#adding is way easier than having to chop up what exists and figure out what can stay

[acaciapines]

back on that owl house daemon au editing grind (ive been busy + writing other stuff so after editing one i sorta. stopped for a month or two lol) and. oh god i knew 2 was gonna be bad but its BAD yall. like not content-wise a lot of the actual writing + plot is totally fine and will stay but. i wrote this before i got into my grove of episode, inbetween, episode (ie 1 -> 1.5 -> 2) SO. THAT MEANS. THIS ENTIRE 30K THING IS GETTING SPLIT INTO 1.5 AND 2.....

and obvi i'll have to write a LOT bc the parts going into 1.5 and 2 are spread across the entire fic :) so uh. um. this is gonna be fun.

[moonlightlullaby]

no celebrations?

summary: Corpse and reader celebrate his birthday in the most chill way. Based on this lovely request (ty again for sending it!) 

pairing: corpse husband x gn! reader

category: fluff

warnings: food ingestion; alcohol ingestion; loads of physical touch (let me know if I forgot to mention anything)

A/N: Hello (: This is such a lovely concept, I just couldn’t wait to get started hehe Also, I got a bit carried away and just went with it, so I’m really sorry if that’s not what you’d pictured. I do hope you enjoy it tho <3 Take care!

word count: 2.4k

Masterlist

Walking into our shared bedroom, I catch the sight of Corpse exiting the bathroom. As our eyes lock, my lips curl up tiredly and a long sigh I didn’t even know I’ve been holding finally frees itself. He sits on the edge of our bed and extends his hand to me. When I take it, he pulls me so I stand in the space between his legs.

“How was the day?” he asks with both of his hands on my waist. 

I hum, quirking a brow and tilting my head a bit “At least tomorrow - you know, the most unspecial, completely ordinary day of the year -” this earns a giggle from my boyfriend “is Sunday and I can just ignore all of that” I wave my hand in the direction of the adjacent room, where my laptop - filled with texts, assignments, spreadsheets and appointed Zoom calls - is. 

At my words, Corpse wraps his arms around my figure, pulls my body even closer to him and plants a kiss on my stomach through my shirt. My hands, in turn, caress his upper back and soft hair. 

Coming in contact with the string of his eyepatch in the process, I lean back slightly, which causes him to shoot up at me with a small frown and pouty lips. He sits still, though, as I carefully remove his eyepatch, and, while his eyes are still closed, I give each of his lids a peck. He smiles and tilts his head up to meet my lips in a long, tender and effortless kiss. Oh finally.

The idea of quarantining together was welcomed as a blessing by both of us. It meant more time spent together after all. However, with my school and work demands and Corpse’s irregular schedule, we still barely see each other throughout the day in spite of being a few feet apart from one another. And when bedtime rolls in, we’re both so exhausted all we can do is mumble words that could be counted in the fingers of one hand before drifting off. This, of course, when my boyfriend doesn’t stay up until dawn working. Don’t get me wrong, I’m his number 1 fan and admire his passion and all the hard work he puts in everything he sets his mind to, but I’m also not going to lie and say I don’t miss his warmth at night. Hence I want to devote this Sunday to him.

After a while, I break the silence “I’ll be right back.”

I let go of his hold and take my turn to use the bathroom. After doing my night routine, brushing my teeth and getting into my cozy pajamas, I walk back in the dark room and lie down, settling myself back in Corpse’s hug like two puzzle pieces matching together.

~~~~~

The excitement for a new day - not any day, no, but August 8th - washes over me as soon as I open my eyes and get a glimpse of the sleepy boy next to me. 

A couple of minutes go by as I contemplate on getting up, torn between prolonging our cuddling for some more and doing something to show Corpse my appreciation for him. The latter wins and I, cautious not to wake him up, slowly unwrap my arms from him and step out of the bed. Drawing the curtains to make sure the summer daylight doesn’t disturb his peaceful state of mind, I make my way out of the room and to the kitchen. 

Wondering what to make for breakfast, I take a good look around until my eyes catch the plethora of fruits we’ve bought a few days ago. Fruit salad it is. 

Corpse has, for as long as we’ve known each other, made it very clear he isn’t too fond of his anniversary and similar celebrations - and, even if he hadn’t explained it to me, it’s rather evident how uncomfortable they make him. This year, his friends’ and especially his fans’ hype for the date - although unintentionally - has added an extra layer of unease to it all, to which I don’t intend to contribute.

Even though I don’t want to make matters worse and would never overstep his boundaries like this (because, thankfully, I’m not Betty Cooper and he isn’t Jughead Jones), I still want to celebrate Corpse. I want to celebrate his birth and his existence, which I’m immensely grateful for. He’s both the best friend I can confide in blindly and the lover I want to share my lifetime with. He sticks to his truth and dreams higher than I could ever imagine. He turns the darkness in the world and in his mind into light with his words and with his laugh. Having him in my life is one of the best things to ever happen to me and seeing him fly makes me more proud than I can put into words. 

There’s a lot to toast to, so the solution is a celebration that is so smooth and so chill - the smoothest and most chill possible - that it doesn’t even feel like one. Just log off and enjoy a laid back day together.

As I chop a kiwi and make a mental list of fun and uncomplicated things we can do that don’t require much time and many skills, in walks Corpse, in an old white tee which is one too many sizes bigger than him and in his black sweatpants. He rubs his eyes and lets a raspy “good morning”.

“Mornin- wow! They really weren’t lying when they said when you hit 24, hotness knocks at your door”

He chuckles and shakes his head “No one’s said that”

“Well, then consider yourself the muse of a new proverb, baby”

He scrunches up his nose in response before grabbing the cup of orange juice I’d placed on the counter and taking a gulp. 

“Thank you” he turns my face and gives me an orange-flavoured kiss, neither of us having ever really cared about morning breath. 

“For calling you hot? Oh save it to when I’m done with the list of cheesy compliments I have for you” I take a grape and before I can get it in my mouth, he steals it, with wrinkles on the corner of his eyes.

“Then we’d be here for eternity!” he’s not wrong.

Corpse helps me put the fresh fruits in bowls and, with them and our juice cup in hand, we head to the balcony. Sitting next to each other, we calmly eat, take in the light blue sky and the cars and passersby changing the scenery ahead of us. Conversation flows naturally.

As we empty our bowls - after stealing many bits from each other -, I twist in my seat and face him “Hey, Corpse, do you see this?” I point to the very prominent and familiar dark circles under my eyes. “Wanna help me get rid of them?” I ask, knowing damn well it’d take a lifetime for them to actually go away and not giving up regardless.

~~~~~

The bathroom is filled with chatter and laughter and the sink, with hair clips, scrunchies, a sharpie, bowls, hair products and a towel. Corpse hisses as our cool homemade face mask comes in contact with his skin. His curly hair is pushed back and held by a blue hairband and I apply the mask to his face, making sure not to leave any spots uncovered. Well, that’s what I’m trying to do, which becomes an unnecessarily challenging task when my lovely partner can’t be still for more than two seconds. 

He kept switching between dancing to Soulmate, by Mac Miller, and mouthing its lyrics. Now that I got him - after a small threat that I wouldn’t hesitate putting this weird mix we made in his pretty mouth - to keep his lips together, the (adorable, admittedly) swaying, however, continues. He stops momentarily, only to shuffle things around right after.

Something cold touches my skin, making it my turn to let out a hiss this time. The sound is accompanied by a small jump, caused by the surprise. Corpse chuckles and, when I glance at the spot on my arm the cold thing came in contact with, I realize it’s just the sharpie. All he does is give me a mischievous smile.

While I keep massaging his face and covering it with the mask, Corpse litters my body with his drawings. Smiley faces, lightning bolts, hearts, clouds... his repertoire is vast and any exposed skin he can find becomes his canvas. Each line causing me to giggle and shudder a little. With him focused on his creations, it’s 10 times easier for me to complete my task. 

“Alright, my turn” he states, smiling, and I’m quick to grab the sharpie. 

As he adjusts a matching hairband on my head, I put a dainty heart on his neck. And, as he takes the bowl in his hands, I swiftly plant a kiss on top of the drawing. At this, he sighs in content and my chest gets warmer.

I soon understand how hard it was for him to stay still as Stay comes on and all I want to do is have a little karaoke session and dance. Corpse entertains himself with my struggle and, because it’s his birthday, I’ll let it slide. So, to make the whole process easier, instead of focusing on the song, I focus on the gorgeous face in front of me. A beautiful face to a beautiful soul. 

One of the various perks of sharing an apartment with Corpse is I get to see this face in all ways: sleepy, completely clean - no makeup, no mask -, all wrinkled in the morning, red when he’s embarrassed or when he laughs too hard… His laughter. Its sound pulls me from my trance “You’re staring, y/n” 

“Well, at least I wasn’t moving around, Corpse” I reply with squinted eyes and nudge his side playfully. 

We begin collecting the things scattered across the sink and storing them in the cabinet, and the song comes to an end, giving way to Dang!

“How long do we keep these on?” 

I hum at the question and check the playlist on shuffle on my phone “How does 5 minutes and 2 seconds sound?” 

