#but I need more and unfortunately my musical knowledge really only extends as far back as the late 60s

[shifuaang]

I need fallout-adjacent song recs for ghoulucy pls

[zaph1337]

Monster Hunter Rating 21: Khezu, the Blank Stare

When I reviewed Basarios, I made a joke about how the devs likely gave it human teeth over sharp teeth because the latter might not give children nightmares, but I don’t actually think that the devs ever intended Basarios to be more terrifying than any other monster in the game. This monster, however, is literally the stuff of nightmares, and I’m not misusing “literally” here. This may be the longest review I’ve written yet, so buckle up. Time to get spooky with Khezu!

(How it appears in Monster Hunter 1)

(How it appears in Monster Hunter Rise)

Appearance: I think there’s been a mistake here; last I checked, Capcom wasn’t making Silent Hill games. Seriously, this thing would fit right into that series, and not just ‘cause its phallic neck lends itself well to metaphors. The pale, veiny skin, the leech-like mouth, the complete lack of eyes...Khezu’s unlike any other monster in the series because it’s the only monster that’s meant to be horrifying to look at. It’s got flabby, tattered wings and gecko-like feet, but its main characteristic (other than the head) is its tail, the tip of which can open up into a suction cup that allows Khezu to stick to ceilings.

Obviously, Khezu’s an abomination that came from a really dark place in someone’s mind, but that’s just it: Khezu is a monster that appeared in an MH developer’s nightmare either before or during the production of the first Monster Hunter game, and said developer (I don’t actually remember who) decided to put it in the game. I learned of this from the Twitch streams of a streamer called DuncanCan’tDie, who’s a huge MH fan that’s on great terms with Capcom. Unfortunately, I can’t find any other sources for this claim, but I don’t think he’s lying for a few reasons; firstly, like I said, he’s on great terms with Capcom. He’s friends with some people who work there, and he even has a tattoo designed by someone on the MH team he called “Kaname-san” (who didn’t actually give him the tattoo, but drew the design that a tattoo artist used) and the only person who could go by that name is Kaname Fujioka, the man who literally directed several MH games, including the first one, and who was the art director for Monster Hunter World. So yeah. Duncan and Capcom get along great, and if he was spreading false rumors, they’d probably know about it.

The second reason I believe Duncan about Khezu’s origin is that someone once came into one of his streams (and I was there at the time) and started spouting “lore” about two monsters that looked like they could be related, but actually weren’t. Duncan flat out told this person that what they were claiming wasn’t mentioned anywhere and asked for sources...which the loregiver did not provide. In fact, after Duncan started getting on their case, I don’t think they said a word for the rest of the stream. Duncan believes that this person was just making stuff up to sound like they knew a lot about MH and weren’t aware that he was an MH expert, and I doubt that someone who would call someone out on that would do the same thing, especially if he had a reputation to uphold.

I apologize if I spent a lot of time talking about that, but I didn’t want people getting on my case because they couldn’t find anything to support my claims. But in conclusion, I believe that Khezu truly was born of a nightmare, and that’s awesome. It makes the Silent Hill comparison even more fitting since the enemies in those games are basically projections of the protagonists’ psyches. Disturbing enemies are much more effective if they scare(d) the people who created them, and Khezu is certainly disturbing. Because of that, as well as its ominous origin, I’m giving it a 9/10.

Behavior: Khezu mostly inhabit caves, jungles, and swamps due to the need for their skin to be moisturized, though they usually only leave caves to hunt, which they don’t have to do very often due to the plentiful fat beneath their skin, which also keeps them warm. Their favorite hunting strategy is to ambush their prey from a location usually concealed by darkness, which is made easier by their extendable necks. However, their reliance on darkness, as well as their preference to dwell in caves, has made them completely blind and reliant on their other senses; despite not having visible nostrils or ears, Khezu have great hearing and a very good sense of smell. Back to hunting, while they need to subdue larger prey, smaller ones, like Kelbi, are slowly swallowed whole...which is apparently something you can actually witness in the games, according to TV Tropes (I normally stick to the wiki and what I already know for resources, but I went to the “Monster Hunter / Nightmare Fuel” page while searching for another source for Khezu’s origin as a nightmare). As if this thing needed to be more disturbing, it doesn’t always kill its prey before it tries to swallow it, so the Kelbi you can see it eat is constantly struggling as the Khezu swallows it bottom-first. That’s...that’s messed up. But it gets worse.

Practically every monster in this series isn’t any more intelligent than what we consider a normal animal to be. Aside from Lynians, which are people, the smartest monster I’ve talked about is the Velociprey, which might not be as smart as, say, an irl crow, which is very intelligent by the standards of nonhuman animals. What I’m getting at here is that most of the monsters in this series don’t really take any sadistic pleasure in killing and eating prey; they just do it to survive. But Khezu is different. In several MH games, including Rise, the first time you go on a quest to kill a specific monster, the gameplay is preceded by a cutscene that shows off how powerful or intimidating that monster is (and in Rise’s case, you also get a poem). Here’s Khezu’s intro, and I want you to pay attention to what Khezu does from 0:24-0:30:

That’s right: this thing “looked” right at the monster it was going to eat, and smiled. That isn’t just me anthropomorphizing it, either; I’ve seen what Khezu looks like outside of that cutscene, and even with its mouth closed it has a neutral expression, so it smiling actually means something, and considering the context, it’s obvious what the devs wanted us to take from it: Khezu likes killing. It enjoyed the prospect of swallowing that monster whole while it was still alive and struggling, which means that this is the first monster I’ve talked about that we can definitively say is evil rather than just an animal. Rather fitting for a living nightmare, I would say. And if you thought all that was disturbing, I have some...unfortunate news. I hope you aren’t eating anything right now, ‘cause this next part is just gross.

Y’know how some wasps lay their eggs inside other bugs so the eggs have incubation they can eat when they hatch? Well, uh...Khezu do that, too. And they’re hermaphrodites that, from what I can gather, don’t need to mate, so any adult Khezu is capable of injecting another monster with its “whelps” (not saying that Khezu are always “pregnant,” just saying that any of them can be). And you know the really crazy part? After everything I said about Khezu, there are still people in the MH world that tame them and keep them as pets. Why would you want to have a slimy, flabby, sadistic, parasitoid, 14-to-40-foot abomination as a pet!? God, people are so freaking weird.

EDIT (05/07/2021): My older brother reminded me that I forgot about one of the odder aspects of Khezu; when you enter a fight with a Main Monster, its battle theme plays (don’t know if every monster has a unique theme, but several do, to my knowledge), but Khezu has no theme to speak of. I don’t know if this is true in every game, or even if it was intentional at first, but it’s still both funny and eerie at the same time. There’s no background music until you get in a fight, so if you somehow tick off a Khezu without seeing it, then it can sneak up on you. “But Zaph, the moment a monster enters ‘fight mode,’ it roars! So the Khezu will give away its position!” See, you’d be right about that if it wasn’t for the fact that, according to TV Tropes at least, Khezu’s roar sounds just like wind--howling wind, yes, but wind all the same. I don’t know if there’s any howling wind SFX in the areas where Khezu live, so for all I know you’ll still be able to identify it in a hurry, but just imagine what that’s like in-universe! Imagine that you’re walking around in the Frost Islands or something and hear a chilling wind from out of nowhere. Unless you’re an experienced hunter, you’d likely have no idea if that was a Khezu or not, so you wouldn’t know if it’s too late to run or not, or even if you should run at all. Going back out of universe, the details I just described are very nice touches to a monster that was already horrifying in behavior, so I’m bumping the score here up from the 7 I initially gave it to 8/10.

Abilities: All of the “Flying Wyverns” I’ve talked about so far have had a lot of trouble with the whole “flying” part, and Khezu are no exception; they’re better at it than Diablos and Gravios, but they still need to flap really frantically to stay in the air. They’re great at jumping, though, and their gecko-like feet allow them to scale walls and stick to ceilings, something that their tails also allow them to do. Khezu are Thunder-element monsters capable of discharging electricity in a manner of ways, including shooting balls of it from their mouths and emitting it all around their bodies. Since Khezu like to spend time around water, their attacks are even more dangerous, as everything near them will likely be wet and therefore more conductive. This also applies to Khezu themselves, which may be why they stick their tails onto the ground before discharging electricity; they ground themselves so that they don’t shock themselves. Finally, Khezu saliva is very dangerous; we don’t know if it’s electric or acidic, but anything that gives off smoke when it touches something probably isn’t good for your health, which is why owning a pet Khezu is so dangerous; their drool can literally kill you. 7/10.

Equipment: Most Khezu weapons are as interesting as you’d expect them to be, considering the monster they’re made from. Most of them have a horror aesthetic, like this Great Sword called the Khezu Shock Sword:

I just noticed that the skin is actually stretched over the blade, rather than being what the blade’s attached to. Gross, but I never expected Khezu weapons to look pretty. There are also weapons which emphasize the monster’s electric aspect, like this Gunlance called the Full Voltage:

It still has Silent Hill vibes due to its “rusty hospital” aesthetic, and looking at it long enough reveals little details it inherited from Khezu. Speaking of hospitals, there are a couple of weapons based off of syringes, such as the Khezu Syringe, which is a Light Bowgun, and a Lance from MHFG that’s literally a giant hypodermic needle, but I didn’t want to show those off in case they triggered anyone with needle phobia. The last weapon I’m gonna show will be very familiar to those of us who’ve played the Rise demo a lot: the Insect Glaive known as the Bolt Chamber!

I like the green tube running from the sac between the blade and the shaft of the glaive; according to the Bolt Chamber’s in-game description, it uses that “pulsating device” to steal energy from its targets. If you mentioned that to me before I grabbed its image for this review, I probably would have asked how it did that. If you then pointed out the mouth at the glaive’s end, I would have thanked you for cursing me with the knowledge of its existence. Seriously, I’ve used this thing probably more than 20 times, and until I saw this render, I never noticed that. As for the armor, here’s the Blademaster Khezu Armor from MHGU:

The male armor here is almost identical to the one from Rise--which sadly doesn’t have any pictures on the wiki yet--and yes, it does look like the main character from Assassin’s Creed. The female armor, on the other hand, looks almost like a nurse’s outfit, especially with that metal thing on the woman’s head with the cross. The more I look at this equipment, the more I feel like they wanted people to think of Silent Hill, and if so, that’s pretty cool. I’ve got another armor set to show you; the Gunner version of the Khezu R Armor from MHGU:

Jesus, is this an armor set or a medical emergency? I can’t imagine bandages are very effective at protecting your body from physical damage, but thankfully it looks like most of them are just covering actual armor...meaning that the people who designed this stuff in-universe wanted the people wearing it to look like they were in an accident. Not sure I get why, but I’m not here to--actually, I am here to judge, so never mind; it’s gross. Also the female set has Khezu mouths as arm coverings, which is someone’s fetish, I’m sure. The equipment as a whole is macabrely interesting (TIL that macabrely is a real word) and calls to mind a fascinating horror game franchise, so 8/10.

Final Thoughts and Tally: I figured that Khezu was gonna be interesting, but I didn’t know how far the devs would take the horror theming. Everything about this monster is creepy; it looks disturbing, it acts even worse, and its equipment makes me feel like I need a tetanus shot just from looking at it. But that’s not at all a bad thing...unless you’re really squeamish, in which case you were likely cringing this whole review. I’d apologize, but you made the choice to stick through ‘till the end. 8/10.

[barnesbabee]

I’m a Lie || K.H

Summary: Destiny is cruel sometimes... And you sure were punished by it, when you met your soulmate in the worst scenario possible.

Pairing: Kim Hongjoong x Reader

Words: Who cares tbh

Genre: Smut, Angst, Fluff

⚠ choking, spanking, praise kink, violence, mentions of drugs ⚠

A/N: I love this one. By far one of my favourites and I feel like it suits the member well. If it flops I will singlehandedly murder everyone. Enjoy xx💖

ᴄʀ: ʙᴀʀɴᴇꜱʙᴀʙᴇᴇ

  The file plopped in front of you. A picture of a man was attached to it and you looked at it briefly.

 Kim Hongjoong.

  "Retain information. Eliminate him. It's not important how, by the end of the month Kim Hongjoong has to disappear."   

  You said nothing. Your only reply was a nod, and with that you grabbed the beige folder and exited the gelid room. The jet was already at the top of the building waiting for you to enter.

  You bowed to the security guards that stood by each side of the jet's stairs, and they reciprocated the gesture.

  Once you settled down in the plane, you crossed your legs and prepared yourself for some thorough reading. You flipped through the pages of the man's profile, taking in all of the information.

  "Producer, writer, rapper... Kid had a future." You closed the binder with a sigh and threw it on the small table in front of you "Too bad."

  You sipped from the water bottle in your hand and a man sat in front of you. He had a rough face, like he'd been through Hell and made it out alive. His dark hair was tamed by a coat of hair gel, and his eyes were droopy yet feral.

   "Junhwan." You said, and bowed at him.

   "Y/N." He bowed back.

   He handed you a second file and a heavy handbag.

   "From now on your name is Anne. You're an exchange student interested in pursuing a musical career as a producer. All of the items to bring 'Anne' to life are in the duffel bag."

   You nodded and set the bag aside, ready to take in your character.

   "Poor kid..." You told your colleague as you read the details of the person you'd be impersonating for the next few weeks.

   The man in front of you scoffed.

    "Since when do you pity people?" He asked with an amused face.

    "I don't. But he got caught in a fight that wasn't his."

    Junhwan leaned closer to you and looked you in the eye, irradiating and intimidation as he slightly leaned his head to the right.

     "Don't let decency and sentiment get in the way." He warned with a cold voice.

     You didn't reply. You felt offended that the man would even insinuate you'd fail at anything. You glared at him for a second, and drifted his attention back to the 'Anne' files.

    However, you couldn't get out of your head the poor man that would be sacrificed in the name of another individual. It was unbeknownst to everyone how it had happened, but Hongjoong had caught his boss making a significant transaction to your boss and talking about it on the phone. He didn't understand at first, but when he caught sight of the bags filled with the white powder he was able to connect all the dots. Unfortunately for him, he was caught. And although the CEO of his company trusted him enough to keep quiet, your boss didn't.

    It was sad... Usually the people you were assigned to were madmen, criminals, vile people that couldn't differentiate joy from violence, but never young men, at the peak of their career whose life was cursed by knowledge.

   You sighed one last time before making your way to the bathroom. You dyed your hair blue and cut it shoulder-length, as you wanted your appearance to scream "creativity". Your hair was usually bleached, so if you had to suddenly dye it for some sort of mission it would be faster and easier.

   One hour later you exited the bathroom, with blue hair and a brand new outfit that had been given to you. You grabbed all of your materials and exited the jet that hat landed not long before that.

   Time flashed by the second you stepped foot in Seoul. You were used to monotone scenarios, cold atmospheres, and torture, but Seoul was the opposite. The lights and colors of the city were inviting and the smiles of the old ladies selling food on the street gave you a warm feeling in your body.

  You tried to adjust to the city for the next day, and by 3 PM your assigned phone sounded with a ding. You checked it and read the message Junhwah had sent you.

   "9 AM. KQ Entertainment, two blocks down your home. They will be teaching you, you're supposed to be an intern. I expect excellence and nothing else."

   You took in the information and nodded to yourself as you read it.

   "Understood." You typed and hit send.

   You studied Hongjoong thoroughly that night. Every little movement, every peculiar habit, and every detail about the man. You wished you didn't need to do it however... The more you looked into him, the more you realized how pure, generous, hard-working, and amiable he was.

  "Fuck..." You cursed, dragging the 'u' in the word, as you threw your head back.

   You couldn't take watching that smile that would soon be gone anymore, so you just crashed in the small bed of your flat and waited for the next day.

   When 9 AM rolled in, you were already in the building, looking for some sort of guidance.

   "Are you Anne?"

   You whipped your head to find a man you'd never seen before. He certainly wasn't a member of ATEEZ, but he looked like an idol.

    It was finally time for you to perform as Anne, and so you put on a scaredy-cat face and bowed nervously.

  "Y-yes, yes I am."

  You made sure to add a little stutter for conviction. It seemed to convince the man, as he chuckled and extended his hand.

   "I'm Jiho, but I go by Zico." He paused as you smiled and shook his hand "I will be one of your mentors, along with Hongjoong. He's the leader of ATEEZ, have you heard of them?"

  You nodded your head slightly and he smiled.

  "You'll like him. Follow me then, he's already in the studio."

  Much to your dismay, Hongjoong was exactly what he displayed on camera. You half expected him to be rude and stuck-up, but he was just as kind and loving how as he made it look.

   Focus on the mission.

  Getting close to Hongjoong was easy. You pretended to be interested in every single task at hand, constantly asking for his help and even staying for longer than necessary at night.

  “Anne... You know you don't need to stay, right?" Hingjoong told you.

   His voice was tired, and he looked as if he needed to sleep for a day straight to catch up on missed sleeping hours but he still kept on working.

   "I know Joong but..." You paused, looking down at your feet and fiddling with your fingers, trying to sell your character as best as you could "I like to spend time with you."

   The last sentence came out a little too sincere for your liking, and for a second you became worried. All of the worry was replaced with confusion when Hingjoong brushed a strand of your hair behind your ear. You looked up at him as if to ask 'What are you doing?'.

   Hongjoong leaned forward and his lips ghosted over yours for a second. You didn't move, afraid of what the aftermath would be, but his impatience won over and he closed the gap.

   You hated it. You hated how amazing it felt, how your lips fit together, how you felt a wave of sparks throughout your body, how his hands burned on your thighs... You felt like your whole body was on fire and fuck, you wanted to grab him by the collar and pull him closer, but you couldn't.

   He pulled away, leaving you wishing for more. His stare instantly roamed around the room, avoiding your figure.

   "I-I'm sorry... I'm sorry if you feel it's rushed. I'm sorry if you didn't like it but I don't know... I feel a connection with you, you know? It's cheesy, but I've never met someone who loves to work as much as you, someone who's always inspired and who's always eager to learn more, someone so loving and creative."

   Your heart broke at the confession. It shattered into a million pieces that could never be put together again, and you hated what you were doing. You were knowingly breaking this man apart, tearing him up and destroying him bit by bit, and he had no idea, he just contributed to it.

   "Hongjoong I... I feel the same way. I love working with you and you're such an amazing person, I'm sorry if you never felt it, it's just that I'm really nervous around you."

  Those words were the hardest you had ever spoken, and the content smile in his face after your untruthful confession hurt more than any bullet you'd ever taken, or any knife that had ever stabbed you.

   A Lie. He was happy because of a lie, your lie.

   "Would you maybe join me for a drink tomorrow?"

   You bit your lip. You were sure that if your response had to be vocal, a sob would end up leaving your lips.

   You only nodded as a reply to his question, and said nod was met with the brightest smile you'd ever seen and a small nervous laugh.

   "It's a date then!" He cheered.

   "So it is..." You said, and pulled off the greatest fake smile.

   You looked at the clock on the wall and pretended you had no idea what time it was before you had noticed it.

   "Oh my! 3 AM!? I really must be going, I'll see you tomorrow Hongjoong!"

   You kissed his cheek and left with a small wave.

   The second you entered the flat, you threw your bag against the table and slid down the wall, face buried in your hands and the sobs you'd been holding back were let out and echoed in the almost empty room. You couldn't help but ket tears fall down your cheeks, wetting your palms in the process.

   You detested the feeling. You dispised the overwhelming guilt taking over you. You hated that Hingjoong probably strolled back to his flat and happily told his friends about how he had a date and was looking forward to it, you hated how your lie was selling perfectly.

    You stood up and stumbled across the room to find a mirror. You placed your hands on the sink for support and rested your forehead against the mirror.

   "You need to get closer to him... You need to know what he knows... You need to make him speak... You need him to expose his knowledge... You need to do this. It is but another job." You repeated to yourself, in hopes that perhaps this chaos in your mind and stabbing pain in your chest would leave and let you be.

   But it didn't. The pain only increased and became stronger, second after second. Hongjoong's face would sometimes flash on your mind, and a small smile would unintentionally spread on your lips.

   The next day came excruciatingly fast, and as soon as it was deemed acceptable to be awake, your phone made a ding, and you checked it immediately.

   Hongjoong told you about the time and place you'd be meeting in, and so you replied with an 'okay!' along with a couple excited emojis, although they represented nothing of what you were feeling, quite the opposite.

   You threw on whatever you thought would please him most: black thigh-high socks, a green flowy skirt, and a black and yellow crop top.

   Before you left to meet him you looked in the mirror and made sure to congratulate yourself for your work. You managed to carry on your mission, even though your wishes were to run away with this man and ket him live.

   You took a deep breath and made your way to the small bar nearby. You had no worries walking around at night in a short skirt, because you were surely not short on knives.

   It was a small place, decorated with rustic furniture and numerous rock and indie band items, ranging from albums, to picks, to guitars. The whole aesthetic fit Hongjoong pretty well, and when you spotted him in one of the tool chairs you realized how he morphed into the ambient. You smiled softly and approached him.

   "Hongjoong, hi!"

   You were immediately met with a blinding, toothy smile from the man, who stood up and immediately hugged you.

   Throughout the night, Hongjoong ecstatically told you about his life, his hobbies, his friends, and about everything and anything. He was thrilled to have you there and you found it adorable how he wasn't afraid to demonstrate his fondness.

    When it came the time to talk about you however, a sting hut your heart, and it's as if someone was squishing it from the inside of your body. But the lies flew out of your mouth naturally, telling him about a life you never had, about friends that weren't real, and about your untrue hobbies.

   It was all so amusing to him... Hearing all about Anne's life...

    The conversation came to a halt when the bartender approached you two.

    "I'm sorry guys but I'm going to have to ask you to leave, on weekdays we close at 2 AM."

   His mouth formed an "oh", and although neither of you said it, you both knew that you didn't want this to end. Fuck, you'd stay up for work for a longer amount of time...

   "Hongjoong do you maybe... Want to go back to my flat and hangout? It's nearby!"

   No, fuck what are you doing, crazy bitch.

   "Sure! I'd love to!" He replied, absolutely thrilled about your invitation.

    He held your hand tightly as you walked down the cold street towards your flat. You couldn't stop asking yourself why you had done it... Perhaps an inner wish that came out at an unfortunate timing?

    It took no longer than ten minutes for you to reach the apartment, and once you stepped in you felt the need to apologize.

    "I'm sorry... It's very small but it's all I need."

    Hongjoong shrugged and took his jacked off, he approached you and placed his hand in your chin, making you look up at him.

    "It's a cute apartment, just like you." He told you, whispering the last words.

   As if it was a magnet, his lips were drawn to yours in a much passionate kiss than your first.

    His tongue entered your mouth and left no corner unexplored, as his hands gripped your ass from under the skirt.

    You could taste the alcohol in his tongue, adding a new flavor besides desperation and neediness to the kiss.

   You were surprised at his dominant demeanor, yet it pleases you very much, and you were impatient to find where it leads you.

   Hongjoong's lips trailed down your jaw and eventually found your neck, where he left small bites, and sucked on the soft spots.

    "If you only knew what this skirt was doing to me..."

    Your hands found his jeans, that you quickly unbuttoned. You slid your hand inside of them and applied pressure on his hard-on with your palm.

    "I think I might be able to guess..."

    You bit your lip, and palmed him through his underwear. Hingjoong threw his head back for a second and chuckled lowly. He grabbed your neck and pulled your face close to his.

    "Fuck, you're such a tease." He moaned.

    Hongjoong removed your hand from his body and gripped your wrist so you'd follow him.

    He sat down on the bad and grabbed your waist, pulling you down in the process so you'd be straddling him.

    He kissed the spot below your ear and tugged on your earlobe.

   "I want you to ride me, baby.

   "Yes sir..." You whispered in his ear.

    You reached for the back of the skirt to unzip it, but hongjoong stopped you.

    "I want you to ride me, with your pretty little skirt on."

    You stopped straddling him and turned around, so he could perfectly see your naked ass as you stripped from your underwear.

    Hongjoong pulled down his pants and underwear slightly, and started stroking himself at the sight.

    You went back to him and straddled the man once more, helping him by placing his tip at your entrance before lowering yourself down on him. He filled you up just perfectly, and you hid your moans by burying your face in the crook of his neck.

    "I wanna hear your pretty voice baby." He asked of you, while striking your head.

    He gripped your hips and started moving you up and down, slowly at first. When you got used to the feeling, you started bouncing on his cock willingly, and he only helped by jerking his hips up and hitting deeper spots.

    Hongjoong slapped your ass continuously, his strength increasing every time you slammed down on his dick.

    You gripped his shoulders tightly.

    "Fuck Hongjoong, I'm about to cum!" You whined.

    The man lifted your skirt, so he could see the way he looked fucking you, and it was a sight to see.

  "Shit, you're so beautiful..."

  One of his hands gripped your neck, applying some pressure to it.

   "Hongjoong fuck you're so good!"

   Hingjoong came at the little praise, his thick liquid hitting your walls, and the warm sensation inside you made you reach your climax at the same time. The room was filled with whimpers, moans and heavy breathing, as you both came and tried to calm down.

   Hongjoong delivered a loving kiss to your lips.

   "God, you're amazing Anne."

   Anne.

   That's when it hit you. You couldn't do this anymore. You couldn't keep lying to the boy, making him live in a false relationship. The feeling was truly real but Anne was just a character.

   You had to put an end to it... You couldn't handle doing it any longer. It hurt you to see the boy thoroughly happy and satisfied by a façade.

