#but the recent events have been more stressful than fun

[artfightdramaconfessions]

Man I wish Art Fight could be free of drama, it’s such a fun event, I always have a nice time drawing for people, but there’s so much shit happening all the time in the community lol

Outside of the latest stuff happening, which is actually serious, most of it is petty or just easily avoidable if people acted as decent individuals

.

[crumb-crumblet-s-crumbington]

individual frames of my recent animation u can watch here on yt or in my previous tumblr posts

feel free to use as pfp or wallpapers as long as its with credit!

re7, pre re8, and during re8

out of all of these the most visually pleasing is re7, i really love the red and green, it was fun making all the frames with their little trinkets that relate to the current events, the one with the lords was especially fun to make

daniela, lady D, angie, donna, moreau, and chris

daniela is my fave, i think she looks so cute, chris is a close second though, i drew lady D first and based everyone else off of her, my least favorite is donna just because there isnt a lot going on

karl, miranda and ethans heart, and eveline

this may be my favorite karl i have ever drawn and i did it with my finger on flipaclip and i have never been able to replicate it again and its making me so depressed

i really like miranda in this as well, she looks very pretty

some of my favorite frames!

this impact frame of ethan being caught by karl, i think he looks like a really stressed hamster and its really funny to me

paranoid ethan pre re8 was very fun to draw, i like how scared and nervous he looks

the frame before ethan detonates the bomb

i like this frame, his eyes r a little bigger than before and his lips r more "M" i think he looks cute, my friends said it was too depressing when i drew the frame in vc

the eveline segment is the only part with shading and i liked it alot, i think she looks spooky

bonus!:

the two backgrounds i made in ibis paint for the walking segment and the test colors i had made for all the parts in the animation, as well as the drawing the re7 segment was entirely based off of which u can find here!

[monstrousproductions]

PSST.

You wanna know a secret?

Neurotypical people use scripts too.

I'm neurodivergent and I struggle a lot with meeting new people. The only thing that helps me is scripting - planning the conversation beforehand, practicing the questions I'm going to ask, the anecdotes I can tell, all that jazz.

But what really helped me turn a corner was realising that neurotypicals are scripting too. Everyone in the supermarket is expecting the conversation with the cashier to go a certain way. I don't have to worry about being funny or interesting - I just have to play my part, and they'll play theirs, and we'll both go away from the interaction content!

And I know this is the Anti Small Talk website I knowwwwww. But small talk serves a vital social function! You can't just jump straight from Stranger to Friend - you need to do the intermediary steps first, or at least get introduced! Besides, it helps make brief, transactional interactions - like being served in a shop, for example - feel a bit more friendly, which, why wouldn't you want to make things more friendly??

It also - and let us simply speak in hypotheticals here - it also means that, for example, if you are an innocent podcaster who found themselves at a wedding a few weeks ago where you knew very few people, and, through various circumstances, ended up being sat at a table on the other side of the room to the people you actually did know, you wouldn't have had to spend the entire meal sitting in awkward silence because nobody else at your table knew how to make conversation with strangers. Hypothetically. For example. 🙃

And look. I get it. Meeting people can be awkward and uncomfortable, especially if you're neurodivergent. But there are things you can learn that can help minimise that awkwardness, or at least help you come across as 'harmlessly odd and doing their best' (my personal favourite social niche).

Society likes to pretend these skills are inherent. But babies aren't born knowing how to do any of this! We have to learn. As a neurodivergent person, I had to learn that skill very consciously, and rather later than some of my neurotypical peers - but they had to learn it too!!

And like every other skill, the only way you can improve is practice. You gotta put the time in. But that time pays off. I'm in my 30s, and by now, I have scripts on scripts, with variations for all sorts of different contexts. It's like a database I access, filtering through it for Middle Aged Woman In Professional Setting or Chatty Toddler On Bus or Millennial Programmer at Casual Social Event.

At this point, I feel pretty fluent in most social situations. It's not foolproof - I got so nervous at the pharmacists last week, I stammered too much for the clerk to understand me and had to start the whole interaction over 😶 But it makes life much easier, and - just as important - helps me to make stressful situations easier for other people, too.

So, please, if you struggle with small talk, can you do me a favour? Can you think of three questions you could ask a stranger? You want to keep them open-ended (no yes/no answers), friendly but not intrusive, and avoid anything that makes an assumption about the other person.

For example, I tend to go for, "What kind of thing do you like to do for fun?" instead of asking about work, because lots of people don't have jobs for all sorts of reasons they might not want to tell me, a random person at their friend's birthday party.

I'm also a huge fan of asking why people like something they said they like, or how they got into it. People like to talk about things they enjoy, and I like to hear about it!

Once you've got a set of questions to ask, you can have a think about your own responses. If someone asks you how you know the friend you have in common, what can you say that will keep the conversation going?

If they mention the weather, what could you say in response? It's been warm in Belfast recently after a cold snap, and I'm a bit annoyed because I was excited to wear all my woolly jumpers again. I've expressed that exact sentiment to four cashiers and three taxi drivers this month alone - and I'll do it again!!

Finally, above all, pay attention. Keep your head up, and try and see who's talking and who isn't. If you notice someone might not be getting chance to join in the conversation, you can bring them in by moving your attention to address them while you're answering someone else. Then, address your next question to them more directly.

The thing is, like I said, neurotypicals are scripting too. They'll be expecting this kind of chat. They'll be prepared. They're expecting to be asked this kind of thing, and to say the same kind of thing in return. There's no trick to it - they just learnt the script earlier than us, and without having to be told explicitly that it existed 😂

It's hard. I know it's hard. But you can learn, and it is worth learning - for your own sake, but also for the sake of your fellow wedding guests/birthday party attendees/newbies at the book club 😅

[mochatsin]

WHEN THE BROTHERS MAKE MC CRY

The brother’s worst fear eventually comes true when their bad days and temper make them snap at the person they care about the most.

This is a request on AO3! Thank you for reading!

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

Lucifer

It’s as if the universe was testing him when another stack of reports came by his desk today. Mammon’s debt collectors, bills from Beel’s last famine rampage, and complaints about the other’s behaviors…

This doesn’t even compare to the paperwork Diavolo had him prepare since there was an upcoming event next week. Lucifer’s patience is running thin and the moment he hears something break from the hallway, he’s had enough. 

He swings the door open to find that you accidentally dropped a cup of tea on the floor. It was his favorite cup too as he recognized the patterns on the broken shards. 

You noticed how stressed he’s been lately and you planned on surprising him with his favorite blend of tea, though you tripped on the way and dropped the cup. Before you could apologize however, Lucifer is already stomping his way towards you, clearly upset with your clumsiness. 

His two hour lectures are nothing compared to the three minutes he yelled at you. You didn’t like how he talked down on you after one accident. The demon seems too busy in his sermon to even notice the tears pooling in your eyes. 

It felt like he was undermining all your efforts that you’ve done around the house after just one simple screw up. It was frustrating to be treated like this when all you wanted to do was to help him. You’re the first being in centuries who dared walk out of Lucifer while he’s talking. 

Seeing how you turned your back on him only made him frustrated. “Hey, I’m not done speaking with you–” He tries to grab your arm but you slap it away, looking at him with tears streaming down your cheeks. 

It was enough to bring him out of his anger and look at you. Suddenly he’s realizing all the weight of his words, all the awful things he’s said to you that he never meant. He’s not quite sure how to take it back, not when his Pride makes it hard for him to do so. He hates how his sin made him just stand back and let you walk away crying.

Lucifer tried drowning himself in paperwork to punish himself, but the weight in his heart is too much. He needs to see your smile again. So he walks in your room and peeks to see if you’re still awake at this hour. 

He finds you trying to fix the broken cup back together with magic, and his heart shatters more than the glassware when he notices the cut or two on your finger from all your attempts. Without a moment's hesitation, he moves in quickly to hug you from behind. 

“You’ve done so much for us. We’ve taken more than we give back and I was a fool to say such awful words… I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said those to you. There’s no excuse.” 

Lucifer left the paperworks undone on his desk. Tonight, his goal is to make sure that he sees you smile again and make up for his previous behavior. He’s not leaving your room until he’s sure that you’re okay again, and he promises to make sure he doesn’t lash out on you like that again.

Mammon

Mammon recently got a big fat check from his modeling gig, and what better way to spoil himself by doing one of his favorite things? Gambling. The minute he gets the money, he’s already on his way to the casino with a spring in his step. 

Of course Lucifer is not too happy with it since Mammon skipped his duties to make dinner for all of them tonight just to go out and waste his money. So you volunteered to go fetch him since he usually listens to you out of everyone. 

He was too far gone in the fun by the time you got there. The winning, the Grimm, it’s all intoxicating. It’s hard to convince Mammon to let go of the cards and chips in his hands as soon as he has them, but you insisted anyway. 

You mean well of course, you just don’t want him to see him gamble away all his earnings and deal with the debt afterwards, added with Lucifer’s punishments for ditching his duties. But Mammon saw it as your attempt to cut his fun short.

“You’re only sayin’ that cuz you’ll think I’ll lose huh?!” Mammon snaps as he turns to you with a growl in his tone. “You don’t have to baby me all the damn time! If you’re just gonna be some killjoy like Lucifer then get lost!” He yells. And he immediately regrets it as soon as he sees the hurt in your eyes. 

You stomp out of the casino and Mammon took his time to process what he just said to you. He didn’t even have the energy to celebrate his earnings when they announced that he won the round this time. So he packed up and ran after you, hoping to catch up before he could even lose sight “MC! Wait!” 

None of the punishments he’s received in his life hurt as much as seeing you cry because of his own words the moment you turned around and he saw your tears. “I-i didn’t mean what I said back there MC… My life has been a hell of a ride ever since you came here and I can’t even begin to think what it’s like when you’re gone. Please don’t go…” 

Mammon drops all that defensiveness, not calling you any dumb nicknames like he usually does. These were the rare times that Mammon was being straightforward and genuine about his feelings. 

He has a grin bigger than when he wins a game of poker as soon as you wrap your arms around him, your way of saying that you forgive him. He hugs you back so tightly that he practically lifts you off your feet. 

“Come on! Let’s have some fun tonight. I’ll make it up to ya” He offers now that he has some Grimm in his pockets. You don’t really have a say in this because he wants to make you smile at the end of the night.

