#but i like being alone & doing stuff by myself!!!

[metaphorfordeath]

Anti-Psychotic

A person living with schizophrenia finds that their delusions may have more basis in reality than they thought. Originally published in the Fall/Winter II issue of Diet Milk Magazine, available here. Content warnings for depiction of psychosis, violence, ableist language.

No one is watching me.

Julie has me write that down at our session. She never listens to me. She says, it can be comforting to realize that people don’t think of you as much as you think they do. I know this already. She asks, what evidence do you have that you are being watched? I say there isn’t any. Just a feeling. She writes something down, and asks about my meds again. 

So fucking patronizing. Of course I take them. I have taken mine like clockwork, every day, for five years. Maybe I missed a few days, but who doesn’t forget sometimes. My meds are cleat spikes jabbing into the earth. Helping me keep my footing. Making sure I don’t slip.

Last week I started getting the prickle again. Like fingers up my back. Someone standing behind me, breathing. I live alone. When I felt it, I wasn’t scared at first. These things happen sometimes. I’ve been around the block. The prickle and I are old friends, practically. When it finds me, I have ways to forget it. 

I drew the blinds, which helped a bit. I had a drink—nobody's perfect—but the prickle didn’t dull. So I peeked through the shades at the street below. Normal street stuff. The sun was setting, painting the world in shades of fire. Cars went by, all the usuals. Some kids were yelling in a driveway. A wasp tapped at my window, wiggling its feelers at me. No obvious source for the prickle. So, probably nothing. For the rest of the evening I puttered, read my book, ate some frozen nothing heated in the microwave, and took my meds. The prickle was temporary, I told myself as I lay down to sleep, the usual fog settling over me in a cool, clammy layer. No one was watching me. No one ever is.

That was a week ago. It’s only gotten worse since then. The prickle turned into a terrified stomach ache that kept me up for nights and nights. I called in sick to group, told Cheryl the caseworker that I have the flu. She sounded alarmed, but she’s only worried because of what happened to Devin.

Devin was like me: good at meds, good at therapy. We were friends, in a psycho kind of way. A few weeks ago, Devin started to get bad. Stopped showing up to group, didn’t even call. I haven’t seen him in a while, even when I went looking for him in his usual bad places. I miss him. I told Cheryl not to worry. I’m steady, just sick. I’ll see her again soon. 

I keep taking my meds, but they aren’t helping like they should. The fog I count on to sleep is thin, or missing. Something scrabbles at my skin from underneath, and I keep catching myself scratching little bits off of me. When I lay down, a low, neutral voice whispers nonsense at me through the pillow I clamp over my head. I can’t shower; that’s when the prickle gets stronger. Someone standing on the other side of the shower curtain, someone looking down at me through the water stain on the ceiling. I hiss and babble out loud just to hear myself talk, to shut up the voices that aren’t mine. I get sicker by the day.

By now I haven’t been outside in over a week, but my meds are ready to pick up. I don’t want to miss a dose, so I put on shoes and the big jacket that makes me feel safe, and I go outside. Birds leer at me from the tops of buildings. Walking in the opposite direction, an old lady frowns at me.

“Hmph, same to you,” she snaps.

My stomach lurches, but I don’t say anything, just keep walking. I hadn’t spoken. Had I? 

The drug store is brightly lit. It hurts to be inside. Too many things to look at. Faces on packaging look strange now. Confrontational. Interrogative. But at least they look like faces. When I look at anyone real, their features shift. Static snow eats at the air around their heads in a halo. It frightens me, so I keep my eyes on my shoes. The pharmacy tech who’s always there gets the packet for me, rings it up.

“Any questions about your medication?” he asks. I shake my head, pay with a card. He has glasses that give his face a sort of stability, so I look at it. His eyes are brown, beard gray, no hair on his head. He smiles at me. “Have a nice day, miss.”

“You too,” I mutter.

And then I go home, have to stop myself from running for safety. The walk is twenty minutes each way; harrowing, the passing cars huge and hungry, huffing and snorting at me. The prickle is more than a prickle by now. It feels like someone is pulling out the hairs on the back of my neck, one by one. My heart thuds against my ribs so hard that I’m afraid it will burst out, plop on the sidewalk and keep throbbing without me. The paper bag with my pills turns damp and tattered in my sweaty hand. 

And getting home doesn’t even help this time.

Julie says too much TV can be a trigger for me, but I start leaving it on all the time. Noise beats silence, any day. No empty spaces that need filling. I can’t watch sitcoms or anything fictional, so I tune it to the news. The news is always. Steady, real, factual. There’s a story about a body they found by the freeway. Pushed out of a moving car. No one knows or cares who it was. There’s a picture of the scene, taped up yellow and covered in those little numbers that say where a bit of evidence is. A tattered jacket lays in a ditch, dark with blood. 

I stand and race to the bathroom, cool porcelain against my hands, bile and nothing coming up as sweat pours down my back. My head pounds, edges of my vision sparkling. I can only see the jacket. Not dirty or bloody or ruined but the way it used to look. Devin’s jacket.

Something is horribly wrong. Men-in-black wrong. The-end-is-nigh wrong. 

The prickle wasn’t imagination. It was intuition. 

Someone got Devin. Who else did they get before him?

---

The next week, I force myself to go to group. I need to see faces. See who else is there, or not. Cheryl picks me up for these, since I don’t drive. I’m sicker than I can remember being, and try to remember to ask Julie about my dose on Tuesday. I sit silently in the passenger seat, feeling Cheryl’s eyes on me. Caseworkers all have the same eyes.

“Feeling alright today, X?” 

My name isn’t the name she calls me. You don’t need to know it.

“Fine,” I say, pinching my hands between my knees. They shake if I don’t. “Still getting over that flu.”

“Sorry to hear that,” she says. Her sedan has beige fabric seats. The passenger seat is dark, stained with sweat and whatever else from all the people she’s ferried around. A vanilla air freshener dangles from the rear view mirror.

Someone shouts in my ear, so close I feel a little blast of hot breath on my neck, and I flinch. Cheryl looks at me suddenly.

“Everything okay?”

