#because somehow I still can't remember the words for search and find

[black-cat-aoife]

I would like to apologise to my Russian course, but if you all reminiscence about a text about Ekaterinburg, you've read before I joined the class and then the teacher asks me if I know something about the city as well...I will answer "ehm there's a memorial for the Dyatlov pass incident" and then continue to explain what happened there

[guiltyasdave]

delicate

pairing: modern!Oberyn Martell x f!reader

word count: ~3.9k

summary: You meet a mysterious man at a club. He's just as attracted to you as you are to him.

warnings/tags: explicit smut (-> 18+ only!), alcohol consumption, able-bodied reader, no use of y/n, very soft dom!Oberyn, protected p in v (who am I), dirty talk, fingering, anal play (m receiving), a hint of angst, romance because I can't help myself

a/n: written for @dancingtotuyo’s on repeat drabble challenge, based on the song delicate by taylor swift. this is honestly just feral, i have nothing to say for myself.

dividers as always by @saradika-graphics <3

find my full masterlist here and follow @guiltyasdavenotifs for fic updates!

Lights are flashing, colors dancing over the exposed skin of your arms and shoulders; the bass is pumping, making your whole body feel like it’s vibrating from within. You’re clinging to your friend, your arms intertwined as you navigate your way through the crowd of people to the bar.

You first see him as you’re gulping down your drink, welcoming the cool liquid in your parched throat. Your eyes are observing the crowd, flying over him and then flickering back to take a second glance. 

He’s gorgeous, his dark hair a mess, a beard framing his face, his skin shining under the lights. He’s wearing a shirt that flows around his body, threads of gold weaving through the fabric and reflecting the dancing lights. It’s almost entirely undone, giving you a generous look at the expanse of his toned chest, at the sun-kissed skin that you feel a sudden urge to run your fingers over. A massive gold chain with a lock hangs around his neck, an accessory that you’re convinced would look absolutely ridiculous on anyone else. But on him, it somehow only accentuates the strong cords of muscle that ripple under his skin in a way that makes you want to lick your lips. 

He moves with a confident ease, his body in tune with the stomping beats, his whole being exuding an almost cocky self-assuredness. You keep drinking him in, fascinated in a way that you can barely understand. You realize that you’ve been staring when your friend follows your line of sight and you hear her quiet gasp beside you. 

“Haven’t seen that one around before,” her voice floats into your ear over the music and you shake your head in silent agreement. You’d definitely remember if you did. 

You both watch him move with the body of a woman next to him, watch him bend down to whisper something into her ear, watch the way his lips curl into a smug grin as she grinds against him in reaction to his words. 

“Too late, I guess,” you laugh, downing the rest of your drink and tearing your eyes away. 

The two of you head back into the crowd, swaying your bodies to the beat. You try to get lost in the feeling of it, but your eyes keep searching for him, hungrily grasping at the glimpses of him that you can spot. Eventually, you watch the retreating backs of both of him and the woman head toward the exit, their bodies closely intertwined. Like you said, you try to shrug it off, too late. It’s not a big deal, there’s more than enough other guys around you. 

But you don’t go home with any of those guys, none of them able to catch your interest the way he did, and when you lie in bed in the early morning hours, your head pleasantly buzzing with the remaining alcohol in your bloodstream, you still see him behind your eyelids. 

A few weeks go by and while you hope to catch him every time that you’re out, there’s no trace of him. It isn’t until your friend’s birthday celebration, a tradition that the two of you have kept up for years, that you see him again. 

Again, you’re leaning against the bar, your eyes aimlessly drifting over the dancefloor while you’re sipping on your drink, when you spot him. He’s wearing another colorful shirt, his chest almost entirely on display, and he’s shamelessly grinding against another young man as they’re both moving to the beat. You can’t tear your eyes away, apparently staring so intently that he catches you and throws you a wink across the room. 

You feel heat rising in your cheeks and almost turn away, but he’s already on his way, moving towards you with a cat-like grace, effortlessly weaving through the crowd of moving bodies. 

“Hey,” he says, leaning into you so close that his breath fans hot against your ear, causing goosebumps to rise on your neck. “Saw something you like?” 

You grin at him over the rim of your cup, biting your lip and nodding. He mirrors your grin, an almost predatory glint in his eyes. He’s even more gorgeous up close, a light sheen of sweat on his face and his eyes a smoldering brown, his dark hair a mess with strands sticking to his forehead. You take in his toned chest, his broad shoulders and you desperately want to touch your hands to his golden skin. A foreign accent is lacing his words in the most delicious way, only adding to the pull that you feel towards him. 

“Let me buy you another drink,” he purrs and you accept, thanking him and offering him your name. You relish in the way you have to lean into him so that he can hear you, greedily soaking in his scent and his body heat that make your mouth water. 

His name is Oberyn, you learn, a name that sounds foreign on your tongue and you could swear that a quiet growl rises up his throat when you repeat it back to him. 

You’d love to spend your evening dancing with him, pressing your body against his, find out if moving with him feels as good as it looks from the outside. But it’s your friend’s birthday, and you’re gonna stick together, dance the night away with each other and no one else, the way you do every year. 

He shrugs it off when you tell him as much, an unbothered grin on his face as he promises you another time then. His hand wraps around your wrist, the warmth of it sinking into your skin as he pulls your arm out towards him, a black marker suddenly in his other hand. 

“What are you–” you begin to ask, but your voice dies at the sight of him pulling the cap off with his teeth, something that really shouldn’t affect you this much. 

He bends over your arm and it takes your hazy mind a moment to register that he’s writing numbers onto your skin. You’re getting lost in the feeling of his hand on you, even in such an innocent place, and your thoughts are already jumping to fantasies of how it would feel trailing up your arm and over your body. 

“There,” his voice floats into your ear and you almost jump. The smug look on his face leaves no doubt that he knows exactly what kind of effect he has on you. He leans in close again, so close that you can feel his breath on your skin. Your mouth feels dry. 

You look down at your arm, now adorned with digits in black ink. A phone number. 

“Give me a call,” he smirks, and leans in even closer, until his lips move against the shell of your ear and a shudder runs down your back at the sensation. “Just think of the fun things we could do.” He throws you another wink and slides away from you, back into the crowd. 

You text him the next day, worried if it’s too soon, if it makes you seem desperate. Then again, you have to admit to yourself, you are desperate. Desperate to hear his voice again, desperate to feel his hands on you again. Texting him is less awkward than you had hoped, his demeanor putting you at ease almost immediately. You catch yourself smiling at the screen, already down bad for this man. 

You’re in bed, struggling to calm down enough to sleep when your phone’s screen lights up the darkness of your bedroom from where it’s lying on your nightstand. 

He’s asking you to meet him in a dive bar, right now, if you want to. You’re reluctant at first, once again worried to appear too eager, but the almost magnetic pull that you feel towards him eventually leads you out of your apartment and to the address he sent you. 

He’s waiting for you in the back, just like he told you. Wearing dark jeans and a white t-shirt, the fabric stretching around his broad chest in a way that makes it hard not to stare, dressed much more casually than you’ve come to know from him. It doesn’t take away from his persona one bit, he’s still exuding that energy that seems to let him command every room he’s in, that makes it so hard for you to resist him. 

He buys you a drink and pulls you into a corner booth with him. Talking to him is easy, he’s an attentive listener and his quick remarks make you laugh, leaning into him when you do. You learn that he’s not from around here, that he flew in to visit friends but that he’s thinking about moving here permanently. It almost scares you, how giddy that prospect makes you, the idea of having the chance to keep seeing him. His arm finds its way around your shoulders eventually, his fingers drawing shapes over your skin. The innocent contact makes you feel like a teenager, suddenly sixteen again. 

He walks you home later, his arm still wrapped around you, pulling you into his side. It feels good, a sense of safety and intimacy that you feel yourself getting lost in. You had thought that he was hot, that he would be a fun hookup, but as the minutes tick on, you realize how much you already like him. How much you want this feeling to last. 

It feels so natural, turning around to face him when you reach your building, both of you leaning in simultaneously until your lips meet, like it’s the only possible way for this evening to end. You think that it is. 

Kissing him feels even better than you had envisioned in your mind, and you melt against him, one hand braced against his chest while the other comes up to pull at the hair in the nape of his neck, needing him closer, not ready to let him go. He’s cupping your face in both hands, his thumbs caressing your cheeks, and you feel him smile against your lips. You lick into his mouth, revel in the groan that rumbles deep in his chest. 

You don’t let go of him, holding onto his hand when you pull him up the stairs, soak in the feeling of him pressed against your body when you unlock your apartment door, let him connect his lips with yours again when he walks you backwards down your hallway.

Everything about him feels so right, so safe and yet like the most exciting experience you’ve ever had. You breathe him in, ecstatic with the sensation of his broad form against you, with the way you feel his muscles move under your fingers where you’re grabbing at his shoulders.

He lets you lead him into your bedroom, his hands still all over you. You push him down to sit on the edge of your bed and he follows your lead, sinking down on the mattress with an easy grin on his face, regarding you with hooded eyes. He wraps his hands around your waist as you’re standing in front of him and he pulls you closer. His fingers find their way below the hem of your skirt, dancing over the supple skin of your thighs, slowly inching up higher. 

You whine, already squirming under his touch, and his grin widens. 

“So soft,” he coos up at you, tightening his grip on your thighs and moving you to straddle him, your legs already spread wide to accommodate the thickness of his thighs beneath you. One hand comes up to cradle your face again, his thumb nudging at your lips and you flick your tongue against the digit, making him chuckle. 

“And so pretty,” he continues, leaning in to connect your lips once more. You want to melt into him, let him consume every fiber of your being. 

Your hands tug at his t-shirt, pulling it up, desperate to satisfy the need to be closer to him, to feel his bare skin against yours. He helps you, lifting the fabric over his head. You’ve seen most of his chest before, but not like this, not revealed just for you, in the dim light of your bedroom, yours to look at, yours to touch. He somehow seems even broader without clothes on and you’re almost transfixed by the thick cords of muscle of his arms and shoulders that are on display for you now. 

He chuckles again, placing another kiss at the corner of your lips. 

“You alright, princess?” 

“Yeah,” you murmur, feeling breathless, overwhelmed with how much you want him. 

His hands splay over your thighs, fingertips dipping beneath your skirt again, slowly, teasingly skating higher. 

“Take this off for me.” It’s phrased like an order, but it’s still so soft, not leaving a doubt in your mind that you could say no if you wanted to. But you don’t. You want him to see you, want to feel his eyes on you, want to have this hungry look that’s trained on your face burning all over your body. 

He groans when you obey, a deep, rumbling sound that goes straight to your core and you know that he feels your thighs clenching on top of his. His mouth is on your bare skin within seconds, kissing and sucking, his tongue moving against you like he’s going to devour you. 

You arch against him with a whine when he circles your nipple, first with his fingers and then with his tongue before sucking the sensitive bud between his lips. It’s all encompassing, the wetness of his mouth, the strong grip of his hands, the heat of his chest seeping into your skin where you’re pressing yourself against him. 

“Please, Oberyn,” you whimper, not even sure what you’re asking for, just knowing that you need more. His responding moan sends vibrations from his mouth straight through you, before his fingers dig into your waist and he flips you over, until your back is resting on your sheets and he’s hovering over you, your thighs still spread wide around him. 

The image alone is enough to send another wave of arousal through you, the way he looks just as wrecked as you feel. His large hands spread your thighs wider as he leans back, his eyes trained on your panties, where you know the fabric must be soaked already. 

“So pretty,” he mumbles again, more to himself than to you. His eyes fly back up to meet yours, almost black, his pupils blown wide. “Can I take these off?” He dips a finger under the lace covering your hip, pulling it away and letting it snap against your skin. 

“Please.” You don’t care how desperate you sound, not when he looks up at you with the most sinful smirk on his face. His hands grasp the fabric and you lift your hips to help him pull it down, but his smirk widens as he tears the lace in half, ripping the shreds off of your body. 

“Fuck,” you whine, not a single thought wasted on the fact that those were some of your favorite panties, every part of you focused on how badly you want his hands all over you. 

His eyes stay focused on your expression, eagerly drinking in your every reaction as his fingers dip between your legs, so close to where you so desperately need him. He groans when he feels the wetness seeping from your folds, swirling his digits through it before reaching your clit. He’s ghosting over the sensitive nub with barely any pressure, but it’s enough to elicit a moan from you, your hips canting up to follow his touch. You’re distantly aware of the pleas that are falling from your lips, giving way to a loud whine when he finally sinks two thick fingers into your heat. 

He thrusts into you, curling them just right, and his name tumbles out of your mouth again, laced with pure need. You watch in fascination when he sucks his slick-coated fingers into his mouth, eyes still trained on your face, a rumble forming in his chest at the taste. 

“Tastes so sweet, princess.”

Your thighs fall open wider, shamelessly offering yourself to him, to his eyes, his hands. You reach out, grabbing at his waist, the need to feel all of him nearly overwhelming. His fingers intertwine with yours, pulling your hands away from his body. He lifts them up to his mouth and presses soft kisses against your knuckles, a whisper of patience on his lips before he lets go of you and rises up to rid himself of his jeans. 

Your eyes widen at the sight of him, a needy sigh escaping you when you think about feeling him inside you, about the way he’s gonna stretch your walls. You sit up, eagerly reaching for him again. Your fingers wrap around his cock, mesmerized by his girth, and he hisses when you move your hand over his length. 

You hear the crinkle of plastic and then his hand is on yours, gently tugging it away, much too soon for your liking. You watch as he puts the condom on with practiced ease, the sight of his own hands on his cock enough to send another wave of arousal through you. 

He’s back on you before you know it, sliding in between your spread legs, his large hands splayed over your upper thighs, pushing them further apart. His eyes are trained on your weeping pussy, a hungry darkness in them. You whine when he rubs his cock through your wetness before tapping against your clit.

“You want this?” he asks, his voice husky. 

“Please, Oberyn.” Your desperate plea breaks off into a filthy moan when he sheathes himself inside of you, breaching your tight walls with the most delicious sting, and you feel your eyes rolling back into your head. 

Pleasure grows inside of you as he starts to move, slamming into your pussy in a forceful rhythm. You feel so full of him, the sensation almost overwhelming as he hits the perfect spot over and over. The wave inside of you crests so suddenly that you barely realize what’s happening, the need that you’ve felt brewing all evening finally reaching its peak. 

You gasp his name, nails pressing into his shoulders as he fucks you through it, until you’re a trembling mess beneath him. He slows, moving in and out of you with shallow thrusts, his lips on yours once more. 

You stay like that for a moment, arms wrapped around him, holding him close while you bask in the bliss that you’ve just experienced. But his continuous movements have the hunger for more growing inside of you once more. You meet his thrusts with your hips, needy to feel him deeper again. He props himself up, and it’s sinful how good he looks, his face glowing, a sheen of sweat on his skin. 

You suck one of your fingers into your mouth, eyes wide and holding his gaze, feigning innocence. He watches you, a curious glint in his eyes, as you trail your hands from his shoulders down his back until you reach his ass and pull him further into you, fingernails digging into his flesh. 

You let your saliva-covered finger reach further, gently massaging the puckered ring of muscle and he gasps, thrusting into you with so much force that it jostles your whole body and you cry out, the sensation of him so deep inside you a heady mix of pleasure and pain. 

“Fuck,” he grits between his teeth as you keep up your ministrations, delighted to have this effect on him. “Fuck, princess, just like that…” 

You bite your lip, grinning up at him. “Do the girls back home touch you like I do?” 

He breathes out a laugh and shakes his head, his movements never faltering as he gathers your wrists in his hands and pins them down on the mattress beside your head. 

“No. And you’re gonna make me come if you keep this up, but I’m not finished with you yet,” he purrs, leaning down and sucking bruising kisses into the soft skin of your throat, the scratch of his beard only adding to the sensation. You free one of your hands from his grip to tug at his hair, your fingers burrowing in the soft strands at his neck and scratching against his scalp. 

“You can give me one more, can’t you?” His voice in your ear makes you shiver and you nod, a breathless please on your lips. 

“Good girl.” His kiss is soft against your cheek before he pulls away, his thrusts speeding up, as he grabs your hips, holding them up, giving you no choice but to take him. “Touch yourself,” he demands, the tendons in his neck straining with exertion. 