You did have to report back to the House. Lucifer is quite upset that Mammon forgot about his duties to cook for them so as punishment, he makes Mammon take them out to Ristorante Six. Beel’s appetite was enough to make the poor wallet empty again. 

Levi

Being a human exchange meant you had a lot on your plate to do. There’s events almost every week, you have to take part in a lot of important meetings and on top of that, you’re practically the babysitter for all the Avatars. 

Normally Levi is understanding when you had to cancel your anime marathon with him, but this is the 3rd time this week! Levi is starting to miss having you around. 

It was an important event that you needed to help organize whilst keeping up with your studies. You’re exhausted by the time you come home from RAD and you bump into Levi on your way to your room. 

He asked if you’d be free to watch the new season of an anime with such a ridiculously long title you can’t even remember half of it. You said that you’re tired and you were going to sleep, and Levi just scoffs since he’s clearly upset. 

Levi eventually starts complaining about how you never spare time for him anymore and it’s irritating, especially since you hang out more with his brothers and not him. Despite your attempts to explain that the brothers are helping you organize the event, jealousy can be quite irrational.

It eventually leads to a fight in the hallway of your bedroom and Levi just won't budge at all. You got so frustrated, angry tears started making their way down your cheeks. Levi was in the middle of ranting when he finally saw that you were crying and he stopped, his anger turning into panic. 

“I-i… MC? No no no wait i didn’t mean—” he tried to reach out to you but you slammed the door of your room by his face. Asmo stepped out of his room, ready to complain on why he’s hearing so much yelling it’s interrupting his skin care routine. But he stopped when he saw Levi crying outside in the hallways. 

Asmo tried to be comforting to his older brother, though when he said “if you don’t man up and apologize you might lose them!” He just made Levi cry harder. It stings, but Levi knows that Asmo has a point. 

Levi was waiting out your door for probably 20 minutes, struggling to even step closer. What if you don’t want to see him anymore? What if he just makes things worse? But he tries to fight through his fears for you and knocks quietly on it. 

All his self-depreciative thoughts went up tenfold when he saw the tear stained cheeks and red eyes as soon as you opened the door. He hates how he made you feel miserable and he wants to punch himself in the gut for it, but he tries to speak the words he’s been rehearsing in his head before he chickens out and cries in front of you. 

“I know you’ve b-been busy… I shouldn’t have made you f-feel worse than you already do. Even heroes need to rest at the checkpoint too…” Levi is wracked with guilt, but he did his best and faced his fear of confrontation. 

Levi just wants your company, it doesn’t have to be in his room watching anime or gaming. He can just stay by your side quietly while you rest on the bed, occasionally mumbling a small “sorry” from time to time as he watches over you while you sleep. 

Satan

As much as he wants to control his Wrath, there’s always days where his sin takes over his rationality and he’s too blind in his anger to even think straight. The brothers have warned you not to be near him when he’s angry, and maybe you should’ve heeded their warnings this time. 

He wants to be known for his intellect, not his anger. So sometimes he would correct other demons when they make a common mistake. Teachers may find that annoying when they get told they’re wrong in the middle of class discussion, though he is relentless in informing them. 

Satan normally doesn’t get ticked off that easily, but a teacher thought it would be a wonderful idea to push his buttons by calling him a derivative of Lucifer. Clearly it didn’t end well when you find the ceiling of your classroom collapses, with Satan in full demon form who’s too busy trying to strangle the life out of the teacher. 

Every student evacuated the classroom immediately while others went to inform Lucifer or Diavolo about the incident. You stayed behind because you were determined to help Satan however you can, you didn’t want to leave him behind like this. 

The problem with his Wrath is that when he reaches this level of anger, it’s hard to talk him out of it. You try to reassure him that he’s nothing like what the teacher said to him. You know how being called as such is a sore spot to Satan. But he snaps back at you, snarling through gritted teeth. 

His anger was blinding and he would lash out anyone, you’re not spared from his wrath. He yells at you about how you can never empathize with him. About how a mere human like you can never understand how frustrating it is to be compared to someone else all the time, much less be called the wrong name. 

Lucifer managed to barge in the classroom, in full demon form as well. His presence agitated the Avatar of Wrath, but Lucifer is the only one who can actually stop him. Just as Satan was about to pounce and claw his face, Lucifer grabs him by the wrist “Stop. You’re scaring MC” and it’s enough to make him snap out of his anger when Satan finally looked at you and saw the tears in your face. 

Satan of all people should’ve known how wrong he was. Ever since the brothers found out about your celestial ancestry, Satan could clearly see how it makes you uncomfortable whenever they accidentally call you Lilith. You both can confide in each other whenever these things happen, and now he regrets lashing out on you like that and used something so personal against you. 

Satan spent his time trying to think of how to apologize to you instead of listening to Lucifer’s lecture after his outburst. He wasn’t even spared from his brother’s yelling after they learned how Satan made you cry, but he knows well how he deserved it. 

Satan wanted to apologize to you and he had all his words ready in his head as he waited for the door of your room to open but as soon as it did, he saw the red puffy eyes on your face after crying so much. That well-prepared apology was thrown out the window and he’s at loss for words. Satan felt guilty and all he wants is to hug you right now, but he’s too afraid he might hurt you again. 

“I… I shouldn’t have said all of that. I, of all people, should have been more sensitive to you when it comes to this. My wrath is no excuse for my words… I just hope that you could forgive me. I promise, I’ll never lash out like that on you ever again.” He’s full of remorse as he apologizes.

Satan asks his brothers that if he should ever fall into a rampage like that again, they should always prioritize your safety over himself. He’d rather not let you get hurt like this again, and he’ll do whatever it takes to keep you happy.

Asmo

There was recently a poll on a website that lets the audience choose who’s more beautiful. Asmo was absolutely confident he would win this poll because as the most beautiful being in all realms, it should be a guarantee right? 

Surprisingly, the results showed that Asmo tied second place. The brothers were of course shocked when they considered the number of fans that Asmo has, but what was more concerning is how they haven’t heard from the demon ever since the results. 

In your search, you find him in the club drinking shots after shots in the bar. It’s clear that he’s very upset, when Asmo always expects himself to be the number one at these sorts of things. This is the one thing he’s confident in, so being second puts him in a bad mood.

You try to cheer him up and bring him home so he can sober up. You did your best to make him smile by singing all the praises he’d normally want to hear, but he’s too drunk and down with his own misery to even care. Your words fall on deaf ears.

To Asmo, you sound like you’re just trying to butter him up and it’s making him feel worse. So he turns at you and snaps. Normally he’s whiney when he’s upset, but it’s different when alcohol is added in the mix. 

The Demonus let his tongue loose and he spat out venom nonstop at your direction with his words. He may not be as physically aggressive as his brothers when agitated, but he knows where to hit it where it hurts when someone upsets him. 

All of his words hit the bullseye, and Asmo realized what he just said as soon as he saw the tears in your eyes pooling. “W-wait MC…” He tries to reach out for you, though the alcohol left him a bit disoriented and wobbly. He’s in no shape to run after you and watched helplessly as you left the bar. 

One of his brothers had to pick him up instead. Lucifer had half the mind to punish Asmo by dragging him by the foot all the way back to the house for making you cry, but once he saw how his brother was a sobbing mess after what he did, he decided that it’s already a punishment in itself and helped Asmo sober up. 

Asmo had to clean himself up and get all the alcohol out of his system before he faces you, though there’s not gonna be enough makeup that could hide the redness in his eyes from all the crying. 

He’s already on the verge of tears again by the time he faces you. “Darling… I don’t like seeing you sad like this. Let me make it up to you, I want to be the reason you’re smiling again.”

Asmo spends the night pampering you. No innuendos or anything of the sort. He wants to show you how much he appreciates you by doing what he does best by treating you like nobility. You spend the entire night in his room and you’re not leaving until Asmo is done spoiling you with all the affection he could possibly give. 

Beel

Beel is never usually one to snap at anyone, it’s rare to ever see him be angry about anything since he’s one of the sweetest brothers. The only exception to that is his uncontrollable hunger for food, that’s when it becomes a problem. 

His training didn’t go so well and his coach is trying to make him focus on the workout, though his growling stomach is making it very difficult for him to listen. 

On top of that, finding the fridge cursed by Lucifer as punishment for failing his last test so Beel can’t open the door and he’s going to have to wait until dinner is made. That just made his mood hit rock bottom. 

His mind is screaming to just eat, eat, eat because he’s starting to feel absolutely famished. He can’t wait for dinner anymore and he’s inches away from just consuming the contents of his bag when you walk in the living room.

You had a bag of chips that you recently got from the human realm, and whenever you started feeling a bit homesick you cope by eating something familiar. You missed the taste of food that didn’t have the words “Devil” or “Hell” in it that’s accompanied with crazy flavors. 

Beel wasn’t thinking when he suddenly made a beeline straight towards you and snatched the snack out of your hands. It’s only natural that you’d protest and eventually it leads to the both of you fighting. 

When you tried to snatch the snack back, Beel ended up shoving you with too much force than he intended. He watched in horror when you fell down and he expected that you’d yell back at him out of anger, but his heart broke when he saw that you started crying instead. 

Beel dropped the chips and lifted you up in his arms before you could even have a say, hugging you close and muttering several apologies as he buried his face by your shoulder. “No… no i didn’t mean to hurt you…”

He’s crying with you, ignoring the monstrous roaring of his stomach as he holds you, patting your back as gently as he could to comfort you. He’s not the best with words, but he’s a real good hugger. If you let him, he’ll kiss away your tears.

Beel waits until you’ve stopped crying before he puts your back down on the floor, picking up the snacks that he dropped and handing it over to you without hesitation. Even though he needs it more, he’d rather not upset you any further. “… i’m sorry, i was being selfish and took it from you. I know how human snacks are important to you after all…” 

You know how Beel loses his rationality whenever hunger takes the reel, and you can see it in his eyes that he regrets his actions whenever he starts to lose control from his sin. Beel has a smile back on his face as soon as you forgive him, and he promises to never lay a hand on you like that ever again. 

Luckily the curse on the fridge doesn’t apply to you as a loophole, so you grab him a few snacks that could help him last until dinner time. Though that meant he emptied the fridge, and Lucifer is struggling to understand how it’s come to this since the curse is still in effect. 

