#and you might be saying oh how does that work?

[firegirl888101]

Insatiable Madness

Diverted-Dimension (Christmas 2024)

|Sagau Yandere Fatui Harbingers x Reader|

Why am I back here again!? Take me back to the canon!

Reader is Gender Neutral!

"Finally!" You cheered, stepping back to admire the Christmas tree in the corner of your living room.

"It looks good." Pantalone commented, looking at all the trinkets placed on the tree. "Although, I believe this gadget would look better placed there... And this bauble, yes, hmm, perhaps on the branch above rather than--"

Y'know, it always takes one person to ruin everyone else's happiness doesn't it? Especially when their name is Pantalone. You rolled your eyes, ignoring his fiddling with what you considered a complete and beautiful tree.

Let's just hope Columbina doesn't see him fiddling with her decorations. For Pantalone's sake, you pray she takes five extra minutes in the bathroom so he can have a safe getaway when he's finished with something he sees as necessary.

Anyway, you've been preparing for Christmas day tomorrow. You wanted to put up the tree earlier, not wanting to leave it this late, however being busy babysitting and making sure all the Harbingers go to work with a happy mood sure takes up a lot of time. Not only does it feel like you're playing a very dangerous version of the Sims, but more importantly, it sucks that when all of them leave you have to entertain the others that don't go to work in the first place.

"It feels like the tree is missing something." Dottore chimed in, standing back with a finger on his bottom lip.

"Please don't say that, The Regrator is already driving himself mad with his own activities." Arlecchino stated 

Ignoring those two... They're right, something seems wrong with the tree. But you used everything in the box, what could be missing --

Oh, of course! How could you forget!?

"It's missing an angel on top!" You pointed out, walking over to the Christmas box and rummaging around.

After a while of digging and loud crashing noises consisting of you throwing out whatever you thought could also be added, you found a dusty china angel missing a hand.

"Agh, this won't do." You scolded yourself. "We'll have to go with a star instead. I'll have to cut one out later."

"Cut one out? How are you going to cut a star out of the sky?" Childe asked with a bewildered expression.

"They mean they'll cut one out of paper you damn idiot." Scaramouche glared out of the corner of his eye.

"I often see the Children of the Hearth doing something similar when I pass by..." Signora thought to herself out loud, leaning on one of the arms of the sofa.

"Yes, the children love cutting out different shapes and animals. It just so happens stars are one of the easiest things to make." Arlecchino nodded in agreement.

If it's so damn easy, why don't you do it for me?? You grumbled with an angry grin. It took you a few days to learn how to cut a good looking star out of paper due to your clutzy fingers, how dare they call it 'easy' in front of you!

"Hm? Why do you look angry at me?"

"No reason." You answered her, sharply turning your head away from her tilted one. "Do I even have any paper left? Ugh, I might have to use lined paper and paint it using gold nail varnish if push comes to shove."

"Absolutely not." Sandrone interrupted you. "That sounds messy and unnecessarily more difficult than if you just bought yellow card."

"And where do you propose I get this yellow card? Out of my arse?"

"No." She looked repulsed. "The shop? I saw some in an isle."

"When and why did you go into the corner shop?" You caressed your head, sighing when hearing her solution.

"That's unimportant."

"Sure it is. Anyway, I need to start thinking about how I'm going to cook Christmas dinner--"

"Oh no you don't." Scaramouche interrupted you with a cold voice. "The last time you cooked a genuine meal that didn't include those 'instant noodles', you poisoned everyone who has an organic stomach."

"No way, the Balladeer cares enough about me to not want to see me bedridden again?" Childe gushed with a chuffed smile.

"That's not important!" You raised your voice with flushed cheeks. "How did you know that what I cooked was 'instant' noodles? I never told you that!"

"I asked a staff member in the shop down the street when I saw the exact same package for sale in one of the pasta isles."

"Oh my god, how many of you have been in that damn shop without me!?"

The room stayed silent, some looking away with a cringe whilst others looked at you with unbothered faces.

“Do I count? I’ve never left the house.” Capitano raised his hand innocently.

"Unbelievable." You cried to yourself dramatically.

"I can't believe he's still fiddling." Pulcinella sighed with judging eyes, watching the banker radically move around the tree mumbling to himself like a robot given an impossible task.

"So this is what happens when you don't give him something to do after a long period of time. Lesson learnt." Pierro sweated, coughing into a clenched fist with shut eyes.

"It's not my fault." He turned to the group with hysterical eyes, every so often one twitching. Considering his eyes are always closed, you’re impressed that his mania has managed to do the impossible. "The Decider won't let me do one of the things I'm best at, manipulating an economy. Denying me access to undermining this country's government is making me go mad!"

"What a lunatic." You ignored him, eyeing his antics as nothing more than a regular occurrence at this point.

"So, we're up for cutting a star for the tree then?" You turned back to the group.

"It's your decision and your tree, so of course." Signora shrugged.

"I'm baaaack!~" Columbina burst through the door like a canary, singing with a pep in her step.

She stopped when she saw Pantalone running around the tree, her energy from earlier vanishing as fast as a bird when hearing a gunshot.

"Erm... It's not what it looks like." He turned around slowly, feeling her menacing and dangerous energy piercing his back.

He put his hands in the air, his smile shaking in fear.

"It better not be what it looks like." Her smile contrasted his own. "Because it seems you've been touching something I specifically warned all not to touch.~"

"He's dead, he's actually dead." Childe commented on the sidelines.

"Amen."

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

Sandrone left to go get yellow card whilst Columbina forced you to tear down the Christmas tree and start decorating it from scratch. She said it was a punishment for you also, due to letting him rearrange it despite hearing her warning. What bullshit, she just couldn't be bothered to do it again. Anyway, Capitano helped you hold the christmas tree up so you could wrap the tinsel around it without trouble. What a nice guy… even though he technically isn’t helping you with what counts most.

"I don't understand why we're cutting out stars. Can't we just use me as the angel?" Columbina giggled to herself.

"No, that would be weird." You frowned at her. "What I don't understand is why everyone is cutting stars with me. Didn't the majority of you say this is going to be boring? Do something else!"

"The 'something else' you're talking about was also boring." Scaramouche picked up his pair of scissors, tracing his finger on the sharp side.

“I’d much rather cut something up than count how many particles are in a cloud.”

“What does that even mean!?”

“Anyway,” Dottore coughed with an irritated stretching smile. “I propose we make this a competition.”

“Of all the childish suggestions–” Arlecchino was cut off.

“I agree, I agree!” Columbina nodded with a happy smile. “It can’t be too hard, maybe we should have a reward for who wins the competition?”

“Although I find the idea of a competition to be senseless, a reward does sound quite… boosting.” Pantalone thought out loud, a greedy smile on his lips.

“This is not happening.” You sighed to yourself, head planted onto the table with exasperation radiating off of your slumped form.

“But what reward could we put on offer? I’m not against competition, heck, I encourage it! But what could we all fight for which would allow us to fight at our strongest the whole time?” Childe leaned against his chair.

The Harbingers thought to themselves, the room erupting in silence with the occasional cough or sniff. All of a sudden, their heads turned and looked at you. Feeling their gazes burning into you, you looked up from the table to see them expectantly eyeing you.

“Ohhh no. No way in whatever thoughts you’re all sharing am I getting involved in this. I’m not becoming some trophy you can flaunt for the rest of the evening.” You denied them.

“But you’re the perfect solution!” Childe playfully pouted.

“Quit torturing them, Childe.” Signora scolded the young ginger. “I propose this; let whoever wins ask The Decider one question. That question can be related to anything, the future or the past.”

“Hmm, but how would we know whether The Decider wouldn’t lie to us?” Dottore suggested.

“I’m staying out of this one.” Pulcinella put his hands in the air, leaving the room. “You youngsters go have fun, I’ll sit this one out.”

“Rooster, I would suggest staying to supervi–”

“So you can go back to that dirty office you keep closing yourself in to work? No thank you, I shall handle your paperwork today. You supervise this time.” He gave the director a harsh glare, making sure to purposefully hit him with his walking stick before walking away.

“Sometimes I can’t tell whether the Rooster is secretly a teenage girl or is just simply strange…” Pierro muttered to himself. Sighing.

“How about both, mixed in with the fact that he’s a psycho with more control issues than you think.”

“Hm? You think even more than the Regrator?”

“Deffo.” You clicked your tongue. “He just hides it because he’s a champ like that.”

“Don’t change focus!” Scaramouche raised his voice. “I order you to answer me. You will tell the truth to the victor of the contest, no?”

“Hold on, didn’t we agree to ask our own questions once we deliver them to the Tsaritsa?” Childe questioned.

“That was just to get you to not hound The Decider back when we first found them.” 

“Fine.” You agreed with an eye roll, secretly crossing your fingers behind your back like a five year old. You’ll probably just make something up that sounds accurate when the winner asks their question. You’re betting that Sandrone will win this though, this kind of has something to do with her job after all.

“It’s decided then!” Columbina clapped in delight. “The Decider and The Director will be our judges. We’ll work for 10 minutes to create a star suitable to be put on the tree, then will be judged to see who has the best!”

“This is not gonna go well…” You said, trying your best to cover the shaky smile on your face. This is the best! You’ll just pick someone who won’t ask a question you don’t mind answering! Thank you Columbina for giving you this chance.

“You’re telling me!” Pulcinella shouted from the other room, sarcasm oozing like tar glooping down a slope.

“Count us down, count us down!” Columbina couldn’t contain her excitement, her body practically vibrating.

“Alright, alright… Ugh, I regret this… On your marks, get set, cut!”

“Seriously? ‘Cut’?” Pierro turned to you.

“What was I supposed to say!?”

The Harbingers sat at the table immediately started cutting, the sound of card shredding and small pieces emitting everywhere. Guess who’s going to have to clean that up? You thought with a frown, watching card pile up in the small crevasses in your carpet.

Looking around at the Harbinger’s cutting paper, you realise one was just sitting there watching the others work.

“Uhh, Capitano? Aren’t you going to begin?” You asked him.

“No.” His deep voice answered in return. “I am not going to join this display, no matter how entertaining it will be for you. Firstly, my fingers won’t fit in the holes of the scissors. And secondly, I have no question to ask you so entering just for victory would be pointless.”

“Brother, your fingers can’t be that big.” You deadpanned, letting your mind wander a bit too far with the thought.

He simply crossed his arms and continued to watch the others, ignoring you from then on. Oh well, he’s not interfering or arguing back like a child so you’ll let it happen. Besides, it looks like he quite likes watching so it’s the least you could do.

Pierro put an arm on your shoulder, getting your attention. You turned to make eye-contact and saw him hesitating in what to say to you.

“Do you need a defibrillator? You look like you’re having a seizure.”

“Who do you think is going to make the best star?” He said after, not registering your insult you said a few seconds prior.

“Wow. Did it really take you that long to think of what to say to me?”

“Quiet.” He warned you.

“Hmm… Who do I think is going to win?” You mumbled out loud, pretending to give it some thought. “Screw it, I’m not going to pretend. Sandrone’s going to make the best one because she does this kind of thing as a job.”

“Hah!” She guffawed after hearing your predictions, continuing her cutting with a content smile.

“Buuuut, that’s not what makes a star special. It isn’t just perfection, but passion and hope. I want to see how unique some people will make it… within reason of course.”

“I wasn’t expecting such an intelligent reply.” Pierro sweated. “Here I was, ready to scold you.”

“It’s like that’s all you can ever bloody think about when it comes to me.” You deadpanned.

“You give me no choice half of the time.” He sighed with a shaking head. “Your choices are often questionable and must be corrected. Would you rather have a physical punishment instead?”

Is this guy nuts?

“No… No, I would not.”

“That's what I thought.” He turned to look at the competition.

“Decider, help me out here.” Scaramouche clicked his fingers, beckoning you like an old woman would to her juvenile cat.

“Do I look like your pet?” You recoiled in disgust.

“I’ll let you leave the house to go to that dumb park you like if you help me right now.”

“I’m on my way!” You ran over to his side, peering down to see the mess of a star he’s created. It’s not bad at all, it’s actually your style - you like it a lot! What on earth could he need help for?

When you peered down to his design, you felt a cold unnatural hand grasp the side of your head and pull it closer to his face.

“Tell me how you like them.” He whispered. “Would you rather me add more detail or remove it? And don’t lie to me or I’ll kill you.”

“Pierro, The Balladeer is cheating! He’s bribing The Decider!” Sandrone pushed her chair back and stood up dramatically, pointing her scissors at the offender.

“Hey, no fair!” Childe whined. “If he gets to bribe them, let me bribe them too!”

“If anyone is to bribe the Decider, it should be me. I am the richest man in Teyvat after all.” Pantalone shrugged whilst lazily cutting.

