#I’ve also got some library books to read that are due soon

[xbratouttahellx]

Craving more Sarah J Maas books but with like bdsm? And queer sex please?

[it-happened-one-fic]

Hours in the Moonlight: Somnolent Gloaming - 5. Quite the Interesting Endeavor

Summary: You’d learned your lesson at the very least. Listen to Sebek when he’s implying someone is important. Even if he is yelling. After all, both Malleus and Lilia were starting to seem more and more important as well as powerful. And perhaps more curious, was that they weren’t hiding it at all.

Series Type: Gender-neutral reader/ Vampire AU/ series/ romantic/ angst/ angst with comfort/ fluff/ sfw/ platonic interactions too!

Trigger Warning: Vampire

Word Count: 1170

Hours in the Moonlight Master-List

In hindsight, I felt almost bad for the way I’d largely ignored Sebek’s words. After all, they had been clear indicators as to exactly how important an individual Malleus really was.

I almost apologized to the young man as he entered the library, glancing around the room until he spotted me. It would have been rather awkward if I had apologized to him though, considering Malleus was still sitting with me in the library.

Apparently the sight of his clan leader was beyond surprising for Sebek, considering how the young man’s eyes bugged out, making their odd yellow-green color even more obvious than it already had been.

And somehow, I just couldn’t believe he was as ancient as his peers, which I figured had something to do with his behavior.

I almost felt myself smile as Malleus looked at the young man, like there was nothing at all odd about the situation and that, if anything, Sebek was the one behaving strangely. But then, it was true that after our conversation, laden with tidbits that just made me increasingly curious about the clan leader of Diasomnia, Malleus and I had simply existed in peaceful silence.

He’d left me to my research, quietly offering his assistance should I need it, and I’d honestly expected him to get bored and leave. But instead he’d simply gotten himself a book and went about reading. Apparently satisfied to stay here with me in peaceful silence.

I didn’t know if it was due to some curiosity of his about the vampire hunter who hadn’t come specifically to see him or some other odd reasoning, but I didn’t have any complaints.

After all, he seemed perfectly unbothered by me, and didn’t pay my presence much mind. 

It was true Vil had implied that once one got used to my scent, I would no longer tempt vampires the way I usually did. Similarly, it was also true that a good number of the vampires I’d gotten to know seemed largely unbothered by me or at the very least they were able to control themselves.

Perhaps Malleus already had a tolerance for my scent that apparently attracted vampires due to being used to Silver. And if that was the case, the Diasomnia clan might be one of the easiest clans to evaluate since I would assume the other vampires here would have a similar tolerance.

Still musing silently to myself, I watched Sebek slowly recover from his shock and look pointedly my way, “THE HOUR GROWS LATE!”

I closed my eyes as soon as he yelled as if it could help with volume, but I opened them fairly quickly when I heard Malleus let out a hum from where he sat.

He was frowning, which was odd considering the fact he’d been wearing a pleasant expression up until now, but I nodded at Sebek nonetheless. Genuinely grateful for him informing me since this room had no clocks and I’d neglected to put on a watch before coming here.

“I see, thanks for telling me. I’d best be on my way so that you can all get some rest.” I paused, hesitating slightly before I looked towards Malleus, “Um… With all the past clans, I’ve come every night until I finish the evaluation, so…”

I’d barely even managed to trail off before Malleus was speaking, a smile on his face like he was truly pleased with my words, “Of course, you are welcome to come here for as long as you like.”

I stood, surprised to see him mirror my motions and look towards me expectantly until I started off towards the door where Sebek stood.

“Would you like for us to send someone to escort you back home, or perhaps on the way back here tomorrow?” The words came from behind me and had my eyes widening. 

I turned to look back at where Malleus stood before I slowly shook my head, “No… Thank you, but I should be fine making home and back here.”

 He nodded at my words, a slight smile on his face, “Very well then. Sleep well, Little Hunter.”

I nodded, still not entirely sure what to make of the clan leader of the Diasmonia clan, before I turned and followed Sebek out of the room.

And though he was silent, Sebek eyed me as we walked. 

A small part of me wondered where Silver was, since the two of them had seemed to be a bit of a duo when I’d seen them together before, but I didn’t ask.

Instead, I walked silently through the corridors until we reached the front door of the mansion. It was only then that Sebek spoke, “Are you trying to win over our leader, human?” 

His voice was low, causing my eyes to widen in slight surprise at his tone. But when I turned to look at him, there was no threat on his face. Instead, it was a mask of smug confidence that puzzled me even further.

“If you are, you will be met with failure. Lord Malleus is not so easily charmed by little mortals,” I felt myself frown at his words, wondering how on earth he’d come to the conclusion.

I shook my head slightly though, my voice coming out in a questioning tone that clearly evidenced my confusion, “I’m not trying to charm him….? He just came in there to ask me some questions.”

Well, ask some questions and drop some hints about his own importance. Though why he had done that was still beyond me unless it had just been some form of strange flex.

My words only seemed to make Sebek smugger, “BUT OF COURSE! He has no doubt already figured out whatever plot your master has.”

I could only assume that my ‘master’ was Crowley, which was an infuriating thought but not entirely wrong. He was, unfortunately, my boss.

But apparently Sebek still did not trust the idea of me being here to evaluate the clan and check some records.

I sighed slightly, preparing to explain myself before another voice broke in. One that had me turning to look at the speaker and making eye contact with red eyes that were filled with amusement..

“You mustn’t keep our guest, Sebek.” Lilia only paused briefly before he smiled at me and continued, “You go on, dear. I’m sure a youngster such as yourself has many things they need to do. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

I nodded slowly at Lilia’s words, quietly thanking him and bidding both men farewell before slipping out the door.

It wasn’t until I was almost back at my apartment that I realized that Lilia had not been present when I said I would be coming back to the clan tomorrow.

There wasn’t much I could do about it now, though… I would simply have to wait and see what tomorrow evening brought. 

The only thing I could say at this point was that evaluating the Diasomnia clan was already turning out to be quite the interesting endeavor.

If you would like to read more

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[enbysanavi]

Resident Lovers: Bela

Bela Dimitrescu hunts down her vice President in an unlikely place.

Warnings: N/A

Bela Dimitrescu always held herself higher than everyone in the Student Council, she was their president after all and being the leader of such a vital club meant she had to be on top of any problem that she came across. Which also meant that if one of her colleagues weren’t pulling their weight, she would figure out why.

That’s how she found herself searching through the library to find her second in command. They were reliable almost all of the time but for the past week they haven’t been handing in the work that she assigned. Normally she wouldn’t confronted them earlier but due to a sudden push in workload from President Miranda even Bela couldn’t take a break.

She peered down a long line of bookshelves to find it empty yet again. This process of checking study area and book shelves were beginning to wane on Bela’s patience. She tried calling them multiple times but the call never connected.

Bela walked down the steps and fished out her keys to get into the archives, maybe her second in command was just doing some research for their Romanian heritage class.

The archives were covered in a thick layer of dust, Bela packed the idea away to get the cleaners down here more often. She walked through the sh lives and filing cabinets with her phone light illuminating her way. Bela would never admit it but being down in the archives always freaked her out, there was just something about the dark that unnerved her.

It wasn’t until she heard the familiar sound of opening and closing filing cabinets that she steeled her fears. “What do you think you’re doing?” She asked, causing the student to jump almost out of their skin and turn to her with wide eyes.

“Woah, calm down. It’s just me.” Bela felt a little more sympathetic to her second in command when she saw how frightened they were. There was something familiar about their fearful face, it concerned Bela and yet she doesn’t remember a time where she saw such wide eyes and laboured breathing on her vice President.

They blinked a few times, almost as if they were actually seeing Bela and not some monster from the darkness. “Bela, you scared me.” They breathed a sigh of relief and put a hand on their chest. “Is this about the council work because I’ll get it finished soon I am just really swamped with work at the moment.”

Bela sighed with frustration and pinched the bridge of her nose. Just as she was about to respond she noticed something weird. “Have you been looking through files without a light? How have you even been reading what’s on it?”

They looked down at the open case file in their hands with a sheepish expression. “I just… I can see very clearly in the dark.”

Pressing her lips into a frown, Bela crossed her arms and looked at her vice President. “What has been going on with you lately? It has even gotten as bad as my sisters bringing up their concerns with me about you.”

“What? Nothing is wrong.” They said sharply and mirrored Bela’s stance. “I’ve just been busy.” They said dismissively and stared back at her with the same tenseness that Bela reciprocated.

“Busy,” Bela scoffed. “Daniela told me that you got drunk so bad that she found you sitting in the kitchen with empty bottles surrounding you.”

The vice president looked down at the floor, seemingly caught off guard for once. “That was a one time thing.” They said quietly.

Bela took a step forward, surprised to see that her friend took two steps back. “You have been acting weird ever since the play finished, hell, even Cassandra is concerned.”

They perked up slightly, looking at Bela curiously. “Well, I…” They trailed off before turning around and shutting the filing cabinet drawer. They sighed and rested their head against it. “I’m just really busy and it’s all piling up.”

Bela took another step forward and gently put her hand on their back, deciding to ignore the way that they tensed against the contact. “Midterms are over, you don’t have a play up soon, you haven’t been going out with Daniela and Angie to party.” She sighed. “The only thing you have to do is the student council and even that workload has gone down.”

Another sigh escaped from their lips as they stood up straight and turned to Bela. She could almost swear that their eyes glowed in the darkness with her light shining upon them. Similar to how a cat’s eyes would reflect the light.

“I’ve been working on personal projects. Something my… family sent me to complete.” They huffed and watched Bela from the corner of their eye.

Bela’s face contorted with worry as she gently guided their face towards her with the use of her hand. “You never talk about your family.”

“It’s complicated.”

Bela snorted with a chuckle. “Trust me. I know how complicated family can be.”

Making light of the situation didn’t seem to be the right course of action with how Bela’s vice president turned their head away.

They grabbed the file that they had set on top of the filing cabinet and tucked it under their arm. “I’m sure you do.” They said shortly. “I should be going. I have a lot of work to catch up on.” And just like that, they disappeared into the rows of filing cabinets before Bela could stop them.

Bela huffed with frustration when she let them escape. “Now I have to track them down again.” She groaned as she leaned against the filing cabinet, pulling back her hand to see some weird black dust on the top. “Gross.”

[pub-lius]

I just wanna say, DUDE. The majority of what I know about amrev comes from your blog. Your in-depth posts literally have me FOAMING AT THE MOUTHH I don't have much time to read longer books due to school but I wanna feed my obsession so do you have any books on the shorter side or some websites/archives I can research/read a bit quicker? If not it's totally fine.

Also off topic but I'm loving "It Began About Dusk" on AO3 <3

OH MY GOD THE FLATTERY‼️‼️‼️ you’re making me blush here anon. im so glad that you find my posts helpful!!! AND IM SO GLAD YOU LIKE MY FICS i have a chapter of it began about dusk in the drafts rn so you’ll get more content soon

now this is a tricky question because im absolutely insane and ive barely ever read short books. right now im reading His Excellency by Joseph J Ellis and i recommend it!! its only around 2-300 pages which is the shortest history book ive got VSJWBW primary sources can be really good to get in book form, things like Common Sense by Thomas Paine, Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior (Washington’s rule book), and Memoir of Lieut. Col. Tench Tilghman, Secretary and aid to Washington are all primary sources i have on my shelf that are short and sweet.

i also have Hercules Mulligan by Micheal J. Obrien which i haven’t read but is VERY small. there is also James Monroe by Gary Hart which is short but i have not finished (i dont even truly remember reading it but i annotated part of it apparently), The Drillmaster of Valley Forge by Paul Lockhart is a little longer than those others, but still isn’t chernow levels of wrong, but i also haven’t read that one. Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger isn’t the most serious history book, but it is pretty good and an easy read.

as for secondary source websites, start with encyclopedias ie Britannica, which post short articles on different historical figures and events that give you the overview. from there im gonna point you to the National Park Service. this is the best thing the US government has ever made for researchers. this is all your battlefields, winter encampments, historical reproductions, and former capitals. also check out private residences turned museums, such as Mount Vernon, Monticello, and Schuyler Mansion. these institutions have an abundance of easily accessible information on more than just the people who lived there.

now the Library of Congress was a good decision on Jefferson’s part, but it can be inaccessible if you don’t know how to use it well because their website is one of my least favorite things about being alive. so instead, i recommend using Founders Online for any primary source regarding the founding fathers or amrev figures. the Washington Papers are filled to the brim with almost everything that went out of headquarters during all 8 years of the war. founders online is the shit

all of these websites i’ve mentioned are free to access, because i do not pay money on any research tools besides books out of spite for late stage capitalism. also any primary source is 100% accessible online. that includes memoirs and court transcripts, which can be very helpful

also i really do recommend watching documentaries and informational videos on the subjects you’re interested in while doing work or other things if you’re someone who does that (ik some people don’t have background noise but im just assuming you’re as neurodivergent as i am) because you can absorb just a little of that information and it being about a subject of interest can make academics seem a little less miserable!

i hope this is helpful and if you have absolutely any further questions, feel free to ask. i know im very privileged to have the time and resources to read long ass books, which is why i very freely share the information i absorb with the public bc i believe education should never be gatekept by anyone. so if you have any questions, im happy to research them for you, or at least point you in the right direction. love ya!!

[theneptuneviolin]

Twenty Books Challenge

Hypothetically, you are only able to keep 20 of your books. Only one book per author/series. So what books are you keeping? Credit due to @the-forest-library. I was tagged by @drasnianfrank (a while ago… ooops)

The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon - If I had to narrow down a single favourite book (not list off about five) I would probably choose this one.

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir - I spent a while deciding which of the Locked Tomb books I wanted to keep and it could be any of them really but I think that Gideon is the most fun of the three of them so far.

Hollowpox by Jessica Townsend - The Nevermoor series really itches the part of my brain that still wants to go on a whimsical adventure like i did when reading fantasy adventures at age twelve. While lots of them still work for me, many of them don’t and the ones that do, I’m coming at from a different perspective now. This series is a rare new-to-me series from the 8-12 shelves that does work for me and Hollowpox in particular unlocked the not-often seen part of me that got properly obsessive and immediately wanted to read the book again from the start as soon as I finished it the first time.

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan - My copy is one of the books I’ve had the longest and honestly looks its age. I’ve lent it to so many people and now the spine is held together with tape, the cover is crumpled and curled and it smells of cigarettes. It’s definitely not the strongest of Riordan’s books and it’s not my favourite (that might be The Hammer of Thor) but the physical object is special to me - it was also one of the rare spur-of-the-moment gifts from my mum.

The Obsidian Tower by Melissa Caruso - Caruso is really good at fast-paced, compelling novels with interesting characters and I love her stuff.

W.i.t.c.h. vol 6 (Yen Press versions) (this is arc 2 vol 3 containing issues 21-24) - I have several versions of the W.i.t.c.h. comics so it was a matter of deciding which versions counted (I am keeping all of my magazines & single issues in this hypothetical) and which one I wanted to keep. I decided not to go for something after my magazines end (shortly after which the comics get bad) but for an alternate translation of my favourite issue (21; I love this version of Cassidy).

The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison - I listened to the audiobook of this recently from the library (I would not recommend the audiobook because the worldbuilding is so intricate that a spent a long time being confused about things that i don't think would have confused me in print) and it’s the first new (to me) thing in a long time that has made me want to read fanfiction. I asked for the physical book for my birthday so I could reread it.

Shadows on the Moon by Zoe Marriott - I originally read this in secondary school and it was the first thing I read that dealt with depression so it did things to me. I read it again a few years ago and it doesn’t hold up (but is still okay if your expectations aren’t too high) and there have been criticisms of one of Marriott’s later books that also apply to this one but I have some emotional attachments to this one and don’t think I could let it go entirely.

Across the Green Grass Fields by Seanan McGuire - While I think most of the Wayward Children series is enjoyable but not amazing, this one got me in the gender feels, which is something that I don’t get very often (I know i need to read more indie/self published books) and I had a very good time with it.

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - I have not read this book and probably never will. My copy was a gift from my grandma from her collection because she thought it might be useful for my English lit A-level. It was not. But it’s still a really nice copy and the copyright date for the introduction and illustrations make it the oldest book (as an item, not oldest from first publication date) in my collection (possibly excepting the matching edition of Jane Eyre, which she gave me at the same time but contains no copyright dates).

Heir of Fire by Sarah J Maas - Knowing her current reputation for smut and what a lot of my friends know about me (not into romance or shipping) this might seem an odd choice but let me take you back to 2012 when the first Throne of Glass book came out: It was in the teen section of the discount book catalogue my mum got in the post, which I read and asked my mum to get me the book with the cool-sounding assassin plot, which she did. When I read it, I loved it (I have long been easily pleased by fast paced plots) and yeah it had a love triangle - but what girly teen books at the time didn’t? (also I still had some stuff to figure out) - but I was still desperate for the next one. I did read the rest of the series as soon as I could but Heir of Fire was my favourite for a long time. Some of it was it was the last book where (on first read) it was still what I wanted it to be (I think there was a definite shift post ACoTaR’s success but some of it was absolutely there in earlier books) and some it the book’s own strengths and some of it was that I went to see her give a talk and a signing session. Also I spent years in the fandom; I still have a sideblog even if I don’t use it and am slightly embarrassed by my old interest.

A Pocketful of Crows by Joanne M Harris - We have definitely reached a zone where all these books are somewhat tenuous. 20 books is somehow too many for me under these rules to fill with books I feel strongly about. I read this one on my first trip home from uni when I was sat at the train station for an hour because I missed my connection. I really liked it then (it was not as good on reread but still enjoyable).

Killing the dead by Marcus Sedgewick - I remember this being excellent when I read it as a teenager. I keep meaning to reread it and I don’t know why I haven’t because it’s one of those tiny world book day short stories.

Avalon High by Meg Cabot - Another book I read as a teenager and had strong feelings about. I reread it a few years ago and it still holds up (unlike the movie lol).

Fairy Dust and the Quest for the Egg by Gale Carson Levine - I read this book as a kid and still have strong feelings about it. I reread it a few years ago and it still mostly holds up (although the rest of the Disney Fairies books that I (re)read mostly do not).

Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr - I also read this series as a teenager and had strong feelings about it. I also keep meaning to rereading it.

Ketchup clouds by Annabel Pitcher - “I read this as a teenager and had strong feelings about it” camp again.

Candor by Pam Bachorz - “I read this as a teenager and had strong feelings about it” camp again.

The Book Thief by Marcus Zusack - “I read this as a teenager and had strong feelings about it” camp again.

Acid by Emma Pass - “I read this as a teenager and had strong feelings about it” camp again. It’s also one of the few teen dystopian books I read in the post-Hunger Games boom that wasn’t set in North America.

I'm tagging @keeperofthetongatooth, @stormykindofgrey, @tiskycat, @satohqbanana and anyone who fancies this.

[emotionallychargedtowel]

9 People You’d Like to Know More

tagged by @wen-kexing-apologist and @thewayofsubtext  <3

Tumblr keeps eating every draft of this post that I write, argh! 

Last Song I Listened To

When I started writing this, I was being lazy and letting the YouTube algorithm pick songs for me and I was listening to this song, Unfucktheworld by Angel Olsen. I've been exchanging song recommendations with a friend for a while now and I guess she has gotten to know me pretty well because this is way up my alley.

But then another song came on--We Ride by Brave Girls (a.k.a. BB Girls)--and that became the new last song I listened to. It's another song that a friend recommended to me. This time it was a friend I've been emailing with back and forth about East Asian pop music. He's a big fan of City Pop, a genre that came out of Japan in the 80s, and he sent me a list of some recent kpop songs that are influenced by/reminiscent of City Pop, including this one. I took to it right away, and it was a big hit with my daughter. 

Currently Watching

I Told Sunset About You - I’m just one episode in to this one and I can already tell it’s going to hit me where it hurts. I took a break due to family visits and related stuff but I’m fixing to dive back in. 

Moonlight Chicken - I got stalled out on this one just as it was getting good, thanks to some life stuff. I need to pick it back up!

Star Trek: Discovery - I’m a big Star Trek fan and recently rewatched everything from TNG through Voyager, but I hadn’t kept up with any of the newest series in years. I’m so glad I decided to start Discovery because it is shaping up to be one of my favorite Star Trek series. There are a lot of reasons for this. Really great LGBT+ representation is a factor. This is also is the first Star Trek series that has inspired more actor crushes in me than DS9. Michelle Yeoh in a corset! Tig Notaro as a cranky engineer! I’m dying over here. 

Minato's Laundromat season 2 - I was looking forward to this as soon as it was announced, but with the usual anxiety that comes with a second season of a BL. I wasn’t 100% sure about the direction of the season at first, but now it’s settling in with some really interesting themes. 

Reservation Dogs - I wasn’t entirely sure about this show when I first started watching during the first season. But not only did it grow on me, it has also been getting better and better. The latest episode, which focused in part on an abusive government-sponsored boarding school (of the sort designed to rob Indigenous kids of their culture), was one of the best of the series so far. 

Edited to add: I forgot about Kamen Rider Geats! My family has been catching up on it and we're almost caught up just in time for the finale. I'm liking it a lot more than I thought I would when I watched the first few episodes, but not as much as my partner (who said he thinks it's one of his favorite Kamen Rider series he's seen). I'm really impressed with the cast, though. I'd especially like to see the actors who play Keiwa and Buffa in more things in the future.

Currently Reading

I’ve been listening to the audiobook version of The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act by Isaac Butler for a while now, but I’m having an annoying situation where it keeps getting returned to the library even though I’ve renewed it. I could just start another book, but I don’t want to! This one is really interesting. 

The vast majority of people spend a significant amount of their time watching (non-documentary) movies and TV series, which involves watching actors engage in this specific art form. And we have opinions about what constitutes good or bad acting. Yet most of us know so little about how acting is done, what kinds of theories underpin acting practice, how actors prepare for roles and scenes. I wanted to not only find out more about that, but also dig a little deeper into the differences between approaches and how they’ve branched off and clashed and so forth. 

So far I’ve gotten a lot of good background and plenty to think about, even though I’m just getting to the point where the Method/System/whateveryoucallit is starting to take on in the US. I’m guessing it’s going to get even more relevant from there.

Current Obsession

I’m always obsessing about lots of things so I’m probably never going to be able to identify just one. Some currents ones are:

waiting for Utsukushii Kare: Eternal to be available with English subtitles somewhere, somehow

foraging blackberries, making jelly out of them, and baking biscuits to go with the jelly

waiting for it to be fall already because I hate sweating and I love wearing layers

finding my Animal Crossing character some decent glasses

thinking about possible BL/Jane Austen parallels for tumblr posts

finishing a post about psychological aspects of Utsukushii Kare that I’ve been writing off and on for months and that has gotten so long it will probably have to be split up into 3-4 posts

Serge Lutens Jeux de Peau perfume (my beloved)

I didn't tag anyone. It makes me anxious and I think pretty much everyone I know on here has been tagged! Except @porridgefeast, who's welcome to do it if she feels like it but (of course) no pressure.

[daemonmatthias]

despite my best efforts at a schedule and socializing... it’s been one of the hardest summers I’ve had in a while.

some of it is big things, like struggling to stick to any kind of schedule I set for myself due to this being the first year my husband’s work schedule is hybrid (he is home every other week, then I am home alone every other week; if it were just one or the other, I’d be fine), and not being able to go on walks due to the heat.

some of it is nebulous things, like needing to save money but then Sales keep happening on things we kinda need/weird things pop up, and my husband is bored af all day at work and then his mood affects mine because i just am sensitive to other people’s moods, and the fact that we need to formally decide if we are moving out of state soon (husband knows his answer, but I am scared/overwhelmed and will have to quit teaching), and that all this weirdness is making it So Hard to Concentrate on Reading, which is usually my solace in the summer.

but honestly, a lot of it is stupid little things and I don’t understand why so many of them are happening all at once. Just since yesterday morning:

the new avocado I needed to quarter for my usual breakfast smoothies refused to yield the pit, which ended up breaking, and I spent a solid 5 min scraping and slicing to be sure there were no remnants

immediately after I finally got that situated, I grabbed the new carton of almond milk, and it was... somehow sealed wrong?? idk how, but it would NOT open. so I tried opening the side to make a spout (like the little milk cartons from school), but that also would not open cleanly. I ended up needing a knife to slice into it. And then I had to go digging for a pitcher we never use to keep it in since the carton was destroyed.

then my nook crapped out on me. [backstory first: 2 months ago, my nook started randomly resetting itself, which deletes all of your side-loaded content. I ended up having to call customer service. They wanted me to hard reset. It took like 1.5 hours on the phone with them because it SAID it was connected to the wifi but then it wouldn’t do the next step of the set up process because it couldn’t find a wifi connection. Finally the set up process actually went through and they were like “ok all good now!” (right. ok. magically fixed the resetting issue by resetting it. yeah.)] Yesterday, while I was in the middle of reading a library book (considered side-loaded content), it reset itself again, which, of course, deleted the book I was reading.

We agreed last time that if it kept happening, I could get a new nook. Unfortunately, the new model doesn’t come out until september and I’m wary of buying another of the same model in case it has the same problem 2 years in (which is past the warranty period, of course). I did decide to pre-order the new one and pray that hard resetting would again “magically fix” the problem for another 2 months.

This morning, I finally made myself start cleaning the porch. This is terrifying because our porch gathers leaf litter like a mofo and I haven’t cleaned it in ages. There are all sorts of spiders and bugs out there. 

AND of course my gardening gloves have been in an unsealed cart out there. they are shot. i will have to do all this bare handed...

I successfully get the pots of dead plants thrown away. I begin to gather the open bags of dirt to throw them away, having to be extra careful of spiders with my bare hands. A wasp starts flying around me. I try but fail miserably to remain calm and run inside. That chore will not get done today, and today was the last day of below 100F/some cloud cover for who knows how long.