Your fingers are on your clit within moments, rubbing against it, slick with your arousal. The coil inside you tightens again, desperate for release once more. 

“Give it to me princess, come on.” His voice sounds wrecked, and it’s the thing that makes you leap over the edge a second time, stars exploding behind your eyelids as you pulse around him, pure pleasure soaring through you. 

He comes to a stuttering halt, hips pressed flush against yours, and his groans are almost enough to make you want to come again. He falls forward, forehead pressed against yours, and you share a lazy smile. 

You think that he really is the most beautiful person that you’ve ever met.

You fell asleep curled against him, your head resting on his chest and soaking up his warmth, with his arm around your shoulder, but when you blink awake to soft morning light falling through your curtains, you are alone. You roll onto your back, staring up at the ceiling. You’ve seen him at the club, he’s probably in a different bed almost every night, you shouldn’t be surprised that he snuck out of yours in the morning. And you sure as hell shouldn’t be disappointed. 

You get up with a sigh, pulling a t-shirt over your head and padding down the hall to the kitchen. You come to an abrupt halt in the doorway, met with a sight that you hadn’t expected. He’s standing in front of your open fridge, the expanse of his back bare and turned towards you. There’s a swoop of excitement in your stomach.

You exhale loudly and he turns towards you, an easy smile on his lips. “Good morning.” His voice sounds raspier, still thick with sleep. 

“Hey,” you say, returning his smile. He closes the distance between you and cups your face, the sensation of his thumb against your cheek already a familiar one. His lips find yours and you get lost in the feeling of it, in the fantasy of this being your every morning, in pretending that he’s yours. 

When he pulls away, the words are out of your mouth before your mind is able to catch up.

“I think I really like you.” 

You want to bite your tongue immediately, to take them back. Too early, the voice in your head screams. Your eyes widen as you search for something else to say, but he doesn’t waver, still regarding you with that relaxed smile on his handsome face.

“Is– is it okay that I said that?” 

He hums, his large hand still on your cheek. 

“I think I really like you too.”

as always, if you enjoyed this, please consider putting a smile on my face by reblogging, commenting or sending in an ask <3 thank you for reading!

[bettymylove]

hello! I really love your work and I was thinking if you could write a one-shot of theo inspired by the song " Open Arms by SZA ". but somehow make it a good ending? idk 😓 ( like a slow burn or something ) reader had to let theo go but theo is kind of begging..? for reader to stay in his life and so on! idk if I explained it good enough but you can search up the song and take a look at the lyrics, you'll see what topic I'm going for!

thank you if your write this! you're an amazingg writer ‼️

never leaving

pairing: theo nott x reader

content: your insecurities push you to break your friendship with Theo, only to realize you were wrong all along.

a/n: hope this matches your expectations, I'm sorry if it didn't<33 (also I feel like I'm apologizing in every a/n)

You could say that Theo took you in, he was the only person in your life that ever made you feel too comfortable. When you were on the train, he had befriended you and he never let his friendship falter.

Theo was everything, he was all you could ever need and it scared you how much you were dependent on him. You had never needed anyone, always doing everything by yourself but you could see that changing.

Friends weren't a usual sight in your life and Theo had changed that, but you still had your doubts and maybe that's why you had decided to tell him.

You always had a lingering feeling, that he was taking pity on you because who would willingly spend so much time with you, call themselves your best friend, he had no reason to do it.

You spotted Theo in the hallway along with Mattheo and Enzo. The former two were smoking, and Theo's eyes met yours, and he immediately threw down his cigarette, crushing it using the sole of his shoe.

His eyes stayed on you while yours diverted here and there, ashamed to even meet his gaze. You wanted to be with him, but he was ruining his life for you, he was way too enamored and you wanted to help him.

You reached the group and scrunched your nose at the nicotine smell, Theo noticed this and dragged you away. Why does he have to be sweet and make this harder? you thought.

"Theo, I-" You questioned yourself, he was the only person who knew you but it would be too selfish to make him stay, so you continued, "I don't think we should be friends anymore"

Maybe friends wasn't the right word to describe you two, you weren't dating but he never dated anyone else and it's not like you could. You always hoped it was because he harbored some feelings for you but that had been a foolish fantasy.

"Y/n, I'm sorry sweetheart, I won't ever smoke again, I mean this was the first time in weeks, I really am trying" what? he thought this was about him smoking?

"No, Theo it's not about that." you simply stated trying to make him understand about you suddenly pulling away. He stared at you, his mouth opening and closing as if he wanted to say something but really could find the words.

"You can't do this, you cannot wake up on a random day and decide to remove me from your life as if I'm a pawn in your chess board" he was almost yelling, Theo had never yelled at you nor had he ever gotten angry at you, it was always you being mad and him picking up on it.

You remembered a scenario from second year and how different times had gotten now, you had changed and him not so much but you guess it was for his better.

"Where's y/n?" The twelve year old Theodore Nott asked his friend and said friend just shrugged in response before saying, "She hasn't been talking to anyone."

You're mad, he knew you were you always shut everyone out when you were, falling silent and Theo knew just how to better your mood and so he headed in your direction.

Your flashback stopped when you saw a tear fall from his eyes, you had never seen Theo cry either, only once and that too not intentionally. He was showing every emotion of his and you stood there unable to think, mumbling a sorry before leaving him stranded in that hallway.

Theo was shocked, hurt, angry and was feeling all these emotions at once. He had known you for six years and you had left him in six minutes. He loved you and you couldn't see it.

He knocked on your door for the fifteenth time, and you finally opened it. Your eyes were red and puffed up, you were crying.

"Why are you doing this?" He asked in a small voice unlike the one he used in the hallway, he was scared to lose you.

"You don't need to take anymore pity on me, Theo, go live your life" you said with a sniffle in the end and your statement had only made him more confused.

Pity? he had never taken pity on you, and it hurt himself that you believed that nonsense. "You can't replace me y/n, I'm forever, no matter what."

You so wanted to believe him, you so wanted to be in his arms right now, you so wanted him to stop as he was doing right now but you just couldn't.

"I'm sorry Theo, but I have to" Those were last words to him before you shut the door and Theo couldn't sleep that night.

It had been 2 months, 18 days of you ignoring him and he thought he might go mad, you were driving him crazy, you not being there was so much worse than he had anticipated.

It was late in the night when he spotted you leaning against a railing, breathing hard, and when he got a bit closer he noticed you were crying.

He went to stand beside you, you flinched but then sort of relaxed when you noticed who it was. You laid your head in your hands and started crying even harder and without missing a beat or saying something spiteful, Theo took you in his arms.

It was much later that you realized that you could not live without him, he was your Theo. Your tears wet his shirt but he didn't seem to mind, he never seemed to mind.

"You won't leave again, would you?" He asked as if he knew you were coming back and he was right. "You could try, but this time I won't let you."

You smiled at him, god he was the only person in the world who would never make you feel bad about what you did, and you realise it was only your insecurities holding you back from him.

He kissed your forehead lovingly and hugged you even tighter, "I love you" he whispered, half hoping you didn't hear him, but you did.

[myun-saidthoughts]

12th House Venus: I Choose Longing

(Disorganized attachment style edition)

"I'll still choose my imagination instead of choosing a tangible you."

My soul is drawn to someone who won't choose me; my body finds comfort in the desire of someone who longs for me but ultimately chooses another.

As I sit on my bed, lost in yet another mesmerizing song, I start to feel this type of longing that my own soul forgets it calls for. I stare into the abyss of what I think is my room and this sinking feeling seeps in; suddenly I start to feel as if I have said goodbye to someone who was never even mine.

I start to imagine false memories in my mind, and i'm suddenly remembering this false goodbye. My soul can't tell the difference, is it reality or just my imagination? I cling onto these false memories as if the person I long for has just chosen another, It's like i'm reading a fabricated story and my eyes can only look in between the lines, not at the words but instead I stare at the unsaid.

Instead, I lie on my bed, imagining a scenario where I walk into a room and I see the side of his face lost in conversation with someone else, my heart clenches, I take a deep breath in and to my expected surmise, I see him with her. And as I look over he turns to look at me, and as our eyes interlock I imagine him clenching his fists, holding his breath while whispering to himself, "I wish you were her."

Instead, I stare at the wall, imagining a scenario where I'm walking into a bar and I see him with her. We make eye contact; he takes a breath and looks down. I can't look away, my heart is suddenly wishing for his hello but seconds pass, our eye contact breaks, and as he walks away, I imagine him holding her hand, while thinking to himself, "It should have been her."

Am I choosing this? Am I wishing to long for someone instead of ever being with them? Why do I envision scenarios where the person I say I want has said goodbye to me before, but only after I fell for him, and after he fell for me too?

"My body finds comfort in only the idea of you, and because I fear accepting the love my own soul reluctantly calls for, I will choose these imagined scenarios over ever being truly yours; i'd rather break my own heart over and over again than allow the love I so desperately wish for in; even it means I'll stare at the ceiling, searching through the what if's and what could be's, I'll still choose my imagination instead of choosing a tangible you."

12th House Venus + Moon aspecting Neptune may relate because oftentimes these individuals will search and run towards those who take, those who won't emotionally satisfy or emotionally give in the way you need. Instead those you choose are those who may have to need you, you're the other woman, the mistress, the girl he hasn't told his friends about, the girl in the shadows or the one he only calls at 2AM. Or you feel a sense of power and a sense of worth when he does decide to choose you over someone he has self proclaimed to be with. Therefore he is with another girl yet he may "dream" and secretly desire you. You're the only one who "gets him" he says, you're the only one he feels attracted to or close with. And on those nights where you wait for his 2AM call, you are receiving a sense of "power" that in this moment he is choosing you, he just may not choose you in the morning, and in that weary state you feel comfortable. And because of that you'll always be searching for his approval or acknowledgement. In essence, you somehow are never the chosen girl, and you find yourself in loops and cycles of choosing those who won't choose you. These individuals are reflecting to you core wounds that you haven't acknowledged or accepted. Especially if you have many 12H house placements such as a 12H Moon/Venus or Pisces Moon. Those patterns you've reluctantly learned from your childhood or from your Mom, has lead you here. Now you stare in the mirror and question your wholeness, you question why the ones you choose never seem to choose you, and your soul is instead asking to give yourself that type of love that you're too scared to develop.

If this scenario resonates with you, then this individual is provoking a wound within yourself that deals with the acceptance of receiving authentic love. This innate need to only give highlights your own fear of receiving real reciprocal, stable, tangible love.

This dilemma is your concrete wall that your brain has created for you to stay "safe." You feel comfortable in shallow connections, you feel more at ease in meaningless connections, and yet a part of your soul is asking for more, a part of your soul knows how much you can give and instead of asking for a sip of the love you crave, you'd rather stay parched.

You'd rather stay away from the chance of truly ever being someone's person, because if you allowed them in, if you allowed them to see you, then they'll have the power to truly break you;

This is how I have felt in the past regarding romantic connections, and for me, these types of feelings only occur when the connection I am forming holds the possibility that I can fall for the person. Especially if the boy I like showcases a slight desire for another or isn't meeting my expectations, I'll get into this longing state where I imagine our connection is completely over, I imagine that he is with someone else and I sit in it; and this feeling somehow feels comfortable for me. It's what keeps me in shallow connections, It's what keeps my walls up, it's what creates the distance between me and love. I am terrified of ever being someone else's, I am terrified of being wanted by someone I can see myself falling for, and yet I want nothing more.

I choose those who won't choose me because this uncertainty is what my body knows. My body feels "safe" in this emotional wishing because it's what I have been used to ever since I was young. Once they somehow show consistency within the connection I feel uneasy and confused, I feel more uncomfortable with them openly stating their desires for me, I feel more unsafe when they look into my eyes to tell me "I want you." I need to want them, and they need to want me too, but only in intervals. I need to see him with another while staring at me, I need to question his feelings and imagine the what ifs. If I can't then a part of me can't want him.

When the connection becomes "real" or more "open" I start to feel reluctant and uneasy, once my self worth isn't being questioned, I ask myself "Do I care?" "Do I actually want him?"

This post is more word vomit, I really don't know if others will relate but this is why I am so drawn to nodal synastry + water house synastry overlays, I don't feel safe with anyone, I don't like being with someone who doesn't bring me ease or the sense of acceptance, and I wanted to share my thoughts.

I have:

A Scorpio Moon that exactly squares my Neptune

A 12th House Venus, Mercury, Chiron and Lilith

My 12th House Venus sextiles my Neptune

A disorganized attachment style with abandonment wounds.

[do-androids-dream-ao3acc]

It hurts to feel, to think, to know I may be nothing

(a kind of fix-it for 8x06)

The knocking on his door is insistent, almost angry. 

Tommy looks at the alarm clock next to his bed. The glowing digits, the only and quite pale light in the room, show 2:45 am. Who would knock on his door at this hour? There's this little tiny heart stumble that gives him a name in response, which he immediately suppresses. Tommy, who is lying on his bed fully dressed and can't sleep anyway, just hopes it's not him. Not … Buck. He couldn't bear that, not now. No pleading from those Bambi eyes, no broken voice with a stutter worse than ever. He wouldn't be able to look at the man and think of him as detached as he had called him when he left, he wouldn't be able to see anything other than Evan, and that would be wrong. Tommy weighed this thought back and forth in his head, trying to make it somehow more correct. 

The knocking is still energetic, it just won't stop. Tommy sighs. He considers just lying there, playing dead and staring at the ceiling until whoever is at the door leaves. But if it's Evan, if it really is him, then he can be trusted to knock all night. Or to try to break down the door. Although... No, he wouldn't do that. Unless he was drunk. Tommy remembers the story of when the Bachelor party got out of hand and a door was kicked in. His thoughts go round in circles, and he sighs again. It sounds theatrical in his empty bedroom, but that's the way it is. He slowly gets up, swings his legs out of bed and shuffles to the door. 

This little stab in his heart, which is not relief but disappointment, is pathetic. It’s not Evan, of course not.

It’s Eddie.

Definitely, the first thing Evan would do is go to Eddie. Then, probably in the early morning, to Bobby. Or to his sister. Heck, he’ll see all his friends because he can; and that thought somehow hurts even more. Tommy isn't afraid that Evan will make him look like a bad guy. He has every right to grieve and seek comfort. It's just that he can. From whom does Tommy find comfort?

In any case, Eddie, who looks a little disheveled and a little drunk with his red cheeks, doesn't exactly appear like someone who wants to console him. 

“Have you checked the time?” Tommy asks gruffly. 

“I did, but have you checked your brain?”

Eddie taps him on the forehead with two fingers, then pushes past him without being asked, casually dropping onto the couch in the living room. 

“This isn't the best time, Eddie,” Tommy says wearily. Yes, he is tired, even if he can't sleep. 

“Might be. But that's what this is all about, isn't it?”

That hurts, and Tommy feels anger building behind his forehead, which will be a decent headache in a few hours. Unshed tears, that's how Abby used to call it. Abby, with whom everything began and somehow everything ended. All the shame and anger about himself make Tommy's muscles tense. 

“Don't think you’d understand.”

Tommy stands there with his arms crossed, defensive, as he has been all his life, but Eddie is not impressed. Of course not, why would he. Eddie has told him stories of Afghanistan and the dirt he's been through. One man’s defensive attitude hardly impresses him. 

“Why not?”

“Because you've never been in that situation, quite simply.”

“Oh, so you want to use my non-existent queer experience against me, do you? Shallow.”

Tommy lets out a long breath and growls, “What exactly do you want, Eddie?”

“I want to know why.”

A simple sentence, a simple statement, but Tommy feels like he's been deflated. He searches for words, but they are hard to find.

“Listen,” he finally says, ”I know you're here as E… as Buck’s friend. That’s sweet, but…”

“That's true,” Eddie replies surprisingly soberly, ”but I'm also here as your friend. Sometimes we need our people to tell us we're being silly.”

Of course, he speaks from experience. That's kind of the point, and now it's bursting out of Tommy. 

“I managed well on my own for years,” he says, the words tumbling out of his mouth. “I've been through it all, the self-denial, the shame, the half-hearted relationships. Evan will never have to experience that, and I'm grateful for that. But still... this guy just stumbled into my life, no, rather rolled through it like a steamroller.”