She didn’t hear that. “Yeah. Sorry. Weird itch.”

“Hmm.” 

Group is fine. It’s usually fine. I don’t say much this time, just look around at everyone in their folding chairs. Their faces are wrong. It makes me nauseous to look, but I look anyway. I need to see who isn’t here.

There are no empty chairs, but there are fewer. One or two down from usual. All the other regulars are here, picking at their skin or looking at the clock or chewing their hair. I glance across the room and for a second I think I see Devin, sitting in his old coat. But when I look again, it’s just Tom. I almost hoped.

When it’s over, there’s bad coffee to drink. I suck on a red straw and let the bitter taste anchor me to my tongue. I inhabit my body, touch my fingers to the side of my face to know that it and my fingers exist. Sufficiently convinced of my realness, I go to Amber, our de facto leader.

She’s drinking water from a bottle with cucumber slices in it, cloudy with pulp and seeds. Ectoplasmic. It makes my stomach turn.

“Amber,” I say. My voice feels far away. She looks at me, expectant. “I missed last week. Have you seen Greg, or Mariah?”

“Oh, no, I haven’t. Greg was here last week, but I haven’t seen Mariah since like, last month. Why?”

“Just wondering.”

A crinkle appears between her eyebrows. I focus on that, since the rest of her features won’t stay put. “You’re worried because of what happened to Devin?”

“I think Devin is dead.” There is a sudden hush as other people in my vicinity overhear. “I saw his jacket. On the news.”

Cheryl appears beside me. “X, would you like to talk in the hallway?” 

She pulls me out before I can answer. “Have you been feeling alright?” she asks again. “Taking your medication?”

“Yes,” I say, a little forcefully. She clicks her tongue.

“Really? Because if you need to move up your next appointment, I can make some arrangements for you.”

Despite the fact that I do want to move my appointment up, her tone hits a button in my brain and my face turns red. “No,” I say. “I’ll wait until the next one. I’m fine. I just need to know what’s happening.” A rancid taste creeps up the back of my throat. “Where are people going?”

“Honey, everyone’s here that needs to be here.”

“No—that’s not right. I need to know.” 

I can tell from the way she moves that she thinks I’m getting agitated. She doesn’t understand what I’m saying. “People call in sick sometimes. You did, just last week. Mariah was having issues sticking with the program, so we’re working something out. No one’s gone.”

“Devin is gone. Devin is dead. He’s dead and no one knows it.”

Cheryl comes closer, her voice so low and venomous that it starts to meld with the others. “I’m going to give Dr. Bern a call and try to get you in with her sooner than Tuesday. If you can’t keep up with your regimen, we’ll have to consider another in-patient stay.”

Anger chokes me until my vision goes white. “Okay,” is all I can manage. I have some unsavory thoughts, which I won’t repeat to you now.

“Good,” says Cheryl, holding my leash. “Let’s get you home.”

I don’t sleep. I don’t even try. Someone is watching me. I think about Devin, the last time we spoke before he was gone. He got paranoid, too. He jabbered sometimes, when we would see each other. The same face, he said, with glass eyes. Looking at him. Following him. He said his pills were replaced, his furniture moved, nothing looked the same as he’d left it. No one listens to me, he said. I’m scared, he said. I’m scared of what will happen next.

“I’m scared, too,” I say to no one. A chorus laughs at me. 

---

“So,” says Julie. “Cheryl told me you’ve been having some trouble sticking to your medication.”

“I stick to it,” I say, and set the pill bottle on the desk in front of her. “Count them and tell me I’m not.”

She doesn’t move to count them. I’d hoped at least that she would humor me. “It sounds like some of your persecutory thoughts are returning. Tell me about what you’re worried about.”

“I saw on the news that they found someone’s body in a ditch off the interstate. They showed pictures. I think the body was Devin.”

“Devin from your group?” I nod. “We actually just heard from him last week. His brother answered when we called his phone. Devin is currently in a private rehabilitation clinic in Cincinnati. He’s alright, X.”

A numb feeling falls over me all at once, like a sheet. Something crawls up my thigh and disappears into a deep hole in my flesh. “Oh.”

“Amber talked to us, too. She said you asked her about Greg and Mariah’s absences this week?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I followed up on those for you, too. Greg had an accident at home and was in the emergency room during your meeting time this week. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to reach Mariah personally, but her father informed me over the phone that her family has pulled her out of the program. She won’t be returning.” Julie leans across her desk. “X, can you please look at me?”

I look at her. Her face is twisted, like a mask, papier mâché, drooping strips of plaster bandage. The static threatens to consume her, and me.

“I’m going to increase your dose to eighty milligrams. For now you can take two of what you have at the usual time, but I’m sending in a new prescription to the pharmacy.” She scrawls something on a pad at hand, and I take the opportunity to look away. “I’ll see you again this time next week, okay? And if anything’s the matter, you can call the nurse’s hotline. We’ll take care of you.” She hands me the script. 

“Thank you,” I say, and then someone brings me home. I am silent for the drive. Thinking.

Wasn’t Devin an only child?

I start doubling my dose. The fog doesn’t come. The prickle intensifies into ceaseless paranoia. I check the window locks three times a day to make sure, even though I live on the third floor. Chair under the doorknob, empty bottles stacked on it so I’ll hear if someone comes. I can’t stop thinking about Devin, and the others. Were they all really fine? Was this just a breakthrough-breakdown, pills ceasing their function and leaving me alone, spiraling? 

I hadn’t tried calling Devin in weeks. He didn’t pick up the first few times, and anyone in that state doesn’t usually want to talk anyhow. But Julie said someone answered when they called. Maybe they would answer for me.

The phone buzzes. Surging forward and receding, like a tide. Devin could be there on the other end. Getting better. Being cared for. I close my eyes and wait to hear his voicemail, or something else.

Click. “Hello?”

The voice startles me so much I can’t speak. A stranger.

“Hello?” says the phone. “Who is this?”

“Um,” I say suddenly, “Devin?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” the voice says. “Devin isn’t here right now. May I ask who’s calling?”

“I’m—his friend. X,” I clarify. My voice is not of me. “Can I talk to him soon?”