Since I can’t do that chore, I check my amazon cart to see if anything we need got put on prime sale. basically... no. I buy it anyway. or try to; the shipping page keeps crapping out on mobile. I move to my computer and finish the purchase on desktop.

now time to pre-order that nook. except it won’t let me sign in. b&n’s website has so many trackers and shit that it breaks firefox sometimes. (is2g i use nook only because others don’t let you completely turn the backlight off, and as soon as my free year of premium membership is up, I’m going back to using bookshop.org for everything.) I switch to chrome (blech) and sign in.

i press “pay with paypal” and then “complete purchase”. It never pulled up my paypal to let me choose which card to pay with. I have to get into paypal to even figure out which card it payed with. It paid with not the credit card I wanted, not even my default card as selected in paypal, but with our shared checking account. (annoying but no damage done.)

time now to hard reset my nook... oh look, it’s doing the same connected/not connected to the wifi thing. goody...

all this in only the last 30ish hours. and it feels like the whole summer has been like this!

I can’t pretend good things haven’t happened. I visited my family, my bestie visited me and we did a fun craft together, I joined a new public library and love it more than my old one, I hung out with a friend to eat good food and visit a thrift/record store, we FINALLY framed/hung some art and it looks GREAT, I reorganized most of our music so its easier to access, husband made an htpc (home theater computer) so we no longer get youtube ads and he set up plex on it so I can watch the shakespeare plays I have downloaded, I finally made our new 9 delights tracker and it’s almost perfect, I joined my coworker-friend’s book club (bingo card system- good-, but the group read is an author I hate), I crocheted a dog sweater that actually worked (but idk yet if it fits cuz it’s for my parents’ dog), I began the process of switching away from google drive/gmail to something more secure (proton, which I got for almost 50% off).

And there are SO MANY good things coming up: we leave in a couple days to visit the city we might move to, we have tickets to barbie & oppenheimer, we’ll go to a friend’s daughter’s 1st bday party, my besties are coming to visit (museum, escape room, and musical all purchased and lined up!), we’re spending labor day weekend in a luxury cabin in the mountains with friends (owned by one friend’s rich aunt who is not charging/excited to host us), we have tickets to see my fav studio ghibli in theaters in sept., I have tickets to see To Kill a Mockingbird with a coworker-friend, we have ballet tickets for the season...

and yet, I’m struggling daily to complete basic tasks and maintain a positive attitude due to the onslaught of Stupid Little Grievances. :/

[treesap-blogs]

(yes this is abrupt shh) Some thoughts on “The Dragon’s Promise” by Elizabeth Lim!

Hello, Tumblrians! Due to my delay on my Gilded Ones review, I didn’t conduct a review for this book after I finished it. Oops. Hence why I’m publishing this in such a short period of time after my Gilded Ones review, as I had most of that prepared beforehand but I’m just typing this one out of my arse in the hopes I catch up with my reading records.

Whilst I may not have it documented on this blog(everything I’ve read is from January 2023 onwards), at the end of last year I finished reading Six Crimson Cranes. ‘Twas a solid book! (I did make an extensive review for it on a Padlet for my school dedicated to reviewing stories available from our library, though! I wish I could share it without being doxxed because then y’all would have more context!) Shiori’s character growth felt very earned, although I can’t say that I was 100% happy to see it under the circumstances she was in. I’m a sucker for fairytales too,  which is why I adore the fantasy genre to pieces (I am trying to branch out though), and the inspiration integrated into the story was pretty neat even if I’d never read The Wild Swans by Hans Christian Anderson. With that said, it still chose to forge a path for itself, and besides having different cultural influences in its world unlike the European origins of The Wild Swans, carried things out a bit differently narratively. It was appreciated, as someone who only needed to read the summary of the tale to know how it ended and didn’t want every plot twist and final word of Six Crimson Cranes to be spoiled to me as a result. Plus, even though I rated it 4 out of 5 stars, it not-so-steadily climbed up my mental ranks to become one of my favorite books. (Again with that “my personal enjoyment of a book is sometimes different from the rating I give it, which I base off of objective quality”.) So as you can expect, I picked up The Dragon’s Promise with zero hesitation after I saw it in a local library and clutched it with glee.

So as you can expect, I picked up The Dragon’s Promise with zero hesitation after I saw it in a local library and clutched it with glee.

I was a little bit disappointed with it, though. I had seen a review a few months ago, before I’d read Dragon’s Promise, saying it suffered from “sequel syndrome”, and couldn’t quite capture the lightning in a bottle from the first book, and it’s a sentiment I agree with. So much happened in this book, but it also feels like so little did too. And in an action that I think is supposed to be emotional, we have to say goodbye to a lot of the elements and characters we grew attached to in the first book. We only got to have one book with them! And now in a world with so much going on, but where everything now moves at an alarmingly quick pace, I didn’t even feel that sad. I just felt disappointed, like I was cheated somehow. We were introduced to all of these characters, and now we have to say farewell to them so abruptly. This issue also, in my opinion, stripped the plot of its permanence. 

I think the worst part of this though is that I don’t think there will be another book to fix the Sequel Syndrome present. Everything is wrapped up here. It’s a duology, soon to be a trilogy with a prequel book coming out about Raikama, but Shiori’s story is done. That realization probably hurt me more than most of the events within the story. I wish this could’ve been a trilogy, the pacing would work so much better.

Spoiler section! This does cover mainly Six Crimson Cranes content. So if you haven’t read that, tread lightly!

So the main issue I had with the book in my Padlet review for it was that I felt that Raikama, or rather Channari if we feel like using her real name, being revealed to not be the main villain after everything she did to Shiori and her brothers felt..strange. Her motivation was confirmed last-minute as she was dying, and they pulled a Darth Vader where they redeem a character with a sacrifice they make that leads to their death.

Sure, there were some memories that hinted at her not being as evil as our protagonist originally thought she was, but they felt more like trying to humanize a villain than foreshadowing the true events of the book? Yes, I get she messes with memories and stuff so we can’t have that much, but I found it convoluted that the explanation for this not being built up very well was because she was so scared of hurting Shiori by being close to her that she completely brainwashed her into thinking she was terrible. And then Shiori had that realization while being burned by that other sorceress or somewhere close to that point (forgot her name but it started with a Z?), and, fine, if we had more time to dig into Raikama’s character while she was still alive, maybe we could’ve seen what got her to be so desperate. But we didn’t get that, and the demon king got defeated by an amateur sorceress like..one book after he was introduced. This is when I start REALLY WISHING THIS WAS A TRILOGY because MAYBE WE COULD SEE MORE OF THE CATASTROPHIC EFFECTS THAT GOT RAIKAMA TO BE SO DESPERATE TO PROTECT HER KIDS AND SAVE HER FROM THEM THAT SHE DECIDED TO CURSE AND TRAUMATIZE SHIORI AS WELL AS PUT SHIORI’S BROTHERS IN AGONY😭😭BRO😭

(Being burned at the stake and technically dying a book later is pretty bad though. Maybe I’m being picky here. Parents who might be reading this help me out???)

Even though Dragon’s Promise essentially expanded onto what I disliked the most about Six Crimson Cranes (the..entire time), surprisingly though that was not the thing I was most bothered by. It was literally the pacing lmao. At some point I just got desensitized to Raikama/Channari’s tragic backstory and the attempts to make her as redeemable and morally good as they could. I literally couldn’t find it in myself to be annoyed anymore. Not that I enjoyed that? I don’t think I did, I was just exasperated.

I get that she isn’t as bad as most book antagonists, though. I guess I should take that into account. Maybe I should be less harsh and there’s something I’m missing idk.

With that said though, the depiction of Shiori’s grief, and how she felt it, was something I didn’t have an issue with. She didn’t fully recover from it, and it wasn’t a linear process. But it’s kind of a weird zone to be in, where I don’t take issue with the subject matter that follows but I do whatever spurred it. Ehhhhggghhh.

End of spoiler territory!! You may proceed.

Anyhow. Did I still burn through this in 4 days, give or take? Yeah. It wasn’t exactly a boring read, and I still liked it to a degree, but I was left wanting more. It didn’t feel like it was meant to be the book to conclude this series’ timeline, despite its poetic ending and all of the goodbyes(which Lim likely wanted the reader to do in their mind, too). I’m just disappointed.

Also! Different note, but: I’m going to have to develop a weekly book review schedule so I a.) don’t get freaked out, b.) can be persuaded to keep up with my Goodreads challenge of reading 50 books this year (4 books ahead of schedule!! Might end up doubling it to 100, it’s only the beginning of February that’s a lot), c.) have something to look forward to every week! I am never in a very good mental state, I find joy in whatever is possible to at this point.

This review is probably the most critical one on here so far. I wasn’t expecting that but I did it as I was writing, so… Hopefully you guys like to see Critical Paz though! Or at the very least don’t mind him. He’ll be going into hibernation shortly after this review is published, honk shoo mimimi.

Here’s some things I did like about it though: Takkan and Shiori’s relationship remained sweet, and although Shiori tried keeping secrets from him initially(for his well-being), it was encouraged for her to communicate honestly and so we didn’t have to do with the dreaded miscommunication trope that plagues most YA media. (Of which I’ve been thankful to have mostly avoided, but..eughhegfheb.) The descriptions of the different locations were very interesting, they felt vibrant like the first book! I also enjoyed Kiki more in this book, she made me giggle a couple of times with her bluntness and sarcastic remarks.

That shall be all.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars.

Paz, signing off!

(Book trigger/content warnings: Blood(a sizable amount, actually), grief, can’t think of any others except for that a character almost dies from drowning.)

[jodilin65]

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 1996 We screwed yesterday and I didn’t have to beg. I only asked once. Do I think he’d have initiated it if I didn’t? No. He prefers to wait until the weekends, but that’s OK.

I’m gonna be giving him his first sign language lesson tonight. I’m gonna teach the way teachers do and the way I’ve taught before. I’ll start with the alphabet, then I’ll do the chapters containing the most common and useful words.

I spoke to my mom yesterday, but not Dad. He was asleep. They both have colds.

Mom started to ask if I looked for something, but then she changed the subject and told me to never mind. I have no clue as to what that could’ve been all about. If she were talking about a package she’s sent, she wouldn’t keep it such a secret.

I’m tired today due to going to sleep late and getting up early. Usually, I wake up when I get going, but nowadays, if I’m tired to begin with, then that’s how I stay all day and night.

The cable company added about 40 new channels and I hope soon enough that we can get some kind of TV guide that lists all these new channels. There’s one channel I like so far cuz it has Twin Peaks. There’s also one with The Bionic Woman.

Tom and I got to the end of the Myst game yesterday. Boring! I also completed all 50 levels of Balistic yesterday, too.

I think I really remembered what Robin really said to me in the cabin before she took me to her cabin. First I thought she said she’d kiss or tickle me, but I think she took my hand and teasingly said to go to sleep and that she wouldn’t stop kissing me till I fell asleep or if I didn’t go to sleep she’d keep kissing me. Or was it tickling me? I don’t know.

Guess I’ll go read the last of my library books now. I just started it, but I know I’ll finish it by 3/16 when it’s due.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1996 Yesterday, sure enough, that teenager showed up to play ball. When I spoke to him, I told him I could deal with it twice a week for a half-hour and so far he’s kept his end of the deal.

I was a bit bummed out last night and today about Tom’s “good news” about this sick leave he discovered he has. How dare he keep playing with my head?! He said he has worried he couldn’t get time off for this new baby we’ll never have. What else has he been worrying about that he hasn’t told me pertaining to a kid? Well, I guess it doesn’t matter.

We’ve got lots of new channels today. More reason for Tom to be glued to the TV than doing whatever with me. I’ve already got to wait till Saturday to get laid. Maybe if I beg for it I’ll get it, but I’d really rather not beg.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1996 I’m watching Charlie’s Angels now.

It’s very cool and windy out now. I’m amazed it hasn’t knocked out the cable.

I mopped the kitchen floor and made Tom Hamburger Helper for his dinner when he comes home.

I quickly spoke to my mom. She and Dad have colds.

It rained last night, but I don’t know for how long. I awoke at 10:30, but only to pee and smoke a cigarette. It also rained a little while ago very briefly, but the good news about it is that it doesn’t look like the roof over the back room leaked.

I hope no one will play ball next door today like they didn’t yesterday. It was obviously due to the cool damp weather we’ve been having. I wish it were summer. It’s so quiet in the summer, but by then, someone will surely be next door.

I wish I could run into that kid so I could ask him what the hell he meant when he told me about the black lady and her 13-month-old son. Maybe such a lady did exist and just told him that for the hell of it. Or, maybe she really was gonna move in but changed her mind.

Yesterday I read 170 pages in my library book. Definitely the most I’ve ever read in one day.

Later…

Tom just got in early cuz he went to bed early. He says there’s a possibility of snow here tonight. There fucking better not be!

I was wrong last Saturday when I said there’d certainly be no sex cuz of our little squabble the night before. He initiated a good screw. Yesterday he went down on me and I sure hope I don’t have to wait till next Saturday for sex.

He got solutions to the game Myst from AOL yesterday, but most of it is impossible to understand.

As I said, the weekend was fun, happy and productive. There was only one dumb thing he did.

He called me to the kitchen table saying he had good news to tell me. Then he picked up an employee handbook from work and showed me how he had accumulated sick days he didn’t even know he had. He said his point was that he could use those days after the baby was born and that he had been worried that he wouldn’t have time. Oh, brother! Time for what? To talk about it? To tease and pretend it’ll happen?

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 1996 How many kids will I have to chase away from next door’s basketball hoop today? Yesterday, shortly after 6:00, I was about to go chase them off, but they left as quickly as they had come, luckily. I wish I knew someone who’d destroy that fucking thing! It’s too fucking close to this house! They may as well be bouncing the damn ball off the walls of the house here.

I got a message from Tammy yesterday who said that if I just ease up and let things happen naturally, all will work out. Including having a baby.

It’s almost like she and Tom spoke about this. Her choice of words is just like Tom’s when she said to “let things happen naturally.” And also, how does she know I have a hard time easing up? What makes her so confident as to what the problem is? How and why is she so confident that in time it’ll work out and that he’s telling the truth? She says exactly what Tom and Kim said about it.

We stopped over at his parent’s yesterday and Mary and Dave were there, too.

Time to go start this week’s round of letters to my parents, Kim and Bob.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1996 Tom wouldn’t have offered to screw me yesterday on his own, but he agreed to when I asked him. I then changed my mind, though, and had him eat me out cuz I had wanted to go to bed.

After eating me out, though, we got into another one of our losing, depressing, angering, frustrating, and confusing conversations. If I’ve said this before, I’ve never said it now with such intense certainty. I could never have a child with this guy, even if it were possible. He’s just too contradicting, too full of shit and that kid would really kill our marriage.

When I told him yesterday that I feel controlled and that everything has to be his way, he turned that all on me. I told him that I feel that he won’t give going to a doctor earlier a chance to see if it’d help my emotional state and that all he cares about are his feelings. To hell with if I have to spend another year or longer depressed. Then he said something about the fact that he may never be whole again and may go over the edge and never be able to have a family if we went earlier. Now how can anyone tell me he wants a kid and isn’t trying to punish me? His not cumming or going to a doctor isn’t just due to his fears of having a kid and due to loving to tease me about it. It’s to punish me.

Then he comes out and says his problem could be cuz the moon is round after I asked him if he thought the reasons for his not cumming could be what I think they are. This isn’t what he’s always told me. He’s firmly sworn it wasn’t cuz of what I said it was.

Then he said another cold statement to cover the truth. He said he’s worried about having a kid with me for doubting him so much that I’d want to see a doctor earlier. What a mean spiteful thing to say cuz he feels being pushed into being the father he doesn’t want to be that he lies about and says he does want to be.

What am I supposed to think after two and a half years? What woman wouldn’t doubt him if she were in my shoes?

Then he said that if I could go 6 months on a day schedule, cuz it’s something I say I can’t do, so that should motivate me, and we’ll see a doctor in September.

What about motivating himself? Also, how sweet of him to say we’ll go if I do something we know I can’t do cuz that’s how much he doesn’t want to go.

Nonetheless, I’ve come to fully realize that this man wouldn’t be any better of a father than I’d be as a mother. I told him the appointment is off and that he either must sacrifice an orgasm with his wife forever, or rubber it up if he wants to cum. I’m telling you, though, where I used to be getting fed up by the month, I’m getting fed up by the day!

Know what his bullshit answer to losing the bet will be? Cuz we fought so much. Or something else going on in life or something I did.

I swear I’m getting ready to have Andy see if he can find a fairly decent enough-looking woman for me on the side, although, I know that’s impossible. And I’m really, really ready for us to have our own rooms again.

Tom also had said something about fear of going to the doctor cuz he fears how my emotional state would be due to something about my calling him a liar or finding out something was wrong.

See? He does know why he is the way he is, and he obviously fears I’d kick his ass. Yeah, I probably would punch him out first and ask questions later if he admitted to bullshitting me all along, but who wouldn’t? Who wouldn’t then want to know how and why he could do such a thing?

I’ll just live the rest of my life wanting a kid cuz I have no choice, but I won’t live the rest of my life playing games with him.

He also tells me he can’t talk to me about his problems which is pure BS and simply a way of lashing out at me for knowing and saying that he’s full of shit.

Tammy said to keep the communication going and this is what we’ve agreed to do from the get-go, yet as he admits, this only frustrates him. Then to punish me further, he won’t cum and blames it on me for bringing it up. I’m sorry I can’t hold in or mask my emotions, but who else am I supposed to talk to? The only things I can bring up regularly are things he wants. If he wanted a kid, then I could bring it up with no problems all I wanted.

He tells me he feels pressured. Why else would he feel pressured if he really wanted a kid? The reason why he feels pressured is cuz he does not want to be a father.

As far as I know, no one’s returned next door since they left yesterday at 11 AM. Tom said that was probably a city worker who took her kid to work with her. He says it’s become a big thing for people to take their kids to work if they can’t find or afford some other place for them. He says there are always kids where he works. There’s another reason why he doesn’t want a kid, I’ll bet. He deals with them enough already at work.

Then why would the kid say someone was moving in? Was it just in the hopes that I’d say, “Well, OK then. If the new neighbor said you could use the basketball hoop, then use it.”

Did the woman and her kid get delayed till tomorrow then? Or did someone drive her here? Does she not have a car but is really in there and this is why it just looks empty?

Whenever Tom gets up, he’s gonna go get some groceries.

At some point, we’ll be going to the library, then possibly over to his parents’ today or tomorrow.

There’ll certainly be no sex today to punish me for last night, but that’s just fine with me.

God, though! If I weren’t going through this shit with him, I wouldn’t have so much to write and would probably be 20-30 journals behind. Then again, I don’t think so cuz then there’d just be some other shit. Some other shit would be going on for me to deal with. I kind of wish there was something else for a change instead of wanting this kid I’ll never be allowed to have.

Later…

So far today, there’s been no one next door, so who knows what the scoop is?

We went to the library and he got 2 electronic books while I got 3 mystery/haunting-type books. So far there’s one I just can’t get into.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 1996 Before I get into my terrible news, let me just say that Tammy’s opinion hasn’t convinced me that Tom isn’t deliberately holding back. He still hasn’t touched me cuz I’m not safe, even though I am. I knew he wouldn’t touch me all week as I said before. See? I know him. So, if I wasn’t wrong about things like this, why should I be wrong about the kid thing?

Tom asked me earlier if I was gonna be up when he got home. A typical question when he’s suggesting sex for later. He’s teasing me, though. I know him better. He’s done that before, but especially when I’m mid-cycle and I know he knows I’m mid-cycle.

OK, here’s my horrible news. I’ll give you a hint - screaming, barking, basketball games and wild company. Yup, the house next door has been sold.

A basketball game started yesterday afternoon, so I went out to chase the guy away. It was a teenager and I’m not sure if it was the same one as before. I told him that that house wasn’t vacant with the hopes that he’d tell his pals and stay the fuck away. Then he said he knew the house wasn’t vacant and that last night he met the black lady and her 13-month-old son that was to be moving in today and she said he could play there.

Shit! However, there’s no for-sale sign. I wondered if it was now a HUD house since a HUD truck has been there. Tom said that due to the city owning the house for a while, they’d want someone in there who could pay full price and that they can’t sell it without a for-sale sign. Then what the hell was this kid talking about and how did he come to meet this supposed woman? He must live nearby or was playing when she came by, but Tom never mentioned seeing or hearing anything.

My feeling is that somehow, with or without a for-sale sign, someone’s moving in today. I better get my “quiet down” letter written. No, this time I’m going over there as soon as things get chaotic.

This really, really sucks, though, and I know she’ll have a dog cuz God wouldn’t allow otherwise. They’re gonna have their fucking living room window open so I can hear the kid screaming up a storm while in the music room and the backyard. People are gonna come over to see the house and a single person, if she really is gonna be the only adult there, is gonna have tons of company. Mothers today are so wild and I can see blasting rap music and lots of ball games since blacks love basketball. She’ll probably have brothers and nephews over playing basketball.

The good thing about a 13-month-old is that it’s not gonna be in school and taking home its buddies, but that won’t eliminate all the goddamn screaming.

Wait till she tries to sleep at night and gets barked awake by those two dogs right by her bedroom window. Not that it’ll matter with her kid and her own dog, I’d think.

I’d love to say she’ll hardly ever have company and will be working all day and have the kid in daycare and will have no dog, but dream on!! God could and would never bless me with that and with barely knowing that they exist.

Now it’s time for Robin’s true test. Remember how I said she said I had nothing to worry about? Well, we’ll see now if she’s full of shit or if it’s some other entity that’s posing as her, cuz I still can’t deny or say that Robin was just my imagination, even though I wish I could.

If just one adult is moving in there paying full price, they better have a damn good job to be able to support herself, her kid and her house. That house was going for $600 and something a month if it hasn’t gone down.

This really sucks and I’d better enjoy my last few hours of peace. With that house having been empty since last September, boy am I in for some very serious and heavy-duty compensation! Big time!

My pigeons will probably only hang out on our electrical wires and not theirs. They’re probably gonna be scared off for a while from sitting on wires above their house or even coming into our yard due to the dog that’s about to be over there.

This really sucks! This really fucking sucks shit big time!

Later…

They’re here. I heard them pull in in two big city trucks. I really think it’s a welfare mom, cuz they help them move. I am sooooooo fucking pissed!

I heard the kid and I thought I heard their dog, but not too much yet cuz it’s probably held up in one of those trucks. I wonder why two trucks, though? Isn’t one enough? Amazingly, though, they’re coming in very quietly compared to the way the M’s blew on in here. In time, things will likely change. At least I should be able to sleep and hopefully there’ll be no trailer filled with people living in their front yard by our bedroom.

I wonder where her car is. Out on the street out of view? I wonder why the dog’s not out back yet, too? If this lady doesn’t have a dog, God forbid, then she’ll be running out to get one since she probably came from an apartment.

I feel like I’m in an apartment all over again!

Later…

I heard Mommy yell out something to some black guy. She sounds mean, too.

I wonder why HUD would let her have a 3-bedroom house with only one kid. She’s probably pregnant.

A good 95% or more of this whole moving-in process, though, they’ve been unusually quiet.

If it’s OK with Tom, I may move this little table out of the music room and back in the bedroom where the vanity is and put the vanity in here.

I heard her again. She kind of sounds like Tracy K.

Anyway, I’m sure Tom wouldn’t mind me swapping the table and vanity since he can sleep through anything.

I saw a white van and I guess it’s hers. Why does God always sic vans on me, too. They’re so loud and obnoxious, but maybe she won’t sit there with the engine idling for an hour every week, either. It looks like a piece of shit like the red one the M’s had. Something I can see a welfare mom drive.

I have nothing against blacks, but I sure hope she’s not in a gang of some kind. Do I have anything against welfare moms? Yes and no. I understand that some of us can’t help being poor, but it’s those that don’t help themselves when and if they can that I dislike. I also dislike those very much who have kids when they shouldn’t.

Later…

Well, the city trucks and white van have left and right now it appears no one’s been there for about an hour and a half. That’s odd. I mean, where did they go? I hope this is a sign that they’ll hardly ever be home, but I know I’m dreaming. I can’t believe there’s no dog over there yet. They could all be over where they’re moving from and picking up another load.

I can almost guarantee what Tom will do when he gets home. If he does not do anything physical or sexual to me at all, he may do something else that wouldn’t surprise me. Something he’s done and would do at any time, but especially with me being mid-cycle. He’ll start feeling me out and rubbing himself against me as if he’s about to initiate sex. Then he’ll say, “How about some fun tomorrow? Or, “I can’t wait till tomorrow when I’m more awake so we can have fun.”

Last time I got my period was between 2-4 AM and he knows that by late this afternoon or early this evening, I’ll be just over 24 hours over mid-cycle.

Well, I’ve done enough writing for now, so I’ll either write later or tomorrow.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1996 He fixed the capping macro so that I can now cap after question marks and exclamation marks, besides just periods. Now, all I have to cap are I’s, names and first letters of words beginning paragraphs and that’s fine with me.

As you can see, though, I began typing with all small letters after having typed with all caps in journal 107 and guess what it did? It left the first letters of words beginning sentences capped, but it made all small letters for the rest of all those first words. Oh well. It’s only part of 1 journal and my typed journals really serve me no purpose other than as backups and for searching for stuff. I can’t run a search mode through a written copy of a journal when looking for certain subjects. I will no longer type any more journals or letters in all caps.

I love it, though, and wish I had this capping thing a long time ago. I wonder if this is part of Tom’s New Year’s resolution. To do the things he promised me long ago. He promised to fix this thing so long ago that I forgot all about it and just totally gave up on it. Will he ever fulfill his promise of a kid, though? No! Of course not!

Tom is full of it, though, when he says we could find a way to afford a kid since you have several months to prepare for it. No way! I may not be a money expert, but it doesn’t take a genius to know that we could never afford a kid. Probably not for quite some time, either.

I still can’t believe that I haven’t heard those dogs. They should’ve gotten their letter from the humane society today, too. I had a bad thought, though. If they got rid of those dogs, they may move their kids and the ones they do daycare for out back. No thanks. Still, I think most kids out here live in their front yards.

As we all know, I’ve mentioned having one weird issue after another to deal with. Or some issue that bugs me for the longest time, anyway. It was wanting the woman I could never have and now it’s wanting the kid I can never have. I asked myself, if God broke down or made a mistake and let me get pregnant, what would be the new issue replacing this one, besides any others I’ve already still got to deal with? What would he then go and do to me or Tom or the kid? I can’t really think of anything he could do and maybe God can’t either, so maybe this is why this shit has been so never-ending. God probably feels he can’t end it by having Tom tell me the truth cuz there’s nothing to replace it with. God’s always gotta do something and he’s gotta have me stuck in some major issue that I just can’t seem to deal with or fix.

