#and talk about how awful the bullying and fatphobia makes them feel

[mrsbakashi]

here i am once again writing holiday-themed stuff because it's one of my favorite times of the year and i just had these scenarios in my head during christmas eve, so why not write it? hope you enjoy it!

🎄 BRINGING HIM HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS - KAKASHI HEADCANONS 💝

summary: you bring your boyfriend home for the first time during christmas eve and your family fall in love with him.

a/n: this is 100% based on my family/friend's family so it's kinda personal, i guess, but i hope someone else also identifies with it :)

⚠️ cw: christmas, family (not perfect), chubby reader, hard-to-deal-with mother, low-key fatphobia

🎁 it's the first time kakashi is meeting your family, and he's very nervous about it, tho he tries to play it cool. he knew it was important to you, that your family was not perfect, but that you adored them, so he wanted to cause a good impression, he wanted them to like him - specially your grandmother.

🎁 at first when you arrive he feels a little awkward, shy and quiet, but as the night goes by, he starts to feel more comfortable and at ease.

🎁 your grandma falls in love with him the second she sets her eyes on him - he brought her flowers, but she was already in love before that. she's in awe of everything he says or do. she starts to refer to him as "prince charming", which is exactly how she refers to your grandfather, even after he passed away. that's a very good sign, and it makes you really happy.

🎁 at first your mother is shocked at how handsome he is, and for a while that's all she can focus on - part of her wonders how a man like him ended up with a girl like you, but she tries to not let it show (it's not that she thinks you don't deserve to be happy, she loves you, in her own way, but she does, it's just that she's very hard on you, specially because of your weight because she was bullied into losing weight by her husband, so she unconsciously believes that big people are not worthy of love).

🎁 kakashi rarely leaves your side, always keeps an arm around you - except when you go help your mother setting the table and finish the food.

🎁 when you're busy he sits and talks with your cousins, that are like your little brothers and want to know him and see if he's worthy of you, and not just a player - they end up thinking he's amazing. i mean, he's charming, handsome, funny, charisma king, it's impossible not to love him.

🎁 your family has secret santa every single year, and it's always incredibly fun, funny and messed up. you asked him to join this year, but because it was his first christmas there, he wanted to let everyone feel more comfortable with him before taking part in your traditions. you get a self help book from your aunt because she thinks you could really use it - it's sweet in a strange way.

🎁 you sing on the karaoke, dance a little to the loud noisy music your sister chose (the ones that remind you of your childhood make you scream like crazy with her) and play every stupid game your mom comes up with to make everyone interact more - AND YOU WIN! not all of them, but like, most of them, and it's all kakashi's fault because he's amazing at everything.

🎁 you, your aunts and your mom try to make him drink more, but all he has is a glass of wine.

🎁 of course your mom ends up making a horrible comment about how big you are, and that your dress didn't fit well and that you should lose weight, take care of yourself, specially now that you had a handsome boyfriend - kakashi hears when she's talking to you, and he doesn't want to be rude, so he shows up hugging you and saying he thinks you look perfect.

🎁 towards the end of the night when everybody's already half drunk your aunt approaches you and says something about how handsome kakashi is, and how happy she is for you, because you look visibly light, happier and better. it's really sweet.

🎁 your mother makes sure kakashi are at least a little of everything and invites over for the weekend. you tell her you have other plans, she ignores you and says she'd love if he could make it.

🎁 on the way home you talk about the night, the food and your family and he tells you he loved everyone, specially your grandmother and your cousins. and he really did. because he didn't have any family anymore, he had forgotten how crazy and lovely it can be, and today specially he felt like he belonged somewhere - to you and your family. now they were like his family too, with their flaws and everything, they made him feel part of them. and that made his heart warm.

kakashi's taglist: @smutteedreams @justmyownreality @nightingaleflow @allyallygator @thetimelesschild @jyotsna-d @rocknrollsoul76 @crimsonxuchiha @hellogeckofriend-blog

fill this out to be part of my taglist :)

[sicariodechinchulines]

Do you want to scream? try living here, my fucking good is awful.

I'm from Argentina, we are the second country with the highest E.D. % and diet culture is SO COMMON that in fact, is part of our identity.

the rest of Latinoamerica loves to refer to us as "pretty" but they only admire how obsessed we are with our appearance. from head to toe, skin, hair, nails, muscle, fat, everything, everything must look natural enough for don´t disgust but impossible enough for being admired.

I once chatted with a fat person from Anglo-America about discrimination... she was bmi 32 and I´m bmi 23, somehow we got the same shit.

i´m not even seen as "normal", i´m chubby. i´m 60 kg and in this country i´m "little fat" (even when most of my weight is on muscle because I was used to train 2-3 hours each day)

sometimes i feel like I´m exaggerating but then I remember an investigation i did on high school.

30% of students in my school had sort of e.d. 10% were male, but when I started with the interview, it was pretty clear that most of them were in denial, just big boys that like to train, then why did a young man cried while confessing how much his muscles ached?

most of them didn´t even realise how sick they were until I asked very specific questions that left them thinking.

it gets worst when you notice every single female teacher was skinny as a model and even like that, they rejected little treats such as candies or diet cereal bars, simply saying "I'm on diet."

