#but here? in text only? as something i am inflicting on something else? pretty safe.

[r-18g]

forcing your pet angel to drink bleach not to actually hurt it (because it doesn’t! …much! it’s fine!) but because it’s sooooo cute to watch it splutter and gag in panic and revulsion as it feels its esophagus erode into what feels like raw nerve, coughing and vomiting up blood as it shakes and shakes and shakes

thinking about angels… with the glk glk… y’know…

[didntwanderstillgotlost]

Winchesters and Angels (and God)

I’m gonna apologize in advance for the absolute trainwreck that is this fic. @malvenue and I spent 3 hours yesterday morning texting each other this mess and I decided I had to turn it into a fic and inflict it on the rest of you. So, here’s some Destiel and Sabriel crack. Enjoy!

Gabriel popped into the bunker and found Sam sitting at one of the tables in the library. He sat down in the chair across from him.

“Hey, Sammy. Did you know I have PTSD?” He couldn’t hide the shit eating grin on his face, but it didn’t matter because, without looking up from the book he was reading, Sam said,

“Don’t we all.” Gabriel’s face fell.

“Oh. Are you okay? Do you wanna talk about it? Do you need a hug?” He grinned again. “I could probably cure it with some CBT.” That got Sam to look up.

“Cognitive behavioral therapy?”

“Cock and ball torture.” Sam coughed.

“I’M NOT EVEN INTO THAT, GABE!”

“I’m just saying things until you say yes to something.”

“JUST GIVE ME A HUG YOU FREAK!”

“Oh. Okay, sure, we can do that.” Gabriel stood up and wrapped himself around Sam. “So, you want me to suck you off now or--.”

“GABE, I SWEAR TO GOD!”

“You called?” Jack asked, causing both of them to jump. Gabriel was grinning again.

“Yeah, I was just telling Sammy that--.”

“GABRIEL, HE IS THREE!” Across the room, Dean leaned closer to Cas and said,

“How come you know exactly what I want, but Gabe can’t figure Sammy out?”

“He didn’t get to fondle Sam’s soul like I did with yours,” Cas responded matter of factly. Dean choked.

“YOU WHAT!?”

“I just hugged your soul with my whole true form to protect it from Hell’s flames and demons. I did try to just grip your shoulder but I was afraid I’d drop you.”

“CAN EVERYONE PLEASE LEAVE!?” Sam shouted. Dean stood up and took Cas’s hand, leading him out of the room.

“Did you really scream that loudly when you saved me that you woke Anna up from her angel coma?”

“I was very happy. You were so pretty. You still are butIi never got to cuddle a human soul before and the first one was the most beautiful one.” Dean felt a blush creeping up his cheeks.

“Yeah, okay, buddy.”

“I can still hear you!” Sam complained. “Go away! Gabe, stop touching me!”

“Sammy, you make it sound bad. I was just gently caressing your cheek.”

“MY ASSCHEEK!”

“Still a cheek!”

“How did this become my life?” Jack tilted his head, much like Cas.

“Is that something norm--.” Cas pulled away from Dean’s grip and stormed back into the library.

“No, son, cover your eyes.”

“GABE, I TOLD YOU, HE’S THREE!” Sam cried.

“Sammy, just give the guy a chance,” Dean said. “Also, he was two when he wanted to fuck that crazy chick on that one case.”

“Yeah, you still didn’t tell me about se--.”

“THIS HOUSE IS A FUCKING NIGHTMARE!” Sam was sounding more and more distressed by the second. Gabriel grinned.

“I can teach you about sex! Come on, Jack!”

“Gabriel, I don’t think that’s appropriate,” Cas said.

“Babe, relax, it can’t be that bad.”

“Dean, I’ve seen Gabriel do some very disturbing things involving various plastic objects and--.”

“ENOUGH!” Sam snapped. “Jack, I’ll tell you, okay? Just please stop guys.” Gabriel smirked.

“Come on Sam! I thought you liked when I--.”

“STOP!” Dean grinned.

“Wow, Sammy, you really--.”

“NO!” Jack looked between all of them, utter confusion written all over his face.

“You totally do!” Dean crowed. San narrowed his eyes.

“Oh yeah? Well have you told Cas about that time in the backseat of the Impala?” Dean stopped laughing immediately.

“Do. Not.”

“I am a celestial being, Sam, and I used to watch over Dean almost all the time,” Cas said and Dean’s eyes widened. “Which time are you referring to?” Sam mirrored Dean’s expression.

“I WAS MORE THAN ONCE?”

“Well, it was--.”

“CAS, NO!” Dean interrupted. “Don’t. And what do you mean almost all the time?” Cas shrugged.

“I just wanted to make sure you were safe.”

“What could happen to me during sex, Cas?”

“Heart failure? Muscle cramps?” Dean had to admit, that was a point.

“Okay, but you didn’t have to watch.”

“I didn’t want you with Anna.”

“CAS!” Cas looked at him and Dean’s heart almost broke at the pain in his eyes.

“That was very painful for me.” Dean swallowed.

“Fuck, Cas, I--. You know I love you, right? I didn't realize back then. I'm so sorry. I'm a complete asshole. I promise I love you.” Cas smiled softly.

“It’s okay, Dean, I know.”

“I am GOING TO BE SICK!” Sam said. Gabriel pretended to wipe his eyes with a tissue from a box he pulled out of nowhere.

“My little brother has grown up so much.” Jack spoke up, clearly still confused.

“Dean and Cas weren’t always together?” Everyone turned to look at him. Dean frowned slightly.

“Why would you think we were?”

“BECAUSE WE ALL HAVE EYES!” Sam yelled. “Oh, here we go again. YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE SO SNEAKY DIDN’T YOU DEAN? With all the longing looks and careful touches and mixtapes and--.”

“Shut up, Sammy,” Dean muttered.

“AND THE PRAYERS, OH MY GOD!”

“Yes, Sam?” Jack said. “I’m right here. Anyway I could always see Cas’s wings around Dean when they were in the same room.”

“WHAT?” Dean turned to Cas, who only shrugged.

“It’s not my fault you can’t see my true form. I had to make sure you were comfortable and safe.”

“Even now?” Jack asked. Sam turned to Gabriel.

“Keep your wings away from me, Gabe.”

“Actually, he--,” Jack started.

“OF COURSE, SAMMY!” Gabriel interrupted loudly.

“Someone please just kill me,” Sam said. “Just end this.”

“Sammy, come on a little wing petting never killed anyone,” Dean said.

“I WISH IT DID!”

“If you died, you’d go to Heaven,” Jack stated.

“No one really dies in this family anyway,” Dean pointed out.

“Fuck you,” Sam grumbled.

“Me?” Gabriel asked.

“You know what?” Sam snapped. “If it shuts you up, YES!” Gabriel grinned.

“FUCK YEAH, I WIN!”

“Sound proof your damn room, Sammy,” Dean said.

“Gabriel can do that for him like I did for--.”

“CAS!” Cas frowned.

“What? You said “Don’t break the walls with your angel voice and don’t let Sam hear me wh--.”

“CAS, DAMMIT!” Sam smirked

“You whimper? Awe, Dean, that’s kinda sweet.”

“That’s NOT what he was going to say. Right, Cas?” Dean shot Cas a desperate look.

“No. Of course not. He, uh, whines?” Dean hung his head.

“On second thought, kill me, too.”

“Sorry, Dean, no one really dies in this family,” Sam said with a grin. “Come on, Gabe.” Gabriel’s eyes glowed a little as he followed Sam down the hall. Jack looked at Dean and Cas.

“So…it’s all okay here?”

“Of course, Jack, why do you ask?” Cas asked.

“You all call me at least 56 times every day,” Jack said. Cas chuckled.

“Abuse of human language.”

“Cas, I cannot BELIEVE--,” Dean started.

“Sounds like conflict,” Jack said. “Bye, Dad!” He waved at Cas and disappeared.

“Dean, why are you upset?

“YOU DON’T TELL PEOPLE, ESPECIALLY NOT SAM, WHAT I DO DURING SEX! Unless it’s something absolutely awesome.”

“But you sound beautiful to me so that must mean that it’s awesome too.”

“Buddy…” Dean could feel himself blushing again. “Just don’t talk about that with anyone else, okay?” Cas paused a little too long.

“Okay.”

“WHO ELSE DID YOU TELL?”

“No one, I just…” Cas faltered.

“WHAT?” Dean watched a few tears slip down Cas’s cheeks.

“You’re just so loving that you sometimes can’t speak so you whimper and it’s just…it’s so beautiful, Dean.” Before Dean could even begin to process how to respond to that, Sam shouted from across the bunker,

“GABE, DON’T DO THAT!” Dean paled.

“Cas, please soundproof their room.”

“GABE, HOLY FUCK!” That was followed by some incomprehensible yelling.

“CAS, NOW!” Cas frowned slightly.

“They’re not in a room.”

“WHAT?”

“They’re…in the hallway.”

“SAMMY, I WILL KICK YOUR ASS IF YOU DON’T GO THE FUCK TO YOUR DAMN ROOM!” Dean yelled. Across the bunker, Sam looked at Gabriel.

“Does he think we're having sex?”

“I mean, I could make you sound like that if you let me,” Gabriel said with a wink.

“GABE NO!”

“SAMMY, I SWEAR TO GOD!” Dean shouted and Sam dragged Gabriel back to the library. Jack popped up in the middle of the room.

“I just left, what now?

“Abuse of language, it’s okay,” Cas said. “We’ll say Jack if we need you, okay?”

“Oh, okay.” Jack disappeared again.

“Your kid takes things too literally doesn’t he?” Gabriel said.

“He did say Cas is his dad first thing,” Sam agreed. Dean studied his brother.

“Sammy, the FUCK were you yelling about? Are you hurt or something?”

“I can’t seem to find any injury,” Cas said. “I just get the sense that--.” Sam cleared his throat loudly.

“No, Cas, please continue,” Dean said.

“No, actually, I should go to my--,” Sam tried to deflect.

“Sam seems to be extremely aroused,” Cas said.

“I’m an angel, Sammy, I told you I can tell,” Gabriel said. Dean smirked.

“Awe, Sammy, that’s kinda sweet.”

“GABE, CAN YOU WAIT TILL WE GET TO MY ROOM THEN?”

“I didn’t do anything, Sam,” Gabriel said with a wink

“Gabriel did you just use your grace to--.”

“Shut UP, DEAN!” Sam yelled as Dean started laughing.

“Gabriel, it’s actually very nice of Sam to let you do that because Dean doe--.” Dean stopped laughing abruptly.

“CAS!”

“What?”

“What did we just talk about?”

“This wasn’t related to your s-.”

“NO TALK ABOUT ANYTHING WE DO ALONE, OKAY!”

“Come on, Dean, a little grace never killed anyone,” Sam teased.

“Sam, I will kick your ass.”

“Don’t bruise it,” Gabriel said. “He has a nice ass.”

“Gabe, I swear to--,” Sam started

“Stop calling Jack,” Cas said.

“You know, Gabe, I think Sammy here would love you to bruise him a little.”

“DEAN!” Dean grinned.

“And I’m sure he would absolutely melt if you bite him a bit too.”

“DEAN, I WILL MURDER YOU!”

“I don’t hear you denying it,” Gabriel pointed out.

“No you won’t, Sam,” Cas said.

“Dean, continue, I’m memorizing,” Gabriel said.

“If I remember correctly, he also really loves when people lick his-.”

“DEAN WEARS PANTIES!” Sam yelled. Dean rolled his eyes. That wasn’t much of a secret anymore. So, of course, Cas had to open his mouth.

“Well, actually--.”

“CAS!”

“What now?”

“No talk about my underwe--.”

“No, no, Cas, please continue,” Sam interrupted.

“Since you didn’t let Dean finish I’ll just lick all of Sam till I figure out what he wanted to say,” Gabriel said.

“NO ONE IS LICKING ME!”

“Sam is aroused again,” Cas commented.

“CAS!” Sam whined.

“Why is everyone yelling at me?”

“Not me little bro. Not me,” Gabriel said.

“Yeah, but you never yell,” Dean pointed out.

“Yes, I do,” Cas said.

“NOT YOU, CAS!”

“I bet Sammy could make me scream,” Gabriel said with a wink.

“Just make sure to protect the room,” Cas said. “You will break everything if you--.”

“If you break ANYTHING with you weird angel shit I SWEAR TO--.”

“Don’t call Jack. Please,” Cas begged. “He doesn’t like conflicts.”

“I wonder where he gets it from,” Dean teased. Cas tilted his head.

“Me, of course.” Dean just shook his head with a fond smile. They stared at each other and Dean could feel himself getting lost in the endless sea of blue.

“Here we go again,” Sam muttered, rolling his eyes.

“I thought they’d stop doing that once they--.”

“Well, no such luck apparently.” Gabriel shrugged.

“Guess eye fucking is easier.”

“GABE!”

“I am not having any kind of intercourse with my eyes,” Cas said, breaking eye contact. “I just stare deep into Dean’s soul and--.”

“Cas, please, not now,” Dean said, blushing furiously. Cas squinted at him.

“You know what, Dean? Why don’t you just tell me when I’m allowed to speak.”

“Wow, Dean, I knew you were an asshole but really?” Sam said. Dean ignored his brother.

“Wait, no, Cas I’m sorry.” Cas just stared at him, looking like a kicked puppy.

“Damn, bro, you really fucked up,” Sam said.

“Sam, shut up! Cas, look, let’s just go to our room and--.”

“��Our room’. Wow, congrats guys!”

“Sam, SHUT UP!”

“Sammy, does that mean your room is our room now?” Gabriel asked.

“No, Gabe! We are not a couple!” Gabriel mirrored Cas’s expression.

“Damn, bro, you really fucked up,” Dean smirked. Sam rolled his eyes.

“That won’t work on me, Gabe. We are not a couple.” Gabriel shed a single tear. “Not gonna work. You’re not my type.” Gabriel turned to his brother.

“Cassie, come on! How do you do it?”

“Well, you’re at the beginning, so you could try showing the shadow of your wings and breaking some glass. Maybe let him stab you.”

“THAT WAS NOT FLIRTING!” Dean insisted

“Of course it was,” Cas said.

“I was trying to kill you!

“Well, I was trying to prove I was strong because I know you want to be protec--.”

“CAS!”

“Right. I forgot I’m not allowed to talk unless you tell me to.”

“Awe, Dean, are you a little spoon?” Sam asked.

“Yes,” Cas answered.

“CAS!”

“So, you don’t want to be anymore?” Cas asked. Dean closed his eyes for a moment.

“Cas, please stop.”

“Sammy, you can be whatever spoon you want,” Gabriel said.

“Still not into you.”

“I bet Sammy’s a big spoon because he’s a control freak,” Dean said.

“Also, even Cas said you’re aroused when I talk to you so you’re lying, Sammy,” Gabriel pointed out. He turned to Dean. “Also, Dean, that’s sizest. I can be a big spoon!”

“Gabriel’s true form is quite large indeed,” Cas said.

“It’s not sizest! Cas is shorter than me!”

“SO YOU ADMIT IT!” Sam yelled.

“YEAH, I ADMIT THAT YOU’RE A LITTLE BITCH!” Dean shot back.

“Sam is not a female dog,” Cas said. Dean sighed.

“Cas, don’t do that.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot to shut up.”

“The only one who should shut up is SAM!”

“Now listen here you jerk--.”

“Oh, Sammy, you’re so cute when you’re angry,” Gabriel said.

“Gabriel, I swear I will fucking gag you.”

“Oh, PLEASE DO!” Sam groaned

“Sam, I don’t think you’re gonna win here,” Dean said.

“Sam is aroused again,” Cas stated. Dean grinned.

“Cas, did I tell you how much I love to hear you speak?” He turned to Gabe. “I told you Sam is a control freak.”

“I have no problem with that.”

“You can all go straight to hell,” Sam muttered.

“We’ve all been there, Sam,” everyone else said at once.

“Hey, Sammy, what were you planning on gagging me with?” Gabriel asked.

“Keep talking and you’ll find out,” Sam threatened.

“If I can choose, please gag me with your--.”

“Gross, Gabe!” Dean complained.

“But, Dean--,” Cas started.

“CAS, NO!”

“One moment I’m not allowed to talk, then you love it when I speak. Make up your mind please.” Dean pinched the bridge of his nose.

“You know what? I'm done with this. I'm going to bed.” He turned to leave. Cas, you’re coming with.”

“It’s 4:30 in the afternoon,” Sam said.

“Never said we were gonna sleep, Sammy,” Dean said with a grin and a wink. Cas’s eyes started glowing a little. Dean grabbed his arm. “Come on, buddy.” They left the room and Gabriel looked at Sam.

“So, big guy, how much do I have to talk to get to choke on your--.” Sam grabbed Gabriel’s arm.

“COME ON THEN!” Gabriel grinned.

“Yay, I win!”

[alo-piss-trancy]

Ok hi, I didn't wanna say anything, but please don't write knifeplay/bloodplay for Yuri. I def don't wanna spoil anything, but it's learned on a certain route that Yuri has a s*lf h*rm problem (I'll leave it at that).

You honestly seem like you're not trying to be a jerk with this ask, so I'm going to do my best to answer this as politely as possible without compromising my personal beliefs on the matter. This is going to be long and a little serious, but please note I'm not attacking you or trying to start a debate. I'm just laying all my thoughts on this down at once so I make myself clear, because a short answer would leave a lot of nuance out.

I understand what you're trying to do here. For the record though, I also considered that a pretty massive spoiler and I did not appreciate that at all. Even if you all think you're 'helping', don't do that again. Y/uri was pretty much the only character I'd managed to avoid most spoilers on and you killed the surprise for me. This game is already so full of fluffy 'filler' in the beginning that I don't have a ton of big plot points to look forward to in each route.

Now, I realise this is a very delicate topic and incredibly triggering to some people, especially with those two things combined. I am 100% willing to tag it with just about any variation needed to ensure you or others affected can blacklist/block it and never have to see a word of it in the future. I'd also be happy to go back and tag that original text post I made if needed. I mean that. You all are welcome to ask me to tag things anytime, and so long as you're polite about it I'm perfectly willing to oblige to the best of my ability in future posts! If I occasionally forget, just toss me a light reminder and I'll jump into editing and add it in.

That said, I want to make it clear that I am very firmly against censorship. I'm willing to take all necessary precautions to ensure people can curate their experiences on this blog and AO3, but at the end of the day I can still post whatever fictional stuff I choose to. As can anyone else. Same goes for more formally published media.

Now, it's entirely possible I would have gotten to that part of the game and decided 'oh dang, I'm not so enthused about that fic idea anymore...'. My whims and ideas change frequently, and what you mentioned is a heavy topic with a lot to unpack and process. It's also entirely possible that future plot would only provide more fuel.

Fyi, when I originally mentioned the knifeplay I was actually thinking a lot more along the lines of her doing it to the protagonist, not the reverse. But for the record, if I did choose to write it with focus on Y/uri, I would still be well within my rights to.

This next part of my answer is going to address some heavy topics, this is your warning!!!

Sometimes people's kinks are a way to take a thing that is personally scary or upsetting to them and find a way to reverse it. To find pleasure or power or get used to the idea of the awful thing in a safe, controlled fashion. I'm not going to go into the full details on this because there's plenty of explanation and research elsewhere already written up, as well as an excellent book on the subject, and I'm not turning this blog into a discourse debate. But I needed to mention it for my point.

There are plenty of stories that could be explored with Y/uri in this context. Did she have this kink before the self harm events started and it was completely unrelated, or did she develop it afterwards? How did she discover it beforehand? If developed afterwards, did it start out as another way of harming mixed with pleasure in a self-destructive way, often done sloppily and without proper technique? Or was it strictly used as almost exposure therapy to deal with those urges and thoughts in a safer, more contained scenario, maybe even allowing the partner she trusted to wield the knife to prove their bond/reinforce that she can be loved without being hurt deeply, that she is worthy of affection and trust and loyalty. Maybe this finally helps give Y/uri a tool to embrace her 'weirdness' without harming herself and others. Or, what if she thinks it can be a useful tool and is sure she's ready, but partway through the scene she gets triggered or has flashbacks... how does she deal with it? How does her partner? Can it be overcome with effort, research, and taking things slowly, or does she realize this kink is actually completely off the table for her?

What if she has this kink and is excited to try it, but her partner isn't? How does she take that rejection? Or do her poor social skills mean she skipped negotiation to begin with and attempted it in the middle of a vanilla session? Would her partner freak out or even get mad, or try to swallow their fear and let her do it so they don't hurt/offend her, even at the cost of their own comfort?

This topic also opens a ton of potential plots for darkfic, but I'll refrain from discussing that out of respect for you and others.

So as you can see, there's much more to explore than 'Knife=Hot'. I believe those discussions and ideas are necessary and provide important fuel for thought when explored fictionally, especially since mainstream media doesn't cover a lot of them.

~~~

I feel I should take a second to clarify knifeplay for those who may be unaware. It doesn't always equate to actual cutting/drawing blood. That can be an aspect, but usually only by those far more experienced and, you know, actually into that. A lot of participants don't actually go that far. Mostly, it's either about the physical sensation of the knife touching you at all, or the adrenaline/controlled fear and intimate trust of a partner bringing an object like that so close/teasing you with it.

In fact, it's frequently advised in those circles (especially to newcomers) to use a dull butterknife instead, because it simulates the same feelings of metal on skin/can dig in a little without any real risk of cutting/drawing blood. Even if one chooses to use a different knife, it's still pretty common to dull the blade, or some people even substitute with a closed pair of scissors (combined with the partner blindfolded, you can't really tell it apart from the real thing).

These versions of knifeplay are well controlled and ultimately pretty harmless, so long as both parties know what they're doing and stay alert. And more experienced players with sharper knives are even more cautious/have studied extensively to know where/how deep to go without risking scarring/serious injury.

Remember the golden rules of kink: Safe. Sane. Consensual.

With those in place, it is not nearly the same as self harm. Just as controlled, consensual, well-negotiated BDSM with safewords, respected boundaries and a trusted partner is never in the same league as abuse.

~~~

Now that that's out of the way, back to my point:

There's no perfect representation or narrative for everyone, in any group (be that gender/sexuality/triggered by certain things, etc). Every human being is different, everyone interprets media differently, and everyone takes away different elements from stories.