“No, unfortunately he can’t talk. But I’ll let him know you called, he’ll be happy to hear people are checking up on him.”

“What’s—who are you?”

“I’m Eric, Devin’s brother. I’m taking good care of him, miss. Have a nice day.” 

The call ends. Something in my stomach shrivels. I run to the bathroom, but there’s nothing to bring up. I don’t know why that voice scared me so much. Why had I thought Devin was an only child? He hadn’t mentioned his family—maybe I’d just assumed, or forgotten if he’d said. Of course he had a brother. He was alright. They all were, now.

---

Days pass. Bugs make their homes in me. My medication runs out, the new pills ready for pickup. I’d rather die than set foot outside. But I need my stability. I steel myself to leave, and exit my apartment into the world. 

Everyone looks at me. They all want to hurt me. A car drives slowly past me and I try not to look at the people inside. My head hurts. It’s hard to see where I’m going, but I go.

The drug store is bigger than it was last time. Brighter. Angrier. People avoid me as I shuffle towards the pharmacy counter. The pharmacist who’s always there smiles at me again.

“Do you have any questions about your medication?”

I shake my head, fumbling for my card. He’s staring at me through his glasses.

“Do you need me to call someone for you?”

His voice makes me want to puke. I shake my head again, take the pills and make for the door. A crowd of voices shout at me as I stagger out into the air. I miss the way things were. My cleats don’t fit anymore. I tear the bag open, pop the lid off the bottle and shake a pill into my mouth, force it down dry and sticky and hope it does its job. My mouth is sweet where it lingered. It didn’t used to be so sweet.

There is a dull shock of understanding that blooms at the edge of my mind. The prickle rises on the back of my neck, and I look over my shoulder again. The pharmacist is looking at me from his position behind the counter. His face ringed in static. He waves at me. And I take off running.

There is no one I can call. No one who will listen. There are only doors that will slam in my face, white speckle tile and fluorescent lights and needles. He knows that. He knew it for Devin, too. He knew it for the rest of them. The wind in my face feels like fingers grasping at me, tugging at my hair, slowing me down. I race home, up the stairs and lock the door, brace it with furniture and then I sit on the floor and cry and cry. They’re laughing at me. Trading whispers. Look how stupid. Look how gullible. Go on and cry, crybaby. 

So I do. It’s all I have left.

The next time it’s group, I don’t come to the door. Cheryl calls me, but I don’t answer. There will be a wellness check if I don’t come. I want them to, now. When her calls finally stop piling up, I wait fifteen minutes, then step outside. I leave my door open, leave what I can to show that I am gone. I leave the pills out, and the script. Crush a few with my heel for good measure. I hope they can put the pieces together.

It’s dark, cool. It reminds me of the fog, makes me wish I could sleep. Eyes follow me through the evening. Headlights burn me as cars move past. I walk slowly in my big jacket, letting myself be watched. Letting the prickle come up my neck, creep over my scalp, trickle down over my face until it covers me in a thin layer and I prickle all over. The prickle and I are old friends. It tells me when to be afraid.

Then there are headlights at my back that don’t go away. The growl of an engine crashes into me. I stop walking, and someone gets out. I don’t turn to look. I can’t stand to look at faces anymore. Suddenly, I have a funny thought. Maybe I do have some questions about my medication, after all.

Something whistles through the air above my head, and the world disappears.

When I wake up later, I’m not sure if I have. There are stars. It smells like gasoline, copper and dirt. My jacket is gone. My mouth is gone, too. My hands. You’re caught, someone says in my ear, you let it happen. With my eyes, which I still have, I look across the floor. It hurts to look. There’s blood under me, sticky black. The prickle is gone. I discovered its source.

I’m alone for a long time. It’s hard to say how much. I realize that there’s a door behind me when it opens. Light falls across the floor, yellow tractor beam coming to take me away. I long to be weightless, but the earth won’t let me. Then the pharmacist who is always there puts his shoe against my face and turns me over. He doesn’t speak. He crouches down and looks into my eyes like he is trying to take something from me. Then he takes the tape off my mouth.

All I do at first is scream. It's all my body knows how to do. He sits and watches me. When I can see his mouth, it’s smiling, and I realize he likes it when I scream. So as soon as I can, I stop. Silence rushes back into the gaps, roaring in my ears.

“Good girl,” he says when I am quiet. His voice is a distorted growl, infrasound, rattling my eardrums. “Aren’t you such a good girl?”

I think about his throat in my teeth. I think about his blood on my face. For a moment it feels like I am lunging for him, jabbing thumbs into soft and fragile places. But he still has my hands, turning numb and purple at the small of my back. So I sit up as much as I can and spit at the floor near his feet. Faster than my eyes can track, he lurches forward. Fist in my hair, hauling me up to hip height.

He looks into my face with his glass eyes. His mouth is monstrous, all his white teeth sharp in a thicket of gray.

“I’ve been watching you,” he says. 

I know this already. There is nothing satisfying in the confirmation of it. 

He is not the man in black I always pictured. He could be anybody.

“Think of this as a favor I’m doing you.”

Then he hits me again. And other things.

When I’m alone, voices chatter in my ears. No one is coming, they say, you are alone. They will not find you. You and the ditch will be friends soon. So you amounted to this—better than nothing, we suppose. I shush them, rock myself against the cement floor and hum and think about grass, and birds. I try not to leave myself room to cry. I don’t want him to have the satisfaction.

A thousand years go by. Outside the room, there are voices. Not any of mine. His, and others. They start loud, and get quiet. His voice goes away completely. Doors open, distant, then closer. Light falls over my body again, and I feel the weightlessness. Real this time. My hands come back to me, but I can’t move them. There are faces, more than I’ve seen in a while. They scare me, but I can’t run, so I try not to look. Except at his. They take me past him, and I look. Through his glasses I see his eyes, still trying to take something from me. He has, by now. But not what he wanted.

I sleep for a long time, and when I wake up, the world is the way I remember it. My feet on the ground, cleats and all, not slipping. When I’m well enough they bring me to identify Devin’s body, since he didn’t really have a brother after all. They find Mariah’s, too. Greg really was in the emergency room, turns out. But there are others. Too many to think of.

