#but i need to fix my sleep schedule first because i can't go anywhere if i sleep from 7am to 5pm

[martsonmars]

also how many episodes of a tv show can a person watch in a day before going insane?

[cryptic-rainfall]

I need AT LEAST an extra week off of work

[daisyletters]

Monday, 8/14/23, 1:46am

Dear Daisy,

I almost made it through this time, it's August already. It always comes back in the summer though. That hallow empty feeling. Creeps up before I even know its coming. Just when I'm thinking I can finally relax and am feeling okay I don't want to be here anymore.

I've never wanted to die, I feel like that's always the first concern when I've talked about this before. I just kind of want to stop existing? Like I wasn't there to begin with. Just for a while maybe, just to exist but not? So no ones worrying about me or upset about at me, like I was never there.

It always starts with me feeling empty and kind of pointless. I try not to think about why I'm even here or what the point is. Maybe I'm just lonely, again. Or stressed? Feeling unwanted as usual, which is one of those things that I can never quite figure out how to fix. Because you can't depend on other people to fix you. But also you can't feel wanted without other people? Can wanting yourself help? I'm always with myself, can't exactly want more time with me.

I'm trying to get over the edge, move past it like I eventually always do. Last week was really hard, didn't go so great but I dragged myself through it. And now this week has technically already began and I desperately want to give up. I'm not ready to push through again but I don't really have a choice.

I'm trying to look ahead, think of the future when I can get past a lot of the things that are making me feel stuck right now. A new job that I can actually live on, and only a job, no more school or a long list of things I should be doing but cant. Then I'll be able to actually move on to working on the other parts of life. I'm not in the same place as everyone else, and we never are. But I don't feel like I can handle more once school starts back up. No time for relationships or even the basic level of socializing with friends. I barely made it through last year and honestly my sleep schedule still hasn't recovered. The summer seems like a nice break in theory but with an income that's in the negatives without financial aid it's honestly miserable. No activities outside of the bare minimum, maybe one or two a month and even that I have to get creative with. Honestly not enough food for day to day either, my rice has bugs in it but I'm still eating it because I can't spare half a weeks food budget on more. The Internet said it's fine as long as you don't think about it too much so it's probably fine, tastes okay. I feel guilty buying a tea or a snack because I know I need that money elsewhere but sometimes you need something to feel normal.

Another year, just hang in there. I can make more money once I graduate. I need to find a new job honestly before I graduate so I don't drown from student loans. More money, no school, a new apartment out of this area and closer to literally anyone else. No one comes over here because it's the worst part of town. It's dangerous, dirty, and far, I know. I feel it everyday when I hold my breath walking down my street because the smell of urine is burning my nose. When I walk through the broken glass and have to stare down men who are harassing me. I don't want to be here, how can I expect anyone else to want to be?

But I can't make plans somewhere else with no money. I can't invite anyone anywhere. I just get scared that other people will be upset with me for just trying to survive. I always feel inadequate, like everyone's looking at me and saying I don't do enough. Everyone else is doing this and that, why can't you? Why can't you just do it? Why can't you be like everyone else? Why haven't you done those things? Why aren't you like everyone else? I feel like being me isn't enough for everyone else sometimes. Like I have to be more or Im not worth anything at all.

Does everyone else just know how much is enough? Do they have to think about it? Do they have to count every interaction and try to decide if its adequate? Do they finish their days going over their interactions and picking them apart? It has always felt like if I don't I'll pay for it. One way or another if I relax it'll come back to me and I'll be snapped back into place because I've messed up again.

People are hard, this is why I struggle with socializing so much. But doesn't everyone? Are we not all fighting for our lives out here so people don't think we're off?

Thanks for listening.

[smuggsy]

Remember this post about how Riddler dug up Elijah's body and we just... collectively chose to ignore it along with Oswald? 😂

Well. I un-ignored it. With a sad angsty fic.

(You can read it down here as well.) Word count: 2040. Tags: #emotional comfort #established relationship #hence: canon divergence #nightmares

Oswald's used to having nightmares. He's no stranger to sleepless nights, 5-am coffees have become a bit of a recurrent habit to make up for the drowsiness clouding his mind after a particularly difficult dream chimes in without permission and throws his sleeping schedule off — so much that he often finds himself power-napping through the day when Ed isn't around to tell him off for it.

