#Industrial Tapes Industry Opportunities

[sramfact]

Packaging tape printing involves the customization of adhesive tapes with logos, branding, or messages. This practice enhances brand visibility, improves security, and provides tamper-evidence for shipments. It's widely used across industries like logistics, retail, and e-commerce to promote brands and ensure the integrity and authenticity of packaged goods, reflecting a trend toward personalized and secure packaging solutions.

The report "North American Packaging Tape Printing Market by Product Type (Hot Melt, Acrylic Based), Material (Polypropylene, PVC), Printing Ink (Water Based, UV-Curable), Mechanism (Digital, Flexography), End-user (Food & Beverages, Consumer Durables) - Forecast ", the packaging tape printing market size was estimated to grow from USD 5.4 Billion in 2015 to reach USD 7.0 Billion by 2020, at an estimated CAGR of 5.4% from 2015 to 2020.

[badbtssmut]

Money shot

When you want to make it into the porn industry, there’s only one thing stopping you; you don’t have a male partner to costar in your audition tape, but fortunately for you, your best friend Jungkook is eager to star in your first tape.

Contains: blowjob, fingering, jk cums on her face, jk being smug, doggy, missionary, riding, dirty talk, some spanking, possessive Jungkook?, recording

Admin note: Idea from one of my anons :)

—

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

“Are you really asking me that while I’m standing here butt naked with a boner in my hands? Come on, I think we are way past the point of second guessing whether I want this or not. Besides, it was your idea to begin with, don’t be a chicken, y/n.”

“I am not being a chicken! I just— was checking on you, I just don’t want things to be different between us, ya know?” You say while staring at the carpet beneath your feet, trying not to look at his big cock standing proud right in front of your face.

Jungkook placed a finger under your chin, raising your head so you would look at him.

"Nothing will be different between us, okay? If at any point you want to stop, just tell me. I won't do anything unless you tell me to, you know I won't force you to do anything you don't want to do. And the same goes for me, aight? If I want to stop at any point, I’ll tell you. Now stop worrying.”

You take a deep breath before answering.

"Okay, okay. Let's do this."

Jungkook grabs the camera, starting the recording. He sits down on the couch and gestures for you to come closer. You kneel in front of him, starting by wrapping your fingers around his cock, pumping him slowly while you looked up at the lens, before your eyes gazed back at the cock, watching his cock swell up at your efforts. You stopped jerking him off, and instead used your mouth, taking as much of his cock as possible before you started to bob your head up and down.

Jungkook grunted, temporarily forgetting about the device in his hands, quickly snapping out of it as he readjusted the focus on you, trying to keep the camera from shaking due to the pleasure he was receiving from the warmth of your mouth.

“Fuck, yes,” Jungkook hissed, throwing his head back as you continued sucking him off, his cock hitting the back of your throat every time you went down on him. “Babe, show the camera your pretty pussy.” He instructed and you stood, Jungkook stood from the couch, positioning the camera on the table in front of the both of you, before he walked over to you to pull off your lingerie.

His hands roamed over your chest, before moving to your backside and giving it a squeeze, a gasp escaping your lips at the suddenness of it.

“Come here.” Jungkook pulled you to the couch and got you on his lap. “Spread your legs for the camera.”

You obeyed, spreading your legs open, and Jungkook took the opportunity to tease your folds with his fingers, before sinking a digit into your wet cunt. You moaned at the feeling of his long digits, and bucked your hips forward as he added another, his thumb flicking at your clit.

He fingered you like this, and your head rolled back, eyes closed in bliss. You let him have control of your body, your moans filling the air.

But before you could get to your peak, he stopped, his fingers sliding out of you and you whimpered.

Jungkook licked his fingers and grabbed his cock, placing it at your entrance.

“Want my cock now, don't you?" He said, slapping his cock against your cunt. You nodded, and he smirked, teasing your folds with the tip of his cock. Fuck, it felt hard as steel.

"Then show them how well you take me, baby."

You sank down on his cock, letting it stretch your walls, and you sighed. Fuck, it felt so fucking good. You started bouncing up and down, and Jungkook's hands settled on your hips, guiding your movements, thrusting his hips up to meet yours.

Your moans filled the air, the sound of your wetness mixed with his grunts. The camera captured every detail of the penetration, and the thought of how it would be used made you feel even more aroused. Would this tape be the start of your career? Would the executives be drooling or getting a boner from watching this tape?

“Love cock?” Jungkook whispered in your ear, repeating himself again when he realized the camera must’ve not picked that up. “You love this cock, y/n?”

“Ya, love cock, so good.” You said with a shaky breath. “Oh!” You winced, forcing yourself to bounce on his cock harder, but your back and hips started to feel sore, and your thighs began to ache. Jungkook noticed how you were starting to slow down, and decided to switch positions, he stopped you, and guided you off his cock. “Get on the bed.” He instructed you, taking the camera from the table, soon joining you on the bed. The camera pointed down at your dripping wet pussy, and his tip teased your folds, sliding his full length up and down against your slick, the head of his cock brushing against your clit, sending tingles down your spine.

You moaned, your body shivering from the teasing, and you couldn't help but lift your hips, trying to get him to enter you. He chuckled, finally sinking into your cunt, and you both groaned at the feeling.

"So tight," He mumbled, pulling his cock out and pushing it back into your pussy. "Feel good, baby?"

"Yes, ah, feels good…”

Jungkook started fucking you slowly, his hips rocking back and forth. He kept his eyes on the camera, the lens focusing on where your bodies were joined. His other hand moved to your ankle, holding onto it as he quickened his pace. Your pussy was so wet, it was making lewd squelching sounds as he fucked you.

“Pussy doing so good, taking me so well...fuck, so tight and warm for me."

You could only moan in response.

"Yeah, your little cunt loves this cock, doesn't it?"

You whimpered, feeling the tip of his cock graze against your sweet spot.

“Yes, my cunt loves cock so much,” You moaned.

Jungkook let out a shaky breath, pulling out of you before he made you turn on your belly, ass up and head down, and he spanked your ass, causing you to squeal. He gave it another smack, the flesh jiggling.

"Arch your back a bit," He said, and you did.

The camera was now aimed at your ass, and he pushed the tip of his cock into your begging pussy. He thrusted into you, one hand holding the camera, while the other hand grabbed onto your hair, tugging at it as he slammed into your pussy.

"Fuck, oh!" You cried, and his grip on your hair tightened, his cock drilling in and out of you, the bed creaking beneath the both of you.

"So fucking good, shit."

"Yes, fuck, more, more, more, please," You whined, and he groaned.

"Take my cock so well, babe. So beautiful." He looked around for a place to put the camera on, and he decided on the dresser, the camera now recording both of you from a different angle.

Jungkook's hand was still in your hair, and he pulled at it, using it as an anchor as he pounded into you.

"I'm close," You whined, the tip of his cock pounding your sweet spot relentlessly. "Oh please, yes, right there!"

"Come, cum on my cock," He challenged you, his pace speeding up, your arms gave out and your face hit the pillows.

"Ah, ah, ah," You gasped, the pleasure building up inside you. You tried to get back up but Jungkook grabbed hold of your arms and pinned them back, his fingers interlocking with yours, his weight on top of you, fucking into you steadily.

"Oh, oh, oh," You moaned, toes curling and teeth gritted. "Fuck, fuck, fuck," You cried, starting to see stars, your knees wobbling.

“Thought you were gonna cum? I guess your greedy pussy didn’t wanna huh? Want to keep it wrapped around my cock, don't you, babe?"

“Yes, don’t want to stop, never want you to stop."

"Yeah? Never want me to stop?” He cooed, his hands now moving to your hips, guiding you back and forth on his cock, and you started to ride him backwards.

At this rate, you were going to pass out, you were overflowing from pleasure, but somehow, you were still eager for more.

"Oh, fuck," You whimpered, and you were a panting, sweating mess, the room was hot, and all you could hear was the slapping of skin against skin, along with the grunts and moans coming out of both of your mouths. You were so close.

Jungkook plopped the camera right in front of your face, now capturing how you were so fucked out and yet, still desperate for more.

"You will show the camera what that face looks like when you cum, right?"

You nodded. "Yeah, want to show the camera when I cum, please, oh, ah, more, please,"

You were moaning uncontrollably, feeling so fucking sensitive, and the camera was now capturing the look on your face, the way you were biting your lips and clenching your jaw, teary eyes from the intensity of the pleasure. You felt Jungkook’s hands squeeze into your tits, his cock pounding your sweet spot mercilessly, and that sent you over the edge.

"FUCK!" You screamed, cumming on his cock, pussy convulsing around him, your legs trembling. You buried your face in the pillows, muffling your cries, and he stopped thrusting, allowing you to ride out your orgasm on his cock on your own pace.

When you were all spent, Jungkook pulled out of you and took the camera, pointing it down at your face as he started to rub himself off, a few pumps later and he was spilling his cum onto your face, some of his load getting in your hair. He groaned, his body jerking forward from his climax, and the camera caught the whole thing, the lens zooming in on the streaks of white on your face.

“And… remove.”

“Huh? What are you doing?” You asked, voice hoarse from the screaming, and he reached over to grab a tissue from the nightstand, wiping the cum from your face.

“Sorry, but you won’t be sending in any audition tapes, After today… I won’t allow any man to see you in this way, this is only for my eyes and mine only.” And without warning, he pressed his lips against yours.

[projectjasper]

POND NARAVIT: On his rocky start in the entertainment industry and believing in yourself even when you don't succeed

[PART. TRANS. CREDIT]

Pond: Basically, in the five years I've been in the entertainment industry, I've never talked about this anywhere. This will be the first time I talk about it, now that I got a chance to finally debut with my friends.

The reason why I want to be a dancer/artist is because that's what I've always wanted, even before entering the entertainment industry. Going back around six years ago, in 2018-2019 - that's when I started dreaming about this. But I didn't dare tell anyone, because I was afraid people would think it's funny or something like that. Like "is that even possible?", so I've never told anyone. It was my passion and I was just trying to do it by myself.

As time went by, I tried more and more. But to be an artist, you have to have training and skills, which you need to constantly perfect. At the time, my family let me earn money on my own. I went to work part-time. It was some coffee shop, it was a while ago now. I worked there every day during school break. I worked until I saved some money.

Then, in the evening, past 6 p.m. I would go to dance classes. I didn't care that I had to wake up early, because this was something I really wanted to do. I thought that one day I could succeed at this, so I went to dance classes every evening. For about two or three months, I went there every day. But it was expensive and - what's more - time-consuming. Because, with dancing skills, it's not like you can do it for a couple of days and become good. At the time, I'd been going to dance classes for two months, but it wasn't enough to go to an audition or anything like that.

So I kept practising, but I also got into university and had to study hard there. I didn't really have an opportunity to go to dance classes as much because I had to focus on studying. We were poor. But there was an audition held somewhere and I decided to try. At first, I was very excited. But I didn't even go past the first round.

It was 2019, I was a kid, and I was like "What am I doing?" At first, to be honest, I was quite disappointed and really sad, because I remember trying very, very hard, waiting for this opportunity for so long, and then it just didn't happen. But though I was sad, I wasn't upset, because I felt like I just hadn't reach my full potential yet.

Then I tried to send an audition tape somewhere. The person contacted me back. I was so happy. At the time, it was like the greatest thing I've ever experienced in my life. Things went smoothly for a while, I almost got it, but there were certain circumstances that made it impossible to move forward at the time. They said: "Oh, the situation isn't right yet" or something like that. "Let's wait until everything is resolved, and you'll be contacted again".

I remember I was really sad about this because I thought they were just trying to be nice and comfort me. I was devastated, I was crying a lot. Because things went quite far, but then they ended up saying it couldn't happen because of the "current circumstances". And I just had to "wait until they contacted me again". I was so sad, I cried and I couldn't dance either. I basically stopped dancing for like a year. I felt really hurt.

Joong: [leans over to look at Pond]

Pond (to Joong): Don't cry, don't cry.

Pond: So there was a period when I just couldn't dance, I would think about it and I'd just get really sad. I couldn't do it. I couldn't even watch or otherwise consume anything dance-related. I just stopped completely, disappeared from the circle of friends who danced with me for a while. For almost a year. At that point I've been trying to do this for almost three years and it hadn't gone anywhere, it didn't work, so I just disappeared because i was devastated. I was so sad. Any time I thought about dancing again, I just thought about what happened. When those friends called me, I kept saying I was busy and making up other excuses.

But then something happened, exactly a year later. I got a call and they said: "Do you remember when we promised we'd contact you?" They really did, they called me back. All this time, I thought they were just trying to console me when they said that.

I was shocked. And I looked back at what I've been doing the past year and thought I shouldn't have stopped dancing. If I didn't stop, all my skills would still be there. But because I did, they started disappearing. They were gone. I had to practically start over with my dancing skills. I was also trying to sing, but that skill worsened too. As for rapping, I never practised it continuously in the first place. And oh, I was so stressed about it all. They told me: "See you in two weeks!" And I was sitting there, thinking to myself: oh no, what am I supposed to do? I can't do anything. So I was practising my dancing skills every day.

Pond: [points at Joong] You know this, you know.

Joong: Ooooh yeah! Woke up early and immediately went dancing!

Pond: I was dancing every day, I was dancing so much that my body could barely handle it anymore. I was working and studying hard at the time too. There was so much on my plate, my immune system was in bad shape. But I just felt like it was a once in a lifetime opportunity. I wanted to do it. I didn't know what would end up happening, but I really wanted to do my best. I was ready to practice even until I died if necessary.

And with time, things were going okay, they were getting good. I was contacted again and they said they want to meet up. They wanted me to prove my talent one more time. And in the end, it didn't happen. I was so upset at the time, but then I thought: oh, that's alright, at least I've grown up during this experience. I wasn't going to cling to those missed opportunities anymore. If I focused on regret and stopped dancing again, the skills that I worked so hard for would deteriorate once more. And that's the story!

I want to tell everyone that no matter what your dream is - I want you to have this mindset. If it doesn't work the first time or something goes wrong, don't be sad or blame yourself. Don't blame others. Don't get so discouraged that you abandon everything. Think about it carefully. It's okay, just try again. Even if that one thing didn't work out, something better will come up in the future. But just prepare yourself, because if I didn't stop for an entire year back then, I might have even gotten that opportunity in the end.