    You stood up and walked to the kitchen, while Hongjoong got dressed. You pulled out your Glock 19 from one of the drawers and rolled the silencer onto it, carefully as to not alarm Hongjoong. You wanted to do this peacefully, you didn't want him to know about your betrayal. However, just as you approached the bed he was sitting in from behind, you let out a sob, and he turned around to look at you.

   You hadn't even noticed you were crying. You hadn't even noticed the burning sensation in your throat and the stream of tears in your face, but you certainly felt as if your heart was being pulled out of you, and thrown in a fire.

   Hongjoong's worried eyes looked at your face, then at your hand, and back at your face. A sad smile formed on his face and he nodded. He didn’t look disappointed or hurt, just... sad and apologetic, like he understood the situtation.

   "It's about the cocaine, isn't it?"

   You bit your lip and nodded, like he had done.

   You approached him and aimed the barrel at his head.

    "Honggjoong I'm... I'm so sorry." The last few words came out as a whisper.

    "So am I..."

     Before you pulled the trigger, he opened his mouth to speak once more.

    "Can I... At least know your name? Please?" He begged.

    Although he tried to remain calm, his voice was shaky and his eyes were covered with tears that threatened to fall, sooner or later.

    "My name is Y/N."

     He smiled, for the last time ever, and looked you in the eye, peeling his stare away from the gun's barrel.

     "Y/N, you look beautiful tonight."

     He blinked, allowing one last tear to stroll down his cheek, his smile never leaving his angelic face, as you cried, and pulled the trigger.

    The silent bang made you collapse, immediately regretting what you had just done. You looked at Hongjoong, looking as beautiful as ever, even if he was bathing in his own bloof, and caressed his face, letting your tears stain his shirt, as you realized you had committed the biggest mistake in your life, but you had no choice.

    "I'm sorry Hongjoong, may we meet again, in our next life."

[curechocolattymilk]

I am in a sorta rambling Skyrim mood again so if you want lists of my mods i have/want to keep for Skyrim Extended Cut’s release/want to get for a fresh save under S:EC uhh here you go??

MOD LIST IN GENERAL/AS A WHOLE (might be a long one)

Immersive Citizens - AI Overhaul

USSEP

Alternate Start

Cutting Room Floor

The Paarthurnax Dilemma

Khajiit Speak (disabled atm, only on for a Khajiit character I plan on remaking)

Wet & Cold SE

Static Mesh Improvement Mod (SMIM)

BarenziahQuestMarkers SSE

Immersive Patrols SE

Apocalypse

Ordinator

Horns Are Forever SE

Wildcat

Inigo

DigitigradeKhajiit_ArgonianRaptor

Falskaar (disabled & prob gonna be uninstalled. Wasn’t satisfied w the mod so i went back to a save before installing it that wasn’t too far back)

Run For Your Lives

Enhanced Lights & FX

True Storms SE (+Compatibility patch for W&C)

Civil War Aftermath

Hearthfire Multiple Adoptions & Custom Home Support SE

Derkeethus Dual

New Beginnings- AS Extension

No More Stupid Dog

D13 Faster Get Up SSE

Amazing Follower Tweaks SE

DWC Player Werewolf Replacer

Diverse Werewolves Collection

Dominions More Argonians

Immersive Good Boy

Skyrim Sewers

Convenient Horses

Fast Travel Ambushes & Consequences

Interesting NPCS/3DNPC (& with it, Cyb’s Overhaul) SE  Patches/Hotfixes

BAT- Bigger Argonian Tails SE

BS: Bruma SE (and patches)

Vigilant SE + Voiced English Addon SE

Cinematic Dragon Soul Absorption (disabled)

Shout - Immersive & Dynamic Overhaul

SkyUI SE + Flashing Savegames Fix

Destructible Display Cases

Dragon Stalking Fix

TK Dodge SE

Immersive Movement

Hun Lovaas & the mod authors other music replacer mods

Hoth

More Tavern Idles

Ultimate Combat SE

Library of Paarthurnax SSE

Dawnguard as vampire (didn’t want to lose part of my sould for the DG quest lol, turned right back into a werewolf)

Real Bosses (Light File)

Immersive World Encounters SE

Better Jumping SE

Kaidan 2

Race Menu

Miraak DB Follower + Dialogue Plus

Monster race crash fix (for the Play as a Dragon mod)

Lucien Flavius

Racial Body Morphs SE - Diverse body types & height

CWN - Civil War Neutrality SSE

Alt Conversation Camera

Guard Dialogue Overhaul SE

Deadly Dragons

Werewolf Feral Run

Bigger Tails for Werewolves

Predators - Werewolf & Vampire role playing tool (Lite version currently disable)

3DNPC Talkative Followers

Masque of Argonian Vile SSE

Talkative Dragons + Enigma Series

My Little Hatchling SSE + Adoptable Argonian Hatchling

Play As a Dragon

Growl - Werebeasts of Skyrim (I definitely recommend this for werewolf playthroughs! It doesn’t have Moonlight Tales’ features but its still balanced/fun & barely buggy in my experience)

Death is Highly Overrated redone 2020

SKSE64

MODS IM FOR SURE KEEPING/MAYBE KEEPING

To keep the bulletpoint list hopefully short: Patch/QoL mods that fix vanilla issues (i.e. USSEP, D13, SMIM, the like), follower mods (save for Miraak since S:EC seems to have something planned for him), mods done to tweak the Werewolf experience, combat & boss difficulty mods, Mods that overhaul NPCs dialogue/AI (guards, citizens in general), weather mods, music mods, & mods that make Argonians & Khajiit look a bit more fun are for sure staying! Any civil war mods I have might be trimmed off, debating on how S:EC approaches reworking the secondary story quest. That being said:

BarenziahQM - For the sole fact it makes that quest soo much better

Paarthunax Dilemma - a solid maybe? S:EC is also gonna do something bout this part of the Blades quest if I read their reddit post correctly, so I might just leave it disabled & see what happens first

Hearthfire Multiple Adoptions - yes pls let me make Tei a papa to every Skyrim also I need it to make Kaidan’s home available for the kiddos

Derkeethus - makes him a more decent follower but eeeh idk i rarely take him out often so it might be snipped itsa maybe

Destructible Display Cases- sometimes i’m too lazy to lockpick

No more Stupid Dog/Immersive Good Boy- Meeko is a good boy I should be able to tell him & also my kids + housecarls shouldn’t call him stupid >:(

More Argonians- I just like these funky reptiles (used to have More Khajiits too but it always would CTD at a certain inn w it installed. F)

Alternate Start- Makes things more spicy

CH- Sorta QoL for the skyrim horses, for sure staying

FTA&C- Again, makes things more spicy, but in the event of some group jumping you while traveling

Vigilant- Maybe?? It’s fun as hell but not really in character for Jeer-Tei. Perhaps re-enabled later as an end game thing alongside BS: Atmora whenever that comes out?

Shout- makes cooldowns more bearable so itsa keep

DSF- also a QoL mod

Immersive Movement + More Tavern Idles + Better Jumping + Immersive Encounters

AFT- big traveling groups are always fun/it makes it easier to horde keep all of Skyrim’s dogs

Race Menu + Racial BM SE- falls under “makes Argonians more fun” like some other argonian focused mods I guess? RBM plays around w everyones height and RM just lets you go buck wild (in a sfw way! unless...yknow you got nsf/w mods i guess) doesn’t hurt to specify tho lol

Alternate Convo Camera- Really fun!! Despite it pointing out how short my LDB is

Deadly Dragons- Makes fighting the Dovah much more fun w all the (honestly not as canon) diversity in looks & abilities! Can recommend, not too harsh on older devices either from what I know

Death is Highly Overrated

Play as a Dragon + Monster Race Fix- another hard maybe because well...you turn into a dragon which isn’t too immersive I guess?? Probably another “end game” mod for Tei

MODS IM EYEING/WANT TO GET (this post is so long so far I’m sorry)

Survival Mods!! (iNeed is one I’m looking at & maaaybe Frostfall?? idk i’ll have to see about that one i heard its not too fun for the Argonian gang) P much looking for something that’ll make exploring the wilds of Skyrim less of a bore

Camping + Hunting based mods! I’ve been eyeing Campfire & Hunterborn specifically, but open to any other suggestions. Same reasoning as survival mods, makes it more fun to travel! Plus, I’m going for an in character experience, it would fit Tei!

Khash & Auri follower mods. I’ve been eyeing these two for a bit, but from my experience w adding Kaidan & Lucien late game, I miss a lot of fun stuff D: So I’m planning on nabbing them for a fresh playthrough under S:EC (or at least, Khash! I uh...don’t know how to download mods manually/always mess it up & Auri doesn’t have the option to let Vortex do all the work unfortunately, but we’ll see!)

Maybe some nice armor mods?? Again nothing too heavy to handle but just to add some flavor(tm)

Saw a mod that made Animal AI a bit more realistic, might nab that

long shot but a mod that lets everyone refer to your LDB via they/them pronouns would be cool too but idk feel like it’d be a nightmare to attempt modder wise. Honestly i’d love the idea of having a mod or two that’ll let me confirm that Tei is trans themselves in game (3DNPC has a quest where you can say your character is, but that’s about it to my knowledge)! Buuut I’m unsure to search for any cause: 1) I don’t want to deal w transphobes ruining my searches & my day on Nexus & 2) Any curious google/bing searches keep bringing up Lovers lab & mmmm no thank you.

and uh...so far that’s the base of it? idk im still looking around & I might have to add/drop some things depending on like...how much my current computer can handle, Not grabbing any fancy graphics mods, that’s for sure lol

[mithranqueersmusings]

The Night Before XV

Chapter: 15/15

Rating: U

Summary: Ringo hangs around after the club closes and meets a stranger.

Tags: Smut, Slow Burn

Pairing: George Harrison/Ringo Starr (Background McLennon)

AO3 link here / Fic masterlist here

Ringo was quickly getting accustomed to the routine of waking up beside George, it was definitely a pleasant sight to open his eyes to first thing in the morning. Although it was rather strange being in someone else's bed, he couldn't deny that George's flat had a real warmth and cosiness to it. He thought back on the previous night fondly, scolding himself for ever being so concerned that it would've been anything less than perfect. Unfortunately it wasn't long before George was waking up too, meaning it was only a matter of time before they would have to break out of this peaceful serenity, the thought of returning to his flat alone again was already upsetting Ringo.

"Morning." George grumbled, evidently feeling very groggy.

"Morning." Ringo repeated, an instinctive smile forming on his lips.

George let out a groan as he stretched his body out, it didn't take Ringo long to learn that every morning was a struggle for George to get out of bed at a decent time. As George twisted and turned, Ringo noticed the marks on his wrists that had been left from the restraints, without much thought he caught one of George's arms and rubbed his thumb against the aggravated skin.

"It doesn't hurt does it?" Ringo asked, concerned.

George didn't realise what he was referencing at first, once he caught on he let out a casual laugh "Not at all. Even if it did, it'd be worth it."

Ringo held onto George for longer than necessary, eventually giving into his instincts completely and pulling him closer for a gentle kiss. The longer Ringo could drag out their time in bed together, the better. George was more than happy to oblige, lifting his leg to overlap with Ringo's hip so that they were pressed together even closer. Ringo slipped his hand under George's shirt, just to feel the warmth of his skin against his fingertips. George pulled away first, though didn't move too far as their noses were almost touching.

"I didn't take it too far did I? I was worried I'd be kinda throwing you in at the deep end." George rested his hand against his face.

"Not at all." Ringo chuckled softly "Don't get me wrong, I wasn't expecting it at all, so I was definitely shocked. But I was surprised how into the whole thing I was."

George hummed satisfied "You surprised me too. At least I know I can maybe turn it up a notch or two next time."

"There's more?" Ringo scoffed "Jesus, George... I'm really starting to think someone's paying you to torture me."

George paused, a knowing look on his face "I'm not gonna make the obvious joke here, as much as I want to."

"You don't have any plans today, do you?" Ringo asked cautiously, unable to look George in the eye so instead focused on his collarbones, trailing his finger along them.

"None at all, why?" George responded in kind.

"Well, not to run the risk of overstaying my welcome, it'd be nice to just chill together." Ringo spoke quietly "If you want to, of course."

"Of course I want to." George smiled, washing away any fear Ringo had "No sex, though... I need at least a day to recover from all that."

"You and me both." Ringo chuckled.

George reluctantly rolled out of bed, making his way over to the wardrobe to find something decent to wear. Ringo enjoyed the view, George peeling off his shirt so that he was stood there only in his boxers. Colours and patterns popped out from inside the wardrobe, Ringo couldn't help feeling rather bland in comparison as he watched George pull out a variety of options, each item of clothing more impressive than the last. Looking around George's room, it was clear that his unique perspective extended far beyond merely what he wore: the furniture was covered in imagery, whether it was from a multitude of stickers, crude drawings or more artful painting. Everything just screamed George, no corner of the room seemed to have been neglected. Ringo supposed he could get used to being in an environment like this.

"Planning on getting out of bed today?" George asked with an eyebrow raised, having thrown on some patterned trousers.

"If you give me a reason to, sure." Ringo responded playfully.

"Well I'm not about to serve you breakfast in bed, I'm not your maid." George took a few steps closer to the bed, hands on his slim hips.

"Shame, you'd make such a pretty one." Ringo pouted.

Despite his jokes, Ringo did manage to pull himself out of the comfort and warmth. He fished for his clothes in the living room, finding them dotted around the floor, before returning to dress himself. George already looked ready for the day, his hair brushed out and a black crop top thrown on to cover his chest but leave his stomach exposed.

"Have you always dressed like that?" Ringo asked, slipping back into his trousers.

"Like what?" George knitted his eyebrows together quizzically, clearly wanting to hear Ringo's description of his dress sense.

"Just very- Expressive." Ringo treaded carefully, George laughed at his caution.

"Not always." George finally answered "I just think fashion should be fun, you know? Everyone's so serious about everything..."

"Couldn't agree more." Ringo smiled.

George led the way into the kitchen, which was filled with even more houseplants than the living room. There were a few music posters taped to the wall: Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Roy Orbison to name a few, it reminded Ringo of his teenage bedroom.

"Your place is incredible." Ringo said, a little taken aback, as he slid to sit at the small table.

"Thanks." George replied with his head in the fridge "I want to move soon, though."

"Really? I can't image why." Ringo continued noticing small details in the room: the novelty salt and pepper shakers, the aged recipe books piled on the counter.

George began starting work on breakfast "Well, I do love it here but I really want a place with a garden. I'm starting to run out of space for these guys." He gestured broadly to the plants.

"Yeah... I've never met anyone with so many before." Ringo chuckled.

"Safe to say I'm a little obsessed." George focused on the food, but the warmth never left his voice "I work at the garden centre, actually. If you were curious."

"Oh, that must be nice." Ringo admired George from where he was sat "I don't think I've ever been, actually."

"What?" George almost shouted "We have to go!"

Ringo laughed, a little caught off guard "Is it really that good? I thought it was just a bunch of old people."

"Well, that's not untrue." George began cracking eggs into a pan "It's not really that special, I just like it there. I get a discount too so if you wanna get any plants, which you should want to, I can sort it for you."

"Why do I feel like you're threatening me?" Ringo chuckled.

"Maybe I am, just a little." George snickered.

They continued talking and joking over their breakfast, luckily for Ringo no under-the-table action occurred this time. Not soon after they were relaxing on the sofa, flicking through the variety of terrible daytime television on offer. They settled on a show about home renovation, always commenting on whether the end result was even an improvement at all, as though they were both experts in the field.

After George got up to put the kettle on, he decided to invade Ringo's space on the sofa by cuddling up into his front. Ringo couldn't deny that there wasn't really enough space for this kind of intimacy, but he allowed it all the same, running his hand over to George's stomach to keep him in place.

The hours soon passed by, neither of them wanting to acknowledge how late it was becoming. Ringo wished he could've stayed here forever, but he knew that was taking things a little too far. As the daylight began to fade, he had to face the fact that he had work in the morning and couldn't really afford to spend another night with George. He decided he should at least have a shower, just to prolong the amount of time he could spend here. When he re-emerged, George was spread out on the bed with a book in his hand.

"So... I should probably get going." Ringo announced, drying off his hair roughly with a towel.

George set his book down and frowned "Suppose you can't stay here forever."

"No, unfortunately not." Ringo sighed, both of them looking at one another but saying nothing further.

The moment dragged on for a little while longer, neither saying anything but it was fairly clear what they were both thinking.

"Before I go, though, I wanted to ask you..." Ringo began, doubting the words as soon as they left his mouth.

"What?" George asked expectantly, sitting upright on the bed.

"I don't want to rush into anything, but- I just wondered what you thought about maybe, only if you want to, maybe making things a little more... exclusive?" Ringo cursed his ineloquence.

George laughed and for a second Ringo worried he'd misread everything entirely, until George spoke "Ringo, if you're gonna ask me out you're gonna have to do it properly."

Ringo paused then tried once more "George, do you wanna be my-"

"Yes." George cut him off with a grin.

"Great." Ringo exhaled with a nervous laugh.

George slid off the bed, approaching Ringo with a familiar look in his eyes "You're not about to leave your boyfriend without a kiss goodbye, are you?"

"Of course not." Ringo whispered as George moved in closer, locking their lips together.

Ringo had to use every ounce of restraint in his body to pull away from George, or else they'd no doubt be repeating the scenes of last night before long. It nearly broke his heart to leave George like this, knowing that both of them would do just about anything to spend more time together, but he could leave satisfied with the knowledge that this was only the beginning of what was hopefully a long relationship.

Things had already been fairly eventful, and it hadn't even been a month that the two of them had known each other. Whatever else was in store, Ringo unabashedly looked forward to it, for the knowledge that George was now his own, made him feel like everything was going to be perfect from here on out.

[afoxysunny]

I've been thinking of so much more for my Lazybug AU but stress at work and my contused hand made it impossible to write anything down or try to draw any more

So, to give you at least a little content you didn't ask for while my hand only hurts a little:

I present to you

The different fighting styles of each Miraculous Holder

Lil explanation: though it's never directly stated in Miraculous Ladybug canon i see it ad heavily implied that, when a Kwami powers up a human, they somewhat fuse. Not like the fusion Ha dance. But a human will display not only physical but character traits from the Kwami of their Miraculous. They're still clearly the same person! Just with a few tweaks to their priorities most of the time. So yes, pointing this out so clearly brings this close to theory or headcanon territory but shhh it's my au, i make the rules

Trixie as Lucky Bug

Lucky Bug has a strong instinct to fight, there are only very few things that could stop her from heading into battle.

Trixie is always set for confrontation and Tikki has the unwavering urge to always do whatever is possible to help. The combination of these two working together as one gives Lucky Bug her strength to take on everything that stands in her way.

When in battle She will make sure to keep her opponents attention fully on herself. She holds the strong belief that while she bears the brunt of attacks she can make sure nobody else gets hurt and that's how she fights. Thanks to the weapon her Miraculous grants her she can exceed in close combat as well as having quite ranged attacks. The lather she will mostly use to pull someone's attention away from others if necessary. Closer ranged combat is definitely her preference though. Here she can use her magical yo-yo like a morningstar and really hammer down in fight. A yo-yo with endlessly extendable cord is incredibly versatile and Lucky Bug is smart enough to always find new ways to mobilize this weapon but good old brute force shouldn't be underrated.

Stephanie as Pitch Serval

Pitch Serval always has an urge to move and that definitely includes battle. Once she gets going there is nothing that'll get her standing still again.

Stephanie will literally jump at any opportunity to start moving and help others, Plagg has deep confidence in his abilities and will let everyone know. In combination that makes Pitch Serval a little bit of a show off. While well able to quietly observe a situation, once she gets into action she will not stop until the job is done.

Watching Pitch Serval fight looks more like watching a professional dancer who just so happens to beat people up while performing. The extendable pole she got as a weapon seems almost to become part of her body. In fluid motions she is capable of a variety of attacks that are both unpredictable without the music only she must hear and so natural that it becomes mesmerizing to watch. Whether she actually fights with the pole for proper hits or uses it to propel herself around, it will be effective and beautiful.

Sportacus as Álfurildi

Álfurildi is not a fan of fighting in a confrontational sense, however, practiced as a sport he finds great enjoyment in it. To him the only reason to actually fight is to protect others.

Sportacus was already a locally famous hero before receiving a Miraculous and brings all the best qualities this encompasses to the table. Nooroo however is a hurt soul, as a surviver of horrible abuse by a past master it took him a long time to extend enough trust to willingly give his powers to someone else again. The combination of these two makes Álfurildi appear a lot more calm or even reserved compared to the Sportacus we all know and love. It makes him worry more and more careful but he's still very energetic, confident and capable in basically anything he tries.

This of cause reflects in his style of battle. Until he's made sure his opponent cannot be swayed without it he won't go in for an attack so most of his battles he spends dodging his opponents attacks while making sure to stay close enough to keep tge encounter from breaking off. He encompasses the phrase "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" as watching him avoid the incoming attacks looks almost supernatural at times, like gravity just doesn't apply to him the same way it does to others. His in depth mastery of most sports in existence surely help with that. Once he switches lanes to actually attacking himself he will use the cane that is his assigned weapon almost exclusively like a bat or racket or other similar sport equipment. You surely can image the punch that packs.

Robbie as Bullock

Bullock is not one to start a fight but he sure is great at ending them, by winning obviously.

Robbie has efficiency, wit and persistence on his side. Stompp, caring and deterninted, speaks his mind without hesitation. These two together give Bullock a reserved and stubborn appearance but when fending for what is right those are strong attributes to have.

Bullock operates best when following a plan so he will mostly be seen as a detached observer which can be accurately described as the calm before the storm. The phrase "mess with the bull, you get the horns" might as well have been coined just to describe him. Once he starts fighting he is quite literally going to bulldoze his opponent. With the ease from a Kwami's powers elaborate movements require no effort anymore do the usually so lazy man can now go all out, but old habits die hard so he aims to be done fighting as quickly as possible. This results in his attacks coming in rapid fire blasts of assaults. Using his armored fists and legs for precise hits, the chain of his tail like a whip and even his horns make him an overwhelming opponent in close combat. At distance, any distance, his miraculous granted weapon, his darts, never miss a target he locked on to and can only be removed by him so no fight will stay at distance for long.

Pixel as Spectra

Spectra needs a good overview of the ongoing battle to unleash the modt effective Amok but that surely doesn't stop him from getting physically involved once the chance arises.

Pixel follows his strong intuition and always has a quick and effective solution to help others out, Duusu is straight forward about everything and easily get enthusiastic. With this passionate combination Spectra often jumps into battle with his friends despite that not being the most logical step. His powers and costume lend themselves a lot easier to defensive fighting, more blocking, enduring, studying and only then striking. Thanks to his extensive theoretical knowledge from video games he knows an expansive array of moves only someone fighting with a fan as their weapon can use so once he gets his chance to actually fight he is far more effective than he would expect from himself.

Jives as Grinder Turtle

Grinder Turtle is really not much of a fighter. But there will never be anything in his way when he has someone to protect.

Jives is a very calm guy, the human embodiment of the gentle giant trope. Wayzz has persistence, patience and a deep respect for everybody. This combination makes Grinder Turtle incredibly passive in battle. He will use his shield only to push people away, which works great because as someone who is much taller than almost everyone he always has the high ground; but for the most part he finds his spot in the back of the team to set up his Shell-ter for them and be content holding up a safe space for everyone.

This style of fighting unfortunately takes a lot of energy out of him, leading to him quickly losing the turtle miraculous to Stingy.

Jives as High Duke

High Duke finds his flow in fighting. Here he can let lose and push himself to his limits.

Again, Jives is calm and unshakable, always too passive to not get along eith everybody. Now, Xuppu playful and mischievous, holding enjoyment to high value. Their combination makes High Duke a force to be reckoned with. They fuse in perfect addition to each other, making him a well confident, experimental fighter who does exactly what feels right in the moment. His wish to protect everyone around him, now fueled with confidence from a new perspective, allows him to move swiftly during battles like he never did anything else.

Thanks to the flexibility this transformation gifts him with he doesn't just stand back and wait anymore, he jumps head first into the fight. His favorite ways of attack is to duck down all the way to the ground and use his weapon, his staff, or the rope he has as a tail to trip his opponents, and to use the dtaff as leverage to jumo high in the air and strike from up above with great force.

Stingy as Vault

Vault is a presence that demands attention, with powerful attacks to back it up he is a heavy hitter even though he isn't so prone to charge to front line.

Stingy's determination and confidence elevate his sharp focus even more while Wayzz is anchored, calm and has a great sense of duty. The combination they create gives Vault a presence of security everyone can feel. He is strong and unwavering in what he does and knows it full well.

There is a weight in his stance like nothing can make him falter, even when not creating a Shell-ter around himself he is undeniable at the center of something powerful. With this mass of confidence he doesn't just hold on to his shield to push intruders back but it also becomes a projectile weapon to knock opponents out from afar. Though he isn't as animated as others on the team each move he makes carries weight and purpose everyone can see.

Ziggy as Mouse the Mighty

Mouse the Mighty looks harmless compared to what he is capable of. He will fight with all he has for what he believes in.

Ziggy is a simple guy, excited by the best qualities of a hero and deterninted to work as hard as possible to achieve whatever goal he has. Mullo has an optimistic approach to everything and shies away from no challenge. Together they make Mouse the Mighty eager to show everyone the qualities of a true superhero

Fueled with so much excitement he could overflow he sonetines bites off more than he can chew. When he rushes into battle, blinded by the chance to prove himself his flight response is a little too strong and he uses his Miraculous power to split into many tiny versions of himself to run away, halfway through running he remembers who he id though, how powerful he now is and that his friends need him and he comes back with even more confidence and determination than he started with.

