#It would not be a nice video either *stares into the distance*

[blushblushbear]

Different anon, but I am having the time of my life with your live blogging, I'm very invested.

thank you anon TTMTT

I do feel like I'm being a bit mean but IDK MAN

I'm a very opinionated musical theater person and while you could easily convince me my opinions are mean, you usually can't convince me that they also correct so

IDK MAN I HAVE A LOT OF FEELINGS ABOUT MUSICAL THEATER OKAY

also I'm only doing act 1 tonight and then tomorrow I'll do the rest

WHICH I JUST FOUND OUT THERE'S MORE AND ALSO APPARENTLY THE NEXT BIT IS GETTING RELEASED LITERALLY TOMORROW

so I accidentally picked the perfect time to do this but also haha end me it'll never stop

but no, legit thank you I have been sitting here this whole time writing this stuff thinking like 'WOW NO BODY CARES, STOP CLOGGING UP THE BLUSH BLUSH BLOG' but at least one person cares XD

so thank you anon, you've encouraged me to continue (you absolute monster)

[sehnsuchts-trunken]

(Don't You) Steal My Thunder

my tyler owens playlist 🤝 inspiring fic titles

Tyler Owens x fem!reader  7k words

summary: Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met. But he's set on getting you on his good side. And the more you get to know him, the less you can resist.

a/n: i had to research sm car stuff for this it's not funny. i now know exactly how to describe a truck bed though, so. that's fun.

again, my inbox is wide open <33 i don't guarantee anything, but you can always come talk to me or request smth

masterlist | twisters masterlist

Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met.

He prints his face on t-shirts, writes his autograph on mugs, comes up with ridiculous sayings ("Not My First Tornadeo" and "If you feel it, chase it" are really just the tip of the ice berg) and most importantly, he costs you the best shots of tornadoes every goddamn time.

Tyler Owens is a problem.

And Tyler Owens seems to have actively decided to make himself a problem too.

Which would be fine, if he flipped you the bird or told you to fuck off or threw his paper towels at you. Unluckily, those are rather examples of what you have done to him. Because it's not fine, not at all - no, Tyler Owens has decided that it's not enough to be in your way all the time, he has to seek you out and rub your nose in it.

Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met. He's cocky and he's arrogant and he's entirely too full of himself. He brags too much and calls you "weather girl" too often. He gets under your skin more than you would ever admit.

And, as if all of that isn't enough - Tyler Owens is the very epitome of handsomeness.

It's like god didn't just have a good day when he created Tyler Owens, no, god must have still been in the post-haze of the best head he'd gotten in his whole immortal life when he'd created Tyler Owens.

Because Tyler Owens has the body of a greek god and the face of a Hollywood actor. He's not a pornstar, he's who pornstars worship. He's the Prince Charming little girls dream of and the Christian Grey grown women lust for.

Tyler Owens looks like everything you've ever wanted.

But he's just such a fucking asshole.

You wish you could say you didn't care. You'd love to be the kind of woman who didn't even acknowledge him. But you're not. You're not. You watch his videos when you can't sleep, you chuckle when you happen to overhear his jokes, you ogle his back when he's turned away from you. Sometimes, you get so lost in staring at him that you realise too late when he turns back around, and then you have to act unbothered when he grins his fucking grin at you. That's mostly when you flip him off, desperately fighting to ignore the heat in your cheeks.

Not like it stops him. You honestly feel like it only spurs him on.

Something has to seriously be wrong with him. It's not his face. But something is seriously wrong with him, you're sure of that.

Something has to be wrong with him. No sane person would ever go tornado wrangling. No hate to the rest of his crew - they're nice, you've managed to hold a few pretty normal conversations with them here and there - but none of them are sane either.

Storm chasing is different. You keep your distance. All you need are a few well-placed photographs - and those you can get from a rather safe number of miles away. The weather channel doesn't care about close-ups (not really, anyway). They want something to show the people on their comfortable couches, up in New Hampshire or Maine, so that all of them can say to each other "What poor folks, wouldn't wanna live there" and nod in pity as they switch the channel to watch another blockbuster.

You're just doing your job.

The only problem is that it's hard to do your job properly when there's always that fucking red truck in the way, driving down empty roads right into the heart of the tornado. And because no one on the news wants people to see that and go "Well, can't be too bad if there's still cars on the streets!", in the last few months - ever since you'd volunteered to move back to Oklahoma 'So that we've got someone right in Tornado Alley and don't have to fly people out there every time' - the weather channel has only shown the first few minutes of tornadoes forming. The rest of your pictures and videos lie abandoned in the trash file on your laptop. Except for a few - a very, very few, very, very good pictures of Tyler Owens and his Tornado Wranglers. But those won't ever see the light of day either.

You'd be damned if you let anyone know that while Tyler Owens is busy disturbing your actual work, you're busy taking pictures of him shooting fireworks into tornadoes. Pictures that would make for some damn good headers (if you hadn't buried them far, far down your gallery).

This time is no different. You get a few amazing shots of the tornado forming – surely an EF2, maybe even an EF3 - before you settle in the driver's seat again, your window rolled down and your camera hung around your neck as you push down on the gas. Then, a few miles further, you get even better shots of the full tornado, of the first few minutes of destruction, right there, in the middle of an empty field.

And as always, of course, just as the tornado takes on full form, you spot that familiar red truck through the lens of your camera. It speeds down the pavement right in front of where you’ve swerved onto the side of the road and you snap a few pictures, just because you’ve got the trigger right underneath your finger. Honestly, something about that dirty red paint against the grey skies just looks too good not to capture. But then the truck comes closer and closer and starts to slow down and you let your camera sink.

Tyler has his window rolled down already when he stops the car. There’s that annoyingly handsome grin on his lips, the one that makes you want to slap him across the face.

“You’re too far away, weather girl”, he calls out above the rumble of distant wind and thunder. “The good pictures are down that way.”

“The good pictures are right here.” You lift your camera at him. “Maybe you just need to update your equipment.”

Tyler’s grin widens, but before he can throw another of those obnoxious retorts your way, Lilly’s voice rings out through the car.

“Hey, T, looks like it’s changing course. You should hurry.”

His eyes are still glued to yours, still glued so firmly to yours that it makes your skin crawl. You can’t look away, couldn’t possibly look away. Tyler Owens might just be a cocky asshole, but you’re only human. And the weight of his gaze on yours is enough to keep you stuck in place, clutching at your camera.

“We’re on our way, Lilly”, he drawls without looking away from you. “See you around, weather girl.”

The rest of the pictures you take land in your trash file with all the other pictures of the last few weeks. You’re laying in bed, your laptop propped up against a pillow, the empty plate from dinner on the mattress next to you as you sort through today’s work. That’s the good thing about the time difference – you’ve got until seven to send the channel the day's results.

By nine, you’ve showered, put on a dress you feel confident in and settled on one of the chairs at the local bar. You’ve been telling yourself you need to get out a little bit more – you’ve been living here three months now and you haven’t really made any friends so far. To be fair, your job has kept you out and about most of the time. You’ve spent more hours at gas stations to fill up your tank than you have in your own home. But now you’ve decided to put an end to that. You're a young woman in a new town, you can meet more people than just the cashier at the local supermarket.

So for the past twenty minutes, you’ve been nursing a mojito at the counter and talking to the bartender. She’s nice, she’s your age, she’s extroverted enough to keep sidling up to you after every time she has to excuse herself to do her job. That, and she tells you she’s grown up here, so she knows most of the people around. She’s just serving another customer – a long-haired, brown-eyed, hat-wearing country guy who’s already shared a smile or two with you – when someone rests their arm on the countertop next to you.

“Didn’t expect to see you here”, he drawls, all low, deep Southern accent and you recognise his voice before you’ve even tilted your head up and looked at him. His grin drips down onto his words and wraps itself around your mind.

Tyler Owens isn’t just annoying – he’s unbelievable. He's unbelievable and he’s here.

“So you’re stalking me now”, you say, as drily as you can possibly manage. You've been doing that a lot around him. Dead-panning everything. Schooling your expression into fake neutrality.

"I'm here all the time, weather girl", he grins. "If anything, you're stalking me."

You snort, but it's rather unfunny when you think of all the videos you've watched, hours after they'd been livestreamed, cuddled up in your bed until midnight just to stare at his face. He's not that far from the truth.

"In your dreams, Owens", you say anyway, dragging your eyes back towards your almost empty cocktail glass. You wrap your lips around your straw and drain your drink entirely. What you say and what you do, none of that matters in the end. All of this is just show. Every conversation you've had with Tyler Owens in the last three months has been nothing but a performance. Other than your name, you don't think a single sentence out of your mouth has been honest. Not when it comes to him.

"Let me buy you a beer" is the only answer you get.

His grin widens when you look back up again - so cocky, so unbelievably cocky.

"I don't drink."

You push your glass an inch further down the bar top. Tyler raises his eyebrows. Fuck, someone really needs to kick him in the face. You can't keep having all these little heart attacks whenever he's close enough that you could touch him if you wanted.

Not that you want to.

"You're drinking right now", he says. You rest your palms against the bar top and blink at him.

"I don't drink with you."

He lets out a chuckle, one of those deep ones that settle right in your chest and make it hard to swallow.

"Just this once?", he asks and in all honesty, for just a second there, you actually consider giving in. He's too handsome for his own good. You really need to get it together. He's an ass (what an ass, goddamn). And he's insane. He's an insane ass. Sometimes you have to remind yourself of that - those times like now, when his piercing eyes and his kissable lips and his rugged stubble and his broad, broad shoulders and his drawled voice overshadow everything else.

"Don't you have some livestreaming to do?", you ask, hoping it still comes across just as sarcastic when you're the slightest bit distracted by how gloriously tight the sleeves of his flannel are. "Go chasing tornadoes, not me."

His grin widens inexplicably further. You're sure that if you were in a comic, there'd be a lightbulb flashing above his head right about now.

"Well", he drawls, "if you feel it..."

"Don't you do that shit to me, Owens."

He's raising his eyebrows again, raising his eyebrows as you clasp your hand around your empty glass so hard your knuckles turn white. But you're serious. Just as you'd lost yourself in the view of him, that angelic, sinful view of him, he'd gone and reminded you why you were so adamant to keep your distance. If you feel it, chase it. Ridiculous. Obnoxious. He's an arrogant, know-it-all, suicidal job-wrecker. He's the guy with cameras pointed at him everywhere he goes. He signs mugs and selfies and hats and shirts and bras. He's the reason you haven't gotten a single un-edited shot of a fully formed tornado in the last three months.

"You're not a fan of my catchphrase, weather girl?"

He can't even pretend to look wounded (even though he tries) with how big the grin on his lips still is. You stare right at him, dead-eyed and unflinching.

"I'm not a fan of you."

Lies slip off your tongue so easily by now that you wonder when you'd become morally compromised enough to not even care anymore. It must've happened somewhere along the way, sometime between the first conversation you'd had with him and the one you're having with him right now.

"You wound me", he grins, his palm pressed to his chest.

For the first time tonight, you allow yourself to grin back at him.

"I try."

With that, you slip off your chair and wave the bartender goodbye. You're already two steps away when Tyler calls after you.

"I'd still buy you a beer."

"I'm still not drinking with you", you call back. You don't turn around again. You just make your way back to your car and mark the evening as a half-successful night of socialising on your to-do list.

...

You see him again first thing the next day. Of course. Because there's no tornadoes without the Tornado Wranglers on their tail. By now, you're used to it. You wave at Dani as they come back out of the store at the gas station you're waiting at. They've got both arms full of coffees and for a second, you consider offering your help, but then you hear Tyler shout something out of his car and you suddenly don't feel any desire whatsoever to get up. You've sat yourself down in your truck bed, your camera slung around your neck and the radar on your lap. If all goes right, you're hoping for a tornado to form a little to the east from here. And as much as you dislike Tyler Owens, the fact that he's here soothes your nerves. Where he goes, there's sure to be tornadoes close by.

The few times you hadn't seen him had never ended well for you. You'd missed an EF3 your second week here just because you'd followed the wrong hunch. Meanwhile Tyler, of course, had been in the middle of it.

This might just be the one singular situation that you welcome seeing his red truck around. As long as you can manage to overtake him on the road after.

It's not that you need to be faster. You don't need to reach the tornado first. You don't even take the same way as him most of the time. He wants in there, you just want a sensible picture. Still, you can't help but feel a pang of disappointment every time you hit the brakes and jump out of your car, miles away from the actual cell as Tyler speeds down towards it. You've been telling yourself that it's because he ruins your pictures. It kind of is.

"Hey, weather girl!"

You let out a resigned breath as you tilt your head up and squint against the sun. He's still in his truck, his window rolled down, his elbow propped up against the car door.

"What do you want, Owens?"

Your fingers itch to reach for your camera. It's a visual, him in that fucking car, leaning out of his window with the sun peaking out behind him. But you can't, you can't take a picture of him this openly. Even if you were to argue that it's just the light you'd wanted to capture.

"To give you some advice", he calls out, his lips pulling into a grin. You raise your eyebrows at him. "East isn't gonna work out. Wind's changing. Go south."

He throws you a mock salute and hits the gas before you can say anything else.

Not that you'd been about to.

Instead you just curse to yourself, jump off the truck bed and throw your treacherous technology into the passenger seat with a little too much vigor. Fuck this. You sit at the steering wheel and stare out at the sky for exactly two seconds before you make your decision. Then you start your car and drive south.

You may not be a fan of Tyler Owens, but you've long since admitted to yourself that this man has got a gift. He has an unbeatable instinct when it comes to storms. And sure, you have your fair share of knowledge, but in the end, you're a photographer, not a meteorologist. You won't miss a day's work just because you're too proud to listen to Tyler.

You're a little further behind, but you can spot his truck and guess that he's driving straight on into the cell today, so you take a right and decide to try your luck with the side of the tornado. Not being right in its path doesn't sound too bad anyway.

You actually manage to snap a few well-placed pictures. You don't know what Tyler's doing, but it seems like he's not shooting random shit up the cell today. You'll watch the stream later - you're just the slightest bit curious now what's happening with them. Maybe they're doing some old-school chasing? Or maybe they're doing a challenge. Maybe Tyler is driving blindfolded. At this point, who knows.

It's good for you though. It's a considerable tornado today, an EF2 at least, and you only spot Tyler's red truck again when the cell moves further down the fields, away from him. It doesn't look like it's gonna disappear anytime soon. Maybe today's your lucky day.

Half an hour later, you're sure you've got at least a dozen pictures of the fully formed tornado, long touched down and without the red truck in the way.

You're just packing up your things, already sifting through the photos on your camera, squinting against the sunlight, trying to both tug the zipper of your bag closed and hit the right buttons at the same time when Tyler pulls up next to you.

"You look busy, weather girl", he says, already grinning that damn grin again.

"I am", you say - truthfully, for once. You let go of your bag and lower your camera. You're hesitant, but... "Thanks for the tip."

"Anytime", he grins. "Just do me one favour."

You already know this can't be good. Not with that cheeky look on his face. But he'd just saved you from chasing hot air (quite literally), so he deserves a little treat. And you don't want unsettled scores with Tyler Owens.

"I want to know what favour that's supposed to be before I agree", you say anyway, because with him, you can never be too careful. And in the end, you're only willing to do so much. (Though for him, you'd already do a lot more than you'd admit. A lot more than you hope he's aware of.)

"Let me buy you a beer", he says, and for once, he sounds serious.

The memory of yesterday night flashes before your eyes, of those same words at the bar. With him so close, way too close - with that grin and that stubble and that voice and those shoulders. You cross your arms and stare at him.

"If you're livestreaming this, I'm gonna sue your ass so hard."

He just lets out a chuckle and raises his hands in surrender.

"Cameras are off, I swear."

You stare at him for another silent ten or so seconds. At him in that fucking truck that looks just a little too good in your pictures. At him and his fucking face. That fucking face that you certainly wouldn't mind sitting on, if just to shut him up.

God, he's asking you to drink something with him. He's asking to buy you something to drink with him. You're stupid.

You're so, so stupid.

"Alright, cowboy", you say, uncrossing your arms and reaching for the handle of your car door. "I'll humour you."

...

You're in the bar again by nine that night, the same way you had been the day before. You're wearing a different dress and there's a different bartender, but you've ordered the same mojito and chosen the same place to sit.

Only this time, you're actively watching the door. And when Tyler strolls in, you've got to shift around in your seat and cross your legs. You don't even pretend you're not staring. You just ogle him openly. Not for the first time ever - you'd checked him out very obviously when he'd strutted towards you to introduce himself three months ago - but definitely for the first time in a while. And god yeah, he's a hunk of a man, alright. If you had your camera here right now...

But you don't. So instead, you drop your eyes to his feet (brown leather boots), drag them up his legs (blue jeans), over his chest (red checkered flannel), over his face (god, what you wouldn't give-) and finally rest them on the cowboy hat on top of his head.