Joong: One door closes but another opens.

Pond: Exactly.

BONUS: Five years later, he has achieved what he set out to do! 🫶

[fantasticsandwich]

yandere influencer x fem! reader (pt 4)

The aroma of freshly ground coffee wafted through the air, encasing your senses as you and Cillian stepped into the threshold of the cafe. A buzz of chatter from the crowded space filled your ears, punctuated by the clinking of porcelain and the hiss of steam frothing milk. The cafe's modern decor, a blend of industrial chic and cozy warmth, seemed to draw in half the city, leaving  you and Cillian at the end of a winding line of impatient patrons.

You fidgeted with the hem of your sweater, an eclectic pattern of colors that you had chosen to appear both sophisticated and approachable. Entering the queue, you the weight of the many eyes skimming over both you and Cillian—some curious, others envious. He stood beside at your side, the epitome of effortless elegance, his dark hair catching the soft glow of the pendant lights above.

“Looks like we’ll be here for a while,” he remarked. “I hate when something I like becomes popular.”

“Seems so,” you replied, your tone light but your mind elsewhere. You slipped your phone out of your pocket, thumb flicking across the screen with swift, practiced motions. Emails, job listings, opportunities—they cascaded down the display as you filtered through them with a sense of urgency that belied the calm front you tried to project.

“Are you looking at anything interesting?” Cillian asked, peering over at your screen with a curiosity that felt too close, too keen.

“Just looking at some job postings,” you said, minimizing the list of applications before he could glimpse the titles. You knew he didn’t truly understand your need to earn your keep, to build something for yourself without the crutch of connections or favors. “It’s difficult to find something with flexible hours and decent pay. I want to find something that fits, you know?”

“I figure it’d be,” he said with a shrug.

Once he retreated out of your personal bubble, you scrolled through one listing after another, occasionally pausing to submit your resume into the void of potential employment. Each tap on the 'apply' button was a tiny leap of faith—a hope that somewhere out there was a chance for you to prove yourself capable, independent.

The cafe was stifling. You removed your cardigan and settled it over your arm, only for Cillian to sweep it into his arms. You glared as he draped the sleeves over his shoulders, tying them into a knot. It was an eyesore against his monochromatic ensemble, but as always, he wore it well.

You shuffled forward in the line, your eyes trailing over the scuffed tile floor of the bustling cafe. Cillian loomed beside you, his body heat seeping through the thin fabric of your blouse as he leaned a little too close for comfort, arms pressing into your side.

“I love this,” Cillian whispered, his breath warm against your ear. “Our weekly meet-ups are all that get me through the week.”

You nodded, a quick jerk of your head, wishing your frazzled hair would shield you from the intimacy of his gaze. Your attention shifted to the chalkboard menu above the counter, where playful script offered promises of bold new flavors and exotic blends. You considered ordering a raspberry mocha or the spiced chai latte, something to break the monotony of your usual orders.

“Hey, Lee, what do you think about those new items> Do they look—”

“No. You know how particular your stomach is,” Cillian cut in, his tone laced with feigned concern as he placed a hand on your shoulder. "You should stick with the usual, and I’ll get the new stuff so you can still try it." Before you could protest, Cillian turned to the barista, his charismatic smile in place. “Two of the usual, please. And could you grab one of those pre packaged blueberry muffins?”

Whatever. I’m eating on his dime, you thought as he swiped his card.

With a sigh trapped behind you lips, you smiled and watched as he paid for the order, his flamboyant duct-tape wallet—the same one you made for him during a particularly boring summer—flashing briefly before being tucked away. The idea of eating another stiff, cellophane-wrapped muffin seemed ridiculous when there were trays of fresh pastries just a few feet away. But he was paying, and arguing seemed like it would cost more than you were willing to spend.

“Come, let’s find our table. Did you know the owner started reserving the one in the back for us? It’s nice when loyalty is rewarded.” Cillian steered you gently by the elbow toward an empty table in the corner. Releasing you, his fingers curled around the back of the chair, sliding it out with a graceful swoop that seemed practiced, almost theatrical.

No sooner than you sat, a broad-shoulder man rushed over with their drinks. “Here you go,” he said, gently placing them down. “I knew what to make as soon as you walked in.”

You settled into the seat, your eyes drifting to the cup placed before you—a frothy concoction topped with swirls of caramel and a mountain of whipped cream. You wrapped your hands around the warm ceramic, feeling its smoothness against your palms, the heat barely penetrating the barrier between them.

“Thank you,” you mumbled, more out of habit than genuine gratitude. Bringing the cup to your lips, you took a tentative sip, the sugary liquid flooding your mouth with an intensity that made you wince. It was cloying, too much, like the heavy-handed perfume of someone trying to mask their insecurities. With each visit, the sweetness seemed to grow, or perhaps it was just your weariness of this routine that soured the taste.

“Say 'ah',” said Cillian, tilting his drink to you. “I asked you to open your mouth. I'm giving you the first sip.” He tilted his head, curved lashes rising and falling with each blink. “Or do you want me to make you? Would you like that?”

“I want none of that. It's embarrassing.”

“Fine.” Cillian snatched his drink back, his lips curling into a contented smile as he savored a flavor that  you could no longer stomach. His phone appeared in his hand—sleek, the latest model—as if by magic, and he began to fuss over their table setting, rearranging the silverware and napkins with meticulous care.

“Wait,” he said, holding up a hand to halt your movements as you reached for a muffin. “Let me get a picture first.”

Sighing, you withdrew your hand. You should’ve just shut up and drank from his cup. He was probably punishing you now.

You were forced to watch as he positioned his phone just so, angling it to capture the perfect composition of their prepackaged desserts. The shutter clicked repeatedly, a staccato rhythm that echoed the tapping of your foot beneath the table. With a sense of dettachment, you observed the scene through the screen’s glow, detached, as if viewing it all from a great distance.

The cafe buzzed around them, a hive of activity and chatter, but in their little corner, only the soft light of Cillian’s phone display and the artificial sound of captured moments filled the space.

“Perfect,” Cillian finally declared, his voice threaded with satisfaction as he admired the digital gallery of confections and cream. “I can make even cellophane wrap look appetizing.”

“So talented,”  you replied, tone flat, the single word falling short of enthusiasm. You watched him now, as he edited and filtered reality into something palatable for public consumption, something that would garner admiration and envy in equal measure.

Finally allowed your beverage, you eagerly dug in, first savoring the whipped cream before it could’ve further melted into the beverage. Scooping some into your mouth, a dollop of whipped cream perched precariously on the edge of your straw.

It was then that the inevitable happened. The whipped cream betrayed you, a small glob landing with a soft plop on your nose. You froze, a flicker of annoyance crossing your face as you reached for a napkin. But Cillian’s hand was quicker, his fingers skimming your cheek, then swiping the cream off your nose. He lingered a second too long.

“Got it,” he murmured, tongue slithering out to lick his fingers. He wiped his saliva on the sleeve of your cardigan, which was still settled around his shoulders.

Your breath hitched. Although a more sensible part of yourself fought the urge to scream at him for the act, a quieter, darker corner of your mind began to race.

“Thanks,” you mumbled, drawing back slightly. You eyed your portion of the desserts, the artificial brightness of the strawberry topping almost mocking in its vibrancy. You scooped up a small bite, the saccharine taste doing little to satisfy the craving you couldn't quite name.

Cillian watched you, his dark eyes gleaming. He seemed oblivious to the fact that your routine outings had become a suffocating ritual, a showcase for the curated life he projected onto his Instagram feed.

“Isn’t it delicious?” he asked, his tone expectant, a hint of coercion nestled between the words.

“The same as always,” you echoed, though the flavor was as hollow as the affirmation. The consequences of defying Cillian’s vision for your friendship loomed large and his approval was a drug you had been conditioned to crave.

Your spoon clinked against the plastic container, a soft sound. You ate mechanically, your thoughts drifting away from the table, away from Cillian and his veiled demands. You imagined stepping out of this scene, leaving behind the cloying sweetness and the confines of expectations. In your mind's eye, you pictured yourself tasting something real and complex, something that didn't leave you longing for more.

Your eyes wandered from the busy baristas steaming milk to perfection, to the patrons hunched over their laptops or lost in murmured conversations. The clinking of cutlery on porcelain provided a rhythmic backdrop to the muffled chatter around them. You inhaled deeply, the rich aroma of freshly brewed coffee filling your senses, yet you found no comfort in the familiar scent. Instead, it underscored a sense of monotony that had been creeping into your days, a desire for something more than these meticulously staged outings.

“Y/N?” Cillian's voice threaded through your thoughts, smooth and commanding. His eyes were fixed on her, expectant, as he leaned forward slightly, his posture perfect, his smile practiced. “You seem distant today. You know you can share anything with me, right?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” you assured him, pressing your lips into a smile that didn't quite reach your eyes. “Just thinking about a paper I have due.”

“Your dedication is admirable,” he replied, his tone laced with an affection that felt like a velvet glove masking a steel grip. “Admirable, but irritating. You need to learn to relax a bit. Don’t worry, I’m here to take care of you.”

You nodded. You watched him as he adjusted his phone on the table, the screen alight with notifications—likes, comments, a digital chorus singing his praises. It seemed that he had already uploaded the images, a new record. Cillian seemed to exist in two worlds simultaneously: the one before you and the one inside his phone, each moment curated for maximum effect.

“Let’s take a selfie,” he suggested suddenly, his voice light but insistent. “We haven’t updated our cafe chronicles in a while.”

Before you could respond, he had positioned his phone, the lens aimed at capturing the dessert and you smile.  You obliged, tilting your head just so. You braced yourself for a barrage, but he merely snapped one image.

Your stomach curdled. Was it alright? How could he be satisfied by only one picture? Were you ugly and was offering to take a picture with you merely a way to maintain the farce of friendship? He was always buying you things, and you had never stopped to wonder what he was getting in return. Was it a sick sense of charity?

“You’re so pretty here,” Cillian declared, reviewing the photo with a nod of approval. "Our followers will love this."

“Our?”

“They’re mine, but they like seeing you, too. I guess I should share you, sometimes.”

“Right. Yeah, guess that makes enough sense.”

You couldn't help but wonder if there was anyone out there who saw past the facade, who understood the reality of the smiles and the sweetness that left a bitter aftertaste. You longed for the authenticity that no filter could provide, a life where moments were lived and not merely documented for the hollow validation of strangers. You wondered what kind of person Cillian was without that glassy shield.

“Your turn,” he said, pushing the phone toward you. “You should post something too. Keep up appearances, you know?”

“Right,”  you murmured, your fingers hovering over the device. You glanced at Cillian and then back at the bustling cafe, the world spinning around you in a blur of motion and sound. You glanced up at Cillian, who was animatedly discussing his latest social media strategy, his features alight with enthusiasm.

“Imagine the likes we’d get if we posted every weekend.”

“What’s your goal with this?” you abruptly asked. “Why do you post so much?”

He paused, his gaze lifting from the screen to meet hers, a half-smile playing on his lips. “I have dreams, Y/N,” he said softly, almost tenderly. His dark eyes held a glimmer of something fierce, something hungry. “I want to be more than just a face in the crowd. Modeling—that’s what I see myself doing. My face on billboards, in magazines…”

Your heart skipped a beat, not from surprise but from the sudden realization that he had been serious about his ambitions all along.

“Then I support you,” you murmured. The words felt hollow, even to your own ears, as if they were being swallowed by the grandeur of his dream.

But as Cillian spoke, detailing his strategies for building a portfolio and networking within the industry, your attention waned. You nodded mechanically, your mind drifting. Your could hear the passion in his voice, see the fire in his eyes, but it was like watching a play through a thick pane of glass. You couldn't reach him; you couldn't touch the world he was so vividly painting with his words.

The conversation began to feel like a soliloquy, his voice the only sound in the room, resonating with aspirations that soared high above your understanding.  Your gaze settled on the phone still clutched in his hand, the screen alive with notifications—each one a confirmation of his allure, each one pulling him further away from her. The light from his phone cast a glow on his sharp features, throwing shadows that danced across his high cheekbones. He was talking about headshots now, about finding the right angle to accentuate the stark lines of his jaw. You tried to listen, tried to be present, but a storm brewed within her, dark and relentless.

Cillian was sensitive, his heart an exposed nerve, and the world he so desperately wanted to conquer was unforgiving, ravenous. The beauty industry would devour his gentle spirit; you could almost hear the snap of its jaws in the distance. Your stomach churned at the thought of him, caught in the maelstrom of criticism and rejection, those princely features twisted in pain.

A shiver ran down your spine upon drawing a cruel conclusion. You wanted to see him crying, but you wanted to reserve the sight for yourself. He would look pretty even when crying—you had seen it before, the way tears clung to his lashes like morning dew, the way his blue eyes deepened into stormy seas.

Your lips parted, breath catching. It was a troubling realization, one that made your cheeks flush with heat. You didn't want the world to witness that vulnerability, to see him stripped bare of the confidence he wore like armor.

“You’re beautiful. The world will love you," you managed to say. “It will devour you whole.”

He paused, his eyes locking onto your, and for a moment, there was silence. “You really think so?” he asked, tentative hope threading through his words.

You nodded, your throat tight. “It’s impossible not to,” you said, and it was the truth. But buried beneath that truth was a coil of scales and green, that dreaded jealousy snaking around your heart. It was a silent plea that begged him not to share his beauty with anyone else. In a world where you often felt mismatched and uncertain, his adoration was the anchor that kept you from drifting too far into the sea of your own insecurities. The only thing you had was him, and the thought of losing even a sliver of that connection was more than you could bear.

“Y/N?” Cillian's voice sliced through your reverie, laced with a hint of suspicion. “Really, what’s wrong? You seem spacey today.”

“Sorry,” you replied, your voice barely above a whisper. “Only tired, that’s still all.”

As you finished eating the desserts,  youur restlessness clawed its way up your throat, desperate for release. With each bite of the overly sweet cake, you tasted the blandness of repetition. The same cafes, the same dynamic, the same Cillian — it was a pattern woven into the fabric of your daily life, one that now chafed and constricted.