"He broke your barriers," Eddie interrupts him. 

Tommy gives him a look. Eddie actually understands. Why is he so surprised? Tommy doesn't give away his friendship lightly, and Eddie is more profound than he pretends to be. Or even than his friends sometimes think. Which, by the way, is also true of Evan, which is where he starts chasing his own tail, right?

“He did. And he comes with a lot of luggage.”

“Oh yes,” Eddie laughs. Then, he narrows his eyes, watching Tommy intently. “Wait, you don’t  mean his past and all?”

Tommy drops into the armchair opposite the sofa and shakes his head. 

“We... actually didn't really talk much about the past. It was more like...”

“The heat of the moment?”

Tommy doesn’t have to ponder about that, because it’s true. Every new relationship is like this, everything is exciting and full of icing. You don't use the time you have with questions. They didn't have much time, that's the curse of shift work and a life as a first responder. 

“Suddenly, half a year has passed,” he says with wonder. “And then he says he wants to move in with me.”

“Were you afraid of the next step?”

The way Eddie phrases this question tells him that Evan hasn't fully understood what happened. He's sorry for that, but he's sorry for so much, it's just more grief on top of a big pile of sorrow. 

“I'm just afraid of losing my heart,” Tommy returns, and strangely enough, Eddie laughs again.

“Do you think that's funny?”

Eddie raises his hands defensively, “What I actually find funny is that you lost your heart a long time ago, Tommy. You left the man standing outside the restaurant and gave him a second chance anyway. You’re the first contact in his phone. You're the one with the ice packs, the one who buried his stupid curse with him.”

“You would have done all that too.”

“Sure, except for the part about the funeral maybe, but only because Buck and I are on terms where you can tell your friend that he's being stupid. You, on the other hand... you have heart eyes when you see him. You stroke his hand in passing, you hold back on the kisses when anybody is around only to protect him.”

“You noticed that?”

“I noticed a few things,” says Eddie. “Especially that Buck feels the same way about you. There comes a point in every relationship when you take off your rose-tinted glasses. The only mistake you've made is convincing yourself that this will end anyway.”

“But it will,” Tommy replies dispassionately. 

“Because you're his first? That's stupid, Tommy.”

“What would you know about it?” Tommy replies heatedly.

Eddie tilts his head, “Didn't you listen when I told you about Shannon? I married my first love. I know what you're thinking, of course, it didn't end well, yada yada. But it wasn't because we didn't love each other, Tommy. We were very young and very stupid, and it hurts me to see two grown men like you, who also love each other very much, behaving so stupidly.”

Tommy sinks down in his chair.

“He acts impulsively,” he interjects. “He doesn't know what he's getting himself into, and in the end, when he understands that he needs more, he'll leave. And that will hurt a lot more.”

“Maybe,” Eddie says and stands up. As unasked as he came in, he steps up to Tommy's fridge and rummages through it for a can of beer. Then he points it at Tommy and says, “But not having loved will hurt more. Being too much of a coward hurts.”

“I'm not a coward.”

“Yes, you are, because you're running away from your own feelings. And not even giving Buck the chance to prove to you that he's worth brightening up your lonely life.”

“Now you sound like a guy in a soap opera,” Tommy says sourly.

“Nah, I sound like someone who has screwed up so much in his life that he should be the last person to give advice to others. But this is Buck we're talking about, and he's just a whining misery sleeping on my couch. And it’s about you, a friend I’m fond of.”

He takes a deep sip and grimaces.

“I think you've had enough for today,” says Tommy. 

“Guess you're right.”

Eddie gets up, and to his credit, it has to be noted that he doesn't sway. Or just a little bit. 

“Let me summarize the whole mess like this: you fucked up, Buck doesn't understand why, and honestly I don't quite get it either. But what I do understand is that you should work it out together. Tomorrow morning… no wait, in a couple of hours. Sleep, then come over, and bring breakfast.”

“I don't know if that's such a good idea.”

The worst part is that there is a certain hopefulness in Tommy's voice, it almost cracks. Evan hasn't done anything wrong, and it's probably only right that he at least tells him that. Even if it hurts. Because Eddie is actually right - it will hurt no matter what, and it's better to love than to grieve over a love that could never evolve. 

“But I do.”

There is so much confidence in Eddie's voice. Something has happened to him, and one day Tommy will ask him about it. Now he holds on to his own door and nods weakly.

“Let me sleep on it,” he says. 

Eddie winks at him as he leaves.

[felucians]

un bisou

Fandom: Marvel X-men | Gambit/Remy LeBeau x Reader

Reader is gender neutral with no physical descriptions. Rated PG-13 because Gambit would be the type of guy to grab anyone's ass during a kiss, he would test the boundaries and we all know it. Reader is a mutant with celestial Sun powers - technically based on my OC's powers which manipulates the Sun, specifically it's fire.

Summary: Takes place during Days of Future Past in the original X-Men series, where Bishop accuses Gambit of an assassination that destroys the future, reader is the only one to believe him. Pre-established relationships between Rogue/Gambit, Reader/Gambit and Reader is a member of the X-men team. Title is French for "a kiss". Wordcount: around 800 words.

"Don't nobody trust Gambit, eh?"

Rogue can't meet his eyes, her gaze downcast and guilt etched onto her features.

Gambit won't look at you, at your eyes glazing over in tears as your shared family denies him, believes that he could be the assassin. He didn't hear your whisper of "I do" as he loudly announces to the room, "Then Gambit don't need nobody."

He stalks away, glowering as his trench coat flows behind like a cape, and then the room is silent as his footsteps fade.

The lights black out and you're finally unfrozen, "How dare you? All of you? Not trusting one of our own, our team. Who are we if we cannot trust each other? What kind of family is this?"

The Sun hesitantly flickers through the windows, as solar flares begin radiating from your arms, anger burning through your body.

Rogue is first to speak, "Calm down, Sugah—"

"Calm down? When you all just turned your backs on him?"

Jean fixes you with a soft, understanding gaze and whispers "Go" in your mind - your chair hits the wall, leaving a dent with flashes of celestial energy trailing behind.

You don't even realise your feet carrying you through the hallways, yelling his name throughout the mansion, praying to anyone listening that he's still here and you find him before he leaves here, before he leaves you.

He's standing, paused at the doorway to the X-jet, breathing heavily with angry mutters of Cajun creole - blurring English and French seamlessly. Gambit looks up at the sound of your footsteps, a flash of vulnerability in his eyes that left in a second, replaced by a harsh piercing glare, "Porquoi êtes-vous ici, Dulcinée?" (Why are you here, sweetheart?)

The nickname is spat out, venom seeping out from the endearment that would usually bring a soft flush of heat to your face. You try not to flinch. Emphasis on try, because you do, and his face somehow looks even more pained at that. Words evade you as your throat dries, refusing to respond, so you take a deep breath and a soft gulp before you respond, grateful that you could understand his mother tongue.

"I'm here because I trust you, Remy."

He falters, searching your eyes desperately to spot any falsehoods, any inkling that you were spying on him for Charles - he doesn't find any. He finds pure raw love, the kind you knew you felt but could never truly verbalise.

Everyone on the team could see your soft spot for Gambit, and he knew it too. Sure, he flirted with every woman he came into contact with and he couldn't stop thinking about Rogue - but there was something about you that left the Cajun torn, as if he also loved you but didn't dare bare his heart to anyone, as if his shield crumpled, then his world would collapse and destroy everyone he cared about with it.

But here, with only you left, dangerously close to him in the enclosed space of the doorframe's entrance, he couldn't remember why he kept those walls up. He allowed his eyes to flicker to your soft lips, watching intensely as you involuntarily catch the bottom one in between your teeth. Your heart is hammering in your chest and before you can think to pull away, to move down the hallway or into the next room, his big hands are splayed on your soft hips, your spandex suit in bright terracotta separating your skin to skin contact.

He's surprisingly soft, as his lips meet yours and he tastes like spice and tobacco. It infiltrates your senses, enveloping you in a blanket of warmth and desire while you gasp, allowing him to deepen the kiss further, to let Remy explore your mouth, your taste, your emotions. His gloved hands grasp around your waist as the other dips down to your ass, giving it a small squeeze. His smirk brushes his stubble against your cheek at the soft breathy moan you let out from his actions - you would swear Jubilee was in here with the amount of fireworks lighting up your veins, the passion and love igniting your whole body in flames.

Gambit pulls away, and his face is almost unreadable and then it's sad. It's a goodbye kiss, you realise as he walks past you through the door to the X-jet - and you almost let him.

He's so lost on his own emotions and thoughts from the kiss that ghosts his lips that he doesn't notice you slipping into the darkened room after him, only to be blinded by the harsh lights as Bishop and Wolverine reveal themselves, entirely unaware of everything that just transpired between you both...

[nsharks]

bleeding blue | apocalypse au

part one —other parts

pairing: Simon "Ghost" Riley x fem!reader words: 3.3k tags: death. blood. zombies of course. single dad ghost. there will be sex but it isn't here yet. summary: After losing your companions, you run into a skull-masked man and his daughter. They are your last hope for survival. a/n: of course i am watching tlou right now so this is what came about in my brain! i can't stop thinking about this story.

The forest is covered in a blanket of white.

You’ve been monitoring the unfamiliar area by the pond for hours. Most of it is half-frozen slush, but there’s enough liquid water left for life to visit. At least, you hope. The brittle cold laced in your bones and the pained hunger in your gut clings to this hope as you wait in position against frayed tree bark.

Desperation has brought you this far into the forest— uncharted territory. The risk is buried beneath the long week you’ve had, days that have blurred together with only death and solitude as the glue between the cracks. You are still alive, somehow. Your blood is still red. It moves. The pulse in your neck— the loudest thing in this forest.

But still, it’s quieting. Slowing.

You drag numb fingers over the bits of snow sticking to your hair, the light flakes feathering down. Then, your hand settles back on the curve of your wooden bow, whittled from oak years ago. Chiseled by hands that belonged to a friend whose corpse you’d left behind. This bow is your only momentum of him, along with the memories. But those memories are turning shallow with each day, killed by starvation. Thirst. Fear.

The clouds above the trees are grey and swollen.

Grey— an in-between color.

Somewhere between white and black, life and death.

You can feel yourself slipping closer to the grey.

Maybe you will be one of them soon— the Greys.

They are the reason for the lack of fresh meat in this forest, man and animal alike, and the reason for the loss of your companions. The smell of their molten flesh, greyed and tattered against rotting bones, has faded from the air the further you have journeyed. Over the years, you’ve grown accustomed to flaring your nostrils in constant search for their scent. Right now, as you keep your eyes on the pond, you don’t bother sniffing for them. If they come, they’ll put an end to your hunger.

There is not even much of you left for a Grey to sink its teeth in. You’ve turned slack and gangly. Your fingers could easily slip between the spaces of your ribs. Clothes hang loosely over your frame— Paul’s frayed winter coat, your sister’s trousers. You’d quickly peeled them off their dead bodies in your fleeing because your own clothes had been torn and doused in blood, unsuitable for the winter.

But that was days ago— now, you barely remember what their dead faces looked like. Grey, maybe. Empty.

Not too different than your own face as you sigh through your nose and dig the tip of your bow into the frost. Only a few hours of daylight remain. You will have to find a tree to sling yourself upon once night falls. That has been your strategy since the loss of your old camp, but you’re not sure how much longer you can keep it up. Climbing the oaks requires fuel.

You swallow the dryness in your throat, thick and tasteless, and listen carefully to the sounds around you: branches in the wind, low whistles, your own heartbeat. And then—

A new sound.

The crackling of snow beneath light footsteps.

Lifting your bow back up, your pained breath quickens in a matter of instinct as you squint through blurred vision. A deer—? You have memorized the sound of their hooves after five years of hunting them. This isn’t it. Maybe it is a lone Grey crawling through the forest towards your scrawny, awaiting flesh.

Your eyes shift around. When you finally spot the owner of the footsteps, shock skips like a stone over the blood in your veins. More than ten meters away stands a child; not too young, not too skinny. Human eyes stare intently into yours, but you keep a strong grip on your bow and take aim.

A child—?

Would your hunger take you there?

Your stomach quivers and howls and chews at its own lining, but even in your desperation, you don’t consider the idea.

You can't.

The child continues to peer at you as you shakily lower the bow. You can’t make out much from this distance, not even gender— all you see is a thick coat on their small shoulders, a hood drawn over their head. When was the last time you had seen someone so young? Children, elderly: they’d been picked off the quickest.

A child could not survive on their own—

In your weakened state, you take a second too long to catch up to this realization.

A burly arm grabs you from behind.

A blade to your throat.

The bow slips from your grip and from your unused larynx, a hoarse scream ripples.

The end came on a day of homemade marmalade and Hemingway. The morning started quietly at your sister’s northern property. A quaint house in the suburbs where her son and husband played in the backyard while the two of you spread the jam on slabs of bread. Breakfast was shared between the four of you before their days began. You were visiting. You often did, taking the four-hour bus ride from London in search of a break from tantalizing coursework. Nursing school had been your dream, but it quickly took the form of a nightmare. Their home, their small family— you found sanity in it all.

You ate with them.

Your sister took the boy to school.

Michael promised to bring curry for dinner before he left for work.

In the quiet house, you cleaned for them. You didn’t know what would happen that day as you folded their laundry and stacked toys in the bins. At noon, the neighbor you knew to be Paul knocked at the door.

“You’re her sister, right?”

He was kind-eyed and of retirement age, yet thick-boned and strong. You’d heard a few stories about the gestures he sprinkled their household with in the loneliness since his wife’s passing. On that day, he offered you a stack of books as you propped the door open. All Hemingway.

“Dropping these off for Michael. He said he was a fan.”

“I’ll make sure they get to him, thanks.”

It was funny how the end of society could bring unlikely souls into collision. When everything cracked later that afternoon, Paul would become the reason for five years worth of your survival. It started with another knock on the door— but this time, Paul knocked with grave urgency. You had paused from cleaning after his first visit. You sat on the couch with A Farewell to Arms in your grip, but when you opened the door for him again, your finger parting your place among the pages, his words caused the book to slip from your hand to the floor.

“Call your sister— Michael, both of them.”

“I— I don’t understand. Who said all this?”

“The news. Fuck— have you not been listening for the past hour?”

You called your sister with fingers that trembled. She panicked on the other end: I'm driving home with Joseph right now and the streets are insane. I can’t even get a hold of Michael - oh god - try calling him for me?

You tried. He never answered. Your sister returned. The three of you followed Paul. You learned he was an ex forest-ranger. He calmed you through the screams you heard in the distance, through the strewn of bodies that began to litter the roads. Some sliced in half, crawling. Cars battered into each other.

“They’re coming from the city.”

He packed a bag. It was a flurry. Your sister carried the weeping boy. Your stomach felt full of acid. Panic. Paul kept a radio on him as you traversed towards the treeline, away from the entanglement of screams and blood and chaos. You overheard some pieces through the static: London was in shambles. The military was closing in on itself.

It is all in the brains. An infection.

Between living and dead.

Grey, grey, grey.

That first week felt like seconds.

Paul took you to a fenced-off parcel of land he owned in the forest; a private shooting range. He only had a few shotguns, outdated. Limited ammo. But he was quick to string tarps along the chain-link fence and add bolted locks to the gate. You helped him pin up two tents. Nailed wood boards to any gaps along the perimeter. You didn’t bring much with you; there hadn’t been time. All you managed was two changes of clothes, a thick coat, canned beans from the pantry, A Farewell to Arms.

You read it ten times over.

Paul did the hunting.

You begged to help, so he made you the bow. The arrows.

He took monthly trips to nearby, abandoned supermarkets.

“Never let anyone into our camp.”

You did well to listen, filling in as the second leader in his absence. Your older sister never did well under stress, never liked the outdoors. She’d lost her husband. A little boy clung to her. You tried to offer quiet comfort to the brokenness of their family, but it was all in vain.

A year.

Only a few hoards of Greys approached the fence. You helped Paul eradicate them. It’s all in their brains. Obliterate the brains.

Two years.

Joseph caught some sickness. Flu, you figured. You did your best with what Paul had picked up from the pharmacies, but you had little to work with. You listened to his wheezing, the dry and insistent cough. The winter didn’t help. Pneumonia.

