#but also I really don’t think it’s healthy when I’m constantly canceling on friends because I’m afraid my family will be mad at me spending | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

bestiesenpai · 4 years ago

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youtuber Sukuna

I beg you to read the shitposts I made about this, they are delicious. You don’t have to of course but...if you loved me you would :) s/n = screen name, and I hope you chuckle at Sukunas screen name

Content warning: uhmhm lowkey incel shit(mean internet comments and whatnot)

part two --- part 3

Name: Sukuna. Age: 25. Height: 6 foot 5 inches. Occupation: toxic Youtuber, fitness trainer and hot guy.

Sukuna wasn’t exactly known for being kind. He wasn’t nice to others, rarely having anything good to say about anyone, and he’d made a successful Youtube career out of it. First starting as a fitness trainer at his gym, through encouragement from his clients and the notion of a quick cash grab, he started Youtube.

He didn’t care about it and that reflected in the quality of his videos and editing. He didn’t have consistent uploads, just filming and posting videos whenever he wanted, analytics be fucked. But somehow, that worked out for him, and he quickly found himself with over two million subscribers just frothing at the mouth for his next video.

And those subscribers were some of the worst people. Sukuna didn’t care about fostering a safe space online for others, not in the slightest. His comment sections were atrocious, both on his Youtube and his Instagram. It was full of toxic men one-upping each other constantly and dragging on each other for not being able to work out as much as Sukuna did.

Sukuna was a large part of why his fanbase were so toxic. He himself often made bad comments about others, whether fellow creators or people that happened to appear in the backgrounds of his videos, and on more than one occasion he’d been ‘cancelled’. None of that mattered though, all he cared about was shitting on other people and making money.

Sometimes he played video games and posted it, but not too often. Sukuna often stated he wasn’t so much of a fucking lonely loser that he’d play video games all the time, and so the gaming videos he did post were few and far between. He played angry shooter games and GTA, mindless button clicking he could get lost in for a few hours for a video.

Laying in bed one night after uploading his most recent video, one where he rages at 12 year olds on GTA online, Sukuna was just scrolling through his phone mindlessly. After he uploads video game content, like clockwork, he gets recommendations for gaming channels. He only watches a few of them, mostly leaving mean comments saying what losers they are, but one catches his eye.

He’s never been recommended this kind of video before. The thumbnail is light and bright with some pink aesthetic lights in the back. But the most enticing thing is the person in the middle, cute pink cat ear headphones on and a bright smile.

“Let’s see…” Sukuna mumbles to himself, mindlessly clicking the video. He hasn’t even read the title, he only clicked it because they were cute, and here he is nearly blinded by the bright setup they have.

“Hi everyone, it’s (Y/N) here and I’m really excited today! We’re going to be playing this new game I found!” Sukuna is immediately enraptured by the sound of your voice, watching how your face changes as you talk. His eyes drift off to the decor behind you, cute plushies and healthy plants, and some twinkling fairy lights. There’s books as well, and your chair is one of those ergonomic gamer chairs he has as well but in pink.

Sukuna watches the video dumbly, totally in the dark about whatever you’re doing, but loving it all the same. All he knows is that he likes the sound of your voice, and when you laugh and smile at a funny part in the game, it makes a light flush come to his cheeks.

It only takes one video for Sukuna to spiral into more of your content. He watches a video on your gaming setup, and he’s surprised that so much technology can come in pink. He watches a video on how you edit, a few of you cooking in your kitchen, and even a few vlog videos.

He quickly subscribes to your channel, and when you plug your social media, he immediately goes there. Pulling up your Instagram, he stares at your profile picture and almost audibly coos at you for being cute.

Your profile is just as cute as your videos are and Sukuna barely remembers to follow you before he’s going through your whole feed, liking every picture he sees. Sometimes he leaves comments, only one word though, ‘cute’. He’s never liked something so outright cute before, it wasn’t who he was and it definitely didn’t fit with his brand.

Falling asleep after following you on every platform, Sukuna wakes up thinking about you as well. And he also wakes up to hundreds of comments from all his accounts, bombarding him with questions and screenshots from last night.

‘SUKUNA WHY WOULD YOU LIKE THIS SHIT?!’

‘OMG Sukuna liked (Y/N)s posts!!’

‘Sukuna is so gross and toxic, you better stay away from (Y/N)!’

‘SUKUNA YOU GAY NOW’

‘EW why the fuck do you like this bitch?’

There were hundreds of comments that he waded through. Most were from his fans, expressing disgust at how many photos of yours he’d liked and wondering why he, Sukuna, most heterosexual alpha male on the planet, would like a pretty in pink Youtuber who had bubbly intros and whined when their animal crossing villagers wanted to move away.

Other comments were from your fans, some in awe that he would like you considering how much he said he hated overly cute things. Other fans expressed concern, worried what this might mean for their favorite Youtuber. Did Sukuna want to cause problems, potentially hurting you? He did have a reputation of bullying others, so this wasn’t far fetched.

Checking your Instagram, you didn’t make any comment about it. There wasn’t any update or anything, but on his end he was being tagged in endless Twitter threads with screenshots of him liking your posts and commenting under them.

“For fucks sake.” He grunted, clenching his phone in his hands. The amount of notifications he was getting were starting to upset him and he nearly threw his phone to get them to stop.

Ignoring his phone for the rest of the day, Sukuna went to the gym like he always did and trained with his clients. Some of them brought it up to him, asking him if he had a mind break last night and forgot what he was doing. Sending them harsh glares, Sukuna refused to talk about it.

“Oh my fucking god.” Sukuna nearly wailed when he got home, finally checking his phone. His name and yours had begun trending, and the hashtag #protect(Y/N) was also. Muttering angrily under his breath, Sukuna turned on Instagram live.

“Okay what the fuck!” He shouted, seeing the live become instantly flooded with people all screaming about you and him. “You’re all fucking annoying, you know that?” Glaring harshly at the camera, he read some of the comments that went by.

‘WHY’D YOU LIKE (Y/N)S POSTS FROM 2017’

‘Are you two secretly dating??’

‘COLLAB!’

“Who gives a shit why I liked their stuff, you’re a fucking weirdo for keeping track of me. And we aren’t secretly dating, dipshits.” Rolling his eyes, Sukuna scoffed as more comments came in begging for a collaboration. “And think about it you morons, why would we collab? Our shit is too fucking different, what would we even film about?”

Sukuna stayed on Instagram live for nearly an hour answering questions asking about you. Every time he had to answer that you weren’t secretly dating, he got a little more annoyed. Not at the comments themselves but at the fact that it was true; you didn’t even know he existed.

Ending the live in a huff, Sukuna didn’t feel any better than before, and it was made even worse by the fact that everything he said was being relayed to Twitter, and you were tagged in every tweet.

“These idiots!” Staring at his phone, Sukuna couldn’t believe what he was seeing. On your Instagram stories, you’d posted a q&a for your followers, and nearly all of the comments were about Sukuna.

“Hi everyone! No, me and Sukuna aren’t dating!” You said, laughing a little to ease how uncomfortable you were. “To be honest, I’ve never even heard of him before! As you know, my content is very...different from his, so our circles don’t exactly intersect. But I’m always happy to have new followers and potential friends!”

“Fuck me.” Sukuna groaned, cringing at how uncomfortable you looked having to address the sudden onslaught of questions. For once he wished he’d actually given a shit about his online presence, so that maybe one day your circles could intersect. He knew he scared you, he scared a lot of people, and this was just proof.

“Uh, Sukuna if you see this, hi it’s nice to meet you!” You said in the next slide, puffing out your cheeks and waving cutely at the camera. It made Sukuna blush, and he hated it. “Thank you for following me and liking my content! I was very surprised that you found me!”

“Of course I did, idiot, you’re fucking cute.” He muttered under his breath.

“I know a lot of people are asking for us to do a video together and I know our content is really different, so don’t feel pressured to respond or anything, but the offer is open! If you’d like, we can collab on something.”

“On what?” He asked like you were there.

“I cook sometimes, and I know you cook too! Maybe we can make a cooking video? You can teach me how to make healthy food or something!” Sukuna could tell a fake laugh when he heard one, and you definitely had one right now. “Anyways, thank you! Bye Sukuna!” But hearing you say his name cutely like that made him not care.

He nearly responded right away, accepting the collab offer now that you’d spoken about it, but he didn’t want to seem desperate. He watched through the rest of your Instagram stories, going back and replaying the parts where you talked about him over and over and his heart clenched every time when you said his name.

In the dead of night, Sukuna DM’s you after watching your latest video and leaving the simple comment ‘check your DM’s’.

“Fuck, what should I say?” He’s suddenly stumped as he looks at the keyboard. Typing and retyping a message, in the end all he can say is hi. He doesn’t expect a reply, ever, but when he gets a vibration on his phone two seconds later he jumps to read it.

(S/N): hi Sukuna! :)

(cursedgod): hey

Real fucking smart, repeating what he just said.

(S/N): is there something you wanted to talk to me about?

(S/N): I hope you haven’t been annoyed at all the notifications you’ve been getting!

(cursedgod): No it’s okay

(cursedgod): we can collab if you want

Good Sukuna, good. Play it cool, don’t let them know that your fingers are actually trembling because you’re nervous.

(S/N): do you want to?? I don’t want to pressure you! I know we’re pretty different haha

(cursedgod): yeah, let's do it. Cooking?

(S/N): sure!

Looking around his home, he was suddenly assaulted with the fact that he didn’t have any furniture. He barely had a proper bedroom, just a mattress on a bare frame and a dresser. His lounge room was the same with his computer setup in one corner and then nothing else. There was only a couch, a mounted TV and a fold out table and chairs for his dining room.

(cursedgod): I know a studio kitchen we can use, I’ll send you the address

Thank god he’d done promo work for a brand in a studio one day, otherwise he’d be fucked.

(S/N): awesome! I’m free next Saturday!

And just like that, it was a date. Well, a meeting. Sukuna knew it wasn’t a date, but his heart still thumped like it was one. Confirming the time, he ended the conversation with a curt goodbye and obsessed about it throughout the night.

When the day to meet you came, Sukuna nearly ran late trying to pick out his clothes. He’d never cared about looking good or presenting himself well in front of others, whatever version of him he turned up in was what they got. But for you, he wanted to try a little harder.

Waiting outside the studio space, Sukuna rubbed his hands together nervously. You’d messaged a day or two ago offering to put the video on your channel since it probably wouldn’t fit his aesthetic, so he didn’t have to bring his shitty camera equipment.

“S-sukuna?” Snapping his head up, Sukunas mouth fell open looking at your curious face a few feet away, an Uber driving off behind you. You were even cuter in person, just his fucking luck. How was he expected to act like a normal person when his recent obsession was here looking better than he could have imagined.

“Hi.” What comes out is a grunt, not the smooth word he��d hoped. He can see you eyeing him up, taking in all the thick and corded muscles of his body. It made his chest puff out a little, he worked hard for this physique and to have you so openly looking at him made him happy.

“It’s nice to meet you!” Sticking your hand out, you smiled politely at him.

“Same.” Shaking your hand with a firm grip, Sukuna could feel the difference in your palms. Yours was soft and nicely moisturized and he had callouses everywhere and a few cuts and scrapes.

Opening the door for you, Sukuna led you to the studio space he’d rented out. It was a clean and modern kitchen, not unlike his own, but it had appliances and looked actually lived in. Helping you set up a few camera angles, Sukuna felt a pang of nerves hit him in the stomach.

“Sukuna, can we take a picture together?” You asked before starting, and Sukunas brow furrowed deeply. Why would you want to take a picture with him? His expression must have scared you, because you quickly backtracked. “F-for promo for this video, on Instagram and stuff!”

“Sure.” God, did he feel bad or what. He shouldn’t have made that face at you, now you wouldn’t look him in the eye. Crouching down to get the right angle for you, Sukuna watched you pick a cute animal filter.

“Just do what I do.” Throwing up a peace sign, you cutely tilted your head from side to side and smiled. Sukuna tried to do the same but he looked awkward, and most of all he was blushing pretty bad.

You snapped a multitude of pictures, some at different angles and some with different filters, and in all of them Sukuna was blushing at least a little. He managed to smile more as it went on, even laughing at one of the filters.

“Thanks! I’m going to post these really quick and then we can get started!” Giving him a brief smile, you turned back to your phone and set about editing some of the pictures. Looking over your shoulder, Sukuna could see that he looked like a blushing high schooler meeting their idol for the first time and not a grown man.

Once the photos were posted and you tagged him in everything, it was time to start. Setting up your marks on the floor, you took a generous drink of water and cleared your throat.

“Are you ready for the intro? I’ll start it and introduce you, okay?” You’d actually prepared a script for yourself, and showed Sukuna as well.

“Okay.” Stepping in front of the camera, Sukuna bristled at feeling you so close to him. Your arm brushed his casually as you were fixing your shirt, and Sukuna was glad he’d worn his most expensive cologne for this.

“Hi everyone, welcome to today's video! As you know, I’m (Y/N), and today we have a special guest today!” Throwing your arms in the air, you motioned to Sukuna.

“Hi.” He nodded, barely cracking a smile. He could feel you looking at him like you wanted to say something, but he didn’t look.

“So, many people have been asking for us to do a collaboration and it’s finally here!” Clapping your hands lightly, you rocked on your heels and nudged his shoulder with yours. “Do you want to tell them what we’ll be doing today?”

“Uh-” The playful nudge you’d given him was enough to make Sukuna short circuit. “I-I-” He suddenly couldn’t remember how to speak. “Rice?”

“Let’s try that again.” You laughed. “Do you want to tell them what we’ll be doing today?” This time, you didn’t nudge him with your shoulder.

“We’re gonna…” the words were on the tip of his tongue, they wanted to come out and be spoken but he couldn’t do it.

“It’s okay, it’s okay!” Nodding reassuringly, you took a deep breath in and out, and Sukuna shakily copied. “One more try?” When he looked at you, Sukuna expected to see a hint of annoyance in your face, but there was none. You were just smiling softly at him, waiting for his answer.

“Yeah. I’ll uh, I’ll get it next time.” Stepping away from the camera, Sukuna took a drink of water and cleared his throat. Cracking the bones in his neck, he took a deep breath and came back. “Let’s do it.” No more fucking embarrassments.

“Do you want to tell them what we’ll be doing today?” You asked for the third time, slightly swaying your body side to side this time.

“We’re gonna make katsudon today.” Finally, the words he wanted to say came out.

“That’s right! As you can see, Sukuna is really fit!” You immediately hopped in, giving his arm a brief squeeze. “And he knows how to make a ton of healthy meals!”

“Mhmm.”

“So I asked if he could help teach me, and all of you at home, how to make it!” Smiling at the camera, you waited a few seconds before relaxing and turning it off. “Did you like that? We can refilm it if you want.”

“No, it’s okay.” Running a hand through his hair, he pointed to the bag of rice he’d brought. “Let’s get started on this shit.”

Taking fifteen minutes to film the two of you filling up the rice cooker, when it was over, you set about getting aesthetic shots of the other ingredients. Sukuna tried to seem casual off to the side on his phone, but he was really watching you.

Getting started on chopping the ingredients, Sukuna somehow managed to say the things he was supposed to without stuttering too badly. He was amazed that you could make the things he was doing sound so interesting, your narration as you held the camera and tried to do things yourself was impressive to the man that barely knew anything about cameras.

“Sukuna, I need help cutting the meat.” You whined, tapping the meat on the cutting board with a knife. “I don’t remember how you showed me.”

“Here.” Without thinking, Sukuan grabbed your hand with the knife in it and moved it for you. “You just have to move your wrist more, it’s not that hard.” Doing it a few times, when Sukuna felt your chest expand with air against his, that’s when he realized how close the two of you were. “S-sorry.” Immediately jumping back, he stared at the floor.

“Thanks!” Giving him a smile, you kept at it.

“I’ll fry the meat.” Stepping in as soon as you were done, Sukuna already had the hot oil ready. He was eager to cook and do something with his hands instead of - what he felt like - was awkwardly watching you off to the side.

“Okay!” Grabbing the camera, you focused on the pan. “You’re really good at this, Sukuna!”

“T-thanks.” Staring directly at the pan, Sukuna didn’t look away. Even with the hot oil popping up from the pan a few times and burning his fingers, he didn’t flinch at all.

“Ow!” But you did. Your hand had gotten too close, and when Sukuna flipped the meat, some of the oil had gotten on your hand.

“Shit.” Abandoning the pan, Sukuna was ready to drag you over to the sink for some cool water.

“I-it’s okay, it was only a little.” Shaking your stinging hand, you point to the food. “But I think the meat might burn.”

“Shit!”

Narrowly avoiding disaster with the meat, when it came time to cook the eggs, you made a joke about how you liked your eggs in the morning and Sukuna burnt them almost immediately. While not an overtly sexual comment, the implications of the words still affected him.

Somehow, he managed to make the dish come together and while his plated dish didn’t come out the best, yours looked at least halfway decent with overcooked meat and burnt eggs. The only things not messed up were the rice and vegetables, and even then Sukuna was surprised.

“We did it everyone, we made katsudon!” Holding up the bowls, you smiled big and nudged Sukunas shoulder again. “You saw we had a few mishaps along the way, but that’s okay, that’s what made it fun.”

“Yeah, it was fun.” Sukuna chuckled. Despite him being more nervous than he’d ever thought possible, he had fun cooking alongside you.

“Sukuna, will you try mine? I made it super pretty and everything.” Holding your dish up to him, Sukuna wasn’t expecting you to do that. Now he felt bad that his looked so ugly and like a teenaged boy made it; he almost said no.

Eating yours though, somehow it tasted better than he was expecting. It must have been how you prepared it, and the fact that you cared so much about the presentation. Eating it in silence, he let you eat in peace as well for a few minutes and compliment the food to the camera.

“Alright, that’s the end of the video!” Putting your bowl down, you turned to Sukuna. “I had so much fun today, thanks for filming this with me.” Now was his chance to make everything better. Putting his bowl down and bolstering himself with confidence, Sukuna threw his arm over your shoulder and pulled you close to him.

“Thank you (Y/N), I really did enjoy today. I hope we can film again soon!” He squeezed your shoulder and smiled really big at not only you but the camera as well. He knew he was blushing, he knew that even the tip of his nose was a nice rosy shade, but he didn’t care. If people teased him for it, then so be it. But he wanted you to know how he truly felt.

“R-really? You want to?” You asked, looking up at Sukuna from your place smooshed against his body.

“Really.”

“Aww, well you heard it here first everyone! Sukuna wants to shoot another video with me!” Clapping your hands a few times, you waved at the camera. “Okay, bye everyone!”

“Bye.” Sukuna waved too, waiting a few seconds before letting you go and turning off the camera.

“Sukuna, did you really mean it? You want to film another video with me?” You were in utter disbelief. All this time, he’d just seemed very standoffish, if not a little awkward around you. You were happy to film this video with him, he had way more followers than you and it would help boost both your channels, and to hear him say that just made it even better.

“Yeah, I was serious.” Sukuna spoke around stuffing his mouth with the food he still had left. He was more hungry than he thought, the nerves doing a good job of twisting his stomach during the video. Now that it’s over, he can finally relax.

“That makes me really happy.” Eating the rest of your food as well, you leant against the counter. “This is gonna sound kind of mean, but I was really scared to film with you today. I thought you were going to be really mean.”

“Shit, you did?” He grimaced, letting out a sigh. “Sorry I had you worried.” He could already imagine the comments you would get from his fans.

“It’s okay! You’re actually way nicer in person, I was surprised!”

“That’s good.”

“And you’re really buff, you have muscles in places I didn’t even know were possible!” You laughed bashfully at that comment, and avoided looking at him when he stared at you in shock. “I couldn’t help but notice…”

Were you checking him out? Had you been checking him out this whole time and he didn’t even realize? He had seen you eyeing him up when you first met, but were you looking at him like that at other times as well? Now he’d really have to watch your video to see if it was true.

“Thanks, it’s my job.” Could he have said that any lamer? “My job outside of all this, I mean. I’m a trainer at this fancy gym downtown.”

“Oh, I’ve seen some of your videos at your gym! I know which one you’re talking about.”

“You do? You’ve seen my videos?” If he wasn’t surprised before, he was now.

“Yeah, you know I had to do a little research beforehand.” You nodded, beginning to clean up the dishes around you. “And I know you’ve already watched almost all of my videos, so it only seemed fair.”

Did you have to bring that up? Now Sukuna was embarrassed again.

“Y-yeah, I did.” Clearing his throat, Sukuna helped gather the dishes. He took up washing them, another task he could do to get his mind off you. As you took down the camera equipment, he nearly broke several dishes and utensils from scrubbing too hard.

“I’ll call you an Uber.” He said when all was said and done and you were back at the front of the building.

“You don’t have to, it’s okay.”

“No, I want to.” Quickly calling you a ride, Sukuna fiddled with his phone a little more. “Uh, could I- could I-” His voice kept leaving him, and he had to cough a few times. “Can I get your number? I really liked your camera shit and I want to improve mine.” Okay, it wasn’t a total lie. He did like your setup and wanted to make his just as good, but he really wanted your number to potentially talk to you more about things outside of Youtube.

“Sure! Go ahead and type it in.” You were quick to give him your phone, a cute pink phone case on the back of it. Typing it in, he can’t help but notice the little devil emoji you add by his name. He wants to ask, but your ride is already pulling up.

