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danyka-fendyr · 5 years ago

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Absence of Good - 9

Chapter Nine: Legerdemain

Hello everyone! As promised, I am posting another chapter of Absence of Good within the same week! I know, I’m kind of stunned too. If it comforts anyone, this is completely unedited, so that’s still on brand for me. I’m really excited for where I’m going to take this series next. I have some ideas for what the plot conflict is going to be now that our two idiots are together, hehe. For now though, enjoy this mostly wholesome chapter (minus the murder, obviously).

Taglist: @dreamwritesimagines @rhabakoli @alwaysadreamingoptimist

AoG Taglist: @pancakefancake @prettyboyspenerrr @youreasnack @alioop3818 @newtslatte @rathersuspiciousbumblebee @andiebeaword @stalker83005

Wordcount: 3206

Warnings: Murder. Some gore. Generally disturbing themes. Mentions of abuse.

“I don’t know what they are called, the spaces between seconds– but I think of you always in those intervals.” ― Salvador Plascencia

You had been on this case for a week now, and it was starting to take a toll on you. Hotch had put you all on a plane about 5 minutes after your confession to Spencer, which at the time you hadn’t been worried about. Little did you know this would be the world’s longest-running case, and you had barely gotten 5 minutes with Spencer.

This was one of those rare times where splitting you and Spencer up was pretty much unavoidable. They needed his brain at headquarters to track this guy and they needed your body out in the field to catch the guy. You and Emily had been teaming up a lot, and while you had learned a lot from her, she was no Dr. Reid.

You missed him. You didn’t realize how much time you had been spending with him until the most you got was a quick, “Hi, how are you?” as you handed him coffee. He had been throwing himself at the books, forgetting to do basic things like eat and drink, so you tried to remember for him when you could. You were all at the end of your rope with this guy.

This unsub, whoever he was, just so happened to be extremely clever. You could only imagine how high his kill rate was, as you were sure this was not where he had started. No, the precision this guy worked with was almost a thing of beauty, if it hadn’t made you want to vomit. Apparently, eyelids were very hard to sew together, but this guy, he was pretty damn good at it.

You climbed up the hill, thighs burning as you approached the top, boots digging into the soft dewy ground. The sun had only just started rising about an hour ago, and you felt your eyelids weigh almost as heavy as your limbs. Emily was right behind you, the ragged pace of her breathing matching yours.

When you reached the top of the hill you couldn’t say you were greeted by your favorite sight.

“Oh. Well that’s just lovely,” you huffed out.

“It’s certainly new.” Emily was turning a little green around the gills.

Evidently, your man had gotten bored of just sewing people’s eyelids shut. This guy had his eyes sewed shut, sure, but he was also cut in half. So that was fun.

“Do you see the dove?” You started scanning for it, knowing it would be present somewhere on the crime scene.

Emily found it first, lying a few feet away from your victim. She bent down to closer inspect the plastic bird, looking for any sign that the killer might have left behind a message or a fingerprint. No such luck.

“Okay, well we know this had to be time consuming, right?” You said.

“To sever a man’s spine? Yeah. That’s no easy task.”

“He’s escalating. Showing off. He’s laughing at us,” you mumbled, leaning over the body.

“I think he’s earned the right to. 5 kills in one week? That’s…”

“Not good.”

“I was going to say scary, but that works too.” Emily grimaced.

“Want to head back to the station? I don’t think we can gather much more from here. We’re better off waiting for the M.E.’s report.”

“Hmm…Sure you don’t have any other reason for wanting to go back to the station?”

“Like what,” you said airily.

“Really?” she said. “You don’t think I’ve noticed you’ve been missing your usual partner? It’s okay, honest. You’re not hurting my feelings any.”

You laughed a little bit, relieved that she had either not caught on to anything or had chosen to keep it to herself if she had.

“Hey, I think you make for fine company. That being said, someone has to watch Spencer. He’s losing his mind right now.”

“Yeah. Hotch had to stop him from throwing a book across the room yesterday.”

“Wait, really?”

“Our resident genius is coming a little unhinged.”

You sighed, beginning the descent down the hill.

“I’m worried about him,” you confessed.

“We all are. He’s taking these deaths too personally. I think he feels like it’s his responsibility to figure this guy out, like he’s the genius and he’s not doing his job or something.”

“He puts too much pressure on himself.”

“You can say that again.” Emily rolled her eyes, but her face quickly settled back into a worried frown. “He always has. This case is just difficult. No pattern with the victims, no obvious clues, and no clear connection between eyes, doves, and now being split in two. It’s just a little mystifying.”

You nodded, climbing into the passenger side of the car. Emily liked to drive, and you usually fell asleep in cars, so in that sense at least you were the perfect duo. You laughed at the thought that Hotch would have paired you up for that alone.

“Maybe something about this will make sense to Reid. Maybe this is the piece we’re missing,” you said.

“Yeah, maybe.”

Emily does not sound hopeful.

As soon as you got to the station you were making a beeline for the coffee machine. It was quite literally the only thing you could think about right now. Selfishly, you got your own coffee first, taking a couple of sips to get your brain and heart working in proper order. You definitely hadn’t been this dependent on coffee before you started this job.

Once you felt like you could be reasonably mistaken for a human being again, you made another cup of coffee, dumping a few cups of sugar in. Just how he liked it. You smiled to yourself, probably looking a little crazy. You had known how Spencer liked his coffee forever, but it just felt different now, more intimate somehow. Stupid human brain with its stupid human hormones.

Spencer was alone amidst an entire library’s worth of books. He was sitting surrounded by them on the floor, some of them stacked up around him, built up like a little castle. You tip-toed your way through the maze, heading towards the oblivious genius who clearly had his defenses and his drawbridge (the meager path you had carved for yourself) down.

“Spence.” Your voice was a soft echo in the room.

He jumped, turning around bewildered and bleary. You took in the site of him, the circles under his eyes that were moats of purple and the way his hands twitched like they were trying to turn a page or hold a shield he had misplaced. Gently, you smoothed out a stray piece of hair that was falling into his eyes.

“Brought you coffee,” you offered, shuffling around a few books to settle down on the floor next to him.

He relaxed, reaching out to take the cup.

“Find anything?” you asked.

“Nope. What about you? Hotch told me there was a new body this morning.”

“Yeah. This guy was chopped in half. We’re waiting on the M.E.’s report. Other than that, nothing new except for me almost losing my breakfast. Not cute.”

“I think you would have been very cute projectile vomiting over a corpse.” He grinned at you.

“Is that what you tell all the girls Dr. Reid?” You raised an eyebrow.

“No. Just you.”

“Hmmm…” You squinted at him playfully. “Then what do the other girls get that I’m missing out on?”

“What if I said there are no other girls?” He raised an eyebrow, but a hint of seriousness crept into his voice.

“Then I would say you’re a liar,” you whispered, leaning forward until your face was dangerously close to his.

“Don’t tempt me,” he said, voice low, eyes lower as they traveled well below your own.

“Oh, do magic tricks for me like one of your French girls, Spencer!” You feigned a swoon, one palm falling back onto a red leather-bound book to support you, the spine digging into the heel of your hand.

“Well, I could. Or I could return your hair tie.”