“Correction: Ningguang is the richest in terms of all. You only count as the richest when it comes to being a man.” You pointed out. “And besides, I would never take your dirty money.”

Piero coughed loudly to quieten everyone down, all in the room turning to him like a deer in headlights. He waited until everyone stopped complaining and then spoke.

“Do continue with your cutting, you have less than a minute left.” He gestured to the timer. “And no bribery. The first to test my patience and even attempt to do so will be put under experimentation during the rest of our stay here and our return.”

“Oh, by all means, bribe away!” Dottore laughed at the Harbinger’s around him, silently cutting.

Huh? Less than a minute left? But when you last looked at the time they had at least 8 minutes left. You checked the timer once more, and found fat greasy fingerprints on buttons that weren’t there prior. You turned to the old man with an incredulous face, mouth wide open. He caught your staring, and put a finger on his lips with a small almost unnoticeable smile.

Pierro, you cheeky bastard. I love you for this.

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

The stars were laid out on the dining table, each Harbinger stood behind their own creations. Sadly but also un-sadly, some Harbingers were too slow and couldn’t finish their star in time. By some, you mean Pantalone and surprisingly Sandrone.

“I’m not going to hear the end of this.” Sandrone had her face buried in her hands, looking at her creation with malice. “In defence, I value time to craft perfection. Announcing a set time dampens my methods and results in mechanics such as this one. Ugh, what a waste!” She threw the craft off of the table, the star unravelling itself immediately.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course.” You sarcastically waved at her embarrassment. “And you, Pantalone? What’s your excuse?”

“The scissors you gave me were tampered with! I call for–”

“So I’m the problem? Okay, whatever…”

You walked down the table, looking at each star neutrally then nodding and moving onto the next. Now, you’re not an expert, but did they really think you wouldn’t notice? They all look the exact same! They all look like copied versions of Scaramouche’s design! When watching him try to bribe you, they must have thought you liked his design the best and copied him to have a fair chance. Well, they’re wrong! You’re just going to pick the person who will give you the least trouble when answering their question, jokes on them!

…That was your original plan. After looking at all the stars, you felt a new motivation when noticing one person didn’t copy and stuck to their own principles. Also they may or may not be the only person to not take this seriously and you want to mess with the others a little bit. Pierro will agree with you, he’s the type to disregard any copycats so he won’t have trouble with your choice at all.

“Okay, I’ve decided on my winner.” You announced, stepping back to view the expectant Harbingers.

“Arlecchino, you win.”

“WHAT!?”

“But why?” She asked, not looking surprised or pleased. “I could care less about an answer to a question, nor do I care about winning this childish competition.”

“That’s actually why I picked you. And because your star is an original design - sorry Scara, but uhh, you might have won if the others didn’t copy.”

“Of course.” He grumbled, glaring at the Harbingers staring at him. “One day, I’m going to murder all of you fools and sell your parts to people far worse than Dottore! I’ll get back at all of you for ruining my chances!”

“Anyway,” You tuned his violent voice out. “Yeah, you’re the winner. Pierro, what do you think?”

“...I agree.” He said in a quieter tone. “Now, I will be returning to my office to continue what’s left of my work… and review what The Rooster has already completed.”

As he was walking away, you turned back to notice the majority of Harbingers had walked away to go back to what they were doing prior, bored after realising they wouldn't be able to profit with staying around for longer.

“Do I get to ask my question now?” Arlecchino tapped her elbow impatiently with folded arms.

“So you do want the reward?”

“Despite it not being my intention when joining, I would indeed like something that was promised. Whether it be an accident or a purposeful decision.”

“Okay, fine. Ask away then.” You shrugged.

“As you must already be aware, the majority of my Children from the Hearth hail from Fontaine, the nation of justice. I won’t lie to you, I’m beginning to grow increasingly concerned with the prophecy where–”

“--where the whole nation will be flooded and all the people will be killed except the archon? Yeah, I know of it. Your point?” You finished her explanation, already having an idea of where the conversation was heading.

“Then you will understand I care deeply about the future of my children. Tell me, will I succeed in convincing the Tsaritsa to visit Fontaine to retrieve the Gnosis in place of Rosalyne?”

“Of course you’d use the question to ask about your ‘precious children’.” Scaramouche mocked. “Just how idiotic can you be?? This is your chance to ask about the future!”

You gave a harsh glare with icy eyes in his direction before sighing, a smile on your face. “Yeah.”

“Hm? You have to give a higher detailed response to that.”

“You go to Fontaine, Childe coincidentally also there for his own personal motivations which may or may not be important. The whole time you’re there, you’re investigating Furina and the prophecy. Long story short, that I WILL NOT be elaborating, the prophecy is sorted and the people are saved. This includes the children in the House of the Hearth.” You explained, pleased with the question she asked you and your own personal answer. Wow, you can even impress yourself sometimes!

“Excellent.” She sighed in relief, her face unchanging. “Thank you. But I do have to ask, is the Hydro Archon really working to prevent the flood?”

“That’s two questions. But fine,” You shrugged. “You can trust her. Everything is proceeding to the plan, although interrogation and suspicion do indeed accelerate it to completion.” You thought out loud, noticing her questioning gaze and smiling deeper.

“That’s enough serious stuff. When are we going to discuss presents? Now that the tree is up we need to put the presents under it!” 

“Uh… We’re flat-out poor. We can’t afford presents.” Childe shrugged. “Guess you’ll have to accept my love as a present instead!”

“Ew, what are you, five? Wait… Don’t come over here! Not after saying something like that!” You panicked, watching him run over to you at full speed and choosing to run away.

“Scaramouche you know how you said you’d take me to the park? I’m cashing in that favour right now!”

[thewertsearch]

There’s the promised waveform - and I'm detecting more than a 'trace' of dissonance. Clearly, that final frog does some serious work on it.

What are you actually seeing in that pattern, Jade? Physical constants? Particle masses? Spatial topologies?

FGA: Okay Im A Vampire Now Apparently […] PCG: WHAT THE FUCK IS A VAMPIRE […] ?GG: she drinks blood >_> PCG: OH PCG: YOU MEAN A RAINBOW DRINKER PCG: YEAH, I ALREADY KNOW ABOUT HER TRASHY NOVEL FANTASIES.

Ghosts? Robots? Eldritch horrors? A puppet who lives on the moon? Yeah, that’s all real.

But vampires? PULL THE OTHER ONE, HARLEY.

PCG: I GUESS I HAVE NO CHOICE TO BELIEVE YOU BECAUSE SKEPTICISM IN THIS SITUATION IS FOR IDIOTS RIGHT?

You are absolutely correct, which is why I’m going to do you a solid, and not quote the rest of this paragraph.

PCG: IF I SAID "YEAH RIGHT! IF THERE'S A DRINKER IN THIS HIVE I'LL EAT MY COCOON!" I'D BE LIKE THE DUMB LUSUS IN THE MOVIE WHO DOESN'T BELIEVE THE KID WHEN HE TELLS IT THERE'S A RAINBOW DRINKER IN THE CLOSET.

Except to note how funny it is that, despite being weird monsters, lusii still fulfill the 'clueless parent' trope in troll fiction. I'd kill to see the Alternian take on, say, Fairly OddParents.

PCG: DID ECHIDNA TELL YOU WHERE TO FIND THIS FROG? ?GG: not exactly… ?GG: she just helped me remember

Here’s another hitherto unknown piece of of Sburblore. For a theorist like me, it's almost like it's Christmas!

Alright - so. Many years ago, Jade found... something on Prospit.

This something looks a lot like a tiny, 4x-prototyped Battlefield.

Now, this clearly ain’t no frog...

...but it sure looks like something that might grow into one.

The Battlefield is supposed to develop into a form where it can 'receive' the Genesis Frog - so maybe Genesis Frogspawn needs to be made of the same 'stuff' as a Battlefield, ensuring the two are able to interface the way they're supposed to, when the time comes.

[onlyrains]

[5:21pm]

genre: comfort, fluff wc: 1.1k ┊not proofread!

you are nothing near from being the greatest singer of the century, to begin with. you're not even a singer at all. but layla, a border collie of your best friend's–jake, might be your first fan ever.

whenever she sees you around in some comfortable circumstances, she's never hesitate to lay down beside you and sometimes even rest her jaw on your thigh. on top of that, one day when jake come to your place to check on you while you lay sick on your bed, she also lies and put her paw on your arm.

she keeps ignoring her nature as one of the most active and energetic breed and you have a soft spot for her also. so of course, you always gladly sing for her. you even made a playlist to sing for her, which full of coldplay's old songs that you found she loves the most.

as an owner, jake found this quite beneficial sometimes when he needs to done his things but very much confused at the same time. what's up with your voice? he's a good singer too. people even recognize him for that. but why's his dog, his best buddy, his love, never react the way she does for you?

"she's my child, jake." you always say.

"stop saying that. i literally clean, do the chores, and work for her?" and he always replies.

today, as he promised yesterday, he came to your place with layla. and no, you're not sick today, it's apparently the opposite. he arrived with a pissed, frustrated face and refuse to talk fifteen minutes ago. he's just walks around your living room with his disheveled white office shirt.

you continue to read your book while playing with layla's hair and humming to coldplay's song. you make sure to open your bedroom door widely to let him know that he can come in when he's ready. it's not the first time you've seen jake in this state and you know the best way to deal with it is just let him do anything he wants. he will talk about it when he's tired.

speaking of which, the tail of your eye catches his movement towards you. well, maybe it is a very serious matter since he has never got tired this quick.

"what's up?" you snap, closing your book on your stomach. layla got up at your sudden movement as she sees her owner walks in your direction. she jumps on the floor and her favorite song is now long gone.

"jake?" he sits on layla's spot earlier and lets out a deep sigh.

"it's work." his eyes looking at the white sheets beneath him and draw an imaginary circle with his index.

"i know. wanna talk about it?"

he drags his body to lay next to you, head burried in your pillow while his arms stretched out to his side and your neck, almost choking you.

"i don't know, girl. i'm just... tired."

"is it that bad?" you ask carefully.

he nods. "there's a problem with the project and this mf blame me for it," he groans. thank god your pillow muffled his voice.

"oh? what a prick."

"can you sing for me?" he raises his head.

you never turn your head so fast.

"what?" you blurt out a laugh.

he lies on his side, perfectly facing you. "oh, c'mon. you always make layla chill out with it."

"but you're not layla?"

"i'm her owner, you know. she's my daughter. like father like dau–"

"okay, stop. you started sound silly,"

"babe, c'mon. i just need to sleep. you know how much effort i put on this project? i barely had a proper sleep,"

as soon as that pet name came out of his mouth you know it's hard to win over him. he will starts pleading as soon as he can, so you let out a heavy sigh and stretch your arm reluctantly.

"c'mere,"

the next thing you know, he already burried his head on your shoulder. well, actually, this is your first time being this close with him in this kind of position despite your nth years of friendship.

so when he’s seemingly already found his spot on the crook of your neck, you can't help but squirm a little, but jake is too quick to catch your waist to prevent you from moving anywhere.

"don't move." he says against your neck.

you bite your inner cheek to hold back a sharp gasp that almost come out of nowhere.

you take a deep breath before placing your hand on his head, brushing his hair lightly. you decide to continue to sing to spark, which was previously forcibly cut off.

"my heart is yours," you start to whisper.

"it's you that i hold on to,

that's what i do,

and i know i was wrong,

but i won't let you down,

mmm, yeah, i will, yeah, i will, yes, i will," your voice get slightly lower.

"i said, oh,

i cry, oh,

yeah, i saw sparks,

yeah, i saw sparks." you massage his scalp lightly.

"sing it out,

la la la la la la,"

you feel his breathing becomes steady while in fact he's just enjoying his action to inhaling your scent that mixed with a soft fragrant from your newly washed sweater. he has never been this relax in a long time.

you keep on with the lyrics in humming as your eyes glued to the plain ceiling of your room. you feel his arm is still lazily attached to your waist then what are you doing, really? is it normal to cuddle your friend from high school? is it okay to comfort your guy friend like this?

you haven't finished think about that but jake already raised his head.

his eyes slightly red from the drowsiness that suddenly hit him but the smile on his mouth is as wide as ever. "y'know, layla actually has a good taste."

a heat suddenly strikes your cheek, causing it to turn to a shade of red.

his head turns to his dog on the floor. "dang, my girl is talented, for real."

you roll your eyes at him. "okay, now move."

he's quick to back on his previous spot, even more suffocating right now as he pulls you impossibly close to his body.

he tilts his head upward to face you. his wet eyes stares at you so innocently, which quite opposite to his actions that practically hugging you so tight while trying to sleep.