“Bye!” Setting all your camera gear inside the car, you turn and wave goodbye.

“See ya.” Just as you’re about to close the car door, Sukuna gets a burst of confidence. “Text me when you get home, okay?”

“Okay!” And off you go. Sukuna watches the car drive off until he can’t see it anymore. He takes his time getting to his own place, eagerly awaiting your message with every step. But even when you do message him, all he can do is send a thumbs up back and nothing else.

It’s about two and a half days after that that you text him again, letting him know you’re done editing and that you’re going to post the video soon. It wasn’t a very long video to begin with, so the editing was simple enough. Sukuna replied with what appeared to be a lackluster ‘can’t wait’, but on the inside he was shaking. He’d already screenshot all the pictures the two of you took together and added them to a folder.

“Here we go.” As soon as the video went live, Sukuna watched it. He was mortified as soon as it started at the blush so evident on his cheeks, and how it stayed throughout the whole thing. He groaned at the part where he helped you cut up the meat, he almost wishes you’d cut it out. Every little detail that made him embarrassed was there, every little nuance of his actions you’d managed to capture and make it cute.

(Y/N): How do you like it??

You texted him after twenty minutes, eager to hear his thoughts.

(Sukuna): it’s good, good editing and stuff

(Y/N): yay! I’m going to read comments in a few hours, you should too! I bet people will be really shocked!

(Sukuna): yeah no doubt

Oh, he was definitely going to read the comments. Whereas you were going to wait for a fair few to come in before commenting, Sukuna frequently refreshed the page and read the new ones as they came in. You were right, a lot of people were surprised, but he also saw a lot of his fans as well.

‘Ew Sukuna really cooked for that bitch? They can’t do it themselves?’

‘Yeah, why do they have to rely on him? Useless as fuck lol’

‘Sukuna only did this to get laid, (Y/N) looks like an easy fuck’

All of those comments, and many more, made his blood boil. Usually, he wouldn’t care at all about the comments, letting them fester in his comment section and spiral out of control. But for you, it was different.

‘Fuck off and die you pieces of shit. Leave (Y/N) alone or say it to my fucking face’

Sukuna sent that message, along with a variety of other threats, to all the people that insulted you. He didn’t care that this wasn’t his channel and that you would deal with it in whatever way you wanted to. He needed to defend you against the unwanted audience he’d brought you.

Luckily, after seeing Sukunas messages, all of his fans backed off. They knew how serious he was about his threats and there were many rumors that he actually did go and beat people up who said things he didn’t like. No one wanted to be on the receiving end of his torment.

With Sukunas name attached to the video and his heavy presence in the comment section, the video easily went viral. It was easily the most viewed video on your channel, getting on the trending pages of several different platforms.

(Sukuna): hey

It’s nearly a week after the first video that Sukuna messages you, and the hype is still going strong, and your follower count grows greatly from it.

(Y/N): hi! What’s up?

(Sukuna): do you want to film a video for my channel now? We can play a game, I have a few

(Y/N): sure that sounds fun!

Oh how wrong you were. The game Sukuna chose was a scary game, a shooter game with scary zombies and a lot of possible jumpscares. He doesn’t tell you either, so on the night of filming - he insisted on it being nighttime to get the full scary effect - you were caught off guard.

“I don’t know about this.” You whined once you saw the title. The two of you were video calling alongside playing the game together, and Sukuna’s eyes flicked to your figure on the screen.

“It’ll be okay, I’ll carry you, don’t worry.” He had started filming as soon as he’d set up the game, and you were filming yourself as well for him.

“You promise it won’t be too scary?”

“If it’s too scary just close your eyes and I’ll protect you.” Smiling softly at you, he started up the game. The beginning was fine, just a quick introduction to the game, but as soon as things started to get moving, you were scared.

“Sukuna a zombie is eating me!” You screamed, frantically pushing buttons in an attempt to get it off.

“It’s okay!” He quickly got rid of it, and made sure to stay close to your character as the story progressed.

“(Y/N) stay by me, there’s about to be a whole lot of them.”

“Close your eyes there’s about to be a jump scare here.”

“Don’t worry about getting that item, I’ll grab it for you!”

Sukuna nearly forgot he was being filmed, saying sweet things to you to help encourage you and make sure you weren’t overwhelmed. There were many parts where you screamed in fright and Sukuna was there to coo at you and tell you it was okay. He made sure that your character never died, making sure to keep you close until the end of the game.

“Sukuna, that was so hard!” Squishing your cheeks in your hands, you looked at him through your phone.

“It was fun though, wasn’t it? I had fun with you.” Completely abandoning the game, he stared down at his phone with a soft smile on his face.

“Yeah, when there weren’t so many zombies.” You stuck your tongue out at him, and it made him laugh. Leaning his head into his hand, Sukuna grinned when you yawned.

“Aw, are you tired? Better go to sleep soon.” His voice dropped to a lower volume, like you were right next to him.

“I will.” You yawned again and it made Sukuna yawn as well.

“Get off the phone and go to bed, you’re making me tired too.”

“Fine.” Whining out the word, you waved sleepily. “Goodnight Sukuna, I’ll send you the video files in the morning, okay?”

“Night.” Waving back, Sukuna waited until you hung up to turn his stuff off as well.

In the morning, Sukuna was ready to edit. What usually took him a week to edit out of laziness, he took only a day to edit this video with you together. Rewatching the footage, he nearly gagged at seeing how soft his face got when he looked at you, and most of those parts were left in because he couldn’t stand to watch them and fix them.

(Sukuna): videos up

The next day, he messaged you. Once again Sukuna patrolled the comments, swiftly deleting any that said even a hint of a bad thing about you. There was less this time, what with Sukuna adding a warning at the beginning of the video threatening anyone that talked down at you.

This video, like the first, went viral. But for a much different reason. Since Sukuna was emotionally unable to deal with how sappy he was and edit those parts out, everyone got to see how soft he was for you. If the comments weren’t mean, they were screaming about how you and Sukuna must be dating now, because why else would he look at you and talk to you like that?

And much to Sukuna’s dismay, there were also fancam edits of you two together. Any clippable moment of him being sweet on you in the videos you’d made together along with the photos you’d posted on Instagram were edited together and posted on Twitter. You both were tagged in every single one, making sure Sukuna saw all the videos of you and him together. He saved all of them too, delighting in the way you looked with him with all those pretty filters.

By the end of the day, people were trying to put a ship name together for the two of you and he’s seen you repost a few fancams with cute messages of thanks as well. Seeing you receptive to the fans screaming about the two of you made him happy, even if he was still too nervous to text you about anything outside of Youtube.

As more comments came in, people on Twitter were begging him to do a vlog with you. You had quite a few on your channel, going to cafes or filming what your day or week was like. Sukuna had watched them all and was jealous of every single person that appeared alongside you.

(Y/N): hey I’m doing a live on Instagram if you want to join me! I know people really like us together lol it’ll be great for views

(Sukuna): sure

Did you want him to join now? He’d just gotten out of the shower and thrown on a pair of sweats, he wasn’t exactly decent. But he didn’t want to waste time getting ready only for you to end the live.

“Hi Sukuna!” You smiled and waved when he appeared on the screen.

“Hey.” He waved back, not caring about the angle he was holding the camera in. He saw hearts begin to fill up the screen and comments started to fly by, almost all in caps about the fact he was shirtless talking to you.

“Guys, don’t be weird! Who cares that Sukuna is shirtless?” You tried to stop them, but it was clear you were flustered as well. You weren’t looking at him, peeking at him through the screen a few times.

“God you’re all thirsty as fuck.” Sukuna finally looked at himself on the screen. He was shirtless and in bed, hair slightly damp and tousled on his pillow. Reading a few comments, he shot up. “Of course I’m wearing pants, you nasty fuck!” Storming out of bed, he stood in front of the only mirror in his house that wasn’t in the bathroom and turned the camera around. “See, look!”

“Oh.” Gasping softly, you were glad Sukuna didn’t notice you screenshot the live. Clad in only gray sweatpants, Sukuna’s freshly cleaned skin gleamed in the light of his bedroom and every single muscle and edge of his body was on display.

“There, told you I wasn’t fucking naked.” Rolling his eyes, he flopped back down on the bed. None of the comments had gotten any better, all of them talking about how hot he was and how you were so lucky to know him in real life.

“L-let's talk about something else.” You stammered, not showing your face on camera for a few minutes. Sukuna laughed at the comments teasing you for being embarrassed, agreeing with some of them under his breath.

“So, what the fuck are you all doing here?” Sukuna posed the question at the chat, but at you as well.

“Well before you came everyone was talking about you...and you know how everyone has been begging for us to vlog?” You started off slowly, peeking an eye at his face.

“Yeah?”

“I wanted to call you to ask how you felt about that?” How he felt? Why did you want to know?

“You couldn’t have texted me that?” That wasn’t necessarily what he wanted to say, but it made you chuckle, so it was okay.

“No! I wanted to ask so everyone could know!”

“I don’t mind it.” If you wanted to vlog with him, he would do it in a heartbeat.

“So…” Worrying your lip, you looked off camera for a few seconds before looking directly at Sukuna. “Would you like to be in a vlog with me, at a cafe? It’s outside the city, kind of far, but we can rent a car or-”

“Yes.” Sukuna interrupted, nodding his head quickly. “I’ll come. We don’t have to rent a car, I’ll drive.”

“Really?” The comments were just as shocked as you were. Sukuna never filmed anywhere but his home and the gym, this would be a monumental occasion.

“Did you want me to say no?”

“No!” You screamed immediately, nearly dropping your phone. “I just- I wasn’t expecting you to say yes!”

“Well I did.” Sukuna bit his lip, running a hand through his hair and flexing his arm. “So I guess it’s a date, huh?” His normal asshole confidence was back now that you were appearing through a screen and not right next to him. A surprised sound came from the back of your throat, and you nearly dropped the phone again.

“Y-yeah! A date!” It felt good to have you flustered for once and not Sukuna. Laughing heartily at you, Sukuna smirked at the comments.

“Was that all you wanted to ask me or was there something more?”

“No, that was it!”

“Alright.” Licking his lip and letting his tongue hang out of his mouth a little, Sukuna watched you bite your lip as well. “Well I’m gonna go, I got stuff to do, but I’ll text you later (Y/N).” Dropping his voice as he said goodbye, Sukuna left the livestream.

“Holy fuck.” As soon as his phone was off, Sukuna let out a breath he’d been holding in. His heart was pounding hard despite how confident he was in his actions. Flirting was nothing new to him, but with you it felt different and like he’d never done it before in his life.

He watched the rest of your livestream while he finished getting ready for bed, laughing at the comments still teasing you about getting flustered with him. The notifications for Twitter were going off as well, and he knew for sure that there were new fancams for him to check out later.

(Y/N): Sukuna!! You’re so embarrassing!

Texting him after your stream, your cheeks were still burning at the memory.

(Sukuna): hey, you said it would be good for views and it was

(Y/N): I know…

(Y/N): did you really mean it, about coming with me?

(Sukuna): of course. If I didn’t want to I would have said no

(Y/N): that’s good lol!

There was a lull in conversation, and Sukuna nearly fell asleep waiting for you to either text him again or for him to figure out what to say next.

(Y/N): so, a date huh? Are you going to bring me flowers?

Now he was awake. He didn’t expect you to bring that up again, and his eyes flew open. Sukuna’s fingers hovered over the keyboard, mind going blank on what to say.

(Y/N): lol just kidding! I know you only said that for the stream! I’ll text you later about the details, I’m about to knock out

(Y/N): goodnight :)

Well shit. Now he definitely wanted it to be a date.

#jujutsu kaisen #ryomen sukuna #sukuna x reader #jujutsu kaisen fluff #jujutsu kaisen fanfic #jujutsu kaisen imagines #jujutsu kaisen scenarios

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verdantmoontruther · 3 years ago

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the anti-bkdk ramble that turned into an anti-internet ramble

i’m not like the biggest or most present bnha fan on here (i’m more about naruto personally) and i know this point has been discussed to death within the more intellectually capable circles of the fanbase, but i think we should really talk about the hypocrisy of people that excuse or ‘forgive�� bakugou’s behaviour for whatever purpose they come up with, whether it be shipping or ‘bc he’s hot’ or whatnot.

the tl;dr of what i want to say: bakugou and midoriya do not like each other. there is no evidence for that in the books or otherwise. it is unwise to view their genuine dislike as unresolved sexual tension because injecting a sexual component into bakugou’s decade-long antipathy makes for a much, much scarier bullying scenario. also, please touch grass and get a hobby outside of media consumption; i make friendship bracelets and photograph graffiti around my town. it’s very fun. take a break from the online world.

first things first: i UNDERSTAND, fully and wholeheartedly, the desire to see a queer enemies-to-lovers relationship happen in mainstream media. i may be young enough to be on the cusp between gen z and millennial, but i’m also old enough to remember when homosexuality was the weird joke paraded out on late night telly to explain a man’s bizarre behaviour, or be the shitty punchline to an equally unfunny joke. i remember feeling young and disgusted, young and scared, young and hopeless when i thought that we would never see anything remotely resembling a healthy gay relationship on tv. i didn’t even think legalised gay marriage is something that would be won in my youth. but you’re going about it the wrong way.

bakugou bullied midoriya for a long time. that is an immutable fact, and a very important aspect of both of their identities. in their childhoods, bakugou cemented midoriya into a victim role by singling him out and tormenting him. it’s important for some of you to understand that you can’t come back from that. whatever relationship they may have in the future will forever be tainted by the fact that, when bakugou knew he had the upper hand physically over midoriya, he chose to ridicule, belittle, and hurt him, and was never told by those around him that he may have been wrong for it.

it bothers me to no end that the people who will recognise how well the bnha universe fits as an allegory to the treatment of disabled people in society - which is, in my opinion, a completely astute and intelligent observation - will fail to see bakugou’s treatment of midoriya in their formative years as not abusive or ableist, but criticise a character because they said something demeaning about the quirkless population. it’s interesting because the allegory only extends to the characters and actions that are easily dealt with (cancelling a minor character for their words is very easy), but as soon as you raise the issue of physically, emotionally, and mentally abusing someone for their disability, it gets wishy washy because that’s their favourite character that we’re accusing of unsavoury behaviours. it begs the question - do you actually give a shit at all?

the reason i raise this is because fiction directly translates to real life. the things an author, screenwriter, or mangaka write about and the perspective they write about it from effect our view of ourselves and other people, especially in an industry aimed at, and mostly consumed by, the youth. that’s why i discussed what i did in the second paragraph - representation is important because it makes people feel more comfortable in their skin. and i can understand why you crave seeing yourself depicted as the hero of a story. but it also means that bad interpretations can weasel their way into the malleable minds of the young people consuming these stories: think about everything jk rowling was cancelled for. her only irish character constantly blowing things up. hook-nosed elves in love with money. werewolves preying on young boys as a metaphor for the aids epidemic.

i can’t blame horikoshi for the way that people infer his writing because there is absolutely no evidence in his writing that bakugou and midoriya harbour romantic feelings for each other, but i do know where this sentiment comes from: you kids are grasping at straws, wanting to make genuinely antagonistic characters into some sort of star-crossed romance because this is your first time being exposed to fighty blowy uppy shounen that doesn’t give a shit about love, and it worries me, because it means you begin romanticising all the wrong behaviours. if i was reading half the shit you guys like about the mythical bkdk dynamic in an actual book, it’d be raising red flags immediately. no communication. possessiveness. jealousy. entitlement. belittling. taking out their anger on each other. i’m concerned for you lot.

some of you aren’t going to like hearing this, but i think the reason we are seeing such a strong insurgence of the romanticisation of such an unhealthy relationship dynamic, apart from representation, is because being bombarded by so many stories and headlines and works in a day due to the internet has desensitised us to a lot of things. you look at a news headline about a bombing or a murder and you don’t feel anything anymore. same thing with fiction: ten years of bullying, when you have nothing from your own personal life to compare it to, doesn’t sound that bad. someone telling you to kill yourself gets brushed off like water off a duck’s back because everyone tells everyone to kts these days. having no friends is normalised because all of us people online are ‘depressed and anxious uwu no fwends’. in order to get a real hit right in the gut you need something that takes the word angst and amplifies it by a scale factor of seven million. in a culture that sensationalises pain and is devoid of empathy, midoriya’s situation is just not enough anymore.

once again idk if any of this made sense. i write what i think and if it comes out like a jumble of random letters then oh well.

#anti bakudeku #anti bakugo katsuki #anti bakugou #bnha #bnha opinions

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redxblueihateloveyou · 3 years ago

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Am I the only one who doesn’t get why some (tw) are shitting on Haru and Rin separately just for the fact that they reciprocate each others feelings? Because it’s not the feelings they wanted them to reciprocate? Just curious because I'm new and recently entered the fandom. And since when miscommunication in between means that they don't deserve to be happy at the end? Because you're an idiot when it comes to love, doesn't mean you're a bad person. I came from chinese bl and it's weird to me.

Hehe welcome to the madness, perfect time to join! Yeah, tbh that's the thing in the fandom that always bugged me the most. The fact that some act like if you don't reciprocate someone's feelings, it makes you a bad person. I always found it incredibly cringy when ppl in real life for example make ppl feel guilty for not feeling the same way and make you feel like shit bc of it. I don't get why you have to apologize for that or feel bad, if you never ever gave him any hope or anything in the first place.

Nowdays it's thankfully a rare sight already in this fandom, bc most already grown and see perfectly what's truly healthy and unhealthy, it's just tbh only the same 3 accounts ppl keep sending me that are still on that, who also think that Haru is literally possessed in the last movie so I don't see the point of like arguing with ppl like this. It's just they're always getting extremely angry when Haru wants Rin as if it's his fault that he feels this way and always go about it like he is inconsiderate of Makoto's feelings. Implying that they're mad that he doesn't feel that way about Makoto, while Makoto does. I'm same as @tododeku-or-bust for example said here (idk what fandom brought this on, but just in general) also do not get what's appealing about this kind of relationships in the first place.

If they shipped it in terms of like it's mutual I'd get it, but they go on about how Rin or Haru are bad friends bc they're not in love with their best friends... like ?????? I didn't know you owe it to your friends to have romantic feelings for them.

In real life if you found out that your bestie feels that way for you while you don't reciprocate, it's a burden, that'll make you feel uncomfortable and at times guilty when you shouldn't technically feel that way. So putting on someone a burden of "I was pining for you all along", when you know they don't feel the same is giving me this feeling of cringe. So I personally do not get what's enjoyable at seeing it like that in Free. But to each their own kink lmao.

It's like... is Haru at fault for the fact that he was Ikuya's first love too? I do not get it really. Like he doesn't have to take responsibility for everyone who falls for him and he doesn't owe anyone to reciprocate their feelings. Even to Rin. Like if he didn't feel the same way for Rin, it wouldn't be his fault either. But since he does feel the same way for him, it's like... good, great, happy for them.

Like once again if someone believes that Makoto and Sousuke are unrequitedly in love with Rin and Haru, that's not rinharu fault. Haru literally never ever lead Makoto on EVER. He never ever did anything that would make Makoto believe that they're more than friends. He was always honest about everything. Like when Makoto thought that he went out to see him, but Haru just wanted to see the sunrise, he told him just that. He never encoraged anything, he refused to live with him and never wanted. I do not get why it's supposed to be his fault that he doesn't like his friend in that way. If Makoto has some unrequited feelings for him and decided to hang up on this, it's his own life choice in my opinion.

It's like saying that Onodera and Takano for example don't deserve to be together just because they unintentionally hurt each other and got separated for 10 years bc of misunderstanding. This argument is like typical Yokozawa life position aka "but I was there when he left you heartbroken for several years, that means you MUST pick me". As I've said before, that's just not how it fucking works. And just bc they couldn't explain things to each other normally, doesn't mean that they don't deserve be happy now. Being idiots is not a crime.

Or if you came from chinese bl, lets go "Guardian" for example. Zhu Hong also was on about how "why you love Shen Wei, not me, I always did everything for you and I was always there, I even wore heels bc you once said you liked those etc". Like he never asked her to do this, he never gave her any hope, he was beyond rude and open about the fact that he's not interested, he never did anything to make her think she had a chance since the beginning. Just bc she decided to dedicate her life to false hope that maybe one day something might change is not his fault. It was her choice. Why Yunlan should feel like shit bc of that I do not get personally.

I'm just buffled bc like Haru for example is the most caring about other ppl's pain person, but they call him selfish and rude bc of the way he is with Makoto at times, not even realising that it IS in fact what means being kind sometimes.. to not give someone a chance when you know you don't feel it. I was always saying this like since forever, being kind doesn't mean for example giving everyone second chances, loving everyone, wanting to be friends with anyone etc. In some situations it's not being kind, it's being stupid or even not being a good person. Once again... offering someone friendship after he openly dissed your friend and you see that he's not in any position to talk back is not kind. Or if someone cheats on you constantly, but you always forgive them it's also not you being kind. It's you being stupid. Sometimes you have to be harsh. It's for the greater good.