Cheryl changes careers afterwards. Probably for the best. I find this out when she drives me to group the first time after I get out of the hospital. She doesn’t look at me much, but when she does, I can see her eyes are different. Not caseworker eyes anymore.

“Lauren is going to be taking over your case starting next week,” she says after a long silence. “So this will be the last time I see you.” I can tell she’s trying not to cry.

“Okay,” I say. 

She never apologizes. No one does. They all say they’re sorry for what happened to me, but that isn’t the same thing. People who don’t listen never think to apologize for it. They think they were listening all along.

Things are mostly the same as before, except I get my pills mailed to me now. And I think about Devin a lot. When I pour myself a drink, I pour one for him too and pretend he’s with me. I don’t have any pictures, so mostly I think about his voice. The last time we ever spoke, he told me, no one listens to me, X. 

What I said then was, I know the feeling, man.

But now I just tell him I’m sorry.

[giddyfatherchris]

Hi there, I was wondering what bangchan would be like dating a bookworm? Like would he like being read to? or he enjoys listening about the stories you've read.

hii!

oooh this is one is so good!!! 🎀 as a bookworm myself i have thooooughts on this and i feel like chan would absolutely love being with someone who’s book obsessed…

‧ ୨୧ ‧ since he's a busy guy who is always focused on work, new ideas and projects i think he would love for you to read close to him. the kind of thing where you're both doing your own stuff but close to one another. when working at home he would def text you or come and pout about you needing to come read next to him while he's working. he would tuck you in a blanket, make sure you're all comfortable and give you a quick kiss before going back to his own thing. he would also love to take little breaks and come sit next to you so you can tell him all about the book you're reading. he would love to see your eyes light up with excitment and get in your own little world as you tell him everything about it.

‧ ୨୧ ‧ i think the reading to him thing would come later, kind of as a surprise that this is something he actually enjoy and can even be beneficial for him. it would probably happen when his insomnia is acting up and it's 3:00am and sleep is not an option to him. you'd find him on the couch, working on his computer, sleep bags under his eyes. ofc he would try to get you back to bed and apologize for waking you up but no no you wouldn't want to hear it because poor baby:( insomnia is a really lonely sleep disorder. so no leaving him alone. you would come back with blankets, your glasses and a book in hand. "sometimes when i can't sleep i pick up my book and it helps me... so i thought it might work for you too." he would smile very big and wide and pull you closer "that's very sweet babe but i'm afraid i'm not that much of a reader" "i know, that's why i'm going to read it to you. i picked that book i told you about and you seemed to like." then, because he is a big ol' softy his heart would squeeze and tighten in his chest at this pure demonstration of love. you would cuddle real close with him laying between your legs, head resting on your chest. he'd pull the blankets up close and settle in to listen to the soothing sound of your voice until the next thing he knows... it's 10am and you're both still on the couch, book on your chest, your glasses askew on your nose and he wouldn't believe it worked and he fell asleep!! he would wake you up with lots of kisses and silly grins because he. fell. asleep. !!! he'd call you a magician and cook you breakfast to thank you :3 i think it would then become a tradition for the two of you and he’d even start listening to audiobooks because ofc he doesn’t want you awake every night to read him books!! (even though he frickin loves it)

all in all, i think chan would loooove having a bookworm partner :3

(pictures are not mine. credit to the owner!)

[rispwr]

“3 words, 8 letters. I mean it” - J.JK - Mini (M)

Pairings : j.jk x fem! Reader

Genre : situationship, smut, slight fluff.

Contents : chuckblair inspired, limo sx, gossip girl parties setting, unprotected sex (yk what to do babes), riding, praisekink, comparing, big c!jk, slight public sex, not proofread, lemme know what i missed!

Notes : don’t expect too much yall. I’m trying a new writing style. The one that’s not too detailed that i write about everything but the character😭 tell me what you think about this? Should i make more smut? Idk i think i’m bad at smut, i’m more better at fluff and romantic stuff but i just wanted to try this. Xoxo gossip girl💋💋 Ive been watching the show and i love itt!! I love chuck and blair and i think i will def write more inspired by them. I loved the “3 words, 8 letters” line. It’s my favourite tbh.

“I knew you had a type…” his voice trails behind me. I didn’t bother to move or to face him but to just stay still and silent, silently enjoying his touch, the way his touch felt like warmth to my cold like skin, the way the world stops, and everythingstops once he touches me.

“I missed you.”

After Jungkook suddenly left me in Paris without saying a word during our vacation together, I was shattered. One minute, everything felt perfect. the Eiffel Tower lighting up the night sky, his laughter filling my heart with happiness as we explored and the next, the right side of my bed was gone . Broken, sad, left, and helpless. I spent the four remaining days locked away in the hotel room we had booked together.

At the airport, sitting alone in business class, I tried to distract myself, to feel anything other than the suffocating pain that clung to me. That’s when a man approached me. At first, I didn’t want to look at him, but when I did, I felt a sharp ache in my chest. His sleeve tattoos, the undercut, the piercings. it all felt too familiar, too much like him.

When I learned he lived in the same city as me, I impulsively invited him to my upcoming party. I told myself it was a distraction, a way to move on. Maybe even a chance to prove to myself that I didn’t need Jungkook anymore.

I thought that was the end of us. I truly did.

Until now.

“You left me… alone in a country whose people I don’t even know,” my eyes keep shut, trying hard not to let a tear out.

“I’m sorry, honey… let me make it up to you?”

“I have Ian now, Jungkook,” I try to keep my tone straight.

“No, you won’t,” he chuckles deeply. “You’re only with him to replace the missing presence that you can’t live without.” His hands trail around my jawline. “And that is me”

“Three words, eight letters. I mean it,” his tone changes into a soft one, one that I only hear when he wakes up to me wrapped up in his arms, one when he starts talking about our future together, together.

“Three words, eight letters. Let’s get out of here,” I say, grabbing his hand, intertwining with mine, his smile widening.

—-

The limo driver’s voice, distant and polite, asked, “Your place, Ms.?”