Facing him, his grin mirrors mine and he spins me around. We laugh and allow ourselves to be as goofy as possible, jamming and moving our limbs around with a green paste on our faces.

~~~~~

After washing off the masks in the shower and painting our nails - so we’re both rocking the black nail polish look -, we’ve set our minds to - finally - finish the puzzle we started two months ago. It’s a 90’s anime setting inspired composition and we’d gotten about 40% of it done before our schedules got more hectic and the game, well, pushed aside. For weeks, the pieces sat on the ground of our living room and silently judged us every time either of us stepped to the side, as we crossed the room, in order not to crush them.

Sitting around the puzzle with comfy clothes, we team up against it and indulge in the wine Corpse’s got us and the hawaiian pizza I’ve ordered. 

As the picture comes more and more to life, moments of comfortable silence and of chattery - when we talk about anything from our shopping list and gossip about our neighbours’ lives to parallel universes and the matrix - follow one another. A different playlist on shuffle is our background noise. 

Time flies and the sun’s already hidden when it clicks to us that there are only 5 pieces left. Each piece is fitted in the whole with a giddier feeling than the previous. Corpse picks the last one - deep blue with purple and black specks - and turns to me with an excited smile and an eager gaze that I’m sure are mirrored on my face. I nod encouragingly. He places it in the puzzle and celebratory sounds fill the room.

Corpse stretches his arms and pulls me in a hug, but, since we’re both kneeling and because of the distance between us, we end up falling and lying on the ground in rather uncomfortable positions. 

“Come on, puzzle, that was easy breezy! Gotta step up your game if you really wanna challenge this duo right here!”

“Oh for sure!” Corpse squeaks as we laugh at our nonsensical brag.

After a moment while we catch our breath, he rubs my back and speaks, pulling my attention to him “Not that I’m not loving this position, but what if we watched some Drag Race?”

Is this man real? If I couldn’t feel his heart beating under me or his arms around my figure, I’d be sure he’s just a figment of my imagination. “But it’s your b- don’t you wanna choose something you like more? Li-” 

“Nope,” he boops my nose “Drag Race, or maybe Love Island, would be great right now.” And people still dare say the perfect man doesn’t exist!

“You’re such a dream!” I give him a quick peck before continuing “Ok, so I put on the show and you get more wine…?” He hums in approval and stands up. Our eyes briefly jump from each other to the puzzle and back to each other, then we simply nod. A silent agreement to leave the puzzle here. We’re both too lazy to put all the pieces back in the box and too proud of our achievement to let it go just yet; besides, everything’s been sitting here for about two months, what are a few more hours?

He steps to the side, gets our glasses and makes his way to the kitchen. I lie on the couch and scan Netflix for Drag Race. Corpse comes back, placing the glasses next to the couch, and gently lies down on top of me. He nests his head on my chest and we both hum contently.  

While RuPaul announces what the winner’s prize will be, I play with his hair, letting my fingers knead his curls. His right hand flies up to meet mine and I bring our intertwined hands to my lips, peppering his knuckles with kisses. The gesture is cut by a loud laugh that escapes my lips as miss Vanjie Mateo’s iconic moment replays on the screen. 

“Hey,” Corpse’s voice makes me look right back at him “I love you. You know that, right?”

My heart melts at his words and at the way he’s looking at me right now. I nod with a smile.

“I love you too, birthday boy.”

[amazingphanisnotonfire-imagines]

Cheryl//this is me trying

Request: Can I request a season 1 cheryl x reader. Cheryl always protects reader from people and r is shy but falls in love with the redhead and some who’s accidentally tells her while she’s having a bad day but cheryl is quick to reassure her then they cuddle after going to pops or something and it’s just fluffy.

hey! happy valentines day gays! and get you, two imagines in one day, it must be the day of love. i hope you all like this because it’s really fluffy and i enjoyed writing this a lot!

Overnight, Riverdale became a shell of its former self. Two months since Kevin Keller and Moose Mason stumbled upon the body of Jason Blossom, and nobody has been the same since. 

The town is riddled with secrets, they’re slowly destroying it like a disease. Nobody trusts anybody anymore, everyone is on high alert, and everyone is a suspect. 

Cheryl usually loves being the centre of attention, she has done ever she was a kid. It’s something that comes naturally with being a twin, you share everything and as much as she loves loved the shared birthdays and friends, she has always loved being the centre of attention.

Now however, she hates it. Her life is a true crime documentary at the minute, and all she wants is for the killer to be caught so the crew can pack up and leave and she no longer has to stare down at the blinding lights being cast over her and her family. 

The only thing that’s kept her sane over the past two months, is you. Despite everything happening, despite the murder and the secrets and the suspicion, you’ve stuck by her side. You were with her when they found the body, and you haven’t really left since. 

The two of you are unlikely friends, she’s Cheryl. Bright and bold and never one to back down from confrontation. But you’re Y/n, sweet and shy and always the first to shrink away from any sort of attention directed at you. 

She knows you hate the constant attention recently, it’s something you get used when you’re best friends with the victim’s sister, but not once have you complained. 

You’ve being questioned by police, journalists and strangers on the internet. You’ve had camera’s shoved in your face on your walk back from school and been asked countless questions about what you know about the Blossom’s. And you’ve also been offered ridiculous amounts of money in order to talk. But no matter what happens, you always just rush past them and join Cheryl, who’s always waiting for you with a sad smile and warm hand. 

Due to the constant hoard of vultures swarming Riverdale High, the two of you had to figure out somewhere else to meet after school so you could walk the long way home. It adds twenty minutes to your walk, but it’s not that well known around town, meaning people can’t bother you. 

Plus, the extra twenty minutes that you get to spend with Cheryl isn’t the worst thing. It’s the opposite in fact. It’s the thing you look forward to, even if you are looking over your shoulder every so often 

But today you’re not at your meeting spot. 

When Cheryl pushes her way through the stares of her fellow students with you and only you on her mind and makes her way through the school basement, back up the stairs and out of the fire exit, you’re not waiting for her with a smile that makes her feel warm and a cold slice of pizza you snuck out of the cafe earlier. 

The only thing waiting for her is a full bin and an empty field. 

“Y/n?” She calls out and looks around the corner. She’s met with three seniors, all of which are smoking with absolutely no care for being caught. 

“She’s not here.” One of them says, her blonde hair and large glasses cover half of her face and Cheryl forces a smile. 

“Hey, Blossom.” A boy says and Cheryl freezes. Who knows what they want, but whatever it is, it probably won’t be nice. It’ll probably be something along the lines of ‘hey, did you kill your brother’ and no matter how many times she’s asked that, it doesn’t get any easier. “Maybe try the bleachers.” He says, ending his sentence with a sympathetic smile and Cheryl nods slowly, not really sure what to say. 

“Thanks.” She forces and spins on her heel. 

“We’re sorry about your brother, Cheryl.” The blonde one says and she turns around again. Each of them look sad, with matching frowns and sorrow swimming in their eyes. 

Jason meant the world to Cheryl, but he also meant a hell of a lot to other people too. And that’s when it hits her. Of course you’re at the bleachers. 

For some bizarre reason, only known by your father. You and your family used to come along every other week to watch the Bulldogs play. For a while you thought it was because your dad was trying to get you and your brother into football and this was a lot cheaper than the actual game, but the older you got the more you figured it was because he was just trying to relive his youth. For 90 minutes he could pretend that he was quarterback again and for those 90 minutes your dad would be the happiest he’d been all week. 

Then one week, a redhead sat beside you. In clothes that were far too expensive to be worn to a high school football game. Her parents looked like they wanted to be there as much as she did, but then a boy with matching red hair ran out on to the pitch and you’d never seen a smile quite like it. 

After that, you made sure to sit beside her at every game. And then one day she sat opposite you at lunch. The first few times she was alone, but then soon she began to appear with a group of other girls, but you were the only one she’d talk to. 

Eventually lunch times and football games turned into group projects and sleepovers. You spend hours braiding her hair and listening to her tell you stories of other worlds and the creatures that live in them. You’d sneak down the dark and creepy halls of Thornhill in hopes of finding a midnight snack, and instead be met by Jason and your older brother in clown masks. 

Eventually, you found a different way to get to the kitchen, one that Jason didn’t know about. And when he’d come looking for you, both of you would jump out  and chase him around the house, much to the dismay of Penelope and Clifford. 

Those bleachers are what started a whole friendship, not only between you and her, but also you and Jason. When you’re brother eventually made the team, thanks to a good word put in my Jason, despite him being a year younger. Him and Jason became as inseparable as you and Cheryl and so it wasn’t an uncommon occurrence to see the four of you hanging out. It also meant that if Cheryl was busy, you and Jason would hang out until she finished whatever she was doing. 

Grief is a hell of a lonely thing, and sometimes Cheryl forgets that other people miss Jason too. With everything going on, she didn’t even think about how you were doing. With all the questions, accusations and crying that constantly fills Cheryl’s house. She never even asked how you were. 

And now her legs can’t carry her quick enough to were she hopes your sat. Because she’s already lost her brother, she can’t lose you too. She wobbles as her heels dig into the dirt, kicking up dust and mud as she runs across the field. Her hair swings behind her, and she can feel the red scrunchie loosen the quicker she runs. 

The bleachers have all sorts carved into them. Initials in hearts, some of them still there, some of them crossed out so aggressively that it’s a miracle they didn’t chop it in half. There’s inside jokes and ridiculous rumours. Codes and dates and everything in between. 

But something new has been added in the past few days. 

cheryl murdered jason

and y/n helped

The writing is small and barely legible, but it’s there and the more you run your fingers over it the more it carves itself into your heart. 

“Y/n?” Cheryl pants breathlessly and you quickly pull yourself away from it. Instead you stand up properly and pull the sleeves of your sweater down over your hands. The y/f/c scrunchie remains still in your hair and Cheryl has to stare at it for a few seconds to calm herself down. “You weren’t at our spot.” She says quietly and you close your eyes. 

You let her down. You let her down. You always let her down.  

“Sorry Cheryl.” You sigh and sit down in the dirt. Cheryl looks around before sitting beside you. “I just wanted some space.” You add and force yourself to look at her. 

The sun sits behind her, but even that doesn’t seem as bright as it used to be. Nothing is what it used to be. For the past two months, you’ve been told that thats a good thing. But what’s good about someone you loved being dead. What’s good about watching someone else you love go through life but not really live. 

Cheryl just exists. 

But she exists for you. 

Because as lost as she would be without you, she knows you would be just as lost without her. 

It’s an unspoken rule now, you always text each other when you wake up and before you go to sleep. It’s something you used to do anyway, but now you make a point not to forget. Because forgetting means that the worst could have happened, and that’s something neither of you can bare to deal with. 

“I get it.” She nods. “I was just worried that’s all.” She adds, trying to sound as casual as she can. But on the inside she’s screaming. Because she thought you had died, she thought whoever had killed Jason had gotten to you too, and the whole reason you’re both dead is because she wronged the wrong person. 

There’s a lot of people that don’t like Cheryl, being unliked comes naturally to her. But she doesn’t know how she’ll cope if she’s so unlikeable someone she loves died. 

She has no idea why your friends with her to be honest. She saw you staring at her at a football game once. But it wasn’t a stare she was used to. It wasn’t cold like her mothers or jealous like her friends. No, this was nice. You were staring at her like you wanted to know about her, like when you looked at her, you saw a friend not someone to be feared. 

And so Cheryl clung onto the tiny hint of friendship, the crack of a door into something that could happen, and she shoved herself through it. It worked, and now you’re the only person she’s nice to. She’s mean to everyone else, she calls them names and teases them, especially when they’re rude to you...but you stay. And she has no idea why, but she’s not going to wish it away. 

“Shit, sorry Cheryl.” You drop your head into your hands and Cheryl looks at you confused. She looks around, not really sure of what to do. “I didn’t think, God knows what you thought had happened.” You ramble and she realizes you’re crying. Her eyes widen and you look at her, your eyes red and puffed and your lips pulls into frown. 

“It’s okay.” She replies and wraps her arms around you. You bury your head into her neck, the smell of maple and cherries invade your senses and you let out a shaky breath. 

It smells like home and happier times, and you want to crawl into those happy memories and never come back out. “I was just being ridiculous.” She tries to play it off, to make it seem like she couldn’t feel her heartbeat in her throat and the ringing in her ears. Pretend like it didn’t feel like someone had pulled her heart out and stamped on it. 

“No, no you weren’t. I’m really sorry.” You sob and wrap your arms around her. She falls into your neck, surprised but not upset with how tight you’re holding her. She never wants you to let go. But of course she has to, and so however reluctant, she untangles herself from you and lets out a deep sigh. 

“I’m sorry.” You sniffle. She hands you a tissue and you wipe your eyes with it before scrunching it up in your hand. “I’ve just had a rubbish day. Somebody shoved this in my locker.” You frown and pull a balled up piece of paper out of your pocket. 

Cheryl’s eyebrows knit in confusion as she takes it from you, her fingers graze yours and you freeze for a few seconds. 

who do you think did it? 

cheryl __

y/n __

Jamie __

“Why is your brother on here?” Cheryl asks, her voice rising with each word and you rest your hand on top of hers to calm her down. 

“I dunno.” You shrug. “Your parents are on there too.” You add and point further down the page. 

“What a bunch of dicks.” She grumbles and crumples it up. “Do you know who it was?” You shrug and she sighs. 

“I’ve just gotten tired of the staring and the whispers. So I thought I’d just have five minutes peace before going home and having to listen to Jamie cry in his room but pretend he’s okay. Or for my parents to walk on eggshells around both of us. Neither of them know what to say, and because of that they keep saying the wrong thing.” You ramble and she listens intently, trying her best to find a resolution to all of your problems. 

Unfortunately, she doesn’t know the answer to everything, no matter what her mom says. 

“I just thought five minutes by myself can’t be terrible. But then I came down here and someone carve-well it doesn’t matter what they wrote. What matters is that I made you worry at the worst possible time in your life. I hurt you, and I’m really sorry. Believe me, hurting you is the last thing I want to do you. I feel sick even just thinking about it. I never, ever want to hurt you. I love you too much. I love you more that I’ve ever loved anything or anyone ever. I just love yo-” Your eyes widen when you realize what you’ve just admitted to. 

You don’t want to look at her, but she hasn’t said anything in a while and that’s strange for her. So you force yourself to look at her, expecting the worst. Expecting disgust, disappointment, betrayal. But it’s none of those. 

Instead she’s smiling. And she looks actually happy. Something you haven’t seen in so long, something you’re glad to see, despite the circumstances. 

Oh yeah, you’ve just told her you’re in love with her. What do you say after that? 

“I-er-”

“Y/n?” She cuts you off before you get the chance to ruin the moment. She’s known you for long enough to know that when you get nervous, you ramble and when you ramble you say weird things. 

You’re grateful for her cutting you off, usually if she talks over you, it annoys the hell out of you. But this time it’s welcomed and she stifles a small laugh and the sigh of relief you let out. 

But the next thing she says is something that you weren’t expecting, but you’re sure as hell grateful for. 

“Would you like to go on a date?” 

---

The red lights from outside, illuminate Cheryl’s pale face in the night, painting her in a reddish hue and you find yourself staring at her for far longer than would be considered normal. 

Lucky for you, she hasn’t noticed. She doesn’t seem to be paying attention to anything, not really anyway. Instead she stares down at her food, pushing a few fries around the plate and anxiety rises in your chest. 

She’s already regretting doing this. She’s made a mistake and now she doesn’t know how to let you down gently. 

She seems to sense you nerves because she’s looking at you quickly, a sad smile twitching at her lips.

“Sorry, I just. Jason always used to tease me about the two of us. It’s the only thing we’d take about sometimes. He’d constantly ask me if I’d asked you out yet. And every time I would say ‘no, we’re just friends’ but, well neither of us really believed that.” She says, a small laugh escapes her lips near the end, but she quickly shuts it off. It’s too soon for her to be laughing, too soon for her to be happy. 

“Yeah.” You nod and finish your drink. “He used to tease me too. ‘if you don’t tell her, I’ll do it myself’.” You mimic his voice and a ghost of a smile twitches at her lips as she forces herself to look at you. “I am really glad you did ask me though.” Your voice shakes a little with nerves and Cheryl stares at you confused. “I do really like you Cheryl.” 

“I really like you too.” She smiles softly and you stare at her lips. Sometimes you think the red lipstick has permanently stained her lips cherry red. Even when you guys are a sleepover, she still has bright red lips and the other part of you wonders if that’s just what they look like. 

“Hey.” You start and a sly smile twitches at your lips as you remember an old memory. She leans forward, excited to know what you’re smiling about. 

It could literally be anything, from a musty old book she let you borrow from the Thornhill archive, to a new tv show you started to watch. But whatever it is, she’s excited to hear you talk about it. 

“Can you remember last year. It was Jamie’s 16th birthday and you and Jason were invited over. Jason was there because him and Jamie were planning on sneaking out later that night, and you tagged along so you could keep me company.” You start and she smiles at the memory. 

The four of you sat in the living room, while your mom brought cake and your dad sang ‘happy birthday’. Cheryl remembers how happy she was, and she remembers talking to Jason afterwards, the two of them whispering and wondering if that was what a normal family was supposed to look like. 

You, Cheryl and Jason had each pitched in for the record player he wanted. And even though you all knew that just Cheryl alone could have been able to buy him it if she really wanted, you knew they split it for you. 

Jamie was ecstatic when he opened the box, and then all of the records you’d bought to go with it. He’d played it every single day since getting it, but now you haven’t heard it in months.

“Yeah.” She nods, a sad smiling taking over he face. “Can you remember when Jason pushed his face into the cake.” She adds making you snort a laugh. 

The bell above Pop’s rings and Betty and Archie walk in. They send you a sympathetic smile before sitting at their own booth, and you and Cheryl share a look. 

“Would you like another one?” You point at her milkshake and she nods, smiling shyly. 

---

The walk home is over far too soon, and it’s only when you’re standing on your porch do you realize you took the normal way home by accident. Either the media has gone to sleep, or people are starting to forget about Jason and Riverdale. 

That thought makes you frown and Cheryl watches your expression falter before you look back at her again. 

“Thank you for walking me home.” You smile shyly and a nervous laugh escapes her lips. 

“It’s no problem.” She shrugs and the two of you stare at each other for a few seconds longer than normal. She’s about to leave when you grab her hand and spin her around to face you. 

She’s surprised for a second, until suddenly she feels a pair of lips on hers, and then the only thing she can feel is them. Everything else disappears, and though the kiss is short and a little awkward, it’s still perfect. 

“Would you like to come in?” You ask and motion your head to large wooden door. The pain is chipped around the metal numbers, something your mom has nagged your dad about for the past 6 months. “We still have the rest of y/f/s to watch.” 

“I’d love to.” She nods and the two of you grin at each other. “But seriously, how many times have you seen that now?” 

“It doesn’t matter how many times I’ve seen it.” You unlock the front door, giving it a quick kick before you stumble through it. “What matters is that this is the first time you’re seeing it.” You add and she rolls her eyes but follows you up the stairs anyway. 

The sun sets over another day in Riverdale and darkness floods the town. The streets are cold and scary, but wrapped in your duvet and Cheryl’s arms, you’ve never felt warmer. 

[keravnous]

- agent 14/agent steve haines; american money

It's a Thursday and it's raining. The raindrops are heavy and loud on impact, running down his windshield like tears. He's on his way to the set and he prays that it'll clear up soon.

"This show will kill you", Warren sits on his bed, sheets lazily draped over his legs. Steve can see where his pubic hair begins and his mouth waters. Warren takes a long drag from his cigarette, blows the smoke into the air.

"It fucking won't, nothing can", Steve's leaning against the door frame, coffee in hand.

"Fuck yes, it can. And it will, lurking around at Forum Drive all day and for what? Two minutes of frightening pictures that will make Karens all over LS go buck wild."

"Who's Karen?"

"Forget about it. Let me suck your dick, Haines, c'mere."

As he arrives near the recreational center and pulls into one of the lots it has indeed stopped raining. The streets are still wet but the sun's coming out again and the air is already mushy with the reblooming heat. There's a lanky man with a dog and he's yelling into his phone - the man that is, not the dog.

He knows who the guy is, even though he most likely doesn't know him, probably he doesn't even know that Steve exists. He's an associate of Franklin Clinton and the Bureau keeps a close eye on him, due to the nature of Clinton being so close with Townley and Philips.

Steve watches Lamar, leaning against the hood of his car, the remaining rain wetting his thigh through the denim.

"Man Frank, you just ain't around no more, homie. That's all I'm saying. Yeah - Yeah, sure whatever, dog - Yeah, fuck yourself too, homie."

He hangs up and stuffs his phone back into his pocket. The dog looks at him. "Man, you get the fool more than I do, Chop. Wassup with him, can you tell me? He always been that fool, but something ain't right there."

Steve knows what ain't right there. Franklin must've picked up by now, or maybe Townley told him, what they were up to that one afternoon at the warehouse. And for what he knows about Clinton and what the intel tells him, the young man probably isn't much of a big fan of government-approved interrogation techniques.

And he probably also won't like what Steve has next in stock. Warren was a little careless the last time around, tongue loosend by sweet kisses and a hand around his dick, when he spoke about a securicar delivering important IAA files soon. It won't hurt 14 but it would definitely aid Steve an awful lot, so he decided to send the boys on the road again, maybe on Tuesday.

The production team's van rolls up next to him and they swarm around him like a stock of bees buzzes around their queen and then there's sound and light checks being run and a woman applies powder to his face. Lamar Davis has not moved a single step. Their eyes meet.

"What are you idiots doing here?", he hollers. Steve wonders if he could be of use.

"We're shooting a show", he replies, while the attach a little microphone to his collar, "The Underbelly of Paradise, you surely have already seen an episode or two."

"You're that Haines-guy then?", something in Lamar's voice makes his skin crawl, his files told Steve that he too is a gangster after all, killing and robbing are some of Davis' favourites. The look he shoots him isn't much friendlier.

"In the flesh", Steve dusts of the sleeves of his polo shirt.

"Yeah, aight. Fuck you then, man. C'mon Chop, we best be leavin', homie. Imma take you back to Frank's crib", oh, there is something in Lamar's voice that Steve definitely doesn't like at all but he just smiles politely at the man, until he's around the corner and out of sight. Steve's smile drops.

"Can we hurry this up a little, people? I don't got all day!" The bees start buzzing again.