You pushed the plate away, the remnants of frosting clinging stubbornly to the porcelain.

“Next time, let’s try somewhere new,” you ventured, your voice steadier than you felt. “Maybe something less curated? We could take a stroll around town and see where we wind up.”

“New?” Cillian laughed. “Why fix something that isn’t broken? This place is us. It’s our spot.”

Your gaze fell to the empty plate, the hollow echo of ‘our’ ringing in your ears. No, you thought, a slow-burning defiance taking root. This isn’t us; it’s you, and I’m just along for the ride because you pay for everything.

“Guess so,” you murmured, the word sticking in your throat like the last taste of artificial sweeteners. Cillian continued talking, oblivious to the seismic shift occurring within.

You bit your lip, gaze lingering on your phone before shifting to your bag, the dog-eared textbook inside. Reluctantly, you retrieved the device and opened your emails, sifting through the job listings yet again.

“Applying to jobs? You can do that anytime.” Cillian’s lips curled into a half-smile, though his eyes narrowed slightly—a fleeting shadow crossing his otherwise immaculate features. “Why are you worrying about that, though? If you need money, I can talk to my father. He’s always looking for competent people at the company.”

The offer hung in the air between you, a gilded temptation laced with implications. Your fingers paused on the page, the words 'cognitive dissonance' blurring before your eyes. You took a deep breath, trying to steady the fluttering in your chest.

“Thanks, but no thanks,” you replied, more to yourself than to him. “I want to earn my way, not just land a job because I know someone who knows someone.”

Cillian leaned back, his expression unreadable as he regarded you through half-lidded eyes. “As you wish,” he murmured, the phrase an echo of acquiescence that seemed to dance on the edge of something darker, something you couldn't quite place.

Turning back to the textbook, you tried to lose yourself in the psychological complexities it held, your mind tracing the intricate pathways of human behavior and motivation. Yet, a part of you remained acutely aware of his presence, the weight of his gaze, and the unspoken challenges that brewed like the coffee behind the counter—bitter and potent.

“Really, Y/N,” Cillian said, his voice smooth like velvet but edged with something colder. You could feel his eyes on you, burning with an intensity that made your skin prickle. “You don’t have to do this. I can make things easier for you. You’re not just anyone to me. But you aren't family either.”

“You’re not getting it. You’re just a friend, and connections can be so easily severed. I’ve done it since secondary school, and now that we’re entering adulthood, I don’t want to keep relying on you. I want to feel like I’m doing something for myself for once.”

“Fine,” Cillian’s voice dropped, a shadow passing over his face that matched the darkening sky outside. “But remember, my offer to take care of you is always there. It would be much simpler than all this.”

You felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cafe’s air conditioning. You tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear, hands trembling slightly. Your ambition battled with the gnawing doubt that his words left in their wake.

“Simple isn’t always better,” your murmured, your attention ostensibly back on your phone, but your senses were hyper-aware of the man sitting across from you.

Your fingers paused over the screen, the list of job postings blurred by a growing resolve. Swallowing the lump in your throat, you met Cillian’s gaze with an icy detachment.

“What do you even want?”

“I need to contribute to my brother's school fees. He deserves that chance.”

His eyes narrowed, and for a moment, the cafe's buzz dimmed under the weight of his scrutiny. “Which school is he at?”

“Some snooty international boarding school,” you replied, your protective instincts flaring. You didn’t know why, but you didn’t want him to know.

“A prestigious place. Must be expensive.”

“Very.”

“A good education is vital yet costly. Surely, for people of your financial status, there are scholarships, grants…”

“None that cover everything,” you interjected, your tone laced with the fatigue of countless hours spent searching for financial aid.

“Then work harder,” Cillian suggested, his words wrapped in a honeyed tone that did little to sweeten their bite. “Or not. You could always reconsider my proposal.”

“I already said no to the job.”

“Not that one.”

You recoiled, as if the words were a physical blow. “Stop joking about that,” you stated, your voice quiet but fierce. “It makes me uncomfortable.”

An unreadable expression crossed Cillian's face before he masked it with a charming smile. “As you wish. But the world isn’t kind to dreamers who walk alone.”

Your heartbeat quickened, not from flattery but from the veiled warning in his tone.

“Excuse me,” you murmured, your voice barely more than a whisper as you clammbered out of your seat, sidestepped away from Cillian. Your fingers trailed the cool, marbled countertop of the cafe as you headed towards the sanctuary of the restroom. Inside, the air was perfumed with lavender and vanilla, an artificial calm that did little to soothe your troubled thoughts.

Standing at the sink, you turned the cold tap and splashed water onto your face, watching as droplets clung stubbornly to your glasses before tumbling down. You looked up, meeting your own gaze in the mirror. The girl reflected back at you had eyes wide with determination, yet shadowed by doubt. With a trembling hand, you pushed the glasses up the bridge of your nose and took a deep breath, trying to wash away the worry etched into your forehead.

“Can you believe we happened to come here at the same time as them?”

“As who?”

“That’s  Y/N L/N,” a hushed voice pierced through the quiet, followed by the sound of stifled giggles.

You stilled, your heart skipping a beat. You recognized the voices of fellow students, their words weaving through the space between the stalls and sink, ensnaring your attention.

“The one who's always with Cillian?” another whispered, a note of envy threading through her tone.

“Exactly! I thought they were just friends, but seeing them here together, they must be dating. She’s so lucky; he looks like he walked out of a fashion magazine… Vogue, who?”

Your hands paused, water dripping from your fingertips. Their words wrapped around you like a velvet robe, heavy with implications you’d never dared to consider. To them, you were no longer invisible, no longer just a friend clinging to the edges of Cillian’s spotlight. You were the object of speculation, the center of a narrative spun from half-truths and assumptions.

Your reflection in the mirror now seemed different, caught in the crossfire of jealousy and admiration. It was unsettling, this new role you hadn’t auditioned for. And yet, part of you reveled in the novelty, the taste of a life where you weren’t just surviving but thriving in the eyes of others.

“Seriously, what does he see in her, though?” the first voice added with a scoff, the sound sharp enough to cut through your fleeting fantasy. “She’s not even that pretty, and she doesn’t even dress well.”

“Who knows? Maybe she's not as plain as she looks. Or maybe it's her brain. Isn't she a biomed major?”

“Whatever it is, I wish I had it.”

You exhaled slowly, the air leaving your lungs like the deflating of a balloon. With one last glance at your uncertain reflection, you adjusted your clothes and stepped out of the restroom. Your eyes scanned the café until they settled on Cillian. He sat at a corner table, his princely features bathed in the soft glow of your laptop screen.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” you said tentatively, approaching him.

“For you, I’ve got all the time in the world,” Cillian replied without looking up, his fingers dancing across the keyboard.

You leaned over his shoulder, watching as paragraphs morphed under his command. You noted how he supplemented your notes with additional information, his edits weaving through the essay like intricate lacework. A warmth spread through your chest at his helpfulness.

“Your argument here is strong, but you’ve missed some spelling errors, and the grammar is wonky in some bits,” Cillian pointed out, highlighting the words with a click. “You need to pay more attention to detail.”

The feelings of admiration died.

“Thanks for catching those,” you murmured, trying to match his attentiveness with an appreciative smile. Yet, as Cillian continued to point out every tiny mistake, you felt the weight of his scrutiny. It was as if he were peeling away layers, exposing the flaws you had worked so hard to hide beneath vibrant colors and earnest smiles.

“Here, another one,” he said sharply, almost triumphantly, correcting a misspelled term with a swift stroke.

“Right. I’ll remember that.”

For a moment, you stood motionless, observing Cillian's meticulous grooming mirrored in his meticulous editing.

“Your words are comprehensive,” he commented, finally meeting your gaze. “But sometimes, it feels like you're not quite sure of yourself. You could be more assertive.”

“Maybe,” you conceded, tugging at the hem of your blouse. “I don’t know how to write well. I just want it to be perfect, you know?”

“Just rest up and let me worry about perfection,” Cillian said, his tone leaving no room for debate.

You closed your eyes for a moment, the screen’s glow imprinting on your eyelids. The day replayed itself behind your closed eyes: all of it now seemed trivial compared to Cillian's insistent editing, his fingers deftly correcting your words as if they were errant children straying from the path.

Opening your eyes, you glanced at the computer screen. His changes were precise, the document almost gleaming with perfection under the cursor's blinking supervision. But it was your essay, your thoughts—your voice, now polished by someone else's hand. You felt a pang of something akin to betrayal, though no promise had been broken.

"Is it better now?”

“Better,” you replied, your voice lacking conviction. You noticed then how the light caught on the angles of his face, a visage crafted to be admired, to be envied. It struck you—how many others had been captivated by that same light, only to find themselves lost in the dark?

“Thanks,” you added, a necessary courtesy.

“Anything for you.”

You turned back to the screen, retreating to your essay to calm yourself. But even there, doubt crept in, whispering that perhaps you were losing yourself in the pursuit of an image—a place beside Cillian, envied by strangers and shrouded in false admiration.

[holymaccaronii]

Hey guys

Guess who is free now.

I passed the admission exam during summer and I’m now studying industrial design! For the one’s who may not be familiar with the career, industrial designers focus on solving problems thru a product’s design in order to ensure its efficiency and help the public. Industrial design has a VERY wide range of job opportunities, I’d like to mainly focus on the areas of toy and jewelry design since they’ve caught my eye and greatly interesting. I’ve practiced my skills on morphological studies (harmony, color theory, etc.), perspective, material experimentation and more. Since I was 4 months straight working on many projects, I’d like to share the ones I liked the most and had fun with:

This was my very first delivery from morphological studies. The objective was to create a balanced and harmonic design with 5 squares, circles and triangles.

This design was also a delivery from morphological studies. It was more of a challenge applied on every single group in which you had to receive specific instructions (in this case, to design a napkin’s pattern inspired on an element for Mexican food restaurants) and complete their requirements under 24 hours. My hand ended up hurting a bit, but the 100 was worth it :D.

This was a size-accurate replica of a hair iron made out of foamed PVC sheets and a lot of tape for material experimentation class.

The objective in this activity was to turn a 2D design (seen from above) into a 3D model with varying volumes. At the beginning I didn’t really like my idea for it but at the end it gave me nice fantasy / fairy kinda vibes.

EDGAR SALT SHAKER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Aaaand this was my final project. The objective in here was to create a design that could create many patterns (called modules) if arranged differently. This was the most tedious project of all since we had to turn the design into stained glass + 16 tiny replicas of a 3D model from it, but it was very fun and rewarding at the end however! I really enjoyed what the career has taught me so far and I look forward to stay here and graduate hopefully :,D.

[hollywoodroses]

Hii I’m not sure if your doing requests but can you do Izzy x female reader smut but she biracial actress like she has wavy hair, green eyes and curvy and she hosting SNL and GNR is starring but she in love with Izzy but he giving her mixed feelings

Yes.

warnings: smut, angst, language, izzy gets a little rough

minors, please don’t interact

It’s Saturday Night

You are the talk of Hollywood, a new A-List actress. Your debut was a big deal as you are one of a few ethnic actresses in the industry. You have striking green eyes and are curvy in all the right places. When joining the industry you had heard of some newcomers doing porn just to get by, but you were better than that. Since the success of your film ‘When Harry Met Sally’ you are invited by NBC studios to host Saturday Night Live with musical guest Guns N’ Roses.

You are currently at a late-night tv show to promote yourself for your appearance on Saturday Night Live. It was announced a week ago that you would be appearing on the show.

“Are you excited for the musical guest.” The host asked you.

“Oh yes, I am. I happen to have a crush on izzy stradlin”. You replied, blushing.

The audience ohhed and awed at you thinking you are very sweet.

Meanwhile the boys are at their hotel watching your interview.

“God, that bitch.” Izzy mumbles to himself as Steven chuckles while overhearing.

“I can’t stand her.”

“I have an idea, why don’t you fool around with her. See what happens when you have her all hot and bothered.” Steven exclaims.

Izzy smiled as he thought about it. This was a great idea but a very dangerous game.

*****

It was finally Saturday evening, the day you are to host Saturday Night Live and possibly make a move on Izzy. You had it all planned out. You will fuck him backstage in your dressing room before the show. You didn’t know that he was unsure about you.

When you got to the NBC studios, you entered the green room and saw him. The love of your life, no, your crush. You just wanted to get as close as possible to him.

Izzy smiles at you and mentions you to meet in another room.

“Hi, Izzy. I am a big fan of you and Guns N’ Roses”. You say to him once you are alone.

“Thanks, you are not so bad yourself.”

You think he is about to kiss you as he leans into you. As you are about to complete the connection, he walks past you and laughs. You frown, you thought Izzy liked you too. Guess you were wrong. You had other plans to get him. You didn’t know that Izzy was waiting for the perfect time to be with you. Leaving the room, you went to your dressing room to get ready for the taping.

For the next hour the members of Guns N’ Roses, minus Izzy, came to visit with you. You had a great time with them. Discussing music and the excitement of being on an iconic tv show. Once you are finished with the visit, you hug Axl as you see Izzy hiding behind a door. When Axl leaves you alone, you call Izzy to come to your room. It was time to get him whether he liked it or not.

Izzy was walking too slow for you, almost in a teasing way. You huff in anger and when he finally gets close enough, you drag him into your dressing room by his shirt collar.

“Come here you bitch.” You whisper as you kiss him on his mouth.

He grabs your leg and wraps it around his waist. You take this opportunity to grind against his dick. You can’t help but moan but he surprises you by breaking the kiss and covering your mouth with his hand. He pushes away from you and walks towards the couch and sits down. He smiles wickedly at you as you shout in frustration.

“I don’t think this is a great idea” Izzy says to you.

“What do you mean? Don’t you see that I want you?” You reply with sadness in your eyes.

Izzy thinks for a moment as you feel your heart pounding in nervousness. Izzy smiles as he gets up from the coach and walks over to you.

He puts his hands on your cheeks and whispers “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t…”

He finally decides to make a move on you. He kisses you with force like he is thirsty for your love. You can’t help but deepen the kiss when he opens his mouth and you lightly suck on his tongue. Izzy moans in shock as the kiss continues. He walks you to a table with a mirror in the corner in the room, turning you around so you can see your reflection.