Belphie

Belphie can hardly remember what he was even upset about anymore. He just remembered waking up already quite pissed and the day was just getting worse. Maybe it’s just those days where he wakes up on the wrong side of the bed. 

His built up tardiness record in the student council meetings forced Barbatos to consider measures that would keep Belphie indoors, such as locking the room so he can’t sneak out like he normally does. If he tries to fall asleep on his pillow, it would immediately harden like cement.

Belphie’s mood is sour, he just wants to recharge himself on his comfortable bed but Lucifer partnered both of you for a task so he’s not free yet. As soon as the meeting is over, he immediately makes his way home but you try to stop him because there’s still some work to do. 

He ignores you and continues to walk, but you’re adamant on getting him to stay and work together because this isn’t something you can do all by yourself. It’s enough to irritate Belphie to the point that he lets all of today’s frustrations out on you. 

He doesn’t care what he says if it means he’ll finally be alone with some peace and quiet. When he gets irritated and fatigued, his words can be quite harsher than usual and he wouldn’t care how snippy he could get.

Beel is the one who spots you two fighting and he tries to make his twin stop before he says anything worse, though it seems he’s too late as soon as they both see the tears pooling down your face as you leave to do your work without Belphie.

Belphie felt awful and tried to pass it off as the fatigue just getting to him, ignoring his twin’s pleas in asking him to apologize to you. The youngest can be quite spoiled and stubborn after all. He wants to get some rest, even the gardens can do the trick as long as he gets some shut eye.

Though that sleep he wanted never came, he’s too restless with the guilt. Whenever he tries to close his eyes, he remembers the sad look on your face as you cried. It kept haunting him as it replayed over and over in his head. 

Normally he would give the other party the silent treatment, but he knows this time how wrong he is. He walks around the campus, hoping that you haven’t left yet. Belphie finds you alone in the classroom, doing the work he was supposed to be helping you in. The little sniffles echoing the empty walls is enough to break his heart.

You were so busy trying to distract yourself with work that you didn’t notice Belphie’s presence until you saw him lending you a hand with the work. The silence between you two was deafening until he spoke up, “I know I can be an asshole. You can be mad at me all you want but… let me make it up to you.” 

With his help, you two were able to complete your task despite the rough start. You were offering him a high five now that everything’s finished, but instead Belphie pulls you in for a hug before he mumbles countless of apologies under his breath. He never wants to make you cry again.

[reds-writings]

crashin' the party

(pairing: rust cohle x fem!reader)

a/n: a bit of a whopper that had me stumped for a bit. i sincerely hope you like it. i didn't plan to go this far with the jj universe but the more i do the more fun i have with these two! i'm going to rearrange my masterlist a bit and put these parts in a more chronological order! this part technically takes place before the events of if only tonight we could sleep. feedback is always cherished and my requests are open!

word count: roughly 6.7k

warnings: cursing, fighting (verbal and physical), two idiots being dumb, miscommunication trope, the boy's a liar, guns, mentions of drugs, rust self-sabotaging, marty being marty, ANGST, making up at the end, things can be a lil toxic, reader gets the shit end of the stick in most of this, etc

You hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that something rather egregious was brewing behind your back over the past several days. Starting with the unfortunate shitshow that was Marty’s young thing of a mistress letting Maggie in on his line of transgressions due to a fit of spite. The fallout was more than unsavory which had him plenty distracted with trying to hopelessly pick up the shattered pieces of his now blown-up marriage. 

Then, Rust decided to take a few week's leave in the middle of the case. Which came completely out of left field given his obsession with having this all solved more rapidly due to the ever-shortening time limit Quesada had set for you all. A dying father in Alaska or something along those lines. He hadn’t exactly informed you of it directly himself until you rang him up the night he was supposedly set to depart. 

“Heard you were takin’ leave.” You idly twisted the phone chord between your fingers as you sat atop your kitchen counter. One of your coworkers at the precinct had mentioned it off-handedly earlier in the day and you were more than curious as to why everyone else seemed to know of Rust’s so-called last-minute trip and not you. 

“Yeah.” Rust’s static voice sounded back to you, sounding stranger than what was his usual. More dazed and gruff.

“In the middle of this case?”

“Mhm…”

“...Mind sharin’ why?” He was being more elusive than usual and it was starting to grate your nerves further by the minute.  

“Visitin’ my father. Anchorage. He’s dyin’.” 

Oh. 

“I’m uh...I'm sorry to hear that…when are you headin’ out? Need me to drive you to the airport or somethin’?-”

“Marty’s takin’ me. Tonight.” 

That made you even more surprised. It wasn’t like the two were necessarily all that chummy. You tried not to let it sting that there seemed to be a purposeful choice in having Marty take him instead of you. The dynamic between you two wasn’t at its most idyllic but you hadn’t thought it to be too strained despite recent events. Things with the investigation were just piling up, getting trickier and more stressful to manage as time ticked on. 

Sure, you guys hadn’t exactly been able to elaborate further on what was the bomb of feelings he had all but dropped on you but you hadn’t been taking it personally. At least not until now. Maybe he was starting to regret things. This was probably him pulling away so you’d get the hint to not be so keen on him moving forward. Were you coming off as desperate?  Suffocating?

Realizing you’d yet to say anything you cleared your throat a bit, “Thought Marty would’ve been too busy dealin' with winning back Maggie and everything...” The couple already managed to give you more than a migraine or two since things went to shit. On top of Marty’s deep-seated 'woe is me' bullshit, Maggie had managed to stop by demanding answers in a hysterical flurry to things you had no knowledge of or frankly any business in. 

“I won’t be back for a bit.” It was becoming apparent that he wanted to finish up this conversation sooner rather than later. 

“Okay…I guess I’ll keep lookin’ for leads and whatnot. There might be a girl I know from way back who’s tied up in the kind of crowd we’re lookin’ at. I’m hopin’ she might be familiar with Ledoux or somethin’. If there’s anything you want me diggin’ into just give me a shout I guess.”

He was silent for a moment you considered too prolonged.

“I gotta head out. Keep track of what you find. Marty’ll be watchin’ my place.” 

“You got it.” 

More silence.

“Bye, Y/n.” 

“Bye-” The line went dead before you knew it. 

Geez. 

The dial tone mocked you as you sat there in curling embarrassment. You don’t think he’d ever blown you off so bluntly before. Not even when you two first met. Your neck and face started to grow warm as you fought off the increasing sense of rejection brought on by your own insecurities and his sudden callousness. You were just overthinking things. Rust’s father was dying and it wasn’t like you could expect him to properly express what it was he was going through. You just had to be somewhat okay with standing by on the sidelines until he was ready to open up on the matter. 

You hadn’t heard much about Rust’s parents or his upbringing but from what little tidbits he managed to drop it wasn’t anything to be envious of. Things seemed complicated from the sounds of it so you had no doubt Rust was probably just having a tougher time trying to navigate what he felt in anticipation of the grief that awaited him ahead.

Meanwhile, after hanging up on you, Rust couldn’t help but bring a heavy hand to his eyes as he sighed through his nose. Marty eyed him warily as he sat across from him in the depressing confines of his partner’s apartment. 

“So you lied to her.” 

Rust didn’t bother meeting the blonde’s disappointed look. 

“You don’t think that oughta blow up in your face? She’s sharper than you may realize…ain’t some fragile thing who can’t handle her shit-”

“Don't need her on this, Marty.” Rust tried remaining passive at the mention of you. 

Things were becoming too complicated. A consequence of his pathetic failure to keep his baneful desires in check. Giving in to those false hopes had him feeling increasingly weak and cheap the longer he had time to sit and torture himself over it. To entertain such notions with you was cruel to an extent he found himself severely uncomfortable with. It wouldn’t work. Not in this lifetime or perhaps any other that would exist in the infinite hell that was the universe. If he backed away now perhaps he could still hold onto whatever little semblance of control he had left. 

“Don’t need her on this or don’t want her on this? There’s a mighty big difference, buddy.” Marty didn’t necessarily know about the recent developments between you two but it was apparent he was becoming aware that something was afoot. The pair stared at each other long and hard.

“This is a two-man job. No need for added weight.” Rust broke first, taking a long drag from the cigarette pinched between his nimble fingers.

“Sure, if that’s what you need to tell yourself. This is her case too and I don’t appreciate you havin’ me be part of some lie-”

“I can remind you that you haven’t had much of a problem with lyin’ as of late-” 

“Oi, don’t get all judgy with me just cause you’re scared of somethin’ you ain’t got the emotional bandwidth to fuckin’ handle on your own. Y/n’s a smart girl. Strong. It would be unwise of you to underestimate her abilities because of some holdup you’ve got-”

“Marty.” Was Rust’s final warning. The steeliness of it had the blonde’s hands going up in mock surrender. If Rust didn’t want to unpack his growingly obvious partialness towards you then he wouldn’t bother pressing. It’s not like he was much in the mood to help out the pissy curmudgeon he called a partner with any hypothetical advances toward you. Marty saw you as something similar to that of a little sister. He wasn’t sold on the idea of romance, if Rust were even capable of the notion, happening between you two. In his opinion, your heart was just too big for the likes of Rust. He didn’t want to see you put in the monumental effort of caring for the hopeless loner only to be sorely disappointed in return. 

The days following the odd phone call had that intuitive feeling in your gut growing all the more sour. You tried your best to find more on Ledoux but the bastard was practically a ghost. Any and all traces left behind were either long gone by now or slipping from you faster than you could blink. Marty wasn’t being much help either, hardly showing up at work or being in a perpetual state of buzzed when he did actually bother to grace everyone with his presence. 

Though, anytime you did really manage to catch him he couldn’t bring himself to look you in the eye for longer than what he deemed necessary. Either the obvious bout of drinking he was throwing himself into was reaching a dangerously depressive territory or he was feeling guilty about something else entirely. He never was the best at bluffing when it came to things outside of the job. It was even more rare to find yourself in a situation where he had something to lie about to you in the first place. 

Something was definitely up. 

“Maggie talk to you yet?” You asked, setting down a styrofoam box of takeout in front of him as he sat miserably hungover at his desk. He took a peek inside and mumbled a quick ‘thanks’ before deciding to dig in.

“No…she ain’t answerin’ any of my calls. Her pops told me to fuck off plenty already so he ain’t an option of gettin’ through to her neither.”