What one person in a particular group may find cathartic, relateable, or painful but necessary food for thought, another may find completely repulsive, personally hurtful, offensive, something they can't stand to hear. And guess what? Both of those can be true at the same time. One side is not immediately right over the other.

There are queer characters or interpretations of them in fics that I vehemently despise, might even find hurtful or sickening and think 'how can anyone create this, it's insufferable! People in 'my group' aren't like that, it's a horrible representation. I can't relate to it at all!' But you know what? Other people can and do, may find comfort in those exact narratives and experiences, may heal their pain instead of inflicting more. And that's great. It's what they needed or wanted and if I don't like it, I click away and do my best to avoid it.

There are specific tropes and narrative themes I personally cannot get through without being triggered into anxiety attacks or dragged back to bad times and places in my life. Sometimes I see them tackled in ways that are hurtful or seem insensitive to me. But I recognise that for someone else, it's exactly what they needed to see to get through that or come to terms with it, or see a way they wish that thing could play out. I would never dream of telling those people they aren't allowed to enjoy it, OR telling the creator of that piece of media or a tv show 'Hey ummm please don't use this plot because it turns me into a human wreck for a week'. Because it's not remotely my place to do so. They can create whatever they want, they have no responsibility towards me or my well being. A few might be kind enough to include a warning at the beginning of that episode or in the description, but they are in no way required to. It's up to me to curate my experience and try to keep my guard up/research what might have those tropes, and in the rare occasions I get blindsided, yeah, it hurts like hell. I struggle, I might even backslide a bit. But I just have to try my best to deal with it and make a note to be more careful next time. Because you can't control the world around you, not even the online world, and you have absolutely no right to. The only right you have is to protect yourself without infringing on other people's boundaries/rights.

And there's also another important point. There doesn't have to be a big important point or explanation for why a creator creates something, or why consumers can enjoy that creation! If someone wants to create a plotline with all of my triggers used in the most 'insensitive', 'wrong', pointless ways possible, strictly for Entertainment or pure kink material instead of some deep dissection of the issues involved? They can go hog wild!!! They are 100% allowed to do so on this earth, and I can't (and wouldn't want to) do a thing to stop them.

One person can read a kink fic and it hits a very emotional theme for them/they think it explores a deep topic well. Another person can read that same fic and get nothing out of it except their rocks off. Both of those readers are completely equal and 'allowed' to enjoy that fic. Both reasons are completely valid reasons for why the creator was 'allowed' to post/create that fic in the first place. Nobody needs permission, nobody has to answer to anybody except themselves. Period. This extends to any topic, any type of fic.

Yes, even for things I find absolutely abhorrent and insensitive and don't understand/want to read ever. I may resent everything about its existence, but I will defend to death the creator's right to make it exist in the first place.

It only affects me if I let it affect me. If someone's making content I despise or am upset by and can't handle, I can choose to ignore or avoid them, blacklist those tags, I can block them and move on with my day. I can do anything within my own bubble, but the second I consider going into their bubble and saying they can't make that thing, I am in the wrong. Because I'm not respecting their space and rights.

If someone makes cookies with ingredients I'm highly allergic to, pastes the ingredient warnings all over the box where I read them, and I still eat one, would anyone cheer me on for blaming them when I have a reaction? Would anyone think it was remotely okay of me to start calling up every bakery in town and saying they weren't allowed to bake those cookies EVER, because some people somewhere might be allergic?

No. They'd tell me I was crossing the line, because I'm infringing on other people's boundaries and lives. I'm expecting everybody else to take responsibility for something that, while horrible and painful, was my fault for touching.

Now, if someone sets out unlabelled cookies not realizing I'm allergic to something in them, and I eat it and have a reaction, that sucks. It's an awful experience. But is it the baker's fault? As long as they didn't do it maliciously, not really. They can be advised politely to label it in the future, and I can do my best to remember to ask/be more cautious next time I come across something I'm unsure of, but they're still allowed to bake those cookies for themselves and others.

Now, if I deliberately baked cookies with an ingredient that people are very frequently allergic to (ex. peanuts) and set it out in a crowded buffet without a warning label, that's a jerk move. That's intentionally trying to cause harm to others. But simply baking that flavour of cookies still isn't a crime or harmful by itself.

~~~

I'll be honest, I'm running out of steam and I think I've said most of what I have to say, so I'll wrap it up. I want to reiterate that I'm not ripping into you with this long answer, anon! I understand why you sent me what you did and I'm trying not to come off as harsh. I'm happy to go back and tag things and will tag anything else similar in the future!!! But at the end of the day, regardless of whether I personally end up writing that fic or not, or even want to after I get to that plot, I don't agree with telling anyone they can't/shouldn't write it at all. I wanted to try and explain my viewpoint thoroughly, and I hope you can respect that, just as I'll respect and try to accommodate you and other followers. This is the only time I'll really get up on a soapbox like this, and I have no interest in debating these things on my blog further, but it is a topic I've been passionate about all my life so I'm afraid I'm not budging on it.

[iwillgiveyoumyhappiness]

박우진, Park Woojin

anonymous asked:

hihi!! i would like to request some fluff with woojin from AB6IX, I’m not sure if you do requests outside your prompt lists but, maybe a scenario where the reader is youngmin’s bestfriend and she has always lowkey had a crush on woojin hehe and some cute youngmin bestfriend moments thank youu

Group: AB6IX

Member: Woojin (and a considerable amount of platonic Youngmin)

.

.

.

“Hey!” you snapped at Youngmin, pushing his hands away from your head. “I said you could touch my hair—not mess it up!”

The boy laughed at your antics. “I wasn’t messing it up,” he defended himself. “I was giving it character.” 

You rolled you eyes. “What kind of a screwed up character were you giving it?”

He thought for a moment. “Frankenstein’s wife?” he offered. “That kind of feeling.”

You pulled your fist back, like a threat to punch him, but you both knew better than that. You could never hit that idiot. You both just ended up laughing at each other as you sunk further into your couch. 

He sucked in a breath after your giggle fritz was over. “So,” he started, “how’s things with you and Woojin?” 

You quirked a brow. “What’re you talking about?” 

He gave you a look. “Oh, come on. I’ve seen you with crushes before, and he’s totally one of them.” 

“Well...” You didn’t have any clever comebacks. “Maybe a little bit,” you mumbled back, shifting around a little. 

‘A little bit’ was a massive understatement. You’d had an eye on Youngmin’s friend for quite some time now. You appreciated his quiet awkwardness, his snaggle tooth, his secretly dopey behavior in contrast to his outwardly cool demeanor. 

His dancing wasn’t a negative trait either. 

Youngmin clapped his hands, like a self-congratulations. “Knew it,” he snorted. “So, what’re you gonna do about it?” 

“Nothing,” you shrugged. 

He did a double-take. “Can you repeat that?” 

“I’m not gonna do anything about it,” you said. “We’ve said two and a half words to each other, I doubt he’s interested in me.” 

A sly smile spread on his lips. “I don’t know,” he said, an impish glow in his eyes. “You might be surprised.” 

Your ears perked up. “Wait a minute. Are you saying he likes me?” 

“I didn’t say that.” 

You scrambled to your knees, waddling yourself clumsily closer to your best friend. “Im Youngmin, you have a 0% strength poker-face, so tell me! Does he have a crush on me or not?” 

He held in a snort. “Why would he? It’s like you model yourself after a penguin.”

“Youngmin!”

He held up his hands in defense. “I’m being serious—I don’t know! Just don’t write him off just yet, yeah? Try befriending him and hanging out some. Maybe you’ll be shocked.”

You huffed, sitting back down. “But that’ll take time... I’m impatient.” 

“I know,” he chuckled. He poked you with his sock feet. “That’s why your brother’s gonna help you out! I’ve got a foolproof plan up my sleeve, m’lady.” 

You smacked his foot away with your own. “You’re not my brother.” 

“But you love me like one,” he said as you both started having a fencing battle with your legs. 

A small smile broke across your face as you jabbed him in the ankle. “True enough.” 

It was around 11:46 at night when you got a text from Youngmin, jolting you up from a half-dozed state. Hesitantly, you rolled yourself out of bed to grab your phone off your desk. 

For anyone else, you would’ve let it wait till morning, but when you heard that special ringtone, you didn’t tend to ignore it—no matter how much you wanted to. He’d been there for you in the tough times and late nights, so it only felt right to do the same for him. 

You unlocked your phone, cringing from the sudden brightness in the room.

From: Youngminnie

Subject: Official Plan for Seducing My Group Mate

You rolled your eyes at the title before clicking it open. Your eyebrows immediately furrowed at the number of steps there were. 10 steps, perfectly typed out a labeled. As expected of Youngmin. 

‘Do I have to read all this tonight? -_-’ you asked.

Three moving dots. 

‘You don’t have to,’ he wrote back. ‘But you should. For good dreams. ;D’

You chuckled at the reply. “Fine, then,” you sighed to yourself, flipping on your lamp and plopping down in your shockingly comfortable rolling chair. 

Step 1: Come To More Hangouts

The kids and I hang out often, so you should start tagging along! 

You weren’t sure if you liked that idea very much. Being the outsider in a close group didn’t seem very appealing to you. That was until you noticed the message right under it.

I promise I won’t let you sixth-wheel, you coward. 

Ah. He knew you too well.

Step 2: Exchange Numbers

I think this one’s a given. After you make that initial connection—jump on him! Well... Not literally, since he’s very important to the team, but you know what I mean. Sure, I could just give you his number, but that’d be no fun, and I know you’re too awkward to actually start a conversation with him. 

Step 3: Find Common Interests

Just look for something you two can do together. I’d say try dancing with him, but we both know the extent of your noodle-arm-ness (not to be offensive, or anything). I don’t think I can help you here, ‘cause I want you to get to know each other authentically, but I know you’ll figure something out.

Step 4: Share An Intimate Moment

I don’t mean it like THAT, you weirdo. I just mean a vulnerable moment. Like, I know it’s scary, but be open with him about something personal. Not too personal, though. Remember, I’m watching you, kid. That, or be there for him when he’s not doing too well. You know work can be stressful for us. Now that! I can give you a tip on that. I’ll let you know when he’s not doing so well. He’ll need comfort, don’t you think~? Warning, though. If you kiss him in front of me, I’ll end both of you.

Step 5: Do Something He Likes Doing

If he invites you somewhere, you better go. Even if you have plans with me, cancel. I’ll be the understanding, amazing, incredible, most-loved best friend that I am and forgive your sins. Wow! I’m really such a guardian angel!  

Step 6: Compliment Him

It’s okay if you do it moderately throughout your time together, but make this one something BIG. Make him think on it! Give him that heart-flutter that only you can provide. 

Step 7: Hang Out At Your Place

It’s a big step, this one. You have to let a guy in your house! ...besides me. I just realized how that sounded as I typed it. Yes, I do regret it, if you’re wondering. Disregarding that; just hang out together! Have a good time, play some games, be safe (please don’t kill me for that) and let him see how fun you are to hang out with on your own! 

Step 8: Tease Him

Again, I don’t mean this in a weird way. I just mean it in a playful way. I have no doubt that you’ll do plenty of it without having to consult the step since you warm up to people in a snap, but I wanted to write it down just in case. Do something a little flirty at some point, please. He blushes easily, despite how tough he seems. He’s a real dork!

Step 9: Have a Sleepover At the Dorms

I know this one seems a little weird, but I think it’s a good idea. If you have a sleepover, you’ll be able to see if you can actually stand him for an entire day, an entire night, and then the next morning. A good test, I think! You’ll be able to see if he’s truly your “chosen one”. Plus, he won’t sleep naked for one night... Blessing, really. 

Step 10 (final step): Hook, Line and Sinker

Now’s the time! I know you’ve totally captured his heart by now, so you should just confess your feelings honestly. Don’t chicken out!! I know Woojin, so he won’t ditch you, even if he doesn’t feel the same. Might be awkward for half a second, but he’ll come around. 

You rubbed the tiredness out of your eyes, glancing at the clock. 12:31 AM. You sighed and groaned, stretching out your stiff limbs. You discarded your phone, switched off the light and threw yourself into bed with an unladylike flop. “Bed, how I missed thee, my love...”  

Even though you felt exhaustion flooding your body, drawing you into what you hoped would be restful sleep, you still felt grateful to Youngmin. 

Your best friend and number one wing-man. 

There you stood, three weeks later, outside of a cafe, a little bit frozen in your spot. You could see Youngmin and the others through the window, chatting freely. They looked so happy together. So at peace. 

You slowly turned around, muttering to yourself, “Oh, gosh... I don’t want to do this. They’re all having fun. You’re gonna butt in and have no place. You’re gonna be the dead fish! The black sheep! The gray cloud!” You shook your head, trying to clear yourself of those thoughts. 

“No,” you told yourself, giving yourself a light slap on the cheek to wake yourself up from your self-inflicted nightmare. “Come on! You’ve got this. This is Step 1: Come To More Hangouts! Youngmin will never let you live this down if you don’t just—!”

“What are you doing?” 

The voice shocked you, making you yelp and clumsily karate chop whatever poor person that had been unfortunate enough to appear behind you. And of course—just your luck—the person had to be Park Woojin. 

He rubbed his shoulder, an amused grin on his face. “Ouch,” he chuckled. “You pack quite the punch, don’t ya?” 

You forcefully snapped your jaw shut. “I am so sorry,” you said, clasping your hands together. You tittered nervously. “At the thought of being attacked I... became a ninja, I guess.”

He shrugged. “Youngmin has a cool ninja friend, then,” he said. Your shoulders became less tense at his relaxed attitude. Something about him made you feel very at ease. “He sent me out here to get you.” 

You nodded slowly, trying to breathe normally. “Yeah, sorry about that. I was just lost in thought.” 

“Oh, yeah?” He quirked a brow, a slight smirk on his lips. “Youngmin said that you were probably stressing out over whether or not you should come in.” 

Your jaw dropped again. “He ratted me out,” you breathed out, disbelief lacing your tone.

“Guess he knows you pretty well.” 

You crossed your arms. “Yup. That’s what years of friendship gets you. Stone-cold betrayal.”

He masked a snort with a cough. “You know what,” he said. “You’re actually pretty funny.” 

Your ears perked up. “Really?” 

Hmm... Maybe Step 1 was a success after all. 

The steps after that were rather successful, too. 

During Step 2: Exchange Numbers, you’d lost track of time and accidentally called him around two in the morning, only realizing your mistake after he’d picked up with a voice deep and raspy from broken sleep. 

“Hey!” you had said, voice chipper and upbeat. “I just wanted to check in on you.” 

He had just chuckled on the other line. “At 2 AM?”

Your eyes immediately snapped to your clock. “Oh my gosh,” you gasped. “I didn’t even realize it was that late. I’ll hang up now, I’m so sorry.” 

He caught you before you left. “It’s okay, I couldn’t sleep anyway. Wanna talk for a while?” 

During Step 3: Find Common Interests, you’d mentioned your love for stargazing while the six of you sat in the practice room and ate lunch. Without any real effort, Woojin had invited himself along on one of your excursions.

That was probably the most at peace you’d felt in a long time, despite your heart beating a little faster every time your elbows brushed as you laid in the grass together, side-by-side, looking up at the vast expanse of sky. 

“Stargazing was a good idea,” he’d breathed out into the cold night air, creating a puff of contrast in front of his face. “I’m glad you dragged me along.”

You scoffed. “I didn’t drag you anywhere,” you laughed, elbowing him in the side. “You came of your own accord, I didn’t even invite you.” 

“You saying you don’t want me here?” he asked, rubbing his side and giving you a knowing smile. 

You crinkled your nose at him. “I didn’t say that.” 

Now, Step 4: Share An Intimate Moment... That one came as a surprise to you. You didn’t expect to be hanging out with everyone, having a perfectly wonderful time, and then suddenly feel so overwhelmed. 

You didn’t expect to excuse yourself to the bathroom when you felt tears welling up in your eyes. You didn’t expect your mind to get flooded with so many thoughts about how stressed you were and how much you weren’t pleased with yourself. You didn’t expect it. 

Not all of a sudden.

Though, you also didn’t expect Woojin to follow close behind you. You didn’t expect him to knock on the door with three gentle taps of his knuckles and ask, “Are you okay in there?” just louder than a whisper. 

You didn’t expect to open the door for him and bury your face in his chest as he stroked your hair. You didn’t expect him to close the door again so you could cry in peace without anyone prying. 

You didn’t expect the two of you to slide down the door, end up in a messy pile on the floor and lean against each other while he whispered small words of encouragement and comfort.  

You didn’t expect to start falling asleep on his shoulder when he started humming softly. You didn’t expect him to say, “You’re pretty endearing when you’re half-asleep”. You didn’t expect him not to ask about what was bothering you. He just sat there, listening to you cry and rubbing your back in long, gentle strokes. 

You were grateful for that. You didn’t even fully understand why you were crying.

It was unexpected... But it was wonderful. You thought you were going to be the one comforting him, but in the end, you were the one that needed it. Needed him. But that just proved something to you. 

It proved that he was worth the ten steps you would have to take to reach his heart. It proved to you that he would be there for you in the tough times, and that he was totally worth you being there for him. 

It proved to you that when you completed Step 5: Do Something He Likes Doing, he genuinely meant it when he said, “I wanna hear you sing” when he dragged you out to karaoke with some of his friends from highschool.

It proved to you that when you went through Step 6: Compliment Him, he had a truly soft heart. Even more so than Youngmin had said! 

“You dance really well,” you had told him one day after watching one of AB6IX’s performances. 

He froze a little, the compliment catching him off guard. “Well... Thanks,” he said.

You eyes widened and a smile spread across your face. “Are you blushing?” you giggled. 

He scoffed and turned away from you. “Absolutely not.” 

“You totally are!”

“Not!”

Youngmin walked by, smacking his shoulder playfully. “Are,” he said, flashing you a supportive wink. 

You gained a proud look on your face. “See? Your leader’s on my side! You can’t deny me!”

Woojin rolled his eyes playfully. “Fine, fine. Whatever you say.”

“It is whatever I say!” you determined. “And I say, I like the way you dance.” 

He suddenly turned around, causing you to bump into his chest. “And I like your hugs,” he said. He waited expectantly. “So are you gonna give me one?” 

It proved to you that when you went through Step 7: Hang Out At Your Place, you didn’t need to feel awkward or worried at all. He made you feel nervous, but nervous in the best way. The nervousness of heart-eyes and butterflies. 

So, in a way, that nervousness gave you peace. That nervousness was your place of balance and tranquility. You could always come to Park Woojin and know you would feel the same way, no matter how much time passed. 

Warm. Always so incredibly warm. 

It made you impatient for Step 10, but you knew that it was a selfish and foolish wish. If you could speed up time (like you wished for sometimes), you would miss precious moments that you spent with him.  

You would miss watching a movie with him at sunset, a fluffy blanket draped over your laps, though you sat a good distance away from each other. 

You would miss hogging said fluffy blanket just a little too much and him threatening, “If you steal the blanket one more time, I’m putting my cold-ass feet on your bare thigh.”

You would miss the fun events of Step 8: Tease Him that ended with you both running around an old playground at midnight, trying to throw melting ice cream at each other. 

You would miss Step 9: Have a Sleepover At the Dorms, which resulted in you having the best night of your life. You didn’t think you’d ever laughed so much since you were born. You had seen Youngmin constantly put the placement of games in such a way that you would be sitting next to Woojin.

He really was the best wing-man. 

The best part of that evening hadn’t been the loudest or funniest, though... It had been when everyone had fallen asleep on you and you were left to do the dishes after a super unhealthy (but very delicious) meal. 

Well... Mostly everybody. 

“Let’s do the dishes together.” 

Of course, it was Park Woojin.

Finally, after all the waiting... It was time for Step 10: Hook, Line and Sinker. 

You didn’t think you would be so nervous. 

“Crap...” you mumbled to yourself. “Why am I so sweaty all of a sudden?” You eyes widened. “Did I forget to put on deodorant? Holy crap—”

You felt a comforting touch on your shoulder. “Calm down!” Youngmin said. He turned your head, making you look at him. “You’re gonna be okay, all right?”

“Am I, though?” You gestured to your knees. “I’m trembling, Minnie!”

He clicked his tongue and put his hands on his hips. “Repeat after me,” he said. You nodded. He was weird, but he was usually right. “I am a strong, fantastic, charming young woman,” he spoke, confidence in his tone.

“Are you now?” you snorted.

He snapped his fingers in your face. “Take it seriously!”

“Fine!” You rolled your eyes. “I am a strong, fantastic, charming young woman,” you echoed dryly. 

“I could have any man I want,” he continued. You repeated him. “But I don’t want just any man.” 

You took a deep breath. “But I don’t want just any man.” 

“I only want one,” he said.

You felt yourself winding down. “I only want one.”

“I want Woojin.” 

You copied him, “I want Woojin.” 

He flashed you a toothy grin. “Nice one! Now—what are you?”

“A strong, fantastic, charming young woman,” you said with a grin, “and I could have any man I want.” 

“But do you want just any man?” 

You shook you head. “No, I don’t.”

“Then who do you want?” 

You didn’t hesitate at all. “Woojin. I want Park Woojin.”

A slow clap sounded from the other side of the room, shocking both of you.

“That was quite the show.” You both recognized the voice immediately. 

Youngmin gave you a quick tap on the shoulder, a silent ‘good luck’. “I’m gonna go,” he whispered before breezing past you and out of the door of the previously empty practice room. 

You slowly turned around—albeit a little awkwardly—to face Woojin. “How much of that did you...” you were struggling with words at the moment. 

“Hear?” he finished for you, a playful grin on his face, showcasing his snaggle tooth. “Pretty much all of it.”

You hid your face in your hands, “Oh my gosh,” you groaned. You peeked through the spaces in between your fingers. “And what do you think?” you asked shyly. 

A short pause just for him to walk closer and grab your hands, pulling them away from your face. Once again, his cheeks were painted the slightest shade of pink. 

“I think that I love you,” he said softly. “I think that you are love.”  

.

.

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Hey, Anon! I hope you enjoyed fluffy Woojin. I had a little trouble with the pacing when I started writing it, but I think it came out all right. ^-^ Though, that’s really your decision, isn’t it?

I hope you enjoyed it a lot! Feel free to stop by again. 

[ithilwen-lionheart]

Love, lead me on - Legolas x Priestess!Reader - Chapter 4 pt. 1/1

Alternatively: With a downcast smile, you pierced my heart like a dagger...

[ Work Text ]

After giving me a smile with downcast eyes, you suddenly grew up

That was like a sharp knife split my chest apart...

There stood Legolas, clad in the finest silver tunic that reached his knees, dark brown pants and matching boots. His entire outfit screamed sophistication and elegance, his hair in its usual perfect braids, but his eyes...

His supposedly stunning and enticingly piercing blue eyes that always seemed so alive just looked too tired, sad and emotionally spent that it physically hurt her.

He was smiling but it was so mournful that Celine just hopes he would stop straining himself by pretending. His gaze then fell to the ground, defeated, as if he'd not only seen war but something much more tormenting.

And it stabbed her with more pain than a jagged saw would ever inflict on her body.

Which of course, makes perfect sense, considering the hole the elven prince had dug himself into.

And then she remembers, of course he'd end up like that. She almost forgotten that she had seen Kili with Tauriel earlier. She was way too caught up laughing with Thorin that she couldn't pay them any heed back then.

It didn't matter whatever it is that they were doing because the war had been won and Legolas had all but lost this one.

"Am I the only one noticing or is it getting a bit too stuffy here, dear prince? Shall we head outside for some fresh air?"

And Celine is just about to lose it too.

-----

--It's not that I want to be loved, but I want to love all of you

"You knew this would happen, did you not?" Celine began right after they got out and into one of Erebor's near nonexistent balconies.

It's not as elegant as the ones they have in Mirkwood, Rivendell or Lothlorien. Neither does it offer any splendid scenery down below. All one could see from where they are were the bloodied battlefields from where they fought earlier, and whatever is left of the -once again- ruined city of Dale.

The morbid side of her thinks that the setting somehow matches the mood they are both currently in, perfectly.

But they aren't here to make small talk about the differences of dwarven and elvish aesthetics and so she kept the thoughts to herself.

Legolas made his way to the crumbled stone railings without a word.

Celine didn't really have much to do but wait for his response, and so she did.

There's nothing she could say to make things better for him anyways.

A few minutes had passed and she thanked the valars for her expansive patience when it came to the prince.

"Yes." he hung his head low and slumped his shoulders from what she could see of his back.

Cautiously making her way towards him as if she's walking on thin ice -which she probably is doing at the moment- she voiced out that one question that had been nagging at her ever since, "Then why did you still do it? Why have you kept pushing the inevitable aside? If you knew you would end up hurting, why?"

And she ponders, she should be asking herself pretty much the same question as well.

Why?

And she'll come up with a pathetic excuse like-

"I cannot. Could not stop. I have tried, multiple times to... To forget. But I couldn't. It had always been and will always be there on the back of my mind... And before I know it, I am back and stuck on the same place as I had been before." He didn't turn to her and just stared straight ahead, glimmers appearing on the corners of his eyes before he bowed and held his head in between his hands, breaths shuddering and racking his body.

"Have you ever tried looking some place else?" Celine began softly, trying her best not to choke because seeing him in this much pain because of someone else is beyond excruciating for her. Reminding herself that she should be the one comforting the prince and not the other way around, she resumed her job of rubbing one hand against his back in a futile attempt to tame the unpleasant shakes threatening to shatter his fragile weeping form.

She was answered by a furious shake of his head and a broken voice saying,

"I-I could not..."

"You could not or you would not?" If there was even a hint of bitterness in her tone, Celine made sure that it was evident enough for the oblivious prince to notice. The priestess doesn't know how long she could take this merciless twist of fate before she just breaks down here and then herself.

Legolas finally faced her as she posted the question, with his brows furowed in confusion, "Have you not figured out that if I could, then I would have already done that ages ago?"

Lavender eyes widened at this, warmth spreading across her cheeks, "S-so you k-knew?" She cursed herself from stuttering.

So this is it.

"I knew what?" He slightly pulled back, certifiably on the exact opposite track of what she is expecting.

No,

He's even more dense than she had originally thought.

His words practically stung that she quickly retrieved her hands as if she'd just been burnt and took a couple of steps back. Eyes wide in disbelief.

"By the valars, Legolas!" She whispered somewhere in between a choke and a gasp, all air literally knocked out of her lungs with the effort it took to keep herself from screaming in frustration.

-this is it.

Tears began clouding her lilac hues as she clutched her shattered chest. All these times she thought she was being lucid enough, all these times she thought he could at least somehow feel that she cares for him badly, more than absolutely necessary.

"How can you not see it?!" Her lips were quivering and every nerve inside her body was quaking but she couldn't bother minding them at the moment.

She has so much to say, so much questions and reprimands piling up from the deepest pits of her stomach just waiting until they could finally spill out. It was as if she had a heart full of explosives that could go off anytime after she had spent the last of her wavering forbearance, as if it was a match just waiting to be lighted up by circumstances.

Circumstances as unfortunate and ruining as this.

And all was out before she could even attempt to reign all the words back in to mull over their applicability and the tone she's supposed to use as she spoke them. It was all cursory as if her mind had finally failed her and her damaged heart had taken over,

"How can you not see how much I care for you?

How can you not realize that I would be willing to do everything just to keep you happy?

How can you not notice the way my eyes would linger long after you looked away?

How can you not see that I would be willing to throw my life away just so that I could keep you safe?

That I'd rather have my heart on the line if that would mean yours would be happy even if it'll be in the arms of another?

How can you not realize how your minute smile would take it's effect on me?

Is everything that I had done not enough to make you see?" Her voice finally broke and her gloved hands flew over to cover her mouth upon realizing that she had finally spewed all these words when she tried her hardest not to make it look as if the prince had made her do it and she blamed him for it or that she would've wanted something in return for something she had done even though the ellon had never asked her to in the first place.

But still, what was done cannot be undone and Celine was sure that it all came out as if she was desperately asking the prince to at least take notice of what she had sacrificed and the ends she would be willing to go to just for him and his approval.

That was precisely when she lost it to one heart shattering cry as she fell to the ground,

"H-how c-can you n-not notice that I-I l-love you all this t-time?" She barely managed to get it through sobs and hiccups as she frantically tried to rid her face of the salty trails out of habit.

"Celine-"

"I love you, Legolas, okay?!" She shouts and tries to stand up on wobbly legs. The priestess swears that had that party inside been quieter, it would've already been heard by everyone else.

Celine couldn't stop the words from flowing out, not now when she had already started it, this might be the one and only chance she'll ever get with her courage and pain enough to push the words she'd kept in herself for too long, finally out. Cracked voice and messed up face be damned.

The blond ellon was just about half on his way off of his position on the railings to assist her when her knees threatened to finally give up but she rose one hand up to stop him. She couldn't trust herself to bear his touches, not when she's breaking down, not when she's prone and vulnerable because she might do something he'll hate her for and she'll regret.

She took her hand back and clenched her chest with it along with her other one, as if the gesture would keep her shattered heart from entirely falling out, "I love you so much that it hits me tenfold whenever I see you hurting because of Tauriel, because I know that if I had only been given the chance then... Then..." Celine made an inner oath never to blame a single thing on Legolas, or Tauriel or on fate because she knew she brought this upon herself. Well aware that everything are mere consequences of her decisions and actions.

Never to blame and never to post herself as better than the elleth Legolas had loved -still loves- because who on earth is she anyways?

"If just.. If you would just see me..." Her voice went out pleading and desperate despite of her efforts not to. The tears kept on coming as if there would never be an end to them, twin waterfalls that kept on running for at last they've been given an outlet.

That was only then that Celine had realized she'd been keeping this much tears for the prince. She'd wished that this day would never come, he didn't need to see her break -especially not when he himself is beyond repair.

They couldn't cry here and cuddle in each other's arms and expect everything to get better for the two of them somehow, they don't comfort and build each other's hearts and end up with each other in the process.

It doesn't work that way. This isn't some fairy tale a mother would read to her children. In fairy tales, there would be magic that would keep people from dying, those in love would end up with the person that they treasure and live happily ever after.

They don't break like this and mourn over their unrequited feelings. In fairy tales, there are no such things.

Maybe there's a reason why fairies are mere legend in Middle Earth. They come up with such ridiculously idealistic tales the world is better off without.

'I should not be despairing like so,' the bluenette shook the negative thoughts away and brushed the tears off her eyes once more as she took one steadying breath and stood as straight as she can.

It had already been a given that she wouldn't notice the prince who was now merely a feet away from her, considering how she had majority of her concentration focused on not letting herself be swallowed by such cataclysmal thoughts.

One cold hand laid against her cheek and freezing was the last thing she had expected his touch to feel. He'd always seemed so warm and welcoming when it came to Tauriel.

His voice, his movements, eyes, gentle grasps and steps.

But she isn't Tauriel.

Celine would never be Tauriel.

Ever.

"Celine, I... My apologies.. "

Still, she looked up even as his own tears went down to mingle with her own as he bowed his head, flaxen strands curtaining the pain that they both shared and had plastered on their wrecked faces.

His eyes were clamped shut and his entire features were contorted in pain, one large hand was trembling on her cheek as the other gripped her shoulder for support. A support she'd be all too willing to give.

"It's alright." Her tinkling voice soothed, reaching up to relieve his face of both the drying and brand new tears with trembling hands of her own.

His eyes fluttered open at this, piercing blue orbs shimmering with a thousand more tears, eyebrows furrowing in confusion because why would it be alright?

And of course Celine knew what that tiny gesture meant.

"It was my choice to love you. You did not tell me, no one did. Not your father, not the elves, or the dwarves, men or even the valars themselves. It was not fate or circumstances that lead me to this. It is my actions. And for it, I regret nothing." She answered truthfully, barely keeping herself from placing the kiss someplace else that would not be his cheek.

The elf could only blink, frozen in place, still broken yet bafflement had -for once- dominated the pain,

"Celine, you are well aware that-"

The priestess shook her head, a timid smile on her lips as she pulled away and let her hands slip off his face to pat his sturdy chest playfully,

"I figured I should at least do that before-" she trailed off as her lavender hues wandered off to the side.

Legolas felt something stir in him. Maybe it had something to do with the state he found her in earlier with Oakenshield.

"Before?" She didn't answer and his suspicion grew all the more unpleasantly potent, "Before what, Celine?"

'Valars, not her too...' It always had to be the dwarves doesn't it.

Celine only takes a shuddering breath and the Sindarin Prince feels every nerve in his body quake with each scintilla of movement.

The hand that was on her cheek moved to her shoulder as he stared into her eyes, the intensity in those shades of blue enough to voice his question out even without him needing to tilt his head to urge her to continue.

"I'm going back to Lothlorien."

His expression was unreadable but his hands went limp and dropped to his sides.

Celine smiled and clasped her hands behind her back, not wanting to dampen the prince's eyes over again. Surely he wouldn't mind her being gone.

"And please do not feel obligated to love me. All I could ask of you is to allow me to at least love you until nothing more is left of me." Taking his hand in hers one last time, she kissed his palm and went off to leave.

Not once bothering to turn back to see the prince's reaction because she could only take too much hurt in a single day, and this particular one had given her her fill of the dreaded emotion for what she could see as the entirety of her lifetime.

[ To be continued in Chapter 5 ]

[infinitehours]

From Dusk to Dawn, an Elder Scrolls Online short fic

Rivenspire spoilers and Daggerfall Covenant questline spoilers (specifically Stormhaven and main quest).  I did like the ideas behind the Rivenspire storyline, even if I did not always like the execution.  Author notes are first, then the story.  Leave a comment or reblog if you enjoyed! 

Author notes before the story:  I’m actually not done with this story.  It’s still got another part to it that I just haven’t had the inspiration to write yet.  

This is my character Elyssa.  She's the youngest of my line-up *(only 18), and that distinction is important.  Naive and more than a little too trusting. She's also probably the only one who would purposely go out of her way just to coax a bunch of vampires into letting her stay the night, if only for the "coolness" factor of getting to stay the night at a vampire castle.

Once upon a time, I had plot bunny idea of a conversation concerning my traumatized Vestige about Molag Bal. I say traumatized because...let's be honest here.  The amount of stuff the Vestige goes through is alarmingly dark at times. It wasn't until I got to Rivenspire that I recognized the perfect situation this conversation could take place, and that the Count's status as a vampire who received his vampirism directly from Molag Bal (only to turn around and embrace morality) added an extra layer of meaning here. I hope that explains why I did this in the specific way that I did.  That vampires, and their abilities, are they themselves almost representations of Molag Bal's whole concept of domination and submission.  I like that bit of symbolism.   I don't think this particular story would have had as much of an impact otherwise.

It's canon that there are different strains of vampires and that they can do different things depending on the strain.  What's not entirely clear to me is how those mechanics always work (because we don't always see them in game), so forgive me for making a few things up. Additionally, ZOS confirmed they were changing how the feeding animation looks to something "more traditional" so I'm assuming we're going to get people biting necks in the update. Which is a lot better than the weird ridiculous looking funnel of blood, if I’m being honest here.

(one of the other reasons I wanted to write this was to come up with an explanation for why the Count is kind of...irritated all the time, lol)  

Content warnings: A little bit of Molag Bal torture going on here. Vampire biting.   Otherwise I can’t think of anything.  

***************

