#but i have been obsessing over these things since september

[sophiamcdougall]

I am never going to complain about Greek Duolingo again

I mean, I am. But still.

So, as some of you know, my family has been coming to this tiny Greek seaside village for several years. Just over a week ago I came out here with my mum, under the impression that early September, after the height of the summer heat, would be a good time to have a holiday. ANYWAY Storm Daniel had other ideas about that. Locally things are improving (I'm actually really pissed off about the disaster-porn tone of most English-language media coverage, but that's another post). The power is back on, there's running water most of the time, and though the latter is not drinkable, a truck from the government came and handled out free bottled water yesterday. But we are currently kind of stuck. Can't do tourist things. Can't go home. There aren't any local flights out until Saturday and the road to Thessaloniki is still closed.

So this evening, feeling kind of aimless and depressed, I go down to the nearest beach with a couple of binbags and start cleaning up in an effort to at least do something positive. I always try to do this at least once out here and obviously, after the storm, there's a lot more plastic and rubbish than usual.

At some point I find this large, round bit of metal - some kind of machinery part, I think -- that's too big for the bag, so I take it to the bins on its own, leaving the rubbish bag on the beach. And when I come back for it, something among the stones beside it moves.

Specifically, it pulls its head sharply inside its shell

So, meanwhile I've been trying to learn some Greek with the help of Duolingo.

I currently have a 33-day streak and... I have questions. Shouldn't I be able to use the past or future tenses by now? Shouldn't I be able to say "x is like y"? I can't do those things. But one thing I absolutely can say all day long is έχω μια χελώνα : I have a turtle.

This is far from the limit of Duolingo Greek's turtle-related content. "An obsession with turtles" is my mother's characterisation. I can inform you that the turtle is not a bird, and, improbably, that the turtle is drinking milk. I can introduce you to a turtle in company with a horse and an elephant. As far as Duolingo is concerned, it really is turtles all the way down.

Now this, you may be able to see, is not a turtle. It has claws rather than flippers. It is a tortoise. I know there are wild tortoises in Greece: my aunt once rescued a pair of them shagging in the middle of the road -- but that was up in the mountains. I've even seen one myself, but it was also on a road and very dead.

I am 95% certain they don't belong on beaches. There's nothing for it to eat, except, unfortunately, a lot of plastic. Even if it gets off the beach it will immediately find itself on a road where it could get hit by a car. I'm pretty sure it must have been washed down by the floodwater and has been just sitting there, dazed, ever since.

Now obviously the first thing I want to do on encountering this unusual animal is to go and tell my mummy, so I do. The tortoise immediately brightens her day. She agrees that the tortoise is not happy on the beach and needs to be taken somewhere safe. it gets surprisingly wriggly when picked up so we put it in a carrier bag with some grapes and cucumber and go looking for somewhere to rehome it.

We find a path leading up between the houses towards a likely-looking field, but before we get very far a dog in a yard goes berserk and a man's head pops over a fence and demands to know what we're doing. He does this in English, as evidently we're just that obviously tourists.

"I found a tortoise on the beach!" I explain. "We want to find somewhere to put it."

"A what," he asks.

"It's like a, you know," I begin and then to my astonishment I find myself saying... "μια χελώνα"

"Oh! A turtle!" he says.

"But from the land. δεν είναι χελώνα", [it is not a turtle,] I say, as I am worried he will tell me to put it back near the sea where I found it. As it turns out it actually IS a χελώνα, Greek does not distinguish between turtles and tortoises, but I don't know that; I can't even name the days of the week or identify any colours other than pink yet, give me a break.

The man's entire demeanour changes and thaws. He does not worry about my turtle-that-is-not-a-turtle conundrum. He knows where οι χελώνες come from and where η χελώνα μας belongs. He leads us through a gate into a courtyard area.

"[somethingsomething] μια χελώνα," he explains to the assembled onlookers, of whom there are, suddenly, a surprising number.

"ΜΙΑ ΧΕΛΩΝΑ!!!" crows the throng of delighted small children, who are, suddenly, everywhere.

"μια χελώνα!" I agree, accepting that at least for current purposes, that is what it is.

"Μπορούμε να δούμε τη χελώνα σας; [can we see your turtle?]" asks an adorable little girl, shyly, and I understand??

The children fucking love looking at the χελώνα and showing it to them is kind of magical?

I finally put the tortoise down on the grass of this wild area off to the side of the courtyard, and marvel aloud that it is weird that I barely know any Greek except how to say μια χελώνα.

"I think she will soon run off," a kind lady called Aspasia assures me, seeing I remain slightly anxious about its fate. "I don't know why I'm saying 'she'. I suppose because χελώνα is feminine in Greek."

"Yes! I know that!" I exclaim, thrilled.

"Well done!" she says. And also she asks if we are OK for drinking water after the storm and if we need any help with anything and is just generally incredibly lovely and now we know more of the neighbours!

So "μια χελώνα" has just become, by a long way, my most-used and most understood and all-around most conversationally successful phrase in Greek. So I guess I have to admit I was wrong to doubt Duolingo's wisdom: it is correct to be obsessed with turtles. And I concede that prior to learning how to count to ten or to distinguish right from left, the simple ability to yell the word TURTLE over and over again is, it turns out, a crucial element of the responsible traveller's social skills.

(I am pretty fluent in Italian and turtles haven't come up in conversation even once?)

[unsolicited-opinions]

The Israel thing confuses the shit out of me, I've gotta say.

I consider myself left wing politically. Pretty darn left. (Or what I thought "left" meant.) I have voted for progressive parties/candidates in every election (local, national, EU-wide) since I was legally able to do so. I am a Pride-flag-waving lesbian, a feminist (I legally changed my surname to my mothers last name in solidarity when I was still a teenager!), a vegan, an environmentalist (I don't drive a car, I don't fly, my home is fossil fuel free, powered entirely by wind and solar generated electricity) and a union member. I'm very careful about everything I buy, always looking for the most ethical option. No "fast fashion". No Twitter since Musk took over. No Amazon Prime.

I try pretty hard, every day, to walk the walk, y'know? Not just talk the talk. I try to live my beliefs. Not just perform them. Even though it is often inconvenient. (Having to constantly look stuff up. See where my money would be going. Check for bad business practices. Who owns what. Who do they vote for. Who do they donate to. How and where is it made. Who made it. How are they treated. What's the carbon footprint. What's the energy efficiency rating. Etc, etc, etc.)

When the October 7th attacks on Israel happened, I immediately realised 'I don't know enough about this' and so started reading about the history (and present) of Israel and Palestine. There were things I felt I needed to know and understand before I threw my lot in with anyone.

One of the earliest things I learned was that Israel existed before Palestine (fact one. And it seemed important.) and Jewish people existed thousands of years before there were Muslims. I learned (fairly quickly and not in great depth) about the Hebrew Bible, the Bar Kokba revolt, the origins of Islam, the Arab conquest of the Levant, the Edict of Expulsion, the Alhambra decree, the 19th century pogroms and the Pale of Settlement, Theodor Herzl and the origins of Zionism, WW1 and the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Holocaust, the first Arab/Israeli war, Black September, the Munich Olympics, the first and second intifada, Hamas and Fatah, culture and laws in modern Israel...

I feel like I did my homework. And I concluded, given what I had read, that I was quite broadly on Israel's side. It seemed to me that the Jewish people have every right to be there. Israel has every right to exist. It's where the Jewish people originated. They purchased land there legally. They achieved polity and declared independence. They have fought and won wars over it. What more could anyone ask for? They're indigenous to the land, they have always been there (to a greater or lesser degree), the ones who left paid for the land when they returned, they fought wars for the land and won. What other ways can they prove or earn their right to be there? They have done more to "earn" their existence on that land than any other people on Earth.

I do not understand the "left"'s antipathy toward Israel, Israelis or Zionism. It makes no sense to me.

Yes, war is awful. Of course. Innocent people dying is awful. Of course. But that does not seem to be what is being protested. It is Israel's very existence that they object to. And I do NOT understand that. I have tried. I have read what I believe to be a fairly thorough account of the history of the land and its people. And I simply cannot get onboard with what my comrades (...) on the left are saying and doing. It just does not make sense to me. It doesn't fit.

And at the moment (since October 2023) it is in all left wing spaces. Feminist bookshops I once frequented. Environmental organizations I was once a member of. Pride parades I once marched in. All are now obsessed with the BDS movement and bashing Israel and Zionists. And it's not even a question. It's just a given. If you are a feminist or queer or an environmentalist you must also (obviously!) hate Israel. And I just cannot logically understand WHY.

Jews don't often encounter non-Jewish progressives these days who can be normal about Jews, rational about Israel, and see what we see...so I can't tell you how much I appreciate this and you, Anon.

Thank you for sharing these thoughts.

I have so much respect for the integrity required to tell oneself "I don't know enough to have an opinion, so I'm going to make an effort to learn more."

I can count the non-Jews I know who have done that on one hand.

The LGBTQ+ Jews I know (including family) all tell me that while they feel secure, safe, and included as LGBTQ+ persons in Jewish spaces, they don't feel at all safe as Jews in LGBTQ+ spaces, and that breaks my heart because I know how important that sense of community is to my LGBTQ+ family and friends and I understand how much that loss must hurt.

Like most of us, LGBTQ+ Jews are liberals who thought they shared values with other progressives until October 7th taught us that while we might have felt solidarity with them, they didn't feel solidarity with us...and jumped at the opportunity to feel righteous about being hateful.

Many (perhaps most) of us similarly lost communities because you're right that all the progressive spaces aren't just unthinkingly hostile and willfully ignorant, but actively hateful and parroting Jew-hatred tropes from the middle ages, the Czars, the Soviets, and a Fuhrer. In liberal spaces. While claiming to be progressives. While claiming to be AntiFa. While claiming to despise Nazis and bigotry. While allying themselves with Islamist movements which favor genital mutilation, child brides, and honor killings.

If you'd like to get in touch without the anonymity, I'd welcome that - because I'd like to see more of your writing.

Again, thank you. This made my day.

[watchmegetobsessed]

ACROSS THE GLOBE

A/N: nan and harry are back!!! it was def time to give them the love they deserve! enjoy this cute little piece from their life!

WORD COUNT: 1.6k

SUMMARY: It's Nan's birthday and Harry wouldn't miss it, not even if he has to come home from Japan.

MORE FROM THE NAN&HARRY UNIVERSE

Summer stretches long this year, September is gifting you with another warm weekend before the cold sweeps its claws across the meadows behind Nan’s house. But for now, it’s still warm enough to fill her garden with chatter and laughter as you celebrate her birthday. 

One of your uncles is on grilling duty, the adults are gathered on the terrace mostly while the grandchildren are making the best out of how great Nan’s backyard is for hide&seek. Though the Sun has started dipping lower, the sky turning orangier with each passing minute, you still have about an hour of daylight. 

With your emptied out cake plate you make your way inside with the intention of washing the plate so you could at least feel like you did something to help, but since you’ve arrived everyone has made it their shared goal to stop you from even lifting a finger. Well into the seventh month of your pregnancy you do feel like some activities take a lot more effort and energy from you, but you refuse to give in to the helplessness, though needless to say that Harry is also part of the let’s-stop-YN-from-doing-literally-anything team. You can only sneak off now because everyone is busy with Nan showing off her new gardening set she just got as a present. 

Your belly is big enough that you have to turn your hips as you lean over to wash the plate so you can actually reach the sink without your navel poking into the stream of water. The clock next to the fridge on the wall tells you that Harry should be here any minute. It’s a complete surprise for Nan, she thinks he is still in Japan and can’t make it home for her birthday. What’s more, she specifically told him not to rearrange his plans just for him.

“Oh Son, I’m planning to have a few more birthdays, you’ll come to those! Just go and do your thing!” she told him on the phone and you saw the smirk on Harry’s face, because he already had the tickets to come back for the get together.

He would never miss an occasion to celebrate Nan.

Once the plate is washed and dried, your attention is averted by the cupcakes that are left on the counter. You tell yourself you’ve had enough sugar for the both of you and baby, but just one more cupcake can’t hurt…

So you’re way too busy with the icing that smears on your nose to notice the opening of the front door and when two very familiar hands sneak around your belly from behind, you jump a little, like you just got caught red handed, but then quickly melt into Harry’s arms, head falling back onto his shoulder.

“Can I get a bite?” he murmurs, kissing your cheek and gently biting the skin as well, making you giggle while his hands are continuously rubbing your belly, something he’s been obsessed with since you popped. He never not takes an opportunity to touch the stretched skin, feel a little kick or talk to his little princess.

That’s what he’s been calling the baby ever since you found out the gender by a cake made by none other than Nan. You still remember the excitement on Nan’s face before you were about to cut into the cake she made as the only person knowing the gender other than your obgyn. The pink filling poured out right when the knife sliced through the white outside and everyone gasped and cheered at once as the secret Nan had been keeping was revealed. A moment you’ll never forget.

You hold out the cupcake for him over your shoulder and he cranes his neck to get a bite, the icing getting on his nose as well and you’re quick to turn your head and kiss it off before turning in his arms all together. 

“Hi,” he smiles at you warmly, his hands slipping to your waist, under your jumper, to your back to rub your back gently. 

“Hi,” you return the smile. 

“Missed you,” he murmurs against your lips before kissing you sweetly.

“Both of us?” 

“Of course,” he grins, stealing another kiss before leaning down and pressing one on your belly as well. “Everything alright?” he asks from your belly, waiting for an answer from you.

“Yeah, everything is great, especially now that daddy’s here.” Smiling, you run a hand through his hair before he straightens up and with a soft hum he kisses you again, this time a little deeper, more passionately. 

You’ve learned that Harry just really loves when you call him that. Early in your pregnancy he was quite anxious, always worried about how he would take up on the role of being a father, but he overcome that by the time you entered the second trimester, a sense of confidence appeared in his mindset and he took a full turn, owning the situation that this is truly happening, he is about to become a father. He’s been loving every hint about that since then, loving being the father figure, loving being a caretaker for not just you, but his little princess as well.

“Let’s surprise Nan,” you smile at him once you pull away. 

“Brought her flowers, let me get them from the car quickly. You just go out and pretend like nothing is happening,” he grins, though he knows everyone will notice the change in you, you can’t help it, this is Harry’s effect on you. 

You part ways, Harry jogs out to his car and you return outside, taking your previous spot. 

“Where were you?” your mom asks.

“Just washed my plate.”

“Y/N! We’re gonna load the washing machine!” Nan tells you off, but you just laugh it off.

“I’m just pregnant, my hands aren’t falling off.”

“Just sit and enjoy!” one of your aunts orders and a moment later you have a plate full of food in front of you, even though you’ve already devoured so much you ate more than everyone else combined. 

“What’s that smirk?” your mom questions, leaning closer to you.

“What smirk?” you ask innocently.

“That smirk on your face. What’s going on?”

“What happened?” Nan joins in on the conversation, her eyes moving back and forth between you and your mom with a puzzled look. 

“Nothing happened! I’m literally just sitting here, being pregnant!” you chuckle and Nan is about to question you again when her eyes move to a figure behind you, pure shock taking over her face.

“Oh you!” she gasps, her hands covering her mouth as she rounds the table and walks over to Harry, who just appeared with a big bouquet of flowers.

“Happy birthday, Nan!” he grins as Nan takes his face between her chunky, wrinkled hands, pulling it down so she can kiss both his cheeks before hugging him tight. 

“What are you doing here?”

“You think I would ever miss your birthday?” he chuckles, winking at you over Nan’s shoulder as she is still hugging him. 

“Told you not to bother! You don’t have to travel across the globe for an old lady!”

“It’s not a bother, Nan,” he smiles once she lets go of him. “This is for you,” he hands her the beautiful bouquet and Nan’s eyes are sparkling as she takes the flowers and takes a closer look.

“Thank you dear. Thank you so much.” She kisses his cheek once more before moving back to the table. 

Harry disappears for a moment, you look for him confused, but then he reemerges with another bouquet, a smaller one as he approaches you.

“And this is for my beautiful girls,” he murmurs as he leans down and kisses you on the lips softly. 

“Ah Harry!” you pout at him, touched that he thought of you as well, even though that’s all he ever does. 

He pulls a chair over next to you and settles, one hand instantly coming to grab yours, fingers lacing together in your lap. 

“How was Japan?” one of your uncles asks as Harry is offered a beer, but he refuses. He hasn’t drank alcohol since you found out you’re pregnant. 

“Great, it’s always a good time.”

“Are you going back?” Nan asks with a worried look. You open your mouth, ready to say that yes, Harry will be heading back for another week in two days, but he is quicker.

“No. This was my last trip for a long while.”

“What?” The surprise on your face is obvious, this is new even to you. As far as you knew, after Japan he still had to make a trip to Italy.

Harry turns to you with a smile as he shrugs.

“Moved things around a bit. I’m staying home.”

A tear runs down your cheek as you lean over and kiss him gratefully. You never told him you’d rather have him home with you in the last two months before the baby arrives, but it was definitely on your mind, you just never wanted to be like the kind of partner who tells him what to do when he is fully capable of making his own decisions.

And he always makes the best ones, this is proof of that as well.

