#anyways i want to write more and actually participate in appreciation weeks and shit but i just dont have the time :(

[zigtheeortega]

sorry i haven’t been that active this week and i won’t be too active for a while LMAO so if you see me wild out only on oph days u know why SJDFKSDJF

[lululawrence]

Can u please be nicer on ao3? Maybe you should try answering people's comments

when i read the first line i was honestly flabbergasted and wracking my brain trying to figure out when in the world i wasn't nice on ao3 ever. because i honestly truly try to be nice to everyone always, even when i'm angry or frustrated or people are going after those i love and want to protect. if there was a time i WASN'T nice on ao3, i wondered if it was maybe because my comment had been misunderstood or someone saw me razzing an author i'm good friends with and they didn't get that we are close and i said what i did with so much love and appreciation, you know? like what??? did i do???

but then i read your second line. and please forgive me if i come off as rude in my response to this, because honestly i'm in a pretty bad spot mentally and emotionally in general right now, but PARTICULARLY today, and this ask triggered an anxiety response in me. so. i'm trying really hard to word this in a way to educate without being condescending or mean, but i might not succeed.

firstly, thank you for your comments i'm assuming you've left. i'm also assuming they were nice comments, in which case extra thanks. i'm sure i'll send you effusive responses on ao3 when the time comes.

secondly, please understand that sending an ask like this, on anonymous no less, is incredibly entitled. writing is not my profession, i receive no compensation for my works that i post for free online, and as a part of that it is not required of me to respond. i do my very best to reply to every comment i receive, but it is not always in a timely manner, because i have other priorities in my life. all of which leads us to my third point, which is:

writers do not owe you a reply to your comments. end of. there are no other qualifications or quantifying modifiers to be added to the statement. is it nice to be acknowledged and know your comment was seen? sure. but do they OWE you one? hell no.

in fact, i'd like to offer you a suggestion. a way of tweaking your thinking about the comments you leave on fics. instead of looking at comments you leave as being something that deserves a reply from the author, think of your comments as your way of paying the author for the gift of their time and talents that they have shared with you by posting their fic. that's how i think of the comments i leave for authors. i'm giving them my thanks for the words they've shared! i want to help THEM feel as amazing as they have made ME feel when i read their fic. in fact, my hope isn't necessarily a response from them, but instead my hope is THE GIFT OF THEM SHARING MORE FIC WITH ME. i'm a selfish bitch in that way and i always want all the fic to read. i never want that well to go dry. one way i can ensure that doesn't happen is by supporting authors and being kind to them and spreading all the love and excitement i can about their writing in the hopes that my words will inspire them to share more.

because whether they reply or not, i GUARANTEE they are seeing your comments. i PROMISE they are. and for all you know, your comment might be the one that keeps them writing even when their words aren't coming easily or when they are tempted to give up.

but, again, please remember that no matter what, these authors (including me) don't actually owe you anything.

the rest of this is going under a cut, because honestly my reply is already far too long and i have a LOT more to say now that you've gotten me started.

now, all of this in mind, i'll explain to you why i'm not great with keeping up with comments made on my fics the last couple of years. i don't owe you this explanation any more than i owe you a response to your comments, and i'm honestly not sure you deserve this explanation either, but i'll still offer it anyway. it'll help me feel better knowing i at least put this out there, whether you care or not, mainly because if i don't do that it will cause me greater anxiety having you possibly think i am not responding to people because i feel all high and mighty or that i think i'm better than the comments or whatever the fuck kind of motivation you're attributing to me to see my lack of a response as something "not nice" towards the commenters.

i'm not sure if you've noticed, but i put out a lot of fic. like a lot. a lot of words and shit. i love writing, it's often my therapy and a way for me to help keep my anxiety and depression and ptsd at bay.

now, more personal shit for you, i've got three kids ages 9 and under. the oldest has adhd which we have yet to find a med for that helps to the extent she needs without side effects that aren't healthy for her to continue with, she also has anxiety, AND she's extremely gifted and starting a new program at a new school, all in the midst of a pandemic. and all of those situations exacerbate her anxiety! huzzah! she's also dealing with the beginning of her tween growing up shit, which is great fun because it means where she used to be pretty damn understanding of her younger brother, she is finding it much more difficult to. because the second oldest? he's autistic with some pretty significant gross motor, speech, and socialization delays that have only been exacerbated because of the previously mentioned pandemic. PLUS he transitioned from his special needs preschool to a fully integrated elementary school for kindergarten last year and then had to deal with all the ups and downs of the switch from e-learning to hybrid to all in schooling when everything in him screams for a normal schedule he can rely on to keep his own anxieties and fears and struggles at their minimum. and that youngest child? he was born in january of last year. he STILL barely leaves the house and has only met other children in close range a couple of times because, once again, pandemic!

add onto all of this my own mental health issues, the fact that my husband ALSO battles major clinical depression, adhd, and anxiety, AND we live with my parents who have their own health issues, both mental and physical. i run the home for our house of seven. i keep this place functioning, fed, clothed, clean, and everywhere we need to be for all of our five million appointments every. fucking. day. there is a REASON i've been borderline burnt out for the last fucking year and a half.

now, for fun, i have fandom shit. i love it here, even if it is a dumpster fire on the best of days, and getting to be a part of the writing community is so very lovely. i adore it. honestly, it's because of those friendships i've built with other writers that i have been able to keep writing and have found just how helpful it can be for my mental health. but i'm REALLY. INCREDIBLY. BUSY. i hardly have time to get on tumblr for just a quick swipe through my dash most days. i put off asks so long i forget i have them. i don't have the mental and emotional capacity to talk to people on here or interact fully a lot of the time. but i do my best to do so and be kind while i'm at it even when i don't want to be.

then, on top of that? i also run fic fests like @wordplayfics and help friends run their own. because not only am i a writer, i'm a reader. i LOVE fic. fic has saved me soooooo many times over the past seven years that i've been here. i want to do what i can to support other writers the best way i can, which is to provide a space for them to create their works that welcomes and helps promote them, but also by doing my monthly fic lists and pocast highlighting what i've been able to read, reblogging their fic posts, and then commenting and kudosing their fics too.

sometimes i get really fucking down on myself because i'm so behind on replying to comments, but my brain is very much a "if you start this, you have to finish it" kind of a brain, and i feel even WORSE sometimes if i reply to comments on some fics and not all of them. but i do my best and reply when i can. i was actually really fucking proud of myself because i had a couple days to myself in june, and i spent hours replying to comments on 20 of my fics. when you have almost 150 fics (i think? i don't even know how many fics i've posted by now), that is only scratching the surface. but i tried and i was so so happy i did that many fics at once. it's exhausting, though, and takes a lot of spoons for me to reply to them in mass like that plus time consuming. so i tried to be happy with those 20 fics and the comments i responded to there and told myself that when i ha a moment to breathe, i'd go and work on replying to some more.

but see, that again causes anxiety and guilt. because i haven't replied to all of them. and that anxiety and guilt can cause me to put it off further OR to put off important things like feeding my children or getting sleep in order to finish it, so i have to make myself put things into perspective and ensure i'm doing the important things, like taking care of myself and my family, first.

and then, i have a moment where i CAN go ahead and reply to comments... but i also have MANY fics that are on deadline and i actually have a schedule. a SCHEDULE. for when i'm going to focus on which fics. i can spell it out for you if you really want. i made it back in APRIL to make sure i didn't sign up for too many fic fests because there are so many going on right now that i want to participate in, but i know i can't do all of them so i had to pick and choose. and when you are SO overscheduled and busy that back in APRIL you had to figure out what fics you would focus on at what time to ensure you got everything written when you wanted to through THE END OF THE YEAR, more choices have to be made.

for example. my writing time and time for myself came down to only one evening a week for ALL fandom things i'm doing and a part of right now once the kids were out of school for the summer. it quickly became apparent that for my own self care i needed more time, so i worked with my husband to find two other days i could carve out at least 30-60 minutes to myself to write every week. and i did. but if i'm already only getting that much time and have committed to those fics and fests and things that you're running etc, you have to choose am i going to use this time to try to squeeze in some comment replies? or am i going to write? and i choose to write. simple as that.

so yeah. see it as selfish if you want. see it as mean. you can honestly see it as whatever the fuck you want, but for me? i know that as soon as i possibly can and i can breathe freely for once and not feel like i am constantly drowning in my day to day life and am doing pretty well when it comes to my fic deadlines and getting started on those christmas cards i'm once again going to be making by hand for everyone on tumblr who chooses to sign up for one this year out of the KINDNESS of my heart and the love i really do feel for so many of you, then i promise i'll be on ao3 catching up and commenting. my friends laugh and make fun of me for it sometimes, because they will sometimes get 10-12 replies to their comments in a single day. they know that's how i work. i WILL reply to every single comment i get, no matter how old it is. but for the love of all that is holy, do NOT add to the anxiety and guilt i already feel over it. the only place that will get you is the ask/comment getting deleted if it's a good day, a fucking long rant like this one if it's not, and a block if it's a REALLY bad day.

if you're asking me to be nice on ao3, then i ask in return that you also be nice by not demanding things of people that they are not in any way obligated to give.

[mrpenguinpants]

Andrius, Venti, and Dvalin: General HCs [+ unhinged Venti]

Oh no, not strange at all! I love seeing the art people have done on human Dvalin and Andrius. I’m not entirely sure if you wanted a Venti x Dvalin x Andrius pairing but I’m going to assume so. But just in case, I added a few points of all 4 of your hanging out. How my desk is positioned with my window, the sun is shining directly into my eyes so I have to type in this weird position unless I want my eyeballs to melt.

Also, if any of this is wrong just look away. This took forever because holy crap there is so much lore on these 3. Not sure what exactly you had in mind so I made some general/friendship HCs

Alright, today’s appreciations post is for maagdalen​​. Super lovely person with some lovely emotes. Oh and your english is really good btw^^ and ty for chatting with me 💕💕💕

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[taglist]  <- if you want to be added, please read this first. 

@hanniejji​​  @mikeysbike​​ @unionwitch​ @musekala​ @twistedsunnshiii​ @stanzastic​ @akaasea​ @xoneaboveallx​ @adoring-ghost​ @asheseiler​ @childelover​ @dilucsz​

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Andrius, Venti, and Dvalin: General HCs

Andrius

Andrius, also known as Lupus Boreas, was tasked with protecting the nation of Mondstadt under the request of Barbatos. He had a noble soul and mainly stays in the area of Wolvendom. He was strict, to the point, and never really partakes in whatever “foolish” activities Venti or Dvain get themselves into. But it’s all just a front because as soon as one of them get’s hurt or is in danger, his fangs and teeth are out. Even if it’s a cute hydro slime. Then he’ll take them by the scruff of their neck back to Wolvendom to get their wounds checked. On Venti it works, but with Dvalin’s dragon form. It’s amusing to see a pouting dragon getting dragged off by a wolf that wasn’t even double his size.

Not many Mondstadt citizen’s know but Andrius isn’t actually a wolf. He chooses to take the form of a wolf and should any of the wolves in Wolvendom be threaten, that’s the form he will appear in. But in truth, it was because Venti suggested it. If he was going to stay in Wolvendom and protect wolves then it made sense that his form would be the big bad wolf. Really Andrius just believes that Venti has a secret vendetta against cats and Andrius wouldn’t talk to Venti if he suggested that he take the form a dog.

There is a bit of discourse between Andrius and Venti due to Venti’s human-like appearance since Andrius views human society as a disappointment. Only accepting abandoned infants that have no where to go. But he does respect Barbatos and helped in his efforts to rebuild Mondstadt and protect it as one of the Four Winds.

While he doesn’t completely enjoy Venti’s extravagant personality he’s glad that Barbatos adopted the name and is living his life in freedom. Despite being the anemo archon, he chooses to live as Venti. Having fun in taverns and doing what he loves.

Venti

Venti always brings stories and sings for the two whenever he decides that it’s been too long since he’s seen his friends. He usually brings a bottle of wine even if he’s the only one that ever drinks - which is probably why he brings wine - which leads to Andrius scolding Venti to try and act civilized when he gets drunk and saying “No Dvalin, you cannot have some. The last time we let you drink you cried so much that Springvale still has a waterfall.”

It’s amusing to hear that after the war, the biggest problem Venti has right now is getting constantly ID checked. Dvalin takes this quite literally, since he still isn’t fully aware of taverns rules and regulations, that it takes both Venti and Andrius to hold him down before another Stormterror incident happens.

Venti has always been bold, never afraid to say anything, which was a trait that Dvalin and Andrius liked about the anemo archon. It was what made him the archon of freedom but sometimes Venti is a bit too bold and pretends to play fetch with Andrius wolf form. He is not amused. When he tries it with Dvalin, Dvalin will participate but he get’s confused and ends up just sitting beside Venti when the archon throws the stick. Which causes Venti to make a walk of shame to get the stick back.

When Venti acts as the Wind Archon it’s always a bit of whiplash when he talks in his philosophical state that it reminds Dvalin and Andrius that despite his childlike appearance and attitude, he was still the anemo archon. But it get quickly covered up when he says it’s time to switch back to Venti time.

It’s hard for them all to meet up in the present day. Dvalin stays in his domain while Andrius stays in Wolvendorm, all alone in their own domain. Venti prefers lively places than those quiet and solitude areas so he’s either in the City of Freedom or under the Windrise tree. But on occasions where he feels lonely he’ll swing by Dvalin’s lair and use the winds to carry their conversation to Andrius. Just so he isn’t left out.

If anyone asks where the ballads that Venti sings that are about a strict wolf and a nervous dragon, he’ll just say it was a passing tune he made up.

Dvalin

Dvalin, same as Andrius, lost his faith in humanity and the city of Mondstadt. He was released as his role as one of the four winds but continued to remain in Mondstadt. Similarly to Andrius he is distrustful around humans after being betrayed by them, chose to avoids human contact but he tries to adopt a more friendly side when Venti visits him.

Dvalin cares about Venti more and isn’t as standoffish in showing that he appreciates Venti compared to Andrius. Venti explained to him and showed him what freedom truly was he felt connected with someone for the first time. He did want to be understood and loved by the humans for who he was and what he wanted to protect. But that’s still a long road ahead.

He’s a curious but clumsy dragon. He’s pure of heart and steadfast in his goals which Venti is full-heartily cheering him on while Andrius disagrees but allows Dvalin to continue on this own path. Even if Andrius is on the other side of Mondstadt, he still tries to keep an eye out for Dvalin should the Abyss Order ever try and take his friend under their control.

However, due to how almost naïve the dragon is, he get’s into rather...interesting situations. While Andrius groans and Venti loses his absolute shit when Dvalin, still in his dragon form, lands and tries to observe the wolves. He only hides behind a thin tree that barely covers even 2% of his entire body and ends up scaring the wolves who run back to Andrius for safety. It takes a lot of consoling from Venti that the wolves didn’t like him, they were just scared and perhaps he should adopt a smaller form?

He’s still a bit sick from the aftermath of the Abyss Order and the poison of Durin so he can’t travel as far as he would like so Venti keeps him company. Telling him what the citizens of Mondstadt have been up to and playing music with his lyre.

---

I love writing Venti, he’s so much fun. :) I say this but I live for Venti who hides behind this happy persona but is actually unhinged or deluded. I have many thoughts on this but I didn’t want to break the pace of the fic (plus this is getting pretty long anyways). So feel free to skip the rest of this if that makes you uncomfortable. I’m just spit balling right now.

But nervous and shy dragon Dvalin plus mother hen Andrius is canon. You cannot convince me otherwise.

This week has just turned into “what will we awaken today?” In other news, Lisa and Diluc. But it might be a bit late since this took some time to finish. In extra news, solo leveling just updated. Oh and jjk is (hopefully) getting a new episode tmr^^

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Barbatos

Andrius and Dvalin trust Venti to fulfill his archon duties should anything ever happen to Mondstadt. The same way Venti trusts the Four Winds will protect Mondstadt should anything dangerous arise. With the carefree nature of Venti making a sudden appearance after Barbatos’s year long nap, they both got a bit too comfortable with this happy-go-lucky version of their archon.

That is until Venti brings a fourth person into their trio. Someone who knew how to play the lyre and wished to fly and see the birds. Andrius and Dvalin share a quick look of anxious tension and it’s confirmed when Venti makes a small slip of the tongue and calls you by a certain boy’s name. They aren’t sure what to do or if Venti was starting to regress back into Barbatos and what that could mean for this innocent traveler.

“Barbatos defeated the previous ruler and left the city to rest because he didn’t want to become the same tyrant. But an archon is still an archon with responsibilities. Those responsibilities can be warped to the point that they believe they are helping and guiding their followers, but are actually trapping them in their cage. He is an archon that believes in freedom so his cage is just a bit bigger. Big enough that you can’t see the walls. Be careful traveler.”

Venti goes to greet you the next day you see him but his words seem to fade away when he approach's you. He asks if you’ve been talking to Andrius lately. You nod and ask how he knows. He says that you just spell like wolfhooks and that you shouldn’t worry about anything. 

The next day Andrius apologizes to you about his words and that he was mistaken. There was nothing to worry about and to trust Venti. You can see Dvalin a bit off to the side looking away nervously and a bit guilty.

Venti always makes sure that Andrius and Dvalin keep an eye on you, especially Dvalin when you’re in stormterror land. It was a pretty dangerous landscape to trek through. As for Andrius, he doesn’t want you to get hurt during your weekly practice fights. It wouldn’t do you any good if you got hurt and couldn’t explore this vast world with him.

[johannesviii]

This is a long post about Shaman King I started to write ages ago and I don’t have a good title for it

Let me tell you about Shaman King for a few minutes, okay. Because the new anime adaptation is coming in like 3 months and I’m still not ready for it. Also I started to write this post 5 years ago just because I re-read the whole thing at the time and it’s been in my drafts since then. Oops

But yeah Shaman King was the very first fandom I got into when I first had a real internet access, around 2003-2004. I was around fifteen. The manga was still going. And in retrospect, it was full of problems. Among other things:

Not enough female characters & questionable choices for most of the ones who actually have a part to play in the plot

A black character drawn with big lips (see above), and I REALLY HOPE this is gonna get fixed in the new anime ; I mean even the author stopped drawing him like that a few years ago when he did the “remix tracks” extra chapters so come on please

An imaginary native american tribe who, while pretty cool, is still imagined by a Japanese dude in 1999 soooo yeah there’s some rough corners here and there (edit: got some anon hate about that but I'm sorry, "ancient aliens" tropes always make me uncomfortable)

An art quality which gets worse and worse over time due to deadline pressures and an increasingly exhausted author

Was stopped before it could reach its natural conclusion (the author drew an actual ending years later and tbh it’s great so I’m putting this very low on the list)

So yeah. Manga from 1999. Problematic. Aged badly. It happens.

BUT.

In retrospect, most of it is such a kick in the metaphorical butt of shonen manga as a whole I can’t believe it was competing against Naruto and One Piece at some point?? Like

It’s a shonen so it plays the "dramatic and sudden power jump” game, but it uses it to reach a surprising conclusion (in the “new” ending I mean)

Most of the characters are “shamans” which means they can see ghosts and spirits, and they use them to fight, to work, or to help other people. This is a manga in which you’re gonna see a Russian shaman channeling a Vodyanoy spirit into a drum to create a torrential flood. You don’t see that in every manga

It’s stated right away that no shaman can be truely, irredeemably bad, because only good-natured people can see ghosts and spirits.

So, no matter how bad a villain may be, they must have had a good nature once even if they look like a complete bastard at the moment.