He died just before his eighth birthday.

Your sister might as well have died that day, too.

She was a ghost for the three years following. You had to force food down her throat. You had to mother her, nurse her grief. Until the fifth winter, when the deer began to diminish. Their carcasses sprung up like daisies in the nearby wood. Eaten and gnawed by encroaching Greys, the smell of spilled blood and their own rotting stench attracted more and more of them from the distant city.

There were just too many for your handmade arrows and Paul’s shotgun. He ran out of ammo. The fence and tarp and wood did little against the coalesced wave of them that finally scraggled over it with moaned hisses and mindless teeth.

You watched them consume your sister.

Then, Paul.

You lived. You ran.

A week.

You slept up in the trees.

You had a knife. Your bow. You whittled more arrows.

Alive.

But barely.

The strong arm cages your body against something hard— a chest. The blade on your neck is icier than the air and it stings and burns with a threat that instantly has you squirming in the owner’s hold.

“Stop movin’ or I’ll fucking kill you.”

It is a gruff, quiet threat in your ear accompanied by a heated breath. Your eyes fill with moisture and you gasp for panicked gulps of air. You lift your hands up to the arm that holds you and attempt to claw at it feebly because your muscles, at this point, are nothing but hungered dust.

“I said stop movin’.”

A growl.

He presses the knife harder against your throat until you feel the skin prickle. The man behind you doesn’t need to step before your eyes in order to make his strength and size known. It is apparent in how easily he restrains you. You understand you have no chance— though, you’re certain even a child could pin you. Bony hands drop to your sides and you turn limp and helpless against him.

“This is my territory.”

“I didn't know anyone was here,” you hiss, voice scratchy. “I’m just passing through.”

His hold has you lifted up to the balls of your feet. The soles of your worn boots hover over crackling snow. There is something hard pressing against the top of your cranium as he lowers his head to utter more words in your ear.

“Give me a reason not to slit your throat.”

Your heart pounds. Adrenaline. A human instinct to survive, even though death is already at your fingertips.

“I’m a nurse,” you half-lie. You never finished. Your credentials are shortened to textbooks and little experience.

“Don’t need a nurse,” he murmurs. “Anythin’ else?”

Words float through the soupy mess that is your brain. It is hard to think. There isn’t a good reason for him not to kill you— you and Paul had to do it a few times before. Other humans could pose even greater threats than the mindless Greys. Humans are smarter. They have something to strive for; something to kill for by all means necessary— survival.

Your failure to respond is cut off by sudden footsteps crunching the ice, as light as a curious rabbit. It's the kid. A young girl you now realize, even through your state of panic. Her cheeks are pale like porcelain under the hood of her coat and her azure eyes observe you from head to toe.

Her lips part, but nothing comes out.

Instead, another growl in your ear.

“I know you have a knife,” he says, tightening his hold until you whimper. “Empty your pockets.”

There is not much room in this situation for you to disobey.

Flushing out your pockets, your nimble hands reveal only a small blade.

“Drop it.”

The knife falls to the ground with a quiet thud, just beside the oak bow. The only two items that have kept you alive for the last week lay in the thin snow. Even if you had the strength or will to fight back, you no longer had the resources to.

“Pick it up, Blue.”

The man behind you nods his chin. The young girl leans down to grab the handle of your knife. She inspects the blade, runs her index gently along the dull edge with her brows furrowed together. She stuffs it somewhere in her coat. Then, she looks back up. She flickers her blue gaze between you and whoever it is that stands behind you.

“So,” he grumbles with a click of his tongue. “Thought of that reason yet?”

You swallow. Then, your throat spasms around a sneer as you say, “This is your kid, isn’t it? Are you really going to kill me in front of your kid? You want her to see that?”

“Nothin’ she hasn’t seen before,” he muses in a dark brass. “Good lesson for her.”

Oh—

Blood chills in your veins.

Freezes over like the nearby pond.

You can’t think of any more words, so it is now that your eyes flutter shut. You seek darkness in preparation for whatever may happen once his knife digs deeper. Death— maybe it’s not so bad. It must be better than whatever it is you have been doing for the past week. Struggling. Life has little meaning at this point, and getting bitten by a Grey seems too transient. Death, on the other hand, will be permanent. Your sister, her family, and many others are waiting for you in the crevices of its darkness.

“Ghost…”

It is a soft voice.

The girl speaks now, and you open your eyes to watch as she nibbles at her lip.

“Ghost, do you have to?” She looks over the length of your body, inspecting it with a softness that is so different from the harsh grip you are locked in. “She's not much of a threat, right? It looks like she hasn’t eaten in days.”

“Told you, Blue.” The gruff voice arrives from over your shoulder. “The hungrier they are, the less you can trust ‘em.”

If you cared enough, you might have pleaded your case some more. You can trust me, you might have said. But you know how this goes. For as long as you are alive within their space, you are a problem. A problem for their food sources, and a problem for wherever they have made camp. The child may not fully understand this, but he certainly does.

“Just do it,” comes your voice; exhausted. The adrenaline hides under defeat. “Just fucking do it, alright? Kill me.”

He snarls.

You expect darkness.

You expect to see your sister again. Her son. Paul.

“Dad… don’t.”

A gentle plea.

A low huff in response.

And then, instead of receiving a slash to your jugular, you are thrown to the icy ground as if you are nothing more than a sack of bones. Your palms barely have time to spread open and break the fall. A pain shoots up your knees the moment they dig into the frozen dirt, but you don’t have it in you to wince or cry.

He listened to her—?

Shifting onto your butt, you look up at your attacker.

A skull mask stares back at you.

Dark eyes, broad shoulders, a towering height.

If you weren’t so relieved - surprised - to still be breathing, you might have been frightened to the point of tears.

He moves and you flinch, but rather than touching you, his heavy boot stamps something beside you. Your bow. The oak splinters in half under his foot.

“Are you—“ You suck in a strangled breath, looking between him and your now-ruined weapon. “Are you fucking kidding me? Just… just kill me. I can’t - I have nothing now! You might as well fucking kill me!”

But he doesn’t.

He gives another nod to the girl. A silent language that you don’t understand, and in response, she carefully steps around you. She offers an apologetic look before she follows after her skull-faced companion, and then you are left with nothing. Not a knife, not a bow. Only your rapid heartbeat and a pink welt on your throat where his knife had been.

[141trash]

rating: sfw (brief mentions of sex, but no graphic anything)

Captain John Price x Reader

AN: Somehow this ended up with very little actual Price in it, but I have plans and he will be more prominent. I just have word vomit rn and needed to get everything down

imagine having a one time fling with Price after your husband leaves you for another one because you just can't seem to get pregnant and he wants a family.

It was a good romp, he was a bit gruff, but was super sweet afterwards with the aftercare. he even stayed to buy you breakfast the next morning. Months later you've been focused on yourself, getting your life together and learning what it means to move on.

Only you've been feeling rather ill the last couple days. And then you remember you're late. Which isn't entirely unusual, sometimes you miss a period when you're stressed and the last couple months finding your feet have been stressful. Still you go to the doctors and its there you remember your night with Price, definitely can't remember if he used a condom or not, and you know you hadn't been on birth control since previously you'd been trying for a baby.

Oops you're pregnant.

The timeline fits that it's his and not your now ex-husband's and part of you is instantly hugely relieved about that.

You leave the doctor's office in a bit of a daze. It doesn't sink in until you're stumbling your way into the cafe you own/manage and you promptly dissolve into a fit of tears in the backroom, much to your teeny bopper part timer's utter horror.

Pregnant. You're fucking pregnant. You're elated, over the moon because you had always wanted kids. (yeah adoption's a thing, but in some places its really hard to adopt if you're single and you weren't ready for another relationship after the last trainwreck). You're also fucking terrified because holy shit you have no plan. Nothing is ready. You live in a tiny flat in the city with one bedroom because why would you need more than that?

Your friend appears in the back room as your mind is going a million miles a minute, turns out your part timer had panicked and called her. You breakdown again in her arms and tell her the news. She reminds you that you're not alone even though you're not in a relationship and that you will have all the support that you need.

With her help you start to prepare for the baby. Things move quickly, you're so busy getting things ready, searching for a larger flat, buying things, filling your head with every single bit of parenting knowledge you can get your head on. All your regular customers say that you're glowing, they've never seen you happier.

You've recorded every little thing since finding out you were pregnant. kept print outs of every scan. More than once you find yourself staring out the window, guiltily wondering about whether or not Price would have wanted to know. Not that you have any way of contacting him. You knew he was military, from the dog tags he'd had hanging around his neck, but not much more.

The first time you feel the baby kicking is when you're in the middle of a shift. Its the slow time of day so you're cleaning up the tables when you gasp suddenly. The girl behind the counter is by your side in an instant, babbling questions making sure you're okay. She's sweet and like your friend has been beside you since you found out.

"I'm fine Cally. The baby kicked." you announce, beaming brightly. She squeals and begs to be allowed to feel next time the baby kicks. Before you can do more the bell above the door dings and you both automatically turn, your customer service smiles back on. Only.

"John?" Your mouth drops open in surprise. Standing there looking oddly sheepish is the man you hadn't thought you'd ever see again. The man whose baby was currently kicking as if demanding your attention.

His eyes sweep over you appreciatively, though when he sees your obvious pregnancy he freezes. The shock of seeing him makes your legs weak. Cally lets out a panicked yelp when you knees buckle, but he's already darting forward, catching your arms gently and helping you to a seat.

"Careful there sweetheart." he says and god does that warm your chest. You remember the last time you heard him say that, it had been when you'd bumped into him in the bar.

"What are you doing here?" you ask breathlessly as Cally scurries off to get you a drink and he glances at you for permission before pulling a chair up next to you.

"Remembered you talking about your dream of opening a café. When i got back to town I spotted the name nd wondered if it was just a coincidence." he tells you, but you can see his eyes keep drifting towards your stomach. He's obviously trying to figure out if its his. But it takes a moment for you to respond because you can't believe that he remembered that. It'd been an offhanded comment you'd made while the two of you had been enjoying late night takeout before going at it another round.

Shaking yourself out of your thoughts you put a hand over his, biting your lip, "Listen. I. I don't want you to feel obligated or anything. I would have told you sooner only I didn't have any way to contact you."

"It's mine." he says for you. You nod, cursing inwardly when tears start to sting your eyes.

You take a deep breath to calm yourself.

"Like I said. I'm doing fine. I don't expect anything from you. I've got a plan. I'm looking for bigger flats."

He stares at you in silence, expression unreadable. You worry for a minute about what he's going to say. You've been prone to overthinking everything since becoming pregnant and now suddenly having the father of your child reappearing in your life. It's a lot.

John squeezes your hand gently halting the panic as you look back up at him.

"I would very much like to be able to meet the kid when they get here. If you'd let me." he tells you hesitantly, "Being in the Military I don't know how often I'd be able to be around, but if you let me I'd like to be in their life."

All of your emotions flood you like a tidal wave at his confession. You burst into tears, letting him pull you into a firm, but careful hug.

"Yes. Of course. I just didn't want you to feel like I was pressuring you. You have every right to know them too." You promise tearfully, smiling at him as he thumbs the tears from your cheeks.

He insists on exchanging numbers so he can contact you and in case you need anything. He won't always be able to answer, but he promises to do his best. Then he bashfully asks if you'll tell him about what's happened so far. Shyly you tell him you've written the entire experience and kept the scans.

He eventually leaves you to get back to work, but the copy of the ultrasound photos you kept in your wallet is tucked into his jacket pocket and he promised to meet you at your flat for dinner and to collect your pregnancy journal so he can catch up on everything.

[fatesundress]

⭑ sunlight parallel pseudostars. tom riddle x reader

summary. your reunion is long overdue for the small thing it should be, sacred for the dingy place it finds you, and most consequentially, entirely on purpose.

tags. gn afab reader, part one of an inevitable part two but this one is just pining because nonny asked so nicely, yes there is fluff but it's a tom pov, so... i do what i can, post-hogwarts, mutual pining (but emphatically, arduously, overwhelmingly tom), tom and reader were hopeless fools in school who never confessed their feelings for each other, legilimency/occlumency training as flirting, reader definitely filter searches the slow burn tag, self-cockblocking, i can't tell if this is ooc even by my own delusional standards, hopeful 'ending' as an apology for my last tom fic, please accept this humble offering

note. finished my first request!! who knew i could do it! i apologize first and foremost for my inactivity and i want to say WOAHHH thank you so much for 400! i'm hoping to make up for my absence by turning this into either a two-parter or a longer mini-series. i did actually forcibly refrain from ending this in smut because i want to try my hand at a slightly slower-burn since my usual preference is like... at least 100k words of longing stares before they even hold hands. i'm trying my best.

word count. 4.9k

There’s something, at least, in the far table at the right side of the bar, that makes the process a tad less dull. It’s somehow quieter here than his flat over Knockturn, sparse with a few old wizards with beards caught in the froth of their cups, Tom’s bend of the pub warm from the fire, crackling with kindling and the scratch of his quill, drizzled in moonlight tealish enough to remind him of the Slytherin common room when little else does nowadays. Something — yes. A tolerable reprieve. The sort of monotony he likes.

As opposed to Caractacus Burke’s constant, doltish solicitations; Tom ponders when the day will come that the man strikes a deal so dumb it lights the tip of someone’s wand green and kills him. It doesn’t drive Tom to any immense grief to consider. On particularly tedious days, he staves off boredom by imagining doing it himself.

But this reprieve can only serve him so well. Tom doesn’t drink — certainly not the dreck they serve here, though he doubts even the finest of wines could tempt him to obfuscate his better senses — doesn’t dance, doesn’t take anyone home even on the rare occasion there’s someone in this pub of bearable taste (except the one time, and that was more a case study than a surrender to gratification). Essentially, he sits at his table and steals the heat and the barkeeps are wise enough to let him.

He’s mused over the exact verbiage of this tome for days. Alchemical equations are the one thing that still occasionally stump him, and Tom is eager to rectify that.

He puts quill to parchment. It bleeds when he comes up short of words. He holds infinitesimally tighter, and the ink spreads like tendrils imagined in the dark; the sort of amorphous shapes that appear on the ceiling when all the lights have gone out. He stares. He lets the shapes form, but finds nothing informative in them, and so sets his quill down and watches leaves fall from the chestnut tree splitting open the sidewalk outside.

Cold air wafts in when the door groans open. There’s the click of dress shoes and a murmur at the bar, followed by a tumbler shaking and a glass being poured.

“Oh, no — er — that one always sits alone,” he hears the barkeep say to the dress shoes.

Tom refrains from turning his head.

 “Doesn’t like to be bothered,” he adds, dress shoes skidded to a halt.

A pause. A sense of eyes on him Tom elects to ignore.

“I know.”

There’s a smile in that voice. He remembers it. The teeth of it, the lips, the tongue that sometimes darts between them.

It must be very late.

He’ll look up and realise there are things other than wine that can addle a person. Too many books, not enough books, not enough sleep, a day gone by without a single spell cast, an itch for control, wanting and not having, and,

you, after all this time.

The lattermost two have for a long time been the same.

Your hair is different than it was before, your figure presented in the rarity of your own clothes when he’s so accustomed to your school robes, but it would be rather bizarre if you ever wore those again. You’re too modern for muggle and magical alike — trousers and a formal shirt, hair somewhere between kempt and wind-blown, the aforementioned nice shoes Scourgified to a squeaky black as you come closer. (You’re coming closer. What a revelation.) A drink floats beside you, your fingers undulating softly to maintain the charm.

“You,” he says, like he doesn’t remember.

You grin. “Me. Sharp as ever, Tom. You look it too.”

The nebulous shape of acumen returns to him and it’s disarming enough to be disarmed — on principle it should not be occurring — but you also should not be here.

He stands. You present your hand as if practised for the proper convention of having it taken, October-cold gloves soft when his lips press to one and he wonders if the skin beneath is softer, or if callouses mar the mounts of your palm. He lingers as the thought does. (What are you up to now? Are you tried by new labours like he is; your knuckles hard from the work? Would they feel voltaic to touch as they once did?)

“Sit, please.” 