“I love you,” you whisper against his lips, your word lost for everyone else in the chatter around you, but Harry hears them loud and clear.

“Love you too,” he smiles into the kiss before pulling back and joining in on the conversation .

Thank you for reading, please like and reblog if you enjoyed and buy me a coffee if you want to support me!

[lggy]

I’m on both and every time I go back over to aphtwt it’s like that guy with pizzas going into a room on fire

its a long ass story thats been going on since the reveal of s7. here's just a recount of what's been going on lately for anyone curious i guess. its just to answer why a lot of people are icked out by laurance right now and why people are saying "i cant enjoy laurance anymore"

bascially laurance's va doesn't know how to properly manage his image,

ive been following him long before, he would have a few old tweets and tiktoks where he gets really annoyed towards aphmau fans, and reasonably so

...after the reveal of s7, he tried coming back to make his brand Laurance except he's using his NFSW bdsm account. after people started trying to link his nsfw links to his aphwiki page i made a twt post asking people to stop doing that. thats when we realized seb is obsessed with searching himself up on twitter and he proceeded to QRT me and make a few response posts reiterating what i said and apologizing for interacting with minors on his nsfw account. he made a new alt account for interacting with fans on aphtwt.

that was back around september-october

he searches himself and laurance up constantly to QRT and pick fights and stuff. its clear he's going through mental shit - he talks about it a lot. but it took him months to realize hes not fit to be running an account to host his image/brand that he wants to be about Laurance. he picks up on any drama around himself and kinda has a villain speech every time someone doesnt like him. im kind of starting to feel bad for him.

this is all while lowkey begging Jess to contact him again to bring him back for VA work, cryptically referring to her sometimes as "The Creator". I forgot to mention he had this whole "Guys im having a huge reveal, Im coming back to VAing for a very special charater.." thing. me and a lot of people picked up on him being kind of.. fake? basically, he shit on aphmau before, equated VA work to a MLM, then had a total sudden switch-up as soon as s7 was announced and realized he can renew his role. he had a video saying he wants this job to get a new tattoo.

^ 'What's wrong with wanting money?' the thing is being a VA means you need to have a good image and thats usually generated by having a good fanbase. all that really said was that he's just hopping on a bandwagon to get paid and thus his fan interactions just came across as desperate and bait-y and fake as hell. think about how other VA's interact w their fans then compare it to this,

what happened yesterday was that garroth's VA announced he was doing a mystreet rewatch with much of the og cast!... then sebastian QRT'd with this

someone even asked if he can join them too

then he joined the discord. then got banned after 10 minutes.. then crashed out about it on twitter, posting that garroth's va blocked him. not posting the massive paragraph he had because its kinda the sameburger poetry. i genuinely have no idea why he would post this than to like, try to get people to turn on garroth's VA. severely inappropriate behavior for someone trying to come back to being a VA

allegedly, seb had livestreamed a while ago where he said something along the lines of, (quoting from oomf's memory) "I don't recommend you contacting or asking any of the old VAs about me, I don't know if they still think about me the same bc of how I was back then. Bipolar Disorder was really bad for me back then, it made me so edgy." and how other VAs had issues with him and tension. - i dont have a source for this but it lines up with this tweet :

where he very inappropriately and for no reason mentioned he had issues with another VA. the problem is he had NO reason to bring that up and had the situation he was referring to was about gene having a fill-in on a cocomau video and nothing to do with seb himself or any drama or anything.

aaand i think thats all. that's the laurance downfall crashout chronicles , i didnt want to get too detailed but i can ask questions and whatever

personally, i nevr really beleived this guy would ever get hired again. all because he uses his real/brand name for his porno stuff. the company does background checks yknow

[ghostgirl-22]

art asking patrick not to cum for a few days so when they have finally sex it’ll be a lot 👀

I think you’re just really neat anon <33

I wrote entirely too much. Edited entirely too little.

CW: 18+ !NSFW! Orgasm delay, D/s I guess if you squint, Patrick cedes power, semen play I guess idk.

—-

It’s a random weekend in September when Patrick realizes how much power Art has over him. They’re just getting home from a pool party at Nicholas Sheridan’s house. He’s like one of three kids that attend Mark Reballato whose family actually lives in Florida. 

They’re dizzydrunk and wet in Patrick’s bed. Art finally gave it up a month ago and he’s been giving it up every night since. Patrick’s peeled Art’s wet and clingy swim shorts down the way he’s been dreaming of doing all night and Patrick’s fucking him. Best sex of his life kinda, fucking him. Art’s come once already and Patrick’s close.. he’s so fucking close when Art whines, “wait—” 

Patrick tries for a second to pretend he doesn’t hear him and then Art says it again, louder, “wait, Patrick stop,” he starts to pull away.

”W-what’s wrong?” Patrick stammers.  

“Nothing just— can you do that—that thing?” He asks, a little shy. Sitting up as he pulls the swim trunks back up over his little waist.  

Patrick smiles looking over Art’s half naked body and grips himself. “Fuck yeah, of course I can sweetie. Lie down,” he whispers. 

It’s so fucking funny. Patrick pulled out once, nutted all over Art’s bare ass and gave him a fetish. 

Patrick did it partially because he’s gross and disgusting and Art is neat and uptight, and partially because he wanted to mark him, claim him. Spill his seed all over him and rub it in. He thought Art would be annoyed but it was the opposite. 

Ever since then Art’s been obsessed with Patrick’s come. Wants it all over him. Likes how warm it is, how much comes out. Loves how it tastes. Dips his fingers inside and licks it all up. Opens his mouth and tries to catch it on his tongue. He doesn’t really like the facial but that’s okay because Patrick’s brain sort of broke after the one time Art let him try and give him one.

Patrick’s jerking himself to that memory and Art scoots forward and grabs his hand to stop him. “Patrick wait—“ he whines. “What if…”

“What?” Patrick starts, breathless. 

“You think a lot more would come out if you um… waited to come?” 

“Probably,” Patrick shrugs, helpless. “But I don’t think I can last much longer.” He’s teetering on the edge. The slightest touch will probably take him out. And Arts sitting in front of him, legs spread, bright eyes shimmering with mischief. Patrick wants to shove it in his mouth.

“Can you try it?” 

“Um— try what?” 

“Not coming.” 

Patrick feels a little dizzy and it’s not just because he’s on the brink. Surely he’s not hearing properly. “Not?”

”Coming, Yeah, just for a little while,” Art says, looking up. The mischief spreading to his smile. “Like imagine if.. if your balls get so fucking full that… that when you finally do I’m like…soaked in it.”

Patrick takes a breath, his dick twitching just at Art’s words. “God.” He whispers. He’s created a monster. 

“So you don’t want me to…”

Art shakes his head. “I do— but later.”

“Not tonight?”

“No later,” Art says again, like it’s obvious what he’s asking. “But um… you have to not jerk off either,” Art continues, and he bites his lip. “Or fuck your girlfriend.” 

“Not fuck Julie…For you?” 

Art nods. “Please?” 

“How long?” 

“Not long.”

That was two days ago and Patrick’s legitimately going insane. 

He was on the edge of orgasm when Art had stopped him. They changed out of wet clothes into pajamas and Art kept telling him…”you’re fine, you’re fine. You can hold it.” Like he was encouraging him to walk it off after scraping his knee. Art put on the television, some cartoons and started talking about other things to distract him.

Eventually it did start to settle when they snuck out for a 3 am cigarette. Instead of all the energy concentrated at one point it starts to spread out, slow and delicious, this dull aching thrum of desire pulsing under his skin. “See I knew you could do it.” Art says, softly and it almost… not quite but almost messes Patrick up again.

They fall asleep in Arts single and Patrick wakes up with Art’s ass pressed up against him. “I’m sorry,” Art says, and Patrick knows he’s not really. 

Patrick’s usually able to deal with morning wood without jerking off. But this isn’t morning wood. It’s morning wood added onto what he didn’t finish the night before. 

The day goes downhill from there. 

It’s only a half day for the students but it doesn’t make a difference. Patrick spends all morning adjusting, accommodating. It flags every once in a while during class, or practice as he gets distracted but it never fully goes away. Arousal simmering low and distant… always just under the surface.

He’s playing singles during practice so he doesn’t have to stare at Arts ass which helps things. He’s fine. At least he thinks he’s okay. But then they get into the locker room and Art pats him on the shoulder and says, “Good job.” 

It’s the tiniest little touch. His soft breath, just a whisper against Patrick’s skin but it’s almost instant. Patrick’s suddenly so hard he needs to sit down. He’s pulling his bag onto his lap to hide it.  Art smirks, blue eyes flickering down to where Patrick is concealing himself. He pulls off his sweaty t-shirt. “Are you showering here or…”

“What do you fucking think?” Patrick hisses and Art’s grin widens. 

“See you in the room then.” 

And Patrick hates him (loves him). Wants to yank his dick out right now and jerk himself stupid to Arts dumb smile. To his tall, lanky form walking naked to the showers. Wants to push him up against the shower wall and nut on his perky little bottom in front of all of their teammates so they all fucking know who he belongs to. He wants to stare at it while the shower water slowly rinses it off of him and it snakes down the drain. 

He runs the water cold in their dorm room and that helps. His dick relaxes but his balls are still achy. He meets Art in the mess hall. He’s doing okay. Even gets distracted enough by the conversation with their friends that it almost feels normal. Until Art brushes his fingers against Patrick’s thigh, then it’s back, bubbling up at full strength like it never left, his pants tight, bulge barely concealed.

When his girlfriend, Julie, sits on his other side a minute later he doesn’t really stand a chance. She’s talking bto him about her new Hello Kitty stickers, he doesn’t hear a word she says. He’s fixated on the pink of her bra just visible under her white t-shirt. She leans in for a kiss and Patrick thinks he might bust spontaneously right in the middle of dinner. 

He avoids her for the rest of the evening, trying his best not to test his resolve. It’s not like he’s never gone more than a day without it before. But it’s definitely never been planned and he’s always been able to take care of himself whenever the need arises. 

“So…” he says to Art when they’re back in the bedroom. 

“Mmhm,” Art says innocently. He yawns and stretches out like he’s tired. He probably is. They were up late and early but Patrick is a nerve.

“Are we gonna…fuck?”

Art presses his lips together and takes a breath. “I was just thinking…” he says shyly, “maybe we should sleep. We have practice in the morning and it’s just…a lot. Tomorrow though.”

“Tomorrow…” Patrick stares him down. Trying to catch any hint that Art is just fucking with him but if he is, he’s playing it straight. 

Patrick can feel it all night, coiled tight in his belly, so hot and sweet. Skin so warm he checks more than once to make sure the air conditioner is still working. Art is relaxed in his own bed, all sated and fast asleep. 

Patrick is irritated. It’s not like this is a binding contract. It’s not like Arts holding a fucking gun to his head to make him keep it in. Patrick could just… he could just… he traces his happy trail, fingers easing into his boxers, tangled in pubic hair settling just at the base….no…at this point it’s a competition. A challenge. A battle of wills. Something Patrick intends to win.

He balls his fists, flops onto his stomach and wraps his arms around his pillow. His heavy dick pressed up against the mattress, he falls into a fitful sleep.

Day two is day one on steroids. He wakes up rutting against the mattress, only to quickly push himself upright when he fully enters consciousness. It’s just moments before he’s about to bust. Arts curled up on his bed, watching him. Glassy eyes still coated with sleep. 

“You’re so pent up,” Art says softly. “So full.”

Patrick takes a breath. “No shit Sherlock. So uh today right… you said today. Right?” He sounds like an addict, desperate.

“Mmhm.”

“Now?”

“Mm,” Art sighs. “After practice? You can wait a little longer. I know you can.”

A little longer and Patrick’s going to lose his mind. They have practice all afternoon. It’s getting so bad that just the feeling of his t-shirt brushing against his skin has his balls tightening. The pressure of his shorts, his briefs, gently squeezing him, barely concealing him, he feels it all. His erection waxing and waning all throughout practice. 

Coach’s radio plays Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood while they’re running drills. It’s a coincidence (or a cosmic joke) but Art can’t help dissolving into a fit of laughter and actually ends up getting into trouble for it which Patrick is secretly pleased about. 

 Not that Patrick needs that. He could come to Let it Be by the Beatles at this point, which is what plays next.

He’s practically a shell of himself by evening time. Fully erect watching sports center and eating a burger while Arts at his desk working on some oh so important math project. “We can do it when I’m done. Okay?”

Okay… so Patrick’s pretending to watch sports center but he’s actually fixated on Arts bare leg bouncing idly as he’s hunched over his desk, chewing on his mechanical pencil. Frenetic energy in him, though nowhere near the level that’s racing through Patrick’s body.

Julie’s called him five times and he’s ignored every single one. Her texts to him growing increasingly frustrated. Hes probably gonna lose her but he can’t focus on that right now. It’s so funny— all it takes is a little bit of Arts attention and Patrick can’t pay attention to any one else. One little suggestion, not even a promise of something in return and he hasn’t touched himself to the point where he feels dizzy.

He clears his throat loudly. When Art remains distracted he does it again.

Art looks up like he’s just remembering Patrick’s there. “Are you okay?” He smiles and then glances at the tv. “I didn’t know you liked hockey.”

Patrick’s got no poker face left but he’s beyond caring. “I think I’m… I think I’m fucking loaded, can we—“ Patrick sighs. He’s so fucking eager. God. If Art asked him to get on his knees and beg like a puppy dog for it, he’d do it. 

Art licks his lips, cheeks beginning to flush. “I want to but…I’m so busy, can you wait… just a little longer?”

“P-please Art—“ Patrick swallows. “How much longer?”

“A little bit. I promise.”

“Fuck,” Patrick throws himself onto his back. He doesn’t know how long he lies there. Till he’s gone catatonic probably. Feels like a dream when finally Art crawls onto his bed.

“You’re so dramatic,” Art sighs, lying next to him.

“Oh fuck you,” Patrick says, no heat behind it as he rolls over to face him. 

Arts grinning at him. “I’m actually kinda impressed.” He cups his palm over Patrick’s dick and starts rubbing. 

Patrick’s fully hard in two strokes, and he’s frantic. pulling Art close and mashing their lips together. He’s grabbing at Arts clothing, at his own. Can’t get naked fast enough. Can’t get Art open fast enough. Lube coated fingers digging roughly into Arts creamy white thighs. Probably gonna leave marks but Patrick doesn’t care. He’s not focused on anything but getting himself off. 

He’s gripping Arts waist, Art gets to have control until Patrick loses his mind. Then Patrick’s manhandling him, pushing his dick inside all while Arts making sounds that would make a porn star blush. He can only fuck into him twice before he’s on the fucking brink. 

“This what you want?” Patrick gasps, jerking himself with one hand and rubbing Arts bottom with the other. “Can’t believe you walk around with this. Fuck.”

“Mm yes,” Art moans, pressing back against Patrick’s hand. And it’s a blessed relief when Patrick finally falls over the edge. Moaning through the best fucking orgasm of his life as string after string after string of come covers Arts bare bottom, the small of his back, his legs, his balls. Some of it even splashes up to his shoulder. Patrick’s wetting him up and he’s moaning for it, body squirming as Patrick paints him in it. 

“So fucking hot,” Art breathes, eager, like he cant get enough. Just makes Patrick feel even crazier about him. He was right actually… it’s a lot. A whole fucking lot. 

“Oh shit, ‘t's so warm,” Art breathes. He’s jerking himself off too, the soft pitter patter of it landing on Patrick’s sheets as he moans. 

Patrick is shaky, spent. he settles on his knees, breathlessly staring at his own handiwork glistening all over Art’s lithe body. Art stretches out on his stomach, reaching back to dip his fingers into a pool of it. “Mm sorry I made you wait for it.” Art sighs before licking his fingers.

Patrick settles on the bed next to him resting on his arms. “Actually now that it’s done… I kinda miss it.” He says.

“Really?” Art says.

“Mmhm. It was kinda hot. Feeling horny all the time.”

Art smirks. “Then I guess you wouldn’t mind doing it again… maybe for a week next time? Imagine it… It’ll be like opening a damn.”

“Sure,” Patrick says, snatching his pillow back from under Art, “As long as next time… you do it with me.”

(Idk, sorry so long lol)

[ja9-animations]

I discovered TGS in June 2021. I was obsessed with Jekyll and Hyde since December 2020, and saw an animatic of TGS on YouTube, and clicked the link in the description that brought me to the comic. The Glass Scientists is a story that greatly impacted my artwork and creativity.

In September 2021, I posted my first TGS fan animation, and in January 2022, I posted a video of me animating bits of the comic. Although they are old (and a bit jarring to watch now,) they still hold a place in my heart because I remember the passion and excitement I had animating them. I remember when Sage announced the comic was being published in book form. I was in my math class, and I told my friend who sat next to me. I saw so excited, but it also reminded me that the comic wasn't something that was going to last forever, so I had to enjoy it while it was still going.