Got a letter from Kim today and two from Bob.

Later…

I just got done watching some TV and in a little while, I’m gonna do Tom a favor he asked of me. He wants some ideas for his Crazy 8’s computer game as far as a heading goes. I’m going to draw cards and write the letters of the game on each card. I’ll do different colors for the cards and letters. There’ll be 6 cards. One for each of the letters in the word Crazy, then the one for the 8’s.

Meanwhile, I’ll return to write more later.

Later…

In 20 minutes, I’ll go get Tom up if he isn’t up already.

I’m taking a break from ballistics right now at level 18. Hope I beat level 39.

In my caps test paper, I did go ahead with my little suggestion for his poor little problem. Sure, I know it’s useless, but if he can give bogus suggestions, it’s only fair that I can, too. A while back we were discussing how therapists condition their patients. They could condition Tom to cum like he conditioned himself to beat the alarm. He said, though, that he doesn’t want to do anything that will take the fun out of sex. Of course, the real reason is simple. He doesn’t want a kid. I said, though, that maybe he’ll have to do something that’s a bitch to get what he says he wants, and then turn it into fun. He adapts better than anyone else I ever knew in my life.

Yesterday I came across something in my library book. A guy was with a hooker and it said he held back for hours to achieve a bigger climax. I asked Tom what he thought of it. Grinning and chuckling, he said that that’s just how they talk in books.

Right!

The dogs have barked this morning, that’s for sure. They just don’t give a damn about those dogs or anyone else around them.

Later…

I absolutely don’t believe it, but then again I do, even though it doesn’t bother me. I’ve never before heard the kids two houses down where those dogs are, but I could today and it sort of reminded me of when the M’s were next door. At least it’s not ear-piercing loud. If it were or if it got more common, then I’d be pissed, but I’m sure I’ve got nothing to worry about. How can they be outside, though, with the dogs? Well, these yards are of a good size so they’re probably tied up in a corner of the yard away from the kids. No, they’re not outside. Otherwise, it’d be louder. They’ve got their windows open. It’s a bit damp out, but still a good day to have windows open. Especially if you’ve got a lot of little kids around you.

What I was pissed about earlier is over the same old shit. This guy has made no effort to try to have a kid or to try to up the amount of sex we have.

Afterward, we took a shower together and when I asked him why he loved me he said, “Love can’t be explained. Love just is.” So, that’s what inspired me to write the song I just wrote.

He also told me how to recap my all-capped parts of this journal that had some small letters. Oh, how I wish I had this thing a long time ago. I love it! He says he can find a way to cap I’s and the beginnings of paragraphs too.

After Tom left, I was still upset and I finally broke down and just had to talk to someone else about this sexual shit with Tom. I called Tammy and I said, “This is so embarrassing and I’m afraid you might laugh,” but I told her anyway. She shocked the shit out of me. I thought she was gonna confirm my fears and say that the guy really doesn’t want a kid, but she said there’s nothing to laugh at, I’m not alone and she’s had the same problem. She firmly believes that Tom’s telling the truth and that in time, it will work out. She also said that yes, it could be physical, even though Tom and I know that’s not it cuz he’s cum before. She said a man can still be able to get hard, but still be impotent and not able to get off.

Really? I didn’t know that.

She’s had problems where she couldn’t cum, so since she gave me her advice and opinion of my case, I gave her advice. I suggested she do what we do and have Bill lie on his side and have her on her back facing him with her legs over his side so that she can stimulate herself. If Tom just screwed me without my stimulating myself, there’d be no way I could get off. Probably not even if I was horny as all hell.

I got up to level 40 of Balistic, so I hope I get higher the next time. In a way, I’m glad I haven’t hit level 50 yet as it gives me something to look forward to little by little. I’ll still always enjoy and love the game though. It’s definitely my favorite computer game. There are other games I haven’t played in a while or even checked out yet, so I think I’ll do that sometime soon.

Later…

My pigeons are out there cooing away. It’s a bit breezy out, but not too bad. It’s not as warm as it was there for a while.

No mail for me today. I’m sure I’ll get those books I ordered, but will I get that CD? I doubt it.

What did Evie mean when she said she liked writing letters and was gonna surprise me with a letter? Will she ever surprise me with a letter someday? I hope so. That’d be nice.

No, I won’t dare tell Tom about my conversation with Tammy. I’m sure he’d rather me talk to her than to some stranger of a nurse, but he’d still be pretty upset over it.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 1996 Soon I want to see if I can beat my 39-level record by playing that ballistics game.

At the moment I don’t really have anything important to do, so I left Andy a message to call me if he wants to chat. Maybe he can come over one of these nights after work to get his birthday toaster present.

I don’t know if I mentioned yet that Tom printed out two pictures of Gloria that he found on AOL as a little Valentine’s present for me.

Tom returns to work today at 4:30. Now watch. I know him. He won’t touch me throughout the whole week after having a vacation and especially not on the 23rd when I’m mid-cycle. I told you he’d never change and has one excuse after another. All he did was look me straight in the eye and say “yes” when I asked for a kid. One big fat complete lie. He lies about it as if he were lying about a pencil he stole. Like it’s no big deal. Just another casual white lie.

I last left off about the junior high schools I attended, so I’ll take it from there. I only attended Longmeadow high school throughout parts of my freshman year.

You see, my mother began her threats of sending me to funny farms a couple of years before she finally did it. She claims that she and Dad were frightened, helpless and powerless to change the situation. I can see how they feel that way, but I’ve always found it to be a petty excuse. I know I was responsible for my own actions, but at the same time, if they hadn’t always been so negative and so preoccupied with their TV or other stuff, maybe I wouldn’t have cut my arm and tried to kill myself or been such a rebellious troublemaker.

During the beginning of my freshman year, I was tutored by a woman at the Willie Ross School for the Deaf. She was a cool lady.

Then, I went to the high school where I did the rest of my freshman year.

On July 27th of 1981 when I was 15, they sent me to the Brattleboro Retreat in Vermont. They admit now that this was a bad move, but they haven’t ever admitted other bad moves such as Valleyhead and a certain foster home I was in and the state funny farm in Northampton. I was in Vermont till December 17th or 19th, so about 5 months. It was pure hell, but little did I know that Valleyhead and Northampton would be much worse. This was just the beginning of my 3-year voyage between 5 miserable places. At least in Vermont, you had your own room and there were more privileges and the restrictions weren’t as harsh. The food was better there, too, and you could have money enough to support your cigarette habit if you had one. For the most part, though, this place, as well as Valleyhead, treated the kids there as if they were criminals. Like with Valleyhead, there weren’t enough supportive people who wanted to truly help you and boost your self-esteem, etc.

The nicer staff weren’t the ones with the power. Those with the power often brushed us off as if we deserved whatever we got in life and made us feel worse in general and worse about ourselves. There were several staff members on power-play, and it didn’t take much, if they didn’t like you, for them to make your life miserable and to put you on restriction for the dumbest things.

After Vermont, I returned home and right away, my parents just had to get rid of me again and suggested a private school in Northampton. I refused. I begged to stay home. I felt like any other kid would feel - rejected, unwanted and uncared for. My parents, especially my mother, couldn’t be bothered with my hyper personality, my energy, my talkativeness, my need for conversation and communication, or my dreams. Most everything I did was silly or not good enough. Most everything was my fault.

I was only home a few months after Vermont and soon attended an alternative high school in Springfield. This school was pretty cool. They weren’t so hard on you and there were only a few teachers and students.

In April of 1982, I became a ward of the state. I was taken first to a crisis center where I stayed for 3-4 days. Then I was placed in a place called LaRagione’s for about two months. This was a rooming house for adults with emotional problems and there were about 7 3-story houses where everyone lived. They came to the main house for meals which was also where I lived. This was in Springfield.

My foster parents were Anna and Harry B and they were pretty cool. They had a house in West Springfield and they wanted to remain my foster parents till I was 18, but the state got in the way of that.

The same woman, who tutored me at the Willie Ross, tutored me while I was there.

Around June of that year, I was in the state hospital for a week or two. It’s a wonder I came out of that place alive. I know that they’ve changed a lot of laws since then, thank God. There were 4 people in a cubicle and there was absolutely no privacy at all. Not while you shit, not while you showered, not while you slept, etc.

From there I went to a foster home that was a nightmare. It was in Springfield too, two blocks from Anna and Harry’s. I lived on the first floor with a woman named Dorothy H and her vicious friend Valerie. I was alone there, till another 16-year-old girl named Shelly came there. She was a toughie and she protected me from Valerie and Dotty’s cruel ways and their teasing me. Shelly could take Dotty, but not Valerie. At first Shelly was intimidating to me, but we became friendly. Every morning she’d hide me out upstairs, out of the way of Dotty and Valerie’s wrath.

This is where I was in the worst of my anorexia. I couldn’t eat if I wanted to cuz of all I’d gone through, but I also wasn’t fed too much as it was. I was lucky if I could find a loaf of bread in the kitchen of that house. I was 85 pounds and my periods stopped till I was almost 19. Due to this, plus serious tranquilizers I was on, I ended up at 148 pounds when I was 18 and it took me till I was 19 to start my descent to 100 pounds which took a year.

Later…

I just talked to Andy and Quinn and then I went to finish some soup I made yesterday. Quinn said that my telling him I weighed 96 pounds made him hungry.

I felt kind of warm and when I took my temperature it said I was 99. I had somewhat of a feeling that I may be ovulating and, of course, there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. Meaning, I can’t go to my husband and tell him of this possibility and have him eagerly fuck me and cum.

He told me earlier that he doesn’t know that he’s positive his “problem” is subconscious but says it may be. He says he doesn’t know what the problem is or else he’d fix it. He also said, though, that the day will never come when he tells me he never really did want a kid. If he doesn’t know whether his problem is subconscious or not and if he doesn’t know what the problem is, then how can he be so sure that what I’m telling him his problem is, is the case? I’m sure he knows damn well what his 3 fears are. He doesn’t want a kid. He doesn’t think I’ll be a good mother and he loves to tease me about issues of sex and a kid.

He doesn’t want me to talk about it, yet he says he and I can bring up suggestions that may help him. Why should I bother? I know better. The only thing of it right now that really pisses me off is how he lied and said he’s gonna win the bet during a moment where I was upset just to cheer me up, even though he denies this. How can he lie to me about a kid as if it was a little white lie that could never hurt me? How can he go about it in such a swift, casual, and easy way?

I just wish to hell I knew when this was gonna end and how. Is it gonna be by him playing this game forever and forever refusing to cum as has been the case? Or is it gonna be by him telling me what’s really on his mind? I don’t see how there could be any other way for this to play out. It’s either lie forever or tell the truth.

I’m terrified every month at the thought of PMS when my feelings are intensified. I can talk to him about anything but this. If I do, he either gets upset or lies and says we’ll have a kid to cheer me up at the moment.

Earlier he also said, “I don’t want you to work just for the sake of working. I want you to work if you want to. I want you to be happy and do what you want to do.”

Well, I can’t do what I want to cuz he won’t allow it. Therefore, I’ll take second best, cuz if I don’t, I’ll just be sitting around forever, and we could use the extra money, and second best is better than third best or lower.

He also told me of an idea he had earlier tonight. He wants to teach me graphics 3 times a week and he wants me to teach him signing 3 times a week. I’ve always wanted him to learn sign language and I think he’s serious this time. Especially since it’s stuff he wants and it sure beats having a kid, as far as he’s concerned. Hell, I think he’d rather me get in trouble all over again than be pregnant.

Amazingly enough, I haven’t heard the dogs bark last night or tonight, but they sure barked up a storm yesterday morning. I’m doing one more thing, that I know is worthless, but that’s OK. I sent a letter to them from the Arizona Humane Society’s complaint dept.

I also sent Anna & Harry a letter just to let them know how my life is and that I’m sorry for the calls I made to them in the late 80s. I told them I still love them and think of them and am grateful for how well they treated me when I was 16 and living with them.

Later…

I absolutely cannot believe that I haven’t heard those dogs bark at all since I’ve been up, but that’s fine with me.

I’m getting bored more and more and I need a new project on top of my hobbies. I need to be working. If only we had a color scanner for my drawings and a laser jet printer for typing.

Andy’s gonna be moving into the house alone for the first 3-6 months. Then Michelle will move in when she gets more money.

I don’t know why Tom wants me to do this. He said he wants it just because and that he’s got no reason in particular. He asked if one of these days I’d write about one day in our lives, then about one week in our lives, minus any feelings or attitude. How totally boring.

Now my temperature’s 98.1. So, who knows if I really was ovulating or if I ever do?

Guess I’m gonna go and wind down now.

Later…

There’s some kind of city work truck next door. The same kind that’s been there before. I guess anytime now they’ll put a for-sale sign back out for all the large families with dogs to see.

Once again, I’m gonna go wind down with some coffee. I’ll also go set the VCR for Law & Order tonight to get that out of the way.

I just hope that whatever they’re doing next door doesn’t get noisy so I can sleep. I’m pretty sure it’ll be quiet, though, cuz they have been in the past.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1996 Another time period of Tom saying or heavily suggesting he’s gonna cum will be over in a day. I knew better, though. I haven’t been upset lately or feeling like a freak during sex, but I’m not PMSing either. Then, everything bothers me. I wish I could always be within a week after my period, cuz then knowing my husband won’t allow me a child is much easier to deal with. Next, he’ll say once again that he’s gonna win the bet and will cum by April 1st, then it’ll be by June, and on and on and on.

So far, my breaking my promises to him and giving him his own medicine of false hopes and not always the nicest things, is working well. I’m down to 96 lbs. Now I just have to get a job. He said we’d discuss that after his vacation, but there’s nothing to discuss. I already told him he could control me from having a child, but he sure as hell can’t control me from other things. I’m gonna show him what it’s really like to have things go the way you wish they wouldn’t and to expect things he won’t be getting.

Remember when I said he said something about just going with the flow if he tries new stuff in bed? What a laugh I had to myself a couple of days ago. While we were screwing with him on his side and me on my back, he put his hand on the top of his dick. I thought something was wrong and he said he was OK. Then, afterward, he reminded me of the new stuff and that he didn’t want me to be curious or ask questions about it, but to just go with the flow. What the hell kind of a new thing do you call that? What kind of a joke and game is he playing with me now? And why do I have to just go with the flow? Why do his reasons behind these strange “new tricks” have to be such a secret? Is he trying to convince me that he isn’t afraid to have a child and that he doesn’t fear I’ll be a bad mother and that he isn’t playing head games with me about it? Well, he hasn’t succeeded and no “trick” will succeed without the white stuff. I mean really, how ridiculous can he be?

Anyway, the only people that are gonna know about my letter to Robert Stack at Unsolved Mysteries will be Tom, Andy, Kim, Bob and Alex. Andy said I forgot to thank Robert Stack for narrating my life. Ha, ha!

My favorite computer game I’ve mentioned before is Balistic. In the past, I’d never beaten level 13, but tonight I got up to 39 levels. There are 50 in all.

Later…

I’m kind of bored right now, but that’s life.

I forgot to mention earlier that Tom doubts Unsolved Mysteries will air my case just like I doubt it. He said you never know, but it isn’t really entertaining enough. True. Especially when you compare it to someone being pulled from a burning car.

He also told me that yes, he does believe I’m psychic which surprised me a bit. I had thought he was rather skeptical.

Well, I’m gonna stay up long enough to take care of the load of laundry I’m doing, then I’ll be hitting the sack.

Thankfully enough, there were no basketball players throughout the weekend, but the dogs bark no less than usual. Mostly at night, though. Primetime for them to go off seems to be at 11:30 PM and 2:30 AM.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1996 I have the movie recording right now, so now I’ll write. Last night I finally decided to send a letter about my search for Robin to Unsolved Mysteries. Tom gladly helped me and gave me feedback as far as the letter goes that I wrote. I’ll enclose a copy of it here, but first, let me tell you what finally prompted me to do this. There was a case of a middle-aged lady who was in a car accident. Two men pulled her out of her burning car, but they took off before she could get their names and thank them. After 15 years, she finally asked Unsolved Mysteries for their help. If they can find two people from many years ago with no names to go on, I think they can find one person. At least I hope they can and that they will, but I doubt if they’ll bother with my case. I just don’t see any reason why they’d bother and it doesn’t seem meant to be and although they do a variety of different subjects and related subjects to mine, I think the little girl who gets stolen from her backyard is more important for them to air. If they aired it, though, it’d be just my luck that she wouldn’t be watching if she’s alive and also just my luck if someone that knew anything wouldn’t bother to call in any info if they were watching.

I called 800 info for their number and when I called Robert Stack came on with an initial greeting. Then some other guy came on giving the two choices. You hit #1 for new story ideas and #2 for info relating to a case. They said all story ideas must be typed and they must include your full name, number and address. They said it’d take about 12 weeks for them to get to it. I guess, from the way it sounded, they’ll send a letter, either way, saying they’re interested or to fuck off. So, mid-May should be when I’ll get my fuck off notice. It’s still a pretty fun joke of a game to play and it’s something someone can’t say I didn’t try. Not even I can say I didn’t try to put any effort into it after all Tom and I tried to no avail on our own.

Here’s a copy of that letter.

Dear Unsolved Mysteries,

First I would like to say that I have enjoyed your show for many years. The variety of the stories you cover is great.

My name is Jodi Lin. I’m writing to you with the hopes that you can help me find someone who made a difference, for the better, in my life. Unfortunately, I do not know this person’s name. She was a camp counselor at a camp I attended when I was 9 years old in 1974. The camp’s name was Camp Naomi in Raymond, Maine, but has been known as Camp Nashoba North since 1988.

I came from a troubled home and was a very troubled child. This is why I only attended this camp for about 2 weeks that summer, then I had to leave. While I was there, however, I met a camp counselor whose first name may have been Robin. She was very kind to me and very understanding of my situation. She really made me feel wanted and cared for and she really listened to things I had to say. I’ve tried for a long time to find this woman, but I haven’t been able to. The reason why I’d like to find her is that I just want to say “thank you.” I’m 30 years old now, but I never forgot her friendliness and kindness.

All I know about this woman is that she may have been a supervisor or a specialist of some kind. She had her own cabin and I stayed there with her and her medium-sized brown dog on my last night there. She was about 5’ 5” with shoulder-length brown hair, brown eyes and slender. At the time, she probably was between 17-21 years old.

When my father came to pick me up from this camp to bring me home to Massachusetts where I grew up, we were crying as we said goodbye to each other, and she gave me a Polaroid picture of her dog.

This is all I really remember about her, but if there’s anything at all you could do to help me find her and put us in contact, this would be appreciated from the bottom of my heart.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1996 I’ve got 20 minutes to write and no, I haven’t forgotten about going through my life in more detail. I’ll get on with it soon enough.

I just thought I’d go through what we did yesterday. I got up around 11 AM, and then we left at 1:45 to go to play miniature golf. For the first time in my life, I was ahead of him, and then he kicked my ass in the end and won. It was fun, though.

Then we went to eat at Dairy Queen and then headed for Walmart. There, we got Andy’s toaster for his birthday present which I wrapped in paper with all kinds of funny lines and sayings on it. I also got birdseed and a birthday card for Andy.

Andy and Michelle are going to be moving into that house on March 1st.

Then we went to Staples where Tom got his mom a new mouse and paint to cover up the stuff he put on the roof to prevent leaks (we hope!). I got envelopes and 6 new pens. So far 3 of them seem to skip. There’s pink, purple, green, blue, red and black. Instead of highlighting each date, I’ll just do a different color every new day for a while.

Tom took his parents to the racetrack today, but I haven’t done too much today yet.

It’s been beautiful out, in the 80s and it made me feel really good to hear Tammy, Larry, Sandy and Jenny tell me how cold it was there with 5’ of snow and it was still coming down.

I’m pissed off cuz about a week ago, someone changed the security light next door, so now that thing blares on for ½ hour at a time while I’m trying to listen to music in the peaceful darkness.

No basketball players in the last couple of days, but I expect I’ll have to chase a few away here and there and hope that they, as well as their friends, get the message - fuck off!

Leave it to me for it to be just my luck to be next to the only house on the street with a goddamn basketball hoop.

I heard on the news that any high school kid who doesn’t pay child support can’t have extra activities in school. God, it’s getting so common! I think I’ve heard that 8 or 9 out of 10 women have their kids between the ages of 15 - 22. Shit!

Well, it’s TV time, but afterward, I’ve really got some far-out news to tell.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1996 Well, Andy’s birthday card is gonna be late getting to him. I totally forgot all about it cuz I’ve been busier. I left him a message asking him if I’m still sending it to the same place. He mentioned having filled out an application for a complex, only to end up getting fucked over by them. He said they couldn’t get the people out of what was to be their new apartment, then offered him another one, but they hated it. He mentioned already filling out a change of address card at the time, too.

Today he left a message saying they’ll be renting a house for $350 a month which is excellent. You could never find a deal like that back East. He says it’s a 700-square-foot, 1-bedroom. It’s a duplex, which I didn’t know they had here, with carports in the middle of them and there’s a single woman living next to them. I’m happy for them and I hope this works out.

Tomorrow we’ll be buying his birthday present. A toaster. We’ll also be stopping by other stores, going food shopping, and playing miniature golf.

I noticed on my list of notes that I mentioned getting two letters from Kim yesterday, but I don’t think there’s anything too important about those letters to mention.

Yesterday and today there were some hang-up calls, so who knows if it was Jenny or maybe even Nervous. I’m right by the phone now, so let me see if Nervous’s phone is hooked up again.

Nope. It now says it’s not in service. I don’t think Nervous would even bother at this time and I’m pretty sure Fran lost our number and doesn’t remember my married name, either.

Yesterday I organized my drawings, getting them prepared to try to sell. I’ve got 3 groups. Group 1 is people, group 2 is animals, and group 3 is flowers. I wrote a list of their file names in journal 54.

I may have accidentally said our bet was up on March 1st, but it’s really up on April 1st, even though I’m 200% sure I’ll win. Actually, I’m 1000% sure.

Yesterday Tom asked me to make some beads to hang on the light fixture of the second ceiling fan in the back room that we never use cuz of how the roof above it leaks. I did and asked if I could have a kid for it. He said yes.

Yeah, right!

Today was a good day, but before I get into it, let me tell you what happened yesterday morning at 10:00. Some high school kid started playing basketball next door and of course Tom was here. Finally, after an hour of it, I said fuck it cuz I live here too and politely told the kid my grandmother was sick and asked him to leave. He was cool about it and left. Tom didn’t seem the least bit upset by this and I couldn’t have really cared if he had been.

Then, today at 6:00 a younger kid was playing, and I asked the same thing and he was very nice about it too and took off.

How the fuck do they know it’s vacant next door? There’s no for-sale sign. Is this gonna be God’s latest thing? He just has to do something, huh? Well, it’s better than that house being sold, cuz then it’ll be an everyday thing, not to mention their barking dogs.

Anyway, we went to the IMAX Theater in Scottsdale (Snottsdale) and we saw a half-hour documentary on storm chasers. It was pretty cool, but they’re full of it when they say the screen’s over 6 stories tall. If that were so, each floor would have to be my height and maybe even a bit shorter. It’s not 120 feet wide, either, but about 75. It’s about 75 feet tall, too. Still, it was neat to see.

Then we went to the mall for a bite to eat, came home, and then went back out to the library where I got two books to read.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1996 Another day of the same old boring shit sexually. Earlier he told me there was plenty of time for him to win the bet. Now, what did that statement mean? I know better and that he has no intentions of winning and if he did, he'd cum by my hand only once to get me off the cigarettes for a day and so he could trash the back room.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1996 I feel so bad for those dogs two yards down. They whine every time it rains out and the owners really just don’t give a shit at all. Maybe I’ll call the Humane Society on behalf of them as I originally considered. How do they stand it? I mean, I know they’ve got kids and therefore it just blends in all together, but how do they sleep?

I hope Tom gets home soon from his errands cuz I only have half a cigarette left.

I did another load of laundry and had the clothes out for a few hours and right after I took them down it began to drizzle, so that was perfect timing.

I just did Larry and others an envelope I think they’re really gonna like. I did 3 plants sitting in pots on the front. On the back, I drew a silver rod and drew 5 hanging plants.

Speaking of envelopes, Tom said Nickolena sent Mom a Valentine and decorated the envelope. Tom says he’s sure the idea came from me, or else they’d have just done something on a separate piece of paper. Yesterday I did a Valentine’s banner for Tom with words and drawings on old adding machine paper.

A miracle happened yesterday. Tom finished the back room and I can now vacuum 99% of it. I just hope it’ll stay this way, but after 2½ years, I’m grateful.

I wonder how many more years it’ll take him to cum, although I know better than that. He’s still teasing as far as sex goes. He said he was gonna wake me up since I took care of myself yesterday cuz I couldn’t get him to. This is one area where I’m glad he’s full of it cuz I don’t like being woken up. It’s the lying I’m sick of. He said he wants to win the bet so he went all out to clean the back room so he doesn’t have to have that on his mind. Now, if you’ve got to have a room cleaned in order to cum, you’ve got a problem. Well, he may not have the room on his mind, but he’ll have the fear of a kid on his mind.

I haven’t heard any kids, so that’s good, cuz if you’re like most people, you don’t want to deal with it unless you know you’ve got to deal with your own kids.

Got a package from my parents. They sent a new cow wind socket. Cool. This one’s a bit longer and a bit different looking. They also sent a small wind socket and a bracket to put up a mini flag. They sent the following for mini flags. A Halloween flag, hearts, a pineapple and one with a slice of watermelon and a drink next to it. The last one is the one we put up. For big flags, they sent a pineapple, a cactus and coyote, and a fish. I put the cactus one up over the microwave and the fish are up in the back room.

They also sent a shade screen for the car.

I don’t know why they bother with sending so many pineapple ones. I hate those. They’re so boring. It’s amazing how little these people know their own daughter. Back on Oswego Street, they sent me these disgusting lemon, lime, and orange sugar-coated candies. Don’t they know I hate citrus flavors?

Any flags I don’t put up, I keep in the hall closet, cuz you never know what we or someone we know may do with them in the future.

When Tom was last over at his parent’s house, they sent back some cake for me, a swing, and a monkey bar. They’ve been put up out back, too, so the backyard is pretty much decorated really well and has all kinds of stuff out there.

