#I've actually had this in my brain for a while but college is awful so I only got to drawing it now

[squidkidcelebi]

It's a miracle he hasn't quit yet

[kteezy997]

the director's daughter-part one//t.c.

this is going to be a revision of the story I originally wrote and posted on Wattpad but got deleted. Luckily, my Beta has it saved for me<33

Warnings: cursing, yearning/sexual tension

While shooting a new movie, Timothee Chalamet was staying at the home of the film's director, Colleen, along with his costars, Florence Pugh and Zendaya, as well as Zendaya's boyfriend, Tom Holland. After getting off their plane, Colleen's driver brought them to a massive, modern-styled mansion.

Upon entering the house with their luggage, they were all greeted by the lovely Colleen, who gave them a quick tour of her large home and assigned them their bedrooms.

Later that evening after everyone settled in, the director and the cast met in the living room to go over the shooting schedule. As they spoke of the coming weeks, they eventually heard some footsteps.

In walked a young woman wearing a white tank top and some trendy striped boxer shorts. She was seemingly so preoccupied with the AirPod Max headphones on her ears and the iPhone in her hands, that she didn't even notice the group of people sitting on the couches.

"Oh yes," Colleen piped up, "I almost forgot I had a daughter." she joked, speaking louder to get the attention of the young lady. "Y/n!"

Y/n was startled and jumped slightly at her mother's yelling voice. She removed her headphones, smiling awkwardly.

"Honey, you probably already know all of these people already, but, Timothee, Florence, Zendaya and Tom, meet my youngest child, y/n. She's twenty-two and she is also visiting me for the summer along with the rest of you."

"Wow, thanks for the marvelous introduction, Mother, but hey everyone, I'm y/n." she smiled kindly now to the other young adults.

The actors all raised from the couch, greeting y/n with hugs and sweet words. But it was different when Timothee stopped in front of her. She could see why the world, especially females, were so taken by his boyish good looks and his curly hair. She felt like those green eyes were seeing into her soul.

"Y/n." he said, giving her a soft smile and then hugging her.

She hugged Timothee, feeling the softness of the shirt on his back and taking in his sandalwood scent. As they both backed away from the hug, she said, "I didn't mean to interrupt, I was just going to grab some water and head up to my room. Goodnight everyone, it was great meeting you all." She parted to the kitchen with a wave of her hand.

Timothee could not get y/n out of his mind for the entire evening, not even as they all dispersed to go to bed. He laid awake for two hours that night, just letting his brain wander to repetitive thoughts about the mysterious young woman who just waltzed into his life.

The next morning, y/n took it upon herself to make breakfast for everyone, to kick off the summer. The cast members were in awe of the yummy smelling spread on the kitchen island she had put out for them. The entire household sat in the kitchen and had breakfast together.

"So, y/n, are you in college or..?" Florence asked, taking a piece of bacon from her plate and biting into it.

"Oh, no, I'm actually, well I was an Olympic diver." y/n answered.

"Oh that's so cool!" Tom said, "So do you have like medals and all that?"

"Yes, I've got three Gold and two Silver." she said, taking a bite of her waffle off of her fork.

"We never could keep her out of the water when she was little. And we are so proud of everything she's accomplished." Colleen said, the pride evident in her tone and she smiled.

"Hey, I knew I'd seen you before." Zendaya exclaimed looking at y/n, "You were in those Nike ads, right?"

"Yeah, they sponsored me for three years." y/n blushed, wiping her mouth shyly with her napkin. She wasn't used to being so recognized, especially not by someone as famous as Zendaya. As they continued the morning meal, y/n couldn't help but notice that Timothee was being much quieter than the others.

After breakfast, Colleen made an announcement: "Okay guys, we are heading to set today. I want you all to see the work being done and have an idea of what it is going to look like." She then looked at her daughter, "And I am trusting you to stay here by yourself and not break anything or burn the place down."

"Mother, I am twenty-two years old, I think I can handle it."

“Yeah, she did cook us breakfast and the house is still immaculate.” Florence pointed out, making the others giggle.

.......

Once everyone else had left, y/n showered and put on a little bit of makeup to go with her white lacy top and black jeans with the knees ripped to catch the summer breeze outside. She ventured out of the house to go to the art supplies store. She wanted to indulge her painting hobby.

It was a quick little shopping trip, the movie gang was still gone when she returned to the house. She went to her room upstairs and kicked her shoes off. She turned on her music, letting it blare through the speakers in her room as she set up her canvas.

After seeing the set, Zendaya, Tom, and Florence made plans to grab some food and then go grocery shopping afterwards. Colleen had a meeting to go to.

Timothee, however, opted to go back to the house instead of dinner, claiming that he didn't sleep well the night before and just wanted to relax.

Upon entering the mansion, he could hear the muffled music coming directly from y/n's room. He smirked to himself, shaking his head. He decided to get a shower and freshen up. It was one of those summer days where you started to sweat just by stepping outside.

After getting out of the shower, Timothee wrapped his towel around his waist. He stopped at y/n's room when he left the bathroom, intending to greet her and let her know that he was back. He knocked on the door, but there was no answer. The music was so loud, she didn't even hear him enter her room. He stopped to watch her for a moment, she was painting, but also swaying her hips to "In the Night" by the Weeknd.

She slathered a bit of paint onto the canvas, did a twirl and squealed when she saw someone in the room with her. She nearly jumped out of her skin! "Timothee! What the fuck?! You scared the hell out of me, dude." She put her hand to her chest to still her raving heart.

"I'm sorry, I just wanted to let you know that someone else was home, I didn't mean to scare you."

"How long have you been standing there, you creep?"

"Hey, I'm not a creep,” Timothée put his hands on his hips, “I only stepped in here for a second."

Y/n found herself distracted by the water beads streaming down his naked chest. "Um, okay. Where is everyone else?"

Timothee smirked, noticing her eyes scanning his chest. "Out."

"mm." she hummed, nodding.

"Is there anything you want from me?" he asked, daring.

She then shot her gaze up to his eyes, "What do you mean?"

"Look, we're both adults here. I see the way you're looking at me, and honestly, I want you too. Everyone else in the house is going to be out for hours. If you want me, I'm yours."

“But,” she shook her head in disbelief, “you didn’t say a word to me this morning.”

Timothée shrugged, “Yeah, I felt kind weird because I wasn’t sure if you were in to me. But now I’m pretty confident you are.”

She grinned, giggling, “Hmm, what makes you so sure?”

“Because you were just looking at me like you wanted to fuck my brains out.”

@gatoenlaciudad @thebetawolfgirl @musicandbooksaremyhappyplace @softhecreator @tchalamss @lixzey @bitchyunknownuser @ducktapebar @aoi-targaryen @yukideadinside @elloise0 @thatoneweirdgirl17 @mel-vaz @sammy-halpert @iwishchalamet @that-one-fangirl69 @jindongdongie @briefkittenearthquake @imnotoverlyobsessive

[baravaggio]

actually story time

when I was in college I had a period of time where I would hook up with this guy every once in a while, it was the worst kind of situationship where there were like. a lot of heavy family issues involved and we weren't really friends, he definitely saw me as a convenient source of emotional support with a side of pussy lol...I was like, riding all the way out to coney island late at night to meet him so he wouldn't hurt himself, that sort of thing. at the time I was going through my own shit wrt starting to understand my sexuality, won't rehash how agonizingly drawn out & painful that was for me, but I got to a point where I thought I had a little clarity on it and had decided to tentatively call myself bisexual (for like a week lmao). and - very very stupidly - I told him this in the interest of reciprocity, because he had shared so much with me about his situation and at the time I saw that more as an honest display of vulnerability than like. him indiscriminately using me as an emotional crutch

looking back the 180 he did on me was pretty awful, it started with like, gross fetishistic curiosity, which I cautiously tolerated within limits because it was new for me too and I was honestly grateful to speak openly about things after a lifetime of keeping it all padlocked in a secret compartment in my brain. he wanted to know where I was & what I was doing all the time, which annoyed me because we weren't together or anything, and even if we were that wouldn't be cool. he even outed me to some people, usually when I ignored him for too long, and tried to convince me it was no big deal

sex was obviously where shit really hit the fan, I won't get into details outside of saying he suddenly would get physically rough with me without asking after having never done that before. again, no details but one of my worst memories was when he started saying disgustingly homophobic things to me about me in bed. I ghosted after that. shortly after he started spam texting me with homophobic slurs & rape threats until I blocked him. I was very lucky that this coincided with the end of the semester and his move & transfer, and that it didn't escalate to physical stalking or anything.

of course I literally never told anyone this, I compartmentalized it for a long time (10 years LOL) when I started IDing as a lesbian because I wanted so badly to make it irrelevant to my life and frankly was very embarrassed by how I let it go that far. but it's really been haunting me since I reassessed all that. it can make figuring out how I go about navigating certain types of sex and even platonic relationships painful and complicated. aside from logistics & other preferences, it's a big reason why I feel the need to keep things casual and unromantic, even as I've managed to work through some of this & have healing and transformative experiences with specific people. last year I had a terribly hurtful argument with a younger gay woman in which I was told the stuff he did to me would've hurt even more if I didn't have the capacity to be into him at all, which has thrown me back into a place of deep angry silence about all of this yet again.

idk. I try to not be so sensitive about dumb bullshit I read but it's very hard when I've experienced the dismissive attitudes and callousness irl. I do my best to hold my head up and do my thing but the routine dehumanization & lack of sensitivity upsets me. I'm angered by the way so many people think they have nothing they could possibly learn from our experiences and thoughts about how these systems affect us, that there's nothing we could share that they don't already know. it hurts my feelings that so many people automatically take our attempts to share these thoughts as an attack on them, regardless of how carefully we phrase things. and on a personal level it hurts to currently have nowhere irl or online where I feel like I can talk about the pain of what I've shared here (or even the healing moments I've experienced) without someone telling me off for not behaving the way they think I should lol.

anyway. I really do wish I was strong enough to let this all slide off my back just for the purposes of my own well-being. I'm trying to limit what I see about these issues so I don't feel tempted to mentally engage. when I see sentiments that clearly want to make me & those like me feel like less than nothing, all I can think about is how there are girls even more raw and vulnerable than me seeing this stuff and it makes me heart ache. even so I know there are people out there who will understand me, I hope to find them one day so I can move through everything with more grace

[lubileaf]

Ahem, behold:

*unfolds note* A commission~

Could I request a male character named Anafis (i've been obsessed w/ that name recently) and a female character named Pamela?

Setting is in collage or a boarding school, and they go for a walk in the forest. Then they find a little kitten that's injured with its mother nowhere to be found, thus leading them to adopt it....

Love you, biche~

     Oh why this is lovely 🤩

Thank you, love, and feel free to request more.

(Also help this took 3 tries 💀 you keep wrecking me lmao 💀💀)

  "Please come!" He tugged on her wrist collar.

       "Anafis- you know I have a meeting with Mr. Collin! I can't-'' She shook her head in frustration. Anafis really wanted to explore the forestry campus since he was free, but Pamela wasn't.

       "I'll cover for you!" Anafis offered, practically dragging her down the hall. Pamela saw no use in resisting and followed along with a huff.

       "How?" She retorted. "You're not good at lying or… anything really."

       "Then how did I get here?" Anafis quipped, spreading his arms in regards to the huge college they had gotten into. "And how did you get here?" He turned slightly, waiting smugly for a reply.

        "I earned it," Pamela slapped his shoulder and walked ahead, Anafis cringing in fake pain.

_______

       The pair exited the building and made way to the forestry campus, used mostly for survival and foraging classes. A black gate stood as a barrier between them and the tall trees, sprouting from thick, green growth.

       Anafis pried open the gate and slipped in, Pamela close behind. 

       Wide dirt paths bound the outskirts of the woodland and plants seemed to multiply as they ventured deeper. The tree tops formed a well for sunlight to pour into, pooling down and nearly blinding any creature that dared enter. The rest of the ground was shrouded in darkness, but still legible enough to see.

       Anafis snaked around each dense clump of fern and jogged on until he wedged himself between some birch trees. Thick-trunked oaks stood silently, blending into the dogwoods and cherry trees that clustered within each other.

       Pamela was overwhelmed by the diversity of growth here. She spun around and around until her brain sunk into her throat, making the world tilt. 

       "Why are we here?" She asked, Anafis peering up a tree in his reply.

       "I'm just bored," he sucked his cheeks in, maneuvering around the trunk.

       "I can't do this right now," Pamela pinched the bridge of her nose. "I have to meet up with my physics teacher. I thought you needed help out here or something."

       "I might, actually," Anafis pointed at something upwards, forebody resting against the crinkly bark. Pamela padded up beside him and squinted.

       "And why would you- oh," her eyes widened, spotting a small cat peeking over the edge of a branch.  Her words were forgotten as it mewed weakly and pawed at them.

       "Help me get up there," Anafis jumped and clung onto the lowest branch. Pamela sighed and used her shoulders to push his legs up while directing his feet to indents in the wood. He began to climb up and up…

       He had disappeared. Pamela waited with her arms crossed and neck aching. Eventually she heard a faint hiss and muttering before Anafis appeared again, this time with a kitten slung in his shirt.

       "Not that I care about you at all, but that thing could have rabies," Pamela stated with closed, quivering eyes. Anafis clicked his tongue.

       "I know, but look," he gingerly pulled out the kitten's tucked paw. It was bent the wrong way and had crusted blood embedded into its fur. It also bore white stripes across its gray pelt, eyes a magnificent green.

       "Aw," Pamela brushed a fingertip over the creature's head and looked at Anafis, who gazed softly at her. Pamela sniffed.

       "I know you want to," She pursed her lips. "So just take care of it for a while. Use this to cover for my missed meeting." Anafis beamed.

       "I saw a stray cat and you helped me catch it!" He gasped dramatically. "At least Mrs. Bellworth may be considered, as she is not fond of them. She will be glad to know we have rid of another."

       "Except you are keeping it…?" Pamela tilted her head, snorting a laugh.

       "Yes! And you'll help me," Anafis quirked an eyebrow.

