a fic! Sorry it has taken me so long to complete it but here it finally is and I hope you enjoy the read! Love, Vy ❤

Alright, it’s been a month since Y/N announced she’d be moving in with me - no, she didn’t ask if she could nor if I’d want her to, she straight up casually informed me she’d be moving in with me since she’s starting college. I’m lucky she even thought to tell me, knowing her it wouldn’t have been so strange for her to just show up on my doorstep with a grin like “Alright, I live here now.” Having a six years younger sister who can act both younger and older than me - sometimes both at the same time - is a bit complex. Obviously, my protective and nurturing brotherly instinct kicks in whenever she complains to me about something, but seconds later she tells me she’s taken care of it already and I feel like a fool for overreacting even if it was only internal. She’s calm and rational when she needs to be and a reckless airhead whose only goal is to have fun when she wants to be.

And judging by her and her friends’ main methods of obtaining said fun I can see how much alike we are: playing drunk video games, drunk darts, drunk pool. You see, there’s a lot of drinking involved and that’s something I’m greatly unhappy with and have scolded her on countless times just to get a fake promise, probably with fingers crossed behind her back - that she’ll cut down the alcohol. Not to mention she’s not even old enough to drink so I’ve been very insistent on her cutting her bad habit. She’s tried calling me hypocritical at times but she can’t do so rightfully since I’m, you know, of drinking age. So she’s basically bound by law to follow my advice and orders.

At least now that she’ll be staying with me I’ll be able to keep a better eye on her. A rascal high school student will either mature-up in college or go even more downhill. I aim to make her fall in the first category, but I’m making no promises - she’s very unruly, just like me. Damn, never did I think my own traits would come hitting me in the back of the head like a boomerang but here we are.

Regardless of all the crap I’ve just spewed about her, she’s a wonderful girl. She’s always been my pillar of support and never gets tired of it. She never misses a call of mine and has never not replied to a message of mine, no matter how drunk she’s been. She’s never skipped a Saturday night Skype call, no matter how busy she’s been. She’s never let herself forget she has a brother who often times needs her by his side.

Once she even talked one of her friends who has a car and a driver’s license drive her all the way to my apartment complex when I was having a really bad anxiety attack and legit couldn’t talk on the phone. She went door to door to find which apartment I live in and stayed with me the whole weekend she was supposed to spend at a music festival or something. It’s not wonder she’ll be a med student - she’s always wanted to be a nurse and has practically been my personal nurse since she was twelve. She maybe wasn’t always physically present to help me, but she’s a great instruction giver for when I need her and she’s unable to come to my aid.

Well now, we’ll both be there to aid one another.

“BEEP BEEP FUCKER!“

I nearly flip off my chair at the distinct yelling coming from directly below my window. I’d recognize that voice anywhere, and it’d always bring a smile to my face without fail.

I rush to get up from my desk chair and open the window but when I do so, she’s no longer on the sidewalk. There’s only a car I recognize to be the one of the friend that drove her here during that nightmarish episode I explained earlier.

Before I can ever back away from the window, I hear my front door swing open and a yell echo from down the hall, “Corpse! How many times do I need to tell you to lock your door, damn it!”

“The same amount of times I’ve had to tell you to cut down on the al- WHOA!“ She doesn’t let me finish the sentence and jumps me the second I step out in the hallway.

“Missed you, stupid!“ She says, her legs wrapped around my waist as she ruffles my hair, “I’ll trim your hair later. Why have you let it get so long?“ She questions, furrowing her brows at me while running both her hands through my mess of a hair - she has a point, I’ve let it get out of control. While doing so, she seems to get an idea all of a sudden so she quickly climbs down, reminding me of the huge height difference we have now that her feet are on the floor. “I know you two have met before, but I think you need to re-meet...“ she says, turning to look at her friend who’s smiling timidly at her. She sends the flustered girl a wink before turning back to look at me, “Corpse, I’d like you to meet Abbey, my girlfriend“ she says proudly, skipping over to the blue haired girl and wrapping an arm around her shoulders. Y/N pushes up on her tiptoes and places a kiss on her girlfriend’s cheek. It’s adorable to see her shorter than yet another person she clearly adores to annoy.

I smile at the two girls, holding back a chuckle as to not embarrass Abbey more, “Well then, nice to meet you Abbey. You should know you are one strong soul to be putting up with all that.“ I purposely don’t look at Y/N as I motion towards her, earning me a pissed off “Hey!“ as a response to my remark, “Stick around for dinner, don’t worry neither of us will be cooking.“ I point at myself and then at Y/N as if to reassure her she won’t be a victim of food poisoning.

“Actually...“ Abbey says, tilting her head to look my shortie sister in the eyes as if taunting her to say something.

She finally caves, raising her left hand as though she’s volunteering, “Ugh fine, I may or may not have taken a cooking course and may or may not know how to cook a decent meal. It’s whatever, really.”

To say I’m impressed would be an understatement. I’m impressed, shocked, surprised and flooded with joy that my sister has finally decided to start maturing. “Cooking course, huh? When did you decide living off of takeout isn’t a nice way to live?”

She rolls her eyes at me, “Oh no I still go full weeks with only takeout and cereal, I just needed a distraction because...well...” she trails off, her gaze dropping awkwardly as she fishes for words or perhaps already has them found but doesn’t want to spit them out.

Abbey huffs, taking Y/N’s hand and lifting it to show off her wrist where I catch sight of a batch of colorful handmade bracelets, “Because these aren’t gonna earn themselves.”

I raise an eyebrow, puzzled as to what exactly she’s referring to.

Y/N sighs, taking one of the bracelets, playing with it nervously, “I have one for every month I’ve spent without getting drunk - Abbey made them for me. I need a distraction to stay sober so...I took up cooking.“

I can’t remember a moment I haven’t felt proud of my sister. Y/N’s always been on top of her shit, drunk or sober she knows what she’s doing. She’s mindful even when she’s reckless, thinks soberly even when she’s been drinking heavily. She’s always proved herself to me and to the people who think of her as a lowlife without even trying. She lets the world breeze by her without thinking too much of it and yet she still mesmerizes me and many of the people she meets - Abbey has now officially joined the club.

But, all things said and considered, I think I’ve never felt as proud of her as I do right now, seeing those six bracelets on her wrist - half a year without getting drunk. I know she wouldn’t lie to Abbey, she rarely lies to me too, so those bracelets have been earned and well-deserved and that makes me feel like the Y/N I remember is not the one standing in front of me right now. That silly girl is still in the suburbs, making a shitty-ass choice of messing up her liver. A grown woman, a responsible adult has taken her place though, and I couldn’t be more glad.

“Y/N...“ I finally manage to utter her name, making her gaze meet mine, “I’m so fucking proud of you.“

A smile slowly stretches the corners of her mouth upwards, her eyes shning in a way that has nothing to do with the lighting in this hallway. She’s not a crier though, I know those tears are gonna stay right there, stubbornly refusing to escape her eyes, “Thanks, Corpse. I’m proud of you too....” she says, nodding her head slowly, “I can overlook the untrimmed hair.”

Sigh

Y/N will always be Y/N no matter what I guess. That’s a good thing - I love her just the way she is.

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[badapricot]

Lovely Writer: Special 1

This is a rough translation of the first Lovely Writer special. There are 8 in total and other side stories that the author compiled. I’ll try to post 1 a week since they do vary in length, and some are a lot lengthier than this one.

This special is from Nubsib’s POV and it’s about Nubsib remembering his feelings for Gene after seeing him on Facebook, and becoming fixated. Nubsib is 15 at the time and Gene is 20.

At that time, I was in the ninth grade.

Since middle school, my parents had sent me to study abroad with my brother. Because of the wealth of my family, this was never an inconvenience. But living alone in a place that wasn’t your home country required a lot of adjustment, mainly doing everything on your own. You had to learn things that you’ve never seen and known. 

This was one of the methods of teaching the sons of the Thanakitpaisan family.

It was their luck to have a son who was mature since childhood. It didn't take long for me to get used to the culture there, where I went to parties, attended sports clubs, worked a part-time job, and even had typical American teen sex. Being Asian did give me some advantages, when it came to distinguishing myself from the others.

I could only smile when talking to the many blonde women who bragged about our experiences in bed, amongst their group of friends. After some time, I felt differently about it.

"Sib.”

"Yes?" I leaned back on the sofa, and raised my head from his screen when I heard my name.

Neung came downstairs. He was wearing a thick gray cardigan with a scarf. "I’m going to go meet a friend. You're not going anywhere today, right? "

"Hmm."

"Okay, I might be coming back late. Please get my package when it arrives. You’re not going out with your girlfriend, right?”

"We broke up.”

"Huh?” Neung frowned. "You dumped another one? Again? You know, you don’t have the face of a womanizer.”

"…"

Neung opened the door of the house. For a moment, the cool outside air blew in, until the hot air from the heater disappeared. I didn’t care much about either, and stayed looking at my phone screen.

I’m not a womanizer.

It’s just that every time I got together with a girlfriend, something felt wrong. I knew I wasn’t in love with the first girl. The others, I didn’t like particularly much. Sometimes the girls didn’t like me much either, and only wanted a partner themselves, so we’d eventually separate.

It was true, that I was only in the ninth grade. But sex here was too normalized. It had become so normal that I’d become bored. When sex became so commonplace, all excitement was lost.

Mom: (send picture)

Mom: I’ve sent you Thai ingredients that should be delivered soon. They’ll be waiting for you.

Mom: Today, I went to see Aunt Run, do you still remember the house next door? Today is the Aunt's birthday. All of her sons have come home.

Mom: I saw it and I missed you and Neung.

I looked at the message that popped up, from the other side of the world. It was dark here, but over there it was probably in the middle of the day. It was time for them to eat.

Mom: Do you remember Gene? Gene and Jap are all grown up.

Gene?

After reading my mother’s message, it was natural to think of the past. I missed it. During my childhood I would run and play with him everyday, and just the same, Gene would play with me almost every day.

I still remembered “P’Gene” clearly after all these years.

We were five years apart. But we somehow became closer than me and my own brother. Since I moved out of the house, we never saw each other again. We didn’t have any more contact with each other.

When my mother talked about that time, I felt nostalgic.

I moved my finger to type to ask for a picture from my mother. In the end, I sent a simple sticker. I sat on the sofa in the living room for awhile before retiring to my bedroom to shower.

In my warm bedroom,  so different from the night air outside, I picked up my phone again. I went to Facebook to catch up with everything back home. My finger kept scrolling through my news feed, my face blank. I started to feel sleepy, but before I could fall asleep I saw a status.

I wasn’t friends with the person who posted. But I was friends with his mother, who was tagged in the photo.

Jap Jarernpipat posted a picture.

This year, my mother has lost another year, haha.

In the picture was a group of six people. The background was a wide garden and a long table. Both of my parents, and Auntie Run and Uncle Teep were there. But the one that most caught the eye was the man in the lower right corner.

The other person grinned until his eyes were crescents. His hands were raised, flashing a peace sign. His hand held a cake tray with a delicious golden egg. The corner of the mouth was stained with white cream, like he was teasing someone. He was smiling, which made his cheeks round and full.

I couldn't take my eyes off of him. For a second, there was a strange numbness in my fingertips and toes.

I didn’t need anyone to tell me who that was.

P’Gene.

He was still wearing a white uniform shirt. It had been many years since we’d met, if counted by age. Gene would have been in university for three years.

Usually, I was the kind of person who didn’t care about the people around me, or anyone else. But this time, I couldn't control my fingertips. I clicked onto Jap’s Facebook page.

Chasing him down, I found a status posted with the person I was looking for tagged.

Jap Jarernpipat posted a picture

My brother brought me to the movies. What kind of crazy alien movie is this? I might puke, but maybe you guys on Facebook will like it.

The post was from three days ago. One was a picture of a cinema ticket on the top floor of a department store in the heart of Bangkok and the other was of P’Gene in a T-shirt and jeans. He hugged a bucket of popcorn. His hand was holding a large glass of water, lifting it up to his lips and sucking. It was a funny candid photo that many of his friends on Facebook commented on to make fun of him.

...but for me, the only word that came to mind was “lovely”.

I didn’t know why I was doing this but I pressed “save that image”.

Jap Jarernpipat posted a picture

My stupid little brother, you make the whole house look bad.

They were in a garden in the corner of the house that felt familiar to me, but was a little fuzzy. They were in front of a flower bush that had been trimmed into a square. Gene was sitting down, with his butt on the ground. A blue hose fell next to him, the hose spraying in another direction. It made him wet all over soaking his shirt, the thin material clinging to his body.

Both of his arms were behind him, to support his body. Therefore, his shirt and body were stretched, so I could see two small nubs contrasted and poking through his white shirt.

My eyebrows furrowed together, and I frowned.

I cursed when my body immediately had a strong reaction, just from the one picture.

I pressed the comment section, when I saw the high number of comments.

Jiranon Jarernpipat: Jap stop posting pictures of other people.

(Reply) Jap Jarernpipat attached video clip.

I clicked play immediately.

"Ow, P’Jap!”

“Hahaha, why would you say you’ll help me water the plants? You can help if the grass is dead.”

“Can you turn off the water for me first? Why are you recording?”

P’Gene raised his white hand. He wiped the water from his face, and pushed himself off  the ground. His shirt clung to his body, so I could see everything. He had the voice of a man, but he was still so cute.

Finally, the clip ended.

There were still a lot of other videos that Jap posted pranking Gene, all of which stopped me from becoming bored. I saved all of them to my phone and computer. In the end, when more and more accumulated, I created a whole separate folder.

That night when I fell asleep, my brain was filled with pictures of the boy next door, who I hadn’t seen in years.

Another morning, days later, I woke up frowning, and I had to gently breathe out. I’d dreamt of P’Gene again. Since seeing that picture that night, there hadn’t been a day where I could go without seeing his face.

I knew Gene’s Facebook. But he didn’t update much, except to change his avatar or cover photo. But Jap’s Facebook page had tons of pictures of Gene. So I was still able to look at Gene’s pictures and progress in life everyday, like some kind of psychopath.

Even when I closed my eyes to sleep sometimes, I still saw his pictures.

I didn’t want to be this way, but I couldn’t control my subconscious.

I always saw Gene lying in my wide bed. He would smile at me, his cheeks soft and reddish. His hands would hold on to me, and his mouth would gently say, “Sib.”

It was a fantasy that any teenage boy would have. But it wasn’t a woman. Instead, it was the boy next door, who always loved and saw me as a brother.

I circled back to look at his pictures every day. In the end, the feeling accumulated like a huge mountain of snow.

I want to meet him in real life.

I want to hug him.

I want to smell him. 

I want to kiss his mouth. I want to do to him what I do in my dreams.

Since the day I saw his picture and until today, my thoughts and feelings had become more and more intense. So intense, that sometimes I was afraid of myself.

I’d already decided how I’d deal with this.

“Will you finish school here?” Neung had packed all his bags and was ready to go because he finished his studies. I leaned against the door frame, looking into his room.

“Actually, it’s nice here too, you know.”

"No, I'm going home."

“So you’ve changed your mind then?”

I nodded.

“Well, our house is nice and of course, our parents miss you too.”

"…"

"I'm not going to be here anymore, don't bring any women into the house...but you're not dating any girls lately. So it's fine."

I sent off my brother, who took a taxi straight to the airport to go back home to Thailand. Personally, I still had a year to complete my studies.

In the past, I had never thought or worried about how fast or slow time would pass. But now, I felt jealous of my brother.

Back at the house, I picked up the phone. I was still for a while. Maybe it was because Neung had returned to Thailand, but I felt like chasing pictures wasn’t enough anymore. My fingers moved before I could decide to send a message to someone.

Nubsib tanagijpaisarn: P'Jap.

Nubsib tanagijpaisarn: Do you remember me?

I wanted to talk to someone who could tell me everything about P’Gene. 

I wanted to learn everything about him.

[avionvadion]

Age gaps are fine. Not when the age gap includes a minor.

My biological parents are the same age- born in the same year, and are a month apart. My step mother met my father several years after the divorce (I was, what, four or five? I was supposed to be a save the marriage baby but they divorced anyway) by some online video chatting thingy, and when it became clear she wasn’t trying to scam him for money he flew over to the Philippines to meet her. She came over to America and got married when I was seven.

Currently, my dad is like 53 and she’s 37. So that’s... some big age gaping right there, though not as bad as my mom and stepdad. She’s 53 and he’s... either in his seventies or eighties??? I’m not close with him, I actually find it somewhat disturbing, but I love my mom and they’re grown ass adults so I’m respecting her choice. If she’s happy I’m happy, and he’s nice to her so! That’s a thing.

Both those couple have about a 20 or so year age gap. Sounds a little disturbing when said out like that, but when you say the ages themselves? 37-53 and 53-70(??) It’s not so bad. Why? Because they’re adults. Mature adults- three of which are in their second round of the marriage game.

But to explain my point, because they’re all adults the 20-ish age gap isn’t bad. If they had been YOUNGER when they met and/or got together, however...

17-33 and 13-30.

Ya’ll see the problem? That’s when the age gap is problematic. That’s when it’s gross and very much not okay. And that’s what the nasties don’t understand.