“It’s a pretty big deal, Marty. It’s best to probably just…give her time to feel angry. Your constant pokin’ at her is only gonna drive her away further. Goin’ to the hospital huffin’ and puffin' like you did didn’t help your case either.” You sipped your coffee as you watched him rub at his eyes.

“I just needed her to hear me out. Hell, I even got Rust to go-” His stocky shoulders locked up suddenly, seeming to have caught himself in revealing too much before settling on shoveling more food into his mouth. 

Your eyes tightened in suspicion.

“Speakin’ of, you heard anything from Rust while he’s been away?” 

Marty shook his head a little too fast to be considered convincing, “Not a peep,” Obvious lie, “can’t imagine the intense bouts of angst he’s brewing up for himself all the way where he's holed up.” 

“Mhm. How’re you holdin’ up at his place? Need me to bring by anything? I know it ain’t necessarily the Hilton-”

“N-no! I’m good. No. I uh-...I got some groceries the other day. It’s a mystery how that guy survives with what little he keeps in his damn fridge. Just ridiculous.” He coughed and took a sip of his own coffee, avoiding your growingly pointed glare. He could feel sweat start to form on his brow and he knew he needed to head out before he fucked everything up even more. Having Maggie angry at him was already enough to deal with. 

“I bet. Listen-”

“L-Look I gotta get goin’. Regrettably, I drank too much last night and it’s honest to God catchin’ up to me right about now and I don’t need Quesada givin’ me shit. Sorry to bail on ya but I’ll see you later, a-alright? Thanks for the food.” Marty scrambled to get his stuff before semi-hurrying to scamper off. He could feel your eyes burning at the back of his head but he didn’t dare to look back. 

Unfurling your arms you sat your mug down and reached for the receiver on your desk. It was a last-ditch effort, dialing Maggie, to see if Marty’s slip of the tongue about Rust meant anything substantial. If they were chatting here and there while Rust was away that was fine. If Marty was having Rust get through to Maggie all the way from where he was that was fine too. If Rust wasn’t in Alaska at all then you’re sure that ugly sensation building within you would multiply tenfold easily. After a few rings the line clicked with an answer.

“Hello?” Maggie’s soft lilt came from the other line. She sounded a little less upset than when you last saw her but still tired nonetheless.

“Hey, Mags. It’s Y/n. Just wanted to see what you were up to. How’re you holdin’ up?” You tried to maintain an air of complete casualness. No ulterior motives to this call whatsoever. 

“Oh, hey! I uhm…I’m doing okay I guess. Trying not to let everything catch up to me all at once, y’know. It’s been hard…keeping what I can away from the girls. Marty just won’t quit it with trying to wear me down. It’s exhausting.”

“Yeah…I told him to leave you be but he never was much of an avid listener. We may work together but just know I ain’t takin’ his side on all this.” You offered up and it was true. Marty may have been your coworker for several years now and something close to a decent friend but this wasn’t something you were gonna coddle him about. The consequences of his petty adultery were ones he had to deal with entirely on his own. 

“Thank you. You should try telling Rust that. Marty’s resorted to having him try to talk me down too, if you can believe it. Not that it worked or anything but I’m getting tired of feeling like I’m the one who should feel guilty for walking away when Marty decided to fuck it all up in the first place.” The woman’s tone grew a touch more frantic as her rant went more into detail but you stopped listening at the mention of Rust. 

Y’know, the one who was supposed to be thousands of miles away right now. 

“He got Rust to talk to you?” You interjected, only feeling a tiny pang of guilt for cutting in.

“Y-yeah. It uh…well it didn’t go to well. Y’know him. He didn’t try to blow smoke up Marty’s ass too much but he brought up the kids which more or less set me off. I said some harsh things but he just wouldn’t quit it with the whole ‘men and women don’t work' thing and 'our only purpose is reproduction’ or whatever bullshit spiel he had on his list of many-”

“When did this happen?” 

“Earlier today. We met at some diner but it didn’t last long with him walking out. I do feel bad for getting ahead of myself but…I don’t know. If you see him could you tell him I’m sorry? I don’t want things being more uncomfortable than they already are between all of us…” 

Ice started to spread like some nasty disease in your veins. The way your heart was stuttering out of rhythm had you grasping at your chest. You held the receiver between your ear and shoulder as your mind went blank at her simple confession. You didn’t know if what was actively consuming you was pure rage or a deep sense of betrayal. He had lied. They both lied. Like it was nothing. 

Why?

Forcing yourself to sound unaffected you spoke up again, “Sure, I can do that for you. I’m sure he ain’t too hung up on whatever it is you said so I wouldn’t beat myself up over it. Sometimes he oughta be put in his place for what he lets slip out of his mouth.”

“You’re probably right. Thank you, Y/n.”

“No problem. I’ll check in with you later alright, Mags?” Your chest was starting to rise and fall at a rapid pace. You needed to get out of here. 

“Alright, Y/n. Thank you again. Take care.” Was her warm reply before you set down the phone almost robotically. 

They had really fucking lied.

It was well into the night by the time you found yourself parked outside of Rust’s apartment. The throbbing in your skull had grown exponentially since your chat with Maggie and the muscle in your chest had yet to cease its sickening pace. It felt as if you were experiencing everything from outside of your body. As if you had no control over your limbs when you clambered out of your car and nearly slammed the door off its hinges. 

They wouldn’t lie to you like this. This was just one big misunderstanding. It had to be! You’d rather be angry for nothing than have the impending doom of betrayal strike you in a way that you felt would be irreversible. 

They just wouldn’t do that to you.

Raising a shaking fist and pounding on the door, it sounded like you were there to raid the damn place like it was police business. You attempted to steady your breathing but as your impatience grew you found yourself pounding again when there wasn’t a fast enough answer. Marty and Rust’s respective vehicles were both here so there was no chance of no one being home. 

Before you unleashed hell on the door once more it swung open to reveal a frazzled Marty. He stood there frozen, jaw opening and closing, visibly at a loss seeing your figure standing in the doorway. He looked ready to just about shit himself. 

“Y/n! W-what-”

“Now, I know you know I ain’t stupid. So if you’ve got somethin’ you’re hidin’, which I know you are, you best 'fess up now-”

“I-I don’t know what-”

“Shut your fuckin’ mouth. I called Maggie. I know he's here.” You felt like some feral cat with its hackles rising by the minute. It was a rare occurrence to find yourself this upset.

“Y/n that ain’t-”

“If you have nothin’ you’re lyin’ about, if he's really not here then let me in.”

He opened his mouth only to be cut off, unsurprisingly, again. 

“Now, Martin.” 

The two of you stared at each other and Marty felt an unsettling sensation lick up his spine. There was no stopping you, especially not when you were like this. He must’ve hesitated for a hair too long because before he knew it you were slamming past the doorway, nearly knocking the wind out of him in the process.

The sight before you had you halting in the middle of your warpath. There stood Rust, still as a statue, looking like a full-blown tweakin’ asshole biker as if it were second nature to him. In the back of your mind, info from files about him being involved in undercover narcotics work for quite some time sparked recognition but you couldn’t seem to connect it with what was playing out right in front of you. All you knew was that something was obviously about to go down and they hadn’t even the slightest intention of making you aware. 

It felt like one devastating punch to the stomach. 

“What’s goin' on?” Your voice sounded foreign to your ears. It felt like your head was being held underwater as you stared down the man opposing you. 

No one made a move to answer. 

“I said what the fuck is goin' on.” Your tone grew stronger and both men had the nerve to look sorry at your state of distress. 

“We have a line on Ledoux.” Rust ground out, having a hard time connecting with your gaze. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not tonight. Not ever. He didn’t need this. Didn’t need the distraction nor your wrath towards his pathetically selfish reasonings for not letting you in on any of this. 

“And it just slipped your mind to give me the heads up? In case you might’ve forgotten I happen to work on this case with the both of you dipshits too. If there’s a tip towards that meth-head fuck then I’d think it’d be common knowledge that I oughta know too.” You snapped, venom bitterly coiled its way through you as the rage taking up space in your body had you hardly seeing straight.

“You didn’t need to be involved. It’s undercover work to get a way in with Ledoux. I don’t need both you and Marty to worry about when I’m dealing with-” 

“Oh, fuck you! Fuck you both! That ain’t for you to decide. I can handle my shit just fine. You're tellin' me you two can throw yourselves into whatever shady bullshit it is your plannin' that could have you killed but I have to sit back like the clueless fuckin' idiot? Make that make fuckin' sense!” You were up in his face shouting now and it infuriated you that he was rearing back like some spooked horse to avoid your anger. 

Fucking coward. 

“Underestimatin’ me like this makes you just as bad as the rest of them in the department. If you think I lack the capability for any of this then you be a man and take that up with me. You don’t make that idiot over there lie for you.” You grabbed firmly at the worn leather of his stupid jacket and he just took it. His heart was hammering and he suddenly felt ill. This was all going wrong and his mind couldn’t keep up. Nothing wanted to pass the threshold of his lips. 

Seeing that he wasn’t going to reply you let go, feeling sudden shame wash over you at your burst of hysteria. Your eyes were starting to burn intensely as the weight of the current circumstances started to settle down on you, making you take a few steps back.

You felt like nothing. It wasn’t an experience you were necessarily new to but having it come from them had you more blindsided than ever imaginable. All you could keep asking yourself was: why? Marty’s never doubted you or gone behind your back. He was one of the only ones who believed in you when you first started out as some newbie of an investigator. You’ve known him for nearly a decade and looking at his pitiful expression now only had you feeling disgusted.

Rust you couldn’t even bother to pick apart any further. You had the impression he respected you enough on the job but that had been debunked in nothing short of just a few hours. Where did he get off? You weren’t some burden who’d just weigh the whole process down with your implied inferiority. None of this was making any sense and your heaving shoulders failed to stop their jittering as you took in the room surrounding you. An old red toolbox sat on the carpeted floor between two lawn chairs with a few guns, random documents, drug baggies, and whatnot scattered around. A black satellite phone on the dining table’s surface caught your eye and a sharp exhale left your nose. Your eyes drifted back to Rust. The bated silence that had blanketed the room was unbearable to the two men. 

“Whether you like it or not you’ve earned yourself an extra set of eyes. I’m sure Marty can catch me up on everything on the way to Tweakersville since y’all tell each other everything now durin' your lil’ sleepovers.” You snatched a pistol from the floor and tucked it into your waistband before stepping out. 