You glanced down at your free wrist, alarmed to find it hair tie free.

“How did you?”

He just smiled charmingly, pulling it out from behind your ear.

“I can think of other things you could do that with,” you suggested, waggling your eyebrows. “But seriously, how?”

“A magician never tells his secrets.”

“Yeah, well I wish they would start.” You soured again, thinking back to the case. “I would love to know how this guy sawed his latest victim in half.”

Spencer sat up rigid, eyes going blank as he thought faster than you could ever hope to process.

“Spence?”

“We need to get that M.E.’s report right now,” he said, standing and leading a one-man charge out of the hardbound, softcover castle he had built.

You followed behind him, scrambling to keep up. Unsurprisingly, you two ended up at the M.E.’s, who was mid-examination.

“Was the victim sawed in half?” Spencer said, not bothering with any niceties.

“He’s Dr. Reid, we’re with the FBI,” you clarified, confused where he was going with this.

“Umm…” The medical examiner looked a little bewildered but answered the question anyway. “As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure this was the work of a saw. Not an electrical one either. Very unusual. Probably took him a very long time to do.”

Reid spun around, heading right back to his books, leaving you to helplessly follow after tossing a hasty goodbye to the poor M.E.

“Spence, what is all of this about?” You asked once you had wended your way back to where you started.

“Don’t you see?” He asked, a slightly insane light to his eyes. “It all makes sense now. The dove, the saw, even the eyes. It all connects!”

“Spence, I think you need to maybe go lie down for a little bit.” You reached for something he could eat, spotting a box of donuts left half-empty on a table in the office space he had appropriated. “Why don’t you have a piece of bread and maybe you’ll calm down.”

“No, look,” he said, finding the crime scene photos amongst the shuffle of information he had acquired. “What do all of these things mean put together? How saws people in half? Who uses doves as part of their show?”

Finally, it clicked.

“Magicians,” you breathed, Spencer’s energy suddenly becoming contagious.

“Magicians!” He crowed. “Even the eyes make sense. It’s a taunt. ‘Now you see me, now you don’t.’”

“Because he always disappears!”

“Exactly!” Spencer pointed at you triumphantly.

“Okay. Now we just have to find a magician with a bone to pick,” You said, deflating slightly. “How hard could that be in a city of a couple hundred thousand?”

“Better go tell Garcia to start checking Fort Wayne’s yellow pages.”

“Yeah.”

As it turned out, it was apparently not that hard to find a magician with a grudge. For some reason, there were several in this city. However, only a few had the migratory pattern of your culprit, who had been clever enough to cross state lines. He had been playing a long, subtle game before he started to toy with you, but the eyes had always been the same, a very unique touch of his.

“Okay team,” Garcia said, bubbly as ever. “We have learned two things today. One, our guy is probably Larry Harlborrow, A.K.A. Axel Ranger, traveling magician who just so happens to have stopped by all of our unsub’s previous places of residence and stuck around for a while. Two, never trust a magician.”

“Hey!” Reid interjected.

“Never trust a magician whose name is not Spencer Reid,” Garcia amended over the phone.

“Better. Carry on.”

“Anyway, it looks like our guy’s stressor was a messy divorce with his wife. Apparently, the magic business didn’t make him a very good bread winner, and the multiple charges of domestic abuse weren’t exactly a winning point for him either. I suspect it was the latter though that caused her to leave him, taking sole custody of the kids and getting a very neat, tidy restraining order put up against him. More power to her, but that’s where we come to our trigger and coincidentally where our timeline of murder starts. But hey, I’m sure there’s no connection there, right?”

“Address?” Morgan asked.

“Oh, you know I’ve already sent it to your cell, sexy,” Garcia purred.

“Alright, well as grateful as we all are, I think it’s time to hang up while this call can still be called PG-13,” JJ said.

“Good luck my darlings!”

“Thanks baby girl.”

Thankfully for you, it was just a simple snatch and grab, and it was about time you had one. He was at home, so confident in his own skill he didn’t have the slightest inkling you would be interrupting his afternoon. Classic narcissist. The homicide was a fun twist, but you couldn’t call it original.

Morgan kicked down his front door and you burst through to where he was, disgustingly, in the middle of sawing in half another victim. His entire living room was coated in plastic sheets, the kind you draped over furniture if you were painting. You couldn’t say you liked the way blood red matched the rest of his décor.

“Hands in the air!” You shouted, aiming your gun.

For a moment he paused, saw still in his blood covered hands, victim well and truly dead before him. You couldn’t believe he was actually considering not giving himself up.

“Piece of advice? Don’t bring a saw to a gunfight,” Emily warned.

That seemed to be enough to snap him out of it, and slowly, he raised his hands in the air. You cuffed him, trying not to look at the body so close to you.

“Try slipping your way out of this one Houdini,” you growled before starting on his Miranda rights.

After safely stowing your mad magician into the back of a cop car, you made your way back to the station to pack up and get ready to go home. It had been a very, very long week. All you wanted was a shower and your soft, warm bed.

You fell asleep almost immediately getting into the jet, your head resting on Reid’s shoulder. You didn’t even care that the rest of the team was watching. This was innocent anyway, and they were all far too tired to care.

When you touched down, you were still so blurry you weren’t sure you could be trusted behind a wheel. Thankfully for you, Spencer noticed.

“I’ll drive Y/L/N home. I still have enough coffee in me for that I think,” he said.

“Okay. I’ve got Emily,” JJ said, supporting her equally sleeping friend.

Spencer bundled you into the car and once again, you were dead to the world for a while, until he was waking you up again to lead you into your apartment.

“Will you stay?” you asked, lazily fumbling for your keys and allowing him to open the door for you.

“Of course,” he said, tucking you under one arm and guiding you inside.

“That was such a long case,” you groaned, stretching out your limbs.

He nodded, setting his satchel down in your doorway.

“Yeah.” A beat. “I missed you.”

You felt everything in you soften at those words, a gasp of relief that it wasn’t just you who had been feeling like this.

“I missed you too. So much.”

He crossed the distance between the two of you in your tiny apartment, wrapping you up in his arms, and you breathed the scent of him in. There was something deeply comforting about this, about the soft material of his sweater and the tickle of his hair brushing against your nose. It was starting to get long again.

“You need a haircut.” Your voice was muffled by his shoulder.

You could hear the frown in his voice. “You don’t like it how it is now.”

“No, I do.” You reached up to play with the longer strands in the back. “Actually, I think you should keep it this way. If you change anything you might get sexier, and then I’ll never be able to focus on cases.”

“Hmm, maybe I will cut it then.”

“No,” you whined.

“I think you need to go to bed.”

He combed a hand through your hair and you sighed blissfully.

“Are you offering to take me to bed Dr. Reid?”

“Something like that,” he said, scooping you off of your feet.

You let out a surprised squeak, wrapping your arms around his neck. The alarmed beating of your heart woke you up a little bit more, enough so that your brain could process the full implications of the fact that Spencer could pick you up with ease. You filed that information away in your brain for future use.

You let him settle you down gently onto the mattress but refused to untwine your arms from where they rested. He tried to move away, but you stopped him.

“One kiss.” A soft, tired plea.