So here we go again:

Sango is 17.

Miroku is 18.

Kagome is 15.

Inuyasha is mentally/biologically 15.

Sesshomaru is mentally/biologically 19.

Rin is 8.

It’s so freaking obvious at this point. There shouldn’t even be anything to discuss. Her official art literally PAINTS her as a child in Trashahime. Like- okay, nasties.

Ya’ll wanna talk about short women? Specifically, short Asian women? Let’s fucking go. I’m 5’3 and white as hell. My step mother is a 4’11 Filipino woman. KAGOME IS A SHORT FICTIONAL JAPANESE WOMAN STANDING AT A WHOPPING 5’2.

Rin don’t even reach Kagome’s shoulders. This is a freaking child. She speaks like a child, acts like a child, and looks like a child. She’s not short because she’s Asian or because she’s meant to be a short woman; she’s short because she’s a freaking child. She has no bodily proportions a woman should have, short or otherwise.

This isn’t even the body of a woman who is flat chested. It’s just a child. Towa and Setsuna has more bust than her and- they’re also children?? And older than her in appearance??? Moroha is flat chested too, and is the only one who even comes close in age and appearance to this picture of Rin. You nasties wanna talk about historical accuracy? Okay, let’s go.

It is historically known that a child can not consent.

A child can not give birth to twins (who she would have had prematurely because twins take too much space on a womb) and survive.

Rin would be dead. She would have bled out from the process and died. Adding to the fact that she was a child who hasn’t developed properly, Rin probably wouldn’t have even lasted half the pregnancy time before going into early labor.

As such, Towa and Setsuna would also have died. Your precious child queen and her twins would have died, and it would have been your even more precious Pedomaru’s fault because

1) He got a child pregnant. 👏

2) He got a child pregnant knowing a child can not consent. 👏

3) He got a child pregnant knowing a child can not consent and would not be able to carry the offspring to term. 👏

[khoicesbyk]

A/N: I'm officially obsessed with Wolf Bride and what does one do when she's obsessed with a certain book? She writes an AU about it! 😁 So, Talley Ho! *in my Sherlock Holmes voice*

Rated: Mature. | Contains sexual content and strong language. (You know? The usual from me. 😁) | Bolded and/or italicized words are conversations and thoughts of the characters. | Main Characters: Roman (LI) and Naia Evans (MC) | All Characters and names: (except MC and certain original characters, created by me) are property of Pixelberry.

Current Word Count: 1,970 words.

Prompt Time! Since this is what consider to be a Drabble I’m using @wackydrabbles Prompt #77 “I didn’t mean to worry you.” It’ll be in bold in black.

Song And Story Inspiration: Fallen (Video Edit)-Mya | Break Of Dawn-Michael Jackson

Tag List: @lifeaskim @choiceslady @pixie88 @lucy-268 @bebepac @sfb123 @secretaryunpaid @choicesficwriterscreations @wackydrabbles

If you’d like to be added to my tag list. Just reblog or dm me and I will gladly add you. 😁😘

This story is ongoing as the game chapters are released weekly. So as soon as I read them (or reread the latest chapter), I’ll write the chapters to this story.

This series is rated Mature. It is NOT reading material that is safe for those under 18. Reader discretion is STRONGLY advised!

Chapter 1.) Call Of The Wolf.

It had been a 3rd straight week of weird dreams for Naia Evans. She would wake up in a cold sweat, a racing heartbeat and goosebumps on her skin. And like clockwork she would lay in bed staring up at the ceiling for 2 hours. And when she was never able to go back to sleep, she would put on jogging shorts and a tank top and go for an early morning run to clear her head.

All of her dreams started after she did research about her mom’s hometown of Hunt’s Peak West Virginia. She wanted to know more about it. Because every time she asked her mother about Hunt’s Peak, her mother immediately shut her down. She was all but forbidden to mention it, but it didn’t stop her from wanting to learn more.

She would look up Hunt’s Peak on Google and see pictures of the forest, mountains and the town square. She would think of meeting the uncle she never knew. But mostly, she wondered why her mother left a seemingly sleepy town in a mountainous area.

After her early morning run, Naia hopped in the shower then got ready for work.

Life for her was as normal as it gets.

She was born Naia Michelle Evans on October 30th 1988 in Raleigh North Carolina to Laurie and Shane Evans. And being an only child, she was spoiled rotten, especially by her daddy. She had a good job as an interior designer. But she wasn’t so lucky in the love department though. After two failed relationships, Naia was back to living at home with her parents in the Washington D.C. area. Although in some way, she felt somewhat unfulfilled. She felt like there was always something missing but could never figure out what it was or why she felt that way.

After coming home from a long day of work, she was in the shower. After the bathroom filled with steam and she stepped inside the shower, she heard a voice.

“Beloved.”

It was a man's voice. One she’d heard for weeks now.

“Come.”

“No.”

She leaned against the shower wall.

“Go away!” She whined.

“Come home.”

She groaned and closed her eyes trying to block it out.

“Come to me…”

When she opened her eyes, the voice was gone. It was just her and a hot shower. She showered, changed into her pajamas then climbed into bed and went to sleep and began to dream. In her dream is where she saw a wolf.

But she wasn’t scared. Strangely, she was calm even a little bit curious. She watched its fur bristle as it walked towards her. As it got closer, she saw its beautiful eyes.

They were golden and bored into her. When she reached out to touch the wolf, it changed into a man. He was what she always known as tall, fine and chocolate. But the one thing that struck her were his eyes. They were just as golden as the wolf’s eyes.

He reached out a hand and she took it. Soon she was in his arms, looking up at him. She felt safe, wanted, needed and desired. She felt his strength and passion while she stood in his arms. She reached up to touch his face and watched him lean into her touch. He looked real. And when he kissed her, he felt real. Her knees felt weak and her body temperature skyrocketed. She needed him just as much as he needed her. Her body yearned for him. Her heart raced. And when their kiss ended, she was dizzy.

It felt real to her. She wanted more, especially after seeing his golden eyes. She felt a connection with this dream man and couldn’t explain it.

“Touch me…” she begged.

He tilted her chin up then whispered, “soon Beloved. Very soon we’ll be together.”

She woke up gasping for air right after those words were uttered. Breathing heavy, heart pounding in her chest and in a cold sweat with goosebumps all along her arms. Just like many nights before but this time was different. Because her body felt like it was on fire. Craving to be touched but not just by anyone. Her body craved him and his touch. When her heart stopped racing and her breathing calmed down she checked to see what time it was.

4:45am.

That’s the time her phone read after she woke up.

She sighed to herself and laid back down then eventually went back to sleep. Dreaming of his golden eyes. As weird as that dream was to her, she wanted it again. She wanted to see him again. She wanted to feel his arms around her again. She wanted to kiss him again.

Later that morning after breakfast she was in the kitchen, having a conversation with her daddy about Hunt’s Peak.

“I don’t know why you won’t but I wish you would drop this, Naia.”

“Daddy you know why I can’t.”

“Naia I’m not having this conversation with you.”

“You and mama never do! It’s like you’re ashamed to tell me anything!”

“There’s a reason for that! Just leave it alone!”

“Why won’t you tell me?”

Just then her mother walked into the kitchen and their conversation.

“Because it’s better for you to never know. Baby I know you want to know but it’s nothing that concerns you!” Her mother snapped at her.

“But mom!” She began to protest.

“No! No more! This conversation is over, Naia!”

Once again her mother shut her down.

“You two are absolutely impossible!” She fussed.

Her mother sat down at the kitchen table and looked at her daughter.

“Trust me baby, I’m doing what I know best.”

“And what is that mama?” Naia asks.

“I’m protecting you!” Her mother replies.

“From what? What could be so bad about a small sleepy town?” Naia asks.

Her mother took a deep breath before she spoke.

“When I was 18 something terrible happened. And I told people. But no one believed me. They said I was lying. That it couldn’t have happened. The people in that town said I was exaggerating the truth. So I packed up and left and I never looked back. That town and those people are dangerous. And I am telling you to stay away from it and them.”

Naia’s eyes went wide.

“Oh my God! Mama were you?” She asked in a panicked voice.

“No I wasn’t sweetie.” Laurie replied.

“But what about your brother?” Naia asks her.

Laurie scoffed and replied, “ohhh you mean the coward, who wouldn’t protect his only sister?”

Naia went quiet.

“Listen to me baby. You are a grown woman. More than capable of doing any and everything you set your brilliant mind to. You can be anything from being an architect like your daddy to a nurse like me, hell I can even see you being the next and first black female president. Hell for all I care you could even be a drug dealer both legally and illegally. As long as you apply yourself and you enjoy it. But this? I can’t allow this. Now I can’t tell you how to live your life or what to do with it. But what I am telling you is this: you are NOT to go anywhere near Hunt’s Peak! Do I make myself clear?” Her mother asks.

“Yes mama. I understand.” Naia replies.

Her father cleared his throat then spoke in a stern tone.

“Naia baby, your mama and I love you more than we could ever tell you. And we are only trying to protect you. Hunt’s Peak isn’t the friendly place you’re thinking that it is. I am begging you to listen to your mother. Hunt’s Peak is no good. So trust us when we say that you are NOT to go there!”

Naia knew she wasn’t going to win this argument.

“Okay. I’ll drop it.” She said to her parents.

Laurie reached out and took Naia’s hands in her own.

“Good. I know you think that we’re not being fair but sweetheart you have to trust us. Especially me. Because if something were to ever happen to you because of those people and town, I would never forgive myself. So you need to drop this once and for all.”

“Yes mama.”

Her mother kissed the side of her forehead.

“Thank you baby. Now if you don’t mind I have an anniversary trip to finish packing for.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to go with you?” She asked.

Her father scoffed then replied, “we barely want you in the house so no. You’re not going.”

“But daddy it’s Paris! I’ve always wanted to go to Paris!” Naia whined.

“And one day you will go to Paris. Just not today.”

They all laughed.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to worry you.”

Her father stood then wrapped her up in his signature bear hug.

“Baby we know that you’re curious about your mom’s hometown but it’s safer for you to just let it go.”

“I promise I won’t bring it up anymore.”

“Good. Now what are you gonna do while your mother and I are gone?” Shane asks.

“Netflix, Hulu and takeout. Ohh and maybe porn.” Naia replied.

“NO!”

Naia chuckled.

“I just wanted to see what your reactions would be.”

“Laurie…get your child!”

“Ohhh so NOW she’s my child? Any other damn time you’d be willing to fight me to claim her!”

The rest of her Saturday went on as it usually does. But that night was anything but usual. After drifting off to sleep, Naia began to dream. And in her dream she saw him and his golden eyes. She was happy to see him and he was happy to see her. She couldn’t run into his open arms fast enough.

“I missed you.” She said to him.

She could feel his arms tighten around her, lovingly and protectively.

“I’ve missed you too, Beloved.”

“It’s time, Beloved.”

“Time for what?” She asks.

“Time for us to be together. It’s time for you to come home. To come and be at my side.” He replies.

“Where are you?” She asks.

He looked deep in her eyes then replied, “Hunt’s Peak.”

“I can’t. I promised my parents that I wouldn’t.”

“We are destined for each other Beloved.”

“But I…”

He silenced her with a kiss so powerful that it made her body weak.

“Come to me. Be with me. Answer the call.”

She woke up soon thereafter. She sat up in her bed and it became clear to her: she had to answer the call.

She HAD TO go to Hunt’s Peak. She had to find him. She had to be with him. So she made a plan to go to Hunt’s Peak. She knew it was a risk and she knew that she was disobeying her parents. But she knew that she had to take it. She needed to know. She had to know.

The next day she set her plan in motion. She waited until after her parents left for the airport, before she packed up her personal items, loaded them into her SUV and left her parents a note before leaving.

“Dear Mama and Daddy,

I’m sorry to write this but I’m going to Hunt’s Peak. I have to go, so please don’t be mad at me. Please forgive me. I love you. Again I’m sorry.”

After driving for several hours, she checked into a Days Inn on the outskirts of town to rest before she continued on.

She was sitting on the bed, blow drying her hair after stepping out of the shower, when there was a knock at her door. When she opened the door, her jaw hit the floor. It was him. She couldn’t believe that he was real and he was looking at her.

[flywithmelp]

Since CNCO hasn’t really posted anything good in a while, it’s made me bored and i started to think about their problematic behaviors. So, this is a post about some of them because I have nothing better to do and I need to entertain myself like it’s a reality TV show. Just a few things I want to discuss. So, Let’s analyze them, ladies

Let’s talk about first the lack of content the whole last year. CNCO the first couple years of their career were worked like crazy under Ricky Martin’s management. Constantly touring, making albums, interviews, and not getting a lot of time with family as most bands are overworked. Once they got under Walter’s label, their work schedule wasn’t as bad but they also lost a lot of fans from it. As we all know their team sucks right now and although they were traveling, performing, doing their thing like they were suppose to, their team wasn’t promoting them/handling them like they should. Their team just doesn’t seem smart, and it seemed like they were doing all this hard work for almost nothing. I think once quarantine hit, they were just burned out. They had hit that point were they found an escape to hang out with their family and resume back to their normal lives and they took it. Joel went to California while the others were in Miami which made all content kinda weird for a lil while. Then the Black Lives Matter movement happened and all content stopped for a while which is understandable but they also should’ve taken that moment to educate themselves and find their voices. After that, it took a while for them to get back on track and them on MTV was cool but also random because their team did it so poorly. They released Beso but then all of a sudden announced a cover album, which at the time I hated but I understand now. But, anyways, It was all so confusing and messy and nothing is ever done right so we’re left with crumbs. I think once they start traveling again they’ll get back into the groove of things but right now they’re way too comfortable.

I wanna talk about Richard next. Richard unfortunately comes from his family who has a very traditional way of thinking that can be very damaging towards woman. I hear him make a few comments here and there but he doesn’t seem as bad as the rest of his family. Like, some of the comments Yashua has made are just gross. Also, he’s probably the one you’ll hear the most making comments that sound a bit like toxic masculinity/homophobia, which again is unfortunately how it is in a lot of Latino households. Another thing, is that he says the words ‘Chris Brown’ way too much. I do see growth in him though. I think one of the reasons he’s not as traditional as his family is because of his daughter, he loves that girl very much and learns from her everyday. He’s also the only one who had a voice during BLM, and actually used it with passion. I loved seeing him so passionate about that. He had to be corrected a few times during time but he took the corrections and learned from it and that it what I like to see, we’re making progress with this one.

Now, Joel, its no secret that i’m not the biggest fan of him. One of his biggest problems is that he CAN’T take correction and anytime anyone tries to call him out, he gets super defensive. Like with BLM, he had no reason to get all defensive and block fans that were trying to educate him. I really think he sees a lot of his fans as annoying little girls, and that’s why he gets all petty on twitter anytime anything happens. I assume it’s some kind of insecurity he has that makes him like that and i can’t imagine how annoying it is to have the fans constantly in his business but cmon there’s ways to be mature about it but he has never gone that route even though he’s super grown now. His friends are truly, problematic clout chasers & i don’t know how he doesn’t see that. And i’m so certain that those friends constantly talk shit to him about the other CNCO members which is what creates a barrier between him and the rest of the guys. But, as long as I’ve been a fan of them I’ve never liked Joel’s attitude, he kinda walks around with a holier than thou attitude and it’s not cute in the slightest. Not to mention the fact that he’s with Sam S right now. I reallllllyyy liked single Joel, he was laughing, playing around, hoeing around with the other boys and it was so amazing to see. I want THAT joel back pls can someone get him away from that girl.

Ok, Zabdiel. With him it’s just him being dumb, dumb. I don’t know how he was raised but I still feel like he needs to make smarter decisions. The main things he’s done is when he said the n word and also the durag, which are both damaging to black culture. I’m 100% sure he was not aware of the significance of the word when he said it seeing as though he didn’t even speak english, but that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be called out for it. I wanna hope that he’s learned since then. The durag was another one that was just like bro, what are you doing? It’s not fashion, friends. Again, I think he’s learned as after people started letting him know, he stopped wearing it. He seems to be good at learning his lesson, although, I wish he would actually apologize for some of these things.

Erick, this poor boy was thrown into this group at 14 years old, he was literally a child. He’s not super problematic but in that video of Zabdiel saying the n word, you can hear him say it as well. Probably not knowing what it meant either but still needs to apologize. Also, going to Mexico during a pandemic like damn, i know they get tested all the time but they literally went to a club full of people not wearing masks cmon now. He’s also admitted to being a cheater which is pretty shitty of him. Idk he just turned 20 so maybe he’ll start growing up soon.

Christopher, an unproblematic king. No actually he really just minds his own business and lives his damn life without bothering other people. But, he did do the whole go to a party full of people barely wearing a mask. That’s Florida for you. I wish he was a bit more vocal politically but none of them are anyways I just want them to be. Also, he’s just a big hoe which could be a problem but i feel like he’s always upfront about his intentions.

Fin. End of rant. Let’s discuss.

