#I’ve been avoiding this show all year for this exact reason

[family-tree-of-ships]

One conversation that has been ongoing for the past 1-2 weeks:

Me: you can’t just watch 5+ episodes of 911 a day, it’s bad for you

My brain: yeah, but there’s seven seasons, when am I watching them if not now??

Me: tomorrow?

My brain: yeah that’s cool and shit but that one episode is named in all caps, must be intense

Me: that’s exactly the message, but that doesn’t mean we gotta-

My brain: first five minutes

*two episodes later*

Me: I got a problem

My brain: yeah, yeah but what if this next one has a Buddie moment-

[bueckersbitch]

i stayed there, dust collected on my pinned up hair.

right where you left me. — chapter two

characters : paige bueckers x anika malik

warnings : injury

word count : 3.1k

authors note : chapter two !! i’m so excited for the small sprinkles that i’ve been putting in these chapters that are gonna matter A LOT in the future ;)

Paige’s POV

Well, at least I knew what my future held for me now. I hated it.

And I hated getting injured. Of course, because I wouldn’t be able to be out on the court, sharing handshakes with teammates, or looking at each other funny when Coach said something questionable. But also because, when you get injured, it turns into your whole life.

People you haven’t talked to in years reaching out “because they care”, people trying to baby you, acting like you can’t do anything for yourself, and suddenly, all the sports accounts I follow posting about how I would miss the rest of this season, and some of the following season. 

It’s like you can’t escape it, I’ve gone through it before, people telling me to do something to get my mind off of it, pick up a new hobby, watch a new show, and visit new places I haven’t been.

But all those things that I would do to avoid it would just remind me of how I was injured more because I wasn’t doing those things for me, I was doing it because I couldn’t do the thing I loved.

I know the real reason why they want me to go to Minnesota so badly, they think being around somewhere I “knew” would help me through it. But I didn’t know Minnesota the way I used to. Everyone who I loved there has left, careers taking off, my Dad moving to Maryland, nothing is there for me anymore.

Dallas wasn’t “home” either though, sure, I made a life here, with lifelong friends, and the small encounters at the local coffee shop by my apartment where the manager knows my order off the top of her head. But something was missing, a feeling of longing, I missed Connecticut, still, after all these years, but even then, Connecticut wasn’t the same anymore either. Now, the team was filled with all new faces, people I hadn’t met, hadn’t giggled with over stupid inside jokes and fought with over things that seemed so small now. It was all gone, a thing of the past.

Maybe I’d never feel grounded anywhere, it was something I had to deal with, you can think you’re finally starting to settle somewhere and then it gets ripped away from you because you get traded. Even though it hasn’t happened yet, that thought is always in the back of my mind, and it’s probably why I didn’t let myself make Dallas feel like home.

My body hurts. I was back in my apartment, and I felt caged. I had taken that Uber driver's advice eventually though, getting back to people somehow, my brain on autopilot while I typed responses I couldn’t remember. 

I did tell the team I was being sent off to Minnesota -the group chat without Coach- they were mad, said it was bullshit, and kept ringing me on the group face time, I didn’t say anything after that, didn’t pick up their calls. I didn’t want to believe it either.

But it was the truth. I couldn’t avoid it. And I can’t avoid my surgery tomorrow either. 

It would cement my absence from basketball for a year.

Anika’s POV

I feel dumb.

I stared at my phone all day.

In the early morning when I was walking Koda, when I got my Matcha, during the 2-second breaks we get during practice to get water.

It was because of her.

I couldn’t escape her, didn’t want to.

Everywhere I looked it was about Paige.

Her injury update.

The replay of the exact moment it happened.

People’s think pieces whether or not she would be able to come back from this.

But I also was staring because I was contemplating.

Contemplating whether I should reach out or not.

It was unlikely she thought about me, I’m sure that she had made friends to fill that hole we had left in each other when we went to different colleges.

But I hadn’t.

I never realized until now, the impact she had on me.

I bite at my fingernails, excess skin on the sides turning into something I could pick at to fidget with.

I think I'm overreacting. I was only missing her so badly because she’s something from my childhood I can still grasp onto, reach for when the life I once knew has been demolished, warped in a way I couldn’t recognize.

My heart beats harshly, moving faster than my head, I scramble with shaking hands to Paige’s old contact, the one I had kept the same since we knew each other in high school, a blue heart nestled next to her name, one I told her I wouldn’t have to change since UConn’s colors had blue too.

I started typing,

Hi Paige!

I deleted it, tried again,

Hiiiii!

Deleted it again. I felt like I was putting up a front. The absolute opposite of what it was like between us.

hey paige, i know it’s been a while, i saw what happened, i know you’re not okay, call me if you can?

I read it over and over. Like it was a final assignment I was submitting that cost 50% of my grade, which was ironic, because I hadn’t been in school in over four years.

I rewrote it in my notes, looked at it, did it seem like I was telling her it had to be bad? That what people were saying was true?

I was overthinking again, something she told me not to do with her all those years ago. 

I stopped thinking about it. 

I hit send.

-

I left my phone on my kitchen counter, and let my couch cushions consume me. The fluffy white pillows cocooned me while I stared at my phone in silence. 

I waited,

And waited.

Until I heard it.

The special ringtone I had set for her, well, the one she set for herself, “milestone” She picked it because she told me we had reached the milestone of going D-1 together, and we would continue to reach milestones together. 

Together. 

Somewhere along the way we drifted apart.

I jumped out of my seat on the couch, the rug set in my living room slipping under my feet slightly, I could hear Koda’s collar clinking together because she had looked up, wondering what all the fuss was about.

I flip my phone over, and press on the message.

Hey! Sorry, I think you have the wrong number, maybe she changed it?

My heart drops,

Because of course, she would’ve changed it.

Of-fucking-course.

I reread the message over and over, burning it into my memory.

Maybe I was being overdramatic again, but why would she change her number, and not give her new one to me?

Maybe this was wrong, I should accept that things change, life changes, people change.

Maybe I valued our friendship more than she had.

I felt a chill rush through me, the kind I would get on a bone-chilling day in December. I bit my bottom lip to stop it from quivering.

Because I couldn’t hold on to the one person I thought I could, and it stings.

Paige’s POV

I woke up in the hospital bed. “Get well soon” and heart balloons tied to the foot of it.

My mouth felt dry, sure enough, a water bottle was set on the table next to me, along with my phone and a card.

I reached for the card before anything else,

“Dear Paige, we know how resilient you are, and will flourish wherever you go. Best of luck in Minnesota!

With love, Curt, and the Coaches of the Dallas Wings.”

I toss the card back onto the table, grabbing my phone instead,

A notification,

“Dallas Wings posted a photo.”

I click on the notification, it brings me to a photo edit of myself,

“Paige Bueckers has gone through surgery on her right ACL and will miss the remainder of the 2028 season.”

I shut off my phone.

I itch the back of my head, finally snatching the water bottle.

Anika’s POV

I read the post.

“Paige Bueckers has gone through surgery on her right ACL and will miss the remainder of the 2028 season.”

“Yo, what’re you staring at your phone for?” Courtney asked, she had practically forced me to be her regular running partner, I only accepted because it was always easier to run with someone rather than alone.

I flipped my phone to show her, my eyes flicking to her and then my phone. Her eyes squinted to read the caption.

“Sucks, but it’s not like she’s the first person to go through it.” She says after she finishes reading. I roll my eyes at her lack of empathy.

“What? It’s the truth. Now come on and let's finish this mile.”

I tuck my phone back into the waistband of my shorts, taking out my other airpod and putting it in my ear too, my friendly front slowly dissolving as I grew more irate.

Paige’s POV

It was weird, I was back home -at my apartment- now, and I had grown so much since the summer before I left for UConn, and I knew that.

But a part of me still felt like the girl who was packing her room up for college, getting her roommate assignment for her freshman college season.

I glanced around my apartment, I’d still have the lease, paying it while I was away, so I didn’t have to pack everything up.

But when you don’t let yourself put down roots, there's not much to pack up anyway.

I start with the big things, my framed UConn jersey, posters, and the clock on the wall, wrapping each in bubble wrap, and stacking them in a big box.

I look down at my wrist, the five hair ties I had worn my last game still on my wrist, I take one of them and use it to tie my hair up into a low bun, the pieces that managed to get loose tickling my face uncomfortably.

I needed something to occupy my mind while I packed, I leaned against my couch, sitting on the floor with my legs stretched out in front of me while I flicked through Netflix.

Nothing seemed interesting enough.

I unlocked my iPad, hesitantly scrolling through my messages for someone to call.

I should be mature, call my teammates who have shown concern.

So I did.

I opened the group chat by hitting the button in the upper right corner to Facetime them,

Slowly, small dings of people joining rang through my ears, Nai, Arike, and Maddy joining, everyone's faces in frame, I squeezed my lips into a tight line, tilting my head slightly.

-

I was wrapping my mugs now, the call was good, lighthearted jokes commencing after the explanation on why I hadn't responded after dropping the bomb of me moving.

“Make sure you wrap the handles too, I learned the hard way when I moved to Dallas.”

Nai said, I hummed, ripping off some bubble wrap to do so.

I placed the last mug into a box, looking around at the almost empty space,

“Feels so surreal, looks like when I moved in for the first time,” I said, flipping the camera to show everyone.

“We’ll all miss you, Paige, I still don’t understand why they’re making you do this.” Arike said, I sat my iPad down on my counter, my palms pressing against the granite, my head pulled back to look up at the kitchen light, “Yeah, whatever keeps the image up I guess, thought I meant more than that.” Finishing my sentence with a hard swallow.

“You do mean more than that Paige, some image to keep up when everyone already knows how it really is,” Maddy said, breaking through my thoughts.

“I think everybody knew from Nai’s reaction to Coach that game against Vegas y’all’s first year here.” Arike followed up with.

They all laughed, Nai telling Arike to shut up within the laughter.

I let myself laugh too, the first laugh that had been pulled from me in a while, I pulled my head down to look at them while it happened, bringing my hand up to slick my hair down as I saw it in the camera.

No matter what I thought about Dallas, the Coaches, the fights, I would miss them.

“Imma miss you guys, promise me you’ll tell me about all your problems even though I’m away.” My voice cracking up at the end,

“Hey hey hey, none of that, okay? You’re our sister, no matter where you are.” Nai said. “Yeah, and don’t think we won’t visit when we play the lynx, you’ll be sick of us.” Maddy continued.

I know I was pushing them, to reach out, and keep talking to me even though I’d be far.

It was because I knew how I would be, trying to pull away from people who care, it’s what I was used to, shutting people out when I knew they were there for me. It was what I did with my best friend from high school, even if I promised her we would continue our basketball careers together.

I was an asshole. And I knew that.

taglist : @pboogerswbb @sierrale8ne @lupinqs @vamptizm @thaatdigitaldiary @ohbueckers @ohmybueckers @flipthepaige

[lucyandthepen]

last young renegade | jjh

summary: your valentine’s day plans with jaehyun may have gone down the drain just a little. (okay — a lot.)

pairing: jaehyun x reader verse: canon, idol!verse rating: t warnings&tags: reader & jaehyun are in an established relationship, quite frankly there is nothing too out of the ordinary in this fic which is a shocker, it’s a rewritten fic so pls excuse any errors I may not have caught! word count: 5.02k

a/n: happy 2024 friends and family !!!!!! and advanced happy birthday to the man who created valentine’s day, he who is perhaps my first love in nct, jaehyun! this is actually just a fic I’ve been hoping to re-write a bit from before, and since it’s valentine’s themed, what better time to post it!! Enjoy enjoy, and may this year bring more fun, laughs, love (and debauchery) to this blog!