How far is the author willing to go with that concept? Pretty far

Even without talking about the main villain and how the story ends because, duh, spoilers... Like

My favorite character, who gets a full redemption arc later, cuts someone open in his first chapter

He’s one of the good guys 10 volumes later

Speaking of which the amount of gore in this manga has to be seen to be believed, Jump would never let this happen nowadays

If you’re wondering why this is in the “positive” (......?) list it’s because I was 14/15 and all kids that age crave blood and angst

The main character, Yoh, pictured above, is very laid-back, and I mean very. He listens to the in-world equivalent of Bob Marley and constantly wears big headphones. Also he wears sandals, and sometimes there’s a weed leaf drawn on his t-shirt

His parents arranged a mariage between him and a girl shaman even though they’re still teenagers, so this would have potential for High Drama - but surprisingly enough it turns out they like each other and after that he just goes around saying “this is my future wife” and she’s like “hello if you touch him I’m going to end you”

It sounds weird and it......... is, tbh, but it’s also refreshing among all the “ugh, girls, yuck” tropes that nearly all shonen mangas used to have at the time

Yoh’s main goal in life is to live with minimal effort

When his grandfather tells him he must train to participate in a shaman tournament which happens every 500 years, because the winner gets a wish granted by the Great Spirit, he decides his wish will be to make everybody’s life easy so that nobody will ever be forced to work or do shit they don’t want to do to survive anymore

Yoh Asakura is a Millenial icon don’t @ me

Speaking of which

Almost everyone in this series is broke as f█ck

Yoh owns a big house but that’s only because the price was ridiculously low since it’s the most haunted place in Tokyo and nobody else wants to live there. The house is constantly full of other characters (including enemies) who have literally nowhere else to go

The only important character who isn’t broke has money because his family is super rich but he hates all of them because they’re all bastards so it’s super awkward

Another character bought a really cool motorbike but he’s going to be in debt for the next 40 years

Also he’s a hobo

And also bi

What I’m trying to say is: relatable

Also the tournament is held by an imaginary Native American tribe. They’re also broke. All of them. The two judges who are in charge of the main characters live in a cramped appartment and often try to sell souvenirs in the street to pay the rent

I know that’s hashtag problematic but I still love them I can’t help it

Just like in most shonen mangas the hero seems to amass a big collection of Friends but since everyone is a weirdo in a way or another and comes from all over the world it looks even funnier

At some point during the tournament, the main characters have to form small groups of three in order to participate to the next part. Yoh’s team is one of the strongest teams among the ones we’ve met at this point, and is composed of 1) Yoh, a laid-back sleepy kid wearing toilet sandals 2) the aforementioned bi hobo who’s sad because his current crush is in a rival team, and 3) a thirty-something tatooed guy with no legs and an IV drip and who looks like he hasn’t slept since 1997

Oh and they all wear adds for a bath house

Because remember: everyone’s f█cking broke

Spoilers for the mid-point of the manga but I need to talk about it because it encapsulates everything I used to love in it

You’ve been warned

So

At some point the main character, Yoh, is asked to choose between staying in the tournament or resurrect his rival

This is framed as some kind of very heavy, very huge dilemma. Like oh no what will he do. Will he give up his dreams and hopes. Will You Push The Button(tm)

So the choice is presented to him

In a very dramatic way

And he immediately goes “there’s a way to save him?? YES PLEASE”

He doesn’t hesitate a single second and drops the tournament in a heartbeat to save the guy

This scene greatly contributed to make me a better person I’m not even joking at all

I love Yoh

So anyway I don’t have a proper conclusion for this

Shaman King is very flawed and its flaws need to be acknowledged to fully appreciate all the good things in it, and the “old” fandom from more than 15 years ago was a very good formative experience for me because the forum I was on (which was nuked from the face of the internet by a hacker “looking for training grounds” (his words not mine, he posted it on our frontpage a full week before he did it) in 2005, rip) was full of people who were really into criticising every little aspect of the manga but still loved it dearly

And I think that’s a healthy way to enjoy things and I think we should bring this back

Anyway

Shaman King extremely flawed but full of good things

I still can’t believe it’s back

Johannes out

[backslashdelta]

1 Day of Glee Blogs: kurthummeldeservesbetter

Every time @kurthummeldeservesbetter hosts a Glee Blog Awards (and I say every time because it has happened more than once now), I want to nominate her, but she won’t let me.

Enough is enough.

Alex, you deserve an award. For all the work you’ve put in to making our little corner of the internet a better, more fun, more positive place to be. You do so much for our fandom and it just feels wrong for all of that hard work to go unrecognized, especially when you do so much to recognize the hard work other people put in.

So, we’ve decided to not let it go unrecognized.

I took a page from your book and figured that the best way to do this would be to ask other people to say things so that I have to say less things. So I reached out to everyone who received a nomination for the 25 Days of Glee Blogs, told them my idea, and asked them if they had anything they’d like to say to you. Several people told me they were thinking about doing this exact same thing, so I guess I’m just lucky that I got around to sending out the messages first. And, of course, lots of people had some lovely things to say (and show!) you! So, without further ado, let’s get on with it.

@coffeeorderwrites: “The glee blog awards were such a sweet and wonderful idea and I was personally so grateful to be able to put some positivity out into the world through doing these nominations. It's also clear a huge amount of effort went into the posts from the individual banners to the personalized recommendations. Thank you so much for doing this! Also I just want to add I thoroughly enjoy your head cannons and very much enjoy having you on my dash 😊”

@20xbetterthanu: “Hi Alex! You’re fucking amazing for doing this for everyone—you’re amazing in general, your head cannons are on point and your love for Kurt hummel is superior and I just wanted to say thank you! Ily—Ally”

@katimanki: “I want to nominate the oh so wonderful @kurthummeldeservesbetter for every blog award there is and has been. Because of all her weirdly specific headcanons that are (too often lol) 100% accurate. And the stupidest shit posts that are absolute gold (the glee-books, Should-I-drink-all-this-coffee-??-!) I admire her motivation and ability to produce daily quality content.💕 All the effort she puts into everything she puts out is simply astounding. She literally did two blog awards this fall, all by herself, completely unprompted and selflessly. She did all that for other people in the fandom and never asked for anything back. I can't be anything but grateful and amazed (and a little jealous of her commitment abilities haha)!! And look at her go again! Just over a week since 25 days of blogs and she already has a new event ready to go! 💖”

@lallagoglee:

@esperantoauthor: 

@spaceorphan18: “I'm glad that they're supporting blogs in a positive way, and not limiting who they're showcasing. I think it's great that fandom can be inclusive and welcoming, and I hope others follower her trend of supporting others within the fandom. :)”

@crissmastrees-and-candyklaines: “I think Alex is such a great person to be constantly putting on things like this. It take a truly wonderful soul to constantly spread gratitude and appreciation for others! Thank you Alex for being so awesome 💞”

@crayonstoperfume: “i love that she brings so much positivity to the fandom! every time i see her on my dash she’s lifting up her friends, celebrating content creators, or just coming up with something amazingly creative and funny!!”

@personalgarbagepile: “Dear Alex, I would like to thank you for all the stuff you have done and all the things you are planning in the future. I’m not sure what the new project is exactly but I will be participating whenever it starts. I love all the writing content you provide as well as all the posts you make in appreciation for the fans. They’re really sweet. Finally, I hope that one day you achieve your dream of moving up north, both because it’s great up here and because living in Florida is utterly unrelatable.”

@kuiinncedes: “amazing blog overall - iconic url, lovely, funny person, her blog awards spread so much positivity and love and it’s so sweet for her to organize them! and her headcanons are so awesome, i always love reading them so much!!! a greatly appreciated part of this fandom :))”

@gleeincorrectquotes: “I don’t know her very well, but she seems really nice, her headcannons are always so spot on and hilarious, and her idea for the glee awards was so sweet :)“

@snarkyhag: “Big thanks to kurthummeldeservesbetter for running the 25 Days of Glee blogs. It's cool to find new people to follow and to see my friends celebrated for the awesome they are. Not sure how his pun machine made it into the group but I am honored.”

@heartsmadeofbooks:  "I've never actually talked to Alex, but that doesn't mean I don't know what a sweet person she is. She takes the time to make Awards and the 25 days of Blogs to brighten everyone else's day despite really not having to go to all that trouble. Her headcanons are amazing and the reason I started to follow her in the first place, and I look forward to more of them in the future. If this were another edition of her awards, she would win "Kindest and Most Generous Person in the Fandom" award :) Sending you much love and gratitude, Alex! ♥"

@black-john-lennon: “I’d like to say Thank you for keeping the fandom alive and spreading positivity.“

@soonbuilt: 

@proudly-so: “Just wanted to say thank you for everything you do for the Glee fandom. It is nice to see someone taking so much time to put together well thought out activities for others to enjoy, especially during such a tough year. Thank you for all that you do!!”

@justgleekout: “She is such an incredible addition to the fandom! With her awards she really creates such a nice community feeling. The way she always thinks of others is absolutely wonderful. Her hcs always make me giggle and she is just a pleasure to see on your dash really!!“

@hippohead: “The amount of time and effort that Alex has put into the 25 Days of Blogs is incredible and so selfless - it wasn't to get anything out of it, it was to create a space for the klaine community to celebrate each other and the things we make and share. I think that's wonderful. A big thank you to Alex for their organizational skills, for doing the event and spreading so much love and support! I hope they know how much we appreciate it and them 💞”

@byebyeblainey: "Alex!!!! Thank you so much for not only hosting the 25 days of glee blogs event, but for also being such a wonderful, kind, lovely person!! we haven't talked much but honestly ur vibes are IMPECCABLE and i'm so glad that u joined glee tumblr!! u light up my dashboard and i'm so happy to call u my mutual! <3"

And finally, I couldn’t end this post without a chart, so I’ve done some thorough research and put togehter the following incredibly precise and accurate graph.

You can see by that red trendline that things are only going up from here! And I wasn’t kidding about the research by the way.

Sources: [1], [2], [3a], [3b], [3c], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12]

Anyway, Alex, I hope you know how much we all love and appreciate you! You bring so much to the fandom, and we’re all so grateful for the time and effort you put in. Thank you so much for bringing some brightness and positivity to our dashes, and I hope that we’ve been able to bring some more joy (or perhaps even some glee) to yours.

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 279: Here Comes the Airplane

Previously on BnHA: Gigantomachia gathered up the rest of the League and headed off to go help Tomura. Also he is now 80 feet tall. The heroes were all, “whoa this guy is really big, we should probably stop him and maybe even devote an entire chapter or two just to that,” and so they sent three whole people after him, which sadly is pretty much the exact sort of strategy I’ve come to expect from them by this point. Anyway so Mt. Lady tried to hold Machia off but kept getting flung aside, and Kamui Woods tried to catch him but was set on fire by Dabi who is just having way too good of a time setting all of the flammable heroes on fire today, and Midnight tried to put him to sleep but Compress threw a bunch of debris at her and so she fell like 80 feet. The chapter ended with Midnight being all “fuck this” and calling Momo, who ordered the rest of the child soldier squad into action as Machia approached. I’m not really sure what they’re gonna do, but I honestly don’t really care, because it’s Momo, and so, YES.

Today on BnHA: U.A.’s first-year hero students, who apparently had nine hours to prepare their battleground instead of the fifteen seconds we had all assumed, launch a complex multi-staged assault which is actually really fucking impressive because these kids are actually awesome. First they pin Machia down in one of Honenuki’s mud pits, and then they take turns making impassioned attempts to take out the other League members chilling out on Machia’s back. Unfortunately none of these attempts work because of Dabi, who’s working overtime while the rest of the League sits around shooting down each other’s escape plans. Basically a lot of stuff gets set on fire, and then the chapter ends with Mt. Lady pinning Machia to the ground while MINA, YES, MINA, charges at him covered in acid like some sort of video game boss that you need some kind of specific item to defeat. DID YOU KNOW YESTERDAY WAS MINA’S BIRTHDAY YOU GUYS. Anyway so this chapter is basically pandemonium from start to finish, and it’s great. It is a RUMPUS, y'all. A STRAIGHT UP HULLABALOO.

IS IT MOMO LOVIN’ HOURS I THINK IT IS, YOU GUYS. ARE YOU EXCITED. I AM EXCITED

but first, the color page we were promised, in celebration of Six Whole Years Of This Bullshit!!

oh god oh god so much to love so little time

some of the rowdier characters are making MULTIPLE APPEARANCES IN THIS SHITSHOW, including Kaminari who appears to be in a record-setting THREE of these! who exactly was taking all of these pictures, and why are they so obsessed with him. also how many of these are going to be used as evidence in the latest Kami Traitor Theory posts and is it too early for me to get mad about it

“WE INVITED ENDEAVOR AND HAWKS TO OUR ‘BEING FANCY ON THE COLOR PAGE’ PARTY, EVEN THOUGH THEY’RE NOT U.A. STUDENTS OR FACULTY. WE JUST FELT LIKE IT.” listen that is fine, y’all don’t have to explain yourselves to me

Mirko however is not here, I assume because if she was, Horikoshi would have forgotten to draw all the rest of the characters again. she’s too powerful

Midnight is so sexy I don’t even ksdfnkl

ALL MIGHT LOOKING HAPPY GIVES ME THE STRENGTH I NEED TO MAKE IT THROUGH THE REST OF THIS WEEK. YOUR SMILE IS THE MVP

Cementoss’s face is the runner-up MVP and one of the greatest things I’ve seen in my life

half the people here seem to be attempting to flirt with whoever is taking the pictures. I am starting to suspect that the culprit is Momo. change my mind

for some reason I am really shocked to see Endeavor getting his drink on. and he’s literally the only one, too

Bakugou’s half-assed I SAID NO PAPARAZZI skills are no match for Tamaki’s legendary “I WILL LITERALLY DIE IF YOU CAPTURE ME ON FILM” abilities

I literally didn’t notice Deku until like three quarters of the page in. he sure does blend right in there

Tokoyami is approximately 97.3% done and ticking EVER CLOSER to full 100% doneness, and when that happens even I can’t tell you what is going to go down

do I even need to mention how sexy Aizawa’s hair is. apparently I do

SERIOUSLY THOUGH CEMENTOSS’S FACE

anyway, so that was nice! NOW ON TO THE MOMOLOVIN’

and we begin with FIRST YEAR CLASS B HONENUKI “MUDMAN” JUZOU just LAYIN’ SOME TRAPS IN THE WOODS, as one does

oh my freaking god Tokage

somehow her quirk didn’t freak me out quite this much the last time we saw her. she is really something. has she always had shark teeth

also WHERE IS MONOMA’S GROUP. I immediately want to know!! is he with the Shouto group? or is there yet ANOTHER student group we don’t know about? what would they even be doing

or did Horikoshi actually get three quarters of the way through writing this arc and then suddenly slap his forehead as he realized that if Monoma just casually copied Machia’s powers he would either DIE IMMEDIATELY or else become SUPER STRONG and also grow 80 feet tall and this would suddenly be a very different battle with the scales tipping decidedly in the heroes’ favor. and so he had to quickly write him out of the battle in this very half-assed way

anyway, so while I ponder that, Tokage is peeking the top of her head out over the trees and staring at Machia who is, you guessed it, still heading right their way! just like he’s been doing pretty much this entire time

and now there’s a whole page of reaction panels you guys. this is why Horikoshi tries to avoid these massive Endgame-style battles with every single hero known to man participating. hopefully we won’t have too many of these. like I mean thank you for the roll call and all but I’d like to get to the action now

Mineta of all people is stealing this entire page with that expression though. he is not fucking around. this is twice in as many chapters that he’s been a page-stealing face-making champ. dare I hope this could be the start of a new niche for him? lord knows it would be so much better than the old niche

also this page is just sweatdrops galore. these kids are so nervous. MANGA GODS PLEASE KEEP THEM SAFE, although I’m honestly not too worried about them compared to the adults. I’m sure I should be, but I just am not

all right so now Momo is explaining what those little canisters are!

okay but someone please explain to me how it is that they had time to stop and lay all of these traps?? not just Honenuki’s, but Mineta’s and what looks like some of Shiozaki’s work as well?? did Machia just STOP MOVING for like five whole minutes all of a sudden for no reason at all? while they were all sitting out here saying things like “with that speed...”? ????? ????????

also lol wtf. “we’re gonna have to make him eat it.” I still have no idea what their plan is, but it’s getting more entertaining by the minute I’ll say that much

okay so Momo says that if they can get him to swallow just one of these, then that should be enough to put him to sleep. oh my god this chapter is going to be AMAZING isn’t it

meanwhile Mineta is worrying about Midnight. I swear to god if they turn this into something where he’s only worried because she’s hot, I will take one of these canisters and shove it right up his...

okay good, Mina’s reassuring him that it’s gonna be okay, and then we’re just cutting to Machia stampeding in with Mt. Lady and Kamui still clinging to him

WHAT THE HELL ARE THESE GUYS EVEN DOING

“we’ll just stand here adjacent to him and just kind of watch as he rushes straight at the children.” someone help me, I’m having difficulty finding a synonym for “useless” that carries the full amount of emphasis I want to place on it right now. this requires a degree of language the human race is not yet capable of

OH SNAP

THEY GOT HIM YEAHHHHH

OH DANG, FOR REAL THOUGH!!

ngl, for a brief spiteful moment I was disappointed he hadn’t actually fallen on them :/

and they’re still JUST STANDING THERE, I CAN'T EVEN?? we’re getting to the point where I honestly think actual civilians might have been of more use in this situation

YESSSSS

TIME TO FIND OUT HOW MANY TENTH GRADERS GIGANTOMACHIA CAN TAKE IN A FIGHT

also, sorry to keep harping on this, but the juxtaposition of that earlier panel with all of the fully grown and experienced pros just standing in dumb awe, immediately followed by this panel of BRAVE BUT DETERMINED CHILDREN CHARGING IN AND YELLING “GO GO GO”, is just... it really is something. shit. if I was the HPSC and this was what I had to work with, I too might have seriously considered fudging a few age requirements in hopes of finding someone who could actually get the fucking job done

also what the hell is going on down there with Shishida and Satou and that third person? what are those Blackwhip-looking things?? I’m confused

ohhhhh no

Shiozaki is about to be sent flying through the air courtesy of her own hair vines omg

OH NO WAIT THE THREE TOUGH GUYS ARE STOPPING HIM. AHHH THE LAST ONE WAS KENDOU AHHHH

I still can’t figure out what the hell those are though lol. did Momo make some steel cables?? I feel like Machia would be able to break just about any kind of rope or chain they could concoct just by sheer brute strength alone

ah fuck

DON’T YOU GUYS GO RUINING THIS FOR ME!! THEY’VE GOT A GOOD THING GOING HERE, LET THEM HAVE THEIR FUN!!

although I do appreciate how they’re all “U.A.!!” in kind of this “oh shit, these guys we actually have to worry about” sort of tone lol

this look on Toga’s face is a bit concerning! well but Deku and Ochako aren’t here though, so I wonder who she’s gonna fight if it comes to that. huh

(ETA: seriously, does anyone have any idea what Toga is planning cuz I sure don’t.)

Shouji and Ojiro, who I might remind you are normal people with no enhanced physical abilities aside from extra appendages, appear to have somehow circled all the way around to Machia’s back and are now climbing up oh shit

oh and Aoyama’s there too! -- is Shouji carrying him omg

he’s using him as a human ray gun omggg. this is the most delightful thing I’ve ever witnessed

NOW SOMETHING IS BEING SHOT AT THE LEAGUE AND DABI’S STARING AT IT ALL “>:(” AND I’M PRETTY SURE THIS THING, WHATEVER IT IS, IS ABOUT TO BE SET ON FIRE, LET’S SEE

lds;afksjdl;fkj WERE THOSE JIROU’S EARJACKS??!!

okay you know what fuck you Dabi. you think it’s funny to set a little girl’s ears on fire?! don’t expect any sympathy from me when Aoyama lasers you in the face

WELL I DON’T KNOW WHAT’S HAPPENING BUT THEY’RE SHOOTING WHAT LOOK LIKE A BUNCH OF LITTLE TAMBOURINES AT HIM NOW

I ASSUME THEY ARE NOT ACTUALLY TAMBOURINES, BUT I REALLY DON’T KNOW, IT’S NOT LIKE THEY HANDED OUT THE RULE BOOK TO THIS THING AHEAD OF TIME

[HUGE EXAGGERATED GASPING SOUNDS]

oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my

OH MY GOD AND YANAGI THREW THEM WITH HER POLTERGEIST QUIRK!??