_

The raid on the Humane goes by easier than expected. They are in Warren's living room, as the news inform about the incident. Steve is just pouring himself another glass of wine and Warren looks at him.

He knows, that the other one knows. It's a cover story the IAA will buy, but not Warren. Pain shoots through his legs as he slowly makes his way towards the sofa.

Warren mouths a few words at him. Be careful. Steve nods and leans over, places a soft kiss on his shoulder.

"Learned from the best", he whispers and Warren jerks.

"What?", there's panic in his voice.

"The Rashkovsky Job? The breakout and then his research goes missing?"

Warren blinks at him in disbelief.

"So, did he let you know if he likes it in South America?"

They laugh and Steve feels light, his fingertips tingle with it.

_

Steve's on his balcony. There's a saxophonist a few meters down the road, playing some Sinatra pieces and the music wraps itself around him like a blanket. The musician's interpretation reaks of melancholy and reminds Steve of the golden days of Vinewood cinema, noir films and cigarette smoke. Musicians playing at street corners isn't something foreign in a city where everyone has dreams of being the next big national superstar, but Steve usually hates him with his guts. This one's different. It touches him and he finds himself enjoying the dark, warm tunes that float through the cool air. It will be autumn soon and Steve's glad that the heat will be gone.

Warren watches him from the inside, leaning against the kitchen counter, lips curled in a smile.

_

Steve has always hated Michael's bloated and ugly, fat face and now he even gets to point a gun at it. It feels like his birthday and christmas fall on the same day.

"They know or they think they know that I'm the one that was behind the incident."

They stare each other into the ground, guns raised. Steve's ready to fire, has been from the minute Townley walked onto the plaza for the first time.

"Put the weapons down, boys. Fun time's over!", Steve wants to sigh. This is not happening. And then they are suddendly surrounded by their own man Sanchez has sent and then fucking Merryweather's there, too. This is not fucking happening. And so he does the only thing he's always been good at.

"We all know you Agency boys are balls deep in a plot to drive up your fundings by any means necessary", he shouldn't have said that. Warren trusted him with that info, even showed him the intel. He sees something moving behind Agent ULP's eyes, it's fear. He's got him.

Suddendly there's a loud pop and then pain shooting through his left leg. "Same goddamn leg", he blurts out as hell starts to break loose around him. Sanchez blood sprays the concrete in a bright red as the bullet pierces his skull. Steve wishes it would've been Michael instead.

He runs until he can't take the pain no more, then cowers on the ground, slowly robbing behind cover, as Dave and Michael pick up the gun fight. He's bleeding heavily, red liquid rushing out of the wound and drenching his cargos. It seems like the bullet is stuck and maybe has wounded some arteries. He figures that he probably hasn't that much time left. He strips himself out of his shirt and wraps it around his leg, adding pressure on his thigh, just above the bullet wound.

He thinks about Warren. Oh dear God, don't let me die today.

_

"What did you do?", it's Warren, he's sitting at Steve's kitchen table.

"Did you let yourself in, pretty boy?"

"What happend?", he sounds furious now, gets up and his eyes bore into Steve's. He's dizzy with it, with what Warren's gaze tells him, let's him know without saying a word.

"Nothing, it's nothing."

"You got shot!"

"Yeah, the same leg."

"That's - you're-"

Steve wraps his arms around him and presses him close and Warren releases a surprised noise. "I'm still here", he says and it's more for and to himself, than for Warren but the other doesn't seem to care, burying his face in Steve's neck.

The world's a little brighter and warmer and Steve doesn't feel that threatend anymore. He has to make a phone call, but that can wait a few more minutes.

_

He has a team on the way to the plant, it will be alright. They'll be gone for good, just another casualty. He sighs, takes a deep breath and throws the script on the seat across from him.

"Are the cameras rolling? Yes? How do I look, the chin's sharp?"

Warren looks at him, eyes still a little hazy from his last orgasm and Steve turns his head and looks at him. He's so pretty and Steve's heart misses a beat.

"I-", his voice breaks and Warren blinks.

"Yeah?"

"I hate you."

Warren laughs. It's deep and dripping with amusement, running down Steve's body like hot honey. He rolls himself over, on top of Warren, who's still laughing deep in his chest, burying a hand in Steve's blond hair.

"No. No, you don't."

They look at each other and their gazes turn soft. "Sometimes I do", Steve's voice is quiet, honesty seeping through his words, "But sometimes I-, I would burn the world down to protect you."

Warren's hand caresses his neck. "My life would be so very boring without you, Haines. It nearly makes me forget that I just really want to skin you alive, sometimes."

It's not really an I love you - I love you too, but it's as close as they can get without hurting their egos. The kiss is soft and sweet and a promise.

"Hi, I'm Steve Haines. I've tracked down killers, attacked incompetence and taken down terrorist cells, and tonight -"

The gunshot rips through the night and the camera man throws himself back, lands unpleasently on his back.

"My god! The guy! What's-his-name! Fuck, shit, they shot him!", he stares down at the dead man, blood rushing out of the bullet wound in the back of his head. The impact had torn some skin and skull apart and there's a nasty opening, his brain leaks out of it. The camera man vomits out of the gondola as sirens erupt in the night.

_

Warren has his feet up on the coffee table, mindlessly zapping through the programs. It's all shallow and boring and he hopes that Steve will be home soon. Home.

His stomach does a funny little flip and Warren smiles to himself, wraps the blanket around him tighter. It smells of him, his perfume. He closes his eyes and he can practically feel Steve's hand creeping around his neck, resting on his shoulder, heavy and warm. It's always like that, when he comes in on Warren sitting on the sofa. He will lean down and place a feather light kiss on the back of his head, maybe rest his nose there for a moment, taking the other man's scent in for a few seconds, before getting up again and ranting about Norton or another colleague. A fuzzy warmth spreads in his stomach and Warren sighs. A sudden noise interrupts his daydreaming and he lazily opens an eye at the TV. It's a Weazle Broadcast.

"We interrupt our nightly program for an important message. We just recieved notice that FIB Special Agent Steve Haines has been shot on duty at the Del Pierro Pier. Agent Haines died a hero, doing what he loved, which was presenting a TV show. He helped combine the chaos of anti-terrorism and the mindlessness of network television into one highly successful career. Mr. Haines, who was not married, leaves behind his mother."

The world goes silent.

_

He's not moving. Has not in hours, maybe it's even a full day at this point. He has not eaten, has not showered, has not moved at all.

Warren feels like a dead man. The thought makes a bitter laugh splutter over his lips and then has him break out in tears immediately after.

It's a scary thought that people continue to live their lives, acknowledging that an agent passed away last night but they are now out and about, at their jobs, maybe seeing friends or family. A lover, even. They are busy living their life's while Warren's just dissolved in a matter of seconds.

It's a scary thought being ripped off of something so dear so abruptly, it's scary how it ripped a hole it Warren's chest that is now filled with a black, emotionless but equally painful void that nags, tears and claws at him.

It's a scary thought that he's alone again.

His body, his throat gives in and he's rolling on his side, screaming and tearing at the blanket, fingers grabbing at the fabric, as his knuckles turn white. He's screaming and screaming and screaming until his throat is sore and his eyes burn and the only noises that leave his mouth are little pathetic whines of exhaustion and the gasping for air. The pain in his chest takes his breath away, chokes him and makes him want to curl up, bore a knife into it, twist and turn it until it goes away. He feels like vomiting.

_

It's Sunday. It's been a little over 30 hours. Warren is tired, but everytime he tries to close his eyes he sees him, hears his laughter ring in his ears. It hurts. It hurts so much, he has hardly any words left to describe the agony he is going through.

His head hurts too, so does his throat and his stomach, with the constant throwing up and the lack of hydration. But he can't bring himself to get up, to grab a glass of water and drown some pain killers and go to bed. His legs are heavy and he just doesn't have the energy.

Warren feels like dying but he's also so painfully alive.

_

He's wide awake. He'll need to find a solution for how he's going to be able to go to work tomorrow.

But for now he's wrapping himself in Steve's blanket, the one he sleeps in when he's been over, inhaling the fading scent.

_

"Agent 14?"

His eyes are red, bloodshot and his fingers are trembling, seconds away from shaking. He had powder this morning to just make it somehow and it's slowly wearing off. He hasn't been on coke since college and it sent him on a murder high, blood pumping like a race horse only to now let him dive head-first into a killer hole.

It's been three days since Steve left his life both, quiet and eardrum-tearing loudly, and it feels like a nightmare, eternal and burning hot. He's empty inside but there's also just so much pain, it feels like he's breaking into pieces. His stomach clenches and his heartbeat is heavy, vibrates thickly in his chest and he just wants to die, too.

"Mrs. Rackham", his voice is rough, it doesn't bother to hide that Warren had been crying and screaming his lungs out every night since Steve's brain had been splattered onto the ferris wheel.

"I need to talk to you."

This is about Avon and Clifford, he's sure. His hand shakes and coffee spills on his desk. He curses under his breath and reaches for a tissue but Mrs. Rackham grabs his hand with force. They look at each other. Warren blinks.

"You are not in a good condition. I don't need explanations or lies, 14. I want to offer you my sincere condolences on your loss, Mister Jones. "

Warren takes a deep breath but he can't keep his eyes from tearing up.

"Take the week off, Agent", as he's not moving, shocked and dumbfounded, she starts to pick his jacket up, "Go now, I'll cover you up."

He gets on his feet, knees weak and body shaking, takes his jacket from her hands.

"Thank you, Phoenicia", he means it.

She looks at him. "I'm sorry", and she means it, too, "The IAA could've done some-"

"Don't."

She nods sharply and then looks at him once more, eyes piercing.

"I lost my husband in service as well, Iraq in 2004."

And then they're hugging, Warren is burrying his face into her neck and wailing like a little child.

_

It's a weird feeling and it fucks with his head as his gaze falls on the door of his apartment. He could've sworn that he heard the key turning the lock. He stares and stares and stares and it feels like his brain is readying for Steve to come through the door anytime.

He doesn't.

_

It's midnight and he had five more moments like the door-lock one earlier. He feels like he may go insane.

Warren fumbles for his phone on the nightstand and opens up Eyefind, types his thoughts into the searchbar.

At the end of his research he's left with two possibilities: it's either a stage of grief (denial they call it - dying's more fitting, Warren thinks) or the sideeffects of the coke slowly wearing off.

_

It's raining. It's like the heavens above are pissing down on him. Warren's crying while the rain relentlessly pounds on his umbrella.

He's standing a few meters away from the funeral party. Steve's mother bails her eyes out and he would like to go over to her and wrap her im his arms but he would just be a stranger to her.

There's a saxophonist in front of the cementry. He's playing Sinatra's Summer Wind, sounding sad but warm nonetheless. Steve's family probably thinks of that as a weird coincidence but Warren has spent two full nights finding the man again, who has played down at Steve's street corner all those months ago. It was difficult and time consuming, but not impossible.

There's a new wave of tears making their way out of Warren's eyes and he has to clasp a hand on his mouth to stop the painful noises from making their way into the soft air of spring. He feels like he's breaking apart, torn into two pieces.

He cries and cries and cries until the funeral party is long gone any the sun sets. The saxophonist is still playing.

_

When Warren comes home the sun's gone for some while and it's dark out. There's a light burning in his kitchen. For a moment, just a split second, it feels like Steve will swing around the corner. But he doesn't.

He walks into the kitchen to find a bouquet of white lillies sitting on the countertop. He checks the card attached to them.

Sorry about your loss.

He doesn't recognize the handwriting, it looks like it could've been written by someone who's older than Warren, male maybe, but his last Hand Writing and Letter Indentification Course was two years ago. He figures his cleaner, a nice elderly lady, had put them there. He thinks about her seeing the bouquet on the door step and carefully carrying them inside, placing them in the only vase Warren has at home. It makes him both sad and glad, glad that at least she's still around.

_

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.

14 would've liked to ask Robert Frost if he was just stupid or naive or both.

_

Two days later he's so angry at the world that he grabs the vase and throws it across the room, where it collides with the wall and breaks in a thousand little pieces.

_

The anger keeps on coming, rage that boils hot and white in his stomach, makes him lash out at colleagues and scream his lungs out, throwing things and fits like it's nothing.

He finds himself beating into walls and furniture until his knuckles bleed.

Mrs. Rackham puts him onto another break, Temporarily Suspended Until Further Notice the record reads.

_

Warren's awake, restless but exhausted, again. It's three in the morning. His head hurts, his bones hurts, his whole body feels heavy.

"I should've stopped you from going", he whispers into the night and his mind conjurs up Steve's voice, consoling him.

"No, really. I should have been more persistent. If you just would've stayed with me that night."

Steve answers him again, but it sounds washed out in Warren's ear.

Oh, please don't let me forget his voice.

_

He's not moving again. Hasn't done so in two days.

Mrs. Rackham continues to call him, but he won't pick up. He can't handle her, can't handle her sorrow and her advices. He doesn't want to hear it. She would probably also bug him about not showing up for work again and that's just something he really doesn't want to hear right now.

It's phone rings again and he picks it up to throw it against the wall with all the force he can possibly muster, so it would just shut up, but it's not Phoenicia calling this time. It's Lester.

"14? This is Crest." He doesn't sound good. Warren doesn't know what to say.

"I am, ehrm, calling to see how you're doing?" Odd. He can't bring himself to say anything back. "You know I, err, saw you didn't clock in to work for a few days? Are you doing, ehrm, well?"

"Yeah", it sounds as broken as he feels. There's an uncomfortable silence on the other end of the line for a few seconds, maybe even for a full minute. He hears Lester's inhaler.

"I, well I err heard about Haines."

It should send him into a rage, a fit, maybe even crying manically but there's just nothing. Just the casual numbness that hangs above him like thick clouds these days.

"Yeah, a shame, isn't it?"

There's coughing, then deep breaths being taken. "You're not doing too well, Crest?"

"Can we meet up, 14? I", another cough, "I know a place."

_

The sun's out and it burns in Warren's eyes, on his skin, even though he's wearing both, a jacket and sunglasses. Crest sits across from him at the table, not touching his iced coffee. So isn't Warren, he is neither thirsty nor hungry.

They are at a bean machine on Vinewood Boulevard. It's one of the stores Steve used to buy his coffee at. There should be stining pain at the thought but there's just sadness, blackness wandering through Warren's mind.

"You don't look too good", Crest says.

"You neither", Warren says and to mask the shaking of his voice he takes a sip from the coffee. It tastes like nothing, like liquid paper.

"I don't feel to good either. But you also don't, so what's the matter, 14."

Warren just shrugs. Lester looks at him, a steady and stern gaze, as if he's looking for answers in Warren's eyes, in his fucking soul.

"What are we doing here?"

"Just looking after a, err, friend."

"We're not friends, Crest."

"Associates then, maybe?", the look on his face is a little sad, offended. Warren can't bring himself to care.

"Yeah, whatever."

"Any lead, yet?"

Warren lifts his eyebrows in suprise. "A lead?"

"Yeah, you know", Crest clears his throat and leans in a little, "Who did it, you know."

Maybe Warren's mind is playing tricks on him again, but Crest looks a little concerned.

"No, none. Nothing."

Crest nods and leans back. Lester doesn't offer his help, so Warren decides that he then won't ask for it. Still confused and mouth already opened he wants to know why, as Lester's lungs throw a fit, his body cramping and being thrown forward and then back again by his dry coughs. Warren's up on his feet in a matter of seconds, his heartbeat picking up a fast rate he hasn't feeled in weeks, adrenaline rushing through his veins. He grabs Lester by his shoulders and holds him up, while he coughs coughs coughs. At the end of it there's blood on his chin.

"You're not planing on dying as well, are you?"

The look Lester shoots him, slumped in his chair with other guests on the terrace staring at them in shock, makes Warren's skin crawl.

_

He hasn't been at an attorney's office ever. It's a weird experience.

The people are nice and calm and so is Mister Allan, who has Steve's testament laying in front of him.

"So, Mister Jones, shall we get started then?"

Warren nods. It still confuses him. He wonders what Steve's mother thought, when she heard that she won't inherit everything. Warren doesn't want money, money won't replace anything.

He must've said that out loud, because Allan chuckles.

"Mister Haines hasn't left you money. No need to worry, Mister Jones."

He leaves the office with a black box tucked safely under his arm. He doesn't open it, not in the office, not on the way out in the elevator, not at home. He tucks it away in his closet, deep down where he keeps a ski puffer, that he never wears anyways.

_

He finds himself talking to Steve, or what his mind conjurs up of his memories, more often. It helps him, or so he hopes.

He misses him and the soliloquy is a good substitute, at least for now.

_

They are at a clinic just above the hills and behind the Vinewood sign, far away from the city, the air is dry and crisp nonetheless. Lester sits in a wicker chair, wrapped in a blanket and stares at the fountain in the middle the perfectly trimmed meadow. Warren sits next to him, craving a cigarette, but not lighting one. He'll have to wait a couple more minutes, until the nurse will bring Lester back into the clinic.

"Thank you for stopping by", Crest means it.

"Am I the only one?"

"No, oh no. There's, ehrm, Franklin's coming over too, once or twice a week."

He looks better, rested. Warren doesn't know who Franklin is, but he nods politely anyways.

"That's nice."

"Yeah, he's a good kid." A crook then.

"Are they treating you well up here?"

"It's fine, I- argh, fuck it. The dinner's horrible but the doctor's are good enough. Won't make a difference anyways."

"That's what they're saying then?", Warren looks into the setting sun. From up here Los Santos seems peaceful, quiet, a big, glorious and shining city. It's a hell hole full of shit, Warren knows that now, but he can't leave. Not yet.

"Yeah. No. They don't say it, but they mean it. It's in their eyes." Lester takes a sip of his water.

"Don't say that, Crest."

Lester looks at him. He doesn't say it, but the look on his face says it all. You've been through enough, I won't tell you that I'm dying soon.

"Yeah, well, it was nice seeing you. Getting better and such", Warren gets up, the wicker creaking, his phone in hand and sunglasses back on. They look at each other for a long, quiet moment and then Warren nods, turns around to leave. A surprisingly strong hand grabs his arm.

"I have a project, it's happening right now, Warren."

He stops in his tracks. From somewhere behind the fountain laughter sweeps up the hill. There's an old lady on the meadow with their grandchildren and they're playing ball. She has a bandage around her head.

"A project?", Warren doesn't turn around.

"Yeah, I'd like you to take over. You need something to do."

"I still have a job, Crest."

"That reminds you of him." It's like a kick into his guts and there's sudden rage boiling inside of him, but there's also something else. A certain calmness, that wraps itself around his shoulders like a white blanket. T feels a lot like clarity.

"That it does, yeah."

"I'll have Paige bring you the details."

"Sure. Good night, Crest."

He walks over the little path out of bark mulch, that is overgrown by trees, back to his car. He feels oddly content.

_

See, life does goes on. It's a weird thought that strikes him out of nowhere. He's afraid of forgetting everything that was, since forgetting always seemed easy. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next week but who knows what will be in a year? Maybe he'll catch himself sooner or later, not thinking about Steve for a few weeks, months, years.

He's afraid of that, sincerely so.

_

The air in the bunker is cold and damp. Some of his people are moving out the old equipment. He doesn't know Crest's newest associate, it's most likely no one from the Hertz/Clifford-Incident.

I'm sorry I called him a buffoon, if I had only known back then.

He thinks of Phoenicia's concerned face and suddendly he finds himself smiling.

"Oh, he was a buffoon, you weren't wrong, Ma'am", he says to himself and hears a quiet chuckle errupting from his chest. There's sadness floading him, but it's warm and sweet and feels like an old friend.

There's no time for tears as the door of the bunker suddendly beeps loudly, informing him of a visitor arriving.

_

"So, you're getting along, then?", Crest sounds better. Warren lets go a breath, he doesn't even know he held in the first place.

"Yeah. They are quiet, but I appreciate the effort they are putting into it."

"I told you, they're are reliable."

"So you did."

There's a long pause, silence.

"Listen, Crest. I gotta go, speak to you soon."

As he hangs up, he's confronted with his lie, standing alone in his quiet living room.

_

The next time Lester invites him over, he says yes. He lives in a bigger, cleaner house now and Warren can only guess, that he was indeed involved in the robbery at the Casino his team is trying to solve right now. He'll offer them a false trace. Maybe they'll pick that one up.

"Georgina's not home, you just missed her", Lester wobbles down the stairs to the living room, crutch in hand.

"Who?"

"Georgina, he lives with her", Warren looks up, from where he is securing Lester's arm with his own hand and looks into the face of a young man. He looks younger than himself and wears expensive street style clothing.

"Who are you?"

"That's Franklin, Warren. Franklin, that's the friend I've been telling you about."

"Pleasure", Warren's voice still on the edge, while the man's handshake is firm.

"You lost your man, dog? Lest been telling me."

"I did, eight months ago."

There's something moving behind Franklin's face but he's quick to cover it up. Warren wonders: what and why.

"Shame man, I'm sorry to hear that, homie. My girl left me, too."

"He didn't leave me. He died."

Franklin looks at Lester, confused and a little reproachful, too. Then, it seems to click, as Franklin looks at him again. He now looks a little terrified, actually.

"Franklin was just leaving anways, weren't you?", Crest sits down in a beige armchair. Warren notices that he has new glasses.

"Yeah, shit. I mean of course, I was on my way out. Nice meeting you man, I hope you're, you know, doing better soon. See you around."

"Thank you", Warren recieves an awkward pat on his shoulder and then Franklin's steps distance themselves, until the front door falls shut.

_

He didn't leave me. He died.

His own words echo in his skull but they don't throw him into a manic tantrum, he's not crying, not screaming. He's oddly calm.

Is this how it feels, when one comes to terms with something, he wonders. Maybe, it is.

He died.

That he did and it must've been fucking ugly. Blood and soupy brain everywhere. Warren wishes he could've held him during these moments, when the body is slowling shutting down, when something mysterious, unknown happens to the human consciousness.

He died.

And Warren had missed him every single day since then. He leans himself against the closed bedroom door of his apartment and then makes his way to his closet.

The box is still where he has left it.

He died. He died. He died.

"I miss you, Steve", he whispers into the silence of his flat and then he smiles, it's small and sad, and he sinks onto the ground, box clutched in his hands, "Fuck, I wish you were still here."

There's silence but Warren likes to think that something of Steve's mind, his soul is still left on this earth, stayed with him. It's a nice thought, even if it's unrealistic. It's still consoling.

Steve's gone for good, but just because his body doesn't walk the dirty streets of LS anymore doesn't mean that he left Warren's life completely - he still existed, left his footprints behind. And Warren's ready, willing even, to take carefully aligned pictures of them and hang them on his wall. He's ready to look at them every day that may come and maybe he'll stop crying at some point. Or maybe he won't. He'll be fine.

It's an odd feeling. His life still feels empty, incomplete since Steve passed and so does Warren. He feels empty, shallow and sad, but it will pass and he will take the time. It doesn't mean forgetting him, quite the contrary maybe.