Yes, he's almost grown too accustomed to Hugo Strange's voice narrating all sorts of gruesome scenarios that he ends up carrying out of his own volition, propelled forward by an unknown and invisible force deep inside. He never really sees the Doctor, but he hears him all the time, he's just there all the time. He tells Oswald what to do and Oswald does it without a pinch of remorse. Shoot him. Stab her. Blow them all to pieces, they deserve it.

It's the kind of hell he's used to. He's almost learnt to accept it's never going away. That it's a part of his psyche now, a part of him that will never really go away — because how do you fix a tattered mind? He wouldn't let anyone try, anyway. Not after Arkham.

This night is different. This night he's assaulted by a new kind of terror, almost perfectly calibrated and specially curated for him. Blossoming from the deepest part of his mind where he'd stocked it, never to be revisited.

And it's most cruel for one reason: when he wakes up with a startle he can't bear the thought of those arms wrapping around him and providing comfort like they've done so many times before. In fact, the first thing he does when he opens his eyes is untangle himself from Ed's sleeping embrace like it burns him.

Which means he's got no-one but himself to count on, again. No-one to hush him through the aftermath and speak softly in his ear and hum a long-dead melody until he calms down or, if he's lucky, falls back asleep.

"Oswald?"

He sits on the edge of the bed, hunched over to catch his breath, and feels Ed shifting position behind him. His partner's voice is clouded with sleep and Oswald can't bring himself to even turn around and reassure him — lie to him. He fears if he turns around he won't see Ed but Riddler. Not Ed's gentle eyes but Riddler's mocking glare. Not a warm comforting smile but a disdainful sneer.

His father, standing on the other side of the bed with a disappointed frown. My boy, how could you steep so low? Do you know where I am? Do you know where he left me?

When Ed's warm fingers brush over his right shoulder Oswald bolts upright with a whine.

"Osw—?"

And he runs to the bathroom and slams the door close behind him, feeling his one-piece nightgown sticking to his chest with sweat.

"Oswald, what's wrong?" Edward's voice is immediately on the other side, he tries turning the doorknob but Oswald is pinning it closed with his own weight, still unable to brush away the gut-wrenching feeling of betrayal that's so suddenly taken hold of him, "Oswald, get off the door."

It's a gentle request.

Oswald might have done it, perhaps, might have considered it, if he hadn't looked right into the mirror hanging on the opposite wall and seen Elijah's pale and sickness-stricken face. A dead man's face that makes him shiver.

He shall never have peace, so long as you're with him, Oswald thinks. Some other Oswald. Some other voice that sounds like his but isn't. Can't be.

"Oswald," Ed tries again, and this time he pushes against the door with more conviction, Oswald leans off and turns around to face him when he comes in, to keep him away, Riddler, he's still in there, he's— "oh dear," Ed coos, having one look at him and taking pity instantly. He takes a step forward and Oswald takes a step back.

"No!" he blurts out with a raspy voice. Edward stops dead in his tracks, lost expression for a moment before his shoulders relax again.

"It's okay, Oswald. It was just a nightmare," he adds, softly like so many times before.

"No, it isn't! It wasn't!" Oswald lashes out, hating that he looks at Ed's dishevelled face and concerned caramel eyes and wants him to just get away, his voice comes out just barely, "you did that to him! You— How could you?!"

Ed opens his mouth and doesn't move, clearly taken aback by the accusation even if he fails to comprehend, thrown off by the way Oswald looks at him, stands like that, like a wounded animal, like he might flee if Edward takes another step forward.

He still takes a step forward, though, because he never was really good with physical cues.

"Os, I don't understand wha—"

"Don't touch me!"

Oswald jerks away and hits the wall behind, still shivering despite his burning skin. Edward shows him his palms, a gesture of surrender.

"Okay. Okay, I'm not," he takes a steadying breath in, "I'm staying right here."

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It's not him, I swear! I didn't—"

"Oswald?"

"He's different now! He's not like that anymore!"

Oswald gestures towards Ed, clever, supportive, thoughtful, with his checked blue pyjamas and plaid shirt and lack of glasses and puffy eyes from sleep. Then he looks back at his father now standing by the door and projects the thought: Ed. Not Riddler!

But Elijah shakes his head and purses his lips, looking him up and down like he doesn't approve and Oswald just needs him to understand.

"It's not hiiiiim!"

"Oswald, this is starting to become very unsettling."

Edward looks around, to his right, there. To where Oswald's looking, to nothing. He knows that deranged gaze, he's seen it countless times before, he's stood in front of the mirror a lot of times and seen it on himself.