[tiramisiyu]

【未定事件簿】Tears of Themis: Main Story 5-29 Translation

--

Translated parts: Chapter 5 – Sounds of Falling Snow (Part 1, 2, 3): 5-1 / 5-3 / 5-5 / 5-7 / 5-9 / 5-11 / 5-13 ♦️ ♦️  5-14 / 5-16 / 5-18 / 5-20 / 5-22 / 5-24 / 5-26 / 5-28 ♦️ ♦️ 5-29 / 5-31 / 5-33 / 5-35 / 5-37 / 5-39 / 5-40 / 5-42 / 5-43

  Translation Masterlist: here

Video: (0:01) https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV15a4y1j7CW?

Stellis City Police Station

Tuesday morning, 7AM, Stellis City Police Station.

10 hours had already passed since the laboratory Heirson built at Rainbow River Village caught fire.

I could no longer remember how I was able to get through these past 10 hours.

The pictures in my mind were like stained glass that the sun couldn’t shine through. The colours were sharp, but they were blurred out of clarity.

Xia Yan: You must be tired. I’ll send you home first.

A thin and light blanket wrapped on my body. Unable to control myself, I toppled towards Xia Yan’s shoulder.

I was indeed very tired, from my heart to my body. Fatigue had chipped away my ability to think. For now, I just wanted to follow my instincts and find something I could rely on.

MC: Was there really nothing left in that laboratory?

Xia Yan: I’m sorry. I couldn’t bring out that bottle of samples.

MC: Xia Yan, I’m not talking about that bottle of samples. You being able to run out from the fire, safe and unharmed, is already the biggest comfort to me.

MC: Not to mention that you were able to catch Wang Han, who set the fire.

MC: I just think it’s a pity that some fire could actually burn that laboratory so thoroughly, leaving not a single bit of worthwhile information.

Xia Yan: It is true that Wang Han appeared outside the laboratory, but I think he was actually just finding out about our movements.

Xia Yan: With Wang Han’s ability, devising a plan on the spot to set some fire shouldn’t be enough to burn everything so thoroughly.

Xia Yan: This laboratory just might have a self-destruction mechanism. The fire might be an internal, self-starting installation.

MC: Either way, Wang Han has already been brought to the city police station. No matter what suspicious points there are, we’ll wait until we can ask him.

MC: We also don’t have to pretend to deal with him with sincerity. We can uncover all his lies in front of him. 

Xia Yan: Right, what’s up with Sun Heping? Why did he follow us to the city police station?

MC: He came to be an eyewitness. I really need to thank Grandpa Sun well, he helped me a lot.

--

[Flashback]

In the warlike turmoil and chaos, I finally finished the whole process of calling the police.

I took up my phone and kept dialing Xia Yan’s number, mechanically and repeating, just like a programmed robot.

MC: Xia Yan, pick up the phone… hurry and pick up, I’m begging you.

MC: Let me hear your sound - even just replying with a number is enough. 

All my attention was set on my phone, so I naturally wasn’t aware of the gradually-nearing danger behind me.

Sun Heping: Little brat, get smacked!

???: Ow!

The cry of pain coming from behind me startled me to consciousness.

I turned around, pulled out the lipstick tranquillizer gun that Xia Yan had given me from my pocket, shooting towards the man who was holding his leg and collapsed on the ground.

Just as Xia Yan said, within 30 seconds, that man lost consciousness.

Sun Heping: Whoa, the young woman brought a self-defense weapon. Not bad, not bad.

MC: Grandpa Sun, what are you doing here?

I looked carefully at the man lying down. It was an unfamiliar face.

MC: Who is this person? He snuck into the yard, wanting to… assault me?

Zhao Yuncui’s agritourism guest house was one floor, connected to the little yard outside. The yard perimeter was surrounded by plants. A grown man could’ve easily gotten past them.

The push-pull door connecting the house and the yard was wide open. It would have been as easy was blowing away dust for this man to intrude in…

Sun Heping: He’s Wang Han’s son, just called back from the city by his father.

Sun Heping: Your phone is right there, so call the police. I’ll go be a witness for you.

[Flashback end]

--

Xia Yan: So it was like this…

I thought that Xia Yan would be very angry after listening, but his expression was very calm – it was just that his tone when talking…

This expression of his looked extremely like the calm before a storm. He must not be thinking about personally teaching a lesson to Wang Han’s son!

MC: Xia Yan, you… though Wang Han’s son is pretty hateful, he didn’t manage to do anything…

MC: We live in a lawful society, so please don’t act rashly.

From when we were small to now, Xia Yan’s always been the person who is most defensive of me, but…

MC: Think about it - if you hit him and got taken into custody, that wouldn’t be worth it at all.

I suddenly had an “idea”, and what escaped from my mouth sounded as if it were missing something.

MC: If you got detained, then Peanut*, that one bird, will starve to death at home.

Xia Yan: …

MC: (What am I saying…)

Xia Yan: I didn’t think that if I got detained, then the one you would be worried about wouldn’t actually be me – it would be Peanut!

Peanut was a myna bird that Xia Yan raised. After going through professional training, it was very smart.

I thought it strange, why Xia Yan would raise a defense animal like a myna bird.

Thinking about his agent identity now, it must be some special reason having to do with that.

MC: You really have gotten more and more “mature” - splitting hairs with a bird.

Xia Yan: Alright, I know you’re teasing me.

Xia Yan: Don’t worry, I won’t directly do anything to Wang Han’s son.

Xia Yan: My mission is to protect the order and maintain the safety of society. How could I do illegal things?

Xia Yan: But…

He leaned close to my ear. The hot breath brushed over my ear, tickling it.

Xia Yan: I’ll definitely give him a taste of suffering and blow off steam for you.

MC: Okay, then I’ll look forward to it.

Just like in years of youth, how children will often mutually “shelter” little secrets about mischievous actions – this was Xia Yan’s and my secret.

Xia Yan: I should send you home. You really need rest.

MC: There’s no issue, I’m still fine…

Sun Heping: Didn’t you two say that you specifically planned to go to the village to find me?

Sun Heping: Why is it that I’ve been troubled for a day and a night, yet I still haven’t seen you ask me anything?

I hadn’t finished speaking when Sun Heping appeared from who knows what place. “Disappearing and appearing randomly” really is an apt description for him…

MC: (Grandpa Sun… it was clearly you who refused to talk, alright…)

MC: Your willingness to provide help really is great. How about we find a quiet place to slowly talk about it?

Sun Heping: No need, here is fine. This old man is open and candid. I’ve got nothing that I need to hide from people.

MC: (I just wanted to ensure that the investigation wouldn’t leak…)

Xia Yan: I just greeted Leader Yan. This office won’t have anyone come in for now, don’t worry.

MC: Okay, then let’s talk here.

INTERROGATION START

Sun Heping’s whereabouts that day

MC: Last year on September 12, did you not know Kong Moli was coming?

Sun Heping: No, I don’t really use cellphones, and I didn’t keep any ways of getting in contact with Moli.

Sun Heping: Originally, I thought that either way, I wasn’t going out of the village, so she’d be able to find me anyways. Who would’ve thought… ah.

Sun Heping: That day, my home suffered a thievery. I caught the little thief and went to the police station to create a record.

Sun Heping: Who would have thought that the thief wouldn’t admit it no matter what. We spent a good half of the day at the police station. Moli couldn’t wait, so she left first.

Xia Yan: Is the thief you are talking about Qiu Heng?

On the return road to the city, I told Xia Yan about the information from Zuo Ran’s investigation yesterday.

Sun Heping: It was indeed him. He even said that he thought that the mutated Rainbow heart fish was worth money, so he went to steal it, hah hah – you could clearly tell it’s a lie from listening to it.

MC: He even had the face to say this kind of reason…

MC: Do you know the reason Kong Moli left in a rush?

Sun Heping: I heard from Wang Han that it was for someone’s birthday. It should be the birthday of the child she adopted.

Kong Moli’s reason for coming

MC: On September 12, what was Kong Moli’s reason for visiting you?

Sun Heping: She wanted the mutated Rainbow heart fish I had raised.

Xia Yan: Mutated? What kind of mutations are you talking about – could you explain in detail?

Sun Heping: Mutated was actually just what Moli called it. From my perspective, those fish were just smaller than typical Rainbow heart fish, and were unable to grow large.

Sun Heping: Moli had taken pictures of the mutated Rainbow heart fish before, but according to her, those photos were stolen by people, so she needed the living fish as physical evidence.

MC: Stolen?

The stolen pictures made me think of Kong Moli’s notebook that had two pages ripped out.

Up to now, we still didn’t know exactly what the notebook was missing.

Sun Heping: Before that lawsuit of Moli’s, the paper mill was closed. Heirson also stopped operations. Both sides weren’t able to collect water samples.

Sun Heping: Without any way to examine again, the fish I raised was the only proof.

Youyou’s origin

MC: You know Youyou? That is, Mu Ziyou.

Sun Heping: I don’t quite remember the name. I just know it’s a boy.

Sun Heping: Kong Moli met that child the first time she went to the laboratory.

Sun Heping: No one knew who or where the child’s parents were. When we asked if he ran out of the laboratory, he also didn’t say.

Sun Heping: The only people from outside in Rainbow River Village were those from the paper mill and the laboratory.

Sun Heping: If it was a child lost on vacation, he would’ve been found much earlier.

Sun Heping: Thinking about it, that child most likely ran out of the laboratory.

Noticing Kong Moli’s death

MC: Do you know how Kong Moli’s accident was discovered?

Sun Heping: It was me who noticed it. It was also me who called the police.

MC: Weren’t you unable meet with her that day?

Sun Heping: It was because I didn’t find her, and I knew that she urgently needed those fish, that I thought about sending it to her in the city.

Sun Heping: I drove the house’s tractor to the passenger terminal at the bottom of the mountain. Halfway, I saw Moli’s car stuck on the guardrails.

Sun Heping: I didn’t see her, so I called police.

Xia Yan: At the scene of the accident, did you notice anything abnormal?

Sun Heping: No. I also didn’t dare to touch anything at the scene, fearing that I would end up causing trouble to the police.

[Got Sun Heping’s Testimony!]

Household situation

MC: We heard that you live alone. Your family members aren’t with you?

Sun Heping: …

Seeming to not expect that we would ask this, Sun Heping froze.

Sun Heping: The situation in my house doesn’t have any relation to this case. You two, don’t ask without grounds.

Looking at it, there really is no need to investigate Sun Heping’s family situation. I just asked casually. If he’s not willing to talk about it, then we’ll just forget it. 

INTERROGATION END

Sun Heping: I’m finished being a witness for the police, and you’ve finished asking the questions you need to ask, so I’ll return to the village.

Xia Yan: Grandpa Sun, I’ll send you.

Sun Heping: No need. If you have time, you should accompany your little girlfriend instead.

Xia Yan: …

MC: …

Sun Heping headed off, while Xia Yan and I had more, harder questions to solve.

Xia Yan: Combined with my investigation at the laboratory, I can basically guess where Mu Ziyou came from.

--

TL notes:

* “Peanut” in Chinese also sounds nearly identical to the Chinese for “Watson” (both are “huasheng”).

[rametarin]

And further thoughts about the yaoi paddles.

If you’re under 20, and just now learning that fandom seniors in their late 20s, 30s, 40s, even low 50s, used to run around slapping eachother on the ass with yaoi paddles in anime and comic conventions after anime became a household media staple, you probably have.. questions.

You’re probably thinking, “Wow!! It was really lawless and anarchistic back then, wasn’t it! They never heard about personal space or sexual harassment laws! SOCIETY must have been SO different, back then!”

NO. I cannot stress enough, the Yaoi Paddle phenomenon was borne PURELY because the demographic MOST LIKELY to protest and be wet blankets about everything fun and sexual and admittedly VERY SKETCHY sometimes in fiction, and ALWAYS bad in reality.. turned off and said virtually nothing. Wokesters that’d protest about the environment and sexual assault against women would take off their Problem Glasses by night and act like paddling was harmless, contextually acceptable behavior.

Yaoi Paddle shit appeared because something absolutely magical happened in scifi and fantasy fandoms. It survived purely because boys didn’t complain, or their complaints were not taken seriously. I promise you, I assure you, if you grew up in the late 80s, your night time TV was INUNDATED with heavy handed messages about how sexual harassment (always male-on-woman flavored) was wrong, even proxy or indirect violence to women (tossing rubber gloves in their lap) was wrong, and to never, ever, ever do that thing or they’d rub your nose in it and consider you mentally diseased until the day you died.

Fandom was always niche, with sci-fi and fantasy stuff being off in its own little corner. Conventions, before the internet was king, was one of few places where more rural, disparate suburban and city-definition isolated geeks, nerds and dreamers could get together and just cut loose. Comic books, novels, video games. All that GOOD shit. But if you knew a girl in the 80s and 90s, you knew a girl that knew a girl that was getting them to be less tolerant and “more conscious and aware” (80s and 90s parlance for Woke) and when that happened, a new persona was created. A new bunch of dialogue options, created.

Suddenly they didn’t say stuff like, “Ew. Why is this character dressed like a SLUT? Typical male writers. Like we’d ever draw ourselves in this or put ourselves in this.” Because that’d be a personal, subjective opinion. Instead, the option to say, “It’s endemic in our western culture that male chauvinist authors and writers in a patriarchal system exploit femininity in media and reproduce misogynistic culture.”

And so assured this was true by mob mentality AND the idea that learned, educated, acredited and tenured academics had this opinion, they were scientists, and so they were right, permeated. Suddenly girl-fans had outlets to have justified apprehension for everything they saw and didn’t like or, if they actually liked it, STILL interpreted it through their lenses to be on, “the right side of history.”

It made fandom miserable and a sausage fest for a while, if only out of fear of driving away female friends. You couldn’t share that shit unless you knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that your female peers and friends wouldn’t disregard you like a “typical misogynistic western male” for enjoying that stuff.

Sentiments and peer pressure thoughts emerged. Like, “The comic industry is hostile and cruel to women that try and enter it, and they exploit the image of women for cheap dollars.” So they simply weren’t interested in comics- mostly- unless the comics were written by women and sold with that virtue in mind. In which case, you had boys glowingly mentioning just how much they liked this authentically written adventure by this female comic author. Isn’t that just so special? Not like those horrid anti-woman cigar smoking old man stories, right?

There was always something to nag and get vitriolic about with the media. That’s part of why the Whedon brand of feminist writing got so popular in the 90s. it was low hanging fruit of peppy “sassy” girl characters doing girly things. They weren’t like “other” girls written in comics and cartoons. They were actually girly. Not idealized infantalized children, like those horrible white men write, you know.

Well. Things were looking really bleak for the forseeable future. Lots of boys just felt like comics and cartoons were lost to girls that weren’t specifically into them, and that meant more sausage fest conventions or hobbies, and signing off hope on those things being respected and accepted on the merits of what they are and were. The girls had embraced serials-filed-off radfem rhetoric and lenses, sometimes without even knowing the origins of where those truisms like the Male Gaze even came from, just assuming it was true and indisputable. And it complimented their insecurities, so they’d embrace that shit until they couldn’t anymore.

And then.. something absolutely miraculous and amazing happened that blindsided this whole vitriolic culture.

Anime.

And amazingly, every complaint that a lot of nerdy girls had about the very much sanitized, policed and made PG writing and characterization of characters in western comics and cartoons, just... fucking up and vanished. Seemingly within a fucking YEAR, the entire social culture of Problem Finders, finding everything wrong about these stories, the characters, the writer and the company that produced them being misogynistic male chauvinism, dried up. Those voices quieted, or were shut out of the groups.

Media from Japan was some of the most infantilizing, sexist, tittelating shit compared to mainstream American comics and cartoons and video games, and girls fluttered to it like flies to shit. We had Buffy basically subverting boogymen that a bunch of girls had been taught were still relevant after the 1950s by fighting crime in melee combat with men, and winning, while wearing jogging pants and cracking sassy, like Lola Bunny being a “tough girl.”

Japan had doe eyed, waif bodied ballet dancers that basically farted iridescent glitter, hearts and all the symbols and shapes of the Lucky Charms, riding unicorns and fighting evil in cute outfits. Being childish and not at all mature or professional to show how womanly and competent they were, basically being overgrown 11 year old girls fresh off the playground swing set.

And the fangirls loved it. Those nagging voices that would speak up and remind them about misogynistic, male chauvinistic “societies” and culture? Just.. they fucking VANISHED from the mind for AN ENTIRE GENERATION. I’m not exaggerating. Tolerance and fun and innocence was back again. The problem-glasses felt too ostracized and alienated, or didn’t even want to wear them anymore for personal reasons, and the Radfem Baby Wokes just seemed to grow out of that collective hysteria and pretend it never happened and never existed.

That’s why the very EXISTENCE of Yaoi Paddles at conventions was just so fucking bizarre to those of us that lived up to that point. After, “Stay in your own personal space, boy. DON’T even TOUCH a GIRL unless she VERBALLY AND PUBLICLY CONSENTS or it’s proof you’re just living up to this misogynistic, objectifying society’s evil history!” was drilled into us, day on the playground by day on the playground, by women with axes to grind and good-boy sycophants performing sharing those sentiments for brownie points, it was so fucking surreal to IMAGINE girls just running around sexually assaulting and physically assaulting random strangers because they thought they looked like cute, gay men.