“Mhm,” I hummed, breathless already, my response barely audible as Jungkook’s lips crashed into mine. The kiss was firm yet full of emotion, like he’d been starving for days…… He starved for my taste

My breath hitched as Jungkook pulled me into his lap, his large hands gripping my waist. all I could manage was a soft hum, barely audible, as I reached blindly for the button to raise the divider.

The divider hummed as it rises, It being the only thing keeping the driver from seeing us do the deed in the back of the limo, leaving only us in the together in the backseat. His tongue parted my lips, the kiss deepening as his hands roamed over my thighs, hiking my dress higher until it was bunched around my hips.

“Fuck, baby,” he groaned against my lips, his voice low and strained. “I fucking missed you, my pretty girl”

I gasped as he tugged my panties aside, his fingers grazing the slick heat of my core. “You’re already so wet for me,” he murmured, his dark eyes locking onto mine as his fingers teased me, gathering the wetness and spreading it over my entrance. “You’ve been missing me too huh?”

“Jungkook,” I whimpered, unable to answer him as my hips bucked against his hand.

“That’s what I thought,” he said, his lips curving into a small, cocky smirk. His hands gripped my hips as he leaned back slightly, guiding me to straddle him completely. “Come here, baby. Let me feel you.”

I reached between us, freeing him from his pants. He was already hard, his cock thick and pulsing in my hand, and the deep groan that rumbled in his chest as I stroked him sent a wave of heat coursing through me.

“Don’t tease me,” he said, his voice low and dangerous, his hands tightening on my thighs. “You know I can’t wait.”

I positioned myself over him, the head of his cock pressing against my entrance, and slowly sank down, taking him inch by inch. The stretch was overwhelming, my body trembling as he filled me completely.

“Fuck,” he groaned, his head falling back against the seat as his hands gripped my waist. “You’re so fucking tight, baby. You feel so good.”

I braced my hands on his shoulders, rocking my hips slightly to adjust to the fullness. “Jungkook,” I gasped, my voice shaking. “You’re so deep.”

“That’s it,” he murmured, his hands moving to guide me as I began to move. “Good girl. Take me just like that. You’re doing so good.”

The praise sent a shiver down my spine, and I picked up the pace, bouncing on his lap, riding him with a desperation that matched his own. The sound of skin slapping against skin filled the small space, mingling with our moans and the occasional broken gasp of my name from his lips.

“Fuck, baby,” he groaned, his voice strained as his hands gripped my hips tightly, helping me move faster. “You’re gonna make me lose it. You’re so fucking perfect. So good to me.”

“Jungkook,” I whimpered, my nails digging into his shoulders as the pressure built low in my belly. “I-I’m close.”

“Me too,” he growled, his hips thrusting up to meet mine as his pace turned erratic. His dark eyes locked on mine, his voice soft but commanding. “Milk me, baby. Let me feel you. I’ll fill you up, yeah?”

“Yes,” I cried out, my voice desperate. “Fill me up, Jungkook. Please. I want it. I want all of you.”

“Fuck,” he groaned, his grip on me tightening as he slammed into me one last time, holding me down as his release hit. “That’s it, baby. Milk me. Fuck, you’re so good.”

The sensation of him filling me sent me over the edge, my body clenching around him as my orgasm crashed over me in waves. I cried out his name, my movements faltering as he held me close, his lips pressing against my neck as we both trembled through the aftershocks.

For a long moment, neither of us moved, our breaths mingling as we clung to each other. His hands stroked my back, his lips brushing softly against my shoulder as he whispered, “three words, eight letters. I mean it.”

“Three words, eight letters. I mean it more.” I murmured, my fingers tangling in his hair as I kissed him, my heart racing as the limo drove us to my house.

[the-bonfires-ember]

Hey friend,

So yes I’m professionally diagnosed with ASPD. I self diagnosed with NPD after starting recovery because a lot of stuff just made more sense that way.

I’ve been alone before and I thought I was fine that way. I mean, people are annoying and unpredictable and inconvenient and I was just so much happier not dealing with that. But I was lonely, even if I didn’t notice that I was.

You see, ASPD or not, we are social creatures. We aren’t meant to survive alone. Us sociopaths just got good at it because it meant we could survive at all. Period.

But I’ve been in recovery for a couple of years now, and I have people and I can see just how badly I was doing back then. In hindsight, it’s pretty obvious. But I also recognise that I was doing what I had to do, as a means of making it to the next day.

There were days, though, where I would see someone call somebody a sociopath and I felt like I was a monster and that everyone else on the planet knew. Which didn’t help me when I was going through recovery. Seeing myself demonised in popular culture started to actually hurt as I got better. It made it harder for me to keep working on it because yknow what’s the fucking point? Everyone’s convinced I’m going to be evil either way so why shouldn’t I just take the easy route and live up to the assumption?

So look, if you are at a point where being alone makes you feel more comfortable, then go for it. But if you ever decide you want to try to recover and find yourself where I was, thinking everyone in the world was just waiting for me to trip, just know that there are some of us who are rooting for you and who’ll help you back up if you do fall.

That’s who this post is for. The people who are trying and feel like it’s with fuck all.

And hey, maybe ask why you are looking on the ASPD tag in the first place if you think all of this touchy feely shit is pointless. Are you looking for community or to feel seen or to have someone else validate your own experience with this disorder? Because if so you are looking for a community. Which means you might not want to truly be as alone as you think

fellow narcissists, sociopaths, and psychopaths,

we're going to hear those words being thrown around a lot over the next few years. more than we already do, which is not an insubstantial amount. i want you to remember that you are not monsters, or fascists, or scum.

as more and more people throw around diagnoses they do not care to understand and words that they do not see as harmful, i want you all to remember that you are not alone and that the entire world is not against you.

there are people out there who care and understand and are not afraid. you are not alone, and you are not unloved.

dont let them make you fearful of yourself, you deserve so much better than that.

stay safe

[knifearo]

everybody! quick! tell me what aro joy means to you <2

[shima-draws]

So every year my company has a huge conference where we all come together and go to different presentations and stuff. That’s the boring part. The FUN part is getting to talk to everyone and drink and party and listen to the higher ups talk about their experiences which always ends up being super inspirational.