He has all it takes to be an outstanding hero and once he gets going he shows all he got. Armed with the knowledge of pop culture and the brain of a suorrhero obsessed boy he can quickly switch styles drastically mid movement. This unpredictability together with his size varying from one bear to many mice makes him practically unstoppable. Not only does he have brute force at his disposal but also he uses his weapon, a jumprope, like nunchucks or to trip people or any other way he once saw and thought looked cool.

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I hope you enjoyed this. I was just hoping i could breath a little more life into the characters I've been playing around with for a while now but you so far only got one still image of each (also hoping to change that soon, I'm really working on that story)

For some of the Kwami's there's just barely any info about them, i hope it doesn't show too much where i was just winging it

[trunkzbriefs]

Any Son and/or Briefs family headcanons? Spicy hot takes? Truths Toriyama and Toyotaro themselves can not handle? Straight up lies?

GODDAMN SORRY this took a while cause i suck at putting thoughts together. i apologize for my obvious briefs bias i have more hcs for them than the son family despite loving them both :pensive: anyway heres some random stuff

briefs hcs:

all of the briefs are pros at non-verbal communication. i hc that saiyans have their own language (and also in my own Mind Canon they still have their fuckin tails) and a lot of it is done through tail movement/body posture/grunts/etc. etc so theyve all sort of picked that up. even bulma, who doesnt have a tail, is pretty good at getting across what she means without actually speaking. they still do speak normally but it comes in handy sometimes considering that both trunks and vegeta are prone to running out of speaking energy or getting very frustrated with words, so having another way to communicate works very well for them

vegeta is fffffffffffffffffffurry. without getting too deep into my own General Saiyan hcs (thats why i made a whole ass four subspecies!!) i think that the entirety of planet vegeta tended to be very hot aside from the part where the castle was, where the temperature would drop. meaning that saiyans working in the palace would grow thicker fur around certain parts of their body, and in the royal saiyans theyd be Especially fluffy. he kept it down on earth, but he has thick patches of fur around the bottom parts of his arms and legs. kind of like snowy boots and gloves! he also has fur that grows in on his neck like a lions mane.

future trunks is an actions sponge, vegeta is a words sponge. vegeta will pick up words VERY quickly regardless if he fully understands the meaning of it or not (completely inspired by 'THATS RIGHT BOYS... MONDO COOL' in z) and future trunks will unintentionally mimic the actions of people - around people he looks up to he might take a few small mannerisms from but this extends to copying the disposition of anyone; he's just very adaptive. this is the most obvious (and funniest) when he's around vegeta bc it really shows like. yeah damn that sure is vegeta's son

vegeta & bulla have an intimidating bastard smirk naturally. their natural smiles are pretty frightening and they have to put effort into a 'normal' one. this also extends to current trunks, his default smile is the Vegeta Bastard Smirk but he learned to have a normal smile quicker than his father and sister. future trunks has a slightly unnerving natural smile (the fact that his pupils are always drawn so fucking small makes me hc that he just has a very intimidating look of 'cat thats about to pounce on an unfortunate trapped mouse' whenever he smiles) but he learned to look normal even quicker than current trunks since he's around humans a Lot and is sort of their uh, Hope. don't want to look scary to the people who depend on you!

bulma has some fighting knowledge and mildly good ki control. vegeta taught her it as a just in case so that she'd be able to defend herself against Bigger threats if he wasn't there and also so she could raise her own ki to alert someone to her if she had to.

vegeta is extremely clean and can not stand to have things disorganized for more than like... an hour before he has to tidy everything up. every time he goes down to the lab and bulma is passed out in a pile of bolts and circuit boards it kills him inside just a little bit

future trunks has little concept of power control. since his timeline was always in danger it wasn't really an important thing for him to learn. the amount of mugs he's accidentally crushed is impressive

vegeta tends to not sound like he's asking questions when he is. he doesn't add the proper infliction to the end of his questions and just sounds flat most of the time. it's confusing to people who dont know him well.

im not even gonna lie, im a BIG fan of the chill demon panchy headcanon so i love the idea that the briefs have a Lil bit of demon in them but just dont know it ghjnkm

[banging my fists on the 'hcs that not even got could take away from me' table] future trunks has OCD

vegeta doesn't really get labels but he's bisexual & "debatably a man", bulma is bisexal & bigender transfem (sometimes shes Wamen and other times its like "gender? no"), bulla is a nonbinary lesbian, current trunks is a bisexual trans man & future bulma forgot to explain the concept of gender and sexuality to future trunks so he's a little confused on that front and his gender & sexuality are "i have literally never thought abt these concepts in my life but i think men are nice. i refuse to think about gender though" (i actually have two main hcs for future trunks which are either gay trans man or more-feminine-presenting nonbinary bisexual)

son hcs:

goku is Not as fluffy as vegeta at all, but he does have fur on certain parts of his body. namely on the back of his elbows + ankles, down his back connecting to his tail, and on his shoulders. its inherented from gine!

gohan is learning saiyan language from vegeta! vegeta acts grumpy about it but he's glad to have someone to teach. when gohan learned that most of the history had been lost he basically wished shenron for a big ol book on saiyan culture and gave it to vegeta just as an act of kindness and vegeta was like [in an angry voice but very touched] "Ok. Sit down. You're learning." by extension gohan is also teaching the rest of his family!

i will take ox king being actually non-human to my grave so like, chichi has horns and a very short ox tail! gohan and goten both have horns, but they're hidden by hair. goten's horns are bigger than gohans.

goten also has a more ox-like tail, with a little puff of fur at the end. generally, gohan looks more saiyan-like and goten looks more ox/human-like.

although he keeps up his cheery demeanor very well, goku is still haunted pretty badly by like... everything that’s happened in his life. he still has frequent nightmares about cell & buu specifically.

gohan will freak out at worse, zone out at best, if he's even tapped on the neck. it reminds him of the whole 'getting his neck snapped on namek' so that area is pretty off limits to everyone

goten gets along really well with android 17. they both have a love for nature and 17s kind of like his chill uncle, so whenever he gets too stressed out or just needs a break you can find him face down on the ground outside of 17's place on monster island.

goku is really really good at remembering completely random shit. bulma uses this to her advantage whenever she's working and has him memorize random technology stuff. a week later goku can not remember what he had for breakfast that morning but as soon as bulma asks "hey do you remember what i told you last week" hes like "oh yeah sure i have no idea what it means but [blurts out three hours worth of technical garble]"

oh boy is this a headcanon that has a lot more depth to it than just a bullet on a tumblr post, but gohan has DID!

goku, like vegeta, doesnt get labels either, and does not even Try, ask him about any of it and hes like "i dont get the gender thing but i think lots of people look nice :)" gohan is gay and like vegeta, "debatably a man", goten + chichi are both bi nonbinary, & pan is a lesbian trans woman.

both:

bulla and pan are both into music! i think theyd mess around making their own stuff w/ launchpads

i have a general hc of ki mixing or shielding, essentially, if youre close enough to someone people wont be able to tell apart your ki and you can also 'shield' someone with your ki for a small amount of time. if vegeta has his energy low, his and bulma's energy are the same. same thing with goku and chichi! goten and trunks are near impossible to tell apart, and same thing with gohan and videl.

though goten and trunks are both protective over their younger siblings, gotenks is that protectiveness times a thousand. look at bulla or pan wrong for 2 seconds and you're going to have an angry gotenks in your face asking if you have any last words. i like to think that trunks and goten fused casually a lot, especially around the time where bulla and pan were young, so its basically goten and trunks own attachment to them PLUS gotenks' attachment to them as his own person combined.

i like to pretend end of z did not happen the way it did so uub, using nimbus, travels back and forth a lot. goku isn’t the only one who teaches him how to fight as goten, gohan and trunks all think of him like a little brother and love training with him!

fuck you letters to toriyama/toyotaro hot takes:

cell, as cool of a villian as he is, definitely should have had a creepier final form. or multiple- just something that really drives in the fact that he's made up of other's dna & fuckin ABSORBS people. also his first two forms should have had a different absorbtion method other than the tail thing (not the drinking thing thats fine) it just feels.   Weird. not good

it would have been far more interesting to keep the bitter attitude towards vegeta that future trunks had imo... in super trunks was going through a Lot granted but the fact tht he wasnt more confrontational to vegeta being a dick to him seemed kind of off considering his attitude in z i just.. think it would be interesting and far better if they had more of a back and forth 'family but lowkey hate each other' relationship

i dont want to rant about super so heres some super condensed takes, goku black arc specific because thats 90% of what ive seen of super:

mai is a fucking freak ass weirdo, why did they not just make another character to pair with trunks

trunks not flipping the fuck out at his timeline being erased feels... out of character. also trunks deserved the win against zamasu

future bulma did NOT need to die

trunks should have just stayed in the current timeline

please fucking let trunks and goten grow up. we SAW a version of trunks who looked 14 (history of trunks....) and the versions of goten & trunks we have r/n in super do not look 13/14 respectively what in the goddamn hell is going on in the character design department

super definitely should have taken place later down the line

supers version of bulma and videl look awful. why are they That stick like.

vegeta needs to kill frieza. just once.

fu has enough potential to be a very interesting mainline character and i am so sad he's not

i would actively enjoy a sdbh anime with more  budget that isnt just a promo anime and has a plot that makes sense... i think db should have more wild spinoffs

xenoverse deserved a better story that went FULL in on the 'what if' type of timelines- like they did in raging blast which is a FUCKING GREAT GAME

straight up lies:

dragon ball z is a good series

[baconpal]

Bravely Default and BD2

Here it is, the partially prompted bravely default rant/retrospective/whatever the fuck!

With the announcement and demo of bravely default 2 out now for a bigger market than the original game ever had, I feel that as a massive fan of the original I should put some amount of effort into explaining what the appeal of the original is, why bravely second missed a lot of the appeal, and why bravely default 2 has been very, very worrying so far.

If you care about any of that, come on in and I'll try to actually avoid spoilers this time and make this a more legitimate recommendation of a game than usual.

THE APPEAL OF BRAVELY DEFAULT The games obviously have a beautiful art style, especially when it comes to the backgrounds. Every city is like a painting, a beautifully composed shot that you see from just one direction to give you one very strong impression. While the overworld and dungeons are fully 3d and do not have as strong of an artistic impact, they are still very competent and have good colors and cohesive elements. The character design, including the job outfits, the monsters, and all the villains are just top notch. Simple, evocative designs that make the most of the 3DS' limited hardware and build upon the teams skill in making handheld games look good. (its the same team that did the ff3 remake and 4 heroes of light, which looks absolutely kino on original DS) The music is also consistently excellent, with great use of motifing, a full and varied orchestra, and many good slow paced tracks for most of the non-combat segments. Shit like "Conflict's Chime" being the main battle theme, "Infiltrating Hostile Territory" being a common dungeon theme, and "That person's name is" as the rival boss themes makes even the seemingly repetitive songs a constant joy to listen to.

The story is pretty decent, it's not the best part of the game, and there are definitely some aspects of the story some people loathe, but the characters (specifically ringabel fuckin love him) are pretty good and the make for an enjoyable experience. The side material like D's journal are really well done and integrate into the main narrative well for how tucked away and ignored it is.

The gameplay and systems are also some of the best of any RPG I've played, and I've played far too many. The job system from ff3 and 5 is brought to an even greater depth with the addition of universal job abilities, allowing any character of any job make use of another jobs features to create an endless depth to strategy. The way various jobs can mingle together, and how no job is completely perfect on its own makes for very compelling team composition and unit design. The extensive amount of jobs helps as well for replay value and for assuring that no easy winning strategy is found by all players.

The BP system makes battles take on a very unique pacing as the player and enemies can choose to save up turns or blow them all at once to make more complicated strategies possible, or to make the most of an enemies vulnerabilities. This powerful option gives the player a meaningful way to capitalize on their knowledge of the game, while also allowing them to make truly detrimental mistakes. That may sound not good if you're a fucking baby, but nobody wants an RPG you cant lose, but losing because you fucked up is much better than losing because the enemies are just stronger than you or anything to that effect.

But the single greatest part of bravely defaults, which creates the games wonderful balance and unique design philosophy, is that the player is expected to hit the level cap long before finishing the game. Reaching level 99 should occur somewhere just after the middle of the game, at the point where the player has access to almost every job and has encountered almost every type of threat. Reaching level 99 brings with it a certain security, the implication that from then on, all enemies will also be level 99, and that any failure to defeat an enemy will be a result of a bad strategy or the players own mistakes. The game is not easy, and is certainly intended for veteran final fantasy players used to the games with job systems and changing up your entire party to combat a single encounter. Leveling up is not a slow grind part of the game, as you have a lot of control over the speed and frequency of battles, and it is not difficult to keep up with the games level curve.

The other layer to this unique design is that the game expects you to "cheat", or use strategies that would be overpowered and frowned upon in most other games. Bravely default easily expects you to know or discover strategies such as: applying a status to all enemies and killing every enemy with that status using another spell, cycling a counter move over and over to have a nearly invincible party member, applying a healing attribute to a self-damaging character to get huge damage at little cost, casting reflect and dangerous spells on your own party to bounce them at the enemy, or duplicating a move that does maximum damage 15 times in a row. The game builds all of its encounters with the knowledge that your team will be the maximum level and that you will be using the most vile tactics you can come up with, and the game will do the same. Bosses and even common enemies will employ equally vile tactics using the exact same moves that you have access to, meaning you can learn from your enemies or quickly grasp the enemies strategy through your own experiences. One of the late game dungeons is entirely optional, but involves several fights against parties of 4 just like your, using the same jobs and skills you have gained during the game as a perfect test of your ability to develop counter-strategies, instead of relying on your own overpowered tactics. This type of design is really not something you find in many games due to the prominence of grinding or the lack testing strategies, and it is the most true appeal of bravely default to me.

BRAVELY SECOND EXISTS I GUESS So bravely second, a direct sequel to bravely default, definitely is a video game. It uses the original game as a base to generate more content, but completely misses the appeal of the original, and the new content added makes the experience even less focused. Overall, it's still a fairly alright RPG, but it fails to follow up on bravely default in a meaningful way or to provide as compelling of a gameplay experience. Here's some of the things it fucked up.

The game reuses almost everything the original game had, including the same music, world map, and most of the original's towns and dungeons, while adding a few of it's own. Going through areas you've been before never feels good, and the new areas lack the quality or brevity of the original game, leading to uninteresting areas that overstay their welcome, despite being the only break from repetitively reused content.

This extends to the classes but in an even worse sense. One important trait of the original jobs is that they were not perfect by themselves. While every job provided some useful abilities to be shared with other classes, or provided a good base with which to make a character, no class was without flaws. The new classes in bravely second are a lot of the opposite, they are closed loops that think of everything they could have to make a good standalone character. The 4 starter classes you get in bravely second are all brand new, and there's almost no reason to use any class besides those 4 as they are just insanely good. The priest and magician specifically augment magic in a way that makes spells infinity scalable into the end game, completely trampling on any other magic classes territory without needing the extra effort of grinding a new class out. Many of the new job concepts are actually really interesting, like going back in time to return to a healthier state, or a class that changes the stats and attributes of all units in a battle, allowing for all new kinds of strategies; but these classes lack any opportunity to be used to their full potential since they don't mesh well with other jobs and are limited by their self-centered design.

Another completely missed aspect of the original is the level curve discussed before. Bravely second only really requires you get somewhere in the ballpark of level 60-70 to comfortably beat the final boss, and getting too leveled up is really hard to avoid if you are plan to try out various jobs.

Second also fails to account for how many incredibly strong strategies the player can come up with, and even introduces some of its own strategies that it has no way to counteract, such as halfsies (the first skill the first class gets) pretty much splitting the game in two by tripling the value of items like phoenix downs, and allowing for fool-proof strategies by making 1 character focus entirely on defense, effectively making the party unkillable. Essentially, if you play second after having played the original (like any sane person would) then you will absolutely destroy the game with no sense of satisfaction.

The story is also a large step down, enough to become an annoyance, as the writing style changes to a strange romantic comedy situation with, for lack of a better term please forgive my sin, anime writing, but like bad anime writing, ya know the kind of shit that makes people write off all anime cus a lot of it is awkward and unpleasant to listen to. The story tries to mess with some big concepts like "what if new game + was a real thing???" and time travel and shit like that but it doesn't mesh with the tone the rest of the game has and that tone doesn't mesh with the world or art style and it's just a mess.

BRAVELY DEFAULT 2 SEEMS KINDA POOPIE SO FAR So unfortunately, the big appeal of bravely default being part of it's end game makes it hard to judge how 2 is gonna go given we only have a demo of the beginning, but given that the original team behind bravely default has slowly been stripped out of the series as it goes on, the outlook is bleek.

Most immediately obvious is that the artstyle has made a horrible transition from handheld to console, somehow even worse than pokemon. The areas are all fully 3d and lack the style or compositional excellence of bravely default, and the outside environment look like asset store products. The small proportioned characters with simple features to be readable on a small screen have been replaced with identically proportioned characters with excessive detail and ugly features, and look horrible up close on a big screen. Only the negatives of the art style have made it over, and everything good has been made unsavory. The character and enemy design overall is much worse as a result, everything is messy, unclear, and clashes with everything else. It's an absolutely shocking downgrade.

The characters themselves are overly hammy and feel like shallow attempts to have a similar party dynamic to the original without having identical character types, and the writing as a whole doesn't seem to have improved from second, which was already quite a step down from the original.

The gameplay also has not done anything different or interesting yet, and seems to be selling itself to people haven't heard of or gotten enough of the BP system. Enemies being on the overworld as opposed to random encounters shows they have dropped the player agency over encounter frequency, which is dumb. The battles lack any of the flow the original had, especially when using the battle speed option, as the camera does not present everything very well and changes position often as a result. Overall, I have not enjoyed the bravely default 2 demo and feel it shows nothing but a continued decline in the series that likely should have just been a single game. With the release date being set for sometime this year, I feel there is no chance any amount of player feedback could save the game or even begin to pull it in the right direction, as it seems to be fundamentally flawed with an inescapable feeling of shovelware.

SO WHAT? Basically, all I wanted to say here is that the original bravely default is a very unique experience I think every RPG fan should give a good chance (and just do all the optional stuff during the "repetitive" part of the game, it's where all the best content is you bozo) and that the sequels are NOT the same experience. I guess it's kind of mean to just say "hey don't buy or like this new thing cus its not like the old thing" but people should know why there's a bravely default 2 in the first place, and should fight for what made the original great. I worry that BD goes down the same sad path that FF did, becoming a completely hollow, middling series that strayed so far from it's home that a whole new series had to be made to give the fans of the old style a place to go.

Thanks for reading, and hope you got something out of it.

[ladyofmaidensandwine]

Day 8

Day 8 of the Hello Spring 2020 Writing Prompt Challenge

Characters- Dean Winchester, Fem! Reader, Ellen Harvelle

Warnings- Classic Rock. Insult it, and face my wrath.

Prompt- “Can I call you?”

Wordcount- 1,345

             Humming the tune of AC/DC’s Girl’s Got Rhythm you served up drinks and polished glasses efficiently. Ellen’s Roadhouse saw plenty of traffic, most of which was hunters looking for a way to celebrate a success, or mourn a failure. You yourself were a well-known hunter, specifically for the kill-count record you held as the undefeated heavyweight champ of werewolf slaying, but you liked to work at Ellen’s bar when you took breaks from tracking down another fanged and furred beast. You didn’t even realize you were still humming the classic rock song as you poured a glass of whiskey for a man you hadn’t really looked at, but he did. 

            “AC/DC, huh? Didn’t take you for a fan.” The man said, voice low, smooth, and making you snap your eyes his way. “Sorry, I forget I’m even doing it.” You laughed. “Wait, if you’re on of those people who diss AC/DC, I’m going to advise you to get a drink from a different bartender.” You said seriously, eyes narrowed at the man. You took advantage of his brief surprise to give him a once-over. Tall, broad-shouldered, muscular, and with a jawline that could cut diamonds, and bloody hell, those eyes. Too bad he hated good music. “What, you kiddin’? I mean, they’re no Led Zeppelin, but they’re a classic!” He scoffed, as though even suggesting he disliked rock offended him deeply. “That’s not a fair comparison considering Stairway to Heaven is the greatest rock song ever written, but I’ll let it slide.” You winked, the green-eyed man giving you a toothy and crooked grin. “Where the hell have you been my whole life?” Green-eyes grinned, extending a hand. “Name’s Dean.” “Y/N. So, ignoring your misguided opinion that Led Zeppelin is better than AC/DC, what else do you like?” You asked.

            You and Dean talked and laughed for the better part of three hours, swapping favourite songs and bands, and testing each other’s rock knowledge. “A ‘67 Impala? Damn. My baby’s a ‘57, Bel Air. Got the white wall tires and everything.” You shared,Dean whistling in admiration. “Sounds like a beauty. You’re an awesome chick, Y/N. Sweet ride, good taste, in music and men,” Dean winked as you rolled your eyes, “and you’re a hunter.” “A what?” You asked, deciding teasing him could be fun. Dean turned pale. “Oh shit- uh, y’know, I thought you were-” “I am. I didn’t tell my last name, did I? Y/N L/N, werewolf huntress extraordinaire.” You bowed dramatically, Dean breaking into relieved laughter. “Jesus, woman, tryin’ to give me a heart attack, or what? Really got me for a minute. I’m Dean Winchester, by the way. Started-the-apocalypse-on-accident-and-died-a-million-times Dean Winchester.” He joked. You snorted a laugh and shook your head. “Man, the stories I’ve heard about you...” You trailed off, Dean nodding his head. “Yeah, well, I can tell ya hunters tend to exaggerate.” He waved dismissively. “Oh no, you’re not escaping this one so easily. I wanna hear the real story. C’mon, Dean, I’ll even bring you whiskey on me.” You winked. Dean groaned aloud. “You play dirty, sweetheart. How am I supposed to say no to that face and free whiskey?” Dean complained.

            “Well, I’ll be damned.” You said at last, somewhat stunned by Dean’s story. “No kiddin’.” He chuckled. “Well, now that I’ve spilled my guts to you, it’s your turn. What does Y/N L/N like besides cool cars, good music- Led Zeppelin is totally better, by the way, but I won’t argue- and my favourite brand of scotch?” Dean questioned, leaning forwards with a smirk. “I had a normal childhood, actually. Started hunting when I was 20, after a werewolf got my parents. I’m an only child, so dropping out of college and starting to hunt seemed like the best way to do it, and I didn’t have a brother to talk me out of it. I met Ellen Harvelle a year later, and she took me in, taught me everything I needed to know, gave me a home.” You said, smiling at the older woman at the other end of the bar. “And I work here when I can. That’s really all there is to it.” You shrugged. “I ain’t buyin’ that for a minute, but you can tell me the rest of the story next time.” Dean said with a deadpan face. “Next time? You plannin’ on a next time, Winchester?” You asked teasingly, arching your brow. Dean leaned in with a mischievous look to his emerald green eyes. “If I say drinks are on me, do my chances go up?” He asked. “Drinks were on you either way, but you’re lucky you’re cute.” You winked. “It is one of my finest qualities. Y’know, after my superior taste in bands.” Dean shrugged cockily. You swatted his shoulder with a glare. “Keep insulting AC/DC and this fine ass is marching itself far away from you.” You threatened. Dean donned a frightened face.”I’m sorry, I swear! You wouldn’t be so cruel as to hit a man’s pride, would ya, sweetheart?” He pouted. “Way I see it, you’ve got enough pride for the both of us, but I do like free drinks, so you’re off the hook for now.” You smiled. “Thank God.” Dean sighed dramatically.

             You were busy after that, but made your way back to Dean when you could. “Hey, Winchester.” You greeted. “Hey, sweetheart. I’m actually headed out now. Got a hunt tomorrow.” Dean said apologetically. “Oh, alright. Next time you’re in town, you owe me a drink, though.” You reminded, a smile playing across Dean’s plump lips. “Will do. Before I go, could I get your number? So you know when I’m in town?” Dean asked, looking nervous, but hiding it well. You smiled softly back at him. “Sure thing, Winchester.” You agreed, his eyes widening slightly like he’d expected a different response before you punched your digits into his phone. Dean grinned back at you and pocketed his phone. 

              “Can I call you? Just to talk, maybe convince you Zeppelin’s a better band?” Dean raised a brow, giving you a lopsided smirk that made him even more attractive. “My mind is set, but yeah, you’d better call. Now, get outta here, before one of us does something stupid.” You teased. “Like what?” “You can’t expect me to not want to kiss you when you look at me like that.” You scoff, inwardly surprised by your own boldness. Dean’s broad smile grew even brighter, making the corners of his eyes crinkle. “Then I guess I’m gonna have to keep looking at you like that.” He retorted, leaning in. You gave him a cocky smirk of your own, and closed the distance between you.

               The kiss was maybe a bit more passionate than was appropriate, but you blamed it on him for looking like an actual Greek God. Dean’s stubble was rough on your hands and cheeks, but you didn’t mind, and he tasted like the whiskey you’d served him, and something uniquely Dean. He wasn’t soft, per se, but he was gentle, letting you make the moves and take the lead, though it was clear he was holding himself back. Just when you tilted your head slightly, your logical brain caught up with you, and you realized you were making out in a crowded bar the woman you saw as a surrogate mother owned with a man you’d met that night. Pulling away quickly, you placed a hand on Dean’s heaving chest. “I would very much like to continue this, but the bar is not the best place, and I, unfortunately, am not off of work.” You explained with a sigh. “Gives me more reason to come back sooner.” Dean winked, looking just as flustered as you did. “Make it real soon, Dean.” “Will do, sweetheart.” Dean gave you a last kiss and a flirty smile, and walked out of the Roadhouse.