EVEN WORST when you notice most of the food in the canteen is low-cal or unsweetened. or when you notice the most consumed thing, NOT ONLY IN THE SCHOOL but in the country, is MATE.

we breakfast MATE, an infusion without calories at all, a lot of us don´t accompany it with anything, and without calories in our system, we start a day.

and don´t make me talk about how normal is fasting here, like is healthy even.

and parents??? i´m not talking about rich or well-accomodated white families, i´m talking about mid-class mixed families, they consider that bullying your kid into an obviously eating disorder is NORMAL and RESPONSIBLE, but is not their fault... after all out grandparents were even worst.

my father bullied us into an e.d. first, while recovering, I was mad as fuck at him, how he could, my own father, do that to me??? to my brother??? at the point of vigorexia, bulimia, anorexia??

of course, he was fucking orthorexic. he learned it from his mother in a way that could look almost healthy, she prohibited him to eat anything high-cal or "weighty" his whole childhood.

and like she, there is a bunch.

you all should experiment the Argentinian common experience of getting in a gym, some of them are judgemental, but other just push you deeper into it, sharing their insecurities and "tips" without thinking twice.

i recall last month, drinking a fucking DIET SODA with a bunch of fighters and how a best friend said to the other "You aren´t allowed to eat! you need to drop 4 kg!" even after 3 hours of exhausting training.

"and why aren´t you eating either then??"

"just in case" 62 kg with 1,80cm.

3 minutes before, the short one, bulky but healthy, spook of fatphobia like he still fat. all of us joined the conversation, 8 people between 16 and 24 from all classes and ethnic, all in healthy weight with bodies of fighters, talking sore about how fucked up this country is.

at this point, i´m just embracing it; all the pressure and pain that appearance brings us and I can only imagine how it is for people below the standard, because i´m the most normal looking human here. i don´t draw attention neither disgust, but if I´m this fucked up and hurted, how is it for ""ugly"" or actually fat people??

anyway, i´m just wondering if my brother ate today, my father already sent a pic, he did a vegetarian healthy recipe. i wonder if my mother is feeling okay or is she lying, lately she was trying to lose weight because a picture disgusted her.

i wonder how my best friend is doing in her relationship, she´s dating a boy with an obvious e.d. but he looks so healthy and beautiful that no one suspect (or do something. would be a shame if he lost his figure while recovering, isn't?)

i wonder how that boy i interviewed is doing, after recognizing his bulimia and how he does coke to avoid eating, or the weird relation between his volatile mood and it.

or the giant rugby player who cried in relief after noticing I wasn't there for judge him.

or the girl who tried to commit suicide in the bathroom after experiencing fatphobia for the first time when she gained 50 kg due to meds.

or that competitive gorgeous light eyed girl who was so desperate for the attention that her competitive anorexic mother didn´t give her that she sPREADED RUMORS ABOUT ME, SAYING I WANTED TO FUCK HER BOYFRIEND OR MY BEST FRIEND EX-BOYFRIEND. YEAH I´M EVEN WORRIED BY THAT BITCH WHO CALLED MY BEST FRIEND (the only genetically SKINNY person I know) ANOREXIC EVEN WHEN WE SHARED E.D. MEMES ON TWT

THAT´S BETRAYAL.

or the other who actED LIKE MY FRIEND AND TOOK EVERY CHANCE SHE HAD TO CALL ME FAT??!! she loved to post unaware pics of me knowing how much I hated it, even flirted with all pretendant I had and excused herself with aUTISM?????? BRO, I´M NEURODIVERGENT TOO, THAT´S HOW WE ENDED UP SITTING TOGETHER, BEING ANOREXIC AND AUTISTIC IS NO EXCUSE FOR ACTING LIKE A BITCH

it´s get better, iT HAPPENED WITH A SHORT BOY TOO- since 13 he loved to call me "bollito" for the bolas de fraile (search BOLAS DE FRAILE) and when I dropped weight he just stopped??? he acted like we were friends????

Diet culture is fucking wild.

I just learned that Trader Joe's labels some of its food as "Reduced Guilt." There's a brand of popcorn called "Lesser Evil." I had to see an ad on Tumblr for a popular yogurt brand with the tagline of "Less sets you free." I read the back of a food product once that described the food as "sinless."

People literally choose a bag of carrots based on the calorie count. I've had to hear multiple people claim that fat people shouldn't be allowed to eat fruit. There was a water brand at the grocery stored that advertised itself as having "zero calories." A woman saw me next to some diet culture smoothie products and made small talk with me about how she didn't understand why the diet culture smoothie made out of fruits and vegetables she was using to replace an entire meal with had a whopping 300 whole calories.

A man talked to me at the store about how he was there to buy a snack, which consisted of two hardboiled eggs and a packet of black pepper. He then told me about his weight loss dreams while being average-sized and thinner than I am.

I saw a post on Tumblr of someone praising a "bread" made out of tree bark that ancient Finnish people ate as a last resort during times of starvation, and they praised this "bread" because it had a fourth of the calories of regular bread—calories that would have saved the lives of countless Finnish people during those famines who instead had to die.

People on here passed around a video of some diet culture soup that promised a loss of 15 pounds in a matter of days, and all of the comments were people laughing at how it did so by making anyone who ate it shit their brains out for a week, yet the people who did were still satisfied with the diarrhea-induced weight loss.

There are so many accounts fat people can give you of thin people who did nothing to obtain their skinny person genetics physically taking food out of the fat person's shopping cart because "You don't need this." And what the thin person decided a random fat stranger didn't need was a fucking melon.

I've talked about this stuff before, but diet culture has legitimately become a cult that destroys lives and kills people by the hour. And yet public outrage isn't about all of this. What people are so worried about is the fact that fat people merely exist. And that is apparently so horrible that we gotta make sure to tax sodas until us fatties go away, which people genuinely think will work.

What really adds insult to injury is how we have known for decades and decades that dieting has never worked from the beginning. But that doesn't make corporations billions of dollars nor one group of people higher on the social hierarchy, so none of that research makes headlines like the next fruit that causes cancer or the new diet that pinkie promises it'll work this time.

I want to scream.