Tom says he wants me to trim his hair again soon. Oh, God! Does he really think I can learn to do it right? Well, he says so. I trimmed my pussy hair and did it in a much better way. I shaved it, but as I got closer to my clit, I trimmed it. That way there’s less stubble and won’t scrape up more hair molecules.

This Wednesday we’re going to the IMAX Theater. A coworker of his won tickets and he gave them to Tom. The screen there is supposed to be 60 feet tall and 120 feet wide. That ought to be interesting.

Kim called last night. Now that she’s got over female problems (hopefully), she now has intestinal problems. Hopefully, she’ll be OK.

I left Tammy a message and hope to hear from her soon.

Other than that, there’s not much else going on. Tom wants me to draw the cactus/coyote flag. I’ll do it on another CD label of his and I’ll also be doing it on my parent’s envelope for their next letter.

Later…

Well, Tom just told me that at 8:00 when his show’s over, he wants me to “spoil” him. Yeah, I’ll spoil him with a wicked hard-on. It’ll be good timing, too, seeing that he’ll be up for over 12 hours. I wonder if he’ll try these new things he mentioned or if he’s just talking.

Later…

The good news is that I did a really good drawing.

The bad news is the same old shit and I’m finding myself thinking of leaving here and there. It’s just that I love this guy so much otherwise that I can’t imagine leaving. I’m just so sick of his lies pertaining to sex. It’s all bullshit. The waking me up, the new stuff, the bet, the kid, etc. He said he knew I didn’t believe him, but to just wait a week to see who’s right cuz he doesn’t want to blow his chances during the relaxing vacation he wants. He doesn’t want me to be quiet about it to up his chances of cumming. He wants me to be quiet cuz he just doesn’t want to hear it or deal with it. I can’t make him deal with it, either, cuz all he does is get upset and blame me and turn an attack on me. There’s no way I can demand we get help now cuz there’s no way he’ll budge, and he’ll just cry no opportunity.

Well, like that woman said, there’ll be no kid as long as I’m willing to set aside my wants in order to make him happy. The only way I can make him happy is for him to never cum, for us to never have a kid and for me to allow him to tease me with these issues.

I miss mutual sex and if it was up to me, I’d only have him go down on me since screwing is only for me. Screwing is something I enjoy, but it also makes me feel like a freak and I’ll sure as hell never get pregnant by it.

I could demand only oral sex, but then he’ll insist he doesn’t like the idea cuz then he can’t play with my head. I swear that sometimes I feel all he wants me here for is to clean the house, draw him pictures and be something to tease and bullshit! I’m so sick of people controlling me all my fucking life. I can’t stay at home, I can’t wear the clothes I want, I can’t be a singer and I’m certainly not allowed to have a child. Am I ever gonna be able to do something that I really want without someone or God trying to stop me? My own fucking husband insisted he’d cum long ago. That was a lie. He promised us a child. That was a lie. He’ll never allow me to have a child, no matter what. What did I do to him to piss him off this much to sacrifice an orgasm so as to never allow me a child? What did I do?!?!

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1996 My non-horny husband just laughed when I said I was horny and is glued to that damn TV. He’s waiting till the end of his day, as usual, so holding back is no problem.

Yesterday we screwed at the end of our day and after I came, he continued on for a short time. He said it felt really, really good going slow. Then why did he stop? Did it feel so good that he feared he would cum? Obviously. Then yesterday he goes and says he wants to win the bet. Then an hour later he said he didn’t know cuz he’d be afraid I’d whine and say how he was holding back and how he came at a safe time. He also said he was gonna try new stuff with me over the next few days, but I thought he didn’t like to plan.

I never heard of anyone who likes to tease someone sexually so much. I know guys teasing women about having kids is common. I’m sure of that as much as I’m sure of the statement that nurse made on how I’ll never have a child if I remain with him. That’s OK, though, at this point, believe me.

I’m just so sick of the TV, the computer and other stuff having to come before me unless I’m sick or in some kind of crisis.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1996 It’s too soon to really tell yet, but I’m pretty sure that as I figured, they’ve done nothing at all about their dogs two houses down.

I’m not in a good mood now, but it’s mainly cuz I’m tired. For the second night in a row, Tom woke me up. First it was his snoring and last night it was cuz he was talking in his sleep.

Now here’s my latest new experience and here’s what I’ve decided to do about it. When I got woke up at 2 AM, I noticed a small spot when I went to check for my period. Then I got curious and decided to see what would happen if I prayed to God. I said the same thing I’ve been saying. That I knew motherhood wasn’t right for me, that I wouldn’t run away from that fact or try to fight it, and begged for my period. Then I was suddenly engulfed in a feeling of such a warm love and I could feel that God was so very proud of me and there it was!

No, they don’t give a shit about the letter I sent. I can hear them barking like hell right now.

Anyway, this experience has reinforced the fact that I must follow my head and not my heart and do the right thing, no matter how many days I spend wishing I could have a kid. Now I’m determined like never before, even though I know I’ve got nothing to worry about and that God and Tom would never ever allow me to have a child.

I’m starting to wish more that we could just go back to having our own rooms. If you’re not attracted to someone enough to cum and if you’re that afraid of having a kid, you won’t cum whether or not you’re together, a room away from the person you’re with, or a whole house away. He’s just so full of shit when he said that having us sleep in the same room would make him cum and that wearing regular clothes would make being nude more special. It’s all bullshit and I’m sick of his lies and his head games. How dare he tell me he’s gonna win our bet just to cheer me up. He just doesn’t understand me and thinks this is such a joke and that he can hurt me like this. At least if we go back to our own rooms I can always sleep.

Well, guess what? Now it’s time for me to let him down with lies. The difference is that I know when he’s lying, but since I’m now just beginning to join in on his games and lies, he’s gonna be getting psyched up for nothing just like he had me do in the beginning.

He’s not attracted to me (he says he is and tries to pretend he is) and he has this thing where he thinks I’m too thin. Well, he better get his eyes checked cuz I have plenty of a belly and my thighs are quite meaty. I’d have to lose a good 15 pounds or so before I started really looking too thin. Anyway, I said I’d get up to 105 pounds which he likes me the best at, but I’m really gonna lose about 10 pounds. Lately, I’m between 98-100 pounds, but I’m gonna get between 90-95 and give him a taste of his own medicine. I know, though, that even though he likes how I looked better at 105 that he’s full of shit and would never cum no matter what I weighed.

No problem, though. Cuz I’m gonna make sure that from now on that I help God and Tom make sure Tom never ever cums. A kid isn’t for me, whether or not I want one. There’s no way I could handle it. I know God and Tom don’t need my help, but like I said, I’m not fighting or running away from what’s right and what’s got to be anymore. It’s my turn to join in on the games, the lies and the making sure he always holds back. I’m also gonna make it a point to walk around here stark naked more and more.

Lastly, in April of ‘97, there’ll be no appointment cuz I refuse to go to a joke of an appointment. He also doesn’t realize that he’s dropping more and more subtle hints as to the truth. We were talking about pregnancy and periods earlier and he was telling me that you feel different in the beginning. I then said I was curious to look it up and see what’s so different that you’re supposed to feel. He said maybe I shouldn’t do that cuz then I imagine things. Well, I wouldn’t for starters and also, if he’s gonna “make things happen” and if he wants a kid, then why would I have to imagine and why does he have to worry about my imagining things? Well, unfortunately, the lying asshole is on vacation after today and I wish I could say we’ll have a fun relaxing time but I know better. I’ve got to make sure that I stick to the things I said I’m gonna do. No more being the nice and honest one here. I’m gonna be just like him. I’ve also got to make sure I talk about it as little as I can cuz he just can’t handle it cuz baby talk just really turns him off.

Later…

The last few subjects I could think of that I have written down in my notes are friends, enemies and those I couldn’t be with that I wanted to be with. They’re all rather connected, so I guess I’ll begin going through my life little by little from as young as I can remember and from whatever events I can remember. There’s a lot that I can remember, but there’s also a lot that I can���t remember. No one can remember everything, though.

Well, let’s just start with the fact that I wasn’t supposed to be born in the first place. That’s why my mother took DES, since back then they didn’t know the problems it causes. A part of me believes that because I wasn’t supposed to be born and my mother fighting to have me is the reason why I’ve gone through so much misery. Another part of me believes that being blessed in so many ways is also why I’ve been cursed in so many ways.

The dogs still bark on and off as usual. Not only do they probably not care if they get shot, but they’re probably figuring, well, we can’t or won’t debark them and we sure as hell would never allow them in the house, so fuck it.

My puzzle book finally came. I was wondering if they either forgot me or were trying to rip me off.

Anyway, I lived at home until I was 15. It was a nightmare. The only things I didn’t go through were sexual abuse, drugs, alcohol or poverty. I went through 80% emotional abuse and 20% physical abuse.

My parents’ full names are Dureen June O and Arthur Irving O. My siblings are Larry Ross O and Tammy Sue G. My maternal grandparents are Shirley & Jack G and my paternal grandparents are Bella & Joseph O. After Joe died, Bella remarried a guy named Herman G. My ex-aunt is June W. Mary & Ronnie G, as well as Ruth & Marty O, are my two sets of aunts and uncles. Ronnie’s my ma’s brother and Marty’s my dad’s brother. Both are aggressive assholes, according to most people’s standards which includes my own. Ronnie’s kids are Lori & Lisa and Marty’s are Polly & Philip.

My mother was very negative and didn’t want any of us kids to be “better” than her. That’d take the attention away from her and make her jealous. She’d cut me down about anything and everything. Her parents lived next door to us in the first house we were in and my mother was just like her mother. Typical case of like mother like daughter, and this is why I know I shouldn’t have a kid. My parents weren’t stupid, though, and they also did do me some good. They’ve taught me valuable things whether they were big or small. They kept me well-fed and clothed. Going to them with a problem, was almost always a whole different story. She seemed to get off by my being upset and by her cutting me down. When I was sick, though, she took really good care of me.

My brother didn’t live at home too long during my childhood since we were 12 years apart, but I liked it when he was there cuz we got along the best.

My sister was a nightmare. She was and still is in most ways, a carbon copy of our mother. Bitchy, too serious and negative. She used to cut me down to nothing too, and boss me around like there was no tomorrow since she was 8 years older.

Later…

Why is God so mean to me and why does He hate me so? It’s a hell of a coincidence that the more I try to ignore the subject and turn away from it I see and hear more about it on TV, the radio, or wherever. He made up his mind to make sure that I don’t have a kid, and I’m trying to do the right thing and get over not having a kid, yet he rubs them in my face. Today would be the perfect day for them to be out playing near the house after school. Something tells me that they’ve just got to be sent here today.

I had to wait a long time to accept that I’m not having a kid, but how long will I have to wait for my replacement? I just hope I even have a destiny. There’s got to be something else out there for me. I just hope that just cuz he won’t let me sing or be a mother doesn’t mean that he won’t let me do something else. I just wish I knew what else I could do and when?

If I had a choice to either have a kid or be repulsed by the idea all the time, I’d want to be repulsed by the idea all the time, but since I am only sometimes, I better quit dreaming and just hope and pray that there’s something else that I’m meant for and that it gets here fast enough.

I was thinking earlier of how I need a new bathing suit and right away I said to myself that I’d get a blue 1 piece. Am I ever gonna quit thinking of him and do for me? Nothing I say, do, or wear will change things.

Anyway, back to my life back in the first house where we lived till I was 12.

I didn’t do too well in school, other than science, gym, music, art, typing and lunch. I was a troublemaker till 6th grade. I’d just walk up to a kid for no reason at all and kick or punch them. I was holding in all that anger that I had for my mother, but I certainly couldn’t take my anger out on her.

I did grades 1-5 in an elementary school named Blueberry Hill. I stood back once in second grade.

For some reason when I was in first grade, there were these two girls I just had to be friends with. Christine T and Cindy F. Chris and I ended up being friends, but Cindy never liked me.

There were two teachers I had crushes on, too. I can see why I had a crush on third-grade teacher Linda M as most people liked her, but why I had a crush on fifth-grade teacher Joan B beats me. What did I see in her? Everyone hated her, too. She was easily the worst-liked teacher there.

During third and fourth grade I was in the resource room, OKA: the retard room, the dummy room, or the troublemaker room. You were put there if you were either slow or a troublemaker. I was in there cuz I was a troublemaker, even though I was pretty stupid till I was in my early 20s. I was about 7 years behind my age in looks and brains. I was always jealous of someone else due to them either being smarter, having longer hair, being skinnier or cuz they had nicer parents.

Stephanie Watnick is another girl that stands out in my memory. She was in the fifth grade with me. She was friends with me, but she was also one of those I beat up on whenever angry.

Other than these 5 people, the only other one worth mentioning was Rose M. She was my fifth-grade teacher and she was friendly with my parents. She even spent a day or two with us during the summer at the beach.

I did 6th grade and 3 days of 7th grade at Glenbrook middle school, then transferred when we moved to the other side of Longmeadow. There are about 4 elementary schools in Longmeadow, 2 middle schools, and 1 high school.

Glenbrook sucked. You had no lockers. Just cubby holes so anyone could rip your lunch money off. There’s nothing about that school or the teachers there that stands out in my mind at all.

William’s middle school was way better. You had lockers there and I liked the teachers and some of the students there better.

Later…

I’m surprised they haven’t begun to play basketball next door. God’s probably holding them off till Tom gets home. That way I can’t go out there and say, “I appreciate your right to play, but could you please take it somewhere else? My grandmother’s real sick and she needs to sleep.”

Back to who stands out in my mind at William’s. There are two teachers. Mrs. Bogert was pretty cool. I didn’t have a crush on her, but I liked her personality. Mrs. Tricinella was one I had a crush on and again, I don’t know why. I don’t know what I saw in her and no one liked her either.

For students, there was Brenda P. She was a friend of mine, but she ended up not liking me. There was Laura C who never liked me. She had long pretty hair, but she wasn’t there for 8th grade, the last grade of middle school. I think she moved out of state.

Then there was Jessie S, Big Bird’s adopted daughter. We had met before when I was about 10 and she was about 8 at the Jewish Community Center. She was another longtime good friend of mine besides Jenny and Andy. I hope she’s doing well today. At least our friendship didn’t end on a bad note. We simply lost touch with each other. I suppose I could track her down through her mother, but there’s really not much to say to her. I could update her on my life, but that’d take forever and I’m sure she’s busy doing whatever it is she’s doing nowadays.

Later…

Thank you, God and Tom! Winning the bet is going to be no problem and Tom has made it clear, although subtly, that I will get my period next month and I strongly vibe it, too. When I was asking him about Ibuprofen being addicting or playing with my period, he said not to worry and that it’s non-addicting and that it won’t mess with my period for next month. I’ve been needing it for my tooth as well as for cramps.

Having a kid has not only become scarier but it’s gotten to be quite a turn-off in my mind in light of all that’s gone on. First I lived in the depression of knowing I couldn’t have a child and now I live in the fear of getting pregnant. Not literally, of course, cuz I know God and Tom are taking care of making sure I don’t. It’s just that even though they’ve got that covered, I still have to do the work at making sure it doesn’t happen. Even if Tom really did want a kid, we have to wait till my teeth are done being worked on whenever that’ll be and we have to wait till his father dies and that’ll probably be during the middle of the summer, I guess.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1996 I finally got my period and I now realize more than ever how much God will love me for doing “right.” Every day I’ve been praying for my period and letting God know how much I know what a wrong thing a baby would be for me. I prayed to never have a baby and for Tom to lose the bet, even though I know I’ve got nothing to worry about.

Tom’s up now, so I’ll write later.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1996 Another day of waking up at 98 pounds, and no period. I’ve got slight cramping and I know it’s coming and that I can’t be pregnant. I hope I get it soon, though, cuz this could mean something could be wrong and that’d be all I’d need.

Tom just got up and I’ve got nothing else to say at the moment, so I’ll return later.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1996 Hey cool! I’m 98 pounds on the day I’m due for my period. I wish my period would hurry up and start, though, as I am soooooo bloated.

I can’t get on AOL till 7 AM ET cuz they’re updating their system.

I watched a movie, listened to music and showered, but now I’m not sure what I’ll do. Maybe type up some drafts pertaining to my life. Maybe do some artwork.

Later…

I left Andy a message to tell Michelle she can forget about calling Tom, but thanks anyway. I told them that if either of us wished to bring up the subject of adoption, we would. In truth, though, I don’t need to know what I already know.

I can’t watch Little House on the Prairie cuz the cable’s out.

Got another message from Tammy. She wanted to know about a way to contact any other people she knew. I also told her to look in AOL’s member directory and how Tom and I once looked to see how many people with my maiden and married name there were.

She also said she did pick out other names, but they were taken. Mystery was taken. That is why I’m Mysterylin.

There was a quick hello from Becky too, and she says she’ll be writing to me soon.

I hope Tammy gets a new printer too, soon.

I sent Kim a letter. She once asked me if I wanted any stationary, saying she had lots of it. I told her to go ahead and send some if she still wants to and if it’s not a hassle. As long as it’s not shaped funny, I can reset the margins to fit it.

Later…

I’ve finally had it with those two dogs two yards down and have sent them a letter. Now hopefully I’ll only have one more letter to send and that’ll be to the people who move in next door about their kids and dogs. I just hope these people don’t come to the door asking if I knew who sent it, even though I’ll say no.

I feel so bad for these dogs, too. It’s so cruel that they have to be outside 24/7.

Anyway, I wrote that I was sorry to have to write this, but I’m just a concerned neighbor with a wacky brother who’s threatened to shoot the dogs due to their barking and as sick as it is, he’s unstable enough to do it, so please try to lessen their barking. It’d be helpful and appreciated. I’d like to give my name and number but don’t want to cuz I don’t want my brother to know I wrote this.

I’m almost 100% sure, though, it’ll do no good. Anyone who doesn’t give a shit about their dogs won’t give a shit about their neighbors. In fact, they’ll probably say to themselves - fine. Shoot the dogs. We don’t give a damn. I mean, they obviously don’t give a damn to be leaving them outside like this. Then again, next door stunned me by quieting their kids down, so we’ll see. And also, their dog was out 24/7 too.

I listened to music earlier, but I haven’t done any singing yet.

Robin was here earlier for the first time in quite a while. I sensed her while I was laying down and I was like - go away! But she then proceeded on to say she was sorry for causing electrical problems, but that she still loves me and loves to see me. She promises that things will work out and that I’ll never have to be as miserable as I was back East. Well, if she’s really for real, I hope she’s right about my never having to be as miserable as I was back East!

It’s gonna be 83º here today and 86º or 88º tomorrow. Wow! We may have to get the EC ready soon. When I go out to smoke in the middle of the night, though, it’s still pretty darn chilly.

It’s amazing that this journal only took 13 days. I still have to finish typing 105 as well as the last 8 pages in here.

Yesterday I did a lot. I busted my ass with housecleaning and other stuff, so I might be kind of lazy today. Maybe I’ll try calling Kim. She mentioned bleeding from her ass (maybe hemorrhoids), but hopefully it’s no big deal and hopefully, she isn’t in the hospital.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1996 No more being able to rank on Tammy for having a piece of shit for a computer. She got a brand new one that’s faster than ours for $1,600. She’s got CD-ROM, Windows 95, big speakers and all kinds of things. I told her that since I can’t rank on her for having a piece of shit for a computer I’ll have to double the amount of ranking I do on her cold and snowy winters and her humid summers.

Just called AOL and got two messages from Alex and one from Tammy. All she said was that she made it online and would talk to us soon. What a boring, non-original screen name she’s using.

I sent her a reply letting her know I am very happy for her and now she can enjoy all the things we do. I won’t be sending her regular mail anymore. Just to my folks, Bob, Kim, and Larry.

I don’t usually print out Alex’s messages since they’re usually short with nothing really new.

Got a letter from Kim today with letters she got from Bob. She also sent copies of her AT&T bill and her Excel bill, but I’m shitty with math, so I’m gonna let Tom check it out. She also sent a $5 bill saying some places charge $5 to switch over, some charge $3 and some charge nothing, but to keep it anyway.

Yesterday my combination of PMS and being tired didn’t have me in the best of moods. I could tell Tom was bored by my rambling on and on and he even said so, but also that it was OK to get it out of my system. Just when I had been doing so good at keeping my mouth shut!

Then he came out and told me the biggest lie to cheer me up, even though he denied it was to cheer me up. He told me that he was gonna win the bet. What a liar and how it’s all the more obvious that he loves playing with my head about this!

Yesterday I really got on my ass about smoking indoors and am now smoking outside. I hate it and it’s a pain, but it’s already begun to cut me down as far as how much I smoke is concerned.

Later…

Now I’ll get into describing places I’ve lived, but first, I got 3 free pairs of pantyhose in the mail today and a form for the Literary Book Club so I can get 6 free books in a bogus name.

After I was born in Springfield, we lived in a house there till very shortly after I was born. I was only a few weeks old, I think, when we moved into a 4-bedroom house in Longmeadow. The house, which was next door to my mother’s parents had a huge backyard. Many acres both out in the open as well as set in the woods where I had my swing set and Larry and Tammy had their private fort. The house was built right before I was born and was pretty modern and still is compared to the second house. It was on Berkeley Drive and the cellar was just about finished. It was carpeted with heated floors and even a toilet, sink and shower stall. The stairs that went down into the cellar were in the middle. To the right was one big room with a few built-in shelves. On the other side was my little playroom, the bathroom in the middle and the laundry room behind that.

The first floor circled the staircase. If you were standing in front of the stairs, the front door would be behind you. To your left would be the dining room, through there in the back would be the kitchen, and through the kitchen would be a small hallway. To the left was a bathroom with a sink and toilet and to the right was a walk-in pantry and the stairs to the cellar. Past this was a long living room that made up one whole side of the house.

Upstairs were 4 bedrooms with just a small hallway in the center and a full bath.

The attic in this house wasn’t one you could walk up into. You had to go through a hole in the ceiling and stand on beams.

There was a double-car garage at the left of the house.

Berkeley Drive was a quiet dead-end road with a circle at the end of it. There were only 7 houses on that road.

When I was 12, we moved to Birchwood Ave., also in Longmeadow. This was on the corner of a busier street with many more houses on it. This house was also a 4-bedroom and it was bigger and older, built in the late 1800s, but I liked it much better. It was kept in excellent condition and my mother had the rooms with different kinds of wallpapers and carpets as she loved to do, so most of the interior was pretty modern looking. Its front and back yards were very small, but this was to free my dad from having to do so much yard work as his heart was never the greatest. Even I’d mow the lawn from time to time. My dad used a sit-down mower at the other house.

Its cellar wasn’t as finished or as nice as the other one, but it was my private resort that I loved. My stereo and guinea pigs lived down there and that’s where I’d do my homework, too, at my desk which had drawers and a bookcase. Again, the stairs were in the middle of the cellar, and towards the right was one big side (my side) with lots of big built-in cabinets. The left side was where the washer and dryer were and there was also a small room with an old freezer in it as well as another small room with no floor in it. I used to wonder if I’d find any secret passageways.

The first floor was kind of like a U. If you enter through the back door which is in the kitchen, as with the other house, you enter a huge kitchen. This was one of my favorite kitchens and I think my mom agreed. Off of the kitchen was a bathroom with a sink and toilet and in front of that, also off the kitchen was a closet area within a small area. There was where the steps leading to the cellar were.

Through the kitchen was a dining room and through that was a good size foyer where the front door was as well as the stairs going up to the bedrooms.

Through the foyer was a huge living room that ran the length of the house. Off of the living room was a solarium.

The upstairs hallway was kind of in the shape of a staple. Once you hit the top of the stairs, there’s a bedroom on the left. If you go right, there’s a full bathroom and to the right of that is another bedroom with a porch off of that. In the middle of the hallway was a big linen closet. To the right of that were the stairs to the attic. It was a full walk-in attic that I’m sure we would’ve used as a playroom if we kids had been younger. To the right of the attic stairs was the master bedroom, then to the right of the master bedroom was the last bedroom. That was mine in the beginning and if you stood right outside the door and looked towards your left, the stairs went right down under you. Off of my room was a small cedar closet. Its door was a few inches shorter than I am.

The master bedroom was always my parent’s room. The first bedroom was my father’s mother’s, then Lisa’s bedroom (Tammy’s first kid when she was a baby). The second bedroom went from being a den to Tammy’s room, then back to a den. My room became Tammy’s room cuz after I graduated I lived in the cellar.

Although I had my share of horrible times in this house, it also gives me a warm feeling to remember it and I did have some good times there. I fell in love with this house the second I saw it.

From when I was about 5 till my late teens, my family and I always spent the summer at our beach cottage in CT. I had more shitty times there and wished we could stay home a lot. When we first got this 4-bedroom cottage, it was a dump. My folks fixed it up really nice and later knocked out some walls making it a 2-bedroom cottage. It was small and on one floor. The walk to the beach from there took only about 90 seconds.

I first went out on my own the day before I turned 20 in 1985, so it’s been just over 10 years now. I first moved to Locust Street in Springfield on the first floor into a 1-bedroom apartment. This 4-story building was built in the 50s and the apartment was nothing too bad and nothing too impressive. It was about 600 square feet and I had a roommate there for a month or two. Her name was Michelle L and she was a 17-year-old runaway that I worked at the Harley Hotel with. She said her father molested her. She turned out to be a major backstabber who took no appreciation for my rescuing her from her home situation. This was at the time I wouldn’t see my brother for 8 years as she, as well as Jenny, came between me and my brother. My brother fell in love with her and they had an affair. Michelle and Larry were becoming more of a nuisance by the minute and in order to get rid of Michelle, I knew I had to get rid of both of them. So, I kicked her out and she went to live with Larry and his family, but I don’t know for how long.

I was only in this apartment for about 5 or 6 months. I think it was the following May that I moved due to someone knocking on my window at night. If I’d had the guts I have today, I would’ve waited outside the window at night to take care of the problem. I think I did once, but no one showed up. This left me to believe it was my brother or someone he knew. I still don’t know up to this day. In the end, whoever it was did me a favor, cuz I moved around the corner in the same building on Woodside Terrace into a much bigger and nicer 1-bedroom apt. This one was about 900 square feet. It was on the fourth floor and I lived there till July 1987. I had a black girl named Barbara T live with me there for a couple of weeks who ripped me off and was a lazy bitch. She rang up $143 of long-distance phone calls while she was there, but luckily my good acting with the phone company got it wiped out. There really wasn’t any way I could’ve afforded to pay that, either. I can’t remember where I met Barbara which is weird since I have a great memory, but I think I met her along Locust St.