When he's close enough to hear you, already grinning, of course, probably at how you're actually sitting there in the same spot as yesterday and hadn't just lied to his face about coming here, you raise your eyebrows at him.

"A cowboy hat?", you ask, your voice as unbothered as you can possibly manage (even though you're very, very, very much bothered right now). His grin only widens.

"Ladies love country boys", he drawls with a shrug.

"Now that's straight out of a song", you say. "You're getting lazy, Owens."

"A song?", he asks. "No, that's an Owens Original."

You pull your eyebrows even further up.

"Ladies love country boys? Trace Adkins?"

"Nope. Not familiar."

But his grin tells you that he's lying. He's a liar. He knows very well where he got that line from. And he knows just how easily he got under your skin with his simple trick. As if his face isn't enough already.

You just shake your head and turn away from him.

"Put your money where your mouth is, Owens. Buy me a beer."

...

Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met. But he's also a great conversationalist.

The hours fly by as you're talking. One beer turns into two, then into an uncountable number of soft drinks. You both agree that you need to drive home, neither of you is willing to risk a run-in with the police. You need your drivers license for your jobs.

Tyler talks to you about the pictures you've taken today, then about the pictures from last week. He laughs when you blame him for ruining half of them and almost spits out his coke when you slap his arm for laughing at you. He tells you about his crew, about the people they've helped with the money from their dumb t-shirt sales. You think you hate him less by the minute. You're not sure if you're okay with that. But he gets you talking about your childhood and your parents, about school and college and about how you've wound back up here in Oklahoma. That effectively distracts you.

That, and how his cocky grin morphs into a genuine smile the more you open up.

Not that you didn't love the cocky grin. You did, just a bit. As obnoxious as it was. But the way he smiles at you all sweet has you melting right in your spot.

It's not the first time you realise that beneath all that rough exterior, there beats a heart of gold. You've known what those t-shirt sales are for, that he offers food and water after a tornado hits a town, that he carries the injured out of the ruins of their houses and helps find lost dogs. The more you've been around him in the past weeks, the more you've seen of his soft side. Of the way he cares and supports. But in the end, it always is easier to go back to the status quo - to fall back onto mindless snark and fleeting first impressions.

You'd clung so desperately to the image of him as this arrogant, smug, holier-than-thou influencer god for the sole purpose of keeping your own sanity. Because you'd known that without despising him, you would fall head over heels for Tyler Owens, and you just couldn't have that.

But now, with his arm brushing against yours and his hat discarded on the bar top and his smile, that beautiful, beautiful smile on his lips...

"Five bucks", he drawls, already reaching for his wallet.

"What?"

"Five bucks says there won't be a tornado tomorrow."

You raise your eyebrows at him, your glass hovering in mid-air between the two of you. You'd meant to take a sip, but now you're setting it right back down on the bar top.

"You're shitting me."

Tyler just shakes his head. He's grinning again, but it's much softer this time around.

"The winds are looking great. The forecast says it's gonna be the best conditions for tornadoes we've seen in the last six weeks. I've heard Dexter talk about how we're probably gonna see an EF4 tomorrow", you tell him, even though you're sure he's well aware of all of it. This is Tyler Owens, for god's sake. He knows about the winds and the forecasts. He knows that his crew is making preparations already.

His grin only grows. And it's smug now. It's cocky now. It's everything you thought you'd left behind during this conversation. He looks like the Tornado Wrangler again, like the guy who fucks up your pictures and makes your job harder than it already is.

It takes you a second too long to realise why.

"Dexter said that on our live", he grins, as if he can't quite believe what he's hearing. You physically recoil from him. "Do you watch our streams, weather girl?"

"No", you breathe, rigid and frozen, shocked to your very core. No, no, no, no, this cannot be happening. This cannot be happening. You'd... You hadn't made that mistake. He hadn't got you to make that mistake.

"Dexter talked about tomorrow on our live", Tyler says again, straightening his back and grinning down at you like he's just uncovered the lost grave of Cleopatra. "Only on the live. You watched our stream."

"No", you mutter, your eyes wide and your mouth dry, so dry. You need to drink. You need to drink so badly. "No, I didn't."

"Yes, you did. You watched our stream, honey."

The petname runs down your spine and clogs your senses. Honey. Oh, he's an ass, he's an asshole! But you're on the spot, you're on the spot and he's calling you honey, honey, honey. You can't do anything but watch as he leans closer to you, grinning down at you like it's his one true purpose on this earth, like he wants to eat you alive.

"I'd say you watch our streams pretty regularly, weather girl."

You swallow hard and clasp your hand around your glass.

"Yeah?", you breathe, hoping against all hope that your voice sounds somewhat innocent. You're sure it doesn't. You know it doesn't. You probably sound as guilty as you are, but... Hope dies last. Hope always dies last. "Why would you say that?"

"Just a hunch." He shows off those pearly fucking whites for you. "Call it an instinct. I'm usually right."

He is.

He's right now. He's right usually.

Him and his fucking instinct. His goddamn gut feeling about tornadoes, always right all the fucking time. He's like an Oklahoma Jesus. The first coming of Tornado Christ.

Fuck him.

Fuck him.

"I'll take your bet." You drain your glass at once. "Give me your five bucks, Owens."

You don't think it'll work. You don't think he'll let you distract him. You don't think it'll be this easy to stop his vile teasing. He's not the type of guy to let something go. He's not the type of guy to let anything go ever. But he looks at you and he grins at you and he trails his eyes over your face and then he opens up his wallet and pulls out five dollars without another word.

He puts the bill flat on the bar top.

But when you go to reach for it, he pushes his fingers down.

"The price just went up", he says.

You raise your eyebrows and let your hand sink again. Tyler is absolutely unpredictable. You should've known.

"The price just went up?", you repeat. He nods. "What more do you want to bet?"

He's closer now, closer all of a sudden. He's too close, close enough to make your breath hitch. He's looking down at you with that cocky, cheeky grin, with his weirdly green eyes, with his three day stubble and his generally much too symmetrical face. You can't do anything but look back up at him.

"A kiss", he says. Simple as that.

A kiss.

Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met. He is. Truly. He's annoying and way too full of himself and much too presumptuous. Tyler Owens is the only man who would ever do something like this. The only man who'd bet a kiss on whether or not there will be tornadoes tomorrow.

Especially with that forecast.

The one that says a tornado is basically inevitable.

"Alright", you say. He may be Tyler Owens, the guy with an infallible instinct - but he is also Tyler Owens, the guy who's been doing his hardest to get under your skin. This time might not be any different. For all you know, he's bluffing to rile you up. "I'm in."

...

At eleven the next day, you're standing next to Dexter in resigned silence.

"I really thought today was gonna pan out", you mutter.

"It should have", Dexter frowns, tapping against the screen in his hands. "It should have worked out. The conditions should have been perfect. Everything's been building the last few days."

"But it collapsed this morning."

You turn your head and watch as Tyler comes to a stand next to you, arms crossed, eyes locked on the clear sky up above. He tilts his head to you and grins. Fuck, he's wearing his goddamn hat again. It's like he doesn't even try to be normal.

"Hey, weather girl", he greets. "Ready to cash out your bet?"

You shake your head at him. No, you're not giving up this easily. You never give up this easily.

"The day's not over yet, Owens. You haven't won 'til midnight."

...

You spend most of the next hours sitting in your truck bed, reading a book you'd thrown into your backseat weeks ago and had so far neglected. Lilly hands you lunch around two, Dani offers you a coffee around five and Boone pipes up here and there to joke about the wasted day. Around six, Dexter comes by to let you know they're calling it.

You still have another hour to go. By seven, it'll be too late to send your pictures anyway. But you want the hour. You need the hour.

You still haven't decided what to do about Tyler. About Tyler and his fucking bet.

He's been loitering the whole day, walking by, joking around with his crew, livestreaming a spontaneous q&a just because.

And the more minutes tick by, the harder it is to keep ignoring that you've most definitely lost the bet. Even though you do your best. You read, you check your phone. You stare at your radar. You stare at the weather forecast. You talk to Dexter and Dani and Lilly and Boone. You take a few pictures of the sky. Then you take a few pictures of Tyler, standing some feet away from his truck and looking out at the clouds.

It's only when two of three Tornado Wranglers cars are disappearing down the road, when Tyler Owens suddenly stands in front of your truck bed, that you put down your book and face reality.

"No tornadoes in sight", he says, instead of 'Hello' or 'How are you' like any other person would.

"There's still six hours left", you reason. Even if only one of those is relevant for your job today.

"You really want to wait out six hours to prove I'm right?"

"You're not right", you argue. It's fruitless, it's stupid, it's unreasonable. But... "Not yet, anyway."

Tyler raises his eyebrows at you, lets out an amused chuckle and leans against the side of your truck bed.

"Alright, so we wait."

You eye him from the side. He's fucking leaning against your truck, staring out at the sky, talking about six hours. Goddamn. He can't be serious, can he? His crew is already gone. They've disappeared into the descending sun and he's talking about waiting another six hours. Leaned against your car.

"Fuck's sake, Owens", you sigh, scooching over to the right. "At least sit down then."

You don't talk much at first. You just open your book back up again and try your hardest to ignore that he's even here at all, barely two feet away from you on the other side of your truck bed. If you stretched your leg, you'd hit him right in the hip.

It makes reading close to impossible.

Even though he's not doing anything at all. He's just sitting there, one arm propped up on the side board, that goddamn cowboy hat on his head and his feet hanging off the opened tailgate. It's almost worse that he's not doing anything.

That he's just sitting there and watching the sky change.

You give up on reading entirely when you realise that you've finished exactly five pages in half an hour. Instead, you put your book back in the car, pull out your bluetooth speaker and two water bottles and offer Tyler one of them.

You don't even ask him what music he wants to listen to. You just put on your country playlist and roll with it. By the twitch of his lips, you know he certainly doesn't mind.

Another half hour later, it's starting to get chilly and you're beginning to grow bored of the music. Tyler sitting next to you makes you fidgety, somehow, and you can't really enjoy the songs you usually love so much. So you switch to a podcast. You don't ask Tyler if he minds. He's free to go anytime.

Around eight, the sun starts to set, and the chill turns into an unpleasant cool. You hadn't really expected to be sitting out here so long. You're not prepared for the temperature to drop. You're wearing shorts, for god's sake, shorts and a top. It's summer in Oklahoma - you don't know how Tyler even manages to survive in his long jeans. You certainly wouldn't.

But now you're a little jealous, to be honest. He doesn't look cold in the slightest while you're fighting off shivers. You can feel your hands trembling already.

You really should've brought a jacket. But who brings jackets in 30 degree summer weather?

So instead, you just resign yourself to your fate and rub your hands along your arms. Anything to get some warmth into your body.

For the first time since you've sat back down, Tyler turns his head and looks at you.

"You're cold", he says, eyes raking over your arms and the goosebumps you'd gotten.

"Great observational skills, Sherlock Holmes", you deadpan, even though he doesn't really deserve that. He had so far left you pretty much alone. "A+ on that assignment."

Well, it's hard to break bad habits.

Tyler just chuckles, shakes his head and pushes off of the truck bed. You watch, eyes narrowed, as he walks back to his own car, opens up the trunk and- pulls out a blanket?

Your hands have sunken down to your lap all by themselves by the time he's standing in front of you again, holding out the blanket.

"For you, Watson", he grins as you slowly, carefully take the blanket from him. You mutter something along the lines of a soft 'Thank you' before you wrap the blanket around your arms.

Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met. But he's also the very definition of "Tough on the outside, soft on the inside". Sometimes, you think the word 'angelic' works for more than just his divine looks.

Your eyes are glued to him as he sits back down next to you and looks out at the darkening sky with that signature grin on his lips, like he knows that you're watching him and enjoys it more than he should. That doesn't deter you though. For the very first time. You don't even stop staring when he turns his head back to you. You don't even stop staring then.

You just look at him until his grin crumbles. Until he's smiling that smile from yesterday night, the one that has your heart squeezing together and then exploding in your chest. You think you could stare at that smile for the rest of eternity and never feel sated.

"What?", he asks, his voice so soft it makes you swallow. Your lips part, but there's no words on your tongue, none in your throat. They're stuck in your chest somewhere, wrapped around your heart so tightly that you can't let them go even now. So you just press your lips together, wrap your blanket tighter around yourself and say:

"So I'm Watson, yeah?"

Your podcast is long forgotten by the time the sky turns dark. So dark that you make Tyler climb into your car and turn on the lights. You're comfortable in your blanket, you don't feel the need to move.

It's around ten when the blanket isn't enough anymore.

You tuck your hands underneath your top, but that only helps for so long. A few minutes later, you're trembling again, trembling even though you're pulling the blanket as tightly around you as you possibly can. Tyler raises his eyebrows when a particularly heavy shiver runs down your spine, one of those that come and go within three seconds.

"Come here", he says, shuffling in his spot and motioning for you to move over to him. You don't really think about it. It's more of a reflex as you fumble the blanket off of your body, scooch over to him, settle yourself against his side and sneak your feet under his thigh. He tugs the blanket back up to your chin, tucks it in behind your back and wraps his arms around you.

Tyler Owens wraps his arms around you.

And he's so fucking warm you literally almost moan. God, you hadn't actually realised just how cold you'd been.

"Damn, you're freezing", he notes as well, just as you nestle further into him and hum in agreement. He's like a living heater right now. You'd like to just crawl inside of him and suck up all his warmth. "You should've told me sooner."

"I didn't tell you at all", you mutter, closing your eyes and taking a deep breath. He smells good. He smells so good. Earthy, musky somehow. You're tempted to turn your head and bury your nose in his shoulder.

Instead, you just satisfy yourself with what you can get. Fuck, he smells so good. He smells just like you'd thought he would, like country and rodeo and thunderstorms. He smells like falling into bed at the end of a successful chase. He smells like more. You want more.

You want more of Tyler Owens.

"Are you sniffing me?", he asks suddenly, but he sounds so amused you can't even bring yourself to feel embarrassed. You just open your eyes and grin at him, tilting your head so you can look up at him.

"What if I am?", you ask, if only to hear that breathless chuckle fall from his lips. Oh, those lips. You're in trouble. "Are you gonna call the cops on me?"

"I could never."

"Yeah, you better not, cowboy", you mutter, eyes dropping to his lips when he grins. He's so close. He's way too close. "There's like thirty things I could call the cops about on your channel."

His grin grows until he's showing off his teeth, glinting against the low light of the leds in your car. He's closer now.

"So you do watch our streams, weather girl."

His voice is so low and he's so close, so close. Your lips part all on their own. You haven't looked back up at his eyes in too long. Far too long. But he's so close, and he's so warm, and he smells so good.

"Alright", you whisper. His mouth is barely an inch from yours. You can feel every breath he takes. "I watch your streams."

And then your lips are on his.

Tyler Owens is the most annoying man you've ever met. He's cocky and he's smug. He makes your job harder than it has to be. He does everything and anything to get under your skin. But Tyler Ownes is the best goddamn kisser this side of the globe.

He trails his hands, his big, big hands, down your sides, pushes the blanket out of the way and grabs at your waist with just enough firmness. He pulls you onto his lap and rests his thumbs over the hem of your top. He breathes into your mouth and takes it slow. He doesn't care that you almost knock his hat out of the way when you try to wrap your arms around his neck. He just holds you tightly to him and lets you tug on his lip.

You honestly don't know how much time has passed when he pulls back, grinning an entirely new grin at you, hazy and euphoric.

"It's not midnight yet", he mutters, the slightest bit out of breath.

"I don't care", you mumble, drawing him right back in for another kiss. You think you might be addicted. You simply can't get enough of him. You can't get enough of Tyler Owens.

But then a thought strikes you, and you pull away with a grin that makes him raise his eyebrows.

You chuckle against his lips.

"If you feel it, chase it, right?"

[yandere--stuck]

would u ever write more for stanley.. its so dry out here.. stanation is suffering in a drought……….

You're so right, I'm so sorry, Stanation!!!!

---

🎱 Stanley's obsession for you manifests into rocketing between pitiful internal justification for his possessive feelings for you and deep, deep self-loathing and disgust with himself while trying to distance himself from you. Oh, and who could forget, Stanley allowing himself to indulge in fantasies of you returning his feelings and living out happily ever after together. Ha, like that'll ever happen! … But, a man can dream, can't he? Just nice, sappy, romantic stuff, you know? Cuddling together in bed, making the kids breakfast with sleep still in both your eyes, watching the sunset together on the porch, and scaring off any lousy creep that tries to take what's his with one of his many guns. In fact, he may already be doing that last one.