[ginger-grimm]

I could scream at the top of my lungs about how fatphobia is a real thing but I know most skinny people would then try and divert the attention away from that because "skinny people have insecurities too 🥺"

Literally no-fucking-body says you don't. I am aware that skinny people have insecurities and that they get bullied too and I absolutely find it wrong to tell really small and skinny people to eat more, but I genuinely don't think most skinny people (like the ones who go through their life at a normal BMI and have never had their weight commented on) understand how heartbreaking it is to be seen as inherently disgusting and to be used as "thinspo" and to not find any cute clothes in your size (most clothes I wear look like something my 40 something year old mom would put on) or have a doctor talk about weightloss when you come with in with a cold, etc.

Some days all I do is walk down the street, the park, or simply sit somewhere and people laugh at me, insult me, etc.

I've had people spit on me, kick me, stick food to my clothes, throw rocks and snowballs at me starting from the age of 9. It is draining to always anticipate being heckled when a group of people walk by you. It is tiring to actively avoid large gatherings in the park because you're afraid of being laughed at. It's exhausting to be on tiktok and watch disingenious people post "this is not healthy" under the guise of "caring for them (a complete stranger who didn't ask for unsolicited "health advice") and that fat people in general literally can't post anything unless they're funny or whatever.

I get that skinny people get made fun of for their possible underweight too but at the end of the day, there aren't hundreds, thousands of weight gaining companies and products pushed onto you. You can go to the doctor for an illness without having your weight brought up. You don't have people staring at you in public when you eat a fucking sandwich for lunch (seriously, I don't eat anything in front of mass group of people because they will stare).

And if you're one of those skinny people who purposefully choses to tell their fat friend "Ugh, I look so fat today. I feel so gross." you can absolutely go to hell. I get that EDs and body dysmorphia are a thing, but when you actively turn to your fat friend and spout that nonsense I can't deal with you. It's worse when the fat friend turns it around on them "If you're fat then what am I?" "Oh, but it looks good on you. You really pull it off!" You are contradicting yourself and what does that even mean?

I just wish people would see that being skinny ≠ healthy and big people can absolutely be healthy (i.e. eat healthy meals, be extremely active) and just have an illness or a shitty metabolism.

[storiesbyrhi]

Angel of the First Degree - Chapter 2: Carrie

Eddie Munson x Chubby & Inexperienced!Reader 3358 words

Previous Chapters: 1 - Valium

Warnings: Anxiety; fatphobia including internalised; drug use; bullying; body issues; discussion of body function and fluids; period shame/stigma; disclosure of sexual assault; disordered eating and thoughts of food; unsupportive/highly critical parents; no beta; warnings updated each chapter

Synopsis: When Eddie Munson finds you in the midst of a panic attack, it is the beginning of something. A fic featuring body and sex positivity, Eddie in a dress, soft small moments, scary big truths, and all the usual special feelings you’d expect from one of my stories.

Chapter Summary: The very first circle of Hell is Hawkins High, and while you have yet to find a Heaven, there’s safety in presence of Eddie.

Chapter 2: Carrie

Almost three weeks had passed and you’d not spoken to Eddie. When you saw him in the halls, you exchanged smiles, but he never said anything. There was a part of you that was disappointed. Mostly you tried to remind yourself it was better to keep your head down. Stay out of the limelight. It seemed the cruel mistress known as fate, however, had other ideas.

“Alright Seniors!” and the assembly had begun.

The Seniors of Hawkins High were dragged into the stadium and told to sit on the bleachers and listen to a presentation on the importance of applying for colleges and planning their futures.

“Now, let’s get some real life inspiration!” one of the teachers said, picking the valedictorian to stand up and tell the class what their five-year-plan was.

Eddie was sitting off to the side thinking about how he couldn’t wait to get home to restring his guitar. He spotted you in the back row, opposite side. You looked bored and sad, which was kind of your default vibe.

The teacher picked another high achiever, and Chrissy Cunningham after that. They all spoke easily, didn’t mind being put on the spot. “Two more,” the teacher said, choosing the next victim. Then she said your name, “You’ll finish us off.”

Eddie watched you sit up straight and immediately begin to panic. You stared straight ahead, and while it looked like you were listening to the kid out the front talk about their early acceptance letter, he knew you were on the cusp of losing your shit.

Before he could weigh up the pros and cons, he was standing and walking from the stadium. “Uh – Mr. Munson, where do you think you’re going?” one of the teachers called after him. Eddie clenched his jaw and just kept walking. He knew he’d pay for it later but he didn’t care. His plan was only a five-minute one but it was going to save you.

When the fire alarm screamed to life two minutes after Eddie left the assembly, everyone knew it was him. Standing around with the rest of the school out on the oval, you looked around for Eddie; he was already in his van on his way home though. You began to think of ways you could thank him.

…

You stood in the entrance of the cafeteria and watched Eddie walk across tables, stick his tongue out at Jason Carver, then push his freshmen friends around. They left the room, talking about finding a sub, and you had no idea what they meant. Eddie had sat back down, returned to a normal state of being.

Sticking to the walls of the cafeteria, you made your way around to Eddie, quickly sitting in the free seat next to him before you could lose your nerve.

He said your name, the surprise evident.

“Hi. I just wanted to say thank you, again,” you started, holding the envelope in your hands so tightly that you were causing wrinkles in the paper. “For the other day and the other week.”

When you held out the small blue envelope, Eddie looked at it for a second before taking it. “What’s this?” he asked.

The rest of his table was dead silent, watching in awe as this totally unexpected scene played out in front of them. You tried to not look away from Eddie to his friends. Seeing their confused expressions would make you even more impossibly nervous.

“I, um… It’s a thank you gift.”

Eddie took out the piece of paper in the envelope and read the list of words. He glanced up at you, bemused.