I DON’T KNOW WHAT THIS “ACK?!!” IS AND IT’S REALLY BUMMING ME OUT, BECAUSE THIS CAME WITHIN INCHES OF BEING THE COOLEST FUCKING COMBINATION I’VE EVER SEEN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE!?!?

(ETA: it would have laid them all flat in seconds. Kaminari is to be feared you guys.)

NO!!!!!

it is sincerely frustrating to me watching the League carelessly toss aside all of their painstakingly accumulated goodwill from the MVA arc in the span of just a few short pages. hey Compress, you think it’s cool to hurl a bunch of rocks at my six-and-a-half-year-old son?? I hope someone rips that cool robot arm off and uses it to punch you in the dick

here comes Sero!! and how are you going to die, Sero

what in the

did he just... sneeze them all into space

okay but hear me out, what if Shouda absorbed that impact. SHOUDA YOUR TIME HAS FINALLY COME. CLASS 1-B’S ASCENT TO GLORY

(ETA: watch this space!! Shouda is here for a reason mark my words.)

meanwhile on Machia’s back, Dabi is soliloquying about Machia’s quirk while his arm is doing... something

please forgive me for not being able to drum up any sympathy for poor Dabi’s arms right about now. quit trying to set all my kids on fire

wait whaaaaat lol

so I scrolled back up to the previous page, and... that was fire?? lord help me why am I still so terrible at being able to tell when Horikoshi is drawing fire as opposed to just air randomly whooshing through trees. I have really got to memorize that foossh sound effect

so can Gigantomachia just BREATHE FIRE now?? or was ALL OF THAT Dabi??? if it was the latter then at least he had the decency to wait until all of the kids got blown out of range before setting the whole forest aflame to keep them back. I’ll admit it, that was thoughtful of him as far as villain power moves go

OHO BUT YOU CAN’T COUNT MOMO OUT JUST LIKE THAT!!

AND NOW EVERYTHING AROUND THEM IS EXPLODING AHHHHHH DID YOU GUYS SET LANDMINES, BAKUGOU WOULD BE SO PROUD

once again I have to ask myself exactly how much prep time they had here. Horikoshi would have you think it was mere seconds, but that clearly cannot be the case?? maybe they set some of these up beforehand to catch any stray villains trying to flee the area?

lmao Spinner’s all “wait why doesn’t he just dig his way out”, because apparently Machia can tunnel himself under the ground. but Compress is all “um because we would die” and Spinner is all “oh right”

though I gotta say, it’s not like they’re that much better off as things are now, either. pinned down in the woods surrounded by fire and explosives. definitely a conundrum

oh snap Compress has realized that their presence is holding Machia back. don’t tell me Machia is gonna head off on his own and leave the rest of the League to square off with the kids

YOOOOOO HOLY SHIT THE HEROES ACTUALLY DID SOMETHING

there you go, League! free cannon fodder to get you all pumped and confident again!

DKFJLSDKJ

PLEASE LET THIS BE THE ACTUAL TRANSLATION OH MY GOD. THIS IS MY NEW FAVORITE LINE IN ANYTHING AHHHH

“I’m leaving it to you, U.A.’s youngsters!” yeah, you and everyone else. ah well, can’t deny they get the job done

OH MMKJKYYYY GODDDDDDJJK

MINA COATED HERSELF IN ACID AND IS RUNNING AT GIGANTOMACHIA AND IS SHE ALSO ON FIRE??!?! SHE’S JUST RUNNING AT HIM LIKE A BIG OL’ FIERY BLOB???! QUEEN MINA???!! FIRE IS NOT HER WEAKNESS???! MINA??!! IS AIRPLANE?!??!!?!? MINAAAAAAA

holy fucking shit this whole arc is just one big Arc Of Ladies Getting To Do Stuff and I am 1000% living for it. THIS ARC IS MY FAMILY. I WOULD DIE FOR IT AND LEAVE EVERYTHING TO IT IN MY WILL. ahhhhhhhhhh

[aellynera]

Frayed Wires (Nathan Bateman x Reader)

FRAYED WIRES (Nathan Bateman x Reader)

(so i decided i may turn the drunk texts thing into a series? i decided at least to do one with Nathan because...well...it’s Nathan. the poem he quotes is Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley, who was incidentally married to Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein (or: The Modern Prometheus) which is also kind of appropriate for Nathan and anyway i sat down today and this happened.)

Word Count: 2122(ish)

Summary: All you want to do is sleep. All Nathan wants to do is talk.

Warnings: Language, naturally.

(Nathan’s texts are in bold. Your texts are in bold and italic.)

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.

You reached blindly for your phone as it rattled on the bedside table. You had no idea what time it was but you did know it was the middle of the night, your phone should not be going off, and you had gotten entirely too little sleep. Like, maybe two hours worth. You were so tired and groggy that you made the mistake of checking your messages before you actually even thought about what you were doing.

Do you ever think about the meaning of life?

I mean like really think about it.

Why we’re here, why the sky is green and the grass is blue?

No wait that’s not right.

You sighed and buried your face in the pillow. It was 3:27 in the morning and Nathan was texting you. Which was just odd anyway, since he knew where your room was and it was much more his style to just walk in and start a random conversation with you in person. 

He was probably drunk.

And now he could see that you had read the messages, so you were going to have to reply, or he really would show up at your door. Technically it was his door, it was his house, you just worked for him and stayed there, but the point was you were not in the mood to deal with him at all right now, and most decidedly not in the flesh.

You rolled your eyes before sending him a reply. You really should just ignore it, but...you were annoyed. Nathan was annoying. And it was now 3:30 in the morning and you were going to push a few buttons. Figuratively AND literally! your sleep-deprived brain cheered.

And things like why is water wet and air is invisible?

YES exactly see that’s why I want you.

I’m sorry?

Your brain. I want to pick you up. Your brain I mean. Pick your brain.

You just want me for my brain, huh?

You have a very nice brain.

Yep, Nathan was definitely drunk.

Not that him being drunk was anything out of the ordinary. But a few hours ago, when you were both in the lab testing some of his most recent ideas about the AI code, he had seemed...normal? Well, normal for Nathan anyway. He wasn’t irritated, he wasn’t condescending, he was actually (you honestly could not believe you were even thinking this) pleasant to be around.

You had been working for Nathan as his personal assistant for a few months. It was a promotion for sure over being a code slinger in a cubicle, but sometimes you honestly wondered what made you say yes to this bizarre existence. It was a beautiful house, beautiful scenery, interesting and highly intellectual conversations...when Nathan was sober.

There was also something you could never quite put your finger on. Something that was shifting as the weeks went on and you spent more time working alongside Nathan in the lab. As you spent evenings eating sushi and steaks and whatever else you were in the mood for that night (most nights, he actually let you choose the menu, you realized.) As you took afternoon walks around the estate, just taking in the scenery. As you debated various philosophies and ideas and theories and tried your damndest to prove Nathan wasn’t always right about everything. He almost seemed like he appreciated it all, but he would never say anything.

And you weren’t about to open that can of worms. Especially when he wasn’t sober.

How drunk are you right now?

On a scale of shitfaced to really fucking blitzed I would say I’m feeling no pain.

Jesus Christ. Well that was obvious. It was obvious just from the fact that he was texting you. Nathan was so uptight about security and data leaks and wiretapping and signals being hijacked (he’d admitted to doing it himself, so he did have a point) but had decided, after much insistence from you, that rigging the cell phones to only work inside the compound was an acceptable idea. It was so vast, you’d said, and what if something happened and one of you was all the way across the house or down in the lab, how were you supposed to let the other person know? It made sense at the time.

Now you were vaguely regretting it.

You could count on one hand the number of times you’d actually considered your boss to be pleasant to be around, and you still had your thumb left over just in case you needed to add to that tally.

At least personality wise. He was definitely pleasant to look at. Very pleasant.

You coughed and cleared your throat. That was not a line of thought to travel right now. The proper course of action was to get him to stop texting you.

A few minutes passed in glorious silence. Maybe a new, shiny thought had occurred to him and he was madly writing it down on a Post-It note. Maybe he just got bored and went to get a new drink. Maybe he’d finally just passed out and---

What are you thinking about?

Dammit. How to make you shut up, your brain snapped back. How to get you to let me sleep. How good your arms and shoulders look in that tank top after you’ve been hitting that punching back and you’re flushed and sweaty and…. Oh no. No no no. Stop it right now, brain.

Nathan hated to beat around the bush. Straightforward was the best policy with him, right?

How to get you to shut up and let me sleep.

Wonderful, glorious silence for exactly forty-six seconds.

Bro...that’s...so not cool.

Okay, this was getting ridiculous. Why were you participating in this? Why was he? You narrowed your eyes and looked toward a corner of your room. You hoped he could see you glaring into the camera that you knew was there and that he was watching while he was texting you. If not, you were sure he would watch it in the actual morning and you hoped the look was withering enough to make him think twice. Probably not. Because this was Nathan Bateman.

Your incredibly narcissistic, incredibly intelligent, incredibly attractive...stop it brain.

But he was pushing your buttons right back. Neither of you could ever really back away from an exchange like this..

I’m not your “bro”, Nathan. Please knock this shit off.

Dude, it’s a figure of speech.

I’m not your dude, either. Please just stop talking.

What’s wrong with dude. Dude is a gender neutral term, anyone can be a dude. Guys are dudes, chicks are dudes, dudes are dudes

Yeah, well, you’re kind of being an asshole, dude.

Dude. Chill.

Turning my phone off now.

No, wait, don’t. I’m sorry. I’ll stop.

Now that was...unexpected. Nathan Bateman just apologized to you? For being a drunk asshole in the middle of the night? Your eyes narrowed again. Suspicious.

You’ll stop texting me so I can go back to sleep?

No not that. I’ll stop calling you dude.

Oh for the love of...you closed your eyes and briefly considered the merits of hurling your phone at the surveillance camera.

Nathan, seriously, can we please just leave this until the morning?

A whole minute of wonderful, glorious, blessed silence this time. You couldn’t believe he might be considering this.

You were right.

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away

If a brain cramp was an actual thing, yours would most certainly be doing it now. You could barely even process it. He was drunk as hell and he was quoting poetry to you? You supposed you probably shouldn’t be entirely surprised, he’d quoted Oppenheimer once in a worse stupor (which you could only quantify because he had actually passed out that time.)

Are you fucking serious right now.

What.

Are you fucking quoting Ozymandias to me right now?

I am.

You couldn’t get the color of the sky right earlier, and now you’re just flawlessly quoting philosophical Romantic poetry at me?

I am.

You are not a normal person, Nathan Bateman.

What is normal anyway, besides really fucking boring? Who wants to be normal?

I would like to be somewhat normal, at least between the hours of midnight and 8am.

See, I knew there was a reason I liked you.

That was the second time he said that, you noted. You found it hard to believe. Nathan liked his work, his routine, his own brain. He liked talking about his work and how smart he was. Other than telling you that you were doing a great job, he barely handed out a single compliment, and if he somehow accidentally did, it was so backhanded you weren’t sure you could actually define it as one.

You mean you like my brain.

Well, yeah, your brain is fucking amazing. It has to be if you work with me.

I work for you, Nathan, not with you. But thanks?

No, no, see, that’s where you’re wrong. You work with me. We’re like partners. None of that employer employee bullshit.

Oooookay now I am one thousand percent sure you are completely piss drunk.

I am but that doesn’t make it any less true.

You could almost hear him saying those words in your head. You could see the way his eyebrows went up, the intensity in his eyes, the way he held his finger up to make the point.

The thought made your brain go slightly fuzzy, and not from exhaustion. Because now you were wide awake. Damn him.

Okay, Nathan, I’ll bite. What do I have to do to get you to stop doing this right now?

There was a pause before he answered, and you swore you’d heard a phone alert that wasn’t your own. It sounded like it was coming from...oh no, he wasn’t…

Getting tired of typing. Can I come talk to you for a while?

Are you outside my door right now?!

You heard the phone chime very clearly this time. He was, definitely.

I am.

You sighed, deeply. So deeply.

Is that really a good idea?

I think it’s a great idea.

Nathan, being serious here.

You could have sworn you heard him sigh from the other side of the door. He could have just come inside. It was his house, his keycard worked on all the doors.

But the door didn’t open.

So am I. Please can I come in? My mind just won’t shut off and I really am fucking drunk but talking to you is helping but tired of typing shit out, I’d rather say it to you.

I wanna see you. And tell you how sexy your brain is.

And that I like you for more than your brain.

And you knew in that instant there really was only one way to get him to shut up. And it was to just let him talk. It made sense, in an oddly Nathan kind of way. What’s the worst that could happen, really? He’d come in, you’d talk, he’d eventually pass out, maybe you could get a couple more hours of sleep, and then in the morning you’d either talk about it on a very deep cerebral level or you’d just pretend it had never happened at all. 

A press to the door release button on the side of the table and the latch let go. The door opened, revealing Nathan standing on the other side. Still wearing what he’d been wearing in the lab earlier that night, black lounge pants and that tight white henley he seemed to love so much. The corner of his mouth turned up in the most miniscule of smiles, but it was there.

You were about to toss your phone back onto the bedside table, when the text alert went off again. You shot an exasperated look in his direction, but gamely checked the message.

Did you mean what you said before? About biting?

You glanced up at Nathan and saw that the sliver of a smile had taken over most of his face and his eyebrows had raised to emphasize his question.

You didn’t say anything. You didn’t text him back. You just nodded your head to the empty spot next to you in your bed.

You had a feeling you weren’t going to get any sleep tonight after all.

~end~

taglist: @anetteaneta​ @rosemarysbaby13​ @darksideofclarke​ @girlwiththemostcake​ 

(taglist is open, let me know if you’d like to be tagged for future fics)

[andaleduardo]

Where, besides Tumblr, can people find you doing fannish things? (Obviously only mention sites and usernames you actually want to be found at. Don’t expose your secret identities on my account.)

What other names have you gone by on these platforms, including Tumblr, if any?

When did you join the IT fandom? And what got you into fandom, to begin with?

What are your favorite ships, or characters, if any, and why? What do they mean to you?

In what ways do you participate in fandom? (ex. Posting memes, reblogging/commenting on content, writing fanfic, making fanart, creating fanmixes, etc.)

Do you have any in-fandom inspirations? Other members of the community that drive you? (And if you have the time/energy, in what ways do they inspire you?)

Name and link some of your favorite works, please!

Do you have any works of your own that you feel particularly proud of, or wish more people would’ve consumed? Please provide links if possible.

Have you ever participated in a fannish event (ie. IT Week, a fic Big Bang) or applied to be a part of a fanzine? If so, which ones, and can you please link them?

Without any form of bashing or lashing out, what is something you feel this fandom is missing?

We’ve talked about it before but I wanna thank you one more time for all the thought you put into these questions and for sending them to me, honestly <33

Okay this is probably going to be a long post I’m sorry in advance,,

- Besides tumblr and AO3 (it’s the same username) I don’t have any more fannish accounts, I have a twitter so I can keep up with the IT content over there but my account is private I don’t really interact there I just observe 👀

- Jesus what a good question, my first name on tumblr was eds-spagheds, that was also my first name on AO3, but then the second movie came out and I had to make good use of that iconic line

- Okay buckle up I love this story. So, It chapter one came out in 2017, but I hate horror movies with a passion, I never watch them, so when my friends asked me to come see it with them I said no, right. Fast forward one year. One random day in high school I think I caught the flu or something and I was feeling like absolute CRAP but me and my friend (the same one that invited me to see It on the cinema) had already made plans for that afternoon, that were: watch IT chapter one at her house. I tell you, I was laying on her couch having fever dreams while we waited for another friend of ours to show up, I was thinking to myself, I’m gonna go home, I feel like shit I don’t want to watch a horror movie that I’m gonna have nightmares about tonight. Anyway, I didn’t leave, they convinced me because they said “you love stranger things you’ll love this too”. The three of us sat down to watch the movie. Me, a dumbass, said this on the first seconds of the movie: “Can you imagine how bad it must feel to enter a fandom based on a movie? Like, with stranger things you can rewatch all the seasons but with a movie it’s just, the same 2 hours to obsess over and over.” No, I didn’t know there was a book, mini-series, or a second part. Yes, I got to know them all in the following months because as soon as I finished the movie I knew that was it for me.

- Okay favorite ships? We’re all tired of this answer but reddie. However, I like every single ship imaginable between the 7 of them, to me they’re all soulmates and I love all the dynamics possible. I lovE all of them, ships and characters. I think I related most to Ben, because of the unrequited love, body image and food issues. That part on the book about Ben’s mom feeding him unhealthy things and him trying to eat better and then the guilt trip? man, that hit too close. But like many people say, we all relate to every loser in a different way.

- Sighs. I don’t really participate anymore... First 2 years I was on fire with content, I did fanart and wrote prompts, one shots, full fics.. now I literally just reblog things and try to give love to the artists. I guess you can say I’m retired

- That’s a difficult question, all of the art I see inspires me, all of the fics I love inspire me, before, I guess they inspired me to create my own content for the fandom but since I don’t create anymore, they just, make my day really much better. I appreciate every single content creator of this fandom, you don’t know how much joy it brings me

- Okay okay!! This is impossible to get right because I will forget many many people for sure but over all this time there’s some works that really stick with me and that I think about every other day:

a (number) neighborhood of seven by  BookRockShooter

I Might Be Dreaming (I Might Be Dead) by batwake

two falling sparks  by zach_stone

Predicament Bondage  by dgalerab

Now What I'm Gonna Say May Sound Indelicate by IfItHollers

& That's For All Time  by  tossertozier (rednoseredhair)

In Over Your Chest is Way Too Deep (AKA Surf Bois) by speakslow

5555 by weepies

- Yes! I wrote a handful of things but my absolute favorite one is this: Late at night when I like who I am, in the dark where I’m finally me

- No :( Sadly I never participated in any fandom event as a creator, but I love to see everyone’s work when one happens ! I bought the loser’s zine and it’s my most prized possession

- Hmmmm tough question, I think a little more empathy? There are so many kind and amazing people here but there are also some people who are... not. I see a lot of discourse over useless things like adults being in the fandom is somehow bad because the losers were once kids? like, are we forgetting this story follows these people from their childhoods through their adulthoods? And are we supposed to stop liking things after we turn 20 or? And when people who write Richie’s parents as bad parents are regarded as edgy teens who just want to cause Richie pain??? like what the....? so many people have only watched the movies and i’m sorry but in the movies there’s nothing that shows Richie’s parents as good parents, that’s only in the book, why do we attack these people then? maybe they relate to Richie and they have bad households, don’t we all project ourselves on our favorite characters?

Anyway, that’s all from me, if anyone reads this far I’ll be impressed but I had a lot of fun with these 👉👈

[suntrastar]

abstract: chapter 1

chapter 2!!

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Artist!Reader

Summary: Wait- Bucky Barnes attends your art class? And you didn’t even recognize him?

Word count: 7k (i am insane i know this!! you can also find this fic on ao3 !!)

Author’s note: hello! attempting to upload a fic on here for the first time ever! do i understand this website’s format. perhaps not. but am i going to try? perhaps yes! anyways hope you all like it :) likes and reblogs are very much appreciated!!! umm idk how this works if you wanna follow me you can?? do follows exist on tumblr dot com i think they do. hope they do. love you all. this is a long chapter buckle up (BUCKle up lmao i am not funny)!! enjoy ;o

“Hey, can you come look at this?”