🎲 Talks a big game and acts like a tough guy around you, but it couldn't be further from the truth - at least when it comes to you. In reality, when Stan's around you, he feels one second away from breaking and acting like a lovesick puppy. He feels like a kid with a crush! He hasn't felt this way since he was a young man! It'd be embarrassing if it, if you, didn't make him so happy. He just feels lucky he hasn't turned into a babbling, blushing idiot in front of you or the kids. That's for when your backs are turned. There have been some close calls, though. Like the time he got so lost in listening to you speak that he hadn't realized he'd started resting the side of his face on his hand while staring at you, hearts practically in his eyes. The moment he realized, he'd run off from you with a shout of, “Nonspecific excuse!”

🎱 Stan is a bit of a collector, and that certainly doesn't stop with you. He loves snatching little keepsakes from you. Nothing you'd miss, or nothing you'd miss for long. Discarded doodles, forgotten gloves, change that had fallen to the floor unnoticed, and occasionally, your phone, to make sure he didn't have a competition. Everything he keeps goes into his study. He also likes swiping your unfinished snacks or drinks and finishing them himself - he thinks of it as an indirect kiss (yeah, he's gross, what of it?) And it's hard to admit even to himself, but he gets a certain thrill whenever he snaps a candid shot of you from one of the polaroid he swiped from stock for “store use.” That's not all, though! He goes through security camera footage and rifles through it for cute videos of you - ah, but hey, you're always cute, aren't you? He saves them all and watches them religiously. He also may secretly go through Mabel's scrapbook to find pictures of you and make copies of them for his own personal collection, always making sure it gets returned to Mabel seemingly untouched. It's probably the most organized collection he has! And, of course, he's put a framed picture of you right beside the one of Mabel and Dipper in the laboratory downstairs. It makes Stan think of an imagined, impossible world where you and he raise the two together. Your own little family.

🎲 Another fantasy he indulges in is drugging you up and keeping you hidden in the laboratory. It'd be so easy. You're so trusting of him when you really shouldn't be, when he doesn't deserve to be. It'd be so easy to steal you away all for himself. Gravity Falls is a weird town. Strange things happen, and they either go unremembered or unspoken. Sure, you'd be missed, but it's not like the police force in town would get very far. Heck, he'd put more faith in his grand-niblings cracking the case than Blubs and Durland! And, well, you stole his heart first. It's only fair. And Stan would take such good care of you, he knows it! He'd keep you all nice and drugged up. Maybe you'd be euphoric and clingy, or your brain too foggy to escape or do much for yourself, or maybe he'd give you something so that you're too sick to even consider leaving for the hospital lest your condition worsen any further. You'd need him. That's all he'd ever want.

🎱 Stan is very protective of you. He tries not to be so obvious, but his temper had such a short fuse when it came to you. You were just so sweet, so nice, even to a scumbag like him! You were so good with the kids, always such a help around the shack, even going so far as to visit on your day off just because you liked the Pines’ company. Liked his company. I mean, how the hell could anyone think they're good enough for you? Nah, nah, nah, he's not letting any mouth-breathing idiots in this town try to make moves on you just because they're too stupid to realize you're outta their league! And if he even thinks he hears someone a bad word about you, he'll be up in their face, cussing them out and making threats (as well as very rude hand gestures.) It's embarrassing for him afterwards, though. He doesn't want to think he's losing control and becoming more obvious, but with how Mabel claims it was ‘so sweet’ of him to be so protective of you, he can't help but worry.

🎲 Stan gradually becomes more physically affectionate with you. “Accidentally” brushing his hands against yours, leaving a hand on your shoulder or arm for a bit too long, nearly embarrassing himself by wrapping you up in a hug in front of everyone. He just can't help it! He's… He's in love! He's in love with you, and he wants to be with you. You make him happy just by being near him. You make his life better just by being in it. He wants to hold you, hug you, kiss you, be with you, and keep you with him forever. But, Stan also knows he can't. You'd never agree to it, surely. No matter how much Stan wants to think otherwise. Old bastard like him, he wasn't good enough for you - but then again, he thought no one was. But he could take comfort in you just being near him (if you ever tried to leave, he doesn't know what he'd do…) That way, at least, he couldn't screw anything up. That's all he'd do, anyway. It'd fail, just like all of his other relationships and all because of him. He should know better. He should know that he's a fuckup, that he destroys everything he touches, and that everyone he's ever known has suffered because of him. He just… He just wishes he could be closer. He knows he's not good enough for you to love him or need him and that he never will be, but God, does he wish he was.

[gay-dorito-dust]

Isekai Reader, was possessed by Martha to talk to her son Bruce but as soon as Martha touch Reader, a liquid substance came out of Reader mouth taking in the form of Martha from head to upper body while looking completely possessed like that is not normal possession..

Alfred, giving them a wipe: are you alright?

Isekai Reader: no the lady came out of my fucking mouth, I never thought I would've been traumatized even more but here we are

Isekai reader: she said she will borrow my body and I thought it was a normal possession! Have I known that would happen I wouldn't be able to refuse either way...

Alfred, raise a brow: and why is that?

Isekai reader, on the verge of tears: she might cry and she was so nice

Meanwhile

Bruce: mama... *was too preoccupied to the sight of his mother that he didn't notice*

His kids on the other hand..

Dick: I don't think I'll be able to sleep tonight

Duke: I am a bit concerned-

Jason: that was... a bit disturbing..

Cassandra:.... ew..

Damian, looks unfaze on the outside but is disturb on the inside: so that is what grandma sounds like

Tim: ....*sips the remnants of his coffee*

Stephanie: why did I chose to come and visit today?

Barbara, watched through a computer: did their throat hurt?

Isekai Reader: can I please get an ice cream and be left alone to sulk?

Isekai! Reader/you: *crying while holding their big ass plushie* I fucking hate ghost possession, why can’t it be the boring kind of possession!

Dick: *pats their back* there there.

Jason: *brings them a blanket and drapes it over their shoulders* first time for everything.

Duke: *bringing them a tube of ice cream* everything will be fine…hopefully.

Damian: I’m not good with comforting others. *brings out Titus who makes himself comfortable on isekai! Reader’s lap*

Cassandra: I wish I could say it won’t happen again…but it will and hopefully we won’t all be traumatised…again.

Stephanie: how does watching some videos of these doofuses falling sound? *gets her phone out and starts showing funny videos of everyone -except Dick- falling on their asses*

Isekai! Reader/you: you’re all shit at comforting people but I’ll take what I can get from a family of emotionally stunted vigilantes.

…

Damian: isn’t ghostly possession an agreement on both sides?

Isekai! Reader/ you: not exactly in most cases but with your grandmother, yes.

Damian: you didn’t reject her.

Isekai! Reader/you: she’s too lovely of a woman to reject as after every possession she feels bad and I have to tell her it’s okay.

*flashback to after Martha possessed reader to talk to Bruce*

Isekai!reader/ you: *on the floor, holding your knees to your chest as you stare blankly into the distance*

Martha: I’m sorry! I didn’t think it would happen like that! I thought I would just take over your body and not like that!

Isekai! Reader/ you: it’s okay…I’m fine really just…just a little traumatised and am never going to trust any ghost possession scenes ever again cuz that was utter bullshit.

*back to Damian and isekai! Reader/you*

Damian: …we shall speak of this no longer.

Isekai! Reader/you: for once I agree with you demon spawn.

..

Isekai! Reader/ you: *petting Titus and Ace while Alfred the cat sat on your lap* this is nice.

*Terry the turkey walks past you, stops and looks at you*🦃

Isekai! Reader/you: *blinks* hi

Terry the turkey: 🦃 *walks off*

Isekai! Reader: you: fucking rich people and their weird ass animals.

[kneelingshadowsalome]

literally can't stop thing about highschoolsweetheart!au where darling is 24/7 clinging onto a slightly annoyed/frustrated könig's arm, autistically chatting his ear off about random things like cute cat videos that she saw, dinosaurs or art, gushing about how much she loves him, how utterly handsome he's looking and that they're absolutely meant to be!! 🥺 always nuzzling him and pressing sweet kisses to his face.

until... maybe he snaps and shuts her up :// not in a nice way. maybe i'm projecting here, but i've been silenced before and it did nasty things to me. (bit of advice for unknowing peeps, don't make autistic people stop rambling, if you can help it. let them down gently if you must 💌)

back to our sheep... she suddenly shuts in. doesn't chat as much as before, slowly sticking to only utilitarian stuff. avoids his gaze oftenly, gradually starting to keep her distance, stops initiating affectionate things. she still absolutely adores him, but she's hurt, heart constricting in her chest. thinks she's doing him a service by listening to his 'request' at shutting the hell up, thinking she's making him happier. she's still itching to babble, making an active effort at stoping herself from going back to her rambling habits.

how would könig feel? react?

imagine what would it be like, if after some time of this distance, at a social gathering or something, he sees a man approaching her. another MAN!! how is this possible?? and he's... he's asking her about things? looking interested in her talk, eyeing her up and down??

would you do me the honour of tormenting this poor man for me? :33

Her ramblings were cute at first, then they started to go in one ear and out the other. König has a budding tinnitus from work and only wants to rest, but she skitters to him like a lovesick cat, climbs into his lap, and starts to talk his ear off about attachment styles and some pop psychology.

The enthusiasm in her eyes is what bothers him the most – he’s hit with envy, bright hot and red, because he has no time for intellectual interests these days. There's nothing but gun oil and gym to keep him busy. He was supposed to become either a philosopher or a fighter, but since they said philosophers can’t get pussy, he chose the other option (and still got little to no pussy), sad wanker as he was back then.

He either doesn’t know what the hell she is talking about or, he would want to discuss with her about the subjects she’s into, so much in fact that it would soon become an autistic competition of its own. But the deeply ingrained memory of being called a scrawny nerd is keeping his mouth shut even now, when he’s approaching his mid-thirties.

So he tells her she should read an actual book about the subject and stop filling her head with nonsense layman theories.

It hurts; it fucking burns, the mute, helpless stare she shoots at him. She scoots away, sorely upset, and won’t come back to him before the evening fall.

There's no cute noises and kisses peppered all over his face, no dangling from his neck and prattling away about the differences between C. S. Lewis and Tolkien; no videos where a cat tries to fish the last pringles with its paw or memes that remind her of him. There's just a broken girl and a knife in his heart, but he’s too ashamed and proud to apologize.

And so she comes back to him when he won't go to her, the deep yearning always overthrowing her pride. It feeds his self loath by gallons: she's better than him, always has been.

She hugs his middle when they lie down to sleep, forehead pressed against his upper back. She’s too small to reach the back of his neck, but she won’t wriggle upwards like an adorable little worm to place a kiss there like she used to. Just falls asleep with a sigh, holding him tight.

His sleep arrives only after hours have passed, and the knife inside his heart has finally done its duty and euthanized the whole organ.

They never talk about it: but she prattles far less nonsense to him now. He nearly breaks the silence one day and asks her about the Myers Pigs test or whatever it was called, see if she would crack open from her shell and laugh. He could coax her to tell him what her newest interest is nowadays, what makes her eyes bright and shiny when he’s away. But he’s too fucking ashamed, too goddamm proud to tell her that she’s annoyingly cute when she talks so much and that he fucking loves her for that. That she’s the silliest girl he’s ever met and if he had a hat, he would take it off every time she wanted to share another monologue.

If he had the balls, he would ask if she had all this madness inside her when they were kids but never had the courage to spill it out… If he's the only person she has allowed to see this side of her without fear.

...

He returns to the party after having a smoke – a bad habit everytime he knows he's about to down a few beers – only to see she’s engaged in a heated conversation with some other guy.

Or, the guy is asking questions, while his girl is about to burst out of her dress from the eagerness to tell him everything about some new hyperfixation of hers. Something she hasn’t really shared with him; not anymore...

The knife is still in his heart, it seems, because it twists. Violently.

He looks for a weapon to defend himself: an empty beer bottle, a knife on the table, an untended umbrella by the door; his fists, ungloved. It’s just a routine check, a simple habit that was hammered in his system years ago, and of course this is not the time or the place for violence. He just… fantasizes about stabbing that guy in the liver with some blunt cutlery, pounding his ribs to pieces until his knuckles bleed with jealousy. He even fantasizes her screams when she sees what kind of a man he really is: a weak wanker who turned into a pitiful beast of a man.

These flashes take only a second or two, then he squares his shoulders and goes to get his girl back.

“How about we dance,” he offers his hand to her, palm up like the other guy was made of air – or not even that.

Her eyes light up with surprise, pure, undiluted hope, her interest in her chat companion now completely gone.

“You... You want to dance?”

His lips compress into a thin line, his nostrils flaring from the need to either claim her right on this floor or turn and beat the competing dick beside him into a pulp.

Then her hand finds his, her soft little smile pulls him back, her eyes now shining to him and only him.

It’s a slow one, the song, and he only notices it when she lifts her hands and cups the back of his neck. Tingles shoot down his spine and send a curious little twitch down his dick – even his testes pull up a notch. They’ve fucked a thousand times, and still, she has this effect on him... All she needs to do is smile and touch his neck, and his body answers; he’s hers.

“Does this mean you like me…?” She asks with a playful smile when his hands come to naturally claim her waist.

“...What?”

“You saw me with that guy and came to whisk me away.”

He tries to avoid her stare, fakes to steal a glimpse at the other pairs dancing, but it’s challenging when she looks at him like… like that.

“He was drooling all over you back there,” he mutters.

“...Oh? So you came to save me?”

“You have difficulty saying no.”

She's relaxed, while he's stiff, the adrenaline leaving him slowly and with a rising boner. It doesn't help that she's drawing little circles on his skin, right there where it tickles and sends more pulls down his cock.

He tries to breathe deep and slow, but it doesn’t really work much. There are times when he gets a hard-on from her playing with his hair or brushing a set of fingertips across his nipple, and then there are times when he really wishes she wouldn’t do shit like this. Not when they’re at a party and he almost had a temper tantrum in front of everyone.

“König… You never dance,” she says with a weighted stare. He answers it with a heavy glare of his own, eyes that should tell her enough about his true feelings for her.

There’s a thin line between love and hate, but never has he felt this undeniable truth as acutely as he has with her...

“If you don’t stop with the tickling I’m going to have to take you upstairs for a fuck.”

Her tiny little fingers stop immediately, but her eyes shine brighter than ever before. From shock, love, or awe, who knows. Then she picks up that annoying habit again, a bit too keenly to convey any kind of actual fear.

“You’re begging for it, aren’t you...?” He comments with genuine contempt.

“...Yes?” She answers with a breath of a smile, pure love in her stare.

He grunts as if tired, then scoops her up, right there on the dance floor and takes her upstairs when everyone can see.

“You like me. Admit it,” she babbles when he carries her inside some guest bedroom and kicks the door shut, with her snug and smiling in his arms.

“Yes, yes. You can tell me all about everything when I’m done with you.”

“All about everything?” She giggles as he throws her on the bed and starts to take off his shirt. Her eyes shoot to his pecs, then to his fingers when he unzips his pants. There's no lie, no deceit in that stare, just adoration and want.

“First you have to be quiet. Think you can manage that?”

She opens her pink little mouth, then shuts it, starts to nod like a broken doll.

When he eventually slides in, the poor doll whimpers, just like he thought.

"Hush," he gruffs, but doesn't cover her mouth.

He can have a little taste, a sip, a treat... Because the knife in his heart stops rattling only when he makes love to her – he does that often, even if he calls it 'fucking' in his mind.

[gimmeyourlovepls]

Trapped

paring: earth 42! miles morales x reader

warning: cheating, gaslighting, basically not a cute fic

summary: you find out miles is cheating on you, and with a heavy heart, decide to leave him, but he's not letting you go.

a/n: hey! sorry this is the first thing im contributing to this fandom, i have a really long story in my drafts that im still working onnnnn this piece of work is inspired by a fic i either saw on here or ao3, pls tell me if u find it so i can credit them ;-;

Cariño = Honey

¿Entiendo? = Got it?

"Thanks for coming, have a nice day!" The cahier said as you walked out of a bakery with a box full of cupcakes, along with some chocolates and other snacks you bought earlier. You were basically bouncing with joy, a massive grin present on your face.

Today was you and Miles' 2 year anniversary, and although there had been a couple of bumps on the way, you were happy that both of you were still together. You looked at your phone to check the time and saw that Miles texted you back.

Mi amor <3

You: happy anniversary!

You: i have a surprise for you but its not ready yet

You: I'll text you when its done then you can come over <3

Mi amor <3: aight see you soon princessa

Giggling, you walked over to Miles' apartment building and walked through the hallway towards his room, already searching through your pocket for the extra key he gave you in your bag. As soon as you found it, you opened the door as quiet as you possible could, which was hard as hell with all the stuff you were holding.

You pushed the door open with your feet and walked slowly, and it seemed like Miles didn't hear, you, because you heard no footsteps coming for you. Putting your stuff down on a couch, you walked around trying to find him.

As you neared his room, you started to hear noises that sounded like Miles and something else, you couldn't really tell. You still wanted to surprise him through, so you slowly pulled open the door.