~~~~~~~~~~

“Difficulty sleeping?”  

Those were the first words out of his mouth the moment she stepped lightly into the study.  Even without turning around, even without her making a sound, he seemed to be keenly aware she was there.  It might have been unnerving if she didn’t know anything about him.  

“Nightmares,” was her reply, the shadow of a sad smile coming and going on her lips.  

He nodded silent acknowledgement as she took one of the carved wooden seats available.  For a moment, she watched him as he stood with his back to her; he was stock still, almost statue-like, save for the occasional instance in which he turned the page.  He wore a different set of mage’s robes than he did earlier.  It was similarly a deep, dark grey, but this one had a few threads of red woven in a delicate pattern across the length of it.

“I suppose it quite normal for a mortal to have those when staying in a place like this.”  

He said it flatly, and it was difficult for her to work out whether he was irritated at the idea or resigned to it.

“I assure you, my lord Count,” she responded carefully in turn.  “I’ve been having nightmares long before I accepted your very generous offer to spend the night.”

Platitudes.  That was surely the best way to handle a noble, undead or not, right?

“But if it is at all upsetting to you that I’m here,” she continued, hastily, “It would be a simple thing to pack my affects and travel to Shornhelm.”

He shook his head. “That won’t be necessary. I am not bothered.  And it is likewise too dangerous to travel the roads at this time at night.”

His eyes still never seemed to pry themselves away from his research as he propped open another tome on top of a large pile of books that conveniently reached his height.  

“Vampires hunt best at this time, I’m sure.”  she said, off-handedly, her fingers dancing through the length of her reddish brown hair that was now free of her usual, careful braid.    

“There’s no sun to burn our skin, and our eyes are much better attuned to the dark than a mortal’s.  The bloodfiends, who are nothing more than feral members of our kind, operate much the same.  So long as the people stay indoors and within the city walls, they should be safe.  But a lone traveler, even on horseback, may offer up a too tempting target for them to resist.  You’d be snatched in the gloom and none would hear of it until the morning.”

She didn’t know how to respond to that, though in her mind’s eye she played out a scene with her own mangled corpse lying by the side of the road.  Pale, glassy-eyed, bite-ridden and completely drained of blood.  She scowled at the thought, and shifted in her chair.

“It may not come down to that,” She said, her voice lacking the confidence she’d hoped for, “I’d say I’m pretty good at fighting bloodfiends; and, in fact, I’ve already fought some of them at night...”

“I don’t doubt that, Elyssa.  But is there any real reason to risk yourself unnecessarily? Stay here for the night, and I promise you can leave in the morning.  As early as it takes the sun to rise to the sky and offer you its protection.”

Her scowl deepened.  Did he think she was scared to spend the night at his home-castle-place-thing?  She knew that he was probably used to being a little bit defensive when it came to dealing with others (and that it was kind of her fault for somewhat insisting on staying to begin with), but he can’t honestly think she’d lost her nerve, could he?

“Count Verandis. I seem to have accidentally given you the impression that I’m uncomfortable here or that I desperately wish to leave if only you’d allow me.  Trust me when I say, if I was that desperate or felt like I was in that much danger, I would have already broken one of your pretty stained glass windows and JUMPED myself to freedom.”

She gestured towards the entryway.  “Although I’d probably just try the front door first. Something tells me you wouldn’t stop me, even if you do think it’s foolhardy for a mortal to be prancing about in the dead of night.”

He still didn’t turn away from his books, but from the angle of where she sat she could see the edge of his mouth twitching into, what she’d hope, was something akin towards a smile.  Or maybe that was just a trick of the light.

“I appreciate your consideration for my family home.  Stained glass is difficult to procure these days.”

She smiled at that (he HAD made a joke, right? That was meant as a joke, wasn’t it?), and adjusted herself so that she was lounging a bit in the chair.  Difficult to do, since the wood wasn’t exactly comfortable.  Her plain beige dress, what she usually wore to sleep, wasn’t padded enough to act as a cushion either.   She frowned for the third time that night, and straightened back up.  

“Do you want me to leave you to your studies?” She asked politely, just as the thought occurred to her.  It would act as an excuse to go back to the upstairs bedroom; one of the few rooms that actually had a bed in the entire castle.

“It’s not necessary.” He stated.  

She waited a moment.

“…May I ask a question?”

“If you insist.”  Again, in that flat, dull tone of his that never seemed to hold much emotion.  

“Are you always thirsty?”

This gave him pause, and she could see a few of his fingers ghosting over the latest text he held open before committing to turning another page.

“At some level, yes.  But if you’ve practiced for as long as I have and feed regularly, it’s barely noticeable.”

“So me being in this room for you is, thankfully, not distracting?”

“Your presence isn’t, no.”

Her eyes narrowed in on the back of his head. He was possibly, in a roundabout way, implying that her comments were distracting. It was another one of those statements that made it hard for her to figure out whether he was pissed off, slightly annoyed, or just bored.

“Would you like a bite?” She suddenly asked.

“What?” This time, he DID look up.  Even more, he turned to stare at her with something akin to surprise.

She sat to attention with a triumphant smirk. “Finally, a normal emotional reaction!”

And with that proclamation, his expression hardened and he returned to his books.

“I do not have time for childish endeavors, Elyssa.”  He said sourly.

“You just seem so….I don’t know. Detached.  Either that, or irritated at everyone all the time.  It’s hard to tell with you.  I think that may be the bulk of the reason why a lot of people may be uncomfortable around you.  It’s rather nice to see you actually have some…well…life left in you.”

“When you’ve lived as many years as I have, my child, and watched just as many of your friends age and die…short-lived humans, no less…people you’ve formed attachments to and cared for, again and again…You find ways of…removing yourself from all of it.  If only to ensure that it need not affect you as hard each time.”

Elyssa considered this.  “So…when you say you ‘care’ about the people of Rivenspire—“

“I do care,” He snapped his latest book shut and spun to face her. “I may not be able to feel as deeply as a mother who lost her first child, but I do care about what happens to the people of Rivenspire. I still remember what it was like to lose family, to lose loved ones, the depths of that pain.  Even if I cannot experience it fully for myself anymore, I remember enough to never wish it upon anyone else.  This is why I detest the idea of ever sharing this gift of mine; inflicting it upon others so that they would have to spend decades just learn how to control their despair enough to function.  Can you fathom, can you even imagine, the maddening realization that most everyone you love will soon wither and fade except yourself?”

He approached her at her chair, and though his voice still held that air of mild detachment, his glowing red eyes seemed to burn all the brighter with an inner light.

“You’re correct in the sense that I do have difficulties expressing this.  That I no longer have the capabilities to show others, in any genuine way, the measure of my desire to help.  Mortals rely so much on interpreting emotions through body language and tone of voice, and I am far beyond the point where I can easily weep in the presence of those who are weeping…or even do a decent attempt at trying.”

As he came to stop in front of her, he actually knelt to the ground. To her level.  Eye to eye.

“There’s a reason, in my belief, why the divines would dictate life to be so short and sweet.  Those of us who are cursed to live longer than normal risk…losing things in the process.  I often find myself wanting to socialize with mortals just to get some of that back.  A sense of personhood and direction.  Passions and strivings.  It’s truly remarkable to see reminders of how easy it comes to you.”

He carefully reached out his hand towards her cheek, as though she represented this.  As though she were a symbol of this very discussion.  Just as the tips of cold fingers brushed against her skin, she turned her head just a tad in an attempt to see it in her peripheral.  It was difficult to say whether he interpreted that as a flinch or he suddenly remembered himself, but he withdrew his hand again.  

“I apologize.” He said, getting up and returning once more to the bookshelves.  “I did not mean to touch you without permission.”

“What?  My cheek? That’s not a crime.” Elyssa replied, still trying to absorb everything he just told her.  

“Countess Tamrith would likely disagree with that assessment.”

“Countess Tamrith isn’t here.  And before you go back to your no-doubt riveting literature, I should tell you that I was genuine in offering my blood to you.”

He turned once more to her, an eyebrow delicately raised in questioning.  

“Is that so?  I believe the good Countess would now consider you to have committed a sin.” He asked, and his eyes stared straight at hers for a good measure.

For her part, believing that he was testing her resolve, she sat up straighter and met his gaze head on.

The room was silent for a moment.  

He took a tentative step towards her, and she was a little ashamed that the unexpected movement caused her to flinch. He stopped at the sight.

“We do not usually find people who willingly volunteer so soon after finding out about our condition. Are you sure?”

“Y-Yes.”

“You certainly do not sound it.”

Elyssa huffed out the breath she’d been accidentally holding.  “Well…it isn’t as though I get bitten by a vampire every other day.  I’m not sure what to expect.  Does it hurt?”

“It’s a bite, Elyssa,” And this time, she was sure those glowing eyes of his were laughing at her even if his mouth didn’t show it. “Pain is usually involved in those.  I can, however, promise that it is certainly not excruciating.”

“Well that’s a relief…I think.”

He carefully stepped towards her while she sat stock still and staring straight ahead.  For every moment that he moved closer, she grew more and more uneasy.

“Should I stand up, then?” She said, trying to distract herself from imagining the pain too much; she’d a bad habit of blowing things out of proportion.