       "Oh, no thanks," Pamela turned and walked towards the gate, a small grin forming on her face. Anafis came to walk alongside her and began babbling about cat care and extra help from friends. Pamela just rolled her eyes. 

       She was late

_______

[thedisablednaturalist]

My theory on why people have mid life crisises:

I think in the first part of our lives, when we are young, we spend a lot of time waiting. Waiting for the weekend, waiting for our birthday, waiting for our favorite holiday, waiting for vacation, waiting for finals to be over etc. Time seems to go by faster because we have taught ourselves to wait to enjoy things. We want the hard stuff to be over quickly so we can get to the good stuff. The good stuff being rare for the working class as we spend most of our time, well, working! And in our young adult years working is especially awful bc we have to prove our worth, don't usually have great benefits like vacation time, have to take more hours, and any free time we get we have to spend on adult responsibilities. So instead of being present, we turn our brains off and try to live in the future. And once we get to that future it goes by super fast because we've been living in it for a long time already. And especially for people who are working (and not still in college), life starts moving really fast. So in your middle twenties through your forties you're on that grind, years pass as you go to different jobs, move up the ladder, etc. And once you finally reach a point where you are stable and can afford more expensive things, go on vacation more often, take long weekends and actually enjoy your free time cause you can afford paying people to take some of the responsibilities off your shoulders, you start living in the present again. And then you realize oh shit! Look how much time has gone by. And I spent it all suffering compared to now! I'm already halfway through I gotta make the most of every moment! I can't believe I didn't do all these things I wanted to do! And then they get an expensive car, try out different clothes, because they are afraid to live in the present. Now they want to live in an idealized past. They don't want to live in the future because that's closer to The End.

Its probably different for people who aren't middle class American office workers. And I've noticed that most of the time, the ones who get mid life crisises are middle age, upper middle-class, American men! Correct me if I'm wrong but you don't hear much about it in different cultures, at least not in the same way. People may be sad they aren't young anymore but they aren't having a Midlife Crisis (TM). But even that stems from the same core issue of being afraid of running out of time.

If humans were able to make the most of every day, to not always be waiting for the weekend or for vacation or important events, I think time would go by slower, or at least we'd feel more satisfied with the time we've spent. But our society has to change to one where people can be doing what makes them happy, and they don't have to worry about survival. People can quit jobs they aren't happy with, people don't have to work if they don't want to or can't, people can access medicine and transportation easily.

These are just some thoughts I've had while driving, please take it with a grain of salt I'm not an expert. This is also from my point of view and does not encapsulate the entirety of the human experience.

[justanothersnakeblog]

My thoughts on Weston College Arc

Episode 1

Wow! This was a fantastic start, like amazing!!! I noticed a couple of scenes out of order, but I actually love how they did it here. The first like 5 minutes reminded me of UP, and the pendulum swing was so mesmerizing.

My favorite sounds were the bells, the pendulum swing, and the crackling of the fireplace, too. I experienced the first episode with headphones on, and it automatically enhanced the experience!

The way MacMillan said “P4!” made me snicker. I wasn't expecting his voice, I'm sorry.

I gasped at its beauty and when Sebastian walked in, I felt his presence! It was demanding and domineering? but welcoming! He looks so damn good, I bit my finger. 🫦

This first episode got me fucking hyped! Oh and “Yes, my lord” with his hair falling out from behind his ear was perfection!

The only nitpick I have is the change from fags to drudges but I understand why and I'll get used to it. It just… feels too vague to me while fag was used for a specific reason since Weston (Eton) is a British school and not because teehee f slur.

Episode 2

I didn't enjoy this one as much as episode 1 but still liked it nonetheless. The animation of the cover, best fucking part! I fucking gasped. Oh and want the fucking tea and the lemon myrtle soufflé glacé… ca cest toujours delish!Seeing

Soma at the end was great!

Episode 3 

Best one yet! I liked that they added a recap. 

I awed when Agni showed up and cried for his master. 🥺 It was better than in the manga! The sound design fucking wowed me once again! 🤩 The hooting, bells, and organ were perfection.

Maurice Cole is more tolerable now re-reading the manga but I still don't like him. His scenes with Soma and Ciel exposing him were funny and satisfying af, cooked to perfection! Edgar breaking his bond and seeing his devastation and his fucking ugly ass were the cherries on top!

The expressions were on point, especially with Maurice Scowl and Ciel's face when he said he wouldn't know what it's like to be a second son, forever untitled. His voice changing from soft and feminine/innocent to his real one was also perfect.

I'm glad they included the elephant scenes because I loved them and the sound the elephant made. It was not as great as the manga, but the scene with MacMillan and Ciel sharing a bed was nice, too.

Ciel is such a manipulative bastard and I love it! I'm glad he shared a laugh with the P4. They're buying his performance and good vibes all around. The organ music playing while he accepts the flower to be Clayton's fag? Magnificent. That devious smile sells it and sets up for a great viewing experience next time. 

The only nitpicks I have are I wished Ciel was asleep while Sebastian rummaged through the trash and the chibi demonstration while Ciel explained vibrations was kept.

Episode 4

The footsteps, clinking of the teacup, and pouring of the tea sounds so clean. The sound design scratches the itch in my brain. The crunch of the bread!

That whole scene under the Swan Gazebo was the best one. I love it when Ciel masks and laughed at Violet, not drawing Greenhill, who got clonked with a piece of bread. I gasped because I knew the scene was coming.

*dramatically gasps for air* That charcoal snapping off and hitting the ground was fucking perfect! 🤩 It didn't disappoint me one bit! This sound design is fucking fire and crisp as hell! They really sold me on this whole scene.

I've been looking forward to this scene as well as a few others. It captured the intensity of that scene and the comedy of it as well! I'm glad they put no music and showed everyone's reactions rather than something dramatic playing in the background.

The scenery around Swan Gazebo is beautiful! I rewinded it. They also changed embroidery to poetry for some reason?

This episode had me laughing with Agares falling down the stairs. I also love Sebastian's reaction to him and how he looked at his hand. That's enough of a giveaway to anime onlys that something about him is off.

Lantern scene: Manga vs Anime

I also finally watched the fire scene where Ciel threw the lantern, and I like it more now that I've seen the episode in full. I think the music here was wonderful, and the whooshing sound/smashing of the window while the dorm caught fire was great!

Manga

Is it inconsistent and makes less sense for Ciel to throw it that far? Yes, and yes. I like it, though, because impossible things happening is the beauty of fiction, and he is doing something himself.

He also has agency and he does have Sebastian use his powers to find Derrick but only after he gives the order. He had an option because of the dialog. Of course you can argue Sebastian is doing what he can help his master.

Sebastian teased him in that scene, though, thus bringing up how Ciel is going to go about this. I like that teamwork makes the dream work, but in the manga, Sebastian gave Ciel an option to make his own decision, and that's what I like about it.

Episode 5:

Yes!!! Burn. Burn! I like the burning and crackling of the fire in any scene. I also love the glow of his eyes and the negative effect used in the anime (as seen with Undertaker and in the intro).

Like, ooh! Ah!

That poor elephant. I like his sounds and scenes, too, like Soma telling him he did a job. I give props to Soma for calling out Violet but a mayor of purple house? Lol. I'm sure he meant prefect.

I like that Clayton being hit comes into play later. It's not really significant, though. It's just funny that he gets hit twice in the same fashion. Next time, don't have a voice that makes you sound like a crabby old professor.

"Shit! There's people around, and I better act normal." *runs gayily toward his "teacher" and places his hands on his chest rather than a normal thank you* Love these two, especially when they share a conniving smile and a brain cell.

I love their entrances, especially Violet Wolf but maybe I'm biased because their my favorite house. It's cute that Lizzy cheers them both on. Ciel should have Edward Midford down as cause of death on his death certificate, lol.

The individual fires are so pretty and combining them are even better!

Pfft, Violet Wolf dormitory eating like gremlins.

Lawrence sisters have really lovely designs, and the little sister they offered to Ciel as a wife looks the best. Soma looks good as well, and Sebastian winking at them... hot! 😍

Edward is clever but couldn't figure out who Mr. Michealis was, lol.

Start of the Sapphire Miracle fashback: *sniffles* Those men are beautiful! I love me some Vindee. ~

Episode 6:

I love that we continue with the flashback of the "Blue Miracle." Vincent may be a cunt who likes to mess around and cheat but he won't let anyone speak badly about his house, even another prefect. The wind and the shadow shows he means business.

I like the sound of birds and the water and the music as well while they talk. The transition from "You better hold up your end of the bet/You as well" to Green House losing was absolute perfection! 😂👌🏻 The music is wonderful, and the sway of his hips as heads toward the boat just... the ✨️ sassiness and sexiness. ✨️ People don't like Vincent's eye color but they made both men beautiful.

Dee swimming after the boat had me rewinding and snorting this time around. Lmao! His voice actor did a wonderful job. I know Alexis is the original fanboy. He ships them! Anyway, their faces at the end of the flashback was priceless. Everyone else is either o.o or 😒 while MacMillan is just 🤩✨️. I wish we saw it.

Imagine being named Coward. That's unfortunate because your teammates could yell at you like: "Get the ball, Coward! Defend the wickets, Coward! We lost the game because of you, Coward! 😤" I'd cry.

Okay, so I don't have much to say about the cricket part overall, except it's beautiful, the hits are satisfying, and like father like son. The Ciel is evil, and that part with Harcourt being sent to heaven DID NOT disappoint! One of my favorite moments, and they did it justice! 😂 There are smaller but significant moments I like, but I'll get to those when they come.

The bit between Tanaka and Sebastian is always great. The old man knows they use dirty tactics but still respects them for it. I like his new VA, too.

Purple Burnout is so pretty! Not so significant, but Edward observing other people and making their moves his own is what makes him great. It's like a fanfic of an original work. He's playing homage to it or gets inspired, and/or even if he copies it, he still respects the author who created it originally.

I love how he can see through Ciel's tricks quickly and that he's there for the Queen, but not that Sebastian is Professor M. God bless him, lol. At least Greenhill sees that he's a genius.

The Radetsky March was done nicely. There's not much to say there.

I honestly thought that removing the cricket explanation and funny bit with Bard's pie missing is sad and fucked the pacing first time around. Also, no Snake. 😭 Stop doing this to my boy!

I love the last shot of Sebastian taking off his disguise, though. Possibly, my all-time favorite part is next. Go, Sebastian!

Episode 7

I like how when Ciel imagined Sebastian, the heart had little sparkles and it floats away! I love when Lau pulls the "Sorry! My English no good" shit! 😆 Lmao, on top of it, Cole is so salty.

The tiny flags waved by Tanaka. 🥺

Yesss!!! The principal vanished?! That would make a cool ending of an episode, but I like how they did it here.

I love it when they do the demon eyes all staring at you twice: First when Ciel trespasses at Purple house and now with Blue House players surrounding the wickets. The first batter for that round feels dread, lol.

The chant "It's not cricket!" to complete silence with no music is wow! That was so good. The cliff tactics visual is really cool and I like the sound of thunder and the batter falling of the cliff.

They went from laughing to being in awe, and the wickets clattering was satisfying as hell. Ooh! I love the visual of Bluewer and the Owl, too. I like the flashbacks they put in the games as well. That smack made my mouth hang open. Like, damnnn Greenhill. The ball damaged the seating area!

Is that a piano version of "The Parade of Battlers" when Ciel is giving Bluewer a different ball? That's awesome until... Ciel gets hit with the bat. 😆 It's the dramatic, and the sound of Ciel grabbing the ball is good like their sportsmanship, and they WON the game!!!

Episode 8

The moment they moved everyone to tears to Sebastian tending Ciel's wound was just beautiful. That Eton looks delicious too. Love anime food! 🤤

They all look so good in the uniforms, and I like the photograph and how short Ciel looks in it compared to the rest. The music is heavenly!

Okay... both the boat scene and the festivities are where the visuals and sound design fucking shine! They are at their best thus far and probably won't get no better! The sword draw was clean and fireworks sound so nice along with the music and other stuff. I want to be there celebrating the festivities with them! Just wow... Amazing. 🤩

The owls cooing, crickets chirping, and the piano music playing while everyone's asleep... "Weston College is blanketed in a silence that sharply contrasts the day's clamor." That's actually worded better than how I would've put it. That flower and teacup/saucer is really pretty! I wouldn't mind having a bouquet and teased like that. It's even prettier when it blooms. *gasps* The bells, the organ, the moon and garden, the opening of the passage, and the clinking of teacups... I love it!

I like how the shadows are over the other boys in the photos and Derrick in the middle as he is the minor antagonist yet main focus of the entire arc.

Great ending with him showing up as if nothing happened. Fabulous!

Episode 9

I like the petals. The voice going from normal to like demonic... that's good. I don't know the sound made after Ciel points his gun at The Headmaster, but I'm down for such a heavy sound. The wind is back with the brief silence, and I have no complaints. Ooh... Derrick's death reveal! 💯 They made Undertaker being Ryan's research partner more obvious, lol. Omg the heartbeat growing louder, yes!

Teeth, teeth, teeth! And Sebastian's red eyes. Lovely!

The visuals and music/sound design for his reveal in this scene is everything! I'm glad Junichi Suwabe returns to voice Undertaker! The cinematic record, the ink, splatter, his smile... absolute 🔥🔥🔥! Not to mention the style and colors, too. I adore that they added this, and it's the coolest way to recap and remind us who he is/what he did up to this point! ❤️

One of the students being hit made me bear my teeth. 😬

Episode 10

I don't think I like people being hit in general but I'm okay with it in Derrick Arden's case. 😌

*chants* Teeth! Teeth! Teeth! Teeth!

Yes! Rock and wobble while laughing in that chair, I love you crazy old man! Also, the whole explanation and imagined fight were so awesome! It shows the difference between Sebastian and Undertaker and how the soul he crafted and molded to be stolen away from him as well as the person he cares most about.

I didn't know Edward came back with a sword. Does that mean he was going to fight and/or protect? In the words of Lizzy: "Big brother! You're so cool!"

Love the shot of the bloodied flower.