"ey, c'mon, don't be so stingy," he snuggles to you, again.

you bite your lip this time. maybe you just as tired as him, but you swear, you saw the sparks.

[confuzing]

I have this idea for an SVSSS fic where SQQ winds up regularly sharing dreams with both his LBH and OGLBH. I'd need to do a reread for it but I'm gonna post the broad strokes because I can't stop rotating it in my mind.

It's Abyss time but SQQ puts his foot down. No he's not pushing his Binghe into the Abyss, shut up System. Oh you're going to kill him? Then do it.

Then he throws his sword away and pulls LBH away from the Abyss.

SQQ: Ok honey I'm maybe about to drop dead but it's not your fault ok?

LBH: WHAT???

And then the System does indeed try to rip SQQ's soul out- except LBH, right there and terrified, mentally grabs hold of his Shizun's soul and won't let go.

MQF rolls up to a fucking nightmare, SQQ is in the process of having his soul ripped out by some kind of mystery curse? LBH is burning through his own supply of qi to stop it but that's a napkin on a stab wound- Liu Qingge put your sword down right now! Yes MQF can see LBH's part demon, now help him keep SQQ alive or fuck off - you too Sect Leader!

Meanwhile the System is glitching out, and decides to initiate a Punishment Protocol because this mess is all SQQ's fault and he won't die like a good user.

So it dumps him in the dreams of OGLBH, who's just been pushed in the Abyss by his own Shizun.

Faced with a very upset teen Binghe, SQQ does the only thing that he can. He hugs that boy and tells him none of this is his fault and he didn't do anything wrong.

It probably only works because OGLBH is very upset and desperate for comfort- and when OGLBH said "SQQ??" incredulously SQQ says "No, I'm sorry I know I look like him" and this man doesn't act like the SQQ he knows at all, and he gives really good hugs.

SQQ is stuck in OGLBH's dreams when he's not just... nowhere and after a few more short hug sessions (OGLBH can't usually sleep for long) OGLBH finally asks who exactly SQQ is then?

Right around this time MQF figures out how to stabilize SQQ without requiring LBH to be awake and actively channeling qi the whole time. So LBH passes the f out and goes to look for his Shizun, turning up right when SQQ is dreaming with OGLBH.

After a little Binghe stand off SQQ sits them both down and decides to just, tell them everything -he can here, the System can't stop him and it's already killing him what else can it do?

So he tells them about parallel universes, and his own original world, about Proud Immortal Demon Way, and his decision, upon waking up in his favorite book in the villian's body, to meddle every way he could. He tells them about the System and explains that it probably sent him here thinking OGLBH would hurt him, thinking he was OGSQQ. Everything.

Eventually MQF and a bunch of other cultivators untangle SQQ from the System, letting his soul come back to his body but leaving that door open between his mind and OGLBH's.

From there I just have ideas I'd want to explore, some of my favorites:

-OGLBH finding out about Without a Cure and that SQQ isn't telling his Binghe about the easy fix and having to decide if he's going to spill the beans or not.

-Every time I think about what to do with SQH I wind up thinking about what would probably be a whole side fic of court wranglings, political assassinations and interspecies dating drama after SQH runs away to hide with MBJ when SQQ wakes up and goes "you're cursed too right?"

-Both Binghes and their Meng Mos coming along on SQQ's scenic tour of SJ's traumatic backstory (I just need SQQ to hug that little tea-soaked Binghe only for him to split into the two older Binghes because when they entered this memory both of them inhabited the baby Binghe's avatar)

- The whole sect deciding that actually LBH is their half demon son and none of the other sects better even look at him funny. (The biggest reason for this might be SQQ waking up from being cursed and immediately threatening to kill everyone in the room and then himself if anything happens to LBH even though he can't even sit up. Also like, the kid's been crying nonstop for days now, not exactly scary demon behavior. Kid needs a hug and some juice)

-A very fraught conversation when OGLBH gets out of the Abyss where he tells SQQ he's going back to the mountain and SQQ refuses to ask him not to kill everyone because he knows exactly what OGLBH suffered at the hands of those alternate versions of the people SQQ loves.

-Every now and the the Binghes just meet up to hiss at each other like angry cats

[the-fab-fox]

Okay so this has been something I've been chewing on for a long while. About making this post I mean.

This one is to those who actively ingest fanfiction but seem to think it's okay to just read free fiction that people have put time and thought and crafted prose for your enjoyment and do nothing in return.

All we ever ask for and all we ever want is for y'all to AT THE VERY LEAST hit that kudos button if you like the work. That is the BARE MINIMUM of what you SHOULD be doing. Especially all of you who say you're too nervous to comment or don't wish to be perceived. And if you don't want your account on the list, you can log out and send a guest kudos.

But as I said, BARE MINIMUM. If you loved the fic, if you got something out of it that left you feeling good and energized (or whatever angst does for y'all) then I want to take a moment and strongly urge you to comment, subscribe (if a wip), and bookmark those works. Did you know there's an option to even mark it as a Fic Recommendation? You can put notes in to and say why you liked it and things like that (DO NOT DO A RATING IN PUBLIC BOOKMARKS HOWEVER). And, you can indeed make them private! The writer still gets the number added to their stats but your bookmark we won't see.

Anyway, I now wanna turn your attention to Exhibit A:

This is a list of my best performing fics. Do you see the problem with this? The green highlights are the hits I've received for those fics. The red is the Kudos and comment threads. Now the kudos is obviously right?

Let's look at my number one fic right now, Accidentally in Love (a Malleyuu fic from Twisted Wonderland fandom). It's the seventh fic in a romance series. As you can see, it's doing great as far as hits, right? And I know it's an amazing fic from the comments I have received and just from rereading it myself. Note, I am probably the biggest bully to myself as @sunshineandteddybears and @mellosdrawings and @romantichopelessly can tell you in great detail. So when I am saying it's really damn good, you can probably trust it's gonna be pretty damn good. And yet, a fic that has 4K hits only has 119 kudos. And now to bring your attention to the comment threads. So honestly with how bad readers are on actually commenting (which by the way if you log off you can send anonymously as a guest—you'll have to put in your email address but we authors won't see that)... 107 seems pretty good right? But you guys don't see that. You see what's on the info for the story. Unfortunately, on the fic info at the top of the story, it counts every single comment (including the Author's). (The comment threads is just every single starting comment, i.e. the first comment received from each commenter.)

The thing is, I—and probably quite a few other writers—do respond to every single comment.

So that means where the info on my fic itself says 230 comments, in reality, I'm at half that when I subtract my half of the comments. So that's actually 115 comments from other people. So some people might see that 230 and think oh they got a lot of comments so I don't think they want to hear from me or I can't be fucked and they're already doing good so.

NO. NO. NO. Do not look at the numbers as a guide if a fic is good or not. Do not look at the numbers and think that we don't need or deserve to get any more. And finally WE WANT TO HEAR FROM Y'ALL.

Excuses need to stop.

Speaking of numbers. Here's my over all stats current on AO3.

In the 3 years on this AO3 account (I've had others in the past and accounts on ff.net and live journal. I'm an oldie fanfic writer lol. 21 years of fanfic. My gods. 🤣) It didn't used to be like this guys. Back in the day I'd get 12 plus comments on a chapter and this is on stuff a teenager wrote.

We have got to get back to the point of supporting each other and building each other up. Also while I'm at it, I have a huge beef with the fact that fanartists get so much more positive feedback and replies and comments, but the thing is, even their numbers are skewed. You can go into the notes of a fanart on here that has 10k notes to see they have maybe 100-1K reblogs (if that, I'm being generous) and maybe 10 or so replies (if turned on) and the rest are all likes. EVERYONE has been on here long enough by now to know that likes do nothing to get a post in the algorithm and tags only do so much. Reblogs are the only way their art (or our fanfictions for people who post them on here) gets seen! By sharing!

So y'all gotta get better. Yes, we write for ourselves first, but ultimately a story is meant to be shared with everyone and feedback should not be optional if you're actively reading the fics or viewing the art for free and enjoyed it!

TLDR:

IF YOU FUCKING LIKE A FANFIC. KUDOS AT THE VERY LEAST BUT BE BETTER. COMMENT. BOOKMARK. SUBSCRIBE IF IT'S A WIP YOU LOVE. (Like, comment and reblog if on Tumblr)

IF YOU FUCKING LIKE A FANART ON TUMBLR. COMMENT. LIKE. REBLOG.

DO BETTER AS READERS AND US WRITERS AND ARTISTS WILL GIVE YOU THE WORLD (AND MANY OTHER WORLDS TO BOOT)

That is all. Please reblog the fuck out of this if you agree.

(and tagging my current and last fandoms so this can get in fandom spaces where it needs to be.)

[seriesxwriting]

Merry scroogemas

Paring- Rafe Cameron X kook reader

Series- Outer banks

Summary- You hate Christmas with everything in you but Rafe try’s to change that.

Warnings- Kissing.

Obviously- like usual my Christmas post is posted after Christmas…!

December the 1st

"How excited are you then?" Rafe came and sat down on my bed. I turned my phone off and rolled my head over to look at him. "It's December the first- it's about to be our first Christmas together- to be honest I thought you'd already have your tree up" he laughed but soon lost it once he saw my face. "What's wrong..." he asked me putting his hand out to pull me up. I sat up and shuffled closer to him, trying to figure out what to reply with.

"Rafe- I don't like Christmas" I told him avoiding eye contact at all costs. "Okay scrooge" he chuckled thinking I was joking. "it's my least favourite time of the year" I shrugged my shoulders looking up at him now, so he knew I was being serious. "You're being serious- nobody hates Christmas?" "I do..." I told him pulling back a little now. I know it was a very unpopular opinion- but it was my opinion.

"Come back" he wrapped an arm around my shoulders pulling me closer to him. "Can I ask why?" he whispered seeing that it was clearly effecting me. "That depends- if you wanna get deep or not" I shrugged my shoulders at my boyfriend. "Only with you my love" he nodded his head keenly and then laid a soft kiss on my forehead in comfort. "Well- my parents would often be so busy that Christmas was never a family thing, when I was little I went to a boarding school and- they never came and collected me on holidays" I began explaining.

Rafe never took his eye off me, he made it obvious he was taking note of everything I said. "When I reached upper school they took me out of my boarding school and sent me to our school- but nothing changed..." my eyes began to start filling up with salty tears. "They were always on long business trips over Christmas, and because i'm an only child I ended up being alone again- just in the house this time" I shrugged trying to shake off the tears. "Oh y/n" Rafe whispered closing his eyes.

'"Last year- my mum was at home for Christmas- dad had flown to Brazil for businness- I thought it was going to be different- but she didn't leave her office more than twice the whole day". "I'm so sorry- I had no idea..." he told me looking sad himself now. "No one does- no one knows- don't get me wrong my parents didn't do it because they don't love me- they just think that me having the material presents they get me is what Christmas is about, they didn't have presents when they were younger because they grew up on the cut" I replied to him.

"Have you ever spoken to them about it?" Rafe questioned but that just made me giggle. "Rafe suggesting communication? what have I turned you into" "I don't know- i'm shocked too to be honest" he joined in with my laughter. "But no- I haven't- money changed them they are very materialistic, their life is their work and nothing I say is going to change that". "I think I might need a strong drink after that, because you've just shattered my heart" "Oh Rafe" I sighed smiling.

"Ive grown very used to it" "You know you're making it worse don't you?" he swept his hand under my arms and pulled me against his body into a hug. "What's happening this year?" he whispered in my ear while holding me tight. "My dads already on a two month business trip and mum leaves on the 16th and comes back on new years" I told him, and then held my breath waiting for the sympathy about how pathetic it was to roll in.

"Then my house is your home from the 16th until new years" Rafe called out making me jerk away from him so I could see his expression. “No- Rafe I cannot impose like and especially not on Christmas” I shook my head vigorously. “Oh come on you’re not imposing y/n you’re family and family are supposed to be together on Christmas” he replied making his face go soft.

“Rafe- I don’t like Christmas- I’ll just bring the spirit down” I answered him sadly. “You light rooms up- you could never bring anything down”. I blushed under his gaze but still wasn’t sure. “I won’t enjoy the day knowing you’re home on your own” “but Rafe you don’t understand- I’m used to it it doesn’t effect me now- I like being on my own because I don’t like Christmas” I explained to him slowly so that he’d understand how serious I was.

“Will you think about it?” He turned his head and put it on his shoulder. “Yeah alright” I nodded giving him a weak smile. “Thank you” he whispered leaning in and kissing me gently. “I love you” rage murmured against my lips. “Not as much as I love you” I returned giving him a peck on the lips.