Yᴏᴜ sᴀɪᴅ ʏᴏᴜ'ʀᴇ sɪᴄᴋ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛɪʀᴇᴅ ᴏғ ɪᴛ, ʙᴜᴛ ɪ ɴᴇᴇᴅ ʏᴏᴜ ᴍᴏʀɴɪɴɢ, ɴɪɢʜᴛ, ᴀɴᴅ ᴅᴀʏ.

♡ jaehyunnie ♡ I know I said birthday dinner but practice is running so late ㅠㅠ ♡ jaehyunnie ♡ Can we meet after? I’m sorry ㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ How about I call you when we’re done? Maybe 11:30?

At times like this, you often wonder if it’s all worth it.  

You know thinking that way is counterproductive, not to mention a little unfair. You knew exactly what to expect, getting into an under-wraps relationship with an idol, and so far, it’s lived up to most of your assumptions, and then some. It doesn’t help that Jaehyun, even just by name, tends to attract an unbelievable amount of attention. You know you can’t blame him; it’s not like he wants to be high on the radar every time, either. For some reason, though, you seem to be looking for something or someone to blame, which you also know is a dead end. You have no one to pin the blame onto apart from yourself by frequently generating doubts that keep your mind running around in circles.  

It’s not even the sneaking around that gets tiring; it’s the waiting — waiting on calls, waiting on free time, waiting on a good opportunity to do something that doesn’t involve him suddenly getting pulled out to attend to one of many of his celebrity responsibilities. Over the last few years that you’ve dated, NCT has only ever gotten more popular; with that popularity came the fact that the public eye was trained on them, focusing on every microscopic detail of their lives. Jaehyun hates that more than anything, which is why he’s given up on trying to avoid it by practically escaping it altogether, locking himself up in the dorm with you when he has his precious few days off. 

While it’s true that you definitely don’t miss having to play espionage when going out for a cup of coffee with him, you’ve also managed to memorize every single inch of Jaehyun’s room, which isn’t good for your mentality, you’re pretty sure. You have to keep reminding him to open the window whenever the both of you are in there, because all you do is stay in and watch English movies without subtitles to see who can understand the most without asking questions (obviously, he always wins) while eating food he runs up and down the stairs to get every other hour. And while him trying to imitate the British accents on these shows is genuinely funny, you’re starting to suspect even he’s starting to get tired of watching Harry Potter over and over again. Twenty hours sounds like a long time unless you spend every twenty-hour period you have together marathoning the exact same films. Much to both of your disappointment, your suggestion to watch it totally out of order did not make it cooler.

Still, you suppose it’s not all bad. Jaehyun also taught you how to play Fortnite on a couple of his days off back to back, and while you hadn’t been as good a player as you both had hoped, he’d still patiently waited for you every time you got lost on the map. He’d even given you his account’s password with the sentiment that this was him ‘taking things to the next level with you,’ and you get to log into his account and play whenever you want; he doesn’t even get mad when you’ve wasted all the stuff he’s farmed on your subpar gaming skills. And, well, the bigger picture was that you loved him. Based on how much effort he put into the relationship, plus the bonus of his trust in you when it came to his Fortnite account, you could at least be confident in that he returned the sentiment.  

Except, sometimes, you still wonder if it would be easier for the both of you if he flew solo and didn’t have a girlfriend that tanked all of his player’s ammo and health kits and generally made a fool out of his cute little avatar while he was out breaking his back onstage.  

You aren’t sure if Jaehyun’s been noticing the turmoil in you; you’re not that good at hiding how you feel, anyway, but if he has, he hasn’t said anything thus far. You do observe how much more he texts you when he has free time, which makes you feel doubly bad, because you know that he’s spending precious minutes he could be resting with on talking to you instead, which isn’t the best trade-off for someone who’s constantly busy — and thereby constantly tired — like him.  

♡ jaehyunnie♡ ___________ I’m going to practice again, okay? Wait for my call ㅠㅠ You I’ll wait for your call ♡ ♡ jaehyunnie♡ I love you ㅠㅠㅠㅠ ♡ jaehyunnie♡ You love me too — a lot, right? I’ll keep my phone now, but I’ll make sure to check that you said so. ㅋㅋㅋ You Right! ㅎ I love you a lot! ♡

When the clock hits 12:01, and your phone is silent, your mind starts working on overtime again. It’s only when the special ringtone you’ve set for him comes to life at half-past midnight that you break your train of thought and put on your socks so you can meet Jaehyun at your front door.  

You’ve made a rule — sort of like a deal — between the two of you that apologies aren’t necessary when work holds you up. You’ve cashed in on that deal a couple of times, but you’re both aware that it’s more for Jaehyun’s sake than anything else, and he keeps to his word on that much when you open the door and duck into his car. All he does is smile at you, and you smile back, and for the rest of the car ride, everything seems okay.  

He always asks you about your day — unfailingly, at any chance he can. It’s never an off-handed question, either; Jaehyun takes great pride in his memory, and the sweetest thing about him is that he’s dedicated a good deal of it to knowing almost everything about you. Right now is no different. He asks you about your team manager, what you had for lunch; he grills you on if you took your vitamins today and if you got to break in the new shoes you bought online — the ones you’d been pining over for the last three months. He even asks you about the guy from the neighboring department who keeps asking you out for after-work drinks.  

“He wanted to go to Hongdae tonight,” you tell him as he slows for a red light. “There’s some new pub of his friend’s doing a soft opening there tonight.”  

“You could have gone.” He keeps his eyes on the road. “I wouldn’t have minded.”  

“I didn’t want to.”

“Good.” He glances at you, a grin slowly spreading on his lips. “Because I lied. I might have minded a little. Or, you know, a lot.��  

“Don’t tell me after all these years, you’ve turned into the kind of boyfriend that doesn’t let his girlfriend go out without him.”

“That’s impossible for me, and you know that,” he chuckles. “You can do whatever you want, whenever you want. Just not with that guy from the other department.”

“Don’t worry.” You tinker with the little charm dangling on your phone — half of a flat, metal heart dangling from a gold chain that Jaehyun had given you two years back on your birthday. He keeps the other half, but since he can’t freely attach it to any of his belongings, he keeps it wedged between the back of his phone and its case. You like watching him change the backing because he does it so carefully, like he’s worried the other half of the heart is going to break if he rips off the case willy nilly. “I told him my boyfriend and I were going out on a date tonight, so he backed off. Although he did wonder why I keep talking about a boyfriend he’s never seen.”

“And? What did you say?”

“I said it was none of his damn business.”  

Jaehyun laughs loudly, and you go along with him, but you don’t miss how tired he looks when he sobers down, the green light illuminating all the shadows on his face as he steps on the gas again.

Nothing good is open this late at night — that is, nothing you haven’t seen before. You hadn’t even expected to go out at all, but since it was the day before Valentine’s Day as well as his birthday (or it would have been, if you hadn’t waited until midnight), Jaehyun had wanted to do something special without having to run into a huge crowd of couples on the day itself. Your only option is this from-out-of-town carnival that’s set up in tents and even has a medium-sized ferris wheel by the edge of the metal barricade. The parking lot is practically empty when Jaehyun pulls into a slot; you joke that he should break one rule and park in two slots, which he smugly replies to by saying he couldn’t park badly even if he tried.  

He tucks your hair back behind your ears as he loops the strings of a face mask around them, using another one for himself. Between that and the brim of his cap, you can barely see his eyes. The only knowledge that you have that you’re walking next to the man you love is that he takes your hand in his, slender fingers finding their way between yours.  

The carnival is half-closed when you get to the middle of it; there are still a few stragglers, but half the kiosks have their lights off already. There’s a woman dressed in flashy clothes standing on a patch of dead grass a few feet away, and she’s holding a hoop that a ginger cat is jumping through. Jaehyun steers you to them, and you stand there for a good five minute watching the cat roll on the ground and stand on its hind legs, but you can tell it’s been going it at for most of the day because at one point, it just ignores the lady, opting to weave its way between Jaehyun’s and your legs instead. You do have a pretty good time when he picks it up and cradles it in his arms so you can pet it for a second, but it just hisses when its owner approaches and jumps out of his hold, disappearing behind a row of trash bins.  

Jaehyun doesn’t have anything in his wallet apart from his credit cards and 50,000 won, and the coin machine operator says he only has enough coins left to break down 5,000 won for the games, so you end up having to jog back to his car so you can fish out some coins from inside his glove compartment. You come up with a grand total of 1,500 won, and you have to sheepishly go back to the coin machine operator to change four 100 coins and a couple of 50s just to get the last 500. Jaehyun tells you to hold onto the three coins so he doesn’t run off with them entirely and leave you destitute.  

You learn you can only do three things at most — you dedicate 500 won for the Ferris wheel entry tickets, which leaves you with 500 won each. The both of you agree on choosing one kiosk to play in, and with only about five left that are open, you don’t really have that many options. You end up dragging Jaehyun over to a stall with a pond filled with those magnetic toy fish, but 500 won only gets you one fishing rod. Since it’s your choice, Jaehyun lets you play, but you feel kind of stupid doing it on your own with him just watching you. In the end, he decides to stand behind you, his arms around your waist like he thinks closer contact isn’t even more distracting. You do manage to fish out 10 fish and win a small bear on a keychain. It doesn’t even pass through your hands as Jaehyun takes it from the stall operator immediately. 

“That’s mine!” You whine, reaching out in vain to take it from him; he just holds it high over his head. His eyes are twinkling under the shadow his cap casts over his face. “I worked hard for that.”  

“Let me keep this one,” he mimics the pleading lilt in your voice. “I’ll put it on my bag.”

“You know you can’t! Give it back.”

“I’ll win you a bigger one,” he promises. “Let me keep this one. It’s cute. It reminds me of you. I’ll kiss it goodnight before I sleep.” He starts to laugh softly. “And then you’ll feel this weird spirit kissing you at like two in the morning, and you’ll know it’s me.”  

Your arms aren’t long enough to retrieve it, and you don’t really want to, so you settle with twisting his ear. He takes it in stride even if he over-acts, making pained noises while leading you to the kiosk he wants to go to. It’s a shooting range stall, and he pays his own precious 500 won for a dart gun. He’s barely paying attention when the guy starts explaining how many points are assigned to each balloon color, more concerned with talking to the bear keychain in his hand and pretending like he’s cooing at you. You have to hit him across the shoulder to get him to focus.  

“You need to start picking out what prize you want,” he tells you — the actual you, not the animal keychain version — as he lifts the dart gun.  

“I’ll wait for you to finish first.”  

“No way.” He tilts his head, closing one eye to steady his line of sight. “Pick already. Or just go for the biggest one.”

“You know that Fortnite and dart guns aren’t the same thing, right?”  