My boy is back! I missed the chaos and enjoyed it more in the anime with the sheep chasing Meyrin and Tanaka riding one, lol! I wish they kept "bastard" but I can't complain because my boy is back!!! 😄🥰🙏🏻😭

The striking of the match and crackling of the fire is always pleasant. I wish they kept the photo, though. 😔 It does look like the oven or stove is like the ones they had back then!

She's got to be the antagonist. That bitch is up to something! There's one episode left but this was a very nice wrap up for WC Arc!

Episode 11

We wrap up this arc with chapter 85 and end it with the beginning of GWA after the credits. Let's talk about it!

Okay, so the beginning scene is really nice! My baby is back, and he's looking beautiful! 😍 Finnian humming is really cute, and a scene that confused me was explained. I was confused because I thought she walked toward another cabinet, not backward!

Who is Agni's VA? They did a wonderful job, though brief, I loved seeing him again! 🥹❤️ These two are always a riot.

Everything looks so pretty, and I love the stuff they add, which made the scenes better imo. The servants are so fun and adorable with the glasses and Ciel the hat!

The Snake and sexy girl scene made me laugh and the cigarette scene was done well, too. Finnian with a lollipop! 🥺 I like that they gave Bard a scene to explain Somerset House.

I like the clinking of the mourning hair jewelry, and it looks really pretty!

They didn't lag in the second half either! I enjoyed the music and the cards gracefully floating down to the audience with sparkles for pizzaz! Miss Irene is looking beautiful in both her appearances as herself and Juliet. This part also got laughs outta me, such as Sebastian pulling the carriage, the crowd rushing toward them, and Ciel's "Sebas-chan!" when he got pulled back and held up. Plus, Sebastian's little clapping bit, lol.

The last couple of minutes after credits like omg! They get you hyped, and there's no down in the quality either! They also actually speak German, and it sounds SO good! I can't wait for my favorite arc to be animated!!! 🤩

In conclusion:

Very solid anime with gorgeous animation, voice acting, and 100/10 sound design that stayed faithful while adding its own touches. The outro isn't bad and is super gay while the opening plus visuals is a banger! Episode 10 is my favorite. I'm over the fucking moon for GWA being animated and I actually enjoy Weston College Arc a little bit more now. Thank you for your excellent work, Cloverworks!

[serkonans]

it's 4 am i'm wide awake and also deliriously tired at once somehow so i'm gonna just ramble out what's on my mind

so there's this project i'm on at work, right, which i've been on in some capacity for a year and a half. when i first started on the project, i attended meetings where i listened to people give presentations on different issues that needed to be solved, and those issues were completely incomprehensible to me. everything was so complex and multilayered and required so much context and logic that it was like my brain couldn't even grapple with the breadth of how much i didn't know and would just go totally blank.

there were two guys who gave a lot of these presentations, who i was really in awe of because i felt like they must be otherworldly smart to understand any of it, let alone break it down for others and present possible solutions. in my mind, they became The Guys to impress. if i could somehow get them to think i knew my shit, that would mean i really knew it.

so i've spent the last year and a half dedicating myself to learning everything i can about this project and the different facets of it. i'm the one giving a lot of presentations that they listen to now. i'm pulled into meetings with a Bunch of people (including them) who are fiercely smart and fantastic problem solvers. and i spend so much of my time thinking no way in hell do i deserve to be in these rooms. my imposter syndrome is so large and looming all the time and i worry incessantly that someone is gonna notice and they're all going to point and laugh and turn to face away from me and i'll never win anyone back over because of my comparative idiocy.

but my kind-of-boss told me that one of them has said multiple times how smart he thinks i am and that he's so impressed by me, and i found out just two days ago that the other was really glad that i was in that room and giving the input i was giving. that one actually said as much to my face. and it was wild bc i literally got the validation i'd been so desperate for and inside i basically was like ......nah thank you but that's nothing.

because of course imposter syndrome is not something that can be cured through external means. so i was realizing that i'm going to have to solve it by finding an internal sense of validation. but while i was thinking about where the hell i was going to find that, i had something occur to me.

of those two guys, both have been at the company for years and years... one has been on this project since its inception 5+ years ago and worked for the company before that as well, and the other has worked for the company since he was in college and is 14 years in at this point and has been working on this project for almost as long as the other. it's not like we all started on the same day and they just intuitively got it and i didn't. they had a shit ton more experience and context for literally every single piece of what they were communicating than i did. they didn't get that overnight.

and i've thought "WHY" so many times about that one thinking i'm so impressive but when i stop to think about it as like. if i'm a guy who's been working on this for over 5 years and i've seen almost everyone involved in this project come and go and i've explained the same concepts a thousand times and basically written the project bible, and then some kid comes out of nowhere and is able to quote that bible back to me and give valuable presentations and feedback (and occasionally say something that stops me in my tracks and forces me to reconsider a plan of action) in a matter of months, i would probably also be like who the hell is this and how do we keep him here.

like. if i step out of my own head where i have been bemoaning not being a 100% flawless expert all the time 1.5 years in, and look at it from an angle of literally anyone else, that shit actually is pretty fucking impressive. like i can actually conceptualize how it would require me to be both intelligent and dedicated in order to get there, and how much respect that would garner for a lot of people. i would want me in the room, and i would certainly want me to be paying attention and speaking up while i was there, and not thinking about whether or not i belonged.

just wild to think about if i'm being real. like goddamn i have been really hard on myself and held myself to really exacting standards that have not been reasonable at all. and also idk. maybe if everyone around me that i'm looking up to is so smart, they'd be able to see through it if i wasn't. and maybe if i stopped thinking so much about whether or not i deserve to be viewed that way, i would be able to spend more time proving exactly why i do.

[nightcrawlerzincorporated]

I like to think I know my Sunny lore; but I've seen people say that the roller rink ep creates so many plotholes. You're my local most-knowledgeable-seeming tumblr blog so I'm burdening you with this cause a google search does nothing for me:

What are some of the plotholes?

only thing I can think of is Dee being sweet because its confirmed she was also a bitch in high school. I feel like most of the other things can co-exist! Am I missing something?

I'm so glad you see me as knowledgeable about Sunny lore <3 I rewatched Roller Rink before answering this and this is my reading:

Dee's characterization is definitely the part of the episode that people tend to dislike the most. As you said, it feels off that she's consistently described throughout the show has having been awful since high school (making Cricket eat dog poop, acting superior and snippy towards her only female friend, Ingrid, setting her college roommate on fire, just off the top of my head) but then in Roller Rink she's all sunshine and positive energy. I understand it's meant to be meta commentary on how Dee was originally characterized as "the nice one", but even in season 1 she's only marginally kinder and more self-aware than the guys. Exaggeration can be a great tool in comedy, but the exaggeration of Dee's kindness is so over the top in Roller Rink the commentary gets lost. It feels like it's commenting on a version of Dee that never really existed. If they wanted to comment on the sexism that led to the one woman main character initially being written to be nicer than the men, they should have actually had the guys act sexist towards her, imo. Maybe when Mac makes his "Dee's nuts" joke, instead of having Dee respond "I don't like crude humor" and walk away, they could have had her laugh, then had Mac make fun of her for being "unladylike" for laughing, so she shuts down and lies about not liking crude jokes before walking away. I can so easily imagine a version of this episode where Dee is trying so hard to be "the nice one", be the stereotypical girly-girl (maybe as a persona to keep all the new friends she's finally managed to make), but in the end she can't do it and explodes, revealing her true colors as just as much of an asshole as the rest of the gang. Like why does she become mean after hitting her head as if her personality flaws are all caused by a physical brain condition instead of just revealing that it was always a part of her, just a part she used to try and ignore. They could have even still had her smack her head, only instead of turning mean right away, maybe Charlie lets slip that she hurt herself because he loosened her skates and she goes off on him, too angry to keep the persona. The way it's portrayed as the guys being super nice to her before she hits her head also feels so off--as if the sexist way they treat her is her own fault and if she was just nicer to them they'd be nicer to her. Yuck! I understand it's Mac, Dennis, and Charlie telling the story and that they would want to portray themselves as kind, but they could have at least put in a line from Dee when it cuts back to the present about how they were never that nice to her so it isn't so muddled. They could have done the same basic idea while actually making sense with the lore, been more aligned with what actually happened meta-textually, and shown how constantly saying women are inherently kinder and more moral than men is sexist in of itself and forces women into shallow boxes of banality instead of seeing them as human. But it feels like all that the actual episode is saying is, "Isn't it funny that we initially created this character to be nice and now she's mean lol things sure are different now!" It's so toothless and messy. Sorry for the rant, I ended up having a lot of thoughts about Dee while rewatching!

To get back to plotholes, the other big thing I've seen people talk about is the way Dennis acts around Frank. But to me that part makes more sense. Yes, Frank treated Dennis and Dee cruelly in their childhood and was severely neglectful, but that's the exact reason why I think young-Dennis would try so hard to impress him and be kind to him. Dennis wants desperately to have a good relationship with his father, and he sees Frank letting him come work for him as his chance to win his father's love and approval, so he's overcompensating. I think a lot of people take his line, "I'm starting to think my dad's a bad man" very literally and say "How could he have just realized how bad Frank is after a lifetime of mistreatment?" But it's pretty common for abused kids to justify the way their parents treat them as normal, and it makes sense to me that a (probably extremely triggering) event like Frank having sex right in front of Dennis would push Dennis into accepting the harsh truths he's been trying to ignore about how shitty Frank actually is. Him finally allowing himself to accept that Frank is a shitty dad and a bad person because of an extreme event isn't the same as retconning Frank's past abuse and painting it all as this one incident, as I've seen some people argue. I mean, even Mac, who is all about family, is almost immediately like, "Well, you never have to see him again if you don't want to" when Dennis vaguely says something bad happened, which to me makes it seems like the way Frank treats him is something they've talked about before. And the way Dennis instantly agrees that no-contact is a good idea also makes it seem more like a "straw that broke the camel's back" situation than the show trying to say this is the only bad thing Frank has done to Dennis. And I really like the way it ties together Dennis agreeing to buy the bar with him deciding to go no-contact with Frank. He wanted the bar in the first place to be able to gain independence from Frank and move on from his childhood, only to have Frank show up one day in 2006 and buy the bar out from under him anyway. Oof! I do wish they would have involved Dee in some way, since it's implied in season 2 they were both no-contact with Frank by 2006, but I also think Dee is overall more willing to accept how abusive their parents were than Dennis is, so it makes sense she wouldn't need a big final reason like he does.

I don't think people typically have any issues with the Mac and Charlie bits, plothole wise, at least that I've seen. Watching through I didn't notice anything about them that stuck out to me.

I hope that answered your question! If there's anything I missed that people consider a plothole in the episode, let me know! I love discussing sunny episodes in-depth any chance I get and I love hearing other people's thoughts!

[lighteyed]

okay so basically, i'm in college (not a freshman) and i was like "hey i still have never been on a date but if it happens it happens, if it doesn't it doesn't" this year. but THEN good ole' marching band rolls around (yes, i'm a nerd, ik) and i'm having fun and getting to know the other people in my section, all that jazz

and then randomly, one day, my brain is like "hmm if C[enter rest of name here] asked me on a date i wouldn't say no" and i was like "where on earth did that come from" and ignored it and continued on with what the band director wanted us to do

days pass. band camp ends. school starts. we have Actual Marching Rehearsal As A Class and i'm driving home and i'm like "aw dang i didn't really talk to C even though we're in the same section and we start the show in the same line. but we did smile at each other? from across the way" and then i was like "wait why do i care"

flashback to the random thought. boom. i have the sudden realization that i actually have a crush on this dude even though i've only known him for, like, two and a half weeks. so it's hardly been any time at all and i'm like. what the freak, girl, this was Not in my plans to happen. especially this soon

but also, like? there might be the slimmest chance C might like me back? i mean he probably thinks we're friends (we are, even if we don't talk every time we see each other) like we had a band meeting this weekend and before it started he just saw me sitting there talking to the peeps next to me and asked if he could sit next to me? when there were other people he knew sitting around with open seats next to them?

plus i friend requested him at like 9:30 at night because i forgot about time lol and he accepted it while it was definitely still late at night but before i went to bed? i'm almost definitely making way too big a deal about that one, haha

anyway, yeah, that's mostly it. 100% i'm procrastinating hw by telling you all this. and also i don't really need advice (this most def needs more time than half a month), mostly i just needed to get it out and into the universe instead of rattling inside my head

so thanks for reading my rambling thoughts about this random dude haha -🎼

LISTEN I LOVEDDD hearing about this and i love crushes and talking about them i used to have a crush tag on here when i was more active where people would come into my inbox and chat w me about it so this was so fun!!! having a new crush is such an exhilarating feelings it’s like what is this where did this come from it kind of just hits out of nowhere?? him asking to sit next to you when there were other open seats around hmmm VERY interesting i would love to be kept in the loop on where/how this goes hehehhe

[thedawningofthehour]

Do you have an entire plot for the story written out already? Because you update quite frequently but I can’t bring myself to continue some stories. Any tips?

It's not written out, but yes I know roughly what's going to happen and have the major climaxes plotted out. Though I'm sure more stuff will occur to me as I write and the whole thing will grow-that's how it always is.

So part of the reason the update 'schedule' for Book 1 was so insane was because I legit had like a third of the story written out before I even thought about posting it. I had almost all of Donnie's Table Content done and I had written up through the point where the fam finds Donnie's battle shell. (there will forever be a stutter in my mind at the beginning of ch 8 because that's where I stopped writing for a while to polish up the first few chapters and post) And I kept writing on even as I had several chapters ready to be posted because my brain was still thinking of stuff. I did run out of this buffer eventually-I'm trying to build it back up because I liked having several chapters written out at a time and able to move stuff around as needed. But those times where there were literally three or four days between chapters? Those chapters were already done. I was just trying to space them out.

Also, keep something in mind. I am a childless adult who is currently unemployed. I'm not in school. I'm not dating. I'm actually kind of agoraphobic and rarely leave my house. I really don't have much else to do. A lot of you seem to be high school or college students, and I'd wager that many of you have part-time jobs as well. You guys are busy. You do not have the time to write this much. That's not a moral failing, that's just life.