And like I saw several times stuff like someone under scenes where Rin has his eyes for Haru only, commenting like "oh great, look at Rin being inconsiderate of Sousuke's feelings again. Can't believe you guys find this romantic." I mean, if in their opinion Sousuke is in pain from being Rin's friend, he can end it, it's his choice. It's not Rin's fault that he thinks of him as just his friend. So thinking that Rin is an asshole bc each time he simply hangs out with Sousuke he's a selfish bitch is fucking insane. I'd feel extremely bad if my best friend was seeing it this way for example. It's like hella ugly.

This annoys me also bc of the fact that Rin, the person who at the age of 12 single-handedly saved his family from falling apart after his father's death, who's an amazing friend to Sousuke and did everything to make his happy after he found out about his trauma and always checks on him first and cries about his shoulder, who in the late evenings taught Rei to swim, when everyone else gave up already xD, who was looking after Nitori during his training, who pretends to walk the same road, just because he's scared to let Gou return alone in the evenings, the most amazing son and brother, is suddenly an asshole just because Haru is in love with him, but not with Makoto. I mean, thats just... huh? Like I dont mind you ship what you want to ship, it's like to each their own crayons for real. But like dissing them and call them selfish just bc they only see their friends as friends and don't want anything more is weird to me.

As for the fact that bc of the misunderstanding they don't deserve to be happy, that's just idiotic. I mean, lets punish Wei Wuxian and Lan Zhan too just bc Lan Zhan couldn't voice his real feelings back then and bc WWX misunderstood him. Lets ship WWX with Wen Ning instead. Nezumi is cancelled, he doesn't deserve to be with Shion. He left him. Takano should stay with Yokozawa, Onodera is trash. Wu Xie is trash for wanting to be with Zhang Qiling too. It doesn't matter why he leaves, it only matters that he always does. I can't believe he doesn't see that Pangzi is there with him all along xD. What an ungrateful trash of a human being I can't even.

And anyways btw both Rin and Haru are not ideal human beings in any way (otherwise I wouldn't love them this much tbh xD). But their flaws are definitely not what for example mh shippers usually blame them for. You can argue about their other imperfections easily. Like being stupidly stubborn for example. I won't point fingers here, Haru lolz. Or literally anything else.

My point is you can find what to trash them for logically, if you wanna. Do it smartly tho. Otherwise you make your ship look bad.

And I once again say what wise person said about his relationships and about the fact that not being able with someone he loves hurt him and 'why is he doing this to himself' he answered: "it's not on him. my happiness and my pain is for me to handle". Everyone decides for themselves. This is why for example Haru was so broken about voicing this to Rin and didn't have any intentions to tell him that in the first place. Bc it's not right, if you're not sure that it's requited. Technically he has no right to blame Rin for making him fall in love with him and then leaving in the first place. It's not Rin's fault really, that he made him feel what he feels for him, it's ultimately Haru's problem. That's why he feels has no right to blame him in the first place. I mean, he doesn't know that Rin feels the same, that means saying to him "you break my heart each time you leave" and making him feel bad about it is technically wrong. That's why Haru to himself said "no, please, don't say such things to him". Everyone for himself decides who deserves your 5, 7, 800 or 10000 years of your pain. It's your decision. It's your life. If Haru feels like Rin is worth it, then you have no say in that matter really. The only reason we call Rin an idiot or Haru an idiot is because we know they feel the same, so we can. But blame someone else for not feeling what you're feeling is not right.

So like even if you feel like Makoto and Sousuke have feelings for their friends, blaming Haru and Rin for having feelings for each other and not for them is beyond weird. And there's nothing wrong with putting someone you love first, every bro/sis gets it. You can say bros before hoes all you want, but like Lan Zhan might just drop his bro for his hoe, if he was given a choice. Would it make him a bad person? The fact that Wu Xie chose to save Xiaoge before Pangzi makes his a bad person? My point is it's not all that easy.

I just feel like many ppl in this fandom are very weird about many things. Either because they do not get what it's like to go through some things or maybe they just do not get that no matter how cheesy this sounds love is not that simple. I mean, for example not all selfish is bad, sometimes like in Haru's case for example not being selfish is also bad. Bc if he finally asks for what he wants, he will make both himself AND Rin happy.

To be angry at Rin bc of the aftermath of his father's death and s1 I never had it in me, after knowing everything and how adults handled it. If some of Sousuke's fans bc of Yakusoku and the fact that Rin found his salvation in Haru bc he helped him to move forward after getting his family out of this hell alone and that Haru was the safe haven that made him happy in this moment of his life, want to trash Rin for the fact that he "neglected" Sousuke, its like your opinion. I personally do not get it. Rin doesn't owe Sousuke anything. It's not his fault again that Haru's existence helped him to feel better.

Just like not everyone will get why Haru in 1x12 was so happy about the fact that he could help Rin. To be that special somebody for someone who can "save" you in moments of your life like this, especially if you love them is an incredible feeling. And no, your bestie isn't always the person for this job, no. I don't see why people do not get that I guess, that's all. But we all have our own opinion on everything, so...

We same as you do not get it since forever, but its like it is what it is in this fandom. I personally just have another life position on stuff, so I'm very far from that point of view they have.

#answered #anonymous #rinharu #harurin #free!#nanase haruka #rin matsuoka

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beclynn-herondale · 3 years ago

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So is it just me or is everyone on tumblr bombarded by issues? Is it tumblr that causes this, or is it only incredibly insecure people that get tumblr? or is everyone just insecure because they’re best friends are book characters? Or is everyone in general insecure so be default everyone on tumblr is as well?

So many questions

Hello lovely.

I think it's partly because a lot of people on Tumblr do have lives off the internet that kind of suck or are very stressful. I personally do. And they use Tumblr as an escape.

But lately I've felt Tumblr isn't much of an escape anymore. I don't feel like I'm escaping much. And I wonder if it's that way for everyone else.

The internet in general puts a lot of pressure on being woke, being good, making sure you aren't making mistakes because if you do you're cancelled. If you make a mistake you learn from it, and do better.

I think the internet is making people insecure. I don't think our hearts were made for everything we see on a daily basis. I don't we were mentally made to see so much on a daily basis. I don't think humans were made for all this competition to be the best and always get everything right. I don't think we were made to see all the tragedy in the world these days, I don't think we were made for the cruelty in the world these days.

I personally feel insecure about what people think about my personality, how they perceive me. Because I don't want to be a bad person or toxic but it's a struggle to not fall into some patterns and make mistakes. But people are utterly terrified to mess up or make mistakes. It pains me as someone who grew up in a household that didn't like mistakes.

In my personal experience the internet can feel like someone is always watching, waiting for you to mess up. It's like someone is holding you at knifepoint (and not in the sexy way). You're constantly anxious, scared even. You constantly think everyone is judging you, or analyzing you. You think many is just waiting to attack you.

You sometimes second guess because what if someone is judging you? What if this one thing you said makes them hate you? What if you really are evil or bad? What if it's true, what if you don't deserve love and a second chance? (That's bs btw, you do deserve one).

We feel bad for blocking people because we don't want to seem like an ass, but some people deserve to be blocked. I had to learn that lesson too late.

The internet has made it so easy to find anything, which is good and bad. It's a gray area. But I don't think we were made to see so much hate or so many opinions on things. I don't think we were made to see people hate on the things we love or put us down for the things we love.

Pretty soon it brings your self esteem and confidence down. Which is sad, because do you remember those moments as a child when you felt for even a split second that you were on top of of the world? That you could do anything? You didn't doubt yourself.

I don't think people start out insecure. I think the internet makes people insecure.

This is kind of what I think, there's more as to why this could be. But I'll end it here. Also this isn't me saying "destroy the internet!" It's.just what I think. I think we can set healthy boundaries to keep ourselves safe and at peace. (I am a hypocrite here lol).

#beau peeps 💛🧡#hopefully this makes sense

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saffronwritings · 4 years ago

Text

C L U M S Y | S H I N S O U PT.3

S H I N S O U | P A R T T H R E E (Final)

I let you down I've been clumsy with your heart again

C L U M Y M A S T E R L I S T

Word Count: 3.7k

A/N: This started off shorter and then I redid one of the segments and welp here we are at 4.3k words. Oops! It’s not favoritism I promise. This is the “final” part to Shinsou’s CLUMSY series! I really hope you all enjoy! I’ll make a post asking what you all want to see next! :)

Denki couldn’t remember what time Shinsou told him to meet up with him after his training with Aizawa-sensei, so he figured he was going to just sit outside of the gym until he saw his purple haired friend exit the locker rooms. It had become almost routine for the two to have after school hangouts, mainly so Shinsou could relax after a long day. Kaminari helped fill the void that he felt without being able to see you. Though, Shinsou was guilty that it had distracted him from talking to you on occasion. While Kaminari was sporadic and chaotic, it helped ease the stress that Shinsou was constantly under.

However, Kaminari was surprised when he noticed the gym door was left wide open. Usually when he had ventured over to this part of UA, he would notice that the doors were closed. A privacy thing so that the students didn’t feel pressured or on-lookers wouldn’t intimate the said student. Had Aizawa-sensei cancelled his practice with Shinsou for the day? He was acting very strange the entire course of the day. He was extra grumpy and even before coming to check in on his friend, he had particularly felt bad for Shinsou having to deal with his sensei’s foul mood.

Curiosity got the better of the blonde boy, Denki decided to peek inside the small private gym, the ones teachers used to mentor students in, only to see Shinsou standing against a wall with his face pale and expression shocked. Shinsou had looked like he had either seen a ghost or had been told someone close to him had died. This immediately made the blonde worry for his new friend. He had looked around cautiously to see if Aizawa was still in the room. When it showed that it was only the two boys just sitting in absolute silence, that is when Kaminari decided to speak up to figure out what was going on. “Oi Shinsou, is everything-” The blonde started to say before Shinsou let out a scream of frustration. It reverberated a chill down Kami’s spine, making him flinch back.

Suddenly gym equipment started to fly across the room in haphazardly ways. His screams and shouts continued while he was heaving equipment left and right. “I’VE WORKED SO HARD.” Shinsou shouted in his fit of rage. “I HAVE WATCHED UNWORTHY STUDENTS SIT IN LUXURY.” Kaminari sat in a state of shock, watching his new friend seemingly lose his mind. He wanted to go and comfort his friend, but he was afraid he was going to lash out on him as well. He opted to just let him get all of his emotions out, even if it wasn’t in a healthy manner. “I PUSHED SO MANY PEOPLE AWAY FOR A SLIVER OF A CHANCE TO PROVE MYSELF.” He spewed again, not noticing the tears starting to stream down his face. He had thrown everything within a few feet radius as hard as he could across the smaller gym room.

He had looked over to Kaminari who was just standing there awkwardly, watching him, judging him. However, Shinsou was so out of breath he wasn’t sure if he even had any energy left to yell at the blonde for looking at him with such pity in his eyes. “I don’t know what’s going on, dude, but maybe you should take a breather before you hurt yourself.” Kaminari spoke cautiously, trying to not provoke Shinsou further. “You don’t get to tell me when to calm down! You don’t understand, you’ve had the privilege to just BE in the hero course!” Shinsou shouted at him, his eyes filled with both tears and rage. “But, you’re doing so well with your training! You were just talking to the support class to design your new gear!” Kaminari still tried to direct the conversation in a positive manner.

The two had just discussed how he was getting one of the girls in the support class to design a vocal chord changing mask. Kaminari was super blown away with the idea of being able to change voices in order to trick their opponents. While Shinsou might have lacked the psychical strength, he was always good at diverting and making a plan for success. “It doesn’t even matter now! Don’t you get it deadbolt!? I not only lost my shot at joining the hero course but I also lost the girl I loved by pushing her away for this opportunity” Shinsou’s voice strained out, it being raspy from screaming and shouting.

The blonde’s eyes widened in shock, realizing the situation at hand in front of him. He was watching Shinsou have a breakdown because for some reason, he had lost his mentor-ship with Aizawa. “What? What happened? You were doing great with your training!” Denki had pointed out making Shinsou flinch in embarrassment from those words. “Don’t you think I know that?!” The purple haired boy cried, clutching his chest in desperate attempts to not let his heart fail him now. Kaminari had also picked up on his specific wording, the girl he loved. Had he gotten into a fight with you the night before? As far as he was concerned, the two of you were fine. You guys had plans to meet up after practice the prior day.

“Can’t you just fix all of this then?” Kaminari’s comment made Shinsou turn very angrily towards him. “If I could, do you think I would make this big of a mess and yell so loudly? Do you think I would have gone into a fit of rage, destroying the gym if i could just FIX it? I can’t, you dumbass! I screwed up big time!” Shinsou cried out more, finally admitting his defeat. His knees crashed to the ground and he fell over onto his hands. He couldn’t stop himself from breaking down completely in front of Kaminari.

Kaminari knelt down next to him, placing a gentle hand onto the boy's back. Shinsou wouldn’t have noticed though, his entire body felt numb. He felt like he was plunging into a sea of darkness, swarmed with all his insecurities and doubts that he was ever good enough in the first place for such opportunities. With each gasp of air he took, he could feel himself drowning further into the waters that flowed over him like a flooding hurricane. Everything he worked for, everything he was aiming for was now just stripped from him.

You always kept him afloat with positive words that always helped him breach the waters that tempted to drown him. Like a ripping current he was being dragged under so quickly it was hard to breath. Kaminari was full of panic himself, watching Shinsou progress in his panic attack without fully knowing what to do. He wasn’t like Kirishima who could easily bring comfort to those in states like this. The blonde was tempted to go get help from one of his other friends but he was afraid of leaving Shinsou alone.

What had he done that had gotten him kicked from the mentoring program and had made him lose you?

…

“Stop right there, Shota.” Hizashi’s voice rang from down the hallway of the teacher’s lounge. Aizawa was still steaming with fury that he hadn’t noticed how far away from the training gyms he was. He came to a halt to see the older blonde glaring at him. “You took that way too far. I don’t know the extent of what your daughter said on the phone, but hurting Shinsou that badly wasn’t justified.” He started spewing, getting angrier through his sentence. Aizawa narrowed his eyes at his friend. “He broke her heart.” The tired teacher said through gritted teeth. “You didn’t hear how upset she was over the phone. I’ve heard her get like that once and that was after the USJ incident with the league of villains.”

“Teenagers go through breakups and fights all the time.” Hizashi tried to reason with him. “You don’t have a daughter, Hizashi.” Aizawa quickly countered. “You wouldn’t know what it’s like to hear your son or daughter call to you for help, sounding like they barely slept the night before.” Shota knew he was going way over the top, but if there was anything he would do, it was for the sake of his daughter.

His daughter wasn’t a planned idea, but there was nothing on the planet that Aizawa could love more. There was a reason he had made living arrangements and let little know about his daughter. The last thing he needed was for the league of villains to find out about you and to attempt to take you away from him. “No, but I know that you just crushed every hope that kid had for joining the hero course. Instead of punishing the poor kid who hasn’t been given a chance since he got here, why not help him out?” Hizashi started to try and reason with him.

“Help him out? After he hurt my daughter?” Aizawa growled through his gritted teeth. He could feel the headache forming in his temples from the day. He spent it so angrily, so filled to the brim with frustration. It was like he was getting hit multiple times in the chest with blow after blow. “You don’t even know what happened between the two! For all you know it could have been a misunderstanding. The last thing you want is for there to be no hope for your daughter to be able to make things up with the boy because you scarred him.”

For once, Hizashi had a really good point. As much as it pained him to agree with the obnoxious blonde, he knew he was right. “I’m sure your daughter would appreciate the effort set forth by you.” He continued to push, making a groan leave Aizawa’s throat. “Fine, fine. If it will get you off my back, and if you really think this is a good idea, then I’ll go make things right. If not, I will not hesitate to hang you over a pool of sharks.” Aizawa threatened, making Hizashi smile widely at him.

Hizashi treaded lightly behind Aizawa to make sure he would stay true to his word. The last thing he needed was for the man to slump over and fall asleep before missing his chance to fix things with Shinsou. He didn’t want to tell Aizawa, because he knew it would make him feel even worse about the situation, but he knew Shinsou had a soft spot for Eraserhead. The way the kid watched in admiration whenever he would explain something to the student said volumes.

Aizawa was not happy about having to be the one to confront the boy who broke his daughter’s heart. Damn that loud mouthed Hizashi for bringing his daughter into the mix. He knew he was right but that didn’t make him any less happy about the situation. In no time flat he made it back to the gym only to notice that things were strewn about. Weights were all over the place, the sparring matt was upright against a wall instead of on the ground. He noticed Kaminari next to Shinsou, kneeled over and rubbed circles into Hitoshi’s back. He almost felt bad when he heard the soft sobbing that came from the hunched over boy. Until he took into account what he had done to his daughter.

Aizawa crossed the room and pointed for Denki to leave. The electric blonde did not hesitate to question his teacher’s instruction and left the gym quickly. Aizawa squatted down to Shinsou’s level and put a hand on his back. “Get up, kid.” He said in a husky voice, before standing up. Shinsou’s eyes shot open and his head shot up to look at him. Surprise and confusion flooded his face as he wasn’t sure why the teacher of class 1-A had come back to him.

“Kaminari, if you don’t scram from eavesdropping from around the corner I will not hesitate to flunk you on your next upcoming exam.” Aizawa shouted loud enough so that his lingering student could hear. Both Aizawa and Shinsou heard shoes scuttling away from the door and down the hallway. He was about to tell Hizashi the same thing, but Shinsou had interrupted his thought process by saying, “Why did you come back?” Shota had noted his tone was defeated, and almost filled with hopelessness.

“I was too harsh, I was overcome with my own emotions of protecting my daughter and lashed it out on you. You are a bright student and one that deserves a second shot.” Aizawa started to explain, rubbing the back of his neck. “Why didn’t you tell me Y/N was your daughter? I had been dating her for well over a year. You had to know what you were signing up for when taking me on as my mentor.” Shinsou questioned quickly, obviously still very confused from the situation.

“I wanted to make you a hero good enough to protect her.” Aizawa admitted, shaking his head at his own thoughts. “I don’t know what you said to her to make her so upset she called me crying, but you need to fix it. However, being my daughter, she’s a stubborn headed mess. If I personally don’t help you, you may not have a shot of fixing it.” Shinsou’s eyes lit up with just a tad bit of hope. “You’re helping me?” Shinsou’s voice came out in a whisper. “In this regard, yes. If you think I’m going to be cleaning your mess here, you are sorely mistaken.” Aizawa said, however, Shinsou could hear a bit of playfulness in his tone.

…

You had been tempted to try and communicate with Shinsou after the blow-up the two of you had. However, judging on the last text you sent him, he had your number blocked. Even if he had unblocked your number, wouldn’t he have tried to reach out and make things better? This wasn’t the first quarrel the two of you had, obviously not to this degree. It had never gone on this long. The realization dawned on you the night before you were supposed to get together with your father, that maybe Shinsou was serious about not wanting you around while he went through his training.

It didn’t help lessen the blow in the slightest bit. It felt like someone was stepping on your chest and every time you felt like maybe you had some semblance of a grasp on your own emotions, the foot would step down harder. You felt crippled without Shinsou in your life. Your phone felt like it had less purpose, even if you had texted a few of your other friends to attempt to try and fill in the void that Shinsou had left. You had missed the late night texts, staying up video calling with him and seeing the sleep slip further from his eyes during his studies. Your grades this past week alone had slipped quite quickly as you were unable to focus on a single word a teacher was saying.

Your zombielike state had concerned not only your teachers, your classmates, but also your mother. While you tried to let it seem like it wasn’t bothering you that you had lost your best friend, you knew that your mother knew you better than that. What was worse was that she was probably keeping your father up to date on the current situation. You hadn’t informed either of your parents the details of your breakup with Hitoshi, and you hadn’t planned on it. The last thing you or your family needed was your father in jail for attempting to murder a minor.

When the weekend came around, you were half-tempted to cancel on your plans with your father. You wanted nothing more than to accept the warm embrace your bed was giving you. While it was dragging you further into your pit of despair it was at least comforting. When your phone buzzed on your nightstand you weighed the options of just going back to sleep, you knew your father was persistent and would call over and over until you woke up. For a man who was tired all the time, he didn’t understand why teenagers sleep so much over weekend breaks. Groaning, you gathered all your strength to sit up in your bed and reach over to answer your phone.

“We are still on for the movies today, right kiddo?” Your father’s voice chimed not even a second after you had picked up the phone. “I was actually thinking of maybe a rain check?” You tried to push, but you could already feel him rolling his eyes on the other side of the phone. “I know you being a teenager and you probably aren’t even out of bed yet, but as far as I’m concerned, it’s not raining.” Sarcasm dripped from his lips and you wanted nothing more than to hang up and turn your phone off. You were in no mood for his antics for the day.

“I’m just not feeling up to going today, papa.” You whispered after there was silence between the two. “I figured you would feel that way. Your mother has mentioned how you have been practically among the living dead this last week.” He recounted, making you curse under your breath for knowing your mother all too well. You had hoped that maybe, just this once she was going to keep things to herself. You should have known better. “I already bought the tickets ahead of time, and I’m not taking Hizashi or your mother.” Your father warned.

“Fine, I’ll get ready. I’ll meet you at the train station?” You sighed in defeat, knowing you would not win this battle. “Sounds good to me.” He said, before both of you hung up your phones.