“Yeah, but I’m well-motivated.” He grins at you, one eye still shut. He looks like a baby pirate. “Go ahead. Pick the biggest one.”

“Why don’t you just shoot, and we’ll see.”  

“Pick it,” he insists. “Tell me you have faith in me. Tell me you love me.”

“Okay, I love you,” you agree. “But I have no faith in you when it comes to this.”  

“One out of two is fine,” he concedes, taking aim.  

All three of you, including the stall operator, let out a disappointed groan when he misses his first shot. His comes with a sheepish laugh as he reloads, suddenly telling you to pick the second biggest prize instead. You can’t even watch him miss over and over, so you pretend to be interested in a bunch of teenage boys playing a game of cups one stall over, trying not to giggle when you hear him get increasingly more frustrated at himself. When you turn back around, you notice he’s holding two small pieces of gummy candy, offering one to you like a kindergartener. He helps you tug your face mask down so you can eat it.  

There’s a food stall nearby that, thankfully, accepts credit and debit; Jaehyun fishes out his card to get you a corndog — only one because he’s watching his weight for the upcoming concert, apparently. This is information you hate hearing but have no say in, and he knows this; you know he does because he says ‘don’t worry about me’ totally out of the blue, like five minutes after the conversation ceases to be relevant.  

His phone starts ringing when the food comes out, and he takes a tiny bite of it — more bread than hotdog — before he answers. You know it’s Taeyong by the way he answers.  

“Hyung, sorry — can we talk later? I’m out with ____________.”  

Taeyong says something loud but indiscernible on the other end. You piece together that it’s about tomorrow’s schedule when Jaehyun speaks again.

“I know. I’ll be home in a bit; don’t worry about it. I haven’t forgotten.”  

There’s more garbled speech on the other line; Jaehyun gestures for you to keep eating, and you do, but you more concerned with the morphing expressions on his face than you are with the act of chewing. He’s making noncommittal noises in response to what seem to be commands and reminders. You’re pretty much done with the corndog by the time he says ‘Okay, hyung. Hyung — I’ll see you later, okay?’

“Taeyong hyung says hi,” he tells you once he’s hung up the phone. “He says you still need to give back that book you borrowed from him last year.”  

“Oh yeah,” you finish off the last of the food. “I’ll drop it off within the week.”  

“Don’t worry about it. He doesn’t actually mean it.”  

Jaehyun watches you snap the stick in half and toss it in the trash bag.  

“We can go home,” you say finally. His eyebrows shoot up. “You’re busy tomorrow. I forgot.”

“I didn’t forget, and it’s fine.”  

“It’s almost two in the morning.” You check your phone to verify. “You probably have to be up in a few hours. You need to sleep, or you’ll die, Jaehyun. I’m too young to be a grieving widow.”

“Let’s at least ride the Ferris wheel,” he suggests. Before you can protest, he tugs you towards the rickety contraption, digging the 500 won out of your pocket and handing it to the bemused operator. He lets you choose what carriage you want because literally no one is on it anymore, and Jaehyun asks for the best carriage. You’re not sure how it differs from the rest, but he makes a show out of guiding you into it, and you don’t miss the corny ‘my lady,’ he mutters under his breath.   

It’s small, clearly meant for either a tiny group of children or couples who want to be as close together as possible. It’s also not air-conditioned, and only one of the windows is open, so you end up sticking to Jaehyun’s arm on the way up. The view is still great, though, and you feel his hand settle on your knee as the carriage makes it slow ascent.  

The ride up is quiet, and you press your face as close to the glass of the carriage as you dare, but Jaehyun doesn’t move an inch. His hand is still heavy on your thigh, but it doesn’t do anything but lay there. When you’re close to the top, you’re hit with the urge to do something romantic — kiss, maybe, tell him happy birthday, or say ‘I love you’ to him in the most sickening way possible — but when you turn to look at him, you have to hold your tongue.

Jaehyun is asleep, leaning against the corner of the carriage, head tilted down a little. His shoulders are rising and falling slowly, and he’s pulled down his face mask a little so he can breathe better; his lips are slightly parted by the slackening of his jaw. His left hand is shoved in his pocket, like he’d passed out halfway through reaching for something in there.  

He doesn’t wake even when you move slightly so you can lean back next to him, rocking the carriage a little — not even when you reach up and adjust his head so he can rest on your shoulder. He breathes deeply, evenly, and you wonder if his ear against your shoulder allows him to hear your heart plummet unfairly to the bottom of your stomach.  

You have to shake him to rouse him when the ride comes to an end; when he opens his eyes and realizes what happened, he looks mortified. Instinctively, he opens his mouth, but you fling the carriage door open and step out before he can apologize.

You have a deal, and he knows what he shouldn’t be doing.

His grip on your hand is much tighter as you walk back to the parking lot, and he doesn’t let go, even on the road. The trip back is quieter, maybe because it’s late, or maybe because there are a ton of things the both of you want to say but can’t.  

He slows down when he gets to your street, but when he stops in front of your building, he doesn’t immediately unlock the doors to let you out. Instead, he turns to you, licking his lips a little nervously.

“Can you…” he clears his throat because his voice cracks a little on the first attempt. “Can you come back with me? To the dorm?”  

“I have work tomorrow, Jaehyun.”  

“It’s still at eleven, isn’t it? I can bring you home before that. You still have some stuff in my room. You can get ready there.”

“Won’t you be too busy?”  

“Just—” he sighs softly. “Can you? Please?”  

You don’t know how to say no to Jaehyun, and tonight isn’t a night you’re willing to try. It’s why fifteen minutes later, you’re walking through the front door of his dorm. Donghyuck, sitting at his computer in his room with the door ajar, greets you sleepily as you pass by.  

Jaehyun steps in the shower with you; you don’t talk, maybe because you’re worried you might wake the others up if you start a full-blown conversation in a bathroom surrounded by other bedrooms. He just passes you what you need, and you do the same for him, and somewhere in between, he kisses you under the spray of the water.  

Later, he falls asleep with a face mask on, and you have to peel it off for him and toss it into the trash. The tip of his nose is shiny, and you want to kiss it, but you know it’ll wake him, and you noticed he’d set his alarm to go off two hours from now. He’s set out a couple of earplugs for you so that you don’t hear it, but you don’t put them in. You want to see him before he leaves, even if it’s in the deadest hours of morning, so you just crawl into bed with him. A minute before you doze off, you feel his damp skin press against your neck, his form curled up against your back.  

The alarm never wakes you; the sun is out when you open your eyes, and when you check your phone, you see that it’s already half-past nine. You also notice that there’s nothing from Jaehyun on your screen, but you try not to dwell on that, considering that you’d been expecting to wake up to an empty bed. His side of the mattress is cold, which means that he’s been gone for some time.  

You don’t know if it’s just because you’re groggy, but your insides still feel like lead when you sit up. The part of you that nags about this relationship is back at full force when you start thinking about Jaehyun going to a pre-recording two hours after spending the last of his energy on you. You start wondering if you’re doing the right thing if it feels like you’re just dragging him down. Your heart clenches tightly when the worst thought hits — maybe, just maybe, he’s tired of you, too.

But you won’t let him go. More to the point — you can’t. He’s the best part of your life; it’d be a cold day in hell if you decided to leave him.

Even the thought of it makes you feel like dying.  

Then again, this isn’t all up to you.  

You’re rubbing the sleep out of your eyes — and maybe a couple of frustrated tears — when the door creaks open. You see two mugs and his hands before you see the rest of him come through the doorway. Jaehyun whispers a careful good morning as he sets the coffee down on his table, making sure to push his keyboard away to avoid accidents, before sitting down next to you. You notice that there’s an envelope next to one of the mugs; the flap is slightly open, and from under it, a flash of red peeks out.  

His hand finds its way back to your knee — it’s his favorite resting place, he’s told you once. Your lap feels like home, he’d joked. Maybe he touches it every so often because it’s like a reset button for him.  

He doesn’t ask if you slept well, or if you want to get ready before having your coffee, or if you’re okay. He just squeezes your knee a little tighter. It’s you that has to start the conversation this time.

“How did it go?”

“It went great. You’ll see it on TV later tonight,” he starts rubbing your thigh idly. “You’ll watch it later, right?”  

“Of course. I’ll call you and tell you how cool you look.”  

He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. When you lapse into silence again, it’s because you’re expecting him to say something, but he doesn’t come out with it directly. You try not to let it show that you’re worried, that you’re skeptical, that you’re wondering if he thinks he’s too tired, too busy for this, too.  

You’re expecting him to start how most break-ups start. You know I love you, right? And then the telltale but… would come, and you would have to hold back your tears and smile for him, and tell him you know, and that you understand it isn’t the right time, but maybe one day, someday, when he isn’t everyone’s Jung Jaehyun anymore — only yours.  

“You love me, right?”  

It’s not what you’d been expecting. Nor is it the playful little text he’d sent — no laughs, no jokes. His expression is somber, mouth pressed into a thin line.  

“You know I do.”

“A lot, right?”

“A lot,” you confirm softly.  

“Then whatever it is that you’re thinking about us,” he says quietly. “Don’t. Don’t think it. Don’t do it.”  

“Jaehyun—”

“I know it’s hard,” his fingers dig into your skin a little. “I know I put you through a lot. I know you think that I’m suffering because of this relationship too. I know everything. But whatever you think I’m going to do, I won’t do it — not ever. So if you’re thinking of it too, I’m begging you. Don’t. Please.”  

Maybe he had noticed all this time. A wave of guilt washes over you when you see the pained look on his face; perhaps you were even more transparent than you’d originally thought. You nod slowly to show your understanding, and he continues.  

“I know yesterday wasn’t the best you could have hoped for,” he carefully avoids apologizing, although it’s written all over his features. “For me, too. I… I wanted something different. It’ll be better next time. Do you believe me?”  

You hear him swallow — his nails are biting into your thigh a little, so you have to gently peel his hand off. Your fingers replace it, tightening around his palm as you nod.

“I believe you.”  

“And you trust me, right?”

“With my life.”  

“Then can you put your faith in me right now?” He asks. “Don’t panic. Just — just say yes.”

He pats around his pants, finally deciding to slip his hand into his left-hand pocket. Unlike on the Ferris wheel, he manages to extract something, but he keeps it closed in his fist. It’s shaking a little as he takes your hand in his other one, pressing something small and hard into your palm before he curls your fingers over it. His hold keeps your fist closed as he starts talking.

“It’s not immediate. We’ll figure it out. We’ll tell the right people, and they’ll help us tell everyone else — the public, the press. It doesn’t have to happen right now, or any time soon either— not if you don’t want it to. We can take it slow, or whatever. Anything you want — just as long as it’s with me.”  

“Jaehyun,” you shake your head, a little dizzy. “What are you talking about?”  

He slowly loosens his hold on your fingers, his hand dropping to the same spot on your knee. You’re free to open your fist, and when you do, you can’t help but feel a little stumped.

“I don’t mean now,” he repeats, now sounding doubly worried. “It’s not — It’s just…”  

“You’ll get in trouble. We can’t.”

“I won’t. Not if we do this right. Like I said, we can do it slowly. Months — years, however long it takes to do it well. What it is — it’s just… a promise.”  