             “Not that I’m not supportive of your datin’ life, but maybe not in my bar, hon.” “Sorry, Ellen. It’s his fault for bein’ so damn attractive.” “Mhm. That’s what they all say.”

TAGS-

@ibwhellowriting​

[grasscorpse]

The Starry Sky and Leslie’s List: Chapter 3

*From Ynntranslations

The next day, when they had finished cleaning up after lunch, Isabella and Leslie met in the music room. “Is this the song you were talking about, Leslie?”

Isabella reached into the bookshelf and took out one of the old books of sheet music lined up there.

“Yeah.”

Leslie took the sheet music from her. He brought a music stand over, and set the score on top of it.

“It’s actually arranged for piano, so I’m not sure how playing it on a violin will work out…”

He carried one of the cases containing musical instruments over to the table, set it on top, and opened the lid. Inside, it held an old but well-maintained violin. 

Leslie removed the violin, the glossy brown surface reflecting the light, and set it against his shoulder, resting his chin against it.

Positioning the bow, he tried playing the first note.

A gentle sound echoed inside the music room.

Leslie gave a small sigh and glanced over at Isabella. He then took a deep breath, trying to dispel his anxiety, and began to play.

A calm melody filled the music room.

Isabella sat in a nearby chair and listened to his performance, clearly enjoying herself.

Dropping his gaze to the strings that he was sliding the bow over, Leslie followed the notes. The gentle music strangely reminded Isabella of Leslie’s singing voice, even though the song and sounds were so different.

When Leslie was finished, Isabella applauded.

“What a beautiful song!”

“Yeah, I love this one… But it’s so difficult. I’ve been practicing it for so long, but I still can’t play it perfectly.”

“Really? It sounded fine to me, though?”

She had thought that his performance just now had fulfilled the first item on his list. Isabella tilted her head quizzically.

“No, that wasn’t good enough. See where it gets complicated, right here? I always mess that up.”

Bow still in his hand, Leslie pointed at the score, making a face. Beside him, Isabella peered at the score, but she couldn’t understand anything other than that there was a string of notes that were connected to each other.

“Hmm.” Isabella thought for a bit, then raised her head away from the sheet music.

“I’ve got it. Why don’t you write down a copy of the part that’s giving you trouble, and then practice that by itself?”

Leslie’s eyes widened when he heard Isabella’s advice, and she smiled back at him.

“I don’t know much about music, but I can help you try to figure out what you can do to stop making mistakes.”

Leslie had honestly wondered if he was boring Isabella by making her come with him to practice, but Isabella had turned around and tried to help him in her own way. Leslie smiled.

“Thank you…”

Leslie played the part that he wasn’t good at over and over, then at the end, he played the entire song from the start one more time.

“Aww, you almost had it!”

By that point, Isabella had also figured out the part Leslie was having trouble with. Inwardly, Leslie marveled at how quickly Isabella could figure out literally anything.

Leslie put down the violin, and muttered, “To be honest, I do even worse when there’s someone watching, because I get nervous…”

“Oh? I didn’t know.”

Isabella pointed to the door and asked if he wanted her to go outside, but Leslie hurriedly waved his hands in denial.

“No! That’s not it… I meant, even though that’s usually true, I can play better if you’re here when I’m practicing,” Leslie said, averting his eyes.

Isabella looked puzzled for a moment, then said, “I’m glad,” with a smile of relief.

“Hey, can you play this one, too?”

“Huh?

When he heard the song that Isabella hummed, he couldn’t help laughing. It was the one he had composed, and Isabella was humming as a substitute for a title.

“Okay…”

Leslie picked the violin back up and positioned it, then began playing the melody while Isabella sang along. Partway through, Leslie decided to go with a different arrangement and increased the tempo a bit. Isabella laughed aloud at how cheerful it suddenly sounded.

“Okay, I need to get back to practicing, now.”

Leslie reviewed the section of the music that he hadn’t been able to play. Isabella glanced at the clock hung in the music room. Their free time only lasted until 5 pm.

“Hey, Leslie, why don’t you save the violin for tomorrow, and go ahead and move on to the next thing on your list?”

Before Leslie himself could remember which one that was, Isabella provided the answer. “‘Get a full score on my tests!’”

Isabella and Leslie sat side-by-side at a large table in the library.

“So when they ask for the surface area in this kind of problem, first you have to use , and that will give you object A’s…”

“Could… could you repeat that?”

With the notebook containing his homework open in front of him, Leslie was clutching his head trying to follow Isabella’s fast-moving explanation. She was kind enough to teach him how to do the parts he didn’t understand, but her explanations were so complicated that he could barely understand anything she was saying.

With a sigh, Leslie did a faceplant into his open notebook.

“There’s no way I can get a perfect score on the test tomorrow…”

“That’s not true! Once you’ve learned how to solve a problem, you just have to apply that,” Isabella told him—which was easy for her to say, as the one teaching him. Leslie wanted to say that it might be easy for her to do, but he resisted the urge.

“Hey, Isabella, Leslie, come play with us!”

“Soon we won’t get to play with Leslie anymore!”

A group of the younger children had come into the library, and were now standing on their toes and peering over the edge of the table. After noticing that the two had disappeared during their free time, the group had searched for them the whole time. Isabella and Leslie glanced at one another.

He hadn’t made any progress in his studies, but they couldn’t just say no to their little brothers and sisters. Leslie nodded, forcing a slight smile, and Isabella announced in a loud voice, “In that case, let’s try the next one, ‘be the last one left when we play tag’!”

Their little brothers and sisters cheered as Isabella stood up.

“W-wait for me, Isabella!”

Isabella and the others had immediately dashed out of the library, leaving Leslie to hurriedly gather his notebooks and papers and run after them with his arms full.

The child chosen to be “it” began counting, the sound of his voice echoing through the woods.

“This way, Leslie!”

Leslie was already breathing heavily. “Isabella, wait.”

Nimbly leaping over obstacles like rocks and bushes, Isabella made swift progress running into the depths of the forest. Leslie tried to follow her, but even a little bit of running left him out of breath. It took everything he had just to keep her in sight, and since he was looking straight ahead, he kept stumbling over rocks and tree roots.

Isabella glanced behind her, and when Leslie caught up to her, she pointed up and said, “Hurry and climb it before he gets here.”

“What?!”

Isabella was pointing to an enormous tree, thick with branches. Leslie was gasping for breath, doubled over, and he looked up at the tree and shook his head.

“I can’t climb a tree that tall!”

As Leslie tried to tell her that it was impossible, a look of sudden inspiration lit Isabella’s face.

“Then this is your chance to do number 5 on the list! ‘Learn to climb trees’!”

“What?”

“This way, we can take care of number 3, ‘be the last one left when we play tag,’ and number 5, ‘tree climbing,’ at the same time! Ooh, and I bet we can do number 8, too, if we keep going through the woods! That’s three at once!”

Isabella’s face shone as she spoke, certain that she had the perfect idea, and Leslie was struck speechless.

Isabella thought about things the same way that she played chess, always thinking about how to accomplish as many things as possible with a single move. Listening to her, she made it sound like it might really be possible for him to do everything on the list before leaving the House.

Unfortunately, whether her plans were good was an entirely different question from whether Leslie would realistically have any chance of carrying them out.

“I can’t reach.”

“It’s okay, just let go with one hand and try reaching over here.”

Isabella, atop a branch, extended her hand to him. Leslie was hanging onto a branch for dear life, kicking his feet uselessly in the air, unable to find a foothold.

“I don’t… think I can… AAHH!”

Leslie fell from the tree with a thud. Fortunately (or unfortunately), he hadn’t made it very far up the tree, so he wasn’t in danger of being hurt.

“Oww…”

“Leslie, what are you doing?”

Their little brother who was “it” emerged from a nearby thicket, having heard the noise, and he looked with astonishment at Leslie lying on the ground.

“Got you!”

“Ugh…”

Leslie slumped his shoulders at having been caught so easily by his little brother.

In the branches above, Isabella folded her arms and began considering her next move in this “chess game.”

“Number 4, ‘read all the books in the library’.”

“No, Isabella, there’s no way I can do that!” Leslie cried, looking at the mountain of books that Isabella had just dumped in front of him with a heavy thunk.

Leslie had been doing homework and studying on his bed before lights-out, when Isabella came in with as many books as she could possibly hold. Leslie’s eyes widened. After Isabella set the books down, she seated herself on the edge of his bed.

“Don’t worry! I’ll read them, too.”

“I’m… not sure that counts…”

Leslie took one of the books and opened it, but he wasn’t sure that he could finish reading even the one. It was a thick, difficult book titled “Mechanical Engineering and Human History.” Who would read a book like that in the first place?

He had only put that item on his list because he thought that if he could increase his base of knowledge, he might be able to become as smart as Isabella. As his eyes followed the words on the page, he scratched his cheek. He liked reading well enough, but when reading difficult books, it took him a long time to figure out each part.

“Isabella, it’s time for lights out.”

“Okay.”

Isabella was sitting on the edge of the bed, absorbed in reading the book on her lap. Even when replying to him, she never ceased turning the pages. Her speed left him wondering how she could possibly read that much in an instant, but she just kept turning the pages one after another.

One by one, their other siblings in the room fell asleep. Leslie could hear the sound of them breathing in their sleep.

Since they had to turn out the light in the room, he fetched a lamp, and the two of them furtively read by its light. Even so, they wouldn’t be able to keep doing this until Mama came to check on them.

“Hey, Isabella, you need to go back to your room.” Leslie said, worried, but Isabella, concentrating on her reading, never lifted her face.

The faint sound of footsteps emanated from the hallway.

“Isabella? Are you listening to me?”

“Leslie, pretend you’re asleep.”

“Huh?”

Isabella suddenly got up from the bed, where she had been sitting, and lay face-down on the floor, clutching her book. Leslie tried to ask her what she was doing, but in that instant, the door to the room opened.

Mama, who had come to make sure that they had the lights off, frowned at Leslie, who was obviously still awake.

“What are you doing, Leslie? Hurry up and go to sleep.”

“Y-yes, Mama.”

Leslie hurriedly shut his book and dived under the covers.

Geez, Isabella… If you knew Mama was coming, you could have told me.

His face half-hidden by the covers, Leslie watched Mama turn around to leave. Number 7 on his list popped into his head. “Get Mama to praise me for something other than music”—forget getting praise, he’d gotten a scolding instead.

After the door to the room closed and the sound of footsteps grew distant, Isabella stood up.

“Is Mama gone?”

“She is, but… you really need to go back now, Isabella.”

Isabella gave a small sigh, and set down the book she had just begun reading. Pushing her braid back behind her, she grumbled to herself, “I only got through ten books…” Leslie realized that beside her was an entire stack of books that she had finished.

Leslie glanced down at his first book, sitting on his lap, and sighed.

“Isabella… I don’t think I’m going to be able to do any of them,” Leslie said in a quiet voice, so as not to awaken the other children. Putting down the book, he opened up the notebook, which he had beside him.

“I just can’t do it.”

He had worked so hard for so long, by himself, in secret.

He had thought that maybe, if he could do all the things on his list, he would be able to change, to become someone different, but before he knew it, lost in his dreams, the day when he would leave the House had been set.

When he had been sorting through his things the day before, Leslie had already given up on trying to fulfill the items on his list. He was out of time, and it was over now, he thought.

But in a way he had never imagined happening, Isabella decided to help him out.

I never thought I’d end up working on the list with Isabella.

He had wanted to quit, thinking of it as an impossible challenge, but every time he did, he remembered Isabella smiling and saying “Why not? This is the last time you’ll be here.” That was the reason he had decided to work as hard as he could at in in the two days left until his departure.

He thought that maybe it could be possible, if he could tackle it with Isabella.

But the result was a disaster.

“Come on, you knew it would be that way from the start,” Leslie thought, slumping. Even if Isabella helped, that wouldn’t suddenly make him more capable.

Even after spending an entire day working at it, he hadn’t accomplished a single one.

“… And it’s not like I could do anything about a shooting star, either.”

Even aside from that one, he had very little hope for any of them. Doing all of them would be utterly impossible. Isabella leaned over toward Leslie, who had his face lowered.

“There’s still time, right? It’s too soon to give up.”

Isabella had wasted no time trying to cheer him up, and he smiled back at her—a smile full of self-loathing and loneliness.

“You’re incredible, Isabella… You can keep going and never give up, no matter what happens.”

Shadows from the lamp, turned down low, fell on Leslie’s face.

Leslie looked down at the list he had written.

“I wonder if my new father and mother will be disappointed when a useless guy like me shows up to be their foster child,” he whispered.

It had been weighing on his mind the whole time.

Leslie closed the notebook, and listlessly placed his hand on the cover.

“I’m think going to ask Mama tomorrow… if I can decline to go to that foster family.”

This was how Leslie had felt ever since hearing that they had found a foster family for him.

Even though there were other children who deserved it more than him.

Leslie looked at Isabella sitting right in front of him.

He wondered what he would do if, when he met his “parents” for the first time, they said “I don’t want a kid like this.” Maybe, even if they didn’t say anything, they would be disappointed and think “I wish we’d gotten a different kid.” His anxieties had done nothing but grow since the moment he was told about the foster family.

That was why fear had won out over hope regarding his new life that would begin soon.

Everyone would eventually leave the House. He had always known that his time would come, too, but once everything had been decided, he found himself frightened of going to live with a new family.

He wanted to stay in the House, now and forever.

He wanted to live here always, with Isabella, and Mama, and his siblings.

Which wasn’t to say that Leslie didn’t also long to see the outside world. It must be overflowing with so much music that they didn’t have in the House. He wanted to listen to an orchestra. He wanted to try playing music he didn’t already know.

He wanted as many people as possible to hear the music he had composed.

He had sometimes dreamed of the outside world like that, but Leslie continued to feel that, as long as he could be with Isabella in the House, he didn’t really want to go be with a new family.

If he left for the outside and a new family, they would be split up, and they would no longer be able to spend time together like this.

Laughing and talking about nothing in particular, struggling to keep up with her wild and unpredictable behavior, being encouraged by her kind words.

Singing together.

Just thinking about it made him feel so lonely he couldn’t stand it.

Leslie sighed. Isabella had silently listened to him, and he was about to tell her to go back to her room, for real this time. At that moment, Isabella, her head hung, opened her mouth and spoke.

“How can you say that, Leslie?”

“What…?”

Leslie started in surprise at the look Isabella was shooting him.

She was furious. The face that was always smiling so happily at him was now, in the lamplight, harsher than he’d ever seen. Shocked, Leslie found himself unable to say anything.

Isabella fixed her intense gaze on Leslie.

“They said they wanted you for a foster child. They chose you. Not me, or any other child in the House. So how can you say that?!” Isabella said, and pursed her lips.

“I-I’m sorry, Isabella… I didn’t mean—”

Flustered, Leslie voiced an apology and tried to reach out to her, but Isabella avoided it, too fast for him.

“… Forget it, Leslie. I don’t care anymore.”

Isabella spit out the words and ran from the room. The door shut, cutting Leslie off as he tried to call out to her.

Mama, who was there to inspect the rooms, was standing in front of the door to her room, but Isabella walked toward the room anyway.

On seeing Isabella appear from behind her, Mama slid her pocket watch back into her pocket.

“Isabella, where were you? It’s time for lights out.”

“I’m sorry, Mama.”

Walking around her, Isabella crawled into her own bed. For a little while, Mama watched her, but finally she said, “Good night, Isabella” and closed the door.

Now that the lights in the room were off, the faint blue light of the stars shone in through the window.

All around her, Isabella could hear the quiet breathing of her siblings who had already fallen asleep.

Her face buried in her pillow, the words she had spoken only a short time ago came back to her, and she felt a pain deep in her chest.

“…”

Why did I say that?

This was the first time she’d ever had a fight with Leslie.

She wrapped herself in the cool sheets, and her mind slowly calmed down from its overemotional state. The things she had said suddenly seemed so thoughtless and embarrassing.

It’s not Leslie’s fault…

“It’s mine.”

Isabella bit her lip.

When she had heard Leslie say that he wanted to turn down his foster family, her darker emotions had come surging out, and she hadn’t been able to hold them back.

Every time Isabella saw off another sibling, older or younger, she would always think to herself, deep down, “They didn’t pick me this time, either.”

Of course, she kept it to herself, and even within her own mind, she tried to extinguish those thoughts. They were all her precious, irreplaceable siblings. How could she not be happy for them when they could have a new life with a new family on the outside? She knew she should be happy for them.

But as other children kept being chosen, Isabella began to experience the first twinges of unease and a sense of inferiority.

She thought that there must be some reason she wasn’t being chosen, something lacking in her.

So she poured all her effort into improving at her studies and everything else. She was always a top scorer, volunteered to do chores, and even looked after the younger children. Isabella knew that Mama held her in high regard.

Yet no matter how hard she tried, other kids were always chosen.

If anything, it seemed like her siblings with lower scores were more likely to be chosen for foster families.

Isabella sighed, tossing and turning in her bed. She realized that her hair was still braided, and used her fingers to undo it. She laid her head back on the pillow, but she didn’t feel like she could sleep.

Leslie was so kind and gentle, and she had hurt him.

His face, struck speechless when he heard what she had said, appeared in her mind. It was the first time Leslie had made that kind of face because of her.

What do I do if Leslie hates me…?

Tears began to well up in her eyes, but Isabella held them back. She castigated herself, asking why, of all times, she had done this when they only had one day left—tomorrow—together.

Leslie’s song began to play in her mind, as she lay unable to sleep.

“…”

Isabella tried singing it, in a small voice, and gradually, a feeling of warmth filled her heart. Isabella kept on singing, in a voice so soft that only she could hear.

This song sounds like a lullaby.

Just listening to it made her feel at peace, and the worry and sadness she had felt until them vanished like smoke.

Leslie would leave the House tomorrow night.

Tomorrow would be the last day she could spend with Leslie.

I need to apologize him, and get him to forgive me…

As she thought about that, Isabella slipped into a deep sleep.

[interestsofabookwormbitch]

Ramble

Me and my music journey

I guess I'm basically writing a little ramble about my music journey thus far. I don't know, ever since I've gotten into MCR I've been feeling a lot of things, and I really need to let it out, so decided Tumblr would be the perfect place. Of course, I will likely focus a lot on My Chemical Romance at the end, but before I even get there I'm going to have to write at least a little about my other two favs, Green Day and Adam Lambert. If you guys don't want to read it I totally understand, it's really just for me to let out my thoughts anyway.

So, I don't know if anyone here knows anything about me, but I'm a very obsessive person. When I get into something I hyper fixate on it so much it's probably unhealthy. Usually these obsessions last about a month I'd say, give or take a week, and then I feel my interest wane. I then have maybe another month of being strongly invested before completely moving on. It's by the end of the first month however that I can usually tell whether I actually enjoy this obsession or not (if not I leave then). The answer is almost always, yes, I do still enjoy it, although a lot of things do fall into obscurity, and I don't remember them much after the second month. There are also those things that I still feel really strongly for, like Harry Potter. I know these are the things that will last with me forever, and continue to influence my life, even if I don't love them as much as I initially did.

This hyper fixation also extends to music, although I'll admit to only recently figuring that out. Nearly a year ago exactly I decided I wanted to go through some bands and artists, so I made an alphabetized list to go through to add. Unfortunately I realized that my hyper fixation extended to music with the first artist on the list; Adam Lambert.

For about a month straight I only listened to his music. I watched countless videos of him and I'll even admit that he was the first actual person that I shipped with someone else(Adommy). I'm actually grateful for that, because as weird as some people might think it is-heck as weird as I thought it was-it helped me to realize that innocently shipping and partaking in fanfiction wasn't hurting anyone, and this made my experience in certain bands much more enjoyable.

Music wise I'll admit that Adam's style is sometimes not exactly tailored to my taste, but what he may lack in the musical sound he more than made up for in vocals. The main reason I loved him was the way that his voice makes me picture melted chocolate being slowly poured into a mould. It's so full and rich, and even now, after my obsessive stage has passed I can still say his voice is one of the most comforting sounds I know.

Obviously I still adore Adam Lambert to this day, and I even have all of his available music on my playlist; but my fixation faded, as it does with most things, and I by summer I realized I couldn't survive musically off of only Adam Lambert. So, I went back to my old playlist, just this time filled with more Adam than before.

The summer was quite an uneventful one for me, so I quickly grew bored, and I decided to go through another artists discography. This time I chose to go through Green Day. They were my favourite band as a kid (because of one song) so I thought they'd be a good choice.

Boy was that the right call. I loved them! Absolutely adored their music and personalities. And I still do. Their concerts look like a blast, and almost all of their songs are amazing. I'm not musically knowledgeable enough to pass critical judgement on their abilities, but I am able to pass judgement on their music, and it's incredible. It made me feel countless different emotions, and that's exactly what music is supposed to do. Out of all their albums I am expecially partial to American Idiot and Revolution Radio. The storyline in AI, and the political commentary in both were especially good in my opinion, leading me to agree the somewhat popular belief that Green Day is at their best when American politics are at their worst.

I will admit that as much as I loved everyone in the band, I didn't really click with them. I couldn't relate to the members, which upset me a little. It did not, however, diminish my love for them in the least, and I would die happy if I got to go to one of their concerts.

Again, just like with everything, I couldn't live just off of Green Day, so I reentered my full playlist again eventually, and this time it had a significantly larger amount of Green Day songs. On top of that I also created a playlist for my favourite artists, which at the time consisted only of two people. Still was a pretty large list though.

Finally, my music journey thus far in life has lead me to My Chemical Romance. I actually decided to give them a shot because of a Green Day fan I was talking to online. I don't ever have people earnestly suggest stuff to me, so when this person suggested My Chemical Romance so enthusiastically I just knew they had to be my next band. So they went on a new list, one they were the top of. Due to school and stress I hadn't been able to really give them a shot until a month and a half ago.

During spring break I was working on this novel I'm writing, and I wanted to listen to music. Well, I didn't have my phone, so my playlist wasn't an option. I wasn't feeling Adam Lambert at that time, and Green Day would not set the right mood for the story, so I settled on playing My Chemical Romance on the computer as I wrote.

By the time I finished writing that day I was in love. I had gone through their four studio albums twice, and had decided that I should name each chapter after their songs (probably not a good idea, but I fell in love). The next few nights and days I spent endless time listening to their music and watching videos. I downloaded Venganza! And the Black Parade Is Dead both, and I have Life On The Murder Scene saves to my phone. I became obsessed, like usual.

The thing is, it didn't quite feel like the normal obsession for me. Back then I didn't want to think too much on it, as I assumed it was just my hyper fixation kicking in. It's now been nearly two months, and I'm just now thinking about letting other music back in. I still think about them everyday, and I don't think I've gone more than half a day without scrolling through the Tumblr tag.

See, with My Chemical Romance I think I found a band that actually sings to my heart. It almost feels like they were writing these songs for me with how much I connect with them. Obviously not all of them in the same way, but if the lyrics don't fit me, the story they do fit is extremely amazing to me, and the music always knocks it out of the park. Something about Gerard's vocals always always makes me feel something, and he absolutely excels at conveying emotion with his voice.

And it doesn't stop at their music. Each band member is so precious to me. Just thinking about them makes my heart want to burst. Sometimes it's with joy, other times it's with sadness and other times it's just too many emotions. I've cried more over this band than almost anything else in my life. I've only been invested in them for such a short time, but I can honestly say I don't want to live a life without them in it. And I don't mean without the band, that ended in 2013, sadly, but also for their own mental wellbeing, ao its fine. What I mean is that I'm just so happy I live in a world where they existed.

They make me feel complete. It's as if they were a missing piece to me my whole life, and now that it's here, I'm more free to be me. And I am more me now. I hide less, and care less about opinions. They made me realize more than anyone else that I'm who I am and that's ok. That I can be a total geek and nerd and loner and fucking loser, and it's cool. Or more accurately, it's not cool, but who the fuck cares? It's me.

Honestly, for such a tiny m amount of time in my life I think My Chemical Romance has left the biggest impact. And it's not just my hyper fixation talking either. I really mean what I said, and I am eternally grateful for them.

Really I'm grateful for everyone I've mentioned in this post. As much as I love My Chemical Romance, they can't take all the praise. Both Green Day and Adam Lambert have also helped me realise so much, and I will love them forever along with countless other musicians who have helped to shape me. And honestly, this whole post does no justice for anything in it. Words cannot describe how important all this music has been to me in my life.

[cinnamaldeide]

#Hannigraham Meet-Cute Challenge

Breathing in the tantalizing sea breeze on this wonderful merMay, we’re certainly enjoying the slow arrival of summer. There has been a lot of rain, so we spent our time in front of a computer, writing about the improbable ways in which our favourite characters would be meeting to share an umbrella, to find shelter from the ugly weather in a nice café, or simply staring at the dark sky and finding someone with whom to share its beauty. Hoping for the storm to actually provide some inspiration to you, let us present some very interesting prompts that could be combined with these menacing clouds and grey days 🌧

#1: B works at a bookstore and offers assistance to an embarrassed A, a customer carrying a large stack of self-help books.

#3: A walks into the kitchen, half-asleep, and mistakes B for her roommate. B knows the roommate and stayed overnight; makes breakfast for A. Need more details? Click on the post.

#22: A is having a quiet night at home – that is, until A’s apartment neighbour begins blasting music. Frustration levels rising, A goes to knock on the neighbour’s door to ask them to keep it down… at the same time B, the resident on the other side, is about to. Need more detail? Click on the post.