It wasn’t that they didn’t know any better beforehand, it’s that they COMPLETELY put those sentiments away and up and decided, as girls, it was okay to violate male autonomy because they weren’t women, and “it’s okay to paddle a yaoi boy ^.^!” With NO self-awareness whatsoever.

The very fact it existed is testament to how attention starved boys were for girls approving gaze and playful interaction, that they’d tolerate some pocky fingered little cow stranger smacking them on the ass with a plank of wood because it was a socially acceptable way to just interact with girls in their lonely assed fandom and interest. It was an acceptable way to meet girls and positively interact. That’s the degrading bullshit boys said virtually nothing about at the hayday of yaoi paddles, purely to be welcoming to girls in anime and hentai approving spaces.

WE GREW UP hearing and watching horror stories and boogymen stories about true crime and sitcoms and crime shows about evil evil men violating the personal space of women for lewd and lecherous reasons. We had it drilled into our heads that the tolerance for boys and men doing that was negatives, and the general sentiment was men caught doing that (to women, or children of any sex) were effectively free game for any violence you personally felt like unloading on them, confident that in such outraged rape and sexual assault hating times, juries would excuse that passion as a defense.

So if you look back on the era of Yaoi Paddles and think. “WOW. That must be like driving cars before they invented seat belts and cough medicine before they invented the drug safety and scheduling legal system!”.. NO.

It was not like the 50s-70s, where many of the rules hadn’t been written yet so it was anarchy and chaos. Yaoi Paddles existed almost PURELY because girls HAD no rules if they didn’t want to respect them. The Yaoi Paddle phenomenon flew in direct opposition to how interactions were supposed to go, and ABSOLUTELY NO ONE would tolerate the reverse; no cis straight man could walk around randomly smacking women on the ass with a plank of even foam in pantomime, or ‘floating hand’ pretending to be a perverted character. The double standard was GLARING. The Double Standard was a fucking bugbear that had grown from a tiny screaming goblin and was now hanging upside down from the ceiling, roaring.

But because it was GIRLS inflicting it on BOYS, absolutely no party cared enough to raise a stink about it. The Radfems kept their mouths shut, because boys were the recipients. The Radfem Sympathizers really wanted to spank boys, so suddenly they couldn’t find their problem glasses and instead put on their neko ears. The boys were either stoic and amused by it or really wanted to be seen as cool and not buzzkills, so they tolerated to reveled in it.

Many times when you hear about things that happened either when you were a child just too young to really personally experience a thing, or before you were born, we’re quick to assume it’s a medieval place and the people were so uncultured as to have never pondered the social problems of spanking one another on the ass unprovoked. Violation of personal space, personal sovereignty- all that. That was NOT okay at the time. It happened because fujoshi decided it was okay and nobody argued with them to not do hat, or they were told to stop and did it anyway.

And as I’ve laid it out, that is the most bizarre and surreal element to the whole thing. They DID know better, but felt it didn’t apply to THEM because they were girls, and a girl slapping a boy on the ass “as a joke” didn’t mean anything- because it wasn’t happening TO them, FROM a man.

And irony of ironies, it was NEVER okay, EVER, throughout that entire era, for the reverse to be a thing. It was very specifically and exclusively not. As a man if you ran around slapping cute looking girls with the Yuri Paddle, you goin’ to either juvy hall, or prison, boi. Both sexes knew it. And yet, yaoi paddles STILL became a thing.

[shitty-reviews-by-me]

“Avatar: The Last Airbender” is one of the best shows I’ve seen

This is your spoiler warning.

Note: I started writing this forever ago when I actually finished the show, but my procrastination is deadly, so I only got through the paragraph on Zuko before waiting like a month to pick it up again. 

Note 2.0: I know that there are comics that continue the series where it left off, but I haven’t read any of them. All of this will be based soley off of atla.

I started watching “Avatar: The Last Airbender” for two reasons. One, I remember seeing parts of episodes here and there as a small child, and I found what I saw intriguing; and two, my boyfriend just really, really loves it. When it showed up in the Netflix Spotlight I knew I was going to watch it, but it ended up taking longer for me to get to it than I originally expected. I procrastinate doing things I want to do just as much as things I don’t, but that’s another story.

I’m going to keep the actual review short. The show has been finished since 2008 and there is probably not much that I can say that hasn’t already been said. Besides that, I mostly just want to talk about my opinions because I have a lot of them.

“Avatar: The Last Airbender” is great on all accounts. All of the characters were interesting and complex. The plot was extremely complex, but easy to understand by anyone, no matter their age. In fact, when I made my grandma watch the first episode, it seemed like she kind of enjoyed it. Of course it is also possible she said that to be nice and was really thinking “what the fuck” the entire time. I haven’t found a single person say they don’t like “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” but maybe I’m not looking hard enough. Honestly I don’t know what else to say, I’m sorry, I just really want to talk about my opinions.

Let’s Talk About Zuko (because I love him)

I mean just look at him. How could he not be your favorite. Zuko is probably the best developed character in atla, and I’ll be honest, I never saw him as a “bad guy.” I mean, he was certainly a villian, but he wasn’t a bad person. In the first few episodes, Zuko is already painted as a sympathetic villian. We learn that as a young teenager his father banished him, sending him into a search for the Avatar. A search that was seemingly destined to fail. It is important to remember that Zuko was a CHILD. His family turned on him and all he wanted was join them again. Zuko’s actions were overall understandable.

Now Let’s Talk About Azula (she deserves better)

Azula doesn’t get as much sympathy as Zuko for obvious reasons. When the show ends her fate isn’t as clear as all the other characters. We get to see Ozai rotting in a cell, but Azula’s last scene is her having a complete mental breakdown after Katara managed to best her in combat. I’m sure the comics cover what happens next for her, but again I haven’t read them.

I’ve seen tons of people calling Azula a psycho, and an irredeemable monster, but I wholeheartedly disagree. Like Zuko she is just a child. She is only fourteen years old when the events of atla take place, and is the product of manipulation and abuse from both of her parents. She deserves a redemtion arc. There are videos and posts that will explain Azula’s psyche better than I ever will be able to, but I’m gonna try anyway.

I would like to make it clear that I do not believe Ozai deserves redemption. He was a grown ass adult who abused and manipulated everyone around him. While Azula also abused and manipulated the people around her, she did so as a child, following her father’s example. In addition to that, we know that Ursa’s belief that Azula was a monster hurt her. Ursa never showed that she believed Azula could be a better person, and therefore why would Azula be choose to be kind and good when her father rewarded the abusive tendencies she developed? One of the big differences between Zuko and Azula’s upbringing is that their mother believed in Zuko. She believed he could do good in the world but failed to show Azula the kindness she showed Zuko.

The cycle of abuse is very real. Pretending that Azula is just some psycho, and not a child following the pattern of behavior she saw growing up is immature. There is no question that she regularly did horrible things, and I don’t even think that her friends, Ty Lee and Mai, or Zuko should forgive her if they don’t want to, but she does deserve a fresh start. Let’s be real, Azula would need a lot of therapy to even get to a place where she could potentially be redeemed or forgiven.

In summary, people need to stop writing Azula off as an irredeemable psycho.

Kataang: Thanks I Hate It (just hear me out, okay)

Kataang vs. Zutara is such a huge debate, and trust me, I’ll get into Zutara, but right now I want to talk about why I don’t like Kataang in a list format.

Their Age Difference-- I think sometimes adults writing teen/preteen characters completely forget what it’s like to actually be those ages. Aang is twelve (I get that he’s technically one hundred and twelve) and Katara is fourteen. While two years really isn’t a big age difference, especially as people get older, it is a little weird when the the people are twelve and fourteen. When I’ve brought up this age difference to people I’ve always heard the argument that Aang is mature for his age and that’s why it works. That is a faulty for a number of reasons. First of all, the claim that someone is mature for their age is used to justify inappropriate relationships by pedophiles all the time. Secondly, it could be argued that Katara is mature for her age as well, so there is no way their maturity is equal. My final point, there’s a good chance Aang hasn’t even gone through puberty yet while Katara is definitely well on her way on that front. Maybe that sounds weird, but males start puberty between the Ages of nine and fourteen, which means there Aang is at a pretty average age to START puberty. Females start puberty between the ages of eight and thirteen which means she’s well on her way. Like I said, puberty sounds like a weird thing to bring up, but a lot of maturity come from going throught puberty.

They Made Such Good Friends-- Aang and Katara had such a good friendship throughout the show. It could have been a great example of a platonic friendship between a straight cis guy and a straight cis girl. Instead we got the male and female lead end up together, just like they do in everything else.

No Evidence of Reciprocated Feeling-- While obviously Katara must like Aang because otherwise she wouldn’t have kissed him, I don’t think there was very much evidence leading up to that moment that Katara had any sort of romantic feelings towards Aang. Throughout the series she says she only sees him as a good friend, almost as a brother. I will admit, there were hints here and there. In the episode The Fortuneteller, Katara is told she’ll marry a powerful bender, and in the end of the episode she realizes that Aang is an extremely powerful bender. In the secret tunnel her and Aang kiss/almost kiss (I can’t remember exactly), and in that moment it seems like maybe she could have feelings for him. Other than various small moments there isn’t a lot of evidence that she liked him. I think the evolution of Katara’s feelings should have gotten more attention because the kiss at the end felt a bit like it was out of nowhere.

It’s A Missed Opportunity-- There are so many cases in real life of cis men thinking their entitled to a romantic relationship with a woman because they’re friends, or she was kind to him once. Because of the young intended audience for the show, it could have been great to show little kids that it’s okay if romantic feelings towards someone aren’t reciprocated, and that it doesn’t have to ruin a friendship. Also that no body is really at fault when that kind of thing happens. It would have been a good lesson but obviously it didn’t go that way.

I haven’s seen it, but I know that in Legend of Korra you find out that Aang and Katara ended up getting married and having children. I think that still could have happened if they ended atla as friends. It could have been them developing feelings for eachother as young adults.

This ship has potential but I wish they did it differently in canon.

Zutara Isn’t Ideal Either

Honestly my biggest problem with this ship is the fact that many of the people who ship it don’t take into accout the fact that they both (particularly Katara) have trauma because of the other person. Zuko spent months hunting down and intimidating the gaang. Like I said he’s redeemed himself but that shouldn’t just brush the terrible things he did under the rug. Katara threatens Zuko’s life when he first joins the gaang, and I can’t blame her for that. She doesn’t know whether or not he’s really changed.

Like Kataang this ship has potential, but it shouldn’t be romantasized beyond the limits of what is possible.

In Summary

(wish i could give credit to whoever drew this but i don’t know who it was)

I could write a book on all of the opinion I have about this spectacular series. However, I’m exhaused and want to go to sleep. I will not be proofreading this, sorry.

Legend of Korra was just put on netflix and I’m sure that once I watch it I’ll have a million more things to say.

I don’t know how to end this, so uh... Peace?

[maljean89]

Do you have a band whose entire discography brings you back to the different chapters of your life? Its very basic-bitch-white-girl of me, but Paramore is that band for me.

RIOT! (2007) — The end of high school I discovered Paramore when I was a senior in high school. I caught this promo at the end of some reality TV show on MTV of Hayley singing “Misery Business.” I actually found the video on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSsDEkbBhZo (about 1:40 in). I was hooked from then on out. A friend of mine burned a CD for me that had “Misery Business” and “That’s What You Get” along with “My Heart” from their first album. When I close my eyes I can see driving through my small town in my black Chevy Blazer with the windows down and the music cranked.

BRAND NEW EYES (2009) — UW Oshkosh This album was the soundtrack of my college years. This album brings me back to mostly bad memories. Memories of a time when I was repressed and not exploring myself the way I should have been. I listened to “The Only Exception” and thought it was made for me and him. I look back and “Playing God” was more accurate. I did create a kickass long-form radio piece reviewing this album that turned out really really great. I was really proud of it — here’s the link: https://vimeo.com/18520889. When I close my eyes I can see the campus, the radio station WRST, that apartment where we had so many fights. I guess you could say this album got me through it, while at the same time DJ’ed the whole shit-tastic experience.

THE FINAL RIOT! (2008) — A metaphor for what I wanted my relationship to be Even though this album came out prior to Brand New Eyes, I didn’t personally own it until after. I got it as a gift from my ex-husband — the same fuck I was dating in college. I loved it. I still have it. Most of my CDs were quickly separated from their cases, never to be reunited again. Not this CD (and DVD). Always stayed in its case, and always lived on the bookshelf. I treated it like a collectors item — something to be displayed. Oddly enough, I treated my then-new marriage the same way. On the outside, to the rest of the world — we were happy. I was happy with my choices. If I just told myself one more time, if I just posted one more picture, if I just put it up on that shelf to display it to everyone... maybe I’d believe that I actually wanted it. To be clear — I love the CD, just not the person who gave it to me and the time period during which I displayed it. Transported back to a time when I dreamed of getting away and being someone in the crowd of this concert — faceless, nameless, and singing along in unison with strangers. 

PARAMORE (2013) — The shitshow that was my marriage

When the first single from this album came out, I hated it. “Now” is still one of my least favorite songs on the album. I remember feeling sad and betrayed that this band that I loved, that I held so close to my heart, made something I didn’t recognize. What could I trust in this world if I couldn’t trust Paramore? I close my eyes and I’m in the grey Ford Escape we bought with the money my dad gave me to pay for my college. The car he would end up taking in the divorce. I’m transported back to countless nights of being kicked out of my own apartment. I grew to love this album. Again, I thought songs like “Still into You” and “Ain’t It Fun” applied to my love-life and newfound adulthood as I convinced myself that I was happy, that I liked my life and my choices. But songs like “Last Hope” and “Part II” bring me back to how melancholy I felt. How trapped. How lost. I don’t even know myself at all, I thought I would be happy by now. Words could have never been more true at that point in my life.

AFTER LAUGHTER (2017) — On the other side I waited 4 years for another Paramore record. And in 4 years, my life changed. A LOT. I left that piece of shit that held me down, held me back. My mom got cancer and I watched her wither away for a year and held her hand as she died. I met the love of my life. This album came out right before I went on the road with him — went on tour with him an we drove across the entire country, blasting this record. Jonah was very sick of it by the time we hit California, but he had no say in it if he wanted me to do the driving! From the East Coast to Canada, through the midwest, down the West Coast, and down through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and last stop, Georgia. I fell in love with these songs and how this band had aged and grown up and gone through depression, just like I had. We all went through “Hard Times” and gave people fake smiles. While widely departed from their pop-punk beginnings, this album feels synthy and dripping with eighties energy — as do the music videos. Paramore wasn’t afraid to change with this album and I felt like I wasn’t afraid to change too.

One song sticks out like a sore thumb and makes me cry every time I listen to it. I was 26 when I left him, when I left that shitty life I wasted behind me. Everything was fine until you came around. Until he ruined everything, I had my close relationship with my mom, I had a sense of who I was. You got me tied up but I stay close to the window. He wouldn’t let me have friends or have a life that didn’t include him. I literally can remember daydreaming, gazing out that front window of our apartment at Lake Superior, wishing I could hop on one of those huge ships and just get the fuck out of here, get a new life. The part that really gets me is this:

Reality will break your heart Survival will not be the hardest part It's keeping all your hopes alive All the rest of you has died So let it break your heart

“26″ is literally a song about hope, but I feel like it was written just for me. Getting out from underneath the thumb of an emotionally abusive partner — missing out on years of valuable time with my mother only to reunite and watch her die — finding hope in the face of Jonah and finally feeling free to be myself, to explore, to grieve, to love, and to live.

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

I grew up and went through lots of shit as I listen to these albums. I got to feel a band grow and mature as I grew and matured. There have been artists in my lifetime that I fell in love with at a meaningful point in my life, but they didn’t keep growing as I grew. Artists (sadly) like Avril, who showed me at 13 that it was okay to be different than the preppy girls, who gave me hope with her 2nd album that I was going to grow as she grew, but who then disappointed me beyond repair with her 3rd album when she took a hard left turn into sassy, stupid, blonde vapidity. But then came Paramore — a band with a sound that matched my teenage spirit, and I was whisked away into my young adulthood. I’m 31 now and Hayley only just released her first solo album this year and I’m still growing and changing with this artist. She stepped away from Paramore (for good? We do not know.) and put out this indie-sounding experimental album that feels like 80′s pop mixed with Sia’s 2005 record “Colour The Small One” — a high school fave of mine. As a fan, it gives me hope when someone like Hayley Williams doesn’t allow herself to be trapped in a box. She doesn’t have to be a pop-punk, flame-haired front woman forever. She can change. I can change. Paramore can grow, and so can I.

Let’s keep changing and growing for the rest of our lives, shall we?

[sugarandspice-games]

I guess this is becoming a trend... I’m popping in before the actual intro to clarify-- if the text is in italic, it is me (Sugar) talking and regular is Spice. Alright? Cool. And so--

So, one night I’m going through youtube and I come upon this one shitposty video about some random anime that I’ve never even heard of. After doing some research, I discover that it’s actually based on a dating sim that I’ve also never heard of. As a joke I was like “Hey Sugar wanna watch this as a joke, it might be funny” and so we did. And uhm. Well.