“A promise,” you echo. It does have a nice ring to it.  

“That I’m not leaving you. Not ever. And… if you say yes, that you won’t either.”  

Your coffee has probably turned cold. Jaehyun is watching you carefully, looking like he’s trying hard not to bite his lip. You look back down at your hand, and he speaks up again.  

“You know I love you, right?”  

You smile slightly. “No but?”  

“No but,” he agrees.  

The ring fits nicely on your finger; maybe it’s well-measured from the amount of times he’s held your hand tightly in his.  

“Okay, Jaehyun,” you whisper. “I promise.”  

When you place your hand on his, he twists his palm, slender fingers gently twirling the ring around the base of your finger.  

Minutes later, he hands you your coffee. It’s sweet and milky, the way he knows you like it best. When he settles back down on the bed, you notice his eyes travel to your finger again, a small smile playing on his lips.  

Perhaps, in this moment, you finally learn to ask the right questions — not about if it’s worth it, but if he is.  

And in this moment, where he sits in silence with you, the sunlight pouring in from his window hitting the tips of his hair and the end of his nose, with the knowledge that his heart is as full as yours, you come to realize that there can — and never will be — any doubt of that.  

[isagrimorie]

I’ve been watching video reviews praising Agatha All Along, and while I more or less agree with their points, one thing that bothers me is the claim that Agatha remained 100% evil, and she didn't change, and that doesn’t sit right with me.

Agatha didn’t have a redemption arc (or as Schaeffer put it, “This lady did not arc out.”), and I understand why. In fact, I love that about her character. The show doesn’t try to sand down Agatha’s sharp edges. I love that Agatha can feel so deeply while still being unapologetically a dick.

But the reason it bothers me when people claim that Agatha didn’t change is because she did.

To put it into context, for a character who hasn’t changed and remains firmly on a villainous path, the reviewers should look at another comic book show that aired at the same time: The Penguin. While it’s not an exact comparison, there are notable similarities: both main characters love purple (sorry, Oz, I mean plum), have a fascinating, wide-eyed, unhinged brunette antagonist, a teen sidekick, and a ruthless quest for power. But there are key differences between Agatha Harkness and Oswald Cobblepot.

The Penguin is the story of Oswald’s rise to power as Gotham’s crime boss. Agatha, on the other hand, was already at the height of her power and villainy. Over 300 years, she killed fellow witches, schemed, and connived. This all came to an abrupt halt when Wanda trapped her in a hex. With the help of Rio and Billy, Agatha eventually clawed her way free from Wanda’s distorted spell.

Initially, it seemed like nothing had changed for Agatha.

But Agatha did change. The Agatha Harkness of three years ago—the witch killer—wouldn’t have sat around a campfire trading stories and feeling emotional about it. She wouldn’t have felt any remorse for accidentally killing Alice.

(It’s funny how, between Rio and Agatha, Agatha reminded me more of Dream than Rio. Both are capricious and prone to holding grudges. Both were held captive by mystical forces and when freed, they denied they had changed—even though their captivity altered them in both small and profound ways. In the end, both characters die because of their capacity to change and are reborn, metaphorically or literally, wearing white.)

I appreciated that the show didn’t dull Agatha’s sharp edges. She was, and remains, a killer. Even when we get glimpses of Agatha’s tragic backstory with Nicky, the show doesn’t excuse her actions. She was a killer before Nicky, during her time with Nicky, and after Nicky. In fact, she became an even more prolific serial killer after Nicky. Her contempt for fellow witches deepened every time they fell for her road scam.

So, it’s tiring hearing that “Agatha didn’t change.” The ending of Agatha All Along made it clear that while she didn’t change—because such a drastic shift can’t happen in just nine episodes for someone with a 300-year history—there was, as Jac Schaeffer put it, progress.

Agatha never considered the consequences of her actions. For example, when she tried to avoid harming Jennifer Kale back when she was a rootworker and midwife, she inadvertently hurt Jennifer for a century.

Agatha spent her life trying to fill the gnawing black hole inside her, running from pain and avoiding anything resembling personal growth. She finds the Darkhold, and she becomes invisible to Rio, her remaining connection to her life with Nicky.

And, even when the world around her burned, nothing truly touched Agatha Harkness—until she found herself in the Hex, facing off against the Scarlet Witch.

Agatha was overconfident. Armed with her vast knowledge and the Darkhold, she thought she was invincible. But she miscalculated, becoming powerless and losing three years trapped in Agnes the Nosy Neighbor's life.

This disruption in Agatha's pattern is enough that when Agatha was about to restart her Killing Game, it gave Agatha pause. When Alice shows up at her house hoping to visit the Road, only to end up dead in Agatha’s basement.

There was even a moment when Agatha went to recruit Sharon Davis as a replacement backup Green Witch, she had to take a moment to confirm to herself that she could live with killing Mrs. Hart.

Agatha’s story (for this season, at least-- because there will be another season or sequel, dammit) wasn’t a redemption—nine episodes isn’t enough to atone for 300 years of killing. It's a story of moving Agatha into a position to transform. Or, as Jac Schaeffer called it, progress. Redemption may come later, but progress isn’t linear. For someone who is an unrepentant killer and con artist, even the smallest shift is big.

Agatha All Along doesn’t try to make Agatha into a hero, nor does it attempt to soften her sharp edges. Instead, the show offers a nuanced portrait—a reminder that even an unrepentant bad guy can evolve, even if they don’t fully understand or accept it themselves.

Agatha Harkness might not be “redeemed” but she isn’t the same either.

[cripplecharacters]

I've been working on a world since 2019 and a few characters have had disability aides that are, like, full arms (haven't done legs yet for some reason, maybe because i drew a Lot of halfbody things for a while) but i have a dilemma that I'd like some advice on

so when a character is amputated/born missing a limb in my world they can choose to keep the amputation as is, or choose to get a 'robot arm' for lack of a better term. they aren't very advanced in technology in the usual way, but everything is kind of shifted to the left. it's been thousands of years and VHS players survived, but the video output hasn't, so now they have reprogrammed them to connect to lazers that show on the top of the box. they also tried cars (a very safe model that ran on water) but stopped once a couple died in a crash. they like pick and choose what they work on i guess

but! the disability part of this is: would it be alright if i have them create a synthetic limb that connects to their nerves (a VERY careful process) so it can still act like an abled limb, or would this just br a cop-out 'magic robot arm that is just like the flesh arm'? there are also alternatives to the ability aides as well; someone can get extremely tall mantis-like legs or get special made claws or whatever makes the person happy. i have a character i always think about with this since she's a tattoo artist that was born with her left arm amputated from the shoulder. so she could use the 'robot arm' to do the tattooing and use her other hand to hold the client still and move them around, but i don't want it to be the 'magic limb' thing again

if this is way too wordy you are more than welcome to tell me to try again, i am sorry, i just want to make sure everything is on the table and makes sense. hope you're having a lovely day/night!

Hello, thank you for your ask!

Note while we don’t have any amputee mods, I live with metal implants and will draw from that lived experience.

If you were to have a prosthetic limb be able to act just like a natural limb, it would fall into the ‘perfect prosthetic’ trope. This kind of character design isn’t disability representation, it’s just for the sake of aesthetic. Here are posts we’ve reblogged on the subject by amputees, I’d recommend looking at them [link] [same post but video format] [link]. These posts go much more into living with prosthetics, what to think about when making an amputee character and tropes to avoid that I ever could. If you really want the cool aesthetic of having a human with awesome robot parts, make an android/robot instead! You get all the cool visuals without peddling myths about disabled people that a surprising amount of people really believe.

As for having a character with an arm prosthetic that’s a tattoo machine, I think it’s fine! I’ve seen real world examples of that exact thing [link]. Just know it won’t act as a hand holding a tattoo machine, it’ll be stiff and to adjust the angle your character will either move their arm or manually adjust with their hand.

There is real world work on making prosthetics that connect to nerves, so I’ll talk about that as well. In previous posts we’ve talked about how most arm amputees don’t like wearing prosthetics since they tend to be heavy, uncomfortable and difficult to use, and that’s especially true for mechanical prosthetics. This article on the subject [link] [video that goes a bit more into it] shows a real world example of exactly the kind of prosthetic you’re talking about, though notably with zero feedback from the people who have one. It briefly touches on how the weight may be uncomfortable, how it needs frequent readjustments and practice from both the technicians and amputee to do things like pick up a block, and how the nerve sensors in it are dull, but I imagine that’s only a small bit of the real story. From personal experience, once a nerve is severed it is extremely difficult to ‘wake it up,’ and in some cases may be impossible. It took months of physical and occupational therapy for me to get back small motions and any physical sensation, and for a long time after that what I could feel changed from nothing to either dull, buzzy discomfort or electrical pain. Not to mention the metal implanted in the person for it to work would hurt [plus these kinds of prosthetic implants that go into the bone have a high failure rate due to the very increased risk of getting an infection, as the implant is both inside and outside the body]. If it gets too cold, if the air pressure changes, and just sometimes randomly metal implants become painful, and I’ve yet to meet anyone with implants with a different experience.

Essentially, using this kind of prosthetic would be extremely difficult and would also be painful and uncomfortable, and any character with one would need to be very dedicated, not to mention have a lot of spare time to dedicate to learning to use it and money to afford it, it’s surgeries and the frequent appointments to get it to work.

I hope this helps!

Mod Rot

[pastanest]

Gale Boetticher x reader

A/N: first thing I’ve ever written for this character/universe but I only recently finishing Breaking Bad (yeah I’m 8 billion years behind Ik) and this man is my mf POOKIE so pls be nice x

warnings: as of writing this I’ve not seen Better Call Saul but I’m aware Gale’s in it so if anything contradicts pieces of his lore found there PLEASE DO NOT SPOIL IT I’ll come back and amend them after I’ve seen that show as well if need be - will be using gifs from bcs tho bc there are barely any gifs from Gale in bb on the internet for some reason

Being Gale’s S/O Would Include

- first of all, Worlds Giddiest Boyfriend™️

- no like actually

- gives very much in-awe-of-everything-his-S/O-is-and-does vibes

- every single thing you tell him you’ve done is a monumental achievement to him, even down to something as simple as going to the grocery store

- LOVES to explain sciencey things to you, regardless of whether you understand the intricacies or not

- in fact, better if you don’t bc he loves going into even more detail just to make it easier for you to wrap your head around

- LEAST condescending person ever, does not believe himself to be smarter than you or anyone else (he is a genius but he’ll only blush and shake his head when you call him that) and is thoroughly impressed by everything you do and know that is outside of his area of expertise

- the king of chivalry

- opening doors for you, pulling a chair out for you, paying the bill at a restaurant, standing up whenever you walk into a room if he’s not already standing, kissing the back of your hand whenever he says goodbye to you; regardless of your gender, Gale Boetticher IS pulling out all the classic romantic stops for you

- is actually a big fan of PDA but not in a making-out-in-public way, more of a will-blush-for-three-business-days-if-you-kiss-his-cheek-in-public-one-time and absolutely loves it

- the fact that you’re proud to be his and proud to love him in front of others makes this man’s heart sing for you

- incapable of giving you anything less than the most heartfelt and expressive compliments you have ever heard in your life

“You are the prettiest star I’ve ever seen.”

