#and now my mother knows i have a new hyperfixation. the most embarrassing shit ever.

[widevibratobitch]

well shit. infodumped too close to the sun o7

[secretgiftsforshaman]

I was an emotional vampire when I was a child. The memories and pieces of evidence have been slowly rising to the surface, and I think I’ve finally pieced them together. While I still have my moments, I’m (usually) much less of a vampire now than I once was. I haven’t examined how, exactly, I managed to become less vampiric over time without consciously seeking to do so. Maybe I just got used to feeling unfulfilled and unloved and accepted that that’s how it would be. Maybe I just kept putting it off until some future day when hopefully it’d be better somehow. I need to reflect on this more, but right now I just need to get this out.

My grandmother often smothered my mom with affection when she was little – it was one of grandma’s ways of trying to fill her own unmet emotional needs, by treating mom like she was her own personal little cuddly teddy-bear play dolly, and expecting the same sickly-sweet treatment back from my mom, even as a toddler, even when she was her own kind of ravenous black hole and only doled out that “affection” because she expected something in return. I think that mom then reacted to that treatment by swinging to the other extreme when I came along, being overly distant, withholding, and resentful of my emotional needs (they reminded her too much of her own – as her firstborn I was her first experience of another person being 1000% dependent on her, and I think it triggered all kinds of shit from her relationship with her own mother, both where I was her and she was grandma, and where she was herself and I was grandma) and she didn’t want to smother me with affection the way she had been. However or whyever it came about, she definitely went too far in that opposite direction. I have no memories of feeling cherished by my mother, or of cuddling together without her acting resentfully and sending me back to my own bed as soon as possible, or of her ever expressing belief or confidence in me and my abilities (part the root of why I struggle to perform any new or intimidating task, I think). As I’ve said before and will keep saying aloud until I have finished integrating, processing, and healing it: I was emotionally neglected, abandoned, and abused, and sometimes I still am. While I’ve lived in material privilege and had all of my basic physical/survival needs met with some material luxuries to boot, I never felt like I had enough of the love, acceptance, and touch that I needed from the very earliest age. This emotional connection is a vital nutrient for the soul, the psyche, and the body – and an emotionally starving child in need of attention, affection, and approval will latch onto anything and anyone that feels like it/they can give them a scrap or two with which to survive. I’ve felt like a gaping, needy, black hole of pain and rejection eating myself from the inside out my entire life and never really been able to explain why until now.

There are all manner of embarrassing memories I’ve been dredging up of how I acted as a kid, and I don’t have enough conscious detail to explain them like stories, but I can feel the energetic reality of all those episodes. They contain the same patterns and themes, they stretch back as far as I remember, and they occur at every age of childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood without intermission. Time and again I latched onto people, be they other kids, warm or parental adults, classmates, crushes, even random strangers: just anybody who was energetically compatible with or susceptible to my ravenous, desperate needs that I might be able to tag along after, attempt to adopt or ingratiate myself to, or mooch off of. If it worked, it worked poorly, and it didn’t work for very long, and as a result very few of my peers wanted to be friends with me for most of my life. I’ve explained away this ‘social awkwardness’ pattern as just part of my Asperger’s for years, but I’ve been coming to realize that while part of it may have been autism-typical misunderstandings of other people’s social cues, the other part of me was manipulative and leech-like and would overstep other people’s boundaries because I didn’t know how to connect to people and receive the attention I needed otherwise (because my own social boundaries weren’t respected – I rarely had boundary honoring behavior modeled for me at home).

This helps account for why I’ve felt so rejected from all quarters. Of course nobody wants to ask the emotional vampire to play with them, or invite them over to hang out, or flirt with them. Of course I fell hard for the narrative that the right romantic knight-in-shining-armor would feed that gaping hungry maw of lovelessness inside of me and got hyperfixated on finding a boy, and later a man, to help me fill in that hole. And of course I am now afraid of expressing my attraction to anyone, especially romantically or sexually: I am both afraid of mockery and rejection, but I also struggle with distinguishing intense attraction from my inner soul-sucking emotional leech.