He hadn’t kissed you in a week, and you were starting to forget the way it felt. You never wanted to forget that, the absolute rush of it. Little did he know you had been obsessing over it, pining after him the entire time you had been on this case. You could still focus on your work, but you had always had him in the back of your mind somewhere, holding you, kissing you, making snarky commentary. At some point, Spencer had become an integral part of your life. Without him something important seemed to be missing in a way you couldn’t explain.

“One kiss,” he agreed, leaning down to brush his lips softly against yours.

A shuddery little sigh unwound in your lungs, fluttering out of your mouth to meet his, and in response he deepened the kiss. One hand cupped your face while the other buried itself in your hair, and you loosened your grip on his neck so that your fingers could trace his face. They danced across his features as his lips danced against yours.

You loved the way he kissed. Every time he did it, it was with his whole body. Like it was the only thing he was thinking about, like it was the only thing he would ever think about. The way he curved into you, the furrow of his brow that you traced with the tip of your finger. You almost wanted to open your eyes, to immortalize this moment, but you couldn’t. You were too absorbed by the feel of him.

All of the effort, the concentration that Spence put into his kisses paid off. He was absurdly good at it, stealing your breath away, making you forget that there was anything else in the universe. The flick of his tongue against your lower lip was positively indecent, and you arced into him, pulling him closer.

Disappointingly, he pulled away, breathing hard. You realized you were doing the same, having forgotten about paltry things like breathing while he was kissing you. He walked around to the other side of the bed, toeing his shoes off and coming to lay down beside you.

Gently, he laid a kiss on your forehead. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

“if only these treasures were not so fragile as they are precious and beautiful.” ― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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destinychose-a · 5 years ago

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What was Haruki’s relationship with their parents/sibling(s) like?

Haruki had what many might call an idyllic relationship with their parents. Born to a well-respected mother and father with wealthy, prestigious backgrounds, they wanted for nothing and grew up in comfort. They were well-loved, accepted, cared for and doted upon during the first seven years of their life.

They had a strong bond with both their mother and father; their mother, Ayano, offered Haruki unconditional support and taught them the meaning of kindness no matter the circumstances, and their father, Syouhei, taught them the importance of respect directed at oneself and others, and eventually tutored them in the way of the sword.

Haruki’s relationship with their younger sister, Maiko, was full of warmth and love in the brief time they spent together. From the moment she was born, Haruki spent time with her often, doting on her, watching on in excitement as she took her first steps and cheering for her as she spoke her first words. Unfortunately, she was taken from the world not long after her second birthday, something Haruki regrets deeply and carries with them, often wondering what kind of person she might have grown into had she survived the demon attack that slaughtered their entire family.

Does Haruki prefer being in a crowd or being completely alone? How many people can be around them before they get uncomfortable?

As they struggle with severe claustrophobia, Haruki tends to grow extremely uncomfortable in big crowds, especially in cities, to the point of suffering from panic attacks. So long as they have plenty of personal space, without being jostled or pushed, they find it slightly easier to cope in smaller, interspersed crowds. However, they typically much prefer to be alone, or around as few people as possible. The only person they really allow into their personal space without the need for a prior warning is their partner, Aoto.

How open is Haruki to trying new things? Are they the adventurous sort, or would they rather stay in their comfort zone?

As a self-proclaimed inventor, Haruki thrives on all things new and exciting, following where their imagination takes them. They’re always open to trying something new, particularly pertaining to any new ideas for inventions they’ve been wanting to try and create ( whether they involve weapons, new prototypes for a prosthetic, or other contraptions intended to make their life easier ). While they certainly have a comfort zone they stick to, in terms of their preference for quieter spaces, when confronted with an idea, their excitement over the thought of creating something new easily outweighs their need for personal comfort.

Is Haruki more likely to follow instructions exactly, throw them out and figure it out on their own, or make it all up? What are the results like?

As far as Haruki is concerned, instructions are more like guidelines ( or, if you will, a mere suggestion ) than anything else. They much prefer being able to figure things out on their own and even consider it as a challenge to see if they can reach the same result without the aid of instructions. In some cases, this works to their favour. In others, especially in regards to cooking, it can end in disaster.

How difficult is it for Haruki to get to sleep? Do they fall asleep the moment they hit the pillow, or do they have insomnia? Any reason why?

Since the loss of their family, Haruki has struggled greatly with chronic insomnia, brought on by extreme stress, the development of depression and the ongoing effects of PTSD. Some days are naturally worse than others, but they typically struggle to get to sleep and stay asleep, prompting them to spend their nights out in their workshop until the early hours of the next morning ( unless stopped by their partner ). For the most part, the most amount of sleep they’ll manage a night is around 4 hours, with the least being 1-2.

How does Haruki handle being sick? Do they pretend not to be? Do they complain a lot? How susceptible to getting sick are they?

While they don’t get sick very often, Haruki hates it with a passion when they do, as it’s often an illness that knocks them for six for up to a week. The feeling constant of fatigue and being unable to focus the way they wish to is something they loathe above almost everything else. Haruki has a bad tendency of attempting to hide any illnesses they might be suffering from ( regardless of severity ) and work through it until collapsing with exhaustion or being figured out by Aoto ( or a close friend ).

How easily does Haruki throw something away? As soon as something is through with its usefulness, or are they more like a hoarder? Is there a reason?

Whether or not Haruki keeps an item is dependent on a variety of things. They’re not immune to emotional attachment to items ( they’ve kept their very first prosthetic, as well as many pieces of art gifted to them by Aoto ), but they can also be somewhat merciless when it comes to throwing things away. As soon as an item outlives its usefulness, they have no problem with getting rid of it or finding a way to repurpose it, especially if it’s an old invention. They’re constantly breaking down prototypes or failed experiments in order to reuse old parts, regardless of the memories attached to it.

What does Haruki’s workspace look like? Are they neat, or are they messy?

Despite their ruthlessness when it comes to throwing things away, they’re somehow always surrounded by piles of what might seem like junk to outsiders. However, Haruki simply lives in an ‘organised’ state of chaos — everything has its specific place that they have come to know by heart, even if it appears random and completely lacking in a system. Every now and then they can be convinced to have a tidy up ( sometimes they even discover things they hadn’t realised were there, much to their joy ), but within a few days, their workshop is back to looking like a disorganised mess.

Is Haruki a workaholic, or do they find it hard to be busy at all? Do they find it easy to relax, or must they have something to do at all times? Why?

Due to their ongoing battle with insomnia, Haruki finds it extremely easy to lose track of time when working on their inventions. They have a bad tendency of shutting themselves away for hours ( sometimes even days, particularly when their partner is away on missions ) without eating or sleeping. When away from their workshop, they often find themselves thinking up new ideas to work on as soon as they return. They struggle when they don’t have something to do to keep their hands and mind busy: they need to be stimulated in some way to remain focused a task, especially if it’s something they don’t ideally want to be doing.

How long can Haruki stay focused on one task before they get bored? Do they constantly have to switch things up or do they hyperfocus? What sort of things is it the opposite for?