An announcement of an interview with Sage on discord was made, and I joined the server. This was the very first time interacting with the fan base, and on the same day I posted my Confrontation animatic, which now has over 43 thousand views, which is INSANE! When I finished the animatic, I began working on the Doctor Sunshine is Dead animation, which was the first fully animated thing I made for TGS. The DSIS animation is still one of my favorite things I have ever animated, and I am so proud of how it turned out. When that was done I began working on my TGS animated part 2 video, and even got some voice actors to make it seem like an animated show.

When I joined this fandom, I was introduced to many incredible artists, voice actors, theorists, and commenters, and even though I don't talk to many of you guys much, I just wanted to say I think all of you are incredibly talented people and it's been a pleasure to be a part of this fandom with you.

Happy 10 years of TGS, hopefully 10 years in the future there will still be people talking about this comic!

[mt-oe]

I’ve just been highly obsessed over modern Mizu. So I’m just asking for that, modern Mizu meets reader at uni or something like that! I love LOVE your writing!! 💖💖

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

Hey dear!

Thank you so much for the request! I hope you don't mind if I add a bit more to this <3 I've been wanting to write modern au Mizu hcs and your request really granted me the opportunity to do so.

Also, I'm so sorry for being so slow on the requests. I've been so eepy lately for some reason and I can't fight against it, like I tried but failed so many times ;; I am a slave to my own body

Anyways, I hope you enjoy! Mwa mwa :*

warning/s: not proofread, she/her for mizu, implied afab reader, game reference (league of legends)

general headcanons

✦ This woman would either overload or underload her units like crazy. She'd either be busy with her academics and work 6 days a week, even sending a letter to the admin so she can go past the mandated maximum amount of units in one semester or doing absolutely nothing while the rest of her friends are going apeshit on their finals. There's no in between.

She would plan it like an absolute psychopath too. Nothing special foreseeably happening in the next semester? She's going above and beyond. A convention she wants to go to on September? Signing up for the bare minimum amount of allowed units just for one event.

Her friends are either concerned for her and losing contact for a whole semester, or are pissed off that she's playing some kind of gacha game on her phone while they're losing their minds on their finals.

✦ Would be the type to be so pissed off by slow walkers in the hallway. The hatred she has for people who walk so fucking slow in the hallway is unbridled. Though she's not the type to pick fights, she'd be the type to sigh loudly, making you feel her anger, before overtaking and wouldn't be afraid to bump against the person if needed. Her hatred goes deep enough to the point where she even remembers people JUST because they walk slow.

✦ The type of friend who would walk to everything. Sure she has her motorbike, but if she can walk to it, you bet she's going to walk. She even knows different shortcuts to different buildings on campus.

"This looks like a good place," Akemi tells them, showing her phone. For once, their vacant hours finally aligned and they've been trying to find a good place to eat since the lunch hall food was getting repetitive and they could feel their taste buds dulling over time. Akemi, being the 'what do you guys want to eat?' friend, and the other three, being the 'I don't know' or the 'I'm fine with whatever' friends, is left to search for a new place.

They took a look at the place and shrugged in agreement, making her roll her eyes at their lack of opinion. "Okay but how are we going to go there?" Taigen asks. Mizu takes Akemi's phone and looks up the map to the place. The distance itself was enough to tell a person that they should take the bus. Hell, it was on the other side of town almost.

"We can walk. It's not that far," she says, closing the map and handing Akemi her phone back. They trusted Mizu. It couldn't be that bad.

Right?

By the time they arrived at the restaurant, they were already sweating, ready to give up, tired out of their wits. The food wasn't even worth it anymore.

"It's not that far" my ass.

Even Taigen, her fellow gym rat and workout buddy, was fucking exhausted. And this bitch (affectionately), has the audacity to stand there, crossing her arms with the most unamused expression on her face as if it was their fault for being so exhausted. If she tells you its walking distance, it is NOT within walking distance.

✦ She's a jack-of-all trades type of person, but she'd have the fattest fucking talent crush on anyone who can express themselves through art. The talents and skills she gathered were purely out of necessity. Fixing and modifying bikes was the only thing she was truly passionate about but it's hard to be expressive through repairing motorbikes, right?

She has always been so amazed by stories of painters, sculptors, singers, and writers who have deep backstories and can reflect it through their art. She would be the type to read the whole description in art museums just because she's so amazed by them.

Deep inside her, she wished she could do that too. To express herself through a medium. Like what do you mean you wrote this poem because you're sad your cat died? Or what do you mean you took this professional-looking picture just because you had the best picnic date with your friends? How can someone write a song about casual sapphic sex? She can't even vocalize her feelings, how much more in art? Whenever she sees someone writing their English essay so well or drawing randomly, she'd secretly be so interested.

✦ Mizu would have social media accounts but would use it bare minimum. She'd be that type of classmate that you're not sure if it's really her because she doesn't have a profile picture you can check or if she does, it's like a picture of an item instead of her face.

Her friends would be so happy whenever Mizu posts an IG story even if it's just a picture of where they were eating or even if their face is barely in the picture.

"Aww you posted us!" and they're like little ants with how small they were in the picture.

Or

"Do you want to eat at that place again?" and she'd be like 'what? why?' but they'd know she actually enjoyed the food because she bothered posting a picture of the place.

Deep inside her, Mizu wants to keep up with whatever trends her friends are into but she's very lowkey about it. The tough love friend who secretly really enjoys being friends, y'know? She'd search about it and try to figure it out. Everyone's surprised by her internet knowledge since she always acts like she wouldn't give a shit whatever new trend is on.

✦ This sounds so corny and stereotypical, but Taigen and her would be those gym rats who solve everything by working out. It didn't matter if it was a weekday, a weekend, a holiday, or whatever weather condition was going on outside, they are going.

They failed a test? Gym. Hungover? Gym. Too much homework? Gym.

When Megan Thee Stallion said she'll go to the gym two times a day, they go three. When she said the results are resulting? The body is bodying? These two are taking it seriously.

Taigen would focus on biceps, chest, and lats, cutting down on fat so his body would look more lean. He'd hate leg day but would do it anyway just to balance out his physique.

Meanwhile, Mizu would have a 'sleeper-type' build and her routine would be more well-rounded and would even include calisthenics on her free time. They'd try to beat each other's PR but it really ain't a competition when Mizu is always winning.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

how did you two meet?

Stupid shitty project.

Stupid fucking publisher gatekeeping the fucking article.

Stupid bitch ass school wifi keeps disconnecting.

Mizu resisted the urge to slam her laptop shut as her device disconnected from the wifi for the nth time. She was stuck in the library trying to finish her midterm project for building design system and holy shit was she frustrated.

She needed to create a specific building design that was supposed to be environmentally friendly, using what was considered as 'green materials' and had minimally destructive designs. It wouldn't be so bad if this fucking publisher just had to put a price on the article she needed. Wasn't education supposed to be free or whatever?

Her friends tried to help her, telling her to use the library computers, but none of them were working or free at the moment. That leaves her to use her laptop in the library. Usually, that wouldn't be a problem but due to the recent rains, the school wifi has been pretty shitty.

After a few more tries, she decided that this wasn't worth the frustration and trouble, and decided to collect her things to get ready to leave. Just as she was about to zip up her bag, a tap on the shoulder stopped her. She turned around to look at who was trying to get her attention, ready to tell them off. But upon turning around, her heart skipped a beat.

There you stood.

In your oh-so fancy sweatpants and college logo hoodie (whose logo wasn't even the university's). Your hair was ruffled and messy, eyes tired and more exhausted than her's. Understandably so though. It was hell week and everyone was tired, but somehow, your tired looked so pretty.

Her eyes continued to stare at you. Like the world stopped moving and it was just you and her in the room.

"Umm...there's a free computer over there if you still need it," you said shyly but in a straightforward manner. A small tired smile on your lips, trying to appear as friendly as possible. Mizu snapped out of her trance and nodded, slinging her bag over her shoulder to move to the said computer.

Maybe she'll stay for a bit. To finish her midterm project.

Definitely not for the pretty lady.

No, of course not.

Upon sitting down, she couldn't help but sneak glances at you, looking back down at the screen when you looked in her direction. She felt stupid, like a lovestruck fool. Borderline, like a child getting their first actual crush.

In her mind, she was already planning how to approach you without making it awkward. Maybe she'll try to strike up a conversation? But how? Hmmm..

It definitely took a while, being distracted and all, but she was finally able to finish her report. Taking a deep breath, she prepared herself mentally to talk to you. She stood up and stretched after logging herself out, pretending to look around the room but in reality she was looking for you.

Much to her dismay, you were no where to be found. A small "fuck" left her lips as she sighed, picking her bag up. The universe must hate her. Giving her an opportunity to see the most beautiful person she's ever seen only for them to leave early? Fuck.

Her thoughts continued to plague her for the rest of the day, even until the next morning. It sounded so silly and so stupid for her to be this bothered, but she really just couldn't forget you. She sighed once again as she stared at the lecture hall walls, face hidden against her palms.

"Excuse me. Do you have an extra pencil?" a voice asked as she felt a tap on her shoulder. Looking up grouchily, her eyes widened immediately.

It was you.

And this time, she wasn't going to let this opportunity pass.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

but what now? (girlfriend headcanons)

✦ Mizu would absolutely remember EVERYTHING about you. Your birthday, MBTI score, favorites, dislikes, and even the silliest things such as what makes you sneeze.

She has a second brain for these, an internal SSD in her brain just for you. You won't even have to remind her about anything, because she already planned it out before you remember.

It's especially great for errands since you don't have to give her a list, she already has a list in her brain. Sometimes, you'd think she forgot because she's so quiet about it but she always finds a way to prove you wrong. If she says she forgot something about you, it's a lie. She never forgets, especially when it comes to her girlfriend.

✦ Would pretend to not understand or know how to do something just so you could teach or show her. Mizu definitely has a lot of skill up her sleeves, but whenever you asked if she knew something that she knew you were good at, she'd pretend not to.

"So I just click like this?" she asked you through the call, clicking on a minion. You had enthusiastically called her, asking if she wanted to learn how to play League of Legends. Unknown to you, your girlfriend already knew how to play and was quite good at it (that's a lie, she's beyond good).

She couldn't help but smile slightly as she watched you nod enthusiastically. The thought of you being so eager to spend time with her was heart-warming. She even made a dummy account just to make her beginner act look believable. "Yeah, you just need to keep this up. So should we queue together?" you asked, sounding really excited.

Mizu chuckled and nodded. "Don't get mad at me, okay?" she joked lightly, accepting your invite. "I won't. I'll be the ADC so you can play support until you get the hang of it, okay?" you said, checking which ADR champions you had cool skins of. Your girlfriend let out a small laugh at your enthusiasm, signaling you to start the queue.

The game went really well. Extremely well.

To your surprise, Mizu was quite a good support. Never accidentally stealing your CS, always being there during a clash, skill shots always hitting, knowing who to focus on. "It's because you're good at teaching people," she said.

But really, you wonder how she knew which items to build when you never even taught her.

✦ Would do the most random or the smallest things for you. She's not good at expressing her feelings so she makes up for it through acts of service and gift giving. Mizu tries her best to be as loving as she can without overwhelming you.

Can you even remember the last time you tied your own shoelaces? You can't. Can you?

Sometimes, you'll be surprised to arrive home with the fridge already stocked even though you had told her that you'll do the groceries on your next day off. The only response you'll get is a shake of her head and a random thing you mentioned you wanted to buy.

Sometimes, she's a bit silly though. Putting in the effort to remove her jacket to shield you from the rain even though you had an umbrella, removing the buckle of your helmet so she'd be the one to put it on you, gifting you random goofy greeting cards.

It's both endearing and a bit funny.

✦ Secretly loves it when you put makeup on her or if you let her do your makeup. Her amazement and fascination skyrockets whenever she watched you put make up on. It was a line of femininity that she was never taught to cross. She'd watch you with deep interest, observing how carefully you did it, how purposeful each step you did was.

"So why do you put it on?" she asks. You hum in thought before shrugging. "It just...makes me feel pretty."

What do you mean it makes you feel pretty?

You were already pretty.

You can't help but laugh at her and her curiosity. "It just does. It feels therapeutic to put on and I like how I look after, it's like expressing myself or something. Like painting but on your face," you explained to her, making her raise an eyebrow.

"But what if you don't like the way it looks?" she asked, picking up your eyeshadow palette and swatching a color on her hand curiously. "I can always take it off," you answered, blending the blush on your cheeks.

She stayed silent for a moment, continuing to swatch the colors on her hand. Her mind still couldn't wrap around the fact that this could make you feel better. Its just color and chemicals, and it washes off too.

Your eyes scanned her face before a soft laugh left your lips. "Here. Want to try?" you offered. Your girlfriend looked a bit hesitant but she wanted to understand.

Was this really fun?

After a few minutes, some struggles and squirming, you finally finished putting some make up on her. You tried your best to make it look as natural and as light as possible, knowing that she wouldn't appreciate the texture of heavy makeup immediately.

Blue eyes scanned over her own face on the mirror. She didn't say anything, but the slight twitch of her lips and the shine in her eyes spoke thousands.

"I want to do it on you too," she said quietly. "At least one thing. Let me try to do it for you."

You heart melted at her excitement. How could you refuse her when she finally finds something she likes? You handed her your eyeliner and sat down. "Here, follow my instructions.."

Mizu actually ended up liking it. Although she enjoyed putting it on you more, she still enjoyed it nonetheless. The amount of practice she put in made you wonder if she was actually better than you now. Somehow, she felt a bit of relief and a bit happy that she finally found something she could do that was considered as 'artistic'.

What started off as a simple "let me try" ended up being part of your routine. This woman never stopped practicing different eyeliner looks and now she just sits on your bed, waiting for you to finish your routine so she can put it on you. Sometimes she'd do a more creative graphic liner look, but on days you had to go to uni or work, she'd do the usual. She could probably do it with her eyes closed.

And the results?

SHARP.

Capital S H A R P.

[salemssimblr]

My Top 24 Screenshots Renders of 2024!

I was tagged by the so many lovely mutuals and creators! Thank you @elderwisp, @savagemagician3, @sikoi, @blvckentropy, @mosneakers, & @azeterna! I love yall so much!

I'm so sorry, despite my very best efforts I couldn't choose just 24, so have 30 instead 😅

Looking at all these together, I'm worried I may have plateau'd just a bit 😅 No but in reality, it's really cool to see that I've refined my style and methods over the year, starting in January and continuing it all through 2024. Seeing progress and improvement is one of my favorite things about this process, so doing these recaps is always enjoyable.

January:

Looking back, I'm still so proud of the first dancing set of renders for Ariss & Vasily, and who could forget the first Alice sighting?? I can't, look at her.

February:

February was a bit of a slow month for me but I still love how this A+tM album cover came out!

March:

March was a bit slower, but I love this set of Ariss (:

April:

April was a goood month, I'm still so in love with all three of these.

May:

MerMay was lacking for me a bit this year, but I really love how my contribution turned out (: & this spicy render of Ariss & Vasily is one of my favorites, if for no other reason than his little fang peek.

June:

June was all about Alice + the Madness! & like LEGIT? I still can't believe I made this Rolling Stone cover? I have a secret, I've tried to make another one for Alice, but nothing has or probably will ever look as good as this one so I've given up lmfaoooo

& this render of Erisande was such a labor of love. I sat down and said it'd be really quick and then spent hours editing meshes and adjusting the lighting... but then, that always happens with me and "quick" renders 😅

July:

Bit of a slow month, but I'm still so floored (& happy!) about the love Millie has gotten! This isn't even a completed render and it's one of my most well-received posts to date haha, but I can't blame anyone, look how cute she is.

August:

Ramping up into spooky season we have two of my favorite renders of all time, my "bog demon" and mothwoman! As obsessed as I am with Ariss and Vasily, it's really nice to do creative one-off renders and these were both SO FUN to do. I hope to do more in the new year too (:

September:

This iconic portrait of Ariss will always be one of my favorites (& is actually my computer's wallpaper rn, but a version updated with her 'new' tattoos), & this render of Kai could definitely be improved on (maybe in the new year...) but it was a really fun challenge! I do see flaws in it now but that's growing and learning!

October:

October was (not surprisingly) a very busy month for me! The idea for the render of Theo & Millie had been rolling around in my head since I first created them, & while the end result wasn't exactly what I was envisioning, I still really love how it turned out.

& though this set of renders for Ariss & Vasily took me FOR-FUCKING-EVER, and I see a lot of flaws even now (after trying my damnedest to have NONE), I still really love it. The end result/edit/colorway was NOT what I planned but I really fell in love with it.

November:

November, the month of ambitious scene-building, pose-making, and upping my skin shader game in a BIG way. I spent literal hours perfecting Ariss' new tattoo, and literal days building the scene for that gorgeous render of Kai.

& I'm so glad yall love that pose set! It was definitely a learning experience and a labor of love.

December:

Looking at this overview, December has been dark and spicy lmfao but I actually love it. Once again, all of these took wayyyy longer than I thought they would when I sat down to start them, but I'm genuinely in love with all three!

& that's a wrap (so far) on 2024! I'm having surgery tomorrow so not sure I'll be able to create/post anything else this year, but I have big plans for 2025! So stay tuned (:

I'm tagginggggggg @kuroashims, @a-m-pyra. @acidheaddd, @gothoffspring, @pralinesims, @thebramblewood, @moonfromearth, @nepotisim, & YOU, I want to see all your creations!