Izzy takes his hands and pulls your blouse off you as you scream. You weren’t wearing a bra and blushed when you saw part of your nakedness. You waste no time in getting rid of your jeans. You take Izzy’s hand that was holding your hip and encourage him to finger your clothed pussy. You felt yourself get wet as you closed your eyes and moaned him name. Izzy moves your panties to the side and continues to finger you until you climax, a cold shiver goes down your spine when your body shakes with excitement.

Izzy wasn’t finished with you yet, he rips your panties off of your body and takes you from behind. You didn’t even notice he was naked from below the waste with his dress shirt open.

You suddenly hear a knock at the door.

“20 minutes to showtime.” An unknown voice says.

“We’ll be out in a minute”. You reply midway to your orgasm. Due to the assistant interrupting your encounter, you couldn’t get off. Both you and Izzy end up putting your clothes back on. It was time for the taping of your monologue.

*****

You can’t help but feel horny for Izzy during the entire taping of Saturday Night Live. Your pussy was dripping for his love. What Izzy didn’t know was that you were already planning on how to get back at him for denying your orgasm. Once the taping was over you meet Izzy backstage.

“Izzy, you’ve been a bad boy!”

the end

[igncrxntripley]

their secret weapon pt. 1

Synopsis: The Judgement Day has their eye on a new member, and they make their move on Y/N to convince them to join. A/N: Part 2 coming soon!!!

The Judgement Day had quickly become one of the most dominant groups in the WWE. They had a hand in both the men’s and women’s division, Rhea was on her way to one of the biggest matches of her career on the grandest stage of them all, and they obliterated any superstar who came in their way. The four of them all walked around backstage with an undeniable swagger that no one could stomp out and they knew they were the best; however, the best of the best still needed to find ways to grow.  Damian and Rhea would usually go to the NXT tapings every week and watch from backstage. They not only were looking for the best talent rising through the industry, they were looking for people just like them; people who were stomped on, taken advantage of…people who continued to prove themselves and got nothing in return. For the longest time no one stuck out. They didn’t see the drive and hunger they needed in The Judgement Day…until Y/N walked in. That night, they’d taken hit after hit in a championship match and had gotten so close to taking the win. And even though the WWE audience that night showed their appreciation, management in the back was much less kind. Rhea and Damian knew exactly what they needed to do. They told Finn and Dominik that night and immediately began working on a plan to get Y/N into the palm of their hand. 

It began with small hints in Y/N’s locker room - black hoods, purple bandanas, any small indicator of the four monsters who’d begun watching them with a close eye. Y/N didn’t think much of it, they just kept going on about their business. They worked their ass off in NXT, fighting for every opportunity big or small just to prove they could be the face of the WWE. Even short backstage promos with other susperstars just go hopefully work their way into the fold of what NXT had planned for its athletes. But for every ounce of work they put in, it was stomped on and ridiculed. Nothing they did was good enough…until four people walked in and changed their life. 

It was the night of NXT Vengeance Day. The day Y/N’s career was about to take a turn for the best. They walked away from their locker room for only a couple of minutes, but when they came back a purple envelope was left on top of their suitcase. The envelope was sealed with purple wings, and when Y/N opened it there were directions to a different room backstage. It finished with simple instructions. Knock three times. Await your judgement day.  Y/N had to admit that the words gave them goosebumps, and while they wanted to run away and keep themselves out of whatever mess The Judgement Day was creating, they just couldn’t. Y/N hesitantly got dressed and made their way to the location given to them in the letter, which was a door that looked pretty much like any other closet door in the backstage area. They following their instructions and waiting for the door to slowly open though, looking around nervously in case any cameras or other superstars caught them. Once it was open, Y/N let themselves inside to a dark room lit only by a couple of candles and purple LED lights. “Take a seat.” said a deep voice from behind them that they recognized as none other than Damian Priest. They’d heard that voice enough during WWE broadcasts.

Once Y/N got comfortable, the other three members of the purple-hued faction made themselves visible while The Punisher joined them. They all stood in front of Y/N, looking down at them with the biggest smirks on each of their faces. “Your life is going to change today, Y/N.” Rhea said. “Yeah right.” Y/N mumbled with a small roll of their eyes.

“She’s right.” Balor chimed in, stepping closer to the NXT superstar. “We’ve been keeping an eye on you. We see how management treats you, how other superstars treat you…and you’re more than what they’ve made you out to be.” He said softly, Y/N’s face watching with curiosity mixed with fear. Dominik wrapped an arm around Rhea’s waist. “And if it wasn’t for her, you wouldn’t even be here right now.” He said with the same shit-eating grin on his face as the rest of them. His words made Rhea chuckle softly. “I turned Dom into a star. I gave him an opportunity when no one else would.” She said softly, this time walking closer to Y/N and wrapping her arms around them from behind. “We could do the same for you. You just need to let us in.” Rhea smirked, her black lipstick-covered lips brushing against Y/N’s ear. 

Her words and her touch made Y/N shiver with anticipation and nerves. Normally they weren’t this much of a pushover; they’d learned to put up a fight for themselves over the course of their time in this industry. But their words were too good to be true; the fact that four people - four stars in this business - were giving them more of a chance than anyone else had…it was like a dream. But Y/N couldn’t give in that easily. They let out a shaky sigh and looked up at Damian, Finn, and Dominik while Rhea continued to stand behind them. “What’s in it for me?” they asked softly. “How do I know I can trust you? I’ve been torn down enough in this business, I don’t need you all to help with that.”

Damian chuckled softly and looked at his friends before looking back at Y/N. “Anything you want and more.” He said. Rhea nodded in agreement and gently squeezed Y/N’s body. “At the end of the day, you have four people who want nothing but the best for you. Not only do they want the best…” she turned Y/N’s face to look at them. “But we’ll give you the best.” Damian nodded and stepped closer as well. “You just have to trust us.”

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

William Faulkner, "Never be afraid" :: [(From a speech delivered May 28, 1951 at Fulton Chapel, University of Mississippi)]

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

September 25, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Sep 26, 2024

In 2004 a senior advisor to President George W. Bush famously told journalist Ron Suskind that people like Suskind lived in “the reality-based community.” They believed people could find solutions to problems through careful study of discernible reality. But, the aide continued, Suskind’s worldview was obsolete. “That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” the aide said. “We are an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality— judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.” 

We appear to be in a moment when the reality-based community is challenging the ability of the MAGA Republicans to create their own reality. 

Central to the worldview of MAGA Republicans is that Democrats are socialists who have destroyed the American economy. Trump calls Harris a “radical-left. Marxist, communist, fascist” and insists the economy is failing. 

In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, today, Harris laid out her three-pillar plan for an “opportunity economy.” She explained that she would lower costs by cutting taxes for the middle class, cutting the red tape that stops housing construction, take on corporate landlords who are hiking rental prices, work with builders and developers to construct 3 million new homes and rentals, and help first-time homebuyers with $25,000 down payment assistance. She also promised to enact a federal ban on corporate price gouging on groceries and to cap prescription drug prices by negotiating with pharmaceutical companies. 

Harris said she plans to invest in innovation by raising the deduction for startup businesses from its current $5,000 to $50,000 and providing low- or no-interest loans to small businesses that want to expand. Her goal is to open the way for 25 million new small businesses in her first four years, noting that small businesses create nearly 50% of private sector jobs in the U.S. 

Harris plans to create manufacturing jobs of the future by investing in biomanufacturing and aerospace, remaining “dominant in AI, quantum computing, blockchain, and other emerging technologies, and expand[ing] our lead in clean energy innovation and manufacturing.” She vowed to see that the next generation of breakthroughs—“from advanced batteries to geothermal to advanced nuclear—are not just invented, but built here in America by American workers.” Investing in these industries means strengthening factory towns, retooling existing factories, hiring locally, and working with unions. She vowed to make jobs available for skilled workers without college degrees and to cut red tape to reform permitting for innovation.

“I am a capitalist,” she said. “I believe in free and fair markets. I believe in consistent and transparent rules of the road to create a stable business environment. And I know the power of American innovation.” She said she would be pragmatic in her approach to the economy, seeking practical solutions to problems and taking good ideas from wherever they come. 

“Kamala Harris, Reagan Democrat!” conservative pundit Bill Kristol posted on social media after her speech. 

For his part, Trump has promised an across-the-board tariff of 10% to 20% that billionaire Mark Cuban on the Fox News Channel called “insane” and Quin Hillyer of the Washington Examiner warned “would almost certainly cause immense price hikes domestically, goad other countries into retaliating, and perhaps set off an international trade war” that could “wreck the economy.” Cuban then told Jake Tapper of CNN that Trump’s promise to impose 10% price controls on credit card interest rates and price caps is “Socialism 101.” 

Yesterday, more than 400 economists and high-ranking U.S. policymakers endorsed Harris, and today, the members of former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley’s presidential leadership teams in Michigan, Iowa, and Vermont announced they would be supporting Harris, in part because of Trump’s economic policies.

While Trump insisted yet again today that “the economy is doing really, really badly,” the stock market closed at a record high today for the fourth day in a row. 

In other economic news, for nine years, Trump has said he will find a cheaper and better way to provide healthcare to Americans than the Affordable Care Act, although on September 10 he admitted he has only the “concepts of a plan.” Today the Treasury Department released statistics showing that 4.2 million small business owners have coverage through the ACA. Losing that protection would impact 618,590 small business owners in Florida, 450,010 in California, 423,790 in Texas, and 168,070 in Georgia.

Trump has made a claim that crime has risen dramatically under President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris central to his campaign rhetoric. The opposite is true. Two days ago, on September 23, the Federal Bureau of Investigation released its official report on crime statistics from 2023 compared with 2022. Those statistics showed that murder and non-negligent manslaughter fell by 11.6%. Rape fell by 9.4%. Aggravated assault fell by 2.8%. Robbery fell by 0.3%. Hate crimes fell by 0.6%. 

Central to the worldview of MAGA Republicans is that immigration weakens a nation and that immigrants increase crime and disease. First Republican vice presidential nominee Ohio senator J.D. Vance and then Trump himself repeatedly advanced the lie that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are eating their neighbors’ pets and bringing disease. 

Clergy members from multiple faiths have asked politicians to stop their lies about Haitian immigrants, and today the leader of Haitian Bridge Alliance, a nonprofit organization that represents the Haitian community, filed a charges against Trump and Vance for disrupting public services, making false alarms, telecommunications harassment, and aggravated menacing and complicity.  

Immediately, Representative Clay Higgins (R-LA), who in the past supported Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and filmed a selfie inside a gas chamber at Auschwitz, posted on social media: “Lol. These Haitians are wild. Eating pets, vudu, nastiest country in the western hemisphere, cults, slapstick gangsters…but damned if they don’t feel all sophisticated now, filing charges against our President and VP. All these thugs better get their mind right and their *ss out of our country before January 20th.” 

After an outcry, Higgins took the post down. According to House speaker and fellow Louisiana Republican Mike Johnson, who called Higgins a “very principled man,” Higgins took it down after he “prayed about it.” Johnson seemed unconcerned about his colleague’s racism, saying, “we believe in redemption around here.” 

But in a statement, House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) called Higgins’s statement “vile, racist and beneath the dignity of the United States House of Representatives. He must be held accountable for dishonorable conduct that is unbecoming of a Member of Congress. Clay Higgins is an election-denying, conspiracy-peddling racial arsonist who is a disgrace to the People’s House. This is who they have become. Republicans are the party of Donald Trump, Mark Robinson, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Clay Higgins and Project 2025. The extreme MAGA Republicans in the House are unfit to govern.” 

On Monday, Dan Gooding of Newsweek reported that although Trump said on September 18 he would go to Springfield, he will not. Republican Ohio governor Mike DeWine had warned that the local community would not welcome a visit from the former president. 

Republican politicians and candidates, including Trump, embraced North Carolina gubernatorial candidate and current lieutenant governor Mark Robinson, who trumpeted the extremists’ MAGA narrative. The September 19 revelation by CNN reporters Andrew Kaczynski and Em Steck that Robinson had boasted on a pornography website that he considers himself a “black NAZI!”, would like to reinstate slavery, and would like to own some people himself, and shared the sexual kinks in which he engaged with his wife’s sister prompted most of his campaign staff to resign. 

Andrew Egger of The Bulwark reported today that on a different online forum, Robinson called for a political assassination as well as making racist attacks on entertainer Oprah Winfrey and former president Barack Obama. Robinson has called all the information released about him “false smears” and has said “[n]ow is not the time for intra-party squabbling and nonsense,” but declined help tracking down those he claims falsified his online comments. Today, multiple media outlets reported that top staff in Robinson’s government office are stepping down.  

Reality hit hard this week in Texas, too, where U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Lopez yesterday approved the auctioning off of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’s media business, the aptly-named InfoWars. Jones insisted that the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting  was a “hoax” designed to whip up support for gun restrictions, and that the grieving parents were played by “crisis actors.” Juries found Jones guilty of defaming the families of the murdered children and causing them emotional distress. 

The auction of his property will enable the families to begin to collect on the more than $1 billion the jurors determined Jones owed them for his reprehensible and harmful behavior. 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[synnamonroll666]

Casting Couch

Picture lightly edited by me.

Pairing: Josh Washington x Fem!Reader Description: You get a chance to play the lead role in the most famous and successful Hollywood producer's—Josh Washington's—new film. And it seems like you got the part! But there is only one thing left for you to do—a sweet deal that's just too perfect for you to refuse…  Warnings: Movie Producer X Actress, Strip Tease, BlowJob (Male Receiving), Female Riding Male, P In V, Creampie. Word Count: 2.6k A/N: FINALLY I'm going to repost this! I don't know why it has taken me so long to, but I hope my new followers enjoy it just as much as my other ones did on my other account. Just to warn you all, this is lightly reedited. So it's not quite like my new writing style but not like my old one either. I hope you enjoy it regardless! 🖤 Main MasterList: 🖤 Synny's Angels: @koexchange, @yesitsloulou, @mistmoose, @jasonexo, @fortune-fool02, and @raven-the-cryptid. (If you want to be added to the taglist, let me know in the comments! 🖤)

𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐

"I'm here to see Mr. Washington." I said confidently to the middle-aged woman sitting at her desk before me.