December the 3rd

“Hello handsome” I smiled as I opened the door. He stood there with a giant smile across his face as if he was plotting something. “Hello my love, you ready?” “Where are you taking me Rafe cameron?” I smirked stepping down onto my front door step to join him. Rafe embraced me and kissed my forehead. I loved how affectionate he’d been with me lately. It took him a while to come out of his shell but now he was always touching me.

“It’s a surprise, come on” he smiled taking my hand in his and leading me to his car. It was pretty dark now and Rafe had told me he had plans for us. But what possible plans could he have for us at 8pm on a Monday. He closed my door for me and then got into the drivers seat. As he began driving he asked me about my day and I asked him about his.

I hadn’t seen him since his offer to spend Christmas at his. We’d both been busy seeing friends and doing work. I enjoyed talking to him but I was also watching the road to see where he was taking us. But it seemed to be into town. Rafe parked in one of the car parks, it was rammed with people and cars. “I wonder why it’s so busy tonight?” I looked at him as we both climbed out the car.

“It’s a mystery” Rafe wiggled his eyebrows, I gave him a funny look wondering what he was up to. “Come here” he put his hand out and I clasped his one as we made our way into town. “It’s packed” I muttered looking around. “There’s top” I pointed through the mass of people. “Oh yeah” Rafe smiled seeing his friend, but he just squeezed my hand and we walked past the group of boys.

“Did you not wanna say hello?” I questioned confused for a second. “No my love, I’m here with you my attention is on you” he told me smiling down at me. “What’s the time?” Rafe asked me, distracting me from blushing. “Erm, twenty past eight” I told him looking at my watch. “Perfect, we made good timing”. “What time do we need to be there for?” “Starts at half eight” Rafe replied as we weaved through the crowds.

As we came to the main square a huge Christmas tree stood, it was unlit but there were loads of people crowed round it. “Rafe” I looked up at him with a raised eyebrow knowing what was going on now. “Yes gorgeous” he answered catching onto my tone. “Is today what I think it is?” I questioned as we came to a stop. “Depends what you think it is” he smirked knowing I knew what we were up to now.

“It’s the Christmas switch on huh”, Rafe chuckled nodding his head and pulling me close to his body. “Yes- I thought it might get you a little more spirited” “I see the Christmas lights every year Rafe, they’re always the same”. Rafe let out a little laugh again “well they might be a little different this year” “I can’t bet you fifty quid they won’t be” I sang back to him. Rafe put his arm round my shoulders and turned us towards the tree.

Soon everyone began counting down Rafe joined in with a huge grin on his face. I felt a wave of sadness that I didn’t feel the same excitement about the season. I felt like I was just brining him down. But my mind was distracted when the lights turned on. There was only one word for it. Gorgeous.

The lights reached all around the tree and the buildings, all different colours twinkling in the night. There were so many more this year, so many different shapes on the street lamps, snowflakes, Christmas puddings, Santa faces. The lights swirled round the drain pipes, and the guttering. I gazed around in amazement, the lights reflected in my eyes. I caught sight of Rafe, he wasn’t staring at the lights he was staring at me.

“How’d you know they were going to be different this year?” I laughed throwing my arms round his neck. “I may have pulled a few strings to make it a little more magical for you this year”. My eyes widened “Rafe Cameron” I shook my head in disbelief. “You know I’d do anything for you, I want you to experience a different Christmas this year” “does that mean you have some more tricks up your sleeve” I chuckled pushing up on my tip toes to get close to his face.

“Lots” he whispered giving me a small kiss. “Come on- I’ve lit up the whole town for you, let’s go walk down some streets” Rafe suggested putting his hand out for me to hold. I gave him a warm smile and grabbed onto his bicep as we began to walk round. I can’t believe he did this for me.

December the 7th

I knocked on Rafes door eyeing up the giant reef attached to the knocker. “Hello my love” he smiled opening the door for me and stepping backwards. “Hey handsome” I gave him a kiss as entered the house and began taking my shoes off. “I’ve told you you don’t need to knock anymore y/n, you’ve been around long enough to just come in- the house is yours” he told me pulling my coat off me gently and hanging it u for me.

“I know I know- but then i wouldn’t get my lovely greeting from you”. Rafe laughed at me shaking his head, “come on I set some stuff up for us” he said, I watched as an excitement flickered in his eyes. What christmasy task has he got for us to do now. I trailed behind rafe as we strode into the kitchen, ward was in there with rose and they both turned and smiled at me. “Hey y/n, how are you” Ward twinkle waving at me.

“Oh I’m okay thank you, how are yous” I smiled back leaning against the island. “Yeah not bad- just trying to organise Christmas as well as keep up with work” Ward rolled his eyes playfully. “We hear you might be joining us this year” rose joined in moving her eyes from me to Rafe. “Oh um…” “she’s still thinking about it” Rafe said for me, putting an arm round my waist. “Well, it would be lovely to have you here hunny, you’re always welcome” Rose nodded rubbing her husbands arm.

“Thank you- you don’t know what that means to me” I expressed watching them smile at each other. “We will leave you to it” ward nodded at the island table. I turned my head round seeing a huge box on the table. Rafe had taken everything out the box and opened the packaging. “Gingerbread house?” I looked at him shocked. “Yeah?” “I’ve never made one before” I blinked walking round to take a look at the box.

“Well I haven’t since I was a kid” rafe scratched the back of his head. “I guess it’s a little childish but it might be fun” “Rafe- I love it” I walked over rubbing his arm. “Thank you” I smiled getting excited now. “I just thought because you like doing your little craft stuff you might make a masterpiece” he joined me sitting down and we both got started picking up the pieces. The actual making of the gingerbread house I kinda sat back talking about what i’d been up to since I last saw him at the light switch on and let Rafe do the work. He seemed to know what he was doing.

But the decorating I was in charge of. We put icing all on the roof and the walls as well and sticking little treats on. Rafe had brought little sweets for us to use too, but we ended up eating half of them before they even made it onto the house. In the end it looked pretty good, we’d done a good job, I’d even go as far as saying it looked better than the boxes one. “Right, let’s take some pictures then we can make hot chocolate and eat it” Rafe rubbed his hands together.

“Mm- yeah sounds good” I nodded getting my phone out. “Smile handsome” I called out at him. We took some together and he took some of me, before Rafe went off to make us our drinks. I watched him smiling the whole time, wondering how I got so fucking lucky.

December the 15th

“Hello my love” I smiled at Rafe as I walked down the stairs, he was talking to my mum in the hall way. “Hello beautiful- you look lovely” he gazed up at me. “Thanks hun” I gave him a kiss on the cheek. “What you two up to tonight?” My mum wondered putting her hands behind her back. “I have no clue, Rafe seems to like surprises this month” I giggled, his hand wrapped round my waist. “She’ll like it, but it’s a bit of a drive so we better get going” “okay darlings, well I’ll probably have left for the airport hotel by the time you get back” she told me.

“Well have a great trip mum” she walked closer to hug me goodbye. “Merry Christmas darling, all your presents are under the tree, you’ll love them this year” she rubbed my arms. “Yeah- thank you” I nodded taking a step back. “Yours will be waiting for you when you get back” I told her feeling Rafe’s arm squeezed round me again. “Oh y/n me and your father don’t want anything off you” she shook her head. “It’s just something little- but we better get going- I’ll see you on new years”.

“Yes- you two enjoy yourself, I’ll see you later Rafe” she waved him off and walked off upstairs. And we left as quick as possible. “Wow- I can’t believe she’s that blind to how it makes you feel” Rafe shook his head baffled at my mum’s behaviour. “Christmas just isn’t a big thing in my family Rafe- it’s okay, she thinks she’s doing the right thing she’s going to work and buying me everything I could ever want” I shrugged my shoulders.

“I suppose” he sighed turning on the car. The drive was quite a while away, we again just spoke about what we’d been up to since we last saw each other on the 7th. Christmas wasn’t far now, and because my mum left tomorrow I had a feeling Rafe was going to want an answer tonight at some point. We drove about an hour away from home, and I really couldn’t put my finger on what we were doing tonight. Rafe parked in another car park, there were lots of people in this one too.

“What are we up to then” “come on” Rafe laughed throwing his arm round my neck. “You don’t have to wait much longer. Rafe lead me through the edge of town to the main streets and before my eyes stood a huge Christmas market flowing all the way down the street. There were stalls everywhere, loud Christmas music coming from the speakers. The lights weren’t as pretty as the ones back home but the market stalls made it very cute. “I’ve never been to a Christmas market”.

“Well I’m honoured to take you to your first one” Rafe rubbed his thumb across my hand. “Anything that catches your eye, it’s yours” “Rafe- you don’t have to do that I have my own money” I told him as we began the walk into the town center. “I took you here so I could spoil you, so anything you want my love, it’s yours”. “Well- we should probably get a drink while we’re walking around” pointing at a stall with a large sign.

“I’ll get a hot chocolate- what do you fancy?” He asked me turning us toward the line. “I’ll have a mulled wine since it’s Christmas”. As soon as the words came out my mouth I frowned to myself. Why was I going along with Christmas traditions? Maybe Christmas wasn’t so bad with the right people. “Of course gorgeous” Rafe answered me taking his wallet out, but I watched the smirk on his face, he looked proud of himself. He knew I was sliding over to his side.

Me and Rafe walked around all the stalls, trying things on, trying samples, buying things. Rafe got some every strong rum and he brought me a load of different trinkets. Jewellery, crochet animals, plants, little paintings, candela. We eventually had walked around and had brought everything we wanted, so we stopped off to get some food from one of the stalls and headed over to some benches to scran it.

“Rafe- I really enjoyed the Christmas markets” I smiled up at him holding my burger in my hands. “Correction- Rafe I really enjoyed spending your money”. I laughed nudging him “how dare you I offered to pay”, he joined in with the laughing. “You will never pay for anything while I’m around” he shook his head and stopped laughing. “So- have you thought anymore about my offer?”. I bit my lip staring at my food. “Okay Rafe- I’ll spend Christmas with you”. His eyes told me everything I needed to know.

He was so excited and that warmed my heart and soul. “You won’t regret it, you’ll have the best Christmas with us” he told me, practically bouncing in his seat. “I know handsome- thank you for everything you’ve done this month”, “well was i successful?- do you like Christmas a little more now?” Rafe slimmed his eyes at me. “Well- I’ve loved spending time with you and if that’s what Christmas is about then yes, you were successful” I nodded my head, it was impossible to stop my smile.

“I’ll take that”, Rafe leant in and softly kiss my cheek. “I love you Rafe- Merry Christmas”. His eyes widened in shock at my words but he still smiled. “I love you y/n, merry Christmas my love”.

Rafe Cameron masterlist

Outerbanks masterlist

All series masterlist

Masterlist of masterlists

[jintaka-hane]

Hiiiiii 👋

First of all I love your work, and I’m so excited for your New Year’s event! Looking forward to read all the smooches 😘

If it’s okay can I request Penguin for the event pleaseee? Thank you so much! 💕

[Kiss your blorbo at the New Year’s Eve event]

PENGUIN

Summary: You think you’re going to spend New Year’s Eve alone in your cabin when Penguin knocks on your door. Word count: 1000 Warning: x gn!reader; fluff; kissing All my stories are written entirely in Spanish and then translated into English, so I apologize for any mistakes I might make.

You know Trafalgar Law isn’t the kind of guy who’s into celebrations. You knew that when you joined his crew, and it’s never bothered you. He more than makes up for it in so many other ways, and you’re proud to serve under his command. But deep down, that night, you can’t help feeling a little sad. It’s your first New Year’s Eve aboard the Polar Tang, and you’re already anticipating that when midnight comes, you’ll be alone, asleep in your cabin.

You toy with the food on your plate during dinner, lost in thought and letting out sighs you don’t even realize. Someone who does notice, though, is Penguin, who’s been watching you closely, just as he has since the day you first set foot on the submarine.

Penguin adores you. He loves your smile, the way your lips curve upward every time you see him, and the way your eyes soften whenever he makes you laugh with one of his goofy antics. But tonight, you’re not doing any of those things. And something inside him tells him exactly why.

When dinner ends, you help clear the dishes, say goodnight to your crewmates, and head to your cabin alone. It doesn’t take long to brush your teeth, run a comb through your hair, and slip into your nightgown with a wistful sigh. Just as you pull the covers over yourself, a soft knock comes at the door, gentle, as if the person on the other side isn’t sure if you’re already asleep.

Curious, you sit up and head to the door, clutching your nightgown to cover yourself more securely before cracking it open just a few inches.

“Penguin?” Your eyes widen when you see him standing there, smiling under his cap with a faint blush coloring his cheeks.