"Miles please..." A girl who had never seen before was on YOUR man's lap, pressing kisses on his face and slightly grinding against him. "Calm down, cariño, I'll take good care of you soon," he said as he held that girl's hips and grinded her hips down with a groan.

You didn't even realize you were crying until you brought your hands over your mouth. You slowly walked backwards and slammed his door, knowing he would be able to tell he got caught, grabbing all your stuff, leaving his extra key that he gave you on a table and running.

Your legs carried you all the way home, though it was a far distance. You couldn't even feel the burn with how sad you were. As soon as you got to your house, you locked all the windows and doors, knowing Miles would try and get in. You just wanted to lay in bed and cry, but you knew you had one more thing to do.

Mi amor <3

You: dont fucking text me anymore, be happy with that girl.

You: by the way, happy anniversary :)

================================================

Scrolling on your phone, feeling sorry for yourself, and eating the snacks meant for you and your now ex was not how you thought your night would go, but the occasional funny video made up for it. You changed out of your nice outfit and wore your most comfortable pajamas (apart from Miles' shirts), stuffing chips into your mouth when you heard banging on your window. Your mom was home and asleep, but she wasn't that heavy of a sleeper, so you went to your window and pulled back the curtains.

"Ugh," you groaned as you saw who was standing behind the glass-pane. "I'm gonna keep knocking if you don't let me in." His voice was muffled, but you understood enough to unlock and open the window for him.

"Hey look-" He started, but you were NOT listening to his BS. "No Miles, you look. I have dealt with you for the past TWO years. Every time you have stared, flirted, or even made out with another girl, I have ignored it and forgiven you. I have NEVER cheated on you, I have even ignored all my male friends for you because you get so jealous. I'm tired Miles, and I can't with you. Please leave."

"Cariño-" Miles pleaded with you. "Don't call me that. That's what you called that girl you were smooching earlier. Go back to her and never talk to me again." You started pushing him towards the window, desperate for him to leave before you either started crying or beating the crap out of him.

"No, we aren't doing this shit." He pushed you backward until your back was against the bedroom door. "Miles, don't-" Your insults dissolved into air as he started to kiss you, the way he did at the beginning of your relationship, when you thought he still loved you. "I ain't leaving you, and there is no way your leaving me, ¿entiendo?"

You wanted to say no, but your heart still longed for him desperately, so you melted into his touch. He noticed your response and pulled back to pull you into a passionate kiss.

It didn't matter what you did, you were trapped, and Miles certainy wasn't letting go.

hey yall i was feeling silly and decided to writeeeeee hope u at least semi enjoyed it and that u have a good day/night :))))

(also if ur waiting for a part two, dont hold your breath, im literally having the worst writers block ever and can not. HOWEVER, if you have requests, please send them in so i can write thank youuuuuuuuu!)

[comfortless]

okay so. König in love or any thoughts rlly i need to crawl into your brain and live there. ;v; you have made me love him 10x more

i can’t decide on whether or not he would be very passive or very aggressive when in the pursuit of someone (let’s be honest with ourselves: there is no inbetween)!

in situations where you’re perhaps working together, it must kick in some sort of urgency. you’re toying with your gun, missing cues, a bit too flighty… as if it isn’t life or death here. his approach is certainly more aggressive, then: you have to be kept safe and away from all of the horrible filth in the world. a battlefield is no place for a princess, and the thought of you getting hurt or worse before you’re able to have a bunch of cute kids or live out on that vast expanse of land with the cozy cabin he’s promised you is horrifying for him.

you don’t get much of an option here. he isn’t retiring his weapons any time soon, but you must. he’s losing sleep, lashing out at any other operator who comes a hair too close. he’s heard rumors of women who sleep around the barracks and those men ogling you must have those things in mind for you. he wouldn’t allow that. he’s seen men come back from torture and he won’t allow that, either. a proposal is rushed, but it’s sincere. he’ll take you on all the nice dates you didn’t get to share prior when he’s on leave. just stay home, send him letters, call him often, and you’ll get the world and then some.

König is only passive when he’s out of his element. meeting an angel on earth in some rundown shop where he’s unprepared and feeling utterly naked without a knife or a big gun on his person is harrowing. he thinks back on those times from high school: the faked confessions, his first kiss only stolen away out of pity rather than love. he has no fucking idea how to approach a woman that he will likely never see again. so, he just doesn’t.

the beast at the corner of the shop flicking through packages of subpar snacks only offers a few subtle glances your way, silently praying you don’t detect the way he openly stares when your back is turned. he follows at a distance, innocuously pretending he’s also interested in the flour down the baking aisle you’re on. he can bake, sure, would happily spend hours in his lonely kitchen preparing you strudel or something more to your liking if you asked, but what’s the point of doing any of that for himself?

if, for some reason he can’t quite comprehend, you decide to approach him… batting your eyelashes and pointing up at something on the top shelf, requesting his assistance, he might try to shove back the thought that you’re only being kind because you need something. he’ll make small talk while passing you the package of semisweet chocolate chips, huff something akin to a laugh when you make a quip about how quiet this store is when it’s your favorite. the flirtations come naturally for you, saying that you wished he could give you an inch or two (as to not heckle anyone taller for help in the future), and damn his loose tongue because he’s quick to respond then. telling you he could give you nine, actually.

silly relationship thoughts…?

he definitely falls into the realm of men that send you the most cringy “couple goals” videos. you know the ones that are like “five reasons your man is not cheating!” followed by a slideshow of a home cooked meal, a soft looking bed, a photo of a couple holding hands and all giddy smiles, a nice clean home, then… a picture of a woman in some cute lacy lingerie. has the worst grin on his face when your expression sours, but he promises to scour the internet until he finds something lovely and strappy for you to wear for him.

sleepy König is a menace!! he snores. loudly. sometimes talks absolute nonsense. it’s impossible to push him away because he’s so big and it’s all dead weight when he’s knocked out. if you’re trying to wriggle out of bed because the birds are chirping outside and the sunlight is peeking at you through the curtains, his grip around you only tightens. he likes to hold your hand while you’re sleeping, too. even when his get a bit clammy. it’s cute until you desperately long for a shower and he still won’t wake up.

his significant other is the perfect comfort to him. even when things are bad: an argument or an entire ocean between you two. your voice whether infuriated or in love, the smell of your perfume or even your sweat, the feeling of your soft skin or the bite of your teeth, your taste whether from your mouth or skin, the view of you’re messy bedhead or dressed to utter perfection. all of you is a comfort. he isn’t just a lover, he’s a horribly obsessed devotee in every way. logs in some mental list what perfume you wear on what day, how you choose to dress depending on what you’re doing, mundane things like how you wring your hands after washing them or just how you position yourself when standing or sitting. every detail has its importance, and he wants to memorize everything about you for those long nights when he’s deployed and you can’t be there with him.

he knows what a meme is, yes, he isn’t that old, but his sense of humor more aligns with whatever is dark or perverse and historical jokes (those “me if i were in medieval Europe” videos might make him grin). if you’re sent one and it goes over your head, he’s happy to explain to you the time period, what role you and he might play in such a scenario, all in so much detail you wonder if he’s actually some sort of genius. only… he would casually tell you he wouldn’t mind going down on you even if you were some maiden from a time long past that hadn’t bathed in weeks.

probably likes to mark you up a bit when he knows he’ll be away for a while. bite marks on your inner thighs, a necklace of hickies on your neck and along your clavicle. it’s embarrassing, trying to explain why you’re wearing a scarf or a thick choker in the middle of the warmer months. he doesn’t do it out of fear that you’ll run off to another (though, maybe that is part of it), but ultimately so you won’t forget. not about the way he made you feel, about the little whines that left your mouth or the way you gripped at his hair, who you belong to just as much as he belongs to you.

[kas-eddie-munson]

Part 1 ~ Part 2 ~ Part 3

~~~

Max woke up.

He heard through the grapevine there was a flurry to go visit her in the hospital, but that she was mostly just sleeping.

“She still has the breathing tube in, so she can’t talk yet, but Lucas has been reading her this new comic -”

One of the nice things about talking to Dustin is he didn’t have to say much.  The kid could go on for hours if you let him.

And he often did.

Wayne asked if he wanted a ride up to visit, and he declined.  He knew the first couple days were gonna be tiring.

It was in a week or two that people would peter out.  Especially since the school year started, he was sure the kids won’t have as much time to visit as they’d like.  He’ll go then, with Steve, so Wayne won’t have to miss work.

~~~

After physical therapy one thursday, Eddie asked Steve if he wanted to come in and hang out.  Steve made a couple sandwiches and they ate in front of the TV, Eddie in Wayne's recliner so he could put his feet up.  He asked about his week, Robin, new videos out recently.  A bit about Max.

“Has her mom been to visit?”

He could tell by the look on Steve’s face she had not.

They went back to watching TV.

On Thanksgiving, he and Steve headed to the hospital.  He tried to push down the bile rising in his stomach at the familiar smell when they went through the front door.  He just let Steve lead the way to her room, folded paper bag in hand.

She had a single room, sizable.  A big window on one wall.  She was staring out it when they knocked.  Her eyes were red, cheeks wet, a distance in her expression that hurt deep in his chest.  Neither mentioned it when she wiped her cheeks on the back of her hand and they said hellos.

She didn’t have a breathing tube anymore, just a cannula and feeding tube.  She didn’t talk much, her throat sore, but Steve pulled up a chair and the three of them caught up.  She wasn’t eating solid foods yet, but Steve talked to her doctor the other day apparently, who had given the OK for chicken broth and cranberry sauce.

So the three of them ate that together.

He didn’t ask where the kids were.  They had their own families.  Hell, Steve had to get home by seven.

(Eddie and Wayne had “dinner” together that morning before he left for work.)

He didn’t ask where her mom was either.

Eddie was in the hospital for the Fourth of July.  And as much disdain as he had for Reagan and co., there was something sadder about being there by himself that day than most.  He never even did much of anything for it.

He didn’t exactly miss the days living with his parents, the few times he stayed up to play with sparklers in the yard, but that fourth?  He would have given anything to just go outside.  Hear the fireworks booming in the distance.  Maybe spot a lightning bug in the bushes of the hospital parking lot even if he didn’t have the energy to try and catch it.

So.  He was a little adamant about coming today.

Before they left, he ducked out to find the bathroom.  It felt almost luxurious slapping the automatic button next to the door.  And damn, maybe he could convince Wayne to install some grab bars in their bathroom.

“Hey!  Where’s your band?”

He looked over his shoulder on the way out of the bathroom and a nurse came up to him, and repeated herself.  Steve closed Max’s door in his periphery.

“My band?”

“Yeah, you’re not allowed to take those off.  What’s your name?  I can print you a new one.  You’re really not supposed to take those off, though.”

“He’s not a patient.  We were just leaving.”

Steve waved her off, standing between them until she left.

Eddie clenched his teeth, but kept his mouth shut. He was tired, today.  As opposed to when exactly, he wasn’t sure.  Maybe a long time ago.

Part 5 ~ Part 6

[zushimart]

crossed wires, ch.2. m!spiderman!reader x civilian!scara. friends to lovers, childhood friends. 2.6k words. warnings: a car almost hits someone, no one is hurt. read ch.1/the teaser here. and remember to leave feedback if you enjoyed!

there’s quiet chatter in the blindingly bright classroom of his morning lecture. the professor is filing through papers in his office a room over, so students are free to flit from one table to the next and examine the different instruments organized for the laboratory.

he takes a seat in the chair at a table farthest from the door, a good distance from the board. it used to be an issue – just last year he was squinting to make out little letters on a powerpoint slide – but now, his gaze is crystal clear. must’ve gone to the campus café together, he notices, eyes glancing at the neighboring table of pre-med sorority girls sipping through straws while trading their phones around.

“i don’t think i’d be into him if i could see his face,” one says, passing a phone back. “like, not to sound shallow…”

her friend pulls her hair back into a pony, shrugging, “so what if you can or can’t see his face? either way, he’s still spiderman.”

“what if he’s bald?” the third one asks, scrolling to another video of the hero taken from the night before.

“some bald people are cute!” the other girl protests. “and he’s better than anyone on your roster,” she says, earning a laugh and a smack to her shoulder.

and despite them paying him no mind, he shrinks into his seat, embarrassed. he keeps an eye and an ear out, though, unable to staunch his own curiosity. he hadn’t had time this morning to see the videos the public managed to catch. the haphazard stop of a grand theft auto almost escalated into a sticky car chase with him attached to the trunk, flying in the wind like a piece of paper.

“i would let him,” the first girl admits. “unless he’s like, over forty.”

“that would make it even better,” one of them giggles.

“what are you staring at?” a familiar voice cuts through his eavesdropping and he tilts his head to the side just before scara can shove him forward, evading the playful blow. “how do you always manage to do that?”

“‘cause i know you so well,” he says, not looking up. “good morning, scara.”

“yeah, hey,” scara mumbles while pulling out the seat beside him. “signora texted me this morning saying she’s using one of her free skips and childe’s traveling for a varsity game.”

“so… we’re alone?” he tries not to sound too excited.

“for lecture and lab, yeah. it’s in pairs anyway. they’ll have to make it up together.”

a yelp from the table over startles them both as one of the girls fights her friends for her phone back in a fit of giggles. he tears his eyes away from them and looks to scara, pulling out materials for class.

“hey…” he bids and scara hums expectantly. “how do you feel about spiderman?” he rubs the back of his neck. “i heard them talking about him earlier…”

scara raises an eyebrow. “what about him?”

“like,” he blows air, “would you consider yourself like, i dunno, a fan?”

“do you?”

he chews his lip. “i-i guess?”

scara nods slowly and shrugs. “hmn.”

“what?”

“don’t really have an opinion. i haven’t thought about it.” scara’s pause stretches into seconds before he opens his mouth again. he likes to make people wait for him. “i guess if it’s one guy… it’s nice that he can protect people from like… i dunno, freak evil scientist shit,” scara says. “vigilante shit is weird. i’ll think about it more.”

“mn. i didn’t really mean morally,” he says, twisting the string of his hoodie around his finger.

“then how did you mean it?” scara asks, tapping the tip of his capped pen against his lips.

“do you think he’s… like…” he asks. “you know…”

scara’s lip puckers like he’s tasted something sour. “are you into him?” he asks like lightning.

“i asked first.”

“i haven’t looked hard enough.”

“fine, then me neither.”

scara laughs, crossing his arms. “yeah right, you’ve totally got spiderman underwear, maybe some toys to match,” he says, rolling his eyes.

“i do not!” his voice cracks with indignation. “he’s not my type at all.”

embers burn in scara’s heart, pumping hot blood to his face and turning it pink. he props his chin up with his hand, head firmly turned. “and what’s your type?” he mumbles, muffled through his fingers.

but the professor strides into the room. the chatter stalls as he readies his powerpoint and podium before staring expectantly at the clock to strike eight on the dot. textbooks slam onto the table, laptops open, pens and pencils hit paper – their conversation lost in biology.

~

he hands scara a pair of forceps, opening and closing his mouth like a fish while a question bounces around his mind a few times.

“you look stupid,” scara says, catching him in the periphery.

“i like people smarter than me,” he blurts. “a-and… mean to me. what do you like?”

scara blinks.

“still on this?” he asks, blasé concealing how his hands falter.

“don’t squeeze too hard,” his labmate says with his way of twisting a command into the whisper of a suggestion. at anyone else’s correction, irritation would pickle scara’s mood.

“are those your only qualifications?” scara snaps.

he blinks. “should i have more?”

“lots of girls are smarter than you,” he points out. “your iq’s not anything special, anyway.”

“i said people?”

“what?”

“i said people smarter than me,” he says.

scara swallows hard, looking up to meet confusion written in those eyes. “oh.” he mumbles, heart slamming uncomfortably hard against his ribcage. “…then even more people are smarter than you.”

“but not a lot of people are mean to me,” he points out, reaching over to turn the burner off before their solution bubbles over. “not like it makes a difference, anyway,” he says with a decorative smile. “because maybe the people mean to me aren’t very smart at all.”

if he didn’t know any better, scara might think he was flirting. “maybe,” he blurts, nervousness ballooning in his throat.

“so, you didn’t know?”

“know what?” he snaps, blush blooming.

“people not girls.”

“you don’t talk about it,” scara points out. “you’re secretive about… that.” he always has been, dodging truth or dare at middle school sleepovers and avoiding drinking games at high school parties like he’s afraid he’ll admit something or kiss the wrong person.