Long story short they had a discussion about like. Taking chances and getting involved in things you want to be involved in even if it means changing positions in the company. And y’all know how much I fucking HATE my current job lol and while I have been searching for work outside of this company I haven’t had much luck (very competitive field + not a lot of open jobs that suit my experience + half the jobs in my field getting taken over by AI, etc etc). But!! While it’s not EXACTLY what I want to do with my life there is a position in this company that definitely has a more creative and artistic side. And that’s marketing. And there’s one (1) guy handling marketing for our entire company and he offhandedly mentioned to me a few weeks back about how he’s looking for help—and he went straight to me in particular bc he knows I have a background in art and design and stuff like that.

So being ✨ inspired ✨ by the conference I stepped wayyyy outside my comfort zone and worked up the nerve to tell him hey I’m interested in what you do and I know you mentioned you might need help and I’d frankly love to help. And he was SUPER excited lol I mean we’ve been friends for a while and he’s literally the friendliest and most extroverted person I’ve ever met. Things are already moving so quickly lmao he’s talked to my boss and his boss about getting me into marketing so I’ll be able to do things like. Photography! And video editing! And web design! And swag design! And lots of creative things!! And I’m very excited!! Bc I’ve felt so fucking stifled at my current job bc it’s just. Very opposite of a creative type job and while I do appreciate my teammates I just. Don’t want to be there anymore.

So I saw the opportunity and I was like. Clearly looking for other jobs is not working rn so you know, maybe marketing isn’t something I want to do forever, but it’ll at least give me more experience in my field if I do end up finding a job elsewhere. You know? And if I do this I won’t be absolutely miserable every single day doing something I don’t care about and don’t love doing. So.

Anyway long story short I might be getting a new position soon and I’m VERY excited and jazzed and grateful to finally get to have a job that I’ll actually enjoy doing. And I wanted to share. :))))

[kawaii-kushami]

having one of those mid-20s moments where you're like well damn. im really not a teenager anymore i dont hate myself anymore actually. like its insane

sorry i gotta ramble but this feels too silly to post anywhere else

[k9emote]

The people who talk about me usually are not just talking about their experiences, and if they are, they don't communicate that well. They get asks like "Why is K9 bad?" and then those people state their opinions like they are facts, or they say things they've heard from others like its undeniably true with no context. These posts have brought me genuine harm. To be angry that I want to defend myself is unfair, because in reality I probably respond to 1/5th of this stuff if that. I have basically begged my audience to bring things to me directly instead of talking about things they don't understand publicly. I have apologized again and again to the people I've hurt, but I owe people like you nothing.

If I respond, I'm called a harasser or attacking people. If I don't, I'm ignoring and hiding from the situation. I can't win.

All I've ever done is provided context and truth to things I've seen spread around. I don't attack every blog that dislikes me and it's unfair to push that narrative. If you were in my position you would be upset and scared and want to defend yourself as well. It literally feels like you're being cornered.

I would love to see those 14 inbox messages, because a part of me doesn't believe it's harassment or hate. Many people have told me they're getting harassed but haven't actually shown me anything. I find it incredibly hard to understand because I have never met a supporter who's mentioned doing this, and I very often heavily push my audience to NOT FUCKING HARASS PEOPLE. DON'T DO THAT.

Nevertheless, if you are genuinely getting attacked, I'm sorry. I wish this app wasn't like that and I have tried my hardest to discourage it.

I am. I am making a post that is in my drafts currently. I am getting things ready so I can move any tumblr commissions to discord. I am getting off tumblr for my health and for the health of those obsessively hating or defending me. I have been scared for a year. I have been nitpicked and shit talked to the floor for a year. I have been demonized and lied about for a year, so yes, I'm fucking leaving. I promise you anyone scared of me has not been experiencing the daily panic attacks that have been plaguing my fucking life because of this app. I will write out an apology, say my final words, and delete this app. My account will be archived and I will fill out requests in my server only. If people are lying about me or copying my art, I won't see it, and they'll be left alone. There will not be a figure to hate here any more. If I'm such an aggressive, abusive creator; then congratulate yourself to the length my mental state has been pushed. I'm leaving.

(making my own post about this because it wouldn't let me reblog for whatever reason)

Here is an unedited speed paint of that emoji. I did not trace Reki. However; I see that I was subconsciously referencing/inspired by Reki's emoji and I'm very sorry. I hadn't ever realized that. I had no intention of copying it, and I hope my screen-recording proves that. I was trying to remake Custom Emotes cheek kiss. To Reki; I'm genuinely sorry. I will take the emote down and recreate it more originally.

Unfortunately I don't have many speedpaints due to the fact I do not have a good ipad and its storage is very bad. I often have to delete past canvases to make room for new ones when I'm done, or the app won't work. I hope the speedpaint I've shared is able to prove that we have issues subconsciously redrawing emojis we've seen. It doesn't make it okay — but it is not intentional as many claim. We have gone back and apologized for this issue and have stopped & double checked every new emoji we make now, just to be sure.

We checked this artists boundaries with staff beforehand and credited the artist. We are willing to take this down if it's too close, it is not traced. It is heavily inspired; and that was said publicly.

That's the point. It's supposed to look similar. It was one of our first ever interactions on our new tumblr account, and we wanted to make a matching emoji guy to the one they'd sent as a silly response. It isn't meant to be used as a public emoji. The credit obviously goes to that person because our emoji was posted in response to them. They never brought this up as an issue with us. If it is a problem, we will take it down if that creator reaches out.

This isn't traced. None of the lines match. The only similar quality is the expression which, again, is easy to subconsciously recreate. Especially because of the fact we used this emoji a few times in the past. This doesn't make it okay and we will take the emojis down due to unoriginality, but this isn't traced and the artist has stated in the past that they were okay with inspiration.