This is a big part of why I am terrified of expressing my needs and desires: I have hurt people and rightfully driven them away from me with my behavior and treatment of them in the past, and the conflict between wanting that connection with someone, particularly a potential partner, and latching onto them in a way that hurts/upsets/repulses them is what has been agonizing me about reaching out and starting to flirt and date again. The newer loneliness of grief and widowhood feels all too similar to that old gaping hole of emotional neglect, and I fear that I can’t accept ANY connection, affection, touch, or love to fill my need without hurting the person giving them to me. Even in our relationship, while I have gradually become more secure and trusting, I think that this is the root fear that has made me worry at times that I have asked too much from you or taken too much from you.

Maybe I stopped being a vampire because it didn’t get me what I needed so I just stopped doing it, but (as I’m typing this and reflecting on it and realizing) I think I mostly just drew the conclusion that there was something inherently unworthy of love and acceptance within me, and became ashamed of the misguided ways that I had tried to seek out love and acceptance. I started to accept that I’d be better off not trying because if so many people had rejected me then it must be because they could all see my obvious unworthiness, so it would be foolish and pathetic for me to seek something that would never be mine – that was so laughably beyond my reach – like love or intimacy. Let alone acting like someone could actively desire or want me – that would be so beyond the pale as to draw ridicule. At one point or another I’ve managed to convince myself that asking someone for anything (friendship, attention, reassurance, compliments, a glass of water, I mean ANYTHING) is actually me just trying to manipulate or leech off of that person, whether it’s through vampirism or a bald-faced request. So the only solution to this mess is to fulfill as much of my needs and desires as I can for myself, and reject the rest because turning to another person for assistance will only harm them, drive them away, or both.

I know that my younger, starving child self was only acting out of instinct to survive the neglect and abuse that she suffered – that she didn’t know any better and she never fed on anybody in malice or out of any intent to do harm. But I’m afraid of my own inner child, of my own ongoing neediness and hunger for connection. I’m terrified that I’ll hurt someone by taking too much from them, that I’ll ask for more than they want to give, that nobody will be able to meet me emotionally. Or WANT to meet me emotionally. I’m trying to hold out hope that my future mate, wherever he his, will want to love me – will not see love as the scarce, precious commodity that my inner traumatized child experienced it as, but that he (and I) can and will both treat love like the bottomless fountain that it is. That it will bring him joy and pleasure to pour buckets of love back into me, that he’ll bail me in when I’m feeling hollow and dry, and I will relish the privilege of doing the same for him. My closest friends and I have begun to do something like this with each other, and it is such a healing thing.

I am trying to keep faith in my worthiness. I am trying to forgive myself for acting as best as I could in terrible situations where I felt next to powerless. I hope that I can disentangle my inner bloodsucker from my honest needs, learn to express my desire and attraction to others in harmless and healthy ways, no matter how intense they feel, and that I can reprogram all that shit in my head about needing to emotionally starve myself because to slake that thirst would hurt someone.

It’s 1:30 AM and I desperately need sleep. And maybe some garlic, holy water, or a crucifix.

Thank you for loving and accepting and holding space for me and all of my mess. I sincerely hope that you never feel unappreciated – you do so much for me just by existing as a good, honorable man. Your presence is a healing balm in and of itself. And you are this way because of your integrity and character. Connecting to your energy is calming and soothing even when you aren’t able listen or respond. Never forget how good and powerful you are. I believe in you and everything that you embody and do.