(There were a LOT more creators I wanted to tag but I saw yall have already done this!)

[petercapaldi-press]

Peter Capaldi: 'You don't just play the Doctor, you represent him' The Telegraph

INTERVIEW

12 September 2015 6:00am BST

Chloe Fox

'What do you say we have dinner in the Tardis?’ Peter Capaldi, aka the 12th Doctor, is looking at me from over the top of his Wayfarer sunglasses with a bird-like intensity; head cocked to the side, a mischievous light in his beady blue eyes.

Fresh from the set (a nearby solar-panel factory in Cardiff that has been dressed up as the kitchen of a spaceship where a monster has been trying to eat everyone in his path), dressed in skinny black jeans and a T-shirt, with his trademark Dr Martens boots, Capaldi crackles with exactly the same combination of fierce intelligence and nervous energy as his Doctor – a darker, edgier, slightly more unpredictable version of what has come before.

This will be Capaldi’s second season at the helm of a sci-fi television show that, now in its 52nd year (with a 16-year hiatus from 1989 to 2005), is the longest-running in history. Distributed to more than 200 territories worldwide, viewed in the UK alone by an average of six million per episode, adored by its legions of obsessive ‘Whovian’ fans, Doctor Who is nothing short of a global phenomenon.

Capaldi, 56 at the time of casting (he’s 57 now), was the oldest Doctor to debut since the very first doctor, William Hartnell, did so aged 55 in 1963. To some, his was a slightly left-field casting. His immediate predecessors, David Tennant and Matt Smith – 34 and 26 respectively when they got the job – were younger, twinklier, more user-friendly versions of the Time Lord. And yet, Capaldi’s older, more volatile incarnation – who shows zero tolerance towards all things romantic – very quickly won his way into Whovian hearts across the spectrum. ‘A class act’, declared The Daily Telegraph. ‘A fantastic, fascinating lead performance,’ said Digital Spy.

By the time series eight (his first) ended – with a thrilling denouement in which the Doctor was made President of the World and his arch-nemesis, the Master, was reincarnated as a woman (brilliantly played by Michelle Gomez as a sort of malevolent Mary Poppins) – Capaldi’s rightness for the role was established.

‘What I wanted to do, I suppose, was remind people of the alien-ness of the Doctor,’ Capaldi says. ‘Doctor Who isn’t a human being, you see. He’s a creature of the cosmos. His social skills aren’t great. He doesn’t care very much if people like or dislike him, because people aren’t his thing, you know?’

We are now sitting in the Tardis – surely the most thrilling interview location of all time – where Capaldi, who is nearing the end of nine months of filming series nine, looks touchingly at home. Often, between thoughts, he gazes reverentially up at the ceiling as if it were the vaults of a church. Long legs crossed, jacket off, vampirically pale, thin hands wrapped around the pot of Wagamama noodle soup that is his supper, you can see glimpses of the boy who penned endless fan letters to the show’s producers and who applied for presidency of the Doctor Who Fan Club aged 14.

In person, Capaldi is a much gentler, more rarefied presence than you might expect, especially if you were a fan of his brutally funny spin doctor, Malcolm Tucker, in Armando Iannucci’s Bafta-winning political satire The Thick of It. He speaks quietly, with an elegant Glaswegian drawl. Questions are answered thoughtfully and with a real interest, even though they are probably questions he has been asked dozens, if not hundreds, of times before. ‘Am I enjoying myself? Hmm, let me see… Am I enjoying myself?’ he says, looking around a set that has been specifically customised to suit the personality of his more retro, 1960s-style Doctor – a glass table here, a hexagonal window effect there. ‘Well, just look at this place,’ he says, with a sweep of a long arm. ‘How on earth can I not be enjoying myself?’

Capaldi concedes, however, that the first season was ‘terribly nerve-racking for me because not only was the job new, but I was also getting a level of attention that I simply wasn’t used to’. And in filming the second series, the challenges, he admits, have morphed – in true Doctor Who style – into something else.

‘I don’t feel I’ve nailed it yet – from an acting point of view, I mean,’ he says. ‘I don’t yet feel that I know how to do this. Quite who the Doctor is remains mysterious to me – which is of course as it should be – but one of the biggest challenges that I’ve found, and am finding, is that you have to sort of be able to spin on a penny. You have to be able to go from pantomime to tragedy, from domestic to epic, within a single scene. You have to keep the ball in the air, and you have to remember,’ – and here he grins wryly – ‘that The X Factor is on the other channel. You have to remember that there are people watching in America, you have to remember that, as much as you want to apply your mature acting instincts, there are actually lots of children watching. You’ve got to cover all these bases, and make it exciting and interesting too. It’s a great challenge – and, by the way, I really don’t say that lightly – and one which I care very much about getting right. Because it’s big, isn’t it? It’s really big.’

When Capaldi speaks of the weight of responsibility that comes with such an iconic role, he shifts imperceptibly into the second person, as if distancing himself from its magnitude. ‘It can be quite intimidating when you look down, do you know what I mean? Because Doctor Who exists on quite a big scale, in terms of its importance to the BBC and to its fans. You don’t just play Doctor Who; you represent him. You represent the 50 years in which he has meant an awful lot to an awful lot of people. And the weight of it – and I really would never want to seem ungrateful – is that it is continual. It is very, very nice because people always greet you with a certain affection, but it is basically every day, everywhere you go.’

When Capaldi got the job, one of his first actions was to pick the brains of his predecessors. ‘I knew David a little bit but I didn’t know Matt at all,’ he explains. ‘They were both very kind, very generous and refreshingly honest. They both made it quite clear to me that the role would bring, shall we say, a greater visibility, and they gave me very good advice as to how to handle it.’

First and foremost, retain a sense of humour at all times. ‘It’s all showbiz silliness really,’ he says, laughing. (On the day his casting was announced on a prime-time BBC special hosted by Zoë Ball, he was given a codename – Houdini – and bundled, gangster-style, into a chauffeur-driven car with a blanket over his head.)

‘Peter has a large anti-bullshit-ometer inside him,’ says his friend, the actor Richard E Grant (who starred in the short film Franz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life, which Capaldi wrote and directed and for which he won an Oscar). ‘And because his fame and recognition have come relatively late in his career, his hilarious cynicism about the yo-yo nature of showbusiness abides.’

Take Comic-Con, for instance. A couple of weeks before our meeting, Capaldi – along with his co-stars and the Doctor Who writer Steven Moffat – flew out to the convention in San Diego for a promotional event. For the two days before the convention started, Capaldi was doing press in his hotel. Wherever he went, he was accompanied by six security guards. ‘Six! Can you believe it?! And they all kept telling me that I couldn’t leave the hotel because, if I did, I’d be mobbed. And then I’d look out of the window and all I’d see would be this little Yoda walking down the street. So eventually I’d had enough and I said, “Come on, guys, you’ve got to let me go,” So they did – although the heavies came with me, of course. And, do you know what? Not a single person recognised me. Not one.’

Unsurprisingly, this wasn’t to last. The group sat down for dinner and, before long, queues were forming for selfies. Which was when Capaldi’s second code for coping came into play: ‘Just enjoy it.’

He understands the obsessed fans, because he himself was one of them. Teased at school for being a sci-fi geek – he was given the derogatory nickname Moon Man because of his obsession with the moon landings – the young Capaldi was far from cool. Not that he cared too much, because he was also very loved. ‘It was very safe, full of delights,’ he says of his early childhood in a tenement block in the Springburn region of Glasgow. His parents – Italian-born Gerry and Irish-born Nancy – ran a cafe in the bottom of the tenement, from which they operated an ice-cream-delivery business.

Family were everywhere: both grandmothers, plus uncles, aunts and cousins all lived in the same block. There was lots of noise, laughter, spaghetti, a Beatles soundtrack and, of course, Doctor Who. ‘To me, it was like a fairytale,’ he explains of his childhood obsession. ‘It had that quality of darkness that you find in a Grimm’s fairy tale: this strange creature of a man who takes you on all these adventures, but who always keeps you safe. That’s absolutely what I want the children who watch my version to feel.’

For Capaldi, Doctor Who is inextricably linked to his childhood. ‘It will always be a part of me,’ he says. Earlier this year, just before he was due to start filming the current series, Capaldi’s beloved mother – who had sent him the Doctor Who annual every year, well into his adulthood – died. It was a source of great pride to her that his visits to her hospital bedside were always accompanied by the happy squeals of just about every nurse in the hospital, coming to catch a glimpse.

Growing up, he didn’t really know what he wanted to be; he just knew he didn’t want to join the grey ranks of ‘depressed-looking souls standing at the bus stop in the rain every morning’. In those days there was only one place to go if you didn’t want to be like everybody else: the Glasgow School of Art.

Submerged in an ethos of creativity, Capaldi embraced the beginnings of punk. He was lead singer of a band called the Dreamboys – who mercifully changed their name from the Bastards From Hell (and whose members included Craig Ferguson, of The Late Late Show fame) – and he also began to harbour dreams of becoming an actor. One night, in 1983, he got home drunk to his Glasgow flat to find his costume-designer landlady chatting to the film director Bill Forsyth, who saw enough promise in Capaldi’s innocent charm to cast the 25-year-old opposite Burt Lancaster in his Scottish seaside fable Local Hero.

A decade, and a few bit parts later – most notably as John Malkovich’s manservant in Dangerous Liaisons – Capaldi wrote and directed the aforementioned short (in which his actress wife, Elaine Collins, co-starred with Richard E Grant) and, totally unexpectedly, won an Oscar.

For a brief, glittering moment, Hollywood beckoned (the couple bought a house in Crouch End, London, with the proceeds from a Miramax option on a feature-film idea) but then, as so often happens in Hollywood, the lights went off again.

When, after the best part of 15 years spent taking whatever hand-to-mouth acting jobs he could get – a Ruth Rendell Mysteries here, a Foyle’s War there – Capaldi got the call to audition for Armando Iannucci, he didn’t get his hopes up. In fact, the whole audition experience was so turgid and long-winded that, by the time he actually met Iannucci himself, Capaldi was simmering with rage; a rage that was to change his life by landing him the part of Malcolm Tucker.

Contrary to common belief, Malcolm Tucker was not based on Alastair Campbell. He came instead from Hollywood, from the American agents and producers – ‘malevolent forces in Armani suits’ – that Capaldi had witnessed, first-hand, barking foul obscenities down the phone at people. His ‘failure’, it turned out, had not been for nothing.

If the success of The Thick of It was a door opening for Capaldi, Doctor Who has been a floodgate from which there is no going back. ‘Would I have appreciated it as much if it had happened 20 years ago?’ he muses. ‘Almost definitely not.’

Happily, the timing of his success suits Capaldi’s life. With his wife now working as a television producer (she gave up acting for a more financially reliable line of work) and their daughter, Cecily, at university, Capaldi can be based in Cardiff from Monday to Friday and return to family life at weekends. ‘And it’s a shock when I do,’ he jokes. ‘Because I’m certainly not allowed to be number one on the cast list there. Here I spend all week with people taking me everywhere I need to go, checking I have everything I need, driving me the three minutes to and from my lovely waterside apartment to the studio, making me endless cups of coffee, loving me wherever I go; and there I am expected to have my feet on the ground. But I don’t want my feet on the ground, goddammit!’

He is too gracious to say it, but Capaldi is definitely tired and homesick. With 13 episodes a year, not to mention the promotional whirl, being the Doctor is more than a full-time job. He has even developed the same knee complaint that had Matt Smith – ‘who is about 12, for God’s sake!’ – on crutches at their first meeting. ‘It’s something to do with running down corridors and turning round very quickly to deliver lines,’ he says, laughing.

Nevertheless Capaldi is uncomplaining. ‘All this will come to an end, you see,’ he says, looking around him at the Tardis. ‘It might just be my Scottish melancholia, but the very first day I found out I’d got the job, I started to feel sad that one day I would not have it; that there would come a day, in the not too distant future, that I wouldn’t be Doctor Who any more. And that is why I try really hard to get as much out of it as possible. Because one day I’ll just be an overweight has-been, trying to get a meeting with Jenna Coleman [Clara, the Doctor’s companion] and being ejected from a Doctor Who Convention in Bolton for being drunk and disorderly. I mean, this is surely my high point, isn’t it?’

Doctor Who returns to BBC One on September 19

[timesomewhere]

in honour of the West End's next to normal closing today I've finally proof-read my 'things I noticed/general thoughts' post that's been sitting in my drafts since I saw it earlier this month. it's very long I'm very sorry.

Act One:

it was really fun watching this show in September given that there's two references to it in the first song

I adore the monologue about the pills that Dr. Fine gives during 'Who's Crazy'. it's rhythmic and funny yet also unnerving. It's such a quick and impactful way to summarise what Diana has been through for the past 16 years

Gabe does a 'one of your French girls' pose on the kitchen counter under the cabinets during 'My Psychopharmacologist and I'

Jamie Parker made direct eye contact with me during the last part of 'Who's Crazy' and it was one of the most intense experiences of my life

I might just be dense but I don't get the point of the neon sign that says 'Fine' which drops down during the Dr. Fine scene. Initially I thought that then one would drop down saying 'Madden' during his scenes to help people differentiate between the doctors but then it didn't so it just feels like a weird extra prop

speaking of random props, shout out to the iPad on the table in the opening scene which Gabe pretty much instantly takes away after telling Diana that she shouldn't obsess over tragic news stories and is then never seen again as far as I remember

Dan in the flashback scene being such an optimist about Diana's pregnancy and the future they're gonna have together... soul-crushing

Caissie Levy's 'I Miss The Mountains.' Holy Shit.

I love how Diana and Gabe are the only characters who sing on/stand on the table. it's as though it's this extra dimension of the house that only they have access to and it's a really neat and subtle way to show that they relate to each other in ways other characters don't

'It's Gonna Be Good' is so underrated. Jamie Parker's somewhat genuine optimism becoming optimism-through-gritted-teeth is incredibly acted

The way Jamie delivers the first line of 'He's Not Here' is devastating. the heaviness of that moment as you feel the audience around you realising what's just happened is something I'll remember forever

Gabe body-blocking Dan from Diana during 'I Am the One' is such good staging. People talk about how Jack Wolfe plays Gabe with a lot of layers and a lot of simultaneous contradiction and this song is one of the best examples of that. how Jack manages to project a character who is goading his father and protecting his mother at the same time is beyond me

also Jack has maybe half-an-inch on Jamie which obviously isn't something the actors control but it does makes Gabe seem just that bit more threatening when he's getting in Dan's face

for the first part of Superboy and the Invisible Girl when it's just Natalie singing, Gabe is actively laughing. He's totally unperturbed by her efforts to make herself seen to her mother. it's only when Diana replies, particularly when she says "you're our little pride and joy, our perfect plan" that you see his face drop and you see him trying to figure out a way to stop her from getting Diana's attention which then results in him kicking her off the melody in her own song

"I'll hurt you" being directed at Dan and "I'll heal you" being directed at Diana as Gabe gently touches her face gets me so bad. but the most painful part of 'I'm Alive' for me is when Gabe looks at Dan as he says "I'm the perfect stranger who knows you too well." that's the first time you realise that perhaps Gabe doesn't just impact Diana, and there's something much larger at play

Caissie and Jack W's voices harmonising on 'Catch Me I'm Falling' was one of my favourite parts of the whole show. Their voices are so magical together and their mother/son chemistry is incredible

The 'I Dreamed A Dance' into 'There's a World' sequence is one of the most tragically beautiful things I've ever witnessed. I went into the show knowing what Gabe was trying to achieve during 'There's A World' and yet Jack's voice is so beautifully haunting you totally forget you're supposed to root against Gabe in that moment

Jamie Parker's 'I've Been' is some of the best acting through song out there. Interestingly my friend and I had very different interpretation's of what Gabe's horrified reaction to the blood meant. I viewed it as him being upset about what he convinced Diana to do - he doesn't like seeing her hurt. Whereas my friend saw it as him being angry at himself that she didn't manage to follow through, meaning that he has failed to regain control over her life

'I'm no sociopath, I'm no Sylvia Plath. I ain't no Frances Farmer kind of find for you' is one of the best musical theatre lyrics of all time. I genuinely don't know why I Miss The Mountains is the 'big song' known from N2N over 'Didn't I See This Movie?', it's just so good

Natalie's 'She trusts you!' line is heartbreaking, I was basically watching that entire scene through my fingers because of how high the emotion was

Act Two:

'Pfizer's woman of the year' will in fact be peak comedy every time. Eleanor's delivery is *chef's kiss*

Gabe having just one line in 'Wish I Were Here', and that line being 'Wish I were here.' Yeah. I feel very normal about that.