“Every atom that makes me the person standing here before you, thanks you for being who you are.”

“If an asteroid hit this exact spot and you, right now, are the last thing I ever see, I will live to be the happiest man there’s ever been.”

- unbeknownst to you he actually has a separate notebook filled with compliments and poetic tidbits that he thinks up whenever he daydreams of you and then saves them up to tell you later

- doesn’t care whether you’re vegan or not obviously but will cook you the most fire vegan dishes ever known to man

- will play records just to slow dance around his apartment with you crying as I type this one fr

- will zone out and smile so fondly, just thinking of you

- the sweetest and most attentive partner in the entire world

- memorizes your every like, dislike, quirk and interest so that he can plan the most perfect dates out for you, surprise you with the most thoughtful gifts and ensure at all costs you avoid things/people/situations that could result in you feeling upset/uncomfortable

- Gale is finely tuned to your emotions and will notice IMMEDIATELY if something’s not quite right with you

“Hey, is everything alright? Actually, don’t answer that; I noticed your hands have clenched marginally more than normal over the past 15 minutes so if you’re comfortable enough to tell me why, I’d love to know, but if not, please just tell me what I can do to make whatever this is better for you.”

- stop it I adore him

[bradshawssugarbaby]

Timeless - III (Bob Floyd x Reader)

A/N: As promised, part 3 in time for my birthday (scheduled to post at the exact minute I was born bc why not)! It's not my finest work, but I'm relatively happy with it. Also, I done goofed and gave OC a name but tagged it as "x reader" - please feel free to just pretend the character's name isn't there, I just didn't want to write "Y/N" over and over and over again - it's written from the reader's perspective so I'm leaving it as "x reader" (also bc I'm lazy and like the parts to all match so).

pairing: Lt. Robert Floyd x reader

warnings/content: mutual pining, some angst, swearing, mildly steamy makeout sesh, Bob drops a bombshell on miss girl.

word count: 1.6k

one - two - three -

You blinked slowly as you tried to comprehend what Bob had just said. You looked at him in disbelief, letting out an awkward laugh as you felt your blood beginning to boil at his words. As much as you’d missed him, pined for him, and longed for him over the last decade, you were frustrated by the fact that this could have been avoided easily ten years ago if you or Bob had just swallowed your pride and said something to one another. While you knew you were just as much to blame on that part, it was Bob who walked away in the end, and in this moment, you couldn’t help but resent him for leaving you, then proclaiming he missed you for so long without ever so much as attempting to make contact. He at least could have asked his mother to speak to yours and provide him the contact information necessary to talk to you - you didn’t have that luxury, a) because he was often away at sea, and b) because he had left you without as much as a goodbye, leaving you under the impression that he didn’t want to see you. For some reason, hearing Bob’s admission made something inside you snap, you suddenly felt bitter and cold towards him for leaving you in the first place. 

“You missed me? Do I need to remind you that it was YOU who walked away 10 years ago? Christ, Bobby, you didn’t even have the balls to come say goodbye to me before you fucked off,” you spat angrily. 

“Listen, Krissy, let me explain,” Bob began, a pleading look in his eyes as he tried to calm you down.

“First of all, my name is Kristen. No one has called me Krissy in years. Not since you left. Secondly, I’ve been waiting, praying, hoping you’d call me. You don’t get to come back after years and hit me with this romantic “I’ve missed you so much” bullshit when you haven’t even as much as attempted to get ahold of me over the years. Do you know how many nights I spend crying when you left, wondering what the hell I did wrong to not deserve a goodbye from you? I thought I was finally over you too, and then you show back up here and remind me all over again just how fucking much I loved you. How much I still love you, and how no other man is ever going to compare to you,” You exhaled sharply as you finished ranting, shaking your head as hot tears stung your cheeks as they fell. 

“Wait, you love me?” Bob frowned as he shook his head, his blue eyes welling up with tears as he looked at you.

“For fuck sake, Bob, out of all that, this is what part stuck with you? Not the part about me needing an explanation as to why the hell you thought it was ok to just abandon your best friend?” 

Before you could continue ranting, you felt Bob’s lips crash into yours, his hands firmly grabbing your waist to pull you into his body. His grip on you was tight and passionate as his lips continued to kiss at yours, and you couldn’t help but moan softly as his tongue gently traced along your bottom lip, almost begging for entry to your mouth. You pulled away breathlessly and shook your head, looking at Bob with a completely bewildered stare.

“Care to explain that outburst, Lieutenant Floyd?” You raised an eyebrow at him and folded your arms across your chest, your gaze intense enough to make Bob worry he’d burst into flames if you didn’t look away from him. 

“Listen, Kristen, I’ve always loved you. I assumed you just…didn’t.” He shrugged his shoulders sheepishly as he blushed, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, “I wanted to tell you, I really did, but every time I got myself psyched up to do it, I’d chicken out and back off. And then I sort of tried to forget about you - threw myself into my naval career, made sure I was one of the best WSOs in the United States, got into Top Gun, I tried my damnest to forget you, Kristen. I really did.”

Bob let out a sigh as he shook his head, his blonde hair becoming perfectly tousled as it broke free from its uniform combed back look. He frowned at you before opening his mouth, hesitating before he spoke, his voice almost in a whisper as the words came out.

“I couldn’t forget about you no matter how hard I tried. I tried dating and throwing myself into my career, I tried forcing myself to see a future with other women, but no matter how hard I tried to force it, it just made me realize I wanted you more. Then I came home and found out you’d moved to New York from Mama, and I wanted to go there and see you - I’d fully planned on coming over here and asking your folks where you lived so I could go visit, try and convince you to listen to me and give me the chance I know that I don’t deserve, and then, as I was getting my coffee the other day, planning on how the fuck I was going to do this all, you walked in and complete threw me off guard, but I love it. It just reminded me more that…that this is the right thing to do, Kristen. I could leave the entire US Navy behind, just walk away and never look back, but I cannot in good conscience leave South Carolina without telling you how I feel.” 

You sighed softly, shaking your head and frowning as your gaze met the floor, completely at a loss for words. You wanted so badly to stay mad at him for leaving without a word, but hearing that Bob had felt the same way you had for the last ten years, it made you soften towards him once again, another gentle sigh escaping your lips before you spoke, looking up to meet his cobalt blue eyes once again.

“Robert Floyd, are you saying that you love me as much as I love you?” You finally said, letting out a sharp breath that you hadn’t even realized you’d been holding in. 

“I believe that’s exactly what I’m saying, Kristen.” He laughed softly, raising an eyebrow as he gently reached his hand out to touch your cheek, wiping a tear away with his thumb, “I never wanted to hurt you, Krissy. I just, I was a shy and awkward 18 year old who was in love with my best friend, and I didn’t know how to tell you. I was scared you’d reject me and I decided I’d rather live with the fact that you just didn’t know how I felt, than risk telling you and you shooting me down faster than I can shoot down an enemy aircraft.”

“For a smart man, you’re kind of a dumbass, you know that, Lieutenant Floyd?” You laughed and shook your head to rid your eyes of any remaining tears that threatened to fall. 

“I know I am,” Bob grinned at you, leaning in to kiss at your cheek, just below your ear. As he pressed his lips to your soft skin, he murmured sweetly into your ear, “But, I’m your favourite dumbass, right?” 

You felt Bob’s lips turn up into a smile against your cheek, his face hovering against your skin for a moment longer as he took in the familiar scent of your perfume, the same one you’d worn since you’d turned 16 years old. His hand found his way around the small of your back as his lips trailed across your cheek playfully. When he pulled away, he gently tucked your hair behind your ear and smiled.

“What happens now? Because, knowing how you feel now, I can’t leave for San Diego without us deciding what to do about it.”

As you were about to answer, you heard your brother calling up the stairs to you both.

“Hey, Ma says to hurry it up with the serving trays, and Dad says to stop fooling around up there like a coupl’a teenagers on prom night,” You could hear your brother’s laughter echoing from the bottom of the attic staircase as he spoke. Your sister’s giggle could be heard in unison with his, and you shook your head as you shot Bob a sympathetic look.

“Nice to see they haven’t changed in the slightest,” Bob laughed softly as he grabbed two of the serving trays and smiled before leaning in to give you a peck on the cheek, “I should probably head back to my Ma’s for dinner before she starts sending out a search party, but maybe after Thanksgiving dinner is over, we can talk?” His voice sounded hopeful as he spoke.

“Absolutely,” You nodded quickly, trying to stop your cheeks from turning bright scarlet red as he kissed you, “On one condition though,” you started.

“What’s that?” 

“You promise to keep kissing me until you make me blush,” You smirked at him as you kissed his cheek, carefully straightening out his hair for him before sending him back downstairs to where your family was surely all discussing the possibilities of what could have taken place between you both in that attic.

[writingquestionsanswered]

Tween Boy Grief/Emotional Portrayal Q's

Anonymous asked: Do you have any tips for writing a young character with avoidance tendencies who lost someone to [tragedy]? My character is a tween boy who lost his older brother, but he's the type of person to shove his negative feelings away and fill his time doing things he enjoys and keep him busy to avoid thinking about them. Because of these specifics I'm having trouble finding advice

This actually falls into the category of questions I don't usualanswer on the blog, as outlined in my ask policies linked at the bottom of almost every ask. Part of the reason I don't answer them is the same reason why you can't find specific information about it elsewhere: everyone and every situation is different. While there can certainly be typical responses, behaviors, methods of coping, etc., how any specific person handles something like grief is dependent upon a whole mountain of variables: personality, mental health, experience, support system, and variables related to the specific situation like: What was the other person like? How close were they? How long had they known each other? What was their status at the time of the tragedy? Was this expected or unexpected? For how long? How long ago did it happen? What else was lost?

I can't give you tips for writing this young character because I don't know any of that about your characters and story. Only you do. And as the writer, it's up to you to do as much general research about this topic as you can so that you know enough about it to figure out how your specific character would react in their specific situation. And even then, there's no right or wrong answer, because even two people with the exact same set of variables can behave differently. All that matters is that it makes sense for what you lay out. For example, if you don't do the work of showing how close these brothers are and what they meant to each other, you would have a difficult time convincing the reader of your character's grief. If you want to portray this character as having avoidance tendencies, you can research those generally ("avoidance behaviors" has over six-million hits on Google...) and that will help you figure out how to make that response make sense for your character.

I hope your research goes well!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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[haptronym]

Hey!! This is the anon from a while back who had that convo with you about quirkless discrimination with your cannon vs fannon posts. The one who sent a way too long ask haha.

I still haven’t picked back up BNHA, just still dinking around in the earlier seasons with my writing after dropping it so long ago due to the exact reason you outlined; I stopped watching due to a certain character stagnating while saying they’re changing. Which I find amusing how prevalent that problem is in so many arcs that it’s the reason I stopped watching the show actual years ago (though not solely, it was that + a combination of other things with that arc but it really exasperated it) and you’re now talking about the same exact issue for the end of it. I don’t even feel like I can say it’s due to external pressures rather then just a weak point of the writer at this point tbh.