…

You stood at the entrance of the train station, checking your phone a few times to make sure that your dad hadn’t texted you that he was running late. You had attempted to call him twice already and he hadn’t picked up on either attempt. A sigh escaped your lips, wishing that you had just stood your ground on staying home and sleeping the weekend away. “Y/N?” If you hadn’t been frozen in place before, the voice you had memorized locked your feet into place. Suddenly your heart was racing immensely too fast and the wind felt like it was knocked clean out of your lungs.

It wasn’t even fair, the way fate had played out for you this day. Not only did you dress in just leggings and a baggy hoodie, you had chosen a hoodie that you only now registered had belonged to Shinsou. Cursing your father for following through with your request for father daughter time, you finally looked up at the purple haired boy who seemed almost sheepish. He was wearing that cursed bomber jacket that you always loved on him, a simple t shirt and a pair of baggy jeans. In other words, he at least looked a million times more decent than you had. Not to mention your hair was thrown haphazardly into a messy bun and god knows you had dark circles developing under your eyes with your lack of sleep you had gotten last week.

“You know out of the two of us for once I think you win in the department of needing some extra weekend sleep.” Shinsou tried to ease himself into conversation with you. The tension in the air was so thick that you were sure that you were suffocating on it. You had so many questions and so many emotions flooding you at once. Your mind was swirling like you were stuck on a teacup ride that you were trapped on. When Shinsou noticed your lack of response to his statement, he returned back to his awkward state of trying to figure out how to make things go back to normal.

Anything would be better than this killer silence. He hated that it looked like you hadn’t slept in over a week and hated it even more than he was the one that caused you to be like this. His guilt was suffocating him for ever causing you this much pain for being so selfish. He wanted nothing more than to pull you into his arms and to soothe your pains away. If it hadn’t been for Aizawa he wouldn’t have even been here. He would still be in his dorm, beating himself up for ever letting this distance drift you two so far apart.

“If we don’t hurry, we are going to miss our movie.” Shinsou settled on saying, before turning to walk towards the direction of the movie theater. You whipped your head up so fast in confusion, trying to stammer out a sentence that made any sense. “Wha- I mean I’m here to meet with my dad.” You finally uttered, grabbing on his jacket sleeve to get him to stop walking. Immediately, Shinsou had reverted back to his nervous nature around you like he had once done when the two of you first started dating.

“Your father gave me the tickets and wanted me to take you out as a way to apologize for my irrational behavior. I should have never snapped at you like I did or acted as immature as I did. I can’t even begin to imagine how it was for you to just be waiting for any kind of affection on my end. I blew you off after an entire month of not seeing you. I probably made it seem like I wasn’t as excited to see you, but I was too focused on my own stupidity to realize what was right in front of me.” He blurted out quickly, stepping closer into your own proximity. “I don’t deserve any kind of forgiveness, but if I didn’t try, I’m pretty sure Aizawa-sensei would personally either kick my ass or expel me.”

You were listening intently until Shinsou had mentioned your father’s last name. “Aizawa-sensei?” You reiterated, raising a shocked eyebrow at him. “Yeah, I was surprised too when I found out. I almost lost my entire chance at getting into the hero course all together because of how pissed he was at me for hurting you.” Shinsou murmured quietly. If your jaw wasn’t open in shock before, it surely was now. Had Shinsou not been standing right in front of you currently you probably would have called your father and chewed him out for his brash behavior.

However, your heart swelled when thinking about how your father had stepped in to try and fix things between you and Shinsou. It must have been why he was so insistent on you coming to meet with him today. You had to remember to shoot him a text later calling him out on his conniving ways. “I know it’s probably embarrassing, your father stepped in on the situation, but honestly if it wasn’t for him I would have never had the courage to do this.” He said, grabbing your hand to hold in his own without hesitation. His hands were ice cold like they always had been, sending a chill up your spine.

“I wanted to be a hero that you could be proud of but instead I turned into a selfish loser-” He continued, that is until you grabbed the collar of his jacket and pulled his lips into your own. The chaste kiss made the nervousness melt away from both you and Shinsou. He relaxed into your touch, snaking his arms around your waist. You kissed him like you were afraid you would never get to kiss him again. When you were laying in your bed days after your fight you wanted nothing more than to be in the purple haired boys embrace. You had feared the last time you had seen him, the month before, was the last happy memory of being together. The time he had finally told you he loved you and the last time you two brushed your lips against one another's.

Tears flowed down your cheeks when the two of you had pulled away, gasping for breaths. You felt dizzy from all the overwhelming emotions you were thrown through but you wouldn’t give anything up for this moment right here. For the boy you loved more than yourself to be in front of you. He cupped your face and wiped the tears that were escaping your eyes with his calloused fingers. “I’m here, and I am not going anywhere this time. I will fight everyday to be the hero you need me to be. I love you more than anything and I hate that I had to destroy something so beautiful to realize it.” Shinsou stated, pressing his forehead against your own. You nodded while sniffling, desperately grasping your hands onto his shirt.

You threw your arms around his neck and pulled him into your embrace and he welcomed this touch. He ran his hand over your head and rubbed circles into your back. You couldn’t see but Shinsou had also started silently into your hoodie, getting intoxicated by your scent.

Aizawa smiled to himself to see the two of you entangled in each other’s embrace at the entrance of the train station. People were walking by without having the slightest of a clue as to what was going on between the two. Aizawa took out his phone and snapped a picture of the two of you in your loving embrace. You’d probably scold him for it later, but he knew you would appreciate it later in years. He would chew out Shinsou once again on Monday, before following it up with the news of participating in Class 1-A and Class 1-B’s field training. Then warning him if he ever hurt you again he wouldn’t get off so easy. However, for now, he headed back to Heights Alliance to give you two the space you desperately needed.

To be continued...? 👀

[Part One] [Part Two]

Taglist:

@uwu-iwanttodie

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antebunny · 4 years ago

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April 27: games

A sequel to archer and bridge, an identity porn extra of a modern cultivators Olympic sports AU.

Note: this is from the perspective of an NB OC named Elaine Chao who uses they/them pronouns. I did this because 1) the number of NB people I know has exponentially increased in the past year, and they all use they/them pronouns so I wanted to make myself familiar with using they/them pronouns to refer to a single person. I chose the name Elaine Chao because that’s the name of Mitch McConnell’s wife and I think I’m funny.

Elaine Chao is taking a class on cultivation, which is a new class offered at their university and also not very popular because cultivation is supposed to be a dead practice now just used as a sport. So it was expected to have like five students, max. The professor is an expert when it comes to the culture and history of xianxia, and now decided to also offer her skills and knowledge on cultivation, which she is also an expert on, despite having previously just taught the history/culture of that era. Then suddenly at the last minute, the class gets six new students. Initially, this isn’t the weird part. With an eleven person class, the students interact somewhat, but for a while all Elaine could tell you was their names.

Soon enough, their professor goes on a tirade about the international cultivation competition. She hates it because 1) it makes a mockery of the original purpose of cultivating, i.e. night hunts and defeating monsters oh and also war, and yet it still 2) puts the lives of the competitors in danger. Not in the way that sports usually do, in that there’s a risk for injury which can sometimes be permanent, but the competitors are all world-class athletes and generally don’t come to harm. But in an active, monsters-are-trying-to-kill-you sort of risk that has led to severe/permanent injuries recently, but no (recent) deaths. And the professor hates that the lives of these teenagers and young adults are so blatantly being put in danger for entertainment. She also hates how gamemasters pass their roles to their kids, who are usually competitors themselves, and so on. So the professor rants about the international tournament and these competitive cultivators and how much she dislikes it.

Then she mentions the last international competition, which everyone has heard of just because of how wrong it went.

The recent competitions have been rife with controversy anyway; there was that whole thing with gamemaster Wen Ruohan where he was favoring his sons and almost got the other competitors killed, and usually the other gamemasters would vote him out but Jiang Fengmian (and his wife) passed away from disease recently, and Jiang Cheng was his nominal replacement since it was assumed that Jiang Cheng would be too old for competition by the time Jiang Fengmian retired, and Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian were skipping that year’s competition anyway because of jfm and yzy’s deaths, but then Jiang Cheng was dragged back to vote Wen Ruohan out. That all worked out in the end, because the Wens were just removed from the competition.

But last year’s competition was the final nail in the coffin. Basically, one of the gamemasters (Jin Guangshan) rigged the game for his own purposes. Since Jiang Cheng was still competing, Jin Guangyao was chosen as the new gamemaster. When only five contestants were left–the same five as the previous years–the monsters suddenly stopped dying and their time-out flares suddenly stopped working. This maybe would’ve worked except that Jin Zixuan was surreptitiously warned at the last moment that the game was rigged in his favor, and immediately told the others once he found them. Then they realized that they were stuck in the arena with monsters that wouldn’t die and no way to get out. They had a collective come-to-grace moment in which they realized “hey maybe putting our lives on the line like this isn’t healthy or normal just because it was what our parents did”. (Meanwhile, the other two grandmasters are panicking because their little brothers are out there jgs I’m going to wring your neck–) Then Wei Wuxian goes “actually I think I can control the monsters using ~demonic cultivation~” and the others go “it may be against the rules but we’ll back you up”. So that was last year’s competition. It was even more controversial because Wen Ning died as a consequence. His sister, Wen Qing, the best cultivating doctor in the world, who has treated all of the competitors in the past, literally hit the ceiling. She treated the five returning contestants and then promptly quit. That would be a problem because there’s no other doctors willing to treat all the cultivating contestants after a competition. But the bigger problem comes when Wei Wuxian, who should have gotten first place, gets banned from competitive cultivation for breaking the rules. They try to award first place to Lan Zhan, who promptly refuses and also vows to stop competitive cultivation because they banned Wei Wuxian. Then they try to award it to Jin Zixuan who refuses because he doesn’t ~deserve~ it and he’s wrecked with guilt that all the others went through this just because his dad wanted to make him win (and also wanted to kill the others). They go to Jiang Cheng who takes one look and goes “you’re kidding, right” and everyone knows that Jiang Cheng is suffering from an inferiority complex due to Wei Wuxian constantly upstaging him but Jiang Cheng is like “if you think I’m going to take a first place prize when I should’ve been fourth and you’re robbing not only the first three but also my brother by banning him from the game that almost killed all of us just because you think I have some stupid complex then you have another thing coming and also fuck you.”

So next year’s competition is canceled. Suddenly, these professional athletes have nothing to do. The five of them sit down and say “maybe we should learn more about our supposed profession” since the only reason they survived was because of Wei Wuxian’s demonic cultivation. Jiang Yanli brings up the university class, and the next thing they know, all six are enrolled in the class.

When Elaine overhears Wei Wuxian needle Jin Zixuan about something to which he responds “that was years ago!”, they can’t help but ask, “do you know each other?” And Wei Wuxian glances nervously at the professor and says “we’re…uh…family friends!” (That brick wall Lan Wangji is glaring at Wei Wuxian because he doesn’t like lying, but Elaine can’t tell because Lan Wangji is a brick wall. In more ways than one). Basically, while they didn’t have any intention of hiding, Wei Wuxian panics when he remembers how much the professor hates competitive cultivators, and everyone else gets sucked into his lies because of him.

And then it all comes spilling out: Wei Wuxian, Jiang Cheng, and Jiang Yanli are siblings, Nie Huaisang is high school friends with Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng, Wei Wuxian is dating Lan Wangji (and that much was already obvious from the very public pda), and Jin Zixuan is Jiang Yanli’s fiancé, and his family is friends with Jiang Yanli’s family, which is how he knows the siblings from earlier. It also comes out that all six of them aren’t regular students at the university, they’re just taking this class in particular. Their answers aren’t particularly enlightening, and Elaine doesn’t understand why they’re being so dodgy on the question. Well, if “dodgy” means Jiang Cheng snapping “none of your business” and Lan Wangji staring at you until you walk away nervously.

This is how Elaine gains perspective on their classmates. Jin Zixuan is an arrogant rich prick who can’t last a conversation without mentioning how much better he is than you. Jiang Cheng would be cool (and maybe even cute, Elaine notes) if he wasn’t perpetually angry, even with the people he supposedly got along with. He’s polite enough with strangers but any personal comments and he acts personally offended. Wei Wuxian is nice enough, but he’s also an annoying troublemaker who’s always late for class, and has the social skills of an agoraphobic lobster. He constantly inserts himself in conversations and gets on the professor’s nerves. Well, the professor appreciates the questions and knows that Wei Wuxian is actually interested and also really really smart, but. Nerves. Lan Zhan is handsome, and a model student, but that’s about all Elaine can say about him. He has the emotional capacity of an old shoe, and rarely offers more than one word answers, as if talking is beneath him. The only exception is Wei Wuxian, and that’s a whole other can of worms, because Elaine cannot for the life of them figure out how those two are dating each other. It’s clear they’re the most in-love couple to ever being in love, but that doesn’t answer the question why. And how. And what. Nie Huaisang is nice enough. He actually has some social tact and can hold a conversation, but he also has zero spine and isn’t interested in anything but art and procrastination. Elaine doesn’t understand why he’s even taking this class. He’s not in uni anyway, why is he here.

The only acceptable person is Jiang Yanli, and that’s because she’s a human person with actual feelings. She’s always nice, but knows that her siblings are not, and she has interests besides ??? and none. She actually goes to university and is majoring in political science, which is how Elaine learns that she is a debate champion, and already managing a business left to her by her recently deceased parents. Elaine brings up their parents once and then Jiang Cheng the aggressive angry grape starts yelling and Wei Wuxian turns downright vicious all cold and dark and Elaine never brings it up again. So Jiang Yanli is the only one that Elaine actually likes/considers a friend. The only thing is that Elaine cannot understand why she associates with the people that she does. Siblings are understandable, but why is she engaged to that rich brat Jin Zixuan? The terrifying thing is that Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian agree with Elaine and think Jiang Yanli could do better, and Elaine knows this because they’re so vocal about it. Like are they trying to ruin their sister’s engagement? Actually maybe they are.

So that’s Elaine’s university class experience.

#antebunny's april prompts #fic outline #spring fest 2021 #mdzs #not my art #obviously

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justkending · 4 years ago

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Just Roommates. Chapter 32

Series Summary: These two college friends have had years to grow together. Each being the others support system, adventure buddy, movie night partner, and dorky roommates. That is until things start coming to a new light in their relationship. At least for him… Is there something else there? Is it possible? Were these feelings always there?

Pairing: (Modern) Bucky Barnes x Reader

Warning: Fluff, Adulting, sexy-times mentions, language.

Word Count: 3600+

A/N: And ladies and gentlemen... This is the last chapter for this series. It’s been an absolute joy of mine to write, and will for sure being going down as one of my top ones. I hope you enjoy, I hope I did the end justice, and I hope it was everything and more for you all like I wanted. I also may or may not write an epilogue. I’m still debating. If I do, just keep an eye open for tags. Thank you all again for supporting and loving on this brain child of mine. Each and every comment, like, and piece of love sent my way was greatly cherished:) Now on to the next story that I have brewing!!!

Chapter 32:

“Hold still, Y/N!” Nat said as she tried to bring the last pieces of the wiggly woman’s hair together. “Jesus woman!”

“Sorry, I just need-” Y/N started as she reached over once again for another grape that she was currently stress eating.

“You know, most girls would be starving themselves before they walk down the aisle to get that extra skinny look. Glad to know even your wedding day won’t change you,” Wanda laughed in the corner as she straightened the ivory dress hanging up.

“It’s grapes. Grapes are healthy,” Y/N turned her head sending a playful glare her way.

“Stop moving!” Nat shouted again with a huff.

“Right, sorry.”

There was a knock at the door as Y/N shoved another handful of grapes in her mouth.

“Hey, it’s Steve. I need Y/N to sign something for the marriage license before the ceremony.”

“Wait-” Nat started, but before she could finish, Y/N had already cut her off.

“Come on in Stevie!”

Slowly, and ever so carefully, the door opened with Steve sneaking in before anyone that might have been in the hallway could see in.

“I’ll be quick I promise,” Steve started as he turned into the master bedroom where they were getting ready. But when he was fully looking at her turned in the chair where she was facing the vanity set up, he stopped in his tracks. “Wow.”

“Hey, Stevie. How’s it looking out there?” Y/N said casually with a smile on her lips and her arm resting on the back of the chair.

“You-You look beautiful, Y/N/N,” Steve smiled not hearing her question.

“Awe, thanks. I don’t even have my dress on,” she laughed standing and walking over to him.

“Don’t need it to be beautiful when you’re you, doll,” he winked, giving her a kiss on the cheek.

“Now, I know you’re going to be at the end of the aisle Steve, but I don’t remember saying yes to marrying you. You keep this up and I might have to,” she winked back.

“Bucky would kill me.”

“True,” she laughed. “So, what do I need to sign? I kinda have plans this evening I have to still get ready for.”

“Right! Here,” he pulled out a pen with the papers already on hand. “Just sign here to state that I can wed you both. I thought I had got all of it done, but when I was doing my checklist this morning-”

“Classic Stevie.”

He rolled his eyes with a smile before continuing. “I realized there was one more document.”

“Easy fix,” she did her signature quickly before handing it all back to him. “Wow, that’s going to be the last time I sign my name with Y/L/N. Hmmm…” she paused as if in shock. “That’s really crazy, isn’t it?”

“It’s pretty crazy,” Steve laughed. “But if I’m being honest I called this since day one.”

“Oh, shut up Rogers!” Nat shouted. “I was the one who called it, and you were the one that said, ‘Eh, he doesn’t deserve her.’”

“Really now?” Y/N laughed turning to Steve with a raised eyebrow.

“Ok, fine. But if I’m being honest he didn’t deserve you at the time. He had a lot of growing and soul searching to do,” Steve defended. “I’m happy to say that has been the case, and you was the one to help him along with that.”

“All true things. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we have a bride to get ready Steve,” Wanda intervene.

“Right, sorry. Sorry,” Steve nodded looking back at Y/N and taking her hand, placing a kiss to it. “We can rag on Bucky after the ceremony. I’ll see you out there Sassy.”

“Thanks Stevie. I’ll see you out there,” Y/N grinned.

With one last goodbye, Steve walked back out and the girls continued their makeover.

____________

“Hey man. You nervous?” Sam asked, clasping his hand onto Bucky’s shoulder.

“I thought I was supposed to be,” Bucky said, adjusting his tie in the mirror.

“Not necessarily. You’re allowed to feel however you want.” Sam countered.

“Yeah, yeah… It’s just surreal to me still,” Bucky said with a nervous chuckle.

“Because you’re marrying a beautiful woman who loves you for you, and would do anything to make you happy for the rest of your life? Yeah, I can see how that’s unbelievable.” Sam nodded.

“Hey!” Bucky said slapping his back.

“I’m kidding ok!” Sam laughed. “I mean usually I’m not, but-” another slap. “Ok, ok!” He paused looking at the strained groom as he threw on his boutonniere with shaky hands. “Here, let me.”

Sam took over the flower problem and noticed how Bucky was still tensed. Steve would have been his best man, and still kinda was, if he wasn’t officiating. Sam was basically his second one since they were still rather close. Even though they were constantly harassing the other, they were best friends at the end of the day. Bucky was very happy to have him by his side on this day.

“You know, I mean it though, right?” Sam asked.

“Mean, what?” Bucky was clearly lost in his thoughts but still listening.

“She loves you for you Buck. And that woman would absolutely do anything and everything to make sure you live a happy life. You picked a good one.”

“I did. Didn’t I?” Bucky smiled, relaxing his shoulders some.

“And I know you would do that same for her.”

“Without a second thought…”

“Then don’t overthink it Buck. You two were made for this. Instead of being nervous, be ecstatic that someone wants to share the same love you have for them to you.”

Bucky paused taking in his words. He was right. He had nothing to be nervous about. Y/N was his person, and he believed he was her person too. This was a match made in the stars.

“Thanks Sam. I needed that.”

“No problem. That’s what friends are for.” Sam smiled adjusting the last of his suit.

Steve came in right in time. “Hey, you about ready to get hitched Barnes?”

Bucky looked at the men in the room and the nervous soft smile turned to a full excited grin.

“Yeah, let’s do this.”

____________

“Ok, ladies and gentleman. Wanda and Sam first. Then Clint and I. After that, Vis and Maria. Then of course our beautiful bride,” Nat instructed as she lined everyone up on the back porch of the house just out of sight from the tree so there wasn’t any peeking. Y/N was in the back adjusting her dress and veil.

“You look stunning Y/N,” Sam said as he looked back at the nervous bride to be.

“Thank you Sam. You look rather dashing as well,” she said with a deep breath.

“I would like to second Sam’s compliment,” Vis smiled in a calming way.

“I’ll third it!” Clint shouted.

“Moron, get back in line,” Nat swatted at him.

“Ow!” Clint said, grabbing his arm. “What? I’m not allowed to compliment the bride?” All he got in return for that comment was a glare. “Ok, yes ma’am.”

“Ready?” Nat asked. Everyone nodded. She peaked around the crew and looked back at Y/N who was staring straight ahead. “Y/N, you ready?”

She paused and then a small smile grew on her face. “Of course.”

Nat gave a nod, and Wanda sent a reassuring smile her way.

“Let’s do this then,” Nat smiled.

Music began to play and the crew started making their way slowly to the tree where the altar was.

Taking a deep breath, it was almost time for Y/N to make her way. She didn’t have anyone escorting her and that was playing in the back of her head as she closed her eyes. But as fate would have it...

“Y/N.”