#32: A checks into a cozy inn while on a cross-country road trip, beyond tired and ready to collapse. When A gets to the assigned room, he or she is in for a surprise! Someone else, B, is already in the room. Uh-oh.

#50: A is at his/her cousin’s wedding. At the reception, A wanders over to B, a stranger, and in the spirit of the romance and happiness in the air, asks if they’re here for the groom or the bride. B’s answer is both simple and, ultimately, confusing: “Neither.”

#116: Although A normally goes to the cafe on Thursday evenings, A’s sibling had called in tears, and s/he had been forced to miss it. So instead A goes the next evening, sitting down at a table with a fresh cup of tea, and then abruptly realized that Friday night was Speed Dating night as B slides into the chair opposite and says, “They say you and I only have five minutes, but I can tell we’re going to need longer.”

#117: A is a professional assassin hired to take out a client’s cheating husband. But the client also spoke to B, a close friend, who has made it his/her’s own mission to also kill the husband. Unfortunately, both A and B have chosen the same night to do so, and it just so happens that B is a bit clumsy… and keeps getting in A’s way.

#143: A’s blind date just left, mumbling some sort of excuse about leaving the stove on. Confused and feeling rejected, A sits orders another beer at the bar, wondering where s/he went wrong. B, who had witnessed the situation, goes over and says sympathetically, “I think I know what went wrong… there’s something in your teeth.”

#162: A is interviewing potential roommates and is having very little luck. When it comes to B, A says, “I’m so sorry, I don’t think this is going to work. I can’t live with someone that I’d like to ask out.”

#166: A is at a coffee shop and sits down at a table, only to find a book on the chair. Intrigued, A starts flipping through it, and realizes it’s actually someone’s journal that had been left behind! And it’s fascinating. Unfortunately, B, the journal’s author, rushes back to retrieve it… and is horrified to see A reading it. But A, having gotten a feel for this person through his/her writing, asks if they want to go out sometime.

#176: A works at a pet store and is utterly surprised when B bursts through the door in a hurry and walks up to the cash without looking around. Out of breath, A says, “Please don’t ask why, but what do capybaras eat?”

#180: There has been a series of recent break-ins in A’s neighbourhood. B, a cop, knocks on A’s door to recommend safety measures and to ask if A has noticed anything peculiar — A hasn’t really seen anything, but invites the cop and his/her charming smile inside for coffee and a bit of false information so s/he might stay a while.

#186: A is walking through the park at night and notices B following close behind. With every step A is getting more and more paranoid until finally, as B goes to pass A, A swivels on his/her heel and punches B in the face! Turns out, B really was just trying to quicken his/her pace to make it home in time for the hockey game.

#207: A meets B and falls immediately for them, but B clearly doesn’t feel the same. After being rejected, A calls on Anteros, the avenger of unrequited love, to exact vengeance on B.

#210: A is a writer struggling to find inspiration for their next book. The publishers are breathing down their neck and the pressure is almost more than A can take. When A comes across an old Greek book in a thrift store, A brings it home and flips through the pages…. only to come across an old chant that was supposed to bring inspiration to those who read it out loud. A gives it a shot and… oh dear. Oh, oh dear. Somehow that summoned B, one of the Muses, to A’s living room.

#215: A is brought in to the police station for questioning about a crime they know nothing about and is put in an interrogation room… with B, who is another suspect in this particular case.

#239: A is sitting in a cafe trying to casually read their book, but is distracted by B’s loud phone conversation at the table over. B tells a joke over the phone, which makes A crack up unexpectedly – B looks over at A, annoyed that they were eavesdropping, but also appreciative that at least someone liked their joke! B hangs up and offers to tell A another.

#246: A was fatally wounded in an accident and suddenly finds themself looking down at their own lifeless body in confusion. B is a reaper and offers A guidance… but A doesn’t want to do the whole follow the light bullshit. A wants to flirt with the cute reaper.

#248: A is a barista and has come to recognize the regulars and their orders. One day, B walks in and A greets them, starting to prepare their order, when B stops A with a sigh: “I’m not who you think I am.” After receiving a blank stare from A who has no idea how to respond to that, B continues, “I have a twin. I’m the other one.”

#252: A is in the public library and notices a strange book that looks like it doesn’t belong in this section. A moves along to another genre, but it seems that this book is in every section… almost like it’s following A. How peculiar! When A finally picks it up to see what exactly it is, B appears out of thin air, and simply says, “I’ve been waiting fifty years for you.”

One of these was not in @fhimechan’s last post, which @mowgliscode, @diemetzgermeisterin, @hannibalsimago, @a-beautiful-day-to-be-arrested, @tigsmulii, @zigzag-wanderer, @h4nnibalism, @hhannahdarling, @fragile-teacup and @jenacar thankfully reblogged. We’re always so grateful for your help, you know we wouldn’t go anywhere on own our :/ Thank you so much!

Someone we really have to thank this month is also @niceven-silace, who decided to accept our challenge and gift us an amazing work! The night shift customer, the fic we’re talking about, is also the first to break our Hannibal Extended Universe wall, introducing Nigel! While the main pairing is still Hannigraham, we’re slowly broading our palate, officially accepting whatever HEU version of our lovely murder husbands.

Speaking of Extended Universe, Space Dogs, Basic Chicken, DogDogs, Royal Instincs and whatever other pairing crosses your mind, there’s an amazing HEU discord server if you’d like to deepen your knowledge ( ͡⚆ ͜ʖ ͡⚆) and speaking of Discord channels, Hannigram HQ has run a lovely initiative this week and some wonderful Different First Meetings has been mentioned, so sink your teeth in these beautiful stories ✧・ﾟ:*

@nera-solani recc’ed @fhimechan’s The hair of the dog @ishxallxgood recc’ed @anomalousy​’s Twisted Fates. @ethicsbecomeaesthetics​ recc’ed ache_for_him’s before you and after you @annabelle-hopkins​ recc’ed @darkmoonsigel​’s Hear My Soul Speak @jainas-art​ recc’ed @emungere​’s Something Warmer @cinnamaldeide​ recc’ed @geneticallydead​’s Clothes Make The Man (serie)

I cannot but rec all of our amazing contributions as well, all the delicious stories we managed to collect so far in these last five months!

#29: Welcome to Widdershins Close by @zigzag-wanderer #110: Fancy meeting you by @mazephoenix #74: Going My Way by @fragile-teacup #55: A Face Like Yours by @hannibalsimago #13: Admirable Deceit by @cinnamaldeide

We’re so proud of our Ao3 collection, where you can find them all, and we’d like to continue adding magic stories to it! While we wait for you to find a prompt that really really inspires you, take a look at all the others on @meetcuteprompts and our Pillowfort community. As you know, you get to choose the next prompt after you fill one of the list above, so we hope there’s always something new to propose. Cute meetings might involve some more blood than other fandoms would comfortably allow, but we’re fannibals, what’s a little bleeding between friends  (ꈍᴗꈍ)

[undertale-rho]

Underearth: Book 1 - Chapter 23

The inside of the laboratory was dark. The only light that Frisk could see was from a massive monitor screen that appeared to be displaying... him? Frisk continued further inside, hoping to find the exit before something found him. Clinging to the right wall, he crept further and further into the lab. A bit further in, he heard a door open, causing him to freeze in place. A second later and the lights turned on. Right in front of him was a large yellow lizard, about Frisk's size. It wore a white lab-coat, a bra, panties, and glasses. After turning on the lights, they went to observing whatever was on a clipboard in their left hand before looking up and spotting Frisk.

"Oh. My god." she said, dropping the clipboard on the ground. "I didn't expect you to show up so soon! I haven't showered, I'm barely dressed, it's all messy, and..." she turned around and stayed silent for a moment before turning her head back to face Frisk. "Ummm... H-h-hiya!" she turned around fully, the lab-coat now fully buttoned up. "I'm Dr. Alphys. I'm Asgore's Royal Scientist! B-b-but, ahhhh, I'm not one of the 'bad guys'!" She stuttered as she spoke, tripping over words all awkwardly. "Actually, since you stepped out of the Citadel, I've, um... been 'observing' your journey through my console. Your fights... Your friendships... Everything!"

Frisk looked back at the large monitor he saw as he walked in, still displaying a live image of him.

"I was originally going to stop you, but... Watching someone on a screen really makes you root for them. S-so, ahhh, now I want to help you! Using my knowledge, I can easily guide you through the Hotlands! I know a way right to Asgore's palace, no problem!"

She stopped for a moment, crouching down a bit to pick up the clipboard.

"Well, actually, umm, there's just a tiny issue."

"What is it?" Frisk responded.

"A long time ago, I made a robot named Mettaton. Originally, I built them to be an entertainment robot. Uh, you know, like a robotic TV star or something. Anyway, recently I decided to make them more useful. You know, just some small practical adjustments. Like, um..."

She began tripping over her words again.

"Like what?" Frisk questioned, a bit annoyed.

"Anti... anti-Human combat features?"

Frisk couldn't believe it. It's as though everything down here has a side purpose of slaughtering Humans. And that self-rightious 'Undyne' called me a murderer.

"Of c-course, when I saw you coming, I immediately decided... I have to remove those features! Unfortunately, I may have made a teensy mistake while doing so, and, um... Now he's an unstoppable killing machine with a thirst for Human blood?" She then gave out an awkward laugh before getting back on track. "But, ummm, hopefully we won't run into him!"

Just as she finished saying that, there was a loud banging sound.

"D-did you hear something?"

Another banging sound.

I swear, if that's this 'Mettaton', I'm gonna be pissed.

Another few banging sounds.

"Oh no." Alphys said before a large explosion happened and all the lights went out.

"OHHHH YES!" Frisk heard a new, unfamiliar voice. "WELCOME, BEAUTIES..." A spotlight turned on to reveal a rectangular metal box on a singular wheel, four dials on the bottom, an array of massive pixels on the top-mid, and two arms sprouting out the sides. "TO TODAY'S QUIZ SHOW!!!"

Music began playing as lesser spotlights came down, covering the lab in colored lights.

"OH BOY! I CAN ALREADY TELL IT'S GONNA BE A GREAT SHOW! EVERYBODY GIVE A BIG HAND FOR OUR WONDERFUL CONTESTANT!"

As Mettaton began clapping, confetti fell from the ceiling onto Frisk. "NEVER PLAYED BEFORE, GORGEOUS? NO PROBLEM! IT'S SIMPLE! THERE'S ONLY ONE RULE. ANSWER CORRECTLY... OR YOU DIE!!!"

While Frisk had never been on a game show before, he wasn't particularly in the mood at the current time.

"LET'S START WITH AN EASY ONE!!" Mettaton began. #1: What's the prize for answering correctly? A: Money B: Mercy C: New car D: More questions

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that D was the blatantly correct choice.

"D" Frisk said confidently.

"RIGHT! SOUNDS LIKE YOU GET IT! HERE'S YOUR TERRIFIC PRIZE!"

#2: What's the king's full name? A: Lord Fluffybuns B: Fuzzy Pushover C: Asgore Dreemurr D: Dr. Friendship

Frisk remembered that Undyne called him Asgore Dreemurr, which sounded like the most correct out of all the options anyway.

"C"

"CORRECT! WHAT A TERRIFIC ANSWER! NOW, ENOUGH ABOUT YOU. LET'S TALK ABOUT ME!"

#3: What are robots made of? A: Hopes & Dreams B: Metal & Magic C: Snips & Snails D: Sugar & Spice

He knew that Metal was involved, but he wasn't sure if Humans used magic in their robotic creations.

"B"

"TOO EASY FOR YOU, HUH?????????? WELL, HERE'S ANOTHER EASY ONE FOR YOU!"

#4: Two trains, Train A and Train B, simultaneously depart Station A and Station B. Station A and Station B are 252.5 miles apart from each other. Train A is moving at 124.7mph towards Station B, and Train B is moving at 253.5mph towards Station A. If both trains departed at 10:00AM and it is now 10:08, how much longer until both trains pass each other? A: 31.054 minutes B: 16.232 minutes C: 32.049 minutes D: 32.058 minutes

Easy? You call this easy? I can't even remember half of what was said!!

"HURRY, DARLING, TIME IS RUNNING OUT!"

Oh yeah, like 30 seconds is enough time to figure out a physics question!

"TIME'S UP!" Mettaton shouted as a bolt of lightning extended from his finger and hit Frisk straight in the chest, sending him flying into the wall behind him.

Frisk fell to the ground, coughing up blood and, in another second, vomiting onto the floor. His chest burned, but, like all forms of attacks he'd encountered so far, not a single mark was found.

"HURRY, GET UP, DARLING! WE'RE NOT DONE YET!"

Frisk looked up at Mettaton, his vision all blurry.

"HMM, WELL I GUESS IT'S TIME TO BREAK OUT THE BIG GUNS!!"

#9: In the dating simulation video game 'Mew Mew Kissy Cutie', what is Mew Mew's favorite food?

Before Mettaton could finish reading the question, Alphys interupted him and started shouting the answer. After a minute, Mettaton stepped back in and began scolding her.

"ALPHYS, ALPHYS, ALPHYS. YOU AREN'T HELPING OUR CONTESTANT, ARE YOU? OOOOOOH!!! YOU SHOULD HAVE TOLD ME. I'LL ASK A QUESTION YOU'LL BE SURE TO KNOW THE ANSWER TO!

#?: Who does Dr. Alphys have a crush on? A: Undyne B: Asgore C: You, the Human D: You don't know

Frisk, fighting through the headache that now plagued him, thought back. Undyne spoke of Alphys, though this could simply be idle speculation, and perhaps just one-sided if that were the case. Asgore was an unknown variable. He himself was out of the question for him. The most correct answer would be D. But, whatever it may be, perhaps curiosity, Frisk chose a different answer.

"A"

As soon as Frisk had said that, Alphys turned as red as a lobster while Mettaton spoke down to her.

"SEE, ALPHYS? I TOLD YOU IT WAS OBVIOUS. EVEN THE HUMAN FIGURED IT OUT."

I did?

"YES, SHE SCRAWLS HER NAME IN THE MARGINS OF HER NOTES. SHE NAMES PROGRAMMING VARIABLES AFTER HER. SHE EVEN WRITES STORIES OF THEM TOGETHER... SHARING A DOMESTIC LIFE. PROBABILITY OF CRUSH: 101 PERCENT. MARGIN OF ERROR, ONE PERCENT."

Mettaton rolled back away from Alphys towards Frisk.

"WELL WELL WELL. WITH DR. ALPHYS HELPING YOU... THE SHOW HAS NO DRAMATIC TENSION! WE CAN'T GO ON LIKE THIS!! BUT. BUT!! THIS WAS JUST THE PILOT EPISODE!! NEXT UP, MORE DRAMA! MORE ROMANCE!!! MORE BLOODSHED!!! UNTIL NEXT TIME, DARLINGS...!!!"

And with that, Mettaton blasted off through the roof of the lab, heading further into the mountain, no doubt.

A silence rung over the lab for a few minutes before Alphys finally spoke up.

"Well that was certainly something."

Frisk began walking towards the exit of the lab.

"Wait, wait!" Alphys called out to Frisk. "Let me give you my ph-phone number! Th-then... m-maybe... If you need help, I could..."

As she spoke, Frisk pulled out his phone. When Alphys saw it, she was shocked.

"Wh... where'd you get that phone!? It's ANCIENT! It doesn't even have texting. W-wait a second, please!"

She then grabbed the phone out of his hand and ran off up a conveyer belt. He then heard a load of mechanical sounds coming from the floor above before Alphys finally came back.

"Here," She said, handing Frisk back his phone "I upgraded it for you! It can do texting, items, it's got a key chain... I even signed you up for the Underground's #1 social network! Now we're officially friends!"

Great, just what I've always wanted. To be friends with *those* kinds of people.

Alphys then gave out a very awkward laugh before going silent for about a minute before saying something about a bathroom and running off.

With Alphys finally out of the way, Frisk continued out of the lab.

A Whole New World : Quiz Show

Previous First Next

[starry-kfics]

picking flowers [sanha]

word count: 15.1k (get some snacks and get comfy)

warnings: mentions of suicide, mentions of bullying, minor depression (no main characters attempt or talk of suicide; no explicit mention of bullying)

author: mel

request: HEY can you do a HS au with Sanha where his crush -and classmate- looks like a cold girl but when she’s with her friend she’s like really funny person and he falls in love with her day by day… i don’t know its clear or not. I think i messed up 😂😂

extra info: kinda angst, mostly fluff. angsty fluff? fluffy angst?? also, i majorly condensed the ages in astro (mj and jinjin are in the same grade, bin and eunwoo in the grade below them, and rocky, sanha, and the reader in the grade below binu)

♡

To say that you were a good student was a bit of a stretch. It wasn’t that you were failing all your classes, you were just never one to get straight A’s all the time. You wouldn’t need Algebra for what you wanted to do.

And, to say that you were popular was also a bit of a stretch. It wasn’t that you were a hermit with no friends, you just didn’t get along with everybody. You didn’t need to be friends with a bunch of people.

Yoon Sanha, on the other hand, was a mystery to you. Almost your polar opposite. He was a straight-A student, was friends with pretty much everyone, and was best friends with the five most popular, attractive, and well-liked upperclassmen at your school. He himself was dorky, tall, gangly, and had just gotten his braces off. Everything popular media said would guarantee him to be bullied for all of his school days. But he wasn’t.

You didn’t resent him for not being bullied, it wasn’t his fault, and you weren’t bullied yourself. But your best friend, your only friend, was. And that, was something you could blame on Sanha.

Yang Jeongin and you became friends on accident. You were going to skip the second half of the school day to go down to the nearby river, and literally tripped on him. He was sitting outside, eating his lunch alone, because nobody would let him sit at their table. So you ended up staying that day, kind of taking him under your wing at school. He was one year your junior, and that combined with his propensity to cling onto you and not hang out with others brought the attention of a bully, Yoon Jaeha. It was a random Tuesday that had you and Jeongin hanging out together at the small outdoor quad before school. You were sitting on a bench, listening to a few new songs as Jeongin did some last-minute studying for his math test. This was really how you spent most of your time with him, doing your own things in proximity to each other.

In your peripheral, you could see a group of boys talking and laughing with each other. You knew who they all were, the popular, attractive, well-liked upperclassmen that had taken Sanha under their wing, much like you had done with Jeongin. Except Sanha was never pantsed in the middle of the halls, or body-checked after second period everyday, or taunted relentlessly whenever he was alone. Jeongin was.

His bully had thankfully learned that you would stand up for your younger friend, and only targeted him when he wasn’t with you.

“Y/N.” Jeongin groaned, slamming his book shut and catching your attention.

“Yes?”

“Can we skip today and go to the river?” “Aren’t you the one who always told me how important school was, and that I should stop skipping?” “I hate math.” “Me too, buddy.” You reached over to ruffle his hair. He swatted your hands away before fervently trying to fix it, “Y/N!” A cackle escaped your lips as you went to mess it up again, only making Jeongin more infuriated and eventually give up, “You’re impossible, Y/N.” “Now you sound like all my teachers.” You grinned, grabbing Jeongin’s book to open it back up for him again, and placed it on his lap. “I want you to do at least two more practice problems before first period, okay?” “Yes, mom.” He said mockingly, but did as you asked anyway. With a victorious grin on your face, you popped your ear bud back into your ear. And accidentally made eye contact with Sanha as he was glancing over at you. His face broke into a smile, probably thinking that your residual grin from interacting with Jeongin was a friendly smile directed towards him, and you quickly looked away. Shit he’s going to think you want to talk to him. Yoon Sanha was unfortunately, a very friendly boy. Awkward and somewhat nervous, sure, but never shy. And you really didn’t like talking to people. Or at least him. So you quickly started doing something intently on your phone, browsing for new music to listen to and hoping that Sanha would just stay with his friends. But instead, two blue sneakers came into view on the grass under your phone. Grimacing, you took one ear bud out, not even bothering to pause your music. “Hey, Y/N.” Sanha greeted you brightly. “Hi, Sanha.” You said shortly as Jeongin looked over to you with wide eyes. “Did you study for the test in Chemistry today?” “Yes.” “Well, did you understand it all? Because I’m not quite sure about balancing reactions, and I was wondering if-” “Sorry, but Jeongin and I were actually reviewing his math right now, and we’re about to go inside to get his calculator.” You started tugging on your friend’s jacket to get him to stand up. “Oh, well I have an extra calculator in my bag, and I was really good at systems of equations last year, so I could help-” Sanha offered, and you cut him off again as you started hurrying away from him. “Nope, don’t need your help. Bye, Sanha.” “Well could we go over Chemistry at lunch, Y/N?” You turned around, walking backwards away from him as you kept shoving the flustered Jeongin, “Wish I could, but I’m afraid that I’m going to come down with a terrible stomach bug right before lunch.” With that, you practically kicked the door open and yanked Jeongin inside, Sanha staying outside as the door closed behind you. Looking at the time, you said, “Here, I’ll walk you to first.” “You don’t have to be mean to Yoon Sanha like that.” Your friend quietly pointed out as you started walking up the stairs together. “It’s not his fault.” “But he doesn’t do anything about it.” “Maybe he doesn’t know.” “How could he not? The whole school knows. And they also do nothing.” “You pull off ‘hating the world’ really well, Y/N.” “I don’t hate the world.” You pointed out. “I don’t really hate anything. It’s just a strong dislike.” “Do you like anything, Y/N?” Jeongin teased, and you took a moment to ponder this. “Food, my family for the most part, food, you, I guess.” He wrinkled his nose, and you rolled your eyes. “Like an annoying little brother.” You took the opportunity to spin it on him, elbowing his side teasingly as you said, “Speaking of liking things, are you going to talk to Yena today?” Jeongin immediately flushed at the mention of his crush, rubbing his neck nervously. “When will you let that go?” “When you finally confess to her. It’s been two months, Jeongin!” “She doesn’t like me!” “I happen to have insider information, that she does.” “Insider information requires talking to someone other than me, Y/N. Which you don’t do.” You finally arrived at his classroom. “Piss off, Jeongin.” He had a grin on his face as he opened the door, braces and dimples making an appearance. “See you at lunch, Y/N.” “See you.” Shaking your head to yourself as you walked away, you were still grinning mischievously. He didn’t need to know how you knew. All he needed to know was that you knew Yena liked Jeongin as much as Jeongin liked her. It felt like your little brother was getting his first crush, and it was adorable to you. Now he just needed to confess. But, your knowledge of people liking other people didn’t extend to anybody who might like you. Which is probably why Yoon Sanha bothering you didn’t catch your attention. To you, that was just who he was, a very nice, very smart, very bothersome boy. At lunch, you walked to your normal spot behind the school building, by the gate that you usually snuck out of. This was where you’d first met Jeongin, and where you two liked to have lunch, once he’d convinced you to stay instead of skipping almost every other day. But he was late to your lunch meeting, and you peered around the corner looking for him. Had Jaeha found him? Was he in trouble? But then you saw him walking out of the building, perfectly okay. In fact, better than okay. Walking next to him, smiling and laughing was Yena. With an irrepressible grin, you gave him a thumbs-up when you made eye contact with him. You two had a momentary silent conversation, as he asked with his eyes if it was okay for him to not sit with you today. You waved him off with a shooing motion and a nod. He sent a thankful smile before focusing back on whatever Yena was saying, sitting together at a table. You were so proud of your friend, and excited for the alone time. Maybe you could skip and go to the river alone like you used to. Jeongin never wanted to skip with you, the most he would do was go just beyond the gate to sit in the meadow with you during lunch. But he always had to be back on school grounds ten minutes before lunch would be over. His insistence on the matter was a good thing sometimes, your teachers had complimented that your attendance was getting better, and your grades were even getting better. Not a lot better, but noticeably so. Standing up, you decided to at least skip the next two periods, and be back for your Chemistry test. Making up tests was the worst, and definitely not worth skipping them in the first place. Jogging towards the fence, you gleefully found it unlocked, as it always was. You were pretty sure the groundskeeper had lost the key and never bothered getting another one to lock it back up again. Once in the field, it was a twenty-five minute walk to the river, which is why Jeongin would never go with you, it was too far to be back in time. But now you were unhindered, and with a skip in your step, took the somewhat worn path you always did. The river was nothing special really, in fact it was more of a creek, no powerful current or depth anywhere. You’d even packed a swimsuit one day and taken a dip, it only went up to your bellybutton at the deepest point. Unfortunately, you hadn’t planned on going, so there was no foresight to bring a swimsuit, or a blanket of some sort to sit on. So instead, you took this time to practice. In a small clearing on the river bank, you laid down your jacket, put a song on full blast, and tossed your phone on top of your jacket. There, all alone, the sounds of the river meshing with the music, you could dance to your heart’s desire. And you did, practicing a routine you’d made by yourself. In your mind, you’d imagined it to be with a partner, but Jeongin didn’t want to dance with you, he was afraid it would make Jaeha tease him more. So you were stuck dancing by yourself, which was fine. You’d gone through the full song about three times when there was suddenly a voice singing along to it, approaching from your left. You could recognize those off-beat, out of tune wails anywhere. “Park Jinwoo.” You declared with something like a smile, as he walked into the clearing. “I didn’t pin you for the type to skip.” “And I didn’t pin you for the type to dance alone next to a creek.” He said in a similar manner, no malice between the two of you. “It’s a river.” “My bad.” You had no issue with Jinwoo, or any of the other upperclassmen Sanha was friends with, but your need to distance yourself from Sanha meant interacting with his friends as little as possible as well. “So what are you doing out here?” You paused your music to talk to him. “I came to talk to you.” “How’d you know I was out here?” “Sanha.” “And how did he know I was out here?” “He notices things about you.” Jinwoo shrugged. “Like the fact that you really don’t like him.” “And that’s your business because?” You were now getting tired of the conversation, pocketing your phone and grabbing your jacket to start walking down the riverbank. “Because,” the older boy followed you, keeping your pace. “I was the one who encouraged him to go talk to you, and you shot him down.” “Again, how is that your business? It’s my right to talk to who I want to talk to, and to not talk to people that I don’t want to talk to.” “I’m not trying to tell you how to live your life, Y/N. But don’t judge Sanha by his brother. He’s a really sweet kid.” “Whatever.” Jinwoo checked the time, slowing down for a moment, and you did as well, curious as he let out a groan. “I need to go now if I want to be back in time for sixth period. Please, just think about it, Y/N. Bye.” You didn’t even return his farewell, watching his retreating figure with satisfaction. Now you could be alone again for another hour; you weren’t going back until seventh period. Plugging your headphones in, you decided to watch a few dance practice videos by some idol groups, to get inspiration for your own dances. Eventually, you realized that you needed to start heading back as well, you’d wandered pretty far down the river. Back at the school, the gate was made to look like it was locked, probably Jinwoo trying to make sure nobody was suspicious of anyone having snuck out. Fake locking it behind you, you got to the quad just as the bell rang, and slipped into the hallways as they started to get crowded with kids leaving their sixth periods. “It’s hella trophies and it’s hella thick.” You half-muttered and half-sang along to the song playing through your headphones under your breath, doing some of the choreography in your head. “What you think 'bout that, what you think 'bout that?” “Bet it’s got my haters hella sick.” A voice joined in from beside you, unfortunately next to the ear that didn’t have an earphone in, meaning that you couldn’t pretend like you didn’t hear them. “Congrats, you know a song that I know.” You rolled your eyes at Sanha as he matched his strides with yours. “I know more BTS songs. Do you like them too?” “A lot of people know BTS songs.” “What’s your favorite?” “I don’t have one.” “Mine is 'I Need U.’” “I didn’t ask.” You walked into your classroom, not bothering to hold the door open for Sanha behind you. But that didn’t deter him, he followed you to your lab table. Unfortunately, on the first day of school when the seating charts were made, you arrived late and the last available seat was at the front, right next to Sanha, who actually wanted to sit at the front of the classroom. Another reason that you liked to skip the second half of the school day, you had lunch, and the last two classes of the school day with him. “You weren’t in sixth period, Y/N.” Sanha commented as he sat down. “Yep.” “Why?” “I told you, I got a stomach bug.” You deadpanned, begrudgingly sitting beside him. “And it magically got better before this class?” “No, I might puke on you at any second. In fact, I feel something coming right now, maybe you should move before I projectile vomit on you.” Sanha still wasn’t put off by your behavior, merely looking at you with an eyebrow raised. “Oh, that’s attractive.” His sarcastic remark almost made you laugh. Key word: almost. But, he seemed to notice you holding back a smile, a small one spreading across his own face. Before he could say anything else, you stuffed your headphones back in and turned the volume on the song up. The teacher seemed to notice this, giving you a pointed look, and you took an ear bud out to listen to her. “Y/N, phones away, and headphones out of your ears.” The teacher chastised you. “Yes, Ms. Kim,” You paused your music, tucking your phone into your backpack. “Y/N.” Sanha called your name, and now you were doubly irritated. Ms. Kim had taken away your only method of ignoring Sanha now. “Sanha.” “Why do you hate me?” “I don’t hate you.” “Well it seems like you do.” “Then you’re about as observant as a wooden stick.” “Well that sounds like you’re only mean to me because you have an enormous crush on me and don’t know how to express your feelings.” “Get your head out of your ass.” “Vehement denial. Suspicious.” “Don’t make me physically put your head up your ass.” “Well then what’s the reason?” Thankfully, the bell rang and Ms. Kim immediately started passing out the test, forcing Sanha to shut up. Surprisingly, you were done before Sanha. It was a subject that was easy to you, balancing equations, formula weight, stoichiometry. For some reason, you understood it with little studying. Sanha, however, scratched his head as he was only three questions into the test out of ten, with fifteen minutes left. You watched out of the corner of your eye with intrigue, were you actually better than Yoon Sanha at something academic? If you really cared, you would maybe gloat about it, but kept it to yourself. No need to interact with him any more than necessary. The bell rang, and he still had his test out, meaning that you could leave and not have to worry about him following you to continue your conversation. At the front of the school, you were elated to see Jeongin waiting for you. The two of you lived in the same direction from the school, and walked together for the first five minutes before having to go your separate ways. “I thought that you would be walking Yena home.” You teased, not even a hint of jealousy in you; you were genuinely thrilled for your friend to be talking to his crush. “She had to stay for art club.” Jeongin explained as you two started your journey home. “You should join art club, then.” “I don’t like art.” “But you like Yena.” “Y/N!” He was flustered again when you brought her up. Slinging an arm around his shoulders, you pulled him down in an apologetic yet still teasing grip. “I’m sorry, Jeonginnie. I’ll stop talking about your crush.” “Now let’s talk about yours.” “And who would that be?” “Literally every member of BTS.” “Ah, you’ve got me there.” You maintained your normal banter with Jeongin until the intersection where you had to split up, saying your goodbyes to each other. At your house, you chatted with your dad and had a snack before starting on your homework.