You teach three classes a week- Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. The latter two are enjoyable in their own right, but Mondays are definitely your favorite. Instead of teaching kids, who are funny and creative but so messy, and so loud, you get to teach adults. People your own age or usually older, putting you in a position of authority, valuing your opinion, wanting you to come look at things.

It’s a delightful power trip.

You turn away from the window to see who’s speaking.

It’s Steve.

Of course it’s Steve, your star student, staring at you with a worn, weary intensity, wiping a paintbrush on a paper towel. He’s already pushed his sheet of paper across the table, bumpy with water and watercolor paint, cream-colored edges starting to curl. He leans away from it, reclining in a seat that’s adult-sized but dwarfed by his frame, looking so forlorn, like the paper just abandoned him, moved to the opposite side of the table by itself.

You stifle a laugh.

“Sure,” you say, and make your way over to his table.

Steve fidgets in his seat as you look at his painting. You try to keep your jaw in check.

It drops anyway.

As always, it’s beautiful. He’s painted a sky, swirling with purples and pinks, and careful clouds, flickering in and out between layers of paint, elegant and pale yellow-orange. And the sun- it’s off-center, and you’re sure it was unintentional, but that adds to the effect, because it’s hot red, and dazzling, and slowly seeping into the still-wet sky. Tendrils of red like real sunbeams, pushing through the clouds like a real sunset.

You don’t know why Steve even takes this class. Half the time, you feel like he should be the one teaching.

“It’s gorgeous,” you say eventually, once your words come back to you. “I love how you painted the sun- the red, oh my god. You’re seriously a natural.”

“Thank you,” Steve says, and you push the paper back towards him. He looks down at it, still tense, brow furrowed, and you almost laugh again, until he looks back up at you. “I wanted to know what you thought about it.”

Power trip.

“I love it,” you say, giving him a reassuring smile, which he hesitantly returns. You might be laying it on a little thick, but Steve still looks distressed, and you genuinely like the guy enough to try to help him.

When he walked in with his friend for the first class, you were floored. People like Steve don’t attend classes like this- classes like this are attended by regular people. Not people that walk like dancers, all grace and light steps, not people that are extraordinarily jacked, with jutting shoulders and rippling muscles, not people that have a weirdly authoritarian air around them, like a politician, but less shrewd.

Still, you welcomed them and made awkward small-talk and tried not to stare at their arms and hoped you came across as a somewhat decent person. It’s your first time teaching adults, you explained, and Steve gave you a smile so sincere and reassured you that you would do great, boosting your confidence to the point where you actually did.

Steve is lovely. He’s passionate about art and has a good eye, a better eye than you, really, and he always tries so hard with whatever he does, and he’s funny in a dorky way, and completely unaware of it. He always wears a baseball hat and tucks his shirts into his pants and called you ma’am once, and looked so surprised when you burst out laughing and told him to call you by your first name. With him, two classes have flown by, and now, during the third, he’s warmed up to you enough to talk to you like a friend.

The friend he brings with him, though?

A total douchebag.

The night to Steve’s day, the rain to his sunshine. It’s obvious that Steve brings him along as some sort of moral support, to make himself look less out of place, which is fine, except the guy always treats you like you’ve perpetually offended him.

And maybe you have, maybe one time you did something that’s worthy of his eternal dislike, but you wouldn’t know what it is, because he’s never brought it up, because he barely fucking talks.

You don’t think he’s a naturally quiet guy. He definitely looks like he has a lot to say, but no matter what, he only ever talks in single-syllable bursts, quiet enough that half the time you miss what he’s saying.

He doesn’t ignore you, either- he listens to everything you say and lets his judgement flicker over his face- which is way worse. A glare is a slight misstep, a shake of his head means that you’ve just said something that he finds stupid, a scowl is a catastrophe.

You don’t even know his name. He’s never introduced himself, and always writes his name in a shaky, illegible scrawl on the sign-in sheet, and by now you don’t care enough to look it up.

Still, you’re nice to him, polite. It’s okay if he doesn’t like you. You don’t need to be liked- being noticed is enough.

You shift away from Steve to his friend, sitting next to him at the table. He’s staring at you in a way that you can only describe as violent, and you flinch, and then plaster your smile back on.

“How’s it going?” You ask, expecting no response, stealing a glance at his paper. He’s painted the entire sheet a watered-down blue, and you want to congratulate him, for actually participating this time, but you don’t say anything. “The watercolors working out for you?”

Your heart goes out to the poor paintbrush in his hand. It’s barely been used, is steadily dripping water, and is being throttled in his gloved grip. He always wears one glove- it’s weird, but you’re not going to pry.

He catches you looking and a whole myriad of emotion plays over his face; irritation and shame, a creased brow and a scowl. You have the feeling that you’ve taken a massive overstep, even though you haven’t said anything else, even though you’re not looking at his hand anymore, just at him.

His hair hangs over his eyes, glossy and carelessly wavy, which you would find pretty, maybe, if he wasn’t looking at you the way he is. Like you’ve just done something terrible.

“Sure,” he says, and that’s it.

Even when you turn away, he’s glaring.

You hate it, so you pretend it’s not happening.

Steve gives you a sympathetic glance before you head back. You wave it off.

“Shonna,” you call, to the fiftysomething woman hunched over her painting a few tables down, “how’re the flowers looking?”

***

Thirty minutes before your fourth Monday class starts, you arrive at the studio to find Rina washing paintbrushes in the sink.

“Hey,” you call.

She turns to you and gives you a surprised grin. “Oh, hey! You’re here early- come help with these brushes.”

You set your bag on the counter by the wall and join her at the sink. You’ve known Rina for ages- ever since you were roommates in college. The class before yours is taught before, some advanced painting thing that she is extremely overqualified to teach.

She’s kind of famous. And kind of self-absorbed, and a little bit pretentious, but maybe that’s just what happens when you’re as successful in your field as she is. No matter what it is, you can’t complain- she’s the one that helped get you this job in the first place.

“A couple of people in my class like to get here early, so I just try to arrive before them,” you say. She passes you a clean paintbrush. You reach around her and tear off a paper towel from the dispenser. “Did you dye your hair? It looks so pretty.”

“Yes!” She shakes her head, letting her hair sway. Last time you met her, she had dyed it pink. Now it’s mahogany red, straight and sleek and falling just past her shoulders. She looks a little unreal. “How’s your class going? Are the people okay?”

“Yeah, most of them are pretty nice.”

She passes you another paintbrush to dry. You consider bringing up Steve’s friend, but decide against it.

“That’s good- and you’re welcome, by the way. But okay, listen. Do you remember that one guy I told you about a while back, Dustin? So yesterday I was just sitting at home, and then he texted me…”

With the formalities out of the way, she launches into a story about someone you definitely don’t remember. Still, you humor her, listen to what she has to say, chime in at the right parts and say “really?” and “no way!” too many times. The minutes tick by.

When all of the brushes are washed and dried, you take them, since you’re going to be the one using them next, and start setting up for the class. Rina walks away and grabs her stuff from the counter. She lingers by the doorway, door already propped open, aimlessly scrolling through something on her phone, hesitant to leave for a reason you don’t know. Maybe she has more to say- if that’s even, like, possible.

You set the brushes in a container at the center table, and head over to the shelves on the far wall to pull out more supplies. Unfortunately, today’s class is revolving around watercolor again. It’s drudgery, such a boring medium- dull, unsaturated, painstaking when it comes to detail. You bring out a stack of paper, the least-depressing palettes, and then mason jars for holding water.

You’re setting the last jar on the table when Rina shrieks.

It startles you, making your hand slip.

The jar wobbles over the edge of the table and then falls, shattering into cloudy glass pieces at your feet.

“Shit,” you curse, and look over at her. “Rina, what the hell?”

Standing across from her in the doorway, having arrived early for class as usual, are Steve and his friends, two shades more flustered than usual. Rina is gawking at them.

Okay, they’re attractive, but not that attractive.

Not shriek-worthy attractive.

You sigh loudly and carefully step over the glass, making your way over to them. “Hi, Steve,” you say, and he jolts, like a scared cat. He’s blushing, stepping back into the hallway, hands awkwardly dangling at his sides. His friend is staring at Rina like he’s about to murder her, and you’re staring at him like you’re about to ask him to pass you the broom behind the door.

Because you are.

“Sorry about… that. There’s a broom behind the door, could you pass it to me?”

He opens his mouth to say something, and you are desperate to hear him, even if he’s only going to utter a simple yes, but Rina buts in.

“You did not just ask the Winter Soldier to pass you a broom.”

Who?

“Girl, what?”

All three of you turn to her, cornering back into the wall. She looks even more unreal, eyes blown wide, red creeping up her neck, giving her hair a run for its money, still gawking. You resist the urge to reach out and pull her chin back up, to close her mouth.

She alternates between looking at Steve and at…  

“That’s the Winter Soldier,” she says slowly, like she’s trying to convince herself, or you, and then steps closer to Steve, who instinctively takes a step back. He’s fully in the hallway, now. “And you’re Captain America.”

Steve’s jaw clenches. He stays silent, and you feel bad for him, that’s all you can feel, really- you are confused beyond reason, halfway convinced that Rina is losing her shit, still awaiting the broom, still awaiting Steve’s friend’s words, racking your brain for any image of Captain America or the Winter Soldier that you might have- and coming up completely empty.

You don’t watch the news, like, ever.

Little details float back to you. Steve’s dressing sense, his manners, his muscles…

The baseball caps that both of them are always wearing...

His friend’s glove…

Oh, fuck.

“Are you?” You ask dumbly. The question is meant for both of them, but you only look at one of them while speaking. A glare meets you back- a slight misstep.

You can’t even see your feet, in this situation. You’re walking blind.

Steve crosses his arms and looks at you sternly. He doesn’t look angry, but as close as he can get. “Yes,” he says, completely guarded and unfriendly and not lovely at all. “I thought you knew that.”

You are so stupid- how did you not know that?

“I didn’t,” you say, and you don’t sound convincing at all. Not much fazes you, but you are absolutely, positively fazed right now, and starting to spiral out. “I had no idea- I thought you guys could have been, like, bodyguards, or something, not actual Avengers, oh my god. I’m so sorry, shit, thank you for your service?”

You’re going to end it all- this is so embarrassing.

Steve’s mouth twitches. Rina is scarlet-faced. The Winter Soldier, god, looks so tense, like he might shatter, too, into silent, grumpy pieces all over the floor.

“You’re welcome,” Steve says, and marginally relaxes. He stays in the hallway, the Winter Soldier by the door- you should have paid more attention in your tenth grade history class, what is the guy’s name?

Rina peels herself off the wall, and you start to get nervous. There’s a painful silence, with lots of staring, where you’re still trying to coax a few rational thoughts out of your brain, and only coming up with one- Rina needs to leave.  

You try to tell her that with your eyes, with a pointed look, but you’re not great at this whole communication-through-expressions thing, so she doesn’t get the hint, or does and just ignores it.

“So, let me get this straight,” she says, tearing the silence like a plastic seal, voice starting to rise, from wonder to excitement, from painless curiosity to danger, “there’s two Avengers taking your class? And you didn’t even recognize them?”

“Nope,” you say, looking away, at a stain on the wall, at the distant glass shards still unswept away on the floor.

“That’s…”

She trails off before she has the chance to call you stupid, because the Winter Soldier gives her a pointed look of his own. Low brows and dark eyelashes, blazing blue eyes- she has no choice but to listen. Your staring was irritating, but his is intimidating.

She scampers away, mumbling something you can’t catch and brushing against Steve as she leaves.

This whole thing is so unprofessional, but at least you can breathe again-

“Here,” the Winter Soldier says, and a broom handle comes into your view.

Just one word, but you’ll take it with open arms. You take the broom from him, give an unreturned, unfamiliarly sheepish smile and head back to the broken glass on the floor.

The broken glass is swept up and tossed in the trash. You avoid looking at the doorway, focusing on other useless tasks instead. Rearranging the supplies on the table, fiddling with the window blinds, chatting with the rest of the class attendees as they start to file in.

Then the class starts and you’re swept back into your demonstration, talking and teaching and showing off different techniques that can be done with different types of brushes. You only look in their direction once, right after showing off some technique you barely remember from art school with a fan brush- they sit at their table near the back, Steve paying attention as usual, his friend silently reacting, as usual.

So they decided to stay- that’s good. Great, even.

Until the next part of the class starts, when everyone gets to work on their own paintings, when you have to stop talking.

You mill around the room, searching for a conversation to join in on or a comment to make, but find none. Then you take a sheet of paper and hopelessly try to draw- search for a distraction and a spark up of an idea, something, anything, and come up completely empty. It’s just...

How famous are they? Like, A-list celebrity famous? Are they offended that you didn’t recognize them- should you start treating them differently? You don’t keep up with this stuff. You have an impossibly long list of other things to worry about- you don’t have the time to worry about this stuff. The Avengers aren’t something you think about ever, because why should you?

If you opened any newspaper or magazine you would find something about them- a charity gala they attended, some recent threat they neutralized, the latest gossip surrounding their personal lives. But those lives are so far detached from your own that you’ve never bothered to look.

You simply don’t care. You’re not a native New Yorker- it’s not like these people are your hometown heroes, that you grew up idolizing them. They save the world time and time again and society is forever indebted to them and all of that, but what are you supposed to do about it?

And most importantly, what is the Winter Soldier’s fucking name?

Enough of this chaos goes on in your mind to make your head hurt. Fuck it, you decide- you’ll face it. You straighten your shoulders as you stand, trying your best to look purposeful as you walk to their table, like you have reason to go over there. Yeah, they’re strong. Genetically enhanced and all of that, and they’re important: they’re Avengers.

But they’re taking your class.

You slide into the chair across from the Soldier without taking the time to gauge their reactions.

“Do other people here know?” You ask.

Steve startles, eyes widening, and then considers the question while swirling his brush in green paint. He’s working on a landscape today, you think. “Shonna might,” he says, not rudely. “But nobody else.”

So maybe not that famous. Or maybe the people here are just like you and don’t care.

But it still doesn’t make sense. “Then why did you think that I knew?”

“Because you talk a lot,” Steve says, like it’s the most obvious thing ever.

“Well, yeah, that’s part of the job-”

Steve cuts you off, and fuck, you hate getting interrupted. But he’s smiling, and you can’t bring yourself to get upset over it. “You talk a lot to us.”

Us?  

More like to him.

You take it in stride, don’t let your confidence slip. You’ve purposely angled your head away, and you know the Winter Soldier is staring at you- you can feel it on your cheek, on your shoulder, on every nerve in your face. You don’t look back at him. This revelation hasn’t made him any less unpleasant.

“Yeah,” you say, like it’s just as obvious, “because you’re a nice guy, Steve.”

Steve raises his eyebrows so high that they disappear under the brim of his hat. You smile at him as nicely as you can, sugar-sweet, until he can’t take anymore and drops his gaze back to his painting. You turn back to the nameless man across from you.

Winter Soldier.

“Hi,” you say, only to him, and prop your elbows up on the table, resting your face in your hands. “I love the little pattern you have going on with your painting.”

It’s random splotches of black paint- calling it a pattern is an exaggeration. But you carry on.

“This is probably a bad time to ask, and it’s kind of a dumb question, but, like, what’s your name?”

He just barely raises an eyebrow, allowing for a fraction of surprise, before schooling his expression back into his usual mix of anger and boredom, a casual glare and slight frown. For a moment, you wonder what he looks like when he’s happy.

“You don’t know his name?” Steve is in disbelief, and then he winces, and you think he’s been kicked under the table. Abruptly, you laugh.

It rings out. A few people turn and stare, but you brush it all off with another smile.

He’s still staring. You don’t mind it.

The paintbrush in his hand is suddenly unsteady.

“My name is Bucky,” he says, slowly and loudly enough for you to make out the sound of his voice, for the first time ever.

He is definitely bothered by you asking, his mouth drawn tight, and you can’t even take the time to appreciate how cutesy his name is compared to his demeanor, because oh hell. It’s going to be difficult to keep up this whole dislike thing, if his voice sounds like this, low and rough and gritty like sandpaper, pleasantly grating over you and your skin…

You have to consciously remind yourself to keep on smiling.

“Nice to meet you, Bucky.”

Things should feel different, but they don’t. Nobody really reacts- everything resumes as normal. Steve focuses on his panting, adding delicate brushstrokes to the branches of a tree. You linger for a moment, and then get up from the table and flutter off to someone else.

For every class, you wear this kitschy apron, paint-stained, with strings tied in a hasty bow against your back that Bucky always aches to even out. Someone tells you something, and you respond eagerly, fully phased out of the past incident.

He stares until he realizes he’s staring, and then drops his eyes back down to his paper.

Steve wanted to attend this class for a number of reasons- he was bored and wanted something to occupy his time, he wanted to revisit an old hobby, he wanted to learn from you- some hip, emerging artist he’s a fan of, whose work he’s been following for a while now, who is seriously talented, although you have yet to prove it. He wanted to go do something separated from the events of his regular life.

So much wanting. Bucky wants to know why you’re so indifferent.

He doesn’t know if it’s a good thing that you didn’t know his name, or that you didn’t flinch or gasp or accuse him of something, or pointedly look at his left arm. Should he be thankful? Steve is clearly thankful, already loosening up, freed of any lasting tension.

Bucky just feels wary. You’re unsettling.

You come back over to their table one more time. The sleeves of your shirt are pushed up, and there’s a smear of something dark on your forearm, ink or paint. On one wrist you’re wearing a  bracelet made of braided leather. On the other you wear a bulky digital watch.

Practical.

“Everything okay?” You ask, as if something not okay could potentially have happened, in your forty-five minute absence.

Steve fixes you with a friendly smile. Bucky can’t ever bring himself to do the same.

“Yep,” Steve says, and you nod your head, clearly relieved.

“Great!” You glance at him for a spare second, and turn away again.

Everyone he knows is so guarded, walls built high and doors barred shut. Except for you, if Bucky can say that he knows you, the perky art instructor, Steve’s favorite artist. You’re confident and flippant, and that should be a bad pairing, but somehow you can carry yourself within it just fine. Always purposeful in the space you occupy, not reacting to the knowledge of his and Steve’s major, momentous identities.

Bucky wonders, idly, as he blots water over what you so generously called a pattern, why you didn’t.

It’s not like he wants you to acknowledge it, wants you to call him a war criminal or a Rusisan spy. He just wants you to-

He doesn’t know.

The class goes on. An older couple sitting a few tables away have caught your attention, chattering on and on about their personal lives.They have a pet cat that their landlord doesn’t know about, and when they retire they want to move to the seaside in Italy, and in May their son is going to graduate high school.

“High school?” You gasp, loud for no reason. “I hated high school.”

Before the class ends, you take your position at the front of the studio, and talk some more. He knows it’s part of your job, but you are excessive.

There’s an art exhibition going on at some museum, and one of the featured artists is an acquaintance of yours, and on Saturday the admission fee is discounted, and if anybody is interested, you have a stack of flyers on the center table. And you hope that everyone has a good week.

You look at Bucky while finishing up your little monologue, giving a half-smile that’s for the whole class, but seemingly only directed at him. He blinks slowly, and when he opens his eyes again, you’re looking somewhere else.

***

“Morning, pal, you ready to go?”

Steve gives him a hopeful smile as he peels an orange.

Bucky’s hair is still wet from his shower, dripping water onto his shirt. It’s early, too early to go anywhere. He doesn’t even know why he’s awake- usually after his wake-of-dawn runs, he falls back asleep, or lies down and just stares at his ceiling, thinking, until he grows restless enough to get up and do something. But today, the restlessness came much sooner, so he got up much sooner, and it might already be a mistake.

He takes a seat at the kitchen island, next to Sam, trying to think of something that Steve might have had planned for today, and coming up completely empty. “Go where?”

Steve looks hurt, for a brief second. “The exhibition at the museum, remember?”

Oh.

That.

“I’m not going to that,” Bucky says, harshly enough for it to be dropped.