“so, you thought i was off the table?” he teases with a half-smile.

well, yeah. scara’s only ever seen him with a girl before. he remembers, the colors still vibrant and the shapes still sharp, unlocking their cramped first-year dorm without warning only to catch him tussling teeth and tongue with his half-sister, mona. scara’s mouth twitches into the ghost of a grimace in the wake of the resurfaced memory.

this time, scara successfully pushes him away, but he’s giggling as he takes stumbling steps back.

he can’t deny how revolutionary the admission is. they’d somehow veered into a timeline where the weed of affection growing a woody stem in scara’s stomach could blossom. maybe he could even pluck it as it grows up his throat and hand it to the boy next to him. and maybe he wouldn’t sneer. maybe he might quite like it, think it nice and keep it in a vase.

a part of scara hopes he might have a type. that type. smarter than him, sure. mean to him, of course. with dark hair, blunt bangs, and maybe… ugh.

“i can’t believe you kissed my sister,” scara mutters under his breath.

“i-i, what? where is this coming from?” he squeaks back, throwing a pair of hands into the air. “that was, like, years ago and it— you know what? you keep dodging my questions,” he accuses.

scara rolls his eyes, scissors slicing fine white lines of paper into test strips.

“so, what kind of people do you like?”

“i like guys dumber than me, obviously,” scara mumbles. nice to me, he thinks to himself. “maybe someone funny. i don’t know.”

and this time, in his periphery, he catches sight of a bit back smile, lips stretched over hidden teeth. “spiderman’s your type, then?”

“i wouldn’t know,” scara grumbles at the reintroduction. like the arrival of a rival, he bitterly reflects. “maybe he’s yours. i don’t care for celebrities.”

“fine,” he draws out the syllable, almost annoyed. a hand pushes scara’s shoulder as he dips the test strips into the solution, knocking him a step to the left and interrupting his ministrations. pressure builds like steam in the teakettle of scara’s little body, but before he can open his mouth to admonish, his labmate is staring at his phone.

“gotta use the bathroom. might take awhile. feels explosive,” he mumbles, body moving to catch up with how faraway his mind has already run. like a flash, it happened.

and scara grabs his wrist before he can take a second step.

“you’re lying,” he says, eyes a little wide as if he’s surprised with himself… surprised by the motion sickness surging from the unpredictable swings between giddy excitement to sharp frustration to sluggish disappointment.

the boy looks from scara’s hold, tight enough to cut off circulation, to his eyes. surprise mirrors surprise. his mouth opens, but this time, nothing comes out.

scara looks away. he pulls away. he makes himself smaller. “whatever. just go. fuck off.”

he walks away without a word.

~

he sips from a juicebox while mentally mapping his patrol route for the rainy afternoon on his walk home from classes. he couldn’t make it back from the corner store robbery before the end of biology and he winces when he remembers the look on scara’s face. guilty conscience manipulates his fingers into sending another apology text that’s delivered but never read. maybe if he finishes the report before scara opens the document, his haughty prince will forgive him.

muscle memory takes him up a staircase, fingers fishing a ring of keys from his pocket to unlock a heavy 19th century door. it swings open on rusty hinges, screaming loud enough to inspire ghost stories at least three floors down. he gives a tentative hello to his aunt, smoke billowing from the kitchen as may disassembles the beeping alarm dangling from the ceiling. she gives him an apologetic smile and he rolls up his sleeves to open rusted-shut windows, fanning for a moment before she shoos his help away.

he holes up in his bedroom, keeping a careful ear listening till minutes later, like clockwork, he hears a goodbye followed by the heavy door swinging closed with another awful groan. after double-checking the stove to avoid another building fire, he’s ready to exit.

patrol is slow. between stopping a simple collision and rescuing a cat from a tree, nothing calls his immediate attention. and now, he sits in wait. the sky looks heavy, but not exhausted — just tired enough to droop. he blinks rain from the eyes of his mask, thinking to himself how useful it might be to have doc ock’s personal phone number so the guy could shoot him a text when he’s on the move. until he catches sight of an achingly pretty face amongst a sea of multi-colored umbrellas.

it isn’t stalking, he thinks to himself as he sticks close to the wall across the narrow street, unspotted by pedestrians below. just curiosity. making sure he’s safe. scara disappears into a flower shop. a few minutes later, he blossoms from the door holding a small bouquet of baby’s breath and a single carnation, eyes glued to his phone as he takes a stumbling step forward onto the sidewalk.

he smiles, a big tenderness swelling in his chest as he imagines himself wrapping an arm around scara’s shoulders to steady his gait.

until there’s an eerie tingle singing up the back of his neck.

the sound of a taxi hitting the brakes after a sharp turn echoes between buildings. tires hydroplane across slick city streets and the yellow cab hurtles over the curb like a speed bump, giving scara a single second between looking up and being hit by two tons of metal.

webs have shot out and stuck to the back of the car. the force of his superhuman pull, leveraged by swinging around a telephone pole and a streetlight, brings the taxi to a screeching halt just a hair’s length away from where scara stands.

some onlookers offer a quick cheer as spiderman jumps down onto the sidewalk before returning to busy lives, but a few linger to watch and film the superhero skitter over to the boy standing stock still in front of the car, frozen in shock.

“are you okay?” he asks, hands reach scara’s shoulders just before he’s shoved off with alien strength — shocked into the realization that he is a complete stranger.

he takes a step back and lets his eyes flit to the taxi to check if the occupants are okay. the driver’s stumbling out, unharmed and apologetic as he surveys the damage to his vehicle.

the hero’s attention snaps back to scara when he stutters, “s-sorry.” he’s white-knuckling the bouquet in his hands, stems broken.

spiderman clears his throat, coughs once or twice as he tries to drop his pitch, “your flowers,” he says. scara shakes his head like he’s coming to and looks down, quickly loosening his grip. “that was scary,” he supplies.

scara swallows hard. “yeah,” he manages. “holy shit. um, thanks,” he bows his head with gratitude. “yeah, thank you,” he repeats a bit firmer.

“no problem,” he says, devoid of all usual disarming charm as his mind conjures a world where he took a minute longer during lunch or made a left instead of a right on the boulevard.

actually, he almost throws up.

scara walks off.

he stares after him, legs moving to catch up quicker than his thoughts can.

scara glances to his right and almost jumps. “w-what? why are you following me? did i forget something?” he slows down, almost to a stop. he looks around at the eyes glued to their interaction, spotting a few phones pointed their way.

“yeah, my number,” he jokes, the delivery falling flat, tripping over the crack in his voice.

scara’s face twists in confusion. “what?”

“a-actually, i can’t give you that,” he stutters. “sorry. it’s just, that was scary. and i was worried and i’m still worried. like, i’m shaking,” he says, raising a hand to show scara the tremor. “but maybe that’s ‘cause you’re really, like, totally beautiful.” oh my god, shut the fuck up, he thinks to himself in a panic. “that’s not what i meant, sorry. wait, i do mean that. you are beautiful. that’s not the point, though, i wanted to make sure that… you’re okay? because if i’m like this, how do you feel? you know?”

he spoke so much for so long that, at the end of his stream of consciousness, the street somehow feels quiet despite the bustle.

with wide eyes, scara tries to placate. “i-i’m okay. thanks to you,” he offers, uncertainty dripping from the words.

“good!” he chirps, clasping his hands together. “okay, yeah. good.”

scara shies away from the superhero and his onslaught of audience attention as pedestrians rubberneck. “i’m gonna… go now,” he says, slowly backing away with another nod.

“right!” spiderman says, “yeah, be safe! safe-r, i guess…” he calls after scara as he’s swallowed by raincoats and umbrellas. stupid, stupid, stupid, he thinks to himself. even superhero status can’t save the idiot he becomes in front of indigo eyes.

the small crowd descends, a courageous few opening the avenue to a few lucky celebrity selfies. ugh, he always has a hard time saying no.

[decks-writing-blog]

Here to Stay Drabbles: Benrey Benry Benrye

Summary: Benrey makes some important decisions.

[A/N] In a not yet released chapter of my current WIP fic 'Gordon Swap' my headcanon that Benrey stole Barney's uniform at some point in the past gets brought up and if I recall correctly I alluded to that being the case near the end of WeverTF Benrey is too because it's an idea I've had a for a while. Writing the bit where it's brought up in 'Gordon Swap' made me want to write this so I did.

~

Everyone paid attention to the security guards. When sensitive experiments were being worked on they blocked the entrance to the labs in question, necessitating people talk to them to be let through. The perfect set up for some fun shenanigans. It wouldn’t work if not one of them though which meant a uniform was needed.

The locker and thus the name tag on the uniform inside read ‘Barney’. A good name… maybe. What made something a good name? That one brought to mind barns so maybe whoever it was owned a barn. Assuming barns existed outside of fantasy video games anyway. Regardless the name was taken and thus that one wouldn’t do no matter how good or bad it was.

Something that started with a ‘B’ would be fine though. B was a pretty cool letter as far as letters went. … A long while of just sitting in the locker room, staring at the name tag so far hadn’t brought much inspiration. Naming oneself was hard. In video games ‘aaaaaaaa’ or some kind of swear word, making the NPC’s look silly and/or rude, worked great. In real life though, in a new human looking form, it had to be something believable. Changing it later was technically possible but what if this security guard thing really took off? A bunch of different names might get confusing and wouldn’t feel right anyway. Any name chosen here would likely stick for a while.

Sticking with being called ‘X’ was possible but it didn’t feel like a name. That was the experiment’s title and the titles of other experiments almost never lined up with any of the proper names for the beings/objects involved and thus it shouldn’t here either. Besides, some distance from that lab would be nice, easier to prank people further away from it as they’d be far less likely to suspect anything fishy.

“Barney. Barbara. Benjamin.” What other ‘B’ names were there? Preferably ones that would be easy to scribble onto the the name tag with the sharpie. “Bob. Boob.” That one wasn’t a name. But it didn’t have to be a real, name did it? Just close enough to one to sound believable. It was hard to know what counted as a real name anyway.

“Barnley. Barley. Benley.” That one had kind of a nice ring to it but wasn’t quite right. “Beney. Ben… ray, like a ray of sunshine? Benray. Hmm… nah, too pretty.” Not that there was anything wrong with being named after a ray of sunshine, the sun was quite nice actually, but pretty wasn’t cool and it had to be something cool. This still felt like a good line of thinking though. So instead of ‘a’ like a pretty ray of sunlight how about the ‘e’ from the original name stay? Meaning it would be… “Benrey.”

“Benrey. Benrey. Benrey. Benrey. Benrey.” Ha. It’d be funny if that was the full name. Maybe some of them could be spelled a little differently too like ‘Benry’ or ‘Benrye’.

Standing and looking around revealed no one to talk to. Which made sense, humans like to sleep every single night for some reason and thus few were ever around during the night. Pretending to talk to someone would have to do.

“My name’s Benrey, nice to meet’cha. Howdy, hello, I’m Benrey. I need to see your uh… papers or something ‘cause I’m totally a security guard so I gotta see that stuff to let you through. … Hello, I’m uh… security guard, Benrey, gotta show me your papers now, ‘kay?” The delivery on some of that wasn’t great. Did security guards even introduce themselves by name? And probably instead of the nebulous ‘papers’, asking for a specific document that he could change up at will would be better. But the name felt pretty good.

The sharpie cap came off with a small pop. Pressing the uniform against the locker made it easier to scribble on the name tag. Turn the ‘ar’ into a big ‘e’ then add a little ‘r’ in front of and slightly over the ‘e’ after the ‘n’ so it wasn’t clear if it was being covered up or replaced, opening the door for it be read as ‘Benrey’ or ‘Benry’. Perfect.

New human looking form and new human sounding name, yay. There was one thing missing though. None of the humans around the lab or in any video games or TV shows were referred to as ‘it’. Why was a mystery because almost everything else – plants, bugs, animals, and video game monsters alike – went by ‘it’ at least some of the time. But if humans went by ‘he’, ‘she’ or in one instance ‘they’, then to blend in more with them being addressed as such was necessary, right? Not that blending in all the way was the goal. Standing out too much too soon would make the bit harder though.

What was the difference between ‘it’s, ‘he’s, ‘she’s and ‘they’s though? Paying more attention to that kind of stuff would’ve helped out here. Was it even something that could be gleaned from looking at a person though? Maybe it was a choice people made and told everyone else and Benrey had just never overheard such a conversation. Asking was an option as was sneaking onto a computer to look it up but… did it really matter? Of everything else, this felt far less important. So… he would be a ‘he’ because as far as he knew all the security guards he knew were ‘he’s so he would be one too.

His name was ‘Benrey’, he was a ‘he’, and he was a security guard. He wasn’t human but he would fit in with them a bit more now, enough to hopefully have some fun.

[miamochi-writes]

Daycare Snacks Vash AU Part 11

A/n: Again I apologize for delaying this chapter! But I hope you enjoy! Also I apologize for this being a long post to scroll through. There’s a lot I needed to add so I’m going to split this part up. Expect another update on this very soon <3

It was another hectic week at the daycare with Vash and Liz. Since the holidays were coming up, everyone was either decorating or trying to cram in as many lessons as they could for the kids. Even some of the kids were a bit more rowdier than usual as they were excited to celebrate. Then there were some who were starting to feel sad that they couldn’t see their friends or favorite helpers. Overall, there wasn’t a dull moment with anyone. It was the week before the holidays started and you were having your lunch break with Vash.

Ever since the night you invited him to the arcade, you’ve been telling Vash more about your actual favorite shows, games, and some of your collectibles. He never once interrupted you and just admired how passionate your were about your interests. Sometimes he’ll ask or remember the things you mentioned and would share memes or news about it that always put a smile to your face. Today at lunch, Vash wanted to show you a new video about one of his favorite video game series coming out. 

“Okay so Y/n, think of it like this. It’s more open world so you can explore and do more things than what the original game series is known for! Just look at how beautiful the graphics are and the music too!” Vash gushed as he had to stop himself from shaking with joy while steadying his phone. You were captivated by the game trailer he showed you as you’ve never seen a video game look that beautiful with its gameplay with a simple but effective art style.

“That looks really cool! And you said it’s coming out soon right? Do you mind if I watch you play it once you get it?” you asked him.

“Of course! I’ll message you once I get it. Plus you’re more than welcome to come over to watch! And I can teach you how to play it if you like! It’s not that hard to play. I’m pretty sure I can adjust the settings for you so it isn’t too hard,” Vash explained as you couldn’t help but smile at how much he was willing to include you for things like this. Meanwhile, Liz and a few other coworkers were staring from the distance with a few smirks on their faces.

“You think they would’ve gotten together by now?” one of the workers mentioned as Liz waved them off.

“Listen, it’s getting there. Ever since I told Y/n I couldn’t make it to that cafe, things have been going smoothly. But maybe we can push ‘em a little more in the right direction,” Liz commented as she started racking her brain with a few ideas.

~*~

It was the end of the day where you and Vash waved goodbye to the last kid who got picked up. You both cleaned up and were about to gather your things in the employee lounge until Liz came in with a cup in her hand. Turned out she wanted to do a small gift exchange for the holidays next week for fun. Both you and Vash agreed it was a nice idea and picked out who you were going to gift. The only thing was, none of you can say who you got until next week when it was time to gift each other. After you picked, Vash took you home.

You were resting back at your apartment watching one of your favorite shows to pass the time before going to bed. As the plot twist was revealed, your phone rang and started you by surprise. You checked to see it was Vash calling you. You took a deep breath and picked up.

“Hey Vash, what’s up?” you greeted.

“Hey, Y/n, is this a good time to talk?” he asked.

“Yeah, you’re not bothering me or anything,” you replied as you heard him relax on the other end.

“Oh good! I was calling because one of my friends told me that there’s this big marketplace event called Traders Village happening tomorrow at the neighboring city nearby. There’s going to be all kinds of vendors there including local and big named ones too. I was wondering if you wanted to go with me? I figured it would be a good place to find some gift ideas for our gift exchange. It’ll only be a 30 minute drive to get there, but I hear it’s worth going to. Up to you,” Vash offered as you pondered on the idea. 

“So what you’re saying is it’ll be a mini road trip?” you clarified as Vash laughed.

“I can provide the entertainment and snacks if you like,” he added as you giggled.

“Sure, I’d love to join,” you answered.

“Aw Y/n it’s going to be great! You won’t regret it. I’ll pick you up at 9!” he gushed as your smile grew bigger by how excited he was.

“Okay, I’ll see you then. Good night Vash,” you spoke.

“Good night Y/n,” he commented and then hung up. You grabbed the plushie he got you and then dialed Cora’s number. You explained to her what happened as she teased you to where your blush kept deepening in shades of red.

~*~

The next morning, you were dressed in your most comfy yet stylish clothes with a cardigan that pulled your look together. You even brought one of your bigger bags to carry a few items with you for today. Vash messaged you that he was on his way, while you waited outside your apartment for his car to pull up. You then saw his car parking and went downstairs to meet him. He unlocked his car so you can sit in the passenger seat. Vash was wearing a black turtleneck with a white button up where he left a few of the top buttons loose. He wore slightly black pants and some familiar combat boots.

“Morning! Someone looks ready to have fun!” Vash greeted as you flashed him a smile.