All my love,

My Vulnerable Parts

[rax-writes]

Title: Hard to Handle Fandom: Stranger Things Characters: Steve Harrington x Reader Word Count: 3,425 Warnings: None Notes: Can y’all tell that I’m on a massive “best friends turned lovers” kick? // Request from anon for “4. “I think i’m in love with you, and that terrifies me.” 75. “I want you to fight for me!” and 76. “Please don’t go.” from the prompt list for steve harrington with a side of extra large angst please 💗💗 (and if u only do a certain # of prompts then u can choose from those three :))” – (I couldn’t find a way to include number 75, so that’s why it got left out.) ♥

gif made by @v-writings

The first semester of college is always the most difficult, for an innumerable amount of reasons. Not only is it nerve-wracking to be thrust into an entirely unfamiliar situation such as college, but it is a momentous change in one’s personal life. They’re away from their family, they’ve now got to balance difficult coursework with attempting to have a social life, they’ve got to attempt to develop a social life in this new environment – there are a thousand and one things that change in someone’s life when they go to college. And any fragment of familiarity is held onto as if it were the most valuable thing in the world. Whether it be the blanket they brought that still smells like home, or a photo of their family setting on the nightstand, any sense of home is cherished.

For Steve, it wasn’t some treasured memento from home – it was you.

Thankfully, the basic courses that every college student must take allowed you to share almost all of your classes with Steve. He was more than grateful for it as well. Despite being the former King of Hawkins, he was now essentially insignificant – and he didn’t quite know how to handle it. He had grown accustomed to everyone in his school knowing his name, to recognizing him as arguably the most popular person at Hawkins High. But here, no one – save yourself – knew him at all. He felt insignificant, and that constant, sinking feeling pushed him even closer to you, made him even more desperate to be with you always.

If he had to guess, that would likely be the primary factor in why he fell in love with you.

Steve had always cared deeply about you. You had been his friend since elementary school, when you’d punched a kid in the throat for stealing his crayons. (You’d gotten in loads of trouble, of course, but it was certainly a fun memory to look back on.) Even when you’d both gained attractiveness with the onset of puberty, neither of you felt any different about one another. You were still just best friends, and absolutely nothing more.

This was what made it even more perplexing to Steve when he found himself staring at you much longer than usual, eyeing the way you held the end of your pen between your lips when you were deep in thought, or the way you’d rock up to class with messy hair and a coffee after a long night of studying. He found himself positively enamored by you – and it was absolutely mortifying.

The situation with Nancy had hurt Steve far more than he’d ever admitted to anyone. Sure, you knew all about how much he’d cried over it, how long he’d been heartbroken and downtrodden from it – but you didn’t know how irreparably it had damaged him. You didn’t know that he often lied awake at night, staring up at the ceiling as he wondered if she’d ever actually loved him? And if she hadn’t – if she’d never loved him in all the time they’d been together – how could he possibly tell if anyone else was feigning their love for him? Was he doomed to spend the rest of his life clueless as to whether or not he was a burden, an obstacle for the people in his life to overcome? How many people were only in his life because they felt obligated to be? You, Dustin – hell, even his own mother? Were you all only there because you felt trapped, spending every day working yourself up to leaving him? Were any of you there simply because you wanted to be, because you really did care about him?

These were but a few of the thoughts that constantly plagued Steve’s mind. Regardless of how many times he attempted to assure himself that you were his friend because you wanted to be, that you would never have stayed friends with him for this long if you didn’t actually care about him – he couldn’t shake the paranoia that you secretly despised him, and you were only still sticking around because you didn’t know anyone else here. The second you made some new friends, Steve would never hear from you again. You’d just toss him away, and the next time he’d see you would be at your high school reunion, on the arm of some douchebag who didn’t love you half as much as Steve did.

All of this only made Steve more apprehensive about his blossoming feelings for you.

And all of this only made him a thousand times more distraught when you started dating someone – someone who wasn’t him.

The guy’s name was Chad, and he was a bit of a prick, but he seemed to treat you pretty well. Chad himself wasn’t necessarily Steve’s problem – it was how you felt about Chad. It was how your entire face would light up when Chad would come up behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist and kissing the top of your head. It was the smile that would spread across your face when he’d bring you take-out on a night he knew you were cramming for an exam. It was the way you’d laugh at his jokes, and the way he’d just smile at you as you laughed, as if you were the most beautiful thing in the entire world.

