#also i've been telling myself all week to write this reply and finally got over that hump that we call executive dysfunction

[hardheadedbighearted]

Salem 'hmm'ed' in thought and looked through the lists. Twibber and Bebop sounded a bit like they would let her build a great following, but they were so impersonal, and it was hard to exercise control over people that she couldn't build a personal dynamic with. Same for Mytube and Onlyhens and Puptreon, which were more monetized and centered on providing content to consumers.

Sites like Birddit and Basebook seemed a little more personal, and better for building closer connections, but neither of them quite felt like what she was looking for.

"Mumblr?" she said after a few walkthroughs of the list. "Tell me about Mumblr."

hardheadedbighearted​:

She sighed, then took a long, long breath, and let it out slowly.

“Show me.”

His beak widened into a smile, his segway moving forward again until it came to a stop near her. “Okay, so if you’re looking for sites that’ll just let you get a foot in the door,” he said, tapping a few keys on the screen before showing it to her. “You’ll wanna try making an account on the sites under List One. List two is full of the more unhinged sites, which might be a bit harder to adapt to until you find a niche audience—although I know several of them have folks would probably flock to an all-powerful, tall witch woman by the hundreds—”

Still letting her see the screen, he scrolled down to the third list. “List three are the wildcards and require getting a bit risqué, but I mean…I don’t know what you’re into, so maybe you’d have fun with that.” A shrug. “Just figured I’d give you the options in case that sounded appealing.”

[neptune-lover]

LOVE!?!? Pt1

Nathan Frazer x reader

AN: hi everyone sorry for being on and off recently just life has NOT been good to me just a lot mentally I'm trying to work on stuff but my motivation comes and goes but I wanted to start another series on top of the one I have rn until I can think of a story more so going forward for that one but recently I've been loving Nathan Frazer and there is BARELY any fan fics of him so I wanna change that this will be a reader x nathan Frazer this is pure indulgence for me but this will be a series and I have at least a first few chapters planned out and I will also in the beginning of the story use the fact that nathan and Thea are dating irl in this story line but I hope you guys enjoy it (ALSO IMPORTANT ive always liked Ali so I'm writing this as if he was still in WWE)

Y/n had recently been let go from her job as a makeup person on AEW. But lucky for her NXT was looking for a new makeup person for the girls and some of the guys for when special effects were needed. That was a few months ago now it had been a few months and she had made tons if new friends including Thea, Gigi, Roxanne and even RHEA BLOODY RIPLEY. And over time y/n have gotten to know a lot of the boys like Dominik, Wes, Ali and..... Nathan. See the thing is it's not like y/n DIDN'T like Nathan it was actually quite the opposite y/n LIKED him like had a crush on him. One problem though.... He was currently dating her best friend thea. They have been together for about 2 years now(I guessed) . She started to realise she liked him over the last few weeks are so and was to nervous to say anything for 2 reasons. 1. She didn't want to seem like a bad best friend for liking her bff's boyfriend if she told Thea and 2. She didn't want to tell anyone IN CASE it some how got around to thea. She didn't want to lose her best friend over a stupid crush of a stupid British boy(sorry but I'm allowed that comment I'm British myself). So she kept it a secret and made sure NO ONE would find out. The thing is being BFFs with your crushes girlfriend means you are around said crush All. THE. TIME. whenever there wasn't a backstage segment or a fight the 2 were always together. But luckily Nathan had been a lot busier recently due to being one half of the NXT men's tag team champions. But usually whenever he was around he would not have axiom his tag partner with him. Which was good because it kept your mind off of Nathan and helped you not feel like a third wheel as much. Now tonight you had a huge match you were facing Kalani Jordan for the NXT women's north American championship. You were nervous but also excited so you, thea, Sol, Nathan and axiom were all hanging out and you were warming up while talking with the others. "So do you feel ready for your match?" Axiom asked. "Yeah I'm nervous but I know kalani won't play dirty and I can trust she will be fair" she replied back "yeah you're gonna kill it I know you can do it!! " Thea said enthusiastically. "Thanks Thea I really hope I win because not only will this mean I get my first ever title but that means that I'm ready to actually BE a champion." As she finished her sentence her music her "wish me luck guys!" She said as he went out to the ring for her match.

SO that was part 1 to my new series if you guys have any requests please feel free to look at my request list if things I will write and again I'm so sorry for not posting my mental health has been really bad until recently and I finally have motivation to write again!!

[blazehedgehog]

hey! regarding people who are politely declining to comment their opinions on your Frontiers video, i don't think it's anything personal – i think some people just find engaging with the greater Sonic discourse to be exhausting (myself included!) and would rather respect the opinions and personal space of others than engage in debate.

which brings me to my question: how do you handle it? you've been fielding comments and asks from rabid Sonic fans for so long, you seem to have it down to a science!

I can understand being exhausted with discourse, yeah. There are some things I'm like that with. But... I dunno, the response to the Sonic Frontiers in general is also a little weird and I'm starting to think I made a bad first impression with some of what I had to say. Some people are taking it personally in a way that it's not directed at them.

But -- and I do not say this disparagingly -- that's Sonic fans. I get it. It's not true so much these days, but ten years ago, twenty years ago, this industry loved to beat up on Sonic and especially Sonic fans, eventually. Some people don't see that I'm one of them too, which is also understandable, because not everybody knows me.

I'm weighing options on how to deal with that. I've said it before but doing follow-up "correction/comment response" videos seem to be a good idea, but I don't know if I should wait until the final DLC is out or try and get it released sometime next week.

As for how I handle it... I don't know. Maybe it just comes naturally. I remember way back when I first got on the internet, when I was on AOL, the big thing everybody was doing back then before blogs was Mailing Lists. "MLs" for short. People would send you a message like "I would like to subscribe to your ML," so you'd write down their email address, and once a week or so you'd send out this gigantic email that was practically its own whole website.

And I juggled two or three MLs, for Sonic, for Pokemon, for Sailor Moon. I'd attach files for MP3s, I'd do Q&A sections, the whole nine yards, and I was like... 15. And I'd get comments (email replies) from people telling me that they loved how natural I sounded. Apparently people running other MLs were pretty wooden and robotic with their writing style, but I was always very conversational and approachable. And the numbers bore that out; I remember having several mailing lists crest 100+ subscribers, which felt like a huge deal.

And it's weird, because if you met me in real life, I'm maybe the most quiet, reserved person on earth. I have to force myself to speak out. I live in a house with five other people and I will go days where the only thing I say to anyone is telling my nephews good night. I feel like I can't talk. Like I don't know how. Which is a whole other kettle of fish, especially when it comes to recording voice over for a video.

But you sit me down in front of a keyboard, or even maybe a phone to some degree, where I can type out my thoughts? I used to be able to type as fast as some people could speak. And literally as I write this right now, I am more or less mouthing the words, either physically or in my head, as I type them. Like I am saying them. It's all a stream of consciousness. That goes for things I write here on this blog and it goes for video scripts, too. It's always flowed as naturally as running water (maybe too naturally, for how rambly I can get).

I would love to have the confidence to speak in the same way I type, and I know I have the capacity for it. I just get too nervous in the moment.

And as for how I handle people who are rude or don't understand me or whatever, I mean I have theories, but ultimately I don't know.

Like, something I learned early on was to distinguish the difference between people who are actually angry and people who are just trying to hurt you for laughs. I remember, all the way back when I was in Kindergarten or First Grade, some kids on the school bus were trying to get a rise out of me and in my head I kept thinking "They're just trying to make me mad, so I won't give them the satisfaction." And I just went totally stonefaced. When I objectively refused to react, they left me alone.

A few years later, I had friends who turned out to be bitter enemies that may or may not have ruined my life, and again, I learned new skills to deal with baseless people who were just trying to make me angry. I learned how to cope with or avoid some of that.

(Until eventually the bomb went off, I beat a kid black and blue, and was nearly charged with assault at 13 years old.)

And then a few of my first internet friends were deeply stubborn people who reveled in their ability to be rude, frustrating assholes. And, again, I learned ways to avoid, cope with, or defuse those people.

(Until I got tired of dealing with them and cut them out of my life entirely.)

Like, compared to some of the things I've had to endure, some of the things "friends" have said or done to me, an angry internet comment feels like a stiff breeze.

And I also just love putting myself in someone else's shoes. Thinking about how they came to a different conclusion than I have. Ask people who knew me 20 years ago and they'll tell you I used to (and still sort of do) live by a mantra that all arguments start as misunderstandings. If two people come to terms with their differences in perspective then all problems can be solved.

So I learned that when someone has a problem with me or something I've said, I just need to explain it better, or explain it more. If the scope of what I said is too small, then I need to provide a bigger picture view of where I'm coming from. And 90% of the time that is a great way to solve a problem, to come to terms and say "Tell me where you're coming from and I'll tell you where I'm coming from and we can meet in the middle." You're being heard, they're being heard, everybody (usually) wins.

I always try to come at everything in good faith like that. Even anger comes from somewhere. Understanding that helps everyone.

(Now, I don't always have the energy for that. There was a twitter thread last week where I incited quite a bit of Discourse™ and I eventually became exhausted by the endless supply of people who were looking for cheap dunks, or were being weirdly rude, plus I was deep into deadline stress... I ended up getting kind of punchy in a way I'm not super proud of)

And I guess just... all of this stuff, it all just combines into my ability to mostly handle it.

Which is why it can feel so weird when people don't want to engage me.

[love-fireflysong]

Got tagged by @queenofbaws like 6 seconds ago to do this thing and because I'm currently trying SUPER hard to stay awake for at least another three hours to get me back on a 'normal' sleep schedule for the next week and a half, we're doing this shit now! ...and also because if I don't do it now then I'll just forget about it and never do it asjdhkjahsdkjs

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

59! Not a bad total all things considered 😤

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

337,514. That's an average of 5,720 words per fic btw akjdshjkahsd

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Until Dawn mostly. Got a decent amount of Tales of Phantasia stuff as well as a lot of ideas for it but cause that fandom is even deader than ud's, I never actually write any of it lmao

4. Top five fics by kudos

Valentine's Day Prompts (crossed out because while it's *technically* my highest I do not count it for the sole reason that like literally not even ten minutes after I uploaded it I got like 50+ guest kudos all at once so those are clearly bots and the correct kudos count is probably somewhere between 20 and 30 lol) What I actually consider my top five fics by kudos are:

The Final Days of Our Youth

More Than Worth It (though considering it was posted only barely a week after the vday prompts the kudos may be a bit suspect here as well 🤔)

Nothing and Nobody But You

The Sound of Silence

Baby It's Cold Outside (so hold me tight in your arms and don't let go)

5. Do you respond to comments?

I did/do. And by that I mean I love to, but the last couple of years I've been letting the few I've gotten pile up due to not being in a good headspace to answer/I've just been really busy at that exact moment. Which is important, cause if I don't have the time to respond then and there, I will just keep forgetting to reply. Which is how I've reached the point where I have almost 2 year old comments that I want to respond to but I feel like shit answering them now 2 years later, and let me tell you the feeling does NOT get any less guilty the longer I wait to respond aksjdhkajsdhjk

(maybe I should use this time to answer them while I try to stay awake lmao)

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Hmmmm. I mean, technically the one I'm writing now? It's probably between Winter is Death and Not Only Monsters Hide Under the Bed where one fic involves Hannah slowly losing her free will as she spends a year with the Makkapitew taking over her body and the other is about a little girl hiding from the people sent to kill her village but being found and killed just before her brother got home to save her.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

...Somehow, this is the harder of the two to answer aksdjkjahsdkjashd uh.... pretty much any chrashley focus fic where the ending involves them actually confessing and getting together I guess? But if I have to chose one, I think The Final Days of Our Youth cause it's chrashley confessing and getting together, but also repairing their friendship that Chris very nearly torpedoed cause he's an avoidant moron.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Surprisingly no! Thankfully anyone who does not like the ships I write for does not read my fics and thus does not leave comments. And if there us people out there who just do not vibe with my writing style (understandable) they've just clicked back and not responded either.

9. Do you write smut?

Once! I did it once and only once because I just really, really wanted to read about an awkward and clumsy first time between Chris and Ashley and that, uh, did not exist. So I (unfortunately for everyone lol) took it upon myself to write it. That being said, because it is smut, it is unsurprisingly the one fic I can always count on getting a new kudos or bookmark on every now and then.

And I will probably never write another one again sorry not sorry lol.

10. Craziest crossover?

I mean the only crossovers I've ever done is my Outlast au stuff but I don't really consider that a 'crazy' crossover lol.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I'm aware of! Like I'm not even sure that they've been scrapped by AI sites. Not sure why anyone would want to steal my fics in the first place though honestly.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

I mean, no one's ever asked so I assume not? If they did though than all the power to them.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Nope! Never been asked and never asked anyone lol.

14. All time favourite ship?

I mean, Chris/Ashley easily, though Chris/Josh/Ashley is a *very* close second lol. (Chester/Arche is also a very close third but no one other than me here knows who they even are so askldjaslkdjsa)

15. What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Oh god, the actual main outlast au fic that really delves into how the initial prank on Hannah snowballed into climbing chrash being thrust into experiencing the events of the Outlast video game. Except that's not a wip I've even started despite all the notes and timelines in my head 😭

16. What are your writing strengths?

I do think dialogue is my strongest strength personally. I think it flows fairly naturally, to the point where I've sometimes gotten stuck on a scene and switching over to some dialogue either earlier on or just throwing a line in randomly will just unstick *something* in the brain and my creativity output stops being a blockage and returns to it's trickle aksjdhaskdhj

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Literally everything else? Descriptions. I just feel like I can't describe things very well and so I'm always worried that my writing tends to read flat because of it.

Also, due to being told that I'm a waste of space, stupid, ugly, blah blah blah by like 99% of my classmates from like grade 1 to grade 9 my self-esteem when it comes to shit like this is unsurprisingly pretty fucking abysmal! So every time I go to post something new I spend way too long hovering over that upload button convinced that this is the fic that will convince everyone that I'm actually a terrible writer and they won't like me anymore lol

18. Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

Never had to use it before myself but it's neat when done... not right or well but, like, done to achieve something you've planned out. I'm not sure what ways I would use it myself, I think it would depend on what use I need it to have in the story itself.

19. First fandom you wrote in?

Oh Class of the Titans easy. Inuyasha is where I discovered fanfiction, but CotT is what inspired me to try it out for myself (my first attempt was uh, not great aksdjklasjdlkasj)

20. Favorite fic you've written?

Oh god, there's a tough question lol. Uh, probably between Baby It's Cold Outside (so hold me tight in your arms and don't let go) and Artificial though. Both are my babies, but Baby It's Cold Outside is the fic that finally started me writing again regularly since middle school after a like almost ten year drought. And Artificial is the one where I finally got to really sink my teeth into what makes my outlast au actually outlast and really get to experience a bunch of shit I had never really written before (torture (physical and psychological), whump, body trauma) and it turns out it was a lot of fun sdlkajsldkjaslkdj

Oh god I have to tag people to do this now don't I? Uhhhhh, @chris-hartley, @icequeen-07, @hannahwashington, @eurazba but if there's anyone else who follows me that wants to do this than please by all means go ahead! Share your work with the rest of us 💖

[theressomethinghappeninginparis]

A lot...has happened.

It's been a while and you can trust me, I took some time off because I needed a moment to process all of this. Currently I am safe, all is cool, don't worry. But the path there has been so overwhelming and honestly crazy I just...needed a moment.

Transcript of the first and second page: All I see is...particles. Some kind of shield glowing. I can hear gunshots and I see Lara Croft shooting Eckhardt, it has to be him.

What the fuck?

Okay they're busy and I don't care and I can't care since I need to fuck off. There's two floors above, metal platforms in the shape of a circle, and I'm still looking for an escape. Is there a way out??

My pen died. I am dying mentally.

There's a ladder and it goes up to the first floor. I need to get there. There's so much screaming in the middle and I need to leave and my head hurts and my ears are pierced by the sounds. I need to leave, I'm not as durable as Lara Croft.

What the heck, here is something hanging from...the ceiling? I don't have much time, I'll try to sketch out what I see. I'm upstairs, and I can barely write. There is something? Hanging? From there, it looks kinda humanoid, not quite. Could it be a true nephilim? The one Eckhardt wanted to use?

There's also a platform with a golden disk and it is looking like this: Somehow it's flower shaped, has symbols surrounding it, spaces for five pieces to be inserted, the stuff hidden in the Obscura Paintings! I think this could be the Sanglyph. It's five golden pieces and they could be used (unreadable)

Transcript of the third and fourth page: Okay I'm not sure what to do, what happened or anything. Honestly all is a blur. I woke up and there's a lot of rumble, dust and chaos. The Sleeper is gone, the room is destroyed. Eckhardt is gone, so is Miss Croft, so is my head, it hurts fucking badly. I'm okay, I think, my head is shit, I have cuts, my already sore knee is bleeding, it's...aweful. There's an open gate on the ground floor, and I hope it leads outside.

It has to.

In the debris I've seen a small piece of this flower-shaped thingy. It's a metal part that I think belonged in the Obscura Paintings. I took it with me. I'm on my way to the train station...finally. If Lara Croft is really the archeologist I think she is, she'd be interested in the piece. If I manage to offer her this metal plate, maybe she'll talk to me about her knowledge of the Paintings, Eckhardt, and the Sleeper?

I am finally back at civilization and am seeing living human beings again. I got myself a new Shirt, washed myself and my wounds and got medical gauze to treat my knee. My head stopped hurting when I drank plenty of water, luckily I was only dehydrated. Surely if I ever tell anybody about what I had seen I'll be considered a maniac...I thought about what to ask Miss Croft. I made a small list:

Is Eckhardt really this 500 year old alchemist?

Who is Kurtis Trent? What'd he got to do with the LV?

Was he responsible for the Monstrum killings since I assume you weren't?

What do you know about the Sanglyph?

The Periapt Shards can kill Eckhardt, right?

What purpose serves the Sanitarium?

Transcript of the fifth, sixth and seventh page: I'll be in Paris soon. I slept until now, the train ride takes so long and I'm just so exhausted. This journey is almost over, but I might be able to find even more. In case of Lara Croftwants to talk to me. I'll write her an email. Will she reply?

We're arriving at Paris. I wrote her a mail with a photo of the Sanglyph piece, asking her whether she'd like it in return for some answers. I even offered her to send her this notebook. I'm sure she'll return it either way, I trust her reputation, and I can prove my volicity and that I'm not a paranoid stalker or something.

UPDATE: It's been a week since I arrived back home and I got a LETTER via CURIER, can you believe that? Lara Croft is indeed interested in the piece and she invited me to London. She had the tickets in the mail, too. I cannot believe it!

She writes she is delighted I survived (I laughed here) and I should come over within two weeks. And that in case I come over with bad intention she's going to shoot me. I think...I think she means that.