Haruki’s attention span is entirely dependent on the task at hand. If it involves something they’re passionate about ( particularly involving the creation of weaponry or how specific contraptions work ), it can often be difficult to tear them away from it until their desire for knowledge has been fully sated, but when their task is something they consider tedious, it can be difficult to hold their attention for longer than a couple of hours at a time.

Is Haruki afraid of touch or do they actively seek it out? Is there a reason for this? What are the exceptions?

Haruki is not afraid of touch, but nor do they actively seek it out. They exist somewhere in the middle: they don’t particularly crave physical touch, but they don’t dislike it either and will in many cases indulge in it when offered. It’s rare for them to initiate any act of physical comfort outside of a friendly pat or squeeze of the shoulder.

The biggest exception to this is, of course, when it comes to their partner, Aoto. Against all rhyme and reason, they find themselves seeking him out for affection, leaning against his side or reaching out to take his hand.

Another exception to this is when they are faced with younger children. Ever haunted by the loss of their baby sister, Haruki has a soft spot for children and young teenagers and hates to see them in any kind of despair. In a cruel world such as theirs, Haruki believes they deserve as much kindness and attention as they can offer if only to temporarily ease a little of their suffering — this often comes in the form of hugs and head pats.

#* ✦ . HARUKI / HEADCANON.#( i decided to dig up a bunch of headcanon memes and pick out some relevant questions to compile into a headcanon dump!#sORRY FOR THE LONG POST BUT...#hopefully this gives a little more insight into haruki! i might actually do something similar for nova one day too! )#long post /

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rubiesintherough · 6 years ago

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some important Mahia facts in one nice convenient place ( considering how long I’ve had her and how she’s my most important bby shhh don’t tell the others, not ALL of her info will fit here, but definitely the most important ones:

In chronological order, the list of traumatic experiences in her life

She has SEVERE PTSD and anxiety from all that she’s been through. As such, she has terrible nightmares, panic attacks, she finds it difficult to trust... when triggered, she will sometimes lose touch with reality and suddenly find herself back in the LAB for a moment. ( a list of her triggers HERE , another note about them HERE... and a deeper look at her mental issues here and here ) She’s very skittish, constantly on edge, and not only because she knows she’s being hunted, but because her mind usually refuses to LET her relax. It has to always be on guard. For the past 10 years, there’s never been a moment when she’s no in fight or flight mode, even when she’s sleeping. All it takes is the slightest noise and she is bolt upright, one hand on her blade’s hilt. There are days she can’t stand being touched, even by people she loves / trusts... and with strangers, it’s even worse. She will flinch from them, retreat from them. Even touches as inconspicuous as a hand on her shoulder.

There are times when Mahia pushes herself — very frequently, actually — and flies far longer than she should. Even if she uses wind currents and glides for most of the way, flying still takes a LOT of energy out of her… and considering her very poor diet and constant stress her body is under, it tends to drain her very quickly. This sometimes results in less than graceful landings. She once managed to not only break two fingers ( one of which — her left pinky — never fully healed right ), but sprained a wing, bruised a rib, and scuffed up her hands and legs so badly it took nearly a week for them to heal.

DESPISE is not a strong enough word for how she feels about her wings and scars... she loathes them. ( more on her scars here ) In her mind, they make her something so far less than human. Something monstrous, unlovable. That’s the reason she’s tried to cut her wings out... twice since coming to earth. But, both times, she’s stopped. She KNOWS she needs them to survive. Without them, she’d be caught within days. -------- And besides, the sensation of flying is one of the most incredible feelings. That part, she loves. Especially night flying, high above the world, unseen... she can forget about everything for a moment. Just be. Imagine that she is flying home.

She’s entirely illiterate. Cannot read or write… Though, in her later teen years, she did learn how to recognize a few words. Things like ‘danger ‘ and ‘ caution ‘. She wouldn’t be able to tell you what the actual word is or spell / sound it out, but she knows it by sight and registers the meaning behind it.

HAPPY BREAK

On molting: she does not molt correctly… most birds lose their feathers over a long period of time and new feathers begin growing back fairly quickly. Hers do not. Her body is all sorts of screwed up from what the LAB did to her.. and this includes her wings. She loses her feathers pretty much all at once, in large clumps, usually over the period of just a few days. And her new feathers can take weeks before they even begin growing back… longer before her wings are in any state to be used. Its the most terrifying part of the year for her because, for over a month, she could be grounded. And that makes her an easy target. She gets jumpier during this time. Also, her wings become EXTREMELY sensitive. Light touches are painful and even the slightest injury to them can leave her nearly screaming in pain. She will be very hesitant to let ANYONE near them for that reason. It is, without the doubt, the time of year she dreads the most.

The GIFT has come in handy in more ways than just healing others… while that is it’s MAIN purpose, there are no laws against using it for other things such as filtering out water to make it safe to drink ( meaning, yes, Mahia is able to have drinking water from any source. It takes a great deal of concentration, but she can do it ) and drying herself off after a dip into a stream or lake, just collecting all the water off her body and shaking it from her hands. If not for these two skills, surviving out in the wilderness would be much, much more difficult for her.

She has been living on the run for 10 YEARS. Survival and taking in every part of her surroundings have become second nature… it will be very difficult to sneak up on this healer.

She has had to learn to fight. Hell, she had to learn it within the first year of coming to Earth. Mahia is NOT easily defeated or overpowered in either a fist fight or a knife fight… she’s gone up against 3 Hunters at once and came out on top. Or, at least, managed to fight them back enough to escape. She may be forbidden from doing harm — and she does her best to follow this law — but, this doesn’t mean she’s a bad fighter. She’s just focuses more on evasion and using their strength against them until she has an opening to escape.

Mahia tries to remain so calm and reserved… especially when it comes to her temper. She definitely has one. But, it’s usually such quiet anger, and she works hard to keep it that way… because she’s scared. Rarely ever will she yell or become outwardly angry. And if she does, she will apologize profusely for her outburst. She’ll avoid the person she yelled at, too afraid to speak to the again for a long while, fearing she’d broken the bond, that she’ll be thrown out of their lives. And it gets worse the more she cares about someone. If she were to yell at someone she really loves, she’d be an absolute panicked mess for the next few days, no matter how much she apologizes and tries to make up for it… she’d bring them gifts, do things without being asked, generally be far more helpful than usual both to apologize and to try to convince them not to throw her out or stop loving her. Because she’s already lost so many people. She’s already lost so much… and fully believes it was her fault. So, the thought of her anger driving someone away is one that absolutely TERRIFIES her. And that’s the reason she works so hard to stay calm, no matter how furious she becomes.

her wings in relation to emotion HERE

a list of Delphonian Ancestral beliefs... which she holds very close HERE

some random but important physical stuff about mahia:

--- She is thin. Like, super, worryingly thin. ( Even with the weight of her wings, she weighs practically nothing. Would be very easy to lift. ) This comes from never eating enough ( or very well ) and constantly being on the run… what she has is all muscle. It has to be. Even under the found coats she constantly wears to hide certain things, it’s not hard to notice that she is pretty much always half starved. --- Her clothes are always just what she manages to scrounge up. Usually discarded or — very rarely — stolen from clotheslines in backyards. Always dirty from her running, wrinkled from her flying, usually a couple sizes too large for her, fraying… --- While the most severe and extensive scarring is, of course, on herback… she does have a TON of others scattered all across her body. Even in plain sight on her arms and legs. Many of them have come about during run-ins with the Hunters. But, some are from rough landings, a stray branch, dozing off too near to her campfires, ect. Her body really does tell the story of everything she’s been through… even though Mahia really, really wishes it didn’t.

wing things mahia does without realizing it:

When she’s snuggling with someone, especially if she’s tired / falling asleep, she does have a tendency to wrap her wings and arms around them. Partly, it’s an almost protective thing. And partly, she just feels such comfort having someone that near to her, not being disgusted by the sight of her feathers, feeling them shift beneath her wing and just knowing that they’re there.