"Os, it's just those new painkillers making you groggy, okay? It's a much heavier dose than the one you're used to. Whatever you're seeing," Edward chances a slow step forward and Oswald finally turns his head back to him, with glassy eyes and tears on his eyelashes and still looking like he'll run away, "it's not there, Oswald. I am here."

Oswald stares at him for a few more silent moments with a lost expression, mouth open and still bracing himself with one hand on the cold tiles behind and the other on the sink.

"You're not... you're not him, I try to— I tell him you're not," he babbles, looking feverish and lost.

That's when the penny drops for Edward. It feels like a stab to the heart, that broken voice, the trembling hands, the quivering lips, the whole sight of an Oswald so distressed he won't even let him get close enough to soothe him.

"No," Ed says softly, his own voice failing him for a moment, shaking his head and taking yet another step closer, "no," he repeats breathless, "I'm not. Please. Come here."

He reaches an offering hand and Oswald slowly looks down as if weighing his options. As if making sure this isn't a trick — which, well. If he's thinking of Riddler, he can hardly be blamed for exercising caution, Ed admits. It hurts him to admit it. To know he's caused this, one way or another. Painkillers or not. This raw incoherent fear is coming from somewhere, however small the flame that ignited it might be, and he can't fix it because Oswald won't stop trembling like a leaf and recoiling.

"Oswald, please," he begs, voice finally breaking and eloquence escaping him, retrieving his outstretched hand and rubbing fingers over his burning eyelids because if he breaks down too... "please, it's me, Ed, just Ed."

He doesn't know what to do. He's on the verge of blurting out apologies when he opens his eyes to Oswald latching onto him with one of those desperate hugs. Ed wraps his arms around him instantly, a reflex, feeling like he's just come back to life.

"Go away," Oswald says, sobs with his face buried in the crook of his neck and starts crying. Edward tightens his hold and hides his own tears in the other man's raven locks, understands he's not the one being spoken to, "go, please. I won't leave him!"

Edward can barely understand the string of pleas when Oswald's clutching onto him so firmly his words come out muffled and nearly intelligible. Either way, he's not about to ask who's there — better not add salt to the wound. Not feed the horror, lest it become a recurrent thing. He needs him to understand this is a figment of his imagination if he's not aware already.

"Shhhh, it's all good," he keeps Oswald in place with an arm around his waist and brings the other one to gently pet his hair, "it's o-kay, Oswald. I'm here, it's just you and me."

Oswald nods against his chest but he can't seem to bring himself to stop crying. Edward rubs circles on his back.

"Just you and me," he repeats, striving for a soothing voice and feeling it waver ever so slightly.

They stay like that for a whole five minutes until Oswald finally leans back, sniffs and looks up with red eyes and a self-deprecating comment on his lips that Ed doesn't let him voice out.

"Come on, it's freezing out here."

Ed guides him back under the covers and tucks him in, Oswald watches his every move like an overcurious child. That cloudy expression is gone, though, and Ed can't help but let out a sigh of relief at having him back. He looks drained but sober.

Mostly sober.

His eyes still dart around with a nervous air but he doesn't seem to find his demon anywhere. When Ed climbs back up on the bed Oswald immediately shifts closer and hides his face in his shirt again.

"I'm sorry, that—"

"No-uh-uh," Ed cuts in, brushing a strand of hair off his green doe eyes and feeling an almost compulsive need to plant a kiss on the now-red tip of his nose, "say no more."

Oswald purses his lips and shuffles even closer, pressing his flush body so firmly against Ed's that they can't exactly see each other's faces anymore.

"Can you...?"

"Yes I can."

And that's that. He settles his chin on top of Oswald's head and starts humming; content to sidestep the issue just for now but unable to brush aside the sour taste of guilt filling almost every corner of his mind.

He starts rubbing circles on Oswald's back and doesn't stop the melody until he feels the other man's hold loosen up and his breath change into a normal and peaceful pace. Only then does Edward slowly extract himself from the embrace, far enough that he can look at Oswald's face.

Red and wet and troubled, still. He reaches over and soothes the lines on his forehead.

"I'm sorry, Os," he breathes out.

He's used to Oswald having nightmares. He wakes up all heaving breaths and uncertain hands latching onto anything that's near for comfort, for safety or reassurance. Ed is always there to provide either one, wrap his arms around his shaking form and listen to him if he wants to talk. Make him a cup of tea or play soft tunes on the piano if sleep doesn't return.

Oswald's always been needy like that.

Having him wake up and frantically keep himself away, recoil from his touch and excuse himself to a third party only he can see... that's a first.

And it's terrifying.