“Uh… hi,” he says awkwardly, holding up a bottle of champagne and two glasses he’s probably “borrowed” from the galley. “I hope you like celebrating the new year as much as I do…”

Your face lights up with a grin so big it covers your entire face, and grabbing him by his boilersuit, you tug him into your room.

“I’ll take that as a yes…?” he chuckles.

“Yes! Penguin, I’m so happy!!!” You bounce in excitement and pull him into a tight hug. He tries to return it, but with the champagne and glasses in hand, he can only awkwardly lift his arms. Laughing, you take them from him and skip over to your nightstand to set them down. “Thank you!”

“Oh, It’s nothing,” he grins, rubbing the back of his neck and blushing even more as he realizes just how much it affects him to see you so radiant.

“There's still an hour until midnight,” you say as you place the glasses carefully on the small table, “What are we going to do until then?”

Throwing that smirk of his that you like more than you really want to admit, Penguin reaches into his pants pocket, pulls out a deck of cards, and waves them in front of your eyes.

“Cards?”

“Yes!” you clap your hands. 

Together, you grab a few blankets and pillows from your bed and arrange them on the floor to create a cozy little fort. Once you're done, the two of you settle into the blanket nest, sitting cross-legged and facing each other.

“Shall we start?,” Penguin asks, shuffling the cards and setting up two small piles between you.

The hour flies by as you play. It’s turning out to be one of the best nights of your life, laughing with him until your stomach practically hurts. You like Penguin. You like him a lot. He’s always treated you well and ensured you were as comfortable as possible aboard the submarine, despite Sashi’s constant teasing. And having him all to yourself that night feels like a dream come true.

You watch him study his cards with intense focus, catching the mischievous smirk that appears when he has a good hand. And you can’t help but wonder what his eyes hide beneath the brim of his cap every time you catch him glancing at your nightgown.

"Hey," he says, rolling up the sleeves of his boilersuit and looking at his watch. "There's one minute left until midnight."

"Oh! The bottle!" you exclaim nervously and try to stand up, but he grabs you by the arm and pulls you close to him.

"No! There's no time! And shh," Penguin laughs, motioning with his hands for you to lower your voice. "You're going to wake everyone else."

You cover your mouth to stifle a laugh, and both of you lean over the watch, staring intently as the hands move in rhythm with the ticking. You're very close to each other. So close that your head nearly brushes against his cap, and both of you can feel the warmth radiating from the other.

When there are only 10 seconds left until midnight, you begin the countdown together.

“Ten, nine, eight, seven,” you whisper.

“Six, five, four,” he continues.

“Three, two, one…” You smile at him. “Happy N—”

Your words are drowned out by his lips pressing against yours. Your eyes widen in surprise, yet the sweet, gentle movement of his mouth on yours makes you close them and surrender to the tender, careful kiss. But it ends as quickly as it began.

“I-I’m sorry,” Penguin stammers, his blush deepening as he grabs the brim of his cap and pulls it down to shield his eyes. “I-I didn’t let you say Happy New Year...”

You stare at him, your cheeks also a shade of pink, and blink a couple of times, still too stunned to form a reply.

“Wait,” he says quickly, lifting his wrist and fiddling with the dial on his watch to turn the hands back. “I’ll rewind it five minutes so you can—hmmph.”

This time, it’s your lips silencing him as you throw yourself at him. You lean so far over him that he has to place one hand on the floor to keep his balance, and, smiling into the kiss, he brings his other hand to the nape of your neck, pulling you closer to deepen the kiss further.

The champagne bottle remained untouched, left forgotten, as your lips didn’t take a single moment’s rest the entire night.

Happy holidays chibinasuu!!

.........................................

Taglist: @fanaticsnail @armiliadawn @pandora-writes-one-piece @i-am-vita @eustasscapitankid @nocturnalrorobin @daydreamer-in-training <3

[avelera]

Oh, I LOVE this point, because I was just noting to my partner the other day that one of the many influences on Arcane is clearly Lord of the Rings and one of the places you see it most is in the way people look at Hexgems and Hextech items for the first time.

It's not just Powder who gets the glint in her eyes the first time she sees a Hextech gemstone.

The first time Vi picks up the Atlas Gauntlets, she gets the blue glint in her eyes as if it hypnotizes her. Later, Cait notes how Vi seems to believe Jayce's gauntlets will solve everything for her, to perhaps a worrying degree.

Jayce is unwilling to put down his Hextech hammer in the Anomaly future to the point where dragging it around is actively endangering his chance of survival AND permanently maims him.

Even Heimerdinger gets the glint in his eyes the first time he sees the Hextech gemstones, it's this very particular blue shine, and if I was less lazy, I'd go hunting down all the gifs and images but SUFFICE TO SAY, every single time a characters sees Hextech up close for the first time, they get a very particular glow in their eyes.

Personally, I think the metaphor here is simply: power.

Hextech gives you the power to do the thing you want to do. I'd argue the sense of power the gemstone gives Powder is what eggs her on to make her monkey bomb in the first place that brings such destruction to everyone she loves in 1.03.

Viktor becomes obsessed with the Hexcore to the point where he's ignoring the living people in his life who want to spend time with him while he's alive, like Sky and Jayce, so even if Viktor manages to stay alive he's demonstrated that he's not living.

As noted, Vi becomes reliant on the gauntlets, Jayce's mother notes with fear how obsessed Jayce has become with magic and Hextech (arguably, he's Patient Zero in all this) to the point where he's ready to die if he can't have Hextech in his life, it's so beautiful he can't imagine wanting to live in a world without it, and arguably his moment of demonstrated growth and healing at the end of the show is when Viktor and human connection replaces the value he once put on Hextech as the center of his life.

Heimerdinger also makes an interesting note when he says he thought the danger of magic came from humanity's, "Turbulent relationship with power." Which is very in line with the One Ring.

However, he goes on to say that the Arcane itself might be responsible in part for the destruction that springs forth from its use, which implies a will beyond that of the mage wielding it.

So I think on one level, Hextech and its intoxicating influence works as a simple and beautiful metaphor for power, exactly the way the One Ring does.

But, because we're in a fantasy world too, there is a deeper implication with both Hextech and the One Ring that arguably inspired it that there is a will at work, and it's a will that is seductive and a will that bends towards destruction.

From the moment people get that shine of Hextech in their eyes, they begin to act differently unless they wrench themselves from its influence. Already unbalanced people, like Powder, fall very quickly and spiral into destructive uses from it almost from the start. Stronger personalities disavow it, like Cait saying that Hextech will keep us alive but it won't save us, only for her to fall prey to its siren call after the attack on the Memorial unbalances her emotions further as well.

The lure of power is particuarly appealing to those who feel they've lost control but there is a sense that Hextech and magic by extension also preys upon those who are attracted to it.

And with the Hexcore representing the Apex form of Hextech, well, let's just say I'm not sure Viktor stood a chance at all, with how much he felt out of control of his own life (for very understandable reasons) and how it took a reaffirmation of connection with others to restabilize him and make him see the damage this pursuit of power had caused.

You know, it's probably ridiculous to assume that Viktor is being somehow mind controlled by the Hexcore in S2 of Arcane. Obviously his actions are entirely his own, right?

After all, mind control plotlines can be a tricky to pull off and when it's employed, creators tend to put a lot of signposts in to let you know what's really happening and how the character isn't themselves anymore.

For example, creators might do things like... having the character's eye color suddenly change, since eyes are the windows to the soul.

Or... creators might indicate that the character's voice has changed somehow, to indicate that another will is acting through them and they're not entirely themselves anymore.

Certainly one really common trope in mind control plotlines is the mind-controlled character is hearing some kind of voice in their head telling them what to do, or seeing someone that isn't there who guides them or controls them.

Certainly in a pinch, if you really want to drive home that a character has been mind controlled and hasn't been themselves, you'd make it pretty obvious by having them be horrified by what they've done once the mind control wears off!

Bonus points if their eyes revert back to their natural color and any other signs of a different voice or appearance go away once the mind control is finally lifted! That way it's definitely clear that they've been set free from whatever influence was upon them.

But seriously, without these sorts of really glaring signposts we can't really be sure if a mind control plotline was intended at all!

(Tongue-in-cheek aside, I actually love the subtlety of how Arcane executed the Hexcorized Viktor plotline, and I love how much ambiguity remains. But for anyone who thinks he was totally in control, I mean, come on guys. When I started going down the list of all the things film and tv usually does to signal a mind control plot I literally burst out laughing when I realized how many of them Arcane had hidden in plain sight.)

[kawoala]

DRIVEN BY ADRENALINE suna rintarou. chapter 004 ; jailbird.

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২ 𓂅 ࣪ ೨ ; 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓 (1,033)

২ 𓂅 ࣪ ೨ ; 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆 (bailing someone out of jail, runa being upset but only bc she loves her cousin, flirty! suna AGAIN, tiny bit of arguing, kind of also a filler :/)

There are many perks of having a roommate. For example, you’re no longer alone. Now, when you stay up late, there is someone keeping you company, making you laugh and swapping war stories with you.

Just as there are perks, there are bad things as well. For example, you can hear everything that goes on. Including when Runa gets a phone call in the middle of the night, despite her phone being silent.

“Hello?” Her voice groggy, sleep still coating her throat. She pauses, then clears her throat. “Rin? What are—“ she stops talking, or she’s cut off. You roll over in bed and face her. “Oh, okay, yeah. Yeah, I’ll be there in a minute. Okay, yeah, love you too.”

She glances at you and, even in the dark, she can see your eyes open. “Sorry,” she apologizes in a whisper. “Rin called me. He, um, got arrested. Again.”

You blink a couple times, your tiredness suddenly gone. You sit up at the same time she does. “Again?” You repeat. You watch her slip on her shoes, forgetting about even needing socks. “Are you going to bail him out?”

“Yeah,” she says, standing up and rushing to put a coat on. “I’m sorry I woke you up. I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Um, wait.” She stops, but you can see the urgency in her eyes. “Can I go with you? I don’t mean to be codependent, or whatever, but, um.”

She sighs, pressing the palm of her hand against her forehead, then nods. “Yeah,” she says, nodding. “Yeah, you can come. Just, uh, hurry up. Please.”

Suddenly, all the years of people calling you weird for sleeping in socks are thrown out the window. All you have to do is slip on some shoes. Thanks to the extremely cold AC in your building, you’re already in a hoodie and sweatpants.

The streets are practically empty as Runa drives down them. That’s to be expected, though, since it’s nearly three o’clock in the morning on a Tuesday. She opts out of playing music. Her knuckles are white as they grip the steering wheel. You wonder how many times she’s done this before. 

You’ve never been to a police station. Actually, that’s a lie. You went on a field trip in middle school— the first and last time you’d ever been inside one. You don’t know how bailing someone out works, either, but Runa looks familiar with the process, so you just follow her.

The police station is quiet— unexpectedly so. You spent years of your childhood watching police shows, so you expected it to be a little more rowdy than a homeless man and a sobbing teenage girl. It’s colder than you expected, too. Even though you’re wearing a hoodie, you still have to wrap your arms around yourself.

The woman at the front desk seems familiar with Runa. They talk in hushed voices for a minute or two, and then Runa gestures for you to follow her. You glance back at the desk woman, but she’s typing away at her computer once again, seemingly honed in on whatever.

You follow Runa to what you assume is the back of the station. There are jail cells lined up against the wall, but most of them are empty. You stop at the last one and a quiet gasp leaves your mouth at the sight.

It’s Rin, but he’s hunched over, elbows on his knees, head in his hands. His knuckles are visibly bruised and you think there might be blood staining his shirt. He looks up at the absence of further footsteps. His eyes are red.

“You’re an idiot,” Runa says, crossing her arms over her chest.

His eyes flicker from her to you and you wave. “Hi, Rin.”

“I mean—“ She scoffs. “This is, what, the third time in as many months? Get it together, Rin! Like, what were you thinking? You know how much this costs me?”

“Costs you?” Rin repeats, scoffing as he now stands up. “I pay you back every time, don’t even.”

She clamps her jaw shut, and you know it’s because she’s too angry to speak. She glances back and waves her hand. The next thing you know, Rin is standing next to you and Runa.

You’re quiet, because what else are you supposed to do? Runa and Rin keep glaring at each other and, for a brief moment, you think they’re communicating telepathically. Rin looks at you, a small smirk on his face, and you look away.

This was a bad idea.

When you finally leave, something occurs to you. Where are you supposed to sit now? The front seat or the back seat? Rin is her cousin, but she’s mad at him, so maybe she’ll make him sit in the back? Your feet seem to stutter and you trip a bit, catching yourself before you can hit the ground. Rin and Runa look back, brows furrowed, but you clear your throat and shrug.