She fidgets with her feathers sometimes. It’s almost a nervous tick. Of course, she’ll only have them out and do this around someone she trusts or when she’s out in some forest clearing, alone. Her wings are extremely sensitive, so gentle touches to them can help to calm her. ( sidenote: if she trusts you, you have full permission to use this information the next time she’s really upset / scared ) She’ll stroke her fingers through them as someone might brush fingers through their hair, or take one single feather between her thumb and forefinger and simply curl it, rub it against the pads of her fingers. Considering how sickened she is by the sight of them, you wouldn’t think this would be the case, but… Mahia definitely has a very, very complicated relationship with her wings.

Her feathers tend to get dirty fairly easily. When living out on the run, she rarely has time to properly clean and groom them, so the most they usually get is when she dips into some river or lake to rinse dirt, blood, and sweat, from her body. She’ll dunk them under and shake them out once she gets to shore. And that’s about it. So, there are a lot of times when she’ll close them against her back and it just leaves dirty streaks over her scars there… this was actually a HUGE issue when she was much younger and her back was still healing. She risked infection each time she pulled them in, and actually had to be very careful about making sure they were clean. As she’s grown older, now, and her back has completely scarred over, she doesn’t pay it much mind. Doesn’t want to take that time doing something unnecessary when each second ALWAYS counts.

#long post #info ( mahia )#(( ooc. ))#y'all thought the CEASG'S list was long. .. .#i've had mahia since like 2012 okay she's my most precious bby my oldest bby in terms of how long i've been writing her #my first muse <3 <3 <3

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sansvoir-a-blog · 6 years ago

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STUDY : NEVA NEVOIR . tagged by : no one.

— basics.

➳ is your muse tall / short / average ?

leaving off at a slender 5′11 (and a half! ), Neva is considered quite tall. in most verses, she’s around 5′5″-5′7″, but 5′11″ will be what she ends her growing cycle at.

➳ are they okay with their height ?

for a span of some time, she would oft’ wonder if her height was just yet another thing that made her abnormal or weird; she knows so few other tall women and this impacted her perception of it greatly. however, she’s moved on from that for the most part. i honestly think sometimes she’s glad she’s on the taller side, maybe it makes her jokingly feel powerful.

➳ what’s their hair like ?

brown, brown, brown! she sports an otherwise plain, chocolate brown intermingled with subtle other shades of the colour. it falls long and tangled lightly, down just about to the small of her back unless fixed up into messy braids.

➳ do they spend a lot of time on their hair / grooming ?

by no means, no, nope, not at all. she appreciates others who have good hair ( she’s a girl who will definitely comment “your hair smells great! what shampoo do you use?!” if she gets a whiff. ) and doesn’t let hers get knotted into huge, painful tangles, but i don’t think she’s ever been to an actual hair salon in her life. off it goes, by the blade of a dagger!

➳ does your muse care about their appearance / what others think ?

one time, a girl named Nora Velt called Neva ugly and Neva cried. she doesn’t care obsessively or anything, but appearances confuse her because she doesn’t understand why they’re important to some people. she wants to appeal to others, certainly, but she also thematically believes she doesn’t have the time for extended upkeep. she tries to be cleanly, at least, when she can.

— preferences.

➳ indoors or outdoors ? both.

➳ rain or sunshine ? either, genuinely.

➳ forest or beach ? beach.

➳ precious metals or gems ? gems.

➳ flowers or perfumes ? flowers, of course! they’re deeply symbolic to her, for sentimental reasons.

➳ personality or appearance ? personality, tenfold.

➳ being alone or being in a crowd ? aah, it depends whether this aforementioned ‘crowd’ contains people neva knows! are they strangers? are they pleasant? what’s the sitch? Neva is often alone anyway, though, so.

➳ order or anarchy ? order.

➳ painful truths or white lies ? there’s a time and place for both, isn’t there? she, herself, lies so rarely, though.

➳ science or magic ? both, either, magic-inclined, however. she has an appreciation for science, as an intellectual.

➳ peace or conflict ? she has never known peace.

➳ night or day ? night.

➳ dusk or dawn ? dusk.

➳ warmth or cold ? she doesn’t mind either way. she’s spent months in the freezing continent in the north, and thrived just the same as when she spent months in the desert. she won’t complain about either.

➳ many acquaintances or a few close friends ? many close friends.

➳ reading or playing a game ? both.

— questionnaire.

➳ what are some of your muse’s bad habits ?

Neva is the Stepford Smiler at its finest; she doesn’t even realise she does it half the time. sporting a false optimism in the face of notorious self - sacrifice, Neva will do everything that she can do to appear unaffected by having to push aside something that she wants to do if someone needs something at the same time; this wears her down, even if she isn’t aware it does. she’s prone to steal, and to swindle with faux - naive girlish charm for the sole purpose of acquiring money ( greedy! she loves wealth! god, does she love it. ). she makes dick - sucking motions with her hand when anything remotely sexual is brought up, cheekily. she exists to the point of exhaustion, hardly allowing herself a break until she’s forced into it. is transience a bad habit? if so, it’s hers. she’d befriend the Devil himself, if he needed someone to chat with; she’s friendly, and tries endlessly to see the good in people. she’s somewhat contradictorily quick to condemn, while also being quick to forgive. this is a girl of many facets of everyone she’s ever met; she emulates without being conscious of it. she’s known to rhetorically repeat some of others’ statements in question form, annoyingly. ( example: ‘ The sky is blue. ‘ ‘ Is it? ‘ yes, Neva, it is. )

➳ has your muse lost anyone close to them ? how has it affected them ?

it might be useless to mention that Neva had an older sister ( Zaynah ) who was killed by a bounty hunter with a grudge. . . . . Neva does not remember this, or her sister. Terra is a dead planet now, and as a result, Neva has lost many people; she does not realise this, as she does not remember the vast majority of them. she is surface - level unaffected.

➳ what are some fond memories your muse has ?

there are so many! she recalls firstly, immediately, a night spent on an island compound with some of her closest friends ( let’s see. . . there was Nikko, and Rhys, and Suzume, and Firese, and Norio, and Moritz the moogle. . . but there are others missing from this list who were not present at the time. . . ) spent playing silly board games and getting falsely mad about Nikko and Rhys’ tireless P.D.A. she remembers the day she was able to turn one of Jonah’s magicked feathers into the sword she wields to this day, and every moment she spent training with him. she recalls countless nights with Firese, wherein he would lay beside her and quiz her on history, literature, science, math until she was ready to sleep.