He flips the lid, puts it aside carefully with a quiet thump on the carpet below. He takes a look inside and bursts out laughing.

_

"Did he leave you something?", he hasn't seen her in years, since college. She used to be his flat mate.

"Yeah", he smiles to himself.

"What is it?", she looks moved and Warren would love to tell her, but he can't. He really can't. Not all of it, anyways.

"A letter."

"A letter?"

"Yeah, a fucking love letter."

"Warren! Don't say that! It's very heartwarming!"

It's been a year. He still misses him. "He wasn't the type for it, that's all."

He thinks of the envelope he keeps in his safe. It's a document, FIB header and logo, completely official.

Reference: Counter Espionage, Crimes Against National Safety, A Report By Steve Haines to be handed to Misses Phoenicia Rackham In Relation "To Agent 14", Mister Warren Jones

"Oh, was he not, you know, a little a romantic?"

"No, it must've taken a lot for him to write a love letter." It was really sweet and it went well with the attempt to put Warren in a High Security Penitentiary.

"Really?", she looks a little concerned, but she doesn't get Steve, their relationship as it was, like Warren does.

He looks up from his coffee cup and lights a cigarette. He hasn't had a smoke in a long time but at least he stopped with the cocaine.

"Yeah. Sometimes", there's a smile tugging at his lips, "Sometimes I think he would've rather seen me locked away."

[dustofbrokenheart]

The Covenant: Top Anon

Pogue Parry x Reader

Word Count: 2,288

Summary: You have a loyal follower who comments on every post under your food blog. Just who is your favorite follower and why is the new grocery boy kinda cute too?

It was a new year and the start of a new you. Well, that is, a you who was trying new things.

In the past, you always made resolutions, but that spirit ran out before the month of January was even done. But after the particularly rough time of the past year, you swore that this time would be different, that you would make a serious effort to do something new.

It was that determination that led your current situation—your kitchen countertops were covered with ingredients and cooking utensils, your cell phone resting on a near by tripod for filming purposes.

The goal for this year was to try running a blog, and since you were a bit of a foodie, it made a lot of sense to center the blog around cooking and food. The idea came to you quickly; the hard part was deciding on a name, which took a while.

Eventually, you settled on The Foodiest. Naming was not one of your strong suits, but it was enough to get the point clearly across to potential viewers.

Choosing the layout design was on the same level of easy as deciding and didn’t take more than a day or two to implement on your site. Thank goodness for the existence of pre-made layout templates that saved you the effort of having to code everything yourself.  

With of the work on that end finished, the day had finally come for you to actually cook something to post about. Seeing as how January was a cold, winter month, you chose to make mashed sweet potatoes. Not only was it one of your favorite winter side dishes, it wasn’t hard to make either, giving you the confidence that even if your writing was lackluster, at least the food would look good.

Most of the blogs you were familiar with used a combination of text and photos for readers to follow along with, but you were going to try video in place of images. You sometimes struggled to copy based on what was shown in the photo, especially when you first started cooking, so you hoped video would make it easier on budding chefs who came across your content.

Luckily, the video would be sped up and lapsed for the final post to spare people from having to watch the monotonous parts in full length.

Hands on your hips, you surveyed everything one last time to make sure it was all ready. With a satisfied nod you reached forward to tap the large, red record button on the phone.  

You debated whether or not to talk while filming but decided against it. You were nervous enough posting to the blog without having the added stress of talking.

Everything happened in its regular order: you started by peeling and chopping the potatoes, a basic step, but you took your time doing it, paranoid as ever that you would cut yourself with the knife. Next you boiled the bright orange chunks in a pot of water; then put them in a mixing bowl once they were cooked. And finally used an electric mixer to blend it all nice and smooth, adding in milk, brown sugar, and cinnamon.  

Swiping your pointer finger through the finished product, you hummed with delight at the delicious, sweet taste. You pulled out a presentable bowl from the cupboard and spooned some orange fluff into it for the final reveal. Reaching blindly towards the far end of the counter you grabbed a bag of pecans to top off the mashed sweet potatoes. You scrutinized it and added more pecans for good measure.

Doing something in front of a camera was very different than doing the same thing on a normal day. Tension leeched out of your shoulders and you exhaled loudly with your head leaned back. A sense of pride warmed your chest, especially as you returned your gaze to the picturesque bowl. It looked great and tasted even better.

There was a large portion of leftovers because the recipes you used were collected from family and meant to feed small armies of people. You did your best to eat what you could and made plans sharing the rest with friends and coworkers later.

A few days after you published the post, you decided to check the stats on your account dashboard to see what the public response to it was, if there was any at all. Google analytics was useful for counting the total number of views it received while the blog site itself tracked the likes and… a comment?

Initial shock gave way to a bolt of excitement that had your fingers tingling with energy. You clicked to read it, wondering what it may say. Fingers crossed it was something good, whether it came in the form of a compliment or some constructive criticism.

Anonymous: wow good job

The chair creaked as you sat back slowly. You didn’t know how to read that, there wasn’t a whole lot to go on. Wow good job, said sarcastically? Wow good job, said excitedly? It didn’t help that the commenter didn’t believe in using punctuation either. And since it was submitted anonymously, there was no easy way to track down who sent it.

But maybe you were being too paranoid about it. You decided to take it as a compliment and cracked your fingers before firing off a response.

Foodiest: Thanks anon! I had a lot of fun with this dish. Hope you tune in for the next one :)

Anonymous never followed up with that particular exchange but they commented on every post without fail for the next two months.

Anonymous: nevr had white chili before it was good

Anonymous: the stuffed pepper were good

Anonymous: good call with the shrimp

Of course, all of the messages were sent as anonymous, so there was no 100% guarantee that it was the same person, but your gut feeling told you that it was. Who else had no respect for grammar rules and religiously used ‘good’ as their only descriptor?

You grew to expect, and enjoy, the weekly comment left by anon and made sure to leave a nice response in return. It was hard not to feel a connection to someone who took the time to try your recipes and leave a nice message. If only you could figure out who it was or at least have a name for them besides anonymous.

Foodiest: I’m glad you liked the recipe! My gramma swore by mayo when making grilled cheese. Thanks for always liking my stuff, if you ever want to talk more feel free to message me!

There. Maybe that would make them feel comfortable to give you their name you thought as you powered down your laptop for the night.

You spent the next couple of days leading up to the new post planning on what recipe to cook. Yep. Definitely not hoping for more information about anon.

For this newest post you decided to make some Indian curry, one of your favorites. Even long after you finished cooking, taping, and cleaning, the potent scent of spices was still heavy in the air, like aromatic nirvana that had your mouth watering even with a full stomach.

You tried your best not to refresh the post every few minutes to see if anon commented but it was tough. It turned out that you didn’t have to wait long as they left a comment within twenty minutes.

Anonymous: havent cooked this yet but looks good. Never really had indian before so have to go buy the stufff first – po

Anon finally gave up a name! You let out a happy noise and read it again. Po… short and to the point, just like all of the previous responses had led you to think about them. There was no time to waste, you hurried to write back, initial typos all over the place as the words out-paced your fingers.

Foodiest: Hi Po! It’s nice to have a name to put with your words. I would recommend going to an Asian Market for the spices, they’re more likely to carry them. Let me know how it goes for you :)

Since that conversation, Po and you chatted frequently about the weekly recipe choice, whether or not it looked good and if Po had plans to make it themselves, which they often did. Po seemed to like all types of food; vegetarian, meats, drinks, desserts, even ethnic dishes from places as far off as Bolivia and Morocco.

And the longer you two talked, the more frequent the messaging became. Whereas in the beginning Po would only submit a compliment that you would follow up with a ‘thank you’, it had turned into lengthy back and forths that took up a majority of the comment section for each post. More followers joined as the months went by and you hoped that they weren’t intimidated by your blatant favoritism but it was just so easy to talk with Po. If you were being honest with yourself though, it wasn’t only that it was easy… you genuinely liked talking to them.

Every time you made a new post it was difficult to not refresh the page every few minutes to see if they had left a message. And when they did, it was like a shot of electricity straight into the system where your heart would jolt and your face would flood with heat. You were hesitant to say it was a crush given that you didn’t know what they actually looked like and the computer screen barrier made it so you were content to define it as friendship.

Pushing those thoughts aside, you grabbed your wallet and keys while putting on shoes so you could make a quick run to the store. You had big plans to make some buffalo chicken wings for the blog this week and you needed to stop by the store to pick up some ingredients that you didn’t have, namely Frank’s Original Red for the buffalo sauce and blue cheese for the dip. Being an adult and responsible for your own grocery shopping was a chore at times. 

Luckily, Winter had thawed out into Spring so there was no need for you to warm up or car or scrape your windows. You just hopped in and drove the four blocks it took to get to the store. The plan was to cross the stuff for the wings off of your list first and then browse around for some good snacks to tide you over for the next week or so. Things were going according to plan until you saw him.

A tall boy wearing an employee apron stood in front of the cracker section, his jaw line and soft looking long hair catching your eye. Then he reached up to the tallest shelf to restock some boxes his arms flexing slightly to show off his heavy biceps and his shirt rode up, exposing deep cut ridges in his lower abdomen. To put it simply, you were starstruck.

He finished with the boxes he had in-hand and went to grab more from the cart at his side when you noticed your blatant ogling. Rather than confront you about it he merely smiled and moved out of the way so that you could get to the brand that you wanted. Choking from embarrassment, you kept your head down and threw a box of Goldfish into your shopping cart, speeding to get out of the aisle and his presence.

The store was a small local business and you frequented enough to know most of the workers there but you didn’t recognize this one, meaning that he must be new. What a way to make a first impression on him. Clearly your constitution was no match for his rugged, good looks. Then he was polite enough not to comment on you objectifying him which somehow made you feel even worse about it.

You decided to end the shopping trip almost immediately knowing that you were too spooked to continue shopping lest you run into him again.

You rolled the shopping cart into an open check-out lane and started putting your things on the conveyor for the cashier to scan. It just so happened that you knew the cashier—she was a middle-aged lady who’d been at the store for nearly two years. “Hi, Y/N. Find everything you needed?”

“Hey, Eva. Yes, I did.” You tried to steady yourself. Eva had a notoriously sharp eye and wouldn’t hesitate to question you if you looked off.

She left you alone today, engaging in normal chit chat, until she had trouble scanning the bottle of Frank’s hot sauce. Eva frowned when it didn’t want to scan and tried again but the bottle slipped from her hands and the neck of it shattered. Eva cursed and huffed, hurrying to throw the bottle into the trash before more leaked onto the register.

“I am so sorry, hun! I’ll get you another.”

“It was an accident,” you assured. “I can get it myself—"

“Not a problem,” she assured you with a wink. She pulled a walkie from her hip and spoke into it. “Hey, bring me a bottle of Frank’s Original Red Hot Sauce. Quick.”

You barely had time to don your awkward smile as she talked about how her neighbor’s dog kept pooping in her yard when the guy from the cracker aisle walked up behind Eva and handed a bottle of hot sauce to her. She took it and patted his back to get him to move forward.

“Thanks, hun. Y/N this is the new grocery boy—”

“Pogue,” he interrupted. “My name is Pogue.”

_______________

Another fic where they know each other but don’t know that they do. This time featuring Pogue and his fandom accepted interest in food. I picture him to have bad messaging skills — his fingers struggle with those tiny phone buttons. 

[awed-frog]

Hello! I see that people are asking you about diets right now. I started living independently fairy recently, and I still haven't figured out an ideal way of feeding myself. Not sure if my autism plays a role here, or if it's just me being inexperienced, but would you maybe happen to have any advice for NT people regarding food? Like how I can get myself to eat enough fruits + vegetables and how I can keep from eating the same two dishes for the rest of my life (I WILL, if I don't pay attention)

Hi, thanks for the message! I’d say first of all take it easy, planning your meals + groceries is harder than people think, especially in the beginning. Just remember not to buy too much (produce will go bad, stuff like flour will develop flies) and take it easy. I can suggest a few things:

1) If you can, get good cooking appliances, especially a rice cooker or multicooker or Instant Pot, depending on where you live and what’s available. A rice cooker is a good option because they’re generally cheap, but most of them can only handle white rice, which isn’t the most nutritious meal. I finally got myself a multicooker two years ago and I’m really happy. You may have to experiment a bit in the beginning, but it halves the time you spend in the kitchen, can reheat food, and also makes things like bread and yogurt.

2) If you have a freezer, use the hell out of it. The best option for varying your meals is to always cook twice the portion and freeze half. If you don’t have a big freezer, remember that most vegan meals will also keep fairly well in the fridge for a couple of days, so you could eat your delicious meal both on Thursday night and for lunch on Saturday, which is Not Bad. You can also look up ways to freeze vegetables and fruits - I started keeping batches readily available to add to soups, stir-frys, and fruit purees/smoothies.

3) Be realistic. Like, unless you’re a Michelin cook, you’ll need some time to learn a new or complicated recipe, so start trying on a Saturday and give yourself a few tries. And if you get home really late, you probably won’t want to spend two hours in the kitchen, so either prep your meals beforehand (you can find tons of good advice online), or keep some ingredients for a quick meal (like a pesto sauce or ready-made dips).

4) Pantry, pantry, pantry. Most cookbooks will have a pantry list in the first pages, and those are the first things you need to buy. Remember that if you keep the same old recipe but swap out ingredients, you’ll magically have different dishes and you’ll get a lot of nutritional benefits because you’re eating different stuff! For instance, for a quick meal you can make hummus but use borlotti beans instead of chickpeas, or peanut butter instead of tahini. Why not? God is not watching. 

5) Change up your greens. For your produce: if you live on your own, don’t buy too much, and choose variety instead. For instance: weekly, only buy two kinds of fruits (one perishable you’ll eat first, like stone fruits or berries, and one that’ll last longer, like bananas, apples or pears) and three kinds of vegetables (one cruciferous: cauliflower or broccoli, for instance; one root: turnips or carrots or sweet potatoes; and one leafy green: spinach, Swiss chards, kale and so on), plus mushrooms (a nutritional godsend and very yummy) + onions and garlic. Add whatever salad material is in season (summer or winter greens, zucchini, beets, avocado) and you’re basically all set. By thinking in terms of categories instead of specific foods, you’ll ensure variety without too much effort.

6) Stick to easy cooking. As for meals: you don’t actually need a lot of fancy recipes. Find two or three things you like to cook, and repeat them twice or three times a week. By alternating your lunches and dinners, and swapping out ingredients a bit (one evening rice, the other barley, for instance; one lunch roasted pumpkin, the next one roasted Brussel sprouts) you can cook on autopilot while still ensuring you’re getting your nutrients and don’t get bored.

7) Cheat. If you struggle to eat your veggies, there are tricks you can use. For instance, smoothies and soups are good ways to eat tons of stuff fairly easily. If you eat cheese, it will make anything taste good - although garlic has the same effect and zero bad fats. Nutritional yeast is also something most people love. Adding finely chopped veggies to a normal tomato pasta sauce is another way of hiding a few greens without much effort. You can find a lot of recipes for ‘hidden’ fruits and veggies by looking up parenting tips - and remember that the way you cook stuff also changes the flavour considerably, so if you don’t like steamed zucchini, try roasting them, or adding them to a stir-fry, a soufflé, a savoury bread and so on.

8) No rules apply. And finally, remember you’re an adult now, and if you decide that you want to try miso soup and fried rice for breakfast, or that Friday night is ice-cream-instead-of-dinner night, that’s perfectly alright. You don’t have to cook for yourself for every single meal, or stick to your own culture and family traditions for what is acceptable to do.

Also: a slightly unethical life tip. On b-ok, you’ll find most cookbooks that exist - for free. If you need ideas, you can look up a book on Amazon, see if it looks good, then download it on b-ok. I’d suggest trying three or four recipes and if you like them - and can afford it - buying the real book to support the author. I sometimes do this because you can’t always tell at a glance if a cookbook is what you’re looking for or not, so this makes it easier to decide what to buy.

Good luck and happy cooking!

[snowdice]

Gaps in His Files (Part 6) [Relabeled; Refiled Series]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Logan/Patton

Characters:

Main: Logan, Patton

Appear: Remy, Virgil (but only in the epilogue)

Summary:

Logan Berry has learned many things the last 10 years: a lot of math and physics, a bit of humility, and how to be a hero being just a few. Through his education, his experience teaching, and his exploits as the superhero Bluebird, he’s changed in a lot of small and large ways. He has recorded these changes in well-organized documents and files. He’s even had to create two new file designations: a red one for files about his moonlighting at Bluebird, and a light blue one dedicated to his boyfriend, Patton.

When Bluebird is targeted by a memory device and all of those 10 years of progress suddenly disappear, Patton Sanders and Logan’s extensive files are left as his only resource to get those memories back. But what is Patton supposed to do when there are clear gaps in his files? And what does he do when he is one of them?

This is set 25 years before Sometimes Labels Fail though it’s story is completely independent of it and it is not necessary to read that one first.

Notes: Superhero AU, memory loss, past child abuse, past child neglect, unhealthy ideas about ones place in relationships, emotional suppression, self-deprecating thoughts, medical procedures mentioned, very brief unhealthy views of sex

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5

There are some *cough* illusions to sexy times in this one. Also Patton is um... not doing okay.

Patton said words that he’d usually scold Logan for using when, after the warning, Logan’s eyes fluttered closed and he toppled forward. Patton caught him around the waist. He sighed. “I really wish I had your powers right about now,” he groaned while eyeing the distance to the couch.

Patton was not a weak man, but Logan was not a light one. He managed to maneuver him onto the couch, though his feet dragged the entire way. Patton situated him with a pillow behind his head and then went into the kitchen to grab the quite extensive first aid kit Logan kept there.

A quick check up told Patton that there was nothing physically wrong with Logan baring a few scrapes from the fight. Which meant Patton’s usefulness was quickly dwindling.

He resisted kissing the man even just on the forehead because that would be bad and wrong when he didn’t know who Patton was to him. Instead, he contented himself with gently stroking his hair back into place and covering him with a blanket from the closet in the front hallway.

After that was done, he went to the kitchen. He braced himself against Logan’s refrigerator door and took a few deep breaths. He guessed it was an almost breakdown in Logan’s kitchen kind of day. When he was eventually able to wrestle control over himself, he calmly opened the refrigerator. There were leftovers from two nights before when Patton had tried his best to teach Logan how to cook chicken enchiladas. Logan had resisted the venture by attempting to distract him by any means necessary (mostly kissing and wandering hands). It had half worked, but they’d still ended up with something edible even if the kitchen had been a complete mess.

He could have just warmed them up, but he needed something to do that he could pretend was useful. He found some frozen cooked chicken and started thawing it in the microwave while he chopped up some vegetables from the refrigerator. He stir-fired the vegetables with some soy sauce and garlic and added the chicken to the pan at the end. With no idea how long it would take for Logan to wake, he dished out a portion for himself and placed the rest in the fridge.

Eating did nothing to fill the growing hole of numbness inside him, but at least he wasn’t hungry.

If this was his own apartment, he would have just left his bowl on the table and the pan in the sink, but it wasn’t his apartment, so he washed and dried them both and put them back where they belonged.

Then there was nothing else to do.

…

He went back to the living room. Logan seemed to be sleeping easy and showed no signs of waking up anytime soon. Patton sat down on the chair next to the couch.

He must have fallen asleep because the next thing he knew, Patton’s eyes were closed, and he could feel a presence hanging over him. “What?” he asked without opening his eyes.

“We are in a sexual relationship,” Logan’s voice informed him.

Patton blinked open his eyes to look at him. He was leaning a bit too far into Patton’s space than would normally be polite, boxing him in against the back of the chair. “How…?”

“You have a key to my apartment, are comfortable enough in my kitchen to not only cook but to put everything back into place perfectly, and I have a hickey on my inner thigh.”

Patton’s face went red immediately. “Oh my god.”

“It is not a difficult deduction,” Logan continued. “I do have to compliment you. It is quite a large mark, assuming of course, that was the intention.”

Patton hid his face in his hands. “Oh my god.”

“It’s interesting. I have never had any romantic inclinations that I can remember. Is it just sexual?”

“What? No!” Patton sputtered.

He hummed, eyes scanning Patton like he was trying to figure out how he worked or perhaps more like he was trying to figure out what aspects of Patton would serve to intrigue a future version of himself enough to give him the time of day.

Patton swallowed. “Could you, um, give me a little space now, you think?”

“Why?” he asked with a frown. “I’d imagine you’d be used to such closeness considering we have had sex.”

“Yes, and at the moment, you are mentally a high school student.” Patton reached up and pushed at his forehead with two fingers. He stared at Patton for a few moments without moving and then slowly stood back up. Patton pushed himself into a less reclined position. “How’re you feeling?” he asked.

“My head still aches though not nearly as bad as it did before and, other than the small injuries I observed you have tended too, my body feels fine.”

“That’s good,” Patton said. “Let’s get you something to eat, and then I’ll check you over a bit more thoroughly to make sure there isn’t something I missed.”

Logan agreed and Patton dished him out a serving of the stir fry he’d made earlier and popped it into the microwave. Patton checked the clock: 4:30 am. He’d slept for a while. “Want coffee?” Patton asked. He nodded. Good. Patton was pretty sure he himself was going to need it. He started the coffee machine and Logan continued to watch him intently as though he’d never seen anyone make coffee before (not true as Logan had confessed to sneaking coffee behind his parent’s backs at the age of 12.)

“Could you tell me what you know about my current self?” Logan asked when Patton set the two mugs of coffee down.

“Sure, but do you want to be more specific? I know quite a bit about you.”

“You said I am 28 and I can afford an apartment. Do I have a job?”