Transcript of the eighth and ninth page: The tickets are valid for two weeks for any flight in first class. A ticket to get to London AND come back.

I'm really on my way to London. Tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. I'm a bit nervous obviously, and the spartanic answer is more than I thought I'd get, but still. Meeting her in person while knowing what she went through is like...we've been in the same places. Seen similar things. I know about this maniac that wants to take over the world, that accused and framed her for murder, I know about the Lux Veritatis and their only member that is still alive (if he is, now). I'll miss the Sanglyph- it's the only thing that can confirm my story. But in Lara's collection not only will it be safe, but it won't do any damage no more. Maybe through her I can also contact Kurtis Trent? He can answer about the LV way more I think. I'll take some pics of the manor if I may. Oh! I'm excited.

Transcript of the tenth and eleventh page: I arrived at the airport in London. I also got a new pen since I've written so much in this book I needed one. It's almost as if I'm at a new chapter right now and since I'm moving countries again- yeah. I think I'm on a good way. The butler, his name is Winston, picked me up in a black cab. I got checked thoroughly for weapons, metals, cameras and whatnot and now I'm on my way to the Croft Manor. I've gotten a few wishes by Miss Croft concearning the talk:

I'm not allowed to take photos of the Manor, but she'll hand me one of the Sanglyph.

She'll hand me the post adress of Mr.Trent and contact him first

I can write down the interview, yet I am to keep it to myself.

So, only here we have the truth.

It's been two hours since I've been here. I had lots of tea, a lot of food and some rest in one of the guest rooms. Lara was slightly cold in the beginning, but as I showed her this book, my photos and talked to her about my findings, like Carvier's death (poor soul), Rennes, Werner's appartment, the poor, poor souls in the Sanitarium, everything she saw I've seen as well. Tomorrow she'll talk about my questions, she listened to me being tired as hell. She got me a key to lock my room and I'm cuddled up in a blanket.

I just noticed how muchmy body hurts. I really need a good rest.

[pine-niidles]

January Project Updates

I'm going to start this by pretending I'm not posting this a week into February, and you're going to go along with me, ok? Ok! 

Well January sure went by quick! My update last time was pretty hesitant, but I think I am properly getting back into things. On top of that I finally got a reply on my visa and I'm flying back to Scotland at the end of the month 🎉 Very excited to be home! I'm looking forward to seeing my girlfriend and friends again and being back in a space I've designed to work for me. Now, onto what I've been up to:

2023 sketchbook

Part two of attempting to document my art: I put together scans of my physical sketchbook with a bunch of digital drawings from last year. The pdf is pretty much complete, I've just been putting off figuring out the cover and writing a quick intro & outro.  

I guess I'm also kind of hesitant to put a price on it since 60% of it is stuff I've posted publically, but I keep telling myself it's worth it anyway. And it's nice to see all that art in one place rather than lost to void of social media.

Stickers

I got myself some sticker paper and have been doing a bunch of test prints to get to know it (and my printer). I'm really happy with how they're turning out! It's extremely satisfying to print out my art and hold it in my hands.

I plan to set up an online shop sometime after I get back to Scotland, I'll probably open it in March. Sticker packs will be up for sale there alongside zines & prints 🌟

Commissions

Perhaps this is more of a February update but by the time the month is over it'll be too late to let you know! I opened regular commission slots and alongside them I made a fun valentines YCH, only slightly vampire themed. Very self-indulgent but I hope you'll like them it too.

I'll probably only take one more slot before closing both the forms :)

February Plans

- Hourly comics day was the 1st of February. I'm pretending this is just a January update, so I won't go too far into it right now. I did finish it, and I'm formatting the comics to make into a zine!

- Sketchbooking - I'm finally returning to drawing in my physical sketchbook again, I'll start posting scans again as soon as I have ~10 pages done

- Impractical but Extremely Cool Fantasy Swords zine, I have (almost) all the swords finished I just need to put it all together

- and gotta focus on finishing those commissions ofc <3

[fuzzyreadingfictionpeanut]

Hi it's me again

Today 060623

It's been 2 year since i last open this Tumblr app

I've doing well and now I've also got some exciting story to share or write ✍️

For first year of 2022 I've been doing well just got my new job as a kitchen helper nothing much I'm doing well at my work and the boss seems good they love how i work they also complement me for doing a good job but fortunately i only last for 3 month then i quite or got out of the place and then starting that i suddenly realized since I've got my paid there just fine and have some saving I've thought of spending it well i spend it on myself i do what i love i go to my first ever event cosplay and first time cosplaying cause that's what i love and I've always been wanted to wear a costume and be something else like bringing the character i love to life well even though my style that time still new well still im fully satisfied with myself oh yeah also i started to go and talk to some other cosplayer i get to experience a new things it worth every penny I've spent it'll be a good time for me I'll remember that dayy foreverr then unexpected things happen i gotta meet lot of new people all kind of people they all nice and kind but still all the cosplayer are to hyper while me there an ambivert i get along with then just find but i started feeling lonely again and lost since I'm not to good with people lots of them says they thought that im a hyper person since me in chat is soo friendly and hype but meeting in person im a quiet person don't talk alot unlike in the chat group and yeah that's how im ,

And in that group chat and events I've also had a crush on someone at first i don't know what that feeling then eventually we meet and greet then chatting then talk about i don't know nonsense,

Well he's been catching my eyes since the first event we meet but don't talk just passing by each other just like a stranger walk pass then one time i follow his Instagram and comment on his status and got his number but still scared to reach out to him yet then one time i got a good excuses to use to dm him, i without wasting more time i dm him and started a small conversation like "will you go to the next event"

He replied then my heart beats suddenly up down badump baadumpp×_×

im dead then we started our longg2 conversation started askingg bout each other like or dislike and then the story go on long and we also fight but then we mad at each other duhh i also don't know why but i always over spoke about anything i want to say but one day finally we talk again after a month or week we haven't contacted each other he finally chat me then im shock feeling relief but unfortunately i got a fever that time so i can't meet him in any event since i can't go outside then we become like we're usual talks about our day telling story to each other playing some q&a then i started spending more time on my phone waiting for his notifications to pop out on my screen then few months past we still talk we only know each other for like a few months then i started noticing that he's been talking about other women he's been catching an eyes on he thinks he has a crush on that girl well i admitted it it's kinda hurt me but i don't really care much bout it since i don't really know what it is then one day he say that he will be confessing his feeling to her today then i without no hesitation i cut him by telling him about my feeling towards him saying how i think I've got a feeling towards him how I've been thinking about him since our first meet and first talk,at first i don't really sure if what im feeling is love but after months talking to him while thinking about him I've also been asking my friend on the internet bout this feeling that i have and they said of course it's love,

Then of course he's answers shocked me and made me feel more nervous waiting for his answer then he replied by askingg me back if i'm being serious about it and not just messing with him then of course i said yes i'm talking about what i really feels then we he answer then yes it is <⁠(⁠￣⁠︶⁠￣⁠)⁠>then i started rolling in bed like a crazy worm to happy and scared at the same time (⁠ ⁠ꈍ⁠ᴗ⁠ꈍ⁠) i can't believe that,I've got my first boyfriend and now i have to figure out how to be a good girlfriend for him (⁠◡⁠ ⁠ω⁠ ⁠◡⁠)

[shattered-starsxx]

MUSE LIST,

Annelie Silverhallow, OC Shadowhunter - FC: Phoebe Tonkin ( pinny. ) Joanna Harvelle, Supernatural ( slightly divergent ) Canon - FC: Alona Tal ( alt: Sarah Michelle Gellar ) ( pinny. ) Iridián Falkenrath, OC Crime/Preternatural - FC: Charisma Carpenter ( alt: Emeraude Toubia ) ☆ ( crime au • emeraude only. ) ( pinny. ) Buffy Summers, Divergent BTVS/ATS Canon - FC: Olivia Taylor Dudley ( cursed immortality fc: Emily Rose ). ( pinny. ) Beatrix Volkov. OC metahuman - FC: Sarah Michelle Gellar ( alt: katheryn winnick. ) ( pinny. )

[ sporadic activity multi muse blog, penned by mare. +40, minors & personals do not interact. ]

TRACKED TAG: shattered.starsxx

follow backs happen from @italianexotiicbeauty

will not write with characters or other writer's under the age of 21/18.

smut is not written, only implied.

your character can hurt mine but not kill them. answer is always no, and if you refuse to have your character take damage when in a fight? scene over.

only keeping it to these four characters, I know myself well enough that my creativity WILL DWINDLE if I have too many.

SPORADIC ACTIVITY = WRITING ONCE OR TWICE EVERY TWO WEEKS. ( reply at your own speed. )

multi ship / multi verse.

no god moding / powergaming / gas lighting / manipulation / abuse / pick me energy / force shipping / theft and/or jocking.

no is a final answer.

discord is only given to people I've known longer than 6 months.

spike × buffy is not an otp, he SA'd her. absolutely not allowed. ( in that same instance, regina x graham is also not supported. )

yeah i will not interact / follow people who I've got bad vibes with.

not a personal supporter of: amber heard, ezra miller, jk rowling, joss whendon, jodi hildebrandt, ruby & kevin franke.

COMMUNICATION IS IMPORTANT. I can't read your mind, you can't read mine. If there's an issue or you feel like there is, TALK. TO. ME. ( also, waiting 'til the last moment before unfollowing me isn't the wisest way to go about it. )

i do tag triggering content, please tell me if you have them.

ageism isn't cute and isn't accepted, writing has no limit just that no one over 21 should write with someone under 18.

east coast united states, northeast. female, mare or mary. she/her.

exclusives ( aka, writing with one canon of a particular face ) is allowed if that is something that eases the mind of the other writer.

all threads after the initial post / response will be iconless. ( any graphics posted have been edited by me & took a while to create, and with me being consistently MOBILE? icons would take longer, so no icons. just the banners during the first posts & nothing else. )

important links.

tags. ☆ self promo.

[choke-me-joey]

43 and 45 reuniting with Joseph Quinn after a long period of time apart

Okay but after writing this I need to be help up against a wall and fucked so I apologise if you also develop this need

43. You've missed me, haven't you? Pretty little pussy is sucking me in.

45. I need you so bad, I can't wait, I've gotta have you now.

Joseph Quinn x reader

Content warning: 18+ content minors DNI, rpf (don't like don't read), unprotected p in v, creampie, squirting, mentions of a blowie whilst driving, established relationship, wall sex????? Idk

Hoe-vember/Dick-cember masterlist

You checked your appearance over in the mirror, smoothing down your dress. You were happy with how you looked, wearing a midi length leopard print dress and heeled boots. You checked your phone again, smiling as you saw your boyfriend's name had pinged up on the screen about 5 minutes ago.

Car is about 10 minutes away, can't wait to see you x

You text him back the GIF of Anna from Frozen when she's all excited, and carry out final checks on your hair and makeup.

It wasn't ideal, but tonight was your mum and dad's wedding anniversary party, an event that had been planned for the majority of the year. Unfortunately, when it was planned it was not envisioned that Joe would be flying back from Japan and landing literally 2 hours before you needed to get going. You had told him to stay home and sleep when he got back as you knew how exhausted he was, but he'd insisted on still attending. He loved your family and they loved him.

Now, time was tight. Joe's flight had been delayed which meant he'd just about have time to change his clothes before you'd need to leave to get to the party venue, instead of a quick shower like he'd hoped. Thankfully, he'd managed to shower on the plane (private flight, fucking wild) so he was happy to just douse himself in deodorant and cologne for a few hours, he could properly shower when you guys got home tonight/early tomorrow morning.

You hear the door open and close and you run out from the bedroom, running at your boyfriend and jumping. He catches you and your legs wrap around his waist. You don't even give him time to say hello before pressing your lips to his. He sighs happily as your tongue finds his, and he moves to press your back against the wall as you make out for a few seconds.

"Hello to you too," Joe chuckles as you break apart, foreheads resting together. "Fuck, I missed you."

"I missed you too, so much. Next time you're away for that long I'm contorting myself to fit in your bag." You grin, leaning in for another kiss. This one is slower, deeper, hotter. You feel a tell tale pulse against your crotch and your pussy flutters in response, but you try to ignore it. "Joe, babe, we have to leave, we're already a little late-"

"I need you so bad, I can't wait, I've gotta have you now." Joe grunts, holding you up with one arm and undoing his jeans with the other.

Fuck it.

"Here?!" You gasp, amazed at his strength. It's always such a turn on when Joe shows how strong he really is.

"Right fucking here." Joe replies, pushing his jeans and pants down, fisting his cock a couple times before moving your dress up and underwear to the side, pushing his cock into your pussy slowly. You tense a little; you hadn't been with him in weeks so the stretch and burn was a little more prominent. "Sorry baby, just relax for me, okay?"

"So big," you whimper. "Joey, you're so fucking big."

"But you're taking me so well, love." Joe glances down at where your bodies are connected, smirking at the shine of your arousal on him. "You've missed me, haven't you? Pretty little pussy is sucking me in."

You moan loudly. "God yes, Joe, missed you so fucking much."

"I know baby, me too." Joe looks up and kisses you sweetly as he begins to move, fucking you up against the wall. "God you feel so fucking good. Been thinking about this for so long."

"Me too," you shudder as he reaches to touch your clit. "Yes, baby, just like that, don't stop."

Joe chuckles. "Gonna come for me? Already?"

You nod, and Joe adjusts his stance to assist you, making sure his cock hit that spot inside you on every single thrust. After a few years together he knew exactly how to make you feel good. His fingers don't leave your clit, rubbing in quick circles, desperate to feel you fall apart for him.

You shriek out his name as you come hard, soaking Joe's cock and shirt that he hadn't managed to remove. "Fuck yes, that's my good girl, squirting on my cock like that." Your pussy clenches around him and he shudders. "Not gonna last long."

"I don't care, come inside me." You grab his face and make him look at you. "Come for me, Joe."

"Oh fuck," Joe almost whimpers, his eyes fluttering shut. You tap his cheek gently.

"Look at me when you fill me up, baby." You whisper and Joe nods, moaning loudly as he pushes inside you as deep as he can, his cock pulsing and twitching as rope after rope of his cum fills you. His knees wobble with the force of his orgasm as his head drops to your shoulder. You run your nails over his scalp softly as you both try to catch your breath. "You good?"

"Can't talk, came too hard, no brain left." Joe mumbles into your collarbone and you giggle. He picks his head up and kisses up your neck, across your jawline and finally your mouth. "I love you."

"I love you." You reply, brushing your nose over his. "But now we are really fucking late."

Joe groans and yawns. "I know babe, I'm so sorry."

"If you drive, I'll blow you as a thank you."

"Let's fucking go!"

[scuttle-buttle]

Chapter 11

WC: 2077

Rated: E

Chapter Tags: full on angst, discussions of emotional trauma, mild depictions of blood/gore, mentions of self h*rm & su*cide, mentions of child abuse, discussions of physical disabilities, institutionalization, some dialogue & plot canon to TV show, hurt/comfort

🧠

The rest of the conference went by much like the first day did. Both you and Laszlo bought a few books for your collections. An ease had settled over your conversations with the help of Sara and John's presence; you spoke more freely with each other. You tell yourself it is not because he's going soft on you or vice versa, but rather that you have found yourself in this imaginary bubble where you happen to get on well. It's inevitable that it will pop once you’re back at school and Laszlo will revert back to his usual callous state.

Laszlo. It still felt odd to think of him like that, rather than by his title. You couldn't lie, it gave you a sort of thrill. Even in your dreams you had only called him by his honorific. Thankfully you didn't have another dream after Friday. You couldn't escape the feeling that you'd said something incriminating in front of the man in question. So you chose to pretend it didn't happen.

Monday morning came and you headed to the train station. Once again he had secured a private cabin for the journey. This time you came prepared with a book since you had yet to replace your broken phone.

"Thank you again for inviting me to this, I really enjoyed myself. It was really nice of the department to foot my travel expenses, the hotel was really fancy. I may have helped myself to a mini-bottle or two," you joked.

"There is no need to worry about the department's finances; they were not involved."

You pause. He paid for you? Laszlo did say he would take care of the arrangements; but the four-star hotel, the private compartment train tickets, the admission to the conference, and every meal? Shit, that must have been a fortune, hundreds of dollars at least.

You don't know what to say, so you settle for an awkward "oh." A moment passes before you add "I appreciate that, um, I can pay you back. Might take some time but I can."

The professor is flippant in his reply. "There is no need, it was well spent for the research and knowledge acquired." He opens his book signaling the conversation is over.

You lick your lips. Fine then, I'll just consider it payment for emotional suffering and damages of the last eight weeks.

The first few hours of the journey were spent reading one of the new books you picked up at the convention. Occasionally you would peek over the pages at the professor. He was engrossed in his own selection; sometimes he would pause to write down a thought.

Around the seventh hour of your journey you had given up on reading anymore in favor of looking at the fields outside. The silence was comforting.

Laszlo had trouble concentrating on the book in his hand. He saw you as a conundrum. One minute you could be sociable and teasing with your comments, then next you were biting at his throat with your quick wit and fierce ideals. He decides that he wants to know what made you into who you are today. Now is as good a time as any.

His eyes on you cause a tingle up your spine but you ignore it. Laszlo breaks the silence; "may I ask a personal question?"

"You just did," you answer, still peering out of the large window. He huffed once, amused. At his following silence you face him. You raise your eyebrows to signal him to go on with his question. Curiosity grows at the thought of what he intends to ask.

"Twice now you have made implications of a traumatic past," he begins.

Bubble popped.

Interrupting, you snark "is this the part where you psychoanalyze me, doc? Because trust me, I've been through enough of that." You pick at the lint on your jeans.

Laszlo tries to choose his words more carefully the next time he speaks. "What I mean to say is, the first afternoon in the classroom where you defended that student you implied you had been witness to a trauma. You then displayed signs of anger and embarrassment before leaving prematurely. Yesterday you mentioned having entered a psychiatric facility. As an alienist I can't help but find myself curious about your experiences."

You slide your eyes to meet his from across the cabin. Your face is devoid of any emotion. "We all have our demons. Even you can't argue with that."

Your jaw clenches. Everyone had warned you. They all said he would try to worm his way into your head to figure you out. All the reviews, the gossip, everything. It was a big fat 'I told you so'. You give a pitiful laugh at the situation. "You know, everyone told me that you would pull this stunt."

He seems confused by your statement. "And what is that?"

"That you'd get inside my head and try to figure me all out or whatever. You already know I googled you beforehand, what everyone says about your methods. By now I assume you've done a little research yourself. I promise you there is nothing exciting here," you scoff and point to yourself.

"You would be correct in your assumption." You chew at your cheek as he starts. "I do know some of what happened in your past. Yet I also know that society likes to dilute the truth into something either more palatable, more entertaining, for people to consume greedily. What I want to know is what you have faced. How you have not allowed the experience to overcome you so much so that your humanity is erased like the characters I lecture on."