➳ is it easy for your muse to kill ?

ah, tricky; she’s quick and merciless to kill those who raise hand or blade in intention to harm her loved ones, even if there’s just reason for it. she will not hesitate to end it. in most other situations, she finds it difficult to do so and often reflects endlessly about it later on, guiltily.

➳ what’s it like when your muse breaks down ?

exhausting! Neva quickly cycles through every range of emotion. she’s likely and prone to linger on rage, which is a cold, bitter and brutal thing for her. she makes some of her worst, explosive split - second decisions in this instance ( she’s manifested entire tornadoes to destroy the interior of someone’s house because she jumped to a —— false —— assumption about them, for example ). her sadness, however, is spiraled and opens up deep despair, which incapacitates her to the point of laying motionless for what seems like days; a saddening stark contrast to her constant busy-ness.

➳ is your muse capable of trusting someone with their life ?

yes, Neva’s life means little to her, honestly. she’s not, however, capable of trusting most people with the safeties and lives of her friends.

➳ what’s your muse like when they’re in love ?

she’s annoying, oh my god —— clingy and physically affectionate, devoted to an unparalleled degree, hopeful, and extremely intimate in every way, shape, and form you can imagine. she’s a patron of gentle touches, soft smooches, falling asleep holding one another and not letting go; if she gets to hold a hand, she’ll be happy. she’s a proud lover, that is: proud to love and to be loved. you’ll find no shyness within her about it. Neva is fiercely protective, as is the norm for her, but you’ll never hear the end of it should you decide to threaten or even insult the one(s) who claims her affections. she has a lot of love to give, and it isn’t difficult to get to it.

#charmsol #uccisore #diavoleste #vibraea #rejectsblood #zelotae #* long post.#* readmore for length.#( listen i told myself not to get out of hand with this and what did i do? i got out of hand. )#( obviously anyone is welcome to steal it from me and if you're tagged you don't have to do it duh! sdklgjlds )#⸨ headcanon ⸩ : ignorance / she knows not a thing about herself.

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lunarfox22 · 4 years ago

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Bloodied and Broken - Part 7

Pairing: Loki x OFC (of color)

Warning: Violence, language, blood, mentions of suicidal thoughts, angst, fluff

Words: 1469

AO3: : Bloodied and Broken by lunar_fox22

FFN: Bloodied and Broken by lunarfox22

Summary: Loki has fallen from the Bifrost, a disgraced prince. He meets Angela Lawrence, a SHIELD agent who helps him, but can he let go of his scorn? Or will he betray the only person who is on his side?

AN: I'm moving these over to my new writing works tumblr. Please forgive any confusion!

Part 6 - Part 8

Masterlist

Loki didn’t often get surprised. People often turned out exactly as he thought they would when he first met them. Angela, however, shocked him. It seemed there was more under that nice, understanding exterior. Turns out, she was incredibly intelligent and witty. She also wasn’t kind to a fault like he had assumed she was. The little incident at Walmart had proved that she had some bite to her after all. A rather big one in fact. At first, it had annoyed him, but in the end he had left slightly impressed.

With what little time together they had together between her working, he spent trying to get to know her. In the beginning, it was solely due to his need of infiltrating her agency. So far he’s had little ground on that front. She was very tight-lipped on her work. He figured she would be, she worked at an intelligence agency. Now, he spent trying to get to know her because she had impressed him.

Angela was a very curious person. By nature, most intelligent people were. It was how one gained knowledge, after all; to ask questions, to learn more. The moment she realized he had no issue with answering her questions about the universe, she couldn’t help herself but to ask more. She wanted to know everything. So he indulged her, and answered whatever question she threw his way.

She had also seemed especially enamored with his magic. It had been a long time since he had actually dazzled someone with it. Everyone on Asgard considered it to be easy tricks. Which was another reason he and Thor grew apart. Everyone loved Thor for being a pure warrior. Yet no one cared for his use of magic in the battlefield. Angela seemed to understand the effort it took to cast even a tiny illusion spell. She wanted to know more about magic, the technicalities of it. Not just sit and watch him perform spells. Which he took in stride and tried to explain as best he could. And she appeared to understand it quickly, and absorb the information as a sponge would water.

With her gone so long during the day they rarely had the chance for him to give an in depth lecture on it. So far he’s been telling her of Asgard and she’s just been informing of Midgardian customs. Midgardians have changed since he was last here centuries ago.

When she wasn’t here, he had to find some means to entertain himself. Which wasn’t difficult considering she had taught him to work the television and ‘Netflix’ as she called it. But, he mostly enjoyed reading her books. She had good taste. Right now he was reading the completed works of William Shakespeare. When he wasn’t doing either of those, he was testing out his magic. During his fall, they seemed to have grown exponentially. What used to take most of his energy, barely bothered him anymore. He was using this time to better himself. And it was working.

But today, Loki was on a mission. Last night, Angela had gotten a call from work and spent some time on her laptop. This meant she kept work-related information on there. The moment she left, he was going to see what all he could find on SHIELD and use it to start a plan.

Her schedule was the same everyday he had been here. When the sun rose, she would wake, get ready for the day, and then break her fast. Then she would leave around 7 a.m., and not return until 6 p.m. That gave him plenty of time to take her laptop and formulate a plan from there.

At seven on the dot, she left just like she always did. Loki took his time cleaning the kitchen, instead of using his magic, to stall just in case she forgot something and came back. It was highly unlikely that she would, the woman was extremely organized, but he did so just in case. Once he was done he crept into her room, and grabbed her laptop. He sat on the edge of her bed and opened it. It was heavily encrypted, but that didn’t mean much to him. Midgardian technology was completely obsolete to the rest of the Nine Realms, and he easily bypassed it with his magic.

After a few moments of searching, he found what he was looking for. The SHIELD database. Angela was high clearance, apparently, but not high enough to gain access to what he was looking for. either that, or they didn’t want her to know of the Tesseract. Still, she could be of some use to him. He had yet to see exactly what she was capable of.

Using his magic, he navigated his way through her file and began to read.

‘Name: Angela Janeatte Lawrence.

Date of birth: February 20th, 1986

Codename: Eclipse.

Level Clearance: 8

Assassin. Undercover Spy. Field operative.’

‘My my,’ Loki thought. ‘What else is she hiding?’

As he began to peruse the rest of her file, he heard the tell-tale sound of her car pulling up to the house. He quickly glanced down at the time. It was only around 9 a.m., what in the realms was she doing home so early?

He hurried and quickly erased all of his doing on her laptop with his magic, set it back in its place and hastily went to the living room and opened a book. He had made it just in time to hear her unlocking the door with her key. He pretended to be reading his book, to appear as nonchalant as possible.

As the door opened he began to speak to her, “You’re home ear–”

Loki lifted his head and almost had to do a double take. Angela was leant up against the doorway, dried blood under her nose. Her blood had dripped down on her dark gray shirt, and left dark spots all down it.

Before he realized what he was doing he stood from the couch and discarded his book. He made his way over to help her. “Angela?”

But she didn’t respond. She was unsteady as she took a few steps into the house.

He knew she was going faint before it happened. He saw the way her eyes glazed over, and the way they rolled in the back of her head. He darted to catch her in his arms.