“It would be much preferable if you remained seated...Else the dizziness may cause you to fall.  It may even be better if you were to lie down…”

“Sorry, but there’s no way you’re going to get me onto your dining room table.  That would just be too…”  She recalled to mind an earlier scene of stumbling upon them whilst they sat around a half-naked Dark Elf “….awkward.  Awkward and probably uncomfortable.  For me, that is.  No idea if you feel a hundred percent comfortable with people just casually laying on-”

Her spiraling commentary came to a screeching halt when she felt his hand rest lightly on her shoulder.  The very same shoulder twitched, of its own accord, and he removed his hand shortly after.

“That’s the third time you’ve flinched,” he accused.

“No it’s not!” She blurted out.  “That’s barely the first!”

“Elyssa…”

“I can do this!  I’m not a coward!” She insisted, finally turning to face him as he stood right next to her.

“Nobody is calling you as such.  But this is also not necessary, and I believe I made it quite clear that my household only feeds on the willing.”

“I am willing!  I just….I…” Her resolve withered a bit in the midst of staring him down.

His eyes glowing red and unnatural.  A sign, perhaps from the Divines, as to dangers that could lurk behind them.  The same kind of red eyes on the bloodfiends she’d been fighting ever since she came to Rivenspire.

“…I…I just need a moment,” she finished, knowing full well that it was an admission of defeat.

He sighed and walked back to his books.  “Go back to bed, Elyssa.  I need to focus on figuring out what Montclair’s next movements may be.”

She sat there for a few moments longer, but he was firmly encased back in his notes and didn’t turn around again to acknowledge her again.  The obvious signs that the conversation was over.

He thought she was just being childish.

It stung a little, the obvious disregard. Ignored and brushed aside so casually. It almost felt a lot like the time her papa had caught her ruining one of his prized books even after she promised she wouldn’t touch it.  Except this was pretty much a stranger, and she couldn’t discern whether that made it somehow worse.

The feeling, the blatant disregard, threatened to stifle the little study they were in, and it became too much for her to bear that she did decide to leave.  

Slowly taking the steps back upstairs to the bedroom.

She passed a dead mouse and thought idly about it; one of the things that Adusa had done to help the servants prepare the room for her was to take out a couple of live mice.  They didn’t get many guests, or so Adusa said.

But she wondered if the mice weren’t just the natural result of vacancy; the bite mark on this one suggested they were also kept around as a midnight snack.

She chuckled a bit at that as she crept onto the double bed.  The fresh sheets had been thoroughly washed with soap, she had been told, and seemed so very new that they did not even have the usual frayed threads at the end or faded patterns.  And they were just a little bit stiff.

The mortal servants didn’t stay here; there were additional rooms downstairs beyond the storage alcove.  This was purely a guest room.  ….And it almost felt fake.   Like the immortal Count of the castle had attempted to make something seem homely, only for it to just perceptively feel off.

Perhaps the room had seen such rare usage that it failed to ever take on the personalities of those who had used it.

It might have even just been the fact that there were three very obvious coffins resting in the main hall, visible from the guest suite balcony.

It wasn’t bad...it was just…

“Comfy yet, little sweetthing?” The Dremora playfully poked her with the end of a very sharp and very pointy rod.

Elyssa struggled yet again, but the bars of the humanoid shaped cage held fast.

Cadwell…

Lyris…

The Prophet…

The only three kind voices in that entire prison, and they were screaming in agony right behind her.

“What are you doing to them?!  Stop it!”  She cried out, trying, in vain, to turn her head to look at them.

“Now now.  We assure you, they’re being WELL taken care of.” The Dremora poked her again right at her collarbone.  “Just as you will be!”

The screaming behind her increased, as if to prove a point.

“But ooh. Oooh.  It seems you have a guest, sweetling.  Someone is here. Just.  To see.  You.”

More Dremora came, dragging a human alongside them.  The woman was pushed in front of Elyssa’s cage.

“….I asked you for help…” The woman said, tears falling freely as she looked up.  

A shiver went down Elyssa’s spine as soon as she realized she was staring at the face of Duchess Lakana.

“Y-your Grace…”

“I asked you for help…and what did you do?”  The Duchess pointed an accusing finger. “You left me!  You left me alone with that man, that murderer!”

“I didn’t…I didn’t mean to….I didn’t mean to, I swear.  I didn’t know it was him…”  Her eyes began to water up, a mirror of the Duchess’ own face.

“How could you?  You said you would help me!  Why didn’t you do everything you could? Why didn’t you stay with me?”

“I’m sorry…I’m so sorry!”

“And you spared him!  You spared that monster!  How could you do that after he killed me?!”

“That’s enough of that!” The Dremora interrupted, prodding the Duchess to move along. “Put her Gracious Grace alongside the rest of them!  You’re starting a nice collection here, my little sweetling.”

And as soon as the Duchess was dragged out of sight, Elyssa could hear her start to scream as well.  

“Stop it!!  Let them go!!”  She rattled the cage as hard as she could.  

“Ooooh.  Making demands, are we? Do you truly think you’re in any position to save them? Look at you. You couldn’t save the Duchess.  You couldn’t save that family of that poor werewolf Duke. You couldn’t save your darling dearest father…”

The Daedra leaned right into her face, its teeth pearly white and crooked.  And the smell coming from its breath was positively putrid in an indescribable way that had no easy comparisons anywhere on Tamriel.

“…In fact, you can’t even save yourself.”

And with that, the Dremora rammed the rod straight into her shoulder, causing her to jerk back and scream.

Scream.

And Scream.  And fall back onto the…

….

…sheet covers…

Elyssa was shaking.  Her eyes darted back and forth as she ascertained that yes, those were indeed sheet covers.  She was in a room with a bed and nice looking wooden furniture.

In a room made out of stone.

A house.

No, a castle.

That’s right.  Ravenwatch Castle.

There were no Dremora in sight.  No screaming.  No water tainted blue with an eerie light.

No crags filled with bleakest rocks that spread out like daggers.

No distant tundras with nothing but dead plants the eyes could see.

No cages….

Elyssa took one, long, swipe of her hand against her brow, pulling away the sweat that had collected there.  She must have dozed off just then, only to be faced with yet another nightmare.

She tried to push it straight out of her mind and attempt to go back to sleep, but her legs demanded to wander.  That, and she was sure that if she closed her eyes again, the Daedra would return to haunt her.

Her feet took her back downstairs.  The shaking ever present in each and every one of her steps.  Soon enough, she found herself back at the study.  The doorway leading outside, the dining table, the whispering quiet of the night; it all gave the comforting confirmation that the horrors she’d just seen really were just dreams.

Adusa was out scouting the nearby towns and municipal villages.  Melina was out gathering supplies.  The mortal servants were likely fast asleep in their own quarters.  Gwendis was….well, Akatosh only knows where Gwendis went off to.   But sure and steady, Count Ravenwatch was still working in his study.  And the nightmare was fresh enough that she felt drawn to sticking around with the only conscious person she had easy access to.

The scratch of a feather quill paused only briefly as she stood at the threshold.

“Contrary to whatever you may believe, Elyssa,” The Count stated, never looking up. “The sun does not, in fact, rise every twenty minutes like you seem to do.”

Her shaking died down just enough to allow her the dignity of a glare in his direction.  Now she was convinced: the real reason people were uncomfortable around him had absolutely nothing to do with his status as a vampire.

“Bite me,” She seethed back at him.

She’d meant it as an insult.  A come back.  But she realized her mistake when he stopped writing to give her back one, long, unamused look.  Complete with an eyebrow raised.

“Did we not just have this conversation?” He said, turning to another page.

“I don’t care.  I’d rather have conversations all night long if it means I don’t have to go back to sleep.”

She started pacing a bit around the study’s doorway, if only to give her mind something to focus on and her legs something to do.

But as she made a few passes, she noticed he had stopped working and was watching her.  This time with a far more unreadable expression than the blatant apathy.

“What are your dreams about that has you so terrified?”  

“Coldharbour,” She whispered, just barely under her breath.  It must have been loud enough for him to hear her, because his eyes grew a little wider.

“You’ve…actually been there?”

The moment she stopped her pacing was the moment her shaking started up again.   She looked him in the eyes, but found she couldn’t stand to do that for long and had to look towards the floor.

She could hear him whisper something unintelligible; cursing, perhaps, under his breath in Aldmeris.

“You carry a much heavier burden than I initially thought.” He said, “You’re far, far too young for all of this…”

“I can help!  I know I can!” Elyssa insisted, “I’m not afraid of Coldharbour!  I’m not afraid of the bloodfiends!  I’m not afraid to get bitten!  I can prove it! You can have my blood; take it!”

It was supposed to be a reaffirming statement, but her protestations almost made her sound even more childish.

“Elyssa…” he spoke calmly.  Carefully.  “Why is it so important to you that you give me your blood?”

“Because you need it, don’t you?”  She said, frustrated.  She began her pacing again.

“That’s not the reason.”

“Because I want to be helpful!”

“That’s also not the reason.”

This time, she stopped pacing and got angry.

“Because if I don’t give everything I can, and something happened to you, or the High King, or the people of Rivenspire, it will be all my fault again!!”

She yelled it out, and her body feeling a little lighter as she did.  Even as her eyes had begun to water just a bit.

“There it is…” Verandis said softly.

And he left her a moment to go over to the cabinet by the door.

“One of the greatest strengths…” he said, and she could hear him fiddling with something. “…Of the Daedric Prince of Domination is not just in his talent to forcefully suppress a person’s free will or inflicting their greatest fears, but in his capacity for making them feel guilt.”

He returned with a glass of a deep red liquid.  “Physical pain may fade with time, but guilt has a habit of remaining.  What’s worse, it’s often the sufferer that fosters and grows it.  Is there any torture more perfect than that which the victim inflicts upon themselves?  Sit down, Elyssa.”

“What…?”  She glanced from him to the glass as he sat it down at the table between the two chairs in the study.

“If you still insist that I taste your blood, then I must insist that you sit down first.”

Her eyes grew wide a moment, but she clenched her fists out of resolve and held fast as she cautiously took the seat to the right.  He maneuvered the chair opposite to rest closer to her, taking a seat himself.

Her fingers were still trembling as she reached up and undid the top button at the back of her dress, but she hadn’t a clue whether they were trembling because of this or if they were simply leftovers from her fitful sleep.  It may have been both.  

“I don’t...need to take off my clothes completely, do I?”  She frowned in disgust at the thought. She hadn’t considered that part, but the Dunmer from before had been…well…half-naked.

“No,” He said, firmly.  “A shoulder is all that’s required.  Are you ready?”

She glanced at the filled glass.

“Do you always take a shot after you’ve already had a drink?” She joked weakly.

“The wine is for you, Elyssa.  I think you should drink at least a little of it when I’m done.  Now, are you prepared?”

Her hand reached up to pull down one of the shoulders of her dress, just enough so that her collarbone showed.  Her fists clenched and unclenched themselves as she rigidly held them in her lap.  If she were ever bitten by a vampire, this is what it would feel like….

Finally, she nodded.

A touch at her shoulder caused her to flinch again, but they were only fingers.  He was gently moving a strand of hair out of the way.

“Tell me.  I saw you speaking to Melina earlier and it caught my attention.  Did she find a particularly interesting rune?”

She brightened up a little at that.

“Oh!  Well not exactly; we were just talking about this one-ow.”

She was simultaneously a little irritated and a little grateful.  The skeever only asked her that as a distraction… and she actually fell for it.

Vampire fangs were apparently large enough that it felt a little like someone had just happily jabbed a pair of sewing needles into the tender part of her shoulder.  She’d had worse injuries before, but it wasn’t very pleasant either.

…And it was just a tad bit awkward.  For obvious reasons.    

Did the servants really do this on a regular basis?  

Just as she considered the pain, a wave of a new sensation came with it.  He was right; it did have the effect of making a person dizzy.  Dizzy and…a little hazy.  Perhaps it was the lack of sleep that she’d self-induced upon herself for the past couple of days, but she was actually starting to feel…calmer.

Numb.

After a few seconds had passed, it no longer hurt.  And she was no longer sitting up straight in the chair, but rather lounging.  The hard wood had suddenly felt a lot more comfy.

She could still feel him there.  It was hard to ignore his mouth (although she valiantly tried anyways, if only to make it a little less awkward), but she couldn’t really feel any blood actually going out of her (probably a blessing).  One of his hands helped to hold up her neck, and the other right at her upper arm to hold her steady.  It was just as well; the numbness had the effect of making her feel like a puddle of water.

She could also feel him pull away.  Replaced with the feeling of cloth at her shoulder.  Elyssa turned to look and found him softly pressing either a handkerchief or a napkin to the wound (for her sanity’s sake, she decided it was the former rather than the latter).

“That didn’t seem like much,” Her speech was a little slurred.

“Do you still wish to fight the bloodfiends while conscious? If so, then this is all you can afford to lose.  You already run the risk of injury on the battlefield.”

He motioned for her to hold the handkerchief there.  “It will stop bleeding in a moment.  How do you feel?”

“Rather nice…” She said with a slightly loopy smile.  But then she frowned. “Am I supposed to find it nice?”

“All vampires have some level of hypnotic ability.  Some use it to effect of creating slavish thralls.  Mostly, I suspect it’s there to ensure that any prey doesn’t try to escape our grasp.  For this reason, I think it tends to show up often in mortals who have been recently fed upon.”

Elyssa thought about Kallin and the almost eager way he introduced himself to her so soon after the Ravenwatch vampires had dined upon him.

“So…do you influence your servants to give you their blood?”

“I do not always willingly inflict this effect, Elyssa.  Think of it more as a side effect than something I always have a conscious command of.  Anyone I feed on could potentially feel like this.”

“But you have some control of your hypnotic ability, don’t you…?”

“I’m not sure what you’re asking of me.  Here.” He gestured for the handkerchief back and for her to fix her outfit.  

“If you’re implying that I somehow force or coerce my servants to give me their blood, the answer is ‘no’.  I made no such demands of them, nor would I need to.  There are plenty of people in Rivenspire of the unsavory variety; bandits, cutthroats, and the like for whom death would be deserving.   So it would be no trouble to us if Kallin should ever wish to seek employment elsewhere.  I would not stop him. Only ask that he keep the secret of our gifts to himself.  Not everyone in Rivenspire knows of our nature.”

She adjusted her dress back to normal after looking at the mark.  The wound had stopped bleeding; only two pinpricks of red against her skin to mark that anything had actually happened.

“I don’t oversee a prison here in my home.”  He said.

With it being so fresh in her mind, it was difficult to keep her thoughts away from her dream; the bleakness of Molag Bal’s domain and how it contrasted with the Count’s own castle.  In spite of the coffins (and questionable décor)….this was practically paradise compared to Coldharbour.

Then again…wasn’t anything paradise compared to that place?

“You should have a few sips of wine.” He said, interrupting her reverie.  

She nodded and took the glass, letting the liquid swirl within before bringing it to her lips.  It was a tad sweet, and something she must have needed because she took in a large gulp of it.

“The numbness is wearing off…” She said, contemplating the glass in her hand. “…And I have to face my dreams once more…I don’t want to go back to sleep and see Duchess Lakana again…”

“The Duchess of Alcaire…I understand that it was you who thwarted the Daedric plot behind her murder.”

“But I couldn’t save her!  She was so….she was so scared. And she said she was all alone there.  The soldiers wouldn’t even allow her to see most of the entourage that came for her from her father.  I said I would help her and then…then…”

She tried not to get too emotional by taking another large gulp of wine “…I should have stayed right next to her instead of running around…”

“We are all bound by our limitations, my child.  In your case, you cannot possibly be everywhere and save everyone all at once…”

“No.  But I could have made sure I brought her murderer to justice…”

She finished the glass and set it back on the table, balling her hands into fists again.

“…I let him go.  He looked so guilty…and his mind had been manipulated by Vaermina…I thought it was the right thing to do.  At least, that’s what I told myself at the time.”

Elyssa looked down at her hands, clenching and unclenching them, staring at them as though she’d hoped they would somehow provide a better thought process.

“Now I’m wondering if I was really right.  The Duke seemed a little bit angry at my decision…”

“He was likely grieving.”

“And the knight in question - the one who killed her? – he himself said that he felt guilty and deserved to die.”

“Those who feel guilt are not always guilty of anything.  And he, as a knight, was likely considering the strained political relations going on within the Covenant.  His duty to preserve the alliance may have weighed heavily on him to the point where he thought sacrificing his life should be a consideration.”

“But he seemed so…I don’t know.  He was acting so normal when I met him; when he supposedly was under Vaermina’s sway.  I have to wonder if he didn’t secretly want the Duchess to die after all…”

“Now you’re being a bit unfair.”

“But…He could have resisted.”  She said, finally.  “He must have been able to resist.  He should have tried.  He was acting so normal most of the time that he had to have some control of his senses. If he had put a little effort into fighting back, maybe she wouldn’t be dead.  Maybe I would have been able to stop him.  Or maybe I wouldn’t have even had to stop him.  If only he’d considered alternatives…He could have just kidnapped her instead, but no.  She just had to die!  He should have been punished for that...He should have died, and I should ha—“

His hand was at her shoulder again, and that numb feeling came back with such a vengeance that she had instantly slumped back into the chair.  Her anxiety laced rambling put to a halt with a slack jaw.

Her breathing steadied.  Her eyelids drooped.  Every muscle in her body had completely and utterly given in to a state of soothing relaxation.  

“Stand up, Elyssa,” he commanded.

A floating, freeing feeling washed over her as she did as she was told.  The room had gotten brighter, the hallway lighting almost dancing in front of her eyes.

“Come with me upstairs,” he commanded again.

And she felt compelled….no, she felt like it was wonderful to move forward.  He followed behind and caught her by her arms to direct her around the dining room table.

They walked, slow and steady.  Elyssa was sure that if she hadn’t been held by the mer behind her that she’d fall flat on her face.  The numbness took all anxiety away….to be replaced completely with contentment and a calm sort of happiness…It was the most relieving feeling in the world.  

“Molag Bal,” He said, “Would certainly love to have you convinced that weakness is a sin.  That people with weaker wills, much like the knight you speak of, deserve to be punished and tortured.”

They began to ascend the stairs, and Elyssa swayed a bit.  She had been trying her best to focus on walking, but the comforting numbness was making her a bit sleepy.  Besides, her feet and legs appeared to find themselves all on their own, without any effort on her part.

In the back of her mind, there was some measure of concern that something was wrong here.  But any attempt at trying to grasp what exactly was amiss slipped right out of her thoughts.  

“But we all have our weaknesses, Elyssa,” Count Verandis continued.  “There is not a person in all of Tamriel who is devoid of them.  For me, it is the sun.  For you?  Right now, it is your generous acceptance of others who are different than you; the trust that you easily form with strangers in spite of how unusual they may be or, in this case, whether or not they are a vampire.  Acceptance and compassion are very much virtues to be exalted, but in the hands of the wrong people they can become weaknesses to be utilized against you.”

They reached the top of the stairs and made their way into the guest parlor.  Each step forwards made her feel like a leaf on the wind; dancing across the floor as though her body was lighter than air.  The furniture danced alongside her, swimming in her vision.  She heard every word that he said (in fact, it held the bulk of her attention, as if she couldn’t ignore him even if she tried), but finding a response was difficult as she couldn’t formulate the thoughts to say anything.      

“I am grateful for your trust, Elyssa.  Far too many have unfairly scorned or judged us for our condition without ever trying to become acquainted with who we are as people.”

He stopped her just as they reached the table.  She frowned with disappointment; she wanted to keep moving around.  It felt nice.  

“However, imagine for a moment,” He whispered lower, closer to her ear. “How disastrous this would be if I had a more destructive desire.  What would happen if we had met on a dark, lonely night and I had no code of conduct to dictate my thirst?  I would beckon you, entrap you just like this.  How easily you would come to me, following me out of sight of any living person who might help you. Can you imagine what I would do then with such a feast all to myself?  This feeling, this enthrallment, would be the last sensation you ever felt; helpless to do anything as I gorged myself on your life’s blood.”

Fingers appeared at her throat, ever so gently pressed against her skin, against the pulse beating there.  And almost automatically, she found she had lifted her chin even more to better allow them.  She felt a tinge of fear break through the numbness; fear of the mer at her back, at the way her own body rebelled against her wishes to expose her own throat… and a growing, frightening consideration at the back of her mind that he might, just might, take the offer.  In spite of whatever he may have said about their feeding habits before.  

“Tell me,” He said, “Many members of my kind would insist that they have the right to feast on mortals because their prey is weaker than them. Would it be just and proper for me to rip your throat out all because you are powerless right now?  Do I have the right to murder you just because I can?  Because I’m stronger?”

A small bubble of panic managed to sober her up enough to try and wiggle free.  But the movement was half-hearted; she still did not feel like she had complete command of her body.  Even though he did not hold her very firmly, her little movements seemed insufficient to loosen his grasp.  Attempting to maneuver limbs felt like trying to wade through dense tar. And as the words died in her throat before they had the chance to pass her lips, she was met with the horrific realization that she was trapped at his whim without so much as the ability to scream.  

She had never been so terrified of him before that moment.

He removed his hand from her throat to grasp both arms in an attempt to hold her steady; her struggling had given her an awfully dangerous sway that threatened to cause her to hit the table.  Or the floor.  Whichever unfortunate hard surface she reached first.

“It’s all right, Elyssa.” He said, his voice kinder. “I give you my word; your life is safe within my home and among myself and my household.  I’ll release you very soon, I promise.  Relax now, or you’ll hurt yourself.”

As if that was also command, a new, fresh wave of numbness and calm settled in, and she felt too exhausted from her last struggle to resist it.  It took over once again, and the world went fuzzy.

“Sit down,” he commanded, releasing his grip on her arms to pull out a chair. And she obeyed, taking the offered seat.

He went to stand before her with crossed arms.  They remained like that for several minutes before she began to notice that she had feeling back in her legs.  The calm was dying down.  Her fingers could twitch at her will.  Her arms now moved unimpeded.  And with her newly re-acquired control of herself, she immediately proceeded to do the thing she wanted to do the most:

Look up and glare at him.

(Punching him was actually the first option, but she was tired and felt that it required more effort than she thought he deserved)

“How are you feeling?” He asked, unphased by her expression.