Eyes closing of their own volition you are thrown back in time to that night so many years ago. You didn't talk about it anymore. Bitsy knew of course, but that was the extent.

Laszlo waits. He knows this is likely to push you over the edge if your history with him means anything. Quite frankly, anyone would be tossed to their limit at his interrogation had they gone through what you had. John always told him that he needed to work on his bedside manner; that he had a habit of coming on too strong in his pursuit of learning the intricacies of the human mind. But your earlier comment about being sent to a so-called 'nuthouse' rubbed him the wrong way. It left a bad taste in his mouth. He needed to know. He needed to understand.

Laszlo can imagine the reprimand that he would receive from John and Sara for this. Just as he considers apologizing for his intrusion you open your eyes.

"She was fine. None of us suspected anything was wrong. I came home from having dinner with some… boy, and she had locked herself in the bathroom. She- she must have started over the sink and moved to sit on the side of the tub. She was hunched inside it when I got the door open. I pulled her out. Blood was… everywhere." Your voice is clinical as you explain.

"After, I shut down. So I checked myself into a psych ward a few days later when I couldn't get the feel of her blood off my hands. It's slippery, you know. And it smells. You wouldn't think so but it does." You clear your throat. "I did the therapy, took the meds they prescribed, all the standard treatments. Later I started watching true crime documentaries. I'd heard about exposure therapy so I figured the more I saw the gore, the less the image of my dead roommate would bother me. And it did help. The nightmares stopped after a while, I came back to school. I was better, just not the same.” You had watched the passing landscape as you explained. Turning to face him you speak again. “That's why those pictures didn't bother me. They weren't anything I hadn't seen before."

He contemplates you. The discovery and subsequent loss of your friend in this manner would no doubt cause lingering effects to your psyche. A stain that would forever remind you. "I offer my sincerest condolences. I do not presume to know what that would be like to experience, but I am glad you sought help afterwards. To make the choice to alleviate yourself of your own suffering where possible.”

As he says this he realizes that your anger towards the idea of being enslaved to unconscious impulse makes perfect sense. It explains why you focused so much energy on defending your belief in free will. That you have the power to choose how you carry your joy, your anger, your healing. It reminds him of how he held onto his own guilt and hurt, ignoring how it festered within him for so long. He feels as though he needs to share a piece of himself with you.

“I played piano as a child, quite well too. My mother hoped I would someday make a career of it. I vividly remember playing Mozart’s Concerto for Piano No. 20 in D Minor at a holiday party when I was seven years old. It was my favorite to play.... It requires two hands." You finally look at him. "My father...” He pauses to gather himself.

Now it is the doctor that cannot meet your eyes. As you listen you feel your confusion grow. How could he have been a talented pianist if he only had full use of his left hand? Unless..., the realization dawns on you just as he continues, his words slow.

“My father had two sides. One loving and the other brutal, the two often coexisting. It was something as trivial as putting me to bed, I recall... A game of tug of war. We were laughing…” He inhales a sharp breath. Already you can feel the tears begin to blur your vision. “I don't remember if he was drunk or if I said something that offended him. He must have pulled my arm behind my back.” Laszlo exhales shakily. “In small children, fractures can often affect…” he trails off, unable to finish. You can hear how he barely holds himself together.

Your heart aches for the broken man that sits in front of you. He never let on how much his arm bothered him, at least not within your presence. Suddenly you don’t see him as this rude, insufferable, obsessive man, but instead as someone that spends his life trying to protect himself. He projects his own anger and hurt so that he may, just for a minute, forget about his own demons. He wants to help others even when he feels he cannot bear to help himself.

But unlike you, he has to live with the physical reminder of his past every day of his life.

You stand and move to sit on his right side. Before allowing yourself to think too much of your actions, you place your hand atop his own, curling your fingers around his palm and squeezing delicately. You don’t bother wiping away the tears on your cheeks. “I’m so sorry, Laszlo;” the whisper is barely heard above the sound of the train. A second passes where you fear you have overstepped and offended him by touching the affected limb. When his thumb tightens against the backs of your fingers you know he is not. He holds you in place.

“You asked me how I kept my humanity. How does anyone really? We learn to take what we get and we carry it in a bag. Sometimes you have to drag the damn thing behind you. But eventually the weight gets less and less if you allow yourself to move forward, even if it’s still there with you all the time. I dealt with what happened years ago and it does still haunt me. It’s easier now than it was, but… I- I suppose I’ve learned from you too. Sitting in those lectures and hearing you talk. We can either let it haunt us for the rest of our lives… or we can accept it… and use the memory of our pain to help ourselves and others.”

“I’m not sure the choice is entirely in our hands.” His tone is mournful.

You turn to smile at him through your tears. His own eyes are bloodshot. “I disagree. If it weren’t, if we didn’t have the freedom to choose that, we’d all be murderers.”

Tag list

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[bbugyu]

of all the views you had seen, there was little that could compare to him.

6.2k | cavalry captain!jeonghan x gn pyro!reader, genshin impact au, fluff, adventure, drinking, so much flirting, mentions of trauma, honestly this is the sweetest i'm ever gonna write jeonghan

happy inazuma release day!!! it's your local kaeya trash, because i predictably fall for gay bastards that lie straight to my face (example: jeonghan), and i'm here to give you a fic i wrote AGES ago and just polished up a bit to celebrate the release of what is likely going to be my FAVORITE region in genshin impact. i'm japanese so 😅 i have a soft spot. if there's any other gaymer carats out there, enjoy this one. if not, sorry! you can actually probably still read this and understand it for the most part, though you might miss a bit of context of the landscape and the lore.

ps. go tell @babiemingoo that wonwoo xinqiu 🤭

~

your work with the adventurer's guild was always efficient. you received your commissions, you carried them out, then returned for your reward, usually before the sun had even peaked. the rest of your day was generally spent either basking in the eternal sun of mondstadt, feeding cats in inazuma, or enjoying a hard earned meal in liyue, depending on where you decided to stay that week, finding board and paying for it with the commission you had earned that day. your tendency to wander came less from choice and more from nature - you could call yourself a nomad, but generally, you just got bored, and preferred seeing everything teyvat had to offer rather than settling in one place. adventuring was simply what you were meant to do, your mother had told you at a young age.

she, too, had wandered for most of her youth, and didn't stop just because you had come into her life. you remembered getting scooped up because you had wandered off a bit too close to the railing at wangshu inn as a toddler, playing with dogs at the docks of liyue harbor. you remembered the ludi harpastum and the first time you had ever had a sweet honey roast, and the way it made your eyes grow ten times in size before you dug in for more.

when your vision was bestowed upon you, you already knew how to use a sword. it was important, your mother told you, that you knew how to protect yourself. she had a vision as well, younger even than you had, and you had come to recognize the static in the air as a sign that she was angry - whether it was because of an altercation with someone on your journey or because you had secretly eaten the last hashbrown without consulting her first.

she used her vision and a sturdy blade she had owned since before you were born to protect the two of you on the road, but when she felt you were old enough, she taught you how to weild. a two handed weapon that was far too big for you when you were only fourteen, but when your reckless abandon got paired with a spark, you suddenly became far more dangerous than even your own mother. she scolded you for nearly starting a forest fire when you tried to pair the two skills for the first time after receiving your vision, and you both agreed that training was a beach activity from then on.

your mother settled eventually, after you were old and skilled enough to take on the road alone, pulling the many favors she had gathered in her travels to build a home in a small neighborhood south of liyue harbor, nestled in the foothills of mount tianheng, where you visited as often as your wandering allowed.

you had become much better with your vision. more careful but just as hot. quick to scan situations and strategize in the moment, hardly taking a second before jumping into action, slaying hilichurls like you were getting paid. well, you were, you supposed, but you had been doing this long before you had discovered the benefit of joining the guild. you were good at it. you were built for adventure, but revelled in leisure. there was good reason you were able to take afternoons off, and you milked every last second of it.

"you're back in town?"

you grinned, leaning your sword against the wall and dropping your bag off your shoulders before settling at the bar. "for now."

rubin often served you alcohol - when you were in mondstadt, at least, however often that may be - but never questioned you deeply. he would ask how your travels were, and listen to your stories from regions beyond his knowledge, of the cultures that he had only heard of from people like you. he enjoyed them just about as much as any, if not a little more, purely because your tenacious personality brought something more to the table. he wondered, though, how long you intended to keep living day by day, sleeping in different beds every week.

"what's wrong with sleeping in different beds?" you teased, laughing into your wine glass. "if i didn't know any better, i'd think you were shaming me, rube."

rubin simply laughed, knowing your tone by now. "i just wonder if you ever intend on digging in your roots, or if you'll continue travelling forever."

"if i dig roots, you may never see me again. is that what you want?"

"what," he said. "you don't like mondstadt?"

"i love monstadt," you assured him. "but i also love inazuma. and my mother is in liyue, though she might be upset with me if i try to settle too close to her. perhaps natlan would suit me more?" you shrugged finally, the door behind you opening as you finished with "i suppose i'll settle when i've found a reason to love one place more than the rest."

rubin shook his head, a chuckle falling from his lips. "a wanderer through and through." his attention was quickly drawn to the man entering the bar. "ah, captain! the usual?"

"please," the decorated man said, quickly taking a seat beside you despite the rest of the bar being available. "would you like another, wanderer?"

you eyed him cautiously, studying what you could see if his face around the black eyepatch, gaze skimming down his elaborate clothing before looking down at your emptied drink. "sure."

"another for your wandering friend, rubin, on my tab, please." your brain swirled, considering the brief information you had been given and wondered how you had never managed to meet this regular during your past visits. "are you just drinking dandelion wine, or something more fun?"

"more fun?" you asked. "what are you drinking, then?"

"well, a death after noon, of course," he stated. "don't tell me you haven't had one."

you blinked at him. "i haven't."

you turned towards rubin when he laughed at the back and forth. "shall i make two, then?"

"definitely," your new drinking buddy said, then gestured to you. "you trust my taste, right?"

you said nothing, but he accepted your silent smile as an agreeance. "captain," you said finally, thinking of how rubin had addressed him. "of?"

the man turned towards you, his elbow planted on the bar and his cheek on a fist. despite his get up, he had a playful smirk across his lips. "you mean, my reputation doesn't precede me? you really are a wanderer. everyone in mondstadt knows my name."

"everyone but me," you corrected. "as i'm currently in mondstadt."

his teeth shone behind his smirking lips before he sat up straight. "well, allow me to introduce myself." he saluted, his arm extending from his side at an angle - a salute you recognized from the guards around the city. "i am jeonghan, the cavalry captain of the knights of favonius."

"ah, the knights," you smiled briefly, before letting your eyes wander as you thought, crossing your arms over the bar. "i don't see much of a cavalry in the city, though."

he let out an amused exhale. "so i have a bit more free time these days."

"i'm sure the acting grand master is jealous of all your free time," you teased. "poor guy, looks like he's staving off a panic attack every time i see him. you should probably help him more."

"so," he sighed, leaning against the bar again. "you know of the acting grand master but not me?"

"jihoon?" you asked. "of course i know of him. he's all anyone ever talks about around here."

jeonghan nodded once, thanking rubin when he placed two drinks before you. "people talk about me, also, you know."

your lips stuck out in a pout. "jeonghan, you said? doesn't ring a bell."

he rolled his eyes and picked up his drink, holding it out for you to cheers against. you giggled, clinking your glass against his before taking a sip. the golden liquid was sweet, but not like the dandelion wine you had grown to love in this region. it had more depth, a subtle bitterness to it, and a refreshing bubble. you stared after the glass when it left your lips, then looked over to find jeonghan grinning at you.

"i see why it's your usual," you said, taking another sip before placing the glass on the bar. "i could drink too many."

"will you?" he asked.

"not tonight," you replied coolly. "i haven't asked sana to put me up at the guild yet, and if i get there too late, i'll get a cot instead of a bed. unless rubin finally wants to come clean about something?"

the bartender laughed. "how many times do i have to tell you? we don't even have rooms to board."

you squinted at him. "i know there's something upstairs. i'll learn your secrets one day, rube."

"i wouldn't be a very good bartender if i didn't know how to keep them."

"so you're in the guild?" jeonghan asked as rubin attended to another patron. "an adventuring wanderer."

you smiled vaguely at him. "i am. i have to pay for my travels somehow."

he shrugged. "there's other ways to make money. probably more profitable, too."

you eyed his teasing smirk. "i'm not sure i know what you're implying."

"as a captain of the knights of favonius, i assure you, i'm implying nothing at all," he said, exhaling sharply and adjusting on his stool. he leaned over towards you before speaking in a quieter tone. "but as jeonghan, i think you know exactly what i'm implying."

you only laughed, recognizing the thinly veiled attempt to worm a secret out of you. "i outgrew those means a long time ago. besides, when mora gets tight, i can always board up with my mother. i like liyue enough."

jeonghan studied you as you drank again. "liyue's home, is it?'

"for her, yes," you said, looking over to him, but you found yourself looking away again when his steely blue gaze met yours. you thought carefully about how much of yourself you were willing to reveal to this stranger, especially considering how important he was in the rule of the city. "she was a wanderer, too, and ended up falling in love with liyue harbor."

jeonghan made note of the way your face softened as you spoke about your mother. "and what about you?"

you met his intent look again, thinking about how his covered eye somehow made him even more intimidating. perhaps that was its purpose. "what about me?"

"what have you fallen in love with?"

a smile crept onto your lips as you processed his question. "oh, archons, what have i not fallen in love with? the smell of the open ocean in inazuma, the breathtaking temples in sumeru - have you ever been to waterfall city?"

jeonghan merely shook his head at you, the corners of his mouth turning upwards as he put his cheek on a fist again, leaning against the bar. "beautiful?"

you exhaled, eyes wide as you thought of the towering falls and the light mist that covered the city, trying to come up with an apt description. "humbling. there's nothing like it."

he watched your expression, head tilting further. "what a wonderful way to describe a place. tell me more."

your gaze went to him, then away briefly, feeling suddenly shy as you noticed his look. "about waterfall city?"

he shrugged a fur covered shoulder, shaking his head lightly. "about anywhere. describe your world, wanderer. i'd like to hear whatever you have to say."

you wondered if the heat that ran through you was because of the alcohol or the man, but you just took another drink and cleared your throat lightly, thinking of more places you had discovered in your travels. you thought of qingce village, one of your favorite places to visit, because the people are kind and welcoming and the fields are so beautiful. you told him about a tea shop owned by an old man - he insisted you call him pops so fiercely that you weren't even sure you had caught his given name - and it was probably the most relaxing cup of tea you ever had.

"it's been a while since i've gone," you sighed. "i think i'm overdue for a chat with pops and his tea."

jeonghan was smiling when you looked at him again. "the tea in liyue is unmatched," he said, reaching for his drink. before taking another sip, he gestured for you to continue.

so you did. you told him about sakura pond, about celestia city, about the volcanic black beaches. you told him liyue had your favorite people, but inazuma had your favorite food. he clicked his tongue at you.

"what about mondstadt? do we have one of your favorites?"

you smiled, genuinely. "sunsets. the night sky is different here than it is anywhere else. i think mondstadt is the closest we can get to the stars without joining the archons."

jeonghan studied you briefly, his blue eye flicking over your face as you finished your drink. "i think that's an apt observation. it seems your eyes are always wide."

"i travel for the views," you exhaled. "i don't plan on missing any."

he thought a second. "have you been to starsnatch cliff?"

your eyes lit up. "not in years," you said, in complete shock that you could have forgotten such a place. you pushed from the bar slightly, turning towards him, and he noticed the flash of a red gem strapped to your right thigh for the first time. "my mother took me there when i was a kid, but i haven't gone since."

"it never gets old," he said, sipping at the end of his drink. "i've yet to see that view and not be in awe."

"i'll go before i leave mondstadt again," you decided.

he looked to you. "when will that be?"

you sighed. "not sure, yet."

he just chuckled. "would you like another drink?"

"oh, no," you said, standing and stretching your spine. "i should make my leave. i don't like sleeping on cots. i just came by to let my ol' pal rube know i was in town again."

jeonghan watched you pull your pack onto your back, grabbing the handle of your sheathed claymore from where it was leaning against the wall next to the bar. "perhaps i'll see you again tomorrow?"

you looked at him, a vague smile on your lips as you strapped your sword back on. "perhaps you will, captain."

"jeonghan," he corrected. "but i don't believe you ever shared your name?"

"that was by design, captain," you said, and he swore he caught a glint in your eye as you bid rubin a farewell and stepped out of the angel's share.

jeonghan spun back around on his stool, immediately looking to rubin. "do you know their name?"

"no, sir," he said, looking at the closed door. "they've never said."

jeonghan's gaze went to the empty glass you had left behind, thinking about your stories, your sword, and the signifier of your vision on your thigh. "fascinating."

you got lucky - sana had a private room for you, and said you were welcome to rent it for your stay. she said not many people were travelling to mondstadt these days, and that more often than not, the adventurer's barracks in headquarters went unused. ever since the fatui had holed up in the grand goth hotel, it had been harder for you to make extended stays in mondstadt, but it seemed that something was telling you to stick around longer than usual. you laid on the hard mattress - a feeling that was more comforting than most, thanks to your continuous travels - and thought of the charming captain that had made a night of questioning you. you wondered if he really had any interest in anything you had to say, or if he had been hoping for details about something pertinent to an investigation.

you packed a lighter bag in the morning, only bringing along the essentials as you set out for your commissions for the day. that afternoon, you wandered around mondstadt and asked questions. questions about the simultaneously well-discussed and mysterious cavalry captain that had listened to your tales of travel, and answers came easier than expected, though they didn't contain all the details you were looking for. that night, you waited up at the angel's share to brag about your newfound knowledge to the captain that never showed, and you did your best to not let that hurt your ego.

the next day, you made a detour on your way back to the city after completing your commissions, stopping by springvale to enjoy a well deserved lunch and catch up with some locals. you sat in the grass with a skewer of grilled meat, watching the windmills of mondstadt steadily spin in the distance as time passed, thinking about how rubin had asked you if you didn't like it here.

you did, you decided. mondstadt felt different than anywhere else you had been. untouched, almost. wilder. freer. despite being born in inazuma, your first memories being in celestia, or your mother being in liyue, mondstadt felt comfortable. felt like a home. you wondered to yourself what that might mean.

sana greeted you happily when you returned much later than you normally did. she told you to go ahead to the guild and come back, filing away your reports and retrieving your rewards. you dropped off your things in your rented room, quickly, practically galloping back down the steps towards the entrance of the city to continue your conversation with the adventurer guilds' mighty receptionist without your sword weighing you down. you crossed your arms on the counter, comfortably lounging as you chatted with her, having always enjoyed her conversations more than most. like rubin, she was a reason mondstadt always felt comfortable.

"fancy meeting you here," an all too familiar voice said, and you pulled your eyes from sana to find jeonghan leaning his side against the counter next to you.