“I know you do music. You’re in a band. And then I read that the game you play, the Dungeons and Dragons one, it’s kind of like… a play. So, I wrote this… for you. It’s just a list of words that people don’t use much anymore. Cool words. I thought they’d be interesting for lyrics or the game or whatever. I don’t know. It’s stupid,”

“It’s not,” Eddie interrupted, putting you out of your misery. “It’s… thoughtful.” He settled on that, didn’t want to gush and embarrass himself. The image of you sitting with a dictionary in one hand and a piece of paper destined for him in the other was burning into his brain.

“Thank you,” he said, smiling.

“It’s okay. I just-” you were going to say, for what was probably the millionth time, ‘I just wanted to say thank you,’ when you were interrupted.

“Well doesn’t this just make sense!” Hayley said. You hadn’t noticed her arrive. How had you missed that green and white cheerleader outfit? How had you fallen into the trap? “Freaks attract freaks. Didn’t take you long to find your place, huh?” she aimed at you, reaching out to push your shoulder.

You stood, moved to leave, when Haley turned to Eddie. “I bet you’re into it, right?”

“Hayley,” you begged. “Don’t,”

“Oh! You haven’t told him?” She was so fucking joyful in the pain she was inflicting. You felt ashamed that she was ever your friend.

“Please,” you said, a tear running down your cheek.

“Trust you, Munson, to have a dirty blood kink,” Haley started. Eddie stood, easily towering over the cheerleader. It made her stumble backward.

“Whatever you’ve got to say, I’m not interested in hearing,” he said to her too politely.

“But it’s about your new girlfriend-”

“Don’t give a fuck, killjoy. Move along.”

Haley opened her mouth to speak, but Eddie had sat back down, turned his back to her, and rendered her invisible. Eddie looked to you, a second away from asking you to sit next to him, when Haley took the few short steps she needed to be close enough to push you.

Landing on your ass in front of everyone, you rushed to push your skirt back down before anyone could see the shorts you wore under it.

“Our very own fat Carrie. You’re so disgusting.”

You crawled to your feet and were running from the cafeteria before Eddie could even get out of his seat.

…

There were only so many places a crying girl could hide on the grounds of Hawkins High. Eddie used his best logical deduction to find you. Not behind the woodwork shed; you had been seen there too recently. Not in the girls’ bathroom; you would want to be away from the study body. Across the field then; the small forest would give you sanctuary.

Eddie followed the sounds of sniffling until he found you curled up behind a tree, bag pulled close to your chest. He sat on the forest floor next to you, saying nothing at first but handing you his bandana.

“I can wash it,” he said when you looked at him.

Before any more body fluid could escape your eyes and nose, you used the bandana like Eddie wanted you to.

“I’m sorry. She’s a bitch,” he said. “Really doing a disserve to cheerleaders everywhere,”

“What do you mean?” you asked.

“Well, not all of them are like her. And you weren’t.”

It made you wonder how many conversations with cheerleaders Eddie Munson had. You didn’t ask. Just sat, sad and embarrassed.

“Look, I don’t know what the fuck she was talking about, but, um, some contextual clues kind of point-”

“Don’t. Please,” you said.

“I’m just saying… People get so hung up on the most boring shit, you know? Like why give a fuck about stuff out of your control? Like whatever weird shit your body is doing. Like one time I had the fucking flu or something and I’d been sick all day. I puked in my bed, probably had enough energy to like, deal with it, but I just rolled over and went back to sleep.”

Eddie Munson was easily the strangest person you had ever spoken to. He was sitting on a bed of dead leaves and dirt, trying to give you a version of the classic ‘it’s okay your body is changing' speech, while maintaining some level of cool.

“Okay?” you whispered out, shrugging your shoulders a little.

“I have definitely eaten my own boogers,” he told you, absolutely no expression on his face. It made you laugh. “Sometimes I bite at my nails, so I reckon I’ve probably swallowed some. I tried to pierce my nipple last year. Got infected, now I have this weird scar. Just looks like I have a freaky nipple. And I’m actually very self-conscious about it, so that one is a secret between us, 'kay?”

You nodded at him, slowly reaching out a hand with your pinky finger extended. Promised. You were smiling and it’s all he wanted.

“So, do you wanna tell me yours? I bet it’s not as bad as you think,” Eddie tried.

When tears started to swell up in your eyes again, he got scared he’d pushed it. But you started to speak. “There was a party last year. We were playing 7 Minutes in Heaven,”

“People still play that?” Eddie asked, clearly unimpressed.

You shrugged, continuing, “I didn’t… I never liked games like that but I couldn’t say anything. The others already teased me because…” The redness in your cheeks told Eddie everything he needed to know. “When it was my turn it was with Andy he… He said that we were almost Seniors and we should be playing the proper version of the game…”

Eddie regretted asking because watching you recount it was hard. He was already trying to fill in the blanks of the rest of the story, prepare himself for whatever fucked up shit happened next.

“He said I had to… Like, go down on him.” Your voice was shrinking with each sentence. “But I wouldn’t. I’d been feeling sick the whole day and we had this gross cherry wine stuff. I was so scared I would throw up on him… He still made me kiss him. And he said I had to… let him touch me.”

Eddie said your name, reached out but pulled his hand back, worried that being touched was the last thing you needed. You let your legs drop from where they had been pulled up to your chest, sandwiching your bag to it. Eddie shuffled forward and started to play with your shoelaces, a gesture that told you he was there, listening, and it was okay.

“I let him. But, um-” It was the same point in the story you hesitated at when you told the school counsellor, Ms. Kelley. “I didn’t know, um, my period had started. And… Andy freaked out. Ran out and told everyone. They all said I was gross. And I couldn’t be a cheerleader if I was gross like that. So, they just stopped being… my friends. And I mean, I don’t blame-”

“Wait, no, hold on.” Eddie was confused. He was looking at you with an intensity that made you feel shaky. “The fucked up part of that story was fucking Barf Bag trying to get with you when you said no. That’s not cool, you know that right?”