He picked her up with ease and carried her to her bedroom. He gently set her on top of her bed before going to fetch a rag to clean her up a bit. As he cleaned her up, he laughed quietly to himself about the irony. Guess it was his turn to take care of her. He used his magic to check her over, and see exactly what was wrong with her.

It seemed the poor dear had severely over-exerted herself. As his magic washed over her, he felt a pulse of power against it.

Oh?

It was weak right now, but it was certainly there still fighting. This is what must have put her out.

To his knowledge, Midgardians didn’t have powers, but once again he hadn’t been here for centuries. And he had learned that he did, in fact, miss much during his absence.

He gazed down at her, looking at her in a new light. Assassin, spy, and had powers. My, what a curious little thing she had become all in one morning.

With her only being exhausted, his job was done. He took the books she was wearing off her feet, then her jacket, and put the blanket over her.

She was knocked out for the rest of the day. Anytime he would go to check on her, she would be whimpering in her sleep. And she was like that the last time he checked on her before settling down for the night as well.

The moment he fell asleep, he knew he wasn’t dreaming. He was back in the desolate land, which meant…

“Asgardian,” the voice rang out from behind him.

He turned slowly, and came face to face with the disgusting creature from last time. Loki met him with a leveled look.

“Have you confirmed the whereabouts?”

Loki linked his hands behind him, “Not as of yet.”

The creature began to circle him, but Loki didn’t budge an inch and kept his eyes on the thing. “Is this meager excuse of a planet that difficult to traverse for you?”

Loki glared, “Worry not, I’m on the right track. I’ll soon-”

A loud scream pierced through the air causing Loki to break eye contact. He glanced around to see the image fading rapidly and he began to wake.

He shot up awake, and heard the screaming continue.

It was Angela screaming.

#loki x oc #loki x ofc #loki/oc #loki/ofc #loki #loki fanfic #loki laufeyson #loki odinson #bloodied and broken

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multiversemuses · 7 years ago

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☕ (Cori)

@darthvoldemaul

I’m not sure if this counts as much of a memory, really, because not a lot happens. One person stays asleep during the main bit of it so… No one’s calling it eventful, okay?

But it still means something to me.

You’ll need a lot of background information first, though, so get comfy. See, Liv had invited me to stay with her for part of the summer holiday. It took some doing, making that happen. My mother doesn’t exactly approve of her children spending time outside of school (or inside it, for that matter) with anyone who isn’t from the twenty-eight. So I cashed in on a favor from Khepri Shafiq.

Strictly speaking, what Khepri actually owed me was money from an old bet, but I offered to consider us even so long as she’d provide this one alibi. The great thing about Shafiq – besides being a bit of a reckless gambler when she’s thrown back a few too many firewhiskeys – is that my parents cannot stand her parents. And probably vice versa, honestly. My mum and dad will be respectful of them at large gatherings of the families but, as a safe general rule, they will not contact them directly if it is in any way avoidable. Dad thinks Gamal Shafiq is a prattling bore and Mum resents the fact that Shadya Shafiq always catches on to the latest trends and fashions well before she does. They can be a petty bunch, the Selwyns. Take it from one who knows. Personally, I’ve always found the Shafiqs among the more tolerable families in my own’s social circle. Fortunately for me, the feeling was mutual for Khepri (either that or she was just grateful to hang on to the bag of galleons I’d won fair and square), and she agreed to let me say I was visiting her for a while in the summer. It probably didn’t hurt that Khepri’s in Ravenclaw, like Liv. What do you know? House loyalty’s good for something outside of Hogwarts, after all. Anyway, suffice to say, my parents were more than happy to send their greetings and love through me. They trusted that I’d pass along the message to the Shafiqs and spare them the need to send any correspondence owls. Ergo, no inexplicable inquiries would find their way into Gamal’s or Shadya’s hands, nor would my parents be waiting on any letters from them detailing our holiday activities. It was the perfect solution.

I arrived at the Eldlunds’ feeling rather proud of myself, if you must know. Outsmarting my parents just heightened the excitement of what already promised to be the best part of the summer months. Liv had spent our time apart planning, I could tell, even though she kept the written itinerary out of my sight so that each new adventure could be a surprise. Truth be told, she could have left everything to happenstance and I’d still have seen so many new things. A lot of items in her house alone were complete novelties to me.

I was poking around her room on that first day and saw a funny little folded box on a shelf. It was pretty easy to open up, but I couldn’t for the life of me guess what purpose it could possibly serve. It had a dark glass circle right in the middle that made me think of those peepholes in the front doors of houses, and there was a long indented ridge at the bottom. I turned the box from side to side in my hands but my grip slipped on this little red button jutting off it. The next thing I knew, it made this godawful whirring noise and spat out a blank square. Liv came into the room just in time to hear me swear creatively and nearly drop the blasted thing on the floor. She made a quick save and caught the box before it could crash to the ground. As she returned the contraption to the shelf, Liv told me its name, and I remember thinking it sounded cold. Polarvoid. No, that doesn’t look right. I’ve added an extra letter or something. Ah, to hell with it, the point is that it was a kind of camera.

“Is that why it spits out a white picture?” I asked. “It just shows empty space near the ice caps every time?“

Liv got a chuckle out of that one. She explained that the blankness of the image was temporary. Liv pulled the square free from the camera and shook it a few times, then placed it down on her desk. I must have still looked pretty skeptical, because she urged me to watch closely and even offered a chair so I could observe with my face right over the photograph.

Shadows started forming on the square. Colors were unfolding across the white the way that flowers open in springtime. I started to recognize pieces of furniture and decorations from Liv’s room, but they were blurry in contrast to the oval dominating the center of the image. It was my face, caught in an unfortunate just-shat-myself expression. “Lovely,” I grumbled, but that didn’t stop me from staying completely still until every detail of that picture had filled into place. Liv wanted to know what I thought of it. “I’d like them better if they moved so we didn’t have that face immortalized for all eternity, but I suppose they do have the benefit of coming back to you much faster.”

That little incident must’ve given Liv an idea because, the very next morning, she took me out and bought me a gift: a disposable muggle camera. She told me I could use it to remember our visit. Which I did, and I made quite a tourist of myself. The land near her house really is beautiful – flowers, clear water, and so much green. Liv and her mother were very patient with me. Neither one ever barked for me to stop falling behind or tried to stop me from going off in my own direction as we wandered. That wasn’t their way and, although it was nice, it took me time to get used to it. There was so much freedom, not just to explore but also to express. I never felt like conversations were censored at their dinner table or like the real messages had to be hidden somewhere between the lines. They were so open. And happy. I’d never experienced a family meal with real laughter like that, not the forced polite kind at social functions where people are just trying to stay in each other’s good graces.

The Eldlunds are quite artsy as well. Liv let me try my hand at a little painting. It seemed like it could all go wrong so quickly, and I ended up starting with a single dot on the canvas. Liv had to quite literally take my hand in hers and coax my arm into that first full brushstroke. I loosened up a little more after that and got a bit carried away. Flecks of paint were in my hair and on my hands. At one point, when Liv leaned round to see how my work was coming along, I darted my brush out on impulse and touched it to the tip of her nose. Her mum said it made her look like a reindeer. That struck me as odd since I’m pretty sure reindeer have brown or white fur, not red. Maybe it’s a muggle thing. Either way, it was pretty funny to watch how Liv’s nose twitched a little until she was able to clean the paint off her skin. As for the painting itself, well… let’s call the finished product abstract and let me save face, shall we?