"good evening, cavalry captain!" sana chirped, placing your reward - your room free already removed - on the counter and bowing politely. "can i help you with anything today?"

his icy gaze flickered from your lightly curved lips towards sana. "oh, no, my dear. i'm just coming back from an investigation near springvale"

"interesting," you said, eyeing him. "i was just there and didn't see you."

"i wouldn't be very good at my job if you did, wanderer," he grinned. "knight business, you wouldn't understand. got the assignment yesterday."

"ah," you shifted to your side to face him, making him eye the vision on your thigh. "is that why you never showed? rubin was worried."

he looked you up and down. "rubin was, huh?"

you rolled your eyes and adjusted your posture to face away from his smirk. sana looked between the two of you twice before clearing her throat as quietly as possible, making jeonghan let out a chuckle before he directed his attention to the guild's receptionist.

"how goes holding the post, sana?"

she looked almost frightened when the attention was directed back to her. "good, captain! in fact, one of our most capable adventurers-" she gestured to you, "-just returned from taking care of some of our more difficult commissions - no one else would take them."

jeonghan looked at you. "why did sana have to tell your secret?"

your eyebrows quirked upwards. "what secret?"

"that you're good at this. shouldn't you be bragging?"

a chuckle spilled from your lips, and jeonghan watched you as you looked away. "i'm not the bragging type."

he studied you a moment. "what type are you, then?"

you considered the question, wondering exactly how to answer. what type were you? if not a teller, than surely you must be a shower, but that didn't seem right either. you exhaled. "the quiet type. see you later, sana."

he laughed, pushing off the counter as you tucked your mora into your waist bag, wishing sana a good evening and following you towards the fountain. "you sure talk a lot for being the quiet type."

a smirk landed itself on your lips as he fell into step beside you. "maybe private is a better description."

"that one i can see," jeonghan said, looking over to you. he thought of how you had spent nearly an hour telling him about the best views in teyvat, yet he still didn't know the most basic information about you. "do you share your name with anyone?"

you thought. "my mother."

he scoffed. "anyone else?"

you looked to the sky. "rubin."

"wrong," he retorted. "he doesn't know your name, either."

you laughed, looking over to him as you came up to the fountain, spinning and sitting back on the ledge. "you asked?"

"of course i asked," he said, planting one foot on the ledge beside you and placing his arms on his knee. "i asked other people, too. almost everyone knows you, but they don't know anything about you. bits and pieces, but never the full picture."

you just smiled up at him from your relaxed posture on the concrete. "what's wrong with a little intrigue?"

he just smiled back at you. "nothing. i tend to keep a bit myself. did you know there's a large number of people in this city that were shocked when i said you wield a claymore?"

you hummed, dipping the tips of your fingers into the fountain. "did you know there's a large number of people in this city that consider you the most eligible bachelor in not only mondstadt, but in all of teyvat?"

his lips parted slightly as you spoke. "so you snooped, too."

"i was bored yesterday. it wasn't hard," you exhaled. you flicked a drop of water towards his foot. "jeonghan yoon, the cavalry captain of the knights of favonius since he was only nineteen. who loves wine and whose adopted brother runs the biggest winery in teyvat, yet they're hardly ever seen speaking. who comes from a far off land on a different continent, but has come to love mondstadt like it was his home. who wears an eyepatch but has never told anyone why."

he chuckled at the assessment and pulled his foot off the ledge to sit beside you. "so when do i get to learn about you?"

"i told you about me yesterday," you said.

"you told me about teyvat," he corrected. "and while i was able to infer some things about your character, i still know close to nothing about you."

you thought for a moment, realizing no one had ever noticed how little you truly shared despite always being willing to tell stories. "sometimes it feels like i am teyvat. it's hard to think of things that are just about me."

"you could start with that vision," he said, nodding at the strap across your thigh. you looked down at it, exhaling.

"what's there to tell? you know what it means, and that's more teyvat than me, too."

he leaned back on a hand, looking you up and down in curiosity. "how old were you."

you chewed your cheek. "fourteen. you?"

his lip quirked upwards. "sixteen."

you bumped his shoulder with yours playfully. "beat you."

he laughed. "how'd it happen?"

you paused. "you go first."

he just chuckled and looked away, watching a dog wander past the general store. "another day, then."

"no fun," you sighed, brushing your hands together as you leaned forward. "what about the eyepatch?"

he met your eyes, mouth slanted in a smirk. "another day."

you clicked your tongue. "if you wanna learn about me, you have to be willing to give up some details, too. i value a fair trade."

"then stop asking questions that you know i won't share the answer to." jeonghan noticed the color of the sky, then suddenly pulled a pocket watch out, checking it quickly to confirm that there was enough time and stood. "come with me?"

you stared up at him. "where?"

he grinned, extending a hand to help you to your feet. "you said mondstadt's sunsets were your favorite, correct?"

you generally weren't prone to following mysterious men into back corridors, but jeonghan easily convinced you with no words at all that sneaking around the sight line of the acting grand master was completely normal behavior, sushing you with a grin as you giggled, taking refuge around a corner after the two of you made it up to the second floor of the favonius headquarters. he tugged your hand with his, pulling you into a steep maintenance staircase behind a door.

"this feels like it's against some rules," you said, climbing the stairs behind him.

"nonsense," he said, looking back at you and grinning. "are you suggesting that a knight of favonius would break rules just to impress a mysterious traveler?"

you laughed quietly, wondering if he really meant that he wanted to impress you. "not most, but maybe this one."

he only thought for a split second. "if anyone asks, we're on official knight business."

he opened the door and you found the sky again, beginning to glow orange as the edge of the sun began to hide behind the cliffs. you stared in awe at the way the few fluffy clouds reflected pink and gold, then readjusted your focus when jeonghan spoke again.

"i hope you aren't afraid of heights," he said, walking over to the parapets that surrounded you. "the best view requires a bit of a climb."

you looked up at the tower, and while it wasn't much higher than where you stood, you also recognized that you were well above most of mondstadt already. "you climb up there?"

he paused, studying you. "we don't have to, we can just sit on a merlon-"

"no, we can climb," you said, walking over to where he was and eyeing the small gap between the parapet and the adjacent roof. "hop over?"

he laughed, stepping over the gap and holding a hand out for you. "watch your step."

and though you didn't need it, you accepted the hand anyways, and it stayed on yours as you walked over the roof to the tower, as if making sure you didn't misstep several stories in the air.

"would you like to go first?" he asked. "i'll catch you if you fall."

you rolled your eyes at him, dropping your hand from his grip. "you go first. i want to see where the handholds are."

he just grinned at you. "very well," he said, tugging on the wrists of his fingerless gloves to make sure they were taught against his skin before taking hold of a brick. you watched him as he took foothold after foothold, and he resisted the urge to show off by speedily scaling the wall in favor of making sure you had the chance to see where he gripped. when he reached the opening in the tower, he pulled himself up and spun around, exhaling with a grin as he seated himself at the ledge with his legs dangling above you.

"your turn."

you adjusted your waist bag as you sighed in amused annoyance, spinning it to be behind you and out of your hips' way to climb the wall. it wasn't much - a couple meters, maybe - and you had definitely climbed further, but jeonghan's presence made you slightly nervous. that nervousness, however, just fueled you to prove yourself.

you scaled the wall easily, making jeonghan whistle and jokingly call you some kind of adventurer, and your only hesitation came when his hand was in your face. despite your initial inclination to ignore it, you put your left hand in his, allowing him to help you pull yourself up on the ledge and sit beside him.

"impressive," he commented.

you laughed, brushing off your hands. "you, too."

"c'mon," he said, gesturing his head over his shoulder before making moves to stand. "the view's on the other side."

you sighed, looking over the view of mondstadt shrouded in golden light as he stood and walked to the other ledge. "never a moment of rest with you."

"if you want to miss the sunset, be my guest."

you leaned back on your hands and laughed, pulling your gaze away from the city to look at where jeonghan had seated himself on the other end of the tower, and subsequently the view of the rolling hills beyond him that were glowing golden in the evening sun. you blinked for a second, realizing you hadn't seen the sunset the night before, and quickly got to your feet to join him before you missed this one, too.

he gave you a soft smile when you sat beside him, and you briefly wondered how many he had in his repertoire. the wind was stronger higher, whipping gently through his hair and alleviating any uncomfortable warmth you may have had from exerting yourself on the way up. you watched the dregs of sunlight skip across the grassy hills and the sky turn deep orange and bright pink, feet swinging lightly over the edge of the tower.

"i was fighting with my brother," he said suddenly, causing you to look at him with a start before you realized he was telling you about his vision. there was a slight smile on his face as he looked out on the fields. "hyungwon. it was bad. he already had his - he's a pyro, like you - and we were both young and stupid and just lost our dad. we were sword fighting and it came to me when i needed it. it probably saved my life, honestly."

you blinked at him. "you think he would have killed you?'

he exhaled, leaning back on his hands. "i think if the roles had been reversed, i would have tried to kill him, too. i'm grateful it didn't go that way, though." he coughed abruptly, clearing his throat. "we're on speaking terms, and i do love him as a brother, but i generally avoid him."

you let that thought ruminate as you watched the sun sink, halfway beyond the horizon. "my father was in a gang in inazuma, but my mom ran away when she found out she was pregnant. didn't want to raise a kid in that world, i guess? we ran into him when i got older and he wasn't very understanding." you paused, remembering the detail too well. "they were going to take her vision. that's what they did to traitors. probably take me, too. they weren't expecting me to start setting fires."

jeonghan's gaze was on you as yours was on the horizon. "just a couple of survivors."

you looked over at him, a smirk on your lips. "a couple?"

he laughed waving at your implication, thinking he would have said the same thing in an attempt to fluster you just as you were to him. "like, more than one and less than four."

you only laughed back. "fortune favors the weak, i suppose. the archons saw we needed help and extended a fig branch."

"is that what it was?" he asked, a laugh on his lips. "we were both fighting people. that's hardly an offer of peace."

"look for the deeper meaning, jeonghan. we were fighting for our lives," you pointed out, and he realized it was the first time you had addressed him by his name rather than his title. "i was fighting for family. for freedom. is that not the greatest pursuit of peace?"

he watched you as you pulled your knees to your chest, putting your feet on the edge of the stonework surface you sat on. he studied the way the golden rays lit your skin and made your eyes sparkle. "i suppose so."

you paused in that moment for a long while, and jeonghan allowed the comfortable silence as the two of you watched the sun disappear beyond the cliffs of mondstadt. the sky was turning a deep shade of purple when you told him your name, and jeonghan thought that it was quite possibly the best news he had ever received, but he kept that joy to himself as he confirmed your name, and you rolled your eyes.

"are you gonna answer my other question now?"

he scoffed. "about the eyepatch? is it really that interesting?"

"not any more interesting than my name," you retorted.

"completely untrue," jeonghan insisted. "i've never been so excited to be told a secret, and i get told a lot of secrets."

you eyed his smile warily. "my name may be unknown, but it's no secret."

he sighed and shook his head lightly. "you really wanna know the reason i wear it? it's probably not as dramatic as you're hoping."

"yet you hide it?"

he laughed. "what's wrong with a little intrigue?"

you looked away, recognizing the parrot of your own words. "whatever you say, captain."

"no!" he whined and grabbed your arm, making you start and look at him with big eyes. "you just started calling me jeonghan, don't go back to captain."

you stared at him, only breaking to laugh, dropping your legs over the edge again. "you won't show me what's under the eyepatch, so i thought we weren't on first name basis."

his hand on your bicep was warm and gentle, but his gaze was piercing as he thought it over for a bit longer. you did your best to hold it, but you felt yourself shrinking when he quietly muttered, "go on, then."

it took you a second to register what he meant, and you reached out slowly, fingers hesitating before they brushed upon his cheekbone. jeonghan closed his eyes, resigning to your touch as you gently lifted the eyepatch. his eyes opened again, slowly, and you thought your heart might have skipped a beat.

"like chocolate," you commented, and a smile spread across his lips.

"that's the kindest reaction i've gotten."

your fingers fell upon his temple, brushing down gently as you inspected his singular brown eye. "since birth?"

he nodded, his eyes flicking down to your lips briefly before he spoke. "heterochromia. it's a characteristic of my family."

you studied his face. "not the one here?"

he sighed. "not the one here."

the icy blue of jeonghan's eye had always struck something in you. it made him mysterious. commanding. it felt like he saw more than you despite having one eye covered. but now, you felt warm. you felt his gentleness. there was comfort hidden away behind that black patch, and you told him that you understood why the cavalry captain had chosen to hide the eye he did.

but to you, he was willing to show anything that would keep you around longer, he said.

"why me?" you asked, studying his expression when he looked away. the sun had retreated behind the hills, leaving the sky a deep blue.

jeonghan didn't respond right away, and you wondered if he himself even knew the answer. "we're birds of a feather, you and i."

you looked out to the view again, watching the subtle movements of the wild hills. "did you travel much before you came here?"

"it was all i knew," he told you. "i was thirteen when my father left me here."

your neck snapped, your eyes on his profile when he leaned back on his hands. "left you?"

he almost laughed, a smile on his lips when his eyes met yours. "i was slowing him down, i suppose. hyungwon's father found me and took me in."

"so you stayed?"

"i didn't always want to," he assured you. "i had the itch to leave for years. as soon as i was able, i always told myself." he paused, eyes dropping. "then father died. then hyungwon turned down his position with the knights. and i was their second choice."

you pursed your lips. "you stayed for a job."

he laughed. "it's not that simple."

you smiled at him, enjoying the warmth of his eyes on yours as the sky cooled. "are you sure we're birds of a feather?"

"listen," he said, getting off his hands and brushing them off on his thighs. "i accepted the job so that i could set the story straight. i didn't want to run from the people that believed that hyungwon tried to kill me to avenge our father."

you studied him. "i'm sorry."

"don't be," he said, nudging your shoulder. "i was still planning on leaving, but then i fell in love."

you looked away, trying to sort out the way your stomach flipped. "are they still around?"

"not with a person," he laughed, then nodded towards the now dark hills. "with the views. besides, i get free reign whenever i leave for missions. i have fun adventuring, and come home to the best sunsets in teyvat. there are worse places to call home."

your eyes scanned the horizon, remembering the brilliant rays of sun you had just seen skip across it. "that is tempting."

"how tempting?" he asked.

you thought on that for a moment. "almost as much as a death after noon right now."

jeonghan laughed, slightly proud that he had hooked you on his favorite drink. "shall we go see rubin, then?"

you hummed, smiling at the captain. "as long as i don't have to sit alone again."

"that's a promise," he told you as he stood, holding out a hand that you took without hesitation, though he withheld his intention to make sure you were never alone again.

[saturneves]

Feel free not to post this ask. Just wanted to update you on myself. Idk maybe you actually care about me, and I don’t want to give you unnecessary anxiety.

I have just been very anxious (always am tbh but whatever). Having a hard writing an ask to you because my brain thinks I am sharing too much. And also because I haven’t talked to anyone for almost a year now (other than for school shit and excluding maybe 2 people that chat with me on and off, and of course my family) so you talking to me and saying compliments my brain go brr for that. So anxiety. I still see your art. It is still so gorgeous and I still love it. I will never stop thanking you about it. Sorry for over sharing.

Uhh just wanted to share this link with you, so that you can have something to do (been reading on here that you need distractions and stuff, and I had this saved for a week now but anxiety again). So I hope it helps https://takewhatyouneed.carrd.co/#distraction . But I can suggest you to do some jigsaw puzzles (if you have them, but I'm pretty sure you can print some and then just cut it out. I haven’t tried doing it this way yet but it probably works, I really like puzzles lol), you can sew to make stuffed toys out of old fabric (don’t know if you have stuffing but if you have an old pillow, that would work), you can try needle felting (again need to buy materials for that, be careful to not stab your fingers while doing it. I have done so countless of times lol. Would recommend you try out a kit first, like the one that tells you what to do and has set materials. Or you can do whatever you want), you can do diamond painting (buying materials again, I like doing small things. Don’t know if you'd like it though), and you can try 3D miniature house kit (again again, need to buy shit with this one. Little things again).

Ok sorry for the long message again. Other that my anxiety I am also having my finals next week. So I probably will be back after that. Let's see if my anxiety won’t be a bitch and let me talk to people. Ok I hope that shit I sent helps. Thank you so much, ok byee

-🎩

this ask truly warmed my heart❤ you never have to worry about oversharing, i love seeing you in my inbox! i'm not big on chatting so asks are perfect for me, as i can take all the time i need to work out what i'm going to say and stuff. you don't ever have to hesitate to send me an ask whenever you've got something on your mind, i love hearing your thoughts about my art and anything else :)

i get the whole not talking to people thing, i got very sick 2-3 years ago and basically had to shut down my entire life, i stayed home with my mom for nearly 2 years and lost all my friends. i missed 2 whole years of school. it really fucked up my ability to make friends/form connections and when i had to go back to school my anxiety was through the roof, and it hasn't fully eased up. it's not until last year i worked up the courage to actually talk to somebody at the new school i had to go to (well she approached me first but hey, i felt brave enough to keep talking to her), and now i think i have a best friend. i sincerely hope you can find some sort of calm, that you can make a connection too. i'm bad with encouragement, but i do try my best, so trust me when i say you've got this!

and woah that link!! i tried a few of them out, i loved the 'watch the stars' one, i like space. i'm gonna check the rest of them out throughout the day, thank you so much! i'm not good with sewing or needle felting (tried both as a kid) but honestly i would like to try it again.. i have a bit of stuffing over from my killing eve bear so i could make the tiniest stuffed animal in the world i guess lol. as for needle felting, i might have to try again someday!! i also poked my fingers all the time when i tried it as a kid, ouch. and i've never actually tried diamond painting!

well this is turning into a long reply. i hope you're comfortable with me publishing this ask, if not just let me know! i wish you all the luck in the world with your finals!! <3

[headinthestaticsky]

Extras for The Dusk Calls for me.

Authors Note: While I plan out the next few chapters of my story, enjoy these memories I did for the re-write I did on Wattpad.

TRIGGER WARNING: Mentions and a attempt of SA

Time: This Takes place a year before the beginning of The Dusk Calls for me.

"Makes me feel like flying

Top-down backstreet driving Dusty road all alone

Tip my hat Puff of smoke, smoke

Makes me feel like flying

I just run ."

American Gurl by: Kilo Kish

I was finally out, those words of bile my mother and sister spew toward me finally pushed me over the edge. Yet those words finally got me back with my father in Forks, where I always belonged.

Flashback: One Week Ago.

"FLEUR! GET DOWN HERE NOW!" My erratic mother Renee yelled from downstairs.

My heart started beating out of my chest, what did I do this time? I walked into the dining room, Renee and Isabella were sitting at the table across from where I was sitting. Bella had a smirk on her face relishing in the tension between Renee and I.

"Yes?" I asked.