So I'm probably not the person to ask about powering through writing when you're not feeling it. I'm awful at that. I mean, you do have to do it to some extent when you're a writer, but I drag my feet so much. One thing I'd do though, is ask yourself where your problem is. Are you just getting bored after a certain amount of time? It's possible long-form just isn't your thing.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Some authors write twenty book series and keep revisiting their universe throughout their entire career. Some of them think up a story idea, bang out a novella or short story, and move onto the next one. If you find yourself dropping stories a lot, you might just be the latter. That's fine! Just know your limits. If you know the story will only hold your interest for a few chapters, maybe try limiting yourself to shorter fics or oneshots. Or if you have an idea that would work way better long-form, maybe collab with another author or get a beta reader? I've never done either, but they seem to help a lot of authors get their wheel unstuck when it's down in a hole.

Another thing that I do-I don't post every story idea I have. I have many, many fragments of stories in my Google Docs that I began, wrote a few thousand words, and got bored with. That is how doth started. I had the idea of Donnie being a little shit to Draxum while in a very obvious "I'm fucked" position and just started writing that for fun. I was not planning on posting it. It was only after I kept writing and more and more ideas occurred to me that I realized I was onto something. This has generally been what's happened for most of my fics. Not every idea you have needs to be a full-fledged story. It is absolutely fine to get bored with a concept and leave it in your Docs folder. It's like pruning a tree-sometimes you need to cut away the unhealthy, broken branches in order for the good stuff to grow.

[airbussy-a330]

Thanks a lot to @nigmos​ for tagging me in this 😊

🎶✨ When you get this, you have to write down 5 songs you actually listen to and post them. Then send this (ask or tag) to 10 of your favourite followers cool ppl✨🎶

Picking just five songs was tough cause I pretty listen to a lot of different genre (though it does have the flaws of rarely getting really in deep into any of them), so I decided to present some songs I’m still listening to that I grew up with.

1) Mala Vida

From the album Patchanka, might be my actual favorite song of all time, though I really much enjoy lately this cover I recently found. This cover also briefly play the beginning of another song by the same band which is Sidi H’bibi. It's also by the band of Manu Chao who is now mostly known for Me Gustas Tu (a song which starts with for me the incredibly relatable lyrics "me gusta los aviones") which is now a...TikTok song apparently?

2) Youri

(oh my god the video has a myspace link in the description)

I actually only heard this song a few time growing up cause my dad had the album and would play it in the car. I rediscovered it recently while going on a nostalgia trip and relistening to that album and yeah. Love it. I'm not sure at 100% but I think it's about the first person in space, Yuri Gagarin. Which like, that's cool, that's a unique topic I guess. (but like that band also has a song about jerking off at a park...like that's not a metaphor the song is literally called "I jerk off at the park". And it used to be on the radio a lot in 2014). From the same album I also very much love Ton Avion. Putting the audio and not the official video cause for some reason the video is an...orchestral version??? Which btw both Youri and Ton Avion have a country version also. Alright then!

3) J't'emmène au vent

This one's a 90s classic in France and the French speaking world in general. That band is pretty much known for the violin going crazy in their songs and the singer always singing like he's on the verge of a panic attack...Ok that one is just me who thinks that. Personally I prefer Les Nuits Parisiennes but I only wanted to put songs with official videos.

4) La Tribu de Dana

Another late 90s classic, a song which belong to the extremely niche genre of Breton rap...Like it's niche enough I'm pretty sure this band is literally the only one. It actually sample a sea shanty from Brittany called Tri Martolod (Three Sailors in Breton). Though it did cause controversy back in the day cause the band specifically sampled that version from the 70s without asking the singer first. I also like Mais qui est la belette which sample another Breton folk song, La Jument de Michao (or Le loup, le renard et la belette).

(unrelated but I found out The Longest John, who became mostly known during that whole sea shanties obsession the internet had two years ago, did a cover of Tri Martolod. which is amazing cause like...the breton language is sadly dying)

(also la tribu de dana is 100% my shitfaced karaoke anthem and yes, it is literally just because i cannot rap so i sound even more awful)

5) Yolande Wong

Honestly this one started as a meme in my friend group during our first year of college but now it's unironically in rotation. I did listen to it a lot growing up cause my dad had a friend who knew the lyrics perfectly. It has alterned my brain chemistry. I love you Yolande Wong, I want you to come to my wedding too. I even made you as a Sims, Yolande. Please come back to me I'm begging.

Alright I think I've humiliated myself enough. I don't really know who to tag, I don't have a lot of followers let alone some I interact with enough to feel comfortable tagging them in this and all the one I have have already been tagged so uh...If you see this and wanna do it, feel free to do so. You don't even have to tag me lol though I'd be nice I always like discovering new music.

[shirogane-oushirou]

hi it's time for a dive into * .✧ ro's ancient oushirou art ✧. * on this lovely oushiversary!!

(aka i don't wanna reblog any of this art directly from the source bc a number of the posts include my old name ^_^ also there's a lot and i'm already spamming y'all with old art KJNASFKJN)

↑ early college era -- still hadn't taken coloring classes, but i had taken anatomy classes and was using my favorite boy as practice outside of classwork :o)

↑ that first one was from when i was drawing my own dakimakura cover bc i figured honeybee would never deliver on an official one (and also a nod to the fact that i had just had my first taste of nutella and it broke my brain (positive)). and i could be wrong but i thiiiink the second one was around when the official one was announced...? maybe?

i just needed a daki so badly. when i FINALLY got my hands on the daki cover, pillows of that size weren't standard over here, so i actually had to make my OWN dakimakura by sewing two standard pillows together... in a larger case comprised of a sheet... which i did all by hand bc i didn't have my sewing machine at the dorm... i was Committed. 😊👍🏻✨

↑ The Sillies. i'm saving everyone from being subjected to all of the oushipug drawings but. ousheep.... ough... and i included the third one in my nick-gave-me-a-pass-to-gush post, but i'm putting it here too bc. it's cute. :3c

↑ practicing with the yoh yoshinari sections in the PSG design books. good stuff, highly recommend taking a look if you're into very interesting western-japanese animation style mixes.

↑ shortly after getting my hands on after winter -- the bouquet is a drawing of a scene from his route ;w; he's so sweet... and so clumsy... top left is from the time when i was watching the end of clannad during all-nighters while working on assignments. can you tell just from that sentence that i was Quite Unwell at the time? KJASNFKJN. (still love miku!oushirou so much tho. honestly love this style. i want to study my art from around this time at some point, maybe regain some things that were uhhh Firmly Discouraged, to put it nicely, during my later college years.)

↑ doodle dumps! first one is from shortly after playing AW, second is from maybe... junior year with a couple from sophomore year? just a lot of style practice. third is mostly from the end of college when i was. struggling kJNASFJKN. SCAD Profs I Will Not Name made me feel like shit for drawing "too anime", then a couple of years later said their "anime" students were their favs, so my style was. very mixed and not confident. skjdnf.

↑ random gifs! wish i could find it, but i also have one somewhere of him blasting off team rocket-style KJASNKDJN and another of him getting scared from a horror game? movie?

↑ first anniversary pic!! and a reblog meme of "draw your favorite character wearing what you're wearing right now", and i was dressed to drive down the street for some late night gas station food w roommates.

↑ selfship-before-selfship "wife blog" art from 12yrs ago!! kazuaki, the series's artist, has drawn catboy oushirou in design docs before, so he'll sometimes pop up in my art as well ksjdnfnkj. also, naturally, self insert art babey. and he's being a little asshole ksjnd.

↑ the one on the left is like. right around when i graduated?? the one in the middle was for his bday, probably 2020, when i was just starting to get back into art, the one on the right is a college sketch that i redrew as practice to ease myself back into drawing in 2020.

↑ bday cupcakes for the bday boy!!!! around like. 2013 or 2014? i used to do a lot of baking for his bdays before i had dietary restrictions kJNASKJFN, though i sometimes sneak a little treat in on his bday if i can find one.

maybe as i sift through posts on my old blog i'll collect all of the weird art i've done and post them in chunks like this. nice way to put them someplace without spamming people with old curiosities ksjdnfk.

(credit)

[lastoneout]

Okay, so before I became disabled I used to work at a movie theater in a small-ish city with this one pediatric dentist who's clinic I guess must have been serving like every single fucking family in the area based on how many ads I always saw, and he had a habit of renting out three or four theaters every six months or so and inviting all of his patients and their families to see whatever big kids movie had just come out.

And bro went so hard on this that he would hire people to come who would dress up as the movie's characters for the families to take photos with like it was a goddamn theme park(I'm guessing like serious hobby actors/cosplayers or something, it was a college town I'm sure there were people doing that), and so he got Belle for the Beauty and the Beast live action release, shit like that. But this rental was for one of the Minion movies and I assume he just couldn't find someone with a good costume...and to preserve the tradition(and stay on his patients' good side) he instead got some like eight year old kid in the most god-awful Minion costume I've ever seen. Like it was clearly home-made, it didn't look anywhere near as nice as the princesses he'd found, and so for the whole event there was just a random little kid in this creepy homemade mascot-style minion costume who....hung out and let people take pictures with them.

Before I continue, I need to stress, you could not see the kid's face, there was mesh in the center of the eye that they could see through, but you could not see their human body-parts aside from their legs. (The thing didn't even have arm holes idk why.)

Also, in the interest of honesty, I'm not usually get bothered by uncanny valley stuff. I'm not scared of mascots or clowns or anything like that, animatronics and puppets don't bother me, I don't think the kids in The Polar Express look weird, but this kid. Idk there was just something OFF about them.

Anyway I was a team leader and my shift that day was Hall, which meant I was just there to make announcements in the full theaters(turn off your phones, take your kid out if they start crying, ect.) and help with managing lines, answer guest questions, do restroom checks if the ushers are busy, ect., which we needed because again this dentist rented out like four huge auditoriums and invited half the goddamn town, and thus I was around this kid...more than I would have liked to be.

And I think they could tell*.

Because after the films had started and the lobby was mostly clear we accidentally ended up standing across from each other, like fifteen feet or so, and I hadn't noticed them until, all the sudden, I get this awful feeling like I'm being watched. Have you ever been able to tell something is making Direct Eye Contact with you despite you not being able to see it's eyes? It was like that. I quickly deduced it was the kid and just kinda froze staring at them while trying to figure out why I'd suddenly ended up in a horror movie, several tense seconds passing as they looked directly at me and I looked directly at their horrifying creepy little painted minion eye...

And then they lunged at me, like they were going to break into a run, and I swear to god my life flashed before my eyes. I have never been that scared, and I have severe anxiety. For a brief moment all of my higher thought vanished, leaving naught but a primal, screaming instinct that something Human Shaped But Very Much Not Human was coming DIRECTLY for my ass with violent intent, which made me visibly flinch and almost scream, and let me just say it is a very good thing that kid did not actually run at me because my brain tends to lean 'fight' when the fight/flight/freeze kicks in, and I absolutely would have instinctually punted their ass across the lobby and been fired immediately had they gotten too close to me.

But they didn't, thankfully. They did, however, get the satisfaction to scaring the absolute shit out of me with fucked up mind games in a way I will never truly recover from, and wherever they are now I hope they're happy with themselves for that.

(*I think most people were creeped out by them and they clearly had no say in doing this and also didn't get to go watch the movie with the other kids afaik, and I'm sure they weren't paid, so I do feel bad for them. They may have fucked with me in a mean way but it was probably only because they were bored and who here hasn't considered psychologically torturing strangers to stave off boredom? I have ADHD and I absolutely would have been pulling that shit in their place. Like it was understandable even if it did scar me for life. I get it.)

re: those last two posts once at work I got the fear of god put into me by a child in a shitty minion costume and to this day it's one of the few times I genuienly feared for my life(that didn't have to do with my stupid fucking OCD)

[mediocre-daydreams]

HI 🫶🏻🫶🏻 it’s the mind reader anon !! can i please request for “I’m not as good as you think I am.” X “Maybe, but you’re everything to me.” OR “nobody needs me,” x “i need you.” with bucky barnes?

YEAH SURE USING AN EMOJI DIDNT COME TO MIND BUT im gonna use this from now on 🐙

— 🐙

I HAD 3 CUPS OF STRAIGHT BLACK COFFEE AND WROTE THE WEIRDEST THING I'VE EVER... EVERED. HERE IT IS!! I'M SO SCARED OF MY OWN BRAIN RIGHT NOW!! I LOVE YOU!!

the eggs benedict to your mass production

college! himbo!bucky x tutor! cynical!reader (and both of them are stupid) notes: absolute crack, it's all just infatuated bucky going from himbo to educated, emotionally mature feminist king like every other word, mutual pining, swearing, a shit ton of dialogue but it's good fucking dialogue, dramatic bucky, you're stupid, he's kind of stupid but like no, just read it and find out i swear it's worth it

w/c: 2k .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. “you’re really good at this, you know,” bucky whispered, his peppermint breath caressing your face. he was tucked into your side, one elbow on the table, one arm around your chair—sure, maybe it was a bit too close to be professional, but neither of you was complaining.

“thanks,” you murmured, not bothering to glance up and meet his eye, partially because you were concentrated on the work in front of you, and partially because you knew you’d get flustered and expose your big, fat crush on the boy who’d, for some reason, was taken by you.

well, not “taken,” exactly. he wasn’t yours, and you weren’t his, though both of you wished that could be true; both of you also did not realize your feelings were reciprocated. in more specific terms, he was taken, as in ‘awed by,’ your determination.

whether that be your raised hand, steady and confident in class, or the quick wit that you weren’t afraid to weaponize against anybody who dared challenge you, or even the determination you’d initially had to avoid him.

bucky knew he wasn’t exactly in your league, so to speak. your social circles might as well be different planets, but he figured you were an actual planet and he was your moon, circling around you, forever and ever trapped in your gravitational orbit. (at least, that’s the comparison he would make if he was passing physics.)

and that’s how you’d met him. you had lingered after class was dismissed to finish writing down the last of your notes, while bucky had hung back because the teacher needed to talk to him about his grades. to bucky’s delight, the refreshingly disinterested girl who would’ve never given him a second glance without necessity was the tutor that your teacher had recommended.

call him a masochist, but he loved that you treated him with just as much disdain as you treated the rest of his friends. it was… an unpopular opinion. att least, his friends—consisting of three-quarters of alpha delta theta and a little less than half the school’s men’s lacrosse team—certainly thought so.

bucky shifted in his seat, sending another wave of his cologne your way. you tried not to show how much he was affecting you, but you broke immediately when the arm he’d been resting on the back of your chair had finally snaked itself over until his fingers had settled on your shoulders. he began massaging small, slow circles into your skin, and you thought you might melt and mold yourself into the chair.