But since Steve couldn’t possibly bring himself to be upset with you, he generally took his frustration out on Chad.

Steve felt his entire body cringe when someone clapped his shoulder and sat down next to him at the picnic table outside the library. Chad gave him a friendly grin, as you took a seat across the table.

“How’s it going, man? Studying hard or hardly studying?” Chad questioned lightheartedly, and Steve managed to force out a brief laugh.

“Bit of both, I guess.”

“We’re going to the game tonight, do you wanna come?” you asked, and Steve felt almost embarrassed by how delighted he was by your offer. You’d both been extremely busy with homework lately, being that the end of the semester was fast approaching, so you hadn’t spent much time together. He was more than happy for any excuse to hang out with you – until he realized that that meant Chad would be there.

Oh well, Steve would just have to take what he could get.

“Yeah, sounds… sounds fun,” he said, and the smile that lit up your face made his mouth go dry.

“Great! I’ll swing by your dorm around six and we can walk to the game from there,” you said, and Steve just nodded, returning your vibrant smile.

That night, for the first time in a long time, Steve actually got ready. Not just the “do his hair and throw on some clothes” type of getting ready. No, Steve changed his outfit three times, spent twice as long on his hair than usual, sprayed on some of his seldom-used expensive cologne, and admired himself in the mirror for ten minutes, before he felt pleased with his appearance.

Truthfully, Steve didn’t even know why he was putting so much time and effort in tonight. The fact remained that you were still with Chad. No matter how nicely he dressed, no matter how fantastic his hair looked – you were still with Chad. That put a bitter taste in Steve’s mouth, and he immediately pushed it to the back of his mind. It’d been awhile since he’d gotten to spend time with you, and dammit, he was going to enjoy himself tonight. He wasn’t going to worry about who you were with, how long you’d end up being with them, or any of that other shit. He was just going to have fun, and enjoy hanging out with you.

Until you showed up at his door with slightly blotchy, red cheeks and puffy eyes.

“Woah, what the hell happened? You alright?” Steve questioned immediately, frowning as he bent down to look at you and brush some hair out from your face.

“Yeah, I’m fine, let’s go,” you said softly, turning to walk away. Steve gently grabbed your arm, and stopped you.

“Hey… what happened?” he repeated, this time with a much gentler tone. You let out a heavy sigh before turning around to face Steve again.

“I… I decided to go by Chad’s dorm early tonight, because I needed to use his computer to send an email to my professor. And when I went in there… he was with someone.”

“What exactly do you mean, ‘with someone’?”

“They… they looked like maybe they’d been kissing, but stopped when they heard the door opening. I don’t know, I… I just left and came here. He was yelling after me, but… I just left,” you explained, sniffling a bit before shaking your head. “Doesn’t matter right now. Can we just… go to the game, and focus on a bunch of people screaming at some guys chasing after a ball, rather than my currently fucked up love life?”

“Okay,” Steve said, nodding and brushing some more hair away from your face, before offering you a kind smile. “Yeah, let’s go.”

The game was pretty much exactly what you’d said earlier: a bunch of people screaming at some guys chasing after a ball. You got into the game much more than you usually did, and it was clear to Steve that that was intentional; you were choosing to focus on the game rather than your own thoughts. So, he did it, too. You both quickly joined those hollering and swearing at the game, occasionally screaming at the ref or cheering at the top of your lungs. Steve felt himself actually enjoying it – this weird, hyperfixated, energetic comradery between the two of you.

Until he felt that unfortunately familiar hand clap his shoulder.

“Oh my god, I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” Chad said, panting a bit and looking relieved. “Baby, I’m so sorry, it’s totally not what you think –”

“Then what the fuck is it, Chad?”