“Dyin’ father in Anchorage…what a crock of shit…” Were your departing mumbles as you disappeared out the door.  It took everything in Marty’s being to not let out the pettiest of ‘I told you so’s’. 

Rust only moved to bring trembling fingers to check his pulse. 

The resulting car ride between you and Marty was deathly quiet as you stared out the window. You could tell he wanted to speak up but finding the right words wasn’t coming easy to him. It wasn’t until you pulled up to the shithole that passed as a dive bar that he worked up the courage to blurt out his defense.

“I didn’t wanna lie to you.” You just scoffed and shook your head wryly.

“Yet here we are.”

“What we’re doin’ ain’t necessarily legal-”

“So? It’s ain't like I’m sheltered from the ways of a dirty cop. I’ve done my fair share of shit over the years.” The skin around your nails was becoming raw at your incessant biting and Marty ignored the urge to swat your hands away from yourself. 

“This wasn’t done out of thinkin’ you weren’t capable. You have to know that.” 

“You can say that but I’m still havin’ a hard time workin’ out any other reason why you’d try to fuck me over like this.” You fixed him with a hard stare and he could only sigh. God, were you stubborn when you wanted to be. He needed to save his own skin on this one, Rust be damned. 

“Hon, Rust’s throwin’ himself back into some old gang mess for the sake of this case. Now, from the looks of it, I’d say he ain’t too keen on having to do it at all in the first place. I’m sure you’re aware of what working narcotics can do to the mind of a man for the minimal time he’s set to do it out on the field. Let alone what it could do one working at it for four years nonstop. The man nearly died doin’ all this shit on more than one occasion. Shootins...cartel torture. Which brings me to my next point.” Your partner watched you intently as if to make sure you were fully listening. 

You made no signs of ignoring him so he continued,

“I don’t know what’s goin' on between him and you, if there even is somethin' going on, but it shouldn’t be hard for you to imagine that he’s strugglin' with it a whole lot. It’s obvious he don’t know how to come to terms with most of what he’s feeling so it’s hard to determine just what the hell he’d do when it comes to being interested in a woman. Let alone you.”

“I fail to see what you’re gettin’ at.” You knew exactly what he was implying but childish insolence held priority.

“Rust doubts you the least out of everyone around here. Perhaps out of everyone he’s encountered ever. You challenge his way of structure. All the Debby Downer bullshit he tells himself starts to lack any sense. Not bringin' you on this was an act of piss-poor self-preservation. He may not admit that and you may not bother to believe it but that’s just what I see. You know I wouldn’t vouch for him on shit like this out of charity.” 

The words sank in deep as you ruminated over them. It made sense but out of pure stubbornness, you didn’t really want to acknowledge it right then and there. When you had a clearer head you could probably find yourself empathizing with Rust’s decisions but you felt like you did enough of that already when it came to any other screw-up of his. This instance cut deep for another reason. Your trust had been breached to an awful extent and it just wouldn’t work if you had to fear it happening again. Romantically or professionally. It wasn’t up to him to make these choices for you. Especially when it came down to your line of work. You couldn’t tolerate that type of interference. 

“I’ll take that into consideration.” Is what you settled on before turning to people watch out of your rolled-down window. 

“I really am sorry, Y/n.” He spoke up again but you were too worn out to accept anything else at the moment. Even if you knew he was being sincere.

You ignored the nagging in the back of your mind that things would likely go terribly wrong sometime tonight. It annoyed you that being as mad as you were you still had half the mind to pray Rust didn’t end up getting killed doing whatever it was he was doing with that gang leader Ginger. You'd be devastated, fight or no fight. Marty had tried assuring you this was all meant to be quick and easy but you didn’t believe it one bit. 

Minutes passed before you and Marty made your way to split up inside the bar. Marty wanted to keep an eye on Rust and you just wanted to make sure Marty didn’t do something stupid. It was safe to say he stuck out like a sore thumb in his bright Pink Floyd shirt and trucker hat amongst the throngs of burly, tatted bikers prowling about. Your expression remained neutral as you felt the number of greedy eyes growing on you while you slinked around. The music was too loud and the thick haze of smoke stung your eyes. The smell in here was more or less repulsive, having you fight the urge to wrinkle your burning nose in disgust. Rust didn’t seem to be anywhere around inside, meaning he was striking the ‘deal’ somewhere out back where the other hoards of folks were hanging around.

It didn’t take long for a commotion to rise up with the unfortunate cause of it being Marty. He was bumbling out apologies as some big oaf all but dragged him out of the bar with people hollering after him. You tried your best to briskly follow, making it out in time to see the man get thrown onto his ass. Miscalculating your gait you just about slammed into the scary man from behind at his sudden stop. 

Meaty hands yanked at your shirt and slammed your poor back into a post near the entrance. “Just what the fuck are you doin', bitch.” 

Trying not to gag at the state of his breath you attempted to wiggle out of his grasp, “Was just tryin' to leave so you can get right up off me-”

The man shoved you again and took his huge mitt of a hand to your throat, “You and your punk ass friend don’t belong sniffin’ 'round here.”

“I don’t know that son of a bitch so fuckin' let go!-” A burst of stars entered your vision as his fist nearly sent you sailing down the old wooden ramp. A boot or two kicked at your curled-up figure, catching you in the ribs and stomach a few times. One even clocked you in the jaw and you hoped you’d still have teeth left if you were lucky enough to make it out. Heavy footsteps boomed against the growing crowd’s uproar and your adrenaline kicked itself up a few notches. The giant's paws cleared the way and jerked you up again, the force of it having your feet leave the ground for a split second. You were struck again, then once more before your hand fumbled behind your back and got a good grip on the pistol in your jeans. 

Cold metal jabbed into the grand protrusion that was his belly and it had him stilling almost immediately. 

“Unless you want a bullet or two in your fatass gut, I suggest you let me go.” You spat.

When you didn’t get an answer fast enough, the cocking of the gun’s hammer sure as hell had him dropping you fast. As soon as he did you smacked him across the face with the butt of it and sent him to his knees. A naive soul or two began to make a move but you were quicker in aiming the gun at them in warning. Blood from your nose leaked like a faucet into your gaping mouth as you struggled for air. They sure managed to get you good. The growing pain you felt all over attested to that fact. 

Once you were sure no one else would pounce, you spit on the big man and backed away with your gun in the air. You nudged Marty with your boot to make him get the hell up before you two booked it back to the car. According to him, Rust got roped into going down the Bayou with Ginger so you two had to make it out quick.

So much for quick and easy. 

You couldn’t even bother to check the time as you sat reclined in the car to wait for Rust’s signal. Marty parked at some mostly empty lot near a grocery mart and scurried inside to grab you a few things. The bag of frozen peas didn’t do much for your rapidly swelling eye or aching jaw. Your nose didn’t seem to be too broken but with all its nerves it made no difference in hurting like a bitch. The bleeding from both your nostrils and mouth had started to clot thankfully but you still sat wheezing from your abused ribs. 

“So much for being able to fuckin' handle yourself.” Marty huffed as he flipped through a tattered copy of Rust’s Nietzche. What was intended as a laugh came out as a wet rattle instead, making the blonde look at you in alarm.

“He let go of me, didn’t he? Not like you were much use.” Your tongue rolled around in the space of your mouth, forgoing the taste of copper in making sure none of your pearly whites were at risk of falling out. 

“How’re you gonna explain this at work?”

“I dunno. I’ll say I took a tumble down my staircase or somethin’. Who cares.” It was likely your lazy nonchalance was the result of a possible concussion. It was getting harder to keep yourself awake as you two were made to wait patiently. 

“Oh yeah. Casual tumble down the stairs. Makes perfect fuckin’ sense-” Marty’s bickering was cut off by the satellite phone’s sudden shrill ringing. You both shot up, adrenaline entering your systems once more, before he hurried to answer it. You could faintly hear a shouted line of demands before Marty confirmed what he heard and peeled off toward the location Rust had given him. You willed your hands to steady as you fumbled with the map you pulled from the glove compartment, making sure you weren’t going the wrong way.

The ninety seconds Rust gave was more like an eternity before you skirted up to the neighborhood that felt like an active warzone. As he was nearing the vehicle with a stumbling man in his clutches, who you assumed was Ginger, you leaped out of the car to open up the back and usher them in. You raised your pistol in a one-handed grip, keeping the other on the door as they stumbled inside. There was shouting from figures out following in the distance and gunfire that was making its way closer and closer. When they found themselves situated you slammed the car door shut and sent off a warning shot or two to keep the approaching group away. Responding bullets were your only answer, having you all but swing back into the passenger’s seat as they whizzed past you. Only one had managed to skim past your ear in sheer dumb luck, leaving your ear ringing something awful. 

With you safely inside, Marty sped off again at Rust’s sharp command. You couldn’t really hear their yelling over the pounding of your heart and the fact your right ear seemed to be temporarily out of commission from the narrowly missed bullet. 

You couldn’t dwell too much on the fact that with an inch difference it would’ve been your head. 

Hours later, daylight agitated your vision as you waited in the new setting that was Rust’s truck. After seeing the state you were in he all but hauled you with him to wherever he planned on taking Ginger, declaring he had some first aid kit he’d need to use on you. You didn’t bother putting up much of a fight when he ordered you to wait in the truck outside of the diner you stopped at after patching you up in the limited capacity he was able to. You were just too exhausted. You hadn’t even mustered the curiosity to get a good look at Ginger tied up in the back as you had driven. Probably safer that he didn’t get a good look at you anyway. 

Rust’s plan b with Dewall didn’t seem to pan out too well either as he came back to the truck with a deep-set scowl. Shoving Ginger back into place all bound up before climbing in up front. There was still hope that Marty would successfully trail the cook to wherever his hideout may be but Rust’s silence was conceringly heavy. Though, now wasn’t the time or the place to get into it with him all over again. You must’ve dozed off somewhere during the ride because when you opened your eyes, well eye…the other having swelled completely shut by now, you were pulled over on some trail. Rust just sat staring out at the scenery, more than likely lost in a swirl of his own thoughts, taking a moment to collect himself. Ginger's form was long gone from the back. 

At the sound of you rustling in your spot, he merely glanced your way before looking away again. There was a tick in his jaw that didn’t escape you and you sighed knowing you’d have to be the one to buck up first. 

“It looks worse than it feels.” Lie. Even the scratchy croak of your voice called you out on it.