Eddie searched your face for even a hint that you understood. Somewhere in the back of your mind you knew, of course. But the white hot shame of feeling disgusting overpowered anything else. And it wasn’t like Ms. Kelley had made a big deal out of what Andy had done.

“You say the word, I’ll go find him right now and-” Eddie almost spat.

“No! No. You can’t tell anyone anything!” you nearly screamed, jumping to a kneeling position and moving to hold Eddie by the shoulders. Your panic was palpable. “Please promise. Please, please,”

“Babe, I won’t tell anyone shit,” Eddie reassured you, nodding frantically and putting his hands on your arms. “I just- That’s fucked up. What he did.”

You sat back down, right next to Eddie. He put his arms around you, pulled you into him. His kindness made you cry, and once you started you couldn’t stop.

“I wanna go home,” you managed to get out.

“Yeah. Of course. I’ll take you home,” Eddie said, pressing a kiss to the top of your head, then cringing. He should have asked, he thought.

When you had calmed down enough to suggest moving, Eddie helped you to your feet and kept a strong grip on your hand as he led you to his van. You said nothing on the drive home, other than small directions to your house.

Eddie fucked around with the tapes for a bit at a stop sign, finally handing over a shoe box filled with mixes for you to pick from. There was one with a hand-drawn label, some sort of mermaid-type creature sketched onto it. It read ‘sea shanties’ but was actually just heavy metal. You didn’t mind.

As you collected your bag from the van’s floor and undid your seat belt, Eddie scribbled his number down on a piece of paper. “We don’t have to talk. But, later, can you call me, just so I know you’re alright?” he asked, entirely genuine and dead serious.

You nodded and got out of the van, offered a small wave from your front door, and went inside.

…

After the incident in the cafeteria, you pretended to be sick for a whole week. Your parents, the type that would say ‘we want what’s best for you’ but mean ‘you better get straight As,’ were pressuring you to return. Just to add salt to the wound, one of them commented that maybe if you had better eating habits, like you had when you were a cheerleader, you’d not take a week to bounce back from a tummy bug.

It was that – that suffocating parental presence – that pushed you to return to school in the end. You got through Monday and Tuesday without talking to anyone at all. Under the radar in the classroom. Strategically timing bathroom visits to avoid your ex-friends. Hiding during breaks. It was going well until Wednesday lunchtime.

You were sitting behind the old water tanks at the far end of the staff parking lot. It was technically out of bounds but it was unsupervised. There was no grass or seating, so students never ventured out there. You sat on the sandy dirt with your back against one of the tanks.

The clinking sound of Eddie’s chains was your first indicator someone was coming. You held your breath until he appeared in front of you, blocking the sun and casting you in cool shadow.

“Hey. Can I sit?” he asked. When you nodded, he sat next to you, mirroring your position of back to the tank, but he stretched his legs out in front of him whereas you had yours crossed. “Haven’t seen you around in a bit,”

“I was sick,” you lied.

Eddie could tell, but he wasn’t going to say anything. “Did I get you in trouble? With your dad?” he asked.

The day Eddie had dropped you home, you never called him to check in. He was worried and had worked himself up into a manic state. Eventually, he walked to the trailer park’s pay phone and used a phone book to find your number.

Your father had picked up and yelled at Eddie. And that was just because he was a boy calling late. If he knew it was Eddie Munson, there was a fair chance you would have been in a lot more trouble.

“It’s fine. I said you were calling about school stuff,” you replied. Your father hadn’t believed you.

“That’s what I told him too but he seemed pissed,”

“It’s fine,” you lied again. There were a few beats of silence. “How did you know I was here?” you asked him, looking over.

Eddie smiled. “I saw you leavin’ the library. I, ah, guess I’ve been worried. About you. I wanted to come see if you were okay?”

In short, he followed you.

“I’m okay,” you reported in that trademark sad and bored tone that Eddie didn’t like. It was a sound of hopelessness, of resignation to fate.

“Okay. Yeah, um, that’s… good. Uh, I also wanted to just say that if you want, you can sit with us. We have the same lunch period, and this is, uh…” Eddie paused and looked around, kicking at that dirt. “I love what you’ve done with the place, but it’s a bit of a trek from everything.”

You laughed a little, which made Eddie feel good. Really good. When you didn’t reply, just gave him a small nod, he continued.

“I know we’re like, rock bottom of the pecking order, but we’re also not assholes, you know? And the guys, once they know someone, they look out for them,” he said.

You just nodded again. Eddie wondered if you understood what he was trying to offer. Protection. Safety. Maybe, if you let them in, friendship.

“And, added bonus here, because I’m Dungeon Master, I oversee the trading of all food. You want to trade pretzels for brownie. I can make it happen,” he bragged.

When you laughed, Eddie was sure you’d at least consider it.

“Do you do that a lot?” you asked, your voice finding itself after days of disuse.

“What? Make freshmen give me the homemade treaties their mommies make? Oh, yeah. All the time, babe.”

Three! He’d made you laugh three times. Feeling bold, Eddie pulled out a joint and lit it. “So, you mind if I just sit here with you? Can’t really be fucked walking all the way back to Mordor just yet,”

“You can stay,” you answered quickly. “And, um. Thank you. For asking,”

“Asking to stay?” Eddie was confused.

“Yeah. You’re good at that. At, like, I don’t know. Boundaries, I guess.”

Eddie shrugged. “Sounds like a fancy way of saying I’m not a total asshole,”

“You’re not. At all,”

“Well, I value your opinion, so thank you. You are also not an asshole,” Eddie said, adding a small bow to accentuate his point.

You smiled wide. “Thanks?”