Then I moved to Oswego St. onto a second floor in a 1-bedroom apartment that was more modern. I even had a garbage disposal there. This apartment was about 600 square feet. My roommate at this place was Crystal C. Another lazy bitch who ripped off a few pieces of clothing from me. She was a real wimp who was under the bad influence of her no-good boyfriend. We met at Dunkin Donuts and ended up chatting when the discussion of roommates came up. After a month or so, she left out of fear of me. I don’t know why she was afraid of me when all I wanted was for her to do her share of chores.

I left there on March 17th of 1989 to move back to the same fourth-floor apartment on Woodside Terrace.

After Crystal, I wanted no more roommates, but I ended up taking in my best friend Andy who I reunited with in April of 1988 cuz he got evicted from his own apt. It was terrible, as all we did was fight and he wasn’t there more than a month or so either. We’re just too much alike to live together, but Andy’s also changed dramatically for the better since then. I think we both have.

I moved out of Springfield to South Deerfield, MA, 40 minutes away from Springfield, on April 1, 1991. This was the most beautiful 1400 square foot (the size of this house), 1-bedroom apartment I ever had, but I was terribly isolated there. This apartment had everything from a Jacuzzi in its bathtub to a dishwasher, washer and dryer in the bathroom, a garbage disposal and a trash compactor. A ceiling fan, a microwave, a burglar alarm and 3 big skylights. There was only one other apartment in this 3-story office building where friends of mine lived. We lived on the top floor.

I moved to Norwich, CT February 8, 1992, to the biggest dump I ever lived in. The Norwich Housing Authority. I lived in a rundown, filthy old 1-bedroom apartment that was about 500 square feet. It was to be a 102-day nightmare and the noise there was horrible and this place literally ran me down physically and mentally till I came to Phoenix on June 9, 1992.

The apartments in Phoenix were very modern and beautiful with dishwashers and some had a washer and dryer in the apartments, but their walls are still too thin. Just about all apartment complexes have pools and even Jacuzzis.

I spent my first 5 days here with Andy who had been here 16 months before I got to his 400-square-foot studio apartment. I ended up getting the same studio two buildings away from him on the first floor. Then, I moved right behind him into his building in an identical studio. The walls were also too thin there and I hated my neighbors. This was in the Vista Ventana apartment complex.

Then I moved about 40 minutes away to the Crystal Creek complex in April of 1993 into my first 2-bedroom apartment on the second floor that was about 1000 square feet. My husband lived next to me and that’s how we met, but I hated the people below me.

Then I moved to an identical apartment in the back of the complex to avoid the pool noise till I moved here in September 1993. This has been the longest I’ve ever lived in one place since being on my own. Then again, I spent a total of 3 years at the Woodside Terrace apartment counting both times I lived there.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1996 I’m bored now, but earlier I typed a couple of letters and played Balistic. I need a new project. Something new and exciting that’ll take me a while to do.

Tammy left a message saying she was just calling to say hi. She would never call to just say hi, so she probably has some computer questions.

I’m getting nervous about Tom’s upcoming vacation. I’m afraid all we’ll do is fight no matter how hard we try not to.

When I look at this man there’s so much love I feel, but there’s also so much anger. I just try to remind myself that I’m sure he tried to find a way to tell me the truth, but he just doesn’t have the heart to break my heart and no one should be forced into being a father or a mother if it’s not what they want. I must continue to accept that just cuz I can’t have the things I want, doesn’t mean there’s not something else out there just as fulfilling.

We had sex yesterday which was a bore. I didn’t cum cuz I had taken care of myself earlier due to thinking he wouldn’t bring it up.

He says his favorite time for sex is in the mornings, but his actions show me he likes it at the end of his day. It’s safer that way. That way he’s more tired so he can hold back.

I know now that Tom and God are only trying to protect me. I’ve been praying steadily the prayer I wrote a few pages back. This way I can feel close to him and that he loves me cuz I’m praying for what’s correct for me.

There are two things out of the many things that Tom’s been all talk and no action that I’m truly grateful for and that’s that he doesn’t wake me up when I’m asleep for sex as he said he would. He’ll also never read my stories which saves me lots of embarrassment. I told Tom that if I die to give my original journals to Andy. Andy will read them, but Tom wouldn’t, so I guess it’d be best for those books to go to someone who’ll read them and get a big kick out of them. The only other person in this world who might want to read these would be Tammy, but I don’t think she’d have the time.

I’m gonna go leave Andy a message unless he answers.

Later…

I can’t believe it took me 30 years to learn that the word instrament is spelled instrument when it applies to a musical instrument!

Andy’s been on the phone for quite a while, but I left him a message. He’s probably talking to Quinn.

Karson hasn’t called which is fine with me. I admire her respect whereas Fran would keep calling people who didn’t want to hear from him, no matter what. I’m still amazed he doesn’t call periodically. He must’ve lost my number and forgotten my married name.

I guess now’s as good a time as any to write more about my life. I’ve thought of such subjects to get into such as places I’ve lived in, health situations and accidents I’ve been in, goals that are both current and past, friends and enemies I’ve had and people I couldn’t be with that I once wanted very much to be with.

There’s not much to say in the way of goals since these have pretty much been a joke for me. I’ve always wanted to be a singer. I didn’t start wanting to be a mom till I was about 24 and then after I left the NHA when I was 26 it went away till I met Tom. I should visit a place like the NHA daily cuz this not only may bring back bad memories, but it’ll surely help me get over never having a kid much easier.

Up till I was about 10, I used to also want to be an actress, but I haven’t wanted to be since then, even though, if a legit deal came my way, I wouldn’t necessarily turn it down.

I had thought about working with the deaf since I’m fluent in sign language, but there’s so much more needed for that than just knowing how to sign. There are extra credentials required like experience working with all different kinds of people, other degrees, etc. Nowadays, I’d just prefer to have a deaf friend to sign with for the fun of it as signing is fun.

Other than wanting to be a singer and a mom which cannot be, I just have to have confidence that I’ll find something just as fulfilling and productive. Like I said, I may wonder why God hates me at times, but I know deep down he’s just looking out for my best interest and loves me enough to protect me. Therefore, I have faith in him that he won’t just let me wander around aimlessly forever. He’ll make sure I cross paths with something. Meanwhile, I know that as long as I keep praying for him to continue protecting me from pregnancy and stuff like that, that I know would hurt me, and that I’d be lousy at, and to help me find something correct for me, I’ll be on his good side for sure.

Let’s move on to the health and accident department. Well, I’ve been lucky for the most part, but I’ve been through enough hell as well. Besides typical colds and flues, I’ve had to deal with asthma and allergies for the most part. I outgrew my asthma till a few years after I began smoking and I began smoking when I was 13. From about September 1990 to early 1993 was when I went through hell with my asthma, having attacks that nearly killed me. It was a constant living nightmare that I never thought I’d be free of. It had me in such a grip that this alone made me wish I was dead plenty of times.

When I was about 9, I had double viral pneumonia and was hospitalized for two weeks in New London, CT with it since it happened while we were at our summer home at the beach in Old Lyme, CT.

When I was around that same age, I was spending a few weeks at Jenny C’s house in Huntington, MA where I went over the handlebars of my bike and wound up with 60 stitches in 4 layers in my chin.

I also banged my pinky finger and my knee doing gymnastics. I got my pinky sprained on the vault and sideswiped my knee on the beam.

I was born with no outer ear on my left side and no canal or hearing. All I had was a tiny portion of the lobe. It took 15 operations in the 70s in Boston to build the outer ear out of plastic surgery. The first 8 operations were in-patient, and the rest were out-patient. Back then they had no CAT scans and was told I’d never hear out of that ear.

Then, in 1994 it took two operations to build an ear canal and in the second operation, the frame was taken off cuz it was causing major sensitivity. Both operations were out-patient. It’s amazing how it took 15 operations where I had to stay a few days to build the frame and it took only one to remove it in 10 minutes when I was home that same day. That ear doesn’t hear half as well as the other, but some hearing is better than none and music sounds pretty neat with headphones on.

The rest of my medical ordeals were self-inflicted. I began cutting my forearm as a sick way to release my pressures which became rather addicting at around age 8. That escalated over time but stopped when I was 17 after I jumped out of a window and broke my upper right arm. That was the most painful thing I ever experienced, aside from wild cramps due to the DES, and that deterred me from suicide attempts, even though I’ve thought about it many times.

I also began starvation diets when I was around 10 and that nearly killed me twice. It began when I was at the beach and didn’t eat or drink for 3 days. When I awoke on the third day, I couldn’t raise my head off of the pillow. If it hadn’t been for the fact that the kitchen was 3 feet away from where I’d slept, I’d have died as my mother couldn’t care less. Her attitude was, “You did it to yourself; you correct it.” It took me nearly 8 hours to muster up the strength and determination to grab a devil dog, then 10 minutes to open and eat it, then another hour or two to get up and shower.

This really messed up my stomach and I’d have diarrhea without even knowing it. It was so gross and embarrassing, but I’d be right smack in the middle of the beach when all of a sudden this brown stuff would be running down my legs. I don’t know who I was madder at. Me for doing this or at my mother for not helping me. Would she have left me to die if I could never have gotten to the cupboard for that Devil Dog? I’ll always wonder about this and it’s a scary question.

I’d have times when I’d not eat here and there, but I always made sure I had plenty of liquids. When I was 16, I became seriously anorexic. A lot of it wasn’t just that I wouldn’t eat cuz I thought I was fat, but I was going through such a hellish ordeal that I just couldn’t eat and the second foster mother I was with wouldn’t feed me that much at all.

When I was around 14, two years before what I just wrote about happened, I overdosed on pain and sleeping pills. Luckily, though, I never needed my stomach pumped.

Before I get into more detail about my life, I think I’ll describe all the places I’ve lived in and that’s omitting any foster homes or funny farms I’ve been in for now.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1996 Tom went to bed a couple of hours ago, and he says he’s gonna get up in about 6 hours. This way he can reset his schedule and he’s already all caught up on his sleep. I wish I could do that!

I called Sandy and Jenny a few hours ago as I figured they’d more than likely be home then, rather than tomorrow morning.

I am amazed at how much Sandy loves to get my drawings. She says she and Jen really look forward to them and run to check out each other’s drawings. Cool.

Sandy and I also teased each other about the weather. It hit a high of 13º there today and they just got 6” of snow dumped on them to add to what’s already there.

Sandy also says they all laugh about the pie incident now and then.

Michelle hasn’t called Tom, so I wonder if Andy talked her out of it. If so, it’s no big deal and I told her she didn’t have to do it and that it was no biggie.

Now I’m gonna start this week’s letters. All the laundry is done, so it’s nice having that out of the way.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 1996 Last night I cried for 6 hours and was so depressed. I was trying to do anything and everything I can to shake it. I still haven’t talked to Tom about it and I won’t ever.

There’s something I’ve always realized that I realize now more so than ever before. There are two things, actually. The first thing is that I’ve come to see more and more that even if I could have the things I want, I could never handle them. I’m just not cut out for them. I can’t sing well enough and I could never be a good mother or handle that either. Also, I realize more than ever that I’ve got to start accepting what can and can’t be and stop trying to fight these fights I could never win. I’ve got to let go and just take what I can get in life and take what’s meant to be. I’m wasting my life and driving myself crazy by trying to get things that aren’t destined. I see more than ever now that it’s not that I’m a quitter or am giving up in any way, it’s that it’s hopeless. I simply am powerless to obtain the things I want in life. I really lectured myself earlier about this telling myself, “Come on now, you know that just cuz you got here and you got Tom that you still can’t have first best. You know you can’t have anything you really want that really matters to you. First best isn’t meant for you, so just accept that and move on.”

Move on to what, though? That’s the scary part. Accepting that I can’t be a singer or a mother is frustrating and depressing, but not knowing what’s meant for me for real is scary. God obviously doesn’t want me working regular jobs any more than he wants me singing or being a mom, otherwise he’d have me able to do that and keep a schedule. He didn’t make me that way or able to be a singer and a mom, so what does that leave? What’s he got planned for me? Does he even have anything planned? Do I even have a destiny? Is this really it as far as my life goes? Will I just continue to do journals, sing for fun, watch TV, do puzzles and clean the house? Is that it? Is that it aside from whatever else Tom and I do together? Is this all I’m good for and deserve?

I miss those days when I first got here when I was so happy constantly, despite my problems with neighbors and money. It’s not that I wish for that life back, but I wish I wasn’t hit as hard by things both physically and mentally. It seems that most others who find they can’t have something they really want can get over it much quicker than I do. They seem to accept it quicker and easier and they also always seem to find something fast enough to replace whatever it was that they first wanted and accept it without being so depressed about it. Maybe these people aren’t as happy as they’d like to be, but they don’t seem so miserable over not being able to get what they consider first best cuz most of us don’t get first best cuz life doesn’t work that way. I guess the only thing about it with me is that wanting to be a singer is much more of a long shot, than wanting a child. Most people can’t sing at all and don’t become singers, but most people also can have a child.

Andy was reminding me again earlier that his sister Linda and her husband tried for 8 years before they could have a kid and she experienced all the same emotions as I am. Yeah, well there’s a big difference between someone who can’t get pregnant due to a physical problem than there is with someone who can’t get pregnant due to her husband making sure she doesn’t cuz of his own individual fears as well as his fears of how much she’d suck as a mom and couldn’t handle it. Well, he’s right and I realize more and more that Tom is afraid cuz of how I’d be as a mom. He hasn’t got any faith in me than I’ve got in myself and I don’t know if all the talk he used to say about believing I’d be a good mom was always just talk or if he’s come to see and believe that through time.

There are still only two things Tom can do. The only question is when? When will he come out and tell me that he not only doesn’t want to deal with a kid but that he doesn’t have faith in me as a mom? If not that, then he’s gonna have to make sure he finds a way to beat the appointment in ‘97 and make sure it doesn’t work for him.

Yes, this type of misery is better than the old types of misery which I know sounds funny. At least I’m not in the NHA or broke or alone. Yeah, I know, though. The person I’m with is fucking me out of a dream. Believe me, I’ve asked myself how I could love him for doing this to me and why I don’t just leave, but I love him. Just like I used to ask myself how I could love my mother after all she did to me, but I guess I love her too. I also know that if it weren’t for my mother I wouldn’t be here and if it weren’t for Tom, I wouldn’t be hearing out of two ears and I wouldn’t have a lot of other things.

I wasn’t kidding when I said I wouldn’t talk to Tom about this anymore. It will never change anything and he just doesn’t get it. He’s not the one who wants a kid and to be a singer and he doesn’t want to change anything to make it so we have a kid. Nothing will change the 3 things that are keeping him from cumming. 1. His not wanting a kid to deal with. 2. His fears of my being a bad mother. 3. His enjoyment of teasing me with this subject.

Nothing will change God’s mind either and I want so much more than ever to work on not trying to solve problems that can’t be solved year after year. I have to treat unsolvable problems like hopelessly broken TVs. If it can’t be fixed, you dump it. Well, it’s my life and Tom can control my body from getting pregnant, but he can’t control me from refusing to play this game and deal with hopeless problems year after year.

For the first time in eons, I prayed to God and here’s basically what I said: I still may never know if you’re a hoax, a myth or evil and you know the reasons why I’ve been afraid to pray to you. I’ve also been confused for the longest time as to what I should pray to you for. Nonetheless, I see it’s obvious you won’t budge on the issue of a child and I know you’ll never allow me to have a child or allow Tom to allow himself to have an orgasm. I’ve come to realize that it’s not that you won’t allow me a child to punish me, but that you’re just trying to protect me. I promise not to fight you on things you won’t allow anymore if you’re really trying to protect me and all I ask is two things. Please continue to protect me from pregnancy as I see that I could never handle it or handle a child. Also, it’s very important that you help me find a supplement in life. Something I’d be satisfied with doing that’ll occupy more of my time and help me to accept not ever having a child. I’m tired of being upset over things I can’t have, so please help me to make it easier to accept the things that I can’t have and to find other things in life.

I decided it was my turn to play another game with Tom. Well, you remember our bet about 5 months ago I knew I’d win and I did win? We bet that if he came within 30 days that I’d have to go a day without smoking and that if he didn’t cum, he owed me nothing. Due to his loving to lie about it, he said he was sure he’d win the bet and that there was no doubt in his mind about it, but we both knew he wanted to lose. He didn’t seem the least bit upset about losing, either, cuz that’s how much he wanted to. I made a new bet with him. I said he could have till March 1st to cum with no excuses such as bad days where he’d need more time. If he didn’t cum, nothing would change. If he did, he doesn’t have to clean the back room (which he tried putting a guilt trip on me about earlier cuz he said he’d clean it nearly 2½ years ago) and also, I’d go a day without smoking. I told him, though, that I don’t make bets I can’t keep. He asked me, “If I clean the back room before March 1st, then win the bet, do I get to trash the back room?” I told him OK. Why does he love things so trashed and unorganized? He says he doesn’t, but his actions say differently, just like with the kid, or else he’d have cleaned it long ago. I can’t believe how stupid he thinks I am. Anyway, we both know he wants to lose this bet and that he will, so I’m far from worried about having to go a day with no cigarettes. And again, if he did cum, it’d be once and during a time when I couldn’t get pregnant and so he could get out of doing the back room and so he could see me suffer for a day without smoking.

Only two things will happen. He’ll either admit the truth about the kid or beat that 1997 appointment.

Tom’s also sick again, by the way. NOW does he believe me when I say it’s gonna be one thing after another and that he’s not the only one trying to hold us back?

The roof in the back room is leaking much more and he’s got to figure out what to do about that this weekend. I also wonder how much longer the TV will last.

I thought the hair growing out by my ear where it had been shaved looked stupid, so I trimmed the other side to make it even. It looks better this way.

Later…

Did I mention something funny I did with Sandy’s birthday letter? On Jenny’s, I drew a flamingo and on Sandy’s, I drew 3 palm trees and wrote: If you stare at these trees, will people think you’re weird? This is what she said was the case when she stared at all the palm trees in Florida.

I forgot to mention how I got the nickname Mystery. It was my stage name as a dancer. A friend’s friend had a baby named Mystery, so that’s how I got the idea.

I spoke to Andy and Michelle about Michelle calling Tom from Big Brothers & Sisters and asking what I already wrote about. Yes, she is an excellent actress and yes, she will do it. When I first told Andy about what I wanted Michelle to do to Tom and why, he was nervous at first that if Tom gave me an answer I didn’t want to hear, it’d ruin our marriage. Now, why would he think that? I explained to him, of course, that it was just my way of assuring myself whether or not I should mention adoption. Of course, the truth is to see if he says he doesn’t want a kid.

How will I react if he tells Michelle he doesn’t want a kid? Not surprised, but pissed. Also, as hard as it’ll be, I’ll have to keep my mouth shut about it, cuz then I wouldn’t be able to do something like this again if I needed or wanted to. Besides, it won’t change anything. It’ll just reaffirm what I already figured, and he’ll be all upset if I were to confront him. Not due to being tricked nearly as much as being “caught” with confessing. I think his answer might be “maybe” rather than “yes” or “no,” cuz he’ll probably not want to bother discussing it and he may not wish to answer yes or no without knowing what the point is. Of course, there’ll be no point as she’ll be hanging up in mid-sentence after his answer.

After the job is done Andy will tell me over the phone what his answer was. Not on the machine, naturally, so there’ll be no way Tom will know about this unless he reads my journals or bugs the phone and I highly doubt that.

Later…

Tom worked 4 hours, then stopped by his parents’ and now he’s working on the back room. I appreciate how aggressively he’s been working the back room, but I almost feel like he’s punishing me for it. It’s like he’s saying, “OK, if you’re gonna get on my case with the back room, I’ll do it, but I won’t be giving you sex.”

No problem getting him to go down on me, but we haven’t screwed for a good 8 days or so. It’s amazing how long he can go with no sex and how low his appetite is, but I’m sure that in the shower and when he goes to the bathroom, he gets it out of his system.

He said he saw a city van go in to clean next door when he got home yesterday. I guess the city does own the house and that they’re gonna try to sell it again. Soon the 2-4 or more kids will be there as well as the 1-2 dogs.

Can you believe I’m 98 pounds 2 days before my period? Lucky me.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1996 Now as far as that love life that’s a joke – well – like I said before, there really wasn’t any till I met Tom. I didn’t understand my being a lesbian and that it’s a genetic thing you’re born with until I was in my early 20s. I just thought it was a phase I’d grow out of, but I was always attracted to women since I was little. They were always better looking to me, but certainly not every woman. I’m pretty picky. I always used to wish I was one of those where looks didn’t matter to me, cuz then I wouldn’t have spent so much time alone, even though that’s much safer.

Once when I was about 13, I let a boy go down on me, but I never came. Then when I was 20 and in my first apt., I let another guy go down on me and I came. I think his name was Richard. The roommate I’d had at that time liked him, but we both saw soon enough what a lying immature jerk he was.

Then I met Ron M when I was 21 and we even told my parents we were engaged. I just didn’t know how to say no to second best yet and thought I couldn’t do any better or ever get a woman. He was the first guy who could get inside me, even though it took a few months of trying and even though he was small. Ron and I were history 6 months after we met.

Then I met Al L when I was 22. This whiny little geek was the type to hate everyone and find problems with everyone. He couldn’t get it in there and he had premature ejaculation, anyhow. After two months, I was sick of him cutting me down, so he was out of the picture.

One night, also when I was 22, I guy named Mike came over and he ate me out as I jerked him off by hand. I never saw him again after this night.

Then after I moved for the 4th time when I was 24, I had oral sex with two different neighbors, Mark and Jai. The reason why it was only once is cuz that was all Mark wanted and Jai felt bad for cheating on his girlfriend.

Lastly, I had a one-nighter with Bruce, a guitarist I’d met. This was the second guy I ever had inside me, who was also conceited and negative toward me. Then there’d be no more guys till I met Tom in 1993.

It was right after my 24th birthday when I learned that I could get a woman, but not Miss Right. Miss Right was always straight, gay and taken or gay and not interested. There would be 6 women. Diana for one night, Lisa for one night, Kacey for a month, Brenda for 7 months, Ann Marie for two nights and Julia for one night. Julia was the only one I was with out here in Arizona.

I met Diana, Kacey and Lisa at a gay bar that Andy and I, who are also gay, would go to in Springfield here and there.

Diana was Puerto Rican, 5’ 4” with shoulder-length dark hair, dark eyes, and was chunky at about 140 pounds. I forgot what she did for work.

Lisa was an EMT and I remember wishing here and there that we could have more than one night. She seemed really cool and just an easygoing person in general. She was 5’ 4”, skinny with shoulder-length reddish-brown hair and brown eyes.

Kacey felt for me what I felt for Brenda. I really wanted Kacey in the beginning, but she just couldn’t get into me. Brenda wanted me really badly, but she became too persistent and had so many problems.

Kacey lived in a duplex and was the only one I’d ever had for a lover or a friend at this time that had a decent job and income. She was a chemical operator and made just over $15 an hour. She was 5’ 4” with light brown hair to her waist and she had hazel eyes. She weighed about 110.

Brenda was my neighbor and this is how we met. She was 5’ 6”, very thin, with medium-length brown hair and brown eyes. She was part Cherokee and she had distinct features and she looked Cherokee. She drove a taxi.

Brenda was a good person who wasn’t stupid, but she was a wimp. She just didn’t know how to stand up to those who pushed her around and she began doing crack. She was also smothering me.

I met Julia at the first club I danced at. She came in as a customer with a male friend of hers and she told me she was curious. A few months later, we got together. She was Mexican, 5’ 2” with hair down to the middle of her ass that was dark and so was her eyes. She was of average weight. I think she worked in an office.

Then I met Tom who was also my neighbor in April of 1993. I moved into his house the following September and we were married on June 15, 1994.

Later…

I guess Tom isn’t sick again. He just had a sore throat due to some allergy and just needs to catch up on his sleep as I did.

I asked Tom his opinion of Jenny. He thinks she tried calling when she got my letter, couldn’t reach me, then had second thoughts about it and figured it wasn’t meant to be.

Maybe, but I think she never intended to call. Lucky for me, though, in a sense. I just don’t want no shit.

Later…

I just did the same Snoopy drawing I did in the back cover of my paper journal. He asked me to do it so he could carve it.

Luckily, I’ll be asleep during most of tomorrow cuz I have a feeling the neighborhood kids just might enjoy the basketball hoop next door, even though I haven’t heard anything in days.

Tom’s working half a day tomorrow, then he’s gonna stop by his parent’s house. I wonder how his parents are enjoying their new neighbors.

Sunday and Monday are Sandy and Jennifer’s birthdays, so I’ll call them Sunday. I made cards/letters with drawings and I hope they arrive on time.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1996 I drew a woman on her toes in ballet slippers up to below her knees in the kitchen. I got the idea from journal 41. I don’t know if I like it. I guess it’s OK, but it seems that one foot is bigger than the other, as usual. It’s hard to get two eyes just right, two eyebrows and two feet proportioned.

I’ve been thinking of an idea that I’m finally going to put into action. I’d need Andy’s roommate Michelle to do this, though, cuz Tom doesn’t know her voice and I don’t know anyone else who could do this for me. I just hope she’s as good of an actress as I hear and won’t fuck up. I was thinking of having her call and say she was from Big Brothers & Sisters and ask if he has any kids, then if he’s planning on having any and see what he says. Right after his answer, I’d want her to start to say something like, “The reason why I’m calling is-” then put her finger on the receiver as if the line got cut off by mistake. Then, she can report to me or have Andy report to me whether or not he said no to the question of if he’s planning on having any kids.

My own best friend, however, doesn’t know the truth about Tom as Kim does cuz she’s a nurse. I’m just too damn embarrassed. He thinks it’s just the DES that’s the problem, so I’ll say that the reason why I want her to do this is cuz I’m thinking about asking him about adoption, but that sometimes people may answer a stranger differently than someone they know.