Steve does not drop it. “Hey, come on. Just look at it.”

From his back pocket, Steve pulls out a flyer, one of the flyers you had out on Monday, folded up in a neat square- when did Steve pick one of those up? He holds it out, and Bucky, wishing he was asleep again, takes it.

He unfolds it, and the words are written in tiny letters, and the few photos on the paper are in color but too grainy to make out, and it gives him a slight headache, but he pretends to look it over. Sam leans into him to see it, loudly crunching cereal in Bucky’s ear.

“Looks cool, Rogers,” Sam says, and Steve grins, and now Bucky is the bad guy in the situation, for not wanting to go, even though Sam isn’t going either.

Bucky passes the flyer back without reading a single word.

“I’m not going,” he says, again.

But Steve is relentless. He sets the orange peels aside and gives him a look, and Bucky can already feel his resolve starting to crumble, and it’s kind of pathetic, really. Does he not understand that Bucky is already doing as much as he can?

“Why not?”

He picks the easiest answer.

“I don’t want to.”

Steve’s brow furrows as he splits the orange into two, giving half to Bucky. Sam slurps the milk from his cereal bowl.

They’re all blissfully silent.

“Come on, Bucky,” Steve says suddenly, almost begging. “I really want to see it.”

“I don’t-” He falters, he’s losing the battle. “How many people are there gonna be?”

Steve lights up. Bucky tries to stay indignant, tries to keep his face twisted in dislike, but it’s difficult with Steve. He’s always so full of optimism, has so much of it that it spills out through the seams, rubs off onto whoever’s closest.

“Not that many,” Steve says, like a promise, shaking his head. “That’s why we should go now.”

“Will she be there?”

Sam perks up.

Steve frowns. “No? Or wait, maybe. It’s a public place- I don’t know. She could be.”

It’s miles off from the answer he wants, but again, for Steve, he’ll take it. Bucky ignores Sam leaning across the counter like an idiot and asking “who’s she?” and eats his orange slices in silence.

***

Huge, bulbous heads, and beady little eyes. The limbs are long and wavy and contorted in the weirdest positions, seas of arms and legs and joints, women twisted over each other in gnarled embraces, a man with his arms twirling over and over again around his own torso. And the colors- a complete eclectic mess of everything- blue, red, yellow, green, purple. Everything.

You walk through the museum floor one, two, three times. The paintings on display are unsettling and ugly, and you’re on the verge of tears.

They’re gorgeous. Pain thrown on a canvas, told through canvas. It’s overwhelming- you’re overwhelmed, and you can’t do anything else about it. The museum just opened and there’s barely any people around- you can wallow in your sadness as much as you want to, for now.

Or maybe you’ll wallow in your frustration, instead.

This… you want to create like this.  

But you don’t have it.  

It being an impossible, nearly unattainable type of pain, or misery or anger or any other emotion so strong and visceral that you could translate it into something like this, something that evokes something else from other people. From an audience.

You might have had something like that once, but that’s all too far behind you now. Forgettable. What you need right now is an idea, a spark of inspiration, a single coherent thought. A confirmation that you aren’t completely lost.

You wander back to a painting in a far corner, all alone in a small alcove. A red woman, with her head nestled in green grass and legs wrapping around the sun, quite literally head over heels for it. Her mouth is wide open, gaping, calling, wailing, maybe. She has a hooked nose and a mole on one of her arms, and her white dress has fallen down to pool on the grass, and her legs are lithe and unshaven, prickly like the grass, just like the yellow spikes of the sun, drawn almost comically.

How do you even- how do you even come up with things like this?

By living an interesting life, probably. Through not being boring.

You stay there for a while. Long enough that more people start to file in, pretentious art students wearing all black, eccentric people with awesome haircuts, tourists. They peer over your shoulders, awkwardly, waiting for you to move. When you don’t, they leave you to be, giving you a rude look or two that you pay no mind to. There’s space on either side of you, if they’re so desperate to see. Sidling up right against you is kind of weird, but you’ll excuse it, for this painting.

Eventually, you realize that you should probably get going.

You’ve been standing so long that your legs are starting to ache, and there’s countless other Saturday errands you have to run- doing your laundry, buying groceries, calling up your mom- boring Saturday things to do.

You leave the red woman, regrettably. The fabric of your sleeve comes back dry when you wipe your eyes, even though you feel fully washed away, feel like you’re floating as you drift over to the elevator.

The doors slide open and a few people file out, and then it’s empty, thankfully. You step inside, press the button for the ground floor, wait for the doors to fully close-

“Wait,” a voice calls.

You’re not rude- you press the button to hold open the door.

When it fully opens, Steve steps inside, followed by Bucky.

You’re still out of it. You don’t even realize who they are, not until the doors have slid shut and the floor jolts as the elevator starts its descent and they’ve been staring at you for a solid five seconds.

“Oh, hi,” you say, after too much silence. You need to get yourself together. “You guys came!”

Put a little pep in your step! And more joy in your voice- nobody wants to listen to someone so drained.

Steve shrugs. “I wanted to see it.”

Bucky just smolders, clearly saying with his silence, “I didn’t.”

“Did you like it?”

Steve considers your question. The elevator stops at another floor and the doors slide open, but there’s nobody waiting to step inside. You wait for Steve to gather his words together, sure that he’s trying to come up with a nice way to voice whatever he’s thinking, which is definitely not nice. There’s no way that he liked the art, not one chance.

“It was… intriguing,” he says, at last. Neither of them are wearing hats today, because the museum doesn’t allow it. Even in this artificial light, his hair shines, golden-blond. “Did you like it?”

“Yes,” you say, without wasting a second. “The one of the red woman- it’s probably the best thing I’ve seen all year.”

“It’s only January,” Bucky grumbles.

His voice shocks you, sends an ice-cold jolt up your spine that you definitely dislike.

Steve turns to him, peering over your shoulder, surprised and disappointed. The two of them have a silent conversation with their eyes and you stand in the midst of it, waiting for the goosebumps to settle back down, waiting for the chill to go away.

It’s difficult- he clearly doesn’t like you, either- and even if he has his own troubling little backstory, which you don’t care enough about to google, it’s not justified.

But…

It almost makes his aggression... amusing.

“It is January,” you say politely, dismissing him. “Great observation.”

The elevator reaches the ground floor and the doors side open. You exit in step with Steve, with Bucky right on your heels.

You all stand around in the museum lobby, a wide hallway down from the giftshop and a small cafe.

“Are you headed out?” Steve asks. He puts his hands in his pockets, feet planted wide.

Bucky crosses his arms. He’s wearing all black. If it were anyone else, you would make a joke- he could almost pass off as a pretentious art student, if the outlines of his body weren’t so visible through his clothes, all taut muscle and sharp angles. His hair curls over his shoulders, prettier than anything you’ve seen on any girl.

These guys are Avengers, you think, and proceed to push the thought away.

They look so… un-Avenger-y.

“Um.” You press a hand against your forehead, trying to formulate a response. Chores suddenly seem miles away, the last thing you should be doing. You have all of Sunday to complete them, anyway.

“I was going to get something to eat from the cafe first,” you say, nodding over in its direction. “You guys wanna join me?”

You don't know why you look at Bucky when you say it

“Sure!” Steve says, all cheery, still standing alongside you. He smiles and his teeth are pearly white.

Of course his teeth are pearly white. Dentists everywhere are probably cowering, clutching their little metal instruments for dear life.

Then he hesitates, and turns to Bucky. “If you have nothing else to do, I mean.”

Bucky pauses. You and Steve both stare him down.

“They have these raspberry-almond muffins that are to die for,” you say, like it’ll convince him.

He rolls his eyes. Bored and still gorgeous- if only.

“I’m free,” he says, and you don’t know why he looks at you when he says it.

You pay the bored teenager working the cash register with cash. He gives you your change, and when he turns away to prepare your order, you shove half of the bills and all of your coins into the tip jar.

Bucky sits at the farthest table with Steve. His knees can barely fit underneath it, and the tabletop is sticky, and he’s now willingly spending more time here, and with no disguise there is no way that he isn’t going to be recognized by someone, and he doesn’t know why he hasn’t fully booked it yet.

Because…

He doesn’t know.

Maybe because you’re not asking for anything from him, aren’t minding that he’s sullen or unapproachable or anything else- his presence seems to be enough for you, which is bothersome, and at the same time, mildly exciting.

“Are you having fun?” Steve asks, while you smile at the teenager handing you plates of muffins, little glasses of some milky-espresso-coffee drink.

“What do you think?” Bucky asks, while you start your journey back to the table, and Steve opens his mouth to respond, already bothered, and Bucky’s already guilty, but then Steve hops up to help you carry everything back.

You sit down laughing. Steve is laughing, too. The corners of your eyes crease and he can see all of your teeth, and you look at him for a split second, and then turn away before he can get a read on your expression.

He sits in silence, while you and Steve trade jokes and stories and easy banter, talking about art and local politics and all types of things he can’t bring himself to care about, things that Steve is relishing in. You’re witty, apparently, or at least quick enough to get a few quick laughs out of Steve, and Bucky would never say it, he’s barely thinking it, but he appreciates you for it.

And the muffin isn’t quite to die for, but it’s okay.

During a lull in the conversation, you break your attention away from Steve and turn back to Bucky. You look concerned, almost, still smiling but without showing all of your teeth, leaning towards him like you’re about to tell him a secret.

“I never apologized for before,” you say, and Bucky immediately sits up on edge.

Even Steve goes wary, eyes narrowing.

You suddenly give a long, weary sigh, and press a hand against the back of your neck, like whatever you’re about to say is going to be so tedious. “For my friend flipping out when she saw you guys- she’s literally crazy, she’s always doing too much- but on her behalf, I’m sorry.”

The silence following afterwards is deafening.

“It’s okay,” Steve says, after a long moment, while you’re still looking at Bucky- your eyes make his skin itch, and he doesn’t say anything else. “She’s not the worst that we’ve gotten.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything.

“Okay, great,” you say, and you slump back in your seat, looking away, back to your half-eaten muffin. You pick off an almond from the top and eat it. “Glad we got that out of the way. I just thought it would be weird if I didn’t say anything.”

“Thank you,” Steve says, so polite, even though you’ve done nothing to deserve his thanks. “Have you known her for a long time?”

“Yes, oh my god,” you say, and readjust yourself in your chair again, accidentally bumping your knee against Bucky’s, but not apologizing for it. He glances underneath the table, at your entire bare knee, visible through a rip in your jeans. “Rina- her name is Rina- was my college roommate for a while.”

“You went to college?” Steve asks.

“I have an art degree,” you say dryly, “which was… an okay decision, I guess. Sometimes I think I should have just dropped out and done, like, stand-up or something.”

You clearly don’t want to discuss it, leaving the last part as some sort of rhetorical joke. Steve takes the hint and nods, already closing the chapter, and you take a sip from your little glass, finally silent. The foam on the top of the drink sticks to your mouth until you lick it off. Bucky replies to it anyway.

“Why stand-up?”

You turn to him so fast that he almost misses you faltering, and give him a dazzling smile. He thinks of your bare knee under the table, and tries not to sweat. “Because I’m funny, Bucky.”

He doesn’t like how his name sounds when you say it. “Tell me a joke.”

“Oh, okay,” you say, and clasp your hands together. Steve is watching, rapt at attention. “Let me think real quick- oh, I have one. Which beverage has a black belt in karate?”

Bucky waits.

You wait, expecting something from him.

It’s Steve that has to say, “I don’t know, which beverage?”

“Fruit punch,” you say, exaggerating the last part, and Bucky just keeps on waiting.

Steve cracks a small smile.

“Let me tell you another,” you say. “What type of phone does a piece of fruit carry?”

Steve takes a few wild guesses. He’s enjoying this, and you are too, both of you feeding off of each other. “A phone-fruit. A fruit-phone. A frone?”

You shake your head. “A blackberry.”

Bucky doesn’t tell you that he has no idea what you’re talking about.

“Tough crowd,” you say, when he doesn’t react. “Don’t worry, I have more. Where do you go on red and stop on green?”

“Where?’ Steve asks, waiting, leaning forward in anticipation.

“When you’re eating a watermelon!”

It is not funny, it’s painfully unfunny, and maybe that’s why you and Steve burst out laughing. Bucky steals a glance at your watch, since he doesn’t wear one of his own. It’s nearing noon- how has so much time passed? Why is he still even here when he doesn’t even like you?

“Why are all of them about fruit?”

You look at him like his question is the dumbest thing you’ve ever heard. “What food is the best listener?”

Bucky just sits. All the foam in his little espresso thing has dissolved, having been left untouched. He doesn’t like the taste of coffee- too bitter, and caffeine doesn’t work on him, anyway. Maybe he should drink it, because you paid for it, and because you didn’t make a comment about old-fashioned manners or chivalry when Steve offered to at first, just shrugged and got in line.

He knows that you won’t care.

The drink sits on its own, glass beading with condensation.

“Corn is the best listener,” you say, without waiting for Steve to throw his questions or guesses at you, without waiting for Bucky to spit out another sentence. “Because it’s all ears.”

“That wasn’t funny,” he says, and glares at the spot beside your head.

You nod sympathetically, and he thinks again of the rips in your jeans. “I know. But it was about a vegetable.”

Oh.

You stare at him straight-faced, crossing your arms over your chest. Steve does the same, and then he realizes- the two of you are a bunch of kids, punks, juveniles- mocking his stature, pretending to be serious, somehow not offending him.

“Jesus Christ,” Bucky says. “You’re…”

He can’t even help it. He looks back at you  and his face works on its own. He gives a single, dry chuckle, but he’s smiling, and dragging his hand over his face, scrubbing it off just as fast, but you still see it, and smile back and gently nudge his knee again underneath the table, and then turn back away again, and he’s still staring at your hair while you take big bite out of your to-die-for raspberry-almond muffin, already back in conversation with Steve.

[excitedlysuffering]

Can you do that headcanon collection thing for Kiba please? Thank you very much

I’m so sorry for the wait I’m really struggling with inspiration rn like I have all the words but I just can’t write?? Anyways I hope you like nonnie❤️✨

Kiba Headcanons Collection

What He Looks For In An S/O~

Someone who appreciates animals. Of course, dogs are his favorites, but he doesn’t hate animals at all, not even cats.

Someone wild who knows how to have a good time, just like Kiba. He won’t enjoy dating a square, just being honest.

He wants a woman who’s not afraid to stand on her own two; the Inuzuka clan is primarily a matriarchy, meaning he’s used to strong-willed women.

He’s going to need an emotionally open person, he pretty much wears his heart out on his sleeve, so Kiba needs someone who can articulate their feelings.

He’s a possessive person, it’s in his nature, so a patient s/o would suit him best.

The saying ‘she’s beauty, she’s grace, she’ll kick you in the face’ is literally everything he’d ever want.

I can see him with someone smaller than him just because he has a thing for size differences.

He loves confidence and would swoon if his s/o took charge sometimes, in daily life, and in the bedroom.

Kiba is big on physical affection, so someone with the same love for touch is preferable.

Kiba leaves constant hickeys and you can’t convince me otherwise, so they’d best be used to it.

Akamaru has to like you. Period.

Relationship With Kiba Stuff~

This boy loves HARD, like with his whole heart, and he’s not afraid to show it either.

He’ll love taking you out on adventurous outdoorsy dates, usually, Akamaru will come with but every once in a while it might be the two of you.

He likes games and challenges. I could definitely see him turning a treasure hunt into a date.

He actually loves going on missions with you (there’s nothing sexier than watching his girl kick ass) and will let you do your thing without unnecessary worrying.

He’s not huge on giving gifts all the time, but he does enjoy treating you to nice places and dates.

He has the nose of a dog. So he can smell your… week before you even know it’s there.

“Hey, (Y/N)... I, uh, thought you could use this!” *shoves snacks, a heating pad, ice cream, and a teddy bear in your arms*

He’s not the greatest at picking up on moods, but once he figures it out he’ll be all over it.

You’re probably good friends with Hana and Tsume, which Kiba appreciates, even though he hates sharing you.

He definitely takes you to see the dogs and the puppies, especially when one is just born.

He’s unashamedly sensitive like just love him, please.

How To Annoy/Lose Him~

First of all, if Akamaru and you don’t get along. Akamaru was there from birth so, you know, if he doesn’t like you, sorry hun.

It’s one thing to be appropriately possessive, like not letting girls walk all over you to your man, but he does have female friends and he does not want to be caged.

If you’re not family-oriented. The Inuzuka clan is very much a pack family and everyone is very close.

Don’t ignore him or neglect him, he will be hurt.

Kiba enjoys playful banter, but he also knows where the line is and he expects you to as well

Being a genuinely rude person. Okay, yes, Kiba has anger management issues, but he’s not a mean person.

Not having compassion/empathy for others. It’ll disturb him, I promise.

Arrogance and vanity. Kiba knows he’s the shit alright, but he’s not a total jerk about it, and he expects the same from you.

Soft Kiba Things~

He’s actually pretty good at remembering things like important dates (thanks to his trusty calendar) so you’ll be hard-pressed to find him forgetting things like birthdays or anniversaries.

He has a dog plush toy that he will give to you when he’s off on missions. But when you’re off on missions, he’ll use your pillow since it smells like you.

He’s a huge cuddler and the position doesn’t matter as long as he’s close to you. (makes an adorable little spoon btw)

He definitely has a secret photo album/box full of candids, drawings from Sai, and little things that reminded him of you (i.e. a pretty flower, a quote, or a trinket) but he’d rather die than let it be found, it would ruin his bad-boy persona.

I feel like Kiba would like to feed you every once in a while. Like not in a weird, fetish way (iykyk) but a romantic thing that was rare?

He would love to train with you, like wow that’s my s/o and they’re so strong?

Kiba genuinely melts inside when he sees you and Akamaru interact. Like that’s his life long companion and the love of his life being friends? Woah.

He’s touch starved but for no reason at all except for the fact that he loves physical affection so please give him all the cuddles.

Random Kiba Facts~

His love languages are physical touch/quality time.

He’s not scared of thunderstorms in a traditional way, but just like dogs, the sounds and lightning are overstimulating and he’ll usually spend it with ear canceling headphones and in the basement.

Since everyone has a unique natural smell (he really liked yours) he’ll most likely complain if you wear heavily scented perfumes/body wash.

He knows he’s not naturally responsible so he creates detailed lists and schedules for himself.

Kiba has a perfectly working bed, but he always ended up on the floor so that’s where he sleeps now.

Contrary to popular belief, he likes to go as vampires for Halloween (he says he’s a werewolf 364 days of the year let him have one day) because of his fangs and ‘drop-dead beauty’ (his words).

He radiates heat like a furnace but somehow still finds a way to be cold at night?

Kiba has a good singing voice. It’s deep and melodious and no one can tell me differently.

He’s alright at regular cooking but amazing at gathering spices because he can smell the combinations and stuff so he’ll help you season things, but that’s about it.

He’s a huge overthinker please help him

Little Things~

Favorite:

Place to kiss: The space where your neck meets your shoulder, something about it just really riles him up.

Way to hug: He loves lifting you up so your legs wrap around his waist. He loves holding you and being able to kiss your neck.

Thing to do with you: He loves hiking or going on long walks, especially at sunset or sunrise.

Cuddle position: He actually loves to lay on your chest and listen to your heartbeat with your arms wrapped around him.

Type of date: Basically anything that includes physical activity or adventure.

This or That:

More of a spring person, a lot of new puppies are born then and the weather is finally nice again.

Morning kind of guy, he loves to go go go and his activities usually require daylight.

He likes to cook, even if he’s not that good at it. He’ll enjoy helping you in the kitchen.

Rarely reads for any reason. Don’t read to him either, he’ll be super bored.

Conflict Happenings~

The two of you will probably have more stupid ‘I’m right, you’re wrong’ type arguments, more than real fights tbh.

That is not to say that Kiba won’t participate in a fight. Cause he will.