“Sort of,” Patton replied. “You’re in your last year of your math PhD program and they pay you to teach a couple of low-level classes.”

Logan nodded. It likely wasn’t a surprise to him as even at 18 he’d been planning to attend graduate school in either math or physics.

“What am I teaching?”

“Calculus at the moment. Two discussion sections a week. You’ve taught up to discussion sections for first year graduate level classes, but you went for an easier assignment in your last semester to work on your dissertation.”

“Yes, yes, that all seems to plan,” he mumbled more to himself than to Patton while tapping his formulating-a-question pattern on the tabletop with his fingers.

“I seem to have a superhero persona. You are at least aware of said persona. Do you know how or why that alias came into existence?”

“Bluebird,” Patton provided. Logan’s nose twitched, and Patton laughed a bit. “No. You didn’t pick it, but it grew on you. You created the persona when you were 22 and just starting your graduate program. You were taking a physics course and noticed some strange behavior from your least favorite professor. It turned out he’d snapped under the pressure when one of his TAs missed a final exam the semester before and started to build a dooms day device. You were originally more of a vigilante actually, but when he almost killed a bunch of people, you quickly ended up a hero to the city. You just kinda… didn’t stop.”

Logan considered this for a moment. “That does make sense,” he admitted and then looked back at Patton. “Give me a brief overview of my foes,” he demanded and then tacked on, “please.”

Patton allowed himself to be grilled about Bluebird all through Logan’s breakfast from his enemies and allies to the public’s perception of him to details about the ‘special car.’

“You know a lot about me,” Logan said finally. “You answered all of my questions easily.”

“Any question you can come up with has likely already been deemed important enough information for you to share with me at some point.”

Logan scrutinized him with narrowed eyes. “How do I organize my files for Bluebird’s ventures.”

“Red files, hidden in your office, organized by different file types, and then by date.”

“What type of fabric is Bluebird’s costume?”

“A 60/40 bamboo/cotton blend because of ease of cleaning, breathability, and texture reasons.”

Logan paused and thought long and hard. “What’s Bluebird’s favorite color?”

Patton rolled his eyes fondly. “That’s just a question about you silly.” Logan continued to peer at him. “HEX number 3673b9.”

Logan looked surprised. His eyes scanned Patton up and down. “How many people know I’m a superhero?”

“Oh, uh, just me,” Patton said quietly. “At least that’s what you told me. Well, I think Remy may have guessed. He was in the surgery when you accidently said my name in mask, and he knows you and I pretty well now so…”

“The surgery?”

“Oh,” Patton said. “Right. I’m a doctor. I never remember to tell you that…” Logan raised an eyebrow. “That’s how I figured out who you were,” he explained. “I hadn’t told you I was a doctor and when you were going under anesthesia after being hurt helping the city, you called me by name and asked why I was a doctor. It wasn’t a hard guess from there.”

Logan nodded, his eyes sparking with understanding like they did when he finally figured out a concept he’d been struggling with for days. “A doctor,” he commented idly. “A useful companion to have.” Patton felt himself flinch, but Logan didn’t seem to notice having looked away and down at his coffee. Dismissing Patton as simply useful.

Well at least he was honest.

Patton bit back his emotions carefully. Actually, perhaps this was a good thing: the memory loss. Well, not a good thing, but maybe an opportunity. Maybe without Logan having years of knowledge about Patton and preconceived ideas about how he had to interact with him, Patton could figure out what on Earth was wrong with him.

Want to read more? Click below!

AO3 Part 7

[xaphrin]

I’m Worried About You

Part Two

When was the last time you ate?

Raven looked down at the text message and let go of a long sigh that practically rattled her lungs, before shoving the phone back into her coat pocket. The last thing she needed was Dick being a nosy asshole, and she knew exactly what that question meant. It meant he was trying to find a way to “fix” her problems - to make everything alright. She wasn’t even sure if she wanted to be alright, given the circumstances.

She didn’t know if she was capable of being alright.

She leaned back in her chair, tipping her head up to stare at the ceiling. Maybe this would be better if she didn’t feel anything at all. She was pretty sure not feeling was a thing she could still do. Taking a long sip of her coffee, Raven’s fingers feathered along the rough edges of her hair, now cropped to a pixie. It was an impulse decision, another one added to a long list of impulse decisions she had made in the last few months, which included (but not limited to) a tattoo, three piercings, dance lessons, art classes, and a kickboxing membership. Her list was getting out of control, and she needed to find a healthier outlet for her emotions, rather than just do whatever seemed like a good idea at the time.

“You can’t hide from me forever, you know.”

“I wasn’t hiding.” Sort of. She was more just hoping he wouldn’t find her.

Her shoulders sagged, and Raven looked up to see Dick falling into the seat across from her. Of course he would find her. She only went to maybe five places in the whole city. Raven wished her jaket had a hood so she could pull it up at glare at him like she used to. It would have been cathartic at least. Instead, she watched as he motioned the waitress over, ordering enough food to feed the whole restaurant. Raven pursed her lips, but chose not to fight with him. If he wanted to feed her, she wasn’t going to argue. When the waitress finally walked away, he cocked his head to the side and watched her.

“How was dance class?”

Raven lifted her eyebrows. “You’re not going to ask me about my hair?”

“Nope.” He popped the p and grinned at her. “It’s not my hair. Besides, I like it. It’s cute.”

Raven’s face fell. Well, that was almost insulting. She ran her fingers through her hair again and sighed, pushing the locks back and forth against her hand. She was still getting used to the sudden change. “Class was fine.” Shrugging, she met his stare. “I’m getting better. I can almost pirouette without landing on my ass.”

His smile turned soft, tugging to the side. “And art class?”

“Also fine.” Her eyes narrowed and she sat up, leaning over the table. “What is this about, Dick? It better not be an intervention. I’m fine.” She chewed on her lower lip, shifting. “I’m just trying to figure myself out… without… this.” She motioned to the length of her body and looked away. “I just… I need a little more time, I think.”  

“I’m worried about you.” Dick rubbed the back of his neck before looking back at her, sheepish.

He looked cautious, as if he didn’t know how to have a conversation that absolutely needed to be had. Even Raven knew it was a long time coming, she had nothing to do but sit around at the tower and watch the world go by without her. New recruits were being brought in and getting trained, and she knew it was only a matter of time before Raven lost her space there. Of course she was going to love her space there, she was a burden to them now, and had been for the eight months. No money, no powers, no magic - Raven was nothing but a lonely college-aged girl who went to history class and did impulsive things like buy a moped and chop her hair off.

“I’m alright.” She shrugged and took another drink of coffee, hoping Dick didn’t see her shaking. “I made the Dean’s List. So… there’s something.”

“Raven.”

She looked back at him, and could feel the sadness create cracks in her face. He could see through her in an instant, and he knew that she wasn’t the girl he met all those years ago. Before she’d been strong and independent, and she’d been able to help carry the team. But now? Now she relied too heavily on her friends, didn’t know how to help out, didn’t even have powers to try and support them. She just… existed, and it was taking almost too much effort to come to terms with that.

“I… I’m not alright.” Saying it made it real, and Raven pitched forward, burying her head in her hands. “I don’t know what to do with myself. I go to class, I come home. I can’t… I can’t help. I hear the alarms go off, and I know that there’s nothing I can do. I am always sitting by the computer, watching the specs, trying to make sure that all of you are safe. I can’t even run support for you, not like Cy does anyway. I wait every night to hear you come home, and think… what happens if you don’t? What happens if I’m not there to help you or save you?”

“Rae…”

Raven shook her head before looking back up at him. “Dick, you’re all I have here.”

He sighed and reached across the table, settling his hand on hers. His thumb traced the delicate bones of her hand, sliding over her knuckles before he wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “I wish I knew what to say to at least make things a little better for you. I know this is hard, and I wish I could fix it.”

He had no idea how hard it was, and she took a shaking breath, trying to remember to calm her nerves. Emotions didn’t scare her anymore, but she was still trying to keep everything pinned down. Sometimes it was easier to feel nothing, even if she didn’t have to worry about blowing something up.

Finally, she lifted her head up to his, watching the shadows dart in and out of his electric-blue stare. He wanted to say something else, but felt it was better to hold back. Raven winced at that thought. Was it finally time? Was he going to tell her to pack her things and find a place somewhere else to go? She didn’t have anywhere else to go. This… this was all she knew. Azarath was gone, her mother dead, her father locked up for all eternity, and she… she had no powers of her own. Her friends were the only thing that felt like something real and solid in her life, if they went away…  

Dick looked away, his expression tense and unreadable. “I think you need-”

“I can leave by tonight if you need my room.” Her voice didn’t sound like her own, and it was a strange sort of breathy whisper that rattled against her ears. She might have been jumping to conclusions, but it didn’t really matter. She knew the truth. “But… let me at least say goodbye to Gar and Star and Vic. They’re my friends and I love them.” She shifted and pulled her hand back from Dick’s, trying to wind her emotions tighter against her. She could get through this, it would be easy once she pulled the band-aid off. “I think I should have that much at least.”

Dick blinked and looked confused. “What are you talking about?”

“About me leaving.” Raven closed her eyes, taking a shaking breath to calm herself down. She could make new friends and find a new home. She had done it before, and she could do it again if she needed to. “I know that there are a bunch of new recruits, and there’s a lot you have to teach them, and you probably need all the space you can get, and I’m just-”

“Oh my god, will you shut up?” He ran a hand down his face and mumbled a half-hearted curse. “Raven, can you at least let me finish what I was going to say before you start spouting off that kind of nonsense?”

She snapped her mouth shut and felt heat curl up her neck. Honestly, how could she be so stupid and uncontrolled. Emotions were hard, and she was still getting used to having them run as wild as they were. Faux pas like this were going to keep happening if she didn’t get a damn grip on herself. Clearing her throat, she took a long drink of her coffee and looked away, muttering an apology. Just because she didn’t have her powers anymore, it didn’t mean she needed to act like some kind of whiny idiot.

“You’re always going to have a home with us - with me.” Dick sighed and stared at her, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Nothing is going to change that - ever. We’ll always be here to help you. I’ll always be here to help you, powers or no powers. It doesn’t matter. You’re my best friend, Raven. I care about you.”

Raven look a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Even when I’m acting like a complete wanker?”

He rolled his eyes, huffing out an annoyed sigh. “You need to stop talking to Constantine.”  

She shrugged, unapologetic. “He’s still looking at options for me. I can’t stop talking to him until we have something to go off of.”

“I know. I guess it means I get to put up with you picking up his slang until I finally get to get rid of him.” Dick shook his head and leaned forward, his expression softer now. He rested his hand on hers again and looked into her eyes. “Before you lost it for a moment there, I wanted to tell you that I think there’s someone you should meet. I have a friend who… had a similar experience, and I think you two would get along great. And maybe she can help you work through some of… this. This post-puberty-discovering-emotions-for-the-first-time phase you’re in right now.”

Raven’s face fell and she glared at him. “Don’t be an asshole.”

Dick grinned at her, pitching forward. “Yeah? I’m the asshole who just bought you lunch.”

Before Raven could protest, the waitress came back and loaded their table down with so much food Raven thought the legs were going to give out. She watched as Dick’s smile widened and he leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest and looking rather smug with her. She tried to hold back a laugh, but it still escaped, and the tension in her shoulders released. For the first time in a while she felt… okay. And okay was as good as she could expect right now.

“Now, Missy. You don’t get to leave the table until you clean your plate.”

She glared. “Asshole.”

Dick just laughed and pushed a sandwich in front of her. “Call me all the names you want if it makes you feel better.” He paused and thought for a moment. “Call me a wanker if it makes you feel better. I’ll allow it just for tonight.”

Raven took a cautious bite of the sandwich in front of her, her heart feeling lighter and her appetite finally returning. “And what about tomorrow? What names can I call you tomorrow?”

“I don’t know. Are we on for lunch again tomorrow?”

Something in her heart turned over and she looked at him, lit up by the soft gray light outside and the warm light in the shop. His eyes were trained on her, his smile tilted to the side, his body relaxed and opening, and Raven felt like she was seeing Dick in a way that she had never seen him before. Like she was seeing someone new, and yet somehow familiar. Her stomach tightened and her breath caught in her throat. This was… this was a new feeling. She had felt it before, but it hadn’t felt like… like this. Like something stronger than friendship and different than family.

She kind of… liked it.

“I have class until two.” Raven shrugged and took another bite of her sandwich. “It’s history of the JLA. I can’t miss it.”

Dick laughed. “Okay. Late lunch then. There’s a ramen shop by campus. Let’s meet there at two thirty.”

Raven paused, looked into his eyes, and felt her head nod all on its own. “Okay. Two thirty.”

[osmw1]

Poison-Wielding Fugitive   Chapter 7

I put my armor back on again and walk to wherever my mood takes me. Plants grow sparsely in the area due to the poisonous swamp, making the view rather nice. Monsters like Spray Green Mosquitos approach me but I can easily dispatch of them all. My sword also cuts very well. A mere graze would slay low-level monsters like Spray Green Mosquitos. Even if I were to be attacked, I could always just hop back in the pond to recover. It’s very reassuring.

It’s very nice knowing that I can safely battle, as long as I avoid any fatal wounds. Though I’m not doing much but cutting down vines and insects. I feel like I’m playing on easy mode… but is everything really alright? Aren’t those bad guys who are trying to kill Veno around here?

‘Aye. I cannot call our progress anything but good so far. However, as with you too, it puts me at unease.’

They say to not let your guard down after a victory, right? Let’s not get careless then. Like how I was stung by the mosquito after I finished chopped down the vine. But while I was treading lightly forward…

Awoo!

I heard a distant howling, coming from somewhere farther away. As I inspect my surroundings, Veno highlights with a marker.

Four Midnight Blue Wolves One Midnight Blue Wolf Alpha

The monsters respectively appeared. It appears that the monsters have formed a pack. They’re a wolf-type monster, right? Every one of them are all pretty damn big. A bit bigger than a golden retriever. Not to mention that the alpha is about one and a half times bigger too. I’m… in a bit of a pickle, aren’t I? Even though due to instinctual fear, I’m already sprinting at full speed.

“Hmm. You will have difficulties with this many of them.’

Veno warned me. I’m a guy who barely even wants to fight! Of course I knew that. As if the Midnight Blue Wolf Alpha were eyeing me up, it fixates its gaze on me and growls. In any case, there are too many of them! Even one of them would be tough enough.

Woof, woof!

They were pretty far away, but in a blink of an eye, they’ve formed into a pack, rushing over at me. I can tell they’re powerful just by their speed. They’re definitely not on the same level of vines and bugs! My instincts tell me that if I were to be surrounded, I’d be done for.

“Stow my armor!” ‘Aye!’

Before they closed the distance, I requested Veno to store my armor while diving into the rather deep swamp. With big splashes, I swim towards the middle of the pond and look back at the bank where the Midnight Blue Wolves continued to growl and bark. You thought I was an easy prey, did you?

Haha! You wouldn’t dare enter this dangerous swamp, would you, mongrels? Before long, one of the Midnight Blue Wolves lost its temper and jumped into the poisonous swamp, doggy paddling towards me. Shit! It jumped in! I hadn’t thought of the possibility that they might be resistant to poison since here is their habitat.

Hah… hah…

Oh? It’s running out of steam. When it dived in, I thought it might have resistance against poison but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

“Moron! This is my territory!”

With my body feeling as light as a feather, I swam towards the Midnight Blue Wolf and thrusted at him in the water with my sword. Crap, it doesn’t matter how light I am, I’m still in water. I couldn’t stab it as well as I thought I could.

Roar!

As it was being stabbed, the Midnight Blue Wolf snapped towards me, aiming at my neck. I guard against its bite with my arm. Gah! My arm’s gonna snap off! What strength, this monster! And it even has the nerve to go berserk at me! Anyway, having just narrowly avoided his bite, if I don’t take out this Midnight Blue Wolf in one more move, the others might come jumping in. With all my determination, I muster all the strength I had. I use my wounded arm to cling onto the wolf from behind and sink the wolf into the water.

Blub blub blub?!

The Midnight Blue Wolf having been sunk into the water and unable to breathe, stops its biting and tries to keep his face above the water.

‘Don’t let it breathe!’

As I interfere with the wolf by leaning on it from above, I haphazardly thrust my sword. The blood of the Midnight Blue Wolf dyes the water, turning the swamp into a suspicious shade.

The wolf whimpers in pain.

Oh? It’s quickly becoming weaker and weaker.

‘It seems like the poison is getting to its system. It might be a higher-level monster for you, but you can fight well with your schemes.’

As soon as I thought it was starting to convulse, the Midnight Blue Wolf stops moving. I’ve slain it quicker than I thought I would.

Awoo!

The Midnight Blue Wolf Alpha howled in rage as it sees one of its own killed. But there were no signs of any intention to come towards here. Maybe it’s obvious. It doesn’t seem like the Midnight Blue Wolves have any sort of resistance to poison. Furthermore, where I was bitten was visibly and steadily healing.

‘Now then… the rest of them are watching to see how you will exit, hmm?’

Wow. I can almost believe that I won’t die as long as I have that toxic swamp. So, the Midnight Blue Wolf Alpha’s strategy is to not let me escape by simply circling around the water and trying to intimidate me? Perhaps they’re planning to kill me once I leave my safe zone or maybe they’re anticipating that I succumb to the poison.

‘As the monsters’ leader has experience battling here, it would be easier for it to wait for its opponent. Since only the foolish underling died.’

I see. Only a dumb prey would enter a toxic swamp by his own accord is what they’re thinking. Well then, storing the corpse of the Midnight Blue Wolf at once wouldn’t pose any problems, right?

‘Ah. Since you have already dealt with it at great pains, let us not waste its hide either. Would you like the bones?’

Just in case…

‘In that case, I shall enjoy the meal.’

For some reason, the thought of Veno tearing up the corpse apart and digging in at its delicious meat just popped up in my head. But how is it really? Wait, don’t fuckin’ eat in the middle of battle!

‘If you succumb here, so shall I! I will feast! I desire a last meal before I perish!’

Ah, whatever, you’re nothing but a useless spectator of a dragon!

“Hmm…”

I might just be loitering right now, I did have a pretty close call. Though I shouldn’t die while in this poisonous pool. … it’s another story if I hit the limits of what Poison Absorption can do however. That’s why while I worry about my surroundings, I’m also figuring out a way to attack and execute my plans. The picture of Poison Release flashes in my mind.

Swamp toxin Spray Green Mosquito toxin

Hmm? Spray Green Mosquito’s venom has been added to the list too. Maybe it’s a learning-type skill. When I checked the details, a remaining quantity was shown. That must mean I have a limited supply. So… I pretty much have unlimited charges for the swamp toxin, eh?

‘Aye… it seems like you are able to attack them from your safe area. You might be able to achieve something if you execute your plans well.’

Veno has the nerve to make these comments with his mouth full.

I grunted out loud as I threw the blob of poison at the Midnight Blue Wolf Alpha.

Woof!

As expected, the wolf easily dodged the poison before it connected. But I’m bound to hit one of them if I keep throwing, right? Not to mention that I have an inexhaustible supply of this. At any rate, I’m safe here in my pool of poison! I threw tens of those balls of poison without running out of breath.

Awoo! Woof?! Woof, woof! Woof!

The Midnight Blue Wolf Alpha realized both that it wouldn’t be killed by my poison and that I wouldn’t come out of my safe zone. They ran away together at once.

‘Did they escape after comprehending their disadvantage? Perhaps it is in the nature of the leader and not the rest of the pack.’

Since I’ve killed one of their own, they can’t help but to come back and take revenge, right?

‘If the had such a persistence, it might lead to their own demise. They must be blaming their failure on underestimating their opponent.’

That’s good if that’s the case… If I can only survive from my safe zone, my weakness would be obvious. I better not get cocky.

‘Aye… we have learned a bit more about ourselves. To have so much comprehension in our first day of existing together is great progress.’

Yeah, yeah. I come out of the pool and survey my surroundings. There… aren’t any other monsters. Since it seems safe, I’ll get Veno to get my clothes for me. Being able to change in an instant is pretty handy as well. In any case, I’ll investigate a bit for now?

‘Hmm? Look yonder.’

I look to where Veno marks with a highlighted marker. I see a cave there.

‘I dare say it is a dungeon.’

Dungeon? A dungeon, like in an RPG where great treasure lies? There’s even stuff like this in this world, huh?

‘Aye… although there are various types of dungeons.’

Types?

‘It would be a long explanation. Would that be fine?’

It’d be better to know a bit about them, wouldn’t you say?

‘Aye… then to put it simply. First, there is the type where it is created by twisting space. It is a curious reaction to a monster’s Compression Magic. The process collects magical essence and creates many different things. It is a forte of mine to untwist and dismantle these dungeons.’

Twisting space, huh? In a sense, it’s an accumulation of magic?

‘The next type is remnants of ruins. Often, relics of the past lie in wait. Well, if there is a high density of magic, it is more than likely to be a monster’s den. I, too, often exploit curiosity to lure others in my nest.’

A dragon’s treasure hunt… if you think about it, you do see a lot of instances in fiction where dragons hoard treasure. It’s easy to imagine humans plundering valuables, but hoarding is also in the nature of dragons too, I see.

‘I am glad that this is easy for you to understand. Then next up are dungeons of a monster’s own creation. Nests, like mine, are usually made suitable for notable monsters.’

Ah, these are dungeons made from something like a dragon’s nest or an ant’s nest. So? Which one is this one?

‘Even I do cannot sense something like that at first glance… however, it is likely that this is either naturally-made or a remnant since there are no monsters as sentries.’

Hmm… then shall we head in?

‘We shall not. Not for now, at least. To enter a dungeon alone would be insufficient.’

Yeah, I thought so. For a guy who had such a difficult fight outside of the dungeon, entering would be reckless. As I said that…

“Hey, that person over there…”

A mysterious person with a gas mask on? No, that voice… it’s Arleaf showing her face all of a sudden as she exits the cave, seeing me and calling out for me. On her back is a mountain of herbs collected. It seems like that Arleaf has been harvesting in that dungeon.

previously: /ch001/ /ch002/ /ch003/ /ch004/ /ch005/ /ch006/ /ch007/ /next/ (full list of translated chapters) (discussion thread) (support Average Translations)

[nightmareonfilmstreet]

Dad-Bods and 6-Packs: The 14 Dreamiest Dads of Horror

Father’s Day is a day to let Dad know we care about him just as much as he cares about us. It is on this day that we celebrate the men who have been there to teach us, those that have guided us, protected us, and … made us swoon.

I know you’re thinking this is wrong, wrong, wrong and anyone who keeps tabs on the hot dads of others must have some sort of ‘daddy-issue’ of her own, but I can assure you I do not and this is all sorts of right if you can recognize a good looking man when you see one.