Natalie's line of "Can I hide my stupid hunger, fake some confidence and cheer?" being pretty much exactly what Gabe has done throughout the entirety of act 1

"And you're not a scary rockstar anymore" got one of the biggest laughs at both of the shows I went to

Dan's desperation during 'Better Than Before.' He is simultaneously trying to cajole Diana into remembering and get Natalie to be more positive. This one song really highlights how he's being pulled in a million different directions while trying to hold it all together and Jamie portrays that so well

Aftershocks. Wow. The way the last word of each line echoes throughout the theatre is great sound design. I've been in exam halls louder than the audience during that song. Holding a room that captive as a silhouette is quite the feat Jack Wolfe you will always be famous

"I don't know where the fucking pieces go" as Diana pushes things off the table as if there's a real jigsaw there that she's rage quitting and choosing to give up on is such a nice detail

"Have you talked of your depression, your delusions and your son?" The gasp in the theatre both times was sickening

the response of "good' in reply to "name?" when technically that was part of his name as they are the "Goodmans". I don't really have a point here I just think it's neat

The 'It's Gonna Be Good" reprise was one of my favourite Dan/Diana moments. Caissie and Jamie are really pushing each other to their emotional limits and they handle it so well

The first "Why stay?" is so fragile as Diana sits against the kitchen island. Also interesting given that Dan and Gabe will also sit against there later when they are at their lowest point in the story. The idea of the characters crawling to the 'centre/heart' of the home when they are at their weakest

"This is one old game that I can play so well" is the line that has stuck the most with me throughout the show. Jack's delivery of it while striding across the kitchen table - seemingly totally invincible - is crazy.

how Caissie manages to deliver "you shrugged and said that no one really knows" with humour and desperation at the same time is amazing

When Gabe and Diana stand on the table and if they let go of one another they'll fall. yeahhhhh.....

Gabe's realisation that Diana isn't going to give up on getting better. Totally collapsing in on himself and beginning to cry. How you manage to feel bad for him after all the destruction he's caused is wild

Diana's "maybe I'm tired of the game" relating back to Gabe's "this is one old game that I can play so well"

the lyrics in 'Hey #3' clearly reflecting things Diana has done, Henry cutting Natalie off at "bleeding in the bathtub"

"I am the one who'll heal you" being said to Dan not Diana this time

"Why didn't you go with her?" is the most devastating line in the whole musical I said what I said. Jamie's delivery of it is heart wrenching

the drums and bass kicking in for the loud part of I Am The One as Gabe becomes desperate to be seen once again

Jack and Jamie's acting in this moment is so intense. there's a moment where it's genuinely feels as though only one of them can make it out of the interaction alive

Jack's emphasis on the word 'loved' in the line "I am the one who loved you" nearly killed me on the spot. how somebody can deliver a line so desperately while remaining pitch perfect is unfair

Natalie coming in to kiss Dan's head at the start of 'Light' like Gabe kisses Diana's in the first scene. I'm such a sucker for a gut punching

the "And are they real?" line about Diana's parent's from Henry gets such a loud reaction from the audience. Some people laugh immediately, some people clearly get shocked out of their sobs. so good

In conclusion, this is my favourite musical of all time and I'm going to be so annoying waiting for the pro-shot to come out

[millersamour]

i don't want the world to see me - frankie morales x reader

A/N: this is totally me procrastinating school work and projecting onto fictional characters

just a lil something i wrote in November and totally forgot about it amidst all my finals so here ya go!

...is this whump?

Summary: Seasonal depression is kicking both of your asses and Frankie starts spiraling. You're about to give up on your crush when Frankie calls you to confess some things.

Warnings: frankie is big sad in this one, talk of addiction, mention of suicide, pining, idiots in love, angst, frankie and mc both have depression/SAD, no smut, it's all sad/fluff folks

word count: 1.9k

love the goo goo dolls <3

"And I don't want the world to see me 'Cause I don't think that they'd understand When everything's made to be broken I just want you to know who I am"

-

It's metronomic at this point. October arrives with a gust of wind carrying a despair that is only attractive this time of year.

It's always been a struggle for Frankie, the space between September and January: creating a perfect void that always consumes whatever success he thinks he's making.

He knew isolation was the catalyst. His therapist had said so on multiple occasions. But it was easy to do. It was easy to hide, trying to mask the irritability and the ache he felt in his ribcage.

He'd started a new job over the summer, night shift security at some storage place downtown. Now, it was even easier to snooze his alarm until the sun was low on the horizon, and the moon was slowly creeping in. But the work was good. He was awake most nights anyway, fighting off nightmares and the desire to self-medicate.

He liked to keep busy.

But it also gave him new excuses—reasons why he ignored Pope's repeated calls, Will's texts, and all of Ben's voicemails. He pretended it was his schedule that made it impossible for him to make it to movie nights at Santi's or any of Benny's fights. It had been almost a month since he'd sat at the bar, nursing a sprite, and watching as you played pool with the other guys.

Watching as your sister clung to Pope and glared at any guy who even looked at you. Frankie liked Lisa. She was a nurse and a single mother, which made her equivalent to a saint. But Frankie didn't think that Lisa was his biggest fan. He knew that her ex had similar issues to his own; that's why she was raising her son on her own. But Frankie had been upfront and honest since South America.

And he'd been completely sober for the last year.

But it was October, and Frankie was feeling lonelier than usual.

He was thankful that he worked most nights, sitting behind a desk, glancing at the cameras between episodes of The Office that he played from his phone. 

However, it was Friday night, and Frankie had the night off.

He sat in the parking lot, listening to the music playing faintly from the speakers of his idling ranger. The rain pattered softly against his windshield, and he sighed, momentarily pulling his standard oil cap off to run his fingers through his curls.

He glanced back down at his outfit, dark wash jeans, and a dark blue hoodie. He checked the time again; 8:07 pm.

He knew they would be there, at the bar. They would all be around their usual table, Pope and Lisa laughing and whispering between each other. Ben and Will would probably be arguing about whatever Christopher Nolan movie Benny was obsessed with now.

Then there would be you. Smiling and laughing along, your eyes shining brightly as you argued with the boys or scolded your sister for sharing an embarrassing childhood memory.

The thought made Frankie smile.

But he still couldn't leave the parking lot. He could already hear the chastising, the way Pope would lower his voice and ask Frankie if he was okay. The way he knows, they would frown at any attempt he makes to conceal his issues with humor. The way you'd order soda all night and smile gently when you caught his eye.

It was a mutual understanding, a real friendship that you'd developed. But Frankie wanted more.

-

Your fingers dragged along the rim of your glass. You sighed gently because it was almost nine and Frankie hadn't shown up once again. It was the third Friday in a row, the third week in a row that he hadn't answered any messages, aside from the vague proof of life text he'd sent the group chat.

It was the same routine you'd had since moving in with your sister. It was how you met the guys: tagging along to the bar as Lisa's younger sibling. Her twenty-eight-year-old sibling, but younger nonetheless. Which had felt embarrassing at first, like you were a child without their own friends. But you knew now that Benny and Frankie enjoyed your company. 

So, you'd spent most nights over the summer laughing with the Millers before making your way over to the bar to get a refill and get what little you could out of the former pilot.

But it was October now. And you could feel the time dragging on, watching the clock and forgetting to eat. The bar was a relief. a relief from work, from the mess of your personal life, and from the feelings that were a little too overwhelming lately. 

But it was Frankie that you were excited to see each week, counting down the days and rewatching the office so that you could slip in a reference since he'd mentioned liking the show last time you'd spoken.

You had thought he also enjoyed your company. Santi had mentioned more than once that getting to know Frankie was difficult.

You knew he had been in the military and that they'd lost a friend not that long ago, Lisa didn't know much about what happened there either. You knew that he was sober. He'd offered a few details about his family, talking about his older sister and his nephews. He talked about his favourite songs and, if you got lucky, what it was like to fly.

He only talked about flying when it got really late, and it was just the two of you left, standing outside the bar in front of your car. His eyes would shine, and you'd see the tears on his waterline right before he blinked them away. You knew he had to have felt it too. The few nights where you'd stared into each other's eyes and admitted things you'd never told anyone else. And it had only been a few months, but you were stupidly in love with Frankie, and you'd shown up three Fridays in a row for the guy.

You were starting to lose patience. You could be at home, with a pizza, your cat, and Buffy. You finished off the diet coke you'd ordered and stole a few more fries from the table before hugging everyone goodbye, letting your shoulders drop as soon as you stepped into the parking lot. 

You crossed the pavement to your little car, turned the key in the ignition, and waited for your phone to connect to the car's Bluetooth, just as the sound of your ringtone suddenly blared through your speakers, making you jump before seeing Frankie's name across your lock screen.

You panicked for a moment, realizing it was a FaceTime call, and you frantically checked your appearance in the rearview mirror before taking a deep breath and answering.

-

You answered and Frankie breathed a sigh of relief. You were sitting in your own car. Frankie knew you'd just left the bar. He could tell by the flush of your cheeks. You sat in silence for a moment, and he wondered if you had missed him the same way he missed you.

"Frankie?" You speak timidly into the receiver.

His name snaps him from his thoughts, focusing on the confused look on your face as you stared into your phone.

"Hey baby," it comes out rough like he hasn't spoken in a while, and he clears his throat before speaking again. "You headin' home?"

You lick your lips and nod.

"I was waiting for you." It comes out so quietly he almost misses it at first. But he catches the way your voice trembles as you pull your phone away from your face.

He sighs, a deep frustrated sound.

"Fuck baby…" He pulls his hat off, holding it over his face and groaning before placing it back on his head. "I'm really fucking this up. Aren't I?"

"What happened, Fish?"

And suddenly, for the first time in a long time, Frankie cries like a fucking baby.

-

The sound of Frankie crying has you panicking.

"Holy shit-Frankie- what's wrong?" It all rushes out, almost incoherently, "Where are you?"

He takes a deep, shuddering breath, and you can hear him sniffle before he responds.

"At home... just sittin' in my car," he clears his throat again, "I was going to be there tonight, at the bar, but I just... I couldn't."

"Where'd you go, Frankie?" You bite the inside of your cheek and debate your next question, "It's been three weeks and you haven't said anything."

"I know, baby, I'm sorry, I didn't know how to explain it to you."

"It's one thing that you disappear on me, Morales, but it's even worse when everyone, including my own sister, is clearly aware of something that I don't know."

You watch as his head falls back against the seat.

"I've been sober for almost a year now." He declares the fact like it's something you're unaware of. 

"Yeah, Frankie, I know."

"The last time I relapsed was last October," he huffs. "This time of year, y'know. It's part of the reason I started in the first place, with the drugs." 

He pauses for a moment, and it hits you—what he's trying to say.

Without meaning to, you let out a soft giggle, and it's like you can feel Frankie's panic through your phone.

"Oh-fuck, Frankie, I'm sorry," You pull the phone closer to your face, "Are you trying to say that this whole time you've been avoiding everyone is because you're depressed?"

He's quiet again.

"...Yes?"

It's your turn to start crying.

"Whoa baby, what's wrong?" Frankie watches as you wipe the tears from your eyes, laughing at yourself.

"Frankie, I don't drink because I'm on antidepressants. It's the whole reason I moved back in with Lisa." You explain.

His brows furrow, and the look in his eyes, sad and tired, makes you wanna wrap your arms around him.

"Are you mad?"

"How could I be angry, Frankie. Honestly, I don't think you realize that it isn't that surprising."

He cocks his head to the side. "Whaddya mean?"

"Well I kinda figured, this time of year is hard for people like us."

"People like us?" He asks.

You bite your lip, considering your next words.

"I know what it's like when everyone in your life thinks that your biggest enemy is yourself." You pull your knees up to your chest and sigh. "Last winter I ended up in the ER."

Frankie's eyes widen for a moment.

"It wasn't on really on purpose. But it was right after the holidays. I wasn't talking to my parents and my roommate was out of town."

You pause for a moment.

"I was drinking a lot. Just way too much..." You huff. "So I get it, the not wanting to be around people..." You trail off, hoping he understands.

"It got worse and then my license got suspended." He speaks quietly at first, "I got into pills in college, y'know just trying to stay awake. But I kicked that before I went to boot camp."

You nod, silently urging him on.

"But the nightmares were getting bad. I'd been clean almost fifteen years. But I wasn't getting any sleep." He groans, like it hurts to say it out loud and you know it's something he hasn't told many people. "I started overcompensating, because it made me feel good. It helped me do my job. I needed to be able to do my job."

His eyes are sad, and tired. You've seen that same look in yourself.

"You don't gotta explain yourself to me, Frankie. We've all got shit. Bad things happen. Sometimes we're the ones who do bad shit. But you don't gotta be alone just because you're hurting."

He smiles, the corner of his lip quirking upwards. "Would you be up for grabbing a late dinner?"

"Text me the address." You bite your lip, holding back a smile, "And hey, Frankie?"

"Yea?"

"I'm really glad you called."

"Me too."

-

reblog and comment if you liked!!! lemme know if you'd be into seeing more of these two? <3

[ripplefield1]

Extension Corps art dump part 2: Kaput & Zösky edition??? (Jan-Mar)

When I get reeeaaaally obsessed with multiple things and the interests are fighting in my head like two wolves, I like to cross them over even if the source material has no correlation whatsoever. I just think the idea of making art that fills an incredibly hyper specific niche is funny. These are from January except the Ten smoking gif, all pretty rough especially the animatic but I made them quickly for fun.

(more specific reasons for the crossover under the cut)

Okay so when Brothership was first revealed I saw a lot of people comparing the Extension Corps to the Best Fitness Friends. I was actually unfamiliar with them because I never played the BIS remake and when I saw them, Beef and Dieter reminded me of Kaput and Zösky, mostly because of their almost identical color palette. I even ended up sketching them together in September. (I was still very much learning how to draw Kaput and Zösky)

Anyway, getting reminded caused me to watch the show again. Both Kaput & Zösky and the Extension Corps have been living in my head simultaneously since then and I guess it's caused me to permanently associate the two with each other oops lol

Besides that, I also think Kaput makes a good voiceclaim for Ecks which is why I made the animatic. I don't think Zösky's voice fits Ten very well but their characters kinda give me similar vibes? So it still works I guess. I also made the animatic because I immediately thought of Ecks when I remembered that clip, given the whole handwashing exchange in Brothership.

The Ten smoking gif was just me goofing around because I've joked about Ten smoking despite not having a mouth and I really love the Zösky smoking a comically large cigar clip.

I'd like to make another K&Z Corp animatic someday! I already have another idea that I briefly started a while ago but I don't know if I'll finish it, I'm struggling a bit. Also I feel really bad for not including Shun in any of these so he will be in the animatic if I do finish. I do not want to contribute to Shun erasure

[herefortheships]

On media portrayals of older women

Commentary on Lydia's characterization in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. 🕷

This post was originally a response to a post from two months ago, but it got so big (and also I kinda moved away from the topic a little), I decided to make it its own post. It's a long ramble, basically, about my feelings around how women over 30 tend to be written and how disappointing it often is, especially now that I am a woman over 30 myself.

Before I get to Lydia and my issues with how she was written in BJBJ, I just want to say something. There is a blatant unwillingness to represent an older woman who isn't a mother or, at the very least, married or divorced, and often those women who are depicted as individuals outside of these roles, tend to be either toxic or unhappy characters (Cruella De Vil totally came to mind when I just typed that 😆 But even Cruella is married in the original story). As a matter of fact, the ex-wife or divorced older woman is often depicted as a cruel, bitter, or even evil woman (Miranda Priestly form "Devil Wears Prada" came to mind. Hey, another iconic fashion industry character lol). Single older women are often also depicted as "ugly", or flat out scary characters (Miss Trunchbull in Matilda came to mind).

It's like for many screenwriters it's impossible to visualize a mature woman who isn't or hasn't been married, and is childless.

The issue is not that they are given these roles; the issue is that their character arcs often seem to revolve around these roles and their identity is very focused on being either the mom, the wife, or the ex-wife. More often than not, female characters over 30 that are good are usually moms or struggling wives, and their identity is confined or greatly centered around her role as the mother or the suffering wife. (Chances are, if she's happily married, she's either not the protagonist or the story is over 💀). And if it is not centered around these, then motherhood is something adjacent to the story in some way, shape, or form.

Using the first "Beetlejuice" movie we have an example of a happily married woman in a leading role, Barbara Maitland. She's not an older woman, per se, but she is a happily married woman in a leading role. But what is one of her main concerns as a character? She can't have children. So she does have a motherly-adjacent struggle. At least Adam accompanies her in this story thread and it isn't just a struggle Barbara alone is facing; both of them are pretty balanced as far as their struggles go in "Beetlejuice". (I could have also used Delia as an example here, but she isn't exactly the main character as Barbara was in "Beetlejuice". That said, she is both a mother and wife.)

I'm pretty new to the Beetlejuice fandom (as in I was a fan who watched the movie a few times a year around Halloween, but never actually interacted with fandom or analyzed anything, until I watched BJBJ and became totally obsessed), and as a relatively new fan who has been here since September 2024, I'm not sure what the expectations around Lydia's future were throughout the years in the fandom. But, I'm positive a lot of fans never considered Lydia would choose to get married and to a pretty regular guy at that at some point and become a mother. I'm sure many fans shared Winona's idea of older Lydia being a goth spinster, living a pretty unconventional, but happy life, just doing her thing. She might have gone into photography and kept interacting with the dead and being her goth, "strange and unusual" self.