The next week of school had gone by seemingly without incident. Until you showed up three minutes later than you normally did to the quad before first period, and found Jeongin curled up into a ball behind the school building. Rushing to his side, you saw that his cheek was split open, a small amount of blood pooling to the surface, and you could tell that he was holding back tears. “Holy shit, I was three minutes late.” “And I was four minutes early.” He added miserably. “That’s seven minutes for Jaeha to do this.” “Jeongin…” You said softly, reaching into your backpack for some tissues and a bandaid. “We should take you to the nurse. And then the principal. This is unacceptable. Jaeha has taken it too far.” He hissed as you dabbed at the blood, wiping around the cut. After you had pressed a bandage the wound, Jeongin shook his head, mumbling, “What will Yena think?” “Yena will think that Jaeha is an asshole and that you were brave for telling an authority figure instead of crying by yourself behind the school.” “I’m not by myself, you’re here.” Your friend pointed out, and you sat back on your knees with a sigh. “Fine, we won’t go to the principal, or an authority figure. But you bet your entire ass I’m going to talk to somebody about it.” And so that’s how you ended up standing in front of Yoon Sanha’s locker before fourth period, arms crossed as you tapped your foot impatiently, waiting for him. Jeongin got to his first period okay, and you were worried for him the whole day until lunch, when you left your third period early to get to Sanha’s locker before passing period started. Surprisingly, it was Jeongin that approached you at the locker first. You sometimes forgot that his locker was in the same row as Sanha’s, “Y/N, what are you doing?” “Don’t worry, Jeonginnie, I’m just going to talk to him.” You assured him, and he cast you a nervous glance. “Are you sure? I really don’t need anything else to aggravate Jaeha…” “Jeongin, I promise, I will get him to stop if it’s the last thing I do in this godforsaken school. Now go eat lunch with Yena, she’s probably waiting.” With those words and a supportive smile, you watched him disappear down the halls. The next person to approach you was exactly who you were looking for, accompanied by a couple people you weren’t necessarily looking for. Myungjun and Jinwoo, his two friends that were in their last year of school before university. “We’re going to go to lunch now.” Myungjun announced loudly, veering the other direction down the hallway. “Good luck Sanha!” Jinwoo whispered to the younger boy, although it was loud enough for you to hear. Sanha approached you hesitantly, but with a big smile. You put up a hand just as he opened his mouth to greet you. “We need to talk.” Grabbing his arm, you dragged him outside. You dragged him past the quad and behind the school building. He was quiet the whole time, but clearly confused, maybe even a little scared. “What do we need to talk about?” He questioned. “Have you seen Yang Jeongin today?” You asked simply. “Your friend? Of course, his locker is a couple down from mine.” “Best friend.” You corrected, causing a glimmer of a smile to cross Sanha’s face, then you continued on. “And, did you see the bandage on his face?” “Yeah. What is it, a pimple that he doesn’t want to scar or something?” “No, it’s a wound. From where your brother punched him.” Sanha froze, eyes widening and jaw nearly dislocating in shock. “M-my brother?” “Yoon Jaeha.” You confirmed. “He doesn’t even know Jeongin. I promise, he didn’t do th-” “Shut the fuck up.” You tried not to yell, taking a deep breath. “You’re in denial, and you need to stop. It’s disgusting.” “What do you know?” Now Sanha was getting angry, his face turning red as he tried to contain his yells of indignation. “Nothing, you know nothing!” “I know plenty, Yoon Sanha.” “Really?” “Yes, really. My older brother used to bully people, too. He would make fun of them, push them into lockers, rough them up if they looked at him the wrong way. And I ignored it, I turned a blind eye and idolized him for being my big strong older brother that could do no wrong.” You practically spat out your words as you relayed the story. “Then one of the kids he bullied tried to commit suicide. He lived, thankfully, but my brother and my family will never be done apologizing and repaying their penance to that boy and his family. And I absolutely hated- no, still hate- myself for what I did; ignoring it, and letting it happen.” Bile was rising in your esophagus as you spoke, your words bringing about the most unpleasant experiences and feelings in your life. But you continued. You had to, for Jeongin, “That’s what you’re doing, that’s why I dislike you. You know it’s happening, and you’re turning a blind eye, whether accidentally or not. I’m not a hateful person, I’m really not. I want to be kind and loving, and giving out second chances left and right. But people like you, people like me, don’t deserve them.” Sanha was speechless after your rant, and you wiped at your lip where saliva was threatening to launch itself. You had gotten yourself worked up, and you quickly realized that maybe you had said too much. He was looking at you with the most complex range of emotions: anger, pity, sympathy, betrayal, disbelief, and just plain old sadness. “You deserve a second chance, Y/N.” Sanha finally spoke, his voice soft but clear. Even though his words were clearly meant to make you feel better, they set you off again. “This isn’t about me!” You screeched, almost in hysterics. “It’s about your jackass brother leaving Yang Jeongin alone.” The boy in front of you was at a loss for words, or anything at all. He stood petrified, and you were too worried about crying in front of Sanha that you’d forgotten about your original mission, slinging your backpack over your shoulder, stomping over to the gate. Not even caring that Sanha now knew exactly where you were, you just needed to get out of there. You knew the field and river behind the school better than anyone, you’d be able to hide from Sanha if he decided to follow you. And you prayed and hoped that he didn’t. If you ever saw his face again, you thought that you might puke. Because all you could see was yourself.

The next morning, you were tempted to tell your mother you were sick, and just stay home from school. But you hadn’t missed a day of school since you’d become friends with Jeongin, and you weren’t about to start now. Especially not when he just got punched in the face yesterday. Jaeha might want to continue.

You left the house ten minutes earlier than normal, not wanting a repeat of yesterday’s consequences of you being tardy. The school campus was quiet this early in the morning, only the staff and a couple other kids were there before you. You even had time to stop at your locker before heading back to the school gates to greet Jeongin. To your delight, his arm was linked with someone else’s. Yena’s, specifically. They were chatting, and you stood waiting for them with a smug smile on your face. “Good morning, Y/N!” Jeongin greeted you brightly before nervously introducing Yena. “Yena, this is my best friend Y/N. Y/N, this is Yena.” “Hey, Y/N. Did you finish our Computer Technologies homework?” Yena asked, and you fell into step with them. “Actually, yeah.” You swung your flash drive around on your keychain. “It was the only homework I did last night.” “You two know each other?” Jeongin was dumbfounded, and you smirked at him. “I told you, Jeonginnie, insider information.” Yena giggled as he sat down on your normal bench, immediately slumping over. You sat on Yena’s other side, talking with them for a bit. But you couldn’t help your eyes from constantly flitting over to your right, where Sanha was standing with his older friends. Had he told them about your “conversation” yesterday? Had he talked to Jaeha at all? For some reason, you doubted it. He was probably still denial, like you had been. Someone approaching from the left of your small trio caught your attention. You were immediately wary as the figure caused Jeongin to tense up. You stood up, slowly moving in between your friend and the older boy. Yoon Jaeha was walking towards you, shoulders hunched. “Hey, Y/N. Could I talk to Jeongin privately for a moment?” He coughed awkwardly, and you narrowed your eyes. “Whatever you have to say to Jeongin you can say to us too.” Yena threw out, and you were unsure how much Jeongin had told her about his situation with Jaeha. Clearly it was enough for her to join you in defending him. “Uh, okay.” Jaeha cleared his throat again. “Well, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry, Yang Jeongin. About your face, and uh, everything. It was a shitty thing to do, and I’ll leave you alone.” Jeongin seemed surprised, standing up himself to stick his hand out to the older boy. “I forgive you, Yoon Jaeha.” Jaeha shook his hand, then mumbled one last apology before slinking off somewhere. Your friend looked at you with wide eyes. “Y/N, I don’t know what you did yesterday, but thank you so much!” Jeongin launched himself into your arms, and you stumbled backwards for a moment. Laughing, you hugged the boy back. “You’re welcome, Jeongin.” He let go of you, and Yena gave you a hug as well, thanking you too. “I’m just happy that he’s done bothering you.” You said, your heart swelling with happiness. Your best friend was grinning madly, braces on full display and dimple deeper than the ocean. “Now I’ve got someone I need to talk to.” You excused yourself from your friends. “We’ll see you later, Y/N!” Jeongin promised as he and Yena went the opposite direction from you. Shouldering your backpack and swallowing what was left of your pride, you took determined steps towards the group of boys who had watched the whole scene. As soon as Jaeha left, they immediately tried to turn back to what they were talking about before, as if they weren’t watching intently. But you knew that they were. And you knew that there was one of them in particular you had to speak with. “Sanha.” You called out his voice as you walked up from behind him and a boy you knew to be Minhyuk. “Hi, Y/N.” He didn’t seem as eager to see you as he did yesterday, and you suddenly got worried. “Can we talk for a minute?” “Of course.” The tall boy gestured for you to lead the way, and followed you to the bench where you had just been sitting with Yena and Jeongin. “Thank you, for whatever you said to Jaeha to make him stop.” You took a deep breath before continuing. “And I’m sorry, for yelling at you yesterday, and for basically calling you a piece of shit that didn’t deserve a second chance. That was out of line.” Sanha blinked, taking a moment to collect his thoughts. “You don’t need me to forgive you, Y/N. You need to forgive yourself. I can’t give you whatever validation you’re looking for. I really can’t.” Your chest shuddered at his words, they were true. You saw yourself in him, in his situation, and tried to get forgiveness from him. He could see right through you, though, and you didn’t know how. “Fuck, you’re- you’re right.” You sniffled as tears started filling your eyes again. Furiously wiping at them, you were determined not to cry. “Come on,” Sanha stood up, slinging your backpack onto his shoulder with his own, and gently took your arm in his hand. “Let’s go somewhere.” You were still trying not cry as Sanha took you to whatever destination he had in mind. The sounds of the students chattering amongst themselves faded away, and when you looked up from your shoes, you noticed that Sanha had taken you behind the school, in the shade provided by the building. He sat down, tugging on your wrist for you to do the same. You obliged, vision still watery as you couldn’t even make eye contact with him. “Do you want to talk?” “No.” “Okay.” He accepted your answer, not moving to stand up or anything. Instead, he just sat there with you, as if waiting for you to say something. Eventually you did, the silence becoming suffocating, “Why are you being nice to me? I was an absolute asshat to you because of something your brother did.” “I’m being nice to you, in hopes that one day you’ll be nice to yourself. Because I really do believe that you deserve a second chance, Y/N. And you should give it to yourself.” His words brought even more tears to your eyes, and soon they were streaming down your cheeks. He was making you truly look at yourself, something you hadn’t done since your brother got the call that his classmate he had bullied had ended up in the hospital, wrists in thick bandages to stop the bleeding.

And it was terrifying. You wrapped your jacket around yourself tighter, trying to comfort yourself. The sound of the warning bell ringing reached your ears, and you said to Sanha, “You should go, you don’t want to be late.” Sanha made no move to leave, “I also don’t want to leave you crying behind the school by yourself.” And so Yoon Sanha sat with you until your eyes were dry, and the red puffiness had receded a little bit. You stretched as you stood up, and he did the same. “Thank you.” You uttered, not quite sure of what to say. He nodded, checking his watch. “We’ve still got twenty minutes left of first period.” “Then we should go in, better late than never.” Checking that there were no wandering teachers or staff members first, the two of you crossed the grassy quad together, slipping into the main building. Both of your first periods were on the second floor, so you were still by him as you walked up. When you got to where you knew your paths would diverge, you were starting your goodbye when Sanha suddenly blurted something out, “See you sixth-” “Do you want to sit with me at lunch?” You cocked an eyebrow, “How do you know I’m in your lunch? You sit inside.” “Ah, I just, kind of notice things?” “I’ll see if Jeongin’s eating with me or Yena’s art club friends today. If he is eating with them, I might come by your table.” “You don’t sound angry.” “What would I be angry about?” “Jeongin and Yena.” “It’s not like I’m into him or anything,” You snorted almost in disbelief. “And I’m actually super proud of him for getting other friends and talking to his crush.” “That’s nice.” He commented, a smile on his face. “Maybe you should get other friends too.” “We’ll see what happens at lunch, then.” You started walking towards your classroom. “Bye Sanha.” “Bye Y/N!” Lunchtime rolled around, and Jeongin still hadn’t replied to your text asking where he was sitting. With a shrug, you guessed that he was sitting with Yena and her friends, and decided to find Sanha’s table. You heard Sanha’s friends before you could see them in the packed lunchroom, various screams and hysterical laughter met your ears. Approaching the table, you immediately looked to Sanha. “Hey Y/N! You can sit here,” He patted the seat to his left, and you did so. “That’s my seat!” Came the indignant voice of Myungjun as he joined the table. “Oh hi, Y/N.” Jinwoo, who was walking with him, elbowed his arm, “MJ hyung, just sit next to me and leave them be.” Disgruntled, Myungjun sat beside his friend, pulling out his own lunch. The other boys came to the table, giving you wary hellos. The six boys were all hungrily munching on their food, and you just sat there, somewhat amused by it. “Do you not have a lunch, Y/N?” Sanha asked with a frown as he noticed that you weren’t eating as well. “I was planning on skipping this period and fifth and going to the boba cafe a couple blocks away.” You explained your lack of a meal, and immediately had various foods shoved in front of you. Chips from Sanha, a quarter of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich from MJ, a cookie from Bin, rice from Minhyuk, an apple from Dongmin, and a juice from Jinwoo, were all presented to you. More like forced at you, technically. “You guys can keep your food, I really don’t-” You trailed off when you saw the pointed look from Sanha. This was part of a second chance for yourself, accepting others’ kindness. Changing your demeanor, you said, “Thank you.” With that, you popped a chip into your mouth, and the friendly conversation and banter at the table resumed.

After that lunch, you realized that you’d gotten six new friends, whether you wanted to or not. Dongmin lived down the street from you, and had started leaving in the morning just before you did, walking with you a couple blocks before Bin would join the both of you. Then, you were most likely to be roped into the group meeting before school started. Minhyuk and you had ended up together for a project in your second period. Jinwoo would often find you after second and talk with you for a moment as you went to your third periods that were near each other.

Then, the group would reunite at lunch. When you all had to break apart for fifth period, Myungjun tagged along to yours, since he was a peer for that teacher. Of course sixth and seventh period were spent with Sanha, whom you’d started finding less and less bothersome. In

fact, if he didn’t immediately give you a bright smile when you sat beside him in Chemistry, you were a little disappointed. And that text to Jeongin still went unanswered. It wasn’t that you’d forgotten about him, it was far from that. You still loved your best friend with all your heart, but his now-girlfriend had introduced him to so many more people that he was becoming friends with. And while it made your heart twinge, you were proud of him. After all, you were also becoming friends with other people. It was as if maybe your friendship was meant to be just a stepping stone for you both. “Y/N, can we study tonight? I did not get that lesson.” Sanha groaned as the two of you walked out of Chemistry. “Yeah, let me give my dad a heads-up that you’re coming over.” You agreed, bringing your phone out of your pocket. There was a text already there, the name having not popped up on your screen in well over two months. [jeongin: do you want to come over for pizza and movies tonight? we haven’t hung out in forever. i’m staying for art club, but you can come over around dinnertime] Your throat seized up as you thought over your response. Theoretically, you could finish studying with Sanha before dinnertime then go to Jeongin’s house. But your dad had kind of fallen in love with Sanha, insisting every time he was over that he stay for dinner. And you really loved it, it was something you’d never pass up, despite the embarrassing stories your father would tell about you.