“I didn’t want you here for a reason. What good is it if you wind up dead-"

“What you want isn’t always what you get. Next time don't take me for some fool-” 

“Don’t be fuckin’ stupid-”

“And don’t you talk to me like you’ve lost your goddamn mind just cause of your pride,” You nearly thundered as you stared him down, “What happened, happened. It’s over. We pulled through with your wild-ass cowboy mission. Your panties can untwist now.”

A warm hand came to grip at your ribs, not violently, but firm enough to prove his point when the pain from your bruising nearly blinded you. Your own hand snapped up to grip at his arm as if playing a fucked up game of chicken. Who would break first? You’d be damned if it were you. Though the look in the man’s eyes had you faltering. You’d seen it before. That deep-rooted fear that bled out against his own will when it came to you more often than not. It seemed to hit him harder now that he was getting a good look at your battered and bloodied face in the afternoon light. Marty’s words from earlier felt mocking as they rang in your head. 

Rust doubts you the least out of everyone around here...not bringin' you on this was an act of piss-poor self-preservation.

The idea of anything with you made him scared. Scared for you and scared for himself.

“Why did you lie to me? Truly.” Your voice fell quiet, the fight in you left just as quickly as it had found you. 

He just blinked before letting his hand drop from you, however, yours stayed on him, “You’re a smart girl. You can work it out for yourself I’m sure.” He almost sounded sardonic.

“Maybe. But I’d like to hear it from you.” It might’ve been foolish to expect confessions of pure honesty from him but you’d keep giving him that option should he ever choose. 

When he said nothing you brushed a knuckle beneath his eye then across his sharp cheekbone. His tired eyes fought themselves from fluttering, trying not to let your touch utterly consume him whole. It proved to be even harder when your thumb swept feather-light over his chapped bottom lip before retreating completely.  

“Anything can happen, y'know. Anywhere, anytime. If you find yourself fearful of that fact pertainin’ to me then you need to let it go. If the idea of this,” You made a small gesture between you both, “is too much for you or you’ve realized you don’t want it anymore then that’s okay. I’m a big girl. I can handle just about anything. Your sanity and the sake of our professional partnership hold more priority over my whims. I don’t want my existence scarin' you to where it creates this big rift or you go to these dumb lengths to push me away.” 

Those long fingers of his fiddled with the ends of your hair, grounding himself with what little contact he was able to allow himself in the moment. He was still undecided on what he wanted to do with you. What he wanted to be with you. The paleness of his skin covered by the sheen layer of sweat from the comedown of whatever he likely took in the company of Ginger had him looking gaunt. Aged even. He found himself drifting between somewhere far away and being present here with you.

“This can’t happen again, Rust. Whether we’re something or not. Especially if we find ourselves workin’ together for however long down the road. It won’t work for me no matter the circumstance. Best believe I’ll be firm on that.” You flicked at this chin lightly, hoping some of the damage from the last twenty-four hours could be undone. 

“I’m-...I’m sorry.” Came the only remaining thing that could sound from his throat. And you’d take it for now. 

“I’ll get over it. Eventually. It might be a tall order but you need to get in the business of regulatin’ how you respond to your own emotions more.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” His final response was slightly choked but he didn’t give much else away after that. Sniffling, you leaned to the side on the truck's leather bench seat to rest your head on his shoulder once he twisted forward to face the wheel. An arm circled around your frame, his large hand finding purchase in your hair and you let yourself go for a moment as the truck began to roll forward. 

You continued down the path in a more comfortable silence where Marty would be waiting for you at the end to scout for Ledoux’s hideout. Soon this could all hopefully be over and done with. What would come after, though, you hadn’t the slightest clue.

a/n: forgive me, babes. they'll be happier (until 02). thanks for reading! i'll probably go back and edit this a bunch of times bc i'm neurotic like that!

[system-to-the-madness]

Classroom Confessions - Sugawara Kōshi x Reader

Pairing: Sugawara Kōshi x Reader (can be read as any gender, no pronouns used) AU: post!timeskip Genre: fluff Word Count: 1 280 Warnings: none Summary: You help Suga clean up the classroom Prompts: acorn, chestnut, pinecone A/N: I’m in love with Suga. I said it before and I’ll say it again. I’m in love with this character. If I could, I’d marry the shit out of him

After hours of sitting on the small chair that had been assigned to you, you felt like it was almost a relief to be sweeping the floor of the elementary school classroom. The children had done most of the cleaning up already but wanting the room to be in top condition for their Monday class, you had offered to sweep out the last dust and traces of their crafting projects; scraps of paper mostly.

“Thank you so much, you really didn’t have to help clean up,” a familiar voice behind you spoke, making you look up from where you had just gathered everything you had swept up in a neat pile.

“You’re welcome, thank you for inviting me,” you smiled and turned around to your former classmate Sugawara.

“I was surprised you actually came,” he admitted, running a hand through his adorably disheveled silver hair, before he grabbed a hand broom and walked over to you, crouching down and sweeping up the paper and dust you had gathered.

“I got invited, so I figured it was the polite thing to do,” you told him, making use of the moment to take in his appearance once more.

His hair was longer than it had been during his school time, but not unkempt. Instead, it looked soft and fluffy, just like the dark green sweater he was dressed in. During your school time you had been close, really close, but with university and the stress of entering a job, you had lost contact for a few years, until you had bumped into him again recently.

It had hardly surprised you, that the attraction you had felt towards him during school was still there, and he had hardly changed. He was still the responsible, caring friend you knew, but at the same time as sassy and chaotic as ever.

One thing that had changed though was that he had grown more confident, and after meeting with him and a few other friends from school, he asked you to go out with him. It was nothing official yet, only the declaration between the two of you that you both wanted to try what a relationship might be like, limited to dates over coffee or ramen and shy handholding.

Both of you were busy with your jobs though, so when he had invited you to the event at his school, you had agreed to join immediately, knowing it gave you a good excuse to spend time with him while watching him in his workplace and interact with the students he taught. And it would have been an understatement to claim watching him treat them so sweetly, taking them serious but not being harsh with them, instead curious and funny, it made your heart swoon even more for the young elementary school teacher.

“The kids were really excited for you to join,” Suga agreed, getting up from the floor and discarding the last dirt in the bin. “And so was I.”

He shot you one of his bright smiles as he put the brooms away.

“I really had fun,” you told him, leaning against one of the small tables. “It was nice, doing some crafting again. I liked the idea.”

“To have children and parents craft together?”

“That too, but also the little figures?” You turned around and lifted up one you had made. “First going out and searching for the acorns and chestnuts and pinecones, and then making these little figures out of it? That’s a really adorable idea.”

Suga smiled thoughtfully, walking over to one of the tables where he had prepared two cups of leftover tea.

“I wanted to do something that fit the season and gave the parents a reason to spend time with their children,” he explained, handing you one of the cups and leaning against a table opposite you. His smile faded away and instead was replaced by thoughtfulness. “Some of the children said, their parents barely have time for them, and it made them sad that they couldn’t play together like in the story we read in class.”

“So, you created an opportunity for that?”

Suga nodded, taking a sip of the black tea. “Hm, I’m really glad every child had at least one parent who made time for them.”

“And they made some really cute figures,” you laughed, remembering the attempts of the students to stick woolly yarn on the heads of their figures and draw faces on the roundish, smooth surface.

“Oh, now that you mention it,” Suga pushed away from the table again and walked over to his desk. “I received a gift.”

Curiously you watched as he carefully pulled something out of a drawer, placed it on his palm and came walking back over to you.

“What is it,” you asked, tilting your head. It seemed like two of the pinecone- figurines, and as Suga came closer, you realized one had silver yarn stuck to its head and the other a yarn that seemed to try to imitate your own hair colour.

“It’s us,” Suga grinned, holding the figures out for you to study more closely. In fact, it seemed like their hands had been glued together, making it look as if they were holding hands.

“Did you tell them we were dating,” you asked amused, taking in the details of the figures. The one that represented Suga had some dark green felt stuck over its body, mimicking his pullover while your figure was dressed in bright orange.

“I didn’t… I might have mentioned you a few times though,” he admitted.

When you looked up at him, he had the softest smile on his face looking at the figures.

“A few times,” you asked amused, knowing if he said ‘a few times’ he probably hadn’t shut up about you. You had already suspected as much, considering how much the children had known about you before you had even stepped foot into the classroom.

Suga hummed, not really reacting to your teasing, instead his soft smile turning cocky as he said: “One of the mothers asked when we’re getting married.”

You sputtered at that, quickly averting your eyes as heat rose in your cheeks. Suga had known exactly what his statement would do to you and took delight in your reaction.

“We’re barely dating,” you told him, trying hard to regain your composure, still unable to meet his eyes, the idea of marrying Suga suddenly making hot butterflies dance in your stomach.

You heard Suga put down the figurines he had been holding, and a moment later he was standing in front of you, caging you against the table with both of his hands on either side leaning against the table.

“Well, maybe we should make it official,” he whispered against your ear, his voice low, but you knew him well enough to hear the nervousness that swung alongside his suggestion.

Turning your head, finally looking at him again, you found his dark eyes watching you carefully. There was still a hint of cockiness and playfulness left, but it was obvious how hard he tried to keep up the façade over the fear of rejection. For a moment you just studied him, his beautiful dark eyes, the faint freckles over his nose, the dark hair on his jaw where he had shaved just this morning, the soft bow of his lips.

Yeah, you thought to yourself, you most certainly wouldn’t mind making it official. The only reason you hadn’t asked him yet was because you hadn’t been certain whether he was certain. So instead of giving him a verbal answer, you just smiled at him shortly before leaning in and closing the gap between your lips.

[catboybiologist]

Boymoding is getting exhausting.

And yay, toxic thought time that's going to be anecdotal and probably come off as somewhat sexist. But I hope it doesn't.

The thing that's really wearing down on me is emotional responses, I think. When cis women cry or show emotion as part of their daily routine, it's still taboo, but often accommodated more than others. I'm going through a lot of emotional swings right now, and there's a very stark difference in how those are treated vs how it's treated in others. And I don't know if that'll ever change, tbh, but hopefully at least someone will acknowledge that it's rough. Even with the good, close friends I have, there very much is a gap in what level of emotion elicits sympathy vs ignoring it or treating it as an overreaction in men vs women. I'm a "man" now, and simply don't get the space for that emotional support as a casual daily thing. It's not uncommon for people in academia to cry or be overwhelmed and anxious, and it's becoming more and more obvious how that's treated in men vs women. It's always a thought I had in the back of my head, but I'm noticing it a lot more now that I'm outwardly a man but have a lot more visibly emotional moments.