So it must have been pretty shocking to see that older Lydia is not only a struggling mother, but she is also anxiety-ridden and in an abusive relationship with some normie guy.

Lydia at least has something that separates her identity as an individual from her identity as a mother, in her show, but it's made clear that getting into making the show was considered by her as "selling out", a sentiment that came up in her conversation with Delia. I wish they would have gone into that a little bit more, because it's not entirely clear how Lydia felt about the show exactly and what her reasons were to do it in the first place. Lydia's interest in photography from the first film, and subsequently from the animated show as well (meaning this was an inherent and very characteristic part of her), is non-existent in the sequel.

While it's understandable that "life happens" and people just change over time, and a life of seeing and interacting with all sorts of ghosts must have taken a toll on her, Lydia's characterization was considerably far from the person she used to be, and it feels like a lot of it had to do with her mother role.

I know a lot of fans also appreciate this, too, don't get me wrong; Lydia as she is now is relatable to many women's experience, but what I'm getting at is that a choice was made to write older Lydia like this, and that choice is the same treatment that's given to too many older female characters in the media. They chose to make her a struggling mother, is the point I'm trying to make.

Her character has also become more reactionary; she isn't exactly in control about anything. Even making her show appears to be a reactive decision, too, rather than something she did because she genuinely wanted to. She's even taking medications to get through the day when she starts seeing ghosts (Nadja disappears after Lydia takes the pills, so one can assume she takes these pills to quiet down her psychic abilities and stop seeing ghosts; Rory's comment in the bathroom also supports this).

Lydia is indeed, overall, unhappy, and she has been for a long time. Not saying this is a bad thing; stories need conflict, and it would have been strange if she was living her best life at the start of the film. After Charles funeral we confirm that she wasn't exactly happy when Richard was around, either ("our relationship was over long before the accident", strange thing to say to Astrid when she's questioning her about why she cannot see her father). Things seemed to have ended amicably between them, but it looks like Lydia was not happy in that relationship by its end.

Lydia only seems to take control when her daughter is in danger, so that which spurs her into action is more linked to her mother persona over any other conflict that's more directly linked to her as an individual. If it wasn't for Betelgeuse's intervention, she might have even ended up marrying Rory, who, not only did she not love, he was also using her and being emotionally manipulative and abusive.

I know Lydia at some point became affected by seeing ghosts every other day through her life, as evidenced by the pills, but (and this is something I talked about before here) the way they ended the previous film, there was nothing to indicate that Lydia was in a downward spiral or that seeing strange things and dead people affected her negatively in any strong, life-altering way (unless Lydia was pretending to like the dark stuff before, and by the end she's more herself and admits to not like the creepy stuff; she does reject dissecting the frog in her science class, but then again, she asks the Maitlands to levitate her and pretty much do a ghostly possession in the house for the "Jump in the line" scene. But I digress. Lydia's character arc in the first film is an analysis for another post).

Moving on, Lydia's brief experience with Betelgeuse in the first film also does not justify her current emotional state for the reasons stated above and in that post I linked. Losing Richard also doesn't seem to be enough of a reason to have created the emotional issues Lydia is struggling deeply with in BJBJ, and it does seem that the movie pointed at that, but it was poorly done, when Lydia told Astrid she didn't have a relationship with him long before he passed away; she also didn't have a strong reaction to seeing Richard in the afterlife.

Whatever happened to Lydia that led her to this current state wasn't properly explored, is what I'm getting at, because the film decided to focus her character struggles mostly on her relationship with her daughter, over her own personal conflicts as a separate individual. Lydia as the suffering mom, struggling to connect with her daughter was the focus of her arc. Did we ever get to know exactly why she was willing to marry Rory despite clearly not loving him? (she even seemed disgusted by him kissing her and when he tried to kiss her lol).

Was it because she thought he was her only chance at being happy again? Was it because she thought she needed to be married for Astrid, to rebuild their family? Lydia's actions were entirely steered by Rory; he emotionally manipulated her so much, he made her believe she had feelings for him and start a relationship with him, even. Maybe it was him, the one who convinced her to start the show in the first place, to take advantage of her psychic abilities (which he totally believed to be bullshit, anyway, but he thought he could use her delusions/fake claims to attract fame and money), he was her producer, after all. (Actually I think it was him who convinced her?? Was she making her show before meeting him? Lol I totally forgot this bit. Fill me in because I've only watched the movie twice.)

By the end of the film, ironically, Lydia takes more control for herself when she sends Betelgeuse away (and I say "ironically" because, without Betelgeuse she would still be stuck in the same toxic situation she was with Rory. In fact, things would have gotten much worse as Rory would have gotten away with his plan. She also had no issues handling Betelgeuse during all scenes they had together; she would even raise her voice at him and act exasperated with his behavior--that is not typically how a person who is terrified or traumatized by someone acts around them, but ok...), and she makes a choice to be more focused in her life, assuming she did quit her job, which is up for debate, depending on when the dream sequence started.

Without Betelgeuse, Lydia would be stuck in a terrible relationship, where her life would have been ruined, and she would have also lost her daughter on Halloween night when Jeremy used her to get his life back. So it's really strange a choice (and poorly executed, again) to have Lydia's character resolution be sending Betelgeuse away like she's finally confronting some deep-rooted fear or trauma, when her character really wasn't explored individually all throughout the movie to showcase in what way exactly did her brief interactions with Betelgeuse over 30 years ago might have crumbled her emotional stability to that degree. The movie isn't clear if her depression and anxiety are related to losing Richard and therefore that's what she needs to heal from; or if it's more related to her past trauma around Betelgeuse, and then, that's what she needed to heal from.

There really should have been more of a focus on her as an individual apart from her struggles as Astrid's mother for her character to really have a good payoff at the end. And truly, if facing Betelgeuse was going to "fix her", then she's back at square one when he shows up on her bed at the end. Lydia's character and story are incomplete. More reasons why we need a BJ3.

What's truly going to heal Lydia is her finding herself again, as just Lydia; not the mother or the TV presenter. And she must get there herself, not have it all fixed for her by Betelgeuse yet again or another external force. She has to make a choice for herself. They need to show her picking up her camera again, and yes, enjoying the "strange and unusual". She needs to embrace her otherness and be herself again.

(And if she doesn't want to be alone... she shouldn't go after a guy like Rory or a normie. She needs another weirdo like Richard who loved scary movies, or, ahem, Betelgeuse, who has already proved he loves her more than any normie ever could.)

I can't stress enough how disappointing it is that mature women are mostly presented as moms or wives or even grandmas, without dreams and motivations of their own that are entirely separate from their (societal) roles. Mature men can be out there living adventures and doing all sorts of things, like James Bond for example. Meanwhile women are either divorced, mothers, wives, grandmas, aunts, etc and these roles are a huge part of what defines them as characters. And if it doesn't define them, they still are moms, wives, ex-wives, or grandmas. It's rare to see a single older lady doing her thing and being just a character and like, falling in love and going through a satisfying arc that has nothing to do with having kids, or dealing with estranged kids, etc. At least Delia was out there doing her thing in BJBJ; she was doing what she loved, while still being a mother and a grandmother, and a loving wife/widow to Charles. She was a realized character. And that's what I want to see, you know? I don't mind seeing an older female character who is married with kids (and even grandkids!), as long as she is also a fully realized individual when her character arc is wrapped up at the end.

If Lydia being behind the camera instead of in front of it in BJBJ is representative of her feeling lost in life, and her being in a toxic relationship and almost saying yes to someone she doesn't love or even remotely fit in with, then healed Lydia should be behind the camera again in BJ3, and saying yes to someone she does love and fits in with by the end.

I definitely want to see a Lydia who is more than Astrid's mom in BJ3; a Lydia who isn't easily manipulated and stepped on, and who has a firm grasp on who she is and a love for who she is. Yeah, I totally want her to end up with Betelegeuse (edit: And I am writing a post about why they are perfectly matched to complete each other's character arcs), but I also want to see her fully realized outside of the mother and (potential) wife roles.

[chimivx]

That one fucked you over last year, this one is fucking you over this year, you had no idea she was involved with him, someone over here has been lying to you, you didn't mean to end up in that ones bed, he told you he loved you... Does anyone even trust anyone anymore?

👫 -> college!teez x fem!reader/oc {frat/sorority} #️⃣ -> 7.5k (part FIVE of ten) ‼️ -> 18+, sexual content, drugs/alcohol, college life, all the drama, heavy angst, infidelity adjacent moments, mean boys, mean girls, mentions of anxiety/depression… IF I MISSED ANYTHING PLEASE LET ME KNOW!

{ there are names & faces in here that come from NMWID <3 }

september 14th ~ saturday ~ 12:02 p.m.

[you]: i’m sorry i left so fast i didn’t mean to run

[you]: i just woke up can we talk

september 14th ~ saturday ~ 4:57 p.m.

[you]: hey just checking in, are you okay

september 15th ~ sunday ~ 10:17 p.m

A book has lived on your lap for two days now. Since you woke up Saturday late morning after your night at ATZ, you’ve been situated in the center of your bed getting a head start on assignments, setting your planner up for the semester, making sure everything was in absolute order. This was the most important part of being here.

Not the boys, not the parties, not the sisterhood drama… The grades.

Nasara offered you a spectacular scholarship because you were actually pretty booksmart. And thank god for it too, you knew your dad would never be able to send you here on his own. He had money to spend, but it didn’t necessarily go to you without a good motive.

The grades had to stick. The grades had to be almost perfect.

Or, you weren’t getting that degree.

Being in a sorority without a doubt took a toll on your wallet, and your fathers. When there were fundraisers you were working your ass off to make sure you raised enough money to both keep the place going as well as hand some of it over to the charity you were doing it for. That’s partially why coming into this year has been so nerve wracking. There were nine of you in the house. You were not prepared to see the cost come the beginning of next month.

Your dad paid for September. He took a couple jobs and was able to give it to you in full. The rest of the year was up to you. Not one part of you wanted to have to ask him for help. You were capable. You were able to do it. The rest of these girls had money, they had the fame… You’d been hustling for two years, you could make it two more.

There was always the option to move into the dorms, or better yet, move into an apartment off campus somewhere in Delo which sparked your fancy. The only issue is there would be no one to take with you, and the only acceptable way to go about it would be to do it with a roommate. Tori was off the table, she was obsessed with the ITZ house, plus it was a couple minutes away from her boyfriend. Why would she ever want to move further from that?

Flipping a page in your notebook, the door to your bedroom swung open and a flustered Tori stormed in, her brows scrunched, her eyes pointed to the floor. She bounced about the room, tossing her blankets around, dropping to her knees to file through her things under her bed, jumping to her feet to scour her drawers.

A sleepy eyed Yuna popped her head in the doorway looking equally as stressed as your roommate. “Hey, Ror,” she mumbled, her eyes darting around the floor and the shelves. “Tor, I don’t think you brought it in here.”

“Hey,” you said to her. “What are you looking for?” Focusing on Tori, you closed your notebook. The two of you haven’t discussed Friday night. Nothing’s been unpacked. She’s been busy with sorority things and hanging out with Mina and Yuna. 

It sometimes fell that way this time of year, at least it did your sophomore year. The three of them were on the board, they were more important than you and your other friends. Though, last year it was only Tori and Yuna taking some time to themselves, overwhelmed by the sudden responsibility. Now she was in on it.

“My ITZ planner,” Tori sighed, her vision tunneled on her surroundings, speaking hushed, but with power. “I had it at the meeting on Friday, I left it in the house, it didn’t come out with me. That has stuff in it that Yeji didn’t write down, if I don’t find it…”

“You’ll find it,” Yuna nodded. “I’ll go check out my room just in case I grabbed it, then I’ll check Yeji’s desk.” She was gone in a flash.

Tori drug a hand through her waves, her hair falling naturally down her back. With no makeup on, her tan skin still had the ability to glow. “Ror,” she muttered, spinning around in a circle to face you. Meeting her eyes, you tried to smile, but it didn’t come through as such. She was so frustrated anyhow, she probably didn't even notice. “Can I check your stuff?”

Hesitating, you shrugged. “You think I took it?”

Tori groaned, her hands digging through her hair once more. “God, no,” she said. “Just in case, I don’t think you took anything, I just have to check everywhere…” Her hands started flying, her brown eyes manic and panicked.

“Okay, okay,” you said, waving her along with a hand toward your bed and your things below it. “Whatever you gotta do, go for it.” She dropped to the floor and you turned back to your book, opening your notebook to copy down notes from your classes this past week.

Tori pulled baskets of clothes out, rifling through them, then she moved on when she didn’t find what she was looking for. Searching through some extra bags you had stored under there, she moved through every bin, every basket, every bag. Nothing. Then, she moved to the other side where you had more recent things shoved without any rhyme or reason. Shoes you’ve worn recently, your textbooks for class, the bag you’d use for classes- she opened that and searched through it.

She popped her head up, looking at you, you could feel it. Turning your head slowly, you found her confused. 

“What?” you asked.

“Ror,” she said quietly, holding up an opened light purple package with words on the front that made you want to be sick. She was shocked, her lips parted ever so slightly. “Is this yours?”

Swallowing hard, feeling your stomach in your throat, you couldn’t lie your way out of this one. “I… Yeah, guess I forgot to throw that out.”

Tori flipped it toward her to read it, then she shot you another crazed look. “Why the fuck did you take a Plan B?”

Hm, now this was interesting. 

You could lie.

But, at this point now there was no sense in lying.

“Seonghwa?” she whispered.

Yep, no reason to lie.

“Seonghwa,” you breathed, and she leapt to her feet, the box flying from her fingers onto the floor. She jumped onto your bed, the mattress moving beneath you.

“Aurora, what?” She almost gasped. Her knees bumped into yours as she tucked her knees up on the blankets. “When, what?”

You closed your book for good, setting it aside. Taking a breath, you looked up at her and cringed. “Last Friday?”

“Last Friday!” she shouted. Shushing her, she clamped her hands over her mouth at the same time. “I’m not sorry, what the fuck?! That’s why we lost you? You were upstairs with Seonghwa?”

“I was,” you whispered, glancing down at your lap. “We were both drunk, it happened, like, so fast.”

Tori snapped her jaw shut and sat up straight. The way she looked at you made you feel about sixteen years old. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Leaning back, you shrugged, then grabbed onto your ankles and sighed. “You got Mina,” you whispered, and she squinted.

“What?”

You cleared your throat. “You got Mi-”

Tori slapped a hand to your wrist. “No, yeah, I heard you, Ror,” she scoffed. “I mean, what?” She leaned into you, dipping her chin down to meet your eyes. After another shrug as answer from you, she shook her head and laughed. “No, no, unacceptable. I won’t take that. What do you mean that’s why you didn’t tell me you fucked Seonghwa?”

“Don’t say it,” you sneered, eyeing your open bedroom door. Tori flipped her hair back and let another laugh of disbelief. “I didn’t tell you ‘cause you’ve been so close with her, and clearly you’ve told her plenty about me. This isn’t a big deal, I didn’t want it to become a thing.”

She rolled her eyes and settled her hands into her own lap. “Fine, you’re right, I told her too much.”

“Thank you,” you said within a breath, blinking away the obnoxiousity.

“It wasn’t right,” Tori reached a hand toward you, one you took, “I’m sorry. You’re my friend first, my best friend. I shouldn’t have said what I said. She should’ve found it all out naturally.”

Squeezing her hand, you tightened your lips. “She shouldn’t have found out about it at all.”

Tori raised a brow every so slightly, the one with the piercing in it. “Do you like Mina?” Your nervous system sparked fight or flight, but in a way that made you groan aloud and half out yourself when you wanted to keep all feelings about it inside. “Wait, what’s happened, I thought everything was chill, we were helping her get Yunho, and taking her to the parties, breaking her out…”

“Yeah,” you said. “Helping her with all that.” Letting yourself collect your thoughts, Tori waiting patiently, you really didn’t know what to say. 

For starters, you haven’t spoken to Yunho since you left his house Friday night. Acquiring your phone from Seonghwa after fleeing the boys bedroom, you walked home, teetering to the side most of the way. Getting yourself up onto your balcony, sloppily, you fell onto your bed and rolled off of it, putting yourself together for bed before Tori made it back into the house.

She appeared later on. The girls told you they came in Ryujin and Isla’s window instead, not wanting to disturb you if you were asleep. Which you were.

None of them know you were there two nights ago.

“Mina’s… Alright,” you said, shrugging. “I like that she’s getting more comfortable, I want her to be comfortable… I hate what I said at dinner, no one deserves that, especially where she is in life, that’s nothing to be ashamed about.” Looking at Tori, both of your lips were pouted. They started to turn into smiles, then eventually giggles.

“Don’t ever not tell me things again,” Tori said through her grin. “Okay?”

Nodding, calming your smile, you said, “Okay.”

Lying straight to her face.

“Now,” she said, scooting closer to you if it were possible. She wanted to occupy the same space. “Tell me everything, I need to know, you slept with the Vice President of ATZ… Is it true?”

You tilted your head. “Is what true?”

Tori made a face, jutting her chin forward like she couldn’t believe you didn’t get it. “The… the thing. Did he…”

Waiting for her to finish, she didn’t. “Tori, the what?”