The lady merely glanced up at me and then continued to type on her keyboard at a speed that showed me just how long she had been working as a secretary while saying, "Mr. Washington will be ready for you in a moment, dear. Please, take a seat." before gesturing to the chairs in the spacious waiting room. Though her body language seemed cold, her tone was sweet and kind. I knew that she was just busy; after all, she did work for one of the biggest film producers in Hollywood, so it was understandable.

Speaking of, it was a huge opportunity to meet up with Mr. Washington for a role. I had already done my audition, but Mr. Washington had requested that I meet him in his office for a more personal review. Despite meeting one of the most successful men in the film industry at the time, I didn't feel nervous. I was more excited and ready for anything. And I had every right to be. It was just one of those days where everything felt right—my hair was perfectly done, my dress hugged my form just the right way, my make-up was on fucking point; I felt like I was on fucking fire.

After a few minutes of reading some useless magazine about 'Top 10 Beauty Tips for Women Trying to Find a Man.', the secretary, who I had learned was named Betty, granted me permission to enter Mr. Washington's office.

I nodded my head as I stood up before saying a quick thank you and entering the room where Mr. Washington sat behind his desk. I looked around the big office and noted just how much it looked like a horror movie producer's office in particular. The walls were painted black with framed posters of all the movies he had done hung upon them, the carpet floors were blood red, and the furniture within it seemed more of a Gothic style than the usual furniture producers would keep. He was casually reading over some paperwork until he noticed my arrival just a few seconds later.

"Ah, Ms. (L/N)! It's a pleasure to finally meet you!" He greeted me as he stood up while gesturing to the seat in front of him. "Please sit down. We have so much to discuss."

I walked over to the offered seat and sat down, crossing my legs afterwards and resting my arms on the armrests of the quite comfy chair. Mr. Washington was definitely more attractive in person, especially in that all-black suit he had on. The man sat back down in his seat and smiled seductively, all while his eyes roamed my form for a brief moment. I could see the wheels turning in his brain as he undressed me with his orbs and it was quite a turn-on, especially with how his pupils dilated his light green iris' the more his eyes stayed on my body.

"So, you liked my audition tape?" I asked nonchalantly, knocking him from his brief fantasy and bringing him back to reality.

"Uh- Yeah! You are quite a talented young woman." He responded in a sort of dazed tone, as if he were slowly coming back from being unconscious.

"Thank you, Sir." I said with a smile.

That title I gave him seemed to do a lot for him, as he visibly shuddered after the word left my lips. He swallowed thickly and adjusted his tie, as if he were trying to fight his urges. But I had a feeling that that battle would soon be lost.

"U-Um... However, there is an additional requirement you'll have to proceed with if you want this part badly enough." He added, and I titled my head to the side slightly, causing my hair to flip over my shoulder and flow down my arm gracefully as I raised a questioning brow. He cleared his throat while adjusting his tie yet again, making me smirk slightly at the effect I was having on him. "The thing is, ladies who work for me not only have to show me how well they do on set, but behind the set as well."

After speaking his last sentence, Mr. Washington gestured to a black leather couch that was placed against the left wall of the office. It didn't take long to know what he meant, and I was more than willing to show him just how badly I wanted this part.

"Well, Mr. Washington, what are we waiting for?" I asked in a low and seductive tone as my lips curled up into a devilish smirk. My tongue cut through their seam to glide across them slowly, wetting them in a rather suggestive manner.

Mr. Washington's sexy smile only grew wider, since he clearly knew he was getting exactly what he wanted. He stood from his chair and walked over to where I was seated before he offered me his hand, which I gladly took without hesitation.

He helped me stand, guided me to the couch, and then sat down on it, resting his arms on the headrest. I smiled down at him sweetly—instantly getting the hint of what he was suggesting—before I kneeled down onto my knees.

Though the extra-soft carpet was so nice against my bare knees, I could barely take time to appreciate it as I stared down at the growing bulge in Mr. Washington's pants with awe. Clearly, he was just as excited about this as I was—maybe even more.

I licked my lips hungrily and began undoing his belt. No longer than a couple seconds later, I was unzipping his expensive dress pants and pulling out his erect member to meet the cool air of the room. I held his length in my hand, admiring the girth of it as I bit my lip to stifle my smirk. It wasn't until I heard the agitated clearing of Mr. Washington's throat that I got snapped out of my little wanton of fantasies and appreciation.

"Are you just going to hold it like it's a trophy?" I looked up upon hearing his words to see him staring down at me with a raised brow. "Trust me, honey, you'll have plenty of those to man-handle once I reward you for your services. Now, get to work."

Immediately after he gave me his order, I began moving my hand up and down his shaft, tightening my fingers around its width, and pumping it slowly before taking the tip into my mouth.

He let out a strained moan at the contact of my lips wrapping around his tip, and I could see him fighting to keep himself from moving one of his hands down onto my head to force me to go deeper. But being a good little servant, I took the hint and lowered myself on his cock. I opened my throat as I took him deeper into my mouth, consuming each thick inch and practically having to fight back a moan due to the delicious taste of his flesh.

It didn't take long for the salty taste of his pre-cum to meet my palette and satisfy my taste buds, earning a deep groan from me to vibrate against his cock. He clenched his eyes shut and threw an arm over them as his mouth hung open, while his voice was producing the most beautiful sounds that had ever greeted my ears.

I tightened my lips around his length and began sucking as hard as I possibly could. I bobbed my head up and down slowly, though I quickly made sure to pick up speed each time his member reentered my mouth. Since I wanted this experience for him to be the best it could be, I let one of my hands move to his balls and grip them firmly. His voice grew louder due to my actions, and I took it as meaning that I was doing a good job. Now massaging his balls in my hand, I wiggled my tongue against his dorsal vein as I decided to work even faster.

But just as I had started to increase my speed even more, Mr. Washington's fingers clenched into a fist, gripping my hair firmly in his grasp. He pulled my head away from his cock, forcing his length out of my mouth with a wet pop.

"I-I think that's enough." He whispered breathlessly, and I cocked my head with confusion. It wasn't until he patted his lap that I understood what he wanted. I stood up, quickly obeying his orders with a lot of excitement for what was to come next.

After standing to my full height, I turned around so my back was facing him. Then I reached behind me to clasp the metal zipper—the one that was holding my dress closed—in my fingers before slowly pulling it down. I let the straps fall off my shoulders, and the only thing hiding my partial nude form fell to the floor, leaving me in my black lace bra and panties.

Mr. Washington's eyes roamed my form slowly, growing more hungry with every passing second, making it clear that I was his next meal to devour. I approached him, taking slow steps as I did so. I wanted to drag this out for as long as I possibly could. Smirking at him, I hooked my fingers under the waistband of my panties and pushed them down my legs as well. Mr. Washington's eyes never left my hands as one went to my core to let a finger brush through my folds, showing him just how wet I was for him.

I brought that finger up to my lips and sucked it into my mouth, letting my eyes flutter shut and moaning a little over dramatically as the salty taste hit my tongue. After I was done with my little performance, my eyes opened again to see that Mr. Washington's eyes had widened with what seemed like crazed lust and want. Smirking smugly due to the effect I still had on him, I climbed onto his lap to allow him to line his tip up with my dripping hole.

I slowly sank down onto his length, letting my heat consume each thick inch. I bit my lip hard as I tried to stifle all the crude noises that my body was dying to release. But to my surprise, Mr. Washington grabbed my face with one hand, squishing my cheeks and forcing my mouth open.

"Don't hold back those beautiful noises." He growled his demand and I visibly shuddered, letting out a shaky breath as I did so.

I stayed still for only a moment, allowing myself to adjust to his large size. But once that stinging shock melted into delightful pleasure, I lifted myself back up and sank back down in a swift motion. The feeling of his size stretching me out was arousing enough, but that look on his face was something else. It lit a fire within me in an instant and only sent me further into a downward spiral of pure ecstasy.

His eyes were squeezed shut, his mouth had fallen agape, his cheeks were a nice tint of red, his slicked back hair slowly became disheveled, and a thin coat of sweat glossed his tanned skin. It was quite a sight to behold, and I felt so lucky that I was the one who was lucky enough to witness it.

I leaned forward and kissed his neck, attacking all the spots that I knew were his weak spots. Though I just couldn't hold back for long, I sank my teeth in, right by his collarbone. To my pleasant surprise, Mr. Washington let out a loud gasp in shock as his hands flew to my back so he could dig his nails into my soft flesh.

"My, my, Mr. Washington." I leaned back to smirk at him. "I didn't take you as the sensitive type."

He responded with a low growl as his eyes burrowed into mine intensely with hunger and need. He clenched his teeth so tight, as if he were fighting back words of frustration—though his eyes said it all. And soon after, he couldn't refrain from letting his lips do so as well.

"Just... Do... Your... Fucking... Job..." He rasped between ragged breaths, and I instantly nodded as my cocky smirk grew.

I rolled my hips in just the right way, not only making the moment more enjoyable for him but for me as well. I tossed my head back as I let out a loud moan, suddenly not caring who heard me—suddenly not caring who heard how I'm his little slut.

Taking the hint, Mr. Washington's thumb flew to my clit, pressing down hard and rubbing the swollen little bead in quick circles. I almost couldn't take it. I wanted to hold on for as long as I could so he could be satisfied first, so I clenched my teeth together tightly and tried to ignore the burning pleasure within my core the best I could.

But then Mr. Washington caught on rather quickly. He leaned in until his lips just grazed my ear, letting his breath fan its shell ever so gently.

"Cum for me." He spoke in a low, deep growl.

Merely a second later, I let go. Between his deep voice in my ear and his cock twitching against my g-spot, I fell into the void of blinding pleasure as I screamed through my climax. His words, his voice, his touch, his scent—it let off an explosion within me quicker than gasoline hitting a match. Shortly after my orgasm, Mr. Washington came too. I was blessed with the sight of him coming undone before me, and the only thing that went through my mind was, 'I did that—I've ruined this big, powerful man.'

Nothing had ever felt so empowering.

I rested my head on Mr. Washington's shoulder as we both slowly came down from our highs. The feeling of his hand gently rubbing my back in slow, smooth circles was a nice contrast to the rough fucking we just had and helped me to come back down to my senses and reality.

After a few minutes of sitting in complete silence, I leaned back to smile down at him. He returned my smile and brought his hand up to gently caress my cheek. I responded by leaning into his touch as my eyes fluttered shut again in contentment. I felt so at peace at that moment, as if nothing else mattered.

He kissed me on the lips one last time—sweetly—compared to the careless ones he had given me prior, as if I didn't even matter to him. But I knew differently then, like I do now. I slowly pulled myself off of him, earning more moans due to the oversensitivity both of us were experiencing in our post-orgasmic state.

After dressing myself while Mr. Washington stayed on the couch, I readjusted my dress and slowly walked to the door of the office. But when I placed my hand on the door handle, I turned around one last time to see Mr. Washington looking at me with a loving smile on his lips—a loving smile that I returned.

"See you at home around eight, hun?" He asked as he slowly sat up and began buttoning up his shirt.

"I'll have dinner ready on the table, sweetheart." I confirmed before blowing my husband a kiss, which he caught, then I turned my heel and walked out the door.

𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐⭒𖤐

[bbluesrreality]

It’s so fun and cool that I’m an exhibitionist that gets to show myself off and be praised for being hot for a living. Genuinely, I am so proud of myself and it makes me feel good about my body and I’m so so so glad I’m in a position where I feel safe enough to do it and have a good support network around me to keep me from some of the more worrying and potential highly consequential vulnerabilities of certain areas of the industry I’m in and actually have fun with my work and feel creatively fulfilled and not have to take up every sometimes shitty offer that comes my way and get followed back and flirted with by some of my biggest crushes ever (and maybe actually DM and meet them in the future…) and “meeting” new hot people every day and all the love and support and now that my terrible horrible no good very bad year roommate is gone I actually feel fully comfortable doing my sex work job where I live!!! Very exciting.

My life is crazy. I can’t believe this is literally me using my degree. I can’t believe my pussy makes me rent plus some. I wish it made me more but that’s just a work ethic and consistency thing at this point. School cost me so much, it’s going to take a long time to be gainfully employed but this is a start and it’s a fun start and I present well, even lightly conservative people tend to like me upon introduction even with the blue hair if I play my cards right, so I don’t think this job will actually close off future employment opportunities I’m likely to seek. It may be where I live and the crowds I frequent but I’ve never gotten a bad reaction to saying “Oh, I’m uh, I’m a camboy.” When people ask “What do you do for work?” And Gen X loves to hear things like “SEO optimization” and “Intrinsically motivated” in interviews. I don’t even need to keep it totally off my resume tbh. And I really have learned a lot of a skills and a lot about learning and a lot about people and a lot about motivation and a lot about myself and a lot about what I want in this line of work.

And a lot about the various angles of my body and divets and bulges in my muscles and niche kinks on the internet and new ways trans people manage to be beautiful perverts and sensations in my holes and compliments that make me blush.

I hope to live a long and happy transsexual life with many phases, many looks, many skills, many friends, many lovers, many tragedies, many meals and tattoos and sex tapes and sexual favors and platonic favors. If, god forbid, something were to happen to me, I want it to be out there that I don’t want my porn deleted. (As of now)

Everything is political. My body is political. Trans bodies are beautiful and I love them and I want them to be seen and demystified in all forms and I know I am only one form, a relatively normative form at that, but making what a naked trans body looks like accessible to the adult public feels politically important to me. I sometimes bridge a gap via “genderfluid” expression codeswitching in my work to help show somebody that they can be attracted to somebody who is feminine in one second, and masculine in the next. It is my attentive study of a vast amount of queer media (read: gay shit) that allows me to do this improv crowd work, lol, on my streams, and my media production experience that allows me to bring it to life with some quality in my horny short films as a one-man production team. I am not a doctor but my body and my trans joy is in part the result of advanced medical research, that was only fought for and made available to my generation recently, and is in danger of belong revoked for those who have it again now in my country after the last election. The nazi’s first book burning was medical literature on transsexual healthcare. The visibility of my little cock is incredibly important to me. His right to reach the eyes of every one who wants to feast upon him. For this trans guy to continue to have the right to be who he is and do as he pleases with his body happily and with safety. My body is political and I want its legacy to live on forever and inspire the transsexuals and transgender people of the future. The internet is forever right? Make it forever. Share me forever. Look at me forever. Love me forever.