“okay, i- i think this is pretty good.” you scooted your chair away from him just an inch with reluctance; he smelled wonderful and had a warm presence and was so, so lovely… however, you were here to help him with physics, not get seduced. (though you’d obviously prefer the latter.)

a momentary flash of disappointment—or was that hurt?—crossed his face before it settled into its usual expression; in other words, he was gorgeous and he knew it.

“it’s not pretty good,” bucky took the paper from your hands with his eyebrows pinched in concentration. your stomach sank. “it’s amazing, doll. how are you- fuck, why do are you so beautiful and so, so smart? you’re killing me, here.”

you begged to differ. you were the one on the verge of combustion.

you pursed your lips to hide the embarrassingly exposing beam that threatened to escape and reveal your hopeless affinity for a man who was obviously out of your league. you wanted to hate bucky, you really, really did, but it made sense why he was able to pull whichever strings he wanted to. he was charismatic, confident, and had a way of leaving people in a dreamy, delirious daze that made them vulnerable to whatever kind of intention bucky had. he’d passed numerous classes that he had decidedly failed, slept with too many people to count—his pool was endless; male and female both—and had somehow managed to talk himself out of a suspension after he’d managed to break a window. 

so was it wrong to be wary of his advances? as far as you knew, he was still “talking” to your roommate’s ex-boyfriend’s lab partner (though it seemed as if not many words were being exchanged in their ‘conversations’) and supposedly was hooking up with the quarterback. 

but those could be rumors, your inner naive schoolgirl with a crush said. rumors have an element of truth to them, your rational side said. you interact with less than half the number of people he’s friends with, your cynical side said, and he’s only talking to you so he can go back to his theta kappa beta alpha friends and make fun of you. 

“bucky, i appreciate the… compliments, i really do. and i mean this with, uh, kindness, but don’t you think it’s a little… immature? manipulative? i don’t know, i just-”

this time, the crestfallen look on bucky’s face lingered, and it was most definitely one of hurt. “manipulative? sweetheart, i’d never manipulate you into anything, oh god no! i don’t und-”

“well, you’re always making fun of me so you can get some reaction out of me, and i don’t understand the appeal of trying to- to fluster somebody for entertainment, and maybe it makes this whole ‘tutoring session’ more interesting for you, but damn it, that’s not fair to me!” you snapped, eyes narrowed with malice.

you expected bucky to reciprocate. to hiss at you, or deny it, or make some vaguely misogynistic comment, but he just sat there, like a kicked puppy that had also been caught in the rain. he licked his lips enticingly and his eyes flickered down to… your lips? was that it? 

the gall of him, to continue to mock you even after you’d confronted him.

bucky laughed bitterly, shaking his head. his knee was bouncing and it was giving you secondhand anxiety. “i can’t- ha, i can’t believe you’d think that’s what- have i not been obvious enough? i don’t understand why- why you don’t understand. i like you, a lot, actually. i have since the first week of physics when you told the professor he was wrong and then pulled out evidence. 

“why would you think that i’m…” he looked at you incredulously, “making fun of you? if anything, you’re the one who’s teasing me! i’ve been trying to, well, yeah, i’ve been trying to get a reaction out of you so i can see if you feel the same way!

“and you always seem to do this little routine, where i’ll try and ask you out or- or tell you that you look pretty, or ask you questions about yourself and you do this fucking scrunch,” he pointed to his face, “on your nose, and it kills me. and it kills me that you always scoff at me like i’m nothing but you’re like… the whole world, or something. you’re like, the bonnie to my clyde.”

you bit your lip to keep yourself from smiling, not wanting to spoil his rant. “bonnie and clyde were serial killers,” you whispered amusedly. bucky looked at you, took a mental note, and continued without correcting himself.

“you’re the… apple to my eye. the chicken to my egg. and the… alpha theta to my kappa beta. and i think you’re incredible, i really do, but you won’t even give me the time of day. so yeah, i don’t understand why you think i’m the one manipulating you.

“there’s obviously a social power dynamic here,” bucky added, waving his hands around like that would help make his point clearer. “you’re cool and smart and people love you, and i’m like, a piece of shit, kinda. so i guess it makes sense why you don’t like me.

 but that’s beside the point. you have the dominant position in this relationship because you’re the one tutoring me; therefore, my performance relies on your decisions. you wield the power of controlling my gpa or whatnot. and did i mention that you’re smart and pretty? so basically, you’re just better than me which means in society, aka the individual social bubble that is every academic institution, you have more, um, influence than i do. you’re like, the prefect, and i’m the dude you report for breaking curfew. or you’re like, the ta, and i’m the guy whose essay you rip apart.

‘cause you’re like, shit, you’re so wow. and i’m so, wow,” he said the second bit with exaggerated sarcasm and a dramatic eye roll. “and i learned about all this in women’s studies, so if you think i’m pulling this out of my ass, go talk to bell hooks and simone de beauvoir, alright? i’m not, like, trying to manipulate you into a date or anything—not that i’d complain about getting a date, or like, just a shot, and i mean shot as in chance, not as in alcohol—i just really like you. like, like-like you.”

bucky took a deep, shuddering breath after his profession of infatuation. you gaped, probably comparable to a fish, at the frat-adjacent, notorious fuckboy, and delectable specimen of a man in front of you who also took women’s studies and also seemed to genuinely want to take you out on a date—though you weren’t particularly sure about the second one since his explanation was very long and not very easy to follow—that you’d severely misjudged.

“i-” you sputtered, for once, out of wit. “that’s so… nice.” you fiddled with the paper that the two of you had been working on. you could hear the sound of bucky’s heart shattering from where you sat. 

you hung your head in your hands, bewildered. “okay, you said you didn’t understand what i said but now i’m not understanding what you said because you’re saying i’m all… admired and intellectual and alluring and, powerful, even, but i- i’m not. bucky, i’m literally sitting in the library tutoring you on a subject i suck at because i have no other weekend plans and because i’ve been bullshitting my way through this class and the professor just so happened to eat it up.

“i don’t know what i’m doing either, bucky. i’m not- i’m not as good as you think i am. i’m… if we’re going back to that stupid chicken-egg analogy, you’re like a crowing morning rooster and i’m an egg produced by a capitalist’s hellish factory farm that’s dropped on the ground and will probably grow mold before someone cleans it up.” you paused. “oh wow, that was a way worse metaphor than yours, wasn’t it?”

bucky shook his head, a brilliant, dopey smile slowly growing on his face. “no. no, that was… so beautiful. you’re so smart,” he insisted, and it seemed like he genuinely believed it. “you think you’re some- some rotten egg, but to me, you’re an eggs benedict that’s been approved by gordon ramsey. you keep saying all these self-deprecating things and y’know, my therapist says that’s really bad for your subconscious perception of yourself and your value, and i know i just said that you’re smart but you’re actually being so stupid right now. because i think you’re really awesome. so…”

bucky swung his legs under his seat, which was really awkward because his legs were already so long that his knees were brushing the top of the table, so it looked more like he was trying to kick the table apart.

“can i kiss you?” bucky breathed, eyes scanning your face with pure adoration.

“absolutely not,” you grimaced, planting your hand on his face and pushing it away. “don’t push it. but… how does dinner at 7 tonight sound? not the cafeteria shit, i’ll take you somewhere nice. and don’t get it twisted, i’m asking you out, okay?” 

bucky nodded eagerly, going from kicked, wet puppy to newly-adopted, instagram account worthy puppy. “i- wow, thank you! wow. i’m so- yes, i will be there. should i get flowers or are you going to do the flowers thing? because i really like you a lot and i don’t want to mess this up and-”

“i’ll do the flowers. and the picking you up. and if you’re a good boy, maybe you’ll get a kiss at the end of the night. does that sound okay?”

it sounded more than okay to bucky.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

bucky barnes masterlist | main masterlist

taglist: (comment to be added!)

@bambamwolf87 @yourallihave @im-a-slut-for-fluff

[sunhowler-art]

i love gordon freewoman so much <3 she is so cute and occupies my mind at all times. i have to ask if u have any more hc for her or anything you wanna talk about regarding her bc i love her

first off, as always, i'm blown away by all the support for my silly little headcanon/au!! genuinely it warms my heart that people love gordie so much. second, i can't give *too* much away because there's a fic on the (admittedly far-off) horizon. will keep you all updated, but i am a slow writer!

answer under the cut, since it's kinda long:

anyways, gordon is canonically incredibly confrontational. he solves all his problems in the series with shouting matches (and then violence, should the shouting not deter whoever stepped on his toes).

for my gordon, i think that she can solve external conflict like this pretty damn easily, but when it comes to internal conflict, she's absolutely lost. shouting at herself, while sometimes cathartic, is ultimately incredibly unproductive. so, throughout her life, she's learned to externalize all her conflicts, and if that doesn't work: avoid the hell out of it. for the love of god, gordon, do *not* think about how the mirror freaks you the fuck out. just look away.

well, after the events of canon, and gordon is left with ptsd, she finally gets a damn therapist and gets marginally better at examining her thoughts and feelings. but the mirror, man, it still taunts her, and she doesnt *get* why. it takes benrey (because of course it does) to shatter her ideas of gender and implant the idea in her head that, hey, you can just trans your gender, that's a thing you can do. and that TERRIFIES her and she's awful at hiding it. for her, she's like "oh god i can't have another major life event happen. i simply can't it's too fucking much". but benrey, an alien with the weakest grasp on gender possible, keeps fucking saying things that make gordon inch closer and closer to an acceptance of her own identity.

i just think the idea of gordon being so neurotic about gender roles and body image while benrey genuinely does not understand At All is so fucking funny. and benrey's outright dismissal of all the weird cisnormative shit gordon's got lodged up in her brain really does make her take a step back and go "huh. maybe this is all actually bullshit. is this bullshit? has everything i've been told a lie? has-" and benrey tells her to shut the fuck up (lovingly)

miscellaneous stuff:

benrey is the first one to know and they accidentally out her to the rest of the science team, who don't really care at all, because they're all different flavors of trans anyway. they pretend to have not known when gordie actually comes out to them though, because they LOVE and RESPECT her!!!!!!! (and dont want gordie to beat benrey's ass)

she picks the name gordie because 1. i am lazy and 2. she is Not a creative person. i think benrey tries to bully her about it but she shouts back that he named himself fucking benrey of all things, so he shuts up about it (for a little bit)

gordie had been out as bisexual for a long time and BOY was her coming out experience in college stressful. which is why she did not want to be trans she was like "no god i have to do it AGAIN? and CHANGE MY NAME ABOUT IT?"

obviously after all the stress and shit she's incredibly happy. and she is a wonderful mom to joshie. i think she would be a soccer mom for sure

there's a bunch of frenrey shit that happens too because i have a brain disease that makes me think about them 24/7 but this is NOT about benrey it's about gordie. my beloved

[get-shiggy-with-it]

Book Drop Boy (Twice x Reader)

✧ pairing: library student worker!Twice x afab!student!Reader

✧ word count: 9.9k

✧ ao3 mirror

✧ warnings: college au/no quirks, maladaptive daydreaming (twice), twice is chaotic af, commits library related crimes, use of the term sweetheart a few times, smut, vaginal fingering/sex, doggy style, afab terms, no pronouns for reader, gratuitous swearing this is potentially the softest thing I've ever written, like she's pretty tame idk what Twice does to me

✧ summary: In which Twice learns that sometimes dreams do come true, except those dreams are just the maladaptive fantasies of a broke library receptionist and, while sexy, also involve more fraud than he expected.

✧ a/n: Hey y'all, this is set in the same universe as my shiggy college piece, but you don't need to have read that. There are some fun little easter eggs though if you have tho. This is like the most tame thing I've ever written and it's way longer than it was meant to be but oh well. Anyway, Twice deserves some love. Enjoy <3

Logically, Jin was aware you probably had no idea who the fuck he was.

But that really didn’t have any effect on the wildly intricate fantasy life he had created for the two of you during his long shifts behind the library reception desk. That, in fact, was the only reason he hadn’t up and quit just to save himself the embarrassment of another loud outburst in the middle of the most silent place on campus.

What was truly more shocking was the fact that none of those said outburst had gotten his ass kicked straight out the door.

But he held out.

If only for you.

Late nights or lazy afternoons you were always in the campus library—studying he assumed or…

'Studying,' because a lot of the time he noticed you’d show up with a drink from the cafe a few blocks down, set out a line of colored pens and not touch a single one of them for hours, content to stare blankly at the chipped desktop. And even that Jin was more than happy to watch.

He did a lot of watching.

Mostly because he wasn’t permitted to leave the desk unattended unless there were piling up returned books which needed to be replaced quickly.

So instead, he pretended to be busy scrolling through something on his old as hell monitor—which was conveniently set up directly across from the comfy chair/desk combo you always managed to grab—and he indulged in day dreams where you’d bring him a coffee from the cafe when you came in and set it on his desk, maybe kiss him on the cheek, maybe loiter by his workstation and play with his hair and—

Yeah.

It was a lot.

But you were always in that chair, always working or pretending to work and you never seemed to notice the uninterrupted hours of staring Jin did, so what was the harm?

If you never knew, you’d never get creeped out—cause it was creepy, he knew that, oh fuckin' boy did he know it was real goddamn weird.

He just couldn’t seem to give it up. Especially when the conditions presented perfectly for some good uninterrupted, totally not stalker-y at all, fantasizing.