Increments of re-introduction tie him to the tangible instead of unfurling from the knots of why you’re here or how you’re here, which cannot possibly be tethered to reality because for all the hours he’s been with you, none in the last three years have happened awake.

There are the dark shapes on his ceiling again. The scraps won’t last. He’ll need to know the details. 

You’ll want to tell.

You take a seat in the chair he pushes out for you, glass sinking onto the table where the condensation immediately shades a ring into the wood. “This wasn’t where I’d expected to find you, you know.”

“No?” Tom asks, returning to his seat, “I wasn’t expecting you to find me anywhere, so the surprise is mutual.”

“I’d have written to warn you, but it was easier to find the places you frequent than the one you live in — wouldn’t know how to get my owl to you directly, you know — and I’m sure that’s not an accident.”

“I feel strangely as though I’m being accused of something.”

“Mm. Your guilty conscience.”

He smiles reflexively. Old habits. “I’m sure.”

You smile too, at least. “You know, when we left school, I gave it — what — two years before you were the youngest Minister of Magic in British history?”

“Then I’ve disappointed you.”

“No, I think I knew you well enough once to know even now that the fact that you aren’t only means you have something better in mind. I’ll have to trust your judgement, because I can’t imagine what that could possibly be.” You take a sip of your drink, twirling your straw as you do. “Come to think of it, though, brooding over a book in an establishment you patronise enough to have all the workers trained to leave you alone despite not even knowing your name is… very Tom.” 

“That one appears to have done a poor job,” he says with a glance at the barkeep. “You’re over here disrupting me. I think I’ll rescind my tip.”

“Still funny, too.”

“Still indecorous.”

“Still saying things like indecorous. You’d better tip, Riddle.”

“Be good company and I might.”

“Oh, I see. I need to prove that I’m a worthy disruption.”

“I was reading a very good book.”

The book was rubbish. His moleskin has roughly four lines of notes jotted on its open page, which he closes promptly, and hopes it doesn’t seem done with too much gravity. Your eyes like to wander, he recalls. Your hands, absentmindedly, too.

Torturous creature you are.

“I missed you,” you say, like you’ve never had the good sense of holding your tongue, or armouring your heart, or not feeding an animal without first seeing the size of its teeth. 

You are so withholding with your work, and so generous with yourself. He wishes you wouldn’t offer him so much. He’s never had the kindness not to take everything you let him.

“You missed me,” he prompts, already asking for more. 

“I missed disrupting you. No one else lets me — or calls me indecorous, and still lets me.”

“You were quite studious, in case you’ve forgotten. More literate than disruptive.”

You raise a brow. “My, I’ve never had a man call me literate before, and I’ve been courted plenty. I’m swooning.”

(Note: you’ve been courted plenty?)

“Inventive, then? Erudite?”

“Do go on.”

“I shouldn’t. I believe you were describing the manner in which you missed me.”

“It was just the one, unfortunately.”

“Why did you find me?”

This generates pause, at least, and that intrigues him.

Addendum: “Why now?”

“I was around,” you decide on, “and I haven’t been in a long time.”

You wanted to continue your studies after Hogwarts. He thinks he remembers that conversation; academics were the topic of most of your discussions, after all. Anything deeper was incidental, crumbs scraped off a plate at the end of a meal.

“Where did you go?”

You drink again. “Portugal, after school. But that was — it’s a bit of a story. I ended up at an academy in Iceland doing a few very boring, ultimately useless courses on spell creation and wandlore. Will you be horrible if I tell you I’m here because I left in the middle of term? Because then I didn’t tell you.”

“I suppose I knew you well enough once to know even now you wouldn’t have left unless you had something better in mind.”

You beam at him, and he acknowledges briefly that it feels like a reward the same way solving a problem does.

“I found you —” (You are far too generous; the question was already answered and here you are offering more) — “because I considered everyone I wanted to see again and you were the first person I thought of. I don’t like to deny myself the little things.”

“No,” he says, “you don’t.”

Rain trickles down the window, and the cool dark of autumn obscures half of your face. He wishes it didn’t, and that’s bizarre.

“I’ll be doing a course in Occlumency in Norway in the new year.”

Oh?

“I know you were always quite good at Legilimency, so don’t start,” you add hastily.

He itches not to smile. It is truth and not arrogance to say that quite good is an understatement.

“I didn’t know you had an interest.”

You scoff. “Please, everyone has an interest. It’s just hopeless for most of us, and painful to be hopeful to learn something so hopeless.”

“Well-put. A terrible ego punch for you, I’m sure.”

“It was. Until I tried Occlumency and realised I’m quite good at that, and then the wound closed a bit.”

“Glad to hear it. You’re honing the skill?”

“Slowly but surely.”

“And — you’re here seeking a teacher?”

“Oh, stop. I told you why I’m here. But if you’re — oh!” You frown suddenly. “Didn’t you say that you were going to apply for DADA after graduation?”

Ah, that. “Denied, unfortunately.”

“Seriously? On what grounds?”

“On the grounds that I’m too young.”

That and the matter of Albus Dumbledore and the air that is ceaselessly wasted on his breath.

“Oh, please; half the staff are over eighty, I imagine it might be nice to have a professor who doesn’t forget to grade their assignments every other week. You were Head Boy! That’s completely mad.”

“You’ll have to write an owl.”

“I could.” And you sigh, and stir your half-empty drink of what must be less than ten percent alcohol and ninety percent spice and apple. “Would you… would you mind, though? If your schedule isn’t terribly busy?”

“Teaching you?”

“Helping me with something I’m already good at,” you correct, “as an excuse for me not to go back to a very frilly muggle hotel by myself after coming all this way to find you.”

He echoes the part of that sentence that matters least — your invitation is all that counts, but he has no wish to make that obvious when you’ve always done this, always tugged on a string you seem unaware even exists. “Frilly muggle hotel?”

“What? I used to go to them when I was on holiday. Didn’t I tell you that?”

No. He would have clung onto it if you had. He didn’t even know you had the money for things like that after two wars, but then maybe that was something new. How would you have attained it while in school, though? An untimely familial demise? A wealthy suitor? You wore no ring. You came back to him.

Illegible signs for him to attempt to read.

“Well?” you ask, pulling two sickles from your pocket and leaving them on the table.

His answer is yes, naturally. 

It’s absurd you even feel the need to ask; your reunion is long overdue for the small thing it should be, because of the small thing you were, sacred for the dingy place it finds you, and most consequentially, entirely on purpose. You didn’t stumble upon each other in the aisles of a shop after years gone by, pressured into empty conversation for the courtesy of it. You missed him, so you found him — and Tom thinks he’s been missed before, in some vague sense by some people blurred long ago by unimportance, but — found? He reconciles not finding you himself by assuring he will make something of this.

“For a worthy distraction,” he says, putting down two sickles to match.

You grin, and he takes your arm again as you thank the barkeep and depart into the slow drizzle of the street.

You tell him of Ponte de Lima and the rootless craters of Myvatn, of old cathedral spires and covens masked as monasteries. You detail the scenery like you detailed your essays in school, and it makes the ennui of London marginally better — that you are walking it with him, talking about beautiful things, in a night dark enough he might not notice the usual absence of them here.

And then, as you step onto busier streets, you say you missed this too, and he is jealous beyond sense of the architectural blemish of Piccadilly Circus.

He glances away from you and the invisible path to your hotel for the first time since issuing Wizarding London for Muggle.

It’s a crowded tableau. The post-war square is spangled with flashbulb advertisements and buskers and skinny double buses orbiting Eros atop his fountain. People skip from hotel bars and teahouses in trench coats and long skirts. Someone outside the Trocadero looks dressed for burlesque. Storefront letters hiccup light through power abscesses and imminent bursts, and the lights… The lights herald cigarettes and chewing gum and Coca Cola and performances at the theatres on Coventry Street. 

You light up with them, sunlight parallel pseudostars. Tom feels half-blinded. He isn’t sure by which.

“You missed London?” he asks. It’s hard to hide in his tone how much he cannot imagine a reason why. All of the things you described in your travels sound better than this.

“I missed home.”

He possesses only a theoretical understanding of what that must feel like. The word itself is a thing long gone. There was Hogwarts, but it was never his.

“Well — I miss this,” you amend, “which I never remembered being like this, and maybe it wasn’t. All I saw in anything growing up was shelter. I’d look at buildings and imagine which ones could survive bombs, and which ones would shatter under gunfire. Since coming back, I’ve liked seeing it a different way. The lights, the people — The Criterion; they’ve a section called the Witches Cauldron, which is very risqué. You would hate it.”

His mouth twitches at the corners. “Risqué?"

“Mhm. Women with skirts over the thighs, men with skirts over the thighs, music with questionable lyrics, and really, borderline indecent comedy. But I think that's the heart of muggle theatre — the good kind, anyway."

“So I was right in calling you indecorous.”

“Hardly. I’m an observer.”

“Upstanding, then.”

You tug playfully at his sleeve. “Saintly.”

“You might revisit those churches in Portugal.”

“And you might learn to let something go. We’re here.”

He looks up at the little dais of steps before the big arch of your hotel door, stones cracked here and there, cigarette stubs smushed at his feet, and back at you, an inviting smile on your face.

“Come on.” You take his arm again and guide him in.

The lobby is all dark wood carved like lace. Fretwork in the moulding, fretwork at the counters, fretwork in the thick columns bolstering the mezzanine; and there, tables with seats turned to face the sound of music, the dulcet flicker of candlelight over plates of food that smell sweet for the hour. As you lead him up the stairs, he gives you a look that warns this was not what he was promised, but you shush him and he abides.

You are lucky for his intrigue. You are lucky for the dullness of his teeth at the maw of his hunger. He doesn’t pretend to understand — he thinks he likes not understanding.

The music gets louder. He can see the entire mezzanine from the top of the stairs; a woman is singing, a man is playing saxophone, the tables are set for dessert, and the plates are almost all licked clean.

You’re watching with the flicker of candles caught in your eyes now, grip imperceptibly tighter on his arm as you lean in to whisper. “There’s something new every night. Yesterday there was the most beautiful pianist. And they served this lemon pudding  — tonight I think it’s… torte? It’s chocolate, at least. It smells amazing.”

“Did you want to stay?”

He did not. It was a courtesy question.

“Just for a song?” you ask, rather more sheepish than suits you.

Just for a song, then.

You press against his shoulder. You’re warm, despite the cold walk.

“Do you ever practise on them?" he asks.

“Legilimency?” You shake your head. “I usually refrain from digging into the thoughts of innocent muggles.”

He raises a brow. “And the bad muggles?"

“I should like to do worse to the bad muggles."

He smiles. You smile too, though you resist it for a moment. “You're as wretched as you were in school."

“Wretched, was I? And what would I have found, if I'd sought out your thoughts back then?"

You laugh, face canted toward the performance. “Thoughts of Os on every O.W.L, what Slughorn meant by a semi-formal dress code, how to get into the kitchens at night..." You turn to him again. “And you? Do I dare ask what I would have found in yours?"

“Hm. Secrets.”

“Damn you.”

The saxophone swells before the last note fizzles out, the contralto timbre of the woman’s voice washed out by a small round of applause. You clap with the other guests, glance over at Tom, frown, take his hands and force them together. He doesn’t resist, but he certainly doesn’t aid the motion. His hands are instead idly patted together, palms hitting the sleeves of his coat and making for a very poor ovation. 

You give up without much effort, fingers looping beneath one of his cuffs to lead him back to the staircase. 

“Wretched,” you repeat.

You search your coat pocket for your key as you walk up the stairs, remarking the artwork on the walls and evidence of a drunk muggle man who spilled champagne on his way to bed last night — you tell him to watch his step, and he averts the side of the stairs where dark spots pepper the carpet. The place is fine elsewise. You mentioned the risqué of The Criterion and he can see notes of it here, in the late night music and the drinking and a few ogling men among the guests, but it’s nicer on the inside than he’d assumed by the exterior, and you can certainly handle yourself amongst debauchees without wands.

Tom stops when you do. Your room is the furthest at the end of the third floor corridor.

“Welcome,” you say, as the key clicks and the door swings open.

A frilly muggle hotel indeed. You flick a switch and the chandelier ignites, dim but extravagant. You go to light a few additional candles at the dresser and windowsill, clipping floral drapes aside as you do. The bed, a queen, matches the fabric of the drapes, with a thick lace skirt and golden brass rails. There’s a small table and two chairs, plush with cushions that loop through the spine and knot like hair ribbons. You tuck your wand away after the room has been brightened and fix him with a look that says, I told you.

“It’s clean,” is all the opinion he offers.

“Hard to make a mess in two days.”

A rather uncharacteristic thought crosses him. He can imagine ways which would not be so difficult.

“Of course.”

“Did you want anything? I could call for room service. Wine? Chocolate torte?”

“I’m more curious to observe your Occlumency firsthand.”

“Right. I’ve been depriving you.” You sit on the edge of the bed and slip off your coat. “I meant what I said, though; I’m good at it.”

“A battle of wills, then.” And he pulls a chair from the little table by the window, sitting it across from you.

You make a face. “This is why I studied with you and never challenged you to anything.”

“Perhaps you should have.”

“Perhaps… I might have saved myself from the predicament I’m in now.”

“You brought me here.”

“I did.”

“You enjoy the predicament,” he guesses.

You smile. “I do.”

He leans in with his arms at the wooden rests of his chair, fixed on the space between your eyes and then the apples of your cheeks, looking for new scars or freckles or stray eyelashes to cast wishes on. Mostly he wonders what’s underneath. That you have presented him the opportunity, even to wonder, feels almost like a wish granted. And Tom is not the sort of man to make them.

But here you are, and the room is quiet, and your gloves sound soft rolling off your fingers, and he should take a chance on one now. He should be greedy. He should want for more.

“Shall I count to three?”

He does. He does want more.

“Whenever you’re ready,” you say, and he can see you steel yourself before his soft surge into your mind.

Your resistance is like a cliffside. His effort is a wave, lapping at the rocks, seeking erosion. It’ll come. It never hasn’t.

You stay there in the cracks between the rocks, not pushing against him as much as shielding yourself from him. He leans an inch further from his chair and inclines his head. Your mouth falls open, breath caught on the sharp edge of his next intrusion. He eases forward but you only hold stronger. An impasse is reached — immovable object and unstoppable force.

Tom’s mouth curves at the corners, patient, persistent and proud. The chase is half of it. Your capability is the other.

“How did you discover your gift?" he asks.

“Don't distract me," you answer, and the softness tells him it’s an exertion for you to speak through this.

Tom nods, though distraction suddenly seems a tempting venture. If he pushes otherwise it will be painful.

For a while he just searches — between the old moss atop the cliff, the space where water strikes and memories propagate in verdant clusters, little runnels in the stone to keep little thoughts. He can see the outlines of those moments you’d described to him on your walk, but nothing deeper, nothing untouched. The abacus on either side of a Portuguese church but no hint of the nave or the apse. The flat horizon of Myvatn lake but none of the pseudocraters.

And still the walls stand, and the wave trickles through the runnels only to feed the moss.

You’re good. He wants to break you. He wants to be gentle. He wants to know if there is a way to do both.

Yes, he thinks there is.

Tom inches his chair closer. There’s perhaps an arm's length between your knees and his, and your expression flickers as you glance at the way it shrinks. A forearm, now. A ruler. Nothing at all, if you look long enough, think about how easy it would be for the space to vanish altogether. And he is thinking about it.

Your eyes dart back to his and he glides through the first crevice of your confusion he can find. A second’s glimpse is all he gets — words on an image of the skin unclad at his wrists, like words on the storefronts of Piccadilly Circus, they spell his name. There’s the cadence of a question. He resists the urge to sink back in his seat in honest pride; that the first thought he’s carved out of you is of his hands and sudden curiosity.

Perfectly innocuous, he rolls his sleeves to his elbows. There’s a quick twitch at your mouth.

“Do you know,” he says, searching again, “there’s something in particular I want to find.”

You indulge him carefully. You must anticipate a trick. “What’s that?”

“The moment you first missed me.”

It is a hard thing to be reminded of a moment and not draw it immediately to the surface. He can see on your face that you have to push the misbehaved thing down with force. But that’s only evidence that it exists, that it’s true, and he must see it like it’s his own. 

Is your missing him not his, in some way? Is his missing you not yours?