"You always have to cause trouble don't you?' She replied back, malice laced her voice.

"What? What are you even talking about?"

"Bella told me you've been saving money to go see your father in Forks." She spat at me.

My rapidly beating heart sunk down into my stomach, I had been trying to see my dad in Forks for a year now. My mother refused to get me a plane ticket herself, she always told me I reminded her too much of my father and that I didn't need to be around him anymore than I already was which wasn't often.

"Mother, it's my money I can do with it as I please," I said calmly though I could feel the rage beginning to boil in my blood.

"YOU AREN'T GOING!" She yelled demandingly.

I couldn't control myself, it was as if someone else had entered my body.

"WHAT IN THE HELL IS SO WRONG FOR WANTING TO SEE MY FATHER!?"

"I'M NOT GOING TO WASTE THAT KIND OF MONEY ON YOU!"

"Well you aren't now aren't you? It's my own money and I will use it however the hell I want to!"

"Oh don't you..." Renee started.

"Are you going to tell me you would be doing the same thing if Bella was the one wanting to go see dad?"

"She isn't a trouble maker." She snapped back.

"How am I a trouble maker? For wanting my mother to be kind and considerate? For wanting my mother to treat me with respect? To get an ounce of love from the frozen, undead heart inside your chest?" I asked, my face heated up it felt like it was burning.

"If you can't stand to be around us so much why don't you just move down there to Forks?"

"I will, just give me the rest of the money for the plane ticket and I swear to god the second I walk out that door I will NEVER come back!"

"Fine..." I turned away from her before she could say anything else. Before I reached the stairs I turned around again, looking directly at Bella.

"Get away from her while you can Isabella, or you're going to end up being just as toxic as she is." I then left before they could say anything else.

Flashback over: 2 years before the Original story begins.

I looked to the side, staring out the window. The desert plains had disappeared while I slept and now the lush green forests overtook the view. The fog wasn't heavy but the skies were covered with dark grey clouds and a downpour of rain. The cold weather was a lot more favorable in my opinion, the sun couldn't burn my skin much here. The plane had begun to shake signaling that the plane was beginning to land. I couldn't wait to see my father again, I hadn't seen him since my 12th birthday. When I got off the plane I stretched, being cramped in a small plane for an almost 3-hour flight wasn't exactly the most comfortable.

I walked through the crowded airport, scanning the area for my father. I bumped into some disgruntled couples and quickly left before I was caught in the crossfires of their mood.

"Petal?" I heard from behind me. I turned around quickly recognizing that voice, it could calm me down before I got into trouble.

"Dad..." I said fondly before running up to hug him.

My heartfelt I little more full, and the pain my mother inflicted on me was healed for the time being. We walked out together, each of us was carrying a bag. The wind was strong today and my hair was flying all of the places. Its cooling touch raised goosebumps on my skin, mom didn't buy any warmer clothes for me so I was stuck in the typical Arizona tank tops and shorts. Luckily for me, the car was already warmed up so I dethawed quickly. We drove for a few minutes in silence, the roar of the engine and other passing cars were the only sounds filling the space.

"So, how have you been? I feel like I haven't seen you in a while." Dad said.

"I've been better, you know how mom is," I mumbled.

"I don't know what happened to her, she wasn't like that in high school. If she was I wouldn't have even wasted a second on her."

"I know you would've dad...she's cruel for sure. She's just good at hiding it from people she wants to impress."

"Yeah, she is."

The drive was a giant wave of nostalgia, being 16 now and seeing all of the familiar sites and views brought back fond memories. The old ice cream shop dad use to take me to, the reservation that Sam and Leah lived on, it all brought me back. It also fueled anger, however, as my mother constantly kept me under the brutal radiation of the sun.  Dad must've seen the look on my face and put his hand on my shoulder.

"It's going to be okay Petal, you're away from her now." He comforted.

"It's not just her dad... Bella's acting like her too."

"That's a shame... it really is."

"Yeah... it is." I sighed.

"I just can't wait to get back home, the attic is calling for me."

Dad chuckled before speaking again.

"You know... I heard you just got your license... So I got you an older car."

"You did not have to do that dad."

"It doesn't get in until next week, so I'll have to drive you to school until then," Dad said as if that would balance out the fact he got me a car.

"That's fine dad. What is it?"

"It's an old Mustang, a Fastback."

"Thank you, dad..."

"No problem Petal.

When we pulled into the driveway of our small but beautiful home the nostalgia fully set in. The colors were exactly the same, and the grass was just as muddy and dead as before.

"Well I cleared off some shelves for you in the bathroom, your room was a bit dusty so I just cleaned it for you," Dad explained as he helped me take my luggage upstairs.

"Sounds good, thank you again, dad, I love you."

"Love you too Petal." He kissed my head before closing the door behind me. The room was bare, I would have to fix it later on. I collapsed on my bed, facing the ceiling.

"I'm home."

September 17th, 2004.

"Dad I have to go, I don't want to be late on my first day!" I exclaimed throwing on a leather jacket.

"Petal I am almost ready, I never knew you were so much of a bookworm." He joked, ruffling my hair.

"Dad I am an entire school year ahead of where I should be... I take my education very seriously." I said, trying to hide the growing smirk on my face.

"Alright alright let's go," Dad said, taking my arm and pulling me out the door.

We were only driving for a little bit when I decided to roll the window down, I placed my arms on where the window used to be and rested my head on them. My hair blew out of my face and the cool mist of Forks hit me. When we arrived at the school dad was scanning the parking lot looking for a place to park when he passed right by a group of people. They were all gorgeous, their faces seemingly perfectly sculpted, and they all had the same colored eyes, golden. My eyes locked with one however, they were filled with pain for a second before melting into shock. something strange filled my chest and my heart began to race. As we drove past them I gave him a smile, hoping to ease his shock.

Timeskip: September 30th, 2004

Something was up, the boy I saw outside that window, Jasper Hale was more than what he seemed. He was freezing cold all the time, and I swore I saw his eyes turn black for a split second when he saw a boy from another make a gesture toward me. It was strange really, we had been friends for a few weeks but he seemingly had a protective...energy over me. But at the same time, I still felt something... I couldn't explain it. It was as if we were connected to each other in some way. My dad had to take my car to the shop and he couldn't pick me up today so I decided to take a trip to the library, hoping to find some new material to read.

I didn't realize how long I had been in the library until I looked out of the small windows of the building. The sky was darkened and daylight was running out, I checked out a few books and left not wanting to be stuck walking in the night. I was a few blocks home when I heard 3 men talking behind me.

"Oh looks at this one..."

"She seems perfect for us."

"Come here girly... we just want to talk."

My heart raced and my pace quickened, speed walking home. I tried taking weird turns and cuts but they wouldn't fall for the bait. I decided to run for it hoping my legs would be quick enough to evade them all. I was then pushed against the wall 2 minutes into my escape again, the smell of alcohol made me want to retch.

"You aren't very good at listening to orders." One murmured, his face was inches away from me, he breathed in my scent and began to chuckle.

"Don't be too hard on her... I like ones that fight." Another said

"Make this easy on yourself girl..."

One reached down to take off my clothes when he was suddenly thrown back a few feet into the air. I just stood against the wall shocked, I saw Jasper standing over the man before making his way over to the other two men. They both took off leaving their "friend" behind but Jasper zoomed toward them. His speed was inhuman and his strength was unprecedented yet I couldn't stop myself from moving from my spot. The other two men were flown into the air and scream on impact. Jasper grabbed them both by the throats.

"If you EVER try to touch her or any woman for that matter like that again... I. will. kill. you!" He growled before releasing them down on the ground. They gasped and ran again, babbling in terror toward one another.

Jasper walked toward me with a guilty look on his face, his hand reached out for mine and I took it without even thinking.

"Come with me Darlin' I have a lot to explain to you." He said softly, his mood had completely changed with me.

We walked for a few moments in silence, I side-eyed him for any shift in behavior, when it didn't I decided to interrogate him.

"How did you do that?" My voice trembled.

He sighed before replying.

"I'm a vampire." He said blatantly.

I looked at him and laughed thinking it was a joke... when he didn't join I stopped and looked at him with shock.

"You're serious?" I said, my eyes widening again.

"Yes I am, I've been 17 for...141 years. I got changed during the Civil War."

"Damn... you're old... wait were you in the Civil War?"

"Yes, I was drafted to the Confederate Army when I was 17..."

"Yikes..."

"You're telling me, I ran away the first chance I got... I wasn't going to fight in some war that was fueled by warped and disgusting ideas just because I was forced to. I never thought the way they did... I never understood why someone could think so low of a human being just because of his skin."

"That's very brave of you."

"I had just made it to Galveston when I decided to take a break... I ended up on a beach... that's when I ran into an immortal named Maria. She was creating an army and decided that I would be a good fit for it."

"She changed you against your will?"

"I didn't even know what she was doing until I felt searing pains from my arms all the way up to my neck." He explained rolling up his sleeves and showing me his scars."

I traced the teeth marks on his forearm before looking up at him again.

"I'm sorry that happened to you..."

He looked up at me in shock.

"You... you feel sympathy for something like me? I'm a monster..." He said sincerely.

"It wasn't even your choice as to what you became... and I don't think a monster would've saved me back there. Face it, Jasper, you're a big softie who's had bad experiences in his long... long life."

He chuckled before glancing at me, we made it back to the house, dad still wasn't home yet. We walked into the backyard, sitting in patio chairs and looking up at the stars.

"There's something else I have to tell you." Jasper admitted in the darkness.

I looked at him in confusion, what else did he have to tell me? He's a werewolf too?

"You're..." He hesitated. "You're my mate." He said quickly.

"What? How... vampires have mates?" I asked in shock.

"Yes we do, and we instantly know when we've met them. Didn't you feel it, when you looked out that window at me? It was enamour... love, something I have never experienced before."

"I haven't either... but I have to admit I felt something too. I just didn't know what it was, I felt connected to you somehow though. But... I'm 16... falling deeply in love isn't exactly something I planned."

"I understand completely. I won't force you to do anything you don't want to do. I understand I am a vampire... this is a lot to take in." Jasper said lowering his head in shame, his curls covered his eyes.

I sat up and turned to him.

"Hey, hey it's not just because you're a vampire honest! I just need to think things through... we can still talk in and out of school I won't push you out." I said a bit faced-paced. I didn't want to hurt his feelings he did just save me after all.

He looked and me and grabbed my hand.

"Take all the time you need Fleur, I will accept your answer no matter what is it." He said sincerely.

"Thank you... Jasper."

"It's not any trouble." His face lit up all of the sudden, car headlights entered my line of view. I felt my hand by dropped by his cold one and a whoosh of wind flew my hair forward. I turned back around and he was gone.

Timeskip: October 16th, 2004.

It was hard, weighing the pros and cons of being with Jasper.

Pros: We were soulmates... destined to be with each other, He knew my limits and respected my boundaries, he gave me a choice, not forcing me into something I might not want to do, and he was a kind and gentle soul. We understood each other, our hearts and souls were connected and I would never find someone else I would be so close to.

Cons: He was a creature who thirsted for blood... a thirst he didn't always have the best control over, Being in a serious relationship at such a young age was a huge commitment I didn't even fully know who I was... would I ever be able to find out who I am being so committed to someone If I did become involved in a relationship two things would happen... I would die and leave him lonely for eternity, or I would be turned into a vampire... leaving my family behind.

My mulling over of the pros and cons was interrupted, a girl had cleared her throat. I looked up realizing I was still in the school library, standing in the back of the constant isles of books. I turned to the voice and my eyes were shocked to see Rosalie Hale looking at me.

"Rosalie? Is there something you need?" I asked.

"Let's go for a walk, I need to talk to you in private." She said she seemed tense about something.

I checked out the books I got before following her to the outside, we walked near the edge of the woods. The dead leaves and grass crunched underneath our feet.

"I know Jasper told you about us... and he told me that you wanted to think somethings over with him." She started.

"Hey... I just wanted to let you know I would never tell anyone about you guys... And I'm not trying to hurt Jasper with me thinking our relationship over. It's just a lot of process." By the time I finished that statement she laughed and patted my shoulder.

"Don't worry Fleur I completely understand why you want to think over some things... I would too if I were in your shoes. Besides, I trust you... I get a good vibe off of you." Rosalie replied smiling at me.

"I want to get into a relationship with Jasper I do but... I don't want to leave my father... he's all I got right now and I'm all he's got."

"Hey, I promise no one would force you into becoming a vampire in our family... I especially wouldn't force you to."

"Really?"

"Yes of course... It's nice to meet someone with a respect for mortality."

"It's just... I always to do certain things... like going to that art school in Cayon City Oregon... the Art Museums down there are amazing... and I always wanted to kid when I was older... a little boy." I explained smiling fondly at the thought.

"I did too... I always wanted a son."

"But at the same time... I wouldn't want to spend all my time with Jasper... only to leave him alone for eternity you know?" I asked her hoping she would get my point of view.

"Of course... I can tell you've been conflicted these past few weeks about it. But I wanted to vouch for Jasper... he's willing to do anything for you, and his thirst for blood has never been more controlled than when he's been with you. He won't take you away from your family either... he would never want to hurt you in any way possible." She explains turning toward me to look me in the eyes so the message could really sink in.

"Thanks, Rosalie..."

"Of course...give Jasper a chance, I promise it'll be worth it." She said.

"I will... I'll talk to him tonight, thanks for the guidance."

"No problem."

Timeskip: October 16th, 2004: 10:12 PM

Dad was gone, he had to work late down at the station tonight. My palms and legs shook nervous to tell Jasper my decision. I was sitting in the same spot I was in when Jasper told me I was his soulmate... the cool air calmed my nerves slightly before I closed my eyes and sighed.

"Fleur? You said you wanted to talk to me... are you okay?" Jasper's voice asked worryingly behind my closed lids.

"Yeah, I'm fine... I just wanted to give you an answer about... everything."

He sat down adjacent to me and nodded, wanting me to continue.

"I will get into a relationship with you... thank you for giving me the time to think about things."

He smiled before asking me if he could kiss my cheek. I said yes of course and it seemed my body melted in bliss and content. All the past weeks' tensions and worrying left me and it was replaced with love... and a sense of stability. We looked up at the stars and I pointed toward the largest one in the sky.

"You see that one?" I said.

"Yes, I do Darlin'."

"That is the star of the path I started with you..."

[krabstick32]

MWAHAHA I'VE BEEN WAITING (✷‿✷) Can I ask for a Giyuu who decided he wants to try befriending the newest Pillar since she's pretty quiet (and also pretty cute UwU haha jk) but whenever he tries to come forward and talk to her she either doesn't respond or runs off looking embarrassed. Finally he asks one of the Pillars for help and they sort of break it to him that Reader just lost her voice in a battle before being a Pillar and is very shy because she doesn't know how to talk to people. Thanks!

Demon Got Your Tongue?

Requested by: @trueblueoceaneyes​​

Pairing: Giyuu x Reader  Synopsis: Giyuu wants to make a friend. Who knows, maybe you’ll end up as more.

Tags/warnings: I don’t think there are any, but reader isn’t able to talk (i’m very sorry if I wasn’t able to portray that properly!) and there are also references to the Giyuu Gaiden—but its not necessary to read that to understand this

A/N: WAAAA Thank you so much for being my first request girl!! As expected, your ideas are just *chef’s kiss* magnifique. ily, hope i did your request justice and that you like it uwu. 

I had so much fun writing Giyuu just being an awkward dork, and the bonus - especially the bonus. (also, pls excuse any mistakes, i feel like i passed over some) Anyway, please enjoy!!

edit: so i reread it, and there were some mistakes. apologies to the people who have read this prior the edit—the edits are very minor, but again, i am sorry _:(´□`」 ∠)_

Giyuu was a man who valued his silence and solitude.

From the start, he made it pretty obvious to the other Pillars that he wanted to be left alone and wanted nothing to do with them. And from that sort of attitude, they were able to conclude that while he was an amazing swordsman, he preferred to work alone, go on missions alone, and just generally be alone.

They knew next to nothing about the man, apart from his breath style and stoic personality—and he preferred it that way. Giyuu knew that getting close to others was a troublesome affair, and it always ended up in someone getting hurt. 

When he saw you though, it’s like he knew that the cold facade he put up was a lie.

Normally, Pillar meetings only happened at the end of every other month for regular reports and for the others to catch up and to exchange information. This time, however, Oyakata-sama called for them to introduce a new member that would stand among them as a new Pillar. 

Oyakata-sama introduced you as he did the others, stating your name, and your position as the Thunder Pillar, as well as telling you the names and positions of the current Pillars.

You seemed to be more on the quiet side, with only a soft, somehow strained smile painting your face set with admittedly attractive features. A young woman who was most likely around the age of nineteen or twenty, with a slightly hunched frame, and a death grip on the hem of your (f/c) haori sleeve. You seemed shy and nervous, but all of them knew that you must have possessed extraordinary skills to be able to reach the rank of a Pillar.

Giyuu stamps down an odd itch to stand and walk over to you, staying still as Oyakata-sama calls out his name for you.

Your introduction ended with a kind smile, and a question from the master. He asked if you were willing for a demonstration of your skills, to which you agree with a shy smile and a soft nod.

Unsheathing your sword, you took a deep breath—a loud whistling sound that seemingly shook the air and shocked the Pillars. For the shy woman they saw mere minutes ago to make such a loud sound with just breathing was a curious sight… but then suddenly, you were gone, only faint images of you visible all around the Ubuyashiki’s garden as you performed all six forms of the Thunder Breath.

You were quick and agile, possibly the fastest among all ten of you.

Everyone could hear the loud roll of thunder, but a quick look at the sky showed them that there was no storm��only you performing in the clearing, a dance so graceful and deadly. Despite having a hard time catching your movements, everyone was absolutely mesmerized by the sheer power you displayed, accompanied by the palpable static in the air. 

When you finished, everyone was staring with large eyes—even Giyuu was a little slack-jawed at your performance. You blushed with the weight of everyone’s stare while the master thanked you and urged you to take a seat.

You didn’t want to force your presence or insert yourself between anyone, so you resolved to take your place at the edge of the line-up. It was a tough choice though because one side had two men who seemed to scowl at the ground or at you, while the other had a man who looked impassive with blue eyes and black hair that contrasted well with his pale skin.

He seemed like he wanted to be left alone, but you’d rather sit beside him than feel the sharp glares of who you recalled were the Wind and Serpent Pillars on the other side.

Even if you made up your mind, you still flush as you kneel beside the attractive man; Giyuu wonders why his heartbeat seems to pick up.

The meeting didn’t take long, as the sole purpose of it was to introduce you and let everyone get acquainted, so Oyakata-sama ended it without any excess fanfare, taking his leave to allow the ten of you to mingle.

All of the Pillars rushed over to you, and Giyuu noticed how you jumped at their enthusiasm. There wasn’t any ill-intent—they were only eager to meet you, but you didn’t seem to be used to having eight people talk to you all at once, with how your mouth seemed to open and close like a fish.