She turned at the sound of her name, and saw a much older version of her brother who she hadn’t actually seen in person in almost 5 years.

“Carson?”

“Hey sis,” he smiled coming up to her in his nice suit, and someone behind him that she hadn’t noticed yet. “You look absolutely radiant.”

“Thanks,” she said stifling back tears that were quickly forming. “What-what are you-”

“Hey Y/N/N,” another voice said.

Peaking around her brother, she saw her older sister smiling in a lavender dress coming up to her.

“Maebry. You guys made it,” she said with a small laugh to hold back the happy tears she was feeling.

“Couldn’t miss the little sis’s wedding,” Maebry said.

“Couldn’t miss my second big sis’s wedding,” Carson added.

They pulled into a group hug with giant smiles on their faces. When they pulled back, Y/N fanned at her face to preserve the makeup.

“I didn’t think you guys could make it,” she said with furrowed brows.

“Nothing too important to miss this kind of day.”

“Thank you guys. Truly, thank you.”

“Of course. We’re family after all,” Maebry smiled rubbing her hand up and down Y/N’s arm.

“Uh, speaking of which… Did mo-” Y/N said sniffling back the few tears that escaped.

“Actually,” Carson pulled out his phone that he had on the whole time without his sister knowing.

On the screen were the faces of Y/N’s mom and dad with soft smiles awkwardly waving at her.

“Oh my-” Y/N said, putting a hand over her mouth.

“Hey Y/N,” her dad said.

“Hey Dad,” she said after pulling herself together some.

“I-I’m sorry we couldn’t be there,” he said, clearly awkward tension radiating through the phone.

“We had a convention out in California that we had already left for when we got notice the wedding was today. We would’ve flown out, but flights are cancelled thanks to a storm going on here,” Her mom added.

“Oh,” Y/N sighed at a loss for words.

“Listen, we don’t want to make this day more stressful than we’re sure it already is, but we want to say we’re sorry,” her dad sighed. “When we saw your engagement post we felt terrible… We saw how amazing you are doing there with work, life, and clearly your relationship. You’re our daughter and we shouldn’t have done what we did all these years.”

“Yes, and we know you’re about to walk down the aisle and you probably hate us, but we would like to watch the ceremony if you’re ok with it. Since we can’t be there in person we’d like to be there in spirit,” her mom added.

Y/N took a minute to process this. Sure they had done something horrible to her when she was going off on her own, but she also never reached out or tried to make things right. They both had their pride that they were preserving. End of the day she did want them there. She still loved them even if they didn’t communicate much over the years.

“Of course,” Y/N nodded. “I, um, I actually have to go now cause I’m already running late to my wedding,” she chuckled, fixing her hair with the veil, “But can we talk soon?”

“We would love nothing more,” her mom smiled. “Now, you go get married darling.”

Y/N nodded with a new smile on her face. Her whole family was actually going to be there for her wedding day. She started the day thinking none of them would.

“Y/N, can I ask you something?” Carson asked as he handed the phone to Maebry.

“If you ask it quickly, yes,” she laughed walking toward the spot she was already supposed to be halfway to.

“Can I walk you down the aisle?”

She stopped in her tracks and turned to her brother.

“Really?”

“Only if you’re ok with it,” he rushed to say worried he overstepped a boundary.

“Carson, I would love that,” she grinned.

“I’m going to go find a seat, and keep mom and dad on the phone,” Maebry said, rushing past them. “And Y/N. Carson was right. You look absolutely stunning.”

“It runs in the family,” Y/N winked before watching her sister race to get a seat.

Taking her brother's arm, they began their walk. Taking deep breaths and focusing on the walk ahead she was finally in sight of Bucky.

He was looking down and taking deep breaths of his own. Once she was at the end of the aisle the music changed and Bucky raised his head.

As soon as they made eye contact, it was like the rest of the world faded away. You know that cliche saying where it feels like it’s just the two of them on the planet? Yeah, that was a real feeling and it was currently leaving them both breathless.

Sending Bucky a grin she saw him break some. He choked up and quickly brought his hand up to cover his mouth not wanting the guest to see him fall apart at the sight of her walking toward him.

Her dress was a sleek ivory gown. Classic and simple. Thin straps holding up the whole thing, and the neckline swooping down making her collarbone pop. Her hair was voluminous with hollywood style waves and her veil was sat in the back pinned by the crown that was on her head. The crown was subtle with stars and moons on it, and sat on her head creating a halo for the angel that she was to him.

“That man clearly loves you sis,” Carson whispered to her.

“And I’m very much in love with him too.”

Finally, just steps from the makeshift altar, Y/N and Bucky never broke eye contact. The tree was canopying all around them creating shade for the little bit of sunlight left in the evening. The greenery mixed with the sun setting behind it made the altar all the more alluring. The tree that was going to be a part of their story.

The small crowd sat down, and Carson patted Y/N’s hand before placing a kiss to her cheek, nodding to Bucky who returned it, and moving to his seat next to his sister.

“You look-” Buck started grabbing her hands and squeezing them while trying to hold back more of his own tears. “I’m sorry, there just aren’t words…”

“Same to you B,” she grinned.

“You two ready?” Steve asked, smiling at the two.

“More than ready,” Y/N answered.

“Yeah punk. Get on with it so I can marry the girl of my dreams,” Bucky said, still looking at Y/N.

Steve rolled his eyes playfully as the crowd chuckled at the banter.

A little less than half an hour later of vows and proclamations of their love for each other, it was time for the next chapter of life.

“Do you Y/N Y/M/N Y/L/N take James Buchanan Barnes to be your lawfully wedded husband?” Steve asked.

“Wouldn’t want it any other way,” Y/N smiled, getting the lopsided grin from Bucky.

“And do you James Buchanan Barnes take Y/N Y/M/N Y/L/N to be your lawfully wedded wife?” Steve chuckled.

“Hell yeah!” Bucky answered, getting the signature eye roll from Y/N.

“In that case,” Steve grinned ear to ear closing the book in his hand. “I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

Before Steve could even say, ‘You may kiss the bride’,” Bucky had both hands on her face pulling her into him for their first kiss as a married couple.

“You may now kiss the bride, I guess…” Steve sighed, shaking his head as the crowd erupted in cheers.

___________

The reception went off without a hitch. Thanks to Natasha’s anal way about making things perfect, the string lights that were bought outside, perfectly illuminated the back yard and porch for a quaint party. They had a buffet of finger foods thanks to Wanda’s friend. There was a small photobooth on the porch. Music was playing at all times, and they even rented a small dance floor to make it easier to dance on the grass.

It was late now. The sun had gone down and a few guest had left, leaving it with mainly just the crew, and a few family friends there.

Bucky and Y/N had just finished talking to his family who were headed home now. His sister was taking his mom home while wishing the couple best wishes.

“Bye Bec. Let me know when you get home!”

“Don’t worry about me. You go dance with your wife,” she winked adding emphasis on the last word making Bucky smile grow.

“Don’t have to tell me twice.”

Y/N was talking to her sister and brother who were also packing up.

“Thank you again for coming. It truly meant the world to me that you guys were here, and that mom and dad, well… You know,” she grinned at her siblings.

“Don’t thank us. You’re friend Wanda was the one who called Mom and Dad telling her about everything,” Maebry said.

“Wait, what?” Y/N said shocked.

“Well, we told mom and dad about it, but didn’t know if there was space to convince them. Little did we know they were actually already considering it, but Wanda was the one who gave them the idea to facetime and such. She supposedly updated them on everything with Bucky and what’s been happening in your life recently. Some stuff we didn’t even know.”

“She didn’t tell me-”

“She wanted it to be a surprise and clearly it worked,” Carson said. “Don’t think too much about it, and just be happy about the outcome.”

“I am. Thank you guys. Really,” Y/N nodded very thankful for how everything unfolded.

“Congrats, sis. We love you.”

They got in a big huddle of hugs before grabbing their things.

“You guys headed out too?” Bucky asked, coming up and wrapping an arm around Y/N’s waist.

“We are,” Maebry nodded. “It was a pleasure to finally meet you in person Bucky. Thanks for taking care of my sister after all these years.”

“No need to thank me for something I love doing,” Bucky waved off. “But thank you for coming. I know it’s a trip for you guys, and I know Y/N really wanted it. As did I.”

“Of course. Now you two be safe, and enjoy your honeymoon. We have a flight to catch,” Maebry smiled. “Welcome to the crazy family, James.”

“Glad to be a part of it,” Bucky winked, giving her a hug.

“You’re a brother, so you know what I’m about to say.” Carson reached his hand out to Buck. “You take care of her or you’ll have me to deal with.”

“If it ever came down to it, I would hope you would kick my ass,” Bucky laughed.

“Good to know,” Carson said with a wink.

“You guys get home safe, ok?” Y/N said smiling at the conversation.

“Will do. Love you Y/n/n!” And with that they were on their way.

“I’m glad they could come,” Bucky said as they watched them get into a car.

“Me too,” Y/N agreed doing the same.

“You didn’t get to tell me much about your parents calling…”

“A tale for another time. Nothing to worry about at all though. I’m actually really happy with what they said, and we’re going to talk once you and I come back from our honeymoon,” Y/N nodded turning back to Bucky.

“Sounds good, doll. Now, I have been instructed by my sister to dance with my wife,” he said with a cheesy grin and eyebrow wiggle.

“I always have another dance saved for my husband,” she said with a wiggle of her own as she grabbed his hand and moved to the dance floor.

______

Y/N and Bucky were saying their goodbyes to everyone as they left. Steve and Peggy being the last to go. Usually there would be a send off for their honeymoon, but considering they had the wedding at their own home, and their flight for their vacation wasn’t until tomorrow morning, no point in doing a send off.

“You guys are sure you’re ok with staying here and watching Alpine while we’re gone?” Y/N asked.

“Positive,” Steve answered.

“It’s actually 5 minutes closer to my work, so I don’t mind at all,” Peggy added. “Plus, Alpine is the absolute sweetest. You don’t have to ask me twice to look after him.”

“Perfect,” Y/N said leaning into Bucky’s side as he wrapped his arm around her.

“Well, we’ll leave you guys be,” Steve said holding Peggy’s hand. “We will be here tomorrow after you leave.”

“Great, and you guys have a key?” Bucky asked.

“Still have the one you gave me when you first moved in. Now stop asking me questions and go enjoy your wedding night punk,” Steve laughed going to the car.

“Drive safe!” Y/N shouted.

“You guys be safe on your trip!” Steve waved after opening the door for Peggy who gave a final wave too, getting in the car.

Once they were out of sight, Bucky turned to Y/N.

“What do you say we enjoy our wedding night, Mrs. Barnes? Alone…”

“Don’t have to ask me twice, Mr. Barnes…” she smiled walking up the steps of the porch with a sway of her hips still in her wedding gown.

“Oh, come on now… You know what that does to me,” Bucky growled chasing after her.

“I know. That’s why I do it.”

Before she could reach the door, Bucky picked her up bridal style getting a giggle fit out of her.

“This is the tradition right?” Bucky said, rubbing his nose on hers. “A start to our new beginning?”

“To our new beginning.”

Just Roommates:

@starfirerules @buckys-blunders @alexxcorona113 @tcc-gizmachine @vrgelivvvv @nighttwingg @firefly-in-darkness @mizzzpink @poppunkdork @nerdygirlwithacrush @irespostthingsiwanttoseelater @ellaenchanted91 @sebbbystaaan @prplprincez

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dah-knee · 3 years ago

Text

I’m just gonna do this whole thing. Because I’m bored.

1. I’m 135 lbs. my ugw is 122-127.

2. I’m 5’6. I love my height. Being taller makes burning calories easier. I also like being the average height for a girl

3. Too lazy to put a picture but Kendall J is my thinspiration. I fucking hate her. But she’s so pretty. I hate it

4. I don’t really have any fears abt weight loss. I guess gaining it back LMFAO

5. I honestly do wanna lose weight for me. I just wanna look nice naked LOL and I’m into fashion, so having everything look nice is a plus.

6. I don’t reallyyyyy binge tbh. I don’t restrict heavily AT ALL. I don’t even have an ED, just a bad relationship with food. I actually eat about 2200 calories a day and exercise off 750 of them. I hav an Apple Watch so burning off 750 is just routine. I just eat 2200 to maintain in a calorie deficit without slowing down my metabolism too bad. When I do binge, it’s on sweet stuff. It happens randomly tbh, or when my mom has mad something she really wants me to try.

7. My mom knows I’m constantly trying to lose weight and doesn’t really care. She cares enough to make sure I’ve eaten though. My dad doesn’t know. He knows I don’t like how I look though. He’s always super kind and tells me I’m beautiful though😢

8. My mom and sister made a ton of negative comments on my weight about a year and a half ago. Not anymore though. An old friend also said something. Those things really did stick with me.

9. My workout routine is SUPER simple. Maybe: run in the morning and burn off 100 calories. If I have school/work that’s another 300/400. Run at night and burn about 200. Everyday tasks totals up to about 100 too. On weekends I run a little more to makeup for being at home all day. I have a treadmill. I also have a gym membership but I don’t use it much anymore tbh. Thinking of canceling it.

10. The hardest thing I gave up is 100% chips and Nutella. God do I miss them.

11. I don’t have a favourite thinspo blog because I’m not consistent on here lol.

12. I eat a yogurt parfait/ smoothie and lunch and dinner are totally random.

13. I’m losing weight a healthy way. I’ve done heavy restriction of 1100 and gained ALL my weight back. Eating 1600 keeps the weight off.

14. My UGW is 122-127. Hoping by this Christmas and if anything backfires DEFINITELY before I start University in Sept.

15. I would not consider vegan Or vegetarianism. I love chicken too much and think it’s an amazing source of protein.

16. Decided to lose weight around July 2020.

17. I do jot have an eating disorder because I eat enough.

18. My weakness is chocolate bars. My dad has always bought one a week for me since I was kid. I hold it to close to my heart to not eat it.

19. Last time I ate fast food was… yesterday LOL

20. I don’t believe in diets.

21. LITERALLT everything. But typically I’m a size medium and a size 6/8 in pants.

22. My lowest was 130. I gained due to heavy restrictions.

23. Originally the media did not play a Role, but now it does.

24. Don’t like the pro terms at all.

25. Never purged I don’t wanna ruin my teeth.

26. JAWLINES AND SKINNY LEGS. God those both excite for hitting my ugw

27. I do t really “deal” with being around food. I like good lol

28. Don’t care much for the gap. Just wanna be skinny. Gap would be nice tho

29. Everyone’s beautiful. Confidence yet humbility is especially beautiful

30. Fact about me: I love interior design!

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scripttorture · 4 years ago

Note

(Villain story PT 1) My story is about two enemies/villains. Character A is tortured by B as punishment for harming a friend of B. A escapes and tortures B for retaliation (other people who have been wronged by character B also help character A do that). A and B are not directly involved in each other's tortures but they know who is responsible for their punishment. Later, A and B come closer to each other's side and start to compromise their politics. They also come closer as people.---

(Villain story PT 2) They also come closer as people. They realize they think alike. They don't have regrets about the torture they did to one another but they don't want to repeat it. Later there is some atonement for their actions. I am doing the trope "enemies to friends" but with both characters having a twisted mentality (aka "it's fine if you come closer to your torturer"). (Villain story PT 3) However, I don't imply that torture is something light or harmless or that it's natural for someone to be kind to their torturer. i also don't try to excuse the actions of the torturers.I am worried if with this story I present torment in the wrong way. Any commentary or advice? Thank you!

OK I think I understand what you’re going for here.

I’m going to start off by saying that I don’t think there’s anything wrong in writing ‘bad’ characters. Or characters who believe in stuff that’s awful, stupid or just plain wrong. If you want to write unhealthy relationships, characters making bad decisions or characters having rare/unusual responses there’s nothing inherently wrong with that.

The issues come when we start teaching people these things are ‘normal’, that survival should look a certain way or that a particular kind of trauma ‘wasn’t that bad’.

Sometimes that stuff can be very subjective, so this is always a learning process.

But this isn’t about telling people to stop writing particular plots or characters. It’s about the problems that come when fiction is the only source people see for something real and complex and misunderstood.

I don’t have a problem with authors breaking from reality; it’s called fiction for a reason. The problem is when we present a potentially damaging fiction as fact and do so in an environment which makes finding the facts almost impossible.

I talk about what is or isn’t realistic often because I think it’s important that we understand the reality. We get better stories when the writers are aware of how and where they’re deviating from reality. We get more compassionate stories when writers take the time to think about what those breaks from reality imply.

I don’t think you’ve chosen a plot that’s inherently torture apologia but it could stray close to some of the common misconceptions about torture. And you’ve recognised that, which means you’re thinking about it critically. That’s a really important step.

First off in this kind of scenario it’s worth distinguishing the torturer from the person who ordered torture.

You’ve made it clear that neither of these characters actively tortures the other. They order it but it isn’t even clear if they’re in the same room when the abuse takes place. And I think that gives you a lot more leeway.

I don’t know of a single case where a survivor and their torturer (ie someone who directly, actively tortured them) became friends or had any sort of positive relationship afterwards.

There are abuse cases where the survivor and abuser have gone on to have a healthy and mostly positive relationship afterwards. It’s rare*, but it does happen.

The thing is abusers usually have an established prior relationship with their victim. Torturers don’t. The most I’ve found is a couple of cases where they were vague acquaintances before hand; I’ve yet to find a case where torturer and victim were actually close beforehand.

What I’m saying here is that generally there isn’t a reason for survivors to want anything to do with their torturers in any capacity. And there are a lot of good reasons for them to not want to be near their torturer.

There aren’t a lot of accounts of survivors encountering their torturers afterwards. The ones that I have found-

Well Fanon describes one that happened in his hospital. Both torturer and survivor had a panic attack. The survivor ran into a bathroom and tried to commit suicide.

Hospital staff managed to convince both of them that they were mistaken about who they thought they saw (a decision Fanon justified as being the only way they could continue to access the treatment they needed). They rearranged the schedules to make sure they never encountered each other again.

I’ve read more recent accounts that were by survivors. Most of them seem to be describing panic attacks or at the very least, extreme distress on the part of the survivor.

That’s partly in response to the torturer in a way that’s beyond the control of both individuals. But it’s also partly because of the attitude torturers typically seem to have to their own crimes.

I’ll pre-face this by saying we really need more research on torturers. At the moment there isn’t a lot in the way of good quality long term studies. Based on the information we have now torturers seem to struggle to understand the scale and impact of their crimes. Some of them do express regret. Some of them will admit that what they did was wrong.

But they might also say (example taken from one of the survivors accounts and paraphrased) ‘Well I served my time in jail so you shouldn’t have a problem with me any more. I have as much right to be here as you do.’

As you might imagine this sort of attitude and lack of understand tends to make a healthy or positive relationship less likely.

As I said, I never heard of a case where a survivor and their torturer had a positive relationship afterwards and I think that it’s extremely unlikely.

But the survivor and the person who ordered torture… that is potentially a different story.

People who order torture usually aren’t present when torture occurs. They don’t exist in the toxic torturer sub-culture these organisations have. They are not typically at risk from the torturers in their organisation. And since they don’t typically witness torture they’re not going to develop the mental health problems torture typically causes.

And because they’re not typically present when torture is actually happening there’s less chance that a survivor is going to feel triggered by their presence. They might blame them, they might hate them. But the visceral response they have when seeing their torturer doesn’t seem to be there, as far as I can tell from what I’ve read.

I think that difference, that distinction, gives you a fair amount of leeway. Because a person can know, logically, that the head of the organisation that tortured them is ultimately responsible for their torture and still not have the same level of emotional response or distress.

Because they weren’t part of the toxic sub-culture torturers create in organisations, a person who ordered torture is less likely to have the same attitude towards their crimes. I can’t say for certain that they’d have greater insight or perspective into what they did; there’s even less research on them then on torturers.

But I think they’d be able to denounce, regret or move away from torture with less personal risk. They’re not going to lose their whole social circle for saying torture should stop. And they’re unlikely to be physically attacked by their peers for it.

I still think that gaining that insight, that understanding of the scale and impact of their crimes, would be difficult and unlikely. But my instinct is that it would be more likely in someone who is at a remove from torture then in someone who was actually a torturer.

Showing that torture is serious is more about how you portray the effects then how you have the characters’ relationships developing. It’s about showing consistently showing the effects symptoms have on the characters’ lives.

Having more survivors then just these two characters could serve to highlight that this relationship isn’t usual, as well as underlining that people’s responses are very varied.

If you make the effort to show, consistently, that both the main characters and any secondary survivor characters are effected by what they went through then you should avoid downplaying the damage torture causes.

You’ve probably already picked out the 3-5 symptoms you want your main characters to experience. Decide what those problems look like for them and show those problem consistently even when the character is improving.

The story I’m writing at the moment has a character with a minor brain injury and part of the symptom set I gave him involved having lower inhibitions. Which in this character looks like a complete lack of brain-mouth filter, he says what’s on his mind constantly. And he does get better at managing his disability through the course of the story but he still says the ‘wrong’ thing constantly. Which in turn impacts on his ability to relate to other people.

That’s the sort of thing you need in order to show the effects are serious: a commitment to showing them all the way through the story.