“I am, thanks for inviting me! So I’m curious what you have in plan while we get there,” you spoke as you buckled in your seatbelt.

“Oh I have lots of things ready for today. Just sit back and relax,” he added as he put his hand behind your seat and started to reverse the car. Turns out Vash made a playlist for this little road trip last night so you could be comfortable and jam out. He even packed some of your favorite snacks that you would ask for at the daycare and a couple of waters just in case. Vash made you the DJ for the first part of the trip while you talked to him as he drove. If he ever asked for a small snack and water, you got him covered. You actually surprised him by packing a few of his favorite snacks as well.

“Wait, you remembered?” he asked as you handed him his favorite treat from your bag.

“Of course I do! You’ve been treating me whenever we hang out and when you get me my snacks at daycare. Now it’s my turn. Although, I know it’s not much,” you answered as he grabbed the snack from you.

“No this is perfect! Thanks Y/n! I was actually craving this earlier, but the store near me ran out,” he replied after taking a few bites. Vash would continue talking about how great the market was. When you passed by certain areas, he would also point out how those were other memorable places that he wanted to take you another time. 

After being on the road for 30 minutes, you both saw the sign for the market event as Vash drove to the nearest parking place. When he said it was called Traders Village, you had no idea that what he said was literal. It looked like the whole event took up the biggest space possible with multiple colorful tents for each shop. The place was much bigger than any convention space you’ve ever seen. Your mouth was agape from being awestruck that you didn’t realize Vash was opening your side of the door. He helped you get up as he had the biggest smile on his face.

“So what do you think?” Vash asked.

“I feel like I’m going to get lost, because this place is huge!” you commented. 

“Just stay close to me and I’ll show you around! I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen. You let me know if there’s a booth you want to check out and we can take a look,” he offered his hand to you. You couldn’t believe how lucky you were to have him with you as you grabbed his hand. Vash led the way as you followed him. You got a glimpse of the entrance to see tons of people walking around to different vendors. The place was lively to say the least as you looked to see what each person was selling. Vash led you to one vendor who was selling trinkets and stationary items that had some characters you recognized on TV. You then pointed out another vendor who was selling vintage merch of old shows that Vash was gushing over as he showed you his favorites.

It wasn’t until you landed at a vendor who was selling jam and fruits at their table. You stopped Vash from moving forward and told him you wanted to check this place out. Once you walked up, you noticed the person was offering free tasting samples. You asked to try a few and the minute you tasted them, you were astonished with how sweet the flavors were.

“These are so much better than the grocery store!” you commented as the vendor laughed.

“I grew these myself, and took a lot of playing around until I got the right flavor. Are you interested in any?” she asked.

“Yes! Can I grab two of your most popular fruit and one jam?” you asked as she prepared some items. Once she rang you up to pay, Vash got in front of you and offered his card to the lady.

“Vash no!” you called out as Vash just gave you a grin.

“Just this one time,” he argued as you got slightly red.

“One time? You mean the multiple times you’ve done this every time we hang out?!” you questioned as you tried to pull his arm back and offer your card to the lady.

“I’ll cover this for today and you can pay whatever you like at the next vendor,” Vash offered as he slammed his card while the market lady just laughed.

“Y’all are the funniest couple I’ve seen today,” she commented as you turned a deeper shade of red after hearing that. Little did you know, Vash was also flustered from hearing that as you stuttered.

“Oh, w-w-we aren’t a couple. We work together and he invited me here,” you explained as the lady was still smirking at you both before handing over your items in a bag. Before you could answer again, Vash pointed out another vendor to check out. You noticed he was also flustered and that his ears were a tinge of red. You started thinking about what it would be like if you and Vash were a couple. But you mentally shook that thought out and had to focus on why you were here. Gift shopping. You can worry about Vash later.

The both of you looked at more booths and saw Vash purchase a few items for himself on some rare collectibles from a video game he couldn’t pass up on. Meanwhile you spotted a few notebooks and handmade jewelry that Vash didn’t stop you from buying. If anything, he was happy that you took the time to show him what caught your eye and gave his honest opinion about you wearing them.

“Those look great on you!” he would say as you happily purchased them. It wasn’t until you spotted one vendor who had the perfect item you could gift to Liz. You told Vash you wanted to stop by the booth and he agreed. But, he wanted to let you know there was another booth nearby he wanted to grab for his gift exchange and that he’ll be there or try to rush back to you. You figured it was okay as you went to the next vendor. 

They had a variety of items, but what caught your eye was the handmade tumblers they had with different characters and logos on them. Liz was a coffee drinker and you overheard her talk about how much she loved this new show she was watching and one of the tumblers had the logo and a few characters on it. You never purchased an item so fast. The vendor also decided to give you a buy one get one free deal. You then picked a tumbler for yourself that you could see yourself using. Then you spotted the booth had some DVDs up for sale and one DVD caught your eye. It was the Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood DVD and Bluray collection with additional items as well. You remembered Vash telling you how much he wanted this but couldn’t find it anywhere. 

“How much for the DVD set?” you asked.

“I would sell it for $80 but since you’ve bought a few things for me, I’ll give it to you for $40,” he offered as you immediately handed him your card. You glanced over to make sure Vash didn’t see you buying this as you made sure to double bag the item so he couldn’t see. You thanked the vendor before making your way to Vash. It looked like he was still at the booth but there were two people talking to him. Maybe it was people he knew? Upon closer look, you saw Vash’s face look uncomfortable as he was slowly backing away and frowning. You walked closer and started to hear their conversation.

“What? We just wanted to say hi to our old friend. Remember the nickname they gave you back then? Vash the Stampede? Or the Humanoid Typhoon?” one commented.

“Yeah, you were such a klutz back then! I can never forget how much of a mess you left that one time back in home period!" the other guy brought up. You noticed Vash was looking more timid.

“Nice to see that you guys are doing well,” Vash said in a more dejected tone that you never heard before. 

“So what brings you here? Are you planning on stampeding this place too?” the guy asked. 

“There you are! I was wondering where you went,” you chimed in as you held onto Vash’s arm. You could feel Vash slightly jump from your touch as he looked at you. His blue eyes looked into your e/c eyes and saw a mix of emotions.

“Oh and who’s this cutie? You didn’t tell us you brought someone with you Vash,” they commented as you kept a smile on your face, but mentally you were ready to throw hands at them.

“I’m Y/n, one of Vash’s friends. We work together at a daycare,” you introduced yourself as the guys chuckled.

“Vash? Vash the Stampede at a daycare? I bet it must be a lot of work cleaning up after his mess. Do you know how much of a riot he was back then in our class?” one of them laughed.

“Actually, Vash is the most responsible person I’ve ever worked with. The kids, parents, and staff trust him with everything. In fact, he mentored me when I first started working and had to clean up my mess. So if anything I was a handful,” you retorted with high praises but slowly started to glare at the two. You were so focused on the two guys that you didn’t notice yourself squeezing Vash’s arm and getting closer to him.

“Look we’re just saying as his old friends what we knew about Vash back then. Just wanted to warn you about him is all,” one of the guys was defending himself as you took one step forward.

“You know last time I checked, friends don’t bring each other down like that. Also warning me? That’s for me to decide about who I pick to be with. And I pick Vash. Now if you’re done talking, we got places to go,” you said a bit aggressively as you pulled Vash away. You kept walking until you found a bench to sit on and noticed Vash was too quiet for you liking. You looked at him to see him staring at you with wide eyes.

“Everything okay Vash? About earlier, I kinda overheard and couldn’t standby. In my defense they didn’t seem like good friends,” you spoke trying to get a feel of the mood right now. His blue eyes never looked away from yours as you were starting to fidget a bit.

“No, I’m okay. I just wanted to ask...everything you said back there. Did you mean it?” he asked.

“Of course, I stand by what I said back there. You’re such a huge help and someone I look up to. And once we started hanging out more, I realized anyone is lucky to have you in their life. As for your “friends” earlier they’re still jerks,” you answered as you pouted at the thought of those guys.

“Would you still say the same if I told you what they said was true? Like them calling me Vash the Stampede? Humanoid Typhoon? The guy who was known to make messes wherever he goes? Would you still hang out with me?” Vash asked once more as you looked away to think.

“You know my parents once told me this saying. Life is kinda like a movie. When you meet someone, you meet them in the middle of the film. You can’t stop the film, so I have no idea what happened before then or what will happen in the future. I guess what I’m trying to say is I met you right in the middle. I have no idea about what happened before. BUT, I’m willing to listen how you listened to me like last time. I’d like to learn more about you if you let me. The good and bad. So I’m sticking by you regardless,” you answered as you flashed him a fond smile as you felt yourself blush. It took a lot for you to say that, but after how Vash asked you...he needed to know. 

Vash was still quiet, but his blue eyes started to light up at your answer. You could even see his cheeks turning pink which you found absolutely cute. He then pulled you into a tight hug and whispered, “Thank you, I don’t know how I got lucky on meeting you.” Oh you were extra grateful that Vash couldn’t see how much your face was turning red as a tomato. Everything he did was making your heart rush to where you might have to call an ambulance for what he was doing. You then hugged him back as best as you could before he pulled away.

“Sorry for making you worry earlier and asking that. My mind tends to wander. Hope this didn’t ruin our market day,” Vash apologized as he scratched his cheek and let out a nervous laugh. You shook your head and waved off his comment.

“Oh no, not at all! You have nothing to apologize for! Besides I needed a quick break before buying some more again. Plus, we haven’t even explored a good chunk yet!” you reassured him as he looked at your bags.

“Woah, you bought a lot there. Is that for the gift exchange?” he pointed out as you looked at the bag filled with gifts. You made sure it was hidden well so he couldn’t see the contents inside and nodded at him.

“Wow! Whoever you got must be really lucky!” he commented. You giggled trying to hold back the surprise and thought oh yeah they’re pretty lucky.

“Oh speaking of, I spotted this booth you might like! Come on, let’s hurry before they run out of stuff!” Vash mentioned as he got up and pulled you with him. He even grabbed some of your bags because he insisted. You gave in as he made a puppy face at you, but you made sure you held your most recent purchase.

“Hang on tight, don’t want to lose you in this crowd,” he finished and quickly turned to look at you while flashing you that beautiful smile of his. With the way he was holding you close, hand-in-hand, and then that face, you felt your stomach turn in knots as your heart raced once more. Oh if only he know what exactly he did to you so effortlessly.

A/n: Hi! Thanks for reading probably my longest chapter! Again this is half of the full chapter I wanted to release. But I rather split it up for everyone who reads this. Thanks for being patient with me! I hope you like this and like the next one <3

@marydragneell @daschstuff​

[moreespressoformydepresso]

sometimes i think about like. what if. the tributes escape, they're running around, trying to get things together. and somehow they get caught. how, we don't know, but imagine a peacekeeper comes across them and has a choice to make. obviously peacekeepers can't have families, but they weren't born without them. this one peacekeeper, maybe wovey reminds him of his little sister. or hy reminds him of his first love, the one he never got to act on. or he's some fresh young recruit who feels like in another life, the likes of sheaf or otto or whoever could have been a friend.

and he lets them go.

even other capitol citizens. some socialite might be more privy to give facet and velvereen more leeway, after all, they're one of the 'good' districts, aren't they? or a shopkeeper lets mizzen or treech get away with stolen goods because they remind him of his kids. or hell, imagine one of them manages to find work, and the supervisor should have half a mind to report it, but teslee knows what she's doing and she's doing it better than the other suckers, it'd be stupid to report her, even if she *is* an escaped tribute. lots of little things build up over time. a story where 24 kids don't escape on their own, it takes a whole village to help them.

That’s beautiful I love it. I had ideas of like- the mentors maybe letting them go if they spot them or even actively helping them escape in some cases, but just random citizens? That’s honestly even better. Because to me, a big part of why so many Capitol citizens were okay with the games is because they had enough distance to it to not care. It’s a once a year thing they can ignore if they want, and they do. Just some district scum, right? So who cares? And when they’re in a literal cage it reinforces that distance. They’re not “like us”, so it’s okay. No need to spend time and emotional energy thinking about it. Especially after what they did to you during the war ten years ago!

But when you’ve spend years fighting with the belief that you’re protecting your people, and you used the image of scared dying Capitol children to fuel you, I imagine it hits so hard to look at a terrified child staring down the barrel you’ve got pointed at them. Maybe the peacekeeper had a realization that they are the monster they’ve been fighting. And in the split second that they realize convincing themself it’s not true isn’t gonna change anything, they let the tribute go.

Teslee and Circ are 100% better employees than anyone in that city. No rationalizing necessary it’s just basic business. And they don’t even ask for much, so it’s win win! Also they’re nice kids, it would suck to see them suffer or even die and if they go into the games only one can get out. So eh, might as well give them some basic necessities.

I think it would probably start with Velvereen and Facet. They are “the good ones” so if anyone’s gonna be let go it’s them. Maybe it gets filmed or something and it’s broadcast in an attempt to get Capitol citizens to look out for the tributes and tip off the peacekeepers. And that video makes the citizens go “oh well, at least it’s the good ones and not one of those backwards savages”. Except once you accept the notion that some of these kids are fine, that slowly starts to trickle over into your perception of the others. If the ones from 1 are fine, the ones from 2 are too right? Because those get lumped together a lot since they’re more well fed. And the boy from 2 is pretty similar to the ones from 11 and 12 so maybe those districts aren’t too bad either. And if the girl from 11 isn’t so bad, well she’s like the tributes from 8 and the boy from 4. And the girl from 12 is a performer like the boy from 7 (actor/performer Treech supremacy). Soon enough the network is complete and we’ve got all the tributes being noted as kind of okay, maybe. So when a clearly starved child steals food, well the shopkeeper didn’t really need that lost income. They can miss it, so it’s not worth the energy to even report. And it slowly escalates from there until we have a district-sympathizer Capitol.

[pokemedia-text-dump]

Match Recording: Teraster vs. N̶e̶m̶o̶n̶a̶ Teko

[Video ID: Nemona pacing on one side of Mesagoza's battle court. Teraster walks up to the other side, and she notices him.

"Heyyy, you made it! You got all of your teammates ready, right?" Nemona says, waving.

"That is correct. Cera wished to accompany me as well for some reason." Teraster says.

"Yeah, because I wanted to see you get flattened. Then again, you did that so many times during the Gym challenge, I think you'd be used to that by now." Cera says from behind the camera.

"Well, it's still good to have someone else who wants to watch." Nemona says, turning to the camera. "...But yeah, good to hear you're already set! You BETTER not hold anything back on me this time, alright...I wanna see you go all-out!" Nemona says.

An air horn playing the opening notes to "La Cucaracha" can be heard faintly in the distance.

"...Huh. What the heck was THAT?" Nemona asks.

"Probably nothing important...Which, compared to whatever this is, would still be important." Cera mutters from behind the camera.

"Eh...Yeah, you're right, it probably wasn't anything important. Anyway, with that out of the way...Time to have us a fruitful-" Nemona attempts to say.

Suddenly, Teko careens up the stairs on a Revavroom, madly cackling while blasting the opening notes to "La Cucaracha" on an airhorn and barreling straight towards Nemona. Teraster reels back slightly as Nemona yelps and scrambles to get out of the way, but is unceremoniously run over by the Revavroom, leaving her comically flattened on the ground, face-down. Somehow, her body has tire tracks on it where she got run over, despite the Revavroom's wheels being made out of rock.

"Oh no. Who could have predicted this." Cera says listlessly from behind the camera.

Teko swerves wildly in an attempt to turn around, leaving burn marks on the ground, then jumps off the Revavroom, landing in the middle of the battle court.

"Ta-daaaa!" Teko says, putting his hands up in a flourish. "Surprise! Nyahahaha...Bet'cha didn't expect ME here, did you?!" he cackles.

Teraster, meanwhile, just stares at what's seemingly Nemona on the ground.

"...Why would you do this? S...she is most likely critically injured...She posed no harm to either of us." Teraster says softly.

"Huh...Yeah, in hindsight, this would be pretty bad..." Teko says, seemingly thinking. He then points to a seemingly empty space off in the distance.

"...if I wasn't right here!" Nemona says, appearing from a puff of smoke next to a Hisuian Zoroark.

"Thanks for the help, Jinouga." Teko says, causing the Hisuian Zoroark to nod before being recalled into a Luxury Ball.

"...I..I fail to understand. You were aware of this as well?" Teraster asks.

"Yep! I mean, I really do want to battle you, and I'm definitely gonna get around to you at some point. But it was only fair to let your big brother have the first shot at you, right?" Nemona says.

"You know it! You've gotten so strong over these past few months...What would a big send-off to your Gym challenge be without a match against your big bro? A CRAPPY send-off, that's what!" Teko says.

"...Ah. I am still confused as to why you would wish to set this up, however." Teraster says.