“I wonder if you missed me over quill and parchment,” he says, “in old libraries, at a café in Paris… Did you remember me by certain colours? By times of day? Or was it —”

There.

It’s the Athenaeum of Madrid, under the ceiling of the assembly hall. You’re craning your neck to admire the art, and you’re thinking how much he would have liked a place like that.

And then he’s back in the frilly hotel, and your face is in something like a gasp. You’ve swallowed it down, batted him away, but he can see it even from the outside; the curiosity is still there despite. The question unposed but sitting neatly on your tongue ready to be asked.

Tom smiles. “I didn’t know you went to Spain.”

“Well, I thought I might leave something for you to learn instead of be told.”

“Ah, so you let me in?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Will you?”

You glance involuntarily at the gap between you. Has it shrunk again? He can note the details of the face he’s missed without trying.

“Will you let me in?” he murmurs.

“I don’t think they teach this method of distraction at school,” you say softly, and now the words have been put in the air.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He shifts his chair ever closer. His eyes go to your lips. And he does mean to look away but your mouth quirks the slightest degree upward and he stays there a moment because he was expecting something else.

“Didn’t I tell you I’ve been courted before?”

“Plenty,” he recounts.

You lean in. Your knees brush his. You incline your head so your eyes find the path of his, the smile on your face finally full. It’s an error of time that he doesn’t expect it because it must not be an error on his part. “Then you should know to make a greater effort.”

You hold a hand to his cheek, watching the motion as your warm fingers trail from jaw to white collar. And then you pull back; a breeze in the place you sat when you get up. 

“That’s enough for today, don’t you think?”

He recovers quickly, but there’s a lingering heat at his jaw and a curiosity he was faulted to have planted himself — he’s suffering the barest satiation for the million more questions he has. But you missed him, and you invited him here, and you wanted to see him in your mind, so he must wonder if you meant to plant some curiosity too.

“And tomorrow?” he finally asks.

There’s rummaging in one of the cupboards, the twist of cap from its tube, and the quick rush of the faucet before your face peers out from the bathroom’s thick archway, still with that smile.

You flick the light on and brush your teeth like he isn’t there. For whatever reason it’s the most disarming thing you may have ever done, and it reminds him that he had considered you torturous like it was something incidental, which means he’d begun the night with only one equation still able to stump him, and ended it with two.

He could sooner solve alchemy (the entire subject) than this.

“I’ll be out,” you say when you’re done, “but you’re welcome to join me.”

“And what might I be joining you in?”

“Tourism.”

“Tourism?” He inches out of his chair, rolling his sleeves back down.

You lean against the bathroom archway and the candlelight makes a sculpture of you. Your silhouette is a blaze tenderly burning the dark.

“It only feels right after years of doing it in other places, don’t you think? Every street I discover something I didn’t notice before.”

Tom looks at the toothbrush fitted in your hand like an unlit cigarette and imagines putting it back like he’d stomp one out, kissing you and tasting apple and cinnamon and mint stuck on the corner of your pretty mouth.

“Well? Is it below you?”

“Yes. What time?”

“Eleven,” you say, and your breath hitches beautifully at your bare collar when he glides into the archway beside you. “Is that all right?”

He brushes the dab of toothpaste away from your lip. “It’s perfect.” 

Your eyes flit down his face, and now it’s him smiling.

He places a kiss on the back of your hand, looking up at you through dark lashes and a smirk as he mutters your name, a soft remembrance, a rekindled wanting. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, Tom.”

The noise outside his flat that night is trivial. He has not for a long time sat awake at night watching the sky instead of the shapes on his ceiling. He has not for a long time thought of you with the tranquil knowledge that he will see you again.

[dropthedemiurge]

Love for Love's Sake | Things You Didn't Notice #9

(okay it's not an episode number this time i just still have many details to point out oops pls let me go)

I swear. I thought I'd stop mentioning small details because I already wrote like 10 posts on Tumblr translating and explaining all the cultural stuff regarding this show and the obsession is already becoming embarrassing, but I rewatched the last episodes again and I've got tiny. Little. Details. That I can't help but point people to once again. Because damn, the amount of thought put into this show!

(trigger warning: first part talks about suicide and depression, next ones are linguistic and cultural)

The Black Suit & The Sea

I would've asked Koreans I know about the significance of such symbolism but they are celebrating Seollal (New Year) today and I don't wanna ruin the festive mood asking about "how would people dress for suicide" x)

But after watching this scene, I recognized some strong parallels in Korean media depicting depression, suicide and one's decision to end their life. One of it is bridges and jumping (if you don't know what Bridge of Life is, ask me and I'll share, so this post wouldn't become too long) but another one is sea.

My interpretation - Koreans wear black suits to funerals, so if someone is headed to the sea in a black suit, it might mean this is the character's attempt to "have" their own funeral before finally ending their life. Why do I think this combination is somehow significant?

Because I remembered a music video one of K-pop artists I like (Kim Hanbin) made, after he experienced the downfall of career, extreme hate and rejection from the public, and severe depression. His whole album Waterfall tells Hanbin's personal story, dark thoughts and his battle to survive during the time when he was gone for 2 years, but in the music video for this album (illa illa) he is seen emerging from the sea in a black suit – metaphorically regaining his music and, most importantly, desire to live. Watch with lyrics!

If we think, this is how you depict suicidal thoughts/attempt in Korean media (of course, Love for Love's Sake was even more blunt in telling us the meaning), then Myungha wearing black suit wasn't just for the pretty or dramatic picture. More than that, we see him wearing the black suit for the whole last evening – especially when he goes to finally meet his mother.

Which tells us Myungha has already decided to disappear from this world, and was determined to do it on that day, and his mother rejecting him and pretending she doesn't know her son might not have been just the last straw... but it definitely could've been Myungha's last attempt to find anything in his life worth staying for, worth not going through with his plan.

Anyway, what a scary but beautiful symbolism.

Let's talk about something happier! More heartwarming!

Do you remember when we talked about the carefully placed movie posters in previous episodes? I payed more attention to the background this time when in Episode 8 Yeowoon ran to the cinema searching for Myungha in his world. And what an amazing discovery! When Myungha starts existing again and calls Yeowoon, the movie poster behind Yeowoon says "Guardian" (보호자).

And I already said in another post that Myungha in previous episodes admitted himself being Yeowoon's "guardian, protector" in the exact same word. But now this word is shown next to Yeowoon! As Yeowoon is the one who changed the main mission and has now declared himself Myungha's guardian and protector and will do his best to make him (his favourite pereson/bias/blorbo) happy. They have now both become guardians for each other. This. Goddamn. Show.

And I also want to shout out the VFX & Production team for this show – all the visual effects are very down to earth, gentle and not over the top but enhancing the series to the max. Like, maybe you wondered where on the screen does it say "Monday, August 14" and "Saturday, August 12"? Well, as expected, you see it on four monitor screens above the box office – the date, the ongoing movies (yep, still our favourite two fake movies) and available dates etc.

But when Yeowoon and Myungha agree to meet each other in the exact system time, they are facing each other without a barrier, and the screens are now counting down the time until the Game End. Instead of normally showing movies, like in the previous shot, it says "Time remaining: 3 hours, 23 minutes, 15 seconds". It was either done with VFX or practically, but still, the thought of incorporating system messages into the actual background is insane and I'm always happy to discover such details.

I don't know how many of you have motivational stairs at your schools, we definitely didn't have this but it's quite a popular thing in Korea. They put popular and uplifting sayings for students on each stair, sometimes they even quote motivational phrases from idols, like this:

And it's interesting that when system gets broken and Myungha is about to disappear, we see the deep cracks coming through the stairs, we see ruined school BUT at the same time the quotes in the show are so obviously in our focus. And they are already written (see screenshots above) in Korean and English, but I'll still write down: one is saying "Stay hungry, stay foolish" and "If you dream it, you can do it, you will succeed". So, perhaps... motivational quotes from sunbae?

And the last moment isn't heavy on translation but I still want to talk about it because cool Korean culture!xD You see the gang grilling meat on the roof (it's called samgyeopsal and it's very popular to have for gatherings), and then Myungha makes a "ssam" and feeds it to Yeowoon – but Sangwon steals it.

Ssam is a wrap, you grill meat then put it on the salad leaf, add other ingredients (like mushrooms, sauces, garlic, green onions etc, there are many side dishes) and then you wrap it in this sort of salad sack and eat it. It's very tasty and unusual combination. But the thing is! There is no way to make it for someone else and leave it on their plate so if you make a ssam wrap for someone and want to give it to a person, you literally have to feed them (like Myungha does with a very fond smile). This is why it's often seen as a romantic gesture (aka feeding someone from your fork etc) and why it's hilarious that Sangwon steals this ssam from Yeowoon (because he wants and he gets Myungha's affection and he's not above being a brat about it!)

I'm sure you can already sense it anyway without me telling you about romantic/close-friend implications, but I thought you guys might wonder why are the guys fighting over the salad leaf.

Another funny thing – Sangwon mentions "There's a saying, 'Don't scold dogs while they eat'". This is a Korean proverb "밥 먹을 때는 개도 안 때린다" ("You don't hit even a dog when it eats") which means that, no matter how annoying you find someone, no matter how angry you are, you can't scold this person while they are eating. Eating is a very important cultural thing in Asia, of course, so do not have arguments at the dinner :D But it's funny how Sangwon uses old proverbs to be mischievous and steal Myungha's love without consequences xD I adore him

I swear, this gotta be my last post about all the details in Love for Love's Sake. There is one more scene with the mirror and a caption, and I'm very curious if it means something because it was seen twice, during system breaking down scene as well, but it's either in Chinese or Japanese and I can't read it.

Anyway! Hope you enjoyed your everyday magazine, I love reading all your tags and thoughts and comments, and if you want to read all my previous translations and pointed out cultural details in Love for Love's Sake, go read this tag!=)

[sirowsky-stories]

The Old Prince

Part 14 - The Sacrifice

Author's Note: I can't believe it's over! But I love it so much and I'm really happy with this ending. As always, I'm happy to continue the story if anyone has any specific requests for something to be further explored, but if not, this will be our last few moments with these two. Thank you to everyone who's read and interacted with this story!

Description: None for this chapter, and no warnings either, to avoid spoilers. But it's an ending, so expect feels!

Rating: Mature 18+ONLY Word Count: 2600 Author's Masterlist

   Lose yourself.    Don’t be afraid of what comes after, this moment is all that matters. Don’t try to control the light, it’ll go where it needs to go.    Find him. Find everything you ever felt about him, good or bad, and live with him again. In one second, you can relive it all, you can have him back.    Lose yourself in him.

   The light will go where it needs to go…

   “You are quite amazing, my dear.”

   Suddenly you’re back there, with him, in his room shortly before your first time making love to one another. He looks at you with those brown eyes, softened with compassion but also hardened by time, and so humbled by your feelings for him.    Your chest burns, but it isn’t with pain. Tears fall freely down your cheeks, staining your clothes, and he looks terribly concerned.

   “Are you alright?” he asks, tightening his embrace around you while he works to understand your reaction. “If you have any doubts about me, or us…”

   He trails off as your face breaks into a smile and you shake your head, trying not to laugh with the flood of joy which surges through you at the sight of him, so real before you again.

   “You do know… I am yours, don’t you?” he ponders, and somehow, you can tell he begins to understand.

   In his eyes you see a quiet but intense search for answers, although it’s like he knows he’ll find them in there even if you don’t say anything. He knows you’ve been to places and seen things beyond his comprehension, and so all he really discovers is, he’s fine with it.    Because he can tell that whatever’s happened to you, he was there with you. Because you love him more than he had ever dared believe possible.

   “You know better than I do,” he whispers, and tears begin to fill his eyes as well.

   He hasn’t lived your reality, this is just a memory, but even so, he knows how deeply you’re connected. And he sees how desperately you need him.    You let your head fall against his shoulder and sob in both grief and happiness.    He feels exactly the same. He smells exactly the same. Because this is how you remember him. And when his hand comes to rest against the back of your head, and he leans his cheek against your temple, all your feelings are blown away, replaced by the unparalleled harmony of knowing… you’re home.

--=¤=--

   Simon never reaches her, held back by the sheer mass of light produced as she surrenders to her spirit and Lux emerges in her place.    It has no form. It’s just a ball of light, so bright that no one can look at it, so strong that nothing can touch it.    The light reaches around the entire globe, for just a second, but it’s enough. All spirits are brought out of their darkened shells, and all creatures made of evil are turned to dust, save the creator himself.

   Then it’s gone. The light fades as suddenly as it appeared, no more than a flash to those who experience it, but at the same time an infinite moment.

   The owl knows what must be done. She still remembers the woman’s words, just as she knows in her heart that the Darkling will rebuild his army if he is not destroyed.    So, she calls to her sisters, calls for them to fight in the name of Freedom.    The beast has recovered from the light by the time they reach him, and he fights back with a fury to rival his losses.

--=¤=--

   On Faial, Andreia drops the stack of brochures she’s carrying to the front desk of the Volcano Interpretation Center, as she feels something leave her. She turns to the west, knowing what was lost was somewhere over there, just as a brightness which somehow comes into the room despite it being underground, forces her to close her eyes.    And when it’s passed, an emptiness follows.

   For years, she hasn’t felt sorrow or fear, blissfully unaware that the strange positivity, which was given to her by another, was only borrowed.    She slumps beside the desk and cries deeper than she ever has before. So lost in this overpowering grief, who’s origin she doesn’t even know, that she cannot tell how every other person in the building does the same.

   Nor does she know her sister, Daniela, is doing the same, thousands of miles away at the bottom of the world.    She doesn’t realize everything living now grieves the loss of this one person, connected to everything in her efforts to keep them alive. This one person who has affected the lives of literally everyone.

   But they will no longer remember her.

   What they truly grieve is the loss of the hope she brought into the world, not the woman herself. She was a mystery, and one not meant for everyone.    Each human is meant to find their own hope, however difficult it might be. That is the journey all living things must be willing to take, or they will never truly live.

--=¤=--

   He regains more strength with every second the battle rages on, pulling new evils out of the ground to protect himself as the spirits combat him across the continent.    They no longer recall the events which brought them here, only that their purpose is to end the darkness. It takes them nearly five days and a winding path which ends at Niagara Falls, but throughout all of this, they never falter.

   Two of them on each of his limbs is what it takes to hold him, while Scarabaeus crawls inside his chest through one of the cracks in his skin and continues into his heart.    When it explodes, the human male whom the dark one had been born into, reemerges for a little while. He is young and frightened. Someone haunts his thoughts while the pain ravages through his body, which is slowly being destroyed and sucked into the earth to be reborn in the future, as the cycle of light and dark continues.

   As a boy, this man suffered unspeakable things, taught to endure hatred and malice until he became dependent upon them. And so, when his torturer died, his world was upended, and the Darkling was unleashed.    Not born of anger or despair, but of the sudden absence of the pain this child had become so accustomed to. It was freedom which hurt him the most, and because of this, his monster was unlike all those before him.

   The Nine leave only when they’re certain his evil has been purged from the world, evident not just by the fading of the unnatural cloud but by how they can once more help the land to grow, returning it to its former vibrance within a few months.    Sadly, the animals and people who are lost can never be restored, but new ones will find their way here in time.

   Before she leaves this new land, Caelum lingers perched at the top of a spruce.    For a moment, she feels sad. But there is no longer anything to be sad about. Still, the feeling lingers, and she remains there, looking out over seven hills in the distance.    Somehow, she feels as though they have voices, speaking to her in a language she cannot interpret.

   But when she spreads her wings and flies over them, a melody seems to carry to her on the wind.    Something sad, but also hopeful.

--=¤=--

   You’re not sure what brought you into town today. You don’t have an errand or appointment or anything you need to do, so far as you can recall. But you have this strong sense that you’re missing something.    Like when you’ve forgotten something just as you’re about to leave the house, but you can’t figure out what it is, so you end up leaving and then halfway to work you realize that it was your fucking phone.

   It’s a small town in Sweden, quiet and calm, but not stale. You’ve lived here all your life, but in the woods twenty miles outside of the city center. And you’re an orphan, so you don’t have any family.    As a kid, going into town had always meant disappointment. Because you’d wanted to go to the movies or buy that dress which you’d been dreaming about for months after you’d seen it in a window once, or have the best ice-cream in town, or go to a restaurant for dinner.