For instance if one of the characters has severe anxiety that gets set off by crowded spaces, improving and managing that condition might look like:

Rearranging their schedule to avoid places at the most crowded times

Medication to reduce the effects of panic attacks

Constantly using breathing exercises in crowded spaces (and possibly sounding a little strange when they talk as a result)

Sending other people to potentially crowded spaces in their place

Putting off or cancelling things if a place seems too crowded for them

Taking the rest of the day off to recover after going somewhere crowded

Any of those might lead to the net result of less panic attacks and overall improvement. But they’re still working around a serious condition. The fact the character has to make these adjustments constantly in their life means the condition is still there and still serious.

The rest of this is probably less about the overall themes or plot and more about how it comes across when it’s written.

I can’t give you a roadmap to a perfect story that no one will ever take issue with. That does not exist. Because every individual reader will bring something different when they sit down to read and they will take something different away too.

Getting beta readers can help with this, and help build your confidence. I’ve found in person (or in these days over skype) writing groups to be really useful.

You’re trying to do better and that is the main thing. You’ll learn in the process of writing this story and what you learn can feed into the next one.

This is a complex topic you’re tackling and your fear is natural. Do everything you can to do it justice, but give yourself permission to be imperfect. You’re only human. I assume.

I think the main thing to consider here is whether you’re portraying what happens with these characters as ‘normal’ or not. Because however you look at it this is an unusual outcome. I think you know that and I get the impression from the ask that you’re not trying to portray this as the ‘usual’ or ‘correct’ response. You’re just trying to tell a story that interests you using an unusual response. Nothing wrong with that.

Implications and atmosphere can be hard to get right. They take practice. Having someone else read over the story can help confirm that scenes are coming across the way you intend them to.

Once again I think having other examples of survivors will help you avoid any suggestions that survivors ‘should/naturally are’ kind to the people who ordered them to be tortured. Showing symptoms consistently should also help you avoid excusing the torture. Especially if that effects the relationship that’s building between these two characters.

Take your time. Take breaks. Read your own writing critically and think about what you might be implying with each scene. Get second opinions to make sure it’s coming across as you’d like it to.

I hope that helps. :)

Available on Wordpress.

Disclaimer

*The fact that it can happen is occasionally used to encourage victims to stay in dangerous situations on the off chance they might be able to ‘fix’ their abuser. This is, of course, dangerous rubbish.

#writing advice #tw torture #tw abusive relationships #writing survivors #writing torturers #writing witnesses #writing recovery #people who order torture #torture apologia #torture survivors and relationships #torture is not safe #writing symptoms #effects of torture #behaviour of tortures #enemies to friends #not sure what to tag this

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timextoxhajima · 4 years ago

Audio

Playlist Feels

*SHORT SERIES

Member: *falls off his chair* juyeon

Genre: BIG ANGST + drama with chaebol/lawyer juyeon

A/N: NOTE THAT THIS IS A TRIGGER WARNING. I can’t include the reason because it’ll be a spoiler BUT THIS IS FICTITIOUS SO DON’T COME @ ME PLEASE

A/N pt 2: there isn’t much juyeon in this chapter so skip it if you just want some juyeon one shots

Links to other parts:

I Never Wanna See You Again

Frustrated (light smut)

Love Somebody (light smut)

Play With Fire (smut)

Stigma

Bourbon

Highway To Heaven (smut)

I Like Me Better

All Time Low

“so much for ‘i love you’.”

“are you sure you want to get on a more-than-twelve-hour flight to freakin’--” sunwoo grabs your passport and flips it open. “Amsterdam?”

you snatch the passport back, shoving it into the pocket of your knee-length coat.

“you ran from your family once...” chanhee looks at you with pleading eyes. “are you sure you want to run from this one?”

looking up from the passport, luggage next to your legs and surrounded by your friends, you scan the big, block letters that spell ‘departure’ across the entrance to the hall.

“i’m not running. i just need to think.”

“the last time you were on a plane, you hurled from the turbulence,” eric scolds. “and it was a three-hour flight.”

you roll your eyes and raise a brow at your friends. they were all just finding ways to convince you stay instead of watching you leave the country just days after you find them jobs that were extremely high-paying.

the calls you made were probably setting off a thousand alarms that would alert both your parents, since you were relying on the contacts you had as a chaebol. it was just a matter of time before they’d figure out that you left the country or something.

“so what if i hurl? i’ll be fine when the plane lands.”

chanhee’s features were strained, and eric sighs, pulling you into a hug and giving you a brotherly rub on your head.

“call us when you get there and tell us when you’re coming back, we’ll come get you.” eric releases you and sunwoo gives you a gently punch to your arm. you nod and look to chanhee, your arms already reaching out to him.

chanhee takes a small step backwards, eyes looking like he was hurt. you knew he was upset with you for blowing things out of proportion with juyeon. if you didn’t try to defend him, the whole argument with juyeon wouldn’t have happened. but it was a fact that he crossed the line, and it had nothing to do with chanhee.

“if i let you hug me, then it means there’s a chance you’re going to run and i’ll never see you again.”

your arms remained stretched out but your head droops to the side, pouting a little and walking towards him regardless.

“i’m not going to run, chanhee,” you wrap your arms around his shoulders. “and even if i do, i’ll come back just to see you guys. you have my word.”

you hear him sigh in resignation and his arms find your lower back. “i’ll hold you to that. i’ll hunt you down myself if you disappear off the face of earth.”

you snicker as you pulled back, constantly swallowing your saliva so you don’t burst into ugly tears.

you settle down in your seat and the passenger next to you greets you kindly. the skies outside the window next to you provided you the warmth and a strange feeling of freedom, but there was so much weight in your heart, you were worried the plane wouldn’t even take off.

you recall the first time you were on a plane. it was a private flight to paris with your parents when you were still a kid. you spent half the time throwing up because of the turbulence.

the second time you were on a plane, it was with eric, chanhee and sunwoo to a nearby country. they watched you hurl out your meals like a fountain and though it might’ve been a little mean and annoying in that point of time, you look back now and realise that all they were trying to do was to make you laugh and get your mind off your motion-sickness.

you wouldn’t be who you were today if it weren’t for them.

had they not dragged you onto a plane, you’d probably still be scared to fly with your motion sickness. but thanks to them, it didn’t matter anymore. it doesn’t matter if you threw up, all you needed to do was think about them and you’ll be fine.

you watch the sunset below the clouds that look like cotton and marshmallows, the constant whirring of the vehicle was slowly but surely getting to your head. the pressure of being in the sky was squeezing the juices out of your brain and making your eyes tear up. your ears were slightly blocked, so blasting music didn’t really help.

you feel the familiar ball of stomach acid push itself up your throat and into your chest, and you barely get the words out to the passenger next to you before she shifts and lets you out.

you watch the half-digested grains of rice and fruit spew out through your lips and into the toilet bowl, the material on your knees soaking up whatever liquid that was on the floor. might’ve been pee, but who cares?

“miss, are you alright?”

“yeah--” you belch out a disgusting scent, a mixture of vomit and food. “i’m okay.”

you grab a handful of tissue and wipe your lips, leaning back on your heels before losing your balance when the plane shakes a little. your back hits the wall of the cabin, and a headache rips through your temples.

you grit your teeth and groans of pain unconsciously pour out through your lips, your hands now pressing into your ear as the pressure in them become physical pain.

“miss! are you okay? do you need any assistance?”

“i’m fine!” you snap back. “it’s just a little... headache--”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“stay with me forever.”

“i can’t pretend you’re not the best thing that’s happened to me.”

“i love you.”

you vision widens and start to focus, but you frown to yourself when you process nothing besides a plain, white ceiling with amber lights lining the edges.

you inhale a deep breath and you give your nerves a moment to find your fingers. you blink so slowly, you were wondering if you were paralyzed or if your brain was just processing it super slowly.

“you’re awake.”

that voice.

turning in search of the source, your eyes catch a glimpse of the room you were in. there was a table in the corner of the room, a television mounted to the wall, and the floor was carpeted with a cream colored rug.

you process the views before you spot an IV drip, and it was hooked up to your left hand. the blanket was riled up to your stomach, and the scent of the room knocks some sense into your thinking.

you were in a hospital ward.

“where am i?” you breathe lightly, shutting your lids and rolling your eyes under to make sure you weren’t in a dream.

“in amsterdam, where else?”

“what date and time is it?” you look behind him and note the pathetic amount of afternoon sunlight spilling through the blinds that were closed.

“i don’t know how that’s going to tell you how long you’ve been here, but you passed out halfway on your flight here. you’ve been in this bed for more than thirty hours.”

you suck in a sharp breath and cover your eyes with one arm, the disgusting scent of medicine and antiseptic making your lungs hurt.

“how did you know i was here?”

dumb question to ask.

“it was a little difficult to ignore the calls you were making to my sub-ordinates and colleagues and partners. adding on the fact that your mother called to scream at me about you getting on a plane here,” your father gets out of the sofa next to your bed and walks around to the table, pouring a glass of water. “i wasn’t very keen on hearing her out until she told me your flight was to amsterdam.”

he brings the glass to you and holds it out.

“it was tricky to pretend that you aren’t my daughter... who also happens to have motion-sickness but still gets on a flight alone.”

you scoff, sitting up and taking the glass only because your throat was killing you. “fun to know that i need to get on a plane to get your attention.”

your father scratches a temple and waits for you to finish the glass of water.

“enough attention for me to cancel my meetings and fly here from croatia. i left the moment the airline called me to tell me my daughter passed out on the flight your mother was telling me about.”

you gulp the last bit of water and hold it to your chest. he gestures for it, and you reluctantly let him take it away from you.

it reminds you of all the times his house staff waited on you and how bad it made you feel. but you were always happy knowing that they were comfortable working in that house.

“so, do i get to know why i had to cancel my meetings to find you here, in a ward?” he lands the cup on the table and refers to the sofa seat next to you.

“solo trip to get away from city life. i simply passed out from the turbulence a long-flight was putting me through.”

he’s probably not going to buy that.

“that’s not very healthy.”

you scoff, lying back down into the bed and running your hand through your hair. “of course it’s not healthy. anymore throwing up and i’ll erode my own digestive system. if only i could fault someone for my throwing up.”

silence.

“so... whose is it?”

“what do you mean ‘whose is it’? i was born with a weak gut, so i guess it’s mine.”

silence.

“i’m not talking about your motion-sickness, y/n. i’m talking about the 15-week foetus inside you.”

the what--

“15-week foetus? what are you--”

oh.

no.

“you didn’t know you were pregnant?”

your heart felt like it was going to explode and a wave of ache rips through your chest.

“if it’s a 15-week-old foetus, shouldn’t you have already missed like two or three periods?”

your fingers find your temples and you shut your eyes tightly. you start to feel your eyes getting wet and your nose turns sour as you desperately try to find any strand of possibility that this wasn’t happening.

“i was... working. i thought it was just the stress--” all of a sudden, you see nothing but juyeon’s face in your head. your eyes were sealed shut but you saw nothing but him.

and now you were carrying his child.

“huh,” your father calmly watches you go through a whole mental breakdown. “you’re not wearing a ring, so i assume the baby’s father isn’t my son-in-law?”

you turn to look at him with tears impairing your vision.

“your mother told me you were engaged over the phone. you can imagine my confusion when you turn up here, on the other side of the planet, alone, pregnant and without a ring.”

this can’t be real.

“get out.”

your father sucks in a sharp breath through his nostrils.

“you can fly back to croatia and tell mother not to poke her nose into this. i’ll deal with it on my own.”

he nods in your peripheral vision, your eyes only staring at an empty space on the ceiling. you shut your eyes and let the tears roll down the sides of your face, curving its way into the crevices of your ears. the sound of the shoes thumping softly against the carpet tells you he’s leaving and you hear the door swing open.

“call me if you need anything. i’m still your father after all.”

and with that, you hear the door shut.

you let yourself sob quietly, the reality sinking into your bones and you swore you could hear your heart beating in your ears. your hands find your abdomen, and you question why the product of your love with him was presented to you not in the form of casual dates and a simpler romance, but a baby, in a world of money you wanted nothing to do with.

you pull yourself together after about an hour of crying, and through swollen eyes, you find your luggage and bags behind the sofa seat your father previously sat on. fumbling around your bag, you were relieved that your phone had not been turned on the entire time since you boarded the plane. it would still be close to full battery.

your home screen becomes flooded with notifications of missed calls. from eric, sunwoo, chanhee, your mother, even your manager, and him.

you swipe away everything and let the phone adjust to the timezone and boot up, and once it was good to go, your first instinct was to call chanhee.

“where have you been?! your flight landed like... a billion years ago!”

“chanhee--”

“you better have a damn good explanation for fucking disappearing off the face of the fucking earth when you literally told me you won’t--”

“i--”

“where are you now, huh?! strutting down some random street in amsterdam thinking about coming back like, never?!”

“chanh--”

“believe me, i WILL get on a plane and fly to amsterdam just to strangle you myself!”

“chanhee, i’m pregnant.”

the other end of the line goes silent and you wonder if he hung up or something.

you hear him breathe into the receiver and that was your cue to finish your story.

“i passed out on the flight and now i’m in a hospital in amsterdam. my father’s in the country because the airline called him about me but i don’t know how long he’s staying,” you pause, bracing yourself to repeat that cursed word reality has decided to offer you. “i’m three months pregnant.”

silence.

you look down at your hands that were absent-mindedly fiddling with the corners of your blanket. your hair was messy and draped over your shoulders. your eyes struggle to remain wide open after the excessive crying in the last hour.

“... does he know?”

“no. even i didn’t.”

“what are you going to do about the baby?”

you purse your lips, pain rippling through you when you realise you had to make a decision that would change your life forever.

“i assume you’re not planning on telling him?”

it was your turn to fall silent.

you don’t want to be a shitty person for hiding this from him, but neither did you want him to have an opinion on what you should do with it.

“i think you should know that he’s been searching high and low for you. sangyeon and jaehyun told us that he’s been to your place and the only thing he hasn’t done is call the bureau director.”

“i’ll tell him after i decide what to do with it.”

“and?”

“i’ll tell him--”

“i know what you’re thinking of doing.”

you feel your facial features strain and compress all into each other, your thumb brushing the skin on your finger where the ring should be.

“you’re thinking of aborting it and telling him right before you get it done, aren’t you?”

he wasn’t your best friend for nothing.

“i know it sucks... the situation you’re in. and i don’t want to be the one who guilt trips you into keeping it just because it’s his or that it’s a life. so forget about him, and think about yourself before you decide to do anything. it’s yours as much as it’s his, and i know you have the means to raise it on your own, both financially and emotionally.”

chanhee’s words crush your last attempt at holding yourself together, and you bury your face into your free hand with the phone held to your ear.

“you’re hurting, and i know there’s nothing i can do to make you feel better besides give you what you need right now, and that’s space and emotional support,” a pause. “so call me when you’ve decided, and i promise i’ll see you soon.”

you sniffle loudly into the receiver, sure that he heard you. nodding to yourself, you thank chanhee and hang up, letting whatever fluids you had left inside you pour out through your eyes.

THE NEXT DAY

“thank you, it was a great stay,” you smile at the hospital receptionist, handing her the black and silver card that your father left behind. it had your name on it, but this was the first time you’ve ever used it.

you promised yourself you’d return the money when you earn it back. you didn’t want them to use this as a hold to keep you by their side.

“the bill’s already been paid by your father, miss,” she returns a bright smile and hands the card back to you.

ugh, one step late.

“in fact, he informed us that he’s booked you a place to stay in a hotel nearby. it’s a five-star hotel so there’s everything you need there, and if you feel uncomfortable or in need of medical assistance, it’s only a five minute drive here from the hotel.”

you provide her a weak service smile as you chuck the card back into your wallet.

the receptionist calls you a cab and sends you on your way to the castle-looking hotel. the hotel staff get your luggage and belongings up to the room while you roam around the lobby and the compound. you find yourself outside the building, now walking along the path next to the river bank.

couples were eating and drinking the evening away, the orange beams from the sun shining down on you and elongating the shadows of the birds that fly past above you in the sun’s light.

you find yourself in a secluded spot where the river opens up to the sea after spending nearly an hour just walking along the water line.

the only source of light around were the street lamps, and the water extends so far out, you couldn’t even see the horizon. you hear someone walk past every now and then and they kindly greet you. the friendly culture here was making you feel so comfortable, you couldn’t help but laugh at chanhee’s worry about you staying here forever.

you pull out your phone and dial for the abortion provider of the hospital you stayed at, and for a second you worry about the medical bills.

but it was quickly washed away once the abortion provider picks up, and you start inquiring about abortion protocols. your eyes travel out to sea as the person on the other end of the line feeds you the information that you were going to need to look over again once you’ve returned to the hotel.

your mind flashes back to the night juyeon proposed to you after you told him about your family. and you truly wonder...

life has a way of putting you in places you were meant to be.

Part 11 (final): Gravity

#timetohajima #angst #sad #lots of sad #im so fucking sad #im not even kidding anymore #lee juyeon #juyeon #the boyz #the boyz juyeon #juyeon fanfics #juyeon fanfic #the boyz fanfic

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justheretobreakthings · 4 years ago

Text

Perchance to Dream

Written for @gentronlegendaryfriendships

Day Three: Telepathic Bond | Crying in Front of the Other

Written for @badthingshappenbingo

Prompt: Sleep Deprivation

Word Count: 5,092 Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender Characters: Keith & Lance Read on AO3 My house, my rules, my ko-fi

Story Summary:

In the stress-filled days following Shiro's disappearance, it becomes clear that Keith is in desperate need of a good night's sleep. Lance and the rest of the team are determined to find a way to make that happen.

It was understandable that Keith would be in a bad mood as of late. After all, now that Zarkon was out of commission, a lot of political matters across the galaxies were up in the air, and the paladins were constantly meeting with one planetary leader after another. They were still having to keep up with battles and missions, and although the Blade was lending its assistance wherever it could, it still felt like they were spread thin now that they were short one paladin, and battles were that much more difficult now that they couldn’t form Voltron.

And, of course, there was the matter of what Shiro’s absence meant for Keith.

The other paladins didn’t have a whole lot of detail about what Keith had gone through when Shiro had disappeared on the Kerberos mission, since Keith wasn’t exactly eager to share any details about his past with anyone, but there were some things he couldn’t hide, not when some of his teammates were witnesses to them. Like the fact that Keith had been expelled from the Garrison for disciplinary issues within a week of the news of Kerberos breaking, or the fact that he had been living in self-imposed isolation for a year afterward, with no sign of having had contact with any sort of family or friends or of any family or friends even existing, until Shiro had finally returned, whereupon he steadfastly took up the role of Shiro’s right-hand man while remaining stubbornly closed off to everyone else in the Castle of Lions.

So, some emotional regressing was probably inevitable, and the rest of the team had formed an unspoken agreement to let it slide when Keith was snappish with them, when he skipped group meals and bonding sessions, when he stormed out of meetings, when he’d take the Red Lion out on yet another fruitless search for any sign of Shiro without letting anyone else know he’d be gone.

It was understandable, sure, but that didn’t mean they weren’t allowed to be irritated by it. And Lance was accustomed to being irritated by Keith, so it wasn’t like this was anything new. Just more of the same.

And more of the same also meant more venting about his Keith-related frustrations to Pidge and Hunk, who were annoyingly not particularly receptive to hearing about it.

��Look,” Pidge told him during one of these rants, cutting him off right in the middle of a very impassioned tirade about Keith having rammed into his shoulder in the hallway earlier that day without even stopping to apologize, “I’d be annoyed too, but cut him some slack. He just lost his brother, again. He has the right to be in a bad mood.”

“A bad mood, sure,” Lance said. “But there’s a limit to mood badness we should be willing to tolerate. Not like he’s never been a grouch before, but now it’s at the point where it’s messing with public image and missions. And team morale.”

“Him shoulder-checking you in the hallway really screwed up your morale that badly?”

“There’s no fucking way he doesn’t know he owes me an apology,” Lance snapped. “He’s just intentionally being a dick.”

“You always say that when it comes to Keith.”

“It’s always true.” He sighed. “Come on, help me out. When you get into a really bad mood about the situation with your brother and dad, you still pull yourself out of it after a while. What’s the difference there, huh? What do you do that Keith doesn’t?”

Pidge bristled. “I don’t get into ‘bad moods’, it’s perfectly justifiable to be pissed the fuck off when a tyrannical empire kidnaps your family and - ”

“Hang on, whoa, I wasn’t saying it wasn’t justifiable!” Lance said hastily. “I was just - ”

“So, what, does it mess with your fucking morale when I get grumpy about - ”

“I think what Lance is trying to say,” Hunk cut in, “Is that, when you’re feeling extra upset about the whole setting, the anger still settles. It’s just not sustainable to stay so angry for a longer period of time, you’d completely burn out and wind up basically breaking down. You’re mad about the whole thing, and rightly so, but you temper it enough that it doesn’t keep you from functioning and interfere with daily life, right? Meanwhile, Keith’s temper’s been flaring a lot longer than is healthy. It’s no good for him to not be coping.”

“Yeah,” Lance said with a nod. “Yeah, that’s exactly what I was gonna say.”

“Like hell it was,” Pidge muttered, but thankfully she let it go for now. “It’s not like I’m doing anything to work through the anger, really. Just, like you said, it burns out. Eventually I just gotta sleep it off, get some air, wait ‘til I can focus again.”

“Ah, okay, so Keith has to sleep it off,” Lance said. “I’m sure a nap will make everything all better again.”