Today we’re gonna be reviewing Brothers Conflict, aka Sweet Home Alabama 2: Electric Anime Boogaloo aka the anime that ruined our lives. [Again, disclaimer: neither Sugar nor I condone incest and/or pedophilia, two themes which are uh, very rampant in this anime which is why I cannot recommend it in good faith. It’s not good, don’t get me wrong. I can’t really say that I liked it even if watching it and ragging on it was kind of enjoyable, and I did get attached to some of the characters because that’s the kind of idiot I am. Also, we’re not shirking our duties to write I swear please don’t kill me--] Anyway, an obligatory SPOILER WARNING though this probably isn’t going in the main tag bc I do not want the fans to publicly stone me. Why are we reviewing this? Bc we need to talk about it somewhere. Though I say review lightly bc this... is really more of a critique.

ALSO we only watched the anime, idk if things are different in the game. There is no full english translation for the games and most of the LP channels have been copyright striked, so please don’t come at us for not knowing anything. I also know that otome games and dating sims don’t tend to translate well to anime, and I will be addressing this later.

So, dear god, where do I begin.

Where do we begin indeed? How about the fact that her name is Ema and I had to google to remember the heroine’s name? Also, she is seventeen.

Our plot, or well... what you COULD call a plot, I guess, if you REALLY wanted to give this anime that much credit, focuses on the aforementioned seventeen year old Hinata Ema, who has an absent father who apparently FOUND THE TIME TO FALL IN LOVE AND GET MARRIED BUT NEVER HAS A SECOND TO SPARE FOR HIS ONLY CHILD, RINTARO I SWEAR TO GOD I AM TAKING CUSTODY OF YOUR CHILD. HAND HER OVER-- Anyway. He’s getting married to a woman who has 13 sons (jesus christ ma’am have you ever heard of a condom?) and he decides to move her in with them because... I guess he has less braincells than I have balls, which is to say, zero. Hi, I’m trans.

So, Ema moves in with them... along with her talking grey squirrel, Juli. Juli is... interesting and by interesting, I mean-- ABSOLUTELY PUZZLING. He, apparently, has seen the majority of Ema’s life from babyhood to teenagerhood and can talk but is only understood by Ema (who he calls Chii) and Louis, the eighth son in the Asahina family. It is never explained why, or how Chii came across him or how in an episode, a single episode, he becomes human because why the hell not, I guess??? (Also, he is pretty. YES. I said it. Fight me.) [Quick Spice intervention, this squirrel can talk to people, transform into a human, enter dreams, and live way longer than a squirrel should since the average lifespan of a squirrel is like 6 years in the wild. Juli is apparently a god as none of this is EVER explained.]

And when she meets the Asahina family, it’s pretty much immediately chaos because these heterosexual (I guess? They look like a bunch of twinks to me but there goes anime trying to convince me that straight people are real and not a lie made up by Trump) men have NEVER and I mean NEVER known a woman in their entire lives, since they seem to want to bang their stepsister immediately. And most of them are GROWN ASS ADULTS. Only three of them are actually minors (though Iori is 18 and only one year older so I guess??? It’s okay??? But still weird) and one of them is a 13 year old who looks and acts like he’s 8.

Oh, and did I mention that out of these boys, only the adult triplets and the abusive asshole 16 year old get any kind of characterization AND character development? I mean, Subaru gets an “arc” if you can call it that, but really, they don’t give him much... personality. You could replace him with a cardboard cutout and it’d be the same. I feel bad for him (but not really because dude you are 20 and she is your sister, what the fuck--)

But if there’s anything good about this anime, it is the characters themselves. Several of the boys have redeeming qualities and interesting personalities and quirks, as well as interesting relationships and dynamics with each other. Yes, some of them are lacking in the plotline department while others may have decent plotlines and lack personality, and then some of them are just given absolutely nothing (COUGH Masaomi COUGH Ukyo COUGHCOUGHCOUGH Iori, and by the way, what the fuck is that game plotline bc I read the wiki since I wanted to know more about him. We don’t have time to unpack the mento illness luv. But you’re telling me they had all this meat to work with and they threw it in the trash and gave him nothing? What the hell?) And if anything, I feel as if the characters themselves are crippled by the plotline. If given a different story, perhaps, they may have room to shine, because a lot of them are compelling if not lovable (though some may not be... lovable. COUGHFuuto, at least not for me.) If you want to see our review on the characters, we’ll put out another post.

Iori... Iori has a hell of a plot in the game, according to the Wiki but I can’t blame the writers for not exploring all of it because whoa. It is dark and not in a good way. But back to the subject at hand... I agree with Spice. I do/did like quite a lot of the characters... provided the entire romantic plot is taken away but we will go into more of why the plot is problematic below. All I can really add is: There is a baby in this dumpster and canon has been taken out back to be shot like a lame horse.

This brings me to a point in which I would like to pause the character discussion and bring up a glaring flaw with this anime in general (aside from the... plot. Look, I’m not a huge fan of weird stepsibling stuff but I think that if you want to do something like that, there are ways to do it and ways not to do it. This was the way not to do it, which I’m getting to). The biggest thing that made this anime so uncomfortable was the imbalance of power dynamics. Why is the protagonist 17 when most of the love interests are 18 and older, and I mean much, much older? And she’s not any 17 year old... she’s a lonely, neglected girl who is starved for the love of a family. This makes her easily manipulated by the brothers, who clearly desire her for less than wholesome reasons, and that makes it skeevy. I’m not sure why there’s such a fetishization of nonconsent in media, as if it’s fine for as many men to lust after female protagonists as the writer desires BUT the woman can’t want a single one of them in return. It’s creepy, and quite frankly, I am very much over it. I also get that the age thing is probably a product of the protagonist of a teenager oriented dating sim not translating well to an anime (because really, all otome game MCs are meant to be a neat little pair of shoes for the player to imagine themselves in), but why are we fetishizing a teenager being groomed by adults anyway? Especially adults who have this much power over her to begin with? The power dynamics bring this plot from “Oh, this might be kinda trashy but it could be entertaining” to “This is extremely creepy and rapey and kind of a dumpster fire.”

This is also true. If we were to take age into consideration, Fuuto, Yusuke, and Iori would be the three candidates left for Chii. This is taking out the youngest as well, who is... thirteen, I think? But anyway, (I know I am probably going to get some hate for this but go for it), I am into stories that explore the stepsibling thing and it can make a good narrative-- but before everyone gets uppity: There is a line between FICTION and REALITY and I do not condone real life incest but a story is a story and there are ways to frame it that make it clear that it is not a romantic thing, or acceptable. This anime does not do that in it’s dynamics because some of the brothers do start off in that very firm caregiving, family role and it is a sharp turn into romance that makes you go, “?” or in Fuuto case, a blending that does lean into fetishization.

All in all I think the plot maybe could have been okay? I’m not saying it isn’t problematic, because we all know it is, who are we kidding? But I don’t think it’s wrong per se to explore family dynamics with romance and to understand where the line should be drawn, and maybe exploring the definition of family itself. I have seen fanfictions with similar tropes ask those questions and explore the concept beautifully without romanticizing or fetishizing incest and unhealthy power dynamics. It could have been good, and I get that perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree by expecting mature themes in an anime based on an otome game, but it also could have been a lot less... creepy (I have used that word so much that it looks wrong now) even if it wasn’t the greatest thing ever. But again, what was I expecting? I watched this whole thing as a joke and ended up attached to the characters like a fool... That tends to be a trend here, and this is why we are so salty all the time. So anyway, stay tuned for our review of the characters! We may not cover all of them since some of them don’t really get anything, but we’ll cover what we found interesting.

[waitimcomingtoo]

In Case You Don’t Live Forever - Chapter Eighteen

Pairing: Peter Parker x Venom!reader

Warnings: mentions of depression

Masterlist

Peaceful sleep came a little bit harder

Sweet dreams came a lot harder.

Your dreams followed the same regime every night. Thanos stepping on your chest, holding you down, as he snapped. You’d be defenseless under his massive body and were forced to watch Peter, Nat, Tony, and Venom turn to dust. It wasn’t even accurate to how the events really happened. And you knew that. You knew how Tony and Nat really died. And you knew Thanos was dead himself. But every night, you fell for it. You watched your loved ones die right before your eyes and believed it was really happening. Every night.

Every damn night.

So sleeping was no longer an option. You’d come back from your nightly patrol with Peter and go through your nighttime routine.

Wash off makeup.

Put on pajamas.

Talk about your day.

Go to bed.

Only you never really went to bed. You’d lie awake in Peters arms until he fell asleep. Then, you’d do a number of things. Sometimes you went back out as Venom to patrol. Sometimes you sat on the roof and contemplated the cards you’d been dealt. And sometimes, you’d cry. You’d cry and cry for what you lost. It wasn’t just the people you loved that had been taken from you, it was also those five years with Peter that he’d never get back. He was only gone for five hours. Nothing changed for him. He didn’t have to lead a completely different life. But everything changed for you. You were somewhat of a celebrity in New York. The L/N Report was the number one video news report in the city. Your business was blooming but it meant nothing to you. Accomplishments carried little to no value when you achieved them on your own. Peter wasn’t by your side for any award you’d won. He wasn’t there to read your front lining articles. He wasn’t there when you appeared on television or in magazines. And yes, that wasn’t his fault. You knew that. It was his fault at all. But no matter how hard you tried to fight it, you resented him. You resented him not being by your side, holding your hand, taking the journey with you. So, everyday, you repeated to yourself that it wasn’t his fault. He didn’t leave on purpose. It became a mantra of sorts.

“It’s not his fault.” You’d tell yourself. “It wasn’t his fault.”

The worst part, Peter didn’t suspect a thing. He didn’t know about what you had to go through. He didn’t know how close you’d gotten to the Avengers. He didn’t know you moved in with Nat, only to have your home and relationship with her lost in a matter of minutes. He didn’t know about the months spent lying in bed, unable to cope. He didn’t about how your hair became so matted to your head from not having the will to wash it that you had to cut it off. He didn’t know how emaciated you became from not eating. He didn’t know how bad you smelled for not getting out of bed to shower. He didn’t know about the times you cried so hard you threw up. He didn’t know any of it. He only knew he turn to dust, woke up in a strange place, and went to battle. He was utterly unaffected by the snap.

Despite all the feelings you harbored, you didn’t speak of word of it to Peter. He had just lost his father figure in a gruesome way. He had to go back to school afterwards and pretend he wasn’t Spider-Man and didn’t just fight two huge battles. He had to pretend Tony was simply his boss and he didn’t watch him die in front of him. He was going through enough as it was. He didn’t need to hear about your hardships as well. And so, you kept your mouth shut and in a smile.

“It’s like it never happened.” Peter would chuckle to himself. Every time he said it, it felt like a dagger in your side.

Like it never happened.

Like you didn’t lose everything.

“Right. It never happened.” You’d agree. You give him a tight lipped smile and went on with yours days like Peter wanted.

Like it never happened.

Peter had to repeat his senior year, only rubbing salt in the wound that he was so much younger than you now. But his school had a Europe trip planned for before school started. You were slightly relieved to know you wouldn’t see him for a week.

“I don’t have to go. I can just stay home.” Peter told you, hoping you’d ask him to stay. He didn’t want to leave you, but both you and May thought this trip would be good for his stress.

“You’re going. Just as long as you promise to come back this time. And not as a pile of dust.” You teased Peter. He smiled despite feeling disappointed that you didn’t beg him to stay. He was fine staying home with you while his friends had fun. You were his whole world now. He needed you and looked to you for comfort. You’d spent every second with him since he came back. You practically lived with him and May. Days were spent in his bed or on the roof, talking about everything Peter missed. He’d tease you and say the only thing he missed was you, but you knew it wasn’t true. He’d missed a lot more than you’d ever admit.

A part of you wanted some time apart. The other half of you dreaded him leaving. The bigger half. The last time he left for a school trip, he didn’t come back. You were weary about letting him out of your sight again. Peter seemed to sense this fear of yours. He was just as weary about leaving you. He never wanted to be apart again. He’d even whine when you so much as left the bed to go to the bathroom. He was clingier than before. And he had a reason to be. Peter noticed things that you didn’t. He noticed men, not just boys, men staring at you now. You were 24 years old. A woman. You had matured and changed both inside and out. Your facial features had hardened and you lost all remaining traces of baby fat in your cheeks. Your cheekbones were sharper, your eyes more tired, and your hair much longer. You looked like a grown up. Peter, on the other hand, still looked like a teenager. He’d always looked young for his age, but it was even more noticeable when he was standing next to you. He still had pimples and a baby face. He was still just a kid. He wasn’t mature like you were. It made Peter feel funny. He didn’t like when men stared at you because he couldn’t help but wonder if you’d rather be with one of them. A man. Not a boy like himself. He brought these fears up to you.

“Peter.” You laughed dismissively. “Why would I want to be with anyone other than you? I had five years to go out and find a man but chose not to. I don’t care if men stare at me. I don’t even notice when they do. I only have eyes for you.” You cupped his chin and giggled at his fears.

“Well I notice. And I’m 18. Don’t you want to be with a man?” Peter said insecurely. He was afraid of asking, in fear of your answer, but not knowing kept him up at night. He was met with more laughter as you wrapped your arms around his neck.

“What’s your name again?” You asked coyly.

“What?” Peter asked, not getting where you were going with this.

“What’s your name? I need a reminder.” You said again. He was the one who need the reminder.

“Peter.” Peter answered. You shook your head.

“Not that name. Your other name.” You said.

“Spider-“ Peter began. He smiled, suddenly embarrassed, as he caught on to your game. You had a grin on your face.

“Man?” You asked, finishing his sentence. Peter nodded in defeat.

“Spider-Man.” He grumbled.

“That’s right. Not Spider-Boy. Not Spider-Guy. Spider-Man. You’re a man. And you’re my man. I don’t want to hear about this ever again, okay? I’m not gonna leave you for some random guy on the street. You have nothing to be worried about.” You kissed Peter sweetly. He smiled at you, but didn’t feel entirely better. Guys still stared. He couldn’t do anything to stop them. He felt powerless when you went to bars with your work friends, a place he was too young to enter. Though you’d never tell him, he knew guys would hit on you and offer to buy you drinks. He couldn’t do anything to stop them.

And so, you and Peter were hiding things from each other. For the first time since finding out the other’s secret identity, you were keeping things from each other. Peter hid his insecurities and you hid your doubts. But when you were together, you played the part of a happy couple. A couple that somehow found each other again after all the tragedy of the past five years. Neither of you knowing of the others pain.

You rolled over one morning and slowly woke up. Your eyes fluttered open and you were met with Peters doe brown ones staring you down intensely. He had a dreamy smile on his face, but his eyes said “I want to kill you and wear your skin.” You jumped back and Peter laughed. He brushed a strand of hair out of your face as you calmed down.

“Sorry.” He murmured, still dressed with a smile.

“You’re staring.” You pointed out. It was something he did a lot. You’d often wake up in the morning to find him watching you, as if you couldn’t take a breath unless he was watching you take it. It calmed Peter down to know you were real, safe, and his. So, he stared.

“It’s romantic.” He defended.

“It’s creepy.” You replied. Peter laughed and toyed with your fingers.

“You’re just so pretty.” He sighed. You couldn’t be mad at that.

“I don’t feel pretty. I feel like you’re gonna chop me with a machete.” You told him. He laughed again.

“I’d never chop you with a machete.” Peter told you. He pulled you closer and ran his fingers through your tangled hair.

“That’s something an evil choppy machete man would say.” You bartered. You laughed at yourself but it was cut short by Peter kissing you. You melted into his kiss. Every doubt, fear, and worry melted away too. He always had a way of reminding you why you stayed single those five years. Why you refused to move on. Why you convinced a man to invent time travel. Why you snapped. It for for him. Everything you did was for him. He was worth it. Peter was worth it.

“Hello?” You asked tentatively into the phone. An unknown number had called you early one morning. You heard a series of grumbling and awkward stutters on the other end of the line.

“Hello!” The voice boomed in a confident way. It got less confident as he went on, soon speaking barely above a whisper. “This is uh, this is Mr. Harrington. I mean, Roger. This is Roger. I teach school. I mean, I teach at school. Peters school. I science. No, um, I teach science. I teach science to Peter. Not just Peter, I have other students. At school. Is this Y/n?” The man rambled.

“Speaking.” You bit your tongue to suppress your laughter.

“As I’m sure you know, Peter and myself and 21 other students are going on a trip to Europe in a short amount of time.” Roger said. It sounded like he was reading from index cards. He was very stiff and definitely rehearsed.

“I’m aware.” You said slowly.

“Well as it turns out, two male teachers alone with 14 teenage girls isn’t sitting well with…anyone. We’ve had multiple complaints about not having a female teacher coming on the trip. Due to unfortunate circumstances that I am not legally allowed to repeat, I am legally not allowed to be alone with the majority female teachers in the school. As you might guess, this unfortunate issue can potentially lead to a series of conundrums that would jeopardize the safety of the children. Because you are an adult and well respected in the community due to your popular news report, The L/n Report, and are familiar with many of our students, you were suggested to come on the trip as a chaperone. Do you accept this offer?” Roger asked robotically. You thought over his offer. A week in Europe didn’t sound too bad. And you had been worried about not seeing Peter for that time. His offer was very inviting.