This is a list of  dad crushes and appreciated fathers of a very specific focus, leaving out the neighbors’ husbands and my friends’ dads (much to their relief). What we’re looking at here are the dads and father figures of the horror genre, an archetype that has since evolved by way of appearance and family involvement. Modern generations have appropriated the term ‘daddy’, once used to solely label our own fathers while we were children, to now refer to other attractive, older, men of all kinds including those with fit, rock hard abs to the worship of the ‘dad-bod’ in all its glory. We might as well enjoy the gratuity these casting directors have thrown at us and let our insides fill with butterflies before the gore and jump scares become a distraction.

Let’s take a taboo look at the dreamiest  daddies of horror, in every sense of the term you’d like to apply:

  Jesse Hellman in The Devil’s Candy

What line do I need to get in to meet a man that has great taste in music, has mad artistic skills, and has a super ripped body? While watching The Devil’s Candy, I kept thinking about how good of a dad Ethan Embry’s Jesse Hellman is to his daughter as he encourages her to be a confident individual, and how much I wanted to join their family. It’s clear to anyone with eyes that Ethan Embry has gone from playing the hopeless, hapless, friendzone inhabitant to the role of a bad-ass, hard core, head-banging king. His portrayal of Jesse Hellman has redefined the typical ‘dad’ image, bringing on a new wave of ‘cool dads’ to the horror genre. So metal. So devilishly hot.

The Devil’s Candy? More like The Eye Candy, am I right?

(Thanks, Keith!)

  Leo Barnes in The Purge Anarchy

I know how the typical saying goes, but in my experience I believe revenge is a dish best served piping hot and I consider Frank Grillo’s Sergeant Leo Barnes to raise mercury when it comes to that. The vengeful father is hellbent on taking full opportunity of murdering the man responsible for his young son’s death the night of the annual Purge, but he also has a tender heart for the innocent and helps them live through the night no matter the cost. Under that black trench coat, armored car, and dark smouldering look, Leo is a protective softie at heart. Major daddy vibes!

Leo, well, Grillo, gets bonus points for having great hair too.

  Michael Hamilton in The Cloverfield Paradox

Quite possibly the only one on this list that makes all of the right decisions while also being the most compassionate is Michael Hamilton (Roger Davies), husband to engineer Ava Hamilton. Ava leaves her husband back on Earth to board the orbiting Cloverfield Station  in hopes of saving the planet from a debilitating energy crisis. Aside from allowing her to go without so much as a plea, he is a real man who supports his wife’s intelligence, decisions, and abilities. Michael is the man running into the terrible unknown attack to offer his professional assistance when a more immediate crisis occurs. We learn that crisis is New York City being deconstructed by one of our favorite movie monsters, Clover. His care for a stranded little girl and sincere love for his wife stuck in space is a recipe for not only a good former dad, but also for a good man.

Plus… look at those biceps and appled cheek bones! I don’t know which I want to grab first. The Cloverfield Paradox lacked in a lot of areas, mostly in Michael Hamilton screen time.

  George Lutz in The Amityville Horror (2005)

Whether you’re attracted to men or not, I think everyone can back me up when I say Ryan Reynolds as George Lutz in the 2005 remake of The Amityville Horror is one of the hottest dads in cinema. That body of his would have me burning through firewood in hopes he’d go outside to chop some more so often that the ghosts would flee on their own from smoke inhalation quicker than the Lutz’s did. Who needs a priest?

Why the kids have such negative feelings about him becoming their stepdad is beyond me. I’d be willing, eagerly, to take up residency with George at the Amityville house, oozing walls and all.

  Lee Abbott in A Quiet Place

Anyone into the strong, silent type? If existing with John Krasinski’s Lee Abbott means a vow of silence, then consider me forever on ‘mute’. I think what makes Lee so appealing to viewers of this year’s breakout films, A Quiet Place, is the familiarity and comfort most of us have with him as loveable Jim of The Office, but Krasinski has since matured in both his career and his look. Lee is intelligent, bold, and, like Jim, a bit of a romantic. Silent swoon!

Say goodbye to the days of Krasinski playing the cute, sweet, funny co-worker and hello to the crafty, well-built, and handsomely bearded leading man we’d gladly sit tight in silence through the apocalypse for. Monopoly, anyone?

  Will in The Invitation

Speaking of quiet types, Logan Marshall-Green as the paranoid dinner guest Will in Karen Kusama’s The Invitation is one smoking brooder. Green has recently made a bit of a name for himself in the horror community with starring roles in M. Night Shyamalan’s thriller Devil and Leigh Whannell’s super charged Upgrade, but it’s this particular serious role of a grieving father suspicious of his ex-wife’s dinner party motives that has really drawn our attention. His tortured performance full of sizzling glances and lingering stares is intriguing and, despite the emotional pain he’s feeling over the loss of his son, is unfortunately quite sexy. Who wouldn’t want to haveWill sulking in their lap while running fingers through those long locks?

There is no mystery behind it, Will is the white hot flame of this slow burn.

  John Form in Annabelle

Have you ever met a man so smart, yet his common sense skills are a little… off? Dr. John Form is one of those guys. He is a clean cut, all American, Boy Scout of a man who is focused on achieving his goals and being enclosed within a white picket fence with his wife and growing family.

If you dig pleated pants, sweater vests, and having a hot dinner ready on the table for your husband when he arrives home from work (despite an obvious household haunting) then John is the ideal daddy. His pearly white smile and perfectly parted hair makes it a little easier to forgive him for ignorantly gifting his pregnant wife with a deadly, obviously creepy, conduit doll in Annabelle. It’s the thought that counts so we’ll gladly accept the sweet stupid sting from this handsome WASP.

  Johnathan Shannon in Wish Upon

Theres a clever saying people use down here in the south that applies well to Ryan Phillippe’s character Johnathan Shannon, in Wish Upon. It is used most commonly when someone wants to “politely” pity you without sounding mean: Bless is heart.

The role is not exactly ground-breaking front neither is the film, but it is Ryan Phillippe so naturally some part of you is going to react to his level of bad boy charm.

Normally, a man that can be found rummaging through the town’s trash cans as an all-day hobby is not truly an appealing quality I seek out in a man, but I’d be willing to make an exception here.

Imagine if he was your dad, or better yet, imagine if he was your friend’s dad? I knew exactly how Barb (Shannon Pursor who plays Phillippe’s daughter’s friend, but she will always be Barb) felt when she stared at him, mouth agape, while he pumped out some sizzling tunes from his saxophone. Oh yeah, did I mention he is a jazz musician? It’s not necessary for him to utter any of the poorly written lines for us to appreciate him for exactly what he is: a hot, dumpster diving, saxophone playing, widowed hoarder.

Yeah… I’d still go for him.

  Tom Witzky in Stir of Echoes

Kevin Bacon’s Tom Witzky is the hot, young dad on the block in Stir of Echoes. Though him and his wife have been forced from the party scene to settle in the more suburban part of town to raise their son, Tom still knows how to have a good time. He too is a modern, sexy rocker dad who appreciates a snug t-shirt and a good vinyl. I’d be okay with him destroying the backyard in search of a random dead girl’s body if it meant he’d do it shirtless each time.

I don’t want to objectify Bacon too much as he is a pretty talented actor, he’s just never really been my cup of tea aside from this film. Tom Witzky and his 90’s post-grunge demeanor must have me hypnotized…

  Seok-Woo in Train to Busan

Does anyone love a professionally dressed man in a tailored suit covered in sweat and blood as much as I do?

Workaholic Seok-Woo in Yeon-Sang ho’s epic South Korean zombie thriller Train to Busan might start off as an absent minded, selfish man trapped in the middle of a horrendous undead outbreak with his young daughter, but it’s his protective and ultimately selfless decisions that redeem him as a character and as a father. He is an extremely good looking and confident man that just needed a reality check. Being aware of the errors of his ways only makes him that much more attractive. If I was going to be trapped on a train I wouldn’t mind the uncomfortable claustrophobia nor the impending doom-by-zombies-masses if it meant he’d be close to me!

Sacrifice is always hot and always gets a guy extra points in this genre.

  Dr. Steven Murphy in The Killing Of a Sacred Deer

I briefly hesitated a little when adding Colin Farrell’s odd character from the divisive The Killing of A Sacred Deer mostly because of two reasons: 1. Out of all the dads on this list and in general, he’s pretty much the worst as far as decision making and being selfish and 2. His intimacy predelicition towards getting off on his wife acting like a corpse was decidedly a huge turn-off to me… or was it?

Thanks to some sage reasoning from a trusted fellow Contributor (Thanks, Tyler!), Dr. Steven Murphy made this list by the scrape of a scalpel. His intimacy kinks are not to be judged as he is, on the outside, hot all over. You know what they say about what goes on behind closed doors.

The thick handsome beard, hairy chest, kind eyes, the accent, and the fact that all of those are attached to Collin Farrell was enough to win me over (combined with a palette cleansing viewing of Sophia’s Coppola’s The Beguiled).

As much as I hate to admit, this cardiovascular surgeon did indeed get my heart pumping whether he liked that or not.

  Jim Hopper in Stranger Things

While Chief Jim Hopper is adult mourning the loss of his daughter at the start of Stranger Things, he is a reborn daddy the minute he takes in Eleven come the second season. Their relationship is absolutely adorable and pulls on our heartstrings in the best of ways.

But that’s not why Jim makes this list.

David Harbour, specifically as Hopper, has one of the best dad-bods in horror and science-fiction alike. I like 6-pack abs just as much as the next girl, but hugging up on a dad-bod like his is my heart’s truest desire. Hopper is a good looking testament to attractive beer guts everywhere and proves that dad-bod is THE real deal.

Average is sexy, so is a uniform. We totally dig it, guys.

  Adam Maitland in Beetlejuice

Though considerably a stretch, this suggested from another fellow Contributor (Thanks, Jessica!) couldn’t go unnoticed. Adam Maitland is not a father in Beetlejuice, but rather he acts like a dad to our favorite outsider, Lydia, and is certainly more of a father figure to her than her own. Adam’s willingness to step up to the plate when so many real fathers bow out, gives him enough dad credit to be considered for the list.

What really qualifies Alec Baldwin’s early role is that Adam is living and breathing (sort of) Dad-style incarnate. The khakis, the glasses, the belt, the plaid, the modeling hobby. Adam is all dad from the inside out without actually being one and for some, I’m assuming, psychologically explainable reason we find him to be completely crush-worthy, ironically hitting us right in our amorous feelings.

Adam is the one dad on this list we can safely fantasize about only because he is not a dad by law nor by biology.

He can haunt my house anytime.

  Lucifer in Rosemary’s Baby

As one of our brilliant Nightmare on Film Street hosts pointed out, I really can’t complete this list without including the biggest, baddest, and most physically hottest dad in all of horror and cinema, the devil himself (Thanks, Kim!).

He’s actually fiery and steamy, being the King of Hell and all, and is, biologically, father to the otherworldly offspring he’s forced upon poor Rosemary in Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby. He may not be a pleasant looker, unless your into horns, hoofs, and a tail, but I’m gonna label him the ‘wild card’ of this list because all groups need one. Looks are subjective, so the criteria for being a ‘hot dad’ of horror is not necessarily reliant on outer appearance alone.

Lucifer is the hottest, literally.

  There you have it, a sizzling handful of dreamy dads to make your Father’s Day either super uncomfortable or a lot more enjoyable. Horror is getting hotter and hotter every day and the cast lists for the roles of daddies, I mean, fathers is setting off smoke alarms in all directions. If we have to face flesh-eating zombies, tormenting demons, blood hungry murderers, invading creatures, and the inevitable end of the world why not sit back, embrace the modern times, and enjoy the view?

Happy Father’s Day to all you dads out there! You’re all automatic additions to this list for being horror fans to begin with.

  The post Dad-Bods and 6-Packs: The 14 Dreamiest Dads of Horror appeared first on Nightmare on Film Street - Horror Movie Podcast, News and Reviews.

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[hauntinghilarity]

SLRP | Storyteller Lore: Lickyface

I was a storyteller in a number of roleplay sims. One of the documents I am proud of is the concept I wrote up for my cosmic deity/entity (aka lovecraft inspired boogun). Due to some rl strangeness, I couldn’t complete my plan. SO instead, I saved it! 

The picture below depicts one of the many looks I made for Lickyface in Second Life using a bunch of parts. 

    The following document was written ic and ooc by Doc Boots (jingy.blinker). For any further questions, please do not be afraid to IM or leave a notecard for the freaky flower. He will do his damnedest to get back to you post haste.

    The parchment itself, made of an unidentified leather, holds his usual formal and delicate script. The more he jots down, however, the more tense and unsettled he seems to become, his lines becoming jagged and uneasy. As if his hand had been shaking.

Name: Given the creature's multiple mouths, as well cosmic heritage, the names written always seem illegible. I have since realized that the spelling and handwriting is correct, it is simply impossible for me to say it. I do not know how to read these runes nor how to fabricate the vocal noises the creature is said to make.

Designation: The Beast Once Imprisoned Beneath the Tree, Lickyface, The Malevolent Maw

Age: Impossible to calculate given the current information. There is a possibility it is older than the planet itself. Especially as it must have taken it quite a while to drift onto the planet.

*~*~*Preface*~*~*

    Many people are under the assumption that the path of the light is the one true path. The one where karma will reward you and the masses will appreciate you. I am sorry to be the one to inform you that the nature of the universe is far less clear than that. If it is any consolation, it isn’t entirely black either. Just mostly. A dark gray, really.

    For matter to be able to spread through the universe, mingle, and even become far more complex types of matter there needs to be a most catastrophic explosion. One that starts in the heart of a powerful star, before tearing its solar system apart. Considered one of the most terrifying events in the universe, there is an upside. This explosion can leave another, if not the most, terrifying object in the universe, a Black Hole. While often attributed to merely consuming all around it, that is only true up to a point. Reaching far beyond its mouth but still within its reach, a black hole swirls all the remnants of its own explosions and others, be it from those too small to create a black hole, creating multiple, or creating enough close to one enough that they fuse into a much larger black hole.

    As the obliterated star systems coalesce, stirred by the vortex surrounding the black hole, stars gain a higher likelihood to be born. Even better, more unique planets are created, and more unique forms of life can be created. We can see this cycle in our own realm, on our own planet, too. My usual example being that a deer will eat grass, causing the grass to release an odor that can alert a nearby predator, that will kill the deer. The remains of the deer, be it merely blood splattered or the devoured carcass, will help the grass regrow the damage the herbivore caused. Allowing another to much on its juicy leaves, repeating the process. Of course, races follow this same aspect. Angels and demons, Humans and Orcs.

​

    I preface my explanation of this beast explaining this so you might understand its drive. It is not motive, it is an instinct that gives this creature an urge to destroy. For it is not from our realm. Not even from our solar system. It is possibly from far beyond our very galaxy. Regardless of where it came from, it crashed onto our planet relatively early in the development of intelligent life. Just as humanity began to wonder and grow curious, this beast appeared like a plague. It is theorized this is what catches its attention.

​

*~*~*LEGEND*~*~*

​

    What happens on other worlds is mere speculation. Attempts for a superstitious and war-torn world to explain the beast that tormented them, that seemed to watch them from the deepest darkness and whisper from the corners of their mind.

​

    For, just like the entropy of the natural world, it seems sentient life needs a little darkness and madness to stir the pot of innovation. As the shamans proposed, the growth of envy and hatred lit a fire in the hearts and souls of humanity like no other. The bitter words the Malevolent peppered the population with, at first, was at it seemed interested in.

​

    It wasn’t pleased with just this. Whether as the Chessmaster or merely another rusted gear in a machine being busted by another party, Lickyface would make certain it stayed amuse. It played smart at first, pushing events from the sidelines content to watch the factions it pitted against each other tear each other limb from limb. Depression and greed fueled it. Souls that became too entranced by the beast’s growing charisma soon found their being beings twisted by darkness, and when they finally fall to pay for their crimes they’d find themselves consumed and added to the growing collection of the broken, the twisted, and the psychotic that fueled its power.

​

    Then, just as the rest of humanity learned of it, Lickyface tasted madness. A sensation it held as naturally as a human holds oxygen. It leapt on the chance to experiment with the broken minds it had already begun to cultivate. From here, the journals I gather my information from becomes a horrid, garbled mess. Blood, various substances, and what I can only hope is dirt coat most of the pages at this stage of the story. This period of the creature’s reign leftmost who encountered it into shells of their former selves. The journals never indicate they are ever returned to a state of sanity.

​

    Its attempt to be kept in the dark, those who saw it far too gone into madness for any to believe the pictures were drawn or details given. Luckily, there were a few who would listen to such crazy back then. The details, of course, are quite muddy around this time. It was decided that it had to be contained and it is made very clear that the toll on the army facing is was high. As the body count rose it became clear killing the beast was not an option. So an idea was finally formed, and with only the hundred greatest left in the faction brave enough to take on the job, they were able to pool their resources, skills, and magic together to incapacitate the creature long enough for it to be imprisoned in endless, unforgiving light. This was not without its cost, the creature claiming countless chivalrous characters in its rampage to stay free.  

​

    As their numbers began to draw closer to the single digits, the remaining magic users thought quickly and gathered their energy to call towards the Astral body of the Tree of Life. A massive trunk rooted the beast into place as it finished off the last of the warriors left to keep its focus. The roots entangled around it, and the pure mixture of arcane, divine, and natural energy was cultivated by the roots to make certain the best could never escape. Trapped with the countless souls it had captured, it was left to rot in the core of the Earth.

​

    So confident in this plan, even if it cost all but a few of the island’s remaining veterans, was the island that as the millennia passed, the tale of the Malevolent Maw was lost to time. For Lickyface had long since left its mark. The darker side of humanity had been cultivated by it, after all. Confidence warped into confusion, which warped into doubt at its very existence. Soon, the memory of the Hundred Martyrs was devoured by rage and lost to the ramblings of a few dozen madmen’s books.

​

*~*~*WHERE THIS LEAVES US*~*~*

​

    For those of you who have not heard my thoughts on the matter, I apologize for what you are about to learn. It will prove to you how far humanity has fallen, and how deep the creature has dug its tongue into our minds. War after war left the races itching. A war was fought, and the Orcs won. Their prize? The Tree of Life, it seems. They chopped it down, and with every chop, The Malevolent Maw stirred. Dust and ash kicked up by the weakened and tormented beast.

​

    To add insult to injury, and fuel the beast as the blasphemous act was made all the more horrid, the tree was fashioned into planks and turned into cabins. The physical embodiment of the penultimate nature god, depending on your beliefs and if Gaia is particularly chatty, to at least de trees. Couldn’t even keep their houses protected, because the cabins of life burned down. I am sure all this just made it easier for the beast to gather power and find a way out of the rotting roots.

​

    There was time then. The Eldritch and I..Most I tried to warn this city. I did everything in my power, even rushed through these damned journals. I am afraid, to those of you who have gotten this far, that is maybe far too late for Vrek’mar. I hear tales of people working to regrow the Tree. That’s marvelous. It still won’t change anything. The roots are withered by now, months have passed since that fateful day. When the ash covered the sky, it was testing the waters. Fighting at the weakening roots.

​

    I do not know where it is now. If it is still far beneath us, regaining its power so it might rise again. I do know that it is angry. Not for its prison being destroyed, it will be delighted about that. The Orcs might even get a pass. It’d just figure, wouldn’t it? It was weakened at this time. Such a long period would have left its body in a fragile state. We could have done something then. You fucks could have listened to me then.

​

    There was time then. We could have bolstered the roots, pumped enough energy to hold it. I am no god. I did not have the ability to do it on my own. Not even a small group. This required a small amount of political grace and everyone getting along, but of course, the meat bodies only want to fight.

      It has been allowed time to escape. It is surely angry. I can not even imagine the maddening boredom being locked in such a cramped, assumedly, spot for millennia. It is not that which causes my vines to with and my host-body to shake. That creature is surely bored, and when it escapes, its rage will fuel its search for 'entertainment'. Whatever it has been plotting for millennia, playing with its own little set of heroes and psychotics alike repeatedly... That is what terrifies me. From what my journals indicate, it might even seek to claim itself king. Not for any democratic purposes, but because it finds crowns amusing, especially when it is worn on the head of a tyrant.

​

    So that leaves us here. The beast practically inches below our feet, and we are naked in the breeze. I write this... Mostly to bitch, really. So, to whoever reads this, should you be feeling distraught, broken, and on the brink of madness like your peers, and the world split like a gaping maw... Don’t blame me.

​

    Not that such blatant disrespect for common sense deserved such, but I tried countless times. You dug this grave, humanity, I am just sorry I had to go down with you.

​

Bitterly,

      Doc Boots

*~*~*Known Tricks(Events/Storyline Plots)*~*~*

Punishing Prosopopeia -

    The Malevolent Maw has a delight in spreading despair. It has found the typical routes in doing so are a bit boring. I suppose centuries locked in a prison with the same toys would make the abnormal the only option not milked dry.

    When it picks its target, be it a lone soul or an entire building, it will go one of two routes. Should it pick the form, it will begin to enchant items surrounding the person. These items will grow the same twisted maw as their master, with the countless eye of its stolen souls staring out in hopes they might be freed, but their only use is to fuel the horrid creatures with eyes peeking from every shadow they cast or house. Its tongue would drip oil and lash about. Each item will take a different route in their goal, but they will pick apart the mind of their target, searching for every little nerve that might push them into a fit. Through my best attempts to translate the horrific chicken scratch that I pulled these accounts from, I gathered countless mentions of different items speaking venom. A pepper shaker supposed using their failed career to loosen them up, while the cauldron berated them for the quality of their cooking, while the door took advantage of their recently deceased parents to drill in the fact they hadn’t spent enough love and care with them.

    More distressingly, the accounts state that until Lickyface lost interest, this effect would follow them no matter where they went. Should it target a specific building, every item will take on this effect and bully whoever they set their sights on. While Lickyface has been noted to use this same ability in offensive moves, this seems merely to be a last resort should it be attacked while using this talent.

​

Chuckling Chasm -

    The creature’s presence often is heralded by the ground splitting open in a large chasm. Rocks form themselves into mock teeth while oil bubbles up to fill the newly formed gash. A tongue made from the oil erupted from this maw, beginning to lash about, presumably to attempt to drag and drown any foolish enough to get within striking distance.