[you: i wish i could, but my dad said i can’t hang out with anyone unless i bring my grades back up. sorry] It was somewhat true, your dad said no friends after school, unless it was for something school-related. Or unless it was Sanha. He didn’t even try to hide his favoritism towards your new friend, preferring him over any of the others you’d introduced him to. Minhyuk had come over before for your project, and your dad pretty much treated him as a criminal, but would probably let Sanha get away with murder. Going into your texts with your dad, you started typing as you and Sanha walked down the stairs. [you: hey dad, sanha’s coming over for chemistry studying] [dad: oh no! i’m going to your mother’s work dinner tonight. give him my apologies. we’ll be home at seven!] [you: can i order us pizza then?] [dad: yes, i left money on the counter for you anyway] Your phone buzzed with another text, and you glanced up to thank Sanha as he held the door to the school building open for you. [jeongin: that’s okay. tomorrow right after school?] [you: that sounds perfect. see you then!] Dongmin and Bin joined you and Sanha at the front of the school to walk home. They said their goodbyes as Dongmin was apparently going to Bin’s house, as Sanha was going to yours. At your house, you threw your stuff down and grabbed a snack for you and Sanha to eat. At your kitchen table, you brought out your textbooks as well notes from the class. “Okay so, which parts of periodic trends do you not get?” You asked, chewing on a cracker. “Uh most of it. Like, I understand why it happens, kind of, but I just don’t remember which ways and the exceptions and all of that.” Sanha replied before popping a cracker in his own mouth. You launched into an explanation of the material, for some reason you actually understood it. Once Sanha was sure he understood, you all did a couple practice problems from a worksheet your teacher had given you. However, when you went to check your answers, Sanha had gotten almost all of them wrong. “That’s it, I’m dropping out.” He groaned, shoving his books and papers away from him. Calmly closing your own book, you stood up. “Let’s take a break. I got Super Mario Brothers Wii.” "Oh hell yeah!” Sanha was suddenly energized, running down the hall towards your room. Sitting side-by-side on your bed, knees touching as his long legs were folded underneath him as best he could, you played video games with Sanha. It had become an integral part of your friendship, whether you were at your house, his house, or one of the other boys’, you two always ended up at a game console of sort. Screams and cheers and groans always spilled out of both your mouths, depending on if you were on the same team, and if you were winning. This time you were on the same team, trying to finish the levels at the best proficiency you could. You were about halfway through World One when Sanha’s character died, losing his last life. That meant that you had to completely restart the world. “Are you shitting me?” You hissed, just about throwing your controller onto the floor. “I’m sorry, Y/N!” Sanha cried out, wrapping his arms around you, pulling you tightly to him. You fell over onto your bed at the force, a mess of limbs and laughter as you tried to wriggle out of his grasp. But he held tight to you, apologies adding to your laughs in the air. “I forgive you! I forgive you!” You squealed out, and he finally released you. Still with a grin on your face, you managed to sit yourself back up. Your eyes caught on something outside your window, and you nearly screamed. There was someone peering into your window, just barely out of sight. Before you could alert Sanha, or call the police, or scream, you realized that it was someone familiar. And that you definitely needed to talk to them. “Sanha, could you go make me a cup of chocolate milk while I set up the next level, please?” You asked him sweetly, and he stood up. “Of course.” He raised his arms above his head to stretch, shirt sliding up ever so slightly before he put his arms back down. “I’ll get myself a glass too. Do you want food while I’m in the kitchen?” You weren’t hungry, but you needed to delay him as much as possible, “A sandwich sounds really good right now.” “Aish, what am I, your husband or something?” “You offered! And, I was thinking more like a servant.” He chuckled, sticking his tongue out at you, which in turn caused you to reach forward to give his chest a push, “Alright, I’m going.” Once he was out of sight, you closed your door before padding over to the window. Pushing it up, you called out, “Yang Jeongin! Get your nosy little ass over here!” Your friend emerged from behind one of the taller bushes in your neighbor’s yard. As he got closer to your window, you realized that he seemed upset. With good reason, as far as he knew, you’d blown him off for Sanha. “Hey Y/N.” Jeongin had a tartness in his voice as he spoke, “I thought you were grounded from friends?” “My dad made an exception for studying.” You explained, hoping he wasn’t too mad. It was true that you didn’t hang out as frequently, but you still didn’t want to lose your friend completely. “That really seemed like studying.” “We were taking a break-” You were only partway through your excuse when you realized that Jeongin wasn’t angry, or even annoyed. Instead, he seemed amused as he listened, head tilted to the side. “Don’t you dare be thinking what I think you’re thinking.” “And what would that be? That you and Sanha have huge, enormous crushes on each other?” Now it was Jeongin teasing you about crushes, and you didn’t like the change of roles. You were supposed to be poking fun at him, not the other way around. Scowling, you attempted to change the topic, “Why are you even hiding outside my window, Jeongin? That’s a bit stalker-ish.” “I saw you and Sanha walking together, and I know that his brother drives him to school. So I decided to investigate.” “That’s super stalker-ish, Jeonginnie.” “You’re avoiding.” “You’re annoying.” There was suddenly a yell from inside your house, “Y/N, do you want ham or turkey?” “Uh, give me a minute!” You replied, just as loud. “I’ll come to you-” Jeongin was still at your window, looking smug as he crossed his arms. “Don’t! I’m changing! Currently naked! Do not enter!” “Oh, okay.” Sanha’s voice was closer, he must be right outside the door. He cleared his throat awkwardly, “I’ll be in the kitchen.” Once you were sure he was back in the kitchen, you turned to the boy outside your window with narrowed eyes, “You’ve gotta go, because now I actually have to change so he doesn’t think I was lying to him.” “Fine, fine, I’ll be going.” Your friend raised his hands up in surrender. “But once you two are a thing, we’re going to have double dates, okay?” “Leave.” With one more dimpled laugh and wave, Jeongin walked around to the front of your house, then down the sidewalk. You breathed a sigh of relief, closing your window up and quickly switching your school clothes out for pajamas. Treading out to the kitchen, you tried to be nonchalant about your changing of clothes. Sanha had two chocolate milks and one sandwich made, and he explained the lack of one sandwich, “I haven’t made yours yet, because I didn’t know what you wanted on it.” “Ah, I’m not that hungry anymore, actually.” You replied, helping him to start putting away the sandwich ingredients. “Besides, we need to get back to studying anyway.” You two had finally gotten through the chapter, and Sanha slammed his book shut in victory. “If I see another chemical formula I might just burn my eyes off.” With a chuckle, you closed your book as well, and finished the last of your chocolate milk before speaking again, “We should order the pizza now, so it’s here by the time we get hungry again.” He agreed, and you quickly called it in. As you were ordering, you watched as Sanha stood up, walking towards your living room. Figuring he just wanted to sit on something comfier, you stayed in the kitchen to finish the order. When you had hung up, you shuffled into the living room as well to see Sanha’s long body sprawled out on your couch. He looked half-asleep, so you decided not to bother him, moving to sit in the armchair beside the couch. “Y/N,” he whined, reaching a hand out to grab your forearm. “Sanha,” You mimicked his tone, and he looked up at you through his eyelashes, clearly tired. “I’m cold.” “I’ll get you a blanket.” “But I don’t want a blanket.” “Then freeze.” “Y/N.” He tugged on your arm, and you realized what he wanted. “Jeez, you’re so needy.” You scoffed as he sat up slightly, letting you sit where his head just was. He laid his head back down on your lap, and your fingers instinctively started running through his hair, absentmindedly playing with his brown locks with one hand, the other grabbing the remote to start finding something to watch. “Y/N.” “I swear to God, Sanha, what is it now?” “Thank you for giving me the chance to be your friend.” Your annoyance faded and you felt your face soften as you looked down at Sanha, putting the remote to the side. He was looking back up at you with a fond smile on his face as you kept messing with his hair, waiting for you to say something back. “I still don’t know why you wanted to be my friend,” You frowned, hands stopping as you became absorbed in your thoughts. “I was a jerk to you because of your brother.” “Yeah, you were. But I knew that you weren’t actually a jerk, I saw you smile, and laugh, and joke with Jeongin at school. And one time I’d gone outside during lunch, and saw you go behind the school building, and I wondered where you’d gone. Then I saw you on the other side of the fence, in the meadow, and you looked so peaceful. I knew that you were a wonderful person, so I wanted to see it for myself.” “And am I as wonderful as you thought I was?” “Even more so.” Sanha’s words were so sincere, and so sweet, and he looked at you with such a loving expression, you felt your heart start to hurt and your eyes threatened to water up. “Thanks, Sanha.” You chewed on your lip, and he smiled up at you. “Speaking of the meadow, do you want to go there with me tomorrow? Just for lunch, you don’t have to skip any of your classes.” “Sure, that sounds like a lot of fun.” And with that he rolled onto his side, adjusting his head in your lap into a more comfortable position. You realized with a fond smile that he was going to take a nap. Instead of entertaining yourself with the TV, you pulled out your phone in one hand while the other absentmindedly played with Sanha’s hair, brushing it away from his face, letting it fall back onto his forehead before you brushed it away again. The repetitive cycle relaxed you, and apparently Sanha too as his breathing evened out, the faintest kitten-like snores coming from his slightly-parted lips. He had actually fallen asleep on your lap. Opening the camera on your phone, you took a few pictures of the sleeping boy at various angles. Some made him look like an angel, while others were so unfortunate you had to choke back your laughter at them. You decided to send a couple of the worse ones in your new friend group’s group chat, appropriately named Hot Mess Central. [you: can you believe this 11/10 visual right here: attached images] [mj: im cACKLING OH MY GOD] [minhyuk: no seriously, he’s actually cackling right now. it’s hurting my ears] [jinwoo: i can also confirm that] [bin: i’m saving each and every one of these pictures] [dongmin: wait y/n, it looks like he’s sleeping on your lap] [mj: THATS THE CUTEST SHIT EVER] [bin: is he??] [jinwoo: i double-checked the pictures and you can clearly see y/n’s hand in his hair!!] [minhyuk: that’s adorable] Rolling your eyes at the detective skills your friends decided to employ to embarrass you, you replied. [you: yeah, his head is on my lap because he’s a Needy Bitch™] [jinwoo: yeah but he’s YOUR needy bitch] [you: that’s one of the least endearing things i’ve ever heard of] [bin: sanha is one of the least endearing things i’ve ever heard of] Holding back a snort, you typed out your response, going back into your camera roll for the angelic pictures of Sanha you had. [you: oh that’s just mean, bin. he’s plenty endearing: attached images] [mj: THATS THE CUTEST SHIT EVER] [you: that’s a very wide vocabulary, mj] [dongmin: that’s a very bad way of avoiding the situation, y/n] [jinwoo; i agree, y/n is avoiding] [bin: i second that] [you: no bin, jinwoo already seconded it] [bin: then i third it] [minhyuk: y/n is still avoiding] Sanha started to shift in your lap again, and you realized that his phone had been continuously going off with the messages from the groupchat. [you: you guys are waking sanha up with these ten million messages] [minhyuk: let’s not interrupt their cuddle session anymore then] [jinwoo: good point!] [you: i’m going to strangle you guys tomorrow] [dongmin: that’s pretty kinky, y/n, save it for sanha] [mj: nO WAIT THEY’RE CHILDREN DONGMIN DONT ENCOURAGE THAT] [jinwoo: anyway, we’re all going, bye!!] [bin: bye!!] [mj: BYE BABES] [dongmin: BE SAFE I LOVE YOU ALL BYE] [minhyuk: goodbye, i guess??] Not even reciprocating their goodbyes, you turned your phone off. But apparently ending the conversation to preserve Sanha’s nap was for nothing, because when you looked down at him, his eyes were already focused on you, watching you sleepily. “Something wrong, Y/N?” Sanha reached up to poke at your cheek. “You’re frowning.” You swatted away his hand, the gesture nonetheless bringing a fond smile to your face as you shoved his hand back down towards him. “Your friends are a bunch of idiots.” “Hey, they’re your friends now too, Y/N.” He pointed out, hands undeterred and still reaching up to poke your cheek, then nose, and you gave up on deflecting them. He continued his cute assault on your face, as his own way of tracing your face, eyes and fingers memorizing your features as he did so, under the excuse of annoying you. But that was how he normally approached something like this, something that went beyond the normal bounds of friendship, that maybe signaled that he wanted something else from your relationship. He disguised it just as him being childish. The bell rang, causing both you and Sanha to startle. He sat up to allow you to stand up and get the door. It was the pizza, and you quickly paid before carrying back to the kitchen. As you ate and talked, you forgot about the groupchat and could just focus on your friend. When you were putting away the leftovers and Sanha helped to put the dishes in the dishwasher, you heard the garage door opening, meaning that your parents were home. “We’re home!” Your mother called out, and you poked your head out of the kitchen. “Hi Mom! Hi Dad!” You said cheerily, going to give your mother a hug. “Is Sanha still here?” Your dad asked as he absentmindedly gave you a hug, and you rolled your eyes. At this point he probably preferred Sanha over you. “Yes, Mr. Y/L/N, I’m in the kitchen!” Sanha called out, and your dad rushed in to greet your friend. You watched with amusement as Sanha put down a plate to reciprocate the hug your father gave him, and they immediately launched into a conversation. You didn’t know how, but if you let them, your father and Sanha could talk to each other for hours like good friends. Your mother put her purse down, watching the two as well. “If you don’t start dating that boy soon, your father might.” Your mother warned jokingly, and you didn’t know if you wanted to argue or laugh at her statement. You opted to look at her with wide eyes and a dropped jaw. She lifted your chin back up with a disapproving tsk, “Don’t be so surprised, I’ve known he’s liked you since you first mentioned the annoying boy in your classes who wouldn’t leave you alone. I didn’t raise a stupid child, you’ve known it too, Y/N.” Sighing, you slowly nodded in agreement. Had it crossed your mind before that Sanha might like you as something other than a friend? Yes, but you never dwelled on those thoughts. Had it crossed your mind that you might also like Sanha as something other than a friend? Yes, but you valued this new friendship too much to think like that. The possibility of losing not one, but six friends, was terrifying to you. You never thought of yourself as wanting to have many friends, but now that you did, you didn’t want to let them go. You’d just be selfish for wanting anything else from your relationship with Sanha, or any one of them. It would disrupt the dynamics of the whole friend group. “Good,” She picked up her bag again, patting your shoulder before calling out to your dad, “Honey, Sanha should be getting home before it’s dark.” “Oh, you’re right.” Your father frowned as he looked outside, the sun was hanging low in the sky. “Y/N can walk him home, right?” “Of course.” You said brightly as Sanha went to pick up his bookbag. “Thank you, Mrs. and Mr. Y/L/N.” The boy bowed to your parents in succession. “We’ll see you later, Sanha. Goodbye.” Your mother hugged him, then your father as they walked you two to the door. You and Sanha walked in near silence, a comfortable silence. The only sounds that met your ears were your breathing, and the tune he was humming lightly. You liked when it quiet like this, it was often hard to get Sanha to settle down, most of the time he was all over the place. Which you liked about your friend, it was contagious, but sometimes you just wanted some peace with him. Sanha’s house was several streets over from yours, far enough from the school to warrant his parents buying his older brother a car to drive them to school, but not so far that he went to a completely different school. The quaint two-story house he lived in came into view, and you stopped on the sidewalk at the front. “Bye, Sanha. Thanks for studying with me.” You smiled, and in the dimming sunlight you could see that he had a bittersweet smile on his face as well. “Thanks for having me over, Y/N.” He said, and the both of you paused. Your mother’s words were on your mind, and your friend seemed lost in his own thoughts. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” You stepped forward to give him what would normally be a friendly hug, but as your arms squeezed around his torso, you felt your heart being squeezed too. “See you.” With that, you began walking away, giving him a final wave as you turned the corner back towards your house.

The next day after third period you walked out to wait for Sanha behind the building. You reminisced about when you used to eat with Jeongin out here; you hadn’t been behind the building or in the meadow since you’d become friends with Sanha and the others. Sanha’s head peeked around the corner, and his face lit up when he saw you. “Hey, Y/N.” He smiled, and you reciprocated it. “Hey. You packed a lunch beforehand?” You question, linking your arm with his to walk out towards the gate. “Yes, and I brought those candies you like, too.” “Ah, you’re the best!” At the gate, you let go of Sanha’s arm to undo the chain, and dropped the unlocked padlock onto the ground. Pushing one side of the gate open, you took his arm in yours again and led him through. You decided not to go too far into the small meadow, stopping at a place where you knew that you couldn’t be seen from the school grounds, but it was still close enough to get back before the next period. Sitting down, you pulled out your own sandwich and drink to start eating. The warm sun above you countered the cool spring breeze that fluttered through the flowers and grass around you. You chewed on your sandwich happily, and Sanha was quiet as well as he ate his lunch. “Oh, I brought that book of poetry you wanted to look at!” You suddenly remembered, reaching into your bag. Sanha had been complaining about a poetry assignment for his Literature class, and you wanted to prove that it actually wasn’t all that boring. Pulling the book out, you realized that Sanha had brought chocolate for himself, and you really didn’t want it getting on your book. With a shake of your head, you scooted closer to him until your thighs were touching, and opened the book. Resting your arm on his leg, you held the book open for the both of you to be able to see. He leaned over your shoulder to look at it, giving you a small nudge when he was ready for the page to be turned, and you would give him a nudge when you wanted him to give you one of the candies he’d brought. Since you were holding the book, he would have to place it in your mouth for you. Soon, the two of you got into a rhythm, you were realizing the speed that he read at and would be able to turn the page without prompting, and just your mouth falling open was enough for him to know to feed you another candy. There was a moment when you two had read a particularly powerful poem, Sanha had said, “Wow, that’s incredible,” and his warm breath washed over your much colder ear and cheek, that you realized how close he was to you. His chin was resting on your shoulder, left arm behind your back to prop himself up, and you were leaning on his lap, back almost against his chest. And you became horribly aware of the fact that you wanted him even closer. This wasn’t enough. You wanted him to wrap his arms around your waist, to sit you between his legs, and nuzzle his face into your neck. “Y/N, you can turn the page.” Sanha’s request snapped you out of your terrified daze, and you quickly did so. But you could never regain the focus on the poems that you had before, every movement or slight shift he made amplified the roaring in your ears. You blamed your mother and Jeongin for putting the thoughts in your head. There was no way Sanha liked you like that, so therefore there was no reason for you to like him like that. In your mind, that was final. The bell ringing for next period nearly made you jump out of your skin, and you were quick to scramble away from Sanha and stuff the book back in your backpack. “We should get going, you don’t want to be late for class and I’m sure if we run we can make it back just in time-” “Isn’t there a river near here?” Sanha interrupted your ramblings, calmly standing up and shouldering his own bag. “Uh, yeah. It’s about a twenty minute walk from here.” “Well then let’s go.” “What?” Sanha looked at you innocently, “Let’s go to the river, it sounds like fun!” “You realize that we’ll have to skip at least two periods, right?” “Do you really want to go to Algebra, Y/N?” “Well no, but your parents would literally kill me if they found out that you skipped with me, they already don’t like me.” You pointed out with a frown. They never said it outright, but you could tell that the Yoons disapproved of you. You weren’t quite sure why; if Sanha had for some reason told them about your tendency to skip the second half of the day, or your previous dislike for him, or if they just didn’t like the fact that you were a girl. Whenever you were at their house you noticed that they treated you much colder than the others, who they pretty much considered as five more sons. You were an outlier at his house, which was such a stark contrast from how he was treated at your house. “My parents can go choke,” He scoffed, and you looked at him strangely for a moment before bursting out laughing. You stood there in the middle of the meadow, keeled over as you just wheezed. Your sides were hurting as you laughed the hardest you ever had in probably months. Finally, as you stood up, wiping a stray tear from your cheek, you saw Sanha watching with a fond smile on his face. “Well, alright.” You said, picking up your backpack. “Let’s go to the river.” As you went on to start leading the way, Sanha casually linked his arm with yours, a simple gesture that made your chest twinge. You tended to walk home together like this but you never were bothered by it until now. And you knew that if you tried to let go he was only whine until you linked your arm with his again. It was an annoying but endearing trait about him. So the two of you continued on the path you hadn’t taken in months, not since the day you’d gone off on Sanha behind the school. It seemed like a lifetime ago, but it was less than five months. So much had changed for you. Sanha rambled on about the most random stuff, and you just listened to him, an amused smile on your face. Occasionally he’d say something you had to refute or comment on, but he mainly carried the conversation himself as usual. It was so different from your friendship with Jeongin, where either you were talking the most or neither of you said much, in a comfortable silence. That made you think about Jeongin again, and how you had dinner plans at his house tonight. When you’d told your mom, she was elated, previously she had been worried that you weren’t friends with him anymore. You knew that she loved him like a son, especially for 'getting you back in line’ again. Not that she didn’t like seeing Sanha all the time, but your mom was always preaching that you needed to balance everything in your life, including old friends and new friends. She suggested that you introduce Jeongin to your new friends, but you shrugged it off. It was okay for you all to have different friend groups, you both knew that deep down you were still each other’s best friend. In fact, Jeongin had made more new friends than you did, eight new friends as compared to your six. Soon, you knew that you were reaching the clearing that you usually practiced your dance moves at, and you got more excited. Sanha seemed to notice that you were picking up your pace, and followed suit until eventually you both were running through the grass, swerving to avoid the occasional tree. Giddy, you finally burst into the clearing, and grinned as you saw it to be exactly as you’d left it. Just twenty feet away was the riverbank, and underfoot was packed dirt with somewhat trampled grass that made it a good place for you to practice your dance moves. “This isn’t really a river.” Sanha commented, to which you pursed your lips. “It’s a river.” You said sternly, and he raised an eyebrow in amusement before changing the subject. “So what did you usually do down here when you skipped?” “The last time I was here I practiced a bit.” “Practiced?” “Oh uh, I dance a little bit.” Sanha’s eyes lit up, “Can I see?” Your eyes immediately widened, you never really danced in front of anybody except Jeongin a couple rare times. “I’m self-taught, and choreograph my own stuff, so it’s usually not that good, and-” “You choreographed it by yourself? That’s awesome!” “Well that’s doesn’t mean it’s good choreography, it’s nothing like what real dancers do or anything.” “What makes someone a 'real dancer?’” “Uh, I don’t know. Actually being successful, and not feeling like you’re going to puke at the idea of dancing in front of someone.” “Y/N, you’ll be fine. It’s just me, you know I’m not going to judge you or anything. Seriously, it’s gotta be great if you did it.” Your friend seemed to know exactly what to say to convince you, and with a sigh you brought out your phone. “I need to do a couple stretches first.” You mumbled, bending over to touch your toes, then doing a few others before returning to your phone. Sanha sat down in front of you, eagerly looking up at you. You selected the song, and quickly paused it before handing it to him. “I haven’t really practiced in a long time, by the way.” “It’ll still be awesome!” With a deep breath, you tried to focus yourself, walking to where you needed to start. Imagining the first few steps, you then nodded for Sanha to play the song. As you danced, you tried to avoid eye contact with Sanha, especially at some of the more intense parts that were inspired by idol dances. You took moves from both boy and girl groups, adding in a few of your own, and desperately tried to match it with the music. There was a couple times you’d miss the beat and have to scramble to catch up. But nonetheless, the song finally came to an end, leaving you breathing heavily and a grin on your face as Sanha clapped madly. “That was so good, Y/N!” He cheered, standing up to wrap his arms around you. You stumbled for a moment, laughing lightly as you hugged him back. “Thanks, Sanha. I messed up a bunch, though, and I know it probably looked really awkward, too. I choreographed it with the idea of a partner in mind, but Jeongin didn’t want to do it with me. I was thinking of asking Minhyuk, I know he’s been dancing for a while. Or Bin or Jinwoo, they dance too, right?” “We all dance! I can do it with you!” “Really?” You questioned, never quite pegging Sanha as the type to dance. “What do you think we all do in first period, hm?” “I honestly don’t know what your first period even is.” “It’s a free period for Jinwoo and MJ, and Music for the rest of us, so they come in and we either dance or do vocals together. We have after-school practices at Bin’s house sometimes, too.” “Wow, that’s actually pretty cool. Why haven’t I heard about this little idol group before, hm?” “We’re not idols.” Sanha pointed out, flustered as he messed with his hair. “Who knows, you boys might be one day.” “Ah, I doubt that.” “Sing for me.” He was clearly caught off guard, face turning pink as he fervently shook his head. “No way.” “Ya! You just made me dance for you!” You complained, and he seemed to realize his hypocrisy.

“Fine, fine.” Your friend took a deep breath, trying to think of a song to sing. As the melody flowed out smoothly from his mouth, you recognized it easily as I Need U, the song he had named as his favorite BTS song that one day in the hallway. It was so long ago.

Sanha’s voice was clear, surprisingly strong and level for someone his age. You found yourself transfixed as he sang, watching him intently, yet he was looking anywhere but you. As he finished the verse, you clapped excitedly, which caused a wide grin to spread across his face.

“That was so good!” You squealed,squeezing his arm supportively for a moment.

“Ah, I didn’t warm up before, but thank you.” Sanha paused, looking around for a moment.

“Something wrong, Sanha?” “No, I just- Let’s go down to the river!” Your friend suddenly burst into a run again, and with a sigh, you chased him down to the riverbank. As soon as he reached the waters’ edge, he kicked his shoes off, rolled up his pants, and stepped into the beginnings of the river. “How deep do you think it is?” He asked, and you shrugged. “It’s about up to my bellybutton, so for you, probably your hips or so.” “You’ve been swimming in it? We should go swimming!” “Yeah, in September. It’s way too cold now, and besides, we don’t even have swimsuits with us.” “So?” Sanha seemed unfazed, starting to unbutton his long sleeve school uniform shirt. He walked up to place it in the grass, then returned to the water in just his white t-shirt, gesturing for you to follow him. “Come on!” “Uh, no way.” You crossed your arms. “I can’t just take off my shirt and go swimming you ding dong! We don’t even have towels!” “Y/N, please?” He pouted, eyes pleading with you. “Nope.” “Y/N.” “Sanha.” You mimicked his whiny tone. “Y/N.” At this point, he was already up to his mid-thighs, pants soaked. “Sanha.” “It’s not even cold, it’s actually really warm!” “So?” “At least take your shoes off and get your feet wet with me.” Relenting, you slipped out of your sneakers and socks, then treading closer to the river. The water was in fact quite warm, you realized as it lapped at your ankles. Just as you were sarcastically about to ask Sanha if he was happy, you were met with a huge wave of water that reached most of the way up your legs. “Yoon Sanha!” You screeched, leaping away from him. “I’m going to kill you, you little punk!” Sanha had a mischievous grin on his face as he waded further towards the middle of the river. “How are you going to do that if you’re all the way over there?” Steeling your nerves, you took a few more steps into the river until you were close enough. With complete disregard for your earlier statements of not wearing a swimsuit or not wanting to get wet, you leapt at your friend. You successfully had tackled him in the middle of the river, causing the both of you to be almost completely submerged. As you continued your playful assault on him, more and more of you got wet, until the both of you were soaked from head to toe and tired of your river wrestling. “Well congrats, we went swimming. Now how are we supposed to go to school in soaking wet clothes?” “We don’t.” Sanha trudged out of the river, pulling his shoes back on. “If I wasn’t so cold and annoyed, I might like this bad boy side to you, Sanha.” You commented, opting just to tuck your shoes into your bag so they didn’t get muddy from the dirt accumulating on your wet feet. “Well then let’s get you less cold and annoyed so you can fully appreciate it.” Sanha offered his dry school shirt out to you. Begrudgingly, you put it on over your own wet uniform. It didn’t do much to warm you up, but you appreciated the gesture. “Thanks, Sanha.” “We should go to my house, I think it’s closest.” “Uh, your parents would most definitely not appreciate us walking into their home looking like this.” “They don’t get home for another five hours, it’s fine.” He said, taking your bag from you to carry it along with his own. So you followed Sanha to his house, which was in fact relatively close. You were thankful that school wasn’t out yet, nobody else needed to know about your midday skip and dip with Sanha. That could go downhill very quickly. Traversing through the streets barefoot, you desperately tried to keep up Sanha’s somewhat quick pace, his legs were way longer than yours. Thankfully the speed-walk helped to warm you up, and he was right about his house not being far away from the river. By the time you got to the familiar two-story house, you didn’t feel cold anymore. Until in the final stretch from the street corner to his house, the wind picked up, thoroughly chilling you to your bones. “Shit, that’s cold! You hissed, breaking out into a run towards the house. Sanha followed suit, desperately fishing his house key out and fumbling to unlock the door as the breeze kept coming. Finally, you both shoved your way through the front door, and slammed it behind you. Taking your arm in his light grip, Sanha guided you to the kitchen where he set your bags down, then upstairs. "I’ll get you some towels, and some warm clothes.” Sanha informed you, leading you into his bedroom before starting to search through his drawers. “You can change in the bathroom. Do you need anything else?” “Uhm,” You coughed awkwardly for a moment as you debated whether or not to inform him of the issue that literally every article of clothing you were wearing was soaked through. “You don’t need to give me your pants.” “Y/N, yours are absolutely drenched, you need to change!” “Yeah, well my underwear is also drenched, so that would just soak through your pants anyway!” Wordlessly, and with red cheeks, he opened another drawer and added one more article of clothing to the stack before handing them to you. You muttered a thank you before slipping into his bathroom. Starting by peeling your own wet clothes off, you took a towel to your body to dry the skin underneath, then to your hair. You attempted to tame your hair with your fingers before addressing the clothes situation. The last article of clothing Sanha had added was a pair of boxers, and you nearly burst out laughing when you saw that they had a pattern of a character from his favorite childhood cartoon. Your awkwardness faded away and you were still chuckling as you slipped them on, followed by the sweatpants and t-shirt. You were delighted to see that he had given you one of your favorite t-shirts of his, the blue and pink striped one. Whenever he wore it you would comment that he looked like someone from a kids’ tv show, which would only prompt him to puff out his cheeks and attempt to look as cutesy as possible. Emerging from the bathroom, you held your wet clothes in your arms, patiently waiting outside Sanha’s bedroom door. When he opened his door, his eyes were caught on you for a moment, and you shifted under his awestruck gaze. “Could I have a jacket or something? My arms are cold.” You requested, and he immediately snapped to attention, retreating back into his room before handing you a large zip-up hoodie.