“I’m allowed to go even though I’m not faculty?” You asked.

“I also shared this concern and asked the principle. She said, and I quote, “who gives a-“ and then she proceeded to say an expletive that I do not feel comfortable repeating in the presence of a lady.” Roger said awkwardly. You were finding it harder and harder not to laugh at him.

“Do you mind if I talk to Peter first? You are aware that he and I are involved romantically, right? Won’t that be a conflict of interest?” You asked Roger. Surely a students girlfriend could never act as a chaperone.

“I am aware of your romantical involvement with Mr. Parker. Once again, I also had this concern. As long as you stay on the girls floor of the hotel and he stays on the boys floor, no one actually cares.” Roger answered. You were finding less and less reasons not to go.

“I’ll ask Peter about it. Thank you Roger.” You said politely. Roger chuckled.

“Please, call me Roger.” He said suavely.

“I…did.” You deadpanned.

“Oh. Right. Sorry. Every time I practiced this with my mom, she called me Mr. Harrington at the end. I’ll talk to you soon, Y/n.” Roger said into the phone.

“Please, call me Y/n.” You joked.

“I did.” He said seriously, almost defensively.

“No I was…nevermind. I’ll call back soon.” You didn’t try to explain the joke to him. It was no use.

You hung up and went to find Peter to see what he thought.

“Hell yea I want you to come.” Peter cheered. He was overjoyed at the thought of the love of his life accompanying him on the trip of a lifetime. It eliminated his fears of leaving you at home. You were a little surprised at his reaction. You knew he loved you, but he had to get a little sick of you at one point right?

“Are you sure? I don’t want to impose.” You told him. Peter shook his head and pulled you onto his lap.

“You could never impose. You know that, baby.” Peter said softly. Your cupped your cheek and kissed the other. You habitability wrapped your arms around his neck.

“Then I better call Roger back and tell him I’m coming.” You said.

“Who’s Roger?” Peter said a little too quickly.

“Your science teacher.” You laughed.

“Mr. Harrington?” Peter asked. He never knew his first name. He never wanted too.

“I guess he and I are on a first name basis.” You shrugged sarcastically.

“I kind of hate the thought of you being on a first name basis with my science teacher.” Peter laughed at the thought.

“Oh, well. Sucks to suck.” You teased.

“Maybe so. I’m so relived you’re coming too. I didn’t want to leave you behind.” Peter admitted. You gave him a slight smile.

“Again.” You thought. “He didn’t want to leave me behind again.” Peter was thinking the same thing.

“This is kinda perfect. Now I don’t have to worry about Ned bringing you back in a little plastic sandwich bag.” You admitted your fears as well.

“I like to think Ned would have the decency to put me in an empty tube of chapstick.” Peter played along.

“All jokes aside, I’m glad for this too. I’ve had a hard time letting you out of my sights since The Snappening.” You confessed.

Peter groaned at your choice of words.

“It’s called The Blip.” He corrected you.

“It’s called The Blip by disgusting people who want to watch the world burn. The intellectuals call it The Snappening.” You flipped your hair behind your shoulder in a dramatic fashion.

“I guess my whole school wants to watch the world burn.” Peter shrugged. His school, specially the school news team, had coined the term The Blip.

“Then we better get you out of that school.” You kissed Peter cheek as he laughed.

You spent the rest of the day helping each other pack for the Europe trip. You called Roger back and told him you’d be delighted to chaperone. He was thrilled to hear you say yes and informed you that his mother always said no.

You washed your face that night and looked in the mirror. You studied your reflection. You didn’t look too much older, but enough to notice that you were no longer Peters age. If he noticed, he never mentioned it.

“This will be good for us.” You said in your head so only Venom could hear.

“Are you telling us or asking us?” Venom asked. She could sense your hesitation.

“Telling.” You said quickly. “I am telling you that this trip will be good for me and Peter.”

“We believe you. But do you believe you?” Venom asked again. You stared at your reflection until tears welled up in your eyes.

“Yes.” You said finally. And you meant it. Doctor Strange told you that you and Peter were soulmates. You had to believe him.

You had to.

Your eyes wondered to the flower you kept in a bowl of water on a shelf in the bathroom. You kept it there so you could see it every morning and night. It’s green and black petals glistened in the dim light of Peters bathroom. You had told him it was from Asgard, which is was, but you didn’t tell him it was from Loki. He knew nothing of that day in Asgard. The Time Heist, Thor’s breakdown, the Aether, the kiss. And he wasn’t going to know. Peter didn’t have to know everything you did while he was gone. He just had to know you still loved him now that he was back. And you did.

You did

Tag List 🏷

@monimiin @truthdaze @honeyccoated @constellationswithapurpose @condy-wants-a-cookie @zipp0flare @vxidnik @maddie-laufeyson @bubblegumholland @the-blindwatcher @pmvelez97 @ziggyspurplehaze @grippleback-galaxy @fangeekkk @twilight-loveer @assemblemotherfuckers @bolivianchickennugget @founding-fuck-bois @neonpandicorn @charismas-world @justletmesleeptillidie @multifandom-fiasco @mellow-delight @dangerousluv1 @eridanuswave @learning-howto-be-myselfx3

[marshmallowprotection]

Well, hey, if youre willing to write for it im delighted to request it! If you dont already have an idea in mind, how about snapshots of each rfa member with the rfas unofficially/officially adopted child? Or what each would do if they needed to pick them up from school cause they got sick? I kind of love this whole idea so ive already thought up way too many ways to use it haha, but id be happy with literally anything related to the rfa communally raising a kid

I've written some little blurbs for you, nothing long but something just enough to get a taste of what it might be like. I couldn't decide on a specific kid to use so I'm just going to swap between a boy and a girl for whichever it feels right for. 

Yoosung 

"Sungie, do you always get to see so many animals?" 

"Mmm. Yeah, it's part of my studies. If I wanna be a great Vet someday, I have to learn about all kinds of animals and meet them." 

"Really cool! I wouldn't mind if I got to hang out with puppies all day." 

"Well… It's not always like that." 

"Oh, right, there must be kitties and bunnies too!" 

They always chatted like this. 

Yoosung spent the time that he did have free with everybody's favorite son. He was often one of the least busy members of the group but only during the afternoons while the others were working. They would waste a lot of time playing games that he enjoyed or LOLOL, which Yoosung liked. 

They got along really well. Yoosung had taken to him like a big brother, and while he wasn't entirely sure if he was doing it right, he enjoyed the time they spent together. 

He wasn't ever really that close with his big sister, so to have a little buddy to hang out with like this was so different!  

He wasn't the youngest person now, so a lot of the words directed towards him were now thrown to the wayside. It made him feel like he was pretty mature! 

That wasn't always the case, though. 

Video games were an easy way for them to interact and because of that he got a little too invested in them. Of course, just because he was older didn't mean that he always won those games. 

The kid took it ten times more seriously than he ever did and he had to actually try to win what they were on. He never really had that issue before without having many people to play against. But, it was like Seven had been tutoring him on how to destroy others. 

Today was no different. 

"I WIN!" he shrieked as he jumped off of the couch and thrust his hands in the air as Yoosung hung his head in defeat. 

"Looks like you win again," he laughed, though still a little embarrassed. 

Zen

She was a star, a bright shining star. 

All she wanted to do was be the one who made all the sad stuff go away, far, far away from here! It was a dream of hers to be as cool as her family was, and she thought the best way to do that would be to practice for the next party! 

She got the idea from Jaehee, cause she always said that Zen could shine so brightly that it made her feel better. 

So, who else to ask for tips then Zen? 

So, she put on her little show as best as she could for him. 

"You're doing great, keep it up out there, princess!" Zen cheered her on as she spun around in circles and circles on end, pretending to perform for the little crowd of plush toys and Zen.

He clapped as she finished up her little routine a few minutes later, with her arms stretched out wide and little chest heaving from all the little motions. 

Her eyes twinkle with such joy. It was a blessing to see her look so happy and all she ever wanted to hear was that she was getting better at this. 

She puffs out her cheeks when he doesn't say much more, "D'ya like it, Zenny? I can't show everybody else less you think s'good!" 

This little girl was an absolute darling to everybody that she came into contact with and it was no surprise given her parent, who had been the kindest soul ever to walk the face of the planet. She never caused any trouble and all she wanted to do was have a little fun every now and again. 

Zen wasn't all that great with kids, at least, he never felt like he was. He didn't exactly do a perfect job all the time, but he did try his best when he could. 

She had insisted that he sit down and watch her perform this time around. She wanted to show that she could be as dazzling as Zen was, and he would stand to agree that this little girl had a future in talent if she wanted to pursue it. 

Even if she was a little bit pitchy with her own rendition of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. 

Zen let out a little laugh. He pressed his hand against the top of her head and ruffled her hair. "It was very good. You'll blow everybody away at the next party for sure, okay? I need to watch out. You're going to give me a run for my money." 

Jaehee

The little boy clutched at his locks, clearly frustrated with the paper of homework in front of himself. It just wasn't making any sense to him and he really wanted to just give up and quit it. 

He had been trying so hard to do it all on his own so nobody would get worried.  

That hadn't worked because Jaehee caught him looking so dejected in the corner of the café. 

There was no hiding anything from that woman. She just knew when something was wrong and wouldn't let the subject go when she started talking. 

She always got onto him. It wasn't rude or mean though! 

She was just looking out for him, he knew. It didn't change the fact it was a little embarrassing. 

Jaehee looked over his notes and instead of scolding him for the bad marks, she merely hummed and nodded her head. She pointed out some of the troubling areas for him and tapped the spots. 

"So you see, you'll need to do this first before you start doing this part of the question. You're getting ahead of yourself when you're working on these types of problems." 

He stared at the paper for a moment with pursed lips, "...Oh. I guess I didn't think about that." 

"Why don't we try some together and see where it's confusing, okay?" Jaehee smiled. 

He may have felt unsure of himself but he knew that he could trust her judgment at times like this. 

Jumin 

"You look lovely today… I see you and Elizabeth the 3rd are wearing matching bows." 

"Oh, you noticed? I tied them all by myself too!" 

"Did you? That's very crafty of you to do so, princess. Elizabeth seems positively pleasant about it. Why, may I ask, did you do it?" 

"Oh! Elizabeth and I are having a tea party today. We can't have one without looking cute n' stuff. You think my Mommy would like these?" 

"She would. That's her favorite color."

Jumin had never been sure how to act around children. He had never really been a normal child himself, and by the time he figured it out, he was already well grown into an adult. Now, he was really learning how to interact with children. 

This little girl had stolen not only his heart but the hearts of everybody she came into contact with over the past few months.

She was bubbly and sweet, never out of line, she had a penchant for cute toys and little accessories, and she liked to make her own things and play pretend. 

Most importantly, she was the only person in this world who could get CEO Jumin Han to sit in a small chair and pretend to drink tea. 

That's what he was doing right now. 

Elizabeth the 3rd was sitting on her own chair as the girl pretended to pour out some tea into her cup with a smile, "You want some more, Elizabeth? Really? Okay, more tea for the lady!"

Once she set it down she glanced over at Jumin with a big grin, "I'm glad you like it too, I tried really hard. I made some for everybody to wear! I made you a purple one!"

And if anybody thought he wouldn't wear a bow in his hair for this kid, they were wrong. 

Seven

“I did it! I think I put it together, it works, it really works!“

She always looked at the world with stars in her eyes. 

Every new experience was something great to watch happen and it didn’t matter what it was that she was doing or trying out. She always smiled and laughed. It was a great sound, and it had been such a long time since Seven had even heard anything like that. 

This little girl was equal parts smart and sweet. 

If Seven handed her something to work on, she would devour it and figure out what was wrong or what needed to be fixed within a couple of minutes. Seven let her tinker with some of his old robots. Granted, he didn’t give her anything really complex, but still, she learned fast. 

It didn’t always work out, but she never lost her big grin. 

He beamed. “Oh? So you did!  That’s impressive. Good job! Meowy 2.0 here is looking much more lively, huh?” 

She gripped onto the little bot and nodded her head. “Mhm! I wasn’t sure if I was gonna be able to figure it out, but thanks to your help, I got it.”

He couldn’t have been more proud. 

Seven didn’t know what it was like to have many older people in your life care for you like this in a way that was more domestic and typical. He never thought that he would ever have to chance to be around kids like this, but it was something that he always wanted to do. 

She had stolen his heart, though. He would do anything for the kid. 

“That’s right,” Seven nodded. ”You don’t have to do everything alone to figure stuff out. It’s actually better to ask for help when you don’t know what to do next time.” 

She was quiet for a moment and grinned. “...Yeah, about that. I was wondering, how hard would it be to add a flamethrower?” 

Nobody tell the others about that though. 

V

"Does it matter if I make my sky a different color then blue? Why does it always have to be blue? Is it wrong to do something like that? Can it only be blue…? I don't understand." 

"Well, the sky isn't just blue, you know. It can be almost any color you want it to be, it's your drawing to paint so it's your choice what it looks like. Why do you ask?" 

He hung his head, not wanting to look V in the eyes. "... Some kids told me I was stupid and wrong. I guess... I’m just not as good as you thought I was."

V frowned. He got to the boy’s level and pressed his hands against his shoulders, "Hey… that's not true at all. I love your sky, that's why we put it up on the fridge." 

He had really low self-esteem. It wasn’t something that was always remedied by the fact that he had a support system behind him. For some children, it was hard to connect with others in some capacity. 

This boy was always radiant and smiling when he was with the RFA. But, when he was alone or by himself, there were those times when the unease shined through. It wasn’t for a lack of love. Those feelings could affect anyone no matter their life or background. 

V hated to see that. 

“Are you sure?” he asked, quietly. “I would understand if you didn’t.” 

Because he was special, not only to him and the rest of the RFA but to himself as well.

“I’m sure. I would never lie to you. Now, let’s see what we can do about this problem of yours at school, okay?” 

Saeran 

Saeran was always wary of children. 

He always thought of his parents and how badly they had screwed him over as a kid, and his first fear was that he was going to do something as bad as what they did to him to somebody else. That was the last thing that he wanted to do to anyone. 

It wasn’t easy for him to build a bond with MC’s little girl, but he did try every now and again. For some reason, the girl really liked him and stuck to him like glue at every chance that she got. It was kind of hilarious to see somebody so bright and cheery reaching out for somebody as dark looking like him. 

There were times when she would talk somebody’s ear off, but she would never do that to anyone apart from the people in the RFA. She was often quite shy and anxious. With Saeran, though... she was quiet and didn’t often press him for talk and chats. 

She seemed to understand that he really wasn’t much of a guy for chatting, and they both could just hang out without worrying about anything. Today was a little different though. 

He had walked in the room that she was sitting in, and noticed that she was crying. His body stiffened, and he felt rather uncomfortable. He knew that he could have directed somebody else to the situation but at the same time, he didn’t think he could make himself do that. 

He had been in that position too many times as a kid and nobody was there for him. Against the dread in his gut, he sat down next to her and didn’t say anything at first. She was clearly looking over at him. 

“S-Saeran?” 

“...Mmm.” 

“I wasn’t... cryin’... just got dust in my eyes.” 

“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want too,” he said, quietly. “I just figured you would feel better if you had some company.“

“...Thank you.” 

[kevinskorner]

A Little Late Series: It Was Good Until It Wasn’t by Kehlani

Kehlani is one of my favorite artists of all time. Ever since I found her music in one of my favorite youtubers’ video I was watching in 2014, I have been completely obsessed. Immediately after hearing her first mixtape Cloud 19, I turned so many people I know onto her and we’ve been together ever since then haha. I can’t believe all the growth and achievements she has received since then but it also feels like she’s just beginning. In the time between this album and her first studio album, she has been thee queen of features, and every single one has been great. I cannot believe that her second studio album is out but, here we are! 