The both of you are probably screaming so loudly no one knows what anyone is saying it’s just loud.

You getting mad will turn him on tbh (and vice versa too tbh)

Depending on how bad the fight is, he might just start making out with you or yell at you more for distracting him with your hotness.

You’ll be hard-pressed to make him back down during a fight if he’s truly heated, so pick your battles wisely hun.

He really can be sensitive, especially since he will value your opinion so much, so be careful with your words.

In general, he’s not really focused on hurting your feelings, more on winning the argument.

Will probably storm off for a while to calm down, but he is always back before the day is over.

The two of you are used to having fights like that, so a big cuddle session is in order when it’s all said and done.

Modern Kiba~

He’s definitely the sexy bad boy you couldn’t bring home to mother and he both owns and rocks his persona.

He secretly (not so secretly) likes dogs more than his peers, even if he is usually very social.

He’s the one who always manages to bring alcohol to the parties.

I could see him on a football or soccer team, and being really good too.

He’s charismatic, funny, good looking, street smart, and has all the It Man™ qualities and I know he’s the captain/president of some club or team.

He’s not naturally super smart but his mother ingrained good habits into him so he’s generally pretty good at studying, probably still has a tutor though.

He’s a very subtle F-boy, has a few girls he does regularly that don’t know about each other and that’s that.

He probably has a part-time job at a shelter, since he’s not big on working.

Always at parties and is always the center of attention. Everyone loves him.

The red fangs were a result of him being absolutely hammered yet everyone seemed to find them incredibly hot.

He’s a loyal friend, but he also won’t hesitate to cut you off if you wrong him (he liked his dog better anyway)

He’s so messy it’s up to his roommate to keep him in shape, and thankfully it’s Shino, who somehow manages to keep it a decently tidy living space.

Has the worst hangovers ever but still never learns??

He’s the wild friend that spices up everyone’s life and knows that you need his craziness.

Bite me, Kiba, plz

[spicycreativity]

Fanfic Appreciation Week Day 7: A Place Where I Can Breathe

Yes, folks, I'm appreciating my own darn fanfic for the final day of Fanfic Appreciation Week because I worked really hard on it and it was a labor of love for/with one of my QPPs, my roommate, the man who got me into Sanders Sides: @\cadeorade-powercade (That's him in the aesthetic board)

Allow me to present the director's commentary for A Place Where I Can Breathe:

Content Warnings: All content warnings mentioned in the fic apply.

Chapter 1: I actually wrote this fairly late in the game. It's meant to serve as a prologue and orient the viewer in the universe, s opposed to staring on Chapter 2, which just throws the viewer in without context. I think it was a good choice, as it also allowed me to introduce the concept of the Sides having power focuses early on.

The Premise: Cade is a Virgil stan and he was getting frustrated looking for Virgil fic. He was finding a lot of stuff written without nuance by young authors, a sort of "by teenagers for teenagers" type deal. We are not teenagers, so we both have a hard time relating to that kind of teen angst fic, as we're not the target audience. So he asked me to write him a Virgil fic and we worked together to identify what plot he wanted, what the Mindscape looked like, and what quirks the Sides have. So a lot of this fic is quite gratuitous and self-indulgent

The Title: Lizzie McAlpine has a song called "Apple Pie" which includes the lyric "I've been running around trying to find a place where I can breathe." Apple Pie SCREAMS Moceit to me, and I had taken notice of the lyric and wanted to use it as the title for a Moceit fic. I didn't really have an idea beyond that, and when Cade asked me to write this fic, I realized it was actually perfect and summed up Virgil's inner struggle quite nicely. So cheers to "A Place Where I Can Breathe," the Moceit Fic That Wasn't

-Cade asked me specifically to include Virgil having a spider and I wrote nearly the whole fic without doing so, then had to go back and sprinkle some references in. I think I managed 2 total.

Chapter 2:

"Uh, how about I hold off on that until I actually see my room?" Virgil stared expectantly at Roman, who bounced on his toes. "Lead on, Macduff."

"That's not the line and you know it," Roman complained, but he turned to lead Virgil to his room. "It's ' lay on, Macduff,' and--"

-This fic was originally supposed to reach a climax with a confrontation between Remus and Roman, and "lay on, Macduff" would come back as a brick joke. Unfortunately, the original ending was a result of me getting tired and lazy, so I had to go back and fix it, and we lost the Roman-Remus confrontation.

It was hard for Virgil to not shudder at the sudden heat and weight on him. With his senses already open and taking in more information than his brain seemed to want to process, touch was an added stressor, more unwanted sensory input.

-Virgil being touch-averse is a direct shoutout to Cade, who is also touch-averse.

Roman had already transformed the living room: metallic streamers of purple and black stretched across the corners of the ceiling, and shiny balloons spelling out A-N-X-E-I-T-Y hovered above the TV.

-Upon first writing, Virgil had already given the upstairs crew his name, so the banner spelled out "VIRIGL" which is way funnier than "ANXEITY." But then his name reveal became a plot point so I had to go back and change it.

-Let! Virgil! Be! Mean!

-Virgil's line about hearing refrigerator noise when Roman talks is another shout-out to Cade, who has leveled that accusation at me

A small, cruel part of him protested at the idea that he would need special treatment and desperately wanted to throw it back in Patton's face. He wasn't a sweetheart, he wasn't a baby. He didn't need to crawl into a blanket fort with Dad just because he was a little stressed.

-Remus calls Janus "Janus Geminus" because I was tired and couldn't come up with a pun. "Geminus" is one of the Roman god Janus' epithets; another is "Pater" meaning "Father." That led to a conversation about Remus deliberately confusing Patton by calling Janus "Daddy," but I couldn't think of a clean way to fit the explanation into the narrative, so I stuck with "Geminus."

Chapter 3:

"There's nothing normal about that! " Roman stared in horror at the coffee massacre Virgil had orchestrated. What had once been a respectable (if not very tasty) cup of black coffee was now part of a 1:1 coffee to milk suspension, the liquid a tasteful shade of tan suitable for business casual trousers or a show-ready chihuahua.

-Cade is a certified Nightmare Man and came up with Virgil's horrifying coffee order after I asked him about it. Keep an eye out for Janus' equally horrifying coffee order later in the fic.

1) Shouts out the fact that Janus is canonically a Dostoevsky fan

Chapter 4:

Janus smiled at him. "Where reason fails, the Devil helps." He fussed with his gloves and straightened his capelet. "It's showtime."

-I fucking love Crime and Punishment. Look at me. Look at me. I fucking love Crime and Punishment. Janus' quoting Raskolnikov serves multiple purposes:

2) Lampshades the fact that Roman just conveniently happened to be alone in the living room, because I didn't want to waste time getting him there. That makes me, the author, the Devil

3) Foreshadows the impending disaster. When Raskolnikov says this line it is because he had planned to commit axe murder. The axe he was planning to steal had been moved, but he finds another, different axe to use. Raskolnikov messes up the murder and ends up killing an innocent witness in addition to his intended target. Janus messes up his manipulation attempt and ends up murdering Roman's self esteem

-I was going to include a reference to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (Remus' line "debauchery and vomit" was originally going to be "blood, love, and rhetoric") but I didn't because... Uh... Hm. Why didn't I do that. Maybe I just forgot about it???

-Roman is too stubborn to manipulate for long and that is a fact.

"I was pretty much done anyway," Remus said. "There's only so much debauchery and vomit you can fit into one story."

-Cade specifically ask me that nobody cry in this fic, but after I had Janus eviscerate Roman I knew he couldn't not cry a little. I kept it to a minimum because there's already a billion fucking fics about [literally any Side] crying on the shoulder of [literally any other Side] and it's really just not interesting to either of us.

-It didn't come up because it doesn't matter, but Thomas dreamed he was participating in the exact Dionysian orgy that took place in The Secret History because it's my fic and I said so.

Chapter 5:

He just sat back and watched and tugged at his hair while Janus spooned mound after mound of crisp white sugar into his mug and Virgil poured his customary eight fluid ounces of milk into his own mug.

-Cade strikes again. Virgil's coffee order is equal amounts milk to coffee; Janus' is equal parts sugar to coffee. He had asked me to include a scene where Roman catches Janus massacring his coffee and is appropriately horrified, but I uhh... Didn't write it. I still might include it as an omake someday.

-I imagine that Roman feels really strongly about dragons vs wyverns, and Remus just pretends to give a shit because he thinks it's funny to wind Roman up. Fortunately for me but unfortunately for my sense of realism in writing, I can't relate because I adore my sister and we get along perfectly almost 100% of the time.

"You shut us down every chance you get!" Remus said, baring his teeth. "How would you like it if your pens never wrote, hm? What would you do with all those thoughts in your head?"

-I do wish I had developed the concept of power focuses a bit more, established rules and such. Basically, Patton is always on the prowl for wrongthink and actively represses it, which in turn breaks or sabotages the Dark Sides' power focus.

Chapter 6: This chapter really should have been Janus and Roman but I was really tired and didn't want to bother with it. Plus, you know, Moceit. This chapter was meant to demonstrate how the characters would get along without Virgil nannying them. There's friction, but everyone is making a conscious, deliberate effort to get along because they love Virgil, and love is a series of choices you make.

I chose "Leo" as the answer for the answer to the crossword clue instead of "Virgo," because my other QPP is a Leo. She'll never read this fic, but I did it anyway because I love her. (Trivia: My sign is Virgo, so it was really a choice between shouting her out and shouting me out, and the last chapter is self-indulgent enough, thank you).

Chapter 7: I was gonna write a fic where all the Sides watched Cats the Musical because I was going through a phase. Then Cade requested this so I combined the two ideas. By this point I was fucking exhausted, and that's the only thing that saved you and the rest of the world from me writing the Sides riffing on the movie scene-by-scene. I could come up with snarky commentary for almost every, if not every single song from the movie.

Most notably, I cut a Patton-Remus interaction where Remus declares his love for Grizabella and Patton gets all staryy-eyed about Remus connecting with the idea of rising above rejection and being loved and accepted only for Remus to shoot him down and explain that he just likes that she got to die in a tire fire.

Other cut scenes include Janus quietly pretending not to go feral over Mister Mistoffelees, Patton full-on fucking sobbing over Grizabella and the kittens, and Logan experiencing a deep, soulful kinship with Munkustrap during Of The Awefull Battle of the Pekes and the Pollices (and henceforth introducing the phrase "like herding cats" into his regular vocabulary

[icycream-catqueen]

Kindling (When You’re Burning Low)

Cinder would rather burn herself out than risk a low grade; fortunately, Neo knows how to make her relax.

Rating: T

Tone: Some angst, lots of supportiveness, and a fluffy ending

Word Count: ~5,000

Important Tags: College AU, Established Relationship

I was gonna post this before now but I had problems with writing it and I was nervous about participating in a ship week especially when I only have something written for one prompt, and also my cat was sleeping on me for five whole hours earlier tonight while I was trying to finish up and as everyone knows it is a crime to disturb a snoozing kitty cat. I hope it still counts. ^_^;

Considering it’s pretty long, I only have an excerpt (the first scene I wrote for this fic, actually) on this post; the whole thing is, of course, over on AO3!

On this fine Saturday afternoon, Cinder was taking advantage of the lounge in the dorm suite. The coffee table was half-claimed by various books and notes while Cinder herself was settled at the same end of the couch, her laptop perched on the arm of it and her right side pressed closely against the suede upholstery as she struggled with the perfect phrasing for her essay. Failure was never an option for her, and even the slightest error would lead to it when it came to this class. She was running on pure caffeine by now, from a supposedly unhealthy amount of coffee. This was her third or fourth solid day of being awake. After the first night, she’d moved her setup from her room to the lounge to help her stay more alert. Winter and Emerald had both tried to tell her what was best for her wellbeing, but she’d firmly shut down their arrogance; she knew her own limits, and she needed to get this stupid project done. Neo, thankfully, had been out of town from Thursday morning to last night, and when she’d come back to the suite, she’d trudged straight to her room and shut the door. Cinder had only seen a couple brief glimpses of her since. Just as well, considering Cinder couldn’t intimidate her into letting her be like she could to Emerald and Winter.

At the moment, Emerald and Winter were both out of the building. They’d each probably told her what they were doing, but she hadn’t bothered to remember it. Neo was apparently still asleep, which was a bit odd but not enough so to risk seeing the pitiful kicked-puppy expression that appeared when her sleep was disturbed. Still, if she wasn’t up and about in two hours, it would be worth it to check on her mental and physical health.

Speak of the devil, Cinder heard a door open behind her. She didn't bother to look, though, until she realized the shuffling footsteps were approaching the couch instead of the kitchen, bathroom, or shower. She took a brief glance, then did an immediate double take because Neo looked absolutely miserable. Her hair was unbrushed and her eyes were dull. The oversized black sweatshirt (which Cinder recognized by the fiery orange phoenix on the front as one of her own that had mysteriously vanished a few weeks ago) and the brown and pink plaid pajama pants were probably what she'd worn to bed the night before, and she hadn't even bothered to put on socks. It was worrying to see her in such a state.

"You certainly look worse for wear," Cinder commented. Neo pouted at her as she slowly made her way to the couch and sank to the cushions. Before Cinder could react, Neo flopped down, squirmed to lay her head in her lap, and rolled onto her back. "I'm busy," Cinder told her sternly.

Neo's response was a soft and pitiful keening sound. She fumbled to grab Cinder's left wrist, staring up at her with pleading doe eyes.

"Neo. I'm busy," Cinder repeated. Neo whined and tugged on her wrist, so Cinder rolled her eyes and stopped resisting, curious about what she wanted. She wasn't sure what she was expecting, but she was definitely taken by surprise when Neo gently guided her hand under the hem of her sweatshirt and pressed it against her lower stomach.

What is she trying to accomplish here? Cinder raised an eyebrow at the woman in her lap. Neo let go of her wrist to sign something at her. The odd angle made it hard to translate, so it took a few seconds for Cinder to understand what she was asking for and why.

"I suppose I can take a short break, if you're really in that much pain," she relented. "You're lucky you're cute," she added as she carefully activated her Semblance.

The reaction was instant. Neo sighed with relief at the warmth, eyes full of soft gratitude and affection. Cinder rubbed slow, small circles over her stomach, feeling the smaller woman go languid under her touch. After a few more seconds, Neo's eyes fluttered closed.

"Is this warm enough?" Cinder asked. Neo nodded, a content smile playing across her lips. "Just ten minutes."

Neo opened her eyes and pouted at her.

"There is a reason I've been awake for," Cinder checked the time on her laptop, "about eighty hours now." Neo looked positively outraged.

"You need to sleep," she signed—easily decipherable now that Cinder had gotten a little more time to adjust to her current perspective. Not that the message was very appreciated.

"No, what I need is to finish this ridiculous project so I can move on to my two remaining essays, do all the work for a 'group project' because the rest of my assigned group are immature and unmotivated idiots, and study for my three exams this week," Cinder retorted.

"When are your essays due?"

Cinder elected not to answer, since admitting the due dates were two and three weeks away respectively wouldn't help her against Neo's accusatory glare.

"Your group project?"

Okay, so maybe it hadn't technically been assigned yet and was scheduled to be due in a month and a half, but all the information was in the syllabus. Cinder's class was full of imbeciles, and somehow she always got stuck in a group with some idiot or another who didn't understand what a lesbian was, so she was getting it out of the way to avoid interacting with anyone.

"Are all three of your exams actually this week?"

Two of them, and one of those barely counted more towards the final grade in the class than a small quiz. Her continued silence was answer enough; Neo knew her too well.

"You're going to burn yourself out again." Neo's eyes were unbearably sad, so Cinder looked away.

"I'm fine," she dismissed the concern. A hand grabbed her chin and yanked her head down so her eyes met Neo's again.

"I watched you collapse in the middle of campus last year, and I almost got in trouble for pulling a knife on the paramedics to make them let me stay with you. I got a scared video call from Winter four months ago because you fainted in her fancy rich-person hot tub and nearly drowned," Neo reminded her. “Do I need to go on?”

"I can handle it this time," Cinder insisted, growing agitated. Neo took a calming breath before responding.

"No you can't. You always say it but you never can. You end up in an exhausted daze. You work yourself into a frenzy. You get into fits of rage...which honestly scare me."

"I would never lay a hand on—!" Cinder was cut off when Neo pressed a finger to her lips.

"Not for myself. I'm scared you'll lose control and take it out on yourself again," Neo corrected her. "You haven't in a while, but..." Neo trailed a hand down Cinder's left arm, tracing her scars.

"I just...I need to...I have to keep working. I can't let myself fall behind. I can't..." Cinder faltered. Neo sighed.

"I know," she acknowledged. She knew about the past, knew why Cinder relapsed into these desperate attempts to excel, to stay ahead. "But it's pointless if you destroy yourself trying."

"I've only ended up being sent to the hospital three times since I started college," Cinder argued. Neo was unimpressed.

"Congratulations! And you've managed to barely avoid hospitalization how many times now?"

"I—that isn't relevant!" Cinder hissed. Neo scowled.

"Really? It's not? How many times have you ended up so exhausted that you were bedridden for days? How many times have you gone into a mental decline because you were incapacitated? And how many more times are you going to make me watch you suffer like that?"

"If you want to leave me, just get it over with!" Cinder spat bitterly. Neo's eyes widened, hurt and shocked. Cinder flinched, realizing she'd crossed a very important line. "I didn't mean...I don't know why I said that."

"An abandonment complex, emotional instability, a mess of insecurities you mask with your ego, previous girlfriends who couldn't handle you or only wanted your body...and like I've been saying, you need sleep,” Neo replied, recovering. "Also, my cramps?"

"What?" Cinder realized she'd subconsciously deactivated her Semblance at some point and quickly remedied that. "Oh. Sorry."

"I'm going to make a deal with you," Neo informed her abruptly. Cinder raised an eyebrow, intrigued.

"What kind of deal?"

"The 'ridiculous project' you're trying to finish. Tell me about it, and I'll explain," Neo replied. Cinder clenched her teeth at the mere mention of it.

"It's an assigned experiment, a five to ten-page report on it, and an oral presentation. And the professor hates me. He goes out of his way to make every class, every test, and every assignment hell for me. I have to work harder than anyone so he can't get away with failing me out of spite. If I make even one mistake..." she growled.

"When is it due?"

"The day after tomorrow. It was assigned two weeks ago, but three days ago he realized he 'accidentally' gave me the wrong experiment. In other words, he's making me do a two-week project within five days—after I'd already finished the one he previously assigned me."

"Watts," Neo guessed. Cinder had come back from his class angry enough times that it wasn't even a question.

"Yeah," she confirmed anyway. Neo wrinkled her nose.

"I already hated that guy, and I hated him more and more every time you came back from his class in a bad mood, but this shit he's pulling now is the final straw, so I'm going to get him fired," she declared. Cinder let out an amused huff.

"And how will you do that?" she asked. She didn’t expect an actual answer but Neo didn't even hesitate.

"It may include breaking and entering, small and well-placed incidents, a flat tire, some bottles of the expensive alcohol he isn't supposed to have on campus, a sedative, and if we're lucky, a little inadvertent assistance from gravity and Ironwood."

"Just how long have you been planning this?" Cinder was taken aback at the immediate response. Neo considered.

"The time you locked me out of your dorm after his class because you were so furious you wanted to hit something, and you were worried you'd see so much red you might accidentally hit me in blackout rage. You've never told me what happens in his class to make you so angry, or even if it's actually him or just another student—though I was pretty sure it was him—so I planned for both situations."

"I'm impressed," Cinder commented. Neo smirked. “Now what was that ‘deal’ you mentioned?”

"You finish the report for your project, then eat something more substantial than coffee and whatever quick snacks you've been living off of for the past few days. And then we go to my dorm and you get some damn sleep."

"How did you know I'm working on the report right now?" Cinder was taken aback. "And how do you know I haven't been eating?"