I feel currently, and yearn to continue to feel, a huge amount of joy in sharing the things I find beautiful about myself and hearing them affirmed by strangers who often become vulnerable themselves to me in return- sometimes not, but sometimes there profile has their name in it, their kinks, their post or reply or like history, all of the people they follow and maybe links to accounts on other sites. Sometimes they feel so compelled to feed as close to me through the internet as they possibly can and send me images of their genitalia. Some of these pictures are poorly shot.

This is a huge amount of information and trust that thousands of people lend to me on the daily and I take that seriously. I try to be straightforward about how I’d like to approach the worker/client relationship and not mislead anybody outright about my role in the interaction, but I also have a lot of fun making use of my generally warm and friendly and open-minded personality and allow people to ask sometimes invasive or insensitive questions about, usually trans healthcare somehow but always a slightly different question somehow with patience, understanding that I’ve been used to this language for my entire adolescent and adult life and that I have selected into a position where I am “meeting” people, frequently, for whom I am the first trans person they have interacted with. For my brothers and sisters and more I owe them the grace of Madonnaesque patience. The amount of times I’ve heard some variant of “I just wanted to let you know I’m straight and I’m into you…. What do you think of that?” Like… what do you expect me to think of that????

But if one man finds himself, if one questioning person looks at me and feels not only the type of attracted that says “Oh I want to fuck him” but also the attraction that says “Oh… I want to BE him” I will have done my job. And supportive, loving, adoring, encouraging comments outnumber the offensive or ill-mannered ones by soooo much. I know it’s really hard for a lot of people, especially millennial content creators I’ve seen who have experienced hate trains and hate waves, (I haven’t really because I try not to say very much controversial stuff on twitter, at the expense of not really feeling like I weigh in at all on some issues that are really important to me, that I may be able to erm, influence my audience about I guess) to filter out negative comments but aside from when I’m live on CB, I haven’t really run into that problem too much.

I read it, I feel it, I can usually let it go. I feel well equipped to manage a number of questions about surgery, language and semantics, identify and trans manners and respect, chasers and how to try to date trans people ethically, accepting shifts in sexuality and not externalizing fear and pain about that onto trans people or invalidating them due to it, my favorite. Genuinely, I’m experienced with this one and turning people gay is my KINK that’s my SHIT I LOVE that it gets me HORNY have a whole life changing realization for me. Yeah I did that. You’ll never forget me now. You’ll learn so much more about yourself and the word now. That’s so exciting. I’ve liberated you. And I will liberate more. Insanity!!!! That’s so powerful!!!! I love it!!! I love my job!!!!!

[sramfact]

Industrial tapes are specialized adhesive products used in manufacturing and construction to bond, seal, insulate, and protect materials. They come in various types, including duct, masking, electrical, and double-sided tapes, each designed for specific applications. These tapes offer high durability, strong adhesion, and resistance to environmental factors like heat, moisture, and chemicals, making them essential in numerous industrial processes.

The global “Industrial Tapes Market by Product Type (Aluminum Tapes, Others), End User (Manufacturing, Others), Application (Packaging, Others), Tape Backing Material (Polypropylene, Paper), Mode of Application (Pressure Sensitive, Solvent Based) - Forecast”, defines and segments the industrial tapes market with analysis and forecast of the global market size for industrial tapes till 2020. It also identifies the driving and restraining factors of the market with analysis of trends and opportunities.

[renwritesbrainrot]

workplaceAU! Touya x Reader

Fem!Reader

Dubcon!

MDNI!!!

some plot but not that much of it

NSFW under the cut

Word count 1.1k

Whattpad link to the “masterlist” (WIP)

https://www.wattpad.com/myworks/372811039-dabi-x-reader-aus

"Final warning," read the paper in your hands that was neatly taped onto the front door of your apartment. For rent was getting too expensive for you, and balancing work with school was suddenly becoming more difficult as time progressed.

For you needed a job and fast. Not knowing where to start you ended up searching, and searching for job listings on the web. 

It seemed like you had been searching for hours before you finally found a link that lead to a website called "Todoroki Industries." 

You then clicked on the flashy "Now Hiring" link, only to be met with a rather sketchy website. You were desperate at this point. Begrudgingly you filled out the application form, and hoped for the best. 

 Clicking off of the website you were unfortunately met with old employee reviews. Most of them being complaints of the harsh/unfair work conditions they were subjected to by the bosses son himself. 

"It can't be that bad?" You thought to yourself. You had already sent in the application, so what would you gain from backing out now?

The next day a notification flashed on your phone screen to head to the Todorokis' office, as your application has been accepted. 

Surprised, you got out your most "professional" outfit which was a black knee length dress alongside a pair of lack and red heels pair with the gold accents on the dress. 

Upon arriving to the office you noticed the drop in energy change drastically, as the environment was more serious than ever. Once you entered you said your name and you were immediately escorted up the elevators to the highest floor. 

There you were met with the sight of an empty office. It was quiet, so quiet you quiet you could hear a pin drop.

The sound of footsteps snapped you out of your deep thought. You felt a hand tap your shoulder, standing behind you was Touya Todoroki himself. 

"You must be the new secretary they hired," he said, eyes wandering all over you. He was trying to figure you out. "This jobs pretty simple, I give you things to do, then you make time to do it."

You nodded, not sure of how to form a reply, as he was completely unreadable. 

The first few work weeks went easy as most of the tasks were basic things such as planning meetings, luncheons, and other relatively boring tasks, that soon seemed repetitive. 

The only difference you noticed, was that Touya was completely different from the ways that the others had described him.

He was less cold to you, sometimes even sparking conversation when the days would go by slower than usual.

Simple gestures were made by him, such as bringing you coffee or keeping you company if you had to work longer hours. 

The more you spent time with him the more you took in his features. The way his white hair was mostly neat but at the end of the day it would come undone in the "neatest way" possible. The tattoos that would come into display whenever his sleeves would be slightly rolled up. The way his blue eyes would gleam, ever so brightly.

The bastard was frustratingly attractive.

One night,  Touya had you working late, which was uncommon for him. As most of the times you had to work overtime was from the head boss. Never from him. 

A small part of you was relived with this outcome, as it gave you an opportunity to spend time with him. 

The night was going by smoothly, you were alone for the most part. But a couple hours in. Touya walked in and he sat by you. 

You caught yourself a few times, glancing over at him. 

"You're staring.." he said, sly smirk on his face.

You quickly looked away, attempting to ignore the fact that you'd been caught. 

"No need to get shy, in all honesty I've had my eye on you for weeks." He continued.

Taken aback by this your focus returned to him. "I didn't notice," you confessed. 

He took a few steps closer to you, his eyes wandering all over you once again. 

He was only a few inches away from you.

You could feel your face becoming even more flushed by the second. 

His gaze almost piercing as his hands came up to hold your face. His lips crashing against yours. 

Kissing him back slowly his hands went from your face down to your waist gently gripping on as his tongue swiped against your lower lip asking for permission. Your lips parted slightly in response. His tongue exploring your mouth as you whimpered slightly in response.

Touyas then picked you up, your legs around his waist as he placed you onto his desk. Lips still connected to yours. 

He pulled away from you, taking in your flushed expression as he slowly began to trace his hands all over you, taking in every curve and expression that you made. 

Your shirt was discarded to the floor first, following your bra.

His lips making his way from your jaw to your neck leaving marks of purple, gaining a small gasp from you. 

Kisses placed on your chest as his hands wandered over your breasts.

"God you're so beautiful.." he said, the rest of your clothes being removed. 

The way his hands inched closer and closer to your core was almost too much to handle.

Touyas head then dipped forward his tongue teasing your slit as he worked his mouth on you. 

Whines escaped your lips as you felt his two middle fingers thrusting deep inside of you, just slightly brushing against the spongy part inside you that drove you wild.

Touya felt your legs slightly tremble. You were close. The second you were about to reach that release you needed, Touya stopped the movement of his fingers, gaining a frustrated moan out of you.

"Sorry pretty girl, wanna see you cum on my cock." "Can you do that for me?"

You nodded your head in agreement. His rock hard cock slowly entering inside of you. Your leg on his shoulder.

Every thrust he made had you seeing stars. Your nails digging into his shoulder.

Whines escaping your lips as his pace increased, his fingers teasing your clit. You instantly knew he was ready to feel you cum for him. 

Your legs shook slightly as you finally came for him. His pace increasing desperate to reach his end as well. Soon you felt his warmth spill inside of you. Your body going slightly limp as you wrapped your arms around his neck and kissed him. 

[pricelessemotion]

Starstruck and Metal | E.M.

Summary: [4.3k] you meet eddie for the first time. it doesn't go quite like you expected.

Pairing: rockstar!eddie munson x fem!music journalist!reader

Warnings: none!

Notes: huge thank u to my bestie chuck for beta reading 🫶 also if you solve the crossword hint i love u

previous chapter | series masterlist | next chapter

InStereo magazine was not The Rolling Stones, but it was a start. The modest music magazine had a humble following, enough to earn some hums of recognition whenever someone made the mistake of asking what you did for a living. Most days, it’s great. You relish in the joy of working in a field some people only dream of entering. The leap from column writer to main article was a large one, but you insisted that you were ready. Your first assignment as a music journalist and of course you got stuck with Eddie fucking Munson. 

Any self-respecting music journalist, anyone with some skin in the game would have laughed in the face of their editor. But instead, you smiled. You nodded enthusiastically, mimicking the bobblehead that has since been removed from your desk. When you decided to become a music journalist, you wanted to write about people who were changing the field. Instead, you were being tasked with writing some puff piece being used to save a wannabe rock star’s reputation. God forbid you gain the reputation of being a difficult woman–in a male-dominated industry no less–by turning down such a great opportunity.  

Even if that opportunity included spending a day with Eddie fucking Munson. 

You paid out of pocket for the cassette of Corroded Coffin’s debut album that was currently underscoring your drive to West Hollywood. You refused to meet the frontman without having listened to their music beforehand. They were good. A little rough around the edges, but it was to be expected. Outside of the occasional headlines, you hadn’t heard much about Eddie or his band. Corroded Coffin was making ripples, not waves. Of course, no one really cared about the music when they could be reading about who and what their lead vocalist was doing. 

Still, you find yourself parking outside of a humble ranch-style home in a neighborhood full of similar housing that likely cost a fortune to live in. The modest proceeds from Corroded Coffin’s tour have obviously paid off, considering that nice area and affordable don’t usually exist in the same sentence when talking about LA housing. The June sun is beating down on the empty street, and you’re thankful that you decided to wear a T-shirt and jeans. You tell yourself that the sweat collecting on your brow is from the heat and not nerves. 

Double-checking that you have the right address, you slam the door shut on your sedan and take a deep breath. The air feels cleaner here, less smoggy. You’re not sure if it’s because of the altitude or the tax bracket of the people who live here. Probably both. You reach into your purse and feel around for what you already know is inside. Pen. Notepad. Tape recorder. The holy trinity for a music journalist. 

There were very few topics that Eddie wasn’t willing to talk about. You guess that when you’ve had your insides strewn across the pavement for everyone to see, you don’t bother trying to uphold any semblance of mystique. Beginning the daunting trek toward your assignment, you remind yourself of two things:

1) Don’t ask about his father 

2) Don’t ask about what happened in Hawkins, Indiana in 1986

The first rule seemed simple enough. As far as the public was concerned, Eddie Munson came to Hawkins at the age of 12 to live with his Uncle Wayne like how a fully formed Venus sprang up from sea foam. He wasn’t and then he was. End of story. The fact that Eddie’s management went out of the way to make sure his father wasn’t brought up only made you more curious. 

The second rule was a little harder to accept. Anyone who knew anything about Eddie Munson wanted to know about 1986. Despite the fact that his highly publicized murder charges and subsequent exoneration are part of what caused Corroded Coffin to skyrocket to fame, he’s remained very tight-lipped about the whole situation. He plays off every question about it in interviews with a smirk and a sly comment. Just charming enough to get away without answering. Just vague enough to keep people guessing. Maybe his publicist wasn’t such a waste after all. 

Eddie Munson opens the door a few moments after you ring the bell. Using a ringed hand to shield his eyes from the midday sun, he squints at you. A pair of sweatpants hang low on his hips. He has a severe case of bedhead despite the fact that the time on your watch indicates that it’s nearly two in the afternoon. The confusion that draws his brows together also indicates that he has absolutely no idea who you are. Resisting the urge to roll your eyes, you state your name and purpose before realization graces his features. 

“It’s you! Shit, yeah! You’re here for the– the thing!” He tosses a careless look over both of his shoulders before widening the opening. “Come on in.”

Eddie closes the door behind you and rushes down the hallway in order to put some real clothes on, leaving you standing in the empty living room. The inside is surprisingly clean for someone who’s gained the reputation of being a hot mess. It smells like cigarettes, weed, and lemon pledge. The lemon scent is strongest as if someone was trying–and failing–to use it to cover up the previous two. A record player is tucked into a corner, the vinyl still spinning. A line of electric guitars is propped up against the back wall, each of them no doubt costing more than your monthly rent. One of the stands is noticeably empty and you glance to your left to see a beat-up acoustic resting on the couch. On the coffee table, there are piles and piles of scrap sheets of paper. For most of them, the handwriting is too illegible to read or it’s been crossed out. Eddie seems to write lyrics like he lives his life: fast and all over the place.

Stepping closer, something along the upper corner catches your eye. Slyly lifting up a pile of paper, being sure not to disturb the configuration, you find that your suspicions are correct. Eddie received the same copy of Sub Rosa as you did. Obviously, it didn’t go over well. He’s used a pen to black out his eyes. Much to your amusement, you see he’s also drawn horns and a tail. The hand that’s flipping off the camera is illustrated to be holding a pitchfork. 

That’s not the full extent of Eddie’s doodling, though. On the bottom right-hand corner of the magazine, there’s a smaller picture of him standing next to a certain brown-eyed beauty. You’re quick to note that he’s drawn a crude halo and angel wings on his long-legged companion. They’ve been scribbled out as an afterthought, making the halo look more like a crown of thorns. 