“Toxic” was not my favorite on first listen but as time goes on, oh my god, its so addicting. I just want to scream on the top of my lungs “THAT DAMN DON JULIO MADE ME A FOOL FOR YOU”. Ty Dolla $ign’s background vocals suit the song so well and they compliment each other so well over this beat. “That dick always been problematic” is classic. Ohhhh “Can I”. I really dont have a lot to say about this one. Its incredible. “Sniper game no Bradley Cooper”?!?!?! Kehlani got better bars than a lot of rappers in the game. Its just such an absolute vibe that I want to feel forever. I don’t usually like Tory Lanez but his feature is actually nice here. I think hearing the other person’s side of the story perfectly blends the song together. On “Bad News”, I love the vocals and harmony on the “give all that shit up” parts. It can be a very beautiful song at some parts but sometimes the verses can be a little unmemorable. “Real Hot Girl Skit” is so fun, real poetry! Thank you Megan Thee Stallion <3 “Water” was probably my most anticipated song to hear because I just love water. Haha. Anyway, on my first listen I didn’t like it and was really disappointed, but! Once I played in a few more times, I fell in love. The chorus is so cool and having her go down an octave every time she says “water” was such a neat effect. I love how after the first chorus she starts speaking faster than in the first verse. her flow?!?! I did not expect rapper Kehlani to be all over this project but I live. I loveeee the chorus on “Change Your Life”. The beat bounce is so cool. Jhene and Kehlani coming together is so amazing. They compliment each other beautifully and as two modern-day R&B powerhouses, its so great seeing these two women come together. The “Belong to the Streets” skit is so upsetting because those are normal conversations that a lot of people have on the daily. People discuss women’s lives so harshly and grossly and find no problems with it. I don’t like this skit because its a sad reality but I guess I just have to accept it. “Everybody Business” is the PERFECT response to the prior skit. She’s owning who she is and talking about how she’s a grown woman who can make her own decisions! I love how the lyrics are really badass but the mood and vibe is really stripped down. It’s stunning to see how much she’s grown as a person. Since I’ve stanned for a long time, I know some things Kehlani has struggled with on the daily like what other people think of her. Seeing how she has tuned those outer voices out and started focusing on herself more is *chefs kiss*. I really didn’t expect to love "Hate the Club” as much as I have. The sax is so juicy and adds a jazzy twist to modern R&B. As someone who doesn’t participate in partying, drinking, smoking etc, I too hate the club! It’s just not my scene and I’m happy Kehlani feels the same way. I don’t ever want to have to “drink enough” as she says, in order to do something. I also absolutely am in love with the bridge. That switch! “Serial Lover” seems like a standout to a lot of people since it was produced by longtime Drake collaborator, Boi-1da. I love when she says “I think I should be single, for awhile” because after that comma she goes down an octave and sounds so sick. My favorite lyric is “I got girls I wanna give my last name”. It’s not my favorite song but its really smoothhh.  “F&MU” is such a clever song. Truly, that line “fuck and make up like its mabeliene” is so clever! How has nobody thought of that before? The only thing that really stands out to me on this song is the chorus. It’s still one of my faves, I just wish it was longer.  The squeaky bed in “Can You Blame Me” is everything. I don’t know how I feel about the Lucky Dayes’ feature though… he adds something but nothing special. "Grieving” was the MOST SURPRISING song on the whole album! I was so shook when the chorus came in omg. How come I haven’t seen more people talk about it?! Even the blending of when James says “Grieving” with Kehlani is heavenly. The transition on “Open (Passionate)” is soooo gorgeous. I like the verses better than the chorus on this one, which is surprising for me. I like the connection between being very open but its only because your so passionate about the love your in. I feel like I can very much understand and relate to that! Regarding, “Lexii’s Outro”, I knew she was going to do something for Lexii on this album ever since I found out about her passing. When You Should Be Here came out, Jealous was one of my favorite songs on the project and I loved Lexii’s verse. I’m happy Kehlani ended her second studio album this way by showing the world what this girl had. 

All honesty, on my first listen I don’t think I paid that much attention to the album and lyrics and it felt more like background noise. As time has gone on, I completely have appreciated this album and love how my girl Kehlani is progressing as an artist. This is definitely her most mature project to date and I love that for her. It’s not my favorite project from her and thats okay. It’s not bad at all. I will always like literally whatever Kehlani does. She can do no wrong in my book. Even if sometimes it feels like background noise than anything else, its still better than half the other projects ive listened to.

Standout track: “Toxic”, “Can I” feat. Tory Lanez, “Everybody Business”, “Hate the Club” feat. Masego, & “Grieving” feat. James Blake.

Rating: ★★★☆☆

[hookedontaronfics]

First Contact series - Part 7

Title: First Contact - Part 7 Read the previous installments here: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 Rating: M Pairing: Taron x OC Warnings: Mild cursing A/N: Although Jess and Taron are officially dating now, will they have what it takes to survive a month apart? This chapter contains plenty of sweet fluffy moments. The series will eventually involve more mature themes as it develops, so be warned! Enjoy! x

I was startled awake by the sound of a large stack of papers hitting the top of my desk. I sat upright so quickly I nearly tipped over in my desk chair, and blinked a few times before gathering where I was. At work, at my desk. Right, just where I shouldn’t have been napping. I gazed up at my boss, who was tapping his foot impatiently.

“Sorry, what do you need?” I asked, wiping the corner of my mouth as surreptitiously as possible.

“Office, now,” he said, and strode off. Shit.

It’d been two weeks since Taron had left London for his work, and while I’d like to say I handled that time with complete calm and utter grace, that just wouldn’t be me. Most of the time he would be available to talk was the middle of the night for me, and sometimes our conversations would take up hours so I’d crawl into work after only having slept three or four.

I sighed and rearranged my clothes slightly, making sure I didn’t look as rumpled as I felt, and hurried off to my boss’ office, shutting the door behind me and trying to steel myself for the inevitable lecture.

“Please, have a seat,” he said, gesturing to the chair. I perched on the edge of it, feeling ashamed and still exhausted.

“Is something going on that I should know about, Jess? I’ve noticed you’ve been exhausted and a bit scattered the past two weeks, and I just wanted to make sure everything in your home life is okay, and if not, if there’s anything I can do to help,” he said concernedly.

“I, uh, yes, everything’s fine. There’s just someone really important to me who’s been out of the country and so the only time we get to talk some days is late at night in my time zone. I’ve been trying to balance everything and not let it encroach on work but obviously I haven’t been perfect at that,” I admitted with a heavy sigh. “I’m sorry, I’ll do better,” I said, figuring that’s what my boss wanted to hear.

“If we need to adjust your hours to give you a later starting time, I think that could be arranged,” he said sympathetically.

“Really?” I asked, surprised again.

“We’re not tyrants here, Jess. Maybe that’s how it was for you in America, but we don’t try to take over our employees’ lives, and you’re one of our hardest workers here. You put in extra hours and always go the extra mile and that hasn’t been lost on me. So if this helps you get more sleep and be more productive, then I’m willing to try it out,” he smiled at that.

“Just for a couple more weeks,” I nodded, still a bit surprised with the outcome. We worked out some later hours for me and even the possibility of working from home when I didn’t have a table read, and I felt much better about things once I returned to my desk.

I made it through the rest of the workday with a hefty amount of caffeine and was grateful when I finally made it home to the flat. I kicked off my heels and laid down in my bed, still just completely worn out. I don’t remember dozing off, but I must have because I was awoken by my phone ringing. I had to dig it out from the sheets and it took a second for me to register that it was a video chat from Taron. I accepted the call and sat up, probably looking like a hot mess.

“Heeeey babe!” Taron grinned cheerily. I checked the time quickly; it was already night for him so I assumed he was just in his hotel room.

“Oh, hey,” I smiled sleepily.

“Did I wake you?” he asked, giving me the most adorable grin.

“Yeah, but I wasn’t supposed to be sleeping, so it’s alright,” I laughed. “I just got home from work an hour ago.”

“I see that,” he grinned, looking over me as I was still dressed in my nice office clothes.

“You mean I’m not just chilling in my jammies for once?” I giggled, before telling him I’d gotten caught napping accidentally at work but that it was all alright because my boss was amazing and I respected him for it. “It sounds silly to say it, but things have been really different for me here in London. I feel respected as an actual professional, not just someone’s slave,” I said thoughtfully. “Not to mention, I met you and that wasn’t something I ever counted on,” I grinned.

“I am oh so grateful that we did, though,” he said sweetly, making that familiar ache grow in my chest.

“I miss you so much,” I whispered softly, wishing I could reach through the screen and touch his beautiful face.

“I miss you too, badly,” he said, the video screen shaking as he seemed to readjust his position. I had to look away so it wouldn’t make me feel dizzy. “But it’s only two more weeks until you get to see me again. We can make it.”

“Do I sound pathetic?” I laughed at that.

“No, of course not, Jess. We’ve literally talked every day because I can’t stand not seeing your face. So if you’ve got it bad, so have I,” he replied.

“Oh, T,” I laughed softly. Sometimes he said things like that, and I didn’t always know how to respond. Our relationship had certainly grown despite the distance between us, and he always made it a point to text me good morning and good night no matter the time of day it was, or leave me funny memes or pictures to make me laugh. I loved how caring and thoughtful he was. He’d done everything in his power to keep me from feeling lonely and I was trying hard to stay grateful.

“I wish I could have brought you out here but that just wasn’t going to work,” he frowned, wrinkling his brow.

“It’s okay. I don’t want to distract you from your work. You know, work I’m completely and utterly going to fangirl over when I get to see it,” I teased lightly. “Don’t forget, Taron Egerton, I may be your girlfriend but I’m also your Number One fan,” I added, giggling.

“Oh boy,” he just chuckled. “Well I hope you’re ready for the VIP experience, because my girlfriend gets a very special place at my side,” he said sweetly.

“I wouldn’t want it any other way,” I smiled, as I heard the front door open. Mary must have just arrived home from work, and Jules wouldn’t be far behind.

“Roomies home?” Taron asked, having seen me look away at something. I nodded at that and yawned again.

“Shit, I need more coffee or something,” I whined.

“Or sleep,” Taron chuckled softly. “I decided it was my turn to stay up late and talk to you at a more normal time for you. I hate that I’ve gone and made you exhausted.”

“Oh please, talking every night has been the best part of every day,” I grinned at that. “I’ll take the exhaustion over not getting to see you. I just wish I could be with you right now. But, I know there will be more days like this ahead. I love what you do for a living and this might just be how it goes for us at times. I promise I can handle that.”

“I’m not so worried about you, love,” Taron said with a tired smile. “I’ve just gotten quite attached, you know. When I fall, I tend to fall hard,” he admitted.

Fallen for me? I thought to myself giddily. It still seemed hardly true at times that I was dating someone I’d long been a fan of, but it also just felt normal too. I’d met him on his level, as just another person living their life in London, and that our lives had intersected and started twining themselves around each other seemed almost meant to happen. We ended up having a lot of things in common, same musical tastes and interests in books and films. We could carry on conversations for hours about the deeper things in life. He was always thoughtful and introspective and unafraid to be emotional. Our personalities meshed so well, the more I got to know of the person he was when the cameras weren’t on. And I was beginning to deeply love that person.

“Hey, what are you thinking?” he asked, after I realized I’d been silent for a moment or two with my thoughts.

“How well we get on with each other,” I mused.

“Almost like it was meant to be,” Taron smirked back at me, his eyes dancing a bit.

“If that sudden storm hadn’t chased us into Tesco’s, and I hadn’t really needed brown sauce that day, then who knows if we’d ever have talked,” I laughed at that. “So yeah, it’s feeling a bit fated, isn’t it?”

“The brown sauce really did the trick,” Taron laughed heartily.

“I’m a bit obsessed, I know,” I giggled, pretending to hide my embarrassment behind my hands. 

“But really, I can’t imagine I wouldn’t have somehow noticed a woman as beautiful as you walking about London.”

“Taaaron, you’re too kind,” I whined slightly. “Tell me again why we have to be apart right now?”

He just chuckled at that, and looked about to fall asleep. “You should go get some rest, babe,” I replied gently.

“Before I drop my phone on my face,” he smirked lightly. “Talk to you soon,” he promised sweetly, waving at the camera, and I tried to remember everything about his precious face in the moment. We took our good-byes and I at once found myself having to combat the feeling of loneliness that washed over me.

I got up and changed out of my work clothes into just a simple pair of jeans and a shirt I’d dumped on the floor that was still at least half-clean before heading out of my room to find Mary, nearly tripping over Tim stretched out in the hallway. “Damnit, Tim!” I said, laughing and hopping on one leg after stubbing my toe on the hardwood floor in an effort to avoid him. He just meowed at me indignantly and didn’t move. That cat had more sass than most adults, I giggled to myself before flopping on the couch.

“So, how’s the day?” I asked Mary.

“Oh! Good!” she grinned over at me, flipping through channels on the telly a bit idly. “Might have a date with my co-worker,” she said off-handedly.

“What!” I shrieked loudly. “No way! Tell me details, come on!” I giggled.

“Well, I took your advice and finally just asked Emmett if he were available and wanted to maybe get a coffee sometime and he actually said yes!” she grinned.

“Maaarreeeee!” I laughed. “I’m so happy for you,” I giggled. “And what did I say, huh?”

“Yeah, yeah, you told me so, I know,” she rolled her eyes at me. “It’s just scary! I don’t want to mess anything up.”

“You’ve just got to let it flow naturally, I guess. Try not to try too hard. When it forces things is when it gets awkward,” I tried to advise.

“What about you and Taron? How are things?” she asked curiously.

“Really good, I think. I miss him like mad. But we talk a lot, about a lot of stupid shit, really. And sometimes we fall asleep on each other and that’s always cute. But we’re becoming best friends first and that’s really important, I think. I’ve only kissed him a couple of times!” I giggled. “I want nothing more than to just be able to hug him again. But we’ve managed the first two weeks already and we’ll manage the next two weeks and then you can bet I’m going to tackle his ass at the airport!” I grinned, making Mary laugh.

“Well I think you two are couples goals,” she smiled. “It’s way too cute.”

“Well thanks, babes, I appreciate it. I really think I’m falling for him, head over heels,” I sighed softly. We talked a bit longer until Jules came home, pissed off about something at work, so we spent the next hour or so dishing on her idiot co-workers and making dinner together. It felt really good to just be there with my friends, allowing myself to be distracted from missing Taron so much. The evening ended relatively anticlimactically, and I fell asleep totally exhausted but at least happy.

The next week passed much the same, and I ended up grateful for my later hours, which meant I was much more refreshed and able to focus on work, and still get my late-night chats in with Taron. He was even sweet enough to have flowers ordered and sent to my work, and I loved looking at them at my desk and being reminded that I had someone who really cared about me. Our relationship was so much more than just what I could do for him; he returned that in kind and sometimes, even more than I felt I could.

“Mail!” Jules called out, breaking into my train of thought as I was perched on the couch, laptop on my lap, typing away at a script I was working on. She held the envelope in front of my face until I grabbed it. “What is this?” I asked, noticing it was from a travel agency.

“Hell if I know, but it’s got your name on it,” she shrugged, sitting on the couch and waiting for me to open it, nosy as she was.

“I never sent away for anything from this agency,” I commented as I slid my finger under the flap to open it. I pulled out what was inside, a plane ticket nestled inside a letter that simply read “Pack your bags and meet me in a week. I promise to make up for this month apart. -T”

Jules shrieked so loudly I nearly upset my laptop onto the ground. “Oh my god! That’s like the most romantic thing ever!”

“Jesus, Jules,” I laughed, a bit stunned as I tried to focus on the ticket’s destination. Dubrovnik? I thought, having to Google where that even was. Apparently it was a seaside town in Croatia; I had no idea, but I was sure Taron had chosen it for a particular reason.

“I don’t even know if I can go, Jules. I have work, I can’t just leave in a week. That’s insane,” I laughed softly.

“I’m sure Taron already cleared that with your boss. He seems the kind of guy to have planned all of that out,” Jules giggled. She had a fair point, I thought, finally giggling over it also.

“Holy shit. I’m going to Dubrovnik in a week,” I said, still not even sure how to process that. 

I’m pretty sure I fairly floated through the next week, after confirming that Taron had indeed cleared my vacation with my boss a month ago, which surprised me that he’d already been thinking so far ahead. It also suddenly made so much sense as to why my boss had been kind to me about my exhaustion; he’d already known about Taron and my relationship and hadn’t been surprised in the least about it.

Jules had insisted that we go shopping and she persuaded me to choose some cute dresses and bathing suits and, even though I tried to get out of it, she conned me into the lingerie store too, much to my chagrin. I felt there was no way Taron would want to see my body in some lacy racy thing, but Jules promised to pay for it so I had a hard time saying no to the black sheer babydoll she convinced me to pick out.

I ended up shoving the lingerie on the bottom of the suitcase as I packed, leaving the tags on because I couldn’t really stomach the thought of myself in it. I tried to be practical also, and packed a pair of jeans and some leggings along with some cute blouses and tees. I figured we would mostly be comfortable; he’d seen me in my after-work clothes or pajamas so often now that it hardly seemed to matter. Plus, even if I’d fantasized about it more than once, I wasn’t exactly sure we’d end up sleeping together. We were closer than ever now, yes, but we had barely been physical. 

I awoke the morning of my flight feeling both excited and nervous. Taron and I had talked briefly just before I’d gone to bed, and he had seemed so happy to finally see me. He told me he’d arrive in Dubrovnik a couple hours before me, and would be awaiting my arrival impatiently. He was just far too sweet for his own good, I thought as I dressed quickly. I did my hair and makeup and finished putting my toiletries together, nestling them in the space I’d reserved in my suitcase and latching it shut. I already had my carryon ready to go, and lugged both of those out to the main room before summoning an Uber to arrive in a half-hour.

Mary and Jules were eating breakfast but I felt a bit sick to my stomach thanks to nerves, so I just grabbed a protein bar and some coffee and made small talk with them until I got the notification that my Uber had arrived.

“Alright, ladies,” I grinned. “This is it. I’ll see you lovelies in a week!” I grinned as they both got up off the couch to hug me.

“You will have so much fun!” Jules squealed, happy for me.

“And come back all tanned, I bet,” Mary joked, and I laughed at that.

“Yeah, we’ll see. It’s gonna take a miracle to make me not blinding white,” I laughed, hoisting the carryon strap over my shoulder.

“Oh please,” Mary just grinned as Jules snapped her fingers and yelled “Hold on a sec!” as she ran off to her room. Mary just shrugged at me, but the look on her face told me she knew exactly what Jules was up to. Mary was a terrible liar.