“He didn’t do it? I guess not if I haven’t seen it.” She dropped her eyes to your neck and you immediately slapped your hand there, your eyes going wide. “He did.” She grabbed onto your elbows and shook you. “Aurora, you have to go to the Sweethearts Formal with him.”

“What? Why?” You’d much rather go with someone else. Shaking your head you pulled the collar of your sweatshirt down and showed her the dulling spot on the base of your neck. Tori started to smile. 

“A little birdie told me that he does that,” she said, her voice suddenly acquiring the ability to quiet down.

“Mingi,” you said, flat as ever.

“Course,” she said without a beat. “But, here’s the kicker, Ror. This means no one else can touch you. Did anyone see you with it? I can’t believe I didn’t notice, I think I was so worried about Mina.” 

Dropping your hands to your lap, you took a slow breath and let your eyes shut for a few seconds. “Tori, what do you mean? That no one else can touch me?”

She sat up and glanced toward the open door, then back to you. Whispering, she said, “You’re his. He’s, like, claimed you.”

“What?!” you shouted, and she shushed you, giggling as she did.

Latching onto your hands, she said, “The boys are serious about this, too. No one’s ever broken it. Mingi told me that if any of them get close then they’re forced to absolutely humiliate themselves, or something. I’m not really sure, ‘cause I don’t think any of them have even tried. You’re Seonghwa’s, and if any ATZ boys try anything with you then they’ll be kicked out of the frat.”

Your heart sunk into your stomach.

“Oh,” you said, nodding your head. Tori narrowed her eyes and rolled her shoulders back, inspecting you.

“Didn’t Yunho say Hwa was dating somebody?”

Gulping at the mention of his name, you shook your head. “He lied.”

Tori froze. “Why would he lie?”

“I dunno,” you spewed quickly, flipping open to a random page in your book, hoping to end this conversation before it drew on any longer. “He’s been weird this whole time we’ve been back.”

Tori glanced down at your work and pursed her lips. Sliding off your bed she spun around and clasped her hands behind her back. “It’s probably just what Mina said, yanno? Coming back, feeling overwhelmed? Did you guys…” Her pause made you look at her. “Oh,” she breathed. “Right.”

Rolling your eyes you took back to your book, you said, “No, we didn’t go to Blend.”

Tori nodded, looking around your shared room. “Right,” she muttered. “We’re banned. You guys have been talking though, right? Maybe you just have to pull him out of his head, you know how he gets sometimes.” She puttered about the room, looking through more things for her planner. “When he loves something he gets crazy. Remember his report on medieval Europe, or whatever he was hyper focused on?” You lifted your chin, watching her walk around. “That boy is kind, I’ll tell you that, but Mingi’s told me he’s been a little brain fried, I think.”

“What do you mean?” you whispered, watching her flip one of her empty designer purses upside down like something would miraculously fall out of it. She sighed and slumped over, then looked at you.

“You guys really haven’t talked?” She tossed the purse to the floor and took your head shake as an answer. Resorting to your shared closet she started pushing hanging clothes aside, dropping to her knees again so her hands could skim the floor full of shoes. “I guess he and I really haven’t either, with the ban, whenever we’re there I’m all over Mingi.” She giggled. An obscure fact, of course. “But, you know Yunho, Ror. When he has his brain set on something, a project, a report, a lesson… If it’s something he loves he’s gonna be scatterbrained.”

“Classes just started,” you said, voice tiny.

Tori flipped her hair over her shoulder and groaned. “Then, I dunno, Ror, maybe he’s in love with Mina or something, it’s a person then, not his schoolwork.” She shot out of the closet, shouting loud enough to wake up the house. “I FOUND IT!” Her ITZ planner covered in cute little stickers was in her hand as she jumped to her feet. Footsteps bound into the room, Yuna whipping around the corner at lighting speed. The two voiced their relief and started out of the room. Tori stopped before she left, looking back at you staring at the floor. “You good, Ror?”

Trying to take a breath, you attempted a smile, one she believed.

“Yeah, yeah,” you said even though you couldn’t feel your legs.

With a smile, she was gone, closing the door behind her.

Blinking, you took the shakiest breath, releasing it with a sigh, you whispered, “Fuck.”

september 15th ~ sunday ~ 11:15 p.m.

[starhwa]: Thinking about you, don’t work too hard this week, need my girl to be happy.

[you]: don’t worry, she’s not freaking out about her classes

[starhwa]: But she’s freaking out?

[you]: slightly

[starhwa]: Do you want to talk about it?

[you]: not yet, i’m sorry

[starhwa]: Don’t apologize to me, when you want to tell me you will.

september 16th ~ monday ~ 8:02 a.m.

[you]: you’re making me nervous, yo

[you]: i need to talk to you, please

september 16th ~ monday ~ 11:23 a.m.

“Small iced coffee, please, with cream and a shot of caramel.”

The cafe was empty for a Monday mid-morning, Blend usually buzzing and alive around seven when students would flood the concrete floor like feins, jonesing for a sniff of the freshly roasted coffee, allowing themselves to be late because they waited in the long lines that’d pour out the door. This semester you’d be avoiding those lines on a Monday, your first class didn’t start until noon.

“Small?” The barista teased, using his ring covered fingers to push his dark hair from his eyes. It fell towards his lanky shoulders, his smaller frame swallowed by the brown apron he had to wear over his jeans and t-shirt. Turning to get started on your coffee, he raised a brow. “You’ve gone weak.” His eyes drew over your outfit, a hoodie and jeans. “Junior year means you’re watching your caffeine?” He mimicked a British accent and you both laughed.

“No,” you smiled, adjusting your bag on your shoulder, “Maybe just watching the anxiety?” Your accent was terrible, and he was quick to call you out on it.

“Darling,” he widened his eyes and crossed behind the bar, fixing your cup. “That was awful,” you both laughed, “Why are we anxious, the year has just started?”

Shrugging, you weren’t sure what to say to him.

Taeyang, with Theo written on his nametag, lowered his brows and rolled his eyes. “I don’t like that answer.” He pumped an extra shot of caramel in your cup, his subtle way of showing you that you were one of his favorites. “Choi Aurora,” he said, setting his eyes on you. Popping a lid and a purple straw into your cup, he came back toward the register and almost handed you your cup, taking it back before you could grab it. “Where’ve you and your friend been?”

“Tori?” you asked, and he shook his head.

“The boy, Yunho,” he said, stone faced. “You’re usually all up in here. Last semester I had to kick you guys out ‘cause we were closing and you two wouldn’t shut up.”

Averting your eyes to the counter, you shrugged again. “There’s been house drama, I guess,” you said. When you found his eyes, his deep, off putting, mystery filled eyes, you said, “We’ve been banned from seeing them.”

The accent was back and he lost it, sliding you your coffee, punching in numbers on the register. “Sorry to hear that, sweetums,” he said, shooting you a smile. The door to the cafe swung open behind you, the little bell that hung above it sung a little song. “Three seventy five.” Setting his hands on the counter, Theo nodded his head to whoever was behind you while you rifled through your bag for the cash. “What can I get started for you?”

“Iced Americano, large,” the familiar voice said, coming a bit closer to you.

Theo shot you a look. “One large coming up.”

“Shut up, Tae,” you grumbled. Your wallet was gone, and you couldn’t even fumble together random cash from the bottom of your bag. Tori must’ve dropped it on the floor when she was looking for her planner, but thank god she put the empty Plan B box back in here, because that was important. “Can I still send it to your number? Is that a thing?” Fumbling for your phone you slid it open and sent an urgent message to your father.

[you]: can i please have five dollars quick, just trying to buy a coffee

[choi asshole #1]: I sent you fifty last week so you’d have it for coffee. Where the fuck did that go already?

[you]: coffee

The empty box in your bag.

“Yeah, Ror, that’s fine,” Theo said with a brow scrunch, already serving the boy behind you. “Six fifty.”

“Ror?” The boy behind you stepped up the counter, leaning his elbows on it. “I got this, put us together.” Whipping your head to the right you’re greeted with blonde hair and black eyes, the tall boy giving you the smallest smile. “What’s up?”

Glancing to the coffees, you said, “You don’t have to do that.”

Soul shrugged, taking a sip of his. “It’s my pleasure.”

Theo laughed, sending you a look. “It’s his pleasure,” he whispered in the accent, making you smile. Soul’s gaze traveled from him to you, and he stood up straight, towering over you.

“Where are you headed?” he asked, slapping a twenty on the counter. Grabbing his drink he started to walk away, taking you with him.

“This is too much, Shota,” Theo said, voice low, studying him through his lashes. The freshman turned back and waved him off.

“Keep it,” he said without a thought. “Thanks, bro.”

Theo rolled his eyes and popped the cash in his drawer. “Anytime, bro.”

“Thanks, Tae,” you said, waving as you walked beside Soul, taking a sip of your coffee. “This is the best, thank you.” He didn’t look up, he only bobbed his head.

Soul held the door for you, the two of you stepping out into the September breeze. Delo stayed fairly warm until the fall months, but not like Sicuro, or Contramano. Those areas stayed hot for long. Delo was comfortable, it was perfect. Hoodies in September, sweaters in November, sundresses in March and April… You adored every bit of it.

“You didn’t answer my question,” Soul said, looking down at you. Sipping your coffee you scrunched your brow. “Where are you headed?” His hair was clean, hanging over his forehead, touching his shoulders. He wore something similar to what he was in the other night, ripped black jeans and a random t-shirt that fit his aesthetic. 

“I have business statistics at twelve,” you said. He started to smile, his lips pressed together, then his eyes scanned your being like yours did to his.

Way to be subtle, Ror.

“Business statistics,” he curled his lip. “You smart people. What’s your major?”

“Marketing,” you said, and he stared at you, not computing. “It’s basically business.”

“Coulda started with that,” he huffed a laugh, then pointed around for directions. “Lead the way.”

Raising your brows, you asked, “You’re gonna walk me there?”

Soul sipped his coffee and gave you a look of surprise. “What kind of gentlemen would I be if I bought you a coffee and made you walk to class all alone on this beautiful day and this…” he glanced around, “...very safe, very clean, very put together college campus.”

He took note of the smile that had found your lips at some point standing here with him. “Alright,” you said, starting down the street to the left, “This way, Soul.”

Falling in step with you, he seemed to find you more interesting than the commotion of other students around him. Asking you questions about when you started at Nasara, how you got into ITZ, how you became friends with the members of ATZ… He got a brief history lesson while he guzzled down his coffee.

“You’re going to join, right?” His eyes went wide while he sipped from his straw, answer enough. “You and your friends? That I met at the house?”

“Yeah,” he smiled, proud. “Me, Seob, Intak… We’ve been friends since high school, we’ve been waiting for this for three years.”

Taking a right down a street corner, Soul kept himself in time with you, though you're certain he would walk much faster if you were the one following him. His legs could stretch for miles.

“Three years? You’ve wanted to go to Nasara since you were a sophomore in high school?” 

Soul tossed his empty cup into a trash can on the street and shoved his hands in his pockets. “You know Taeyang was in ATZ, right? Theo?” Pausing at a green light while the cars passed by, you looked up at him curiously. “Tae?”

“Yes, I know who you’re talking about,” you half laughed, shaking your head.

“He’s my brother,” he said nonchalantly, moving his focus to the traffic.

Popping your jaw open, you said, “Oh my god, wait, he graduated last year. He’s your brother?”

Soul shrugged. “Step-brother,” he mumbled as if the words tasted bad. He turned to you. “My dad married his mom right before he graduated high school.”

“Interesting,” you said, grabbing his arm when the light turned red and the crosswalk sign lit up. Soul moved into you, a crowd of people coming from the opposite way forcing you together. “He’s never said anything about a brother.”

“‘Cause he hates me,” Soul scrunched his nose, again with some sort of pride, some sort of confidence. Landing on the other side of the street you both took your hands to yourselves and headed toward the end of the street where a massive building waited for you.

“Why would he hate you, he’s a grown adult who-”

“I fucked his girlfriend.”

Stopping dead in your tracks he didn’t catch on until a couple steps later. Taking in the shock on your face as he turned around, the grin that lit him up was entirely adorable, a word that shouldn't be used after what he’s just told you. Walking backwards, willing you to follow him, he laughed.

“You’re not serious,” you said.

Soul nibbled his bottom lip. “I’m so serious.” Expertly threading his feet behind him, he cocked his chin up and asked, “Am I ATZ material?”

Rolling your eyes, you said, “This year I think you fit right in.”

He allowed you to catch up to his side, then he spun around and continued forward, eyeing the building you were approaching. “Theo’s mom doesn’t think I’m smart enough,” he mumbled, a secret he didn’t seem to want to say. Either that, or he hasn’t had anyone to say it to. Giving him a look, he hung his head back, the confidence still pouring from him despite his sudden lament. “My dad could pay them off though,” he shrugged, meeting your eyes. “Another reason for Taeyang to hate me.”

“Well,” you began, pausing at the bench on the street in front of the double doors you were meant to go inside. Dropping your bag to the seat you searched for a lipgloss and pulled it out, twisting it open. “That’s not very fair.” 

Sliding the brush over your lips, Soul watched. “It’s not?” he asked, his voice almost whispering. Rubbing your lips together you shook your head.

“Not really, I mean most of those guys work really hard,” you said. Applying another layer of gloss, Soul poked the tip of his tongue between his lips. Rubbing your lips together with a smack this time, he snapped his eyes back to yours. “I think if you just applied yourself and worked hard to get your grades up this first semester, they’d consider you without the money.” He bobbed his head, hanging onto every word. Taking the last sip of your coffee, the straw sticking to your fresh gloss, Soul held out his hand.

“I’ll take care of it,” he breathed, his eyes flickering to your lips again. Slipping the cup into his hand you slung your bag over your shoulder and smiled.

“Thanks,” you said, and he nodded. “For the coffee and the walk.”

“Anytime.” His face was so pure, so seemingly innocent that one would never be able to believe he fucked his older brothers girlfriend. “Thanks for the advice.”

“Of course.” Ignoring the way he ogled your lips again, you headed toward the double glass doors, not going inside until you threw him a, “Work hard, Soul,” over your shoulder.

september 17th ~ tuesday ~ 3:30 p.m.

[choi asshole #1]: I’ll be in Contramano until Saturday Aura.

[you]: wonderful, enjoy, bring home the big bucks

[choi asshole #1]: Don’t talk like that, come on.

[you]: what else do you do in Mano

The phone screen lit up, choi asshole #1 in bright white letters across the top of it.

“Who’s calling you?” Tori asked from the seat at the table next to you. She leaned on your shoulder and gasped, the sound startling you. “Answer it, answer it, answer it.”

Disgust bled onto your face as you looked at her. “Don’t have a crush on my dad, Tor.”

“How can I not?” she whispered, staring at the bouncing text on the screen. His photo was a funny one of you two from when you were a toddler, sitting on his lap, the two of you with matching pigtails in your hair. Releasing a breath, you gave her a small headshake, then drug the arrow across the screen, answering the video call. 

“Hi, Dad,” you said, not the least bit excited to listen to what he had to say. Tori grabbed the back of your hand and twisted the phone so you were both in the frame.

“Hi, Mr. Choi,” she crooned, sitting her chin in her hand.

He appeared, his black hair parted to the side over his forehead, cut short, but long enough to reach his brows. “Tori, how many times do I have to tell you, call me Yeonjun, I don’t like the honorifics.”

She smiled and giggled. “It’s respect, Mr. Choi, I can’t not call you anything but that.”

Your father clicked his tongue and glanced over his phone, a woman's laugh sounding off camera. “Fine,” he said, then looked back at you. “Aura, I wanna be able to give you enough for next month, that’s why I’m going.”

“Okay,” you said, hardening your glare.

Yeonjun glanced over the phone once more, seeming to share a sigh with whoever was behind the screen. “It’s fast,” he said, trying to reason with you. “Your uncle’s coming with me, we’re gonna be fine.”

“And Seulgi? Or is that Lisa?” You swallowed your laugh as Tori launched herself out of the frame to lose her composure. Yeonjun laughed, letting his head bob.

“It’s Haru, but thank you for that.”

You smiled. “Of course.”

“How was your first week of classes? The second starting out okay?”

Ignoring the way Tori tapped your arm, you leaned over the table and focused on the phone. “They were just great, Dad. Same old shit.”

“And the sorority? Everything going okay?”

Now you shared a look with Tori, one that told her to keep her mouth shut.

“It’s all good,” you said, looking down at your phone. He was walking around now, the woman he was with mumbling things to him as his brows twisted. The two spoke to one another for a second before he focused on you.

“Glad to hear it, Aura,” he finally said. “You staying away from the boys down the street?”

A knife to the gut. “As much as you’re staying away from the women in Contramano.”

Yeonjun shot a glare toward the camera, the woman laughing aloud near him. “Really hope you’re not serious, Aurora. Remember what I told you, they’re trouble. They might look all nice from the outside, but they’re only thinking about one thing.”

“What if we are, too?” Tori whispered, and a laugh shot through you. Thankfully, your father didn’t hear.

“I don’t want or need any grandkids yet, okay?”