   But your adoptive mother had been poor, only going into town for groceries, having to take you along since she lived alone, but unable to let you have any of the things you wished for.    She’d been a very kind woman, though, and you’d grown to love her as a mother before her unfortunate passing, shortly after you’d turned nineteen.    Sadly, the town has remained a negative to you ever since. You only go there for groceries or the occasional upgrade to your wardrobe, and each time it always feels like a chore, never anything you do just for the fun of it.

   Frustrated that you can’t work out what’s nagging at you, or why you think you’re gonna find it in the middle of the little city center, you take a seat on a bench in the main square, crossing your arms and legs and preparing to wait for exactly five minutes. If you haven’t thought of what it is by then, you’re going home.    Honestly, you feel incredibly stupid even sticking around for one minute. You don’t have any reason to be here.

   People are walking by, some rushing to get something done on their lunch break, others just moseying along without a rushed bone in them, but all of them with a purpose.    An elderly gentleman with a walker, and at least one gammy hip, sits down on the other side of the square, looking up and down main street, clearly waiting for someone.    He looks nice, but tired. His clothes are clean and very proper. He makes a point of not sitting too close to anyone else, so his walker won’t get in their way. He’s used to leaving space next to him for someone. A partner.

   When the people he’s waiting for turn up, it’s his grandchildren, and he lights up like a star in the sky.    But he’s not quite well. You can tell by… well, you’re not sure what exactly. You just know he’s not healthy. Probably fighting an infection of some sort.    Wait… How would you know that? How would you know anything at all about this man?

   This has happened before and it rattles you just as much each time, so you get up to leave, only then realizing it’s been twenty minutes since you sat down already, and you scoff at yourself as you quickly turn to your right, heading around the side of the bench you’ve been sitting on, to cut across a small patch of grass on your way to where you parked your car.    But you’ve only managed to get up and turn when you suddenly hit a wall.

   “Oof…” you breathe in surprise, just as you realize that you’ve actually collided with a person. A very broad and sturdy person.

   “My apologies, miss,” he politely says while he takes your right hand to keep you from losing your balance. “I’m afraid I have a habit of moving quietly.”

   He meets your eyes for a long moment and with each passing second, your insides turn warmer and strangely, you’re both pained and terribly relieved. As if you’ve missed him and never known it until now. As if you’ve been cut in half all your life, and his mere presence has made you whole.    And even more strangely, he feels the same. You can see it.    You know this man. His pain and his fears, but also his love.

   “…my Oberyn,” you whisper, having no idea where it comes from, half expecting him to start questioning your sanity.

   But instead, tears fill his eyes, and his hand tightens around yours as he pulls you closer.

   “Yes,” he answers, just as quietly, his voice strangled by strong emotions. “Yes, I am yours.”

   You will never come to recall anything from your previous life. Not the spirits or the dark one or even the dragon. Nor will you ever know why you and Oberyn had been granted the gift of rebirth as ordinary humans after the war.    In fact, no one knows the answer to that one.    Perhaps the Earth itself took pity on you both, after witnessing your sacrifice. Or maybe it was you, somehow realizing how to save your souls in those final moments of your life.

   But however it was accomplished, you will always know in your heart to cherish the man you fell in love with at first glance. You’ll always remember that he is the reason you’re alive, simply because without him, you’re incomplete.    The two of you are younger when you first meet this time around, and somehow you both know to cherish every day together, filling your lives with laughter and love, not ever worrying about what lies behind or ahead of you.

   Illnesses and accidents somehow pass your family by, as if some unseen guardian watches over you. And sometimes, late at night when the skies are the darkest and there’s no moon, there are moments when you could swear you see something gliding through the air on barely visible wings, and a pair of pale blue eyes looking at you.    Other times, sunlight tricks you into thinking there’s something in the corner of your eye, like green leaves seemingly moving on their own, or the flickering wings of an impossibly large butterfly. You’ve even heard the proud snorts and heavy hooves of a horse a few times, only to always look up and find nothing there.

   It happens rarely, not even once a year, but enough that with time, you begin to sense a familiarity with these things. An understanding that it isn’t just happening in your head. That some small part of you is connected to something bigger.    But you don’t care.    What matters to you is that your life is everything you want it to be. The rest is just white noise in the periphery.

   Your mother used to say that happiness is a choice, and that the mistake most people make is in thinking you only have to make it once, when in truth, you have to make it all the time. At every junction, crossroad, turn, and dip. You must choose to be happy, at every opportunity given, it’s not just gonna come to you automatically.    But she would always add that the very best way to live a happy life, is to find someone who makes the choice easier. Someone who makes your heart so light that you come to the right decision by simply existing in their presence.

   Most days, you feel like it was Oberyn who found you, though, not the other way around. You feel like he’ll always find you, no matter what happens.    Sometimes, you’re even absolutely certain that he found you eons ago, before the world had even become this world yet. That your paths are somehow linked by the cosmos itself. And every time this feeling hits you, it rings so true in your heart it makes you cry.    Then it passes, and you feel silly.

   But then again…

   What if…?

-=THE END=-

Thank you for taking this journey with me!

@harriedandharassed @kittenlittle24 @joelswritingmistress @pedrostories

[litlunacy]

I don't have anything finished for N7 Day, but I do have this wip I've been chipping at for a while. Takes place immediately post Destroy ending. ~1200 words

It's deathly silent.

The quiet settles over her like a heavy blanket, thick enough to be suffocating. Though, that might be because the last time her world was this dark and silent she had been gasping for air in the vacuum of space. She remembers how her lungs had burned while she thrashed uselessly, panicking in a way she hadn't since she was a teenager watching her brother get shot in the face.

That same panic is lurking at the edges of her mind now, waiting to take over. But she won't let it. She can't let it. There are too many people waiting for her to come back. Friends, people she cares about and who care about her. A lover who would follow her to the end of the world, and practically has. A wild wrecking ball of an adopted son she has to keep pulling out of trouble. 

She is Commander Lorelei Fucking Shepard, and she did not save the whole damn galaxy just to leave it behind.

So she keeps calm. She takes slow, deep breaths to keep her heart rate steady. The wound on her side is still oozing blood between her fingers, and she tries to keep pressure on it as best she can. Her entire body hurts, but she's slightly more concerned about the parts she can't feel. Maybe they're just numb from blood loss, or maybe she actually lost them in the explosion, but she tries not to think about it. 

Instead, she thinks about her crew, her strange little family that she's built for herself. She thinks about Liara's gentle smile and Jack's rabid grin. Grunt's throaty laugh and Wrex's bone-crushing hugs. Traynor's babbling and her frightening dedication to strategy games. She thinks about Joker, and knows that he got them all out, somehow. She thinks about her hamster. Somebody better be feeding the little furball. And the fish.

But most of all, she thinks about Garrus. She thinks about his icy blue eyes, and the way they go all soft and warm when he looks at her. She thinks about the feel of his talons gently carding through her hair. His wry, sarcastic humor. His voice. The feel of his keelbone pressed against her spine, his thrumming subvocals lulling her to sleep. 

God, what she wouldn't give for that right now. She's so, so tired...

But she can't sleep. Not yet. Somebody will be looking for her, and she needs to stay awake. As long as she's awake she can remind herself to breathe. As long as she can breathe, she can get back to her people. Her family.

So Commander Shepard lays there in the rubble, and she breathes.

***

Most of the krogan teams were still on Earth when the Crucible fired. Wrex had been hip-deep in husks, blasting one to bits only for three more to take its place when the shockwave had rippled across the galaxy. 

And all the husks had dropped dead.

It's now too many hours and one cramped shuttle ride later, and Wrex is leading the search team combing the wreckage of the Citadel. Officially, they're searching for any survivors. People who were on the station when the Reapers had dragged it to Earth. Civilians, officials, even the damn Keepers need to be saved if they want any hope of getting the Citadel up and running again. 

But personally? Wrex is looking for Shepard. Wrex is only looking for Shepard, and anyone who has a problem with it can talk to his fucking shotgun. 

Thankfully, nobody has a problem with it. 

When he finds a corpse, he ignores it. There's nothing to be done for the dead and not enough time to waste on them. When he finds someone alive, but not Shepard, he calls for a medevac and moves on. There aren't many alive. 

He digs through piles of rubble, shifting hunks of metal and stone that other races would need machines for. There's smoke and the smell of blood in the air. The joy of victory is soured by the still-rising body count.

But he hopes. He has to. If anyone could survive this, it's Shepard. She's already come back from the dead and survived what should have been a suicide mission. His friend is still here. She has to be.

"I hate this," comes a grumble from behind him. Wrex knows that it's Shepard's whelp without even turning around. "It's too quiet. Makes me antsy. Like I wanna kill something, but there's nothing left to kill."

Wrex snorts. "It's called worry, kid. And it'll eat you up like fear if you let it, so stop worrying and keep looking." He moves some twisted hunks of metal out of the way and walks through the new hole. Grunt follows.

"Krogan don't worry. We shoot things, and then we die. We don't worry. We get angry. We get violent." He kicks the discarded scrap of metal as if to prove his point.

The older krogan heaves a tired sigh. "You've got a lot to learn, kid. Don't pull this tough-guy bullshit with me right now. You're worried about Shepard."

"Shepard is fine. She's here somewhere, and she's fine. Why would I be worried about her?"

Wrex whirls around and grabs him by the headplate. "Because we're all worried about her! I am worried about her! She's my friend--"

"And she's my Battlemaster!" Grunt shouts, wrenching his head free and throwing an angry punch that Wrex easily catches.

"Then you need to channel this worry like you do your battle rage. Focus yourself so we can find her." He shoves Grunt's hand away and keeps walking. But the next words out of the kid's mouth make him stop cold.

"And what if we don't find her?"

Wrex doesn't answer right away. He balls his hands into fists, biotics fizzling as he resists the urge to throw the tactless youngster. Of course he's aware of the possibility. He's not stupid. But he also knows that what-ifs won't help anyone right now. This is a rescue mission, not a retrieval, and this whelp had better get that through his head.

"We will find her," he growls, though his traitorous brain adds an unbidden dead or alive in his head. "And when we get back to Tuchanka, we'll build her the biggest fucking monument the galaxy has ever seen. Now let's go."

"How can you--"

"Shut up!"

Grunt narrows his eyes and makes to grab Wrex by the shoulder. "You can't tell me to shut up, you old fossil."

Wrex slaps a hand over his mouth. "I said shut up. I thought I heard something."

Grunt grumpily shoves the hand off his mouth, but stays quiet. He turns his head, straining to hear...anything.

The dead silence is unnerving. It reminds him of the tank. If Shepard were here, she'd be making noise. In all the time he's known her, Shepard was always making noise. Humming to herself, tapping her foot, muttering under her breath as she scoped out a target with her sniper rifle. The woman even made noise in her sleep.

Grunt hates this silence. The ash and dust floating in the air. The smell of burning and death. They just won the greatest war in galactic history, but this wreckage smells like loss.

[farahtissaiamyloves]

I love you

Tissaia De Vries x fem!reader

You paced around the room, too anxious to lay on your bed for sleep.

Tissaia was sitting on the armchair by the fireplace; her eyes focused on the flames roaring.

Your movements came to a halt as you turned and sat on the other armchair facing the fireplace.

You looked at her. You looked at your wonderful wife.

Tissaia turned her head to look at you. " Y/N, please don't start again. I really can't- "

" But I want to come with you ! Fight by your side ! Protect you ! " You cut her off feeling more and more exasperated.

Tissaia shook her head. " Darling, no. Please, don't. "

You stood up angrily. " Why them and not me ? " You asked.

Why did she prefer other sorcerers to her own wife ?

Tissaia sighed. " Because... " Her voice trailed off standing up too. 

She closed the gap between the two of you with one step taking your hands in hers and locking eye contact with you. " I love you. I love you more than anything in this world. "

You teared up wrapping your hands around her neck and pulling her into a hug. 

Tissaia embraced you back, pressing you against her, enjoying the feel of her body against yours and the smell of your unique perfume. 

" I don't want you to die, my love. If you follow me, the only thing you would achieve would be to put your life in risk. I don't want that. " Tissaia added leaving a gentle kiss on your neck.

Silence enveloped you afterward.

You didn't dare to break it, loving the way Tissaia's words repeated in your mind.

The rectoress moved to kiss your forehead. " Darling, please, stay here. "

You looked at her for a good moment before shaking your head. A tear rolled down your cheek. 

" I prefer risking my life alongside you than sitting here doing nothing but pretend to be a good housewife. " You declared.

Tissaia sighed in defeat and then nodded t you. " As you wish. But I tried to warn you; remember that. "

" Yes, yes, yes, of course. " You agreed without even thinking. You kissed her cheek as a thank you before preparing for  bed.

Tissaia smiled sadly at you when you finally joined her on bed.

You reciprocated the smile closing the gap between the two of you again.

Your wife kissed you back with an unmatched passion.

It was your last day at Aretuza; she was going to make the best of it.

꧁☾︎❥︎☽︎꧂

It was done.

The fight was over.

Poor Tissaia could find neither you nor Yennefer.

" Y/N !!!! " She shouted.

Tissaia looked down at the bodies lying on the soil.

Her eyes examining every and each of them.

She chose a soldier who somehow had lost his right hand and with the use of her powers saw his last moments.

Still no sight of you.

Neither any news from Yennefer.

The sorceress sighed and continued her way through the battlefield.

You couldn't have disappeared.

You must have been somewhere.

Alive or dead.

A tear rolled down her cheek at the image of your motionless body laying in her hands.

No.

She wiped it away checking on an other soldier.

You were one of the most powerful sorcerers alive; you must have survived.

You NEEDED to survive.

She walked down the hill and continued wasting her chaos in a despair attempt to find not only the love of her life, but her favorite student as well.

Minutes became hours.

A witcher came asking about Yennefer.

She felt a tiny bit sad telling him that she was dead; but what else could she do ?

The search for any survivors came to an end a couple of hours later and Tissaia didn't know how to feel.

Yennefer was probably killed by her extreme use of magic.

But you. What had happened to you ?

No body was found, meaning that you were still alive... right ?

The recroress walked through the bodies until she reached the forest.

A sound full of pain left her lips remembering how much you loved wandering around forests.

She continues walking until her feet hurt.

The famous sorcerer sat down.

Her hand hesitantly trailed beneath her dress, on her shoulder, caressing the hickey you left there the previous night.

Tissaia cried over the fact that she was to never see you again.

She would never take you hand in hers. Touch you. Kiss you. Tell you how much she loved you.

She cried.

And cried.

Mourning over you.

꧁☾︎❥︎☽︎꧂

A rush of pain woke you up.

You gasped opening your eyes and looking around you.

You were in the woods.

Your eyes focused on the soil where the dead bodies of your enemies were laying.

You took a shaky breath.

You remembered killing them but you had no idea how you ended up unconscious on the floor with a rather big cut on your right shoulder.

You grimaced in pain trying to get up.

You were exhausted.

" Ah. Ah. " You sat down with your back resting against a tree.

You couldn't walk.

Great.

You hissed as you accidentally moved your right hand. 

You paled at the realization that it wasn't only cut but probably broken as well.

You swallowed hard focusing as much magic as you could muster.

" Tissaia. " You whispered before drifting off.

꧁☾︎❥︎☽︎꧂

And then she heard it.

Like a whisper.

Or should she say like a gentle kiss on the cheek.

She heard your voice.

Weak but not dead.

Tissaia got up in an instant.

She didn't walk but run toward the source of the magic.

She followed it like a thirsty mosquito in a dessert which finally smelt a living being with blood.

And then she came up with the bodies.

Scars of lightning could be visible in most of the bodies. 

Tissaia continued her way carefully, refraining from having any kind of contact with them.

She scanned the place with her eyes until they landed on you.

Your eyes were closed and your right hand was swollen and bloody.

Tissaia took you in her arms.

You were breathing.

A sigh of relief left her mouth as another tear rolled down her cheek.

She used her remaining magic to stop the bleeding and alleviate the pain.

When Tissaia was finished treating you, she was panting. 

She called to the other mages to come and help her transfer you to Aretuza because she was unable to open a portal.

The rectoress let out a breath and rested her forehead against yours.