The rest of lunch went by quickly with the aid of Eddie’s wild storytelling and the comfortable silence that sat between you. It was the most at ease you had been in a really long time. You would even go as far as to say it was the happiest you had been in a really long time.

Eddie walked you to your next class, smiling at you gently as he reminded you, “Tomorrow. Come sit with us, ‘kay?”

…

It wasn’t like you didn’t know where you were going. Yet, you stood awkwardly outside the doors of the cafeteria when the next day rolled around and it was time for lunch. There were a million panicked thoughts buzzing through your head.

It’s stupid to put yourself in the firing line. Being in the cafeteria put you closer to the cheerleaders and basketball team. What the fuck were you doing? Sitting with the same people regularly meant they would inevitably notice your eating habits. Stupid. Stupid. And all that food. Everywhere.

You were about to turn and bolt when Gareth, one of Eddie’s right hand men, stopped and greeted you. “Eddie said you might come sit with us,” he said casually. He frowned when you just stared at him. “Um… Are you coming?”

Slowly you nodded, then followed Gareth through the doors and to the table.

“Look who I found,” Gareth announced as he took his usual spot.

Before you had time to think about it, Eddie had motioned for his friends to move down a seat, making room for you next to him.

“Uh, hi,” you said to the table.

“Glad you made it,” Eddie greeted, sitting up straighter and angling himself towards you.

After the novelty of a new person at their table wore away, everyone engaged in their normal teenage conversations. Despite everything you had predicted, it was comfortable sitting there. Although you didn’t insert yourself into the conversation, you didn’t feel ignored. You ate your green grapes, every now and then swapping one for one of Eddie’s pretzels.

You returned on Friday, and every school day after that.

CHAPTER 3

End Note: I promise I'm going to heal all of us just a little bit with this fic. Trust me and the process, yeah?

Let me know your thoughts and feelings!

Fic Taglist: @ajeff855 @b-barnes04

Eddie Taglist: @solomons-finest-rum @ruinedbythehobbit @munsonlives

[indigoire]

It Read-through Interlude and Chapter Four: “Ben Hanscom Takes a Fall”

Not a bad couple of chapters this go around. I might even be able to keep this short and concise. 

Warning for bullying, mild gore, and fatphobia.

The interlude is rather short and I breezed through it fairly quickly. It is the first chapter we’ve had thus far in first person point of view though. Have you ever opened up a fanfic, fully expecting something in third person, and you get launched into something written in first person point of view, and you’re immediately compelled to exit out of the work? Well, King pulled a fast one on me, and I suddenly felt that compulsion to click the little red x in the corner. But I can’t do that, who will break down all of the ways Stephen King sucks at writing if I do?

So the interlude is from Mike’s perspective, and the opening paragraph informs the reader that it’s taken from Mike’s notes, which were also written up into a potential novel, though in the form of a journal or diary. Mike had hoped to possibly publish his experiences, and had gotten quite a bit into the project it looked like. 

Mike details for us his fears that a “malefic echo” might be back, and his inner struggle not to call the Losers up right after Adrian Mellon is killed. He is very frightened by Adrian’s attack, and it leaves him shaken, but he holds out, waits for something else to happen, to show that it’s not just some wayward tramp or some freak accidents killing people. 

He mentions the Turtle speaking to him, launching him into his research of the town (and IT) in the year of 1980. He mentions Bill saying “the Turtle can’t help us”. Even acknowledging the Turtle, Mike has doubts, wondering if it’s just his rabbity mind playing tricks on him. 

Still he holds off on making the calls, saying “if I have to make these calls, it may kill some of them,” and he lies awake at night wondering who among the six is the weakest. 

He speaks to an old librarian mentor, an Albert Carson, about what he should look into and who he should speak to in order to learn all about Derry. The old-timer gives him some good advice and Mike pursues his research with gusto, talking to people and pumping them for information, in addition to reading anything that might be useful. 

He even speaks to old Mr. Ripsom, who tells Mike that before their child Betty was murdered, his wife heard voices from the drain while she was doing dishes. The voices claimed “We are Legion” and Mrs. Ripsom had been so shocked she had refused to do the dishes for years. So Mr. Ripsom had fallen to the task, and some two years after his child had died he’d been doing dishes himself, and he’d heard something from the drain, after the water had been sucked down it. He heard Betty, laughing in the sewers, or possibly screaming, or probably both. 

He almost tells Mike more, but they’re at his gas station, and a customer arrives before he can reveal anything else. 

Albert Carson is once more consulted, once Mike has pumped the town for information. Mike dares to bring up that something is not quite right in Derry, and Albert almost brushes it off, but does agree. He mentions “the cycle”, the cycle of bad things that happen in Derry, and warns Mike to “Beware!”

Mike ends the interlude with “if anything else happens, I’ll make the calls” and prays that he doesn’t have to. 

We then move on to Ben. Now, let me preface this by saying that I love Ben dearly. He’s a sweet, respectful boy. He’s also boring as hell. He’s a very “aw, shucks” Leave it to Beaver sort of a kid, and it might just be the time period he resides in but his chapter is very, I don’t know, slice of life. If it wasn’t for the brutal bullying that goes on in his chapter I would be dead asleep from reading it. 

But. I do sort of relate to Ben. I was an, ahem, “big” kid growing up, and I had the same sort of worries and insecurities. I also sought refuge in reading and made friends with the teachers. So part of me goes out to the kid. 

Another part of me really resents King for how he writes Ben. Because part of it is masterfully done, the kid worrying about his shape and having body dysmorphia, and you feel for him. And part of it is written the way every thin person thinks a fat person acts. The kid gluts himself on candy while worrying about it. His mom feeds him too much, and Ben wonders if there’s a malicious reason why. The librarian thinks to herself that Ben’s digging his grave with a knife and fork. And listen, far be it from me to say that there aren’t some fat people who got that way just from indulging in leftovers and candy. But the idea that all fat kids got that way from being unable to stop eating is kind of stupid and rooted in fatphobia. 