Its weird. I have made efforts to be more open about bisexuality, and my day to day vibe has gotten fruitier as a result. A lot of cis women friends have gotten closer to me as a result, but they very clearly treat me with a "gay best friend" kinda vibe. Which is honestly fun, but it provides an interesting baseline for the biases people have in how much emotion men vs women are allowed to show, even among good friends.

On the flip side, another thing I'm becoming more acutely aware of (even though I always knew it was a thing, it just feels more pressing now) is how casually women are ignored, talked over, disregarded, etc etc when compared to men in a academia. I've always known this was a problem, but it's been on my mind a lot more recently.

Top all of that off with the endless physical considerations of compressive bras, managing the way I walk, baggy clothes, mitigating dysphoria vs hiding my transition, not accidentally slipping into my shitty voice training voice while going around daily, making time for injections now, taking sublingual pills midday when I was still on those... Yeah. It adds up.

I've tried making my transition an "open secret" by going to social events and queer events femme, and I know word gets around to labmates and such. I just don't know who exactly knows, and the barrier of actually talking to people about it is huge. I really think, for my own sanity, I need to start telling people what's up even before I socially transition.

I'm particularly moody and stressed bc of my qual tomorrow, but yeah. Consider this a toxic unfocused rant. I'll probably have more to say in a more focused way in a couple days.

Oh also. Please don't be like "ooohhh then why are you still boymoding idiot" cuz that's not helpful. There's a right moment to socially transition and I have a plan.

[pupi-pop]

So basically- I got to thinking about how Wukong offered Macaque the peach popsicle at the end of the special and it's been seen as an olive branch and I was like "What if that becomes a reoccurring thing they do--" So in my mind it's become something they offer eachother after something rough happens either between them or as a situation together. A silent message of "We'll work on this", kinda like a pinkie promise- But y'know their own monkey version of it. I imagine Macaque was the first to start it after something that stressed them both out, Wukong mostly, and it's just become a common thing now. I normally don't draw anything other than cutesy wholesome moments but even I realize these two have so much to work through emotionally and they've barely had time to even do that because they're emotionally hit with a bus just about every episode.

Honestly, me drawing the two will probably mainly stay on the wholesome side since it's just more comfortable for me to work with, but who knows there might be bits and pieces of the harder work they gotta go through to get there. I'd like to think they get there eventually though. --- Wowie hello- this took like a week to complete the first drawing and within that period the new episodes dropped and it also felt like I was emotionally hit by a bus. I started this with the intention of the first drawing after whatever events of the new episodes occurred but I've suddenly learned that this show has a very chaotic releasing every single time- I am so sorry for those who's had to experience it in the past- my god. I have seen the new episodes- Only not in English so I only could understand what I watched but man it was a lot-- I also have those non English episodes saved saved because I played this "Find the episodes" game when I started watching and had to hunt down the special for 4. Fun times. Regarding spoilers- I'll be drawing new art for the recent episodes of course- but won't post them for a good bit to be fair to those awaiting the English dub, one of those being one of my friends that follows me. I don't wanna spoil anything for them until then <3 Also might I add- this is the same friend who is probably the reason this took days to finish for dragging me to play modded minecraft with them daily,,, Anyway, I'll be trying to branch out and draw the other characters in meantime so I'll see you then!

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA if I reminded a friend he owes me money?

@aitathrowaway321 for finding later

I (20s, they/them) lent a friend Johnny (fake name. 20s, he/him) about $300 for rent about a year and a half ago. He was panicking because he'd bought a small tattoo that week, and had thought he'd budgeted for rent, but realized he forgot about another bill.

I'd once not had enough for rent and a friend who wasn't well off, without me asking, had offered to lend me the money for rent. It had been an incredibly kind act, and though I'd paid that friend back a few months later the first second I could, I've always remembered it. So I offered to do the same to Johnny (who knew this story) as a sort of pay-it-forward and that he could just pay me back when he was able, no rush at all. I also at the time had an okay job where I made enough to be able to do this, and Johnny's job was pretty awful.

Johnny was very thankful and agreed. At first, he'd bring up the debt a lot himself (I would never bring it up) and continually promise to pay it when he could, to which I'd be like - just as soon as you comfortably can, don't stress! And he mentioned it A LOT. Multiple times every single time I saw him at first. But eventually he stopped mentioning it entirely.

The two of us had this in-joke, and Johnny realized he could buy something related to the in-joke. He swore he'd buy it for me as a birthday gift (I didn't ask) and it would be so much fun, very soon after I lent him money. It would have been a nice gift, but it would've cost at least $200. In my head I decided that if he decided to get me the gift instead of paying me back I'd be happy either way, bc it's nice to be thought of. All I said aloud was that it would be a lot of fun, and it was a very kind thought from him. He would then regularly bring up buying me this gift for months. Then my birthday passed and I didn't get anything at all from him. Which was fine, I didn't ask for gifts! But then he stopped bringing up buying me anything OR paying back the money.

Now it's been almost a year and a half, and he seems to have entirely forgotten he ever owed me. I wouldn't mind so much - times are hard! - and it's not like I'm going to be angry if someone is spending money on nice dinners and pretty clothes instead of saving up for a no-deadline debt to a friend. People need to have nice things to get through life. But he keeps getting new tattoos and piercings (we go to the same parlor, I know they're pricey) and he recently planned and went on a big trip with a friend. It's not as if he hasn't had the ability to pay me back in the last few years. I also got laid off from my job, and $300 is a lot more to me than it used to be.

It's not so much that I want the money back as it is that I'm hurt he spent so much time talking big about paying me, and then when enough time had passed just dropped it entirely. I've had an issue in the past when after I got an okay job, suddenly people who had ghosted me were begging me for money (didn't know my salary but just assumed bc of the job title). And having been in awful situations, I tried to help where I could anyway, but then after getting the money they'd ghost me again. Johnny hasn't ghosted me, but he seems to have decided not to pay me back and pretend it never happened.

We have an event coming up where people will be paying for things and everyone else will be paying them back immediately - just bc it's easier to do things like buy tickets all at once and then pass them out, and easier for a restaurant to have one bill and then people venmo each other after. I was considering having Johnny pay and then tell him he can take it out of his debt to me.

I'm unsure if this is passive aggressive and rude, or if it's a good way to gently remind him he owes me without being a jerk about money - if he is still just struggling financially and hasn't forgotten, I don't want to rub anything in or make him stressed. I don't want money to ruin a friendship, but I'm feeling hurt.

[twoa-plus]

dissecting stanford pines and finding organs that don’t exist but like in a metaphorical way

that’s it that’s the title i’m going with. this is a long one folks o7

most of this isn’t sourced or canon at all it’s just personal interpretation/headcanon/whatever else u wanna call it, but!! since more people are seeing my deranged gravity falls ramblings now i figure i should probably give some perspective as to why i like/defend ford as much as i do

(in my other gf posts i do try to stick to canon to back up whatever point i’m making - this is just about my personal opinion of ford as a character, and should be able to be thrown out in regards to my other posts)

so for some background/setup/whatever (it’s important i promise bear with me), different people have different instinctual responses to anxiety/stress. i come from a family (genetics are fun) where the default response is to start (metaphorically ofc) biting and hissing like a cornered animal. this doesn’t necessarily mean there’s any actual hatred or malice or anything towards the people that end up getting scratched - they might just be at the wrong place at the wrong time, they might’ve done something super minor and insignificant that added on to a preexisting pile of stress, etc etc

i cannot stress enough that i am not saying this is ok. you dont need me to tell you that hurting people who don’t deserve it is a bad thing, lol. what i am saying though is that sometimes people can kind of suck for reasons other than just genuinely wanting everyone around them to be miserable

this is the last “background” part i swear BUT another thing thats less genetic and more just me being weird is that i’m the type of person where like. any minor environmental change can really stress me out lol. like even just reorganizing my desk can be pretty emotionally taxing

SO. finally back on topic. stanford pines. i see a lot of the behavior/patterns i just described in him. like i’ve spent my entire life around people like this, and while i understand why a lot of people see him as just some asshole, i can’t help but see him as a guy who’s just kinda going through it lol

just talking about the more recent events as of the series, he’s just spent 30 years god knows where doing and seeing god knows what, he has an abusive ex who wants to murder him and his entire family (plus the whole dimension, really), and in the three decades he’s been gone the entire world - including his own house - has changed and left him behind. add onto that that he went missing in 1982, way before we had all of the emotional/mental health resources we have now, we all saw what the stans’ childhood was like, and that ford is terrible with people - including, imo, himself. if there’s anybody out there who would have Feelings and not understand what they are or where they’re coming from or what to do about them, it’s this guy

this entire setup is the perfect circumstance for fear and anxiety and stress and uncertainty to all get translated into anger. a really big example of this, to me, is how he talks about dipper in journal 3. i’ve talked about this before somewhere so i’ll try to summarize as fast as i can lol

reading his initial entry about dipper would make u think he like. hates this kid lol. but i really don’t think he ever did - he was really excited to meet the kids in the show and already seemed to care about them just by virtue of existing, and his opinion on dipper in journal 3 seems to do a complete 180 pretty quickly which ,,, doesn’t really fit ford as a character. like i love the man but that guy can hold a GRUDGE

here’s how it reads to me:

ford gets back to his home dimension after 30 years and everything is different

he’s subconsciously kind of struggling with the fact that he doesn’t really have a “home” anymore - the sense of familiarity and comfort that would normally come with the word is gone. (i specify that it’s subconscious because, like i said earlier, i do not get the vibe that he’s particularly aware of his own emotions)

he finds out that journal 3 - something he made with his own two hands and considers part of his life’s work - has also changed in the decades he’s been gone. this adds to the feeling of unfamiliarity with the world around him

it’s easier to blame that “final straw” and say that he’s just upset about his work being tampered with rather than address the actual root of the problem, so that’s exactly what he does. this still doesn’t mean that there’s any genuine hatred towards dipper. anger in the moment, yeah, but not hatred