"Oh, I thought this would be cool to do before I came up to battle you." Teko says. He picks up the flattened Nemona from the ground before tossing it aside, revealing it to just be made out of cardboard. "I mean, if I'm gonna give you an awesome celebratory battle, I wanna do it RIGHT."

"...Hm. If this is your aim, then...I wish to battle you as well. Now that I am a Champion-ranked Trainer, it would be beneficial to pit my team against stronger opponents." Teraster says.

"NICE! Well, what are we just standing around for, then?! Let's RUMBLE!" Teko says, pounding his fists together.

Nemona attempts to perform some sort of flourish with her hands to "introduce" Teko, but is shouldered out of frame by Teko himself before she can finish, as "Attack-a of the Whacka! - Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door" starts blasting from his Rotom Phone.

Teko takes out an Ultra Ball and throws it, releasing a Tinkaton with a serving of Leftovers around its neck. Teraster does the same with a Luxury Ball containing a Glimmora with a Focus Sash tied around its cone.

"Alright, Cotton, let's get this party started with Stealth Rock!" Teko says.

"Please use Stealth Rock as well, Ningguang." Teraster says.

The Tinkaton slams its hammer on the ground twice, picking up several rock fragments, which start glowing as they're embedded into the hammer. It then swings the hammer to launch the rocks onto the other end of the battlefield. The Glimmora plants its cone into the ground and opens up its body, spitting out several glowing rocks onto Teko's end of the battlefield.

"All set up? Gigaton Hammer this time, Cotton!" Teko says.

"...Please use Power Gem this time, Ningguang." Teraster says after some thought.

The Tinkaton charges towards the Glimmora, its glowing hammer raised up. The Glimmora builds up an orb of light inside the orifice on its body, then fires it as four separate beams of energy. The Tinkaton then goes into a spinning swing, deflecting the beams one by one before jumping up and crushing the Glimmora with its hammer, scattering countless purple crystals upon impact. The Glimmora slowly lifts itself out of the crater the Tinkaton created, its Focus Sash glowing white and dissolving.

"Keep it up! Let's use Knock Off this time, Cotton!" Teko says.

"...We are running out of options...Please use Power Gem again, Ningguang." Teraster says.

The Glimmora begins charging up another orb of light as the Tinkaton charges towards it. This time, however, the Tinkaton uppercuts it with its hammer, forcing the orb to detonate inside the Glimmora's body and knocking it unconscious.

Teraster recalls the Glimmora into a Luxury Ball and sends out a shiny Metagross with a serving of Leftovers tied around its body from a different Luxury Ball.

"Hey, Axis doesn't usually come out until later, doesn't he? ...Eh, we can still handle 'em. Knock Off, again, Cotton!" Teko says.

"Please use Earthquake, Axis." Teraster says.

The Metagross rears back on its hind legs as its front legs begin to glow white. As the Tinkaton charges towards it, it slams its legs down, creating several shockwaves that juggle the Tinkaton in the air. It crashes down to the ground, unconscious.

"Oh, now THAT was clever! " Teko says, sending out a Hisuian Goodra with a Damp Rock tied around its shell.

"Time to set up Rain Dance, Escargot!" Teko says.

"Please use Earthquake again, Axis." Teraster says.

The Metagross rears up and slams down on the ground again, sending several shockwaves towards the Goodra. It retreats into its shell and braces for impact: it gets juggled around by the Metagross' attack, but takes notably less damage than the Tinkaton. Eventually, it rights itself and shoots a blue orb of energy into the sky like a firework from its shell before untucking itself. The energy orb bursts into countless gray clouds, causing it to rain.

"Ride over that guy with Surf, Escargot!" Teko says.

"Please use Earthquake once more, Axis." Teraster says.

The Goodra retreats into its shell and spews out a massive amount of water, swamping the battlefield and creating a wave that lifts it up and sends it toward the Metagross. The wave crashes down, smashing into the Metagross and staggering it while dropping the Goodra, but the Metagross uses the force from the attack to slam onto the ground hard enough to create shockwaves. The Goodra, taken by surprise, is unable to retreat into its shell again, and falls unconscious after being slammed with several shockwaves in rapid succession.

"You're doing pretty good...But are ya ready for METALHEAD?!" Teko says, sending out a shiny Archaludon wearing an Assault Vest.

"...This one appears to be a Steel-type as well...Axis, please use Earthquake." Teraster says.

"Now, use Electro Shot, Metalhead!" Teko says.

The Archaludon gets down on all fours and charges up an orb of electricity in its mouth as its terminals start glowing with energy. As the rain hits them, they crackle and spark violently before the Archaludon fires its stored energy as a blue-and-white beam. The Metagross is carried a significant distance by the attack, and lands in some of the water, electrified by the laser's energy, and falls unconscious as it's flipped upside down.

Teraster recalls the Metagross into a Luxury Ball and sends out a Greninja wearing a pair of Choice Specs from a different Luxury Ball.

"Please use Ice Beam, Kappei." Teraster says.

"C'mon, you can take this! Electro Shot, again!" Teko says.

The Greninja begins running around the Archaludon. As it attempts to get a bead on it before laying down to fire, the Greninja's tongue begins to glow light blue, and it fires a beam of pale blue energy from its mouth, freezing the water around the Archaludon's feet and immobilizing it. The Archaludon makes a desperate attempt to fire at the Greninja standing up, but misses completely. Its terminals begin glowing even brighter.

"Wait, WHAT?! Nyahaha...Where'd you pick up tricks like that? ...Well, if that's how you wanna play this, I guess it's time to show you how it's REALLY done!" Metalhead! Draco Meteor!" Teko yells.

"Please use Ice Beam again, Kappei." Teraster says.

The Greninja does a backflip as it shoots another beam of icy energy at the Archaludon's feet. The Archaludon charges up a massive orb of orange energy in its mouth, then shoots it into the sky as the glow fades from its terminals: the recoil slightly loosens the ice on its feet. The orb then explodes into countless meteor-like fragments, which begin to home in on the Greninja like missiles. Each of them detonates on contact: when the smoke and splashes of water clear, the Greninja is laying face-down in the water, KO'd.

Teraster recalls the Greninja into a Luxury Ball, then sends out a Weavile with a Loaded Dice in its head feathers from a different Luxury Ball.

"Please use Knock Off, Hookula." Teraster says.

Teko's eyes light up with an idea. "Hehehe...Metalhead, use Body Press."

The Archaludon repeatedly crouches slightly in preparation, then makes an enormous leap, breaking the ice on its feet all at once. It plummets towards the Weavile, making an enormous splash in the water on impact. When it gets back up, the crushed Weavile is unconscious. The rain slowly begins to let up before dissipating completely.

Teraster recalls the Weavile into a Luxury Ball, then sends out a Volcarona wearing a set of Heavy-Duty Boots from a different Luxury Ball.

"Iblis, please use Quiver Dance." Teraster says.

"Electro Shot this time, Metalhead!" Teko says.

The Archaludon gets down on all fours and begins charging energy, while the Volcarona begins squeaking and flapping its wings, leaving behind white afterimages of itself. The Volcarona spreads burning powder from its wings all over the battlefield, but the water causes it to fizzle out instantly.

"It appears to still be charging...Please use Fiery Dance, Iblis." Teraster says.

The Volcarona flaps its wings and creates fireballs from its body, which arrange themselves into a semicircle around its body above the water. Fire begins swirling around the Volcarona's body, and it flaps its wings once more to send the fireballs hurtling towards the Archaludon just before it can fire. The fireballs detonate on impact, one by one, and when the smoke clears, the Archaludon is keeled over in the water.

"Whoa! Metalhead's like one of the sturdiest guys on my team...But we still got this! You're up, Pocket Change!" Teko says, sending out a Gholdengo.

"Please use Fiery Dance again, Iblis." Teraster says.

"Hit 'em with Power Gem, just like we practiced!" Teko says.

The Volcarona begins flapping its wings to create fireballs from its body, arranging them into a semicircle. It then flings them all at once at the Gholdengo, scattering coins everywhere from the resultant explosion. The Gholdengo shakily gets up, then charges up an orb of light in its right hand. With a flick of its left hand, it tosses countless coins into the air, then fires its stored energy out of its hand in the form of several beams like a gatling gun. Each of the beams reflects off of the coins, bouncing every which way as they travel from coin to coin. Eventually, they come out of the other side of the coins, rapidly bombarding the Volcarona and knocking it to the ground: each and every beam is a direct headshot. It takes some time, but the Volcarona eventually shakily gets up, weakly shaking the water from its body.

"That attack is devastating...We must ensure they do not have a chance to use it again. Please use Fiery Dance once more, Iblis." Teraster says.

"Ouch...Iblis' Fiery Dance is pretty nasty...We gotta try and make sure we have a chance to survive this next one! Try Recover, Pocket Change!" Teko says.

The Gholdengo raises its hands up as a green glow surrounds it, and most of the coins scattered throughout the battlefield return to it, getting absorbed back into its body. The Volcarona slowly begins flapping its wings, creating another semicircle of fireballs, then sends them towards the Gholdengo, bombarding it repeatedly. When the smoke and splashes of water clear up, the Gholdengo is under the water, unconscious.

"Man, you're on FIRE! And I'm not just talking about Iblis!" Teko cackles, recalling the Gholdengo into a Luxury Ball. "But THIS one is gonna mess you up GOOD! Get 'em, Rathalos!" he continues, sending out a Roaring Moon with a capsule of Booster Energy around its neck. The Roaring Moon tosses the capsule into its mouth, then spits it out and lets out an earsplitting roar.

"...Please try Tera Blast, Iblis." Teraster says.

"Ok, you know the drill by now, don't you? Acrobatics!" Teko says.

The Roaring Moon lands on the ground and dashes forwards, leaving behind several blue afterimages of itself. Before it can even charge up enough Tera energy to attack, the Roaring Moon grabs the Volcarona in its jaws, then jumps up and slams it against the ground, making a big splash. It beats the Volcarona against the ground multiple times, then shakes it violently in its mouth until it stops moving. It tosses the KO'd Volcarona to the side and roars triumphantly.

Teraster recalls the Volcarona into a Luxury Ball and sends out another Luxury Ball containing a Porygon-Z with an Expert Belt tied around its horn. He takes out a Tera Orb and holds it up, his body spasming as energy surges into it. Eventually, he regains control, and Terastalizes the Porygon-Z into a Normal-type as a thick sheath of Tera Crystal grows over his arm.

"He's going all out, huh...Well, we gotta match him! Use Dragon Dance, Rathalos!" Teko says.

"Pl3ase use 1ce Beam, Junk1l." Teraster says.

The Roaring Moon runs in a large circle, dragon energy building up around its body, then flies upwards, causing it to spill out of its body at once as it roars. An orb of blue energy builds up on the Porygon-Z's tail, which it then fires as a beam of more blue energy. It scores a direct hit on the Roaring Moon's mouth, covering it with ice and forming a makeshift muzzle.

"Oho, smart! ...But not smart ENOUGH! Shake it off with Earthquake, Rathalos!" Teko says.

"...P1ease att3mpt to u5e Ice Beam on the w4ter, Junkil." Teraster says.

The Roaring Moon flies up high, then dives back down headfirst at incredible speed. It smashes its head into the ground, removing all the ice on its head, and the impact is great enough that it creates several large shockwaves, smacking the Porygon-Z around violently. As the Roaring Moon pulls its head out from underground, the Porygon-Z spasms and manages to levitate back up. It charges up another orb of ice energy on its tail, and fires it directly under the grounded Roaring Moon. The ice beam causes a large spire of ice to rapidly crystallize under the Roaring Moon, knocking it into the air and flipping it over. The Porygon-Z then moves closer to the ice spire it made, and the Roaring Moon flails its legs in the air for a bit before managing to right itself.

"Well, we got your mouth back in action, at least...Try Acrobatics again, Rathalos!" Teko says.

"Pl3ase dodge and use Hyp3r Beam, Junk1l." Teraster says.

The Roaring Moon roars and attempts to charge towards the Porygon-Z, leaving behind several blue afterimages of itself. However, at the last second, the Porygon-Z moves out of the way, causing the Roaring Moon to bite the ice pillar instead and get stuck. As it tries to dislodge its open mouth, the Porygon-Z folds its limbs and tail to the front of its body, charging up a big orb of energy. It then fires a massive yellow energy beam, blasting the Roaring Moon away before knocking it unconscious. The Porygon-Z then flops unceremoniously to the ground.

"Hehehe...Nyaaahahaha!" Teko cackles, sending out a shiny Kingambit with a serving of Leftovers around its neck. "Man, that was INSANE! I don't think even I could have done something like that...You don't have ANY IDEA how much fun I'm having right now! But THIS is gonna be Arcdamn AWESOME!!" he continues.

As the Porygon-Z spasms and slowly floats out of the water, Teko takes out a Tera Orb, bites the rim as energy surges into it, and spins around to toss it onto the Kingambit, Terastallizing it into a Fairy-type.

"Time to end this RIGHT! Maou, set up with Swords Dance!" Teko says.

"Pleas3 use Hyp3r Be4m aga1n, Junkil." Teraster says.

The Porygon-Z folds up its limbs and tail to charge energy again. As it does this, the Kingambit slams its hand on the ground, creating several swords made of energy. They spin around it, and it lets loose a war cry as they dissipate, coating its body in a red aura. The Porygon-Z finishes charging its attack, and looses a giant beam of energy at the Kingambit. The Kingambit raises one of its arms up and tanks the attack, sliding back continuously until the beam dissipates: when it does, it looks notably pained before sitting upright again. This time, instead of dropping to the ground, the Porygon-Z simply struggles to stay upright, staggering and spasming slowly in midair.

Teko's eyes light up. "Hey, it looks REALLY weak! Try jumping towards it with Iron Head, Maou!" he says.

The Kingambit's head blade glows white as it flexes in anticipation before leaping towards the Porygon-Z headfirst. It rears its head back, then slashes once it gets in range: the Porygon-Z's Tera Jewel shatters and it collapses to the ground, unconscious.

"YEAAAAHHH! Nyahaha...Let's GOOOO!" Teko cackles, hopping around wildly.

"Hoooly CRAP, did you SEE THAT?! That battle was NUTS!!" Nemona says, running up to Teko.

"I KNOW, RIGHT?! HE DID AWESOME!" he laughs.

"I...I lost. Why do you wish to praise me?" Teraster asks.

"What do you mean 'why's he praising you'?! Don't tell me you didn't get how insanely you fought out there!" Nemona says.

"EXACTLY! I knew you had gotten really strong, but I didn't expect you to pull up with crazy stuff like THAT! Like that part where you somehow managed to flip over Rathalos with the Ice Beam and then you used the ice against him and it was all like 'PSHEEWWW!'" Teko says frenetically.

"...You know, it kinda reminded me of how you countered Glaivenus whenever we fought. That was, admittedly, pretty smart." Cera concedes from behind the camera.

"Whoa, now that you mention it, it kinda did, hehe!" Teko says.

"...You are...proud of me? Even though I could not defeat you?" Teraster says, tilting his head to the side slightly.

"Damn straight! I couldn't have picked a better robot to be my weird pseudo-adoptive-brother-thingy." Teko says, putting his hand around Teraster's shoulder.

"...Thank you, Teko. I am pleased to have made you proud as well." Teraster says after some thought.

"Hey, you wanna see if Florian or someone else wants to come eat with us to celebrate?" Nemona asks, pointing her thumb back at the academy in the distance.

"I suppose I can entertain the thought of you for slightly longer." Cera mutters from behind the camera.

"That sounds good, yeah. C'mon, li'l bro! You've earned this!" Teko says, pulling Teraster along with him as the video cuts out.