"Because I can see it on your computer. And once again, you've done this before, so I know you don't take the time for more than the minimum amount of food to keep hunger from 'distracting' you," Neo pointed out, almost accusingly.

"I haven't even started working on the oral presentation. I'll do all that after I'm completely finished."

"Nope. You can start that part when you're well-rested. If you make me physically drag you to bed while I'm on my period, I'll make damn sure you regret it," Neo threatened with a scowl.

“Fine,” Cinder gave in reluctantly. Neo smiled brightly, and dammit, it was nigh impossible for Cinder to stay bitter in the face of such genuine fondness, joy, and relief. She wondered when she’d gotten so soft—even if only a select few people got to see that soft part of her—and realized she didn’t even mind anymore.

[mingisblackgf]

slut | c.s

prompt: could you write a san smut with hair pulling and degradation but like without daddy kink?

pairing: choi san x fem!oc genre: smut for dayz boi, highschool au, badboy!san word count: 1.8k warnings: hair-pulling, degredation, filth really. just filth :)

school. 

school was a place, like any other public place, where you put on a facade so that people will like you. you could showcase any part of yourself, nobody will ever know if it's real or not. that's the beauty of it all, pretending anyway.

why did you have to be yourself? who said we couldn't bend the rules a little and act a little different than the real us? in your case, you didn’t think most people would want you to act the way you really are, a sex crazed animal that constantly thinks about boys and what you could do to them. you were sort of like a male in that aspect, how you thought about sex 24/7, even when you weren’t thinking about sex, you were

at school though, you always tried to be as conservative as possible. whatever that meant.

you didn't wear revealing clothing like girls here, you always had my hair up and out of your face, you didn't wear much makeup and you never wore your contacts to school, only your glasses.

you just didn't want anyone getting any ideas. because after all, you were a slut, you just didn’t want anyone to know. and what was wrong with that? it was something like a mystery, you think. a side you didn’t want anyone to see.

you also didn’t want anyone to see the side of you that got in trouble, because that showed its colors today, too. so picture it: in your english class, you and the hottest guy you’ve probably ever laid your eyes on, choi san got detention. both of you. 

of course, your mind began to wander about the things the both of you could do, so you we’re desperately praying that you didn’t fuck him.

or so you say. really, you were afraid of being caught.

"y/n!" you hear your name coming from down the hall and you jump, not realizing you were lost in your thoughts. tensing up, you whipped around, cautious as ever.

it was only your good friend here at your school, yoon nayeon. captain of the cheerleader, the korean sign language association, the debate club, film appreciation club, yeah, yeah you get it, the chick was the queen of clubs.

"hey, kid! why are you rushing out of woo's class too quick?" she'd approached your side just as the wary thoughts began to flood your head. that was another thing about her. she definitely has amazing timing, you thought.

you chuckled out your apprehensive doubts about her character. they were a daily thing. "oh, yeon, you know i hate english." you sighed. “plus she gave me detention.”

"you got detention? what the hell did you do?” nayeon exclaimed, incredulously. she’d never heard let alone said the words “i” and “detention” in the same sentence, so it was hard for her to comprehend. 

you rolled your eyes at the memory. “she caught me texting or some shit. it was bullshit, it felt like she was targeting me. same with san.”

she smacked her lips, shaking her head. “i get it. well, look, if it makes you feel any better, i fell asleep in her class yesterday and someone had to pinch me awake. honestly, thought i was gonna wake up in a castle or some shit, but here i was on her fucking desk.” nayeon jokes, emitting a hollow laugh from you. “but hey, did you hear?”

you shake your head at the question.

"well, this shouldn’t come as a surprise to you considering his record, but choi san has detention, for like. the rest of the week. and he can’t participate in any of his games coming up. he fucked up big time." nayeon rambled as we walked. 

i stayed silent as if i didn’t know, wanting her to continue. “he’s so fucking hot, but i could never date him, he has like, no goals or anything.”

you nod, realizing that you and san were more similar than you might’ve thought.

then you sighed when the two of you faced the classroom. as you looked through the door glass, you saw that the only seat filled up thus far was choi san.

great.

“hey, good luck, don’t do anything dumb.” nayeon joked, squeezing your hand supportively.

you chuckled, not taking your eyes off the glass, and gulped when san met your eyes too, smirking.

“i won’t.” you lied, turning the door handle slowly.

**

it didn’t take long for things to escalate at all.

one second you were half asleep, wanting to die of boredom in detention, the next you’re straddling san's lap making out with him. he snaked his hand up your uniform shirt and you had no desire to stop him, your mind too clouded with lust to think straight. he pulled away slightly and thrust upwards to your core, making you hitch a breath instead doing your go to: moaning loudly.

it was probably his dream: fucking you, you having to be quiet, him dry humping you, and your lips were on his, almost begging for more of him. 

"fucking shit slut, you know how hot it is when you're being quiet?" san lowly growled, thrusting his groin deeper into your wetness, and as much as you wanted to scream out from all the teasing he was doing, you two were in detention and the teacher would be coming back in any second if he heard any noises from either of you.

"p-please," you stammered, throwing your head back in a complete state of passion. who knew that dry humping like a bump of two horny dogs in a classroom would be so exhilarating?

he crashed your lips together once more hungrily, placing his hands on your cheeks to steady you. he kept riding his clothed sex onto yours, and by the core of your stomach, you could tell you were close to release.

"you know, i always knew you were a slut." he whispered with a smile against your lips, and you squeezed his arousal, making him jerk up and groan in your mouth.

you knew you had a bit of a dominant streak, but that was no match for san, as he pulled your hair, snapping your head back quickly. you could have yelped out at the sudden action, but you could only whine, feeling hopeless even on top of him.

“oh no, let me make this clear before we continue,” he said lowly, yanking your hair follicles harder. “don’t get all bratty on me. you’re going to obey me, okay?”

you actually didn’t know how to formulate words at his sudden words, and the sensation of him pulling your head all the way back by your hair made you completely mute. 

“say something, slut.” san grunted, thrusting his clothed member into once more and pulling your hair back harder. “now.”

“y-yes, i’ll obey.” you stammered out, it almost coming out as a squeak rather than words.

the blonde beauty smiled cheekily at the words, releasing his grip. “see? that wasn’t so hard, was it?”

his sudden mood shift had your head swimming, confused but hazy with lust, anticipating his next action. and an action it was. he picked you up from his lap and put your on the desk in front of you two, prying your legs open and kneeling in front of your soaked entrance.

“no panties, huh?” san noted, flashing another dimpled smirk. “such a whore.”

before you could react to his words, he acted quickly, diving into your wetness and beginning to suck and eat at your pussy. you had to bite your lip and grip the desk with knuckles as he devoured you. you hadn’t felt anything like that before, his tongue was swirling around your clit feverishly, and then he added a finger unknowingly, and you gasped loudly at the sensation.

he used his unoccupied hand to clasp it around your mouth, pulling away from your pussy. 

“shut the fuck up.” he whispered against your heat, looking up at you with wicked eyes. “you want me to fuck you, don’t you?”

again, speechless,  you could only nod, your head thrown back in pleasure, eyes meeting his. 

“then shut up.”

you obeyed, screaming internally as he continued to eat your pussy. you felt your peak coming, so you jerked forward into his face. san snickered to himself at your eagerness and calmly stood up from you, unzipping his pants.

“you’re on birth control, right?” he asked casually, his dick fully hard and now on display. he was inches from your hole.

you nodded and he quirked an eyebrow. “damn. where have you been all my life?”

you gazed down at his dick, it was slim and hard, not the biggest but something told you he knew how to use it.

san entered inside of you slowly, still for a moment to let you adjust. you bit your lip so hard it nearly bled when you felt all of him inside of you, and he threw his head back at your tightness.

“m-move, san, please?” you pleaded, meekly.

without words he began to pound into you deeply, keeping a quick pace as he fucked you. his pace wasn’t letting up, as you slapped the desk next to you in pleasure. he began sapping your exposed neck with kisses and bites all over.

“oh my god, fuck, san, i-i can’t-” you hiccuped as he suddenly grabbed your chin, forcing you to look up at him.

“fucking l-look at me, slut. right here.” he didn’t stop fucking you as he spoke, gritting his teeth as your skin slapped against his. you had to stop your eyes from rolling to the back of your head, and continued to keep eye contact with him.

you felt an intense orgasm coming on as you collided your lips upon his, moaning as his groans got sloppy.

almost as if he knew you were close, he reached down to begin rubbing your clit, and then you couldn’t take it anymore. you mewled weakly into his mouth, scratching his back with your nails. it was the only thing you felt you could do in that moment.

not soon after, he came too, and quickly slid out of you.

you looked to the door, surprised no one walked in and caught you, seeing the school work business as usual. san broke the tension-filled silence with a giggle.

“you know, i could get used to that.” he said, smiling. “my own little slut, huh?”

and you laughed a little nodding, knowing that you also could find safety from fucking san more often, too. ____________ masterlist

[poptod]

hey there! hope i’m not bothering u. maybe a snafu x reader after the war where he tries to impress them at a bar with war stories but y/n was an air force pilot and it turns into a debate of who was more badass during the war? sweet at the end maybe? i’m addicted to ur writing lmao. thanks again for always answering my requests!

notes: not a problem at all :) unfortunately the power has been out at my house for a day or two so this is a tad late, but youve got fun ideas so i dont mind writing them at all. hope you like this one too

It had to be past midnight – somehow despite that fact, you were still wide awake. Maybe it was the fact that you hadn't taken your sleeping pills, or the pounding loud shouts of the bar's drunken patrons, but you did not lag behind your friend. She'd dragged you there, saying something about getting free drinks since she was banging the bartender. Before either of you knew it, she was off flirting with another man (which the bartender did not like), and you were ordering your third drink. Not the most you'd drunk in one night, not even close, but it was enough to give you a pleasant buzz, allowing you to relax against the bar counter and look out across the crowd.

Within the next several hours most of the crowd had filed out, making way for a new wave of soldiers, ones that had just arrived home and were celebrating their life still belonging to themselves. You were once part of that menagerie; the only difference was you had become a marine before the war ever started, and while you were there for the beginnings of the war, your contract with the marine corps ended soon after. It left you feeling apart from both citizens and soldiers – someone who didn't know the horrors of war, but who was traumatized enough that society didn't care to love them anymore.

Unlike many returning soldiers, you did not turn to alcohol to fix your issues. For the most part you distracted yourself with work, working and working till there was nothing in your head but work – there was little else in your life besides work now, the one exception being your friend, Penny. She made sure you ate, made sure you got outside and had human contact. For that you will always be grateful.

Your attention wavers from her only when one of the returning soldiers stands right beside you at the bar, ordering a bottle of beer before noticing you, his posture suddenly changing as he does so. His back straightens out a little, his hips a little more forward, elbows on the bar behind him so as to show off toned forearms and a skinny waist. He stares for a little while – you pay him no mind. When he gets his drink, that's when he actually speaks to you.

"What's a doll like you doin' here?" He says, and you almost roll your eyes. What a typical start.

"Keepin' a friend company," you answer him quietly, taking a swig of your own drink. It's not entirely a lie, although you feel you're keeping less and less of her company the more she drifts off to the side, caught up in the stare of a rather handsome man with a fair amount of scruff.

"Really? You come here often? I'm - jus' curious. I've never been here before," he says, clarifying that he isn't that stupid so as to use that specific line, a clarification you appreciate.

"This is my first time. My friend though, she comes here often, says she likes the atmosphere," you tell him, nodding in the direction of Penny, who is currently in a corner with the stranger. "You're a soldier, right?"

"Yessir," he says with a proud nod, "just returnin', actually."

You nod absently, looking out across the general crowd before you at last meet his eye. In the neon red lights you can barely see him, the shape of his face against the black mass of people, the color of his eyes against long eyelashes that flutter when he scans you up and down. All you can tell about him is his voice – rough and deep, drawling his words and humming his thoughts.

"You meet many marines?" He asks, and you can already tell he's gearing up to tell you some horrid stories of the war. Unfortunately, you don't know him well enough yet to know if he's going to tell you the truth, and a small part of you hopes he doesn't tell the truth. The truth is gorey and dangerous and heartbreaking, and you're not ready to live out such memories and tales again. Not yet.

"I've met a few," you say vaguely, watching the way a grin cracks across his face as he chuckles smooth and low.

"All I gotta say is you're lucky I ain't no army kid, those assholes are weak as all hell," he says, something you fully agree with, and something that has a sweet giggle coming involuntarily out of you. He smiles even bigger when he watches the way you laugh.

"My father was a marine," you say, coming down from your high. "He said the same thing."

"He's right, y' know... me n' my troop, we was out on that godforsaken island in the Pacific, hot as hell every day – humid, too. We saw hell n' back, shootin' at Japs n' gettin' shot at, sitting in all those damn trenches, up to ya knees in mud, and there go the fuckin' army soldiers, prancing around like goddamn deer. Funniest shit I ever seen, though to be fair, I don't think any a' us had much to eat that day," he recalls fondly, but you can tell he's suppressing the worse memories. You don't ask on that – it'd be rude, and it's not a subject you want to talk about. Nonetheless, he continues. "An you know, you're sittin' in mud all day n' night, you're gonna get pretty dirty, right?"

You nod attentively. If there's one thing you're still good at after your time in the marine corps, it's listening well.

"So we're all covered in mud, and they come by in a neat row, with their freshly washed hair and white as all hell skin – I made a bet with this one fella, Burgie, a' said they'd get so sunburnt after a week on that island, they'd be cryin'. I was right, of course," he says, motioning with his hands as he told the story. At the end he rubs his nose and turns back to you, watching for your reaction, and loving the way you still manage to enjoy his story.

"So you're tellin' war stories now?" You ask, leaning in closer and smirking imperceptibly when his breath catches in his throat. "What's your best story, then?"

He doesn't skip a beat, another one of those sweetly impure smiles coming across him as he starts.

"Hell, there's a lot to choose from. I do remember though," his hand comes up to his shirt collar, unconsciously toying with it, "this one Jap snuck into our camp, still don't know how, but he was one a' those damn kamikaze soldiers, the radical ones. He shouted somethin', don't remember what, but everyone went for their guns – I did too, an' we all pointed at his chest, cause it's easier to aim that way, y'know? But the bombs were tied to his chest, so a' aimed at the head. Shot him dead center between his eyes," he tells you with an air of pride and a hint of disgust. You don't blame him.

"That's a good story," you say with a small smile.

Anticipation creeps up on you as you wait till he's done prattling off little details, just waiting till you can watch the light die in his eyes as you tell him your own war story.

"I think my best marine story would have to be when I was flyin' over this active war field, there's fighter pilots everywhere in the sky, and sometimes it's hard to tell which jet belongs to which side in the moment. Everythin' goes by fast, but I saw this Jap flagged plane drop a bomb the size of a whole person. Immediate reaction was to shoot at the bomb, and I got pretty lucky – it blew up midair, and I was far enough it didn't hurt me," you say, unable to stop a grin from coming to you when the man slowly realizes that he's talking to another marine.

"Oh, you're a marine too, ain't you?" He says, but it's not a question – no, it sounds more like a challenge, and one you're completely willing to participate in. "Where you stationed?"

"I was in Hawaii at first," you say quietly, and he immediately gets the implication. Although you both now know what you saw, and the topic is in your heads, neither of you explore that further. "Later got stationed at some place in the Pacific. Like you. Though, I was on the ocean, not an island."

"What's your kill count?" He asks, and he leans forward just a little bit, drawing closer to you.

"Does it really matter?" You ask in return.

"'Course it does. You gonna be out here tellin' me you didn't count?"

"I didn't," you say truthfully. "A bit hard to see how many y' kill from a thousand feet in the air."

"Y'ever do parachute drops?"

"Once," you say. "Did you?"

"Nah, parachute drops ain't nothin' compared to the shit I did," he says, dismissing the notion as if it wasn't important. Now he's trying to impress you – again.

"Really?" You ask, almost sarcastic, but you manage to hold that part back. "What is it that you did then that was so much more terrifying and dangerous than freefalling through the atmosphere?"

"Try carryin' mortars on ya back in searing heat, n' all the while you n' ya company's out takin' a little hike 'cross a whole island filled with Japs," he says cockily, angling his chin upwards in a motion that accentuates his already sharp-as-hell jawline.

"Wow, a whole island," you say sarcastically, but he sees the humor behind it.

"Hey, Japan's an island too an' they big enough that they got the whole nation in uproar," he points out.

"Whatever makes you feel better," you say, taking a sip of your drink.

"What's your rank anyway?" He asks as he puts his drink on the counter, crossing his arms.

"I'm a major," you say, and once again the light dies in his eyes. You almost want to spare him the embarrassment of telling you his own rank, but you are curious, and it's just too fun to let him off. "What's your rank?"

"... corporal," he answers quietly, and you have to hold back a laugh. You try really hard, you really do, just so hard not to laugh, but you end up snorting anyway, and you can't even begin to work on your smile.

"Alright, corporal," you say, still trying not to laugh. Placing your own drink down on one of the bar coasters you turn to him, curling his loose tie around one of your hands and pulling him forward, practically devouring his nervous delight. "Y' really wanna play this game?"

"I'm the one who started it, ain't I?" He says, and you admire his tenacity to talk back to a superior officer.

"What's your full name and title, Corporal?"

"Corporal Merriel Shelton," he answers softly, his eyes suddenly stuck on the words that form on your blushing lips. "Ma' friends jus' call me Snafu, though."

"Mmm," you hum, looking him up and down much like he'd done to you earlier, "the hell you do to earn that kind a' name?"

"Oh, I'm just reckless, baby," he says with a smirk, gaining the confidence needed to lean into your touch more. You can feel his hips almost pressed against yours, the feeling doing nothing but making you pull his tie even more, a smile beginning to tug at the edges of your lips.

"Mind showin' me?"

"Not at all," he says in the impossibly low voice of his, and with that you're his, if only for the evening.

[zwritestuff]

Some Things Are Bound To Be (Chapter One) - Kyara

A/N: Okay, hear me out, I know this ship barely has a week of existing - I’m very aware of it, thank you very much. But this idea wouldn’t stop haunting me, and before I knew it I churned out 2.7K in the span of two days. Obssessions be like that, I guess. With that being said - I’m hoping that this will have between 5-7 chapters, because I can’t deal with long multi-chaps at the moment. A big, massive thank you to @fromthenorthernskies​ for beta-ing this 💓 And to Winter for always being on board with my shit and peer pressuring me to write this.

Summary: When simple office gossip snowballs, Kyne finds herself faking to be Kiara’s girlfriend, the daughter of the owner of the company she works at. Not that she has any complain, though.

***

Kyne had been working a little over a week at Schatzi Co. when she met Kiara, though she had heard rumors and hushed whispers about the only daughter of the owners of the company — some said she was a bitch, others that she was a spoiled brat; to Kyne, she was none of those things.

It might just be because she exchanged a total of four words with her, and Kiara treated her as politely as she could be before going on about her day. Either way, she never participated in the insulting comments some of her co-workers made about Kiara, because she didn’t have any bone to pick with her.

Priyanka, her best friend and the one that got her the job interview in the first place, had wisely suggested she stay out of the office drama, at least during her first weeks. She had been working there for a year now, so she knows what she’s talking about; she doesn’t mind when Kyne asks one too many times what did Kiara Schatzi actually do to earn so much hate from the employees, considering she rarely is at the company.

“I don’t know, existing?” Priyanka offers as an answer, while they’re having lunch together at her office. “She’s set to inherit the company once her father decides to retire, that much I know, but I’m not sure where this hate comes from — probably from something that happened before I worked here, but nobody would tell me.” She shrugs, biting her sandwich.

“Oh, c’mon, she can’t be that bad, can she?” Kyne asks, picking at her Adobo. Priyanka is about to answer when someone knocks at the door, and as soon as she tells whoever it is to come in, they see Julia’s head poke from behind the door.