He was in a good mood, as I said earlier and he said he felt relaxed and calm. Just what he needs to feel to cum, so he says. Is this why he only wanted to go down on me earlier? It’s ironic - and maybe funny - but true that there’s one day out of every month that I cannot count on us having sex and doing other stuff. That’d be the 14th day after my period started, of course.

He’ll be on vacation from the 10th-19th of this month and I jokingly said, “Wouldn’t it be funny if we made a family during your vacation?”

He said, “That wouldn’t be funny. I’d be happy.”

Yeah, right. Sure he would. Well, his vacation’s out of the question anyway as I won’t be mid-cycle till a day or two after his vacation.

When I thought back on the message that he wrote for me in the angel journal, I’d always thought there was something phony or just plain old not right with it and it was last night that the answer hit me. I guess it was the way he worded it “if you’re not a mother” and not “if we’re not parents.”

We were talking about what sex therapists do and he was telling me that they condition people like he’s conditioned himself to wake up before his alarm goes off. I then asked him how come he couldn’t condition himself to cum and he said cuz it’s harder. Oh. Then that’s not gonna help us in ‘97 for sure. What the doctors will have to do would be strictly physical (plant his sperm in me), unless he then comes out and admits to not wanting a child.

Speaking of kids, well, I do hate to listen to them, just like other people’s music, dogs and whatever noise they can give off. Once or twice in the last 5 days or so, they’ve been fucking using the basketball hoop next door. I fucking swear, if there was a way I could tear that thing down I would! Don’t fucking tell me this is gonna be a new thing with them that’s going to occur more often. And the bulk of the time the kids have made noise has ironically been mostly when Tom’s here. As if God’s really trying to tease and rub in the fact that he won’t allow me one.

I just wish I knew why God hates me so much. Take Karson, for example. You mean to tell me that God loves her so much more than me that he goes and blesses her with a child and feels that she deserves it more than I do? Does he really think I’m that undeserving and such a bad person? Obviously so. I just hope to hell Kim can get pregnant when she marries Doug. That’d really restore some of my faith in God.

Anyway, I’ve decided to write according to subjects for the most part. I told you about myself, Tom and where we live and now it’s time for me to tell you why I hated New England so much. It’s too damn cold, old, ugly and expensive. That pretty much sums it up, not to mention the many bad memories I have from back there. I always felt “out of place” since I was little and that I didn’t belong there, and I really believe that I was born in the wrong state. I always knew I was meant to live out west. I just thought back then that it’d be California. I can’t wait to visit California, though.

So, where have I traveled to? Well, I’ve been to all the New England states as well as New York, and other states below Connecticut. My parents and I drove to Texas when I was about 11 to see my sister Tammy who lived there when she was married to her first husband.

My sister Tammy who’s 38 now lives in Salem, Connecticut. My brother Larry who’s 42 lives in Feeding Hills, Massachusetts and my folks like in Palm City, Florida. I’ve been there 3 times. I don’t remember the first time, though, since I was just a baby.

Anyway, Arizona’s the furthest from MA I’ve ever been.

Rather than get into my family and places I’ve been too much now, let me continue on with the jobs I’ve had. I don’t want to jump around too much and get sidetracked too much.

After I both quit and was fired from the Harley Hotel, my parents got me on SSI and SS checks in 1986. It wasn’t much and sometimes they had to help supplement me. I only worked a couple more jobs that barely lasted a month cuz I hated it so much and found it getting harder and harder to keep a schedule.

I tried waitressing in Springfield, then I worked in the laundry dept. of a nursing home in Springfield, then down at the end of my street in Springfield in a small convenience store, then waitressing at Denny’s in Chicopee with my best friend Andy during 3rd shift.

I quit all of these jobs, but I quit the one down at the end of my street out of fear as the neighborhood was getting deadlier by the minute.

I tried housekeeping on my own and babysitting back east here and there and even when I first came out here, but that was a drag, too.

Then I met someone after I’d been here a few months in 1992 who told me she was an exotic dancer and she didn’t feel threatened or scared by her work and that I should think about doing that myself. I did think about it for a few more months and after I’d been here for 6 months, I finally got up the nerve to audition at a nearby topless joint. I auditioned with two songs and even other dancers gave me tips. I got $18 just for those two songs and was hired that night.

The good news was that my money problems were over, but I was making far less than I’d hoped to. I thought I’d have hundreds of dollars left over to just blow off in the mall and even help my sister out back east, but this wouldn’t be the case.

For 8 months I worked at 4 different clubs. I didn’t work too much through February of 1993 cuz of a cold followed by the flu. First I worked at Sha Na Na’s, then moved and worked at the Mile High club which was the deadest. So, I left there and went to work at the Candy Store, but they changed their story as to what hours I could work, so I left and went into private-room dancing at a place called Favors. I made $275 the first night, got my picture in a magazine that these places advertise in, but then left cuz I made no money for 3-4 nights in a row. The last place I danced at was the Ex-Caliber club and that was OK, but by then I had settled in here with Tom and just decided to take care of the house so we could have more time with each other as he worked days and I’d have had to work nights.

[safereturndoubtful]

It Waits in the Woods

Sunday 29th October 2023

I’ve borrowed the title from a short book (by Josh Malerman) I read this morning before heading out. It’s from a series of six released for this time of year. It promised a lot, but didn’t really deliver. Nonetheless, it was entertaining enough. It concerned a student, who after a particular story told around the campfire, heads by herself into the woods to see if there is any truth to the ‘impish demon’ that is supposed to lurk there.

I have wandered so many forests around Europe, but so far not encountered anything like such a demon. I live in hope though. Two problems stand in the way of such an experience. The first being that I see too much beauty in their midst, whatever the weather, day or night; I’m not approaching the situation from the right angle. Folklore, myth and legend is part of that beauty, and it fascinates me. The best authors do it so well, from writing about nature, as for example with Shrubsole’s Lost Rain Forests, to the more sinister, horror from the likes of Shirley Jackson, MR James, Robert Aickman, Algernon Blackwood..

The second, is that with Roja, we see very little anyway. We often hear foxes, boar, who knows what else, but rarely catch a glimpse. With Roja leading the way, he ensures any such demon keeps its distance.

It was a cloudless day today, pretty much perfect conditions, with the day soon warming up to the early 20s.

I walked the couple of kilometres down to the magnificent Portitsa Gorge, with an old stone bridge spectacularly guarding its entrance. It was built in 1743 to serve the needs of the locals to pass from the village of Spilio, and it’s monastery, to the village of Monahiti.

We hiked the Portitsa Trail, a six kilometre loop that climbs into the forest steeply, before reaching a four wheel drive track, from which there are great views across to the gorge and Spilio village above it, winding its way much less steeply, down to the river. Ford the river, and back along the road.

In the above photo, the village of Spilio can be seen above the valley. It’s possible to make out the steep path up to it also.

By midday there were a few more people around, including a minibus of English pensioners who live on Crete.

I spent the afternoon attending to my online book library, something I haven’t done for a few weeks, and always takes far longer than I think it will.

I had hoped to continue to work on my new website, but due to the sport on, dismal England cricket, and extremely wet rugby from Newcastle, I never got to it.

I certainly enjoyed the World Cup Final, and exchanging texts with various friends. By the time the Cup was presented, it was twenty minutes after midnight, so it was done with a Jamesons on my part. A good night to have an extra hour..

It’s been a memorable 7 weeks. I’ve watched almost all the games, which I thought I would struggle to do in the West Balkans, from up at 1500 metres in the remote Bjelašnica plateau in Bosnia with one bar 4G and a speed of about 5mbps, to a surprisingly strong signal, at a similar altitude in the Accurseds in Montenegro.

I’m glad it’s over though, I do feel culturally malnourished. In the short term, it’s that time of year, so I’ll be trying to find some decent horror films the next few nights.

[enderexplorer1212]

Decided to go over the books I’ve picked up or have been reading, just because I’m in a good mood and classes start in a week so best not squander my time and actually read stuff! These are all nonfiction because for some reason I’m just not very interested in fiction books, I tend to read that sort of stuff online, and instead buy books to learn about stuff I wouldn’t from Wikipedia.

Now, without further ado:

American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin; I watched Oppenheimer recently, and I liked the movie, pretty good, so my Mom decided to buy this book because she thought I’d be interested considering I like biographies. I haven’t read it so far, and honestly I don't know if I will because I have several other biographies that I already have to read that are about people I’m interested in a bit more. I already watched the movie as well. Still, it should be interesting, maybe around a year or so down the line when I’ve forgotten the movie.

Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell (AKA Eric Blair); I’ve already read 1984 and Animal Farm as part of the American Education System, so I thought to myself “why not read Orwell’s (maybe) third most famous book?” So I picked this up at the bookstore recently, and I haven’t started it yet, but it should provide an interesting look into both Orwell himself, and into the Spanish Civil War and how that whole ordeal went down. Not too much to say about this one because I obviously haven’t read it yet, but hopefully it’s interesting.

Shanghai by Harriet Sergeant; The Warlord era of China was a period from 1916 to 1928 where China basically fell apart, which was followed by the Nanjing Decade where the KMT gained power. These periods of Chinese history are some of my most favorite to read about, because of just how interesting it is to me, and I picked this book up so that I could read more about the era. There weren’t any books solely on the Warlord era, and in the future, I hope to get a book on Chen Jiongming or Yan Xishan, but for now, I’ll settle on this.

Painting as a Pastime by Winston Churchill; By far the smallest book I’ve obtained recently, this is a very short book by Churchill that details his interests in painting. My mom picked this up for me because she thought I’d be interested in it. I have painted a few things, although I prefer filling in the colors rather than drawing something out, but who knows, maybe Churchill was like Bob Ross in a way? I’ll have to read this soon, as it should be an easy thing to knock out quickly.

How to Survive History by Cody Cassidy; I picked this up in a bookstore upstate because I thought it looked interesting and was similar to a few XKCD books that I own. The book is a semi-humorous detail of roughly how to survive several historic events, which I should keep in handy when I get my physics degree, in case I somehow violate most of the standard model. Haven’t read it yet, but it’s a smaller book and not exactly a feature length biography so I should be able to pick it up sometime and read through it.

We Had a Little Real Estate Problem by Kliph Nesteroff; I also got this upstate in the same bookstore because I was drawn to the analysis of Native comedy. The book goes over the history of comedy amongst Native Americans, the nature of Native comedy (lots of dark humor in my experience), and also how we tend to be sidelined by much of popular culture due to the low amounts of us, meaning that we aren’t a very big demographic to focus on unfortunately. Also because of racism, because people were historically (and currently tbh) kinda racist against us, who’da thought? But seriously folks, I like comedy, I like the Indians, should be an interesting book. Little on the longish side, so maybe I’ll spend a few days in between larger books to read this one. Maybe it can me give tips on how to break out into comedy, you know?

Roosevelt Sweeps Nation by David Pietrusza; I visited the FDR library while upstate, and I picked up this book there. The book details the 1936 presidential election, one of the most lopsided in American history. Now then, I’m a U.S. election nerd, I like this kind of stuff, so this is exactly up my alley. Reading about FDR and the decisions made on the campaign trail and what he did and also what Landon did, this is my bread and butter. The book’s somewhat large, so I’ll have to figure out what books I want to read before and after this one, but it should be interesting at least.

The Years of Lyndon B. Johnson: The Path to Power by Robert Caro; This book is a huge book that I picked up… somewhere, I don’t actually remember. Regardless, this book is a biography of LBJ, kinda good, kinda bad president of the U.S.A. I find LBJ to be a fascinating politician because of how high his highs were, and how low his lows were. This book goes into detail about his early life up until his first bid for Senate. This is actually just the first volume in a 4 (soon to be 5 [hopefully]) volume set, of which I actually own all the rest. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to read all of these volumes, but it should be interesting. Currently reading this one right now, kind of the only book I am reading right now actually. So far I learned that the Apache one time tricked the Spanish into building a fort in the middle of nowhere claiming they wanted to convert, only for the fort to get sacked by the Comanche. Pretty smart.

On His Own Terms: A Life of Nelson Rockefeller by Richard Norton Smith; I visited Nelson Rockefeller’s house during my trip upstate, and so I decided to pick up this biography on him there. His house was actually much more interesting than I anticipated, first because of all the modern art lying around (of which I’m a pretty big fan), and because our tour guide was actually very invested in the place, so I enjoyed listening to him talk about it. Highly recommend. Anyways, Nelson Rockefeller was an interesting guy, last of the liberal Republicans, maybe could’ve saved Humphrey in `68 if he wanted to, may have died because he had sex with his mistress (happens to the best of us). Overall, interesting dude, and I will admit I don’t know many details of his life, so hopefully this book can shed light on it. I think I’ll plan to read this after I finish at least volume 1 of LBJ.

Also, I didn't pick this book up because I couldn't find it, but I do hope to get Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 by Hunter S. Thompson soon. Talks about 1972 election, and Thompson's a pretty funny guy to read, even if he is a little, you know, weird. Hopefully I can get it soon!

Anyways, that’s all the books I’ve gotten in the past ~2 months or so, hope this inspires others to pick up these books and give them a try! Also I'll take book suggestions, don't know if I'll be able to get to any of them, but suggestions are appreciated :)

[pleb-the-original]

Day 8: Tuttle Bottoms Monster

(So this is another one I had no idea existed before now. The thing was, as soon as I read the description of it, the anteater snout part immediately made me think of a capelobo. So, why not lean into that? I already did one story about how a monster can be misinterpreted into becoming a cryptid, so why not another? I did not mean for this to become a theme.)

Final Submission for My Contribution to the Cryptid Immigration Project:After weeks of research, tracking down sources, and even an interview I finally have all the information that I feel is required to close this case. When I first received the package that contained my initial resources I was confused. Quite frankly my first thought when I heard the name “Cryptid Immigration” was a bigfoot getting harassed by an employee of ICE. Then when I actually read the contents of what I was assigned to do I knew this was my opportunity to finally pursue a project I’ve had in the back of my mind for a long time. A long time ago back when I initially applied to join this program, I remember checking a book out from the library about cryptid cases that still had unknown origins to the wider community. One that stood out to me the most was the case of the Tuttle Bottoms Monster. A bigfoot like creature with a snout akin to an anteater. That had stuck in the back of my mind for a long time where I had a slight inclination as to what could have spawned such a beast. Once I got this package however, I was determined to see if my hypothesis was correct. As you can see with my provided evidence and testimonies, it indeed was. I am now confident in confirming the fact that the initial Tuttle Bottoms Monster sighting was that of a capelobo; just like me before I died and became a Cursed. I knew the moment I heard about that snout that it couldn’t be anything less than another fellow who had taken on the curse. The problem was determining how the transformation could have occurred. In order to transform properly when it is time, one must not only repeat the rhyme of the jungle as you get lost in its leaves but also let yourself be consumed by the foliage. But Illinois has no jungles, so how could he have taken on the jungle’s gift? That’s when I came across some pertinent clues. The first was the records of an older Brazilian man who had moved to Illinois a few months before the incident. This normally would not have been important if it weren’t for the fact that I also found a very strange police report about the house he lived in. He went missing and when the police entered his home, it was transformed into a jungle. Trees and bushes straight from the heart of the Amazon grew from his walls and floors, with him of course nowhere to be found. After that, I was able to track down the man since he also died and became a Cursed. He told me that he also wanted to walk the ways of the verdant, but that he felt like he couldn’t make it back home in time to transform. The reason why he was in Illinois was because he wanted to be there to see his son grow up. However his practices meant that the voice of the jungle still called to him and that he still had to obey. It sang him the song of old which was the key to growing the environment and completing the transformation. It was honestly a little sad to hear. As a fellow walker of the moss and ferns, I know how hard it is to avoid the call once you hear it. But that is in the past now, for him and for me. This clearly shows another case on how the migration of people who have magical curses, specifically immigration, can cause the creation of new cryptids due to the removal of their cultural context. This concludes my report. 

[finelinevogue]

Can you write something about when Harry and Y/N broke up but fans speculate that they got back together and they did get back together. They broke over something stupid, please. You don’t have to do this exactly it can be something like that.

let’s see how this turns out! hope it’s what you wished for?!

The last few months had been rough.

What had started as rumours of a breakup between everyones favourite couple, you and Harry, had turned into an actual breakup.

It had started by Harry spending more time with Olivia, due to press for Don’t Worry Darling. They were always hanging out with each other, even when there was no publicity stunt telling them to. You found it appropriate at first, wanting the movie to gain some form of reputation, but after a while you believed it turned South. It was becoming a definite friendship and not just because they had to. It was the way that Harry would bring Olivia over for dinner without checking with you first, or taking the dog for a walk with her not you, or even staying longer out on stunts than they needed to just because they wanted to.

So you challenged Harry on it. Hell, even the tabloids were challenging you both - claiming Harry had split from you for Olivia. You made him question whether he thought his actions were irresponsible and appropriate or not, to which he thought there was nothing wrong and thought you were being irrational. You didn’t speak to him for the rest of the day, only to find him later on the phone speaking to Olivia about how crazy you’d been acting about it all. So you showed him crazy and walked out.

Until today.

For over a half a year your sister had her wedding planned and Harry was supposed to be your guest. You were nervous about turning up without him, because your family were very judgy. Your sister couldnt help being the smarter and the prettier one, but she also didn’t have to parade it around so everyone knew of it. Your mum and dad thought you a disappointment for the longest time, but once you’d gotten a job and had moved out they were a bit more loving over you. Still didn’t hide the fact they desperately hoped for you to have a relationship. It wasn’t that you were bringing Harry along to prove that someone loved you, but more to prove that they would never fully be satisfied whether you had a boyfriend or not. There would always be a podium stand slightly lower for you to stand on.

However, they didn’t know about the breakup.

“Y/N, nice to see you. Where’s Harry?” Another guest asked you, relatives of your mum. It was the same question over and over again, no one really caring about how you are but instead whether you’re in a positive relationship.

“Oh um I think he’s just running a bit late.” Was your chosen answer to respond to said question. It was repetitive, but it kept people off your back.

The wedding was completely beautiful. It was in a beautiful church and was decorated to perfection. The theme was white and royal blue, something your sister had always dreamed of. Children played amongst the pews and family relatives mumbled to each other about gossip. There was still a heavy sadness to the event. Maybe it was because your sister hadn’t asked you to be a bridesmaid - instead, choosing her best friends instead - or maybe it was because you missed Harry so much.

He’d fucked up. He really had, but it didn’t take away that burning passion for him that spread like a wildfire in your belly. You missed him. You still loved him. Worst of all, you had to pretend everything was all alright in front of your family when actually you were breaking apart inside.

Harry hadn’t messaged saying that he was or wasn’t coming, but after everything that had happened you were confident he was going to be a no show, and you would be the embarrassment of the family once again. Your relationship had been very private and exclusive, but Harry’s fans were so investigative you wouldn’t be surprised if they knew that you’d broken up and were aware that you were at a wedding today without him. Neither of you had made a public statement about your breakup, but neither of your wanted to damage each other even more. Fans suspected though and rumours travel fast.

“Y/N how are you doing? How’s Harry?” Another aunt came and asked you, this time with your mother in tow.

“Oh he’s great, yes.” You smiled forcefully, not actually having a clue how your ex-boyfriend was doing. You didn’t keep up with his social media because you were afraid of what you might find.

“Where is he? Is he here?” Your aunt asked.

“He’s late, apparently.” Your mother answered for you, sneeringly. “You’ll be made a fool of if he’s a no show Y/N.”

“I know.”

“I hope everything goes well for you both.” Your aunt kindly said, before waiting for your mum to say something nice too. That was a mistake though.

“Well it’s unlikely she’ll find someone again!” Your mother laughed and pulled your aunt away from you. You furrowed your eyebrows and let your heart sink low.

What were you thinking, letting Harry go like that? Your mum was right, you were never going to find anyone else again. You were so lucky with Harry. He was so kind and so patient with you, but obviously he’d run out of steam towards the end. It doesn’t surprise you. You’ve always been told you’re a mighty handful and you need a lot of work put into looking after you, so you understand why you were probably too much for Harry. The showbiz life had never really been something you’d completely submerged yourself into, whereas you guess for Olivia it was rooted in her from birth. She understood Harry’s world the same way he did hers. They would match perfectly for each other, if that’s what they wanted.

You watched the room continue as usual, but you couldn’t keep yourself here. There was too much sadness welling deep within you that you wanted to just run and then keep running. So you did, only to get as far as the bench in the front courtyard. The outside felt calmer and more freeing than inside, you sat and absorbed it for a while, not realising that you were crying until your pretty multicoloured dress had grown darker with a pool of your tears.

“Shit.” You tried rubbing the tears out, but only made you cry a little harder. You thought about your makeup running and tried to compose yourself, fanning your face to calm it down from the heat now.

“And here I was thinking weddings were supposed to be happy.”

You stopped fanning your face to look at him. You couldn’t believe he was standing there, dressed in a beautiful white suit and salmon pink shirt underneath to compliment the colours of your dress - the outfit that you’d helped him pick out over a year ago. He’d remembered. He trusted that you’d still be wearing this dress. He was a sight alright. A vision of beauty and love.

“Harry?” You questioned, wiping your under eyes to clear away any running mascara, not quite believing he was standing there.

“So what was it? Bad music playing? No vodka? Or maybe there’s nowhere for you to escape to go read the book I know you have stuffed away in your clutch bag.” He stood at a distance from you, hands in his trouser pockets, to make sure you were comfortable.

“I brought vodka instead of the book.” You chuckled, reaching into your clutch to prove it to him.

“Lucky for you, i’ve come to save the day.” Harry reached to the inside of his blazer pocket and pulled out a Kindle. You’d always been debating whether or not to buy one, because the feeling of having a book to turn its’ physical pages is a feeling second to none. “Take it, it’s yours.”

Harry handed it out to you and you stood up to reach for it hesitantly. Harry assured you that it was okay and that you’d been reading too many books if you thought it was a trap of some sort.

“Thank you, Harry.” You spoke sincerely. You stroked your thumb over the cover and turned the case lid over to start up the screen. The screen lit up and it was set to a picture of your favourite quote, annotated just as you would have in your own book. You chuckled and let a few tears drop from the kindness of all of this.

“And then…” Harry unlocked the Kindle with your birthday as the password, before clicking on the library so you could discover what was waiting for you on your virtual shelves. Harry had downloaded all your most favourite books, whilst also downloading the ones he knew had been on your to-be-read list. He’d even added a few of his favourite books too, just because you liked reading his recommendations.

You smiled, but felt so lost.

“W-why are you here, H?” You asked, closing the lid and bravely looking up into his enchanting eyes. You had to control yourself not to comment on how wondrous they looked.

“To save the day.” He chuckled in repeat, until he knew you weren’t taking that for an answer. “Because I fucked up. Big league time.”

“Yeah.” You whispered, looking down at your shoes to see that they weren’t that far apart at all. He was so close to you, yet he wasn’t yours to catch.

“And i’ll never forgive myself for letting you walk out of that door. The promotion shit with Olivia? Done. I’ve finished. I explained that the movie isn’t as important to me as you. You,” Harry paused to breathe out, and took the risk of guiding your jaw up to meet your gaze with his soft hand, “you are real Y/N. You’re so important and key to my life and it bloody terrified me, still does actually, to think that you make me feel this way. I want everything with you. Marriage, kids, a home. A life. I was so worried I would screw it all up, though, to the point where I did screw it all up. I lost you and so I lost me. It’s selfish of me to ask whether any part of your heart still wants me, but—”

“Yes.” You quickly interjected before he could say something he’d later regret. “There is, yes.”

“R-really?” He stumbled over his response, not expecting you to react so soon but his words had got to you. His feelings were vulnerable and raw and it reminded you of how much you love him and feel safe with him.

“Why? Would you like me to say different.” You teased.

“No,” Harry rushed, stepping closer towards you, “God now. Stay, please. Forever, if you’ll have me?”

“I can deal with forever.” You leaned up to where his lips were, craving the taste of them against yours so badly. “Can I?” You looked between his lips and his eyes, watching his eyes coo in admiration of you. His arms snaked around your neck and cupped the back of your head, resting his ringed fingers against your skin delicately.

“You don’t have to ask, angel.” And with that you didn’t hesitate to reclaim your clips on his. He tasted as sweet and as soft as you could remember. The hint of mint sweets he kept in his car could be tasted all over his mouth, and he could no doubt taste the vodka on yours. He took no time in rushing to have his tongue exploring your mouth once mouth, biting on your lip when he got the chance to. He wanted you to remember this moment and how much love he has for you, and always will. Just as you do for him.

Hesitantly pulling away you smiled at him cheekily, feeling so much lighter and happier to have him here. With you in his arms so expertly.

“What?” He asked, leaving a quick kiss to your nose, inhaling his scent as he did.

“Just can’t believe you’re here.” You stroked his cheek with your thumb, and he leaned into your touch so comfortably. He had missed you so damn much, and it showed.

“Let you down once before and I wasn’t going to do it again.”

“So you’d have shown up even if I hadn’t?”

“Not happily, but yes.” He laughed thinking about it.

“Why?” You laughed with him.

“I’ve got to make my impression on your family somehow. Need to remind some of them how amazing and beautiful their special Y/N L/N is.”

“Some are going to need a lot more persuading than others.” You sighed, side-frowning over your words.

“No offence, but anyone who doesn’t treat you as a fucking diamond doesn’t deserve you and should watch out for kick up their backside from me.” You laughed over his empty threat and buried your head against his chest, listening to the heartbeat and rumble of laughter that came from within. This moment alone felt like home. Safe and warm.

“I love you, H.”

“Bloody love you too.”

Harry ended up returning to the wedding with you, much to your mothers surprise, and you both enjoyed the celebrations together. You shut yourselves out from everybody and just danced, talked and drank the night away.

You were so in love.

Later, photos got leaked of the wedding and it showed you and Harry dancing away in one of the backgrounds of the photos. It was supposed to be a shot of just the bride and groom, but you two have managed to get caught in it. You looked so caught up in each other that you still weren’t even aware the photo had been taken. You and Harry had determinedly avoided the camera all night, exactly for this reason, but a part of you was kind of happy that this one photo got leaked, because it showed the world that Harry was yours and you were his. It showed that you were together, or back-together as addressed by some FBI fans, and that you were stronger for it.