The Water Pillar really wanted to talk to you for some odd reason, but seeing as how you already seemed extremely overwhelmed, he decided to do that later—maybe once the others let you breathe—and opted to stand by the sidelines. Not a minute later, however, three crows came flying by, one perching on his shoulders, one on Muichirou, and the other on Sanemi.

“Head to the forest by the town up… northeast!” His crow, Kanzaburo, squawked. “By the town northeast, children disappear! children disappear!”

He wasn’t able to hear what the other crows assigned to the Wind and Mist Pillars, but he was a little disappointed. He really wanted to talk to you, for a reason he could puzzle out later, but that would have to happen on another day.

He still had a job to do.

The next time Giyuu sees you is a couple of weeks later at a decently sized town.

He received notice from his crow that there was a demon trying to make this village its territory, which left him where he was now. The sun was out shining brightly, so he was using the time to gather intel by listening around for any mention of strange disappearances or odd sightings. He didn’t want a repeat of what happened to him at that town with the Matagi Hunters and Shinobu, so he stayed within hearing range, acting as inconspicuous as he could with a sword strapped to his side.

From the corner of his eye however, he catches something familiar—a trail of (h/c) hair and (f/c) haori.

Was that…?

Moving at a reasonable pace, he weaves around wandering merchants and people, slightly hoping for any other sign of you. He tried to be as polite as he could in moving around, but it seems that he already lost you once he reached the end of the crowd.

He heaves a heavy sigh after taking a seat on a bench far from the bustle, and the information, but it was about time for a break anyway.

What was it about you?

Why was he so curious to talk to you? Why was he so drawn as to chase after what he thought was you? There was something about you that made him want to get closer, to get to know you, even though he stopped himself a long time ago from forming connections to others.

Was it the strength you displayed? Was it your quiet disposition? Your pretty face?

He hoped he wasn’t as superficial to be drawn by that last one. You were pretty yes and he was willing to admit that, but he hoped that he wasn’t as shallow to want to talk to you for your looks. And yes, you were strong, but so were the other Pillars, and a lot of other demon slayers, but he didn’t feel the same pull to them as he did to you.

Giyuu throws his hands in the air. Making friends and thinking about you was making his head spin. “Focus, Giyuu.” He scolds himself and opens the wrapper of his salmon-filled rice ball.

He was about to take a bite when again, from the corner of his eye, he saw a trail of (h/c) hair and (f/c) haori. Giyuu immediately whirls his head to make sure if it was actually you and calls out before he could think about his actions. “(L/N)-san!”

When you turn around at the sound of your name, you gripped your sword in surprise only to face a pair of familiar blue eyes, and a haori split in two.

Giyuu turns back to his opened rice ball, quickly wrapping it back closed, and stands abruptly, jogging to where you were standing.

“I’m not sure if you remember but, I wasn’t able to personally introduce myself last time. My name is Giyuu Tomioka, and I’m the Water Pillar.” Giyuu wanted to give himself a pat on the back. He sounded literate.

Of course, you remember him. You kind of wanted to say that it was stupid of him to think that he was forgettable. You remember feeling a little disappointed when he left before you had a chance to talk to him. But you immediately squashed down that feeling because you could talk to him now—!

Giyuu pauses, waiting for you to reply as you seem to look for something at your side, but your eyes widen and seem to look at everywhere but him. “Is there anything wrong?” He asks and worriedly watches as your face turns into a deep red.

You raise both your hands in front of you and shake your head, even if there really was something wrong. You start to amble backward—and Giyuu couldn’t see it, but you could feel your palms and your forehead sweating bullets—an apology at the tip of your tongue, that would never be heard.

“(L/N)-san?” At the sound of his voice, you bowed deeply, almost at a ninety-degree angle from the ground. Giyuu was trying to process the reason you were bowing so deeply that he didn’t even realize that you’ve already turned around and scurried out of there.

The Water Pillar was confused out of his wits. He rubs the back of his neck, his eyes blinking and squeezing shut, before ultimately collapsing back at the bench he was sitting on. “Was it something I said?”

Maybe his habit of pushing others away was catching up to him.

The sun sets not long after Giyuu finishes his salmon rice ball.  He pushes his encounter with you at the back of his mind as he places the folded wrapper into his uniform pocket and moves towards the portion of the forest he heard townspeople gossip about. On the way, he could see that people were already closing up shops and walking hurriedly to their homes.

At the edge of the forest, Giyuu feels the tangible difference in the air and tenses up once he senses the demon. The presence felt so thick, that the raven-haired man was itching to cut the air with his Nichirin blade.

This isn’t good.

He fastens his pace and he grips his sword tighter, his heart already pounding a mile a minute despite keeping his stoic expression. It almost felt like the demon was already there at his side, surrounding him with its presence.

He stops at a clearing, a round opening with barely any moonlight seeping through, and stops when he spots his target. He unsheathes his blade and rushes in with his sword held high.

Not even a meter from the demon, he hears a growl, and a hand darts out managing to snag the exposed sleeve of the skin of his face. Immediately, he twists his body into a flip, before landing deftly on his feet, safe from a distance away. He wanted to scold himself for being caught off guard by something he should have easily sensed.

So there were tw- no, now there were three.

As he was moving into a defensive stance, he didn’t notice the two demons regroup and he sure as hell didn’t notice a third one join in.

Giyuu parries an incoming attack and dodges a cheap hit they tried to land. He sees an opening when the three try to surround him, breathing quick and deep as he jumps up and slashes one body into multiple parts.

Water Breathing Fourth Form: Striking Tide!

The head drops with a loud thump, and when two more appear in place as the severed body parts start to disintegrate, Giyuu just wants to groan out loud.

There were now four when there were previously three, and at this point, Giyuu was certain that there were more hiding in between the trees and the blind spots of his vision. He couldn’t stay on the defensive forever, and going on the offensive when there were others left too many openings for his liking.

One of the demons was about to try and swipe a hit while Giyuu was distracted with parrying. The arm was an inch away, but with the roll of thunder and a flash of lightning, the arm previously reaching for him sat torn on the ground.

You rushed into the clearing in a blazing glory once you sensed a demon on your patrol around town. In the heat of the battle, you leave your embarrassment and stand defensively against his back, and in an impulsive thought, Giyuu connects the fact that you might have been sent to the same mission he was on.

Ah, maybe that was why he saw you in town.

You were sent on the same mission; perhaps to cooperate—he did go on missions with the others Pillars at times despite wanting to work alone—but if that was the case, it didn’t explain why you ran from him earlier. Maybe you only realized it now too?

Regardless, he was incredibly grateful you arrived when you did because about fifteen more dropped into the clearing.

One ordinary demon was usually no trouble for demon slayers, but having multiple of them like this was a little trickier. They fought dirty, desperate for survival, and it was so, so easy to make mistakes in the heat of the battle—even for the higher ranked and, in extension, more experienced members of the corps like them.

Having a large group of demons like this was strange though because demons preferred to move alone or at least in smaller groups of two or three, at most six. This is probably the most Giyuu has seen in one place.

The two of you were a blur as an unspoken agreement passed. He’d deal with half, and you would deal with the other, and with that all sorted out, the fight was over in a little less than twenty or so minutes, both your swords being sheathed into its respective scabbards.

Giyuu gulps in a breath of air, his hands over his knees as he wheezes out a few words. “Thank you for the help (L/N)-san, one of them almost got me.”

Your heart beats a little faster—not from the battle but from the soft, relieved smile on Giyuu’s face. Why didn’t he smile more often? He looked absolutely beautiful.

“Oh, are you alright?” His eyes widen at the bleeding cut on your right arm. You almost wanted to laugh, because he looked much worse than you did with bleeding scratches that marred his handsome face. 

A chuckle escapes your lips and you dust off your right hand on the fabric of your uniform, reaching down the pocket of your skirt to pull out a pristine handkerchief. Gently, you press it to his bloody wound, and the warmth from his skin seeping through the fabric felt pleasant against your cool fingers.

You hold it there, discreetly checking over him for any more wounds and time seems to pass by the both of you.

Giyuu swallows nervously. His stomach was flipping around, but he was sure he had no wounds around that area. “(L/N)-san?” 

You seem to snap out of it when he calls your name, your hand flinching away from his face and the handkerchief sticking from the blood. He could see the red rush to your neck and up your cheeks, to the tips of your ears. You looked kind of cute.

He stares at you as you move forward in your odd ninety-degree angle bow, and was about to ask why you were bowing, but only realized too late what you were doing once you ran off. Again.

His old crow perches wearily on his shoulder, seeming to huff before delivering a message Giyuu had already anticipated.

“Pillar Meeting! Pillar Meeting! Arrive three hours before noon!” He was aware that the Pillar Meeting was today. The only reason he wasn’t rushing to get there was that he didn't want to arrive only for it to be canceled, or moved at another time. That would be a waste of time.

“Thank you, Kanzaburo.”

Pillar Meetings usually happened in the daytime, mostly in the morning. Sometimes it’s at high noon, or when dawn breaks, maybe even before the sun sets, but rarely at night. That was when they were on duty after all, and those only happen in the direst of situations.

He arrived just on time. The others were already gathered loosely in the line-up formation they unspokenly kept, making small talk over matters Giyuu couldn’t hear. You weren’t there though. You were most likely late, but that didn’t stop him from letting his shoulders sag in slight disappointment. He was hoping to talk to you before the meeting started.

It was just his luck that you arrived a minute before Oyakata-sama did when he was already making a move to walk over to you.

He swallows down a sigh as he kneels at his spot at the edge of the line-up between Uzui and you. Giyuu liked being at the edge or at the farthest side of any kind of gathering because it always provided him with an opening to leave when he wanted, but with your newfound presence on his left side, he finds himself not minding as much as he thought he would.

The meeting carried on as usual, almost as if you were always there in the first place. One by one, the other Pillars gave their oral reports of the past month, and when Giyuu was done relaying his information, including that mission with you, he was a little surprised when you stood from your position beside him and walked towards the master’s seat when he gave a nod with his comforting smile in your direction.

You reach in your pocket and pull out a pristine roll of paper with the barest mark of black ink bleeding through. It was tied with a red braided cord that the master pulls when you hand it to him with a respectful bow. The master asks one of his children at his side to take it and read the contents.

Giyuu was a little confused. The others didn’t seem to find it odd, he notes when he takes a quick glance at his comrades. But he wonders why you didn’t speak choosing to hand in a written report. He decides to push it out of his mind. It wasn’t his business anyway.

Everything continues on, the meeting ending not long after that. All of the Pillars stood and bowed as Oyakata-sama left with the help of his children, as per usual, but Giyuu has never felt so relieved when the meeting finished as he did now.

The others were already talking among themselves while four of them left for missions assigned directly during the meeting, leaving him, you, Gyomei, Kyojurou, Mitsuri, and Muichirou. Normally, this is where Giyuu would take his leave, with or without the excuse of a mission, but to everyone’s surprise, he stays and walks up to you.

He stops at a respectable distance from you and nods politely at your right arm. “I hope your arm is okay.”

The Pillars pretended that they weren’t listening in (though Muichirou didn’t have to because he was already busy staring at the clouds) and they were doing their best to carry on a half-hearted conversation to keep up with the guise that they were minding their own business.

Your slightly spooked expression morphs into a small smile—Giyuu couldn’t help but think that you had a lovely smile—and your mouth opens, almost on its way to producing a word towards him. He didn’t notice it, but he was leaning a little closer in anticipation of the sound of your voice.

It immediately shuts back down, however, and your cheeks flush a charming shade of red as embarrassment flits across your face. Instead of speaking, you give him a respectful nod, pointing to his bandaged face, and giving a thumbs up. Then you turn back to the others with a small wave of your hand before you’re suddenly gone, your body bowing yet again as you move incredibly fast to the garden gates.

Everyone watches the gates you pushed open swing back close with a creak that sounded all over the garden.

Giyuu wanted to slap himself.

His mind flashes back to the conversation he had with Kyojuro and Mitsuri as he was walking at a bustling street in a village on the way back to his estate. He felt incredibly stupid that he was only able to connect the dots when someone spelled it out for him.

Giyuu, Kyojurou, and Mitsuri sit around the training room of the Love Pillar’s estate.

Giyuu wandered into Mitsuri’s home after he decided to ask for advice, help, anything at all to understand what he was doing wrong. You seemed close to the pink-haired woman—you two were always beside each other before and after meetings after all—and he thought that Mitsuri was nice and cheerful, so maybe asking her for advice about you wouldn’t be so bad.

When Mitsuri opens her door, she’s shocked to see the Water Pillar standing there. “Wah! Tomioka-san!”

“Uh, hello, Kanroji-san,” Giyuu greets awkwardly. “I have a question to ask you.”

“Oh, of course, no problem, come on in! I was about to make some food for us!”

He didn’t account for the fact that Mitsuri might have company over so when he sees Kyojuro after Mitsuri leads him to her training room, it seems that he would have to settle for talking to both the Love Pillar and the Flame Pillar. Oh well, having two opinions was better than one. He hoped that saying was true.

“Oh, Tomioka! Did you come to train? Kanroji and I are just taking a break if you want to spar.” Kyojuro asks when the Water Pillar takes a seat.

“No, I… just wanted to ask for some advice.”

Mitsuri must have heard all the way from her kitchen because not a moment too soon, she barges through the door with three plates in hand piled high with food. “Advice?! Is that related to your question?” Giyuu nods and takes the plate she offered. “Well, ask away—I love these kinds of things!”

He starts by recalling the day of the mission he had with you. How he called out for you to formally introduce himself in the afternoon, how he asked if you were alright in the evening after the battle with nearly twenty demons, and how you ran away from him both times with your tail between your legs. He ends with his painfully one-sided conversation with you after the meeting a few days ago, and the ever-present question of why you keep running away. (But Mitsuri and Kyojuro already knew about that part—Tomioka speaking to anybody on his own volition was a rare sight. Of course, they listened in.)

This was the most Mitsuri and Kyojuro ever heard Giyuu speak, though and they reckon it was the most he’s ever spoken at all. But they brush that off and look at each other, deciding if they should tell him what they thought everyone already knew.

“Well, you see…” Mitsuri plays with the hem of her uniform. “Tomioka-san… (Y/N) lost her voice in a battle with a lower moon. She won and became a Pillar because of it, but…”

By the slight widening of his eyes, they were able to confirm that no, he didn’t know.

Kyojuro draws his brows together, swallowing a bite of food from the plate Mitsuri handed him. “Though, it’s odd that she keeps running away. (Y/N)’s shy—that much is obvious, but she was able to talk to us. She uses this large notepad, almost the size of my arm, but she rarely uses it because she says it’s a bother to carry around.” 

“Maybe she was embarrassed?” Mitsuri hmm’s for a moment at her mentor. She taps a finger on her chin, her head tilted slightly to the side as she suggests. But then she gasps, leaning closer to inspect Tomioka in a new light. “Or maybe she likes you! Wahh~”

“Oh gods,” he says, ignoring the last bit before dropping his head on his hands. “(L/N)-san can’t speak?”

You couldn’t talk.

He felt like the biggest asshole in the entire world and felt absolutely terrible for the many times he expected you to reply to him—that was rude and thoughtless of him. 

Ignorance would never be an excuse for his insensitivity, but It was just like him to mess up this badly the first time he genuinely wanted to talk to his peers.

Though, he could only imagine what you felt.

Banging his head on the wall sounded like a mighty fine idea, but doing that in the middle of a busy street might make people think that he was crazy. Not that he really cared for what people thought of him but that might get him tied up for prison. He still wasn’t over that mission.

On his way back to his estate, he sees a man his age gesturing in strange motions with his hands towards a kid, around eight or ten years old. He watches as the man and the kid form figures with their palms and fingers, letting them move towards their mouth, their chest, parts around their faces, in turns. The Water Pillar has seen it before, but only now, with the revelation he just had an hour prior, did he ever question it. What were they doing with his hands? It’s almost as if they were…

“You need something, Boy?” A lady behind him speaks.

The raven-haired man jolts in surprise, and the voice laughs. He didn’t notice that he was staring, nor blocking the entrance of a shop.

Giyuu turns to find a kind-looking elderly woman, leaning over the stall of her shop watching the kid interact with the man who he presumed was a relative.

“Ah no, I’m sorry.”

She waves off his apology and grins when she notices that she got the attention of the fine-looking young man standing in front of her shop. “It’s amazing, huh? Talking with the use of hands. Pretty useful if I do say so myself.”

Getting out of the way and moving to a polite distance, closer to the shop, Giyuu asks politely, “What are they doing exactly?”

“You must be new around here huh? Explains why I’ve never seen that face.” No, he just didn’t leave in the day that often, even if the village was right down the hill of his estate. “They’re talking, I reckon—‘bout what can’t say for sure. I’ve only caught a few gestures when that little boy drops by.”

“Oh.”

“It’s a shame though, his brother—the young man—can’t speak, but on the bright side, they can communicate at least. Those fancy gestures they’re doing are pretty fascinating, you’d have to admit.” Both of them turn back to the kid and his brother.

“It is.” Giyuu agrees because it is amazing. Talking without the use of voices, only with the use of movements. There was something elegant about the way their hands would move around, how the expressions on their faces seemed to also be included in how they communicated. He found it absolutely mind-blowing that the way they gesture around carries an entire language.

When he turns back to the old woman, only then did he notice her wares and the items on display around the shelves. Maybe he could make it up to you.

“Is this for sale?” He asks, and the woman laughs loudly.

“Of course it is Boy, this is a shop after all.” She ushers him further into her store. She knows that look on his face, and old women like her were always eager to help a young man in love treat his lady right.

You were training in the courtyard of your estate when a loud knock stops you from swinging.

The training sword in your grasp drops unceremoniously as you grab the small towel on your engawa, wiping at your face. You would normally shout that you were going to get the door but there was the issue of your voice, and the Thunder estate was too big…

You try to drown out your negativity by rushing to the door before your visitor left. The door swishes open, and to your complete and utter embarrassment, the Water Pillar was there.

Oh Gods, was he here to call you a total dunce for running away from him?

“Ah, (L/N)-san, sorry to barge in on you but I wanted to a —um… t-talk? Just for a bit. It’ll be quick, I promise.” He sounds nervous—even if his face was still a little blank—but you give him a nod, and timidly move aside to let him in. He says a quick thank you before setting his zori to the side of your entrance.

As you lead him to your engawa, you could feel your nerves start to fray and short-circuit. You gesture for him to take a seat while you point to your home, wordlessly telling him to wait.

When you come back from the kitchen with a tray of tea, you hand him a cup before taking a seat a few feet away from him. You faintly hear his sharp inhale before he turns to you and speaks. “Um, I’m really sorry if I offended you on our past encounters. I didn’t know that you couldn’t… couldn’t speak.”