“Thanks. Uh, where’s your dryer?” “Oh, yeah, here.” Sanha led you to the laundry room, and once you got the load started and slipped your arms into the hoodie, he dragged you out to the living room. “Movie?” “Sure, you choose.” You said apathetically, tucking yourself into the corner of the couch. He promptly settled in beside you, resting his head against your side as he looked through his Netflix. Your thoughts were elsewhere, the movie just providing background noise to your internal turmoil. Sanha was too sweet on you, and you didn’t know why. You weren’t spectacular at anything, and you definitely weren’t nearly as nice to him as he was to you. You were sarcastic, with a biting tongue, and sometimes too harsh of a sense of humor. But it never phased Sanha, he still pursued you. He softened you sometimes, like now, as you sat in his clothes on his couch, absentmindedly running your fingers through his hair; or like earlier in the meadow, when you were reading poetry together. But you were terrified, of what you would eventually do to him. This couldn’t last forever, you weren’t a soft person, you weren’t a nice person. You weren’t a person fit for Yoon Sanha. The warmth against your body was suddenly gone, and your fingers fell from the top of Sanha’s head as he sat up. You blinked in confusion, watching as he turned to face you, the most serious expression across his face that you’d ever seen. “Y/N.” He finally spoke, and you noticed that the movie had been paused. “What’s up?” “Nothing, Sanha.” You shook your head, trying to feign a smile. “No, there’s something. What’s wrong?” “Sanha, I’m fine.” “Y/N, you’re crying.” You hesitantly touched a your face, and you were, in fact, crying. Bitter tears slipped down your face, one after another. They wet your hands and your lap, but you kept crying silently. Your chest shook as you cried, and you could feel your lip quivering as you tried not to fall into full on sobs. “Talk to me, please.” He begged, grabbing your hand with his. You wrenched it away, sputtering out, “I don’t deserve a second chance. I don’t deserve your friendship. I don’t deserve you, Yoon Sanha.” “Y/N… I don’t know what else to say to make you understand that you deserve so much in life. I wish I could give it to you, and I’m sorry that I’ve failed you and that you still feel this way. If I could take all your pain and put it on myself, I absolutely would.” You could hear his voice start to waver, and when you looked up at him, his eyes were pooling with tears of his own. He looked at you with red eyes, and you could almost hear your heart breaking. “No no no, I didn’t want you to cry too.” You mumbled, wiping at his tears with your thumbs. “I’m not worth your tears, Sanha. Please don’t cry for me.” “Y/N, how the fuck could you think that?” Sanha’s voice suddenly turned hard. “Was I not good enough to you? Did I treat you so badly, that you still think you’re not worth anything? I thought I had tried my hardest, to show you that you deserve to be happy. I’m sorry, that I didn’t.” “No, Sanha, you did, I promise. You did so much for me, it’s my fault.” It really was your fault. It was always your fault. “Do you know why I wanted you to like me, why I wanted to be your friend so badly?” “Because you thought I was a wonderful person.” You answered his question with a confused frown, knowing that he had just told you this yesterday. “A wonderful person that I had- have, a huge crush on.” You just about choked on your own throat, shock halting the flow of your tears. Scanning his face for any sign of humor or something else that would signal he’s not being truthful. But there was a pink tinge across his ears and cheeks, and he had immediately started fidgeting with the hem of his shirt despite his confident words. He was telling the truth. Yoon Sanha has a crush on you. You wanted to immediately apologize to him, that he had gotten a crush on someone so horrible, that you couldn’t date him, because you wouldn’t be good enough for him, you would end up hurting him. But you stopped yourself from word vomiting. You were only thinking about yourself, pretending that it was for his sake. You’d been doing that this whole time, and you could see the disappointment and just plain tiredness on Sanha’s face from it. It was exhausting, to him and to you, to always be belittling yourself. He wanted you to love yourself, to have happiness so much, and here you were ignoring his wishes. You were hurting him almost as much as you were hurting yourself. You wanted to chastise yourself and hate yourself for being so selfish, but would that get you anywhere good? No. You needed to break this cycle. “I… have a crush on you too.” You finally let yourself say it. It would have been a big weight lifted off your chest, except an even bigger one replaced it, pinning you in place.

It was Sanha, who had practically tackled you in a hug, pushing you further back against the arm of the couch. You would have loved it, except you were awkwardly contorted, the wood underneath the upholstery of the arm pressing into your vertebrae. “Sanha, my back, please.”

“Oh, I’m sorry!” He apologized, sitting up straight again, but one of his hands had found yours, holding on firmly. “So?”

“So what?”

“Where should our first date be? Ooh, we could go get dinner tonight! I’ll pay for you and everything!”

“Sanha, I’m still wearing your clothes, no way am I going on our first date looking like this.”

“I think you look cute in my clothes.” He said with a frown, and his newfound bluntness for complimenting you made you hide your face in your hands momentarily, you could feel your cheeks heating up.

“I also already have plans with Jeongin tonight,” You added, remembering your friend, and then glancing over to the clock under the TV. School was ending in two minutes, and you nearly rolled right off the couch, hastily running to the kitchen table where your phone was.

[you: hey, i’m not at school, so i’ll just meet you at your house]

[jeongin: that’s fine. you were at school this morning, where are you now?]

[you: sanha’s house]

[jeongin: i have a couple questions]

[you: i’ll tell you about it when i see you in like, ten minutes, okay?]

[jeongin: fine]

Clicking your phone off, you returned to the living room to see a dumbfounded-looking Sanha, exactly where you had left him. “Sorry, I had to let Jeongin know I wouldn’t be walking home with him.”

Sitting back where you had been before, Sanha slowly blinked, and you reached over to take his hand in yours again, missing the feeling just in the minute you’d been away from him. You couldn’t imagine how it’d be when you actually left his house.

“That’s fine.” He plastered on a smile, and you tilted your head curiously.

“We’re having a movie night.”

“Oh that’s nice.”

“At his house.”

“Cool.”

“And we’re just friends.”

“I know.”

“And he has a girlfriend.”

“So do I.”

You nearly choked when he had said that, the heat rushing back to your cheeks. “Who says I’m your girlfriend yet?”

“Who says you’re not?” Sanha retorted, which only made you lightly smack his chest indignantly. “Okay, okay, I get it. We should have at least one date before I call you that, right?”

“Three.”

“So we’ll have one date tomorrow, and since the day after that is a Saturday, we can have two dates that day.”

As he revealed his plan to you, despite how dumb you knew it was, you found yourself still with a fond smile on your face. Yeah, he was a dork sometimes, but wasn’t that why you liked him? He was purely just… himself.

“We’ll see what happens.” You forced yourself to stand back up off the couch, still holding Sanha’s hand and pulling him off with you. “I need to go, I told Jeongin I’d meet him at his house in ten minutes, and that was two minutes ago.”

“How far away from here does he live?” Sanha followed you back into the kitchen, fingers still laced through yours.

Thinking for a moment, you tried to compose a mental map of your neighborhood. You lived between Jeongin and Sanha, closer to Jeongin’s house and the school than Sanha’s house. Thinking back to when you’d walk to either of their houses, you did a small amount of math in your head.

“Nine minutes. So I’m already late.”

“Then what’s another two minutes?”

Narrowing your eyes at Sanha, you were trying to decipher what he was implying. “Two minutes to do what?”

“I don’t know- just, not leave me yet.” He mumbled, swinging your linked hands.

A fond smile found its way onto your lips as you hoisted your schoolbag onto your shoulder, leading Sanha to the laundry room so you could get your now dry clothes. You only let go of his hand to put them in your bag, then sat at a kitchen chair to slip your shoes back on. As you stood up, you put both backpack straps on. He immediately took your hand in his again, following you to his front door like a lost puppy.

“Y/N?”

“Yes, Sanha?”

“Have fun.” Your friend? boyfriend? date mate? told you with a soft and genuine smile on his features.

You were expecting him to whine and beg you to stay, but you were pleasantly surprised to see that he was willingly let you leave to see your friend. “Thanks, I’ll text you later, okay?”

“Call.”

“Okay, I’ll call you later.” You let go of his hand and wrapped your arms around his waist tightly. “Bye, Sanha.”

“Bye, Y/N.” He hugged you back with a firm yet comforting touch.

Your chest swelled and you couldn’t help but bury your face in his chest, just loving the feeling of being with him. But you’d already wasted another two minutes getting ready to leave, and Jeongin tended to get impatient, and you knew he’d have a million questions for you when you got there. Finally you had convinced yourself to let Sanha go, and opened the front door. Outside, the breeze had settled down, and you were glad that Sanha had given you warm clothes, it was still somewhat chilly.

“Y/N, one more thing?”

“Hm?” You turned around in the threshold of his house.

He swiftly leaned down, placing a soft peck on your cheek. Your face was heating up again, and you hid your face in your hands that were covered by the sweater sleeves. “Oh.”

Sanha had something akin to a smug smile on his face, clearly proud of himself for being able to make you flustered. “Bye, Y/N!”

“Bye again.”

With that, you forced yourself out of Sanha’s front door and onto the sidewalk, giving him one final wave over your shoulder. The wind picked up again as you walked, but you could barely feel it, your insides felt all warm and fuzzy from your interaction with Sanha. Not to mention that you had wrapped his hoodie around yourself partially to block out the chills and partially just because it reminded you of him. It was ridiculous how soft you were for him already.

Arriving at Jeongin’s house and knocking on his front door, you were ready for the earful you were about to get for being five minutes late. The door swung open, and you sheepishly smiled at your friend as he took in your appearance.

“I have a lot to tell you.”

[ayearofpike]

“Collect Call”

From Thirteen, ed. T. Pines Scholastic, 1991 73 pages, 2 parts ISBN 0-590-45256-8 LOC: unknown OCLC: 24486627 Released October 1, 1991 (per Amazon UK)

When the new boy at school gives the head cheerleader a tape for her birthday, Janice Adams is jealous, enough that they get in a fight as they’re driving home from a party. Unfortunately, the fight makes Janice drive off the road and wreck her car, killing the cheerleader. But when she gets home, her answering machine starts playing new messages from the cheerleader, leading her back to the scene of the wreck – somehow, before it ever happens.

We’re fully into the edgy ‘90s now, and kid lit has come along for the ride. This collection, to me, reads as Scholastic trying to not only sell this book, but others by related authors. They knew kids were getting into thrillers, and that a compilation of short stories might be a good way to move more books. Tonya Pines says it herself in her introduction: the boom in sales made this book inevitable, with the part about buying other writers’ books going unsaid. And there are some names we recognize there on the cover – Pike for sure, R.L. Stine (who might have ended up even hotter in terms of pure sales), and also Caroline Cooney and Diane Hoh, who we might recognize as Cheerleaders authors. What I can’t get over is that obvious pen name at the top. D.E. Athkins indeed.

For the purposes of this blog, I only read “Collect Call” this time around. However, some of the other stories in here are quite good. Ellen Emerson White’s “The Boy Next Door” was my favorite at the time I read the book. I definitely shared that one around more than the Pike. She built the hard left turn at the end far better than anything I had seen from him, and certainly never before in such a tightly-crafted short story (it’s only like 18 pages!). White mostly wrote historical fiction, it looks like, besides the very occasional foray into thrillers, so I don’t know how she got tabbed for this anthology. The only other of her books I read, an adult mystery that came a few years later, was kind of boring. “The Boy Next Door” was far more memorable.

But anyway, we’re here to talk about Christopher Pike and “Collect Call.” It starts at a high school party, where Janice is trying to get up her courage to talk to Bobby Walker, the mysterious and cool new kid who always wears the same black leather jacket and jeans. For a minute, he seems like he’s too cool to remember her, but then he knows more about Janice than he’s let on. But right when she feels special, he calls over Caroline Spencer, the head cheerleader whose birthday it is, and hands her a cassette tape of music from some hot new artist called the Black Walker. Hmm, wonder if they’re associated in any way? Nah, too obvious.

So a couple hours later, the party’s ending, and Caroline asks Janice for a ride home. Janice is more than a six-pack in at this point, but she agrees. They listen to Bobby’s tape, which moves them, but then they get in an argument about him. This is the whole reason Caroline wanted a ride from Janice. She wants Janice to lay off, and Janice is basically like screw you, he’s not your property. So Caroline literally slugs the driver of the car she’s in in the face, just as they reach a curve over a steep incline.

When the car finally stops at the bottom, Janice is just a little scraped up, but Caroline has gone partway through the windshield and is obviously dead. Remember, Janice was not just driving drunk, she was driving totally fucked up. She doesn’t want to go to jail for this, so she gets the great idea to move Caroline into the driver’s seat. The tape is on Caroline’s lap, so Janice just sticks it in her pocket before starting the shift. Just as she’s getting Caroline positioned, she gets a weird premonition and gets away from the car right before it explodes in a giant fireball. And Caroline starts screaming as she burns alive. 

Freaky, no? It gets weirder. Janice gets home after being treated and questioned about the crash, drops everything right beside the answering machine, and jumps into the shower. When she gets out, there’s a new message - and it’s Caroline, asking for a ride to the party. The party that’s over. The one that Caroline died on the way home from. So Janice figures, huh, that’s weird, but she must have called before and I didn’t notice the message light. So she gets in bed, starts to settle in – and then hears the answering machine start going again. And it’s Caroline, even more insistent than before. Janice turns the machine off – and it starts recording again anyway, and Caroline is getting pissed. So Janice puts on her torn and bloody clothes, including her broken watch, and gets into her mom’s car and takes off.

To kill some time while she’s driving aimlessly, she sticks a tape into the player. The tape from the answering machine. And now Caroline is giving her driving directions like some kind of ethereal GPS. Janice, for lack of anything better to do or any kind of real explanation, follows them, straight to the point where she drove off the road before. And there’s no wreck. There’s not even broken glass. While she’s checking out the site, her watch starts again, counting down the last couple of minutes before her car is slated to come bombing off the road. And sure enough, right at the hour, here it comes. Janice realizes that she needs to get Caroline out of the car first, but when she goes around to help the driver, they keep canceling each other’s attempts to open the door. And pretty soon it’s too late, and the car explodes with Janice inside.

So Caroline wakes up in the hospital and learns about poor Janice’s fate. She’s told that Bobby Walker is hoping to see her, and while she’s waiting for him to come in she checks the voicemail on the hospital room phone. Because I guess pretty popular girls assume they have messages no matter where they are or what’s just happened.

But she has two. The first is from Bobby, hoping she liked the tape. The second? You already know. Janice says that the fire burned off her hands, but don't worry, she'll be in touch soon. And that's where the first part leaves us hanging.

Part 2 starts a month later, with Caroline having agreed to go on a date with Bobby. She's still recovering from her injuries sustained in the accident, hasn't even been back to school in fact, but there's something about his voice and his attitude that makes her feel like she needs to go. Bobby wants to go to a horror movie, and Caroline doesn't even like horror movies but she still agrees. The movie they go to? The Listeners, a story about a lizard monster from the past who possesses one of a set of twins and starts killing everyone. I know, this sounds familiar, but it's also upcoming: Pike has once again referenced one of his works that he hasn't yet written. At this point, The Listeners the novel was still four years away from publication, but he must have had the plot fleshed out already. (And we'll talk more about how he reuses YA themes in an adult novel again when we get there.) 

(And now I’m thinking about whether I need to try to tie together the Pike Extended Universe. It’s not the first time another work has shown up in one of his stories. But I’m not going to do it in this post. Just thinking about it I’m getting tired.)

But so anyway, Caroline averts her eyes for most of the gory parts, and Bobby doesn't like that. He thinks she's missed out on understanding what the movie is really trying to tell her, and makes her stick around for the next showing, with the implication that he'll do something bad if she doesn't watch every second. So Caroline does, and she starts remembering stuff about the accident that didn't happen: Janice climbing out of the car, Janice pulling her into the driver's seat, Janice backing away just before it exploded. Only this couldn't have happened, because Janice is dead. 

But we the readers saw Janice do this too, so what gives? Bobby's not totally forthcoming with what gives, but he does want to take Caroline somewhere else, and says she'll know more when they get there. "There," Caroline is appalled to learn, is Janice's grave. Before she can even move to get away, he's tied her to a tree and is digging up the coffin. 

While he does, he puts on the Black Walker's song and explains it. If you put a tape recorder in a silent location, Bobby explains, sometimes you'll get a ghost whisper. Bobby lucked out and got an entire song, which acted as an explanation of how to sacrifice unaware young women to a demon god. It haunted Janice into a nightmare before she ever knew she was dead, and it continues to haunt Caroline with her knowledge that her punch is what made Janice drive off the road in the first place. What's more, it gives Bobby the strength and the motivation to do what he does. So just like the twin in his favorite movie, Bobby is a vehicle for an ancient evil, and Caroline is just his most recent victim. He plans to throw her in the coffin with Janice's body and bury her alive.

Lucky for Caroline, it takes a while to dig through six feet of earth, even if one is possessed by an evil spirit. And also lucky for Caroline, there's only one copy of the song on the tape, which provides enough blank space for her to hear a ghost whisper of her own: Record. Button. So she snags the tape recorder with her feet, rewinds the tape to the beginning, and records over the Black Walker's song with "Silent Night." Bobby doesn't notice until he's ready to throw her in the grave, and the missing song saps all of his energy, which gives Caroline time to whack him over the head with the shovel and throw him into what was intended to be her final resting place. And as she heaps the earth on top of him, the voices on the tape swell and expand, a ghostly choir presumably of Bobby's victims singing along with Caroline's lone voice.

And so we reach the end of Pike’s first short story that we know of. It works fine, I think, but it seems like it wants to breathe and is out of room to do so. Part 2 seems like it could have (and maybe should have) been a short story by itself, but without the background of Part 1 it wouldn’t have worked as well. You get the impression that Pike, constricted to a length of maybe a third of his regular works, really wants to throw more detail in but can't. And that's not really what short stories are about anyway – it’s about crafting a tale with the minimum amount of information you need to tell it, without sacrificing the details that will engage the reader. Every word counts, and if it doesn’t count you should leave it out. Pike isn’t super good at leaving stuff out, and so "Collect Call" is straining against its bounds. (I never even mentioned the dude who threw the party and all the extraneous details used to describe a kid who’s not even integral to the plot.)

To be fair, Pike’s bio at the end of the book says he’s "America's best-selling author of young-adult fiction," and if that's true it makes sense that they'd let him kind of go as long as he wanted here. (None of the other stories even goes more than 30 pages, let alone two parts.) Still, I don't think it was quite enough for him. After all, this is a dude who has now written nine books about an eternal vampire. We’ll get to some more short stories in a bit, and as I recall he’ll start to figure out the genre. But “Collect Call” takes too much time on extras and is too floaty and flighty (at least in the first part) to be a real engaging read. Kind of like this blog.

[wordsablaze]

(2) Nostalgia Makes You Fragile

Stubbornly In Love Magnus and Alec are two beautiful souls that both happen to be in love, heartbroken, and painfully stubborn. An angsty malec fic prompted by this lovely soul! Enjoy!

A/N: So I tend to ramble when writing angst, my apologies! Feel free to point out mistakes and I hope you like it anyway...

Alec Lightwood was not coping.

If he had been coping, he hadn't been coping well. At this point, he'd even given up pretending to be coping. His lack of a healthy coping mechanism was far too obvious, even to those who didn't know him at all.

It's odd how quickly he'd become attached to his warlock - the warlock - and how quickly he'd forgotten how to exist without magic and glitter in his life.

What's worse is that everyone can sense it. Pain, he thinks, is bearable only until it's repeatedly pointed out to you, day after day, like a million little needles pressed into your skin, within plain sight.

He hates being viewed as incomplete, as weakened, as lonely. He wants to shout at the world for assuming he isn't self-sufficient and making him out to be something akin to a symbiote for Magnus. He wants to scream until his voice runs out, he wants to run until his legs can't hold his weight, and he wants to punch people until the skin on his hands peels off.

But he can't.

He yearns to sink under his blankets and stare at the messages he'd received from Magnus but he ends up almost buried under paperwork and files to check over. He wishes he could ignore the world, run to a remote forest, and think about the times he's spent with a certain warlock- or forget them, he doesn't care either way - but he's always drowning in the questions of everyone else walking through the institute. He needs his sense of normality back but, since meeting Magnus, his normal had changed and he can't figure out how to undo everything they'd created, partly because he can't tell which parts of him were unlocked by Magnus and which parts he'd always had.

"Alec?" He hears a voice asks and, strangely but not at all surprisingly, it takes him far too long to recognise it's Izzy.

"Iz, yeah, you okay?"

She chuckles - but it's a sad chuckle - then nods. "I'm good. Raphael was looking for you."

"Why?" Alec asks before promptly shaking his head. "Wait, Never mind. Thanks for telling me."

He shakes his head, trying to physically expel the fog of guilt taking over his intellect, as he walks to where he guesses he could find Raphael. Not wrong in his guess, he greets the vampire without thinking about it and the two of them settle around the circular table, one that he'd totally not modelled around King Arthur's table because he's a nerd, definitely not.

"We have a problem," Raphael states.

Alec nods; he'd been expecting that. "How can I help?"

"We'd had a few clashes with the warlocks-"

He doesn't get to finish his concern because Alec's brain, against his best wishes, decides to stop paying attention. His brain, his stupid, stupid brain, chooses to spiral into nostalgia and he can't think because he can feel the ghost of Magnus' magic in his soul and he can see those beautiful, kaleidoscopic eyes every time he blinks to try and clear his vision - a counter-intuitive habit, really. Somehow, he's at the door before he registers standing up, his feet propelling him anywhere away from the mention of warlocks. He thought he was better than this but, as it turns out, he's not good at suppressing memories that want to float at the front of his mind like hot air balloons powered by helium and gasoline and the agony of caged birds.

Breathing heavily, he shuts his eyes and lets himself sink to his knees, dimly registering that he's in Izzy's room as he cups his pounding head with his sweating hands. He can't open his eyes because he can't bring himself to face the reality of an unsupported reality and he can't move because he can't feel the love he never knew he needed until he lost it.

It doesn't occur to him that the earthquake he can feel is his own body shaking. At least, not until there's a hand on his knees and a soft, quiet voice humming from somewhere near him.

Beats of music fill his ears and he breathes in time to the tune changes, slowly but surely realising he'd barely been breathing and that his body was trying to stop him from shutting down entirely. An age and a half later, he manages to gingerly unclench his fingers and roll his shoulders back, wincing when bones crack and his muscles complain from being so tense for so long. It's even later when he finally blinks and lifts his head up, his gaze flickering between irrelevant objects until it lands on Izzy.

"Welcome back, big brother." Her voice, usually filled with confidence and an attitude to be reckoned with, is gentle, too gentle as if she thinks slightly raising the pitch of her words could shatter him.

"Izzy... I..."

"I know," she whispers, "I know, even if you don't know."

"What don't I know?" Alec asks desperately, his voice a pitiful reminder of his collapsing sense of control.

Izzy's smile is sad as she replies, "If it was my place to tell you that, you wouldn't even know that question exists."

Alec groans and stretches his legs out, wincing once more as his knees protest at the sudden movement. He rakes a hand through his hair, sighing when it falls back on his forehead before wiping his eyes for the sake of trying to hide his confused pain. He knows it won't work but he has to convince his heart that he's okay if he wants to try and function like any other person. Unfortunately, it turns out the heart is incredibly difficult and almost impossible to persuade.

"What were you humming?" Alec asks instead of addressing the elephant in the room.

"I don't know, something Simon was showing me while we waited for Raphael."

"You waited on a vampire?"

His inquiry is met with a frown. "No, we waited for a vampire. We waited for the head of the clan because rushing him meant making him wait for you."

Alec sighs in defeat. He feels the tears in his eyes and the horrible sparks of emotion rising in his nose that tell him he's about to cry. Shutting his eyes is a pointless decision but he chooses to make it anyway, squeezing his eyes shut so hard he can feel the tension in his temples. Izzy sucks in a breath as he starts to shudder but she knows better than to falsely convince him everything's alright so she quietly leaves, leaving Alec alone with his angry regret. His sobs are inaudible but they're the only thing he can hear, the rest of the world fading away as if it had never existed in the first place - as if he'd lost his world the moment he'd chosen to extend their trust outside their comfort zones, outside everything they'd agreed on.

Now his muscles are complaining for a different reason. They're complaining because holding in sobs that want to roar and echo throughout the world is not without consequence and Alec has chosen to take on every consequence as an alternative to the agony of unwanted nostalgia. He can't think beyond the dull throbbing in his head and the way his hands are shaking too violently for him to wipe his incessant tears.

He hates this.

There's nothing he despises more than to be helpless in the power of himself. He'd grown up believing that nobody could ever order him to do anything unless his heart was in agreement but now when he can't feel the strength of his heart and his worst enemy is his own mind, there's nobody to turn to for help. There's nobody who knows him better than he knows himself, as the much-loved saying goes, but who is he meant to ask when he doesn't know if he knows himself anymore?

It's a completely new feeling for him to feel lost in his own skin. 

His mind is a maze and he can't find the entry, never mind figure out how to navigate his way through. He's an open book but he's written in a language that belongs not to intellect, knowledge, and scholars, but to emotion and the parts of the heart nobody can decipher. His problem is a badly hidden secret but he can't bring himself to look at the clues and piece everything together so he can figure it all out. It should be obvious but, as much as Magnus drew strength from him, he'd drawn strength from Magnus and, without it, he's falling, falling into a mess.

The last thing anyone would normally call him is fragile but, right now, sat on his sister's floor with his knees pulled up and tears slipping out of his tired eyes, he can't help but admit the perfect summary of his current state is exactly that: fragile.

like/reblog but don’t repost, thanks!