And then Runa solves all your problems by getting in the passenger seat. Rin is driving, got it. You get in the backseat and sit behind Rin.

This is ridiculous. The car ride is quiet. You can practically see steam coming off of Runa. Rin is driving with one hand. Your head is swimming. You stare out the window and look at the houses as you pass them.

Rin drives to his house and, before he leaves, he walks over to your side of the car and leans down into the window. “You came with her.”

You shrug, wringing your fingers in your lap. “I’ve never been to a police station before.” It’s an excuse, you know he knows. “And I was bored.”

“You were sleeping,” he hums out. “I think,” he leans closer, now whispering, “you just wanted to see me.”

“What?” Your face heats up, eyes widening a bit. “That’s— I didn’t— Runa was just—“

He laughs and smacks the roof of the car. “I’ll see you guys later, yeah?” He looks at Runa and stops laughing. “I’m sorry, Runie. I’ll pay you back tomorrow.”

“Yeah, whatever.” She rolls her eyes. She puts the car in drive and drives off.

@sahrii , @cherrysurf , @heartmaddie , @jpegarchives , @massacremars

@vertejay , @tiramizuloz , @gumims , @mybelovedvi , @chaotic-neutral-ig

@usbrous , @iheartamora , @iluv-ace , @xavlyzn , @velvetreds

@mysticstrawberryballoon , @h0n3y-l3m0n05 , @aethersluvrr , @smiithys , @rriwyu

@twiishaa , @kissingkzuha

[serge-starr]

If you hate Donald Trump and Elon Musk like I do, I need your advice, please read this

Red text - Why I hate them

Blue text - My problem

Green text - Why it's a problem/why I need advice

Genuinely, do I even really have to explain why I hate Trump? Is it not ovious enough? He is one of the most evil people ever known and there is NO SUCH THING as a "good trump supporter". THEY'RE ALL BAD. He is openly a misogynist and talks about women so poorly. He talks about them like they're s-x objects and says that women deserve punishment if they get abortions. He's been accused of SA by DOZENS, literally DOZENS of women. He even sexualises his own daughter and says that he would date her if they weren't related. Furthermore, he's cheated on all of his wives.

And what else? He is racist. Straight up, he is literally just racist. AND transphobic. He also openly admires dictators and said that he wants to become one himself. He said that he wants an army just like (Germany mustache guy)'s. He has a friend called Nicholas Fuentes who also has openly said that he admires (Germany mustache guy), is a Holocaust denier and said, I quote, "your body, my choice" and "there will never be a female president". Trump has unfair tax policies that only benefit rich people and fuck over the middle and lower class. I struggle to explain this and why it upsets me to my parents because my parents don't care about politics or understand me as a person. Even if they did they wouldn't have the same views as me. They're conservative and I'm alternative.

So my problem is that my Mother says that all politicians are narcissists. I tried to reason with her and explain that politicians might just be people who stand for something and want to make change. She said that all politicians are power hungry and all they want is money and fame. I told her that I was passionate about politics and I cared about it a lot. She said that I shouldn't care about politics. I tested her standards and told her "what if I want to work in politics? Does that make ME a narcissist? Or does it not apply to me because I'm your child?" My Mum said that I would never make it as a politician because I'm too soft.

My Dad on the other hand, has bought a tesla, for multiple reasons. Firstly because they're good for the environment, and also because he liked the car's design/functions and he liked that he didn't have to pay for gas. I have begged my parents multiple times to not take me anywhere in that car (we have other cars). My Dad asked me to explain why and I told him that it went against my beliefs to go in the car. The company of tesla is partially owned by Elon Musk who is the richest man in the world and oh my God he is an ASSHOLE. He has so much fucking money that he doesn't even need and once he literally prevented money from being donated to a charity for children's cancer. He is the definition of a priviledged asshole. And of course he's a fucking Trump supporter. My parents believe that I'm being unreasonable but I don't think they understand how much it truly upsets me. At this point, it's not even political opinions, it's a political fact. I don't support Donald or Elon, I never have, and I never will. It is not justifiable to support them.

I need your advice because my Mum has continuously forced me to get in that car and take me places with it, like school, my art club, to town or literally just anywhere. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of people seeing me get out of it at school. It's embarassing. My parents don't understand. My Dad said that if I don't want to get in the tesla then I can just stop going to art club and other places. He asked me to explain why I hated the tesla and I told him it was difficult to explain.

What if people at my school think I'm a trump supporter? Look, I'm always one who doesn't care what other people think, but that's only if I'M BEING AUTHENTIC AND MY TRUE SELF. That tesla is not me, it's not my thing and it never will be. I hate going in that car. I hate its size, I hate its design, I hate its company, I hate everything about it. I'm sick of worrying that my friends and classmates think I'm a priviledged asshole. I wish my parents had a sense of reality and would just understand this.

Please, if you have any kind of solution, tell me. And don't say something like "Oh just try explaining to your parents how you feel and why you're uncomfortbale". DUDE I'VE TRIED THAT 9892423 TIMESSS. THEY WON'T LISTEN. THEY DON'T GET IT.

Who can I call? Who can I reach out to? Who can I ask for help? WTF DO I DO???!?!

That's all! Thanks for reading

[gibberishfangirl]

WINDBREAKER | twinzies

Synopsis ✰ being a couple consists of matching doesn’t it?

Characters ✰ Haruka Sakura, Hajime Umemiya, Hayato Suo, Akihiko Nirei, Toma Hiragi, Mitsuki Kiryu, Jo Togame, Choji Tomiyama

Contains ✰ sfw!, established relationship, matching accessories/items, teasing, couple goals tbh, fluff, literally just cutest couple stuff

when matching with Sakura ᡣ𐭩 it had to be kept simple and light. if you suggested anything too much or something too obvious he might have a heart attack. in all honesty the fact that you two had matching phone charms didn’t even register all that much in his head. he’d notice a cute mini miffy charm that you had connected to your phone and stare at it. he wouldn’t even realize the amount of the times you caught him looking at it. you thought it was cute to see your boyfriend be intrigued by the same things you liked. it inspired you to get him the same one you had for his. you surprised him with it and he’d blush while saying “thanks… whyd you get me one?” “no reason, just thought it would look cute on your phone too.” your smile would make him even more flustered as he was quick to put it on. a few days went past and sakura was slightly memorized by the gift, he’d play with it when he had free time or spend him time just looking at it. one time when he was fidgeting with it Nirei distracted him by saying “hey that’s a cute phone charm sakura! doesn’t your girlfriend have the same one?” “oh yeah… she does.” another blush was found creeping up his face as he realized you two have the same exact charm.

Umemiya ᡣ𐭩 wasn’t by any means a shy guy so whenever it came to matching or expressing any sort of affection he had no issue with it. he would want to do anything that would make you happy and he also liked the idea of showing off your relationship even more. you were all his and he’d let the entire world know if he could. no amount of teasing or comments could ever make him retract his feelings. even if it meant the teasing would leak into his meetings and personal conversations. “you’re not a dog y’know, wearing a chain with their name on it? just buy yourself a collar at that point.” Hiragi would tease, not meaning his words but just trying to get a reaction out of Ume. not that it worked, Ume knew exactly what he was trying to do. “no need to be so bitter Hiragi, i still care about you. don’t feel like you’re getting replaced.” Ume would pat Hiragi’s back sympathetically as if he were consoling him to which Hiragi would just roll his eyes at. it was impossible to make Ume feel any ounce of shame. especially when it was about his personal relationship with you.

when you mentioned matching couple’s clothing Suo ᡣ𐭩 was a bit caught off guard. not that he was against it by any means, it’s just that he didn’t think you’d be the type to suggest it. the matching essence was more minimalist than anything since the two of you would coordinate the outfits to go together. you two would have matching shoes and simple jewelry. you would wear a black skirt while he wore black pants and then have matching colored shirts (different styles, same color). anyone who saw you two apart wouldn’t assume you’d have a matching twin but it made sense whenever you two were reunited. you loved to do this whenever the two of you went on dates and Suo loved the way your eyes lit up when you planned out the outfits. it was a win win situation for everyone. most people would compliment your outfits or stare in awe at how adorable the two of you were. even if the date was interrupted by running into some of his friends it would still be fun. All of them would typically compliment the two of you and comment on how well you two look together. Sakura was a bit more on the shy side so he would blush at the sight of your relationship in general. he might have to stop staring at you guys after realizing that you’re matching, the cuteness would be too much of him. he would secretly wish he had someone to do that with.

it was Nirei ᡣ𐭩‘s idea to match. not that it was surprising to hear that he wanted to have matching accessories. he absolutely adores you and it’s hard for him to purchase only one thing for himself when he knows you would also love it just as much. he was for sure a little cheesy with some of the accessories such as the matching necklaces that were a heart and a key. SO CHEESY AND CLICHE but you can’t bring yourself to even cringe at the sweet boy as he was excited to show you it. you eventually settled with the heart while he got the key. you know since he had the key to your heart. pained you to stay out loud but his bright smile made it worth it. he literally never takes it off he doesn’t even bother to shove the necklace into his shirt he always has it out on display. the necklaces were actually somewhat subtle whenever the two of you were apart but whenever anyone saw the two of you it finally made sense. you could never tell your sweet boy no whenever he brought something new and cheesy to match. …even if it meant wearing ridiculous tee shirts.

honestly… Hiragi ᡣ𐭩 didn’t see the point in matching. not that he’d ever say that out loud. he does whatever you want but he genuinely didn’t understand why couples would match or what it’s supposed to signify… if it even has a meaning? he definitely isn’t too experienced in the dating department let alone in a relationship that actually shows a lot of affection. no matter how silly the item was or how out of character it was in comparison to him he would never reject any gift of yours. he also sure as hell would never even let anyone dare to make a funny comment about it either. especially not in front of you. he most likely has hit the boys a couple of times for trying to tease him about it in front of you. they would quickly get shut down by catching an elbow to their gut. nonetheless, as much as he tried to avoid it from happening he caught himself also starting to like the concept of it little by little as the days went on.

matching with Kiryu ᡣ𐭩 had a more sentimental effect to it. especially since you two were quite picky about it. it wasn’t something you two did often or really planned out. that’s what made the matching heart lockets you got on your anniversary so special. when you opened them up they were customized with a special message you two secretly made for one another on one side and the other side had a photo. Kiryu was a romantic he couldn’t help fidgeting with the locket in his spare time and glancing at the photo of you in it every couple hours. your cheesy smile in it would bring a subtle blush to his cheeks and he would remember the exact moment he first had taken that photo. not to mention it was a huge pick me up booster whenever he felt the tiniest bit down. all he had to do was look in his locket and he would find the motivation to go on with his day with ease.

Togame ᡣ𐭩 found it cute whenever he noticed you begun to copy his style. he found it funny how you began to look like a mini him by stealing his hoodies and shirts. soon enough he started to learn more about what looks good on you and flatters you. he loves how you look in the oversized streetwear style, he thinks you look cool but will never say it to your face in order to keep you humbled. last thing he wants is for your ego to skyrocket and for you to rub it in his face that you look better in his style than he does. even though he knows it’s the truth. anyway if you really think about it, you only look cool because you’re wearing his stuff so he should take the credit for it. however, now whenever he shops he tends to buy two of the same item since he can’t help but imagine how much cooler you’d look with him on your side. so in the end matching was technically his idea and you never caught on to the fact that you two were matching a lot until you started to receive compliments about how cute it was.

matching with Choji ᡣ𐭩 was subtle in a way that no one really even knows or realizes the two of you have matching items. the only ones who know about it are you two and you both don’t mind that. you both have matching items such as plushies, random items, or room decor. you both had a lot of the same interests and would accidentally buy each other the same items for the holidays or as gifts. it was funny as it was never intentional. there were so many times where the two of you would purchase something for one another and had to fight back the urge to keep it for yourself. only to find out that the other got you the exact same thing anyway. you both know each other so well sometimes it felt like you were the same person. it’s surprising how no one has even noticed that you two constantly wear the exact same pair of headphones everyday. yes. you both gifted each other the same style headphones in the exact same color.

[hctrslly]

❝𝗔𝗟𝗟 𝗜 𝗪𝗔𝗡𝗧 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗖𝗛𝗥𝗜𝗦𝗧𝗠𝗔𝗦 ❞

summary: Satoru's your Christmas gift !?

Cw: subbttm! Satoru , Satoru x m! Reader , bondage , ass slapping (like once) , butt stuff , slight (?) breeding kink , alternate universe (duhhhh)

i also wanna apologize cause at the moment this isn't completely finished , but I wanted to release it before Christmas is completely over 💔

wc: will update eventually (not proofread plus I'm tired so it might suck serious buns

My goat <3 I miss him this isn't funny

It was Christmas Eve , and Satoru held a Christmas party for all the students at Tokyo Jujutsu High ! After all they didn't really have anywhere to go , so why not spend the holiday together !?