“Hey, you asked how I deal, and I told you. Not my fucking problem if you don’t like the answer.”

“Well,” Hunk said slowly, “It… actually could help.”

Lance frowned over at him. “What do you mean?”

“It’s kind of a well-known fact that lack of sleep basically kills your mood, right? Just think of how cranky toddlers get after they miss a nap. I mean, I’m not trying to say Keith is a toddler or anything, or that this is a temper tantrum, nothing like that. But, well, he’s been really pushing himself trying to find Shiro, and he hasn’t really been recharging. He’s still up earlier than the rest of us, and a couple nights ago when I woke up halfway through the night and went to get a snack, he was up pacing the hallways.”

“Huh,” Pidge said. “Come to think of it, I’m usually the last one to bed, but I have heard Keith still moving around in his room a few times while I was heading to my room to sleep. And he’s been yawning a lot in diplomacy meetings. More than usual, I mean.”

“Oh!” Lance said. “And our last team training session, I was totally kicking his ass on reflex time against those drones! Normally he’s like, almost as fast as I am, but he was stumbling around like a drunk! Think that was because he was tired?”

“Lance, he normally has the fastest reflexes out of all of us,” said Hunk.

“No, no, we’re pretty much even. My reflexes just look slower to you guys because you’re more used to seeing them.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s how it works,” Pidge said, rolling her eyes. “But hey, the point stands. Bit of sleep would probably do him some good.”

“Well, if it means a possibility of a slightly less pouty Mullet stinking up the place? It’s gotta be worth a shot.”

---------------------------------------------------------

The next time Lance encountered Keith in the hall, he didn’t wait around to get brushed off or bumped into. Instead he strode straight up into the path of Keith’s stomping boots, earning himself a level glare that he pointedly ignored.

“Hey,” Lance said, “Cancel any plans you’ve got for tonight. We’re doing a sleepover.”

“... What?” Keith said, blinking uncomprehendingly.

Lance wasn’t sure if Keith was just taken aback by his abruptness, or if he actually didn’t know what a sleepover was. Just in case, he explained. “You know, we all gather together, have some quality bonding time, get as comfortable as possible, then pass out and sleep through the rest of the night and, if we did it right, half of the next day too. We’re all meeting in the paladins’ lounge, at - at half past, uh… fuck it, Altean clocks are stupid. Once you start seeing someone heading that way in pajamas, it’s time.”

“No thanks,” Keith grunted.

He moved to step around Lance, and Lance held out a hand to block him. “Wait, you gotta hear me out first. We’re all gonna put on our paladin pajamas and lion slippers - that’s all mandatory, by the way, sleepovers are very strict about dress codes - and gather up all the pillows and blankets we can find, and we’re going to basically transform the lounge into a massive blanket fort. And Pidge is gonna bring her caterpillars along to join, and they’re basically the softest things in all of existence, and we’re gonna taste-test some of Hunk’s new dessert recipes he’s trying out, get nice and stuffed before we go to bed. Basically, this is gonna be the best night’s sleep any of us have had in years.”

“I’ll pass.”

“No, look, you can’t pass. It’s team bonding.”

Keith huffed. “We do plenty of team bonding in all our battles and meetings. And speaking of which, we’ve got more important things to be focusing on than blanket forts.”

“Well, yeah, but how are we going to be able to focus on those important things if we don’t take some time to relax in between? All work and no play makes Keith a dull paladin.”

“All… what are you talking about?”

Lance sighed. “Okay, look, I’ll level with you. The whole team’s been kind of, uh, concerned, lately. About your mood. And Hunk noticed you haven’t been getting much sleep lately, and frankly it’s making you even more of a grouch than usual - no offense, I mean - so we figured - ”

“You have got to be kidding me,” Keith growled. “Yeah, I’ve been in a bad mood. Do you wanna guess why, Lance? Can you think of anything that might have happened lately that may be worth getting a little bit upset over? What could I be concerned about, huh? What could I possibly have going on that’s more important than a goddamn sleepover?!”

“See, this is exactly what I’m talking about,” Lance said. “Maybe if you got a decent night’s sleep, you wouldn’t be yelling at me right now.”

“I’m not yelling!” Keith snapped. “And I definitely don’t need you to be monitoring my sleep schedule!” He stepped around Lance, and this time, Lance didn’t stop him. “Have all the sleepovers you want, but leave me out of them,” Keith muttered as he left.

Lance slumped as he watched him go. He had figured that it would take a bit of convincing to get Keith on board for a sleepover, but he hadn’t actually expected him to get angry over it.

God, he definitely needed a nap.

“Stupid, stubborn Mullet,” Lance grumbled under his breath, scuffing his shoes against the floor as started back to the lounge.

-----------------------------------------------------

The sleepover may have been a no-go, but that didn’t mean they had to give up on Operation: Make Keith Actually Get Some Sleep quite yet, especially since, in the coming quintants, the dark bags under Keith’s eyes, the disheveled state of his hair and his clothes, and his irritability were all increasing before the very eyes of the rest of the team. If any of them had had any doubts over whether he was sleep-deprived, they were certainly dashed by now.

But since apparently Keith had some sort of issue with his teammates actively encouraging him to sleep, they agreed that they would have to try more subtle methods to get him past his insomnia, help him sleep without letting him realize they were doing it.

Lance initially proposed raiding the med bay for some sort of sleeping tonic and slipping it into his food, but that idea was shot down immediately by Pidge explaining that it would be too risky to use a medicinal sleep aid on someone when they didn’t know how it would react with his biology, and Hunk saying that drugging Keith without his knowledge and consent was just an extremely sleazy and messed up thing, and making it clear that he found it very disturbing that he even had to point that out to them.

But there were other things to try, discrete ways to try to make the Red Paladin a bit more susceptible to some solid sleep. Hunk planned out dinners over the next few nights that heavily featured poultry and whole grains, which he explained to Lance induced the production of some sort of sleep hormone - Lance honestly had sort of zoned out the moment Hunk started throwing science into the conversation. Pidge messed with the lighting in the living quarters to dim the lights in Keith’s room, just enough that he probably wouldn’t notice the difference, but would also have a slightly easier time falling asleep despite the light.

Even the Alteans got in on it, as it seemed the human paladins weren’t the only ones who had taken notice of Keith’s insomnia. Allura had them all do meditation shortly before the castle’s night cycle began, under the pretense of it being a training exercise for the paladin bond. Coran, who it turned out was an ardent advocate of aromatherapy, pumped some sort of faint fragrance into the air vents in the living quarters, which smelled a bit like lavender and vanilla, although with a certain tartness to the scent that was distinctly Altean.

And yet, even after all of that, they still weren’t seeing a change. It was frustrating, to say the least.

Lance decided to try his own hand at it a few quintants into their new subtle approach, figuring it couldn’t possibly hurt. He waited in his own room with the door kept open, until he saw Keith pass by in the hall and called him in.

“What?” Keith asked. The word came out sharp and tetchy, but lately that was how everything Keith said sounded, so Lance paid it no mind.

Instead, he simply held out his headphones. “Would you mind giving this a listen for me? I think something’s a little weird with the audio, like it’s scratchy or something, but it’s hard to tell. I wanna know if I’m just imagining it.”

“Wouldn’t Pidge be better with audio stuff?” Keith asked.

“With fixing it, yeah, but right now I just need someone to give a second opinion.” Lance bounced the headphones in his hand. “Come on, please?”

Keith let out a long, low breath, but he obliged, taking the headphones and sitting on the edge of Lance’s bed as he placed them over his ears. Lance gave him a thumbs-up and pressed play on his music player, watching Keith’s face carefully. This was a special mix he’d been using for the last couple of years, and the fact that he’d had his player in his backpack with him when they’d wound up in the Blue Lion was a godsend. A playlist of soft guitar songs and light Caribbean ballads with steady and melodic percussion beats, all interspersed with ocean sounds. It had lulled him to sleep every night since he’d been in the Castle of Lions.

The mix played for a few minutes before Keith moved one of the earphones aside and said, “I don’t hear anything weird.”

“You positive?” Lance said. “Listen real closely, all right? Close your eyes, it’ll help you concentrate.”

Keith did, and his eyes stayed closed for another few minutes before he shook his head. “It all sounds fine to me.”

“Well, that’s good,” Lance said. “Guess it was all in my head after all.” He accepted the headphones as Keith handed them back to him, then cleared his throat. “So, ah, did you like that music? You looked like you were enjoying it.”

“Sure,” Keith said with a shrug.

“Hey, that’s - that’s cool. Gives us something in common. You know, if you want, you can borrow my music player for a while.”

“That’s all right, you keep it.”

“No really, I think you’d like it. You could, like, give the whole mix a listen, let me know what you think. I bet you’ll enjoy it, I’m sort of known for having great taste in music.”

Keith narrowed his eyes. “What are you doing?”

“What do you mean?” Lance asked.

“Since when are you so eager to let me borrow your things?”

“Uh, since always? I’m generous.”

“Lance, last week I accidentally used your toothpaste instead of mine and you acted like I had stabbed you.”

Lance huffed. “Our bottles look completely different, how could you possibly have - ? You know what, not important. Just, I’m up for sharing now, okay? So come on, just take the music. You’ll like it.”

“Not until I figure out what you’re trying to - ”

“Jesus fucking Christ, I’m just trying to help you, Mullet! This is supposed to be relaxing! So could you quit being so goddamn stubborn for once in your life and just take the stupid headphones already?!”

A pause of silence stretched between them as Keith’s expression slowly fell to a dark scowl. “Oh my god. Is this seriously about that stupid sleep thing again?!”

“Yes,” Lance said, rolling his eyes. “You know what, yes, it is. And honestly, we shouldn’t be having to go to this much trouble to get a grown-ass adult to actually take a nap, and this is getting really ridiculous - ”

“Wait a minute, ‘we’?”

“Well, it’s kind of really fucking obvious that you haven’t gotten half a dobosh of sleep in ages, but since apparently you’re too proud or something to admit you actually need help, the rest of us have had to intervene to keep you from just straight up dying of exhaustion.”

“For the love of - I don’t need anyone’s help to sleep!”

“Oh, like hell you don’t. Look at you, the bags under your eyes are so big I’d have to check them at the ticket counter. I don’t know why you’ve gone and decided that having trouble sleeping is something you’ve got to be ashamed or whatever’s going on in your head, but - ”

“I can sleep just fine! I don’t want to sleep!”

“What, because you’re being so damn productive in those extra waking hours you get when you don’t? You’re not exactly doing yourself any favors here.”

“It’s got nothing to do with that!”

“Well then what’s it got to - ”

“Do you know what happens every time I fall asleep?” Keith snarled. “You know what I see every single time?”

“Uh…” said Lance.

“I see Shiro.” Keith crossed his arms, his scowl deepening. “Every time I close my eyes to go to sleep, it’s Shiro. Sometimes I see him bleeding out in the hall of a Galra base. Sometimes I see that gladiator arena he told us about, and he’s in the middle of it, barely hanging in there. Sometimes he’s just floating out in the middle of space and he’s cold and he’s too far from anyone or anything to get help. And sometimes it’s just the Black Lion, getting shot to smithereens right in front of me in the middle of battle and I can’t do anything to stop. He’s hurt and he’s dying and I just do nothing.

“Because that’s what I did, didn’t I?” He choked out a dry laugh that was completely devoid of any humor. “He got taken, right under our noses, and we didn’t even know until we got back to the hangars. He could be dead, or being tortured; maybe the Galra have something in mind for him that’s so horrible we can’t even fathom it. And we could have prevented it, but we didn’t. And it’s all I can think about, and when I’m asleep, it’s all I can see.

“Hell, I got nightmares after the Kerberos thing too, imagined his shuttle crash-landing against that stupid moon and wound up with that playing over and over every night. But at least that time, it wasn’t like it was my fault. Not like I was there and could have done anything. Not like I’d ever seen Shiro hurt and scared before, so my stupid brain couldn’t use that for reference. This time, though?” He tapped his temple. “It’s all there. Just waiting to play out.”

He took a shaky breath. “If I stay awake as long as possible, though, just let my body pass out when it can’t handle being awake for one more second, I don’t dream. I guess I’m just, like, too exhausted for the subconscious to do anything but wait for me to wake up. So I can’t sleep until I absolutely have to, you know? Because if I don’t I end up - I have to see - ” He gritted his teeth and scrubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands.

“... Shit, dude,” Lance said, slowly lowering himself onto the bed next to Keith. “I, uh… I didn’t know.”

“You weren’t supposed to,” Keith grunted. He lowered his hands and Lance could see the glistening of tears there before he brought his knees up, wrapped his arms around them and buried his face in them. “God, you’re not supposed to see this.”

“Why not?” Lance asked softly. “Keith, if you’d told us what you were dealing with, we could’ve helped you out.”

“How?” Keith snapped. “You can’t control what I dream about, you can’t undo what happened to Shiro. I just - I have to deal with this.

“Keith, you don’t need to - ”

“Yeah, I do.” He sniffed, wiping at his eyes. “Okay? And this isn’t me being stubborn or anything, I’m just stating facts. This isn’t something that can be fixed, it’s just something I - something I have to figure out. Somehow.” He coughed. “So, please, Lance. Stop trying to help. Tell the others to stop trying to help.” With one last sniff and failed attempt to blink away the now cascading tears, he stood and turned away. “I’ve gotta go,” he mumbled. “Should really get to the training deck.”

“But - ”

“Don’t - don’t tell the others. About this. It’ll just… make them worry.” And before Lance could say anything in response, Keith was out the door.

------------------------------------------------------------------

It was several vargas later that Keith finally stopped training and came back to the living quarters, and by then the castle was well into its night cycle. Keith was drenched in sweat, trembling somewhat from exertion as he trudged his way back toward his room.

So, the sight of Lance standing in front of the door probably wasn’t a welcome one, and Lance was unsurprised by the glare he received as Keith approached, which deepened further as he spotted the music player in Lance’s hand.

“What the hell are you doing?” Keith asked.

Lance took a deep breath. “I, uh - I had a bit of an idea. I know you said you don’t want me to, like, get involved in - in this whole thing going on with you, but I gave this a lot of thought, I really did, and I think you should hear me out. I’ve got something you really need to try.”

“Lance,” Keith sighed. “We already went over this. I don’t need you to help me fall asleep. And besides, the music, the beach sounds? They just don’t work for me, okay? There’s no point in - ”

“No, okay, I know we went over all of that,” Lance interrupted. “But this is different, I swear.”

“Lance - ”

“Look, this is either going to be the dumbest thing I’ve ever done for you, or a stroke of absolute genius. It’s like fifty-fifty and we won’t know which one it is until we try it. So, here.” He held up the headphones. “Just give it a shot.”

Keith frowned down at the headphones, but slowly, he obliged, taking them from Lance’s hand and positioning them onto his head. “All right,” he said, closing his eyes. “Ready.”

Lance nodded and pressed play, then watched Keith’s face. At first he remained stoic, then, gradually, his brow began to scrunch in confusion. Lance held his breath as he watched, and after about a minute Keith’s eyes opened to look warily at him. “What… what is this?” He moved the headphones down, and Lance could just hear the sound of the playing track: a voice, soft and tinny at this distance from the earpiece but still confident and sincere. “We’re entering a new era of human exploration of the unknown universe, and every one of you has the ability to become part of history.”

“That,” Lance said, “Is a speech that was made about five years ago at my middle school, and probably a couple hundred others. By a certain Galaxy Garrison lieutenant I admired very much.”

“Yeah.” Keith brought the headphones off his head completely to stare at in his hands. “Thought I, um, recognized it. How did - how did you even get a recording of it way out here?”

“I downloaded a video of it that was on Youtube, converted into an MP3. Listened to it while I worked on my Garrison application, because that stupid application process was frustrating as shit and I needed the motivation. Guess I just never deleted it.”

“...Oh.” Keith kept staring at the headphones for a while longer before slowly moving them back up onto his head and closing his eyes again. Lance watched as he stayed still, for long enough that Lance was starting to wonder if Keith had forgotten he was there, when Keith finally opened his eyes back up and pushed the headphones aside again. “It’s… nice,” he said softly. “Hearing him talk. I’d… forgotten… how nice that was.”

Lance gave him a small smile. “Yeah. That’s the idea. See, I got to thinking, about the stuff I was having you try listening to before, and how you didn’t find it relaxing the way you were supposed to, and I realized, like, the reason that that stuff calms me and helps me sleep, is because it’s for me, specifically. Like, the Timba music is stuff I’ve been listening to my whole life, that I’d play in my room at home all the time, and the ocean sounds, they make me think of swimming and going to the beach with my family and laying down on a surfboard to watch the sun and stuff. And, you know, stuff like that, it makes me feel at home, right? It feels peaceful, and familiar, and safe, and that’s all good for getting a good night’s sleep, and for keeping the bad stuff away.

“But for you, well, none of those sounds are really home to you, are they? The music genre’s kinda niche, and I figure you’re more into… I dunno, punk rock? Post-hardcore? Some genre where your mullet might be considered acceptable. And as for the ocean sounds, I mean, you lived in the middle of the desert and you don’t even swim.”

“I can swim,” Keith said.

“Eh, you don’t so much swim as just ‘not drown’, but whatever,” said Lance. “Point is, they weren’t the right sounds for you. So I asked myself, okay, what sort of things would make Keith feel at home? Duh, explosions. But then I realized explosion sound effects would probably be hard to sleep through, so I went searching through my MP3s and found this. And, like, it works doubly well because if you fall asleep with this playing and Shiro shows up in your dream, then your subconscious or whatever might connect the two. So instead of him, um, going missing or - or stuff like that, dream-Shiro will start giving a motivational speech instead. You know, how sometimes when you’re asleep and dreaming and you hear a sound in real life and your brain just sort of incorporates it into the dream? I mean, it’s just a theory, but it has to be worth a shot, right?”

“Lance, I dunno if - ”

“Yeah, I don’t really know for sure either. Might be a little out there. But, you know. I just thought maybe this could be, uh - this could work. Here, you can set it to play the track on a loop like this, see.” He held up the player to show him. “And the whole thing is about an hour long, so it’ll probably only make it through one loop, if even, before you fall asleep, so you don’t need to worry about it getting super repetitive and driving you crazy. Now, the real motivational stuff is only at the beginning and the end. The whole forty-five minutes or so in the middle is mostly just talking about the Garrison’s programs and how to apply and stuff like that, but that’s still probably better than nothing, right? You can dream about Shiro in teacher-mode or whatever.”

Keith bit his lip in thought, eyes darting between Lance and the headphones, before quietly saying, “... Yeah. Maybe.”

“Try it, at least. For the team’s sake, yeah? ‘Cause we’re all kinda worried about your health at this point, and - and I don’t care what you say, you really need a good night’s sleep.”

“...Okay.”

“Okay?”

Keith nodded, reaching and hand out to take the music player from Lance. “I’ll try it, at least.”

“Great!” Lance said, face brightening. “Let me know tomorrow how it goes, okay?”

“All right,” Keith said. “And, um - just - for the uh, for the - I just - it’s, um, it’s nice to know that you guys all - ”

“Yeah, you’re welcome, Mullet,” Lance said. “Now, go the fuck to sleep.”

-------------------------------------------------------

For the first morning in a long time, Keith wasn’t the first paladin up and about. In fact, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge were all already halfway through their breakfasts when Keith finally showed up in the kitchen, blinking drowsily against the light. But it was a different drowsiness than usual. The sort of drowsiness that came from just having woken rather than from desperately needing to go to bed.

Wisely, none of them made any remarks about the change. They bid him good morning and asked if he’d like to join for breakfast, as casually as they would have on any given morning on the castle before Keith’s whole insomnia episode began, and he accepted, his focus entirely on the food in front of him.

Lance waited until Hunk and Pidge started their own conversation, distracted enough by each other not to pay the rest of the table any mind, before tapping the table near Keith’s plate and giving him a questioning thumbs-up. Keith nodded, and Lance smiled as what he had already suspected was confirmed: Shiro’s speech had worked.

Lance was a goddamn genius.

And in the following quintants, as Keith gradually grew less irritable and the bags beneath his eyes started to fade, it became easier to believe that maybe, the team could get through this. Keith could get through this.

He just needed his goddamn genius teammates to help out a bit sometimes. That’s all.

#gentronweek #badthingshappenbingo #vldgen #keith #lance #shiro #my writing #fic: perchance to dream

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news4bees · 4 years ago

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Things I do to make my ADD/ADHD slightly more manageable.

Full disclosure: everyone is different and non-neurotypical behaviors are not a copy-paste situation. What works for me might put others in the exact opposite head space and that’s okay. I just wanted to share what I’ve learned works for me over the years. I’ve been really struggling with my ADD/ADHD lately and I need to remind myself of the healthy coping mechanisms I’ve developed so I can implement them again.

1. Have a morning routine.

Working from home as a freelance editor / publishing consultant, I have a lot of autonomy over my day. Which is great… if I make the most of it. I learned a long time ago that I am most productive in the morning, so it’s important for me to get myself into the right head space as soon as possible. I set an alarm to get out of bed at 7:00am every day, I try and go on a walk around the neighborhood first thing (weather permitting—we don’t mess around with rain or snow), I eat breakfast (usually including either coffee or tea for caffeine purposes and warmth) and take my supplements, and prep for my day. It sounds super simple, but it’s really all about inertia. A body at rest will want to stay at rest. I’ve had just as many days where everything goes according to plan and I’m able to have a productive day as days where I don’t get out of bed until I have to drag myself to my service job in the afternoon. So having that morning routine and sticking to it can honestly be a night and day difference for me.