I have nothing to say here besides sorry. It is obvious that in the past we have had a blatant issue with accidentally recreating emojis/art we had internalized, and we've apologized for that multiple times publicly and stopped. We now double check everything we make to make sure we're not accidentally copying someone. I have no recollection of making this emoji, but we obviously must've referenced this artist while trying to make spider emotes and forgot about it before posting. (We used to draw emojis and let them sit in our ibis paint before posting them.) Before we had a bigger audience we really didn't take crediting or this issue seriously and we understand now, especially with our own boundaries, that it wasn't okay. We haven't been shown this before to my memory and I'm really, genuinely sorry. That does NOT make it okay and I am completely at fault for the lack of credit. I've background searched the art but I can't find the artist. Those emotes will be taken down, and if anyone knows who drew this, please let me know.

I've never said people have to like me. I've said the exact opposite, but at least bring things to me before saying stuff that isn't true. I have been open with the fact that this was an issue witn us, but we've worked really hard to fix it. This wasn't a simple issue to be fixed; it was literally how our mind, memory and creativity worked. Still, I'm sorry. Like we've said before, we won't let it happen again.

https://discord.com/channels/1222249319240040501/1222250341228089465/1295186047344447589

[autisticlee]

is it an autistic experience to ALWAYS be the one in a friend group who gets left out, alienated, secretly disliked, then kicked out of the group?

[the---hermit]

Lately my internal dialogue has just been my compromising with myself as if i were a little kid, like if we do this and this we can skip class on wednesday

[zebratimw]

Spirit animal SQH

[echodrops]

If the "straight women are much more likely to write a spicy and well-written m|m romance with complex male characters because they're naturally attracted to men" claim is correct, then why do straight male authors have acquired the stereotype of writing one-dimensional female characters and lame romances if they're naturally attracted to the opposite gender? Why do they prefer to focus so extensively on the male characters and their bromances then?

First, I think we need to clarify: Absolutely nowhere did I say the spicy mlm fanfics were uniformly "well-written." 😂 There are beautiful gems among fanfiction that have moved me to tears like nobody's business, but there's also just a whole lot of... not very... philosophically deep works out there. I don't want to sound mean, but just being brutally honest, I'd wager if we considered all fanfiction across all fanfic sites, a pretty solid majority of it wouldn't meet most people's definitions of truly "well-written." (Which is completely fine! Fanfic writers aren't getting paid! They're usually amateur authors who are writing for fun and often include younger writers just learning the ropes of grammar and character building for the first time! A fic doesn't have to be perfect to be enjoyable for readers!)

On top of that, let's also just be real--a lot of the explicit-content-for-explicit-content's-sake fics out there aren't really trying to write the most realistic and three dimensional male characters ever. They're trying to write sexy fics; realistically depicting men with life-accurate emotional depth and nuance is often... not the goal. 😂

Of course there are standout fanfics and incredible fanfiction authors. But, if we're being 100% transparent, I think a solid majority of fanfic authors don't actually write male characters that well. A lot of them have limited development, unrealistic or unclear motivations, out-of-character behavior, or a lack of interiority to their thoughts and feelings. A lot of times male characters in mlm fics are even reduced to caricatures of what women want men to do and feel. (I'm not judging here though--if a woman author is writing for women and her women readers want to see men who meet women's expectations, then hey, give the audience what they crave!) Just like Disney princes, a lot of men in fanfiction would seem very unrealistic and flat if you compared them to actual men from the real world!

I think we fanfic readers are just a bit biased, you know. If you're an average fanfic reader, I'm sure you've had the experience many times of being willing to give fic writers the benefit of the doubt even if their works aren't perfect--far more than you would give an actual published author or TV showrunner.

We don't scrutinize fanworks to the same extent that we scrutinize published media. Most people aren't grabbing someone else's fic and writing a ten page essay on how their male love interest wasn't properly fleshed out. Fanfic is full of poorly written men too, we're just not looking for the writing flaws when we read fanfics, at least not to the extent that meta analysts notice flaws in published media.

Side note that I also think is worth thinking about here: Because most fanfiction readers are female (and statistics suggest that a majority are even cisgender women), I think we're already at a slight disadvantage. Do female readers really have the most accurate perspectives on what realistic and three dimensional men would feel or act like? People are people, of course, but my perspective as a cisgender woman is never going to be as "100% genuine" as the perspective of someone who actually identifies as a man.

Second, and sorry, I know this is already long, but I think it's actually a mistake to buy into the stereotype that a majority of male authors can't write believable and interesting female characters. I think this illusion comes because fanfic fandoms congregate around very specific types of media, and often (though of course not always) that media is geared toward younger audiences. The bulk of the fandom claims that "male authors suck at writing women" come out of the shounen anime and young adult genres which are so prevalent in fandom spaces.

The target audiences for both these types of media are teenagers, who (I'm going to be completely honest) are usually not that picky about the development of the characters in the stories they read. I don't mean that no teenagers care about well-written stories (obviously there are many who do!), but that the typical standard for philosophical depth and nuance to which media for young adults is held is, for better or worse, lower than the standard we hold media for adults to.

We don't expect Twilight to be as deep as Moby-Dick. We don't expect My Hero Academia to be Maus.

This isn't an insult to young adult media; we have different genres of content for different reasons, and I definitely would not have wanted every single manga I read as a teenager to be as mentally or spiritually challenging as Moby-Dick. Content for teenagers should be designed to resonate with teenagers, both intellectually and emotionally. Many works for teens can have excellent writing and punch above their target audience demographic too. But the bulk majority of teenage readers are not (yet) going to be experts in literary criticism and sociocultural theories, capable of pounding out advanced meta analyses of the gender dynamics of characters in their favorite stories. Some will, but most won't.

Stories for young adults just don't have to hold up to that level of scrutiny, at least among their target audience.

At its core, however, the issue with the lower standards for depth of character building in young adult media is that it corresponds with lower standards for becoming popular as an author in fields such as YA lit and shounen manga. You don't have to be Leo Tolstoy or Emily Brontë to gain recognition among younger audiences. Sometimes, you don't even have to be good. Twilight was a roaring success, even while people lambasted it for being poorly written.

You don't have to be a literary giant whose books will be short-listed for addition to the canon of classical literature to develop a massive online fandom; Voltron was insanely popular despite being terribly written. 😂 You don't have to be god's gift to storytellers to become a popular shounen mangaka; Naruto is still one of the most popular manga in history and I hope no one genuinely thinks its characters were masterfully developed.