Your boyfriend went all out , making sure everyone was having a good time and got gifts they'd love. Especially you.

All the students went back to their dorms , and you were helping him clean up. But , when you were cleaning up you found a present hidden behind the tree.

"Toru ! Did you forget to give one of them a gift ?"

"what ? Oh no , that's yours !" Satoru says excitedly , setting down whatever it was he was holding.

“aww . . . Can I open it right now ?” You ask , a small smile on your face.

“sure !” He exclaims , sitting down on the floor next to you.

You take the bow off first before tearing apart the wrapping paper. It wasn't a big box , and was actually kinda small. Underneath the wrapping paper was a white box with a small amount of tape keeping it closed. Using your finger nail , you break the tape that is over the end of edge of the box. Finally you're able to see it's contents.

A very long piece of ribbon and a bottle of lube.

“surprisee !!” Satoru exclaims , a bright grin on his face , " ‘m your Christmas present !"

“ you're s'posed to unwrap presents 'toru ,” you say with a chuckle , leaning forward to give him a kiss.

“It's the thought that counts . . .” He retorts , resting a hand on your waist. Your fingers bury themselves into his messy white hair , tilting his head to get a better angle that will deepen the kiss.

Pale hands reach beneath your pj's , groping your ass before sliding them off completely.

“Toru . . . Dontcha wanna go to the bed ?” You ask between kisses , practically breathing into his mouth.

“presents go under the tree , m/n ,” Your boyfriend giggles , eyes hazy with adoration and desperation. The statement makes you giggle as well , as you slip off the top his silk pj's , the ones you got him for his birthday a couple weeks back.

“is it tight enough ? Or does it need to be loosened ,” you ask softly , leaning over his shoulder.

“it's good , nice n’ tight ,” he replies , a hint of excitement in his voice. You finally tie the ends of it into a bow , taking a moment to appreciate your work. And Satoru's body.

The muscles in his back flex because of how his arms are bound behind his back , and so are his arms themselves. It was a beautiful sight.

Satoru turns around to look at you , scooting a bit closer to you.

“so handsome . . .” you murmur , running your hands along his body , resting at the elastic of his pj pants. You pull him a bit closer , kissing his body all over. He smells sweet , faintly of cologne – but mostly like his shampoo.

Hands trail down and slip his pants off , feeling his bare skin against yours .

“no underwear ? Is that why you had the blanket over you earlier . . .” you tease , sliding your hands down his thighs as you slip them down to his ankles.

Satoru blushes , leaning back on his hands as your hands run down his thighs , casually ignore his fully erect cock.

You spread his legs , resting your thighs against his own as you pull down your pjs pants and boxers , just enough for your dick to spring out. You grab the bottle of lube , squirting some on your fingers.

You run your hand up and down your shaft , shivering at the cold sensation of it on your skin; using the rest of it to stretch him out.

“J'st fuck me already ,” Satoru huffs , almost in a whiney manner.

“so impatient 'toru !” You chuckle , reaching up from the floor to grab a pillow from the couch , placing it behind him before gently pushing him to lay down.

You push the tip in , watching as his hole sucks you in so eagerly. He's so warm and tight you can't help the moan that leaves your throat. Slowly , you push into him , feeling how he tightens around you.

Satoru squirms around , obviously wanting to hold something. His mouth opens but not a sound comes out.

“s’ tight–” you moan , finally bottoming out , your hips meeting his own. His back arched as you hit his prostate , your dick soaking in the bundle of nerves.

"oh God– fuck , oh !" He gasps , brows furrowing as he struggles to stay still. Practically kicking his legs around.

You pull out a lil , then thrust into him just as deep as you did the first time. After a but more of this he felt like he was gonna go dumb from how good he felt.

"gonna cum . . . Wan' me to pull–"

"in ! Stay in , please stay in ," Satoru begs , trying to wrap his legs around you but God he's so sore already :(

It's ok though , cause it doesn't take long for you to fill him with your seed , watching as some of it leaks out of his ass.

But , he still hasn't come , which is shocking cause it tends to not take very long for him , especially when he's this horny.

You pull off him for a moment to flip him on his tummy , holding him by the very same ribbon that keeps his arms behind his back.

"hah– m/n . . . What happened t' stayin' in ?" Satoru asks in a way that almost sounds pathetic.

"I know I know . . . I am ," you reassure him , giving one of his cheeks a firm slap making him yelp. You spread the same cheek , putting your cock (which is almost full hard again already) back in his hole; fucking your cum back into him.

He takes you in so well , and always make the best sounds , especially when he gets close.

Satoru's cheeks are turning pink from how hard your hips are hitting his ass but you can't help it when it's so plump and is begging to be full of your cum.

"s ' good Toru . . . Fuck !

[bitethedevil]

I am so tired of how the internet works now with algorithms and FYP’s. I know this isn’t new and I can’t say anything about it that hasn’t been said before, but it’s so goddamn tiring regardless. It’s just so stupid (and straight up dangerous to old and young people who don’t understand it).

Let’s say you find a sick picture of a horse on a post and you like it. Just that one post. Now your dash/FYP/whatever won’t stop showing you horses because you LOVE horses apparently. Then you might find a few other posts about them, like those too, and boom: you’ve been forced into an interest you didn’t even really want in the first place. Tired of horses? We’ll stop showing you horses only when you’ve latched onto another interest and then we will bombard you with that.

Now even worse: let’s say I fucking hate horses with a passion, but for some reason I one day think: “hey, maybe they’re not that bad. I should learn more about them and maybe then I’ll understand”. Then two things can happen: I can look it up and the first many suggestions will be from other people who hate horses just as much as I do, which won’t help me get a better understanding OR the algorithm once again goes “oh great, so you love horses now” and once again bombard me with horse posts, discouraging me from ever trying to look at the other side of things again.

It does the same with ideologies, religions, political subjects, lifestyles, etc. Is it a wonder that we live in such a shitty polarized society? I just wanted to save a rad fucking picture of a horse, man.

[hyperpotamianarch]

Hello. Today, I'd like to make some random anecdotes about Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra - poet, commentator, linguist, mathmatician, probably not too bad at chess and cursed to be poor for the entirety of his life.

After a cursory look at his wikipedia page, I must admit I didn't really know much about his life: only that he was born and raised in Spain, went travelling, had terrible luck with everything, wrote his commentaries on the Torah for money (which I think didn't help with the "cursed to be poor" thing), befriended Rabbenu Tam in France, possibly married the daughter of Rabbi Yehudah HaLevi and promptly died... somewhere... oh, and also wrote lots of poetry in the middle.

Historically speaking, he lived at the end of the Golden Age of Judaism in Spain, around the 11th-12th centuries CE. This puts him right after Rashi - which allows him to snark at everything he thinks Rashi was wrong about, but before Rambam - which means he doesn't get to snark at everything Rambam got wrong. His commentary on the Torah leans a little towards the linguistic side, though he has a couple of other things going on as well, like roasting people he disagrees with (Ben Zuta is the only friend a bull has, anyone?) and dancing around verses he thinks were added later to the Torah, like every time it says "to this very day".

He also wrote one of the first math books in Hebrew - Sefer HaMispar, he wrote a poem about chess, one about how whatever he'll work at he won't get enough money. And generally, he wrote poems. Quite a lot.

I suppose at this point I should mention something: Hebrew linguists were, at the middle ages, predominantly Sepharadi. I mean, sure, there could be a non-Jewish Hebrew linguist, but for some reason I don't hear much about those. And there probably were Ashkenazi linguists, but there weren't many of them. Rashi does deal with linguistics - but half the time he does, it's using the books of two famous Sepharadi linguists. The Sepharadim, living in Muslim lands as they were, simply had a better background with learning Hebrew, since they were surrounded by speakers of a closely related language - Arabic. And Ibn Ezra's deep understanding of Hebrew led to him loving linguistic riddles, which I can never figure out - and I was reading an eddition with footnotes! Though maybe I didn't make enough effort or something.

But no, the reason I wanted to talk about Ibn Ezra was the impossible standards for poetry, as set by Sepharadi poets. You see, Jews were always influenced by their surroundings, in multiple facets. and poetry is definitely one of them. So, the influence from Arab poets includes strict rules for rhythm and - and this is what I actually wanted to talk about - rhyming.

The rythm thing is bad enough. Only once in my life have I tried keeping up with that. It was very, very hard. It's probably because I'm not used to this, but no song I write can keep a consistent rhythm and meter, and that's without trying to apply the standard Sepharadic rules. So trying to have such a strict meter... didn't work well for me. I guess I'm the frenchman from

וּמִי הֵבִיא לְצָרְפַתִּי בְּבֵית שִׁיר,

וְעָבַר זָר מְקוֹם קֹדֶשׁ וְרָמָס;

וְלוּ שִׁיר יַעֲקֹב יִמְתַּק כְּמוֹ מָן,

אֲנִי שֶׁמֶשׁ, וְחַם שִׁמְשִׁי וְנָמָס.

which was actually written about Rabenu Tam, but I'm a distant relative of his so this might still be applicable. Besides, as far as you know my name is Ya'akov, just like Rabenu Tam! (Sorry for not providing a translation, the gist is "how dare a frenchman trample all over poetry?!")

But rhymes. Oh, the Ibn Ezraic rhyming standards.

According to Ibn Ezra, one must always rhyme with the entire syllable. So no, just the last sound isn't enough. In Ibn Ezra's book, rhyme and dime don't actually rhyme - though I don't think he'd care about English at all. For the Ibn Ezra, shor and ḥamor can't be rhymed with each other; shor can rhyme with Mishor, and ḥamor can rhyme with har hamor, but you can't rhyme any other pair of those with each other. And I can't stay up to this challenge. It's nearly always impossible for me to find proper words to rhyme even without the extra demand for the rhyme to be the entire syllable. With English I don't think I even bothered or ever will. You have too many weird syllables for me. But with Hebrew... I do try with Hebrew, really. But I can't keep this up. And the most frustrating thing? It doesn't appear other Ashkenazi writers had this problem.

Now we get to the interesting part. I have been trying lately a new possible format for my very-anticipated-and-definitely-not-only-I-want-it Jewsade fanfic: introduction, preface and Haskamot to books. I just really enjoy reading prefaces for books, and one of my recent favourite pieces of writing is the conclusion piece of the Vilna edition of the Babylonian Talmud. If you're interested - it can be found in most editions of the Talmud at the very end of Masechet Nidah. The piece describes the trouble they went through to publish this edition of the Talmud and it's very interesting. Another favourite piece of mine is the preface of the Levush, a slightly obscure Halachic book from the time of the Shulchan Aruch. If you've ever seen me talk about the race to Halacha - this is my source for that, because the poor author was upstaged about three to four times by other people doing exactly what he planned on doing. I highly recommend this piece as well, though I don't know how easy it is to find. And the Levush - Rabbi Mordechai Yeffe - is a nice Ashkenazi guy. So he must be more lenient with his rhymes, right?

Well, I guess I didn't establish that part. Yes, the preface to the Levush starts with a poem. It's fun. It's great. It's also up to the Ibn Ezraic standard, while my attempt to write an equivalent is... not.

Huh. This post is oddly rambly. Ah well, maybe someone will like it. Anyway, the preface portion that really takes the cake is actually one from a fairly recent obscure book - like, this one was written barely a century ago. I only found it because one of my favourite singers, Aharon Razel, made a song out of it, but the song doesn't really capture the hilarity of the piece. Do ask me if you want to hear more, this one's great.

Signing off with a "darn you, Ibn Ezra! Why must you set such high standards!"

[angeisherexoxo]

Manifestation cheatcode:

BE NONCHALANT!!!!!!

When I say be nonchalant I mean say you want it done? And move on with your life, just move on.. its simple! And when ppl say its simple ik you're like "how??? How its simple because I've been working so hard to get what i want my entire life and now you're suddenly telling me it is simple.. how is it simple????" I will tell you how just read the post. (Long post ahead)

As i was saying, decide your desir, affirm for it and move on, what do I mean by moving on? I mean:

1. NOT OVERTHINKING IT

2. NOT STRESSING IT!!!

Because if you're someone who gets whatever tf they want, whenever tf you want.. why do you even think twice about it right?