The one Liv painted of me about a week later was much better (no surprise). She saw me sitting at the window, snacking on a green apple, and asked if she could have me pose for a while. Since that basically required me to stay comfy and keep eating, I was more than happy to oblige. I know that I clearly am no expert at art. It’s questionable if I should ever be allowed to be near a brush or paints again but, even so, I feel like I can fairly say that Liv really knows her stuff. Watercolors seem so difficult to me. Difficult to keep from running, difficult to control the details, difficult not to make your painting one big dripping mess. But Liv does it. Over and over again. And she makes it look easy. When she really got to work on that portrait, I think she became more relaxed than I was. I started overthinking everything. Would I mess up the light and shadows if I readjusted my legs? Should I eat more slowly so she had a chance to get the apple right before I chewed too close to the core? Did I need to keep my head angled the same way? Meanwhile, from what I could see in my peripheral vision, Liv was perfectly at ease. She had checked out and was well and truly “in the zone.” I could feel the weight of her eyes on me, but it wasn’t in a judgmental or critical way, simply studying. It gave me gooseflesh, but I resisted the urge to rub my arms and clear it away. When she’d finished working, I was finally allowed to leave the window and see the end result. I could hardly form the words to tell her how well she’d done. If it weren’t for the fact that the girl in the painting was wearing my outfit and holding the same snack, I’d have argued it wasn’t me at all. Not to say that it didn’t look like me – it did, remarkably so – but she’d made me look… well, a lot of things, really. Thoughtful. Serene. Beautiful. Variations of “that’s really good” felt horribly inadequate, but I could only seem to stammer rewordings of that same sentiment while I stared at this other version of myself who seemed to have it all together much more than I did.

Liv also introduced me to her taste in music. We played so many songs during my stay there. If we were in her room during the daytime, there was music of some sort playing even if it was just softly in the background. A lot of wizard bands reference wizarding world things more than is strictly necessary (have you heard anything by the Weird Sisters?), so it was a little odd at first not to hear the artists comparing themselves to magical creatures or characters from our folklore, but I liked it. Liv wanted me to be able to take some of it with me even after I went back home. She started compiling a mix tape and gave me a device I could use to play it. I’d have to hide the player in my trunk, but it’d hardly be the first thing I’d concealed from my watchful mother.

I suppose that brings us to the specific memory I’ve been meaning to tell you this whole time. It was somewhere in the middle of my visit with the Eldlunds and, in an extremely rare occurrence, I woke up before Liv one morning. The house was quiet and still; I was pretty sure her mum wasn’t awake yet, either. So I leaned over the side of her bed and scooped up the player with the mix tape already inside. I slid the earpieces into place and pushed the button on the top. The songs Liv had put together for me were so peaceful and relaxing. They were the perfect thing to keep me company in the pale, early morning light with no one else stirring but me. I sat upright with a pillow propped behind my back and looked lazily around the room. My hand started playing with something soft and smooth beneath my fingertips, letting it run across my knuckles and slip through my grasp before picking it up again. I think I was three songs in before I realized that I’d been absentmindedly playing with Liv’s hair. I froze and sort of held my breath. I tried to make sure she was still fully asleep since I was pretty sure that’d be an odd thing to wake and find me doing. Liv didn’t show any signs of consciousness. She rolled over, and that brought her body right up against mine. If it’s possible, I think I moved even less then. I held my arms up, away from her, and just stared down at her face. No, the features were too smooth; she wasn’t faking being deep in her dreams. The sudden closeness was completely innocent and unintentional. Still, I swear on my best crystal phials that I could feel my heart beating in the back of my throat. Prickles of sweat broke out across my forehead.

That’s when I knew I was in trouble.

I didn’t want to let myself call it what it was, not yet, but I knew that what I was feeling for Liv went beyond the bounds of the friendship we’d established.

My arms were starting to get tired by this point. One I was safely able to lower to my side, but the other was directly above Liv. I knew I was going to have to put it down, to allow my skin to touch hers and rest behind her back. But actually doing so felt like a more pleasant version of having your limb wake up after the circulation was cut off from it. I had these tingles from shoulder to wrist. I had to keep consciously telling my lungs to inhale and exhale.

Oh, this was bad. Bad, bad, bad.

And yet I couldn’t ignore the heat from her, seeping through my pyjamas, or the way the ends of her hair tickled the crook of my elbow. My hand was shaking the whole time, but I let myself rub my thumb just once across her back, between the shoulder blades. It was a very quick gesture, but it made me choke on my own pulse again.

Later, when Liv started to stir a little and murmur drowsily, I panicked and tried to rearrange our position. I put my arm behind my head and let the other fall past the edge of the mattress, shutting my eyes and trying to look sprawled out in unconsciousness. I guess it worked. Liv made no remark or sudden movement, except to gently take off my headphones and stop the tape player, presumably so I wouldn’t get tangled in the cord. Her hand grazed my shirt as she lifted the player off my torso, and it took everything in me to keep my face completely relaxed. Then she leaned over me to place the whole thing on her nightstand. It’s a good thing she wasn’t looking down at me because the clench in my jaw must’ve been visible as I focused on keeping my breathing even. She settled back into place and tried to wake me with a soft shake of my arm. I pretended to peek out from behind my eyelids for the first time and smiled at her. The smile she gave back to me made my stomach pull a Wronski Feint.

There’s not much else to tell about that day. Everything was pretty normal after that, and I was trying to be normal as well. I can’t say I didn’t embarrass myself once or twice along the way. There were a few clumsy mishaps: tripping, running into things, dropping stuff. Thankfully, since I tended to let Liv lead the way because she knew where we were going, she didn’t see all of it.

I did do one more thing. Just for myself, just to remember. I was pretty sure I would want it later, and I was right about that. I took a picture with Liv in it while she wasn’t looking at me. I wanted one to keep of her just existing, just relaxing and being herself. I’ll admit, the reason behind it was partly for my collection of photographs from the visit but also partly because of what I was starting to feel. It ended up being a good thing that I took the picture, though. I needed it more than I knew. The following year at school, when things were falling apart, I still had that image to look at and her mix tape to listen to while we weren’t together. It probably wasn’t the healthiest way of dealing with the fact that I was too afraid to go public and she was seeing someone else, but it was all I really had.

Well, this took a sad turn at the end, didn’t it? It got better after that, I swear. Slytherins aren’t known for swallowing their pride quickly, but I did eventually get my shit together and override that built-in lean toward self-preservation. And you know what? I’d deal with all of it again – the pain, the complete nonsense from some of the people around us (my family included), the loneliness, the fear, everything – because it was worth it. Liv was infinitely worth it. If I had to survive the misery to be happy, I’m fine with calling that a fair trade.

#Ask Meme Answer #Cori Meme #theclonewriter

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destinychose · 4 years ago

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