I'm not saying it doesn't take talent! It absolutely does! What I believe is that there's just not a guaranteed correspondence between "this author is popular and has a huge fandom" and "this author is actually good," especially in genres where the target audience is younger and therefore a little less likely to deeply critique the media they consume. Even if your characters--male or female--aren't that well-written, you can still get very, very popular in internet fandoms, especially with younger and more forgiving audiences, where only the rare few in the fandom will dedicate hours of their lives to performing meta analysis of your work, picking apart the writing quality and development of your characters.

So, long story longer: It's not that male writers overall are incapable of writing women. It's that a lot of fandoms spring up around kind-of-poorly written stories in the first place, and male authors who are not great at writing in general are equally unlikely to be great at writing women.

In fact, I'd suggest that male writers who are poor at writing women are probably also not great at writing men. Like, come on, don't tell me you think Bakugou and Midoriya's writing was good by the end of My Hero Academia.

Many popular authors with big fandoms are just being given more of a pass when it comes to writing poor male characters than they are with their female characters, and I'd argue that's likely because of the same reason I highlighted before: Their fandoms are dominated by women who like men and are willing to do more work to flesh out/fix the male characters they're interested in.

(It also helps that, with an overwhelming number of fic writers being female, they have less insight into truly depicting the male experience in authentic ways in the first place; if you are a woman, you're more likely to recognize a poorly written female character on the spot, while having at least slightly less ability to identify the unrealistic or inaccurate elements of male characters.)

Essentially, it's confirmation bias in action: We think men don't understand women, so we scrutinize male writers' depictions of women very closely, all while giving a pass to the fact that a lot of these writers just kind of suck at writing men too.

The "lame romances" in stories written by men aren't exclusively lame because of flat female characters--if the female character is flat, half the time the male character is flat too, and the romance is lame because the writer overall is... kind of lame... 😂

But why all the bromances? I wrote about this in my big long essay before, and I think there's plenty of very complicated reasons that men write so many male-male friendships and relationships into their story (re: coming from genuinely misogynist cultures, deliberately baiting fans with hints of BL, an actual internalized desire for greater emotional connection with fellow men due to perceived male loneliness, self-projection into their own characters, having been told they aren't good at writing women so they've given up, etc. etc.), but I honestly think one of the simplest reasons is genre. The majority of these "bromances" are coming from shounen manga, and shounen manga has some very common recurring tropes, chief among them being the whole "me and my ~RIVAL~" dynamic.

A lot of mainstream shounen stories have had such enormous success with this "young male protagonist and his best bro/rival/arch-enemy" dynamic that, frankly, I think many modern manga are just piggy-backing on the trope. "Dudes who beat each other up and become besties" has worked for so many series now that it's just become a staple of the entire genre.

I also think the market for Japanese manga in particular is very unique, with male manga artists recognizing--and capitalizing--on the power of the "fujoshi" reader early on. It's easy for shounen manga artists to see the benefits of over-stocking their stories with male characters and queerbait, because hinting at mlm ships they have no intention of ever paying out on 1) rarely reduces their male readership and 2) actually broadens their readership dramatically by deliberately bringing in female readers.

Basically, so long as the endgame is a het ship (or at least no ship), male readers will still read a story even if it has mlm shiptease, while more women will be drawn to the story for the mlm shiptease when they otherwise might not be that interested. There's no way to lose.

In essence, on the topic of queerbait, the shounen manga artists were just really savvy and realized faster that "having your cake and eating it too" is possible by incorporating a higher number of male-male relationships in their stories in order to broaden their readership and sales. Comparatively, western media was just much slower to cotton on to this technique, and I'd say it wasn't until relatively recently that western series have begun hyper-emphasizing male-male relationships specifically to appeal to women readers and viewers (see Supernatural, Good Omens, probably Teen Wolf [I don't actually go there so I can't confirm but I feel like this is true lol], etc.).

And, one final sidenote: I think it's difficult to compare published media to fanfic in terms of "featuring what you're sexually attracted to" because in published media, people are at least supposed to pretend their own sexual preferences aren't entirely warping the story, especially in young adult series (which have the biggest fanfic fandoms). Like... Compare: If you're a shounen manga artist you can get away with some panty shots but you can't be a flat out gooner--conversely, if you're a fanfic writer, you can write hardcore porn without hesitation. If we want to make an actual comparison in how much sex appeal sways character gender ratios in fanfic versus published media, I'd say the only comparable match would be comparing the ratio of female characters in harem anime and straight up hentai to the ratio of men in fanfics. We can't be out here comparing like... the original story content of Harry Potter (made for children, cannot be overly sexual) to its AO3 content (where nearly 40% of all HP fics are labeled explicit/mature). You gotta compare 18+ apples to apples.😂

Phew, sorry, that was a lot.

tl;dr: Tons of factors--yes, including misogyny--affect how men write women, but the issue of male writers being bad at writing women is likely being exaggerated in fandom spaces because 1) Fandoms are overwhelmingly female and women are better able to identify and critique poorly written female characters than anyone else, 2) Most of the biggest fandoms on the internet center around stories for younger audiences who haven't had enough time to develop strong media literacy and literary criticism skills, allowing writers to become popular without necessarily needing to be of highest quality, 3) Female fans are more willing to forgive poorly written male characters because they're more likely to be interested in and attracted to those male characters, and 3) A lot of writers just suck in general; it's not localized to just being shitty at writing women.

[lordelmelloi2]

🥲

[caterjunes]

this sucks. this all fucking sucks. i wish my dad cared about me like he thinks he does, or like he wants me to think he does, or like he pretends he does. when it's not inconvenient, when he isn't forced to remember i'm trans/mentally ill/disabled/unemployed/unemployable/a Failed Citizen.

i wish anybody was treating it like a big deal that i traveled halfway across the country to spend time with them. it felt like a big deal to me.

[megumi-fm]

.

[phagodyke]

the masculine urge to take a saucepan off thr draining board and bash myself repeatedly over the head with it until I pass out and no longer have to experience feeling Bad 😍