But anyways. Ben is a smart, sweet kid, who has a secret crush on Beverly Marsh, and will never tell her out of fear she’ll be disgusted by him. He also has an enemy in Henry Bowers, who he refused to let copy off his test paper and thus earned his wrath. Henry was held back a year, and he’s almost held back again for flunking said test, but the teacher says he can just take remedial classes over the summer. Henry views this as worse than being held back. If he’d been held back he might have had his dad beat him once, but since his father will be losing Henry’s labor on the farm over the summer he’s probably in for multiple beatings. Thus Henry’s want to take his anger out on Ben, who he refers to as “Tits”. 

Ben has a fairly nice day for most of the chapter. He finds some glass bottles in a hedge, turns them in for money, and gets candy with said money. He goes to the library, he reads some books, and then he buys a postcard for three cents from the library (which is encouraging kids to find pen pals). He writes a poem to Beverly Marsh, styling it after a haiku, and thinks that she probably has a boy she has a crush on, and she’ll think of him and not Ben, and it’ll make her happy, and that’s enough for him. 

Ben is a really sweet boy, once again. 

Of course, once he leaves the library, Bowers and his cronies are on him in an instant, and they push Ben to the side of the canal, against a fence. Bowers springs a mock “test” on Ben, making him swear to always let Bower’s cheat off of him, and to make him remember to do so, takes out his knife and starts carving his name into Ben’s stomach. 

Ben, after Bowers carves the H of his name, makes a frantic escape by kicking off of Bowers and breaking through the fence, tumbling down the embankment, and messing up his leg on a tree, which breaks his fall. 

He then flees the pursuing bullies and runs across the Barrens, where Stuttering Bill and his friends, unbeknownst to Ben, are building a tiny dam. Ben hides close by to the them in a little hidey-hole, and avoids Bowers, who bullies Bill and his friends instead and destroys their “babydam” when they tell them they haven’t seen Ben. 

Ben has a little flashback, or rather a dream, to the past January, when he saw Pennywise near the Barrens, his balloons floating against the wind, and Pennywise spoke to him in a voice that he heard in his mind, “although it seems he heard it with his ears.” Pennywise offers him a balloon and then transforms into a mummy, The Mummy in fact, the titular one from the Universal movie. Ben gets scared off and runs home. 

When he wakes up from his little doze, he stumbles from his hidey-hole and onto the Losers. Bill asks if Ben can help, because Eddie is having an asthma attack and his aspirator is empty. 

“”I think he m-might be—” His face froze, turned red. He dug at the word, stuttering like a machine-gun. Spittle flew from his lips, and it took almost thirty seconds’ worth of “d-d-d-d” before Ben realized Denbrough was trying to say the other kid might be dying.”

And thus ends the chapter! 

There’s not much I can interject or say really. There’s a long section where King goes on about the geography of the town, that I somewhat know is essential to setting the town and getting us familiar with it so we know where the characters are and what their surroundings are like...but it just drones on for long enough that my eyes glazed over out of protest. Other than this and the rampant fatphobia, I don’t really hold anything against these chapters. Mike and Ben are sweet and polite boys and later, men, and I have a lot of fondness for them. I feel like maybe King was trying to hint at there being some mommy issues with Ben, and he implied something dark about Ben’s mom feeding him too much, but their relationship reads as that of a concerned mother doing her best to raise a boy alone. 

Anyways, sort of a mediocre place to leave off, but next chapter involves my favorite boy, Bill Denbrough, so we’ll save the salt for tomorrow. Bye for now! 

[asexualbookbird]

ALLEGEDLY BY TIFFANY D. JACKSON  ★★★☆☆

Mary B. Addison killed a baby. Allegedly. She didn’t say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: A white baby had died while under the care of a churchgoing black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary and the jury made it official. But did she do it? She wouldn’t say. Mary survived six years in baby jail before being dumped in a group home. The house isn’t really “home”—no place where you fear for your life can be considered a home. Home is Ted, who she meets on assignment at a nursing home. There wasn’t a point to setting the record straight before, but now she’s got Ted—and their unborn child—to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary must find the voice to fight her past. And her fate lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most: her Momma. No one knows the real Momma. But who really knows the real Mary?

TRIGGER WARNING FOR SEXUAL ABUSE, PHYSICAL ABUSE, BULLYING, RACISM, FATPHOIBA, HOMOPHOBIA, MENTIONS OF CSA This book was hard for me to rate. It's wasn't a bad book, far from it really, but the ending let me down enough that I had trouble figuring out just what I thought of the book as a whole. The writing was engaging, and I never truly felt bored, but the "twist" along with some not so great lines about fat characters left a sour taste in my mouth. This book is definitely important, it tackles racism and discrimination in the justice system and it does a great job at making you angry about it, but it's hard to stomach the casual way it deals with child sexual assault.