“Pretty pissed.”

“As well you should be.  But recognize that it is my fault for exerting my power over you.  It is not your fault that you hadn’t the strength to resist back.  You can’t hold yourself responsible for my actions or the actions of any others…Just as you should not hold other people responsible for the actions of Vaermina.”

Her glare lessened as she contemplated this.  “Do you…suppose that was a taste of what Sir Hughes felt?  The same sort of influence he may have been under?”

“I cannot guess what sort of Daedric magic Vaermina used, but I can almost surely guarantee it was potent.”

She was silent for a moment, unsure of how to respond. So she looked down to fiddle with her fingers.

His demonstration made an impression.

“Never doubt that you made the right choice to spare that knight’s life,” He said, softly.  “He was not a cultist, nor did he willingly implore Vaermina for any of this; she forced her influence upon him by taking advantage of the little bits of doubt that we all experience when it comes to change in our lives. No mortal deserves death all because they were weaker than a Daedric Prince.  If we should go by this logic, then all but a potential handful should be summarily executed right here and now.”

“…Yeah.”  Elyssa sighed, avoiding his gaze. “I think a part of me realizes that.  That I don’t actually blame Sir Hughes, I just…”

“…You still feel a little guilty because you happened to be there.  And you’re desperately trying to look for an excuse to assuage that guilt.”

“Yeah,” She winced to hear it aloud, but he had put it very succinctly.

“Her death wasn’t your fault, Elyssa. You cannot hope to control what a Daedric Prince decides to do; you can only hope to try and stop them.  Even then, such foes are so formidable that it isn’t a guarantee that you will be successful.”

He leaned against the table. “I would consider it impressive that you were even able to save the poor soul manipulated by Vaermina.  He may be punished in exile, but that is a far better, far more appropriate fate than what the Daedric Prince of Nightmares had in store for him, I can promise you that.  I don’t think I need to remind you that Daedra often treat mortals as toys, and are known to mercilessly toss aside those that have passed their usefulness.”

“I guess…” She sighed again, gaze transfixed to the floor in front of him.  But then she remembered what had just happened, and she snapped her head back up to glare at him. “I’m still angry at you, though.”

“And I apologize that I frightened you.  I do regret that.  Make no mistake, it is wrong to affect people’s minds in such a way, and I apologize for that as well.  But I thought it would give you some perspective as to what it feels like to be influenced in such a manner.  At the very least, I would hope that it proved to you how difficult it is to escape.”

“How do you escape?”  She had a terrible thought pass through her head about having to face a much more sinister vampire who would use this technique.

“Different strains of vampirism, different capabilities.  But in this particular case, there were several factors working against you.”

He gestured to her.

“First, you had allowed me to feed off of you, which, I believe, actually helps with this.  Second, you trusted me.  At least, enough to stay the night without any discernible fear for your own safety.  I was able to take advantage of that to exert a much more potent sway.  If you recall, you had regained some ability to fight back the moment I lost that trust and started to frighten you.  Unfortunately, you had, by that point, been under my control for a bit too long that it was difficult to break through.”

“So…Feeding, length of time, and trust.  Did I get that correct?”

“For my particular type of vampirism, yes.  You’ll likely meet many others whose abilities operate under a different set of rules.  It does, however, take no small amount of effort to inflict such hypnotic influence, so it is doubtful that you’ll meet very many opponents who would consider using it against you in the heat of battle.”

She nodded.  “That’s comforting a bit…I think.”

Silence settled over them.

This time, it was Verandis who sighed.

“I cannot speak for the Duchess,” he said, “But I am quite familiar with both the High King and his brother, the Duke of Alcaire.  And I can assure you that neither of them would want you to be this distraught over Duchess Lakana’s death.  Especially not to the point where it is affecting your sleep.”

“Yeah, about that.  I still really don’t want to close my eyes.  So do you have anything you need that I can help with?”

“Blood loss and exhaustion doesn’t strike me as a particularly brilliant plan for fighting off blood fiends.”

“I can’t.”  Elyssa stared him straight in the eye, trying to keep the twitching of her mouth from grimacing too much, “I really, really can’t do this.  I can’t go back to sleep right now; it’s just going to be the same nightmare again.  Like it was yesterday.  And the night before that.”

He stared back at her without comment at first, but eventually uncrossed his arms to head towards his alchemical table in the corner.

“How about,” He said, “I brew you a sleeping draught.”

“But—“

“You needn’t drink it if you don’t want to.  But I’ll leave it here with you, just in case.”

She shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

“Is this going to be like the last potion you made for me, where I wandered about in your memories?”

“No memories.  Just a typical sleeping potion.”

Her nose rankled at the undesirable scents and burning smells that were already coming from the station as he worked.

“Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “I didn’t really mind stepping into your past.  It was kind of fun being someone else, actually.  Just not sure I’d want to do it on a regular basis, because it was also kind of disorienting.”

“Considering everything you’ve told me, I believe we shouldn’t have a repeat of that.  I’m already beginning to regret what little I’ve shown you; I think you have enough worries without me adding more of my own to your pile.”

She could hear sounds of him pouring liquid into a container, and soon enough he approached her with a bottle of something blood red.

He held it out for her and she reached for it, but his grip held fast.

“Please look at me, Elyssa.”

Her blue eyes looked up to find contemplative red.

“Never let Molag Bal win by accepting his ideology,” He said, resolve in his expression. “Believe me when I say, he would cherish such a submission from you.  Weakness is not a sin…and the powerful should always strive to protect, not abuse.  Remember that.”

She nodded slowly in response to the seriousness in his words, and he released the bottle to her grasp.

“….Vampires fall under the realm of Molag Bal, don’t they?” She asked, holding tight to the vial, “To the point where I even heard that Coldharbour is where their souls go when they die.  Is that one of the many reasons why you have an honor code?  Not just to be a good person, but to fight back against him, even if a little bit?”

The flickers of a very sad smile tugged at the edges of his lips.

“…Have a good night, Elyssa.  May your dreams bring you a much-needed and well-deserved rest.”

And with that, he left her to go back downstairs.

She stared at him as he went.  And stared at the potion he left her when he was gone.

After crawling back to the bed, she pulled out the stopper to take a little sniff of the concoction.  It smelled awful, like most potions do.  And she winced as she pulled back to take a tiny taste of it.

Fortunately, the taste wasn’t half as bad as some of the magicka brews she’d had before; this one only had a faint note of rotting eggs and cabbage, instead of an overt one.  That was an improvement.  

After much staring and much consideration, she held her nose and downed the rest of it in one swallow, smacking her lips with a sour expression as she finished.

But the taste lingered, and soon enough she crept out of bed to go back to the parlor. Rustling through the pantry next to the alchemical vials was a bottle of unopened wine.  She silently gave a prayer of thanks to the Divines that bottles of wine were so readily available in a house full of vampires just as she popped out the cork and took a long swing of it to try to drown out the disgusting rotten eggs.

With the taste gone and her thirst satiated, she made her way back to the bedroom.  A wave of dizziness and exhaustion had quickly crept up on her, and she mumbled her discontent under her breath; apparently it was a very, very potent sleeping potion.

Just before she came upon the bed, all the furniture in the room performed perfect backflips.

Her whole world spun around…

…And faded to black.  

[neshabeingchildish]

So, I didn’t feel like reformatting this for Tumblr, so I included the link with the bold/italicized etc. Otherwise, I may or may not get to doing the Tumblr post text, eventually (so the confessions, letters, etc, will all appear the same since Tumblr undoes everything that I type in docs by the time that I paste it here. SO, for the proper way, the ff.net link, but the words are still here, too... Just not formatted. 

@chenoahchantel @adorkable-blackgirl @henry-p-fart @up-the-tube

Dear Charlotte

She told Jasper to go get the letters and meet them at the table, and he was still doing that when Henry came off of the elevator. She approached her second guy and folded her arms, but only sighed, “So… You snapped at Jasper?” She asked it, and sounded genuinely puzzled. This wasn’t an accusation and she didn’t seem to be fussing at him, so he was grateful for that.

“That’s why I sent an apology. I didn’t mean to snap at him, but with the tone that I took, I’m sure that it bothered him, because of how I used to talk to him whenever I was lashing out about everything.” He bit his lip and looked at his shoes.

“I think that he probably has a mild trauma response to some of the emotional danger that may have been inflicted upon him.”

“Definitely, that.” Henry looked up at her and her arms were still folded, but she still didn’t seem angry. “I’ve tried to speak with him about my emotional abuse towards him, but he brushed it off and changed the subject. I don’t want to keep bringing it up and stir up his responses, but I also don’t want him so settled in it that if I raise my voice a little, he has a panic attack, even if it’s a little one.”

“Well, maybe we need to sort through the emotional distress he was in while being with you. I’m going to have to sort through some of mine…” She said and as though on cue, Jasper came in with the letters and began setting them in the stacks on the table. “We’re going to get to the bottom of all of the stuff that we were feeling and try to figure out what to do with all of that.” Henry looked indescribably grateful. She whispered, “You need to start by opening up to him the same way that you opened up to me on that elevator.”

“Won’t that sound like me making excuses?” “No. Open up about who you were at that time, what you’re aware of, what you did to him and then go from there. I’ll be right here…” She realized that it was super quiet and they turned to see Jasper, standing next to the table, wondering what they were whispering about. She smiled and came to him, “Hey. You feeling better?”

“Yeah. I just needed you to validate me,” he said it cooly and shrugged his shoulders, but he meant that down to his core. She kissed him on the cheek and took a seat at the table. 

Henry came up next and Jasper frowned, but Henry opened his arms and asked, “Is it okay if we hug this out?” Charlotte cleared her throat and smiled. Jasper gave Henry a buddy hug, with a shoulder pat and sat next to Charlotte. She flared her nostrils. She’d told Henry where to start. And it wasn’t any damn hug! 

Now, Henry began his talk to Jasper. He kneeled between he and Charlotte, but was looking at Jasper, who looked a little bit confused, but was paying attention. “Jasper. I want to make up for so much of what I did to you, and I realize that not only back then, but every lingering bit of fear or sadness that you have because of that is my responsibility to tend to and make it up to you.” Jasper furrowed his eyebrows, but his shoulders relaxed and both Henry and Charlotte noticed that small gesture. “I know that I’ve mentioned this before and you weren’t really interested in talking about it, but I definitely emotionally abused you when we were together. I gaslit you. I manipulated you. I lashed out at you. Sometimes, I was very conscious of my lies and my games, and sometimes, those toxic parts of me just came out naturally and unfortunately, you were the closest person to me and the most frequent target of rage and sorrow that had nothing to do with you. I’m so sorry that I did those things and that it’s still bothering you, to this day.” THIS would have been the time to ask for the hug, Charlotte sighted. She took that time to reach over on the table and take Jasper’s hand. He intertwined their fingers, but hadn’t taken his eyes off of Henry.

“SO, I’m going to use the best of my ability to try to help you to heal from my harm, if you’ll let me. But, I need you to know and to believe that I am not doing this because of Charlotte. I’ve meant what I said, and I feel what I feel for both of you, whether or not that gets reciprocated.” He reached out and cupped Jasper’s face and Jasper tilted his head, slightly, rubbing closer to it. Jasper’s eyes closed and he experienced this gentleness for a moment, something that he had wished for, for a long time. Henry glanced at Charlotte and she puckered up her lips and gestured. He looked confused, but moved forward, and stopped just at Jasper’s face. Jasper’s eyes quickly opened as he recognized how close Henry was to him and Henry’s eyes were closed now, but he was moving forward and Charlotte let go of Jasper’s hand for this moment that he supposed she approved of. 

And it was everything that he remembered it was, but not as cold. It was like true love’s kiss, finally, from someone he had long since thought was his soul mate. He barely wanted it to end, but when it did, Henry simply leaned back and stared into his eyes, cupping his face. Jasper took a swallow. His mouth was dry and his hands were sweaty. He gently removed Henry’s hands from his face and reached for Charlotte’s again, hoping that she would accept it; that he hadn’t misread her silence. She intertwined their fingers, smiled softly at him and stroked the back of his hand with her thumb. For a moment, he didn���t think about Henry’s lips or how gingerly he touched him. For a moment, he was looking at his true love, his soul mate.

When Henry stood up to go to the other seat at the table, Jasper watched him. There it was again. The same butterflies, the same heart eyes. He didn’t know how it was possible to feel so strongly and deeply for more than one person, but he did. Both of these loves were true, and nobody would ever be able to convince him otherwise.

Charlotte said, “Okay… I love what you’ve done here. I think I’m ready to dive right in. The stacks can serve as a bit of trigger warning, but I think that I’ll read them in order, if that doesn’t make you feel like you worked on organizing for nothing.”

“No! Do whatever you need to do.” He shuffled his chair closer to her so that he could hold her free hand, and also have his arm around her. She’d told him numerous times that his big arms made her feel safe. He peppered her temple with kisses accordingly, through her reading and Henry sat, bouncing his leg and waiting for moments to answer questions, or fetch water, or whatever Jasper and Charlotte would ask or demand of him.

.

(Day 1) Dear Charlotte, 

Okay… My thoughts are kinda all over the place, at the moment. It's’s taken me a long time to figure out what I need to say and I still don’t feel like it came out right or like I’ve earned the right to even say anything to you. Less than 24 hours, and you seemed to have obliterated me from your life, and I get it. I promise, I do. I don’t believe that it's forever, and I hope that it isn’t for long. You and I were building a life, and I was the one who came through and bulldozed it down by talking to other women and behaving like a down low hoe… I still promise you - I’ve never touched anyone else. I never would have. It shouldn’t have been so much fun to me to talk dirty and exchange photos and fantasize. My love for you should have been enough to tide me over, just like you said, whether or not I was in any danger. But… you’re my goddess, Charlotte. I never had faith in much, but I’ve always had faith in you. I don’t know how I will ever survive without you. You keep me whole and balanced and safe. Please, if you can’t forgive me, can you have mercy on me? You have no idea what I went through when I was in that place. Scratch that. I’m sorry. What I meant to say was I went through something and I don’t think that I’ll be okay if I can’t have you here with me to help me recover. You don’t owe me, not after what I did, but please. I’m begging you, Char. Please, don’t forsake me right now. Please, just save me this once more and I’ll never ask anything of you again. I’ll offer you every sacrifice. I’ll dedicate my entire life to this. Please. Please… don’t have actually abandoned me. Please, be coming back, at least to call me stupid and tell me off. I can’t handle this silence. I can’t handle this darkness. I’m so sorry. I promise, I love you. I’m sorry that I didn’t do it right in the dark. 

Love, Henry. 

P.S. I will never do anything to risk us again. I promise. Even if you won’t take me back. I need my friend for what is haunting my mind right now. 

Charlotte slapped that one face down and almost started crying. “You wanna stop?” Jasper asked, concerned. 

She shook her head and looked up at Henry. He looked like he was in pain. Even though she read it to herself, he had pretty much memorized those letters. He looked over them all of the time. He’d used them for key points to focus on whenever he went to therapy. He knew that she knew what he’d been going through now, and he wished that he hadn’t sprung that on her in the elevator. She whimpered, “Does Jasper know? What was in your head at the time?”

Henry shook his head, fighting off tears. This was his muck. He couldn’t cry right now. “I didn’t want to open up to Jasper about it. I was subconsciously worried that if I talked to anybody but you about it, you’d feel betrayed again.”

“So… He still doesn’t know?” She asked, incredulously.

“Whenever I said it to you in the elevator, that was the first time that I said it out loud to anybody but Ray. That was the first time I admitted it to someone who wasn’t there when it happened.” Charlotte reached for the second letter and Henry wondered, “Should I tell him now?” She looked at Jasper.

Jasper shook his head, “I don’t want to hear anything that might distract me from taking care of Char right now, unless I need to know it TO take care of her.”

“Later, then,” she said and already felt exhausted as she read on, letter after letter of the same thing in different ways. The handwriting got increasingly bad for a bit, like he was too emotional to really get the words properly. After a few days, there were more mistakes, some letters were written in pencil and the erase marks caused holes in the paper. Many of them were slightly ruined by tear stains. He always apologized for the condition of less than pristine letters, but his tone was everchanging. He was becoming very angry about things. His moods swinging, even in the process of writing, from being angry, to being apologetic and pointing out that he knew he didn’t have a right to feel that way. 

Day 17, Dear Charlotte,

I tell you that I love you everyday, but you never get to read it or hear it. I don’t know if I send up a prayer, will you somehow know? They told me that you’ve moved out of state. They’ve told me that you SAID TO THEM that you didn’t want to be near me, see me, talk to me, or have to ever even run into me. You don’t think that’s harsh? You don’t think that even though I GROSSLY messed up and did something very, VERY wrong that remorse and repentance should be at least discussed? All of the years that we were friends and all of the years that we were lovers, I honestly didn’t earn any leeway for doing something wrong?

“Ugh… You didn’t just do something WRONG, what you did was selfish, destructive, a violation of my trust, and of the stability and integrity of the relationship! You write these letters like I somehow did something TO YOU because of how I responded to what you did TO ME!” She fussed, as she read. He knew that she wasn’t looking for feedback. She had done similar things throughout this reading project. 

All of those years, I thought that no matter what we ever did to each other, that neither of us would ever do something like this. If you had done this, I would have forgiven you. Maybe, you might think that we both know that you would never do something like this, but we don’t know that for sure and you don’t know how hard it is for me. My responsibilities started at a very early age. I’ve had to always man up and take care of everybody around me. In my mind… I thought that I deserved more from you. I hate to say that. Now, I know that I was mistaken, by the simple fact that everyday you’ve been gone feels like dying. I feel like I agree with what you said that night… I should have died…

“I NEVER said that you should have died!” She shrieked and sniffled and pushed the letter away from her, not even wanting to read the rest of it. “That’s not what I said! What I said was bad and I’m sorry, but if that was what you thought I said all these years, I…” she stood up and tried to catch her breath. 

Jasper jumped up and collected her from the table. “I think we’re done for tonight,” He told Henry. He cuffed her closely to himself and escorted her to her bedroom. After a while, he came back out and sat in his seat. He sighed and shook his head, “It was unfair of us to make her feel like she had to read any of this. She shouldn’t be crying herself to sleep for reacting in anger to something infuriating that you did to her.”

“I know. I agree.”

“What do we do? She asked me to not even sleep in her room tonight. She never wants me gone when she’s asleep.” He rested his face on his fists and Henry came around the table and rubbed his back, then laid on it and rubbed his arms. Jasper allowed it for a while, but then he shook him off and shook his head. “I wanna be available, if she needs me,” he said. He got up, left the table and made himself a little pallet outside of her room to lay down, charge his phone and get a little bit of rest.

.

Eventually, she came out of the room. Jasper was asleep on the floor and she immediately felt bad. For some reason, she thought that maybe he and Henry would spend the night together, but she might have known that as her official boyfriend, he would have felt obligated to try to be there for her. She leaned down and shook him a little, “Jasper,” she whispered. He was a pretty deep sleeper. She’d joke that she hoped nobody ever broke in, because they’d make it out with everything and might even be able to kill her while he slept. He declared that if he heard her in danger, he’d definitely most likely be woken up by that.

She tried in vain to get him to wake him up back she barely even got him to budge. Charlotte sighed, grabbed her fuzzy blanket and laid right next to him. If you can't beat them, join them. Where was Henry? 

Charlotte found him still at the table, staring at the letters across from him. Whenever she appeared, he stood quickly to come to her. "Are you doing okay?"

She hugged herself and cleared her throat, “Jasper fell asleep on the floor and I can’t wake him up to get him into bed.” He nodded and moved quickly to help her out. 

Jasper woke up as Henry tried to hoist him. “What are you doing?” He asked groggily. 

“Char wants you in bed,” Henry said. 

Suddenly, Jasper was more alert. “Char! You okay, Babe?” He found his footing and she nodded and took his hand, leading him into the room. Henry stayed at the door. Jasper was speaking softly to her. Henry couldn’t hear, but he turned to leave and Charlotte caught his hand. Jasper was climbing into bed. 

“I didn’t say that,” Charlotte said, softly. “I was very angry and very hurt, but I didn’t say what you wrote I said. I wouldn’t say that to anybody, not even you at my angriest!” She sniffled. “I… was really mad at my dad. Whenever he left my mom, I felt like I needed to try to be there for her and she was like, ‘No, go be with Henry. You’ve already planned to move out…”

“My mom was alone in the house for years. My dad left and I moved in with Henry and she was there dealing with an empty nest and a failed marriage. He was in and out of her life and I was only checking in part time, because I had so many things I was trying to build. But, I thought those things were worth it, to maybe not be able to put as much energy into her as she might have needed at that point.

For me, I was leaving her behind, but I rationalized, because she told me to do what would make me happy, and I thought that was Henry… 

Then this happened and I just couldn’t believe that I’d left my mom behind for someone who would do this to me. Somebody that I felt was obviously just like my father. So… I was definitely mad at Henry, but I felt like I was reliving a lot of my rage towards my dad and I guess that I melded the two in my brain and I snapped that night.”

“I left my mom alone during the hardest part of her life, so that I could build a life with you. It just… I was hurt and angry, but that’s not what I said and it’s important that you process this.” He nodded his head and moved a few tendrils of hair from her face. She sniffled again and he offered a semi smile. No matter what, Charlotte hated crying in front of people. She loved crying. Scientifically, she knew that if the body was doing so, it needed that emotional release, but she didn't like the misfortune of someone witnessing it. That made her feel exposed. She was fine to roam around completely naked in front of someone, but crying? That was just too intimate. Henry realized at that moment, even for him.

"You wanna come in?" She wondered. He nodded and when she closed the door after him, he got into her bed and offered her an embrace that she gladly came into. 

Jasper was next to him, eyes open and just musing. Henry spoke. "I was done with them, that night. I knew before you even found out that I needed to distance myself from anything that might take my attention off of you. I talk about it in a letter, too. How I was ready to come home safe and MARRY you after the days that Ray and I had on that mission. I was gonna cut out Bianca, Chloe and every other girl that I was talking to at that time. I was gonna ask Jasper to start helping me look for rings. I just wanted to know that no matter what I did… particularly… what I had to do to make sure that I got back home to you… I needed to know that you could still love me."

"You had to kill someone to get back home to me."