2. Make a schedule for my day.

I have a terrible concept of time. I can look at a task, assume it’s going to take several hours, and abandon it before I even begin. Or I can see a gap of time in my day (such as the two hours between lunch and when I have to get ready for work) and be worried it’s too small of a window to accomplish anything so I lie around instead. By creating a schedule, literally an hour-by-hour layout of how I want my day to progress, I have a tactical roadmap for how to achieve my goals. I also make sure I schedule little breaks and time to eat, walk around, shower, etc. into my day so I don’t forget. It doesn’t have to be perfect, and I have to remind myself not to get upset if I end up deviating from the schedule for one thing or another. It’s mainly supposed to help me look at my day in a way that makes more sense to me and how my brain processes time. I fully understand that there are others that might see my hour-by-hour schedule and be completely overwhelmed—that’s fine! Find what works for you.

3. Set attainable little goals.

This one goes hand in hand with making myself a schedule. If I have a giant task I need to complete at a future date, I really struggle with conceptualizing it as something I need to get started on now. I see that future date, feel overwhelmed, try to calm myself down by thinking, “It’s okay, I have time,” and will sit on that task until the last minute when I have to scramble to get it done. It’s procrastination, yes, but it’s also not feeling too overwhelmed to act on something until there is that “go go go!” anxiety-inducing pressure to get it done. So I break it down into smaller pieces and set little goals. A 352 page manuscript I have to create an index for by March? Scary. But indexing one or two chapters a day? Much more doable. This also helps me accomplish non work-related tasks, such as calling the bank or scheduling appointments or canceling a subscription—things I would have trouble accomplishing on my own otherwise because my I have trouble differentiating between “important” and “immediate”. Goals don’t have to be solely task oriented either. Set a goal to reach out to a friend you haven’t connected with in a while; set a goal to meditate for fifteen minutes, or be intentional about doing something you love like reading or art or exercise. Personally, the more things I can check off my “to-do” list the better, so I write out everything I want to try and get done, even if I would have done it regardless.

4. Keep distractions out of reach.

This one is extremely tricky for me since I work exclusively out of my room since I moved back home. I’m always surrounded by distractions, from my phone to my bookshelves to the dozens of internet tabs I constantly have open on my laptop. I have little tricks I know work for me: keeping my phone on the charger in a different room (but close enough that I can still connect to the Bluetooth), leaving the book I’m currently reading and the journal where I write my fiction in my work bag downstairs, blocking YouTube and other distracting sites from my laptop, and making my bed each morning so I’m not tempted to crawl under the covers when I’m feeling burnt out. But knowing these things will help eliminate distractions and actually implementing these techniques are two very different things for me. As I write this, my phone is on the charger next to me, my fiction journal is within easy reach and I have corresponding document opened in another tab, none of my site-brokers are enabled, and my bed is a mess of cozy blankets—all major distractions for me that I’m blatantly ignoring. So what can I do about this? Set a new goal: move my phone and journal out of the room, close unnecessary tabs, re-engage the site blockers, and make my bed. Little things to reset my headspace and get back on track.

5. Have an accountability buddy.

While freelancing gives me a lot of personal freedoms, it also means I function as my own boss. Some people might enjoy such responsibility, but I personally really struggle when I’m not constantly checking in with someone and showing them my progress. An accountability buddy doesn’t need to function like a micro-managing boss, but they should be someone you can go to and say, “Here’s what I set out to do today and here’s what I accomplished.” Currently, I do not have a good accountability buddy (my ex was my accountability buddy when we were together during my last semester at college, but he often criticized me for only working in short sprints and needing to take a lot of breaks, so I’ve been really hesitant to trust another person in that role ever since), but my mom often lets me inform her about my goals and will share some of her’s in turn; my dad and sister on the other hand get uncharacteristically angry when I ask about goals, so I’ve learned to steer clear. Mirroring is also a common strategy for ADD/ADHDers. The visual stimulation of seeing someone else working can often be a bit of a jumpstart to my brain that says, “Okay, it’s time to do things.” In the old days, this meant I would spend hours in the library or at coffee shop doing my homework instead of my apartment because I was surrounded by others with similar tasks. Now, if I find myself needing a mirror I’ll move my operation to the kitchen table so that I’m closer to where my mom works and I can feed off her productive energy, so to speak.

6. Give myself grace.

Whenever I have an unproductive day, my first instinct is to be angry or upset at myself. What kind of person spends the entire day in bed and doesn’t get a single thing done? This would lead me down a self-deprecating path of calling myself useless and a garbage person, which is a big trigger for my depression and I can easily find myself spiraling. ADD/ADHD means my brain functions differently, but at the end of the day my brain still works. It doesn’t mean I’m stupid or lazy, and a bad day doesn’t mean I’m a bad person. My schedule and my list of goals are a template to help me focus, but if something happens that gets me off task, whether intentional or unintentional, I have to remind myself that it is not the end of the world. I have to give myself grace and forgiveness, because things happen.

I’d be really interested to hear what other strategies people have developed to manage their ADD/ADHD, especially in the midst of a pandemic that might have altered the way we approach our days. Keep being awesome!

#adhd brain #adhd things #adult adhd #coping mechanism

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rkrispyt · 3 years ago

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I wish I were stronger.

It’s funny, when I was younger I was always praised for my ability to ‘be professional’. Phrases like “you were up all night breaking up with him and sobbing? Wow, I never would have known, you came in here and really left all that at the door” were so commonly said to me.

Then I started at a theatre that immediately saw those walls I put up and made me tear them down. And now, despite all the benefits that come from that change, there are just times I feel so weak because I can’t just shove my emotions aside, put my head down, and plow through whatever needs done.

This TX abortion law has me all kinds of fucked up.

I can’t even bear to pay attention to the news right now with the state of the virus and anti-vaxers and anti-maskers and people taking horse dewormer but claiming science isn’t real or that they know more than doctors cause they saw it on Facebook.

It’s all too much. Much like the 4 years Tr*mp was in office and the 2020 election, I’m finding reality absolutely overwhelming and my anxiety is just through the roof constantly.

On top of that, there’s the stuff in my life directly that’s…less than ideal.

I was told to expect to hear about next steps for this job I’ve been interviewing for by today. There was one more interview and then they’d make a decision. I’ve heard nothing so I’m assuming if anything is coming, it’s just a kind and professional rejection letter. I wanted it so bad. It felt like it would literally change my life in a really wonderful way.

Today at work was just too much. Too many people ignoring the mask mandate. Too many people at the end of the day wearing me down.

I pulled something in my shoulder and the pain of it keeps waking me up around 4am the past 3 nights. I’ve been unable to fall back to sleep and am going on so little rest right now. I’m also almost constantly in pain from my shoulder. It’s starting to really get to me.

I can’t get motivated to get back to eating healthier, despite a fridge full of healthy food I got. Then I get mad at myself for it, which makes it even harder to find the energy. A vicious cycle.

And I’m realizing I don’t have a thing anymore that brings me joy. I try to have at least one small thing in my life every day that will make me smile or laugh or excited. Just a nugget of genuine happiness. Whether it’s a friend I connect with or a good home cooked meal or a new song or tv show or book or even lounging around laughing at Tik Tok.

And today, I just feel nothing. No joy. Just lethargic about everything. And that’s so hard. I don’t want to feel that way about my life. End I try to think of how to change it all but I’m so damn old, it just feels too late for me. Like I should’ve figured this out in my late 20s or early 30s.

I felt such happiness for so long this spring and summer, and I don’t know when this current feeling crept up but I feel like there’s nothing I’m excited about right now. There’s nothing I’m looking forward to going on right now.

It’s the least important thing in the grand scheme of things but all these people are talking like HSMTMTS is about to be officially cancelled and it has become such a comfort show, I’m not ready to say goodbye to it or add another show to my list that I’m forever bitter about. But I just have this bad feeling, like I can’t picture it all being fine and actually being renewed and all this worry and weirdness around it being for nothing. I hope that feeling is wrong, I really really do.

And during all of this I’m just wishing I could remember how that younger version of me could just turn it all off when she needed to and go on with her day and her life.

I don’t even know who or what this post is for. I just…need a good cry. And to not carry all these thoughts around in my brain anymore. Maybe purging them will help?

#mental health #life stuff

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stars-in-my-universe · 5 years ago

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I Hope: part 2 Tyler Seguin

The long awaited sequel of I hope. This will be the final part, I feel like we all needed some closure. I hope you all like it and please let me know what you think, I hope I didn’t disappoint.

Part 1

“McKayla, are you serious? You’ve known about these plans for over a month!” He watched as the blonde parades around the bedroom putting on the last touches of her make Up. Tyler sat on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands as he waited for her to hurry the hell up.

“Tyler, I have to go meet my sister! She’s going through some stuff okay?’ Tyler was very understanding and had more than enough patience but the fact that she was canceling on Tyler's friend’s barbecue after knowing about it for over a month...it irritated him to no end. He watched as she walked out of the bathroom in heels.

“You’re meeting your sister in heels?” He arched an eyebrow and looked at his fiancee.

“We’ll probably go eat honestly. What is the big deal?” Tyler shook his head and grabbed his keys from the dresser.

“I’ll see you later, if you get home before me let the dogs out but do not leave them outside til I get home. Let them in, Mckayla.” Tyler rolled his eyes as he heard her let out a ‘mhmm.’

Tyler knew this wasn’t working, he knew something else was going on behind his back but he hadn't caught her in a lie nor was their proof plus she still wore her engagement ring. It still didn’t excuse the fact that all they did was fight, constantly. He was tired of it. He drove To His friends barbecue, tapping his fingers to the song and thinking of what he should probably do about the whole situation.

Past

“Tyler, I don’t like fighting with you and I also don’t like the silent treatment you give me every time. We’re adults, we should talk about shit like this.” The two had just gotten into a fight about how she was planning to go to school in California and not Dallas, news that Tyler had no idea about.

“I’ve always planned to go to school in Cali once I saved up enough, Tyler. That’s always been my plan, the plan my Parents and friends always knew about. I didn’t think I’d ever change my mind.” He knew he couldn’t ask her to give up her school for Him, she loved it.

“Y/n I want you to go to school, I want you to have your dream. I just-“ she watched the anger leave him and watched as sadness and uneasiness washed over him.

“I just wish you didn’t have to go so far.” She sighed and moved to sit in his lap. Her hands found their place on his shoulders and his on her hips.

“I would look at schools in Dallas Tyler, but if I had some sort of I don’t know long term commitment from you? Like if I looked at schools here we’d have to be in it for the long run.”

“Deal. You could move in.” He watched her eyes widen.

“Y/n, I’m here for it. For you. I love you. You can move in and look at schools here, anything to get you to stay.” You bit your lip and nodded, you two were really doing this.

“I love you.”

Present

Tyler shook His head as he pulled up to the house, the music already blaring from the back yard.

He may have been engaged to Mckayla and it may have been months since it happened but the past couple of weeks he hadn't been able to get you out of his head.

He hadn't seen you since the last time you said goodbye to him; you stopped showing up to the parties and you stopped hanging around the same Crowd. You had let Him go and Tyler didn’t realize how much it had hurt to not see you around anymore . He had fucked up and he knew that. He knew that the moment you found out about him cheating, he knew that the moment you looked at Him sadly and told him you were going to be staying with your best friend and you’d come back for your stuff which you never did, he knew he ruined it all when you bent down and kissed his dogs goodbye for the last time.

Tyler knew you were done with him when he came Home one day and the pair of house keys were on the kitchen counter, the engagement ring next to it and the wags jersey that you’d specially wear to his games folded neatly underneath it all.

He wasn’t an idiot, he had fucked up Something good and lately he had been wondering if it was even worth it. If what he did was worth breaking your heart, because as cliche as it was he never meant to hurt you.

x-x

Tyler threw his phone against the wall and threw himself onto His bed. He had been home waiting for her, when his phone binged with a text message. And then another and then another. When he finally locked it and looked at his messages he wished he hadn't. ‘Dude Mckayla is here, you coming?’ ‘Bro whose the guy with your girl?’ ‘Segs, wtf is going on?’ It was officially, she was cheating on him and she didn’t even care to hide it. Going to the same spots his friends did, probably not thinking about covering her tracks. He had called her several Times and no answer, all going to voicemail. He was sick to his stomach, he was hurt, and angry and a little bit disgusted. He knew he needed to end it, not like it would come to a surprise, they were both unhappy to the point where she was seeing someone else, Something Tyler had expected for a while.

Picking up his phone, he had called her again, which was sent to voicemail again. Shaking his head he threw his phone on his bed and made his way downstairs, whistling for the boys to come. All three labs greeted him at the foot of the stairs, their tails wagging happily. He was getting restless and angry so he figured waking the dogs would help Him calm down a bit.

Past

“Why is he so fat, ty? Like where did you go wrong?” He shoved you gently making you laugh.

“I left him to my mom and sisters one summer and I guess they over fed him.” The black lab was happily laying at your feet on the grass in Tyler’s back yard. Marshall was chewing on a dog toy in the shade and Gerry was jumping in and out of the pool every time Tyler would throw the toy in.

“You would think having three of them, they’d be a lot crazier but it’s almost as if the more there are the calmer they are.” Tyler nodded and looked over at you.

“Yeah even when Gerry was a puppy he’d just follow what Marshall and Cash did and it was so much easier to train him.” You ran your hand along Cash’s back making him let out a sigh.

“Maybe one day, you and I can get one...together.” You looked up at Tyler.

“You already have all the colors though.” He let out a laugh making you smile.

“It doesn’t have to be A lab, it would just be nice to adopt one with you and raise one.” You nodded.

“Honestly I think when we’re more settled, I think it would be a good idea.” You watched his face light up, Tyler was such a dog dad.

“On one condition.” He raised an eyebrow at you.

“It has to be a girl, this time.”

“Noooooo!”

Present

“This isn’t working mckayla and you know it. Cheating on me, running into my friends and basically ignoring them. Ignoring my calls, late lunches with your sister what the fuck.” He watched as she rolled her eyes.

“What did you expect Tyler? All we do is fight, it’s exhausting.” Tyler didn’t say much else. He knew what a healthy relationship was supposed to be and this wasn’t it. He had one and he ruined it.

“McKayla give me the ring, get your shit and get out.” McKayla stopped folding the clothes she had in her hand.

“So that’s it? You’re not even going to try to work things out?” Tyler gawked at her, she had to be kidding?

“No, I’m not. Because this hasn’t worked out for a long time and you know that. You hate my dogs, you don’t even try to spend time with my friends, but yet we always have to run to your sister’s? A relationship is a two way street, McKayla.”

Past

“Relationships are a two way street, Tyler. I’m tired, I’m tired of chasing you, of begging you for attention. I shouldn’t have to!” You were fed up with his partying. He had stopped caring about the dinner dates, ranked on dinner with your friend, You had even taken a skype call from his mom for him having to lie as to why he wasn’t there to talk to her. All because he was out with his friends partying till 3am.

It had all started when the Stars lost the game against the Blues eliminating them from the Playoffs. They had all taken it hard, but the team decided to go to Vegas before summer started which Y/N could deal with. She encouraged Tyler to go, saying he needed it but then he came home and he was cold, and continued to party well into the night; you would come home from work and people would be everywhere throughout the house and in the backyard, so you’d go straight upstairs with the dogs and go to sleep feeling empty and sad.

“I know that, I’m trying I just-” Y/n glared down at him.

“You’re not trying, Tyler. You’re hardly here!” You were mad and hurt and all you wanted was answers. The two sat in deafening silence as you chose your next words carefully.

“Who is she Tyler?” His head shot up in confusion.

“Don’t lie to me just tell me who she is or tell me you have no idea what I’m talking about.” Tyler didn’t know what to say and apparently his silence was your answer.

“I knew it…”

“Y/n wait, just let me-” Tyler looked up at you and expected to see tears and heartache but instead all he saw was...nothing. Your face was blank, guarded, your eyes cold.

“I will get my stuff tomorrow, I’m going to stay somewhere else tonight.”

Present

Tyler didn’t expect to run into you ever, in Dallas. He figured you would have either moved on or gone to California. But then he saw you at the park, with a cute little black lab puppy on a leash he felt like he could breathe again.

You looked good, healthy and most of all happy. You had that light back to you and the puppy that is currently jumping in your lap probably helped a lot. He didn’t know if he should go over and talk to you or just walk away and leave you, you seemed at peace.

Maybe it was the fact that he was nursing a broken heart or maybe he just needed something positive in his life, or maybe he just missed you but he decided to take the leap and go talk to you.

He watched you stand up and grab the leash off the ground and then it was like time stopped. You turned around and you looked up, the smile on your face immediately fall. Shit. Tyler sent you a small smile and stopped in front of you, his hands in his pockets.

“Tyler…” You didn’t know what to say.

“Y/n, hi.” He glanced down at the puppy who was nipping at the leash.

“Oh uh, this is Bella.” Tyler bent down to say hi to the puppy who happily licked his face.

“You finally got one?” You nodded.

“A girl, like you always wanted.” You let out a sad laugh, Tyler stood back up and stared at you.

“So how have you been?” You sighed and ran a hand through your hair.

“Tyler, let’s not do this.”

“I miss you.” You looked up at him and shook your head.

“Tyler.”

“I know it’s a lot and it’s been awhile. I just, I wanted to say sorry. I’m so sorry for everything I put you through. I messed up, bad and I just-” You chuckled to yourself and stopped him before he could continue.

“She cheated didn’t she?” Tyler was taken back, how did you know.

“You’re not wearing a ring, Tyler. Plus you wouldn’t be apologizing if you didn’t know how it felt, men don’t work like that.”

“I really am sorry, Y/n.”

“Tyler, It’s okay. I’m sorry you had to feel what it’s like but I just hope you grow from this. I hope you realize what this all means and you grow up and the next time you find someone, you keep her and treat her right…” You were smiling sadly at him, no malicious or anger.

“What if ‘the next time’ is standing in front of me.” You bite your lip hard, you would always have a soft spot for Tyler Seguin but enough was enough.

“I’m sorry Tyler. I’m seeing someone…” You watched the small smile fall and the confusion grace his face.

“I- uh, who is he?” You never heard Tyler stutter before.

“He’s a guy I met through school. He’s nice and funny…”

“Does he treat you well?” You glanced at him.

“Yeah, Tyler. He does. He makes me happy.” You could see the heartbreak in his eyes. You didn’t want to hurt him, despite all he put you through, you still didn’t want to hurt him but you needed to end this.

“I used to hope to run into you, Tyler. I would hope you’d run into me and we’d talk and you’d tell me you made a big mistake…” Tyler went to say something but you shook your head.

“I missed you every day after that night. I missed our texts, our phone calls, I missed watching you play hockey funny enough I still watch it because he’s a Colorado fan. But I missed your tattoos, I missed your laugh. And then one morning I woke up and I didn’t miss you anymore, I didn’t think about you, I didn’t hope, Tyler.” His breathing was ragged and he wanted to walk away and forget this ever happened.

“I knew what I was getting myself into Tyler, when I dated you. You loved to party, constantly had girls around you but I trusted you with everything in me and you threw that away.” Your voice was soft, no harshness detected.

“I loved you so much. I loved the future we had planned, I loved you. And I will always have love for you. But you broke me Tyler in ways no one else ever had and I’m sorry McKayla hurt you. But I’m happy now Tyler and I won’t apologize for that.” You glanced down at Bella who was laying at your feet and then back up at him, his eyes rimmed red and his hand clutching his phone.

“We adopted her together, we live together, Tyler. I won’t go down this road with you again. I healed, maybe it’s time you do the same.” He blinked back the tears at the rejection.

“I won’t be yours again, but I hope you find someone that will. I hope you find a girl who is going to love you and support you. I hope she loves your dogs unconditionally-” He remembered the last time you told him something similar but this time around instead of sadness and hurt, your voice was filled with hope and empathy.

“She’ll treat your family how they should be treated and I hope she makes you happy. I hope you find her and I know you will, Tyler. Because you’ve never had problems in that department.” Both of you let out a small laugh.

“But when you find her, Ty. I hope you treat her right, I hope you learned your lesson and keep her close and for any reason I hope you never let her go. Let her in, let her see you, Tyler. Because despite everything I think there’s a good guy in there, he just wasn’t ready for commitment. But I hope when she finds you, you are.” Tyler looked at you and you could feel it in your bones, this was a final goodbye. He shook his head.

“You were it,” You smiled at him.

“If I was it, you wouldn’t have done what you did, Tyler. Love wasn’t enough this time around and that’s okay.” You stepped a bit closer to him and leaned in to kiss his cheek, his body spray and aftershave hitting you bringing back memories.

“You’re going to be okay, Tyler. But this is it, I won’t be seeing you again.” You pulled away and motioned for Bella to follow you which he puppy happily did.

“Goodbye, Tyler Seguin. I hope you get everything you want in life and more.” Tyler watched you walk away and he could feel his heart break. Tyler took in a breath and closed his eyes, glancing back, he collected himself.

“Goodbye, Y/n.” And Tyler knew it would be for the last time.

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