[hanazuma-inactive]

Are you fine with top beta mreader and bottom alpha iwaizumi? Reader is model student in school and rumor tells that he is better than most alpha. Iwai who never interested about that kind of thing suddenly changed his mind when his inner beast screamed out for reader when he saw him in the library. That caught reader attention. So they have sex there, with Iwai trying hard to holding back his voice and he can only knotting at nothing when climax. After they were done, Iwai kinda light headed and Reader bridal carry him outside. I just think it will be cute 🐽

That's all 🛁

out of the ordinary (nsfw) top beta!reader x bottom alpha!iwaizumi

pronouns: he/him (FEMALE ORIENTED DNI!!)

warnings: slight degrading, omegaverse, reverse roles, knotting (not really), public sex (sex in library), slight overstimming

a/n: i can't find any,,,good iwa panels help. but this was an interesting concept especially the last part. i also love iwa with my entire life please 🧎‍♂️ sorry this took so long because it's pretty long around 1.8k words

_____

you were an exception, someone who's out of the ordinary. being born a beta, people didn't expect much from you. they had no reason to believe that someone who was a part of 90% of the world population was capable of doing anything extraordinary. however you were there to prove them wrong. ever since elementary going into highschool your grades were always at the top of the class and in some cases in the district. everyone was surprised to find out that you were only a beta instead of an alpha.

your achievements were spread all of the school board and among your classmates. most people respected you and some wanted to be you. your grades weren't the only thing you had, your looks were at least above average and nearly everyone who saw you wanted to fuck you, or get fucked by you. except for one person, iwaizumi hajime.

the spiky haired boy was never interested in this type of stuff. in fact he is the only alpha in the entire school that hasn't tried to hit on you or asked you out yet. unfortunately this just so happens to be the one person you were somewhat interested in. unlike the other betas and omegas you weren't exactly submissive. sure you were nice and friendly towards other people but in the bedroom? all you wanted was to make an alpha cry out your name and cum from your cock. it was an unrealistic fantasy due to how your society functions but you've seen it happen before and you wanted to experience it yourself.

the more iwa didn't notice you, the more frustrated you became. you tried all sorts of things to grab his attention. "helping" him with homework, which he denied many times. inviting him to hangout afterschool, also denied. and even as far as behaving unlike yourself, none of the above worked and you were quite upset about it.

until one day, when you were just walking to the gym you overheard iwa and his friend oikawa qtalking about something.

"c'mon iwa we all know you were head over heels for him when he was performing that day."

"shut up, it doesn't matter even if i do, he has enough alphas and omegas on his dick, he doesn't need another one. so what if i want to fuck him, who doesn't? you did too at one point but he turned you down almost immediately."

"jeez! calm down you freaking porcupine. all i'm saying is, next time you two are alone, maybe give it a shot instead of avoiding him. he's the first person that ever got you feeling like this and it would be too good of a chance to pass by, don't you think?"

"yah yah whatever i got it."

so the two were… talking about you?. there was no way right?! the one person you wanted attention finally gave it to you. it might not have been directly but he admitted it, and that's all you needed to know. so all the things you were doing did work after all. you were excited but you needed to keep your cool for now, and figure out a way to get you two alone. little did you know he was going to come to you all by himself without you even lifting a finger.

you strolled to the library afterschool to borrow to borrow a book your friend told you to check out that you know you won't be reading. while searching for the novel, you heard someone open the door of the empty library. it was pretty rare for anyone to be in the library except during class time so you wondered who it could've been. you peeked over the bookshelves to find a spiky haired male trying to find a book as well. it was iwa, looking for a book in the dystopia section.

this situation couldn't have been better. you and iwa were alone in a place where nobody usually comes. it was the perfect opportunity to do what you always wanted to do. you walked over to the other section to greet him.

"yo! how's it going iwaizumi?"

"it's going fine… thank you, i'm surprised to see you here though."

"oh yeah haha, just checking out a book."

iwaizumi looked away and directed his attention back to the bookshelf. you were a little upset and while thinking about something to talk about, he spoke again.

"h-hajime, is fine...by the way." iwa said while his face flashed a bright red.

hajime? his first name? we barely talked ever and now you guys are on a first name basis? you didn't mind of course, you a little surprised that's all.

"alright hajime! same goes for you too!"

he looked away again, gripping the book in his hand.

"alright, fuck it." he murmured under his breath. hajime turned around to you and pushed on onto the bookshelf behind you. his hand holding onto yours and his face red as a cherry. you were a little startled but this stuff wasn't exactly new to you so it wasn't as flustering to you as it was to him.

"uhh, hajime? y-you alright there?"

"i wanna fuck you alright?! there i said it. i'm not expecting anything because i'm the last alpha you haven't rejected. but still, i want to try. so…what do you say?"

it was all going better than expected. all the things you've done to attract iwa was finally paying off! you were excited but you needed to keep your cool before completely losing it on him.

"sure! i don't see the reason not to~ but…we are going to switch it up a little bit." you said with a smirk on your face. iwa looked confused about what you meant by switching up, but now that the person he liked agreed to have sex with him, he didn't care about what's about to happen.

you grabbed iwa's arms and pushed them behind his back as you turned him around, reversing the positions of you two.

"w-woah, what are you doing…y/n."

"i've always wanted to do this hehe, fucking an alpha and making him beg to cum as a beta, someone who is supposed to be below him in society standards. what do you say hajime? is this still the sex you were looking forward to? or are you gonna leave me here all by myself?"

there was fear and anticipation in iwa's eyes, eager to find out what happens next. as much as he wished it was the opposite way around he didn't want to lose the opportunity in his hand right now. reluctantly, he nodded and agreed, gesturing to get on with what you wanted to do.

gaining the signal to start, you aggressively pushed your lips onto iwa's, reaching into his mouth and soon intertwining your tongue with his. the other male let out stubborn whimpers as the kiss grew to be more sloppy. soon you broke it, leaving him panting for breath and a dirty smile on your face.

you licked your fingers and reached into the back of iwaizumi's pants. at first he jolted a little, not being used to his ass being touched as an alpha. you then started to move your fingers into his asshole. going deeper inside, hajime struggled with the pain that no alpha in this school will ever experience. hajime's grunts started to become moans, you put in more fingers as you found his pleasure point. massaging it and doing all the tricks you knew on it to make him feel as good as possible.

it didn't take long till a wet spot started to form on his pants and his eyes became hazy. you took out the finger and let hajime catch his breath before preparing him for the real thing.

"w-what's next…" hajime asked

"just close your eyes, i promise i'll make you feel good~"

he trusted you and shut his eyes, latching on to your shoulder. you revealed your cock and lifted iwa up so that his face would be facing you and his plump asshole would be right above cock. iwa was nervous, you could tell and that was the best part about it. gently you put your cock into his ass. it was still rather difficult even with all the preparation from earlier. iwa let out a small cry as you entered him, not used to anything so big inside him, or anything at all really.

"f-fuck that hurts…"

"i know, it'll feel good in a bit, alright? bare with me here a little. i'm gonna start moving."

you didn't even put into consideration that this was iwa's first time. you went at a moderate speed, sometimes slowing down and speeding up. iwa's hard cock leaking with precum and bouncing up and down on yours. it was such a pretty sight seeing the alpha cry pretty tears from all the pain and pleasure. of course you felt amazing too, iwa's virgin hole felt better than your hand or anything your dick had ever fucked.

iwa used one of his hands to cover his mouth. attempting to stop the people outside of the library to hear his moans.

"hajime~ people are gonna hear us if you keep being naughty like this~" you said with a cocky smile on your face.

he didn't say anything in response, barely being able to comprehend anything while getting fucked.

"c'mon...look at you, an alpha? being fucked by a beta in a library. moaning like a slut in heat, i might as well knot you while i'm at it hm?"

speaking of knots, the alpha was getting closed with nothing around his cock. nothing for him to knot. his cock enlarged in size as he reached his climax but a face of disappointment appeared because of the empty area around iwa's dick. he didn't even think it was physically possible until today looking at it right now in front of him.

hajime had his fun but you weren't done yet. right after he came you continued to fuck him and stroke his cock to overstimulate him. after you came inside you noticed that iwaizumi had already passed out from the pleasure. his own cum spilled on his stomach and his ass filled with yours. you stood still for a while, enjoying the view of the sleeping prince in front of you. to make this more fun for the both of you, you decided to carry the alpha in your arms as if he was your bride.

you got a bunch of weird stares and murmurs from the students around you but you didn't care. all the reputation that you built up could fall into shreds but you could not have cared less. now, the only thing that matters is the one person you wanted attention from gave it to you and is sleep soundly in your arms.

[mayalaen]

i’m sorry for pushing you guys away

My family has had A LOT of counseling over the years, but I’ve had very little because counselors don’t seem to know what to do with schizophrenics and they end up doing weird shit to me.

Recently my brain has decided that the childhood experiences I thought weren’t a big deal were actually pretty traumatic, and my brain wouldn’t let me stuff it down anymore. Damn, but I was so good at stuffing that I didn’t even realize I had anger issues!

Apparently I have A SHIT-TON of anger issues 😲

However, in the process of going through counseling, my mom and I finally have a second label for the 4 bipolar people in my family who have caused me the most trauma.

They’re not JUST bipolar. They’re also Malignant Narcissists. Surprise! (Generations of abuse+substance use+mental issues breeds these fuckers if you didn’t know)

It’s kinda nice to have a label for them because now we can learn how better to deal with them, and the tips we’ve learned so far have worked GREAT!!

The BAD NEWS is that they’ve all carried a diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder for years, so I assumed all the toxic manipulative shit was due to being bipolar. Because that’s what I was told! (I did think it was odd that most of their behavior wasn’t included on the symptoms of bipolar disorder lists on websites and in psych books)

Because of that, I’ve put distance between myself and bipolar people I start to become friends with as soon as I realize they’re bipolar or have mood issues.

The reason I’m posting about this here is because I’ve been pushing away some really great people who are simply bipolar, thinking they were just being nice to me until we got close and then they’d unleash the manipulative toxicity on me.

I can’t tell you how hurt and angry this it makes me that my family’s behavior fucked up my friendships, but I’m also thankful for the thick skin they’ve given me.

There’s a few people I could name, but I don’t want to out them if they haven’t told anyone else they’re bipolar, but if you see this and you’ve tried to be friends with me and you’re bipolar or even have the barest hints of mood swings, this is for you.

I AM SO SORRY 😭

I really liked being with you. You’re fun and easy to talk to. You’ve never actually hurt me, but I was protecting myself.

As you can imagine, this has been super upsetting, and it’s part of the reason I haven’t been around much.

I went through a grieving period for all the people I could’ve been friends with over the years and quite a number of fuckbuddies and even a couple relationships that could’ve been long-term.

It’s not completely my family’s fault -- counselors told us what they were and missed the malignant narcissism diagnosis -- but I’m in the anger stage of this whole process, and I’m really fucking mad and resentful. I haven’t even been able to look my father in the eye for months now.

Good thing he’s so narcissistic that he hasn’t noticed or cared otherwise I would’ve had to talk to him about it 🤣

One of the things I really enjoyed was watching movies online with friends, and something I’m really excited about is that I’ve created a Plex server with just over 2000 movies and almost 300 TV shows on it, closed captioning as well.

At my insistence, as a family we finally cut ties with cable TV and big ISP a few months ago, so we’re not spending ridiculous amounts of money with Cox. I put two months’ worth of Cox bills to good use with this server, and we’re all enjoying that and a few paid streaming apps.

Which means that I can easily set up and host movie nights for friends and share my libraries with friends 🥳

Of course with me being in the middle of selling the shop, I have no time to do this, but I have hope that I’ll be able to do this soon and play games again and try to rekindle friendships that I hopefully haven’t fucked up beyond repair.

If you’ve made it this far reading through all my rambling, thank you 💜

[btsmosphere]

Lost in a Book | JHS

~summary: you and Jung Hoseok don’t exactly see eye to eye. but when you (literally) fall headfirst into a whole other world, that becomes the least of your worries ~pairing: hoseok x reader ~word count: 8.5k ~enemies to lovers, college au, fantasy au ~rating: g ~warnings: naughty freudian slip, sexual tension, arguing, fire

~a/n: this is my gift for the wonderful @moccahobi‘s birthday! I am so lucky to be friends with someone as funny, hard working and gorgeous as you and I hope you have a great day!! and no, of course I didn’t choose the biggest bingo square only to forget and write this in a week.. (okay, I did, so pls go easy on any errors!) as always the lovely admins at @thebtswritersclub came up with a fun challenge to prompt this story, so I will be including my makeup palette bingo square at the end so you can see what prompts I used for this! enjoy x

The moment you had seen Jung Hoseok coming through the door, your eyes rolled.

Almost entirely made of large windows, the front of the coffee shop you worked in allowed you to see all the passers-by. So when you spotted your classmate coming down the street, laughing loudly with a couple of friends, you had prayed that he would just pass by.

Of course, you could never get what you wished for.

“Yoongi-“ you tried in vain to capture your friend’s attention, but too late. Yoongi hadn’t even looked around from where he was scrubbing coffee cups when a familiar voice reached your ears, making you groan internally.

“Y/N! Hard day at work? You look frazzled.”

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” you drawled, resigning yourself to serving him.

He simply leaned on the counter, sagging with laughter.

“Always service with a smile with you, isn’t it?”

“I’m sure you’d be just as tired if you even tried to focus in class,” you fired back.

His grin didn’t even falter. But at last, he dropped his teasing. With a scoff he ordered a tea and turned around, scrolling on his phone with his back to you as you got to work.

It seemed you had grabbed Yoongi’s attention after all, judging by the poorly-hidden snort from the washing up area.

Scowling, you chucked together a cup of tea distractedly, only too relieved when you pushed it over the counter to be rid of Hoseok. So when he sipped it only to wince in disgust, your heart sank.

“Jesus, where’s the caffeine? This is so weak.”

Your desire to argue back lost its short-lived wrestle with your customer service training, and you were reluctantly offering to make a new one. This time, you forced yourself to pay more attention. You knew that way, you could actually get rid of the nuisance on the other side of the counter.

“You see Y/N, the bag goes in the water,” Hoseok remarked, leaning over to see what you were doing.

Shooting the most passionate glare you could muster had the undesirable effect of sending him into peals of laughter.

Eventually, after making a point to leave the teabag in for much longer – at least until you noticed his fingers begin to tap on the countertop – you passed over his second cup with a sarcastic smile. His mood didn’t seem to have dampened that much, but he left without a fuss.

“You have great chemistry.”

The dry remark from behind you had you whirling around to glare at Yoongi instead. He stood in front of his stack of clean washing, observing you with a smirk.

“I don’t think Jung Hoseok knows what chemistry is,” you grumbled.

But as you set to work, a little aggressively, on scrubbing the counter, you never would have guessed how right you were. Or that it would soon become your responsibility.

“So when we sleep, what part of the brain transfers memory from white to grey matter?”

“…what’s grey matter again?”

“I think you could do with some more of it,” you muttered in lieu of an answer.

Hoseok lifted his head from his arms just enough to fix you with reproachful puppy eyes. Sighing, you tugged the textbook back across the table towards you, flipping a few pages back and jabbing your finger at the relevant passage.

Raising an eyebrow, he read it for the second time today with a growing frown.

“Long term…” he said at length.

“Long term memory!” you groaned, dropping your forehead against the heel of your hands.

Behind you, you knew Jungkook and Yoongi were watching this unfold with amusement. You weren’t sure you could take much more of this.

If you had envisaged this when you had signed up for your college’s mentor program, well, you may have changed your mind.

At last, the hour dragged by. Apparently Hoseok wanted to be there as little as you, collecting the books and leaving very quickly once you were done. Though your shift was over, you were sure you might explode if you didn’t get to rant about the guy right now.

Huffing, you marched over to the counter.

“He’s such a jerk!” you threw your hands out, “his ego’s so big, it’s like he thinks he’s too good to even try! And now it’s up to me to make sure he isn’t so behind, but there is so much to do!”

Your coworkers weren’t helping. Both had given up suppressing their laughter, openly enjoying your pain.

“You guys are no help,” you grumbled, folding your arms.

“Just be patient,” Jungkook offered, “it might get better in time.”

“Patience is not something Jung Hoseok inspires,” you retorted, “and I’m being good enough as it is! I even had the generosity to lend him my textbook!”

“You’re a saint,” Yoongi chuckled.

A withering glare later, you slung your bag over your shoulder and bid your friends a tired goodbye.

Much as you hated to admit it, there may have been some truth in what Jungkook told you. Patience did seem to be the key after all. A lot of patience.

A few more meetings had passed, and Hoseok remembered a lot more now. You weren’t sure whether it was due to the quality of your teaching or just a desire to avoid your constant scolding, but it didn’t matter too much. The result was what counted.

You were to meet again today. As always, he came as your shift finished so that you could work in the café.

“You like him really.”

Jungkook’s voice tore your eyes away from the clock you had been watching.

“I’m sorry?”

“You like him,” he repeated, “I’ve never seen you so impatient to get off work.”

“What? I’m not,” you scoffed, “it’s just-“

The little jingling bell above the door interrupted you. Never finishing your thought, you left Jungkook to meet Hoseok at the counter.

“Tea?” you asked him.

“Not if you’re making it,” he quipped, eyes already skimming the menu on the wall behind you.

You scoffed with a roll of your eyes, but said no more. Hoseok’s teasing eyes returned to you as he said,

“Think you can manage a hot chocolate?”

“Of course I can make hot cock-“ your eyes widened at your momentary slip “-chocolate. I can make hot chocolate-“

But for all your correcting and muttering, there was no hiding your embarrassing moment from Hoseok, whose eyes lit up with surprise before laughter spilled out of him in reams.

“I didn’t mean to make you so flustered, Y/N!” he cackled.

Biting your tongue, you hid your burning face from him as he half-collapsed against the counter with the force of his laughter. You angrily set to work on the drink, milk sloshing in the jug as you thrust it under the machine.

“With whipped scream on top too, huh?”

Hoseok’s incessant mocking didn’t stop until you had handed him the drink. If anything could prove to Jungkook just how wrong he was, this should do it. Still, you didn’t dare to turn around and see what your friend made of the situation.

Mixing the powder into the hot milk forcefully, you glared down at the cup.

Damn Jung Hoseok! He couldn’t be any more infuriating if he tried. It wasn’t your fault he was so annoying it made it hard for you to think straight. No one else managed to rile you up so much as him.

You gave him the drink with a side of deathly glare. It only served to amuse him more.

Safe to say you were dreading the next hour.

Clocking off soon after, you hung up your apron regretfully and headed across to your usual table. Thankfully Hoseok was a bit more subdued now.

Unfortunately, you were about to find out why.

“So, Y/N,” he started as you were sitting down.

This brought your attention to him straight away. Your eyes narrowed as he toyed with his mug on the table, avoiding your eyes.

“So, uh, that textbook you lent me-“

You had a bad feeling already. Looking around, you didn’t notice it on the usual pile of books.

“Where is it?” you cut him off.

At last he raised his head to meet your eyes, and you didn’t like what you saw.

“It’s not like we need it that badly anyway,” he began, though you weren’t sure you had ever heard him sound so hesitant, “we finished most of the stuff in there anyway…”

“You lost it, didn’t you?”

“Well, yeah. And I think I also spilled some-“

Not waiting for him to finish, you exclaimed your frustration.

“I can’t believe you! Just because you don’t see a use for ever picking up a book, I need that! I don’t have that kind of money spare either…”

As you raked a hand through your hair, Hoseok decided now was the time to be helpful.

“Gosh, I was afraid you would do this. We have a library for a reason, you know?”

Stopping your train of thought abruptly, you lowered your hand to glower at him.

“And now you’re going to make me go in the library? Ugh, you really have it out for me.”

Incredulous laughter followed. Hoseok leaned back in his chair, observing you with raised eyebrows.

“You’re telling me you believe in those stupid rumours?”

Shifting uncomfortably, you shrugged.

“Well, you’ve got to admit the place is creepy, right? And my flatmate said she knew that girl Cindy-“

As you spoke, Hoseok’s laughing grew louder, steadily filling the café until you were forced to stop.

“What?” you hissed.

“We’ve all heard about “Cindy”,” he made quotation marks in the air, “but that’s just a story! The older students made it up to scare newbies – and it would seem it worked. But everyone knows the scariest thing in the library is just the course reading.”

Biting your tongue, you didn’t muster up a response. You would only face more ridicule if you argued about this.

“Don’t forget the librarian,” you joked half-heartedly.

Hoseok chuckled lightly, and you were glad he dropped the topic after that.

But still the issue of your sorely misused textbook remained.

There was nothing to be done. You had to go to the library.

It may seem a ridiculous thing to be scared of, especially for someone who loved books, but, as Hoseok had kindly refreshed your memory of, there were… stories. The campus library at your college warranted a degree of wariness.

Most commonly told was the story of Cindy, supposedly a student at the university many years before. No matter how dramatic the story was made, the essentials were the same; she had gone into the library and never come out.

Logically, you knew that this was just one of those quirky urban legends that came to surround certain places.

Nonetheless, your nerves only worsened as you entered the grand building.

On your way in, you only passed one other student. Most people were leaving uni at around this time, but you needed to hang around anyway because your shift was soon. You had sent a quick text to Yoongi to let him know you would be there once you found the book, and somehow it comforted you a little that someone else knew you were here.

Moving through the first few rows of tall bookshelves, you had to pass by the main desk on your way to the section you were looking for.

Doing your utmost to tread with care, sandals making as little noise as you could manage on the wooden floor, you walked on.

As you drew near, the librarian looked up. Greeting them with a bright smile, you didn’t let it show that your heart was really thumping in your chest.

Hurrying along, you only slowed once you had entered the right section. Near the back of the library, it was dimmer as no light from the window reached all the way into the corner. Utter silence dampened the air. Not even the rustling of the librarian sorting papers could be heard from here.

Alone with the hushed sound of your own breath, your eyes flicked along the rows, searching for the right name.

Spotting it at last, you wasted no time in reaching for it. But as you tried to slide it from its spot, you were met with resistance. Perhaps it was very tightly packed in its place.

You tried again with both hands. It was still wedged in, but you felt it give a little so kept pulling. You managed to tug it out a little way, but this time, the book tugged back. Holding onto it as tightly as you were, you stumbled forwards, nearly slipping out of one of your sandals.

Gulping, your brow creased. More determined this time, you tried once more, but it seemed the book only retreated further among its companions on the shelf.

Breathing heavily, you stepped back. Books were not meant to do this. You swore it had moved by itself.

Maybe Hoseok would call you crazy if this was your reason for not getting the textbook. But, you thought, staring back down the empty row of shelves, a science textbook was less important than not getting involved with the strange happenings of the library.

Already you were questioning your sanity. Books didn’t move.

Looking back at it once more, it appeared perfectly unassuming. There was nothing unusual about the book. Maybe your mind was playing tricks, driven from the fear you felt about this place.

Breathing deeply, you reached your hand out for one last try. Picking up a book couldn’t be that hard. As long as you didn’t fear it-

Your fingers came into contact with the spine, and not a moment later, the book shrunk right back. But though it shot out of sight between its neighbours, your hand was stuck to it. Your intent to snatch it straight back at any sign of movement failed, and you were yanked forwards.

Flying clean off your foot now, your sandal clattered to the floor among the silent shelves behind you.

Your stomach jerked at the sudden movement. Now, as you plunged towards the shelves, you screwed your eyes shut, anticipating the imminent collision.

None came.

Instead, your insides seemed to be suspended. You had not crashed, but still your feet didn’t meet the floor; though your eyes were closed you were certain you were falling.

Rapidly upping its pace, your heart tried to punch through your ribs the longer you were in this state, fearing your landing. Panicked, you took great gulps of air, limbs flailing fruitlessly.

You landed.

It felt like you had been falling for a long time – too long – yet the force you hit the ground with was not painful. For a second, it expelled air from your lungs, but by the time you had rolled and tumbled enough to land on your back, you were sucking in a shaky breath.

Blinking, you turned to look around you. Your arms struggled to push you from the ground, but you heaved to sit up anyway.

This was like nowhere you had ever been.

No parquet was beneath you here. The ground was earth, sparse tufts of grass growing from it. But in places, the foliage was abundant, great swathes of vibrant grass surrounding a nearby rock which protruded from the ground.

These rocks were also plentiful, though not of regular size. They poked from the ground, rough surfaces being seized by moss of all colours.

Other plants stretched higher still, all in shades of purple, green and blue. Climbing slowly to your feet, your eyes traced up the stem of a slender tree whose leaves drooped downwards with their size.

The only thing you could hope to recognise were roses that grew in places, curved petals familiar atop their stems that wound around larger plants.

In the scattered canopy above you, there appeared to be vines as well. Climbers, perhaps; it appeared as if they were winding around ceiling beams above you, except that they were in open air, pale sky stretching above them.

Very deliberately, you blinked.

Nothing changed.

Jaw hanging open, you turned slowly around. This place continued the same everywhere you looked. You certainly weren’t in the library anymore.

Taking some effort to breathe evenly, you forced your feet to still.

Remembering your phone, you quickly reached for it. But as you repeatedly pressed the power button, the screen remained black. Either you had let it run down, or it wouldn’t work in this alien place.

You replaced it in your pocket with bitter disappointment and continued to stand still, observing this place.

Purposefully, you walked towards the nearest rock. Given the way you were transported here, you were a little wary of touching random objects, but you tentatively reached for the mossy surface. Briefly grazing it, you jumped backwards, expecting something to happen.

Nothing. Just the springy surface of moss, solid and very real.

Staring at the rock, your mind ran in uncomprehending circles. How had you got here? Why? How could you get out?

Cutting through your thoughts, a thump came from behind you.

Startled, you jumped around, eyes darting in panic around the world you had found yourself in. Nothing seemed to have moved…

A cough, followed by a groan, drifted from somewhere.

Frown deepening, you stepped forwards. A few paces brought you around the next rock, bigger than the last. Not only was it taller than you, it was bordered on one side by more of the tall plants, blocking your view of what was behind it.

This was definitely where the sounds were emanating from. As you cautiously rounded the boulder, rustling sounds reached your ears.

Reaching the trees, you peered between two dark blue trunks. Every muscle in your body was tense, ready to spring away at the first sign of danger.

Instead, you were greeted with the shape of a person. They wore a dark jacket, their hair also dark, but they were facing away from you where they sat.

For a moment you stood frozen. You were divided: should you announce yourself? Maybe they could help you? But for all you knew, they might not feel kindly towards you. What would another person be doing in this strange place?