But, besides that, on the topic of why I initially started this ask, I just wanted to say it’s interesting to hear the story has still done squat with quirklessness, really goes to show the whole glaring divide in exactly what we where talking about so long ago. Full circle kinda?? It really is such a shame the show never went into it and kinda failed to scratch the surface of anything with how compelling it would have been and how easily it could have tied into the whole of the series’ themes.

But hey, like you said, there’s always fanfics. Just thought I’d send in an ask about it since it was fun talking to you about it last time.

Now that it’s over, I might give the show another shot, for old times sake, we’ll see!

Oh as an add on, as the fannon vs cannon anon, I do want to put a note that since I haven’t seen the thing myself I’m not making too strong opinions on it or agreeing with everything in that post, just contemplating the specific stuff I talked about in that previous anon ask as a sort of now outsider to the series.

This isn’t a “oh you’re wrong!” but making sure people know I’m not blindly following things I’ve read about a series rather then forming opinions around it from first hand cannon, HA! I’ll do that when I maybe start watching it again…one day…

-

(The post under discussion)

Hello again! Glad you're still enjoying the fandom space and haha, it's ironic that this issue is why you dropped the show. I'm also going to caveat that I'm not trying to dunk on Horikoshi or be a bitter hater. The issues I'm bringing up are par for the course for most serial writing, way harder to avoid than they seem. I really liked MHA overall and have huge respect for Horikoshi's writing, art, and ability to keep his sanity while bringing this behemoth to life.

Anyway, a response.

I mentioned a few aspects where quirklessness got brought in later in the story, but overall, yeah, it still felt kind of… vestigial. To me it felt like the author threw it out there at first thinking it was a cool idea, then later went "ugh, shit, that's not actually where I want to focus. I can't retcon it, so let's just... minimize it and move on." A lot of times when big series start, they toss out a whole bunch of possible story hooks and then narrow down to just a few that they're actually going to spend serious time on... anyone who gets hooked on a premise that doesn't end up being developed further can be left feeling disappointed.

I suspect this is exactly the reason why MHA has such a giant fandom. The show's clown-car cast means that pretty much no character really gets "deep" treatment. Instead we get 1,000 tantalizing flashes of really, really cool possibilities. We get sucked in by an awesome idea, get frustrated when the cool character/premise barely gets touched again after that, and then feverishly fill the empty space with fanfic and fanart. (I'm lucky that my favorites, Izuku and All Might, were about the most main of main characters, and even they felt somewhat shallow. I can't imagine the agony of being, say, a Momo fan.)

Unfortunately when a story does this, it also means that it's inevitably going to disappoint its fanbase. It tossed out 1,000 awesome ideas but it only has space to cultivate a small handful of those into proper plotlines… not only is it sad to see all the unused plot threads peter out, but usually the realized story ends up outright contradicting at least a few very popular fan theories and hopes. This doesn't mean the story's bad, far from it. But in these weekly-chapter stories where fans have years or decades to get attached to their interpretations and predictions, praying each week that yes, it seems like a long shot, but maybe the story will veer off into X… things quickly spiral into enormous bitterness when those decades of hope are finally snuffed out for good. (This same phenomenon makes me dread the eventual end of One Piece…)

MHA had a lot of people going "it's not like other shonen!" because it had lots of promising ideas. But it turned out that… yes, it is just another shonen. Shonen are tons of fun, and I love MHA overall. But man, it got hit hard by those high expectations.

I was a bit harsh (and incorrect) in my post, saying Izuku/All Might haven't changed at ALL, and that quirklessness meant NOTHING. It gets outright confusing when there are characterization backsies like the ones I described. Which is canon: the single panel where a character says "quirklessness is a big deal to me!" or the way that every other character behavior and plot point screams "sure doesn't seem like it"? They're both real. And this discrepancy depends on the reader's interpretation too: I'm extremely picky about characterization, while someone less anal might not see any contradiction at all. So we get All Might fans insisting that the show made quirkless issues into a huge enormous part of the plot/characters, and meanwhile I don't see it, and get annoyed and preachy because it feels like the narrative is being unfairly ascribed depth and profundity that I really wanted but never actually saw from it. How dare!

ANYWAY, I highly recommend checking out the rest of the show. I have a feeling the final arc is going to look amazing in animated form once it's finally done. The final section is a combo of delightfully over-the-top shonen insanity and surprisingly weighty outcomes. We can debate whether it really earned those outcomes, but I'm at least pleased that it tried.

[sliky-pixels]

I have shown you the sims but I never explained who they are or my idea behind them. Partially because I didn’t think anyone would care and partially because it’s hard to find the words.

But alas,

Here is what I’m calling my Question Series:

Hayes Mackenzie

As I have mentioned before, this sim was my first experimentation in to female clothes on the masculine frame. I am very proud of the way they came out.

Hayes Mckenzie has been out for a while, just not like this. They're not sure what it was. Finally having enough money to get their own place, finally starting to be known as the resident queer fisherman in Brindelton Bay, or if the need to hide just finally dissipated. But Hayes is ready for the world to see them as they truly are. Regardless of what the people of Brindelton Bay might think or say about them.

Question: What happens when you are finally ready to connect with the world?

Felicity Woodson (everyone’s fav *including me)

Felicity to me is one of the best sims I’ve ever made. They are simple, but bright, and (i feel) not what everyone (straight) thinks a nb looks like. I literally feel like I struck gold with them.

Felicity Woodson has just moved out of her mom’s house. While they still live in Windenburg, they don’t plan on staying long. Not that the friends they’ve had since high school would know, but they have always dreamed of leaving Windenburg behind. They find it all exhausting. The drugs, the drinking, the appearances, the partying everyday and twice on the weekends. But the longer they stay, the harder it is to avoid it all.

Question: How do you carve out a world for yourself? How do you escape where you are?

Atsushi Hidaka

If I’m honest this is the cutest male sims I have made in a while. He took forever to make for that reason. I think with men especially I just click whatever and take it, but wanting to show this character's past/present through his clothes I found it a bit of a challenge.

Atsushi Hidaka has been down on his luck. He's been on his own for awhile, trying to make do with basically nothing. Then by pure chance? luck? fate? he was able to buy a home in Willow Creek for really cheap. Maybe he just met the right person at the right time. Maybe the Gods felt like all his hard work had to pay off at some point. Maybe this is just too good to be true and something is bound to put him on the street again. He doesn't know and he isn't sure if he will figure it out.

Question: When you finally have stability, what do you want next?

Deborah Devi & Karlee Cortez

When I made these two I was thinking fem on fem crimes. I believe I was reading Moby Dyke and Krista, the author, had written something abotu how not a lot of fems date other fems. Then I was thinking what does it really mean to be fem.

Deborah Devi and Karlee Cortez have been friends since their first year at Brichester University. They have been there for each other through it all. Deborah's mom ignoring her after she got her lip pierced. Karlee failing her history class twice. Deb changing her major halfway through and then doubling up on classes to still graduate at the same time. Then after all that, Karlee having to stay an extra semester to finish. Finally, both of them are on the same clueless page with only themselves and each other to figure it out. So many feelings rise up and none of them have anywhere in particular to go.

Question: Will they or won't they? What's right and what's wrong?

Carly Naskar & Denise Naskar

This idea was already living inside me as this is the life I lived from 2023-2024. I wanted to make it clear that her mom deeply influences her. So I tried to make things more modest for her and have just little moments of her popping through. The nose ring, the long red nails, the tattoo. All her just easily digestible.

Carly Naskar did not think she would still be living in her mom's house at 22. She isn't sure where she should be, but it can't be with her mom. Denise Naskar sees the exact path that Carly is on and only wishes to guide here down it smoothly and carefully. She doesn't want Carly to make the same mistakes she did. Carly cherishes her mom. She respects her and longs to be the woman she is. She doesn't know what the cost of all that is yet.

Question: What happens when the pressure from your mom is too much? Who do you become?

[addictedtostorytelling]

Still loving the newest addition to the Happy Accidents series & your last chapter got me thinking about a potential scene I would love to hear from your perspective (or maybe you’ve already written it & I’ve just got to be patient…)

In the last chapter you mentioned Sara’s PTSD & Grissom was so sweet. Particularly this part “She knows why he is worried: Over the years, he has learned to associate nerviness in her with periods when her mental health is poor. She isn’t usually quick to startle, but during the times when her PTSD is bad—around anniversaries—she can be. She gets so in her own head that anything happening outside has the potential to shock.”

It got me thinking about how in this alternate universe, Sara would be about 6-7 months pregnant when the anniversary of her abduction came & I would love to read her thoughts on that & how Grissom helps her deal with it. Does it cause her to reflect on how different her life looks now than a year ago? Does she think about all the reasons she didn’t give up in the desert? Does she feel the baby kick & is brought out of her thoughts, grateful for how her life looks?

And if you’ve already written a scene like this…I’ll sit over here (im)patiently waiting.

hi, @chelsshearman!

good to hear from you again! i'm so glad to know you're enjoying the story so far.

i've taken a while to come up with an answer to your (very thoughtful) question, and though i can't show any prose from that part of the story just yet without revealing some major accidentsverse spoilers, i can offer you a more pared down answer after the "keep reading," if you're interested.

note: in order to avoid major accidentsverse spoilers, i purposefully use ambiguous language surrounding sara's pregnancy in this answer.

__

sara knows from experience: trauma doesn't adhere to a strict calendar.

sometimes exact anniversaries are bad, but other times the days and weeks surrounding are when the cptsd symptoms really hit.

november has historically been a crapshoot for her, any day—not just the exact anniversary of her father's murder—liable to be a bad one, the whole month something of a slog.

though she is hopeful: now that her wedding anniversary falls mid-month, maybe she'll have better associations going forward.

she is well-aware of this temporal idiosyncrasy in her brain, and so is her therapist, which is why he starts counseling with her in mid-april about what to anticipate come may, for what will be the first anniversary of her abduction by natalie davis.

admittedly, she is, at this point, distracted. not only is there a lot going on in her life pregnancy-wise, but things are busier than ever at work. by now, she is no longer in the field and has instead become the de facto "point person" for her teammates at the lab, which, contrary to what she had expected, has somehow upped her caseload. still, she tries her best to complete her therapy assignments with what few spare hours she has. is diligent about going in for sessions. practices all of the self-care techniques her therapist recommends. stays on top of taking her meds. makes sure to look after herself as well as she can.