You were relieved that he didn’t seem to be here to call you out, but you were quick to move and shake your head and your hands from side to side. No, it’s not your fault! you would have said, but you hoped that your actions were enough to speak for you.

“No, it is, I’m really sorry. It was rude and inconsiderate of me, and I hope you could forgive me.” He bows a little, and you were starting to get a little flustered. “I know it’s not much, but I hope you’ll take these as a token of my apology.”

You watch as he fumbles with his pocket, and brings out a nicely wrapped paper bag. Gingerly, you take it when he offers it to you, and wordlessly ask if you could open it.

He nods and you peek into the contents. Inside was a stack of small paper bound together by string and designed with fabric the same pattern as your haori, and a small metal pen set with simple but delicate carvings.

“It’s a small notebook and a fountain pen,” Giyuu explains, rubbing the nape of his neck with his hand. He could feel the skin burning along with his ears. “It’s small enough to put in the pocket of our uniform, so you could bring it around. I thought that you could use it to talk with others, but in hindsight, maybe you already have one of those. You don’t have to use it of course, but it would be nice if you did, but you don’t have to feel obligated to or—!”

A small giggle escapes your lips, and you flip open the pretty notebook he gave you and uncapped the pen, writing down words in your neat script. You show what you’ve written to him, a pink blush coloring your cheeks.

[Thank you, I love it! This is so much easier to bring than a large notepad and a bulky bottle of ink. I’ll be sure to bring it with me always!]

The Water Pillar lets out a breath he didn’t know he’s been holding and his face unconsciously morphs into a small smile, warming his cold facade by a mile. “I’m glad. I could bring you there if you run out of pages. If you’d like.”

The blush deepens as you turn back to the notebook.

[I would like that.]

BONUS:

The Pillars were no longer surprised when you and Tomioka entered the Ubuyashiki’s garden together. It’s been like that for the past couple of meetings, and finally, they were able to get used to the cold, stoic, normally silent Giyuu Tomioka talking to the warm, shy, and more social (Y/N) (L/N). Everyone found it ironic though that the Thunder Pillar who could no longer speak was more talkative than the Water Pillar who could.

These past few meetings have also been different than the first two you participated in. You were more open and seemed to be smiling more. You even showed them the thoughtful gifts Giyuu gave you—though that was more of an accident than anything.

“Oh, (F/N)-chan!” Mitsuri squeals when you habitually pull out the notebook and the pen from your pocket to answer a question Uzui asked you. You were used to using the notebook to talk with others now. “That’s a really pretty notebook! Where did you buy it?”

The answer you were in the middle of writing sits unfinished as you move to answer Mitsuri’s question first.

[Ah, I didn’t get it, Giyuu gave it to me.]

Everyone was paying attention to your little notebook — it was actually really nice of them to be paying such close attention to your words when you couldn’t speak — and their eyes seemed to bug out of their sockets when they read the name ‘Giyuu’.

The Pillars’ heads immediately dart over to the man in question, and Giyuu immediately turns his face to the side, pretending like he wasn’t embarrassed. He wasn’t fooling anyone, with how red his ears appear to be.

Mitsuri inwardly screeches at the Water Pillar’s expression (but Obanai seems to have noticed anyway). She couldn’t keep it in though when she and the others turned back to you, your cheeks painted a charming shade of red.

When you arrived early or had no mission after a meeting, you would even show them a few signs from the new language you’ve been learning. Japanese Sign Language, as you and Giyuu would call it. Sometimes, he would join in if there was one you forgot.

“That’s interesting,” Muichiro says, actually looking at you instead of the clouds.

”I never knew you could talk with your hands!” Kyoujuro looks down at his hands, as he repeats one of the signals you just taught them. “It’s spectacular!”

“Yes, it is.” Shinobu agrees, an idea forming in her head—maybe she could suggest sign language to some of her patients who lost the ability to speak. “You should teach us any more you learn (F/N)-chan. It would be nice if we could talk that way, and I could teach some of my patients too!”

You would pull out your notebook though when you didn’t know how to sign what you had to say.

[It’s all thanks to Giyuu! When we’re both free, we go down together to the village close to his estate and learn from one of the people there. Oh, that’s also the village where he got this notebook for me!]

That was news to them. First, the gift, and now the two of you were together even in your spare time? Though, they had to admit that it was incredibly sweet of him to accompany and learn along with you, even if he didn’t have to. And they also found it cute when he would unconsciously turn to you, touching you gently, and moving your hands to the proper position. But Obanai and Sanemi would never admit that. They would rather fight an upper moon.

Occasionally after meetings, they would spot the two of you standing off to the side. Both of your hands would be moving around, a little too fast for them at times to really analyze what you two were talking about, but there were moments—and Mitsuri would swear on her life with this—where those hands didn’t move.

They would only hold onto each other, calloused thumbs brushing past each other’s knuckles. It was like the two of you were absorbed in your own world.

There was even this one time when she thought she saw Giyuu kiss your forehead. (Later on, you two would explain that you thought no one was looking. You were hiding behind your notebook in embarrassment, while Giyuu’s face was flushed— as red as an apple).

Nobody knew this (well maybe you did — you had a knack for being able to understand Giyuu, with or without the help of signing or speaking), but Giyuu craved for interactions, even if he was successful in making others believe he didn’t. He was glad you saw through him though, and you were glad he let you into his world.

But no, what got their attention wasn't the two of you walking in together, it was your hands—your hands that used to be a few feet apart in constant movement were now all joined and tangled fingers. And what’s more, was that Tomioka was smiling. It was probably at something you said, nothing new, but a closer look told them that he was smiling, because you were holding his hand.

The meeting started later than usual. Not even Oyakata-sama’s presence was enough to stop the questions his cute little swordsmen have been dying to ask the two of you for months.

It was further pushed when Mitsuri screamed looking away from the huddle she and the other pillars were in, pointing to you who just pulled away from kissing Giyuu’s cheek (you two thought you were being discreet). “See? I’m right, now pay up people! And stop calling me crazy!“ 

She was 5,000 yen richer by the time the meeting started, and she fully intended to spend it on sakura mochi.

A/N:  Even if it was in the tags and the ask, I tried to reveal that bit of info as giyuu discovered it, so I hope some of you were still surprised (even just a little!!) when it was revealed that Reader couldn’t talk. Again, I hope you enjoyed, and thank you to @trueblueoceaneyes for the request uwu (requests are still open!!)

[cocastyle]

Robin — ONE

Pairing - Joel Dawson x reader

Word Count - 5,047

A/N - this chapter was so much fun getting to write! I wanted to introduce you guys to the dynamic of our two characters before they take off into the world. they are just a super close pair which is definitely going to cause some interesting scenes throughout this movie, especially with Joel being in love Aimee at the moment and Y/N being in love with Joel. but no matter what, it’s their friendship that makes them Y/N and Joel and it’s just the cutest thing.

also, I just want to say, take note of the little letters Joel writes to Aimee. they are definitely going to show growth in Joel’s character as the story goes on :))

if you would like to be added to the tag list, let me know!

R O B I N

Robin Series Masterlist

⭒❃.✮:▹ ONE ◃:✮.❃⭒

Dear Aimee,

I am wide awake. I've just gotten good at not really moving or breathing.

Being stuck in a survival bunker with a bunch of people who have all found their soul mate is less than ideal.

Karen and Ray got together a few months ago, so they're still kinda in their honeymoon phase. It is super physical. Good for them, you know. They're both very attractive and apparently quite flexible.

Hey, life's short. Especially down here.

After Tim's parents were eaten by a warm of termites, he and Ava became inseparable. In every way.

So pretty much everyone's coupled up down here besides me and Y/N. We're the singles of the bunker and I don't know how I would survive by myself without her. Having your best friend stuck down here with you helps a lot.

Our first baby was born last winter. It was super emotional. Welcome to the apocalypse, kid. The food sucks. At least you'll never know what you're missing.

Kala and Connor got together after Carol died. Carol was a cow who ate a box of laundry detergent and now we only have one cow. Her name's Gertie. Gertie is great. Y/N named her actually and every time someone uses the name she gets this goofy grin on her face that's hard for anyone to not smile back at.

Gertie's not our only food source. We actually have a hunting party that brings back whatever they can from the surface. It was easier in the beginning, you know, before we ran out of bullets. Facing down one of those things with a hanky handmade weapon is no walk in the park. Or that's what Robin tells me. I-I don't go on the hunting parties. They need me in the kitchen. I'm kinda the, uh. . .the chef of the bunker. Everyone likes my minestrone.

Me and Y/N being the only single people in the bunker has its perks too. We get to hang out with Mav1s. Of course, she's not much for conversation anymore. Her core battery's shot, just like every other Mav1s, I'd imagine. Actually never seen a working one.

Other than that, it's become our favorite pass time to mess with the other couples. Or at least that's what Robin does. I kind of just cheer her on.

Sure wish you were here, Aimee. I'd love for you to meet everyone and become closer with Y/N. Maybe we could do a little target practice together.

It's kinda my thing.

- - -

Y/N had been in the middle of dreaming about killing a monster when something began poking her face and pulled her from her slumber. Letting out a groan, the girl turned her head towards her pillow in an attempt to hide her face, but the person was persistent and instead began poking the back of her head instead.

"Joel," Y/N whined in annoyance earning a soft chuckle from the boy as he continued to poke her head. "Joel, I swear if you don't stop poking me right now I'm going to drag you out of this bunker and feed you to the nearest cold-blooded creature."

The poking stopped instantly and she slowly turned her face and let her eyes flutter open for a second to see Joel smiling at her in amusement. "Seven years underground and you still aren't a morning person," he mused.

Y/N groaned and fell further into her pillow as she closed her eyes once again. "I don't think I'll ever be," she muttered, her voice trailing off a bit at the end as sleep tried to take over once again.

"Hey, I just woke you up. Don't go back to sleep," Joel insisted as he reached out to poke her again. However, Y/N was quick to grab ahold of his finger and stop him without even having to open an eye.

"Don't poke me," she told him before letting go of the boy. "I'm tired, Joel. I don't have to see the sun to know it's still shining on the other side of the world. It's too early."

"Actually, it's not too far away from dawn," Joel said earning a groan from the girl because it was in fact too early. The boy frowned and gently nudged her as he rested his head on the edge of her bed. "Come on, Robin. I can't sleep and as my best friend it is your job to keep me from doing anything stupid while I'm awake. You can't exactly do that while sleeping, can you?"

"Joel," Y/N complained.

"Y/N," Joel mimicked. Y/N frowned slightly and Joel sighed before looking away as he got lost in thought. Finally he let out a small gasp and nudged the girl again, a smile appearing on his face, "I'll make you breakfast."

Y/N peeled open an eye at that, flickering her gaze over the boy's eager face before hesitantly saying, "Throw in a piggyback ride all the way to the kitchen and you've got yourself a deal.”

"Deal!" Joel exclaimed as he reached out to grab her hand and shake it. Y/N let out a soft sigh, knowing she was going to regret waking up, but pulled herself up out of bed and let out a yawn. Joel was practically bouncing from foot to foot due to his impatience and Y/N just ignored it as she sat up for a moment longer before looking to Joel.

"Okay, I'm ready," she said and the boy quickly turned around. Y/N lazily got out of bed before slowly getting onto Joel's back. He made sure she was on securely and waited until she had her arms wrapped around his neck and her head tucked into the crook of his neck before he was practically running out of the room.

"Woah! Slow down!" Y/N exclaimed as she almost went toppling off of his back from how bumpy the ride was. Joel slowed to a walk and looked back to her with an apologetic smile while she just rolled her eyes. "You're lucky you're my best friend," she muttered, propping her elbow against the boy's shoulder in order to keep herself up right.

"You know you love me," Joel retorted and Y/N let out a soft sigh for she knew the boy was right. He just didn't understand the kind of love she had for him.

The two were about halfway down the hallway when they suddenly passed a door that was wide open. "Hey, Joel! Hey, Y/N!" a fellow colony member of theirs named Ava greeted.

The best friends turned their heads and instantly looked away, their faces red while Y/N hid her face against Joel's neck once again. "Oh. Hey, Ava," Joel said, coughing awkwardly as he held onto Y/N a bit tighter and tried to ignore the fact that he just saw Ava and her boyfriend Tim being intimate.

"Ava," Y/N greeted.

"Joel. Y/N. How's it going?" Tim asked.

"It's going good, Tim," Joel responded, attempting to hide his small smile as Y/N just shook her head, obviously embarrassed. "How are you. . .How are you doing?"

"Yeah, good," Tim replied.

"Good," Y/N muttered as she sat up a little more and just leaned against Joel's shoulder. "Uh, we were just. . .um. . .heading to the kitchen. Joel here couldn't sleep, so now here we are." She let out an awkward laugh and Ava and Tim returned it.

"Yeah, we know the feeling," Ava told her and both Joel and Y/N made a face.

"Yeah. Probably not for the same reasons," Joel muttered. "Y-You guys's, uh, door's open. Is that. . .did you know that?"

"Yeah," Ava admitted at the same time Tim said, "Yeah, we know."

Both Y/N and Joel didn't move before Joel muttered awkwardly, "Okay." A silence fell among the group after that and Y/N could just feel herself growing more uncomfortable by the second and it was obvious Joel was too.

"Batman, away!" Y/N exclaimed, pointing towards the direction of the kitchens in hopes that they could get away from this situation as quick as possible. Joel chuckled softly and shook his head before bolting off down the hallway making the girl yell at him.

Joel didn't slow down until they were in the kitchen, setting the girl down in a chair before moving across the room. "This better be the best breakfast you have ever created after putting me in that sort of position," Y/N told him. "This is why you sleep at night, so you don't have to see or hear what the others are doing when the lights are out."

Joel just waved her off with his hand and Y/N craned her neck in an attempt to see just what he was doing, but the boy merely moved his body each time so that she couldn't see. "Joel!" Y/N complained, but the boy was already turning around, his hands behind his back as he grinned at her.

She fell silent almost instantly, the grin making her heart skip a beat while she watched him stop on the other side of the counter. "You ready?" he asked and Y/N nodded her head eagerly, her stomach growling at the thought of food. Joel's smile widened and he quickly took his hand out from around his back and slammed an apple onto the table in front of her.

Y/N stared at the apple with a blank look on her face before scowling up at her friend. Joel just smiled and leaned his arms on the counter before he shrugged, "I never said what I was making you for breakfast."

"You didn't make anything," she pointed out, grumbling softly to herself as she grabbed the apple and took a bite out of it. "You tricked me."

"Hey, but look on the bright side," Joel told her and the girl raised an eyebrow. "Now that you're up, we can spend more time together and I don't have to be alone!"

Y/N made a face before looking to her apple and chuckling as she took another bite. "Well, joke's on you because today's planning day," she said, her words making Joel frown because he knew that planning day meant she would be with the hunting crew all day and not him.

"But planning day was last week," Joel complained.

"It was actually last month, but nice try," she replied with a smug smile on her face.

"Can't you skip it? I was wanting you to help me with my aim. I'm using the tips that you said, but it would be different if you were actually there to help," Joel said.

"I'm sorry, Joel, but I have to go. I have to pull my weight somehow," Y/N reminded him.

"Then at least let me help out. I don't do anything around here except make shitty minestrone," Joel sighed, running a hand through his hair in frustration and not noticing the way Y/N’s eyes seemed to follow the action.

Y/N set the apple down, rolling her eyes slightly when Joel picked it up and angrily took a bite out of the other side. "First of all, your minestrone is heaven, so never refer to it as shitty ever again," she told him. Joel just looked away and Y/N sighed before reaching out and setting a hand on top of the boy's arm. He hesitantly looked her way and she offered him a small smile. "I know you may think you don't do anything to help out around here, but you do, Joel. You help out in more ways than you may think."

Joel looked away and bit into the apple again. "You're just trying to make me feel better and I appreciate it, but we both know I don't do anything," he muttered. "Not anything important anyways."

"Joel," Y/N began but the sound of someone yelling her name made her fall short. She glanced in the direction of the voice, putting together who was calling for her and why. It was planning day after all and those days always started at dawn so that they could get some training out of the way before mapping out their next hunting trip.

Sighing, Y/N looked back at Joel and gave his arm one more squeeze. "That's my cue to leave," she said, pulling herself up out of her chair. The girl began to make her way towards the door before pausing and looking back at Joel who was just staring at the table with the half eaten apple in hand.

Before Joel knew what was happening, Y/N was jumping on him from behind, her arms wrapping around his frame for a quick hug as she kissed his cheek and said, "Have a great day, Joel. I'll see you later for lunch, okay? Love you." She then slyly stole the apple from him and winked in his direction before running out of the room as her name was yelled out once again.

Joel couldn't help but smile as he watched the girl leave, ignoring the way his heart seemed to skip a beat which was unusual for him.

"Love you too," he whispered.

- - -

Y/N stared at the map in front of them with a contemplating look upon her face. She was resting her head on her hand and gently tapped her finger against her cheek while her eyes flickered over the marks they had already made.

"Why don't we try over here?" Y/N suggested, pointing towards the section that they had already marked off as 'Do Not Enter.'

All eyes turned to her almost immediately and Connor shook his head. "Y/N, you know why we don't go over there," he told her, referencing the incident where half of their hunting squad got killed, but the girl was persistent.

"That was back when we were just beginning our second year down here. We're more prepared now," Y/N told them. "Every time we go hunting, we stay close enough that we can run back to the bunker if needed. We can't keep living like this. I mean, aren't you guys a little bit curious as to what it's like out there?"

There was a unanimous, "No."

Y/N frowned and looked back down at the map, her fingers now brushing across the small area she had been pointing at while the others all watched her. “Y/N," Anna Lucia sighed, walking over to the girl's side and placing a hand on her shoulder. "There are so many unknowns out there and you know that. What if we go out there and our whole hunting party gets eaten by those monsters? What would the others do?"

"Live off Joel's minestrone," Y/N suggested before sighing and looking towards her friend. "But what if we don't die? What if this opens up a whole new world for us?"

Anna Lucia squeezed the girl's shoulder before whispering, "We can't risk it."

Y/N frowned and looked away while Anna Lucia let her hand fall back down to her side. "Anna Lucia's right except for the being able to live off Joel's minestrone thing. I'm pretty sure he'd be out there trying to avenge you before even thinking about making minestrone," Tim spoke up.

"He wouldn't be stupid enough to do that," Y/N assured them.

"He'd be reckless enough," Connor retorted. Y/N gave him a look and the man sighed, "Seriously, Y/N? When are you two just going to grow a pair and tell each other how you feel?"

Y/N blinked in surprise, a light blush taking over her features as she looked around at her friends who were all smirking. "W-What?" she whispered.

"Gosh, you're insufferable sometimes," Anna Lucia muttered jokingly. "It's obvious that you like him and he is your best friend who is also the only one that's still single down here."

"Joel and I—" Y/N hesitated, the thought of actually being with Joel like that making her heart flutter. "We're just friends," she insisted before giving them all a sad smile. "We won't be getting together."