Before you had the chance to decide, let alone move, the person slumped backwards to lie down, huffing a great sigh as they went.

Your eyes widened. Now you could see their face — and you certainly hadn’t expected this.

“Hoseok?”

Squeezing between the trees, you pushed your way into the small clearing he lay in. On hearing your voice, he twisted towards you with wide eyes.

“Y/N?” he jumped up, eyeing you suspiciously, “what is this place?”

“I have no idea,” you answered honestly. Then, “what are you doing here?”

Echoing your earlier words, he said, “I have no idea.”

After a moment, he seemed to remember something and looked around sharply.

“I found this,” he told you, pointing at the ground some feet away. There lay your sandal from earlier.

“Oh. Thank you.”

You flashed an awkward smile and went to pick it on, sliding it back onto the foot it had lost not long ago. Then your silence resumed.

Briefly, you did nothing but stare at each other. Then you stared again at the bizarre scenery around you.

Hoseok was first to move. Apparently becoming tired of your company so soon, he turned away with hands on his hips and began to pick through the undergrowth, which was thicker here than where you had first landed.

Even if this was all the company you were granted, you were eager to keep it, and so followed him.

A few minutes passed. Eerie silence was all around, save for the tentative brush of your footsteps against plants. He hadn’t complained about your presence, though, so you eventually decided it safe to speak.

“Did you… fall here?” you ventured.

His eyes snapped back to you. With a nod, he confirmed it.

“From the library?”

Slowing down, he allowed you to catch up and walk at his side.

“Yeah, why? You too?”

“That’s what happened to me,” you nodded, “but… what were you doing in the library?”

But Hoseok never heard those last words. A deafening, crunching crash resounded through your quiet conversation, drowning you out.

Both of you reacted quickly, spinning to the source of the monstrous sound in fear. Your hammering heart only sped up as you located a dark shape above the treetops.

“There!” you cried, grabbing onto Hoseok’s sleeve.

He spotted it as you pointed, for it was rapidly growing, soaring towards you.

“What is that?” he yelled, stumbling backwards.

You had nothing to offer in reply, instead watching with wide eyes as the creature flew closer still. Still grasping at Hoseok’s sleeve, you tugged at it, looking around for the nearest cover. He made no move. Struck dumb with awe, he seemed to be rooted to the spot.

Turning back to the sky, you were panicked to see the beast drawing closer. You could make out a long snout protruding from its head, spiny wings beating slowly and yet carrying it swiftly over the land.

The monster was enormous, blocking out a chunk of the open sky.

Not wanting to hesitate any longer, you pulled Hoseok forcefully with you as you retreated under the cover of a thick patch of foliage. He complied, still unable to tear his gaze from the flying creature.

You almost daren’t look, even now you were secluded among shadow. But curiosity overcame you.

It was near enough on top of you now. You held your breath, terror washing over you at the sight of it, close enough now that you could make out scales on the thing’s large belly. They glimmered a blazing red as it moved.

But its pace was fast, and it continued quickly, long tail etching a path through the sky behind it.

“Was that…” you breathed, after you felt enough time had passed to be safe. But your thought was too absurd for you to speak out loud.

However, Hoseok finished it for you.

“A dragon?”

Both of you slowly turned to face each other, matching expressions of perplexed shock painting your faces. You opened and closed your mouth, but no words presented themselves.

Your gaze was only severed by the return of the same cacophony to the air that had first heralded the dragon. Only now, it was louder.

Ducking by reflex, you whipped around. Above the treetops, the dragon was returning.

Still filling the air, the sound was that of treetops rupturing as the scaled beast flew low over them, snapping them like matchsticks. Once again, it seemed like the thing was coming straight towards you.

“Let’s move,” you shouted over the noise.

Hoseok didn’t need telling twice.

Side by side, you raced between trees, feet and clothes catching on leaves and vines that spanned the floor. Plunging on nonetheless, you kept your eyes set determinedly ahead.

By the time your lungs demanded you stop for breath, you were sure you must have gone a considerable distance from where you had first been hiding. But the deafening crashes from above had become no quieter.

Slowing down, you sagged against a tree as you gasped for air. Just in front of you, Hoseok looked around, finding you holding yourself up shakily against the trunk.

With a look to the sky and back at you, his face sank further, eyes wide and afraid.

“Y/N!” he cried.

Lifting your head, you met his eyes. Still panting, you turned to follow a finger he raised as he took trembling steps backwards.

Overhead, the leaves seemed to shake. A shadow was sliding along the forest floor as above it, twigs and branches rained down, bouncing from their lower counterparts until they disappeared into the shrubbery.

The dragon was following you.

“Come on!” Hoseok’s voice reached you somewhere among the din.

Spinning, you found him holding a hand out to you, gesturing maniacally for you to continue. You had barely caught your breath, but forced yourself to push away from the tree and run towards him once more.

What did surprise you was that he waited for you. When you came within reach, his outstretched hand was grabbing you, pulling you along at his side.

But there was no time to think of that. Chest heaving with exertion, you willed your feet to move faster underneath you in an attempt to flee the dragon.

All at once, the tall tree trunks you had been running between, almost dense enough to form a forest, stopped. Realising too late, the two of you shot from the cover at full speed, only to find yourselves utterly exposed.

Skidding to a stop, you looked to Hoseok in panic.

Before you could take another step, shadow fell over you again, but it was not cast by harmless trees. The roar of splintering branches grew to an overwhelming crescendo as the dragon caught sight of you and dived, uncaring for the insignificant wood pushed aside by its bulk.

Beside you, Hoseok screamed hoarsely. Together you fled backwards, knowing there was no hope of outrunning your pursuer.

In a few seconds, the beast had descended, giant nostrils flaring at your eye level. Curved fangs gnashed.

With horror, you saw a glow brighten the deep tunnels atop its snout.

In the corner of your eye, you spotted another rock, rough surface towering from the ground. You barely had time to think before you were shoving Hoseok to the side so you fell together behind the barrier. Not a moment later, blazing orange flared, obscuring all other sights as fire erupted from the monster’s jaws and nostrils.

You gave no thought to the position you had fallen in, your push having left you tumbling directly on top of Hoseok. His scream rang in your ears, only rivalled by the crackling heat in the air as his arms wrapped around you. You too were curling up, hands shielding your head in some attempt to shelter.

Thankfully, the rock you had chosen was one of the larger ones and took the brunt of the blast.

Not that it encouraged you much, considering the persistence the beast had shown so far. The dying away of the heat and fire only brought on dread, gnawing low and incessant in your stomach, of the next blast.

Barely daring to breathe, you stayed still, huddling against Hoseok, who did the same.

Any moment, you expected another massive roar to rip through the air. A swipe of the malicious claws or the sizzling heat of dragon flame. The longer you waited, the harder your heart rioted in your chest.

“Students.”

You jolted violently as a loud voice resonated through the air. But it was not the dragon.

Looking around showed you no one who the voice might belong to.

“It is gone,” the voice said.

Hoseok’s hold around you was loosening. Swallowing, you became aware of your proximity and carefully extracted yourself, not looking him in the eye as you moved to sit next to him instead.

It was true that no indicator of the dragon’s presence had made itself known, but you were not inclined to trust a faceless voice. You crawled to peer around the edge of the rock. Finding the space empty, you emerged further.

The clearing was totally deserted. The only evidence of the recent fearful moments was the debris of burnt leaves and broken branches scattered across the ground.

“Who are you?” Hoseok raised his voice, though it shook a little.

You returned to his side, the voice replying as you sunk down beside him.

“Students,” the voice repeated. It was level and calm, but awfully cold. The word was spoken with disdain. “I doubt you would recognise such a voice as mine. You young humans know not the value of words, of books. I am the librarian.”

You blinked in surprise. Next to you, Hoseok sat forward from the rock you leaned against.

“You are? Can you get us out of here?” he yelled, aiming his voice at the sky for lack of target for his pleas.

“Certainly not. I am the keeper of this land. You see, due to the neglect of your kind, my creatures are only kept alive through written word, and I cannot let them be endangered. Students are all the same. Careless. I do not appreciate those who vandalise or waste the knowledge granted them through books. And so, I cannot let you take another one.”

“It’s just a science textbook,” you muttered.

Meanwhile, Hoseok was growing more desperate.

“We won’t!” he called, “just let us out!”

Ringing silence was all he received in reply.

Eventually, he flopped back against the rock with a huff. Worrying your lip, you turned to him, though you had nothing to propose for what you should do next.

His hair was a dishevelled now, strands falling into his eyes which he now turned to you. To your surprise, his mouth curved back into a smile, breathy laughs bursting from him as he rested his head back on the rock.

He shook his head.

“This is crazy.”

You had to agree.

Turning your despairing eyes away and to the surrounding forest again, you were surprised to see movement among the trees. But this creature was not enormous or fire-breathing. A sandy-coloured tail waved, blurring in the air.

Bounding through the trees and coming to a stop at the forest edge, came a labrador.

Staring in bemusement, you found the dog looking right back at you. It was panting, mouth open in a smiley-looking shape. Its tail continued wagging enthusiastically behind it.

Just as you opened your mouth to tell Hoseok, the dog went rigid, body jerking as it barked across the space.

Sitting up straight, Hoseok spotted the dog as well, and together you watched it.

The dog watched back, standing still as if waiting for something. It reminded you of the way your flatmate’s dog used to wait for you to throw the ball when you played with her.

After another minute of stillness, it barked again, then turned and ran. You jumped to your feet as the yellow tail went wagging away through the shadows.

“What are you-“ Hoseok exclaimed as you started towards the trees, following the dog’s path.

Already tired, your legs lagged behind the dog’s pace and you nearly lost sight of the sandy fur. But you kept your eyes trained on it. This animal did not seem unfriendly, or angry. Something told you that you could trust it.

“Where are you going?”

You hadn’t noticed the pursuing footsteps until Hoseok was grabbing your arm, forcing you to stop. Looking around at him in annoyance, you shrugged him off and turned back around. But you had lost sight of the dog now, finding the forest empty.

Your shoulders slumped.

“I was trying to do something to get us out of here-“

“By getting more lost?”

Hoseok’s eyes blazed with anger and he threw his arms out to punctuate his yell with frustration. Opening your mouth, you returned his outrage.

“We’ve been lost since we got here! We don’t know anything about this place, but we can’t just do nothing!”

“What can we do? You heard what the librarian said.”

His volume had lowered and he took a step back.

Breathing out, you did the same, noticing only now how you had crowded each other’s space in your anger. Swallowing down your own frustration, you levelled your gaze at him. His words spoke of despair.

Sighing, you pushed a hand through your hair.

“There’s no use in fighting,” you muttered, “and I’m scared too. But we have to try.”

Lifting his eyes to you, Hoseok felt then as if he was seeing you for the first time.

You shared his fear, and had spoken that out loud, but still the steely glint never left your eyes. Rather than run or hide, you stood tall, resolved to find a way out, no matter how hopeless this crazy turn of events seemed.

“Hoseok?” you called, rendered hesitant by his silence.

Giving his head a quick shake, he averted his gaze from you.

“Hobi,” he spoke.

You frowned.

“I’m sorry?”

“Call me Hobi,” he repeated, “if we’re stuck here forever, I won’t be able to stand it if you call me Hoseok all the time.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Taking that to be some odd form of agreement, you turned around and started to pick your way again through the forest, no matter how blindly. The only vague thing guiding you was the notion that the dog had left this way, but that certainty grew weaker with time.

The only thing bolstering you were the steady steps of Hobi right beside you. A reminder you weren’t alone here.

“Sorry for losing your textbook.”

Smile quirking your lips, you turned to Hobi. He was steadfastly ignoring your gaze, kicking his feet through the low undergrowth while his hands were buried in his pockets.

“If you hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t be here now,” you hummed.

That caught his attention.

“Hey! At least I’m apologising!”

“Doesn’t fix the fact we’re lost in… well, wherever this is,” you chuckled, “though I’m sure it’s worked out well for you.”

“What do you mean?”

“If I hadn’t come here to replace my textbook, you would be here all alone.”

Hoseok simply tilted his head in vague answer.

After a few short moments of quiet, you resumed the conversation.

“So, what were you in the library for?”

He let silence stretch out for longer than you expected, and you slowed your steps to look at him. His eyes were wide, and when he spoke, it was with a nervous smile, as if he wasn’t sure he should be smiling.

But he was too quiet, and all you heard was something that sounded like ‘yuzbook’.

“Sorry?” you frowned.

With a long-suffering sigh, he finally spoke up.

“I was looking for your science book as well.”

Your eyebrows shot upwards.

“You were?”

“Yes.”

“I thought you had decided it was my responsibility? Even though you lost it.”

“Exactly, I had lost it. I felt bad.”

“Ha!” you exclaimed, jumping around to dance in front of him, “Jung Hoseok admits remorse! What is the world coming to?!”

“I told you to call me Hobi,” he grumbled.

A smile was still bursting at your lips, but you calmed down and returned smugly to his side.

“My bad. Hobi wanted to do something nice! For me, of all people! Maybe this really is a dream…”

“You dream about me?” he grinned, teasing right back.

“Eugh, of course not,” you scoffed.

His laughter filled the forest, and you were glad of it. At length, it faded and you walked on.

“But, turns out you were right to be scared of the library,” he admitted quietly.

Simply nodding, you kept going. By now you had lost all hope to have remained on course with the dog you had seen earlier, but there was little use dwelling on that.

Most of the way, you had been trekking through forest, but now the trees were thinning. Once again, they began to be clustered in patches near protruding rocks.

Coming between two waist-height boulders, you found a pond lying cradled by short grasses and more rose plants.

Agreeing on a break, you and Hobi slumped down at its bank, though you also agreed not to drink it. Hobi seemed much more distrustful of everything you came across in this curious land than you, but there was no harm in caution, you supposed. It was true that, on getting closer to the water, it appeared to glimmer silver.

What that meant, you didn’t know, but didn’t care to investigate.

Reclining on the ground, you breathed deeply. The pond was in a large clearing, similar to the first place you had crash landed in. You couldn’t escape some dread that all this time had brought you in a mere circle to the beginning, but there was no way to be certain.

Forest lined one side of the oasis, while the other stretched away, obscured behind that rocky landscape dotted with an array of foliage.

As you scanned the area idly, a familiar blur of motion had you sitting up with a yelp.

“There! Did you see that!” you cried, but began running without waiting for a reply.

Twisting to attention, Hobi clumsily took to his feet after you.

“You sure?” he called after you.

You kept running. You had seen it – it had been right here. You were certain it was trying to lead you somewhere, and you felt compelled to follow it.

Plunging between rocks, Hobi’s slower steps faded behind you. Uncaring, you continued, eyes alert for any sign of your goal.

And there it was: another brief glimmer from just beyond the next clump of plants. You were so close. This time, you were going to reach it. It would get you out of here.

Still running, you didn’t care that the way wound deeper through the terrain, nor that the world around you darkened as you went. No, your mind was set. You kept moving.

When you finally reached what seemed to be the midst of the darkness, it never occurred to you that this was never what you had been looking for. All you were filled with was delight; in the middle of the dark clearing stood a grove of roses. They were taller than the roses you had seen so far, growing thickly and close together.

In the blackness, the petals emitted a soft glow that shone through their delicate veins.

A smile curved your lips. But as you took a slow step towards the luminescence, something emerged from behind them. It became clear that the roses themselves were not glowing, but the creature. A unicorn.

White coat shimmering with its every move, it seemed to glide over the landscape. The slender horn protruding from its head appeared crafted by the finest silversmith, with hints of colours dancing along it even in darkness.

All breath was stolen from you. Your startled exhale left a cloud lingering in the air beside your lips which glittered as the majestic animal walked in front of you.

Either it didn’t see you, or didn’t mind your presence, because it proceeded perfectly calmly. Keeping your eyes fixed on it, your feet stumbled after the serene creature without you willing them to.

You barely blinked as you followed the graceful unicorn, desperate to keep your eyes on it. You couldn’t have torn them away if you wanted to. Just watching the animal had all your tension melting away: legs feeling heavy, mind fogging. All your worries dissipated as easily as smoke in the wind.

The world was silent. It was as if your ears were plugged as you reached out, somehow confident enough to touch the noble beast.

Another step closer.

Your fingers stretched out, ready to meet the sleek, glowing coat-

“Y/N!”

A blow knocked you sideways, a weight falling with you as the shout of your name rung loudly in your ears. For a split second, you winced, expecting to be crushed on the ground, but already a hand shielded your head. Instead, you landed on a body, held securely in the person’s arms.

Gasping, you found yourself breathless. Your gaze had been severed on being tackled, and now that you blinked, dark clouds seemed to lift from your vision.

Looking around wildly, you were slow to come to your senses, but the person was already shifting.

“We need to move.”

That voice was familiar. Looking around, you found Hoseok’s eyes trained on you as he struggled to stand with your weight against him.

Clumsily getting your feet underneath you, your mouth opened, but a shriek filled the air before you could speak.

Clapping your hands over your ears, you winced at the piercing wail splitting the air.

Hoseok, however, wasted no time. He grasped your wrist, pulling you stumbling across the clearing behind him as he sprinted away.

Wide-eyed and breathless, you twisted to look behind you. The unicorn was still there, but it wasn’t glowing, just plain white. But your eyes only caught it for a second, before a darker shape was swooping from the sky.

Feet pounding, you fled the shrieking beast as it descended in a rush of feathers.

Glinting talons flashed, inches in front of your face as the bird-like shriek reached its peak.

And then you were plunged into shadow, squeezed between leaves and petals.

Hoseok slowed, dropping your hand, but you were practically frozen. You staggered backwards, eyes trained on the spot those razor sharp claws had been.

Above you, the shrill cry was quieting, echoing around the land as your attacker circled higher once more.

“What… what was that?” you panted.

“That was close,” Hoseok responded, no humour in his voice. “I was calling to you! Why didn’t you move?”

“You were?” you frowned, “I-I didn’t hear. I don’t know what happened.”

Light frown creasing his brow, Hobi looked seriously down at you. Swallowing, he looked you over. Your heart still trembled, trying to take in what had just happened, and you looked up at him fearfully. Was he angry?

Fixing his eyes on your own, Hobi stepped forward, bending to draw your faces closer together. Holding your breath, you stiffened, heart rate rocketing as his breath fell warm over your cheeks.

Then he reached his hand out. You forced yourself to hold his gaze, not sure why your face was growing hotter under his scrutiny.

His fingers met your hair. They pulled gently at a strand.

“You had this in your hair.”

Blinking, you found him holding a rose petal up, the hint of a smirk playing on his lips.

“Right. Thank you,” you spoke awkwardly, snatching it from his hand.

“Let’s stay here for a bit,” he said then, turning around as if nothing had happened. However, you didn’t complain. You didn’t want him to see your burning cheeks.

Hobi had pulled you into the grove of roses you had seen earlier, which grew some way above your heads. The bushes were close together, providing the perfect cover. You heard no more of the shrieking monster as you walked after him through the plants.

Beautiful flower heads were nestled everywhere, the graceful bundles of petals peering at these strangers walking through their home.

Eventually, Hobi came to a halt. When you stopped at his side, he pushed aside some leaves to show you what lay beyond.

You had reached the other side of the grove and a new clearing lay before you. Unlike the other places you had been, there were no tall trees or wide rocks rising from the ground. At last it was flat.

But, most noticeably, in the middle of the clearing there was a building. Deep blue walls rose from a gold base, thin pillars winding upwards to support the corners of the many-sided roof. Small arched windows were set high up in the walls, through which you could see a silvery glow from inside.

Hobi looked around the space before emerging. No longer impatient, you wholly agreed with his caution and also peered out carefully.

As you remained mostly hidden by the roses, something came running around the house.

The dog.

Same as before, it stood looking at you, smiling mouth and wagging tail welcoming.

First, you looked to Hobi.

“What do you think?”

“You were right,” he replied, “the dog seems alright. We should give it a shot.”

Smiling, you felt assured now you were in agreement. Not stopping to think too much about the action, you placed your hand resolutely in Hobi’s and stepped forwards.

This time the dog did not begin running away, waiting for you by the blue house wall instead. As the two of you drew closer, you bent a little, holding your hand out to the creature.

“Hi!” you cooed, ignoring Hobi’s light scoff from beside you.

The dog poised as if it would bark back, but instead it looked towards the house. Following its gaze, you looked through the window and instantly fell silent.

Inside, a figure was sitting, though you could only see their head and shoulders – and a pair of wings. They fluttered lazily, glinting in the silvery light.

“The librarian,” Hobi murmured.

Nodding, you looked back to the dog.

“Will you help us?” you whispered.

Its tail wagged harder.

Smiling, you reached out to give it a gentle pat, ruffling the soft fur between its ears.

Satisfied, the sandy blond animal turned around, tail blurring all the while. It trotted away, leading you around the house. On passing the windows, you both ducked, fearing what the faerie would do if they discovered you here.

A short dash, looking over your shoulders, and you finally reached a thick row of trees. Squeezing behind the large trunks, you were surprised to see large wooden doors waiting for you.

If not for the lingering worry of the librarian somewhere nearby, you would have laughed out loud.

Hobi rushed forwards, grasping the dogs ears and ruffling them enthusiastically.

“You got us out!” he whispered happily.

You were amused to see the dog’s smiling mouth grow wider, tongue hanging out with his praise.

Jumping up with a brilliant grin, Hobi walked to the door. Waiting by the handle, he let you also say goodbye to your four-legged saviour.

“Thank you,” you told it with a loving pat. For a moment, you looked into the dog’s eyes, wishing you could somehow convey your gratitude.

Then a thought came over you. Tilting your head, you frowned slightly.

“Cindy?”

The dog’s tail whirred back into motion, hopping up and down a little at the name.

Breaking into a smile, you patted it affectionately.

“Good girl, Cindy,” you grinned, “thank you.”

Then you stood to join Hobi’s side. He lifted the great handle, which made a concerning thunk in the quiet.

Hurriedly slipping through, you fell against the other side of the wood as he followed and shut it firmly behind him. You were back at the entrance of the library, the glass doors at the front of the foyer showing the road beyond it, no different than ever as cars and pedestrians hurried along.

“Who let someone like that work in a school?” you laughed, incredulous.

Hobi laughed loudly at last, the sound bringing a bigger grin to your face.

You had made it out.

All of a sudden, a pinging sound rang from your pocket, soon over taken by at least five more.

Pulling out your phone, you found it alive again, the screen lit up and full of messages.

“Yoongi’s wondering where I am,” you muttered, “my shift…”

Hobi pushed away from the wooden door, starting to walk with you across the entrance hall. Stuffing his hands into his pockets, he nodded.

“Yeah, um, I should get going too, I guess.”

Opening the main doors, you stood outside on the steps, at a loss. A bus rumbled past.

“Okay,” you spoke at length, “yeah. Er, see you around.”

Smiling briefly, Hobi took a few hesitant steps back before he committed to walking away. One last wave and he was engulfed by the crowd on the street.

You sighed and set off in the opposite direction.

The bell clinked, swinging wildly above the door as you hurried over to the counter.

“I’m so sorry I’m late,” you spoke as you set your stuff down.

Turning to lean against the counter, Yoongi shrugged.

“’s’alright. Where were you though?”

“Ah…”

What were you meant to say? Your head was still spinning from everything that had passed, but you knew no one would believe you if you told them the truth. Shifting a little, your teeth nipped at your lower lip while you tried to come up with a reasonable excuse.

Meanwhile, a knowing look was sliding onto Yoongi’s face.

“I see,” he grinned, and then, to your mortification, winked!

“No, you don’t- that’s not-“ you protested, but he was already snickering and turning back to the washing up.

Shaking your head, you concluded that whatever his belief was would make as good as excuse as any. At least he had made it up for you, saving the hassle.

You got to work.

Over the next couple of days, everything ran like normal. Except for you, nothing was normal.

You still had no idea how such a small amount of time had passed while you and Hobi were busy running for your lives in fear of the librarian and their crazed world. You had barely been late for your shift afterwards; when it was time for bed you had collapsed straight in, feeling as if you had been awake for two days straight.

Of course, you had never gone back for that textbook.

In college the next day, you had taken a detour to class, stubbornly avoiding the building that had all but kidnapped you, wondering at the fact no one else seemed to realise.

At the café later on, you waited impatiently for any sign of Hobi outside. He was the one person you desperately wanted to see. Surely he must be feeling the same? He would understand.

But you waited and waited, serving countless other customers without much thought. He never came, and so you were left to question your own sanity by yourself.

Nothing about your impromptu adventure made sense.

If it had been real, why didn’t Hobi act like anything had changed? You certainly couldn’t pretend that nothing had been altered between you while you had been trapped in that strange world inside the library.

Perhaps it had been a dream. All of it seemed so implausible that even recollecting it sent you spiralling with more questions.

But there was one hope. Even if Hobi remembered nothing of what transpired, you were still supposed to tutor him. You would see him next week, and try to assess what he might remember.

So when your phone buzzed that night, screen lighting up with a message from him at last, you had expected to arrange this week’s session. But all it said was: come outside.

Though you frowned, you weren’t going to pass up this chance.

Sliding off your bed, you quickly stuffed your feet into your slippers and tried your best not to break into a run on the way to the door. Collecting yourself first with a deep breath, you pulled it open.

The first thing you took in was empty space outside your door. Blinking at it, you couldn’t prevent the disappointment from creeping in. But then your eyes flickered downwards.

There at your feet lay a rose.

Your lips parted in wonder as you stooped to pick it up. Taking it between your fingers, you rolled it gently there. It was the exact same as those delicate flowers that had filled the grove where you sheltered together in the library.

A smile tugged at your mouth. It only grew as you remembered the identical petal Hobi had pulled from your hair.

He remembered.

The relief that washed over you was dizzying. Clutching the flower to your chest, you smiled out of your doorway once more, silently thanking Hobi.

But you wouldn’t have to be silent for long. Your eyes landed on a figure leaning against a lamppost a few metres away, smiling right back at you.

As your eyes met, Hobi stood straighter. His mouth shifted to a radiant grin. He had come back to you.

Thank you so much for reading!! And again, send lots of birthday love over to @moccahobi​!! As promised, here is the beautiful bingo card I used for this story:

taglist: @aianloveseven​ @preciouschimine​ @un2-verse​ @ddaechwita​ @taegularities​