Anyone who has experienced the uniquely awkward feeling of standing next to an arguing couple would understand why Steve decided to sneak away. He waded through the sea of people until he was down a few rows, ready to return to you when you inevitably dumped Chad for good. Despite the fact that it made him feel a bit ashamed, he couldn’t deny that he felt a little hint of excitement rise up in him. You were finally going to be rid of Chad, and maybe – just maybe – Steve could be with you.

Every couple of minutes, Steve would look back at you and Chad, to see if the argument was over yet. It was mostly you looking furious and upset, and Chad doing his best to placate you, and to come up with excuses for why he was snuggled up in bed with someone else. The argument eventually seemed to be winding down, and Steve assumed that you had reached the point where you were telling Chad to get lost. The team scored, and Steve returned his attention to the game for a few moments. And when he looked back, he saw Chad leaning down to kiss you.

Something in Steve’s heart snapped. He instantly wanted to be as far away from there as possible. He felt as if he were in a bit of a haze, his legs guiding the rest of his shell-shocked body down the bleachers, and towards his dorm. He walked like a zombie, and he felt like one. When he reached his room, he managed to close the door behind him and kick off his shoes, before falling face-first onto his mattress, burying his face in his pillow. Tears that he didn’t know where there began to wet his face, and before he knew it, he was sobbing.

It was a myriad of factors that ultimately caused Steve’s little meltdown. There were some external factors, such as the pressure of the multitude of homework he was dealt resting upon his shoulders and weighing him down. But primarily, of course, he was crying about you. He was crying because he’d been so stressed about his feelings for you, that he’d never taken the time to actually deal with them. Now he was being forced to deal with them. And he was being forced to deal with the fact that you didn’t want him; you wanted some cheating piece of hair-gel slathered garbage named Chad, and you may never want him. All of these intense, burdensome feelings that Steve now felt for you were likely all for naught; you’d probably never want him. Why? Because he didn’t feel that he was worth wanting.

Steve couldn’t be sure of how long he’d cried, but when he was through, he just felt empty. He felt empty, and then mad. And for the first time, he felt mad at you.

It was another hour before you showed up to his room, knocking softly before letting yourself in. You found him lying on his bed, his hands folded over his stomach as he stared up at the ceiling. After you dropped your coat on the ground, he didn’t acknowledge at your presence, so for a second, you thought he was asleep, until he spoke.

“What’re you doing here?”

His voice was hollow and hoarse, and you frowned at his question.

“I’m here because you disappeared. You ditched me at the game, and I couldn’t find you anywhere. You actually worried me a little, I thought maybe you got sick or something. I wanted to see if you were here, and check to see if you’re alright.”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Now go ahead, run back to Chad, like always. I’m sure he’s got some more bullshit excuses to give you.”

“What the hell is your problem, Steve?”

He sat up then, and in the dim light of his bedroom, you couldn’t see the tears that still stained his cheeks.

“What’s it matter what my problem is? Just go suck Chad’s face some more, and continue to not give a shit about me, just like you have been for the past several months.”

“You think I don’t give a shit about you?”

“Sure as hell seems like it,” Steve scoffed.

“You’re my best friend, and not having the time to see you makes me feel like a horrible person. You know just as well as I do that they’ve been piling on the homework for the past month or more, and I’ve just been too swamped to have the time to hang out. And it’s not like you’ve been coming to see me, either. But I know that it’s because you’re busy, and I don’t hold it against you. You need to untie the knot in your panties, and understand that I’m not doing this because I don’t give a shit about you. It’s because I just don’t have any fucking time, Steve.”

“Alright, and what about Chad? What about you being too blind to see that he’s obviously cheating on you, but you’re too thoughtless to just dump him and move on? Look, I get that you’re in love with him, but you’re being stupid.”

“I did dump him, you moron,” you snapped.

“Yeah right, I saw him kiss you.”

“Well, you must’ve left before you saw me slap the hair gel off him, and tell him to go to hell,” you retorted, and that visibly took Steve aback. “I told him that his excuses were bullshit, that I know he was cheating on me, and to never speak to me again. You clearly don’t know me at all if you think I’m ‘stupid’ enough to take him back, so I’ll just stake my ‘stupid’ ass home. Goodnight, Harrington.”