Sometimes he thought you might have some mundane superpower that let you always snatch that perfect seat right across from his computer, and made it so the library was just cool enough that he’d get to watch you shrug on that cute extra sweatshirt you always brought. So he could catch a glimpse of some skin—in a totally normal and not invasive way—when your arms went over your head. So he could imagine it was his ratty old sweaters you were wearing just so you could smell him on you and god he really wanted to get close enough to smell you—was that too weird? No. Yes? No.

Not at all.

But the best part, the part that really convinced him on those awful days when he really just could not be bothered to drag himself out of bed and walk the couple blocks to campus just to sit in awful silence alone, in his head alone with the fucking thoughts that made him want to rip his hair out—

What made it worth it was those times every few weeks when your classes would get new assigned readings. Because then you’d have to check out new textbooks, since you were one of those geniuses that had figured out the library kept a ton of those books in stock. Of course you were, cause you were fucking perfect.

And when you had to check out new books, you had to come to reception.

Jin got to watch as your lovely figure moved through the stacks like you were ballroom dancing along the halls of faded, sea-green shelves, almost floating over the linoleum trying to find just the right volume in the right addition before anyone else beat you to it.

It was one of the most gorgeous things he’d ever seen.

Spinner would call him a fucking simp if he ever dared to uttered any of that out loud, but it didn’t matter.

If it was you, he’d simp for fucking life.

And then, you’d walk that fucking glorious ass over to his desk and plop the books down, smiling—cause you were polite like that, so fucking perfect he couldn’t hardly believe it sometimes—and asking how his day was while he checked you out in every sense of the phrase.

In a completely platonic and not freaky way.

So Jin kept coming to work, to that god awful job he really hated and which hated him just as vehemently. He clocked in every day and waited patiently like a fucking puppy counting the hours till its workaholic owner arrived home, ears perking up when you walked through the door and flashed your ID to the attendant.

If only for that.

He’d put up with his boss’ complaints and the weird stares he got when the thoughts just wouldn’t stay in his head anymore and he had to start talking to himself to fill the silence.

If only for that.

Those few hours when he could lose himself in the fake inner life where you were waiting for him when his shift let out, waiting to gather him, tired and understimulated, into your arms. Where you’d sneak into the back room with him just to chat and lace your fingers with his and maybe sit that fucking wonderful ass up on the tables so he could stand in between your thighs and you’d pull him down to—

Yeah.

That was enough.

***

It wasn’t until Tuesday when he had to come in again that week, and he already knew it was gonna suck balls.

Friday he’d gotten another round of complaints from some stuck up fucking business students—it was always the fucking business majors with those silver spoons so far up their asses—snitching to his boss that he’s been ‘disruptive’ and ‘disturbing’ during his last shift.

“Not my fucking fault,” he muttered under his breath, kicking a rock along the side walk he’d picked up two blocks before. “Yes it is. No it’s not!”

Jin groaned and tugged at his hair, wishing he’d brought a Tylenol or something to curb the headache that was already sticking it’s ugly ass claws into his temples. He really, really heavily contemplated just ditching, calling in sick or some shit. Technically he was a student worker, so they had to work with his DRS accommodation and he was actually having a bad fucking time.

But one of his friends had already texted to ask if he’d try and reserve them that sweet ass study room on the third floor and Jin wasn’t really looking to disappoint anyone else this week. Besides, it was fun to abuse his minuscule power. Fun to go corrupt for once. Fight the system and all that.

He liked to think you’d be proud of him for it, based on the kinds of texts you checked out at least.

So, he dragged his sad ass back to the looming library looking far too much like a prison than was necessary and clocked in. Actually, the first thing he did was check the chair—your chair and nobody else’s chair, he might actually make a fucking scene if somebody ever did steal it—and his face visibly fell when you were not occupying it.

It was a bit early, Jin supposed as he paused briefly when he noticed the can of Monster and rando vending machine chips sitting next to it by the reception computer. The sticky note slapped to the top read 'For your troubles' in familiar handwriting and that pulled a bit of a smile from him as he quickly rearranged the scheduling of study room sign ups so the fancy third floor room would be free for the rest of the night.

Then Jin sat, staring at the study room schedules for a moment, feeling his eyes softly glaze over until a hand slapped down on the raised lip of the reception desk.

“Hey bro,” Spinner greeted him with a wild smile and a flurry of bright pink hair.

Jin had to blink a few extra times to get his vision to clear. When it did he saw, horrifyingly, that he’d been staring at the fucking blank screen for two hours without moving.

Why was it that his head was either deadly quiet, devoid of even a single errant thought or so loud as fucking shit at all times that he couldn’t physically keep the thoughts in?

“Hey, dude, what’s up?” Jin asked, running a hand through his unruly hair.

“Aren’t you supposed to like shush me or something?”

Spinner chuckled a bit at his own god awful joke and Jin couldn’t find it in himself to be annoyed, too glad for the company.

“I mean,” he shrugged, popping the can of Monster and ignoring the dirty looks he got for the sound. “I would if I was, uh, good at my job.”

“Which I’ve heard you definitely are not,” Spinner wrapped his fingers over the lip of the desk and leaned back on his heels, swaying side to side idly.

“You’re just figuring that out now?”

Jin didn’t bother watching while Spinner nearly tripped over himself fidgeting as he spun to stand at the little gate that corralled Jin inside like livestock. He was too busy glancing over to check you hadn’t slipped in while his brain had taken a trip to the astral plane without him.

“No, I been knew, but my sources tell me you’ve gone off the rails my friend,” long legs stepped over the wooden partition until the only friend he had who was quite possibly more annoying than Jin himself was sat on the counter next to his computer. “Finally been radicalized have you?”

Jin huffed and sipped his Monster, “Guess it fuckin’ took me long enough.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” Spinner was messing about with the stacks of multicolored sticky notes littered across the desk before glancing up to wink at Jin. “So what can I get you to do for me in exchange for free food?”

“Now I really am gonna fucking shush you,” Jin smashed his finger against Spinners grin only to get a hand covered in spit for his trouble.

“Right, right,” Spinner held his hands up in defeat, “can’t have you cheating on your sweetheart.”

“Not my—yes I’m in a committed fictional relationship thank you very much—ugh!”

Jin could feel the heads shooting up from laptop screens and textbooks to stick daggers in his back with their angry stares. Spinner at least had the good sense to look a little fucking guilty for egging him on.

“Sorry bro, I had to shoot my shot ya know?” a hand disappeared into the mop of bubblegum locks in apology.

“It’s fine…” Jin trailed off, mumbling and blushing more than a little profusely as he turned to check the book drop box. “Not like I’m ever gonna fuckin’ shoot mine anyway.”

“Oh we are not gonna have that kinda of shit discussion,” Spinner’s hand shot out and grabbed him firmly by the shoulders, spinning Jin in his chair. “On god bro, we’re gonna get you a date one of these days.”

Jin didn’t dignify that kind of lie with a response.

Spinner once again, had the good sense to not push the envelope any farther.

“And in the meantime, you can come to the League meeting tonight!”

“Your gaming club thing?”

“Yeah, it’s Smash night and we need to fill a space sooooo…”

Jin knew Spinner and his roommate—the same friend who he’d gone study room rogue for—had started a gaming club their freshman year. Spinner had been trying to strong arm him into attending ever since. To, as he put it, ‘socialize,’ and ‘make new friends.’ All things which Jin was patently horrible at and avoided like the plague.

Needless to say, he’d refused every time.

It wasn’t just the whole being alone with like two people he kinda knew in a room full of strangers. Games themselves were just a lot for him. The flashing colors and the loud noises made his head—which was already so fucking full all the time and he really needed to keep any extra scrap of space for extra random facts he picked up about you and your future married life together—get a bit misaligned.

They just weren’t his jam most of the time.

“I’m good, thanks for the offer though,” Jin twisted out of Spinner’s grasp and craned his head to check your seat again.

Still empty.

He sighed.

Spinner continued to ramble and Jin continued to only half listen. It wasn’t as pleasant to day dream when you weren’t there for the added visual aesthetic. And he was trying to not be a dick and ignore the one friend he had managed to keep around over the years. But it was hard when his mind had a mind of its own.

Wow.

Meta.

“Jin?”

The voice—deep and dark in such a dramatically ominous way it might have been funny if it didn’t belong to his permanently disgruntled supervisor—interrupted his already derailing train of thought.

“Oh, uh, hello sir,” Jin stuttered, turning to find Kurogiri leaning against the reception desk with one arm, turning only slightly to accommodate Spinner’s form bolting over the gate and out the library doors.

He did manage to throw a fading, “See ya later, bro” over his shoulder before he disappeared around the corner.

Yeah thanks for the warning, bro.

“Aren’t you supposed to be reshelving the books from the drop box?” Kurogiri sighed, perpetually disappointed in a way that had Jin’s face burning and shame bubbling up in his throat.

He hated this job. He was objectively terrible at it, and so usually he wouldn’t give that much of a shit at not doing it well. Kurogiri just had some type of vibe—like daddy but not in the sexy way Spinner always joked about—that made it really, really upsetting to let him down.

Father figure? Yeah that's what it was called.

“Right, yeah um, sorry,” Jin nodded quickly and leapt from his chair, only mildly bruising his knee on the desk as he reached to empty the book drop.

Another incorporeal sigh was the only acknowledgement he received as he loaded the cart with wheels louder than Jin on a particularly bad day and rolled the pile of books back to the stacks. He paused once more, just before the sea green shelving units swallowed him up, to sneak another futile peak at your chair. But it still sat empty—empty and lonely with no you and cold without your body pressed against the worn upholstery.

Jin felt a chill too, a slow tingling thing that worked its way up from the base of his spine. It drove him deeper into the walls of books, away from the empty spaces.

It was harder to look.

Harder to be reminded of what he did not have.

Of what he’d never have cause he was too much of a goddamn pussy to ever just fucking talk to you—

But then what if he did? What if he did talk to you? What would happen then?

Those were the types of questions he tried to avoid when crafting your intricate, fictional lives together. Precisely because they were the easiest to answer.

You’d realize within the first five minutes or so of conversation—if Jin could even make it that far without embarrassing himself—that he was just a generic brand weirdo that all your pretty, normal, aesthetically pleasing friends would warn you to stay away from and because you were also pretty and normal and not a fucking idiot, you’d have the common sense to listen.

He’d lose you in the blink of an eye.

Your chair would sit cold and empty forever and the imaginary garden he’d been planting for you to come imaginarily home too would wilt and die like all the other happy thoughts in his head.

It was quite the conundrum and one Jin was not keen to solve soon.

Not that things ever really went his way. Cause problems could only be avoided for so long before all that time spent ignoring them came back to bite him full on the ass.

Which, apparently, came this time in the form of what had to be quiet, muffled sobbing drifting in between the shelves from the back hallway.

It was dark here in this section of the building—free of most windows so as not to cause any sunning damage to the books—and Jin had seen more than enough horror movies to know that it was a horrendous idea to follow the ominous crying sounds coming from the bowls of this old as fuck building. But even as he made up his mind to ignore it, the hand currently working one of the returns back into its proper place dropped the book to his cart as his feet slowly turned to face the corridor.

He looked around skeptically for a second, not entirely certain his poor brain hadn’t simply malfunctioned again, as it was wont to do, and fabricated the sound entirely. But as he peaked out from between the stacks, and down the dimly lit hall, he heard it again.

Echoey and soft in the wide, empty space it—was definitely coming from the hall and it was definitely a person.

Jin caught himself moving without ever meaning too, the books laying forgotten as he crept towards the source of the noise and paused just before leaving the stacks entirely. This hall was full of small alcoves built into the centuries old walls and led to the lesser used storage portions of the library that only the janitorial staff and the university librarians ever entered. He really didn’t want to stumble across someone from the special collections department bawling over a damaged or lost manuscript.

But his wayward feet pushed him forward, too sympathetic for his own good. He found himself shuffling down the abandoned hall, peering into each small dip in the walls to find the source of his distraction.

And when he did, Jin was—for once in his life—thankful for his lack of self-preservation instincts.

And cursed his blatant lack in interpersonal skills.

Because it was you.

You curled with your knees to your chest and your head in your hands, shoulders shaking, as you cried into your palms.

The universe had handed him maybe the only golden opportunity he would ever get on right on a platter.

But Jin didn’t have a fucking clue what do with it.

And there certainly wasn’t much time to formulate a game plan as his nervous breathing and sudden intake of breath upon discovering his imaginary lover sniffling right in front of him, had certainly alerted you to his presence.

Your head shot up in an instant, knocking dully against the stone wall with a thud.

“Shit,” you cursed and hands flying up to cover the area as Jin jumped on the spot at your outburst.

“Are you okay?” he asked lamely as you glanced over at him, eyes red and wet and so fucking sad oh fucking god, widening as you realized you’d been caught.

“Huh? Ye—oh uh, yes,” your words came out jumbled, legs unfolding quickly to push yourself off the bench and hands wiping furiously at your eyes. “I’m fine, sorry.”

“You sure about that?”

Jin cringed visibly and frowned at the way you deflated under his stare. God the first fucking time he actually talks to you and he already made an ass of himself.

Spinner’s roommate was such a liar, it really fucking sucked to be right sometimes.

“I mean,” you crumpled back down onto the ledge and Jin took a careful step closer, “no, but yes. Like I’m definitely having a breakdown in the back of the fucking library but I don’t wanna, uh, bother you with that. So, yeah I’m good.”

“You can bother me,” he replied way too fucking quickly.

But he couldn’t really be embarrassed about it. Your voice was just so captivating, and you weren’t talking to him in that raised pitch anymore like you usually did—the way everyone does when they’re trying to be surface level and polite. No this was your voice how you sounded when you were relaxing with your friends or making breakfast in the morning or talking to yourself in the shower (he liked to think you did that, or sang maybe as you worked the soap into your skin, one of the two but he always imagined you filled silences with how fucking pretty you were).

“No, really. That would be weird, right?”

Jin grimaced as you fixed him with a watery yet suspicious stare.

Yeah it was weird.

Everything he did concerning you was weird, objectively. He was definitely being over-familiar and too eager, especially considering you didn’t fucking know him.