—and especially because grissom is so obviously worried about her.

not only does he admit as much outright, sans prompting, but he also is so careful with her. he had already been wonderfully attentive, but now she hardly even has to think she might want something before he appears to offer it. she swears to god: the man is telepathic. also, far too sweet.

thankfully, as the calendar turns over into may, there are some fun, new pregnancy developments to help to take her mind off the impending anniversary: grissom is finally able to feel kicking. (for a long time, she had felt fetal movements internally, but they hadn't been detectable in any external way.) also, a first instance of fetal hiccups, which is just about the weirdest, coolest sensation she has ever experienced.

that said, about two weeks before the big anniversary™, she does start experiencing some "trauma residuals" from her abduction. she's not having flashbacks or nightmares or full-on panic attacks, per se; she just feels off. spacey. emotionally unbalanced. like everything in her head has just been shifted two inches to the left of where it should be.

she keeps expecting to have some kind of big breakdown at some point, but the catharsis doesn't ever come.

and, honestly, the lack of punctuation is what bothers her more than anything.

she confides in grissom: she's scared. she tried to get out ahead of her trauma by "doing all the right things," but she is still being affected, not in any obvious, dramatic way but enough so that her trauma is inarguably impacting her behavior. coworkers keep asking her if she’s okay. looking like they don’t fully believe her when she says she is. she can’t help but be concerned: what if the same thing happens a few years on from now? the last thing in the world she would ever want to do to her child(ren) is make them feel like mommy's sad or upset for no reason.

so she and grissom talk the issue through: they both agree that trauma is a fickle thing—particularly as trauma reactions can't always be pinned down to one day or easily predicted in terms of how they'll manifest. show great variance in intensity, duration, form, etc. also can't be totally prevented, even if one tries to account for them as much as possible. chances are, she will be dealing with after effects—from her childhood, from her abduction—for the rest of her life.

sara explains: logically, she knows all of these things. but she still doesn't want their child(ren) to suffer for having a traumatized parent. she has experience that way with her own mother. remembers how helpless she felt when she was little, watching her mother struggle; how much she internalized her mother's sadness and anger. though as an adult, she (mostly) knows better now, back then, she wondered if she caused or exacerbated her mother’s misery and questioned why she wasn't enough to make her mother happier.

here, grissom digs in: "and did your mother ever answer those questions for you?"

her silence tells him no.

grissom offers his postulate: the truth might have helped—not by making sara’s mother “magically better” but by allowing sara, even as a child, to contextualize the situation and understand her mother's mental health conditions existed independent of anything having to do with her. just hearing, in no uncertain terms, that her mother wasn’t sad for any reason having to do with her may have alleviated some of her misplaced guilt.

sara agrees: they should be honest with their child(ren) and explain things at a level they can understand.

but she still worries: it will be a long time yet before they can have those kinds of honest conversations. what will happen in the meanwhile? babies pick up on their caretakers' cues and moods, after all. she doesn’t want to do damage by exuding sadness or fear in their child(ren)’s presence.

grissom reassures her: in all the time they've been together, even during periods when her mental health has been at its poorest ("even in november"), he has always felt loved by and safe with her. he has not been oblivious to her sadness and fear. but he also has never felt that those reactions in her negated her affections. he suspects their child(ren) will feel the same.

still, she makes him promise: if she ever gets to the point where she can't be a good caretaker of their child(ren), he'll intervene. "that was part of the problem," she explains, "with my parents. no matter how miserable things got, no one said anything or did anything about it. no one asked for help. we all just sat there with it."

grissom agrees: they'll ask for help if they need it. offer help when they see it's needed, even if it hasn't been asked for. and neither one of them will give up.

the promise does make sara feel somewhat better.

—though, of course, it doesn’t fully alleviate her cptsd symptoms.

may proves to be a hard month, not only because of the trauma but for other reasons, too.

[insert major accidentsverse spoilers here]

but it also is not without happy moments—sometimes impossibly happy, like the first time they see a footprint, clearly discernible for what it is, show through the skin of her belly—and, most importantly, never without love.

she reflects: one year ago, she was alone in a desert, sure she was going to die. now, she is never alone, and she has never been surer of what she has to live for. lying in bed with grissom, his hand over the footprint protruding slightly below her navel, she feels a kind of peace she could never have imagined she would feel, just one year on from that day. she knows: what happened to her will stay with her for the rest of her life—will sometimes rear up in unaccountable ways—but it won’t be what defines her. won’t be the main throughline in her story. she’s writing that one herself, here, now. and she loves where her story is headed.   

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

[agentnico]

Top 10 Worst Movies of 2024

Ah shit, here we go again. It’s that time of year again and goodness what a mediocre movie year 2024 has been. Even the decent ones as a majority are not ones I believe will stand the test of time (sorry for the overt pessimism). Nevertheless though, I believe I did manage to avoid a lot of the cinematic damage this year, as there are many films I’ve heard negative responses of that I have not seen. Some of those include Madame Web, Venom: The Last Dance, Kraven the Hunter, Borderlands, Rebel Moon - Part Two and many more. Also wanted to shout out Red One as it’s a movie I started but gave up on an hour in as I got bored. However due to not finishing it didn’t seem fair to have it on this list, as for all I know that movie features a Primal Fear level of an ending that would have changed my life forever. Heck, guess we’ll never know. Anyway, there are films I did have the misfortune of coming across this year, and these are 10 of the worst, in my humblest of opinions…

10) MEGALOPOLIS - “So go back to da club” maybe one of the unintentionally best line readings in cinema history, but aside from that this passion project from Francis Ford Coppola is a total mess. It most certainly is unique, but for all the wrong reasons. Maybe Coppola needs to smoke less whilst making his movies.

9) MOANA 2 - How far I won’t go to see another unnecessary Disney sequel at the cinema. Don’t get me wrong, this movie is a box office juggernaut, but it also a project that so obviously was meant to be a TV series and turned into a movie last minute so that the studio could capitalise on an additional pay-check. The result is a sequel that is in every aspect worse than its predecessor, from the music to the story to the characters… you’re not welcome.

8) GLADIATOR 2 - Been there done that. Paul Mescal nowhere as entertaining as Russell Crowe was. Hans Zimmer’s score is missed big time. The story is essentially a copy of the first? Sharks in the Colosseum was fun. Denzel Washington is the only saving grace.

7) KUNG FU PANDA 4 - Unlike Puss in Boots where the wait for the sequel was more than worth it, Kung Fu Panda 4 feels as if the franchise may have run its course and the writers have simply ran out of ideas. There’s nothing new here, simply retreading old territory. I’m sure if you show it to your kids they’ll probably have a good time. Probably. Or maybe just show them the first three films instead. That “Hit Me Baby One More Time” cover though - hell yeah! Also, can we please petition to stop Awkwafina from appearing in every new animated movie?

6) FLY ME TO THE MOON - Is it a comedy? Is it a romance? Is it a space exploration epic? No clue, nor does the movie know it either. Channing Tatum is trying to find his inner Rock Hudson, and legends say he’s still searching for him to this day. The script feels like it had been written by AI, and if this is all AI has to offer then why the hell are we pursuing it in the first place??

5) WOLFS/THE INSTIGATORS - Kind of cheating here by including two films in one, but both these action comedy thrillers from Apple gave me the exact same feels, or lack of. Ironically the collective cast of these two features an Ocean’s Eleven reunion, however all four of them look so tired and deflated in these roles, evidently in it just for the paycheck. These are the types of films where you expect some fun bickering and skullduggery from its stars, yet here the jokes are barely chuckle worthy.

4) BOB MARLEY: ONE LOVE - Every little thing is not going to be alright. For a very special individual this is a very unspecial biopic. Bob Marley is well known legend and icon, and the movie sets out to present him as such, yet it’s done in such a banal and messy way. The film zeroes in on pivotal events that occurred in Marley’s life between 1976 and 1978 however in the context of the movie they lack and real energy or impact. It’s all quite vanilla and under-cooked, and feels like a disrespect towards the man with one life and one destiny.

3) UNFROSTED - Honestly, I expected nothing less from Jerry Seinfeld. It’s easily the movie I most enjoyed on this list. There’s high Cat in the Hat level colourful energy to this stupidity. In no way a good movie, but that Mad Men reference was fantastic!

2) BROTHERS - I was wondering why this movie was so bad as I was watching it. Then I checked on IMDb that Brothers’ screenplay was written by Etan Cohen, who’s responsible for that Holmes & Watson parody with Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly from a few years back. It’s all beginning to make sense now! But this movie’s biggest sin is that it has put a stain on Brendan Fraser’s Brenaissance!

1)DRIVE-AWAY DOLLS - While his brother Joel is out making such masterpieces like Tragedy of Macbeth with Denzel, Ethan has decided to go back to his roots and make a road trip movie that is infused with the 80s/90s goofy feel to it, and he even brings back the briefcase from Fargo! Or from No Country for Old Men. Or The Big Lebowski. Or Hail Caesar!. Pretty sure Brad Pitt also seeks a briefcase full of cash in Burn After Reading…. Honestly what is it with the Coens and their briefcases!? Regardless, this should have had all the charm of the previous Coen brothers outings, but unfortunately this is by far the biggest disappointment I experienced in a cinema this year. Unfunny jokes, boring overdone story, over-the-top annoying performances (Margaret Qualley as fast talking Jamie with a cringe-inducing accent twang gets extremely overbearing by the end of the movie), sloppy editing and transitions that belong in a Harold and Kumar flick…. this features all the bad tropes of a stinker. Drive-Away Dolls - a real no cunt-ry for old men I tell ya.

[daysever]

I have everything I need to really start fresh. I made the change I’ve wanted for so long, a change that at some point I thought would be unreachable for me. Things really do happen. The challenge now is to maintain them—keep them fresh, clean, and unburdened. Because once you reach something, you get there and start to wonder, "What now?" Look at all the changes around me, all the images I can't save, and the ones I can. Where am I putting them? Am I really saving them in a place where I can access them, to remind myself that I've moved forward, that nothing ever really stays the same?

The world isn’t always as kind as we wish it would be. You really have to walk firmly, not letting people get too much into your head, being sure of yourself even when you feel insecure. It seems like I attract a lot of attention, which can be overwhelming, and there’s not much I can do to avoid it. At the same time, I’m caught in a mix of wanting to be noticed and wanting to be invisible. I think my loneliness speaks loudly in the way I carry myself.

I think about the past, and some things can’t really be explained—like how you’re always alive today, expecting tomorrow, waiting for the next month to arrive, hoping for the change that will finally reach your life. There’s something almost divine about the course of your life. It could be the hand of God, or something else, but how many times, for reasons unknown to me, have I crossed these exact paths, seen the church that I now live close to—almost like something was preparing my view, showing that maybe something is written somewhere, something about my future.

Life is a constant management, a constant “next thing to do”—finishing what wasn’t finished, going where you need to go. But what do I really need to do? What sacrifices do I have to make to maintain something that feels like life to me?

If you think in years, we are kind of close to death, if I live more 30 years, that is not much, even if I live more 45, that is kind of a lot, a lot of management to make, a lot of face and body changes to accept when they come, a lot of births and deaths and wars and loves?

I havent been waiting for love in these past few years I think, I have even think really much about it, look at someone and thinking, there could be a new life there. I think I have been so obessed with the idea of fixing, changing and reaching that being loved seems like something I don't really need like these other things, being loved seems not so necessary inside of me like a new seat of bed sheets of a new outfit. Love became such an thing to me that I don't know how to manage, how to mainteined, but I think it comes from the idea that love is not much of a connection between two where only these two need to understand each other but something that need to be understood from others, something that need to be classified and work not just in the feeling itself. When I think I first fall in love I was free in a way that I didn't knew the cruelties of the word, I was so focus on that feeling and that person, the only management I had to really do was between us, when it start to crumble one of the biggest reasons was that we were involving personally and the world was starting to become more close to our connection and get between us. I think now I desire a love that it is manageble but that it feels natural, I so much don't want to doubt myself with the perception of the other, I so much want to feel wanted and enough, loveble and to feel like things, no matter what they are can be resolved without feeling like I am going to lose everything all the time.