So, you think to yourself, he’s a little immature. You can work with immaturity. Immaturity means that he won’t be as guarded as some of the other celebrities your coworkers have had the misery of meeting. In fact, from what little you know about Eddie, you wonder if he even has any guard at all. He did leave you alone here with stacks of potential songs for his band’s next album. If you were a better journalist and a worse person, you would probably take the time to decipher his chicken scratch and see if you could glean any insights into his creative process. But you don’t. Instead, you release the stack of papers and wait. 

For a moment, you don’t know what to do with yourself. You’ve never been inside of a famous person’s house before. You’re not sure if you should sit down and make yourself comfortable or if Eddie has something else planned for the two of you to do. The specifics of your assignment were intentionally vague, most likely to accommodate Eddie’s spontaneity. 

Venturing further into the living room, you come to stand in front of a shelf. Brushing your fingers across the collection of vinyl, you tilt your head to read the names along the spines. There are the usual suspects–Dio, Metallica, and Judas Priest–but what surprises you is that, in the midst of all the metal and hard rock, there’s an array of old-school country music. At the end of the lineup is the most surprising one of them all; Sentimentally Yours by Patsy Cline. It’s exceedingly worn, cracks and creases litter the empty sleeve. If you were a betting woman, you would say that the record is currently on the player across the room.

A muffled crash followed by a string of curse words breaks you out of your reverie. Eddie opens the bedroom door with the finesse of someone who is obviously used to being the center of attention. He’s traded his sweatpants and tank top for a pair of ripped black jeans and a v-neck. It felt reassuring to know that you hadn’t underdressed for the occasion. 

It also gives you a moment to drink in the blinding light that was Eddie Munson. He’s leaner in person. Though he always looked lithe in every photograph you saw of him, his frame seemed more imposing and large. Maybe all the stars just look that way when they’re so high above you. 

He was taller, too. The boots on his feet surely aided in that, given that the soles were at least an inch thick. Still, you didn’t anticipate how much you would have to tilt your head up just to look him in the eyes. 

There, standing in Eddie Munson’s rented living room, you realize something; You’re absolutely starstruck. 

Although you had turned up your nose at the prospect of interviewing him and regarded his reputation with the same disdain you reserved for bad drivers and shitty landlords, you were still a person after all. 

With all of the stars around, it’s easy to think of Los Angeles as the center of the universe. But you are not a star or anything even close to it. You’re some space debris, hopelessly floating and waiting for something bigger to come around and influence you with its gravitational pull. 

Eddie is a heavenly body. You can’t help being pulled into his orbit. 

“So, I see you’ve found my collection.” His voice is still rough with sleep. The sound makes you weak in the knees. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to snoop.” You mumble, tucking Patsy Cline back into the shelf. “You’ve got some really good stuff here.”

“Don’t worry about it. Actually, that reminds me, I have something for you.” He swiftly turns and stalks back towards what seems to be his bedroom, motioning for you to follow him. 

The blood rushes out of your cheeks. The terms of your interview suggested that you would have a lot of access, but this was different. This was up close and personal. Your feet seem to have a mind of their own because while you’re still wrapped up in the fact that you’re gonna see Eddie Munson’s bedroom, you’re already following him down the hallway and through the open door. 

It’s about as messy as you would expect. The furniture is all pale wood and earth tones, fitting the mid-century modern stylings of the rest of the house. You suspect that Eddie took the time to clean up a little while you were rifling through the stacks of paper. The bed is haphazardly made. There’s an ashtray on his bedside table, filled with the remains of a few cigarettes. 

“I’m not supposed to smoke inside. Shh.” He brings his index finger to his mouth, pink lips barely brushing the skull ring he’s wearing. “Don’t tell anyone.”

You let out an airy laugh. Being reprimanded for smoking inside is the least of Eddie’s worries and you both know it. 

Eddie’s nimble fingers skim the top of the dresser, brushing aside even more sheets of scrap paper. A couple of guitar picks plummet to the floor, but he pays no mind. 

“I heard that metal isn’t usually your thing.” He remarks, still sifting through the clutter. 

That much is true. While you dabbled in a little bit of everything, not only as part of your job but also as part of your interest in music, metal wasn’t usually the genre you gravitated towards. In fact, the most metal album that you had listened to recently was written and produced by the man standing in front of you. 

“It’s not, but I’m open to everything.”

“Aha! Here it is.” Eddie holds up the cassette like it’s the key to the universe. Handing it to you, you can see that the writing on the sides is reminiscent of what you saw in the living room, though slightly neater. You’re familiar with some of the bands listed, but the songs don’t ring a bell. “I thought I would broaden your musical horizons.”

You gawk at him. For someone whose job is about words, you can’t find any. He took the time to make you a mixtape? 

“Track five is a personal favorite.” Eddie says, leaning towards you and tapping the tracklist, obviously unshaken by your inability to form a coherent thought. 

“Thanks. I’ll give it a listen.” You manage to choke out, tucking the cassette into the front pocket of your purse. 

Looking around the room, you see that there’s a battered copy of The Lord of the Rings on his bedside table. The corners are frayed, and you’re certain that you could accidentally tear the cover off of the paperback if you’re not careful. Cautiously, you trace the spine with your finger, waiting for Eddie to say something. To tell you that it’s the one thing that’s off limits. But he doesn’t. He just stands there, watching you. Opening it, you can see Property of Eddie A. Munson written underneath the title in a childish scrawl. 

“You like books? I mean–you’re a writer, so of course you like books–I mean, have you read that one?” Eddie is visibly flustered, the words coming out of his mouth at an alarming rate. It almost makes up for the way he rendered you speechless moments ago. 

“I’m more of a Dune girl myself. But, I love The Lord of the Rings. My dad used to read it to me before bed every night.”

“Yeah?” A small smile tugs at his lips before he practically whispers his next words. “Mine too.” 

A flash of something you can’t quite decipher crosses Eddie’s face. 

“Right! Where are my manners? Would you like something to drink?” He shuffles out of the room like his life depends on it. You’re still reeling at the fact that he brought up his dad unprompted. Keeping a brisk pace, you put the book down and follow him into the kitchen.

“We have…” He trails off, opening the door to the refrigerator. “Nothing.”

He shuts the refrigerator and dashes to the table by the front door. He mumbles to himself before grabbing a few things, shrugging on a jacket, and finally turning to face you again. A pair of sunglasses covers the half of his face that isn’t plastered with a mischievous grin. From the tips of his fingers hangs a set of car keys.

“You hungry?”

–

You should’ve known that Eddie Munson would try to kill you within 20 minutes of meeting him. Lifting up the garage door, he reveals that the car keys were in fact, not car keys but keys to a motorcycle. The vehicle in question is an absolutely stunning deathtrap. It shines so beautifully that you can see your terrified face in the warped reflection. 

Putting his helmet on, Eddie straddles the bike and looks at you. 

“C’mon.” Eddie smiles wolfishly, tilting the spare helmet towards you. “I’m a safe driver. Promise.”

You’re still standing frozen. His wolfish grin melts into something more patient.

“Hey, if you don’t want to take the motorcycle, just say the word. I’m not gonna make you do anything you don’t wanna do.” 

Despite the sincerity in his voice, you can’t help but take the words as a challenge. 

“No, it’s fine. I’m fine.” You profess, though the shake in your voice is evident. Grabbing the helmet out of his hands, you ignore the way your face heats up when your fingers brush.

Eddie takes gross advantage of California’s lane-splitting laws, leaving you clinging to his leather-draped torso for dear life. Outside from the occasional shout of assurance that you can’t understand, the ride is quiet but for the roar of the bike and the wind in your ears. You’re vacillating between being absolutely terrified of crashing and secretly relieved at the fact that you didn’t have to make small talk on the drive from his place to wherever he was taking you. 

You were very close to liking Eddie Munson. Now, you were sure that he was sent as some kind of karmic punishment.

“Parking in L.A. is always a pain. That’s why I love this baby,” He gingerly pats the handles as he kicks the parking brake down. “She can fit basically anywhere.”

You hum in agreement, mostly just happy to have made it to your destination in one piece. While Eddie hops off the bike with ease, you have a little more trouble. Swinging your leg over, your toe catches on the fuel tank, causing you to stumble and nearly fall to the ground. Out of the corner of your eye, you can see that Eddie is biting back a smile. He offers a calloused hand out to you. You brush it away out of embarrassment, planting both feet firmly on the ground and taking in your surroundings. 

You had expected Eddie to take you to one of L.A.’s finer dining venues. Somewhere with fancy mood lighting and clientele with pockets so deep that they don’t even bother to put the prices on the menu. His management was footing the bill, after all. 

The building that sits before you is none of those things. The diner is old and slightly dilapidated. Graffiti mars the stucco that hasn’t already crumbled away. The neon sign that says Zazie’s! blinks drowsily, more of an eyesore than eye-catching. 

Eddie opens the door for you. As the bell above it jingles, you’re hit with a rush of conditioned air and canned nostalgia. The walls are covered in artifacts from a bygone era of poodle skirts and letterman jackets. A lonely jukebox sits in the corner, playing a soft hum to a Billie Holiday song you have long forgotten the name of. 

A plump woman sits behind the counter doing the crossword in the newspaper. Likely, the same one you were doing that morning. A thoughtful look is etched into her soft features, and you wonder if she’s also stuck on 57-down: Idle during the heist. The ten-letter space confounded you so much that you were almost late. Luckily, it doesn’t seem like Eddie is the type of person to care too much about punctuality.  At the sound of the bell, she looks up, squints, and smiles. 

“Is that you, Toto?” The glasses that sit on the tip of her nose are attached to a chain around her neck. She lets them fall to her chest, her voice bright and amiable. 

“You know it is, Dorothy!” Eddie gushed, an award-winning smile back on his face. 

They fall into easy conversation, making it obvious that he’s a regular here. You keep glancing at him trying to find hints of ingenuity but there are none. Eddie regards the woman with the warmth and respect that you would expect from a boy scout, not a rockstar. 

Sliding into a booth, Dorothy hands you both a menu and leaves to make a fresh pot of coffee. 

“You have to try the french toast, it’s divine.” Eddie barely steals a look at the laminated folder before folding it back up and putting it down on the table. 

“I’ve never really been a french toast person. I don’t know if I wanna risk it.”

Eddie gives you a pointed look, sunglasses slipping down the slope of his nose. “You rode a motorcycle. How much more risky is a plate of french toast?”

��Maybe that was all the risk-taking I had in me for one day.” You force yourself to shrug noncommittally. You don’t know why breakfast food is the hill you’ve chosen to die on, but you’re going down swinging.

“Well, you already trusted me with your life.” Eddie takes the sunglasses off and tucks his fist under his chin, forcing you to look into his deep brown eyes. “Think you can trust me with this?”

Suddenly, all of the fight in you disappears. There’s that sincerity in his voice again. You realize then that the best and worst thing about Eddie Munson is how genuine he always sounds.  

“Yeah, I do.”

The smile on his face is so bright that you feel compelled to look away. Eddie orders for both of you. It’s enough food to feed a small army, but it seems that Dorothy is used to it because she leaves the table with a wink and says if y’all need anything just holler! 

“Do you mind?” You say, pulling out the notepad and pen from your purse. 

Eddie freezes for a fraction of a second. It’s almost imperceptible. Almost. In the small amount of time you’ve known him, it has become abundantly clear that Eddie wears his heart on his sleeve. Recovering quickly, he gives you the go-ahead and smiles. For the first time today, his grin doesn’t quite reach his eyes. 

“So,” You begin, clicking the button on your ballpoint. “I have to ask. Toto?”

Eddie barks out a laugh. He goes on a whole spiel about how he was having a terrible day and walked into the diner feeling homesick and hungry. When he first came to L.A. he felt like Dorothy stepping into the technicolor world of Oz. Once the novelty wore off, he found himself missing when the world used to be so black and white. Upon telling the wise waitress, aptly named Dorothy, she lovingly told him, Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore. The nickname stuck ever since.

The story almost sounds rehearsed. A perfect sound bite that shows how you can take the boy out of the Midwest, but you can’t take the Midwest out of the boy. And yet, you feel inclined to believe him. Eddie just seems to have that effect on people. 

The food finally arrives and you’re amazed to find that Eddie’s eyes are not bigger than his stomach. He talks about music and his band in between bites of pancakes and hashbrowns, both of them drowned in an inch of syrup. He speaks of his friends back in Indiana with a certain fondness, but you can’t help but notice how avoids naming his hometown. He also never refers to Hawkins as back home, instead saying where I’m from.

Conversation between the two of you flows as easily as the never-ending coffee from Dorothy’s pot. It’s almost too easy to forget that this is an interview. Remembering yourself, you take a moment to ask Eddie one of the harder-hitting questions you have in your back pocket.

“What about Evelyn Chau?”

Eddie winces. The open book that was sitting before you shuts tight with a resilient slam. The mouthful of pancakes and syrup seems to turn to sludge as his chewing slows. Despite having no regard for table manners earlier, he points at his lips and holds up a finger to indicate that he needs a minute to swallow. 

After taking a sip of coffee and wiping his mouth with a paper napkin, he slouches in his seat and crosses his arms defensively. 

“What about Evelyn Chau?” He repeats your question back to you but with an unmistakable air of forced nonchalance. 

You want to crumble under his pointed gaze, but you don’t. You steel yourself with the reminder that asking uncomfortable questions is part of your job description. Besides, it would raise many more alarms if you didn’t ask about the raven-haired model spotted painting the town with him than if you did. 

“Everyone wants to know if you’re together.”

“Everyone.” He exaggerates the word, using his index finger to trace the lip of his coffee cup. “Does that include you?”

The smirk on his face indicates that he’s either messing with you or flirting with you. Maybe both. 

“Well,” you demure. “are you?”

“Evie is just a friend.” Eddie’s still perfectly composed, but the familiarity with which he says her nickname betrays him. His face twitches when he catches his slip-up. “A really close friend.”

It’s already too late. He couldn’t convince you that she was just a friend if he tried. A flash of a crossed-out halo and crooked angel wings comes to mind. 