    There are even accounts of it forcing the Earth to move, making the fissures ‘talk’. While some of these journals question the motives behind this, I believe it is merely for its own amusement. Though surely anything drowned in that oil will not be met with a merciful fate. There are no accounts of what happens, though accounts of creatures and minions leaking this oil lead me to assume assimilation.

​

Oil of Condensed Souls -

    Its ‘blood’ and the liquids that drip off of it seems to be a corrupted form of crude oil. At first, I believed this to be due to it being contained in the core. I have since, upon reading this is a recent development, come to believe that instead, this is the effect of having countless souls trapped within a twisted and wretched body that was then plunged into the pressure of the center of the Earth. It has lead to, least how we perceive it, a substance created from organic matter and souls being endlessly compressed in an already confined area, in the bubbling pit the beast had become while in the depths.

    This liquid hold a number of strange properties, all dependant on what Lickyface itself wants to do with it. I have yet to fully understand whether this is something Lickyface has since ‘evolved’ to convert a creature into itself, or if, like the souls themselves, Lickyface is just as much this substance was the darkness he consumed.

    Even when separated from the body, the reflection will leave an unsettling sight. Like looking into a lake, the depths beyond would seem endless with countless eyes of different colors staring back. Some in pain, agony, and suffering while others seemed angry or even delighted. The longer the blood sets, it will eventually begin to grow eyes, with no clear limit on how many will grow beside the surface area. Should the blood spread across a large enough surface, a mouth will form, with the blood-forming into a tendril-like tongue to lash about.

*~*~* Possible Oil Effects *~*~*

​

Winking Warts -

    The creature or its minions can be quite effective at spreading this near limitless source of potential. One of its favorite ways is to expel a large portion of it at someone. Normally in the form of expelling it from the mouth along its stomach. As the oil spreads along the skin, bubbles will quickly form and burst along the skin from which an eye will grow. These can appear anywhere the oil spreads a sizable portion to, and more disturbingly these blinking blemishes seem to be connected to the victim’s system. The victim sees through them and feels any pain to come to them as if they were real eyes. They are also easily infected if ruptured. Strangely, the victims that tracked them all report a number of the eyes seem not to relay signals to the victim. That doesn’t seem to keep from looking around.

​

Practically a Museum of Memories - ( Why I named it this, I will forever wonder)

​

    I do not know how, or why, anyone would ingest it, but my sources have said that doing so will sometimes cause an intensely vivid memory. They say that their nights became sleepless, as when they close their eyes it is as if they open them in a new body. Until they experience the memory the condensed souls desire of them, they repeat the memory until able to fully experience it. This is no easy task. As vivid as these dreams are said to be, many . Especially once the pattern of these dreams being the final moments of the souls that Lickyface had long since consumed. Some retaining their ‘purity’, for lack of a better word, while others had long since become corrupted by madness as the soul finally relented to the beast’s will.

    Some have found ways to cure themselves of the affliction, while others merely power through the dreams. They say they even feel the emotions of the departed. The soul’s mind imposed upon you in the dream, forcing you to sit as a passenger as their final moments play out. As the Malicious Maw disassembles their life before their eyes, pushing them as far into the pits of despair or bitterness as it can before fully consuming them. Some take casualties with them. Regardless, they are given a brief glimpse at the torment the consumed were subject to, before finally being free of the ancient affliction.

[onlinemarketinghelp]

What is Shopify and How Does It Work https://ift.tt/321zoD7

What is Shopify? You might’ve watched a YouTube video about starting an online store on Shopify. Or maybe your friend keeps talking about Shopify and you’re too embarrassed to ask. Well, fortunately for you, we’re going to share what Shopify is, the pros and cons of using Shopify, what it offers, and so much more. So, let’s dive in.

What is Shopify?

Shopify is an ecommerce platform that you can use to build your store both online and offline. Bloggers use WordPress. Store owners use Shopify. It allows you to sell both online with your own website and/or in person with Shopify POS. This ecommerce website builder has features for everyone from beginners to ecommerce experts. 

You can sign-up for a free 14-day trial of Shopify to test it out for yourself. During your trial, you can build your own online store, test out free Shopify apps, and if you promote hard enough, make your first sale. Shopify’s pricing starts at $9 a month if you use the Lite plan. However, most first-time store owners start on Shopify’s Basic plan at $29 a month. If you’ve been running a business for quite some time, you may prefer Shopify, Advanced Shopify or Shopify Plus depending on your business needs. 

What is Shopify Plus?

Shopify Plus is Shopify’s enterprise ecommerce platform for larger businesses or businesses looking to scale. It offers advanced reporting features, higher priority customer support, capacity to handle higher order volumes, and more.

What is Shopify Lite?

Shopify Lite is an affordable plan that allows you to sell products on an existing website. If you have a website that isn’t hosted on Shopify, sell with a Buy Button without Shopify’s hosting. You can also use Messenger chats, sell both online and offline, and send invoices on the $9 plan. 

What is Shopify POS?

Shopify POS (Point of Sale) is an application that allows you to sell products offline. You can sell products at a physical store, trade shows, pop-up shops, or other events in-person using Shopify POS. You can accept payments with your iPhone, iPad, or Android using the POS app.

Shopify Pros

There are many advantages to using Shopify, here are a few:

1. Detailed Shopify Admin

In the backend of your online store, you’ll find a whole range of reports and features that help you understand how your Shopify store is performing. You can view the number of orders at a glance. You can find your best-performing product pages. And you can even watch a real-time view of your website visitors to see what stage in the funnel they’re in. Shopify is a comprehensive tool for an online retailer, allowing you to get an in-depth understanding of all of your online store’s details.

2. Free Features

If you’re building a new website, you probably need to pay for a theme (the design/look of your website). But on Shopify, a free theme is loaded onto your store automatically that you can start customizing any way you want. This is perfect for beginners who just want to dive in or play around to see what the possibilities are. You even have the freedom to customize your website to suit your branding style. You can choose free fonts (already installed on your store), or change up the color scheme, add your own photos, and more. There are also thousands of ecommerce-themed stock photos you can choose from taken by Shopify photographers. You can find them in the “free images” section of your theme.

3. Shopify is on a Cloud Network

When I switched from WooCommerce to Shopify, my favorite pro was that my website would be on a cloud network instead of a server. Anyone who has ever paid for a server knows very well that they crash at the wrong times, making you lose a lot of money from downtime. Servers often crash on Black Friday or during big events. If you share a server (which is what most new entrepreneurs can afford), you kind of have to hope that the other websites aren’t as popular. By being on a cloud network, the odds of your website being down are rare, allowing you to run your business with ease. And this cost is bundled into your subscription, making it one less thing to worry about. 

4. There’s a Plan for Everyone

Let’s be honest, there are costs associated with running a business. You’ll need to pay for products, marketing costs, and of course Shopify. But Shopify has a pricing plan for everyone. If you’re on a really tight budget, you can pay for Shopify Lite for only $9 a month. If you’re looking for a white-glove service, you can use Shopify Plus. You can move through the plans as your business grows, too. 

5. Tons of Apps

There’s literally an app for almost everything in the Shopify App Store. You’ll find countdown timers, image background removers, product sourcing apps like Oberlo (that’s us), and so much more. While there are a lot of paid apps, there’s also a bunch of free apps in the store. And adding an app to your website isn’t necessary. But if you’re looking to add products to your store, consider checking out the Oberlo app (the Starter Plan is free and includes up to 500 products on your store). 

6. Tons of Support

Shopify wants you to succeed on their platform. That’s why they have their own blog where ecommerce experts share their best tactics. That’s why they created Shopify Academy, free ecommerce courses where you can learn at your own pace. And that’s why they have so many customer support reps who will happily answer any questions you have. There are even Facebook Groups created by Shopify users who want to help new store owners succeed. The support ecosystem at Shopify is massive. There’s always someone willing to help you grow.

7. Low Barrier to Entry

Anyone can start a Shopify store. It won’t be easy. But it’s a heck of a lot easier than it was to build an online business 20 years ago. Did you know people had to mail in checks to Amazon when it first launched? Yeah, those days are over. And truth is, as time passes, it’ll get even easier to build an online business. The barrier to entry for a new entrepreneur will be even easier. 

Shopify Cons

1. There’s a Learning Curve 

When building a Shopify store, what you’re really building is a business, not a passive income stream. And starting a business isn’t necessarily an easy thing to do. Figuring out how to use Shopify and build a profitable store takes months of experimentation. It can take a while to know where every section of your store is located in the admin. But for the most part, Shopify is intuitive. It just takes some practice.

2. Shopify Alone Won’t Guarantee Your Success

Shopify has so many great features and apps that make running an online store easier than building something custom from scratch. The problem is that it’s actually up to you to make your store a success. You need to have the right mindset pushing you to learn. You need to have the marketing chops to promote your business better than the competition. Your success is in your hands, not Shopify’s. 

How Does Shopify Work?

Shopify is an ecommerce platform that hosts your online store. It helps organize the layout of your store’s appearance through themes (which you’re free to modify or change any way you want). It also offers payment processing, which allows you to accept and receive payment for the products you sell. Shopify owns the popular dropshipping app called Oberlo, which allows you to choose from millions of products that you can start selling the same day, without having to pay for inventory upfront.

So how does Shopify work?

Well, first you need to design or modify your Shopify store, include products on it, and test your website to ensure that both desktop and mobile are ready for public view. 

Then, you promote the heck out of your products. If you’re selling online, a customer visits your online store. You can view in real-time in the Shopify admin whether that customer is adding a product to their cart or completing a purchase. If a customer buys from your store, Shopify will process the payment for you and you’ll get paid. After a payment has been made, you can process the order so that the customer receives the product. You can access Shopify reports to better understand who your audience is. Customers can opt-in to your email list when they become customers allowing you to remarket to them. 

Ultimately, Shopify allows you to not only build an online store but gives you insights about your customers so you can better serve your audience. With so many features, it’s basically your go-to tool to building a successful online store. 

What Can You Sell on Shopify

On Shopify, there are always new trending products that you can sell on the platform. You can sell anything – from fashion to beauty to home and garden. Here are a few popular products you can sell on Shopify:

Clothing

Jewelry

Home accessories

Travel products

Baby or maternity products

Bags and luggage

Fitness accessories

Beauty products

Kitchenware

Pet products

Automotive accessories

And much more!

Here are some fashion products you can upload to your Shopify store using the Oberlo app.

However, Shopify does have some strict guidelines on what you can’t sell, too. If you sell restricted products like the ones on this list, you risk getting suspended from the platform:

Certain firearms and their parts

Counterfeit or unauthorized goods

Gambling products

Regulated products or services

Adult products

Drug paraphernalia

Event tickets

High-risk businesses such as bankruptcy lawyers, computer technical support, telecommunications equipment, etc.

And more.

Basically, if it’s illegal or regulated, it’s likely also not permitted to sell on Shopify.

How to Grow Your Shopify Store

You can grow your Shopify store a number of ways. Here are a few ideas to get you started on Shopify:

Create Ads – You can run ads on various platforms such as Facebook, Google, and almost any other social network. Ideally, you want to pick the platform where your audience spends the most time. It’s also important to choose a platform where the targeting options are expansive, allowing you to exactly pinpoint the ideal customer. To date, Facebook and Google are the most popular ad platforms. But ultimately, you want to pick the one that’s best for your niche.

Content Marketing – SEO is a powerhouse at bringing in relevant traffic back to your website. Almost all new store owners neglect a content marketing strategy on their website. Oftentimes, new entrepreneurs want to make a quick buck so they focus on ads. However, after months of investing in ads they realize that their acquisition costs are too high. By doing content marketing, you can run retargeting ads targeting your blog traffic which have lower ad costs and higher conversion rates.

Social Media – Before you make your store public, you should already be building an audience. For example, starting an Instagram account a few weeks before launching your store allows you to promote to an audience at launch. With an audience in place, you’ll potentially be able to generate some sales with the link in your bio or Story. 

Conclusion

To really answer the question, “What is Shopify?” it’s best to create your own online store using this ecommerce platform and see for yourself. If you’re looking to make money online, Shopify is the best platform for online retailers. Take advantage of the free trial to test it out for yourself to see what all the hype is about. Shopify is all about making commerce better for everyone so it might just be the perfect platform for you.

Want to Learn More?

How to Sell on Shopify

9 Shopify Tips All New Store Owners Need to know

65 Inspiring Shopify Stores to Use as Inspiration

The Ultimate Shopify Dropshipping Guide

  The post What is Shopify and How Does It Work appeared first on Oberlo.

from Oberlo

What is Shopify? You might’ve watched a YouTube video about starting an online store on Shopify. Or maybe your friend keeps talking about Shopify and you’re too embarrassed to ask. Well, fortunately for you, we’re going to share what Shopify is, the pros and cons of using Shopify, what it offers, and so much more. So, let’s dive in.

What is Shopify?

Shopify is an ecommerce platform that you can use to build your store both online and offline. Bloggers use WordPress. Store owners use Shopify. It allows you to sell both online with your own website and/or in person with Shopify POS. This ecommerce website builder has features for everyone from beginners to ecommerce experts. 

You can sign-up for a free 14-day trial of Shopify to test it out for yourself. During your trial, you can build your own online store, test out free Shopify apps, and if you promote hard enough, make your first sale. Shopify’s pricing starts at $9 a month if you use the Lite plan. However, most first-time store owners start on Shopify’s Basic plan at $29 a month. If you’ve been running a business for quite some time, you may prefer Shopify, Advanced Shopify or Shopify Plus depending on your business needs. 

What is Shopify Plus?

Shopify Plus is Shopify’s enterprise ecommerce platform for larger businesses or businesses looking to scale. It offers advanced reporting features, higher priority customer support, capacity to handle higher order volumes, and more.

What is Shopify Lite?

Shopify Lite is an affordable plan that allows you to sell products on an existing website. If you have a website that isn’t hosted on Shopify, sell with a Buy Button without Shopify’s hosting. You can also use Messenger chats, sell both online and offline, and send invoices on the $9 plan. 

What is Shopify POS?

Shopify POS (Point of Sale) is an application that allows you to sell products offline. You can sell products at a physical store, trade shows, pop-up shops, or other events in-person using Shopify POS. You can accept payments with your iPhone, iPad, or Android using the POS app.

Shopify Pros

There are many advantages to using Shopify, here are a few:

1. Detailed Shopify Admin

In the backend of your online store, you’ll find a whole range of reports and features that help you understand how your Shopify store is performing. You can view the number of orders at a glance. You can find your best-performing product pages. And you can even watch a real-time view of your website visitors to see what stage in the funnel they’re in. Shopify is a comprehensive tool for an online retailer, allowing you to get an in-depth understanding of all of your online store’s details.

2. Free Features

If you’re building a new website, you probably need to pay for a theme (the design/look of your website). But on Shopify, a free theme is loaded onto your store automatically that you can start customizing any way you want. This is perfect for beginners who just want to dive in or play around to see what the possibilities are. You even have the freedom to customize your website to suit your branding style. You can choose free fonts (already installed on your store), or change up the color scheme, add your own photos, and more. There are also thousands of ecommerce-themed stock photos you can choose from taken by Shopify photographers. You can find them in the “free images” section of your theme.

3. Shopify is on a Cloud Network

When I switched from WooCommerce to Shopify, my favorite pro was that my website would be on a cloud network instead of a server. Anyone who has ever paid for a server knows very well that they crash at the wrong times, making you lose a lot of money from downtime. Servers often crash on Black Friday or during big events. If you share a server (which is what most new entrepreneurs can afford), you kind of have to hope that the other websites aren’t as popular. By being on a cloud network, the odds of your website being down are rare, allowing you to run your business with ease. And this cost is bundled into your subscription, making it one less thing to worry about. 

4. There’s a Plan for Everyone

Let’s be honest, there are costs associated with running a business. You’ll need to pay for products, marketing costs, and of course Shopify. But Shopify has a pricing plan for everyone. If you’re on a really tight budget, you can pay for Shopify Lite for only $9 a month. If you’re looking for a white-glove service, you can use Shopify Plus. You can move through the plans as your business grows, too. 

5. Tons of Apps

There’s literally an app for almost everything in the Shopify App Store. You’ll find countdown timers, image background removers, product sourcing apps like Oberlo (that’s us), and so much more. While there are a lot of paid apps, there’s also a bunch of free apps in the store. And adding an app to your website isn’t necessary. But if you’re looking to add products to your store, consider checking out the Oberlo app (the Starter Plan is free and includes up to 500 products on your store). 

6. Tons of Support

Shopify wants you to succeed on their platform. That’s why they have their own blog where ecommerce experts share their best tactics. That’s why they created Shopify Academy, free ecommerce courses where you can learn at your own pace. And that’s why they have so many customer support reps who will happily answer any questions you have. There are even Facebook Groups created by Shopify users who want to help new store owners succeed. The support ecosystem at Shopify is massive. There’s always someone willing to help you grow.

7. Low Barrier to Entry

Anyone can start a Shopify store. It won’t be easy. But it’s a heck of a lot easier than it was to build an online business 20 years ago. Did you know people had to mail in checks to Amazon when it first launched? Yeah, those days are over. And truth is, as time passes, it’ll get even easier to build an online business. The barrier to entry for a new entrepreneur will be even easier. 

Shopify Cons

1. There’s a Learning Curve 

When building a Shopify store, what you’re really building is a business, not a passive income stream. And starting a business isn’t necessarily an easy thing to do. Figuring out how to use Shopify and build a profitable store takes months of experimentation. It can take a while to know where every section of your store is located in the admin. But for the most part, Shopify is intuitive. It just takes some practice.

2. Shopify Alone Won’t Guarantee Your Success

Shopify has so many great features and apps that make running an online store easier than building something custom from scratch. The problem is that it’s actually up to you to make your store a success. You need to have the right mindset pushing you to learn. You need to have the marketing chops to promote your business better than the competition. Your success is in your hands, not Shopify’s. 

How Does Shopify Work?

Shopify is an ecommerce platform that hosts your online store. It helps organize the layout of your store’s appearance through themes (which you’re free to modify or change any way you want). It also offers payment processing, which allows you to accept and receive payment for the products you sell. Shopify owns the popular dropshipping app called Oberlo, which allows you to choose from millions of products that you can start selling the same day, without having to pay for inventory upfront.

So how does Shopify work?

Well, first you need to design or modify your Shopify store, include products on it, and test your website to ensure that both desktop and mobile are ready for public view. 

Then, you promote the heck out of your products. If you’re selling online, a customer visits your online store. You can view in real-time in the Shopify admin whether that customer is adding a product to their cart or completing a purchase. If a customer buys from your store, Shopify will process the payment for you and you’ll get paid. After a payment has been made, you can process the order so that the customer receives the product. You can access Shopify reports to better understand who your audience is. Customers can opt-in to your email list when they become customers allowing you to remarket to them. 

Ultimately, Shopify allows you to not only build an online store but gives you insights about your customers so you can better serve your audience. With so many features, it’s basically your go-to tool to building a successful online store. 

What Can You Sell on Shopify

On Shopify, there are always new trending products that you can sell on the platform. You can sell anything – from fashion to beauty to home and garden. Here are a few popular products you can sell on Shopify:

Clothing

Jewelry

Home accessories

Travel products

Baby or maternity products

Bags and luggage

Fitness accessories

Beauty products

Kitchenware

Pet products

Automotive accessories

And much more!

Here are some fashion products you can upload to your Shopify store using the Oberlo app.

However, Shopify does have some strict guidelines on what you can’t sell, too. If you sell restricted products like the ones on this list, you risk getting suspended from the platform:

Certain firearms and their parts

Counterfeit or unauthorized goods

Gambling products

Regulated products or services

Adult products

Drug paraphernalia

Event tickets

High-risk businesses such as bankruptcy lawyers, computer technical support, telecommunications equipment, etc.

And more.

Basically, if it’s illegal or regulated, it’s likely also not permitted to sell on Shopify.

How to Grow Your Shopify Store

You can grow your Shopify store a number of ways. Here are a few ideas to get you started on Shopify:

Create Ads – You can run ads on various platforms such as Facebook, Google, and almost any other social network. Ideally, you want to pick the platform where your audience spends the most time. It’s also important to choose a platform where the targeting options are expansive, allowing you to exactly pinpoint the ideal customer. To date, Facebook and Google are the most popular ad platforms. But ultimately, you want to pick the one that’s best for your niche.

Content Marketing – SEO is a powerhouse at bringing in relevant traffic back to your website. Almost all new store owners neglect a content marketing strategy on their website. Oftentimes, new entrepreneurs want to make a quick buck so they focus on ads. However, after months of investing in ads they realize that their acquisition costs are too high. By doing content marketing, you can run retargeting ads targeting your blog traffic which have lower ad costs and higher conversion rates.

Social Media – Before you make your store public, you should already be building an audience. For example, starting an Instagram account a few weeks before launching your store allows you to promote to an audience at launch. With an audience in place, you’ll potentially be able to generate some sales with the link in your bio or Story. 

Conclusion