Jules came back holding something behind her back. I tried to get a glimpse but she dodged my attempts and unzipped my suitcase, shoving something in there and zipping it back up. It was a box of some kind, but I couldn’t tell what. “What the hell did you just sneak into my suitcase?” I laughed at my roomies’ antics.

“Just something we figure you’ll need and wouldn’t have thought of yourself. Just trust us,” Jules said with a smirk.

“If those are condoms, so help me,” I said with mock severity.

“Oh for bloody’s sake, Jess. You’ve been flirting with Taron for three months now. Don’t you think it’s time?” Jules giggled, as I rolled my eyes but also blushed.

“Yeah, well, I can’t go into this expecting that, you know,” I shrugged. “Anyway, I’ve got to go. Bye!” I said, grabbing my suitcase and pulling it along with me, figuring I could toss the box later if I needed to. No sense in giving myself needless hopes.

“Have fun, but not too much fun!” Jules called out the door as I playfully flipped her off and hurried to the waiting Uber. I tossed my suitcase and bag in the back seat and soon we were heading off to the airport. My Uber driver had a decent playlist playing and didn’t seem one for conversation, and that was fine with me. I thanked him once we arrived at Heathrow and got myself through security and customs before feeling like I could finally relax a little.

<Just waiting to board! I can’t wait!> I texted Taron. I had no idea if he was already in the air or not, but almost immediately a text pinged through.

<I can’t wait to kiss your lovely face again. It’s been too long!> he wrote, making me swoon a bit.

<Same, T. Same> I texted back with a smile.

<I really think you’ll love it there. There were many things I wanted to see or do when I was filming but I was far too busy to do so, so I thought some day I’d like to go back and this felt like the perfect opportunity. And even better to have such lovely company. You deserve a break too, your boss told me you hadn’t taken any vacation time since you started working there over a year ago.>

<I’ve just enjoyed the job so much and truthfully had no where I really wanted to go. London has suited me just fine> I texted back.

<Yes, well, you had vacation days to burn. With me> Taron really could be so cheeky sometimes, I thought as I heard the attendant begin the boarding process. We texted until I was seated comfortably in my first class seat; I’d never flown first class so this was an experience I intended to savor. The flight was smooth as could be, which made me happy. I watched a movie, read some, and mostly daydreamed about being in Taron’s arms again. I was incredibly impatient to deplane once we had landed in Dubrovnik; the process felt like it took forever but was probably no longer than normal.

<We’re here! We’ve landed safely! Just waiting to get off this plane!> I texted.

<I’ll be waiting, love> came the reply.

I made a pit stop in the bathroom on my way to baggage claim, mostly because I had to pee really badly but also because I wanted to make sure I looked put together. I exchanged my leggings for a skirt I had stashed in my carryon and ran my fingers through my hair, nodding to my reflection in the mirror. That would just have to do.

I had to make myself walk at a normal pace as I followed the signs to baggage claim, but probably dashed the final bit, trying not to knock into people rudely. I slowed as I neared the carousels, searching for my boyfriend (I was still so giddy over that word) in the crowd, and spotted him easily enough. He was holding two coffees and looking extra fit in tight jeans, a black shirt and a silken patterned button-down over that. But he could have been wearing a trash bag and he still would have stood out. His bright eyes and chiseled jaw were things I would never get tired of admiring. When he finally spotted me, the way his smile grew on his face made something in my chest ache, and soon we were crossing the space between us at the same time, meeting in the middle.

I dropped my carryon to the ground and Taron somehow managed to set the coffees down on top of his own suitcase without spilling a drop before enveloping me in his hug, burying his face against my shoulder as I hugged him tightly back. We stayed like that for a couple of minutes, before finally pulling away just long enough to gaze adoringly at each other. “I know I’ve said this 80 times before, but I’ve missed you so much,” he said softly, tearing up slightly.

“Oh god, stop, you’ll make me cry too,” I laughed, having to wipe at my eyes a bit. “I’ve missed you like crazy also. Funny how that works, even if you talk every day, it’s just not the same.”

“You certainly can’t do this over the phone,” he said, tilting my chin up and leaning in, kissing me sweetly. It was even better than I remembered, the taste of caramel latte still on his lips. I relished it, letting him pull me to him; if anyone gave us looks, we couldn’t care at all. When we broke apart again he hugged me one more time for good measure, before scooping our coffees back up and handing me one. I grabbed my carryon again and we went to find the right carousel.

We chatted excitedly while waiting on my luggage to appear, Taron filling me in on how lovely the place was. I felt a thrill of excitement travel through me; I really was on a full week of vacation, alone with this man. I had no idea what he had planned, but I was so ready to discover it all with him. Taron grabbed my suitcase when it arrived, and for some reason my brain chose that moment to remind me that Jules had slipped a box of condoms inside; I ended up giggling like a lunatic, and Taron looked over at me, his eyebrow raised.

“Nothing, just thought of something funny Jules did is all,” I tried to explain.

“Why am I not surprised?” Taron chuckled as we headed toward the exit, stepping out into the bright sunshine and blue sky. Taron hailed a cab and gave the driver the name and address of the hotel we’d be staying at after we’d loaded in our luggage and clambered in. It suddenly occurred to me that I hadn’t thought this all through. Oh, right, all alone, in the same room, in the same bed, with Taron, I thought, feeling something seize in my chest. Was I ready for that? Were we? He seemed to sense my tension and reached over to squeeze my hand.

“Alright, love?” he asked me concernedly.

“Yeah, of course,” I said, a bit faintly.

“No, what’s wrong, be honest with me please,” he said, turning my head so I was looking at him.

“I just don’t think we discussed our sleeping arrangements yet,” I managed to stammer out.

“Oh sweetheart,” he said gently. “I booked us a room with two beds, so you wouldn’t be anxious over that,” he replied. He really did know me too well. “I promise you, this isn’t some setup. I wanted you here to enjoy yourself, to relax and have fun with me. Nothing will happen unless you want it to, understand?” he said, almost as if he was reading my mind. I nodded and tried to not feel ashamed of my anxiety. Any other girl would probably jump at the chance and not look back, but overcoming what I’d been through was going to take some time. Taron seemed to understand that and I was so grateful for him.

As we left the airport I couldn’t help but look out the windows around me, taking in the place, especially the historic district of the old city. I took in the stunning architecture and the people in it, baking under the sun. We drove a little bit of a ways out, to the other side of the bay, stopping in front of the Hotel Bellevue. We disembarked from the taxi, Taron paying our fare and then unloading our luggage. We walked inside and I had to gasp. The place screamed luxury and expense, sleek and modern with an unparalleled view of the Adriatic Sea. It was more than I honestly could have hoped for.

“Taron, this is too much,” I said softly after he had checked us in and was leading us up to our room. “I feel like I should be helping you pay for some of this,” I said, but he waved off my concern.

“Nonsense. I invited you here. I chose where I wanted to stay, but I asked you to come along with me. And you deserve the best,” he winked. “Besides, all I do is work. I’m finally taking a moment to rest. I should be able to enjoy what I’ve worked so hard for.”

“Yes you should,” I agreed. “I’m just not a freeloader.”

“Jess,” he said, turning to stop me in my tracks. “I try really hard not to judge people I don’t know but whoever you’ve been with before certainly didn’t know how to treat you well or right. And maybe this is a grand gesture, sure, but who would want to vacation by themselves anyway? This isn’t just for me, it’s for us, and that has nothing to do with money. I don’t care about that. I just want time with you, and that’s not something I’d ever expect you to pay for, alright?” he said, his expression so genuine I could only nod in agreement. “Now, you’re just going to have to get used to a bit of pampering,” he grinned, as we continued on our way to our room.

He let us in and I could only shake my head at how cozy and lovely it was, and the view out the windows and our private balcony were to die for. I couldn’t resist pushing open the doors and stepping outside to take in the view and the sea salt air. I breathed in deeply, resting my hands on the railing and leaning out slightly.

“Like what you see?” Taron grinned, coming up behind me and placing his hands on either side of me on the railing.

“Very much so,” I replied, smiling to myself. It definitely wasn’t so bad to feel him so close to me.

He leaned in close, slowly brushing my hair to one side and placing a couple of sweet kisses on my neck, drawing shivers down my spine as I felt his breath on my skin. “Welcome to Dubrovnik, love.”

Join Taron and Jess on their Dubrovnik adventure and see how their relationship unfolds in Part 8. Read it HERE!

[thereseoutspoken]

10 things I wish I knew (and told myself) at 20

20 is still a very young age

When I just became 20, I felt like I was a full grown woman, for the very reason that I was already out of my teenage years. I felt like I was already mature, and independent, and I felt like I should be serious with my life because I am already old enough. I couldn’t say these assumptions were all wrong. But I wish I could have told myself that 20 is still a very young age. It was an end chapter for my teen spirit, but twenty is only the beginning of a new one. Basically, at this age, you shouldn’t feel too old yet. Yes, you can still play dress ups on Friv, feel giddy over a childish crush, not know how to use the ATM machine, and still want your mom’s assistance during dental check ups. You have your entire life ahead of you to grow and learn. Right now, at twenty, just take things slow.

     2. Taking risks is different from gambling. Avoid the latter.

I have been told countless times by friends (and even the guy I fell in love with) that I should learn how to take risks. I should have listened. At times I am such a coward for not even trying. So yes, I should have listened when they said I should take some risks. But when they told me to take risks even though things are uncertain, I’m going to get hurt, or even if it’s not worth it, I disagreed. Know how to take risks… and when to take risks. Sometimes taking risks even if it’s not worth it could lead to so much pain, which also requires a great amount of time for healing. You could have used the time for healing for waiting on something you could have deserved at the right time, but instead you used it for risking on something uncertain and unworthy (At least there’s the learning part, though). So I tell you this: learn to take risks at the right circumstance. Do not gamble on ambivalence.Because part of taking risks is knowing (and internalizing) what’s at stake.

      3. You will fall in love with the wrong person and you don’t need to force them to be the right one.

Part of growing up is learning to open your heart to love. And part of loving is welcoming the pain, and accepting the things that are beyond our control. Sometimes, when we fall in love, we set aside their bad qualities because we love them. Sometimes it gets toxic and the hurt never stops yet we remain because again, we love them.

We just love the person so much that we want to make them better by changing them, or we change for them to adapt to their standards. But that shouldn’t be the way it is. If you want to change, do it for yourself and not for others, the same way change should transpire to them. It’s not your role to change who people are. More than that, you can’t make them right for you when they are obviously the wrong one.

I get that it’s not love if it doesn’t hurt, but if it puts you in agony more than it makes you feel safe and secured, then it’s not the love you deserve. Self-worth over feelings. At all times.

That’s why when you fall for the wrong person, don’t force them to be the right one. You’ll just end up draining yourself because you will be the only one left trying to keep the relationship together.

    4. As much as you will gain new friends, you will also lose some and that’s okay.

Every year I meet new people who, in the long run, become friends. That didn't change when I was 20. I established such awesome relationships with new friends and it felt so good—extending my circle a little bigger. But as much as I gained new companions, I also lost some. Some were because of big fights, others were just…well, we simply grew apart and realized we didn't need each other for our personal growths. At first I felt disappointed that it had to end that way. But then a vlogger said in one of her YouTube videos that “you don't grow up if you don't lose friends.” And I started to think that yes, she was right. In order for you to grow, you have to let go of what's keeping you from being a better version of yourself. If your relationship with anyone gets toxic, drop it. If it's not doing you any good anymore, calmly walk away. Part of growing up is letting go of what's hindering you from flourishing. Just be thankful for the ones who stayed and bid your silent farewell for the ones who left (or needed to leave).

    5. Start planning what’s next for you

You don’t need to figure everything out all at once. Life is still a blur at 20. But that shouldn’t stop you from envisioning what’s next for you. Commonly, at 20, people are already looking for a job, planning out their career path especially after graduation. I couldn’t say I wasn’t pressured looking at my friends being busy making resumes, travelling to different towns, being  wanted by two or more companies, and there I was… not knowing what to do with my life.

I don’t regret where I’m at in life right now. But if I could turn back time, I wish I’d have made concrete plans for my future self. 

    6. Try something new, even if you start out being bad at it.

I am always known for being a writer. If my name gets mentioned to people who barely know me, they usually say “you know, the journalist” or “the writer-slash-editor from Crusader”. A part of me is happy and proud that I have already established that image for myself. But somehow, I wanted to do new things. I wanted to branch out from writing because I felt like writing was the only craft I knew what to do; so I delved into photography. I always had a thing for good photos and also aspired to shoot such epic sceneries or emotions. I didn't have the equipment though, so I just borrowed from friends. I had a couple of photos published in the official page of the student pub, and also had several shoots with friends. But I knew I wasn't that good yet. I still had a hard time with the camera settings, my photos get blurred most of the times, and I still had a lot to learn. But the worst thing about exploring new things is being discouraged to excel at it. I have been told I am not considered as an artist, or that I should just stick to writing, or I should stop feeling like I'm an artist. Aside from the fact that my skills in photography aren't really that exceptional to be worthy of a handshake or an “artist” label, I gave up on photography because the people around me didn't believe in me the same way I put myself down for not being good enough.

And that was one of my regrets. I should have told myself that “hey, it's okay. You are still a beginner. Allow yourself to learn and improve.” I focused too much on my insecurities and other people's comments that I had to let the craft go. But now, I will pursue it once more.

You, wanting to learn more is okay. You, starting out as a loser is definitely normal. But you, surrendering because you feel like it's not for you just because you suck at it or people discourage you, is undeniably unacceptable. You do you. Soon you will be great at it and you will thank yourself for not giving up.

    7. 20 isn’t always sunshine and rainbows. Bask in the rain, overcome the storms.

The day I officially left the teenage life, I asked 20 to be better. 19 was rough for me, so I hoped 20 would be a lot easier, with a more stable emotional and mental state. Buuuutttt, I was wrong. It was actually pretty worse. Right now I’m just laughing at those struggles, but back in the day, I didn’t even know how to make it through the storm.

Needless to say, if 20 was a weather, she’d be a moody bitch, because it wasn’t consistently bad. There were also good days where I was thankful to just relax in the pouring rain or be happy because of the sunshine that reflects my soul. Actually, this doesn’t only apply when you’re 20. You can experience hardships and get through with it at any age. And that’s what makes surviving beautiful— you get to witness seasons and the weather change, and through it all you can finally say, “I made it past the gloomy days.”  

    8. Start being extra responsible.

I always wanted to work in Manila, but my parents do not quite agree with that plan. My mom would say things like, “Who would take care of you there?”, “Are you sure you’re responsible enough to live on your own?”. When I get sick or fail to do what she instructed me to do, she’d say, “See? You don’t even know how to take care of yourself.”, “You can’t be that irresponsible when you are in Manila.” So I thought about it for a long time. I know I am independent. But am I responsible?

I changed my goal from wanting to prove my mom that she was wrong, to proving myself that I can make things work on my own. Now I do things that adults do, like getting a TIN card, or spending for myself with no allowance from my parents. Maybe these are just little things, but they are stepping stones to being a responsible adult.

You have to think like you’re preparing yourself to live in Manila or any place far from home. Imagine how you can handle things without their financial support or physical guidance. Not only will you learn not to rely on them all the time, you’ll also grow and learn new things that can help you in the long run.

    9. Invest on things that you feel would help you be better.

Being 20 for me was full of negativity. A lot of things made me feel bad, and in result I got emotional and would often cry. But I learned that just like medicines, there are things in life that could relieve you from pain. All you have to do is invest on the ones that could make you be or feel better. In my case, I invested more on my spiritual growth. Some of you may not be (so) religious, but trust me when I say you have a God you can rely on. If you lift your inhibitions and worries to him, he will lighten your load.

Another thing worthy to invest on is self-care. I have been such a mess and would often cry in desperation because I didn't know how to get rid of the emotional pain I was feeling. But a good friend of mine, Winstar, made me a pinterest board full of tips on how to handle anxiety and execute self-care. It was great being reminded that I had to make myself better and I had to focus on my well-being, too.

    10. You are at your own pace

There are times when I can’t help but feel jealous over people who, at such a young age are already successful. While I’m just at home scribbling on my laptop, other people my age are already making a name for themselves. Some are already full-time employees, or opening their own businesses. Others are on their way to law school or med school.

On the contrary, I also have friends who are still starting out with their plans in life. Some friends would tell me, “You’re even lucky you’re done schooling. I’m not even graduating yet.” or “You’ve reached so much in life, while I haven’t even achieved anything yet.”

And it became clear to me: we’re the ones making competitions for ourselves with others. Perhaps the system and the society is pushing us to be this and that, to achieve this and bring honor to whom. But we’re only putting so much pressure on ourselves trying to race with the progress of others when in fact we have our own pace.

So what I have learned from all of this is: focus on your growth, your progress, your own fulfillment. Others may already be at their 4th lap while you’ve just started the engine. But so what? Others’ finish line is not your finish line.

You haven’t found the right career yet? You’re extended in college? Others are already getting married but you’re still single? That’s perfectly fine. Just continue the drive and soon you’ll get there.