"It's only a matter of time," Anderson smirked making the girl glare in his direction. However, she didn't get a chance to say or do anything because they all were frozen in place as the lights to the bunker flickered on and off before turning on once again.

"What was—" Anna Lucia began, but Y/N could already feel the hairs on the back of her neck standing on end and had a sneaking suspicion of what was happening.

"Breach," she muttered at the same time someone yelled out from another room, "There's been a breach!"

They all ran out of the room, a few of them scanning the perimeter before they made their way to the main room where everyone was waiting to help them get ready. They hurriedly put what armor they did have on their bodies and Y/N was pulling her hair back into a ponytail when she noticed Joel stumbling into the room with all the weapons in hand.

"Guys! Guys! I got the weapons," Joel announced before proceeding to hand them out to the hunters that walked by.

"Stay," Anderson told him as he took a crossbow.

Joel blinked in surprise, "What? What's happening? What's going on?"

"We've been breached," Y/N explained while she waited for Anna Lucia to grab her weapon so that she could finally reach Joel.

"Breached?" Joel asked. "What do you mean? Like, inside the bunker breached?"

"That's what 'breached' means, kiddo. Y/N, come on," Connor demanded causing the girl to sigh in frustration as him and all the hunters left the room. She turned to Joel who was still trying to process what was happening.

"Joel," she said and he quickly turned to her.

"Right. Right. Here," he muttered as he held out a back holster with two katanas strapped in. She had taken them off of a guy back when the apocalypse had first begun. He had been dead and it wasn't like he planned on using them anyways, so she had taken them in order to keep herself alive. They were her weapon of choice, but she was also one of the best shooters they had so she tended to use a crossbow when necessary. "And here's this," he told her before handing her a crossbow as well.

"Thanks," Y/N told him before nodding her head at him and running out of the room.

"Wait!" Joel yelled, but the girl was already gone. "Breached," he muttered to himself in shock before running after his best friend. By the time he made it to where everyone was, Y/N was already inspecting the gate to the sewers with a frown on her face and her crossbow at the ready while some others worked on getting it open.

"Anna Lucia, Y/N and I will engage," Connor directed. "Anderson and Tim, flank us."

"Flank 'em, yeah, okay. Where do you guys need me? The rear, or. . ." Joel trailed off causing them all to look his way, including Y/N.

"I thought we were past this, Joel," Tim told him as they all looked back to gate.

"Past what? You need help. I can help," Joel insisted. "In case you've forgotten, Robin and I are a duo and I know she goes on the hunting trips and I don't, but this I can help with. Let me help."

"You gonna make me say it?" Connor asked.

"Say what?" Joel questioned.

"You can't handle it, Joel," Connor told him.

"You're shook," Tim added.

"Okay, yeah. So, you guys don't get scared ever?" Joel asked them.

"We get scared."

"We all get scared, Joel, but you get really scared."

"We're not trying to make you feel bad."

"We love you, Joel."

"But you're unsafe."

"You're a liability."

"Even on supply runs."

"Guys!" Y/N exclaimed glaring at the men while Joel looked between them a bit confused.

"Okay, why did that speech feel so rehearsed?" Joel questioned.

"He's got a point," Y/N muttered, turning back around while she nervously fidgeted her hands against the crossbow. "If you're going to tell him something like that at least be sincere instead of rehearsing in your mirror beforehand."

"We did not—" Tim began, but the sound of a growl and something banging against metal made them all tense while Joel jumped back a good foot from where he originally was.

"Connor, Y/N," Karen said as she handed a device to the man. Y/N quickly stood up and hurried over, her eyes flickering over the screen where she could see a blue dot making its way through the sewers towards them.

"Shit," she muttered before standing up more and cracking her neck. She got an arrow ready in the crossbow and jumped in place for a moment to get her nerves out. "Let's do this."

"Okay, 30 meters out. Let's move," Connor directed.

The sewer door was pulled down before the hunters began making their way inside. Y/N was about to follow when someone grabbed ahold of her wrist. She looked back, her eyes locking with Joel's as he held on tightly and whispered, "I can help, Robin."

Y/N let her eyes flicker over his face while her mouth opened up to say something. However, she found herself unable to. All she could imagine was Joel getting attacked by whatever creature was in the sewers at that very moment. She couldn't let him go in there, no matter how badly he wanted to. This was the first time a breach like this had ever happened. Who knew what awaited them down there?

The girl rushed forward, hugging the boy tightly and making him stumble back a bit in surprise. She didn't give him time to react before she was pulling away. "I'm sorry," she whispered, quickly turning around and climbing into the sewers. However, she didn't disappear before she yelled out, "No one let Joel follow!"

Joel's eyes widened. "What?" he exclaimed before attempting to rush forward, but Tim was already there to stand in his way. "Tim, you got to let me go with her. I can't let her go alone. I-I can help."

"She'll be fine, Joel. Y/N’s a survivor. She won't let whatever creature this is take her down," Tim assured him before reaching out to grab the curtain. "You heard what she said. Now go with them." He then pulled the curtain between the two, effectively blocking Joel's view of the tunnel and leaving the boy standing there with a numb feeling coursing through his body.

"Robin," he muttered in frustration before turning on his heels and running to the room everyone was in. The door was locked behind him and Joel quickly shoved his way to the front so that he could watch the monitor with Karen and Kala.

They could all see five yellow dots moving through the tunnels near a bigger blue dot in the center of the screen. "They're getting close," Karen muttered, a silence falling upon them all as they noticed the five dots stop not too far away from the creature. Before anyone knew what was happening, the blue dot lunged out and grabbed ahold of one of the yellow dots.

"Shit."

"Oh, my God."

"It's got one of 'em."

"What about the others?"

The lights began to flicker while Joel felt his heart drop to his stomach. "Y/N," he whispered, his voice making everyone look his way. He was pale, his hands shakily holding onto the crossbow in his hands.

"We don't know if that's her, Joel," Karen tried to tell him. "She could be fine. She—"

"I'm going after her," he said before turning and running for the door. Everyone's eyes widened as people began to make a move towards him, by the boy was quick and already had the door open.

"Joel!" Kala yelled.

"They need help. My best friend needs help. I'm going," Joel insisted before running out the door and slamming in shut behind him.

Joel spun around quickly, crossbow in the air while he nervously looked around the bunker. It was like he was walking into a foreign place, the usual warm feeling of the bunker being replaced with nothing but an eerie feeling and a coldness that shook him to his very core.

His breathing was shaky as he began to walk forward, his eyes flickering around his surroundings while Joel tried to keep himself calm. The only thing keeping him from collapsing in fear was the knowledge that Y/N was out there possibly hurt. He had to get to her. He had to.

The lights flickered as he slowly made his way back towards the tunnels where he knew he had his best access to the others. It was a deafening silent as he walked into the room, so quiet in fact that his ears were ringing.

He nervously looked around and adjusted his hands on the crossbow. As he grew closer to the curtain Tim had pulled out earlier, a new sound filled his ears while his feet slowly stepped in the new puddles of water and blood that were on the ground. The sight made him feel sick to his stomach, so Joel did his best to keep his eyes staring straight ahead.

A lightbulb exploding behind him made the boy jump and spin around, his eyes wide in fear before he realized what had happened and turned back around. He could hear Tim and Connor's words replaying over and over in his head.

We all get scared, Joel, but you get really scared.

You're unsafe.

You're a liability.

Joel walked forward and took in a shaky breath as he attempted to push the voices from his head. His eyes continued to survey the area and he hesitated at the sight of a figure on the other side of the curtain. It almost looked like—

"Connor?" Joel questioned, his voice barely above a whisper. When there was no response, Joel furrowed his eyebrows in confusion and lowered his crossbow just a bit. "Connor?"

It was at that moment that a loud hissing sound came from the other side of the curtain and Connor's body limply flew across the room before being shoved into the mouth of whatever creature was over there with him. Lights from the other side shinned their shadows against the curtain and Joel's eyes widened in fear as he slowly took a step back.

Joel's whole body was shaking, his eyes tearing up a little as he feared for not only his life, but Y/N’s as well. If the creature had done what it did to Connor with Y/N. . .well, Joel didn't even want to think about what he would do.

It seemed he wouldn't have to because at that moment the monster finished up eating Connor and turned its attention towards the curtain. It made a noise that Joel swore was able to rattle his bones. The crossbow was back up in position once again, but his hands were shaking so badly that he knew if he didn't get his fear together he was going to be the monster's dessert to the meal it just ate.

The monster began to stand up on the other side of the curtain, its shadow growing bigger and making Joel gulp. He shakily got the crossbow ready to fire before freezing at the sight of the monster appearing over the top of the curtain.

There were tears in his eyes at this point and Joel couldn't even move as he watched the monster tear the curtain down before moving towards him. A few tears slid down his face and Joel felt the fear and panic coursing through his veins.

He closed his eyes as the monster grew nearer, his face confronting in pain and fear as he felt the monster's breath fanning his face and heard the growls rattling in his head.

Then before he knew what had happened, he heard the sound of something flying through the air and then the monster cried out in agony. He felt someone rush by him and opened his eyes to find Y/N standing above the monster's dead body, one katana dripping with blood in one hand while the other protruded from the center of the monster's face.

"D-Did I kill it, or did you?" Joel whispered, her eyes flickering between Y/N who still had yet to turn around and look at him, Tim, and Anna Lucia.

"What do you think?" Anna Lucia asked.

"Robin," he muttered for he knew she had been the one to save him, his eyes flickering back over to his best friend. It was then that she turned to look at him, her whole body shaking as she breathed heavily and attempted to calm herself down. Joel inhaled sharply at the sight of her, her face covered in dirt and blood while a scratch ran down the length of her arm from where the monster had no doubt tried to grab ahold of her.

Joel began to break at that, tears rolling down his face even more while Y/N pulled the other katana out of the monster's head before shoving them both into their sheaths. She moved forward in an instant, her hands grabbing ahold of Joel's arms while she looked to him with a worried gaze.

"Joel, are you okay? Are you hurt?" she asked earning a slow shake of his head in response. "What were you doing? What were you thinking? You could've gotten killed!"

Joel slowly lifted his gaze to her, his whole body still shaking as he whispered, "You-You were in trouble, Robin. I—"

Joel was unable to finish what he was saying, his words being cut off as he closed his eyes and more tears fell. It was obvious he was holding back a sob due to the fact they were in front of other people and Y/N felt herself soften almost immediately.

She was wrapping her arms around his neck without a second thought, pulling him in for a hug which Joel quickly accepted. His arms were around her waist and he held onto her tightly while he shook, his tear filled eyes flickering to the ground where the monster that had been seconds away from killing him laid dead on the ground.

- - -

Oh, and I have a pretty severe freezing problem.

But I am working on it.

- - -

Tag List

@simplybarnes

@spideysimpossiblegirl

@bookdorkfangirl

@katemusic

@eternallyvenus

@juliebean247

@trustfundparker

[hey-there-juliet]

Random Drabble Day (2/23)

Summary: First off, let me just say that this is more like a one-shot than a drabble because I'm a wordy bitch and I cannot control myself 😅

That said, I always had a hard time imagining Julie writing some of the Perfect Harmony's lyrics about herself, so I thought why not make this just another song that Luke and Julie wrote together? This is set somewhere between Finally Free and Edge of Great, in that week when Ray was stress-eating. This is supposed to fit back into the show at the end, so it might seem like a cliffhanger, but it's not.

Quick shout out to @jamestkirkish for betaing this for me! I love you and you are amazing! Any remaining mistakes are my own. And to the fabulous Sloan, for helping me out with Luke's handwriting! Enjoy 🧡

Fandom: Julie and the Phantoms

Relationship: Juke 💜

in the great scheme of life and ghosts

No matter how many times Luke insisted that she had been snooping through his things, Julie knew for a fact that she had done no such thing. In reality, she had simply been cleaning the studio when she came across it.

For three ghosts who didn't eat and could barely even touch anything most of the time, the boys sure knew how to make a mess. Every morning Julie would walk into the studio to find the chairs or coffee table rearranged, at least one of the rugs was always askew, and the clothes... the clothes were everywhere, and the worst part was: they reeked. 

And so every morning before leaving for school Julie would shoot them a stern look and tell them to pick up after themselves. Which they did - when she got back home, things were mostly in their rightful place. Still, every weekend Julie would make sure to take a moment away from homework and rehearsal to tidy the place up to perfection, just like her mom liked it. She'd dust off the furniture, water the plants, sweep the floor, and even vacuum the whole place. One Saturday when she was home alone (her dad photographing a wedding, and Carlos at a friend's house), she even went through the trouble of washing all of the guys' old clothes. 

Somehow, and she didn't even want to think about how that worked, the clothes didn't stink when they were actually wearing them, but at any other moment when they made no contact with their skin? Yeah... not good. So she washed them all (three times, using every trick and product she had). She washed them a fourth time for good measure and, by the time she was finished, any traces of twenty-five year old mold was gone, and so was the smell.

So no, she was not snooping - no matter what Luke said - when she came across the crumpled paper ball between the couch and the low cabinet, just behind a big vase her mom had gotten from tía Victoria.

Julie sighed, making a mental note to tell Luke to put his discarded ideas in the bin (again) if he didn't want them anymore, when one scribbled and wrinkled word caught her attention: Perfect Ha-

She bit her lip, staring down at the teasing word. Perfect what? Was it lyrics? Maybe half formed ideas? Doodles? Julie knew Luke liked to doodle in the margins of his notebook whenever he got stuck trying to come up with the next best piece of lyric or melody. She also knew she should probably just leave it alone, put it with his stuff to ask him later if he wanted to keep it, or put it in the garbage. Except the more she glanced down at that damn word, the stronger she felt it pull her towards uncovering whatever else the crumpled paper ball was hiding. 

In the end, the pull was too strong. She'd just take a quick look, make sure it wasn't anything important before she threw it away. And, she reasoned with herself, trying to squish the guilt that was making itself known in the pit of her stomach: Luke had gotten rid of it, so he clearly didn't care much for whatever was in there. 

Not able to resist any longer, Julie carefully unfolded the paper, slowly making her way towards the piano and using its surface as a table to help smooth the page over.

Luke's (horrendous) handwriting covered it with the bare bones of a song, random lines were scribbled in the margins with a couple of doodles for company, and even a little note from their bassist - ‘Reggie was here ;)’.

It took her a minute before the chicken scratches became words, and then Julie's breath left her in a rush, as the guilty feeling in her stomach turned into butterflies and flew away with her imagination. 

It was a song, parts of one, anyway, and - more importantly - it was a love song.

Unprompted, her own words came back to her, "Wow, Luke! I didn't know you were such a romantic." Quickly followed by Alex's short reply, "He's not."

She knew now who Unsaid Emily was really about, but these new words were clearly about a different kind of love. The romantic kind, and Julie couldn't help letting herself believe - just for a moment - that the song might be about her.

Before she could let herself be carried away in a daydream, there was a - now familiar - shift in the air, a sound almost like static, the only thing letting her know of a ghost's appearance. Without a thought, she crumpled the page again and shoved the paper ball in her pocket for later inspection. 

"Hey, Julie!" Reggie's cheerful greeting sounded across the studio from where he had poofed in, and soon - with his "help," bless him - Julie was finished with her weekend clean up. 

As if summoned by the end of her chores, Luke poofed in, ready to rehearse. Alex soon followed; and by the time Julie retired for the night, the song had been almost forgotten where it hid inside her pocket. 

Almost.

***

After getting ready for the night, Julie settled on her bed with the wrinkled page and her dreambox. She read over the words again and again, imagining they were about her.

Step into my world, 

Bittersweet love story about a girl 

Shook me to the core 

Voice like an angel, 

I've never heard before, 

- 

You and me together, it's more than chemistry 

- 

Love me as I am 

I hold your music 

Here inside my hands 

- 

You are my brightest burning star 

- 

We create Perfect Harmony.

And unless Luke had been singing with another girl, there didn't seem to be many options on who it could be about, right?

From the beginning, Julie had felt something connecting her to him; to all of them, in different ways. But Luke had been the one to give her a little piece of his soul right after meeting her when he let her use Bright to earn back her spot in the music program. Seeing his passion reflecting back on her, the way he treated music like she used to, made her miss it more than anything for the first time in almost a year. It made her miss the way it felt to use music to connect with her mom.

After they spent a whole weekend finishing each other's songs and working on new ones, getting to know each other's inner workings - the part of them that bled out feelings into paper to create beautiful melodies, Julie knew she was a goner. Finding out he'd been the one to write the words that shaped her taste in rock certainly didn't help. Like he'd been helping her find her way to music long before they even met.

Her crush on him had been inevitable from the start, and while falling for him was probably one of the worst things she could’ve done, it was too late to stop it. She'd been free falling for a while, and hopefully she'd land in his arms soon enough. Reading over his words again gave Julie a warm fluttering in her stomach that made her think he was more than ready to catch her once she reached the ground. 

Carefully folding the piece of paper, she put it inside her dreambox, then placed the box back on the shelf.

***

The following week went by without any hiccups. Every once in a while, Julie would remember Luke's song and a familiar warmth would fill her up, leaving a soft smile on her lips and glazed eyes staring off at nothing. Just as often, Flynn would have to shake her out of her daydreams.

She didn't think much would come of it until her dad decided to throw the band a party so he could film them and post their video on YouTube. Which was fine. Amazing, even. It was most certainly great! Until Luke came to the school, staring at her with his stupid, beautiful, awed eyes, and with his soft, perfect smile, saying things that made her combust and melt, all at the same time.

"I think you make me a better writer." 

    "I think we make each other better."

Calling Nick 'Luke' was bad enough, but slipping into a complete musical sequence as she danced with him? "Goner" didn't even begin to describe her. 

Like the other times they'd written together, the lyrics flowed through her, finishing the song he'd started with the same ease as one would take a breath.

Julie knew that whatever was going on between her and Luke couldn't happen or, if it did, it couldn't last. In fact, in the great scheme of life and ghosts, she didn't know much, but what she did know was that - be it in life or in death - love was constant. 

He didn't need to have a heartbeat or to be able to touch her for her to love him. He was just as real to her as the next person, and whether it would hurt in the long run or not, it didn't matter. 

She knew Flynn was only looking out for her, but that ship had sailed, and Julie was already so lost in his ocean eyes that avoiding eye contact wasn't going to bring it back. She would entertain her though, even knowing it wouldn't work. Just like the tide, eventually he'd pull her right back in.

She could love him just as he was, for however long they had together, and especially after that.

-

End notes: I hope you guys enjoyed it! And, if you'll notice, at the beginning it kind of gives off the impression that Luke eventually finds out about the song and Julie tells him how she found it. Which may or may not lead you to believe that they're in a relationship. I guess it all depends on interpretation though ;)

Oh, also! Shout out to the chaos squad folks that guessed right! You guys are no fun :( /j lmao