[lebihanto-universe-blog]

Be Irresistible, Click Here Stonewalling is very destructive to any relationship, it creates distance and disconnection in the intimacy and safety that's ... Transcript all right in this video I want to shed some light on why your avoidant partner is stonewalling you during a conflict how you should respond when it happens and what I did to heal and stop stonewalling my wife okay let's first go over what stonewalling even is so stonewalling is a term to describe a refusal to communicate it usually happens during a fight or conflict where one partner will get very quiet their whole demeanor changes they develop a flat affect sometimes they just stare at the ground or the wall they might even pull out their phone and act like they just don't care about this conversation anymore they're done and it doesn't matter what you do or say they will either stay completely silent or they will just answer every question with I don't know over and over again they essentially shut down the conversation and as you can imagine it makes any partner feel like they obviously couldn't care less about me they can't even be bothered to talk about something that's important to me and stonewalling is a really big deal in our relationships Dr John gottman studied thousands of couples and he was able to predict divorce with 90 accuracy based off The Chronic presence of four traits during conflict defensiveness criticism contempt and last but not least stonewalling so this is a really big deal now some of you might know that technically more men Stonewall than women but we're not going to turn this into a gender thing because we all have areas we need to work on and the silent treatment is actually one example of stonewalling and we know both men and women can be guilty of that right so I think we can all agree both the silent treatment and stonewalling aren't healthy examples of how to manage conflict right and for anyone who is courageous enough to be listening to this because your partner sent it to you let me first say thank you for being mature enough to explore this it might feel uncomfortable but you're doing a good thing and I'm not here to judge you I'm not here to label you as the problem and I'm not here to shame you the truth is I just care about you and your relationship most people would have just labeled you a narcissist but I'm not here to do that I know you think I'm on their team but it's my job to hold both of you accountable I'll be the first one to say that if your partner who starts a con conflict with disrespect and criticism and name calling and contempt and then you end up stonewalling them you're both wrong our words matter our tone matters we should never be demeaning our partner belittling our partner that's not okay on either side now I'm not saying that just because you say something in a nice way that someone's not going to still Stonewall you they absolutely might it's not our job to control their reaction it's our job to make sure that we're being respectful and vulnerable and self-reflective and if they turn this discussion into a toxic Direction then we have to be mature enough to set healthy boundaries what that would look like is saying I'm not going to continue in future conflicts if there's any name calling or invalidating my feelings or stonewalling it's hurtful behavior and if it happens again I will take a break from the conflict regardless of how upset that makes you and we can try again in 30 minutes if we're both ready remember we can have empathy for our partners past we can have compassion for their traumas and triggers we can try to understand why they are in either shutting down or escalating a conflict and we have to hold them accountable to destructive behaviors that hurt us and the relationship I think we have an obligation to do both if we love them now let me tell you why stonewalling hurts our partners so badly because it should be our goal to be a safe place for our partner to bring up a hurt or

a complaint or a desire we should not be discouraging our partners from being honest about their feelings just because they make us uncomfortable they are not wrong for wanting someone to be vulnerable with about their inner world or hurts or ways that they feel loved the most they're not wrong for wanting their experience or perspective validated those are basic needs for closeness and connection and they aren't wrong for having them and let's remember validation doesn't mean agreeing with all of their facts or details it simply means that their feelings matter to you you don't have to agree with them or the actions to be able to say what you're going through matters to me validation requires us to be curious instead of confrontational we don't have to agree with their feelings to have a desire to understand what led them to feeling disrespected or hurt or scared we can seek to understand their pain even if we don't have all the facts yet that's called valuing someone's experience it's called respecting them honoring them and if you ever want them to listen to your side of the street as well the first and best way we do that is by showing them that we value theirs and when you shut down it makes them feel completely abandoned and unheard and unloved that's not your intent but that's what's happening they feel like they're being abandoned by someone they love to them it feels like you're communicating you're not worth being heard you're not valuable enough to try to understand you're not important enough to have my attention once again that might not be your intent but that's what's happening and if this is making sense to you I think it's important to their healing process that you admit out loud to them say I can understand that when I shut down or when I dismiss your feelings or when I go silent I can see how that would lead to you feeling very unheard and Abandoned and hurt that makes sense and that's wrong of me to do that I'm sorry I don't want to hurt you like that anymore and then it's our job to do the hard work required to learn how to not do that anymore because so far trust has been broken they haven't been able to rely on us so let's rebuild trust by showing them that they can count on us now here's where it gets interesting let's dive into why you might shut down or go silent and you tell me if you agree or disagree so when you stonewall your partner feels abandoned right but I think part of the reason you're shutting down and going silent is because you also feel abandoned remember what I said earlier that your partner who sent you this isn't trying to label you as a failure they aren't trying to make you the bad guy or the soul problem but isn't it interesting but that's exactly how you feel isn't it let's just be honest I know this is no place for honesty but it's just you and me if you were honest you might tell them I feel like nothing I do is good enough for you like you're always waiting to catch me on something and tell me I messed up or didn't meet your expectation and that's really hard for me it makes me feel very insecure it makes me feel like you think I'm a screw-up and sometimes it makes me not even want to try because well I'm just going to let you down again I dare you to tell that to your partner if it's true that's not being weak that's being self-reflective and vulnerable and mature and if someone tells you that don't screw it up that's the vulnerability that you've been asking for avoidance are oftentimes the very bad at accessing identifying or even feeling their feelings vulnerability terrifies them and they just laid their heart out on the chopping block maybe for the first time and if you launch into defensiveness if you dismiss them because of your own legitimate pain that they might have caused if you use this as an opportunity punish them while they are vulnerable you can kiss this relationship goodbye what they need in this moment is curiosity validation understanding and empathy it doesn't

mean your pain doesn't get addressed it just means Let's Be the Change we want to see let's respond with safety and love just like we ask them to do okay back to why I think this might be happening I believe that for a lot of you in those moments when you're shutting down and you've given up on the conversation and you're going completely silent think you're having a shame response I think you're being honest when you say I don't know as in I don't know how to make this right all you know is you feel lost and rejected and criticized and unfairly attacked and overwhelmed like you're carrying a weight and they just keep adding to it and in that moment you're thinking I just don't know what they want from me right and if you're honest and if you were aware of what's Happening inside your body I think you feel scared I think you feel abandoned like this person who is supposed to love you and accept you that you feel like all they do is tell you that you're failing and there's a part of you that wonders maybe I am a failure and it's only a matter of time before they realize that and they leave me and if that was true then it makes sense that you would think the best thing to do in this moment is just shut down shut up and hope this passes because I'm only going to make it worse by opening up my mouth right anybody else ever thought that except for me I think it's possible that your shame has kept you stuck in survival mode for a long time emotionally and physically and I'm not a coach or counselor but you might be potentially projecting Old Wounds from the past onto your partner in the present because I bet a lot of you grew up in families that conditioned you to believe that if you made a mistake you failed or that having feelings and emotions made you weak when you slipped up and expressed a feeling or a hurt you were punished in some way weren't you even if it was just psychological so it makes sense you've tried to stop feeling altogether or maybe you were conditioned to believe that if you don't perform to a certain level then you aren't seen as worthy of love in the end it's all shame it it taught us to keep people at arm's length don't let them in because they will only hurt you so put your walls up keep your defenses up push them away when they try to get close so that you won't ever get hurt again right and the problem is when those Old Wounds aren't healed it still really hurts when people bump up against them years later doesn't it our nervous system is always on high alert that's why we have such a disproportionate reaction that's why we can get so easily overwhelmed because that shame and anger is always just beneath the surface isn't it and what's really happening when we shut down is that we're rebelling against that notion that we're a failure we're rising up against that shame and fighting it and it comes out in a fight flight or freeze response to our partner the only problem is we're fighting old battles with new partners this isn't their fight and we're pushing them away because we're making them the enemy of our past that's why you hear constructive feedback as an attack on your character you hear complaints as criticisms we will hear our partner calling us a failure when that's not what they said at all what they said was I can't feel close to you when you do X or when you do I it hurts me and those are massively different so let's stop making assumptions and creating false narratives that we've never actually expressed or verified and I know it sounds so silly when we say it out loud I mean we would never intentionally discourage our partner from telling us how they felt loved or that something we did hurt them we would never want to do anything that leads to distance and disconnection and yet that's exactly what we're doing unintentionally every time we dismiss defend criticize or Stonewall and I want you to really hear my heart on this if you haven't been paying attention I need you to minimize ESPN or Amazon

and come back because this is important the sad reality is for some of us we don't have the capacity for their pain or hurt because we have so much of our own that we're not even aware of so my challenge today is this acknowledge that shutting down hurts our partners acknowledge that it's a coping mechanism to keep us safe from the past but it's destructive in the present it's leading us exactly where we don't want to end up alone and abandoned so what's the solution the solution is curiosity validation understanding and empathy the solution is radical self-reflection and self-compassion and accountability tell yourself it makes sense why I do this I can have empathy for myself but understand that this isn't healthy and I'm not going to do this anymore I'm going to learn a new way to regulate my nervous system I'm going to learn what triggers it and what I can do to interrupt that cycle remember the goal isn't to avoid conflict altogether the goal is to work through conflict in a healthy safe way and it's possible the goal isn't perfection it's Direction towards emotional maturity I still make mistakes but I know how to apologize and repair and that has made all the difference in my relationship so what's the healthy alternative to stonewalling well recognizing when we are emotionally dysregulated when we're overwhelmed and triggered this isn't a bad thing to admit it's a very mature thing to admit and we should trust our partner enough that if they tell us that we seem triggered that we should stop and take a break the mature thing to do is say I'm noticing that my heart is racing my ears are getting hot my voice is getting louder I think I'm overwhelmed I understand that this is very important to you and your feelings still matter to me there's no threat to our relationship ending but I need to take a break for 30 minutes and I promise to come back and finish this discussion now some people will tell you that you're being immature by leaving those people are stupid okay because this is what maturity actually looks like this is what healing looks like trust me because I rebel against this all the time if Emily and I ever get into a fight I think now I got this and I usually say some stuff I wish I could take back continuing to fight when you're dysregulated is not only dumb advice it's dangerous you can leave conversations for mature reasons and immaturity this is a mature one it's not weakness it s strength and when you leave a conversation go take some deep breaths try to ground yourself pay attention to any anxiety or fear that you're having acknowledge it and instead of suppressing it just say it makes sense that I'm having these feelings they aren't bad they're signals and indicators of what's happening in my body I accept them but they aren't in control of me they don't control my behavior and I refuse to react in a negative way because of them so what do I need in this moment to feel safe that's love that's loving yourself that's loving and respecting your partner and it's moving your relationship towards a healthier Direction where you both feel heard and understood and connected which is what the majority of us want trust me when I say you aren't broken for dealing with this you aren't flawed you don't need to feel bad for needing help in this area we all are a work in progress learn to have some compassion on yourself and take the mask off Perfection that you think everyone needs you to wear it's literally killing you and lastly talk about this stuff with your partner when things are calm initiate these types of talks be proactive talk about what happens plan for a conflict ahead of time go step by step for how you want to handle things okay when you feel disrespected or hurt what are you gonna do how are you going to bring it up how am I supposed to react in those situations go through the whole thing write it out and then follow your plan when it happens and trust me you'll eventually get into a conflict where you

need that piece of paper and when you're in a conflict remember you're on the same team be sure to look at each other in the eyes touch each other occasionally hold hands occasionally try to take breaks in the tension with tiny bits of humor or intentional breaks reminding each other you matter more than any conflict we have we can get through this together and trust me when I say when you are both learning how to be vulnerable with each other's feelings and fears and insecurities when you're both practicing mutual respect and trying to understand each other and valid and empathize with each other's pain when you're repentant of how you've shown up in the past and you're actually trying to repair things in the present when you're honest with each other about what you need to feel safe and valued and loved when we sacrifice for each other mutually the connection and closeness that's possible in that environment is all the incentive that you would ever need to make that counseling appointment and work on this stuff and start healing each other you deserve that and so does your partner thank you so much for listening I'll see you in the next one

[little-luna4256]

Are you Real?

This one I actually wrote in 2022 but I was reading some of my old work and I honestly like it. I don't use my tumblr for something cutesy since I only post when I'm spiraling into my crazy but I like this. The feeling of what my writing used to be. Of who I was.

I couldn't help the shaking in my leg. I was impatient for his presence. It's just that everything about him was either so fucking cute or just insanely hot. His voice, his looks, the smile he gave me...those glasses were a nice touch as well. His fluffy hair was always messy even though he took care of it a lot. Plus the stubble. I was never really one for facial hair, but on his, I didn't care at all. It just made him even more perfect.

We met online.

Most would say much of our initial relationship, but unlike them online was where we both strived.

I sat at the airport waiting. I mean I still can't believe I did it. I flew out here by myself for him. I came all this way for a boy, but boy was he something special. I was then snapped out of my thoughts when I felt my phone buzz from beside me.

"I'm here my love"

I giggled at the message and stood up, walking towards the door that would lead me to him. My palms were sweaty while trying to hold my luggage. I mean can you blame me? The most perfect man for me was waiting for me right outside those doors. I felt like I looked wrong or I could have fixed up my hair before I left.

I guess it's time huh?

I couldn't keep my eyes off the floor as I walked toward the car. I knew it was real, yet some part of me felt like if I looked up at him then everything would just fade into oblivion. I reached out and opened the car door. I guess now was as good a time as any. Right?

I lifted my eyes to meet him in the driver's seat.

It was as if everything in the world just made sense. We had all of those random talks when he would rant just for me because I loved hearing him talk. There he was. My cutie. He just sat there with his adorable goofy grin. I knew he wasn't saying anything because he wanted to make me feel better and comfortable before he spoke. He was just so considerate which I guess is what started it.

His kind and compassionate personality were wholesome. You know that fuzzy feeling you get when you get your crush that you can't stop staring at in class? Or the way the movies portray it when no one else in the world exists when he is around? I felt that. Right here in this very moment, I felt him here and in person rather than all those times when we would just call and I just longed for him from a distance. 

But here is the thing. He was here now in this very moment and I still wasn't sure if it was all real or just a figment of my imagination. My dear XX. The one I had been longing for all of this time was now here next to me. 

We rode in silence for a moment before he spoke up. 

"So my gorgeous girl. Are you ready to speak to me yet?"

I could feel my face warm up as I just shifted in my seat so my body was facing the window even though I leaned more towards the driver's seat. 

"Hello, my handsome" I spoke barely above a whisper. 

I can't believe it. Over the phone and video calls I was a powerhouse that did nothing but tease him and yet here I was waiting for him to speak because I couldn't utter a single word to him. 

He really did that to me. he left me absolutely speechless and all I could do was look at his reflection of him in the windows and mirrors. 

I heard him chuckle which snapped me out of the fact that I had been staring at him since he spoke, just not directly

[watermelaniee]

Named after anyone?

Not really. Melanie was kinda randomly chosen without much thought. Tabrisa, the middle name, is an evangelion reference though.

Have any kids?

Nah. Shits tough for a single middle aged mom when you're a college student and also have no children

Use sarcasm a lot?

Is the sky blue? Is grass green? How can we be sure that we see the same colors? What is blue?

Last time cried?

I think it was yesterday. Or maybe the day before. Last few days have been kinda jumbled together. All I know is that I've cried more recently than I can remember otherwise.

First thing about others noticed?

Probably eyes. I have a habit of staring people directly in the eyes that I forced myself into to be polite. Now it sometimes gets almost unnerving to people how much I look them in the eyes.

Eye color?

A very dark brown. 75% cacao dark chocolate brown. The kind that looks black at certain distances or angles.

Sport you play or have played?

I used to play soccer and golf a little. Wasn't much good at either. Never been a sports person.

Any special talents?

I... Don't think of any talent I have as special. I guess I'm very good at Ultrakill, if that counts?

Where were you born?

Mesa, Arizona, a small town in the shadow of Phoenix.

Scary movies or happy ending?

I love good thrills. Plus, if you're there with, say, a girlfriend who's easily scared, you get to hold them a lot.

Any pets?

I have a cat living on my back porch named Penny. She's got a big long story attached to her by now so I won't go into detail lest this post become a wall.

How tall?

5'10" last I checked. About the same height as Kat.

Favorite school subject?

The culinary stuff. Foods classes in high school.

Dream job?

Anything culinary, but I suspect running a food truck or being a bartender would be nice specifics.

Hobbies?

Cooking. Playing video games. Writing, occasionally. Playing games again. Eating. Eating my cooking. I don't... Have a lot that I do. I just play a lot of games and scroll through chats.

This has been Melanie, The Waiiif, and I'm off to be a gay little bitch once again

Thanks for the 15 questions tag @alicearmageddon

Named after anyone?

I named myself Kate after the wife of beloved sillyman Nathan Fillion in the pretty good show Castle. Then I turned it into Katie because it's cuter and eventually my at the time girlfriend russified it into Katya

Have any kids?

Yes @krawlerfizz she is my daughter

Use sarcasm a lot? 

No. Never. I've never been sarcastic in my life

Last time cried? 

Yesterday. Being a lesbian is hard

First thing about others noticed? 

Probably their hair

Eye colour? 

Brown ^^

Sport you play or have played? 

Skiing, scuba diving, going to the gym if it counts

Any special talents? 

I like playing music ^^

Where were you born? 

Zagreb

Scary movies or happy ending? 

I am a massive pussy the only good thing about horror movies is scaring you into a girl's arms

Any pets? 

Two little dogs in Croatia, Bora the malamute and Luke the whatever dog as well as a cat in Germany

I also plan on keeping a wide variety of snek, lizar and crustacean (lobster are cool)

How tall?

almost 6'0" women hmu

Favourite school subject? 

biology ^^

Dream job?

Immunology research. Working in a lab would be fun as fuck

Hobbies?

Guitar, fiddling with electronics, any sort of physical labour, Vidya games, having loads of gay sex with trans women (real), star trek Deep Space 9

Thanks for the tag! I’m gonna pass it on to Borat voice ma waiiif since all my other friends on here have already been tagged

@watermelaniee