But he knew you.

Jin felt like he’d known you for all months he’d spent pretending to be by your side.

And you were crying and he had to do something.

“I mean, yeah I guess,” he mumbled, taking a risk and plopped down on the opposite end of the alcove and resting his head on the wall. “But not any weirder than having a breakdown in the employees only section of the library building on a Tuesday.”

You kept staring blankly for a few moments before the most miraculous thing happened.

Jin had to physically stop his jaw from hitting the floor when the quiet giggle bubbled up from your chest and spilled out into the hall, warm enough to melt even the freezing linoleum floor.

“Yeah, you’ve got a point,” your voice cracked a bit as a few more tears slid like pearls down your cheeks.

“My name’s Jin,” he said, shocked stupid both by your laugh and the apparent success of his comforting methods.

“Oh, hi, well I guess I don’t have to call you book drop boy anymore,” you rubbed at your face again and tucked your legs back into your chest, though it looked a bit more relaxed this time.

Not so trying-desperately-to-fade-out-of-existence.

“You called me that?” Jin asked, brain still functioning at half capacity, only shocked at the fact that he existed as a concept in your head enough to have a name and realizing a bit too late how accusatory he must have sounded. “Shit, I mean it’s totally fine I just didn’t think you, uh, well I mean, like, knew about me I guess?”

You finally smiled and his brain power cut out another fourth at being personally graced by the expression this close up.

“Yeah, you always check me out—fuck sorry not that you check me out, just you scan my books and I just called you ‘book drop boy’ in my head cause I never got a chance to ask for your name but I have it now so that’s cool….”

Your head dropped back down to your knees as you groaned and Jin suddenly felt a lot less nervous than he had a few seconds ago.

You were weird too.

For so long you’d existed on this pedestal thousands of feet in the air, and now you were stepping down from the heavens and onto earth. Not in a bad way! Just, Jin had never really stopped to think that you might be a person too.

Well.

No, he knew you were a person, just he never thought you might get flustered and ramble and be nervous in front of him.

Cause he was a fucking train wreck—the bar was so goddamn low.

It was almost as comforting as your smile.

“Oh, yeah sorry I’m not the best at customer service if you couldn’t tell,” he sighed and ran a hand through his wild hair.

You looked back up with a wry grin, “I don’t know, I’d say you’re going above and beyond right now.”

And you were funny.

He was gonna fucking combust.

“Ha, yeah, I try,” he trailed off for a moment before glancing back at your curled in your corner, fuck he could just imagine sitting behind you, your head on his chest while you—”So uh, did you wanna talk about it or…?”

“Uh, yeah,” you picked idly at the grouting of the stone and mumbled, “I guess it’s not so weird if we’re on a first-name basis.

And that was how Jin discovered that you’d been hiding in the back of the library bawling your eyes out for hours—since even before his shift started. Apparently you’d gotten here extra early, even skipped a class, to snag some super specific required text for your final thesis and right before you got to the shelf some jackass swooped in, effectively hit and running with the only copy of that book on campus.

The book in questions was one of the newer additions that had special added footnotes you needed for your paper and was a whopping 500 fucking dollars to rent from every other place online. You couldn’t afford it, and honestly what fucking student could? But you needed it to complete the paper or you’d fail and Jin very much understood the need for a good breakdown after a catastrophe like that.

“Damn, that’s uh, fucking awful,” he frowned on your behalf as your head hit the wall a second time in frustration.

“Yeah so, I’m like royally fucked either way. Now I just gotta decide which hole I’m taking it in I guess,” you groaned.

Jin’s eyebrows raised at your choice of words but they were apt, he supposed. People really do get comfortable with each other pretty quick when bonding over shared institutional rage.

“Well,” he began, wringing his hands nervously at what he was about to suggest. “You might be in luck cause I’ve recently decided to abuse my library powers for good and I maybe, possibly, could try and see if there’s some strings I can pull?”

You perked up a bit, looking at him incredulously.

Jin felt comfortably full under your stare.

“Seriously?”

The word was soft and it bounced off the walls just as much as it did the inside of his skull.

Swapping study rooms to help a friend out was one thing. But falsifying checkout dates for someone he barely knew—had essentially married in his maladaptive fantasies—could get him fired.

He hated this job but he needed it.

Were you worth the risk?

Of course, he found himself thinking without hesitation.

You were everything.

“Yeah, sure,” he nodded, any lingering uncertainty washing away at the way you looked at him through your lashes. “I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t mean it.”

“Are you always this nice?”

Jin didn’t answer right away. He was too caught up in how you’d leaned forward on your hands across the bench, peering like he was some exotic animal or a stray cat in the parking lot—all soft wonderment with fingers curling like they ached to grab hold and rescue him from this parchment scented monotony.

“Not always…”

“Should I feel special then?”

If his face wasn’t red before, it was now. Red and blistering under the summer campfire heat that radiated off you—woodsy and warm and so painfully familiar like an old friend’s hand.

“...I guess you—fucking definitely, ” he quite nearly shouted the last bit, startled by his own volume and already mortified at the outburst but then you chuckled again from beside him.

He turned to see you standing and offering a hand which he gladly too if only to feel the weight of your palm against his.

“Well, you’ll have to let me pay you back then.”

“Oh, no you don’t actually—”

You held a hand up and the words turned to ash on his tongue in an instant, mouth glued shut by your gesture.

“Coffee on me or something, there’s a nice cafe a few blocks from here,” you dropped your hand and your eyes were clear now, no sign of the previous afternoon sobbing alone in the hallway. Jin felt a surge in his chest knowing he was the one who did that. “You gotta pass off the contraband anyway, and I don’t think it would be that great of an idea to do it here.”

God you were fucking perfect.

“Can’t argue with that.”

***

Jin was sweating profusely as he snuck past the library attendant, totally inconspicuous and not not all looking like he was doing a single thing wrong in the slightest.

Yeah they definitely didn’t suspect a thing.

The process of fraud was actually a lot less complicated of an undertaking that Jin had expected. All he had to do was search up the book, find the student that had stolen the success of his sweetheart’s educational career and flag his account. They’d get an automated message about the flag, instructing them to return any borrowed items or they’d be forced to pay fines while the account was examined.

Technically he needed administrator credentials to report student accounts, but luckily Kurogiri had his login info written on a sticky note hidden on the back of the monitor. All in all it was a pretty easy job.

The whole thing had taken only a matter of days, in which time you had returned to the library only twice—the first to get confirmation on the success of Jin’s newest descent into low level crime which had set his heart thundering in his chest as you bent conspiratorially over his desk, your face just inches from his.

The second time, Jin had horrifically been absent from his desk, however he was met with possibly the most wonderful sight of his life upon returning from the labyrinth of shelves.

On one of the hundreds of post-it note pads that littered the library reception area, there were scribbles that he was sure hadn’t been there before. He almost tossed it, but upon closer inspection, you’d written your number there and signed just below it. In the cutest fucking handwriting he’d ever seen—cute not for any stylistic reason, but it simply felt that way just by virtue of it being yours—was written the digits and “-for book drop boy”

The noise he made reading that turned more than a dozen heads and almost got him fired there on the spot before any of his indiscretions were even discovered, but he couldn’t find it in himself to regret it.

So, nerve wrackingly, Jin texted you as he nearly sprinted home from his shift after that piece of shit asshole who made you cry had trudged angrily in and dropped off his ‘stolen’ book.

— HEY IT’S JIN!

— from the library

— shit sorry that wasn’t meant to be in caps

— n e way….

— I’ve intercepted the ~package~ so whenever you’re ready for the hand off, I’m good

Most perfect fucking human being to…

Oh my god thank you so much!!!—

Is tomorrow at like 5ish good for you?—

Also send me your order—

so we don’t have to do that awkward waiting in line for drinks bit—

Holy fuck you multi-texted too! Spinner would roll over in his fucking grave, he hated when Jin did that. But there was always so much to say and he could never think of it all at the same time. Plus, you wanted to save him from that god awful silence where you both stand in line next but he can’t talk cause he has keep repeating his order in his head over and over or he’ll blank when he gets to the register so it’s just this painful weird glancing back and forth—

Ugh, maybe all the shit about manifestation that girl who always loaned him exacto knives in his sculpting class always talked about was real.

Cause there was no way you weren’t just heaven-sent, handcrafted especially for him and all his general brand of weird.

The hours which usually flew by without Jin’s notice dragged all that night. He was so full of excess energy that made his hand shake and his thoughts race, not sure what to do with themselves now that they didn’t need to fantasize about you.

He decided to use all that extra motivation to vacuum the kitchen at 4:30 in the morning, much to his roommates' chagrin. She liked to get a nice solid eight hours every night and constantly reminded Jin of this, trying to sell him on that sleepy time tea before bed, though he really hated the smell of camomile.

Magne may lose out on some of her beauty sleep—not that she needed it and Jin would tell her that constantly, even if he did have some patently horrible judgment most of the time so he wasn’t really the best at offering reassurance—but the kitchen would be clean when she woke up so win-win really.

When she did wake up—wandering out of her room looking effortlessly put together in a way Jin could never hope to emulate—she sat at the table, sipping her tea and appraising him worriedly.

Jin was still in his jeans from the day before, hair spiking in every direction but down, and chewing his nails nervously despite losing most of them to the hour or two of early morning floor scrubbing.

“Babe,” she shook her head slowly, “take a breath.”

“Yeah okay,” he sighed and inhaled deeply, letting himself slide off the couch cushions and to the newly sparkling floors on the exhale.

“There, now wanna share what the hell is going on?”

He glanced up at her from the hardwood and groaned as she looked back down, brows furrowed over her glasses.

“Huhh, okay. So that absolute work of art from the library is meeting me for coffee later cause I have trade over this book I sort of stole, it’s a long story, and I don’t know if it’s a date—it sounds like a date, cause that’s where people go for dates and shit—but it might just be to pay me back for stealing the book. And if it is I’ve only ever been on that one date before which was with fucking Spinner like two years ago so—”

Magne held up a hand to quiet Jin before the speed of his words tied his tongue in physical knots. She looked contemplative, taking another soft sip of tea and nodding her head for a moment getting up to crouch on the floor by his head.

“You think too much for your own good, but never about the right things,” she mumbled, smoothing some of the hair from his face. “Does it really matter if this is a date or not?”

Jin blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Well,” she chuckled in that way people do when kids ask them obvious questions—kindly, appreciative of the curiosity, “either way you cut it, you’ll be spending time with this person you like, yeah?”

“Mhm,” he hummed and sat up to face her as she stood.

“A date is just hanging out with a special name anyway,” Magne’s hands were firm but gentle as she hoisted Jin off the floor and onto his feet. “You’ll be fine.”

His shoulders slumped both in mild relief and dejection that he’d waisted so much precious time he could have been preparing possible topics of conversation or strategies to ask you out for real date on worrying over how this first time would go.

How did Magne always fucking know all this stuff?

Other people were such a mystery to him.

To be fair, though, Jin was a mystery to himself most of the time as well.

“Thanks, sorry for not saying anything about it earlier,” he sniffed as she smiled and pinched his cheek way fucking harder than necessary.

“It’s alright, I’m only a little insulted you waited until now to tell me about this massive crush you’ve developed.”

“Yeah it’s got its own gravitational pull at this point.”

Magne laughed at that and Jin felt the room lighten.

“I do expect details when you get back though,” she said pointedly, finishing her tea wandering back to her room to grab her bag. “Spinner asked me, very begrudgingly might I add, to fill in at another of his club tournament things tonight so I’ll be out late.”

“Really? I didn’t think you liked that stuff.”

Jin shuffled over to her doorway and peaked into the neat little space. Magne was rummaging through the meticulously organized closet and frowning as she answered.

“I do, Spinner just doesn’t agree with my battle strategies,” she huffed. “My alignment is far too ‘chaotic’ and ‘recklessly violent’ for his tastes apparently.”

“Oh, yeah that makes sense,” Jin laughed this time just envisioning the two of them stuck on a team. “Well have fun with that.”

“Yeah well,” she brushed by him into the hall, keys jangling as she went and calling over her shoulder. “Text me how it goes, and wear that new button up you got last week, it looks good on you!”

***

Much to Jin’s surprise and delight, Magne was right.

He was fine.

He was fine.

Fine was a bit subjective—as he was most certainly still highkey panicking on main as he got out of his last class and walked the short few blocks to the cafe on campus—but regardless he was perfectly okay.

Of course that all went right out the fucking window in the split second between him walking in and you already staring at the door as he entered. Your eyes widened just a bit and this smile broke out slowly across your cheeks when you waved him over and it was like suddenly every single creepy as hell day dream had just become reality.

It was a little overwhelming to say the least.

His heart may have actually stopped in his chest for a bit and he did contemplate the possibility that Kurogiri might have actually discovered his little plot, murdered him in cold blood and stuffed his body in the records room. This might all just be the afterlife, but that would mean that Jin had gone to some kind of heaven which didn’t really add up with his current tract record.

But it was fine.

Because you were really fucking easy to talk to.

Like, really fucking easy.

It was sorta strange actually, how you seemed to know all this shit he was into before he even really mentioned it.

After you traded off the goods, you both sat in the big comfy couches upstairs in the loft and you listened to him info dump, inevitably getting lost down innumerable unrelated tangents. You managed to keep up well enough though and not question the winding conversation.

“Damn,” he said, sipping at the last dregs left behind in his cup. “How do you know about all this stuff?”

“Uh,” you paused then, looking maybe just a bit sheepishly into your own drink. “I may or may not have spent a considerable amount of time eavesdropping into your conversations while you’re on shift.”

He saw flashes at that moment—dial up sounds going off between his ears.

Jin.exe has stopped working.

“...What?”

You grimaced and hid your face in your hands for a moment, “I know it sounds really creepy, my friends just sorta made a, um, game out of it? They tease me a lot about going to study at the library just cause of the cute guy that works there, so we all kinda stalk you a little bit just—wow this is sounding exponentially worse and worse every second.”