"I did," he cleared his throat and said, "I didn't quite get over it. I'm still working through it. It doesn't happen frequently, but has happened since. It's never okay and I never even have an excuse anymore. So… I just deal with it." He shrugged his shoulders and Jasper sat up and moved in behind Char to hug her from behind and rest his head on her shoulder, pulling Henry closer to both of them and strumming his hair. "How are Jasper's hugs still the very best thing in the world, even from a person away?" Henry asked.

"Because he's Jasper," Charlotte said, like that explained it all. Jasper was happy to see that between the other two, it honestly seemed to.

.

"The hardest letters were the ones where I had to admit and apologize for being a shitty person. The threesome with the Woods Girls, some of my more detailed examples of rudeness to Jasper… and somehow the easiest ones were ones that I was having a full out mental breakdown while writing. It's like Char and Jasp could sense how distraught I was and they felt bad for me. We're working our way to the last of them. With every single one, I feel like I get a little bit lighter and like we get a little bit closer and that was ultimately what I wanted the most. 

It gives a doorway for Charlotte to ask me things that she didn't know that she cared to know about and for me to explain things to Jasper that I wasn't man enough to admit to him back then. I feel like they have newfound respect for me, or at least they like being around me again and I'm just… Piper told me that my smiles look real again."

"I'm surrounded by fake people all of the time. I know a real smile when I see one."

(Caption) Piper Hart, Public Figure, Media Influencer, Founder of Pay the Piper Enterprises, Henry is Her Brother, She’s not “Henry’s Sister.”

.

Henry was in his office for a really long time, lately. Charlotte noticed it first, because she was attentive and suspicious by nature. Plus, Jasper spent the first part of most days asleep. She had fully recovered and went back to work at the lounge, but her hours weren’t as hectic as Jasper’s were. She went in for evenings to waitress and left before people got too drunk, unless she was singing, in which she closed the place on stage. 

A typical day for her was to wake up for yoga and the sunrise, which the guys met her on the balcony for… They would talk while it occured, not even watching it sometimes, whenever they had a nice chat going. Besides, nobody there thought that anything was more beautiful than seeing the others’ features come to life by the light of that rising sun. Henry would tend to plants and he and Jasper would hit the gym and have brunch. Jasper would come home and go to sleep while Henry would get washed up and go into his office, and Charlotte would do various things around the house to make sure the vibe felt good for everyone, then either get out and get some sunlight, stay in and write music or read books, or go the the Man Cave and work on her project. 

She spent a few days inside, so she noticed that Henry was spending way more time in his office than usual. She asked Jasper if he knew what that was about. “Maybe he’s taken in more clients to support you,” Jasper said. He said it casually and innocently, but Charlotte felt some kind of way about it. 

“I’ve never asked Henry for anything and yes, I got really comfortable being in his space and using his things, but that was mostly because he OFFERS things. He says, “I’ll cook you something.” He asks, “Want me to order whatever you need?” He custom made a bedroom for me years before we even spoke to each other. So, for Jasper to say that to me, like I was some kind of additional burden on Henry or something was hurtful, but I didn’t dwell on it.” *Folds her arms.

Charlotte waited in the living room, in a pantsuit, with a book, and whenever Henry came out of his office, he paused. “Is something wrong?” He wondered. “What is it?”

She put her bookmark that she’d created of the dried yellow rose petals in her book and shut it, then sat it down and stood up. “Is it Jasper?” He wondered. 

Charlotte approached, glanced at his office door and folded her arms, “Did you not have a client?”

“No. I had some other work to do. I usually just do all of my work in my office.”

“What other work did you have to do?” She asked.

“A few things concerning the show with the production team. Getting some of the house affairs reorganized with my assistant…”

“Like, everyday?” She wondered.

He furrowed his eyebrows. “Yeah, until I get it all sorted out. Is something the matter?”

“You’re lying to me,” she said, point blank. “And, I thought that we were beyond that. But, if we aren’t, I don’t see any reason to waste either of our time.” She reached for her book, and he reached for her wrist. She gasped when he touched her, flashing back to that night, even though this was completely different. This was gentle and warm and just as reflexive, but he wasn’t angry or upset, and she wasn’t as angry or upset. “Henry…”

He let go, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to put my hands on you. I just… It’s a surprise, for you and Jasper. Okay? Sorry I lied. I should have known that I wouldn’t be able to hide stuff from you and I should have thought about the fact that I’m not the easiest person to trust. But, I’m never going to do anything to hurt either of you, again. I promise you that and hopefully, one day you’ll see that I’m telling the truth about it.”

“I don’t really like surprises,” she said.

“I know… but it isn’t like a SURPRISE surprise. It’s more like, I’m putting some things in motion that I hope everyone will appreciate, okay?” She studied his body language, facial expression, the tone of his voice and the look in his eyes. She believed him.

“Okay.” She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek. “You’ll tell me if I’m putting you out by being here, right?”

“I want you here. I want both of you here, for as long as you’ll stay. Don’t worry about putting me out. You know what kind of money superheroes make?” He smiled. 

.

“Day 467.  Dear Charlotte,

Jasper told me that it’s our 1 year anniversary. Well, no… He told me “Happy One Year Anniversary,” and got me some nice gifts. I don’t know how you can actually count and pinpoint an exact date to something that began as a Friends with Benefits arrangement. Like… At what point did it become something to count the days and at what point was it decided that a year was significant? 

Like, a few months back whenever he said that since he’s been here for like a year, like everyday, he should just apply to be added to the lease, it sounded like a convenience thing. Why wouldn’t he say something like, “I’m your boyfriend and I’m here everyday, so we should move in together”? We’re best friends, but we also have sex and that makes things kinda murky. Now, he’s talking anniversaries and gifts and you know what, Charlotte?

Part of me is like, Rubberduck it. He’s good to me. He’s a complete GOD in the sack. Nice to look at. His hugs are like awesomely great and he will talk to you and listen to you about just about anything…”

“I agree with all of that,” Charlotte said and reached for Jasper’s hand, kissed it and kept going.

“The other part of me is like… Sure, he’s all of that, but you’ve been torn since day 1 and it is now… I just did the math on my phone and it has been 467 days since you left and I began writing these letters. I think… Maybe, it's about time that I stop. You will likely never return. I’ll likely never see you again. You’ll likely never read these and never know just how loved you actually were. You’ll probably always think that you were only loved until the point that you were betrayed and that maybe, I never actually loved you anyway. Because, who does things like that to somebody that they love? Maybe somebody that wasn’t properly taught to love, or wasn’t shown the healthiest of examples of it. It doesn’t matter anymore. All that matters is this…

When I got home that night, all I wanted was you. And, if you ever see this, I know that I’ll still feel the same. I’ll always love you more than life itself. But, it’s my anniversary, apparently and I have to try to love somebody else too. I have to try to move on. I have to try to be better in the future. I have a wonderful best friend who still wants me, even though I’m kinda highkey trash. I have to at least try to make it up to him, having been here to see me through getting over you. It didn’t work, but I won’t write again. I’ll have to just live with all of this. But, if we meet again, know that I’ll want you. Know that I’ll love you. Know that I’ll need you. I won’t ever find rest without you. I’m sorry that I caused this.

Goodbye, Charlotte.”

Jasper took a deep breath. “I can’t believe that we finally got to the end.”

“There’s another one,” she said, and picked up a heavy letter.

“No, there wasn’t. I opened all of them and sorted the whole first half before you came on board with reading, and I’ve been right here for the rest of the readings, too. That wasn’t part of it,” Jasper said.

Henry cleared his throat and said, “It’s new.”

Jasper frowned, “You wrote another one? Like… since we’ve been here?”

“Yeah,” Henry said. After the reading of that last one, Jasper didn’t know if he wanted to hear another one. 

Charlotte slid it across the table and said, “You read it to us.” Henry took a swallow, nodded his head and opened it. He definitely stumbled along the way and he knew that he paraphrased a few things. Reading right off of the page wasn’t exactly his best gift, but he knew the heart and soul of what he’d written there for them.

“Day One. Dear Charlotte and Jasper,

It’s so silly to call this day one, but I feel like we’ve now all come to a point where whatever lies in the future, it can be a new start for the three of us. I messed up with both of you, one way more than the other and in a way, I messed up longer and harder with one of you, because I was still holding on where I had been told to let go. I didn’t really respect either of you, upon further self examination. What I thought was love was tainted in a variety of ways and whenever I did good and nice things, I had begun to treat you both like I treat my obligations - doing it for the sake of being able to say that I did something nice or good. Which, at the end of the day is self-serving and underhanded. 

I had to lose every good thing that I had to realize that even if I could accumulate fine things, expensive things, high quality things, have every sexual exploit that my eyes desired and my mind could create and live what I would say has to be my best life… my life still wouldn’t be fruitful and I’d have zero joy, because I never knew love after you two were gone, and having both of you back in my life has been the hardest thing to process and the best joy that I have ever had. 

I love both of you so much and I really am willing to spend the rest of my life, my time, my energy, my money, my moments… just giving back to you as much as I can for all of the love that you each gave me when I didn’t know how to handle it in a healthy way. I’m so much better now, and you two are a big part of that. I never would have went to therapy if I hadn’t hurt the ones that I thought I cared so much about. I never would have unpacked my problems and toxicity. I hate that it turned out the way that it did between us, but I have hope that what will turn out from here on out will be harmonious and beautiful. The three of us, on one accord, for as long as you both are willing to have me, if you’re willing to have me…” He came around the table and Charlotte was tense. Jasper was close to tears. Henry got down on one knee, in between the two of them.

“What are you doing?” Charlotte wondered, suspiciously and kind of terrified.

He slid two rings out of the envelope and Jasper started crying. Henry said, “I know that legally we can’t really… commit to each other the way that I would want us to, but I felt the need to do something important and have a show of how significant you both are…” Jasper offered his hand and Henry slid one of the two rings onto his finger. Charlotte chewed on her lip and stared at the other ring in Henry’s hand. “It’s either the three of us, or I leave both of you alone. I won’t try to come in between you two.”

“It’s not that,” she said, trying not to cry. She hated that shit SO MUCH. The crying shit. “What if you find that I don’t fit into this? That it can’t be the three of us? What if I’m the one that winds up… It’s just that I worked really hard, and I keep having nothing to show for it. Not because I’m not good at things, but because I probably need to be… easier to deal with and I don’t know to do that. Everybody eventually catches on.” She wiped her face and started crying harder, angry that she was crying more than the initial fear of being the one in this group that messes up the emotional/romantic flow of this union. 

“We’re not gonna go it without you!” Jasper told her trying to make eye contact with her and taking her hands. “We won’t force you, but what you’re worried about, I promise you, I’m not letting it happen. You read those letters. You know what I’m willing to put up with and we both know that you’d never ever be able to manage that level of being hard to love. You’re amazing. You aren’t difficult at all. You have standards and you deserve them, and we’re gonna try to meet them, and if they get to be too hard to meet, we’ll talk to you about it. But, I’m never letting you go, if I can ever help it!” 

Henry pulled her closer to him and strummed her face, searching her eyes for a moment and said, “If I ever hurt you again, whatever I don’t do to punish myself, Jasper definitely wi-”

“I’ll beat the living shit out of him,” Jasper said before Henry’s declaration could be completed. Shakily, Charlotte offered her hand for Henry to put a ring on it. And she closed her eyes, cried, and leaned forward to give Henry the first real kiss that she had given him in a long time.

[serpentsangel]

Talk Me Down: Part Six

A/N: So sorry this is delayed, I’m currently away and had an extremely long day today (4:00am to 3:00pm) oof. And I also just haven’t been feeling well in terms of motivation and whatnot so writing was hard-hence why this is a shorter chapter than usual. I hope that once I get back home I can get my muse back. So apologies if this is crap

Plot: With Veronica and Betty taking (Y/N) into their group, a new threat arises and Reggie wonders if he can protect her from it until he can 

Words: 2,277

Part One // Part Two // Part Three // Part Four // Part Five

Part Six

(Y/N) yawns as she slowly gathers books and supplies from her locker and places them in her bag and when she goes to close her locker, she’s almost taken aback by the sudden appearance of Veronica and Betty. “You two scared the living hell out of me.” (Y/N) places a hand over her heart and feels the sudden speed of her beat but she laughs it off and adjusts the falling strap of her bag on her shoulder. “What can I help you with?”

“I wanted to say, I accept your apology.” Betty nudges Veronica. “And I’m sorry for not being the least bit understanding towards your attitude. You clearly have been through enough already and the least I can do is to set aside everything and help you through it.”

(Y/N) smiles softly. “You’re not at fault at all. You were already trying to get me accustomed here but it was I who pushed you away and therefore, I’m sorry but I am glad you are accepting my apology and just hope that from this day on, we can hopefully be friends to a degree. Right now the only person I really know is Reggie and hey, there’s just some things only girls can gossip to each other.” The three of them laugh as (Y/N) reaches her hand out and shakes it with Veronica and Betty.

“We saw Cheryl give you a River Vixens uniform and we would love to have you there.” Betty chirps up. “Your moves are killer and I know you have some of your own views about cheerleading, and we don’t mind that, but it’d be nice to…”

“One try won’t hurt.” (Y/N) pops in, opening her locker again, grabbing the uniform and placing it inside her bag.

“That’s great! We’ll see you at practice.” Betty and Veronica wave at (Y/N) as the two of them walk pass her.

(Y/N) turns back to wave them goodbye too before looking forward just to be scared again, this time by Cheryl. “What is it with people here and sneaking up on others? I feel like I’m going to die of a heart attack before I even graduate.”

“Oh, (Y/N), you and your silly sayings. How’s your mother? Haven’t seen her since the Rosewoods Charity Gala.” Cheryl folds her arms elegantly as she shifts her weight from one foot to the other. “Anyways, I’ve come here to see if you’ve thought about my offer. Especially because my girls and I have been training hard to maybe make it to Nationals, and with your talent by my side, I’m sure you and I can lead them there.”

“My mother is…..fine.” (Y/N) mumbles, not really wanting to bring any of her life from the outside into school, as if it isn’t bad enough already to have to go through, why would she want to bring any of that to the one place she can actually feel safe from her mothers wrath? “And I’m coming for one try, I don’t know if this even a thing I want to stick with.”

Cheryl rolls her eyes playfully. “Being a Vixen will change your life, trust me, it changed mine. And please, I’ve been a vixen for as long as I can remember, I’ve been a dancer for longer and I have to say, your talent is unlike anything I have ever seen. Like I said, we could really use someone like you. Stay if you’d like. It’s like poison, sweetheart, try it once and you can’t turn back.” Cheryl swirls and walks down the hallway before being rejoined by her two minions, leaving (Y/N) to stand there in her own thoughts. Maybe she shouldn’t be so afraid to do an extra activity, if she’s going to eventually reach to the hopes of being a normal student then maybe she needs a constant in her school life, and if studying regularly with Reggie is the constant, then maybe coming here isn’t worth it. The constant of studying and learning with one individual only inflicts too much memories of her homeschooled life under the watchful gaze of her mother. Looking down at the uniform in her bag, (Y/N) shoves it to the lowest point, pushing it aside as she heads down to maths.

The class is already starting to fill up and (Y/N) grumbles as she finds some random seat next to a boy she has yet to learn the name of. As she sits down, the boy pauses conversations with his friends and turns his attention to (Y/N). “Hey, I don’t think I’ve introduced myself yet. I’m Chuck.” Chuck extends out a hand to which (Y/N) shakes carefully, going to her books and taking out all the required items for the class. “I don’t want you to think I’m one of those students that looks at you like a circus animal, I just want to welcome you into our school. Not everyone in this school is as mean as they make themselves out to be.”

“That’s somewhat comforting but so far, I’ve only met three decently nice people.” (Y/N) states, not looking at Chuck as she opens her text book and turns to the pages that were required for the class. “And I’m sure there are nice people out there but they aren’t anywhere near me.”

“Consider me the fourth decently nice person.” Chuck smiles, turning his body to face the front of the class. “Students can be tough, especially when you’re as notorious as you are but I look past that. I’m pretty sure you can be as normal as everyone else because we’re all human, right?”

(Y/N) shrugs her shoulders. “I guess so but normality is subjective. Everyone experiences it differently and everyone considers it differently. So, however low or high your standards of normality may be, regardless of the fact that we are all ‘human’, I  could be considered insane and not anywhere near to being normal. You take the pick.” Through class, the two made small talk here and there, mainly just (y/N) feeling not to bothered for that much social interaction so early in the morning. It was towards the end that they realized they also shared a class afterwards and while (y/N) took time to make sure she gathered everything, Chuck waited patiently before the two of them headed out to their next class.

“So, I’m not sure what your interests are but I’m holding a party this week with a few friends and I want to invite you over. Introduce you to some of my pals, show them that you’re just a regular high school student. It’s nothing too serious, not too big, not too crazy, just a couple of friends getting together away from the stress of school.” The two of them walk side by side, trying to avoid bumping into any of the other rushing students.

(Y/N) thinks for a moment to herself. The sound of a party peaking her interest but also the sound of it is horrendous. In her mind, all parties included the same thing, booze, mindless drink games and a hook up, not something she really wants to engage in when people still believe her to be a cannibal and or a spy but then again, if she’s going to try and change peoples minds about her then maybe this isn’t as bad as she is making it out to be. “I’ll think about it. I’ve got a study session with Reggie this Saturday but if it’s Sunday or Friday, I can probably make it but don’t hold me to my words, yet.”

“I won’t.”

**** A new day. New opportunities. New chances. As happy as (Y/N) is that Veronica and Betty accepted her apology, and that she’s met at least one more guy that isn’t Reggie, the horror of lunch time still haunts her as she wonders if she’s high enough in anyones social blade to warrant her the pass to sit with them. It hurts more when you know them and have spoken but you still are enough of a stranger to not be on their table and for the first time in her life, (Y/N) felt the pain of lack of friendship. Just as she is getting ready to sit alone at her usual table, she hears Veronica call her out. (Y/N) looks up and sees her waving her over. (Y/N)’s brain suddenly goes into overdrive as she’s given the window of opportunity but hesitates on acting on it.

Eventually she takes her tray and walks towards the table, not able to shake off the feeling of the entire room staring at her as she sits down next to Betty. “Welcome, (Y/N). I’d like to introduce you to everyone. This is Kevin. You know Veronica, next to her is Archie and I’d introduce you to Jughead but he’s moved schools and is only around here sometimes.” Betty excitedly welcomes (Y/N), who says hello to all the new faces she hasn’t had the chance to meet yet. “So, how are you finding Riverdale High so far?”

“It’s not what I expected to be honest.” (Y/N) pauses to take a bite out of her sandwich as she wipes the corners of her lips of sauce. “I mean, it’s better than being homeschooled because then I can at least do things that any other old teen would do. It’s nice to get out and whatnot. Also, to have activities that aren’t just tending the garden or feeding my mothers pets.” (Y/N) laughs.

“We’re here to make sure that you are given the best high school experience, ever. Betty and I can take you to Vixen’s practice each time, that is if you choose to stay.” Veronica offers. “Kevin is profound in the arts and is aiming to direct a school play one day and Archiekins here is musically talented. There’s also Josie, who is the Mayors daughter, and has a band of her own but they’re a little bit exclusive to their own. This school is a gold mine for you, just make sure you have a sharp eye.” She sighs. “As much as I adore this school for what it is, not every place is perfect and you get bad apples here and there.”

“Especially Cheryl Blossom.” Kevin chimes in. “She’s a walking Black Widow ready to strike. Don’t be fooled by her cherry red smile, she’ll play you like a friend, then when you least expect it, she’ll find a way to tear you down. Especially you.”

(Y/N) raises an eyebrow as she pushes her tray a little forward. “What about me?”

“Cheryl runs on social power. It’s how she manages to keep roaming the halls like she owns the place.” Betty explains. “If someone poses as a threat to that order, then she’ll see them as a target. A threat. People have been curious about you since you arrived and all the attention is towards you and not to mention the fact that you completely dominated the dance floor that one day at Vixens practice, which I must say, was pretty sick.”

“I just don’t get it.” (Y/N) groans. “Why am I so fascinating? What is so great about a girl who was practically locked up in her home most of her life? Its a lot more depressing than fascinating.”

“It’s because your family is known in Riverdale’s Elite and when you have that social rank but is never seen, it’s going to get people curious and talking and the rumours start.” Kevin states. “And trust me people do talk, half of which is ridiculous if you have any ounce of a sensible brain.”

“Whatever it is, there’s nothing Cheryl can do that can tear me down. I’ve built enough of an exterior, itd be tough to break it down enough for me to be a social mess. And besides, how bad can she get?”

**** At the end of school, Veronica and Betty waited for (Y/N) as she tried on the Vixens uniform, once she manages to get it on, she walks out and both girls look at her happily. “You look like a natural, my friend. Now, are you ready to rock it out there?” (Y/N) nods as she follows the girls to the outside field, right by where the football team were practicing. Cheryl is still busy setting up as (y/N) joins one of the other Vixens in stretching.

In the distance, Reggie approaches the field with his helmet, seeing Chuck wave over at someone with a big smile on his face. Curious, Reggie follows the direction and sees him waving at (Y/N) and he couldn’t tell what shocked him more, the fact that (Y/N) is in a Vixen’s uniform even after she said she wasn’t going to, or the fact that he just spotted Chuck creepily waving at her and (Y/N) acknowledging him back. “Whatever it is that you’re planning to do, you better get the idea out of your head, Chuck or I will ruin you.”

Chuck scoffs. “Please, not all of us are sleaze’s Reg. She’s coming to my party.” He smirks. “Try to stop me then.” He places his helmet on as he runs off to join his mates, Reggie clutching his helmet tightly as he looks back at (Y/N) staring at her momentarily before sighing, the least he can do is protect her from the other dirt that threatens the wound, at least until he’s the one to open it.

TAGLIST: @serpent-squad @daddyxpea @notanotherfangirl @superhalsteads @abbigail-583 @static-heart-break @thesouthside-princess @idontknowhatiwant168393 @djdre92 @maryosprinkle @jimmys-afterlife-love @sarasmismyonlydefence@ccshbh @sweetpeaprompts @fantasiasvt @flannels-and-fire @xeniarocks​

Want to be added to the taglist? Just message me and I’ll add you into the next chapter!