♡: Examples from My own life lately:

1. As some of you might noticed I disappeared here, because I have midterms and I'm a medical student so I've got to study more yeah? Since i didn't study ever since the term started (I was focusing on manifesting as you see in my latest posts)

But as I started focusing on studying and nothing but studying my manifesting process POURED ON ME!!!!!!! bitch I was complaining about how I don't get money as a college student (we have financial issues) , now as I focused on studying and dropped thinking about manifesting (because my brain is so busy inhaling study sheets) suddenly mom gave me 20$ bucks to buy medical sheets for my studies, then she gave me another 10$ to buy something else if i wanted, later at the same day dad gave me another 20$ JUST BECAUSE (Which never happened) , that was at 24 of December right? Yesterday suddenly a relative of ours got sick, and I have an exam, we had to go pick up my grandma so she visits the relative yeah??? She saw me and decided to give me 20$, and I'M NOT EVEN FOCUSING ON MONEY or manifesting I'm literally busy studying..

Q: So ange what happened there? What does this all mean?

A: I HAD no time to even think against what I want!! That's what fkn happened, before studying I was inhaling affirmations and repeating, now as I've let it go (by inhaling my studies and not having time to think about my manifesting process) it all just worked out, who would know that I will suddenly see my grandma and she'll give me money? I DIDNT SEE HER IN MONTHS!!! that's what they mean when they say everything will move for you to have your desires, for me it was that relative who got sick that caused me to see my grandma (pray for the relative btw thanks<3)

And this here was being nonchalant but I did it by studying, YOU can just say you want this to happen and fkn forget about it, Yk when we complain always about buying this book we DESPERATELY want, or that guitar or that phone or that car or laptop and then when we BOUGHT IT and it's in our room we just- ignore it, literally live as if we never desperately begged for it and that's the fkn key, i never understood what bloggers mean when they say “Embody the person you want to be, dont wish you are, YOU ARE, assume you have it and you will” that's what they fkn mean, weeks ago I was hoping for a 10$ now I've got like 30$ per day!

2. My studies!!!

As a medical student it's fine hard to study medicine, especially when you're lazy like my own dumbass, I only study the days before the exam, for example yesterday I had a midterm for 4 sheets that I studied in 2 days, each sheet have 14 pages that's FILLED with informations, and as a girl who has ADHD and a messy mind it was hard to focus and honestly I'm princess coded I just want shit done without being tired I'm sure you all understand since you're reading this, we want it done in the most simple fast way yeah? Fuck yes we do, so! Whenever I stressed and complained to ANYONE (I'm a complainer) I started reflecting the complaining, if I noticed I was about to complain to my friends or My parents about my studies I just immediately start bragging to them, I be like oh it's so easy to me and I'm even smarter than the professors there and LORD how it's easy to predict their exam questions, and istg as I focused on this technique (if I thought against what I want, I immediately start correcting myself and think as if I'm so smart *I am btw* and it's all so easy to me) that's what fkn happened, yes I got tired and I've got so many back pain while studying but I suddenly started making questions out of the sheet instead of just studying the information as the professor has stated it, for example if he said components of immune system are : innate immune system and acquired immune system, I be like oh that's easy he's gonna ask me : Q: What are the components of immune system?

This made it so much easier to study and the next day in the midterm I saw 6 questions of the ones I fkn made in the sheet!!! It's like I hacked his mind???

3. My last and third example of My life is also about my studies, as I said I'm so princess coded and sensitive af guys, and I hate college as a girl who wants no stress and just success, so the last weeks I skipped college, I was sick and stressed and just had so many issues going on so I didn't go, and that's where they announced my name because I crossed the limit of absence (strict medical bitches) and if you cross this limit they won't let you attend the midterms and therfore you won't pass the final because there is a gap due to the lack of the midterm grades, even if you wanted to pass the final you'd have to get a full mark no matter what so you avoid the damage of not attending the midterm, SINCE my cute ass crossed the limit of absence it means I can't attend the midterm, LOGICALLY it means I failed the midterm already isn't it?

But I just decided that it won't hurt me in anyway, why? Because manifesting isn't about logic, if you tell me you can't fly I'll say I can fly and one day I will!! And guess what? That's what happened

The boss of our major came yesterday (first midterm exame as i said) and called my name, and she gave me a paper saying that I only didn't attend one subject- which is so untrue bitch I skipped them all!!! How tf there's only one subject????? I didn't want to correct her I just signed the paper (signing it is like a promise that I won't do it again) and just like that I survived the whole danger of failing- was it logical?? Did it make sense? NOOOOO but it happened omgmgmfmiquwuwu2!!!!

START BELIEVING THAT IT ISN'T LOGICAL, ITS LIKE SUPERHEROES MOVIES, THEY BELIEVE THEY HAVE THE POWER TO DEFEAT THE VILLAIN AND THIS IS HOW THEY DEFEAT IT, THE VILLAIN HERE IS YOURRRR MINDSET, START DOING WHAT I SAID AND SEE HOW SHIT SHIFTS!!!!

I've got more to say for the examples but I've got to go study (wish me luck btw), I hope I helped I really tried my best to <3!

Ps: another side example is yesterday was hella cold in my country so I wanted a vacation (to study more because as I told yall it was 4 sheets and I stressed myself out so I wanted more time to get my shit together) no one said ANYTHINNNG at all about any vacation, but I just thought "idc they're gonna give us a vacation for the bad weather and that's just it) right next hours the whole country started talking about the vacation due to bad weather, all the fkn cities, but for some reason my stupid town decided that there will be no vacation for us because our town's weather is better than the other towns yk? I'm still mad about it because I was soooo close to manifest it, I guess it was because I kept stressing saying "oh god I want a vacation *crying and complaining*

I don't consider it as a success story because I had no vacation I had to go solve that stupid midterm -_- but bitch I got above 10+ towns to have vacations due to BAD WEATHER, THE WEATHER WAS FINE UNTIL I DECIDED ITS BAD. WTFFFFFF, exactly, no logic, logic doesn't fkn exist I'm about to cry oh my godness!!

Another side success story is that i suddenly started thinking void is so easy (it fkn is) out of nowhere, since i was inhaling attempting to tap into it i sat so many alarms to go try to induce it, now whenever i see the alarms i be like- its so easy why tf im complicating it- just bcs i stopped focusing on it!

cheers to all of us dreamers, I'm sure whoever is reading my post is someone who was one a wattpad person who loves Y/N stories, a Harry potter fan, marvel fan, my hero academy fan, fantasy fan, miraculous ladybug fan, in general ppl who just dont want to be here surrounded with logic boring stuff (in my case a girl who wrote fanfiction novels about one directio) , because I know you and I are here because we are dreamers!! we knew there MUST be a magical key to get out of this logical bullshitful and stupid cruel world, you already have the key you FOUND IT YOU CUTE IDIOT!!! you just need to know how to flick it and get that golden door opened (your pretty subconscious mind), me and you? We are gonna do it, just easy on yourself!!! Xoxo

[astronicht]

we talk in the fandom so much about if marc got amnesia (waking up with broken a broken body and SEVERAL broken personal and professional relationships) but i often think about what an insane well of drama it would be for vale to have amnesia. would marc just SHOW UP with all his insane person confidence like well this time i can just do it better….

I’m answering these both at once because oh mein gott dot meme. I angled more towards the second one i think?? I also played a liiiittle fast and loose with the usual type of amnesia in the trope. The core trope tenants are still there!

“It’s like,” someone says, “Like when you should always agree with dementia patients.”

“And psychosis,” says Marc, smiling.

“What?” says Uccio.

“Psychosis,” says Marc, very slowly, in very clear Italian. It’s the same word in Italian and Spanish, almost, so no one can be misunderstanding him. Still, he bites down on each S, sharp as glass.

“Oh, okay.”

Yeah, okay, thinks Marc. You try dealing with it, then.

What no one in this house knows, excepting possibly Valentino, is that Marc has kept this successfully quiet for a week. It was a tour de force. The only thing he didn’t succeed at was getting Valentino to the Marc’s neuro specialist, because Marc, deep down, did not want to know. Wanted Valentino here, with him, saying yes yes if it makes you feel better before he made it real with a doctor.

Valentino does, sort of, remember the concept of Marc Marquez, because he remembers up to about 2008. Marc was fighting for the 125cc championship that year. He lost a baby tooth, and his mom told him not to tell anyone about it, because people fighting for the world championship shouldn’t be losing baby teeth. He had understood, and tried not to smile too wide. Fifteen was sort of old for that. But he’d been a late bloomer. Hadn’t been able to properly jerk off till the year before, either.

“He thinks I am Marc Marquez’s older brother,” Marc tells one of Vale’s assistants, perfectly calm, furiously even. She’s the one woman in the room. Her name is Laura, and she looks like any woman who has been working in racing all her life: straightened hair, weathered face, tight expression.

She’s the one who gets Uccio out of the room and two hours up the road by telling him someone needs to fill in for Valentino at the meeting with Ducati in Bologna tomorrow. Marc, cold, realizes he doesn’t know for sure what Vale has missed.

He doesn’t particularly like Laura, even though she got Uccio out. That doesn’t mean much, just that she knows that to handle Marc she must first handle Uccio.

And she has to handle Marc, because they ended up at Vale’s neuro guy, not Marc’s and he said to reduce confusion. Yes, like how you agree with dementia patients. Vale thinking Marc is Marc’s older brother — some fabled first son, some larger creature, who can have Vale when the younger Marc he remembers or has made up cannot yet — is not making the neuro guy happy.

They make Marc point out all of the things that are Marc’s. Marc pulls it out for them, but leaves it in piles on the floor. They can put it away.

*

“Marc,” says Valentino down the shitty phone line. Marc wants to sit down and scream. He is at the grocery store. He is in Madrid. Valentino is not better, because fifteen minutes ago one of his assistants was texting Marc to ask where Vale might have put the pill box they gave him for all the vitamin supplements, to help his brain recover.

Marc had texted back, Try the coffee cabinet, knowing with absolute clarity that Valentino would have thrown it out. Valentino hates pill boxes. Marc sometimes has to use one, and Valentino can’t even stand to have it on the counter. Marc keeps it under the bathroom sink, along with his migraine meds.

“Hi,” Marc says. He doesn’t say Valentino’s name because he is in the pasta and rice aisle of a Mercadona. His hand shakes on the phone.

“Hello, hello, ah. You’ve moved my black t-shirts.”

Marc’s number is no longer in Valentino’s phone, for Valentino’s own neurological health. Did Vale remember the number? How? Did he get the contact from somewhere?

“Your black tshirts?” Marc repeats. They are, Marc realizes with a jolt, speaking Spanish. Marc can speak Spanish and usually Catalan to Valentino anytime, who understands perfectly, but Valentino never speaks in Spanish. Never. Except that he just did.

“Yes, my black tshirts, and my favorite sweats. Are they in the laundry? I need them today.”

The Spanish is throwing Marc off. Whole sections of Marc’s life exist in Italian. Work, for example. And, largely, Valentino.

He overthinks it, tangles. Says, “You don’t own black tshirts, do you?” in Italian. A woman walks around him and sighs and says, “Fucking tourists.”

Valentino, if he were here, if he really were on this phone line, would find this very funny.

“No, no, I’m certain. Did you send them to get washed? All, today?”

Valentino is wrenching them back to Spanish. He’s harder to read like this, but suddenly Marc hears the panic under his tone, the high tight paranoia. There are other people in Valentino’s house. He does not trust them. He has found a way to call Marc.

Marc drops his shopping basket on the floor. “I’ll come look,” he tells Valentino, still in Spanish, smooth now. “The cleaner must have moved stuff again.”

Valentino, plaintive, relieved: “Yes, yes come look. I’ll go complain at someone for you.”

“Good,” says Marc, with tightly controlled, bloody-mouthed fury. The tshirts aren’t even with Marc. He has another full closet at the house in Madrid. Why take them? “But ah, I’m out at a few appointments I can’t get out of, so it will be a few hours,” Marc says. The flight to Bologna is two hours and twenty minutes.

He pulls his phone away from his ear to start texting, and sees that he has a text from Valentino’s assistant. He swipes it away unread. No point when he already has Valentino on the line.

His phone says, “Are you still there?”

“Yes,” says Marc, already out of the grocery, on the hot street. A car is going to pull up for him very soon. “Yes, I can stay on the line.”

“Hm,” is all Valentino says, and a TV switches on. But when Valentino sighs into the phone, Marc can hear the relief. Marc wants to lay down on the hot sidewalk and not get up.

The car comes. Marc gets in. He cries perfectly silently in the backseat. Eventually, and with no obvious reason, Vale says, “Okay, I’m going to go now,” and Marc pulls his phone away from his ear, damp with sweat. The heat wavers on the cars taking the airport exit. The driver sighs.

Marc thumbs open the text from Valentino’s assistant, the one he ignored earlier. It reads, Found his pill box, thank you! It was in the cabinet under the master bath sink, with his migraine meds.

Marc smiles, sharp and awful. Above the car, a plane screams across the street through the smoggy air.