You’re about to ask him another question, but Dorothy and her impeccable timing interrupts the moment by placing the check on the table. Eddie throws down a few bills from an old leather wallet, while you’re trying to figure out how you can spin a two-hour diner date into an entire article. 

Eddie stretches as he stands up, the hem of his black v-neck raises to expose a tattoo on his right hip that snakes down further than you’re supposed to look. On the other side, you catch a muddled array of purple and red scar tissue. Averting your eyes, you look up and are met with a stony gaze. He caught you staring.

“What do you say we get outta here?”

Because you’re a very stupid, stupid woman, you agree.

likes are appreciated, comments and reblogs are cherished ♥️

taglist: @twisted-wonderland-of-wren

[landoftheocsmegablogformyocs]

Zaria (Something's Wrong With Sunny Day Jack Oc)

Full Name: Zaria Baker

Age: 25

DOB: June 19th

Occupation: Frozen yogurt cashier; amatuer writer 

Sexuality: Straight

Ethnicity: African-American 

Affiliation: Popov's Big Top Yogurt-Topia!

Relatives: Elizabeth Rover (mother); Anthony Baker (father); Geoffrey Rover (stepfather); Jacqueline Baker (stepmother); Richard Rover ( paternal half brother); Michelle Baker (maternal half sister)

Residence: El Paso, Texas 

Headcanon Voice Actress: Vivian Nixon 

Likes: Animated movies & shows; sweets; breakfast; reading; writing; singing; retro media ; flowers; scented candles, fragrance, & bath and body products; anime/manga; video games; pink ; thrift stores; book stores; kids; Afrocentrism; researching topics; marriage

Dislikes: Raisins; orange juice; nuts; chitlins; heights; bad writing; super spicy foods; applesauce; kid haters;divorce; abortion; rude customers; anti-marriage jokes; bad singers; bad research; people who diss pink; cheating

Background: Just regular Texan girl who works in the grueling world of the fast food industry, who is waiting to really sell with the children's books series she is trying to come up with. She is still reeling from the bad break up she had with her childhood friend turned boyfriend turned cheating ex, Ian. He's trying to to worm his way back into her life, while she forgives him she also still is not ready to let him be close to her again. Despite trying to get her series off the ground, she is not above looking for extra opportunities like helping with old college roomate, Shaun, with his script. She is a bit disappointed that others seem to have gotten somewhere farther than her in life since college, but also is happy at least for Shaun he's made it big. Her life although rather mundane takes a dive when she goes thrift shopping and finds a mystery vhs tape which she buys and takes back home. She then meets an unlikely friend that only she can see named Jack who used to be the host of an old 80's kid's show, who seems first to be friendly but shows he has more of a dark side.

Personality: On the surface people might think of her as being at first childish, but underneath she is much more smarter than people give her. She really tries to prove she can do what people all her life underestimated her as. She tries to have a lot of confidence herself, but at times she can doubt herself. She often feels her immature demeanor drove Ian away to find a much more mature person to deal with. She also feels like she really hasn't done anything big in her life like her classmate and ex are doing. As a result, she really loves the praise that Jack makes her feel at times while also being a bit wary of his more darker stuff. She also is very sympathetic to wonder what happened to him to make him that way and really wants to form a relationship with him while making sure he doesn't need to feel possessive. She's very touchy about relationships due to her parent's divorce which also didn't help when Ian cheated and made her even more wary of getting into relationships. She has a big heart for kids and it's a reason why she wants to write a children's book series and even one day settle with a family. She really treasures her loved ones and would do anything for them. 

* She's autistic 

* Her parents have been divorced since she was three years old. 

* College graduate with a Bachelors of art in Creative writing. 

* She has a strong Texan twang. 

* She wants to one day publish her own children's book series. She wants it to be a kid's horror series. 

* Her half siblings are still in high school. Richard is a senior while Michelle is a sophomore. 

* She and Jack will have two twin children and a second daughter. 

* Ian's cheating really stung her since she's a child of divorce and had to deal with tons of issues in her parents custody handling of her where they switched between months having her. 

* She is on good terms with both stepparents and half-siblings despite issues during divorce. 

* She was also doubly hurt because Ian was one of her more consistent friends in life due to how her autism made her stand out at times. 

* The flower pin was a gift from Ian back when they were dating. 

Created through picrew.me/en/image_maker/94097…

[red-bat-arse]

steddie musician AU where Eddie makes it big after s4 and invites Robin and Steve to live with him in Chicago so he can tour and always have a home base -and now he has the resources to buy a bit more for himself so he makes sure a good studio space gets installed in the house

and ofc Robin's already musically inclined so she likes to help Eddie fuck around with weird trumpet solos for experimental songs, and Steve learnt piano as a kid but never had the opportunity to get creative with it -so when Eddie's gone and Robin's in class, he putters around the studio, learning guitar from Eddie's books and adapting to a keyboard and having fun with synths and singing. that lack of expectations and freedom to have fun is what trips him into making his own music

he puts together a few songs and asks Nancy to listen to them -he knows she'll be honest about whether he's wasting his time with this, since he at least wants to make music Robin or Eddie could give a pass to. but to his surprise she tells him he's good, and if he wanted to he could make a little extra money playing alternative nights at clubs. needing a second, more objective from a personal connection standpoint, opinion, he asks Argyle, who actually worked at a record store for a bit

Argyle, without asking bc he thought it went without saying, passes the cassette on to a few buddies of his in the local live music scene and later introduces them to Steve when they want to have him at one of their regular places. Steve goes with Robin who he asks not to tell anyone -he doesn't want to distract Eddie while the guy's making a big name of himself, and maybe Steve feels embarrassed or inadequate about being late to the game and doing it as a hobby, so he also uses a pseudonym. 'Zdev' maybe, if we want to parallel 'Djo'

he finds out he really likes it, so he starts doing small gigs for bars or parties Jonathan connects him with. puts a short album on cassette that he recorded at home, has fun with it even as the songs become more personal. but by then 'Zdev' has a little local fame and one of his cassettes is picked up by some label and they reach out -Steve definitely doesn't expect it, because psychedelic rock kind of faded from radio play after the 70s, but now he's being faced with a record deal he isn't sure he wants and no idea how to handle it

so he calls Eddie, who comes racing back from recording with the band out in LA, thankfully not ditching at too inconvenient a point

and Eddie nearly doesn't believe it at first but once he gets his hands on a tape so he can get an idea of the sound, he's obsessed. while he's a metalhead to the core, he's never heard Steve sing before (let's use twenty twenty as the album here) and there's something about the way Steve ties the groove to a sense of melancholy that digs into his skull. it also doesn't help that some of the songs set off alarm bells bc they talk about loving a girl or packing up and leaving or feeling adrift and they make him want to stick as close as possible lest they turn out to be true

he helps Steve through it, pretty well versed in the industry by now (i'm thinking its about 5 years post Vecna) but he's quietly worrying over the album's content the whole time. they go through the re-recording process, which ofc Eddie really wants to hear, but with Steve still being embarrassed he doesn't end up sitting in on any; but they talk over each song before and after and its so easy to drift back into hinting at the mutual attraction they'd each independently resigned to pass them by, back when Eddie first moved away after 86. and eventually it comes out that the album was Steve's way of, yeah, having fun, but also exorcising feelings from his past in Hawkins. that there's only one song that's really about his life now, and he didn't put it on the cassette but he's planning on including it on the LP

by now its pretty obvious to Steve that Eddie is flirting back, not to mention the guy put a hold on recording his own work to help Steve out, which is easy to read into. so he finally invites Eddie to sit in for the recording of the last song, which he's hoping will be subtle enough that he can bluff if it doesn't go well, but if Eddie is on the same page, it'll be clear. the song he plays is Mutual Future (Repeat)

it's got a long winding intro of just guitar that Eddie sits through, unaware, and Steve starts singing low, almost just his speaking voice the croon is so subtle, and when he meets Eddie's eyes through the glass to ask will you be mine?

well, Eddie gets it. and while there's not a lot of privacy in a recording studio, he eventually finds a small filing room he can kiss Steve stupid in until quitting time for the day comes and goes

[reasonsforhope]

Odd jobs are few and far between in Nearobo. Peter knows because every day he walks the streets of his village in south-east Liberia looking for one. In a good month, he might make $20 (£16.70). That’s hardly enough to feed himself, let alone his children.

But today things are looking up. As part of an innovative new donation scheme, Peter receives $40 (£33.40) per month for a minimum of three years. No paperwork. No requests for receipts. No catch of any kind, in fact. Just hard cash transferred straight to his mobile phone. 

The 59-year-old casual labourer plans to use the money to buy materials for a new home for himself and his family, he says. “Although it is going to take long, I will continue until my house is completed.”

The scheme is part of a new-look approach to development assistance that, if taken to scale, could potentially turn the £156bn international aid industry on its head.

At least, so says Rory Stewart, the former UK foreign secretary turned podcaster-in-chief (he co-hosts ‘The Rest is Politics’ with Alastair Campbell, a surprise hit which has topped the Apple podcast charts virtually every week since it launched a year ago). From his new base in Amman, Jordan, Stewart heads up GiveDirectly – the world’s fastest growing nonproft – who are behind the initiative.

“It’s a rather radical, simple idea to help people out of extreme poverty. We deliver the cash directly … there’s no middleman and no government getting in the way.”

It feels like an odd statement from someone who has spent much of his life in government service: first as a junior diplomat for eight years (during which he penned a bestselling book about dodging Taliban bullets and hungry wolves whilst walking across Afghanistan), followed by almost a decade as a politician at Westminster.

Pictured: Rory Stewart and GiveDirectly’s Ivan Ntwali talk with a refugee household in Rwanda. Image: GiveDirectly

His enthusiasm is even more surprising given his initial caution. During his various ministerial stints at the UK’s department for international development (including three months as secretary of state), he was an out-and-out “cash sceptic.” 

Giving away money with no strings attached was, he felt at the time, an impossible sell to tax-paying voters. What’s stopping recipients spending it down the pub? Or investing in a hair-brained business venture? 

Quite a lot it turns out. No one knows the value of money more than those who don’t have any, he argues. Give an impoverished mother-of-four $40 (£33.40) cash and, 99 times out of 100, she’ll spend it on something useful: repairs to the house, say, or school fees for her kids...

By virtue of GiveDirectly’s model, participants can spend their money on whatever they choose, but the charity’s research indicates that most goes towards food, medical and education expenses, durables, home improvement and social events.

On the flipside, Stewart also has numerous examples of well-funded aid projects that deliver next to nothing. A decade ago, the then United Nations general secretary Ban Ki-moon estimated that 30 per cent of aid money disappears in corruption. There is little to suggest much has changed.

The aid industry doesn’t need corrupt officials to see its funds evaporate, however; it has its own voluminous bureaucracy. Stewart recalls once visiting a $40,000 (£33,560) water and sanitation project in a school in an unnamed African country. The ‘deliverables’ were two brick latrines and five red buckets for storing water...

The beauty of direct giving, he stresses, is not just that it annuls opportunities for thievery and red tape; it also frees the world’s poorest individuals from the well-meaning but, very often, misplaced guidance of donors. An aid expert in Brussels or Washington DC may well have a PhD in development economics, but who is best to judge what a single mother in a Kinshasa slum needs most and how to obtain it most cheaply: the expert with her degree, or the mother with her hungry children?

Empowering recipients to decide for themselves helps end the kind of “mad world” where aid agencies pay to ship wheat from Idaho, US, to Antananarivo, Madagascar, only for local people to sell it in order to buy what they really want, Stewart reasons.

“So often, these communities are having to turn the goods we send them into cash anyway, but just in a very inefficient and wasteful fashion … instead [with direct cash transfers] they are given the choice and freedom in how to spend it.” 

Pictured: Villagers in Kilif, Kenya, at a public meeting about the GiveDirectly programme. Image: GiveDirectly

Is the system perfect? No, clearly not. Stewart concedes that opportunities for fraud and coercion exist. To minimise these risks, GiveDirectly employs field officers to meet face-to-face with recipients, as well as a team of telephone handlers and internal auditors to follow up on reports of irregularity.

By his reckoning, however, the biggest impediment to direct giving really taking off is donor reticence. At present, only 2 per cent of official aid is given direct in cash. Stewart thinks it should be closer to 60 or 70 per cent...

‘My children will not have to beg anymore’

Happiness Kadzmila from Malawi enrolled on GiveDirectly’s Basic Income project last summer. She will now receive $50 (£41) a month for a year ($600/£496 in total).

What are the biggest hardships you’ve faced in life?

I am a divorced mother of four children. I got divorced in 2020 while I was eight months pregnant with my last-born child. Since then, I have been depending on working on other people’s farms. I get paid $0.49 (£0.43), or a plate of maize flour per day. As a result, it has been a challenge to feed my children, buy clothes for them, and to pay their school fees My firstborn child is in year 4, the school charges $0.69 (£0.61) per day for her. My second is in year 3, I pay $0.49 (£0.43) for him. There were days when I would have no food in my home, and my children would go to my neighbours’ homes to beg for food. This made me feel sorry for my children as a mother.

What does receiving this money mean for you?

I was so happy the day I received cash amounting to $51.75 (£43.56) from GiveDirectly. I used the money to buy maize at $9.88 (£8.32). My children will not have to go to our neighbours to beg for food anymore. I also bought a sheep at $34.58 (£29.10). I will be selling sheep in future when they multiply. I also bought lotion and soap at $1.88 (£1.58).

How will you spend your future payments?

I plan to renovate my house. I have always admired those who sleep in houses made of a roof with iron sheets because they do not have to think of fetching grass every year for a new roof. I will also start a business selling doughnuts to sustain my income after I receive my last transfer. I did not know that an organisation like GiveDirectly would come to help me this way All I can say to those who are giving us this money is ‘thank you’."

-via Positive News, 3/3/23

More and More People to Help

In addition to their universal basic income programs, GiveDirectly also has dedicated programs where you can donate to emergency disaster relief, people living under the protracted civil war and human rights disaster in Yemen, refugees, and survivors of the Syria-Turkey earthquake.

They have also commissioned a number of large-scale, third-party studies on the effectiveness of their numerous universal basic income models. Find these and other projects here.