[existentialterror]

A humble compendium of asexual dating advice

Happy asexual awareness week! I’ve been aware of (my) asexuality for 2.5 years now and am currently happily dating a couple very wonderful gentlemen. I’ve been asked for advice, and it’s also come up at ace meetups. While I can’t speak for everyone, I’m going to write what advice I would have liked to hear. Maybe you’ll find it useful too. For seeking out potential partners, I’m going to assume that you want to find a broad dating pool, and also that you want to avoid unnecessarily painful rejection. Some rejection is going to happen and in fact will always happen in any dating situation, of course. But while being ace is nothing to be ashamed of and isn’t something terrible you have to “warn” a potential partner about, there are a lot of very nice people who are just incompatible with ace partners, and our goal is A) for you to be happy, and B) for you and them to realize this incompatibility as early on as possible.

Online dating sites

I’d find the biggest dating platform in your region among the age demographic you’re looking at. As you might imagine, being in a big city or being open to long-distance dating helps. For a lot of places, that platform is OKcupid. Here’s my strategy:

Mark yourself as “asexual” in addition to other relevant romantic preferences.

Then, mention it again in the text of your profile. Asexuality is an umbrella term, so quickly describe what that implies for dating you. I like the phrasing “I identify as X, which for me means...” (This tip brought to you by several iterations of refining my okc profile, interspersed with new dates gradually getting less confused about what my actual preferences were. Trial and error: it works!)

After this, you can sort matches by asexuality. But there are also people who aren’t ace, but wouldn’t mind dating an ace person. I recommend the Chrome plugin “OkCupid (for the non-mainstream user).” Among other settings, it has an “asexual-friendly” setting that filters through a person’s question for ones relevant to ace dating, and shows you their answers on their profile page. Turn this one on and leave it on.

Click and message away!

Oh, yeah, especially if you’re a lady, you are probably going to get some sexual messages anyways, and you might get some messages asking you about the ace thing. All I can say is use that block/report button liberally, or just ignore them. (Screenshot the really weird ones to show your friends for a good horrified laugh. And then report the senders.) You can respond to anything if you want, but even if someone’s apparently completely nice and polite and is just curious about how the ace thing works, you still don’t have to respond to them - that’s not what you’re here for. There are also some ace-specific dating websites. I think the idea is neat, but haven’t tried any, and every ace person I’ve talked about them has said the same thing, but maybe you’ll be the first.

If you’re not sure how to describe yourself, I endorse this mindset about orientation labels being about communicating preferences. You might find it helpful too.

In person You can ask people out in person too! You don’t have to disclose being ace on the first date or anything, if sexual preferences haven’t come up. That said, I recommend getting it out there early on - see “The talk” later down.

If there’s a social or friend group you might want to date in, and the circumstances are right - the group is at least somewhat LGBTQ+ and/or sex positive, etc - maybe try to have it be known that you’re ace. It’s not a big deal, and it’s a reasonable thing to bring up if the conversation turns to sex, dating, etc. I like it because it’s an extra screening measure - if people approach you for dating, they’re more likely to have a sense of what’s in store. Even if they don’t know, a lot of dating starts with people telling their close friends that they’re crushing on so-and-so or “who is that, they’re so cute”. Even if the person gushing doesn’t know, their close friend might know and be able to tell them. Also, being visibly ace is pretty cool, and you might be able to help other people come to important realizations about themselves.

Polyamory

Obviously not for everyone, but if you think polyamory sounds interesting and there’s a local poly community (or you’re connected to ones via friends, internet, w/e), it might be worth checking it out. This can expand your dating pool - there are lots of people who dislike the idea of not having sex, but are more than willing to date people who don’t want to have sex, if they can get sex elsewhere. I also suspect poly communities also tend to be more aware of and cool with LGBTQ-ness and unusual preferences about sex, like not having it, but YMMV. If there are meetups around, or places where the poly people congregate, it might be worth going as a social adventure and seeing if the people there seem like the kind of people you can hang with. Poly dating is like normal dating, but a little weirder because we don’t have all the cultural scripts for things like “when do you tell a partner you’re dating someone else” or “what kind of small talk do I make with my metamour”. In general, communicate and be kind. I like the books More Than Two and The Ethical Slut. (I do worry there’s a minority of aces out there who really aren’t into to the idea of polyamory, but think it’s the only way they can date without ‘inflicting’ themselves on sexual people, and I want to be clear that if this describes you: hang on, don’t do polyamory, and look around some more. There are lovely people out there who will be thrilled to date just you, and it’s worth taking the time to find them.)

“The talk” At some point, you are probably going to want to have some kind of actual conversation in which you say you are asexual and what that implies for dating you. This might not be necessary if you’ve already talked about asexuality a bunch, but even if you think the other person knows, or it was on your dating profile so they really ought to know, have it anyways. They might actually not know, or they might have questions. It’ll also open up the floor for any concerns, and ensure that everyone is on the same page. I recommend doing this early on, when the stakes are low and both of you are still feeling things out. My guess is that it’s slightly better to have this talk face-to-face, but if distance bars or if you’re very shy, I’d say 100% do it via a text medium. Especially if you’re worried they’ll be weird about it. It’ll give you the space to choose your words carefully, and it’ll also mean you’re more likely to get a response that’s more thought out and truer to what the other person actually thinks, rather than their immediate first reaction. Fortunately, after this, you won’t have to talk about all this awkward boundary stuff again. Just kidding.

All the talks that come after

You have to keep talking about comfort and boundaries and what you want. This definitely isn’t ace specific. We’re messy people with bodies and lives. The edges of my comfort zone have changed over time, maybe from person to person as well, and they might for you too. Your partner will have them as well, even if they’re not ace. I have this sense that society has sort of a pattern of what a typical romantic or sexual encounter looks like - what kind of touching or contact happens, in what order, over what timeline - and that if that’s what you both want, you don’t have to talk about it much, but if you want something else, you have to clearly explain what that is. Maybe I’m wrong and nobody’s dating actually looks like the first case. Either way, once I’m getting physical with people I’m dating, even after we’ve had the “yes I’m ace” talk, they or I generally start another, more practical talk. I always feel like these talks are a little bit like pulling teeth, but even if you feel that way too, they’re good to have. There are some things that don’t naturally come up (or get remembered) long before you get physical, but that it makes sense to establish early on in the process:

Places on your body you don’t want touched

Activities or escalations you definitely don’t want to do right now

Kinds of sensation or touch you don’t like

Kinds of sensation or touch you do like

Ask your partner what their answers are too. They might be like “I’m up for anything” or they might not be. (Particularly if they’re ace too!) While I remember boundaries, I tend to forget the answer to “what kind of touch do you specifically enjoy” right after a cuddle session, and have to re-derive it from experimental evidence, at which point it sticks. I wish everyone had secret google docs about their gushy physical preferences for their dates to refer to. This is a tangent but I think it’s a great idea. Anyway, note is that you don’t have to precisely define all of your preferences right now in this conversation - you’re just giving them a road map for right now. You’ll keep having versions of it as things come up - “little to the left, ooh I’m ticklish there, not good”. It’s also reasonable to lay out some broad boundaries or preferences and then be like “okay, explore.” Expressing a positive response to your partner doing something nice (”that feels amazing”, etc) is highly recommended. Tips -

This article from Captain Awkward is not quite about this topic, but it’s relevant and sweet and powerful. You’re going to keep talking about preferences and boundaries and desires as long as you’re romancing, so you’ll figure it out.

If you’re up for it, giving each other back massages is good and classic practice for communicating your desires about touch.

Make sure you’re enjoying things and don’t have reservations

Finally, as things go, check in with yourself and/or the other person. Are you enjoying things? Are they enjoying things? Does anything feel off? To ask yourself: Do you feel safe, respected, and happy? If your boundaries are being disrespected or criticized, or you find yourself being talked into things you don’t enjoy, get out of there. If you’re just not enjoying yourself, or something feels strange or bad, still consider getting out of there - you don’t need an airtight reason - or at least talking to the other person. You deserve to be enthusiastic and happy about a relationship! If the other person rejects you and it’s because of the asexuality

I’m sorry, I’ve been there and it sucks. Maybe you're into someone and they just can’t do relationships without sex (or whatever - some fundamental preference incompatibility.) Maybe they can do ace relationships sometimes, but not right now, or not with you. Maybe that’s not even the real reason, but asexuality felt to them like an acceptable, no-one’s-fault reason to offer, so that’s what they told you. (Rejection is by no means an ace-specific phenomenon, but I think it feels worse when it’s pointed at something you knew was going to make dating hard, or part of your identity, or something you’re already a little unsure about. I don’t know if this is universal, but when a relationship is going south, I sometimes catch myself wondering if I should offer to start having sex with them. “If I do, they might like me more, or get back together with me, or spend more time with me, and it wouldn’t be that bad, and...”

And here’s the thing: every single time I think that, that’s my brain trying to solve the wrong problem. It probably wouldn’t work, plus I’d be miserable, and I should not do the thing. I’m not going to say this is 100% always true for you too, but if you start wondering the above, I invite you to STRONGLY CONSIDER that your brain is lying to you. Your boundaries are important and meaningful and you don’t need to compromise on them.) Ultimately, whether it was kind or not, they don’t want to date you, and there’s nothing you can do to change that. Sit tight, feel your feelings, take care of yourself. You didn’t do anything wrong by being asexual or by having a boundary. Once you feel like it, dust yourself off and get out there again.

Finally, of course, your worth and your happiness don’t depend on you dating anyone at all. But it is nice, and if you want to, you can. Good luck, fellow aces!

[jarienn972]

Only a Little Superstitious - Chapter Six

With my kids spending the week with my mother, I’m looking forward to some peace and quiet to get some writing and editing done.  This ended up being a long chapter but there are a lot of little, very important things woven into his installment.  Apologies to @killian-whump as there isn’t a whole lot of actual whump in this chapter  - there is a little angst on Emma’s part, but don’t worry - I’m definitely not done with our injured pirate.

AO3  FF.net    Tumblr: Chap 1  Chap 2  Chap 3  Chap 4  Chap 5

Emma tried not to dally too long in the bathroom, not wanting to appear rude and be late when invited to dine by one's host. At least she now felt a tad more presentable although there really wasn't much she could do about her filthy blood-stained clothing at the moment. She was quite certain that Grandmother Sarah Bending Willow already sensed she was hiding something by not immediately removing her leather jacket but she couldn't take it off until she was in the privacy of the tiny bath, shrugging it off and carefully folding it to keep Killian's hook concealed within.

Now that they were on the Sun Valley floor, she retrieved her cell phone for the first time in hours knowing she needed to check in with her family and trying to keep a positive outlook when she glanced down to check the battery charge level. 45 percent – not bad considering she'd been out of range of a tower for so long. It would at least give her a few minutes to speak to her parents before she'd have to try to scrounge up a charger somewhere. What surprised her more than the battery indicator was the time displayed – nearly 6:30pm here in Arizona which meant it was after dark back home. Had it really been twelve hours since she and Killian had met her parents for breakfast at Granny's? It didn't seem plausible – unless the portal had somehow altered time for them? So many things made so little sense right now…

She ducked outside with her jacket balled up and tucked under her arm just in time to see Ranger Littlecreek climbing into his SUV to head back to work for the rest of his shift. He didn't have much time for farewells, but he promised he'd check back with her as soon as he could and assured her that Grandmother would take good care of them. Not having had a clock at the way station and pretty sure her cell phone time wouldn't have been reliable up on the mountain, Emma wanted to ask him what time it had been when he'd arrived at the cabin, but she decided to save that for later. Her story already sounded like the ramblings of a crazy person. Why add fuel to that fire?

So, she kept her question to herself and instead tapped the speed dial number for her father's phone.

"Emma!" her father answered a little too enthusiastically. "I'm so glad you found a way to call back. Are you okay?"

"Dad, I'm in Arizona, not another realm. Just had to get to a place with cell phone service. And to answer your question, we're fine for now. A Park Service Ranger found us and brought us down to the home of his Navajo grandmother who was kind enough to treat Killian's wound with some natural potions and herbs. He's sleeping again now…"

"Why didn't you go straight to a hospital" David sounded confused at her decision.

"Honestly, Dad, I was a little bit afraid to. When you said that the man who stabbed Killian followed us through the portal, all I could think of is that he's already hunting for us. The first place I would start searching would be hospitals and urgent care locations and until we know more, I just couldn't take the chance that this mystery person would think the same way. Have you learned anything more about this pair that started this mess?"

"Not yet. Regina hasn't gotten back in touch with us yet, but knowing her, she'll get a name out of our prisoner. Hopefully, we'll hear from her by morning."

"Okay. Call me or text me as soon as you know anything. I've got to try and find a charger for my phone and maybe some clean clothes if I can get to a store around here, but please, let everyone back home know that for now, we're safe."

"Try to stay that way," David insisted. "I'll call you as soon as we know anything else."

"Thanks, Dad," she said as she disconnected the call just as a grumble from her stomach reminded her that their gracious host had offered dinner and she wasn't about to decline that offer.

She hadn't thought of herself as being that ravenously hungry until she'd completely devoured the offered bowl of stew and a piece of bread that she could only describe as a thick, puffy tortilla that had been flash fried in oil. It was warm, crispy on the outside and chewy inside and was a perfect accompaniment for the savory stew - so good that it had her desperately wishing to ask for seconds but she didn't want to appear greedy or disrespectful.

"I honestly wish there were words to describe just how much we appreciate everything you're doing for us, Grandmother," Emma thanked her.

"It is my honor to provide my meager services to someone who has been so dedicated to helping people," the elder woman replied with a humble smile causing Emma to nearly choke on her last bite of fried bread. Just what exactly did this woman know about her?

"I've helped a few people get through some tough scrapes…"

"You chose to become Sheriff," Grandmother explained her earlier words. "I'm sure your decision to enter law enforcement has aided many?"

"I guess," Emma deferred. "I suppose I've never really thought of it that way." Okay – it was about her being a Sheriff, not a savior.

"You're allowed to take pride in what you do. A little bit of pride isn't harmful." Emma had to stifle a chuckle at the old woman's advice. If only she knew what her work really entailed.

"Thank you for the advice. I'll have to keep that in mind the next time I'm dragging a drunk out of the alley behind the Rabbit Hole," she responded with a wide grin as the elder woman began clearing dishes from the table. "May I ask you a question though?"

"Of course, child. You may as me anything – except my age." Grandmother said with a sly smile on her lips.

"Your grandson said that you'd had a vision of someone needing help up on the mountain and that you'd been the one who sent him up to that way station earlier. Is that really how he managed to find us?"

"I used to see things all the time, but it has been many, many years since a vision has been so clear. I saw someone in distress near the summit trail so I asked Carlos if he would go there. He humors my eccentricities at times, but this time, I'm pleased that he listened to me."

"So are we. I don't know what we would have done if he hadn't come by… Would the man who attacked us have found us first or worse yet, would Killian have bled to death because I was too stubborn to call for help?"

"But those things did not happen. For now, you will be safe here, but I warn you that there is only so much I am able to do. I don't wish to frighten you but I am worried that the bleeding will not stop. The trouble is we only see what is on the surface, but below – below, I fear may lie a greater threat."

"What do you mean by that?" Emma wondered, a chill suddenly finding its way up her spine at the Navajo woman's mysterious choice of words.

"There is no way for me to be certain, but I fear that a piece of the blade used to stab him remains within…"

"Wait...," Emma gulped, all of her senses instantly heightened. "You think part of the knife might have broke off when it struck something inside his chest?" She didn't want to believe it. She knew her father had found the dagger after it had been dropped, but why wouldn't he have mentioned it was broken? Did it not occur to him how important that miniscule bit of information might be?

"I obviously cannot verify that. It is merely a feeling that I have."

"I'm inclined to believe that your 'feeling' is probably correct," Emma sighed, weary from exhaustion and a day filled with worry. "My father found the knife that Killian was stabbed with, but he didn't tell me it was broken. I suppose he assumed it happened when the attacker dropped it, but my gut believes you."

"I would prefer that not to be the case as it only makes the situation more grave for your husband. Every time he moves, that piece could shift position, inflicting additional damage - so, until it can be removed, his life remains in jeopardy."

"Story of our lives…," Emma muttered under a deep frustrated breath.

"You look completely exhausted, child. Why don't you try to get some rest while your husband sleeps?"

"That honestly sounds like a wonderful idea."

"Then go. You will need the rest as much as he does. Just promise me that when he wakes, you'll have him drink more of the tea. It may not be the most pleasant substance, but it is brewed from plants with antibiotic properties to hopefully prevent infection and the pain reliever it contains will also help him greatly."

"I may have to give him a rum chaser," Emma replied with a tepid laugh as she stood up. She collected her folded jacket from the chair beside her where she'd carefully placed it before sitting down to dinner, her body already screaming for a nap. "I'll make sure he drinks it though. This has been such a long day…," she mumbled as she withdrew her phone to turn it off, hoping to conserve the remaining battery until she could locate a charger. "You know, I really hate to bother you with this but you wouldn't happen to know where I could get a charger for my phone? I didn't exactly have the foresight to shove one in my pocket this morning…"

"I'm sure my grandson would know. I'll have him check to see what he has lying around."

"Thank you," Emma replied then before she could excuse herself, the elder woman reached out to grasp Emma's right hand, squeezing it tightly between both of hers.

"Perhaps we will soon learn the reason you were brought to us," the Navajo woman stated cryptically, a sentiment that rung in Emma's ears long after the words were said. She'd smiled politely and nodded, perhaps too tired to discern the meaning behind the odd gesture and statement. She understood that it was intended to be encouraging, but in reality, it left Emma slightly unsettled as she made her way down the narrow hallway clutching her jacket to her chest.

Trying not to disturb her husband, she pushed the door open slowly, then closed it behind herself before perching on a corner of the mattress to finally unzip and remove her boots – an act in which she took a likely unhealthy amount of pleasure completing. Wiggling her now freed sock clad toes, she heard a soft rap on the door. She padded over to the door and opened it to see the dark haired, hazel-eyed teen she'd briefly met earlier standing in the hallway with a handful of assorted cables.

"Hi," he said timidly. "Grandmother said you needed something to charge your phone. I didn't know what kind…"

"Hi, Joseph. That's partially my fault. I didn't really specify. Let's see if you've got one that matches…" She showed him the charging port on the bottom of her device and together they narrowed his collection of cords down to the proper one. "Thanks so much! I'll return it to you in the morning…"

"That's okay. You can keep it as long as you need it. My new phone uses a different one now."

"Thank you," she smiled as he walked away and she quietly closed the bedroom door again to get a little privacy.

The double bed took up most of the room so it required a bit of contorting on her part to reach the electrical outlet behind the nightstand, but it was worth the challenge when she saw the word "charging" appear on her screen. She dropped her jacket onto the floor next to her boots and started to unbutton the tattered remains of her blouse when she heard a weak, raspy "Swan?" from the bed behind her.

"I'm sorry," she apologized as she carefully sat back down on the bed, this time beside him, trying not to jostle it too much. "I didn't mean to wake you."

"I don't mind. I'm still quite tired…"

"Well, I hate to do this to you, but while you're awake, I'm supposed to have you drink more of the tea sitting here…"

"Bloody hell, Swan… I'm already wounded. Do I have to be poisoned as well?" Much to his disdain, his wife simply rolled her eyes, unmoved by his protest.

"It can't be that bad," she insisted, shaking her head as she lifted the mug of the now cooled liquid from the nightstand. It did have a rather strong, earthy odor to it, but it didn't really seem any worse than the untold number of potions she'd encountered since learning about magic. "Some of the concoctions that Regina has brewed up have been far worse than this – and this one has an antibiotic that you need. The wound is probably already infected since we couldn't exactly treat it properly right away."

"It's a good thing that I'm too fatigued to put up a fight," he relented, pushing himself into the most upright position he could manage without sending further bolts of pain radiating throughout his chest. Emma tried to guide him and urged him not to move so quickly.

"Easy – not so fast… The bleeding has finally slowed. We don't want anything to open back up…" She wasn't about to inform him that he might have a razor-sharp fragment of the dagger embedded inside his chest just yet though. She slid her arm around his shoulders to support him as best she could while she brought the mug to his mouth, allowing him to take a tentative sip. He grimaced as soon as the liquid hit his tongue, but she wasn't going to let him stop there. "It's going to take more than that…"

"Easy for you to say…," he grumbled as he begrudgingly took another mouthful of bitter tea, but that second swallow was all he could stomach, his face suddenly blanching as he was struck by a swell of nausea. "I'm sorry, Love… I cannot…"

"It's alright," she assured him, placing the mug back onto the nightstand before helping to ease his head back down to the pillows beneath him. "How about we both get some sleep and we'll worry about that in the morning?"

"There'll be no argument from me…," he whispered, the pain and fatigue already taking their toll on his lucidity. She made her way around to the other side of the bed, curling up beside him after turning off the bedside lamp, not even knowing which one of them drifted off to sleep first.

Morning came in the form of a bright light filtering through the curtains on the window above her head providing a rather rude interruption to Emma's dream. Blinking awake, she couldn't yet make out the time displayed on her phone but she guessed it was early based simply on how quiet it was around her. She could make out the slow, shallow breaths of her still sleeping husband beside her, noticing that at some point during the night he'd jettisoned the blanket off as it now lay in a crumpled heap at his feet. She wondered if he'd simply gotten too warm, which was highly likely considering the beads of sweat that glistened across his forehead and down his neck.

Leary of waking him, she sat up unhurriedly, contemplating whether or not she should take a moment to inspect his wound. She conceded that even if she did inadvertently awaken him, he'd be less bothered by the fact that she did so tending to his injury. He recoiled slightly as she peeled back a strip of the cloth tape holding the bandages in place, but he didn't stir. Beneath the layers of bloodied cloth, the edges of the puncture were still an angry red and the darkened appearance of the surrounding skin had her concerned. As much as she feared his unknown assailant locating them, she knew she might have to rethink her decision soon – especially with the knowledge that a broken piece of the dagger might still be lodged inside his chest cavity. She tried not to think about how much internal damage might have been inflicted while they were hiking down the mountain trail. Had she unintentionally caused him irreparable harm by forcing him to suffer through all that additional motion? Had her decision to not immediately get him medical attention endangered his life?