He gaped a bit despite himself as you cringed visibly and Jin tried to discreetly pinch his thigh to make sure this really wasn’t some sort of cruel, cruel fever dream.

“You think I’m cute…?”

He blinked once and your eyes shot up to meet his, a pained, half smile caught between your teeth. “I mean, yeah. I kinda thought I was being a bit obvious, sorry.”

“What no, holy fuck,” he spluttered, face on fire and legs bouncing restlessly against the couch across from you. “Don’t apologize, I have a, uh, staring habit too I guess.”

“I know,” you rubbed at the back of your neck and Jin didn’t think it was possible for you to be anymore endearing. “I’ve noticed, that’s like the whole reason I insisted on buying you a drink.”

“So wait is this a date?”

Jin wished almost immediately that he hadn’t asked, because Magne was right, it super didn’t matter but fucking shit on a stick he really wanted it to be a date!!!!

“Yeah,” you nodded. “If you’d like that.”

“Yes!—ah, I mean, uh yeah mhm,” Jin choked on his spit with enthusiasm, but it did earn him a concerned shoulder pat so he’d take the win.

It also afforded him the opportunity to walk you home after hours chatting until the streets were lit by burnt orange lamps and the cafe was closing. You didn’t live all that far from him actually and when you stopped to point out your door, the two of you were overcome by that telltale, charged silence.

Filled with potential.

Like a gas stove waiting for a spark to go up in flames.

It was you that struck the match.

“So, um, I promise I don’t just, uh, do this with everyone but, do you wanna maybe come inside,” you let your hand trail down his arm and slip into his palm, “I don’t feel like you’ve been properly compensated for saving my ass.”

Jin’s mouth was watering at the thought. He nodded slowly, eyes like saucers as you pulled him up your steps and through the door which shut promptly behind him.

Your place was nice in the sense that it fit you. He wasn’t really paying all that much attention to his surroundings as you locked the door and squeezed his hand in yours, leading him towards the end of the entrance hall.

When he stepped through to your bedroom, you toed off your shoes and he did the same, staring nervously and waiting for you to show him what exactly you meant by ‘further compensation.’

It was exactly what he’d hoped.

You approached him, still in the doorway, and stepped close so your chests brushed together. It was soft, the way you looked at him, sort of fuzzy around the edges while your hands trailed down his arms to place his palms at your waist.

It wasn’t like Jin hadn’t done this before—he totally had and definitely remembered all of it and wasn’t shit faced at all nope—but it hadn’t really mattered before. He knew in theory that he should take the lead, be a gentleman and make the first move and holy fucking god he was dying over there with the desire to finally live out his months and months of fantasies

But what if he did it wrong?

What if he ruined it now when he was so close to the finish line?

He’d never fucking forgive himself for it, and he could goddamn hear Magne in his head.

“You think too much for your own good.”

And he did, and he was right now, cause the room was only dimly lit by the street light streaming in through the window and you were reaching out to loop your arms behind his neck.

Should he lean down now?

Tilt left or right?

What if he clacked your teeth together?

What if—

Your lips were soft and hot against his, rubbing at the stubble on his chin before pressing close in that precious, puzzle-piece way human bodies fit together. He didn’t do much thinking after that.

His hands were too busy digging into the flesh of your hips separated by way to many fucking layers of fabric, and he couldn’t quite stop himself from indulging just a bit. Jin sucked gently at your lower lip, knees going weak at the glorious fucking sound you made in the back of your throat as he licked over the taught skin and tugged it between his teeth.

He could feel you smiling into his mouth, sharing breath and raking your fingers through the hair at the base of his neck. Jin groaned and you—fucking cheeky little bastard—slipped your tongue right past his lips and licked at the back of his fucking teeth like a popsicle in July.

Your hands in his hair hard tugged and his breath was coming faster, lips gliding against yours as the room turned to steam around him.

Through the haze he clung to the few remaining seconds of clarity.

Jin pulled away for one painful second to mumble against your lips.“You meant have sex, right?”

“Yeah,” your voice was barely more than a whisper, but you nodded frantically and rolled your hips against his.

“Ohh fuck, ‘kay good, thank god.”

For once Jin had nothing more to add.

And you weren't exactly willing to give him back his tongue long enough for any interruptions anyway.

***

“Holy fucking shit, look at you,” Jin gasped into your ear.

Both of your clothes had been discarded long ago, and he had your bare back to his chest while he sat propped against the headboard with your legs hooked on either side of his knees. It didn’t afford him the best view, but he got your head resting on his shoulder and pretty moans spilling right into his ear.

He didn’t need to see your pussy anyway.

The slick pouring out of your pretty fucking hole and coating his fingers as he pumped two of them into you was more than enough. His other hand wandered in the lovely expanse of space between your chest and your waist, running softly over the skin and pausing to pinch and roll your nipples just to hear you whine.

His cock was so fucking hard, trapped between your ass and his stomach, twitching every time you thrust your hips to meet the movement of his wrist.

“Jin, fuck please-”

You used his name every time you begged him for more and it was really going to his head.

“You’re so goddamn perfect, I’m gonna fucking ruin you,” he groaned and sunk his fingers deeper into your soaking cunt while his mouth dropped to your neck and sucked hard to mark you lovely skin.

He licked at the indents of his teeth, tasting your sweat on his tongue that tangled with yours again as your hand reached for his cheek and pulled him in. It was less of a kiss and more of a sloppy forming of your mouths that left you connected by a silvery string of spit that flashed in the low light. Jin sighed at the sight, rutting his hips against the cleft of your ass.

Your thighs twitched where they were spread and your hips lifted off the mattress to meet the languid thrusts of his fingers that curled up on every push in to hear the hitch in your breath.

He took pity on you and brought his other hand down to rub circles on your clit, listening for the telltale whimpers and the way your nails dug into his arm to find the perfect rhythm.

“I don’t really—mm, there fuck—feel like I’m paying you back right now,” you mumbled nipping your own trail of stepping stone bruises onto his throat as he picked up the pace and held steady on that sweet bundle of nerves.

“Are you fucking serious?”

He didn’t really mean to full on growl at you then, but just the thought that you’d really believe he wasn’t about to fucking drown in ecstasy just from watching you get off—just from touching, speaking, being in anyway acknowledged by you at all. Jin nudged your head to the side and bit down harshly into the crook of your neck, shuddering as you moaned and arched against his chest.

In any other scenario, he could never really find the right balance between too many words and not enough. The sheer volume of thoughts and interjections that raced like cars reaching the end of rush hour traffic made the formulation of any coherent conversation impossible, but now—

Now with your body so pliant in his hands, so willing and sweet and wanting him.

Wanting him.

What a concept.

He needed you to understand, to know how fucking over the moon, sunshine bright you had him burning.

And for once, he finally had the words to do it.

After all, he’d had months to prepare.

It was surprisingly easy to change your positions, to pull away from you for just a moment so he could roll and cage you on your hands and knees under him, ass in the air nestled against his cock.

“You really don’t think I’m getting anything out of this?” he groaned into you ear, rocking his length against you both for emphasis and because it felt so fucking good.

“Ah, well ya know,” your voice was so wrecked he was desperate to find out how much it would take for you to lose it entirely. “When you put it like that—mmh—I just feel bad you’re doing all the work. ”

You had this cheeky fucking grin on your face when you rocked forward so back so his cock slipped down to your dripping lips. The heat of your cunt was mesmerizing and it took a fuck ton of self control Jin was unaware he possessed to not ram straight into you right then.

“Yeah cause I’ve wanted to for fucking months goddamn it’s driving me insane.”

“What?”

Now that he’d started, Jin couldn’t find it in himself to stop. His hands dug hard into your hips, rocking so the tip of his dick caught your clit and you shivered below him, hot skin sliding with the motion of your bodies.

“It’s all I think about whenever I see you,” he was shaking when his hand reached down to grip himself, spreading your folds and soaking his length in your slick. “When you come in to work I just fucking lose myself thinking about how bad I want you to be mine, my pretty fucking thing to bring me coffee while I work and let me fuck you in the backroom.”

You whimpered under him, face pressed into the mattress as he draped himself over you, chest to back with his breath ghosting over your ear.

“Literal hours I just sit there at that awful fucking job and I only keep coming cause of you, cause I can watch you sit all cute in your chair and watch the way your cheeks squish up when you put your face in your hands and imagine they’re my hands and I’m about to spit in your fucking mouth so you remember who you belong too.”

“I—” you were nearly choking on the drool that soaked through your sheets as Jin lined himself up with your pretty little hole, pressing just the tip into your heat. “I didn’t think you ever—nggh, shit—noticed much about me.”

The corners of his eyes burned as sweat dripped down his forehead, he had to hold back a sob as he sheathed another inch into those perfect walls.

“Notice you? You’re all I fucking think about,” he pressed his lips softly against your shoulder, hands running from your chest to your sides as you took his cock and every word that slipped from his lips without complaint. “I could take such good care of you. I just fucking know it, just please, let me take care of you?”

“Fuck Jin,” your voice was closer to a sob than anything else but he needs you screaming. “You don’t really have to convince me—”

His patience had run out long ago, not even willing to let you finish before he’d sunk in to the hilt, spearing you on his cock with one final thrust. You ass was flush with his hips and his balls hung heavy and tight against the back of your thighs. The strangled little cry that worked its way out of your throat had gooseflesh erupting across his arms where he held you to him.

Jin couldn’t really be sure—it wasn’t like his brain was all that functional on a day to day basis and it most certainly was not now—but your walls clenching around him and that addictive warm, wet feeling milking his cock was on a whole other level than any fuck he’d ever had before.

There was something about the curve of your back against his chest, and the way you seemed to suck him in, drawing his length back in just seconds after he’d pulled out. Some about the feeling of your chest in his hands, of the sweat on your skin that he licked off in a long strip up your spine. Like you really were made for him. As though all those months spent in dream land, concocting your pretend lives together had spilled over into reality, molding you into the perfect shape to take him deep and hard and cry while you came on his cock just like he knew you were meant to.

“Oh, fuck yeah, gonna make you feel so good, I promise,” he mumbled, forehead pressed to the nape of your neck as his hips drew back and he sunk into you over and over again.

He needed you to moan louder, needed your neighbors on the other side of every wall to hear what he did to you, how he fucked you dumb on his cock and made you drunk with the pleasure of it—slutty and perfect and better than any fantasy he could ever concoct.

The room was filled completely with the wet slap of your bodies—his balls tightening up just at the squelch of you taking him—leaving only enough space for your cries and his grunting, no room left for any bitter doubt to creep in and ruin the sweetness in the air.

He could feel the surge growing in his stomach, the tensing in his thighs as his hips stuttered, but he needed you to cum first. Wanted to tip over the edge to the feeling of you spasming around him, so he let a hand slip from your hip to your folds. Jin only paused for a moment to run a finger around your stretched hole, feeling himself plunging into you, before drifting back up to your swollen clit and working the sensitive bud.

The mattress creaked and rocked along as Jin increased his pace, shifting his hips until his tip knocked against something that had your hands fisting in the sheets and your tongue lolling out in between cries of his name.

You didn’t give him much a warning, not that he minded really. Just a muffled shout with your head smashed into the pillows and the tightening of your walls surrounding him before he felt your whole body wracked with tremors so hard he had to wrap both arms around your middle and hold you while he rammed into you.

Jin wasn’t really keeping track of the filth that was pouring from his lips as he brought himself closer to release. A lot of encouragement, that you were taking him so well, cumming so pretty for him, mixed with a lot of thanks—for letting him have this, have you, for not casting him aside like everyone else always inevitably did.

He did have the clarity to drag one arm up and link your fingers together, pressing hard into the bed while blood pounded in his ears and his hips stuttered in their relentless rhythm. When Jin did finally cum, it was a strangely silent affair, all the words and sound that usually roared inside him dying on his lips as his cock spilled milky release deep inside you and your walls fluttered at the fullness.

And then it was as though every muscle in his body changed physical states.

Boneless, he collapsed onto you with a little huff. You didn’t even complain, just squeezed his hand tighter in yours and hummed at the weight of him.

“Well I think that was a, um,” you panted while he nuzzled his face deeper into your neck, “pretty equivalent exchange yeah?”

“I don’t know,” Jin kissed and nipped at the sweet skin of your shoulder, “I think you might have over paid a bit.”

You laughed, the joyous movement of your chest jostled him from your back and had his soft cock slipping from you in a gush of combined release. “I doubt that very much, I didn’t know I’d be getting to take your fucking load as part of the deal.”

“Shit,” he felt his heart seize in his chest, raising up on his elbows to look down as you turned to him. “I’m sorry, I should have asked.”

Your hand came up to stroke his cheek, clammy but welcome. He sat up enough so you could lay on your back and pull him back down to your chest amidst the sweat and cum slicked sheets.

“Don’t worry about it, I would have asked you to anyway,” you kissed the baby frizz at his hairline and if Jin hadn’t already melted into a puddle, then he certainly was now. “If I’d been able to talk at all.”

“Ha, yeah….”

A short silence descended in your dark bedroom. The noise of cars and the occasional shout filtered in through the window, but there was no other sound than your evening breaths. Jin tried not to ruin the peace while he had it.

It was such a rare commodity.

But he couldn’t say he mourned the quiet when you finally spoke.

“Did you wanna stay the night?” you asked in that soft way he always envisioned you would.

Soft so he’d know it was just a courtesy.

That you didn’t want him to leave.

“Uh, yeah, yes I would,” he stumbled over the words a bit, trying not to sound too eager but wanting you to know he would work a thousands shifts at the reception desk if it meant you held him for just a second longer.

“Good,” you sighed.

He felt you scoot down the bed and flopped onto his back so you could settle your head on his chest and drape an arm across his stomach. After another few minutes he felt you go limp at his side, soft and relaxed as you slipped away into dreams.

But though his muscles ached and his eyes felt heavy, Jin resisted the call to sleep.

He didn’t need to now.

You were here, in the flesh, and he could study you intently while his eyes were open.

No need for his brain to conjure up scattered images of you.

Because he had you now, tucked safely under his arm for him to keep and hold and fuck and love the way he wanted.

So there was no more need for sleep.

And no need for dreams.