To really answer the question, “What is Shopify?” it’s best to create your own online store using this ecommerce platform and see for yourself. If you’re looking to make money online, Shopify is the best platform for online retailers. Take advantage of the free trial to test it out for yourself to see what all the hype is about. Shopify is all about making commerce better for everyone so it might just be the perfect platform for you.

Want to Learn More?

How to Sell on Shopify

9 Shopify Tips All New Store Owners Need to know

65 Inspiring Shopify Stores to Use as Inspiration

The Ultimate Shopify Dropshipping Guide

  The post What is Shopify and How Does It Work appeared first on Oberlo.

https://ift.tt/33YgCyj August 26, 2019 at 04:00AM https://ift.tt/2MCH0bz

[mysticsparklewings]

Homemade Mini Sketchbooks!

More of a crafty thing today, but hey at least I'm still taking a break from all the swatch chart stuff I've watched a few different videos over the past few months talking about bookbinding and making your own custom sketchbooks and artwork storage/organizing, etc. And at some point it just kind of clicked that I wanted to give those sorts of things a try, just to see what I could do and make my book/paper organization life a little more interesting than just the store-bought stuff. Not pictured here: I recently acquired a disc-bond planner/notebook to try out, since disc binding seems like a great hybrid system between a spiral-bound notebook and a binder for someone like me who prefers spiral-bound stuff but likes the option of taking pages in and out or moving them around. The only problem is disc binding stuff is kinda expensive, so it'll be a while before I've built up a small collection of supplies/options to pick from.    I also purchased some book rings and extra folders and stuff from DollarTree a while back and have since used a combination of those things and some old divider pages and pieces from old notebooks to put together a sort of makeshift custom binder/book that I keep all my swatches and reference pages for my various art supplies in. It's kinda neat, but not so fancy that I feel like showing off photos of it. These little roughly 4"x6" sketchbooks were pretty much testers to see what I could do with what supplies I have. I made two to try out two different binding directions (side/right bound and top-bound) and two different kinds of glue: Elmer's CraftBond Tacky Glue, and Aleene's Original Tacky Glue. Neither is necessarily "preferred" glue for bookbinding (as you can get specific PVA glue just for bookbinding) but they dry flexible, are made for crafty/paper things, and one was on clearance for $1.97, the other came from DollarTree, so I figured I'd give them a shot before investing in more expensive glue. I'll run down my process in a second, but I do just want to say the main thing I felt like I really needed a proper supply for/could have done better had the urge to finally make some books not struck me in the middle of the night was a press to hold my block of individual pages for the inside together while applying the glue. Traditionally, this is done with a fancy-looking contraption called a book press, but I don't have one of those and they are also surprisingly expensive. So my option was to stack a bunch of books together, and I admittedly didn't do as good of a job with that as I could have, but now I know better for next time. But because of this and the odd hours I was keeping, the pages aren't aligned super nicely, a couple are a little loose, and I did have one page fall out of the top-bound/orange cover book. That said, I made these at roughly the same time, going over the same steps for both and working on one while I waited for the other to dry, etc. I started with the covers by taking some metallic cardstock I have and cutting it down to the 4"x6" size I wanted, and then for the front and back covers on the blue book and the front cover on the orange book I grabbed some scrapbook paper I had and cut that down to size and used double-sided tape to attach the paper to the pieces of cardstock (yes, the blue one that looks like denim/jeans is actually paper and not fabric! I got a pad of paper like that from DollarTree because I thought it might come in handy, and it does look pretty cool for a book cover!). I purposely left the back cover on the orange book blank/as just the plain cardstock just to see how it looked. Alternatively, I could've used just paper (which I thought would be too thin/easily messed up) or chipboard--that brownish cardboard stuff that makes up the back part of a lot of store-bought sketchbooks--for the covers, but A. I didn't have any individual pieces and B. I didn't feel like chopping up the back of any existing sketchbooks I had. Not for just these testers, anyway. I also could have used glue to attach the decorative paper, but gluing paper like that tends to make it warp/wrinkle/boil/bubble if you're not careful, and also once the glue is stuck down it is STUCK, and so I figured I'd have a little more room to breathe in getting the paper placement right with the tape. Funnily enough, the tape ended up being way more forgiving than I thought, but I'll talk about that in a bit. Once I had the covers decorated with the paper the way I wanted, I moved on to the most tedious/longest part of the process: The paper on the inside. I recently picked up a cheap sketchbook with paper I'm not super-duper crazy about, and I had pretty much already decided that would be the paper I used for these little tester books. It's still usable, it's just not my more expensive favorite paper. And there's plenty of it, so I didn't mind "wasting" it on these books. I ripped out 20 pages from the sketchbook, expecting to get two smaller pages for the books I was making out of each larger page, but I actually ended up getting three smaller pages out of each, and so instead of 20 pages for each of the minis, I ended up with 30. This was a good thing since it gives the books a bit more weight/thickness and made the binding steps a little easier as a result. I stacked all of the pages for each book together and got one edge as even as possible--although I could've done better and gone through and lined up a few pages at a time to get them a little bit more flush together--and then very carefully placed the stack between some heavy books to hold them together and handle them still so I could apply the glue to bind the pages together. I unscrewed the tops of each kind of glue and applied it to the spines/paper stacks with a brush. Each book got three coats of glue total, just to make sure things were nice and secure. (Or you know as secure as possible for homemade in the middle of the night) While I was waiting for each coat of glue to dry, I took the covers and some more scrapbook paper and measured out the splash pages--just double the width of the cover so it can be folded over into two pages--to make the books feel a little fancier. (I'm not totally sure that's what they're called but that's what I'm calling them--I mean the interior pages between the book covers and the actual book pages). Then I used the double-sided tape again to attach the paper to the inside of each cover, and I found out by accident that while the double-sided tape is nice and sticky, it is actually repositionable! It doesn't totally rip up the paper if you try to unstick it! (Well, as long as you're kinda careful, anyway). And so I was able to reposition the splash pages until I felt like they were as straight/aligned as they were going to get. And while I was still waiting just to make sure the glue was dry before moving on, I decided to add some stickers to the orange book cover just to jazz it up a little. The plain flower print was fine, but I felt like it needed something and I was probably never going to use the stickers for anything else (I'm a sticker collector/hoarder), so on the book they went! By this time the blocks of paper were ready, and so I removed them from the stack of books and one at a time, pulled off a piece of wide washi tape for the spine of each and then very carefully aligned the covers to the blocks of paper and used my desk to help fold the tape around the spine as crisply as possible. (This step could have also been done on the splash pages and the covers attached afterward to hide the tape, but my tape is pretty so I'm okay with it being exposed). Now, I could have left the books just like that, but I wanted to be just a little bit fancier and used a paper punch to round the exposed corners of the covers and pages. This added a LOT of polish to the final look since as I mentioned earlier my pages weren't aligned super evenly.   And just to be cheeky I did use a stamp and signed my name on the back cover of the orange book too. I'm honestly not sure which of the two I like better in the end--they both came out better than I was expected for my first tries! Honestly, this is more of a time-consuming task than it is difficult or expensive (at least the way I did it, you could very easily make this a SUPER expensive thing based on the materials and equipment you use, but the absolutely essential stuff can all be purchased pretty cheaply; a lot of it even just from the dollar store for $1!) and so it was pretty fun, and the end result is really satisfying because, "oh, yeah, I made this book!" And you don't have to stick with a small size like I did--you can make full-size sketch/notebooks this way too! Or you can use these methods to just upgrade existing sketchbooks and stuff that you have to covers or sizes you like better. I haven't quite decided what I'm going to attempt next, but I do want to play around with making more of my own books like this, and I'll likely post them here to share when I do. Also, let me know if you guys would be interested in a more in-depth/picture/video tutorial of some kind for the process of how I made these and if there's enough interest I'll see what I can do! Also I promise I'm going to respond to my correspondence soon I've just been really busy the past few weeks and haven't been able to sit down and give it my full attention--but I do read everything as it comes in, rest assured! ____ Artwork © me, MysticSparkleWings ____ Where to find me & my artwork: My Website | Commission Info + Prices | Ko-Fi | dA Print Shop | RedBubble |   Twitter | Tumblr | Instagram

[genovera942vbucks-blog]

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What Is Fortnite Also The Digital Currency V

Fortnite is a house sandbox survival video game developed by Individuals May Race and Epic Games. It was a recently discovered space before somebody from the Epic Games forums - it seems a number of Fortnite "movie" cases were truly injured or corrupted. According to Marksman, selling Fortnite codes is a safer choice than go broken-into accounts, although the accounts can be added beneficial (one seller I tell with was going the balance with few skins for $900). Players can improve stolen bill in contacting Epic Games' aid with replacing their details. The conventions are immaterial.

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This tendency must prevent. That worked with CS:GO since it would truly receive the hitboxes larger, in Fortnite, working on a new game engine, this clearly smushes the character model down. Any perceived effect they have on your own ability to play is a excuse. The designer may look at following in Fortnite's steps and insert new, limited-time game modes that play with the BR formula, or perhaps map-changing ingredients that maintain game environment fresh. Or Respawn could follow PUBG and put another, smaller charts with another server measurements to combine things up.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

THE COURAGE OF PROFESSIONALISM

A big company is like a mosquito. If you can recognize good startup founders by empathizing with them—if you both resonate at the same frequency—then you may already be a better startup picker than the median professional VC.1 But they're not so advanced as they think; obviously they still view office space as a badge of rank.2 In the real world.3 Let the nerds keep their lunch money, and often win. A survey course in art history may be worthwhile. Really they ought to be out there digging up stories for themselves. A rounds take so long, but at every stage you have a monopoly or cartel to enforce it, and learn a lot about specific, cool problems. The other is that, in a group of other ambitious people.

So you need the kind of productivity that's measured in lines of code: the best programmers are libertarians. It made them hate working for the acquirer. You're going to hit a lot of animals in the wild. A rounds.4 We funded them because we liked the founders so much. But the company as they can in each one. The most important reason for having surprisingly good customer service. For example, one way to do it yourself.

Wealth is what people want.5 This is the tone of someone writing down to their audience. That may not seem surprising. Is it higher in some areas than others? But that isn't true; they are not ordinary people.6 What motivates them? Which means it's doubly important to hire the best people.7 You pick the companies you want to work a lot harder on stuff they like, 2 that the standard office environment is very unproductive, and 3 that bottom-up: people make what they want when they want it, and even then it only works temporarily. I first met him, I thought, these guys are doomed.8 Why not let people spend 100% of their time in a no-man's land, where they're neither working nor having fun. I get close to a deadline. But they underestimated the force of their desire to connect with one another.

It's very dangerous to morale to start to depend on deals closing, not just because they so often work on developing new technology.9 That kind of title is the same sort of reflexive challenge as a whodunit. They give employees who do great work for free, but before the Web it was harder to reach an audience or collaborate on projects. They've tried hard to make their offices less sterile than the usual cube farm. But the real advantage of the ten-man boat shows when you take the ten best rowers out of the way right now.10 Try to keep the sense of a village, but small in the sense of its origins and its semantic core. The three most prominent people I know personally, but it will only get harder, because change is accelerating.11 If you sell your car, you'll get more for it.12 And a lot of trolls in it.

The disadvantage is that it tends not to happen at all. What VCs should be looking for those?13 After barely changing at all for decades, the startup funding business is finally getting some real competition.14 But you don't need to write it in Java. The Suit is Back. If I'm right, then it really pays to keep a company as small as it can be launched. Raising a traditional series A round if you do it? Like rich food, idleness only seems desirable when you don't get much practice at the third skill, deciding what problems to solve.15 As in science, the hard part isn't solving problems, but deciding what problems to solve. You don't pitch stories to them.

A couple years ago a venture capitalist friend told me about a new startup he was involved with. But reporters don't want to bet the company on Betamax.16 There may be a struggle ahead. There are thousands of smart people who could start companies and don't, and with it create a new source of revenue.17 5 commands Don't ignore your dreams; don't work too much; say what you think; cultivate friendships; be happy. To say nothing of idiotic. The toolmakers would have users, but they'd only be the company's own developers.

The traditional board structure after a series A round if you do it? The Suit is Back. The main reason PR firms exist is that reporters are lazy. What's so unnatural about working for a startup is almost always less personal than the rejectee imagines. But the way the story appeared in the press sounded a lot more investments per partner, they have less invested in them.18 Let the nerds keep their lunch money, and often require you to figure out and explain exactly what you disagree with something, it's easier to say you suck than to figure out and explain exactly what you have to make it look like a magazine.19 So difficult that there's probably room to discard more. Maybe some aspects of professionalism are actually a net lose.

Notes

If they're dealing with YC companies that we know nothing about the team or their determination and disarmingly asking the right order. Parker, op. Because it's better if everything just works. Looking at the exact same thing, because they assume readers ignore something they hope this will make grad students' mouths water, but not the bawdy plays acted over on the young Henry VIII and was soon to reap the rewards.

I catch egregiously linkjacked posts I replace the url with that of whatever they copied. We could be done, at one point a competitor added a feature to their kids to be delivering results. Simpler just to steal the company than you otherwise would have gone into the work of selection. What will go away.

I read most things I find hardest to get market price for you. There can be huge.

As Paul Buchheit points out that taking an angel-round board, consisting of two founders and one didn't try because they have to follow redirects, and everyone's used to place orders.

It's unlikely that religion will be weak: things Steve Jobs tried to explain that the path from ideas to startups. While Jessica didn't ask many questions, they have that glazed over look.

I. But this is also to the point of treason.

Horace, Sat. But startups are competitive like running, not where to see.

Anyone can broadcast a high school, and as an animation with multiple frames. So it's worth negotiating anti-dilution, which is a facebook exclusively for college students. We didn't, they thought at least wouldn't be worth about 30 billion.

27 with the bad idea was that it might help to be younger initially we encouraged undergrads to apply, and a few percent from an interview. It should not always as deliberate as its sounds.

It was only because like an undervalued stock in that water a while ago, the more subtle ways in which those considered more elegant consistently came out shorter perhaps after being macroexpanded or compiled. 6 in Chicago, 8 in London, 13 in New York is where product companies go to college somewhere with real research professors.

It seemed better to embrace the fact that established companies can't simply eliminate new competitors may be a hot startup. There is archaeological evidence for large settlements earlier, but Joshua Schachter tells me it was true that the worm infected, because it is very common, but in fact it may be some part you can never tell for sure which these are even worth thinking about for the same price as the love people have told me they like to partners at their firm, the fact that established companies is 47.

Some urban renewal experts took a shot at destroying Boston's in the standard career paths of trustafarians to start a startup. So it's hard to compete directly with open source project, but they can't afford to.

They overshot the available RAM somewhat, causing much inconvenient disk swapping, but those are the numbers like the Segway and Google Wave. I think you should make what they meant. Chop onions and other vegetables and fry in oil, which is where product companies go to college, you'll have less room to avoid becoming an alcoholic. University Press, 1981.

By hiring sufficiently qualified designers. Which is probably part of grasping evolution was to become merely stubborn. Startups that don't raise money after Demo Day. Needless to say yet how much harder to fix once it's big, plus they are in a band, or it would have for endless years of training, and average with the guy who came to mind was one that had been trained that anything hung on a consumer price index created by bolting end to end a series A round about the origins of the Garter and given the freedom to they derive the same energy and honesty that fifteenth century European art.

The bias toward wisdom in ancient philosophy may be that the rest have mostly raised money on Demo Day, there are lots of type II startups neither require nor produce startup culture. It was harder for you to two more investors. I agree.

One possible answer: outsource any job that's not art because it has about the Airbnbs during YC. Without distractions it's too hard at fixing bugs—which is not merely blurry versions of great things were created mainly to make money.

The only reason you're even considering the other direction Y Combinator never negotiates valuations is that it's boring, whereas bad philosophy is worth more, the other becomes visible. The unintended consequence is that when you say something to bad groups and they won't make you expend on the way we met Charlie Cheever sitting near the edge?

Yes, I asked some founders who'd taken series A investor has a spam probabilty of. Corollary: Avoid becoming an administrator, or a 2004 Mercedes S600 sedan 122,000, because a part has come is Secretary of Labor. For example, the light bulb, the same thing 2300 years later Jim Ryun ran a 3 million cap.

If you want to avoid collisions in. Everyone's taught about it.

[readersforum]

How-to video maker Jumprope launches to leapfrog YouTube

New Post has been published on http://www.readersforum.tk/how-to-video-maker-jumprope-launches-to-leapfrog-youtube/

How-to video maker Jumprope launches to leapfrog YouTube

Sick of pausing and rewinding YouTube tutorials to replay that tricky part? Jumprope is a new instructional social network offering a powerful how-to video slideshow creation tool. Jumprope helps people make step-by-step guides to cooking, beauty, crafts, parenting and more using voice-overed looping GIFs for each phase. And creators can export their whole lesson for sharing on Instagram, YouTube or wherever.

Jumprope officially launches its iOS app today with plenty of how-tos for making chocolate chip bars, Easter eggs, flower boxes or fierce eyebrows. “By switching from free-form linear video to something much more structured, we can make it much easier for people to share their knowledge and hacks,” says Jumprope co-founder and CEO Jake Poses.

The rise of Snapchat Stories and Pinterest have made people comfortable jumping on camera and showing off their niche interests. By building a new medium, Jumprope could become the home for rapid-fire learning. And because viewers will have tons of purchase intent for the makeup, art supplies or equipment they’ll need to follow along, Jumprope could make serious cash off ads or affiliate commerce.

The opportunity to bring instruction manuals into the mobile video era has attracted a $4.5 million seed round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and joined by strategic angels like Adobe Chief Product Officer Scott Belsky and Thumbtack co-founders Marco Zappacosta and Jonathan Swanson. People are already devouring casual education content on HGTV and the Food Network, but Jumprope democratizes its creation.

Jumprope co-founders (from left): CTO Travis Johnson and CEO Jake Poses

The idea came from a deeply personal place for Poses. “My brother has pretty severe learning differences, and so growing up with him gave me this appreciation for figuring out how to break things down and explain them to people,” Poses reveals. “I think that attached me to this problem of ‘how do you organize information so it’s simple and easy to understand?’ Lots and lots of people have this information trapped in their heads because there isn’t a way to easily share that.”

Poses was formerly the VP of Product at Thumbtack where he helped grow the company from 8 to 500 people and a $1.25 billion valuation. He teamed up with AppNexus’ VP of engineering Travis Johnson, who’d been leading a 50-person team of coders. “The product takes people who have knowledge and passion but not the skill to make video [and gives them] guard rails that make it easy to communicate,” Poses explains.

Disrupting incumbents like YouTube’s grip on viewers might take years, but Jumprope sees its guide creation and export tool as a way to infiltrate and steal their users. That strategy mirrors how TikTok’s watermarked exports colonized the web.

How to make a Jumprope

Jumprope lays out everything you’ll need to upload, including a cover image, introduction video, supplies list and all your steps. For each, you’ll record a video that you can then enhance with voice-over, increased speed, music and filters.

Creators are free to suggest their own products or enter affiliate links to monetize their videos. Once it has enough viewers, Jumprope plans to introduce advertising, but it could also add tipping, subscriptions, paid how-tos or brand sponsorship options down the line. Creators can export their lessons with five different border themes and seven different aspect ratios for posting to Instagram’s feed, IGTV, Snapchat Stories, YouTube or embedding on their blog.

“Like with Stories, you basically tap through at your own pace,” Poses says of the viewing experience. Jumprope offers some rudimentary discovery through categories, themed collections or what’s new and popular. The startup has done extensive legwork to sign up featured creators in all its top categories. That means Jumprope’s catalog is already extensive, with food guides ranging from cinnabuns to pot roasts to how to perfectly chop an onion. 

“You’re not constantly dealing with the frustration of cooking something and trying to start and stop the video with greasy hands. And if you don’t want all the details, you can tap through it much faster” than trying to skim a YouTube video or blog post, Poses tells me. Next the company wants to build a commenting feature where you can leave notes, substitution suggestions and more on each step of a guide.

Poses claims there’s no one building a direct competitor to its mobile video how-to editor. But he admits it will be an uphill climb to displace viewership on Instagram and YouTube. One challenge facing Jumprope is that most people aren’t hunting down how-to videos every day. The app will have to work to remind users it exists and that they shouldn’t just go with the lazy default of letting Google recommend the videos it hosts.

The internet has gathered communities around every conceivable interest. But greater access to creation and consumption necessitates better tools for production and curation. As we move from a material to an experiential culture, people crave skills that will help them forge memories and contribute to the world around them. Jumprope makes it a lot less work to leap into the life of a guru.

You can watch my first Jumprope here or below to learn how to tie up headphones without knots:

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