She tells Priyanka that the head of the construction team needs to speak with her about a mistake in the planes for the new project, using that very nasal voice Kyne has become used to rather quickly, and saying in a pretty non-confrontational tone to not shoot the messenger.

Priyanka groans, excusing herself to Kyne before following Julia, who’s still apologizing on behalf of the contratist, and leaves Kyne alone with her Adobo.

Not even a minute goes by when the door is opened again, but this time, it’s Kiara that interrupts in the room.

“Miss Priyanka?” She says, looking around the room and finding Kyne instead. “Oh, hello. Isn’t this Priyanka Kapoor’s office?” Kiara asks, squinting slightly.

Kyne briefly thinks that the red suit fits her so well it should be illegal, but she just nods curtly.

“She just left with Julia, something about a plane for a project being wrong?” Kyne hesitantly replies, though she heard the conversation very clearly.

Kiara groans, rolling her eyes. “How could that woman outrun me when she’s wearing six inch heels?” She asks aloud, barely holding back a laugh. Kyne chuckles.

“I mean, I’ve been working here for a month and I’ve never seen her not wear six inch heels,” she says, though she’s not sure if Kiara pretended to get an answer from her. 

She feels a weird flutter in her chest when Kiara giggles, shooting a smile her way.

 “Yeah, I guess that’s probably it,” Kiara replies, “What’s your name again?” She asks, lingering at the door.

“It’s Kyne Aguilar, miss Schatzi,” she replies with a genuine smile. Kiara smiles back, and Kyne thinks the smile suits her very well.

“I’ll see you around, Miss Aguilar,” she simply says before leaving, and Kyne’s stare stays glued to the door.

When Priyanka returns, much later and with a very visible frown in her face, Kyne doesn’t mention her encounter with Kiara, because she doesn’t find it relevant when her friend is complaining about her professionalism being questioned by one silly mistake.

When the day is over, Kyne is just making her way to the parking lot to meet Priyanka when she runs into Kiara again. She’s walking with her dad, and it makes Kyne straighten her back and avoid looking directly at him. She mutters a good night sir as she passes by their side instead, and she’d swear neither he nor Kiara listened, but she nods politely and says a have a good night that echoes in the otherwise silent hallway.

She’s not sure why, but she barely pays attention to Priyanka’s rant about her day, answering with non-committal sounds, as her mind drifted off and replayed the brief moment she’d spent with Kiara.

Yeah, Kyne is definitely skeptical about the rumors surrounding Kiara.

***

Kyne quickly gets used to her routine at the company.

She’s always been good at math and numbers, so being an accountant was one of her first options going into college, though she would’ve been as happy getting an overall degree in math and teaching children.

Her job as an accountant isn’t as dull as she would’ve imagined, though; she’s the one that everyone comes for calculating budgets, how much would they earn if they invest on a certain project and all that jazz — all of this means people don’t necessarily see her as interesting, and therefore she never gets involved in any kind of office drama, which she appreciates due to the fact that her friends seem to be a walking target for drama worth of High School girls.

Priyanka was the one that introduced her to Scarlett and Bo, and though Kyne appreciates their friendship, she has to admit they’re a little bit messy. Just a little. Scarlett and Bo know everyone’s business at the office, primarily because Scarlett sleeps around more than they’ll ever admit to, and Bo is able to charm her way through people’s most pettiest complains about other co-workers. Oh, and Priyanka is there to de-escalate situations that come back to bite the pair in the ass.

So, overall, work isn’t monotonous at all; she has her friends that always have some sort of gossip to tell her — and there’s also Kiara.

Kiara started working full-time at the company shortly after she graduated from college, just one year after Kyne. This meant she saw her a lot more frequently, instead of sporadically running into her at the hallways once or twice a week — now, it’d be a pretty weird day if she didn’t see Kiara around, talking to people, collecting reports and having meetings with other important members of the company.

They didn’t talk much, though, only exchanging words when Kiara came to collect reports at Kyne’s office and they did small talk for a moment before Kiara went on with her day. Sometimes they’d greet each other if they happened to bump into the other at the end or beginning of the day. It was a cordial enough relationship.

That was until one day she comes to her office unprompted, asking her to follow the flow if her secretary, Lena, appears by looking for her.

“She’s more of an assistant that a secretary, you know? But she can be a bit too overbearing sometimes, though I’m sure I would have to blame my dad for that, he was the one that hired her for me,” Kiara rants, and Kyne just lets her, looking up from her reports from time to time to let her know she’s listening.

She’s pretty sure that this is the first time she’s exchanged more than a few words with Kiara, and there’s some sort of excitement — and a little bit of intimidation — bubbling up in her stomach.

“I mean, you’re the boss of the boss of my boss; if anything, you could just tell her to chill or you’ll fire her. That should calm her,” Kyne suggests, and she’d like to believe her deadpan delivery is what causes Kiara to giggle. 

She feels a tad of pride in herself for making Kiara laugh.

“I would, but I’m not that mean — and she’d tell my dad, anyway,” she jokes with a shrug, and Kyne chuckles. “I have to go, I have a meeting to attend, but thank you for letting me hide here.” Kiara winks at her, and Kyne tries to ignore the weird flutter of her heart.

“You’re welcome to hide here any time, miss Schatzi,” she says earnestly, smiling up at her. Kiara hesitantly turns to look at her.

“You know what? Just call me Kiara.” She smiles back, and all Kyne can do is nod dumbly.

Kiara leaves and Kyne goes back to work, until it’s time for her lunch break, when Priyanka, Bo and Scarlett barge into her office and oblige her to accompany them to this new restaurant that opened two streets away. 

She passes by Kiara in the hallways, and Lena is talking her ear off. Kyne catches Kiara’s glance and she shoots her a smile, Kiara returns it in the form of an eye roll as she briefly looks towards Lena and then back at her, a sneaky smile creeping on her face.

Kyne snorts, trying to focus on the ongoing conversation between her friends, but, much like the first time they met, Kiara doesn’t leave her mind for the rest of the day.

If her friends notice she’s like a deer in the headlights, they don’t bring it up, choosing to instead poke fun at Scarlett for struggling to get Ilona from Human Resources to text them back.

***

It’s becoming a common occurrence for Kiara to hide in Kyne’s office. Kyne’s not sure if Kiara should do that as often as she does, but she supposes she’s allowed to since she’s the daughter of the owner — Kiara gets away with a lot of things she wouldn’t get away with had she been someone else.

Such as interrupting in Kyne’s office in the middle of the day, because otherwise she’ll snap at the wrong people, and she doesn’t want that. Kyne doesn’t really mind, if anything, she’ll gladly let Kiara crash at her office if it means she’s doing the company a favor. Besides, she enjoys her company. Kiara is funny, kind and interesting in so many ways; there’s also the fact that sometimes Kiara brings her sweets to compensate for using her as a couch therapist, which is definitely a bonus in Kyne’s books.

It all makes her wonder what did Kiara do to not be so well-liked among the employees, because Kyne really likes her — as a friend, obviously.

Her other friends, such as Priyanka, Scarlett and Bo —but mostly Priyanka— are always asking her why does the daughter of their boss spend so much time with her, especially during work hours, and Kyne just shrugs and gives vague excuses. She won’t tell anyone Kiara talks shit about the other CEOs like it’s her actual job, she’s not a snitch.

Scarlett likes to joke that Kiara has a crush on her and Kyne should take advantage of that, seduce her and get all her money. Kyne just doesn’t pay attention to them, and flat out denies such thing being a possibility. Because not even in ten lives Kiara would like her like that for more than obvious reasons.

“You don’t give yourself enough credit, Kyne,” Scarlett says one day, on their way to the parking lot. “Like, your flirting is shit, but you’re not that bad looking,” they tease, earning a few chuckles from the girls and an eye roll from Kyne at that.

“Says the one that still can’t get Ilona Verley to go out with them,” Kyne quips back, intelligently derailing the conversation thanks to Scarlett going on a tangent about how they don’t care if Ilona texts them back or not, and how they’re water under the bridge.

Kyne just brushes off her friends’ constant teasing, and doesn’t really bring it up to Kiara, because why would she? It’s just playful nagging, and she doubts anyone else gives two craps about what Kyne does and not.

Well, so she thought.

Kiara comes to her office one day, and nothing seems strange, not even when she settles a cup of coffee in her desk and offers her a bagel. She figures it’s just Kiara thanking her for never complaining when she comes to her for venting.

“Do you have plans on Saturday?” She asks out of the blue, and Kyne cocks a brow, taking a sip from her coffee. She shakes her head no, and Kiara bites her lower lip. “So, uh, the charity ball is on Saturday, I think you know that. And I’m fairly sure you’ve heard the rumors--”

“Wait, what? What rumors?” Kyne cuts her off, knitting her brows in a frown and staring at Kiara, who looks absolutely mortified.

“Oh, no, you have no idea, do you?” She asks, and Kyne can swear this is the first time she’s seen Kiara blush. She looks cute with her cheeks crimson red, actually; it’s a nice change from the poised woman she’s come to know.

“Of what?” Kyne presses, trying to not get distracted by Kiara.

Kiara proceeds to tell her through gritted teeth how many people at the company think they’re dating — apparently her constant visits to Kyne’s office had caused some eyebrows to raise their way. Kiara never bothered to say anything about those rumors, because as the future owner of the company she shouldn’t dignify cheap office gossip with an answer, but then shit hit the fan when the rumors ended up arriving to her father’s ears, and now he expected Kiara to bring her alleged girlfriend to the charity ball.

Kyne sits still at her chair, owlishly blinking at Kiara for a moment too long. She tilts her head, waiting for Kiara to say it’s all a joke and she just wants her to calculate something for her.

But that doesn’t happen, and Kiara just silently stares back.

“That would explain the looks Susan from customer support gives me when I pass from her office on my way to get lunch,” Kyne muses absentmindedly. In fact, if she thinks about it for more than a second, it makes a whole lot of sense. Now she gets why Jenna from the architecture team went on a tangent about how much she hates people that sleep with their bosses for a raise whenever Kyne was around, raising her voice a tad too loud so everyone would hear.

No wonder why one time Priyanka scolded her for not interacting more with their co-workers, saying she’d benefit by being up to date with the office gossip.

“Have you thought of telling your father it was all a misunderstanding?” She proceeds after a few moments, and Kiara shrugs.

“He was excited that I was finally going out with someone, and I didn’t want to ruin his happiness,” she explains, and Kyne cocks a brow. She always assumed Kiara was constantly dating people — with how gorgeous she is, it didn’t seem that much of a stretch.

Kyne thinks it through for an entire minute, and comes to the conclusion that though it is definitely a bad idea (lies have short legs, they say), there’s something that drives her to say yes. It might just be that she’ll never get to be with a pretty girl like Kiara ever again, fake or not, so she decides to bite the bullet.

“If I don’t get a raise after this, I’m going to work for your rival company and sell them all your corporative secrets,” Kyne deadpans, and it takes Kiara a full minute to understand that is Kyne’s way of accepting to be her fake girlfriend for the charity ball.

Kiara lets out a sigh of relief, slouching in her chair and thanking Kyne profusely, promising to take her shopping on Friday to find a dress for the charity ball. Kyne jokingly says she’ll suck the money out of Kiara’s credit card if given the opportunity.

“As if that was possible, darling.” She winks at her, and something inside Kyne twitches. “I gotta go, but I’ll text you later to sort this out.”

“Wait,” she interrupts her again, before she leaves. “How do you have my number?”

Kiara smiles mischievously, and Kyne mentally goes over what she ate today, because her stomach twitches again.

“I have my ways of finding out things,” Kiara says, winking one last time before she exits Kyne’s office.

Once she’s alone, Kyne wonders out loud what the fuck had she messed herself into.

[essie-essex]

anybody here remember night blogging??

You know thinking back on how I would do things differently, I would probably have gone to another school for college. I had assumed that you were required to write a thesis at every school to graduate, and at my school we had I.S. (Independent Study), which was kind of a final 100 page paper + project that we had to do our senior year, in addition to taking classes. But my school offered me the most money, and everyone I talked to said that it was a good school. I remember my English teacher being surprised that I got in. I wasn’t the best student, but during my senior year I started to be more engaged and pay attention in class. I think part of it was that my family (me and my mom lol) hosted a Japanese exchange student that year. She stayed for 10 months and I loved having someone at the house to do things with, and I think having her around really helped me out a lot with feeling less lonely. So, my grades improved (with the exception of math, I actually did a lot worse in math than usual despite studying every night for hours because my teacher was horrible, but that’s another story...) and for the most part I did a lot better academically. Also, I started running, lost weight, and felt generally better about myself (I thought that finally after all those years of depression, things were finally getting better, and I was stronger, and blah blah blah).

When I was accepted by a university, I was so excited, especially since my advisor told me I wouldn’t get into college (because of that awful math class--like honestly that year would have been so much better if I had had any of the other math teachers who could actually teach, and I came to my advisor meeting thinking that I was doing so much better with my grades than usual, like I literally had A’s in everything except for math, in which I had an F, and I thought she would ask me about what was happening in math and offer help, like seriously who sees a bunch of A’s and one F and thinks “this student clearly isn’t applying herself” and not “clearly this student needs some help with this one subject,” but no she said “I just don’t know what to do with you. At this rate, you’re not going to get into college.” And I just remember being so upset especially since I went in there without any emotional armor like I would have put up if I actually had really bad grades and was expecting to hear about it, but right that’s another story, so anyway... )

My problems started after I got back from Japan. Before that, while I did still have my moments of depression, especially when dealing with my boyfriend who had his own share of mood problems which tended to be a bit more high key than mine, it was a lot better than it was in high school. I loved my major, I had friends who actually appreciated my presence, and, for the first time in my life, I felt hopeful about the future. I remember when I was taking the bus back to my city after visiting my boyfriend and one of my friends, and I realized that for the first time I just felt like a normal person. I didn’t feel like some weird defective mistake that clearly didn’t belong in this world.

Then I went to Japan. And I fucking loved it, which is why I was so sad to leave. I’m usually a really quiet person, and in order to be outgoing I have to completely turn off my filter, which, I realize, can make me sort of obnoxious. It worked for me at first. I made several friends in different groups so I could have different options and be able to go out with friends more often.

My school only allowed us to study abroad for one semester. So, I had 4 months to do everything I wanted to do there. Like I’m not an energetic person at all, but basically I told myself “I’ll sleep when I’m back in the US, but right now I’m in fucking Japan and I need to do everything.” But basically everyone else was staying for the entire school year, so they weren’t in a rush to do and see things like I was. My no filter self helped me make friends, so I would have different groups to go out and do things with (like I changed my personality so much that when I told one of my dorm mates that I liked to play videogames, she said that I didn’t “seem like the type” who would do that. Like she was genuinely surprised.) Public transportation and the safety of Japan made it easier for me to be more independent than I was in the US. My college was in a small town, so while I was more independent there than at home (where if I so much as opened the front door, my mom would come rushing downstairs wondering where I was going/what I was doing/why was I going outside) I was still basically confined to one or two streets in the area. In Japan, I could just get on the train and go. Plus when you’re a foreigner you sometimes get random people talking to you on the streets and can even meet new people since you stand out. I went out to clubs at least once every weekend, and sometimes even twice (the advantage of having more than one group of friends). I didn’t sleep too much and always wanted to be out doing things since I just didn’t have a lot of time. I met guys, went out on dates and everything, had cultural experiences, and I mostly just didn’t care about any danger because I was in Japan and I basically had no plan after that and had done the one thing I really wanted to do (which was travel to Japan). The attitude was also brought on by me not giving much of shit about my studies because I was so angry and disappointed for not getting a placement in a program in which basically everyone who applied would get accepted. It was especially annoying because it allowed me to get experience in participant-observation while volunteering at a place that interested me, but most people who did the program were just doing it for fun, like there were a lot of various sciencey majors plus at least one math major, and I was just really disappointed. Luckily this attitude I adopted didn’t affect my grades too much, since most of the classes were pretty easy.

So, getting back to the point of all of this, I realize that the real problem was my shitty attitude, and I should have made the most out of my four months and then come back to “the real world,” as my mother put it, and be the same person I was before. Unfortunately, that’s not what happened. I have never been popular before, and having so many people not see my weird defective self was so exhilarating to me. For once I wasn’t the weird quiet girl. For once I could be independent. But then I was back to the small college town, and I wanted to go out and do things, I wanted to go to parties on the weekends. But my friends would mostly stay in and watch movies on the weekends. Like we went to the occasional party or did the usual hang out together and drink thing, but it wasn’t the same. I couldn’t be the same person I had been for the previous four months, and I didn’t take it well.

I had never had the kind of depression where I had brain fog. While I was still depressed in middle and high school, I could still do things like read books or write song lyrics. But brain fog made it impossible for me to get anything done. Like I could read a page and not know anything about what I read. I’d be stuck reading the same sentences over and over. When I hung out with my friends, I could muster up some energy, since I would cling to anything that brought me even a bit of joy, but mostly I just did nothing. I had this tiny room at the back of the house (we were a volunteer house and went to the local animal shelter every week) and I never even unpacked my clothes. Everything was in bags or boxes or in a clothing pile somewhere. I would have dreams of being back in Japan and wake up so disappointed. It was especially upsetting to think about all the people I knew in Japan, since they still were there. I tried checking in on people to see how they were doing, but--as is usual--they didn’t miss me nearly as much as I missed them. And I felt the same way about my friends at college too. I was back to just being tolerated instead of wanted. I always let them have their way and yielded to their decisions and just tried to keep my group of friends but I think a good number of them stopped liking me.

ANYWAY, getting to the point. I got on meds over the summer and felt kind of better. I didn’t having nearly as much brain fog. I was ready to do my IS and graduate, and then things went downhill again. My friends used to automatically include me in things, but now I always had to check in with them to see if they were doing anything. I started my IS, joined a local Pagan group to do my research, and started reading books to use as sources. My IS advisor was my favorite professor, but when I told her that I was having trouble doing everything because of my depression, she said “but you took care of that, right?” Like the meds I was on were supposed to fix everything. I just straight up never went back to her office. I stopped going to classes. I purposely avoided meal times and went to get food at times when most people were in classes. I stopped everything.

I feel like if I had gone to a different school, I might have been able to power through the year and finish my classes. Maybe. Or maybe not. I don’t know. This school truly felt like it was the best option though. They offered me the most money, and I was able to visit and write an essay while I was there to get an even better scholarship. I remember when I was offered a merit scholarship for the first time (for one of the schools I didn’t choose to go to) and I called my dad and told him they were offering me some money. He just thought it would be a few hundred dollars maybe, but when I told him $11,000 he was so surprised and was speechless. Like there was just silence for a few seconds for him to process it. The school I went to offered me $14,000 a year, and the scholarship I applied for and went there to write the essay for, brought the amount up to $18,000 (Sadly, this didn’t even cover half of the yearly tuition). It seemed like the best choice, even if they didn’t offer Japanese, I figured I could still learn on my own, and I didn’t realize that their IS program was so unique. If I had gone to any of the other schools, especially one of the bigger ones, I wonder if I would have made more friends. There would have been much more to do there. And all I would have to do was take classes and not be horribly stressed out by IS. Even if I was depressed toward the end of it, all I had to do was pass. Like even though I got good grades for the first two years, I would just need to pass the classes in the last two years to graduate. I got really off topic here I know. This is mostly just a stream of consciousness thing to get my thoughts out. And putting it here has probably stopped me from going into the kind of depressive rant that I usually go into when I write about my life.

Anyways, I’m not editing this or anything. I meant to write this while letting the Sims 4 load since it takes a while with the 938347283333 mods I have, but I forgot to actually start it, whoops!

tl;dr started writing this post meaning to talk about my college and senior IS, ended up having one of those sitcom clip episodes but in writing.

Also fuck my senior year high school math teacher, holy shit she was horrible at teaching