She whispered the three so unique and magical words.

" I love you. "

[amunyan]

Yeah... I go for an other Fanfic again...

The person she trusts most... (1/3)

The air is scorching hot and the disgusting smell of sulphur brings tears to your eyes.

„Ugh, you think to yourself, trying not to vomit. Both the heat and the smell make it hard for you to breathe.

„The ultimate volcano... An active volcano, as we can easily see,“ you mutter to yourself as you watch the lava bubble up again and again. „Yes, I've come to the right place. “

Anyone else would have made you suspicious. You might even have thought you were at the wrong location. But any other person wouldn't have suggested an active volcano as a place to meet. It was even somehow typical of her, Mereoleona Vermillion. You would have been more surprised if she had ordered you to a romantic forest lake with ducks quacking happily.

„She really is crazy, “you remark, still a little paralyzed. „Do I really want to go there?“

You wrap yourself in your magic, keeping it tightly drawn around you to protect you from the high temperatures, but also from the strong mana of your surroundings. To make it a little more bearable, even if you still find it hard to fight the enormous heat with your plant attribute.

“She called it Manaskin...”, you remember. A magic technique that Mereoleona tried to teach you before you split up in a fight.

„If you don't stop beating yourself up, I can't help you. All you do is complain and moan. “

„But my magic is weak. I can't do anything. “

„Nonsense! Your magic isn't weak. You're just full of self-doubt. That's why you can't control it. That's why you've never tried to go beyond your limits. You've never even approached them. “

„But... I'm trying. You see? I train hard to be acknowledged by you. So that you...“ Your voice broke as you looked at her with tears in your eyes. „Mereo… We spent so much time together. We did a lot of training together... we even had an intimate relationship. Mereo... I really love you. I would do anything to be loved by you.”

„You stupid little... It doesn't work that way! Tell me, how can anyone acknowledge your abilities if even you don't believe in them? “

„But... If you just tell me that I've grown... That I'm strong. I would start to believe...“

„That's not my job, “ she replied gruffly. „Try to accept yourself first - not the other way around. And when you've done that, we can talk again. “

With those words she had left you alone. Unclear whether she was just so damn angry with you, or because of the letter she had received earlier that day. A message about her younger brother, who had been so badly injured that she had to take over the order of the crimson lions for him.

Since then, a couple of months have gone by. Almost a year...

You wonder if she still remembers you: "Or has she already forgotten me? The first question I should ask is whether she's even here. Or is she too busy to come?"

Despite these questions swirling in your head, you take the first step onto the hot, rocky ground to search for Mereo, feeling something other than that hellish mana - a warm, familiar feeling that has grown so close to your heart.

„That answers the question of 'if' and 'whether'...“, you consider, „She's here...“ A painful smile appeared on your lips, and with this certainty, at least the first doubts were removed.

„I have to be careful, I know her, she has a tendency to attack you out of nowhere...“ You strengthen your defences and a light scent of lavender and other herbs envelops you; A sweet-smelling potpourri to mask the foul aroma of a completely different herb. An herb whose scent alone is poisonous and intoxicating enough to stun. The foul odour of the golden, but highly poisonous Angelic Taraxacum. Although your trait is herbal magic, you have used your knowledge of plants to find the most poisonous herbs and use them in your magic. What you have acquired is almost comparable to poison magic. You can summon any herb and imitate its scent. Provided you have touched it before and immortalised it in your Grimoire...

„I hope this works...“ you mumble, still unsure and uncomfortable with your battle strategy in this area.

Barely three steps later, a flaming beast rushes towards you as if it came out of nowhere. So fast, you probably wouldn't have noticed it before. But you activate your defences at the right moment and block its playful attack.

„So you actually dared to come here, “a wide smile flits across Mereoleonas lips.

„Of course I did. I wanted to show you that I've grown stronger, “you reply with a thin voice and a narrowed eye.

„Well then... Let's see what you've learned, my sweet. “She jumps back, keeping her distance and allowing her fiery mana to flare up.

You get into a fighting stance too, spreading your legs a little and bending your knees to get a firm foothold. Your heart pounds in your throat. You are nervous. Not only because of Mereo, but also because of your surroundings. „ I have never trained in such an extreme environment. Not to mention fought. One false step and I'll be barbecued. But... I've trained so hard every day for this. I can trust myself and my abilities. I'm ready for this fight!" The grim expression on your face, which you had just used to stare at the lava in fear, turns to pure determination. You show this to your opponent, who gets probably even more energized by this.

„Very nice! I like you like that! You really seem to have grown a lot since we last met. Not just your mana, but your whole aura seems much more confident. But will that be enough for you to fight me? “

„I hope so, “you call out to her as you prepare for her attack. The adrenaline rushes through your veins as she launches her first move. Fast and silent like a lion on the hunt. Her movements used to terrify you. You couldn't keep up. Time and time again you have been defeated by Mereoleona with ease. But today, the rush of adrenaline has only made you stronger and sharpened your senses. You can dodge her attack and launch a counterattack.

„Blossoms of Oblivion, “you call out, and your Grimoire flips to the page with the spell. A split second later, you envelop her in a swirling column of colorful petals. Sharp-edged little leaves, but they can do little harm to the undefeated lioness Mereo.

She swings her flaming fist at you, not only piercing the swirling herbs, but burning them as well. You barely manage to dodge a follow-up attack by diving away.

Stepping aside you and try to improve your manaskin in this harsh environment. To take it to the next level, so that you are no longer tied to the ground by the manazone. „This technique that Mereoleona tried to teach me back then. It took me an awfully long time to understand it and an even longer time to use it. Will I be able to do it here in this mana-rich area? I can't let her down. No... Most of all, I can't let myself down“.

You pushed yourself to the limit. Even keeping your manaskin up in this heat was hard. Even harder in this battle - so many things to focus on just to stay alive. Another attack seems rather difficult to handle. At least for now.

„I just need a little more time to get the hang of it. I don't need to be perfect. Just wait for a good opportunity to attack her. And while I wait, the scent of the herbs will make her tired and make it easier for me. Hopefully...“

The battle continues. Even though you're both mages, you fight with your bare hands. Especially Mereoleona, who more or less only uses her magic to enhance her physical abilities. She's more like a very skilled boxer who fights with flame-covered fists.

It was she who taught you the basics of combat. So your style is quite similar. But not the level of your power. Not even close, as you will now discover to your horror. „Damn it... Her mana rate is increasing way too fast?! I can't keep up my defence. Her mana is completely wiping out mine...”

Panic began to creep in. Even though you had told yourself not to rush, now you are. You want it to be over quickly. The smell of your herbs grows stronger. And a little out of control; because Mereoleona notices it too.

A knowledge smirk crosses her lips. „I see what you were trying to do, (Y/N). Nice strategy. But... Does it really do any good against this? “

You swallow as you notice a drastic change in her mana.

„To be honest, I've been putting a lot of effort into my training too. I've been pushing my bounderis harder than ever for an upcoming battle against some devils...“

„That's not possible, “you stumble and take a few steps back. Your legs and body tremble at the sight of Mereo. She wasn't just covered in mana or in control of it. No. She's become pure, fiery mana.

Your scent of poisonous herbs, which had enveloped her to support her in the duel, was burned away by her heat in a fraction of a second.

Slowly the heat penetrates your defences. You find it harder and harder to maintain. Thick beads of sweat form on your forehead and you begin to feel the first twinges of self-doubt.

"Hey! Concentrate!" Mereoleona shouts at you. "The moment you lose your manaskin, the heat will burn you to a crisp! Don't be afraid of me. You know I would never seriously hurt you. So come and show me all your power!"

Mereoleonas words have jolted you out of your rising despair. You see her challenging gaze, which encourages you to continue. With a silent nod, you concentrate again. You gather your mana tightly around you. One last time for this fight, you try to go beyond your limits. You want to use all your remaining mana for one last attack. Although you expect it to be pointless.

„But maybe it will catch them off guard...“ This thought was enough for you to give it a try.

„Herbs of Doom, “you call again. Your Grimour lights up and flips through the pages, a vortex of blossoming leaves enveloping you.

„Again? I thought you'd learned more? “The scream of the lioness was full of disappointment. But you know better. This attack was not only your defence. The moment Mereos Attack would hit you, the herb storm would grab her. Besides, the little herbs were not only sharp, but also poisonous and caustic to the touch.

„I don't think they could seriously hurt her, but they might give me a chance for a surprise attack...“

Your opponent comes closer. As her punch penetrates your defences, you send a swirl of herbs at her. She wasn't expecting that, and you use the split second it takes for the herbs to turn into small fireballs to catch up and strike with your right fist. You aim for her face. „She'd have no problem taking it, and I’ve already gotten one or two purples from her, “you think, and hit her with everything you have. And you hit her. About half. Your fist grazes Mereoleonas cheek. You don't even feel it yourself because of the heat. And you've closed your eyes because you don't want to see for yourself.

A mistake. A serious mistake. Because of course you can't see how she clenches her fist to counter. The fist lands with full force in the pit of your stomach. You can't breathe for a few moments and water shoots into your eyes. And if you weren't already blinking, you probably would have been now.

The force of Mereos Flame Fist throws you back a few meters. You manage to scramble to your feet, but you stumble and stagger back another two or three steps as you take your final step, unable to feel the ground beneath your feet. Nothing but crumbling rocks falling into the bubbling hot lava beneath you. Frantically, you flail your arms, trying to catch yourself, but the blow of the attack was too strong. Making you lose your balance and fall.

You don't even have to try for a mana zone, as your manaskin slowly dissolves and the heat of the lava welcomes you with its greedy claws.

„That's it, “you think to yourself, “that was the wrong move to turn me into a BBQ. Shit...“

[letoasai]

No one remembers Anime Spiral

What do kids even do on the internet? I'm genuinely asking. Everything revolves around social media and that's fine but what do they do. Are their cool things they can do anymore?

There used to be websites and you would just wander the internet on the family computer. Newgrounds. Gaia Online. Neopets. Yahoo Games. Quizzila. Live Journal... I'm not saying they were all great but they were something to do and... no i'll commit, they were great. I wasn't worried about posting pictures of myself when i was busy watching a flash animation of Dragonball Z that someone put painstaking hours into.

A lot of younger kids and teens don't know how to download something and save it to a particular folder on their computer because they've never used a computer. Meanwhile we were somehow... coding our Myspace pages to have a particular background. When did we acquire that knowledge?

In 2004/2005 i went looking for Inuyasha pictures, as one did, and i stumbled upon a site of people posting fanfiction? Sign me up... Anime Spiral was the wild west of chaos fanfic writers. People would make banners for their work that would sit in their summary sections. God help you, but those seizure inducing flashing colors were going to get your attention.

People would write anything, stories, poems, lyrics. People would post art and open commissions for people to ask for things in the comments, and the OP would just do it... There were frantic collaborations. Some were really good. Some were really bad.

There were chaotic originally stories with random anime characters thrown in for fun because who was going to tell them they couldn't? Some people just ranted to anime characters and i will always remember Ask Sesshomaru where you'd ask Sesshomaru a question in the comments and the next chapter he would answer every.single.question. The fact that it was probably a 16 year old girl writing that just didn't matter.

Some people just posted picture of anime characters. They did all the internet searches so you didn't have to! They were harder to find then.

The comment/response section to this day... was the best format i've seen on a fanfic site (imo). It was so easy. I miss it! I miss going to my word processing class and pulling up that site and chatting with people in the freaking comments of whatever...terrible story i'd posted at the time. I was probably so proud of it then but yikes...

The notification system was good and it was easy to talk to people without it feeling intrusive.

Maybe Anime Spiral was Tumblr before Tumblr.

I met two strangers on Anime Spiral a week apart. Internet dangers weren't as obvious then as they seem now. Those two strangers became two of my best friends. It's been nearly twenty years and they are still so prevalent in my life.

I met my best friend on that site. That seems so impossible to me now. We never would have met otherwise and i can't imagine my life without them. We were so upset when Anime Spiral went down. We missed the ugly green and mustard yellow template to this day.

It wasn't a great site, it had it's problems... It had a lot of problems but at the same time, it was a great site. It's hard to find people who even remember Anime Spiral anymore. Going to FF .net or Fiction Press afterwards felt like... a downgrade somehow. The systems overly complicated and it lacked...something.

I do enjoy the hell out of AO3, it actually checks all the boxes for a great writing site, but i'll always remember the chaotic nostalgia of Anime Spiral.

What do kids do on the internet now? Is it safe? Is it just selfies, gossip, and bullying? Do you have a little dragon you can take care of? Neopets could take up a lot of their attention. I don't think 2024 Neopets is the same as 2005 Neopets and that's a shame.

I have no idea. I feel old.

[hyikien]

I wish I could love you in a way everything was all you, again.

There's a peculiar kind of ache that comes with loving someone in a way that's less than whole, a love that's been chipped away at, leaving only the sharp, jagged edges. It's the kind of love that cuts into you every time you breathe, a reminder that the air you inhale is the same air that once danced around them, tantalizingly close yet immeasurably far.

I used to dream of loving in vast, boundless measures, where the universe itself seemed too small a stage for the magnitude of my affection. I wished to love in a way that made everything else insignificant, where the mere thought of you would eclipse the sun, the stars, and the galaxies beyond. I wished to love you in a way that was all-consuming, where sacrificing the world for your sake would be as effortless as the sun's rise each morning. But wishes, as they say, are the currency of the foolhardy, and I, it seems, had invested heavily in a market of heartache.

Now, my love for you has been distilled into something painfully pure. It's a love that hurts, a love that's become its own entity, gnawing away at my insides, leaving me raw and exposed. Do you ever feel the weight of a love that's too heavy to carry, yet too precious to put down? It's like holding onto a shard of glass, knowing it will cut you, but you can't let go because it's the last piece of something beautiful that once was.

I find myself wondering, is it worse to have loved and lost, or to have loved and be left with the echoes of what could have been? To see you in the crowd, the light catching your hair just so, and feel the world tilt on its axis, only to remember that the axis now spins on a point of pain. How do you reconcile the image of someone who was once your everything with the reality that they are now just a silhouette against the backdrop of your life?

There's a cruel irony in the way love can transform. It starts as a gentle flame, warm and inviting, only to rage into an inferno that consumes everything in its path, leaving nothing but ashes in its wake. And here I am, sifting through the remnants, searching for a spark that might reignite the fire, knowing full well it would only burn me again.

I've asked myself a thousand times if I would go back and do it all over again, knowing the heartache that awaited me. Would I still choose to love you with every fiber of my being, or would I take the coward's way out and shield myself from the inevitable fall? The truth is, I would choose you, every single time. Because even though this love hurts, it's a testament to the depth of what we had. It's a reminder that I am capable of a love so profound, so intense, that not even the pain of its loss can diminish its worth.

But what does it say about me, that I would willingly embrace this suffering? Is it strength or foolishness that keeps me tethered to a love that no longer exists outside the confines of my own heart? I grapple with these questions, turning them over and over, like stones worn smooth by the relentless tide of my longing.

The reality is, I can't love you the way I used to. That love belonged to a different time, a different version of us. Now, I love you in the quiet moments, in the spaces between breaths, in the whispered dreams of what we might have been. I love you in the past tense, with a love that's a ghost of what it once was, haunting me with memories that refuse to fade.

I wish I could say that this love has made me stronger, that it's given me the courage to face the world with a defiant heart. But the truth is, it's left me battered and bruised, nursing wounds that may never fully heal. And yet, despite the pain, despite the scars, I wouldn't trade this love for anything in the world. Because it's mine, in all its agonizing glory.

So here I am, penning my heartache into existence, hoping that somehow, these words will reach you, that they will echo through the void and touch the edges of your soul. I'm not asking for a second chance; I'm not even asking for absolution. All I'm asking is for you to understand the breadth and depth of a love that refuses to die, even as it slowly kills me from the inside out.

In the end, this is my confession, my testimony to a love that was all-encompassing, a love that was you, again and again. A love that, despite the hurt, I would sacrifice the world for, over and over, without a moment's hesitation. Because, in the twisted labyrinth of my being, you will always be the minotaur at its center, fierce and untamed, a beast I will never stop trying to tame, even if it means losing myself in the process.

-ayi, @hyikien on insta :)