I think it has to do with the reality of our death, that we feel like we are awalys losing something, that things are ending, maybe because they are somehow. But not in a way that they will cease to exist, maybe something that is fearfull is telling you, this is ending in this way because this thing will become something else. I want to accept the end of things to a new thing arise. After a first date for example, if it will happe again or not, there is an ending in there, you will not have the first date thing, in the same way again, but maybe it will have a second and multiple other ones that each will have their endings, but to a new thing, to a new feeling, a new meeting with that thing. Sometimes indeed things end and don't start something new, they really cease. So I think the fear comes from the fact that there is ending even in the possibility of a continuation, of a forever. It's awalys ending, that moment will never happen exactly the same, nothing is really keeping the same skin, everything is rooting, rebirthing, reseing. That is life, there is no garantes of staying where you are, with who you are with, there is only the garantee that it happen and it will change, even if it stays a little like the same, is not.

It’s crazy how the things you write can lead you to something completely different, a new resolution for a past feeling, a past situation you thought you had figured out but you didn’t. Right now, I’m writing to understand. Am I always writing to understand something? Understand myself? I think it was Joan who wrote about the act of writing—that she writes to discover herself, to understand why things affect her, what affects her. I imagine how difficult it must be, or maybe easier—I can’t tell—understanding life through words, or just letting things happen with you and around you without thinking too much about them, without making something of them other than what they are in themselves.

For as much as I want to have something really specific to do with my writing, the specific always seems to need to be something culturally recognized, something for others to read. Which, as a writer, the desire to be appreciated for my writing is very real, but in what way?

There is a day where things arise, where you notice them more deeply? There is a day where the God inside of you or inside your modern typewriter makes you seat and do this, taking control of your time, or your eyes. I don't think he makes this with everybody and that is why I think I feel lonely but the things I notice, there are things, very small ways, of the weather and how the place I am sitting feels, that I am the only one who is feeling like this and that is who you are, what everyone can do but not everyone can feel it exactly like you. Good or bad, that is you and no one else.

I think if I never stop writing eventually I will have the tought that is really my subconcious saying what it means to feel it.

I think if I never stop writing, eventually I will have the thought that it’s really my subconscious saying what it means to feel it.

[monsterkong]

The Grind Never Stops: How Work Ethic Defines Success

You’ve probably heard a lot of motivational speeches about success and hard work. But let’s be real—some people just don’t want to put in the effort. 🙅‍♂️ I’ve seen it firsthand: people who don’t want to make calls, who avoid tough tasks, and simply can’t be bothered to grind. And guess what? That’s the exact reason some people succeed while others don’t. 💡

The Work Ethic That Separates Winners 🏅

Here’s the thing—every successful person I know is a workaholic. They don’t just dabble in their work; they go all in. They’re relentless in their pursuit of success, and they don’t complain when things get tough. 💪 They have thick skin, and they know how to push through adversity. 📈

If you’re serious about building something great, you need to develop this kind of work ethic. Not just showing up, but truly giving it your all. No shortcuts, no complaints, just a mindset focused on results. 🚀

Surviving the Tough Times 🌪️

Let me tell you, I’ve been to the brink in my business. I’ve faced moments where I thought everything was going to collapse. 😩 It’s been a rollercoaster of challenges and victories, but the only way I’ve survived—and even thrived—was by adopting an insane work ethic.

In the past six months, I’ve grown more than I did in the years before. That’s not an accident—it’s the result of intense focus, relentless effort, and pushing through, no matter how tough things got. 🌟

The Bottom Line 📝

If you want to succeed, you need to be prepared for the grind. There’s no secret formula, no magic bullet—it’s all about work. The ones who make it to the top? They’re the ones who keep going, no matter how many obstacles stand in their way. 🌱

So, let’s embrace the grind, push past the challenges, and work like there’s no tomorrow. Because at the end of the day, work ethic is what separates the winners from the rest. 🔥

[dailydivination365]

What a weird dream...

I had a really weird dream last night. One of my cats was pregnant and, for some reason, stopped being pregnant. It made me sad, so my partner and I had sex. I decided to impregnate her without telling her. For some reason, I thought she wouldn’t know I did this, so I kept it to myself. It bothered me all day that I was hiding the secret from her, so at night, in our home's basement, I told her, to which she responded in a dead pan tone, that she knew the whole time. I was taken aback by her lack of emotion, initially thinking she’d be furious when the dream ended.

When I woke up, I thought it was a good opportunity to do an I Ching and Tarot reading for the dream since it was so jarring. Not surprisingly, both readings offered a unique perspective and gave me a good idea of what the dream represented symbolically.

After the I Ching reading, which I did first, I realized that I was avoiding a potential conflict out of a desire of what I wanted. Sex is an intimate and vulnerable experience for me. Sharing that with someone is always a challenge, sometimes even with my partner, whom I’ve been with for close to 6 years. I also have a desire to care for people. I mention in many of my posts how my purpose is to help people discover themselves. In a way, that’s like being a parent. But the fact that I was hiding that from the world shows my shame in feeling this way.

Upon realizing this, the movement led me to a place where I could know what I really felt and not be afraid of expressing it. It allows me to have the innermost sincerity. I don’t want to express it symbolically hidden in a basement but on the main floors of my home, during peak daylight, where everyone can see. 

I went into the tarot reading with this knowledge and I was faced with an unexpected situation. The reading was negative. The more I thought about it the more it felt like a warning. While I was afraid to express myself in the dream, I was acting on selfish desires and scheming to get my way. I wanted something and abused my surroundings to get what i wanted. Obviously, this the exact opposite of what I want to do.

I thought that maybe this was a warning. Since I was uncertain, I asked the tarot if I understood correctly and found that I did. Conflict will inevitably arise if I’m not honest with myself and the world around me. Being able to sit in the dangerous waters of my unconscious, not being afraid of being swallowed up, shows the resolution to my problem. My dream could have been avoided if I had the gall to communicate what I wanted. 

I’m afraid to be open with every post, but I always do it. I do it because I know it’s the right thing to do and will help me achieve my purpose. It seems the dream told me to continue being honest with myself and the world. It’s telling me to keep posting my thoughts, feelings, and revelations. It also told me not to take advantage of situations to get what I want - an underhanded tactic. All I can say is thank you to my unconscious for showing me the truth without reservation and for the universe to guide me in understanding that truth.

JARGON SECTION:

I Ching Reading:

Q: What does this dream mean?

10. Treading (conduct) - Heaven over Mountain - Moving lines: 4th

Transformed hexagram: 61. Innermost sincerity - Wind over Lake

Tarot:

Q1: What does this dream mean?

Deck: Rider-Waite

Spread: 3-card spread (situation, problem, resolution)

Situation: 6 of Pentacles (Reversed)

Problem: The Fool (Reversed)

Resolution: Ten of Pentacles (Reversed)

Q2: Is my interpretation of the reading correct?

Deck: Rider-Waite

Spread: 3-card spread (situation, problem, resolution)

Situation: Five of swords

Problem: Knight of Swords (Reversed)

Resolution: King of Cups

[payservewomen]

….I look up to see her stroll over to my backpack…She began screaming at me….throwing each item from my bag at me. This might’ve been the most humiliating moment(shockingly)because i had a chastity cage, wartenburg wheel, a hollow butt plug, and ofc a collar/leash which she’d actually told me to bring, she’d said “I’m going dancing tonight, so bring the leash”

Couldn’t for the life of me figure out how/why those 2 things were connected?🤷‍♂️

All i can come up with is- Dancing means she’d be drinking? Therefore, would enjoy being more aggressive? But saying that to me, maybe she was thinking that I’d get extra excited, and hopeful that she’d have me wear it for whatever reason…my thought was of myself wearing it, and taking slap after slap from her, as she used the leash to pull me closer….but nope! When everything else was laying out all over the sidewalk for everyone to see, she took out the leash/collar and began beating tf outta me…as i bent over, at first on my knees, then falling over tryna shield myself from the beating….at first it was just my back and body, but as she yelled at me, she condemned my poor decisions…ofc those being spending HER money on useless shit. Useless because- Nobody wants to use kinky sex toys with a loser like me….”Wtf you think, huh? U think I would ever wanna use this shit with YOU?! You gon’ learn bitch, you don’t spend MY motherfuckin money on bullshit! Stupid ass ugly fuck!”

Something like this is what she said…I was genuinely shocked at how brutal she was being!

Evidently, she’s paid attention to, and read many things i’ve commented on, on twitter….part of me wants to believe there’s some mutual respect or something there, but tbh, that’s silly n stupid af!

I couldn’t believe it, she held onto the collar part, and swung, hitting me with the leather handle of the leash, while also getting hit by part of the chain….she screamed n berated me sooo loudly, by this point, i could faintly hear ppl laughing and talking from the shadows…..I tried looking around a little, even glancing at her friend who was sure to keep her distance but was watching the show intently….then, Goddess adjusted her grip, holding onto the collar and leash handle….leaving only the metal chain to beat me with…..she swung n swung, hitting my back, sides…everywhere….Think then, she asked me something a few times, making me look up at her, and when i did, I took painful shots to back of my head, but also the chain wrapped around my head, whipping my face and neck.

I still remember feeling the chain land on the side of my head perfectly as it wrapped around my face causing extreme pain.

I was somewhat in a state of shock….I’ve never in my life been beaten up…once many years ago, I was punched in side of my head hard enough to throw my body to the ground….That’s literally IT!

This was by far by far the most/worst beating I’ve ever received in my entire life.

Shorts down around my ankles, lying on my side, like if ur on ur knees and knocked over, but hunched down, cuz of tryna avoid the chain beating…..She stepped on my head at first, pushing my face into the concrete, yelling at me to lick it, i ofc did, and she stomped my head a few times…once bouncing it off the concrete….she backed up, looking at me…..said “fuck i should make ur bitch ass walk home like this” looking over at her friend while laughing…yeh know what? Take em off bitch! I was still in a state of confusion and haze after going through such violence…at this point, there was no horny feeling, nothing erotic at all…at this point, it was more shock than anything, and I obeyed without even thinking, but as I began to take them off, I did realize “oh fuck, my phone!” As i slid my shorts over my shoes, I slid my phone and vape out, leaving them on the ground, just hoping she wouldn’t demand i hand that over too! She took my shorts, holding them up, then going back to my bag, she took out an extra shirt and shorts i’d brought(with this exact scenario in mind) “Oh so you brought extra clothes, huh? What, ur dumbass thinking I’d just not notice?! Huh?! stupid fuck” And she took it all with her…

Oh and I neglected to mention…just before dumping out all the sex toys, causing me to be red faced beyond belief, she took out everything one by one, asking “is this for me?” Something about how she did that…me lying there, completely emasculated, then asking if each item was indeed for her….Wonder what would’ve happened if i’d have said no to any of it, lol can you imagine??

Here I sit, on a monday, at 1pm, remembering this beyond sexy, gorgeous Goddess(Seriously, my god, she had a tiny top on, but her skirt?!😲 Hugging her curvy hips like nothing i’ve ever seen)who beat my ass on saturday evening…yesterday, I did nothing, just laid around in bed all day….I suppose tryna repair my broken ego…..And STILL haven’t jerked off!

For many reasons really….