You snatched your coat up off the floor, and you were just about to walk out the door, when Steve jumped up to grab your arm, effectively stopping you in your tracks.

“Please don’t go.”

“Why should I stay?” you inquired bitterly. “To listen to you insult me some more?”

“No, I…” Steve trailed off before exhaling slowly and running a hand through his hair. “You’re not stupid at all. God, you’ve never been stupid, and you’ll never be stupid. I’m the stupid one. I got upset with you for no good reason, and I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve any of that. I’m so sorry.”

“But why did you get that upset over thinking I got back with Chad? I would’ve thought you’d just… tell me that I’m not making a good decision, and talk with me about it – not yell at me and call me stupid.”

“I know, I know. I should never have acted like that. I feel like such a jerk. I’ve just… got a lot going on, and I took all of it out on the first thing that made me mad – which was thinking that this prick cheated on you, but you were taking him back. God, I’m so sorry,” Steve said miserably, leaning his back against the wall and running his hands over his face.

“Steve…” you said gently, and he looked at you. “What’s going on? What all do you have ‘going on’ that’s making you this upset?”

“Just… just homework, and shit like that,” he quickly lied, then shook his head. “You don’t need to worry about it, I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine, Steve. I know you,” you said, frowning at him with a pitying look in your eyes. “What’s going on? Talk to me, please.”

“I… I think I’m in love with you,” Steve blurted out, before he could even think to stop himself. “And that terrifies me. And I don’t know how to deal with it.”

You just stared at him in silence for what felt like ages. The inevitable shock was clear on your face, from your raised eyebrows to your slightly agape lips – but beyond that, Steve couldn’t read you. He’d always been great about that, knowing what you were thinking without you saying a word. But now, you were stunned silent, and he didn’t have a clue what was running through your mind.

“You’re in love with me?” you finally asked, and Steve nodded. His mouth was too dry to choke out a response. You repeated, “You’re in love with me,” but this time, it felt more like a disbelieving statement. Again, Steve nodded.

He could feel his hands begin to grow clammy with fear, and he began wringing them together. He was on the verge of begging you to say something, anything at all to break the silence. Eventually, you looked up at him. Your eyes seemed to be scanning him critically, attempting to determine your next course of action. Then, all in one swift movement, you put your hand behind his neck and pulled him down to your level, crashing your lips against his.

It took him a moment or two to regain his composure enough to return the kiss, delicately placing his hands your waist, as your free hand moved to grip his bicep. Every single thought in Steve’s mind escaped him, besides the thought that you were kissing him – and it was the single best moment of his entire life.

When your hand drifted upwards into his hair, he managed to maintain his equanimity. But that went straight out the window when you tangled your fingers in his soft curls. As if on instinct, Steve pushed you back against the nearby door – which, mere minutes ago, you were getting ready to storm out of.

It was a very welcomed change of pace.

Steve’s hands moved from behind you to grip your hips, allowing your back to be pressed firmly against the door’s cold, hard wood. He pulled your hips closer, pressing your body against his, and both of you felt dizzy. By the time you broke the kiss, both of you were out of breath. Steve rested his forehead on your shoulder, and wrapped his arms around your waist, almost as if he were pulling you into a languid hug.

“I love you,” he heard you whisper softly, as if you were scared of saying it. “I’ve always loved you.”

“I’m pretty new to it,” Steve admitted, chuckling breathlessly. He absentmindedly turned his head a kiss to your neck, then added softly, “I love you, too.”

There were a few moments of content, comfortable silence, and you were the first to interrupt it. Steve could hear the smile in your voice when you spoke again.

“Now kiss me again.”

@v-writings @emmcfrxst @shirostellations @keithstellations @kendrasauhders @whoarumancek @willsomeoneholdmyhand @queen-of-the-pineapples @pansexual-and-a-geek @bisexualillis