Because He made that happen. Because Oswald's grown to be too dependant and Ed's grown to be his anchor in moments like these and if he can't even be that... then what can he be? What's left for him to be, besides the clear instigator?

Ed closes his eyes and lets out a sigh, focusing on the sound of Oswald's breathing and on the touch of his cold feet and the smell of cherry-scented hair conditioner. He relishes in the familiarity of the hold and shakes the darker thoughts away.

Perhaps he's become a bit dependant himself.

[fxckdensxgden]

robron/prison headcanons

- aaron wakes up horribly early and just watches robert sleep for a while and can't bear the thought of not seeing him like this for so long that he runs his finger along his shoulders and whispers every reason he loves him that he can think of, and the only reason he doesn't feel stupid is because Robert is asleep the whole time

- when he's leaving he can't kiss Robert for tears so he hugs him instead and they both know they need to keep it together so Robert hugs him so hard he leaves indentations of his fingerprints in Aaron's coat and he presses his head into his shoulder with enough desperation that it hurts and holds him for so long and so tight that they start struggling to breathe and it sums up the fact that they always do this, have something they love hurting them at the same time

- Robert repeats the bit of his vows where he promises to be faithful and Aaron promises to trust him and maybe it's the rings that have changed things but there's not a shred of doubt this time

- he makes a dinner and accidentally sets four spaces instead of three (him, Liv and Chas) and they have to ask paddy to join them because no one can bear to put them away

- Robert writes Aaron a letter and it's just five sides of A4 full of things he's planning to do to annoy Chrissie while he's not there

- aaron also never appreciated quite how bad his handwriting is until he reads his letters and 'god Robert how do you run a business with writing like this'

- he starts taking his tea with sugar in it because he made it like that once accidentally and then realised Aaron is actually right and sugar in tea is good, although he isn't going to ever tell him that

- Robert goes to the scrapyard to pick some stuff up for work and Adam gives him a cuddle, but once the moment has passed they're both too awkward to discuss anything other than the weather

- the first time Robert drives to the prison to see him, he cries almost the whole way there so he can get it out of his system and he won't cry when he sees him since that will make things difficult (to say the least)

- Robert takes the opportunity of Aaron not being there to tell Chas and liv all the stupid and dodgy stuff he's done that he's not told them about

- he has to sleep on the couch for the first few nights because being in bed without Aaron is worse than not being there at all

- he develops a habit of twisting his ring round his finger, which Chas had noticed was actually Aaron's habit first, but doesn't mention it

- there aren't many perks of his husband being in prison but thank god he can wear that brown leather jacket now and not have to listen to complaining

- he also starts wearing floral print again and really enjoys his new sense of fashion independence (although he is the only one)

- Aaron won't answer any questions about his ring and barely manages to hide the fact that he misses Robert so badly he gets a jolt in his chest whenever he sees blonde hair

- the visits aren't long enough and they can't talk properly and neither of them can decide if it makes things better or just makes them worse

- 'you know how you can tell aaron's not here Chas?'

"because Robert's miserable, liv?"

'no'

"because i don't have to buy obscene amounts of bread?"

'no'

"because we don't have to constantly fix things?"

'no. because it doesn't stink of man'

(Robert is quite offended by the last part)

- about a week after Aaron leaves, Robert can't hold it together anymore and sits with Chas on the couch and the pair of them have a tearful conversation about what they'll do when he gets out

- Robert is always Aaron's phone call and Chas moans about getting less than a minute to speak to him, but after she heard them discussing how much they loved each other like they'd not seen each other for years, she didn't have the heart to take more time away

- Chrissie pulls a sarcastic 'are you missing your boyfriend, Robert?' and gets an equally sarcastic 'he's my husband nowadays actually' in return

- without deciding if it's bad of him, Robert makes a mental note to buy Aaron more shirts in that colour because even if it is prison uniform, he pulls the colour off to no end

- Robert is rude to Finn on several occasions because even though it's not really his fault, he needs to blame someone (and not Aaron)

- Robert actually wins a game of darts for once

- he can also watch awful telly and enjoys himself far too much

- he makes so many plans of what they can do when he gets home that he eventually loses track of outings he's booked and things he's bought and it doesn't matter anyway, because once he sees Aaron and knows he doesn't have to visit him on schedule, they only need to watch the football together in the front room, more tangled in each other than they'd ever felt comfortable to do in public before to be as happy as they would be anywhere else- because they've both realised that they don't have the time to hide from things, and since they're married and have the rest of their life ahead of them, it doesn't even matter anyway