“Yeah, and I don’t want or need any siblings, okay? Wrap it before you tap it, Junie.”

Tori just about lost her shit.

Yeonjun shook his head and glanced upward, seeking some sort of help from the heavens. “You’re my child. Think I made you myself. Did your mother help at all?”

Running your tongue over your teeth you tilted your head. “If you ever find her, ask her.”

Yeonjun sighed, exasperated. “These phone calls exhaust me as much as they exhaust you, Aura. Trust me.” He paused whatever it was that he could possibly be doing at this hour on a Tuesday, and he gave you his full attention. “You are my everything. Please, be safe. You and Tori, don’t leave each other alone at those parties, okay?”

“Okay,” you said.

Tori peeped her head into the frame. “Okay, Yeonjun.”

His face lit up, his smile wide as he looked at her. “Yes! Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she said, her cheeks flushing pink. You kicked her ankle with yours.

“Aura, I love you,” your father said, raising both his brows. “I’ll let you know when I’m there, okay?”

“Okay,” you whispered. “I love you, too. Be safe.”

He gave you a soft smile. “I will.”

Before he hung up you tossed in a, “Don’t get arrested again,” that made him grin and equally groan as the screen went black. Laying your phone on the table you drug your hands through your hair and took a long breath, turning towards Tori in your chair, laughing quietly at the way she eyed you.

“Go ahead,” you muttered.

She wasted little time. “Hottest drug dealer ever.”

september 18th ~ wednesday ~ 6:47 p.m.

[you]: this is the last time i’m messaging you yunho

[you]: did i sit on your dick wrong or something, just let me know whats going on

september 20th  ~ friday ~ 9:19 p.m.

Yeji, Tori, Mina, Yuna, Chaeryeong… The three of them holed up in a meeting the second all of their last classes for the day were over. In two days you’d all be meeting the freshmen recruits out of the applicants your trustworthy sisters ran background checks on now.

ITZ had applicants. The chapter would grow, the costs would go down, the drama would lessen, and life would move on.

Neither you and Tori nor any of the other girls have attempted to sneak out of the house this week. With classes in full swing the attention had shifted and now the priority was homework and good grades. In order to be examples for the future of ITZ none of you could afford a slip in GPA.

This past week has been a strange one. Anytime you set foot into Blend for a coffee you were reminded that Theo and Soul were step brothers, though you never brought it up to your favorite barista who also in turn had been one of the safest guys you knew in ATZ last year. Seonghwa hadn’t left you alone, he asked you about your day everyday, allowing you to rant about your classes or bitch about a professor. And Soul, well, he always seemed to find you on campus day after day since Monday.

Much like right now.

The soft knock at the door seemed to embody his exact energy. Soft at first, but the second the door was opened he was entirely unpredictable.

“What the hell are you doing here?”

After unlocking the several locks on the front door you tugged it open to his smug little smile and his blonde hair pulled back in a tie. Wisps hung at his neck and his forehead.

“Come to ATZ,” he said, and you hushed him, turning backward to see if anyone was around. They’d been in the meeting for over an hour now, who knew when it’d be over.

“You’re lucky I answered the door,” you said. “If it were anyone else you’d be done for. You’re not allowed to be here.”

He perked a single brow. “The ban?”

“The rules, Soul,” you hissed, stepping out onto the porch with him, closing the door behind you. He stepped aside and folded his arms over his chest. “That’s always been an ITZ thing, it’s a sorority thing, no boys allowed without permission.”

He checked you out without shame. Taking your hands to your black shorts you tugged the cotton down a smidge. “Come for a little?”

“Look, Soul,” you sighed, stepping closer to him. He pouted his lips the slightest, his black eyes shining and wide. “I like this friendship we’re starting, and I admire your persistence.”

“But?” he asked, adding in the word himself like he knew it was coming. Dropping his chin he looked down at his feet, a frown forming on his pink lips. 

“But,” you said, watching him as he slipped his phone out of his pocket, tapped a few things, then shoved it back into his jeans. Laughing quietly, you gestured toward it. “You’re young.”

“I’m nineteen.” He screwed his face up. 

“You’re a freshman, you’ve got a lot on your plate right now, especially with ATZ, I’m dealing with a lot, especially with ATZ,” you paused for a moment, feeling half your heart crumble as he gazed at you. “If I’m picking up what I think you’re putting down… Soul, I have feelings for somebody else. What you want won’t work, it won’t happen.”

He nodded, his expression falling solemn. “Seonghwa?” he asked, looking up at you. 

Your lungs contracted in on themselves. “Yes,” you whispered, and he nodded, glancing down with his brows pulled together. “I’m sorry, Soul. You’re cool, you’ve got a lot going for you.” Taking another step closer to him, you pushed some wisps of hair from his eyes. “And you’re adorable.”

He blinked a few times, his black eyes lighting up. “I am?” He spoke in a whisper.

Smiling, you nodded once, then leaned into him, pressing your lips to his cheek. His shoulders rose and a quiet gasp shot through him. When you pulled back, he was wearing the tiniest smile.

“If you liked that Monday walk I wouldn’t mind if it became a thing,” you said. “Y’know, occasionally. Grab a coffee, walk to class?”

“I skipped my ten o’clock for you,” he whispered, then he giggled at the look you gave him.

“Soul, didn’t I say to work hard?” You nudged his shoulder and he played it up like you shot him, his hand latching on top of yours to keep it on him. “How did you even know where I was?”

He shrugged, squeezed your hand, then let it go. “Lucky guess?”

Sighing, you stepped back and waved him off the porch. “Go to your classes, Soul. Go back to ATZ, or wherever you came from.” You both shared a smile, and he obeyed, leaping off the porch with a single jump. “Don’t ruin your chance,” you shouted as he walked backward, his eyes eating you up. “You can do it here,” you pointed to your head, then moved them to where your pockets would be if you had any. “Not from here.”

“Thanks, Aurora,” he said, and when he hit the sidewalk after passing through the gate, he was gone, thankfully, because the moment you had the door locked the meeting was adjourned and Tori had a wicked grin on her face when she grabbed your arm and hauled you upstairs.

september 20th  ~ friday ~ 9:49 p.m.

On the leather couch in the back of the ATZ living room, Seonghwa sat with his legs stretched out, his entire being taking up the space of three people. With his head laid back on the armrest, he scrolled his phone, mainly Instagram, taking note of the follower counts, the comments on posts, and what people were saying about either house. 

Yeji was trending, she posted her outfit of the day this morning with the hashtag #presidentialvibes on her story. Her groupies were buzzing, dissecting the clothes, breaking down the hair, curious if it were her same routine or if she had changed it because of the new color.

Wooyoung’s name popped up somewhere, he was always posting. This time it was of the view from the window of his education and society class, the sociology major keeping up with his followers, commenting back to them whenever they’d leave him something of interest. San was actively under his posts, the boy was next in line in the amount of followers he had, but only because every single post was of him half naked. Thank god he was smart otherwise there’d be an issue there, even though he was usually the one to pull people into the house and get them hooked.

Mingi posted about his homework confusing him, saying he needed help, Jongho, like Yeji, posted a fit check, and Yeosang had a photo up in the last two days of him and this girl he’d started seeing. She wasn’t a part of ITZ, something he was keen on. They shared a major, that medical shit. Her profile was quiet, just as the other ITZ girls were.

As was Yunho.

In fact, he’d been keeping a low profile in the house since last week. The guys would see him leave for class, and then he’d come back and camp out in his bedroom.

Last Friday was curious. Seonghwa had Aurora by his side, as he should, and then she was gone. And then, Yunho was gone. The house, entirely too crowded, made it impossible to track them down anyway, until Aurora appeared and asked for her phone back. Tentative to hand it over, intrigued by how fast she was moving, Seonghwa reluctantly handed it back to her and mumbled, “You need to put a passcode on that.”

But, she didn’t hear him.

She was flustered, overwhelmed, and all the more flushed.

Seonghwa knew that face.

Seonghwa knew why Yunho was avoiding everybody.

“Hey,” Soul said, out of breath, rushing into the living room with his phone out. There was little movement around the house this evening, Hongjoong was working on plans for the recruitment dinner with Mingi, and the others were hunched over their homework scattered around the property. Yeosang was on the couch through the archway, nose deep in a textbook with the occasional break to send a text message with a smile.

“You’re back quick,” Seonghwa said, sitting up, dropping his feet to the floor. Soul, grinning wide, shoved his phone into the vice president's hand. “No way you made it happen.”

The freshman took two steps back and propped his hands on his hips, finally able to take a breath to steady his racing heart. “I did, watch that, listen to that.”

Seonghwa eyed him, then tapped the play button on the video.

Aurora’s voice filled the air.

“If I’m picking up what I think you’re putting down… Soul, I have feelings for somebody else. What you want won’t work, it won’t happen.”

“Seonghwa?”

“Yes. I’m sorry, Soul. You’re cool, you’ve got a lot going for you. And you’re adorable.”

“I am?” 

Seonghwa’s eyes bugged out of his head as he stared up at Soul, the freshman laughing to himself. “She did it herself.”

Soul threw a hand toward the phone. “You were right, she’s easy.”

“Watch it,” Seonghwa sneered, and Soul planted his hands behind his back.

“She kissed my cheek,” he said. “It wasn’t an actual one, but it still counts, right?”

Seonghwa paused the video halfway through Aurora telling Soul how to live his life, like the boy would actually listen. “I’ll count it.”

“Thank you,” Soul sighed, tipping his head back, squeezing his eyes shut. Seonghwa looked him up and down.

“You tell me she’s shown interest?”

Soul looked at his domineer and nodded. “Not in her words, but…”

“In her eyes?” Seonghwa asked, and Soul continued to bob his head. “Yeah, she does that,” he breathed, handing the freshman his phone. “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind ending up in bed with you.” The corners of his lips perked up, and Seonghwa glared at him. “Wipe that look off your face, are you stupid? She’s mine, you heard her say it.”

“Right,” Soul shook his face clean. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

Seonghwa clenched his jaw before he said, “Go home, Soul. Come back tomorrow, I’ll have something else for you.”

“This clears senior year though, right?” Soul asked, anxiously awaiting the answer.

“Just about,” Seonghwa said, and the boy sighed in relief. “You’ve passed with San, and you’re almost through with me. Gonna need you to keep up this act with her, okay?” Soul smiled. “An act, Shota. Don’t get ballsy, do you remember what you said? She’s easy.”

“Yeah,” Soul said, quietly. “I got it.”

“Go back to the dorms. I’ll send you her location tomorrow if she goes out.”

Seonghwa watched him hurry from the house, giving Yeosang a sly goodbye as he passed him. An act. One Seonghwa knew Aurora and the freshman who moved with his dick instead of his brain wouldn’t be able to hold themselves back from.

Picking his own phone back up, he opened his messages and smirked.

[seonghwa]: Soul’s in her head now. Can’t confirm if last Friday is true or not still. Will let you know when I find out.

[hbic]: You need to recruit him.

[seonghwa]: He’s proving himself. If he can get her here, he’s an automatic in. His GPA sucks.

[hbic]: Keep her hooked. Have they been talking?

[seonghwa]: No proof. Haven’t seen Yunho in days.

[hbic]: Get Soul to find out. Otherwise we find out at the recruitment dinner.

[seonghwa]: Yes ma’am.

[hbic]: I’ll update Yeji.

NU home ✧ nice for what masterlist ✧ talk to me ✧ thank you for reading <3

you do not have permission to copy or translate my works without my consent.

[poorlemons]

A little look-back through 2024, how fun!

January

Certainly a range going on, dungeon meshi, moomin, rottmnt, and whatever is happening to Rhode. I don't think I really drew much during Jan, all things considered.

February

A failed attempt at amphiburary- school took over, or something- and a lot of oc art! overall I did more art that month and while some of it bugs me, and i dont have pleasant memories attached to it, i still like a lot of what I did. Got experimental 'n stuff!

March

Its all OC art baybe!! and some stuff included that I never posted. Rhode (the ginger with glasses) is my special little guy and I had plenty happening in a rp thing I do. You can see how his nose hadn't reached its full evolution yet.

April

Again with the oc stuff! Rhode persists! March was the eclipse, which honestly I forgot happened this year... man that feels like so long ago. Also, I did some stuff with my magical girl ocs, a rare treat! I honestly really like that art set I did, the magazine idea was cute

May-June

I did a lot of mostly complete artworks these two months, but theyre 90% oc art so I figured i could shove them together. You can see me experimenting with coloring and rendering in some of these. Also, I visited rottmnt again for a lil bit in June! Honestly I was having a great time drawing me and my friend's ocs

July

And so I discovered Reigen. Plus some more rhode n other ocs. But mostly it was Reigen. Mob psycho is great, i had a great time watching it. Kinda wanna go back and rewatch it but all for another day.

August

didn't draw as much in august, i had a really fun trip I went on that I spent the month preparing for! Love ren fairs. But what i did draw was (drum roll) oc art! Rhode, Lamp, Ann and otheres- theres a decent variety here. Still mostly Rhode, though.

September-October (and so my Michael obsession begins)

So um. Michael, amiright? honestly i have so much fun drawing both michaels, its a damn delight. ive been so happy at the reception of them from everyone too- i draw michael solely for myself but i do like it when my work makes others happy

November

Honestly some good michael art from november. plus the creation of Clear Image AU! I have less to say about these last too months, since itd be less looking back and more recapping what is basically yesterday.

December

And so ends the year.. More michael, some Lyf, some oc art, all the fun stuff. Plus... a little sneak peak at the expert testimony animatic im working on in the upper righthand corner.

Happy new years, fingers crossed for a better 2025 for everyone!

[veylia]

Time for a history lesson!

A friend commented on this picture on my Facebook:

In the US, we learn that World War II ended when we stormed the beaches of Normandy and when we dropped the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I also learned that the war had been going on for so long and wasn't anywhere near its end until you "awoken the sleeping giant" that was the US.

My reply:

First, I just want to say that I'm not dismissing the help we got from the US. What's frustrating is that the general idea is that you did everything, and we basically did nothing.

The Netherlands, for example, was liberated by Canada in 1944, which had been with us from the beginning, 10th of September 1939. The royal house of the Netherlands took refuge in Canada, and the Queen even gave birth during that time. The bonds between Canada and the Netherlands are very strong to this day. They send thousands of tulips to Canada each year, and Canada holds a tulip festival once a year. And Auschwitz was liberated by the Soviets.

So, not to mention that we didn't just have WW2, but also the Holocaust. And the problems in Europe didn't start with WW2 either.

The Nazi party was formed as early as 1921, 18 years before WW2. Hitler fought in WW1, and since the Germans lost that war, Hitler became obsessed with "making Germany great again" (sounds familiar?) and he blamed the Jews for how bad things were, and the Great depression only helped his cause. In 2 years, they went from having just 3% of the vote to a sizable 18%. Hitler ran for president in 1932, and in 1933, the Nazi party gained three ministerial positions, with Hitler as Chancellor of Germany. He started planning for the Holocaust, the first concentration camp, Dachau, was created as early as March 22nd, 1933. And the short version is that WW2 started because Hitler needed people distracted, for his "final solution" to work.

So, now that you know it all started, let me continue by saying that the attitude of the US president at the time, as well as the US people, was the same as it is today when it comes to Ukraine: "it has nothing to do with us, not our problem". You were forced into the war by Japan when they attacked Pearl Harbor, and shortly, Hitler also declared war against you, since he was allied with Japan. Your president, along with the other two major powers at the time, Great Britain and the Soviet Union, and even countries from Latin America, signed the Washington agreement.

In 1942, Germany started a devastating operation (for them) called Barbarossa. The attack is considered to be the biggest one in history, with over 3 million German soldiers along with their allies, 4000 planes, and 3000 tanks. But their downfall was the winter. They thought the whole thing would only take a few months, so they had no winter equipment. By that point, they were outside of Moscow. At the same time, Germany attacked the city of Stalingrad, one of the toughest battles in WW2, and they had to surrender. That was a big turning point in the war, and many began to doubt a German victory. After that battle, the Soviets began to win on almost every front and take back their lands. By 1943-1944, the Germans had been pushed back to the Polish border.

The Germans and Italians surrendered in North Africa to British and American soldiers in May 1943. In July of the same year, the two also liberated Italy from Mussolini. In September, the forces reached the mainland of Europe.

By 1944, hardly anyone believed Hitler would be able to win, and in January, the Soviets drove the Germans even across the Polish border. In June that same year, the allies (as in, not just American soldiers, but British and Canadian as well) stormed Normandie from the West side, soon liberating Paris as well as Belgium. It got more intense with the Soviets from the East.

After that, it was basically defeat after defeat for Hitler and the Germans until he offed himself and lost the war.

So, while I don't dismiss the help we got from the United States, it was a joint effort to end it, with a LOT of help from the Soviet Union. (Personally, that's why my own feelings about Russia are very complicated.) That's why, over here, it feels like America is that kid at school that you need to do a group project with, everyone does an equal part, and then they take full credit. That's why this post is so insulting. Because even though America did lose a lot of soldiers, it's nowhere NEAR what Europe and the Soviet Union lost.

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I can understand why Americans are the way they are if what they are taught is so far from the truth.