GOODREADS

SPOILERS AHEAD

I think had I not read other books that hyped up the Did They Or Didn't They narrative ending with the accused ultimately being guilty, I would have felt differently about the twist at the end. They spent so much time building up the mother as being the culprit, doing a complete 180 in the last two pages soured everything. It felt a lot like Perdido Street Station did for me, though for different reasons. I was caught off guard and loved the ending of Dangerous Girls, but the way that was handled was so different. There was always doubt, but you didn't want to believe it. The ending of We Were Liars was, dumb to be honest. It was a let down like this one was. I actually would have preferred it went the route Defending Jacob did and kept it vague as to what really happened. It would have made the ending more powerful, this way it's almost like it's saying Mary deserved this because she did actually do it, not her mother like implied for 300 pages. The problem with this ending is Mary was nine years old and didn't know anything. It wasn't really her fault, she shouldn't have been in jail regardless, but no one seems to care about that. They all care about what really happened and not the fact a literal child was getting death threats for what was ultimately an accident. It's realistic, sadly. People demonize children of color all the time and it's awful, and this book does a great job at depicting that, but I would have liked someone to sit Mary down and say "you were a child, no matter what actually happened, this shouldn't have happened to you." She gets a bit of that from the lawyer, but not enough. I admire the way the author made me feel so much for Mary. I was always rooting for her to come out on top for once, catching a break where it seemed like all hope was lost. I'm on the fence about the romance, to be honest. It skeeves me out that Ted is eighteen, and Mary fifteen when they get together, and they do address it. Mary refuses to talk about Ted and tell people he's the father because she knows it's statutory rape and he'll go back to jail. I'm glad Ted seems to be a decent person and not predatory, but it still doesn't sit too right with me. Mary is also assaulted throughout her childhood and while she's in jail and it's never addressed. This can be written off because she doesn't mention it to anyone in her life, so how can it be addressed, so it's not like the author forgot about it. It seems intentional. It's part of Mary's life. She does mention what her mother's husband does to her, but no one believes her. It makes sense she'd keep quiet in the future. It's sad, but works within the novel. I think this is more a Me problem than a Book problem. The fatphobia doesn't sit right with me, but the main character is fifteen and sixteen so it fits with her character I guess. I just don't like that the people she hates (rightfully so, I won't argue that) are mostly reduced to their size. The women running the group home are gross because they're fat. One of them stomps around with her swollen legs, shovels food in her mouth, it's hurtful. I don't like these characters, and I'd never defend them, but reducing someone to their size isn't the way to go. This book is important, I won't argue that. It did a lot of things right, but the things that rubbed me wrong are probably more due to me than the book itself. I wouldn't not recommend this book, but would like to make sure people know what they're getting into.

[nyctophilin]

March 5th 2021: First day of circus

Warnings: weight talk, eating mentions, mental abuse done by family members, fatphobia, swear words, long post, personal stuff. Please don't read if any of those trigger you or you don't care about my life. I just need to vent.

Today marks the first day of my diet and the first day I went to the gym. For the next 3 months I'll continue to follow this lifestyle changes and try to reach the "perfect" body and the "ideal" weight because I am sick and tired of being bullied by my family. As if they are one's to talk, fucking whales.

The fact that my mother is more excited about this than I am should already tell you how I feel about the whole thing. She should start loosing weight herself first before talking about me. Age and having kids are not good excuses for how she looks. My friend's mom is the same age and she had kids too and she is slim. But fuck principles I guess, right? We just want to be able to walk around with our daughter and not feel ashamed.

I just want to move away already and cut all ties with them. But until then I need a way to make them stop the constant fat shaming so I'll loose the weight.

Table of contents:

Monthly goal

Question I have for myself

To don't list for after I am done

Starting weight

1. Monthly goal

List of things I will definitely achieve in a month (Source: Mom and the articles she read on sketchy sites at 2am)

cup going from an E to a D with no sagging whatsoever (I literally should stop arguing because she knows better; I know my things from different reliable sources and she read it once in some unknown article)

my hump will be gone (I don't have it because of my ginormous tits, it's because I am fat apparently)

joint problems will disappear (for some reason this is because I am fat too)

sleep will be better (the stress I go through can't be a cause of that because you can't be stressed unless you are 30)

loose 5kg (it will be more because I know my body, but if some unknown doctor said otherwise in some forgotten article then my knowledge of my own body doesn't matter)

2. Questions for myself

1. Am I doing this by my own free will?

Absolutely not. The last 3 months of constant fat shaming and being made fun of and constant pressure coming from my own family pushed me to finally break down and do it.

2. Was I intending to do this before the constant bullying?

No. I am comfortable in my body. I look very hot right now. The only thing I wanted to change was my eating habits because they were very bad and inconsistent. But I did not have any intention of loosing weight by doing that.

3. Why am I doing this then if I don't want to?

Because I am sick and tired of having my mother push her insecurities on to me. We have the same weight and she is double compared to me. I do not have the urge to "not buy pretty clothes" because of my weight. I do not "feel disgusted" by my own body. I do not "have problems climbing stairs". These are all things that she sees in herself and then pushes on to me thinking that if I reach my "ideal weight" then she'll reach the peak of happiness and this is pathetic.

3. To don't list

Things I won't do once I reach this so called "ideal weight":

take photos with my family; if now you are embarrassed and ashamed to take photos with me because people will see how "fat" I am then you won't take photos with me after; especially my dad that looks like a barrel but has the nerve to always remind me how fat I am

dress in pretty clothes aka have that soft aw vsco girl aesthetic that mom so desperately wants me to have; I'll continue to dress in "ugly" clothes because I feel comfortable in them and I want to spite her

go out more; they are convinced that I don't go out because I am embarrassed by how I look; well jokes on them, I look hot and I don't go out because I don't fucking like anybody

get a boyfriend; as a bisexual, I like boys, but I will never get a boyfriend as long as I live in their house, especially not when they'll think that is a result of them forcing me to go on a diet; I'd rather die

thank them "you'll see, once you become slim and beautiful you'll thank me for harassing you for months on end" literally fuck you; die in a fire; you ain't doing me no service

4. Weight reveal

All I have left to do now is to keep on going to the gym and follow this stupid diet and wait until I fit into society's stupid and fucked up beauty standards. I cannot wait to be done with this so they can finally get off my fucking dick.

Starting weight: 76kg

See y'all with the update on April 5th. Then we'll see if all the problems I've had for years even before being fat will magically cure.