She buried her face in her hands as all the thoughts overwhelmed her, but she didn't allow herself to dwell on them. Pulling her head back together, she gently replaced the dressing over his wounded skin and tugged the blanket back over top of him. She tenderly caressed his cheek, her fingertips sensing his slightly feverish temperature as he turned his head toward her, seeking out her touch. His chest heaved as he drew in a deep breath, but she watched his face immediately contort as he grimaced through the obvious discomfort that even the simple act of breathing brought on.

"I'm sorry…," she whispered as the pad of her thumb absentmindedly traced the scar across his cheek, pausing when she reached the corner of his mouth. She hesitantly withdrew her hand, knowing she needed to let him rest, but she felt so listless – forcing herself to set her feet upon the floor and stand before finally managing to slip silently out of the door into the hallway.

She wasn't at all surprised that Sarah Bending Willow was already awake, rustling about the kitchen likely preparing breakfast. When Emma walked in, the older woman was scooping up a spoonful of a substance that looked like oatmeal, dropping it into a cast iron skillet and frying it a golden brown. She might not have known what exactly was being cooked, but the aroma was delectable, smelling of vanilla and something resembling popcorn?

"Come," her host invited her to the table as she noticed Emma lurking at the end of the hall. "I'm making sweet corn fry cakes and I've brewed a fresh pot of coffee. Mugs are in the cupboard right above the coffee maker so please – help yourself…"

"Thanks," Emma replied, taking quick strides directly toward the coffee pot, grinning as she opened the cabinet door to see the old woman's eclectic collection of mugs. No two were alike yet there was clearly a coherent theme – celestial objects. Suns, moons, clouds and even a few planets graced the exteriors of the ceramic and plastic mugs. Selecting one with an image depicting the big dipper constellation, she filled it two-thirds of the way with the steaming hot liquid and added just a splash of cream from the tiny pitcher next to the pot.

"I hope you slept well," the old woman said to her as she continued uninterrupted making the little cakes. "Your husband is still resting?"

"I slept quite well considering and yes, Killian's still asleep. I tried hard not to wake him while I took a quick peek under the bandages. It's looking really red and seems darker around the edges."

"I will mix up more of the medicine, but skin discoloration isn't uncommon with the turmeric and clove used in the mix. Were you able to encourage him to drink any more of the tea?"

"Only a few sips, but then he started to get nauseous so he stopped and went back to sleep."

"Very good. I know it isn't the easiest to swallow, but it is good for him."

"Most medicine isn't particularly easy to swallow," Emma smiled as she took a seat at the table, sipping the still too warm beverage. "And he tends to be rather stubborn when it comes to taking medicines anyway. Rum is usually his answer to everything."

"My guess is that his obstinance has served him well," Grandmother stated with a knowing smile as she flipped two of the corn cakes onto a plate and delivered them to the table, sliding them directly in front of her guest. "It seems to me that your husband has a very old soul – and an oft-troubled one at that."

"I guess you could say that…," Emma replied, almost sheepishly, not wanting to let on exactly how old of a soul Killian actually possessed. The old woman simply nodded at her response while reaching in to an open drawer behind her to fish out a fork.

"Now – eat," the elder woman insisted as she passed the fork to Emma's hand. "There is butter on the table and I can get you some agave syrup if you prefer them sweeter…" Emma cut off a small morsel with the side of her fork to get a taste of the creation, realizing that they were essentially a sweeter, crispier version of cornbread – and that they were delicious.

"Don't need to add a thing!" Emma gushed, both in response to the flavor and toward this woman's generosity. "These are amazing! I'll have to get the recipe from you because my family would love these."

"Ancient Navajo secret," Grandmother stated, seriously at first, but rapidly breaking into a wide grin. "No – not exactly… I've modernized my recipe with instant grits but don't tell my grandson that. Beats the hell out of grinding all that corn." Both women shared a hearty laugh as Emma finished up her breakfast while Grandmother continued frying more until the batter was finished. "Carlos will be stopping by soon for breakfast as well. He does every morning before heading out to the mountains."

"Seems like a pretty lonely job – just driving around a National Forest all day."

"It is sometimes, but he loves it. He says it allows him time to connect with the mountains – with our heritage and ancestors. The land you now know as the Superstition Mountains and the Tonto National Forest holds many sites sacred to the tribes. This land was once rich with magic, but not so much anymore. Centuries passed, beliefs changed and the magic left."

"Maybe it's still out there somewhere?" Emma suggested. "After all, some sort of magic did lead you and Carlos to find us…"

"I would like to believe that it is," the old woman replied with a noticeable hint of sadness. "Do you believe in magic, child?"

Emma had to pause before attempting to answer the question, not exactly certain of how much she should say on the subject.

"A few years ago, I would have said no, but then something changed. The son I'd given up for adoption found me and led me to a place where I was able to reconnect with my parents and then Killian unexpectedly came into my life. They all brought me the greatest magic of all – true love – so I guess you can say that I do believe in magic."

"It makes my heart stronger to know that someone does still believe. There's too much cynicism in our world today. The magic won't return if no one believes…" The old woman turned away as if she didn't wish for her guest to see the melancholy present in her eyes.

"Is Grandmother giving you her 'believe in magic' speech?" a voice asked as the mobile home's front door swung open and the tall, uniformed figure of Ranger Littlecreek stepped through, taking the same path directly to the coffee pot as Emma had earlier.

"Ignore him," Grandmother scoffed. "He will believe one day as well. He just needs the right person to guide him to the truth."

"I think I can relate," Emma responded with a half smirk curling on her lip.

"I may not know much about magic but I know a thing or two about helping out my fellow law enforcers," Carlos stated as he filled an oversized mug with coffee and then added a generous amount of cream and a heaping spoonful of sugar. "We keep a couple of storage bins full of donated clothing to help out lost hikers, wildfire victims and the like. It's nothing fancy, but I gathered a few things for you and your husband. I figured you might like to shower and change into some clean clothes. Hopefully I grabbed the right sizes too."

"I'm thankful for anything that's not caked with mud and soaked in sweat," Emma replied. "And I'm pretty sure Killian will appreciate anything not covered in dried blood."

"I thought you might feel that way. Bag's out in my truck. I'll go grab it for you and I'll bring in your husband's jacket that you left in my back seat too," he sat his royal blue mug with its bright yellow crescent moon image onto the kitchen counter and headed back out to his vehicle, returning seconds later with a jet black nylon backpack slung over his shoulder and Killian's balled up leather jacket tucked under his arm. He dropped everything onto the chair beside Emma and strolled over to retrieve his coffee while she surveyed the contents. Inside, she was surprised to find a couple of men's and women's tee shirts, two pair of basic black women's leggings and a pair of charcoal grey men's sweat pants. At the very bottom of the backpack, she even found a pack of unopened women's panties and two pair of men's boxer shorts with tags still attached. It was honestly far more than she'd expected.

"This is wonderful. Thank you so much," Emma said graciously. "I hate to keep saying this but I really don't know how to repay the kindness both of you have shown us."

"No payment is necessary," Grandmother insisted. "Now, if you would like to go bathe, I'll check on your husband."

"I would love that," Emma smiled, incredibly grateful for the change in their luck that led them to these amazing people, but they still had a long way to go, something she was instantly reminded of with the Ranger's next question.

"Quick question for you first, Sheriff – the man you think is hunting you – do you have a description of him?"

"I never really got a good look at him, but he was definitely over 6 foot tall, very stocky build – not overweight but just big. I know he had dark hair but that's about all I can tell you right now."

"That's fine. When you mentioned that someone might be out there stalking you, I checked in with a few colleagues last night for reports of unusual activity in and around the Superstition Mountain trails and found a report of a vehicle stolen from another trailhead approximately 10 miles from the way station you were in. Vague description given was a large, dark-haired man but the owner who witnessed the theft was too far away to do any better."

"Ten miles seems like an awful lot of distance away from us, but the man's description sounds close enough. About what time did that happen?" Emma wondered.

"The theft occurred just before the storm – reported approximately 12:30pm when the owners were heading back to their vehicle. Another hiker on the same trail gave them a lift down to the Ranger Station."

"Wait – 12:30? That was before the storm?" Emma was confused as it hadn't been that long after they'd dropped out of the portal and Arizona time was earlier than Storybrooke's… The timeline couldn't be right...

"Up there, yes. Storm rolled through about quarter to 1," Carlos replied. "If this is your guy, he was down here in the valley more than an hour before I found the two of you. The vehicle was found this morning near the bus depot in downtown Mesa. Unfortunately, their security cameras didn't pick up the vehicle when it entered so we didn't get an image of the guy to know for sure."

"Sounds like this guy knows what he's doing," Emma sighed. Odds were that this was the man who'd followed them from Storybrooke but where was he now? He could be absolutely anywhere in the Phoenix area by now which made her even more anxious to find a way home, but it was going to be a while before Killian would be able to make that trip – not without another magical portal opening up at least.

"Do not worry about this man right now," Grandmother told her. "He is not here and would not know to look for you here. Go and get yourself cleaned up. All this talk will wait for later."

[imagine-that-one-thing]

Broken Dancer.

Shawn Master List found HERE

Just as much as you’re supportive of his career, always attempting to visit him on tour, attending his shows and what not, he’s just as supportive of yours. 

Being a dancer isn’t the simplest of careers to maintain, you’ve gotten to the point where it feels as though there’s always some sort of ache in your body— you’ve gotten used to it. 

He’s sitting in his dressing room, half dressed with his hair still a mess as his eyes are glued to his phone. You had sent him the final, 

“I gotta go, baby, good luck. X.” Text around an hour ago, in which he had replied, 

“Good luck to you too! X” 

He despises Monday nights, particularly when he’s stuck doing his own show while you’re sitting in Las Angeles, backstage while draped in a dancing costume getting ready to perform for the nightly entertainment of dancing with the stars. His eyes stay glued to his phone as he follows the current two dancers that are currently treading the tango, Shawns hair stylist striving to get his hair to represent something other than a curly mayhem. 

“I hate this show, I’m just trying to watch my girlfriend and they always put her on last.” He mumbles, unfortunately, peering into the mirror at his stylist, 

“Always save the best for last, right?” She chuckles, spraying his hair one last time with hairspray before combing it back a little. He grumbles under his breath, uncomfortably moving in his chair as he continues to follow his screen, not wanting to miss anything. 

“Shawn, you need to go on stage.” He is summoned by his manager, interrupting him from viewing the live broadcast on his phone. 

“Five-minute delay?” He attempts to work his magic, batting his eyes as he’s eager to see your performance. Shawn’s manager shakes his head, “please? Five minutes just so I can watch her. She’s been so excited about this one performance.” He tries to persuade his manager but he continues to shake his head, “c'mon she’s on next.” Shawn pouts, gesturing towards his phone as the announcer announces your name and your dance partner. 

“Sorry, we are on a strict schedule, if it was up to me I’d let you.” Shawn’s manager sighs, giving Shawn a small smile, “C'mon, don’t make me drag you.” He jokes in a somewhat serious tone as Shawn stands to his feet. 

Shawn sighs, “I’m going, I’m going.” He nods his head, placing his phone in his pocket and adjusting his t-shirt, taking in a deep as he prepares to walk on stage in front of thousands of fans. 

The minute he finishes his concert he’s backstage and changing into more suitable clothes, eager to get to the car so he can watch your dance that happened precisely two hours ago. 

It’s when he reaches his hotel room that he belatedly has the chance to fully pay attention to his phone, at first he ignores his unusually large amount of text messages, promptly skimming over the text from his sister that asks about you. He doesn’t reply, instead, he watches your performance, fascinated by how elegantly you dance across the floor, and how well you have managed to train your dance partner. 

He’s more than proud when he sees the scores the judges gave you and your partner, his own smile widening when he observes that you took the lead of the completion, a quick “that’s my girl,” mumbling from his lips. 

But it’s when he’s about to pause the video and climb in bed that he hears the voice of the announcer calling for a break, your name immediately being called in the background. 

He frowns for a moment, unsure if it was just a video mishap or whether something happened. He glances towards the time and notices it’s already one in the morning for you, deciding there’s no point in waking you to see what the drama was about. Instead, he turns to social media and that’s when he sees the tweets to both you and him regarding what happened. So many questions directed to your twitter handle and his. 

He wastes no time in calling you, not considering the time or the fact that you could be sleeping and this could all just be some sort of misunderstanding. 

He counts the rings and anxiously waits before your voice is heard on the other end of the phone. He notices how your voice sounds exhausted and pained. “Hey, are you okay? What happened? I have all these tweets.” He instantly interrogates. He hears you sigh on the other end of the phone, knowing all too well that you’re about to confess to him that his thoughts are correct and that the tweets aren’t a misunderstanding. 

“I’m okay, don’t stress… I did something to my back.” The moment he hears your words he stands to his feet, already beginning to throw his clothes back into his travel bag, “Shawn, are you there?” He’s reminded that you’re still on the phone. 

“Yeah, I’m on my way, okay? Are you still in LA? Of course, you are where the hell else would you be?” He answers his own question, “baby, I’ll be there soon, I’m on the next flight, promise.” He murmurs, struggling to multitask at this point in time, more conceded about you. 

“No, you have a show tomorrow. I’m fine, I get discharged in a few hours.”

“Are you kidding me? You’re all alone, I’m coming.”

“Shawn, please finish your show.” You beg him, spending the next twenty minutes convincing him that it is unceassary.

You’re used to the aches and pains dancing can inflict on you sometimes, it comes with the job. You either put your heart and soul into dancing and come out with a few twinges and pains or you half ass it and stay on the safe side— that is how dancing is, there is no in between. With that being noted, you knew it wasn’t just a small throbbing or pain when you received incredibly painful back pain the moment you concluded the choreography. 

A crippling pain ached your back the moment the lights dimmed and the audience began their round of applause. You did your best to hide the discomfort while the cameras still kept their eye on you as the judges held up their scores. But the minute the last score was tallied you couldn’t contain the pain any longer. 

With much effort, you persuaded Shawn not to get on the first flight to LA and to instead finish up the last concert he had booked. Despite his constant reassurance that catching a flight was not an issue at all, you refused to allow him to miss the concert, there was no need for it — you are stuck on bed rest and dropping everything is not going to fix that. 

You wiggle your toes in the bed, pulling at the comforter as try to pull the remote closer to you — you had gotten frustrated and thrown it across the bed — and now you are struggling to reach it. 

You let out a little whine, beginning to wish you hadn’t assured your dance friend that you were fine and wanted to be alone. 

“You are so adorable when you whine.” You hear Shawn’s voice chuckle, your eyes immediately flickering towards the doorframe where he stands with his travelling bag in his hand. 

“You’re back.” You smile as he enters into the bedroom, dropping his bag at the end of the bed before walking closer to you. He nods with an endearing grin already leaning down and placing a soft kiss on your forehead, 

“I am, how are you feeling?” He questions, reaching over and grabbing the remote, 

“I am bored, very bored. Can I have the remote?” You smile, stretching your arm out to reach his arm, gently holding his arm, 

“Mm nope,“ he shakes his head, "I need you to tell me why you refused to let me leave early.” He adds, referencing to your pleas for him to finish his last concert. 

You sigh, curling your lips into a pout when he withholds the remote from you. “Shawn, it was your last concert,”

“You’re more important. You didn’t even tell me when your injury happened.” He sighs, gingerly sitting on the edge of the bed, leaning his arm over you. 

“You were mid-concert, I didn’t want to bother you.”

“I don’t care, I want you to bother me when things happen. I don’t care what I’m doing.” He presses, disliking the fact that he didn’t find out until hours after the incident. “Promise me you’ll just tell me from now on.” He insists and you nod with a sigh. “Okay, how are you feeling? How’s your back?” He delicately leans over and kisses your cheek, waiting for your response. 

You glance down at your hands in your lap before sighing, “It hurts and I’m pretty sure my dance career is over.” You enlighten him, your eyes watching as he frowns, 

“Sweetheart, I’m sorry.” He whispers, searching for the right words to say to make you feel better, “did the doctors say you can’t dance?”

“I can’t dance for a few months, so I miss out on the show. I don’t want to feel the pain again so I think I should just stop dancing,” You inform him, doing your best not to show him that deep down it hurts to know that you need to give up the only thing you have cherished since you could walk. 

 "I’m sorry, we will figure it out. Is there anything you want or need? Somethin’ to eat?“ He proposes, placing the remote by your hand, 

"Can you just help me up? I’m sick of lying here." 

"Ehh, are you meant to be walking?" 

"Shawn, if you don’t help me, I will do it myself, I’m already going crazy on bed rest.” You whine, pouting your lips again, softening your eyes to work your charm on him. He lets out a sigh, as he carefully removes himself from the bed.

“Okay.” He nods, watching you finally smile as he does his best to help you without causing you any more pain the necessary. “Are you okay?” He frets, a small whimper escaping your lips. 

“I am okay, promise.” You respond, draping your arms around his neck, burying yourself into him as he carefully presses his hands to your waists. 

“Oh, okay. You want hugs.” He chuckles as you keep your body pressed with his as close as possible. 

“Mhm. Missed you.” You mumble into him, ignoring the pain in your back, his embrace being well worth it. 

“I love hugging you, but you need to walk because I do not want you on your feet too much.”

“Yes, Mum.” You tease, gently pulling away from the embrace and allowing him to help you walk around the bedroom, his protectiveness kicking in the moment you stumble for a split second. 

“Nope, Nope. Nope.” He shakes his head, “Bed.” He mutters, guiding you back towards the bed. 

“Shawn, I am not going to break and shatter to pieces.” You remind him that you are not that delicate.

“You are in pain. I am looking after you and it is time to rest.” He caresses a kiss to your cheek, gingerly helping you into the bed, watching you like a hawk as you lie yourself down, your body settling against the numerous pillows. “I will go and get you some food. Don’t move.” He warns, leaning down and kissing you sweetly. 

“Mhm, sure, Mum.” You wink, his eyes rolling at you. 

“You’d be hungry if I wasn’t here.”

“Ehhh, I would have managed.” You respond, “But, I am glad you are here." 

"Mhm. I know.” He cockily grins, “I will be back, Y/N.” He smiles over at you, exiting the bedroom and allowing you to rest while he takes himself to the kitchen to prepare you something to eat. 

[wheremgoing]

a leap of faith over a cliff

make sure you communicate with your professors ahead of time so they can better understand your situation.

keeping good communication with your coworkers shows your responsiveness and due diligence.

if you communicate with people what is going on in your life, they can better understand how they can be of help.

commune

community

communicate

communication

I am a matrix of mishaps. A culmination of self-inflicted pain and sorrow with a healthy dose of bad life happenings. I like it sometimes. It's edgy. Fun. Cool. Hip. What’s even better, people like the idea of me. You hang around me enough and, dare I say, you’ll love me. Conceptually. That’s what the data says. 

My characteristics don’t add up. There are too many of me. My mind works like me. A matrix of mishaps. Though things are pretty convincingly intentional up there. 

What is going on? Why would anyone ask me that? Besides the fact that time is not real therefore nothing is truly -ever- going on, what would that information do? Would you use what I tell you to give me your trash opinion? I’m sorry, that’s rude... your eventual unhelpful advice? For the most part, it’s all baseless. Helpful for conversational purposes, but like, why are we having a conversation?

There is too much going on. For the sake of relatability, let’s pretend this time thing is a thing. I can’t imagine a time where things added up. Everything lives and dies in the most anticlimactic way possible. I can’t allow myself to thrive no matter how hard I try. Everything is attainable, I know it is, until I get the best of myself. I know the answers; I’m a quicksand of wisdom. Well, I know most of the answers. The answers I don’t know impede me beyond repair at this point. 

There is nothing telling me that I shouldn’t want to die. That I shouldn’t end this matrix of mishaps. I don’t know why I’m here. People say this– they talk about finding their purpose and dream about the day they’ll do something they love. But I don’t. Let’s say I find my purpose. I open the pandora box of possibilities for my footprint on the world the way it should be. But that’s not the way it’ll go. Beyond me not knowing what I specifically need to be in this world for, I am pretty sure it won’t matter. Because it doesn’t. We do all these random yet intricate things to reach new amazing heights... but I don’t care. It doesn’t matter to me. None of it matters. We’ll die, rot away, and forget the tales we told our kids and coworkers, about the nothingness that really mattered to you your whole meaningless life because beyond this there’s nothing else. 

I write this with a knot in my throat. This semester has been a series of failures. And for some reason, the academic series of failures is what seems to matter the most to me. So much of my esteem is centered around my intellect. Academics is such a sad excuse for measurement of true intellect that I can’t believe I’m spending so much of my time (whatever that means) living at its fingertips. Like I wish you understood how tragic academia is. It’s an institution which basically takes the form of bastardized curiosity. 

So what’s going on? Why am I imprisoned by my impending academic failure if I know the truth? 

It’s amazing how tightly the strings in your life can hold you hostage. And it’s crazy how “family” is the root of it all. No one has ever shown me purpose, just work. Not by example really, I don’t know those niggas, but by tale. I sit and listen to lecturers/family members tell me what working hard in school, and therefore life, will do for you. The resolution is almost always that you will live a comfortable life where you or your family doesn’t have to struggle and you will have the freedom to do whatever you want. As long as whatever you want also falls in the box of acceptable desires. These lectures are about as far as my communication with my family goes.

Real connections aren’t real. Intentions are never pure. Humanity is a hierarchy. Those are some major themes from observing communication. So it’s safe to say that maybe communication makes me anxious. Answering emails is always scary. Answering text messages is pointless. But what really, really, makes my head spin, is communicating my own issues. It’s always hard when you already consider yourself a burden. When you were taught and shown that you are a burden. What does a burden have to say about burdens? 

I get wrapped up in my own issues. Tangled in thought. Tie a bow with my endeavors and responsibilities so I can dress up my issues with productivity. Then I fall apart when I physically and mentally cannot fit enough time or energy to do what I set out to do. 

But here’s the kick.

I love strangling myself. It’s the only thing I know how to love. Everything my family has taught me about communication has told me not to let anyone know. And if family teaches you love, it all adds up. I love seeing myself fall apart because it’s all I know about comfort. I work in a circle of destruction where the only one who can help me is me. The only communication is between me and the other me’s. So why communicate my issues if I will inevitably grow dependent to them and the only one who will understand is me?

Did you follow? If you did, thank you. If not, it’s fine because I wasn’t talking to you anyways.