again, this is entirely personal interpretation, and i completely understand if u don’t see it like this!! this is just a pattern of thoughts/behavior that i’m very familiar with, so it’s easy for me to apply it to situations like this even if it’s not really part of the canon

i also think there’s a big problem in this fandom with just ,, not seeing ford as a Person with Emotions? idk how to explain it but it feels like people expect him to always know exactly what to do in every situation just bc he’s old and academically smart. like whenever another character does something objectively bad it’s “well there were extenuating circumstances,” (which is usually true and i agree !!) but ford never really seems to get that treatment. if he does something bad it’s just because he sucks

a big example of this i think is the fight between him and stan (y’know the “you ruined my life”/“you ruined your own life”). you cannot look me dead in the eyes and, in full seriousness, with the context of everything ford was going through with bill at the time, say that he was fully mentally/emotionally stable during that conversation. “oh so you’re blaming stan-“ NO!!! stan was also going through it!!! that’s the entire point - they’re both people with their own lives and emotions and everything else that comes with that, they had very human reactions to their respective situations, and they both ended up hurt!! hopefully i’m explaining this right but i just don’t like it when people pin everything on ford, like there was a lot going on and at the end of the day he’s just a human

wasn’t really sure how to work this in so i’ll just put it here - i don’t think ford ever truly hated stan, either. familial bonds are complicated, and there can be a whole lot of anger towards someone without true hatred being present. i briefly mentioned the stans’ childhood sucking earlier, and i don’t just mean stanley - it’s easier to pinpoint him as a victim of abuse/neglect, but that doesn’t mean ford had it great either. their parents (specifically filbrick, but caryn didn’t exactly do a fantastic job with them either) expected nothing of stan and the world of ford, both of which would weigh heavily on any child. plus, ford being the favorite doesn’t mean all of his emotional needs were met - filbrick seeing him as an opportunity to make money doesn’t mean he was suddenly an emotionally present and caring father towards him. WCT wasn’t just an opportunity for ford to go be a famous scientist or whatever - it was a chance for his father to love him, something both of the stans desperately wanted. (WCT was also on the opposite side of the country from where they lived but i’m sure that’s completely unrelated !!!)

do i think stan deserved anything that happened to him after the science fair incident? no, absolutely not, he was a child. do i think it was right of ford to just stand there as his brother got thrown out? no, absolutely not - but he was a child too. as for them not speaking for a decade after that, like i mentioned earlier ford can hold a grudge like no other. (this doesn’t just apply to stan, either, ford dedicated half of his life to trying to kill his ex lmao.) i think ford’s ability to hold on to anger like that is actually a pretty major part of/flaw in his personality, but again, anger - even the strongest, most long-lived of it - is not synonymous with hatred. stan, who ford has always gone to for help when he truly needed it, it not what ford’s hatred looks like. bill, who ford actively wants to die, is

anyways!! i never know how to close these things lol. ig in summary i just see ford’s behavior (in the show at least) as more of a sign of internal struggle rather than like ,, genuinely hating the people around him and wanting their lives to suck. did/does he have an ego problem? absolutely. is he incapable of love and human connection? no. is he immune to manipulation/abuse/neglect/etc and everything that comes with that? also no

he’s an interdimensional criminal why can’t he go to the theraprism. i think he should

[nyaagolor]

More Team Star headcanons that I’ve been thinking abt recently

Giacomo really took advantage of the STCs, perhaps more than anyone else in Team Star. The audience and academy permission really brought out the event-planner in him, so he often runs open-invite socials for the academy at the various STCs— always DJd by him, of course!

Mela has a lot of anger issues to deal with, but her favorite way of letting loose is to invite her friends to go egg throwing with her. She goes to the supermarket to buy the cheapest eggs she can find, hikes into the woods, and lobs the eggs at trees while ranting her frustrations. It's a non-destructive stress reliever and a good bonding exercise

Atticus would tear shit UP at a Renn Faire. He brings all his friends there and asks them to be in character, and they actually end up having a lot of fun! Atticus is absolutely THRILLED that people are engaging in his interests, and seeing all the admins inspires more team star members to join them. Now Atticus, Youssef, and a handful of grunts travel to different renn faires and historical conventions to geek out about stuff

Ortega and Tyme have a borderline rivalry because Ortega is really good at math but he's also a little shit. He absolutely antagonizes Tyme because he kinda wants to find this kind old woman's limit. He's gettin Real Close, but she will not crack under the pressure. He may be the world's most annoying 12 year old-- but she grew up with a sister

Eri began a yearly tradition called the Caph Caterwaul where for one day during finals week, everyone in Team Star (and the academy if they so choose) takes a hike into the mountains to scream at the top of their lungs for one minute at the stroke of midnight. The teachers found out about it and HAPPILY joined in the opportunity to scream into the night on company time

Penny, by virtue of being a cybersecurity expert, has a fursona. Team Star found out. Now THEY have fursonas. Taking suggestions as to what they would be bc i'm not sure atm

[fort-incest-is-bad]

Welcome to Fort Incest Is Bad(TM)!

Come in! Grab a blanket and some pillows and cuddle up with a snack!

This was made to be a DRAMA-FREE safe space for the victims of the big blogs, the gore anons, the people on the “exposure document” list, and those who have made their main blogs a safe space for these victims! The friends of these people are welcome, too :)

Of course, since this is a safe space, there needs to be some rules:

No bad-mouthing each other. We’ve all been through shit here and no one deserves more stress.

I would prefer to keep drama away from this blog, as it’s not healthy to be drowned in the situation everywhere.

the only exception to the rule above is if you need to vent and have nowhere else to go. Otherwise @sams-venting is available :)

any type of content other than incest, pedophilia, or anything NSFW is welcome! It does not have to be exclusively tsams related.

This blog is supposed to be a safe space without drama, but if you feel uncomfortable here, feel free to block this blog. No one will blame you.

Unless you need to vent here specifically, the names Alex, Dana, Twin/Ceph, Bruja/Witchy, Z, E.C./Reed, Davis, and Kat are not allowed to be mentioned here.

Support of the big blogs, the “exposure document”, or the idea that the gore anons are fake will end in blocking. On both here and my main.

After recent events, the names Choco/Garbagechocolate and Meg/Ayyy-Imma-Ninja are banned from this blog. Again, venting to this blog when necessary is an exception.

Just chill and have fun! There will be no judgement here :)

As of 10/17/24, mentions of the blog @/a-voice-for-the-victims is PROHIBITED. The exception is when you need to vent, as the mod of the venting blog is only comfortable talking about it through DMs

If anyone wants to add something else, feel free to reblog! Have fun in the IKEA fort!

— Mod Bitty

[wayfayrr]

You don’t have to do this one if it’s too much!! I just simp for twi and time so hard but I don’t wanna overwhelm you, please take breaks!! Ily :’DD

Soft fruit cake w eggnog to eat in?

I hope you'll enjoy your order this evening ~

Time is one of the links I'm less confident with writing, but he's still so much fun. He's a bit of a blushy dork in this one for you. <3

[Event masterlist]

“It's kinda comforting to know that Hyrule has the same traditions as home. Some of them anyway.”

Time isn’t focused on it, it seems off for him to be acting like this, unless he was lying to me? what reason would he have to lie about something so harmless though… it’s just gifts. Why would he ever need to lie as something as a tradition?  

“You don’t actually have it as a tradition, do you?” 

“What, no, we do. It’s part of the winter festival here.”

“Why do you feel the need to lie over something so small?”

Red illuminates his face at that, whatever has him so embarrassed over being called out for this? It’s so different from his usual stoic self too, not a bad change, just a sudden one. It makes me want to pry into what’s causing this even more than if he did manage to keep his cool.

“You seemed so excited when talking about it. I just wanted to do it for you.”

“But why lie, why not just be honest and just do it as a new thing?”

The red grows from his cheeks to the tips of his ears now, this new bashful side only becoming more appealing the more of it I get to see. Still though, it’s such a childish thing to get so flustered over. Like he’s a little kid rather than one of the oldest links here, not even able to make eye contact with me anymore. 

“Well, never mind that. It doesn’t change the fact that we’ve both gotten each other a gift right?”

“I'd still like to know why you didn’t just admit it’s not commonly done.”

“You were so- hmph.”

He’s close to cracking on the reason why he’s lying about all all of this to begin with, if I push it a little more he’ll spill I can bet. I don’t even really mind what it is, it’s only sheer curiosity making me want to learn now. What reason is enough to lie over something so small for so long?

“Time - link please, I’m not bothered or anything, I just wanna know.”

“You just seemed so excited talking about your home and I know you’ve been homesick… So I just… Wanted to make you more comfortable.”

That’s it? I can’t deny that it’s not a sweet reason, it does feel very childish though, it really is like he’s just some love struck teen. If I were to close my eyes and focus… I could probably see his young adult self still dressed in that forest green.

“While I appreciate it, you really didn’t need to go that far for something so simple. I’m honoured though… If we’re not following strict traditions though… why not just give each other gifts now?”

“That wouldn’t bother you? I thought christmas day was what you said was important.”

“The thought of it is what counts above everything else, besides if you’re so worried about the day, I don’t know if it’s passed or not back home.”

The blush is slowly fading now, his fluster dying down till he looks more like his familiar lightly stoic self. Finally moving to sit down next to me rather than over at the opposite side avoiding looking at me but not before picking up his bag. Setting himself down with a sigh and a hand running through his hair. Hyping himself up by the look of it, it makes a lot of sense why he’s so nervous now that I know it’s his first time doing anything like this. I can probably take some of that stress away by simply giving him his first, hopefully, then he’ll feel less pressure. 

“Here, I got this for you at the recent village -”

His surprise is cute, I knew it’d be worth it to hand-decorate some paper to wrap it with. Even though it’s torn in a matter of seconds, anything is worth it for him.

“I saw how you were looking at it for ages - don’t worry I brought it myself and not out of the supply fund. Do you like it?”

“You… I didn’t expect it… it was so expensive.”

So getting him a cloak and the armour polish he was staring at longingly was the right idea. Wiping my savings might not have been as good, but I can earn it back fairly quickly if the others are still as bad with bets. He’s blushing a little as he passes me two neatly wrapped parcels.

“This is for you then I hope you’ll like it as much as I did.”

My breath catches in my throat as I unwrapped the first, and I’m greeted with the most beautiful leather-bound sketchbook. A quick glance at him as he gestures for me to open the other. These art supplies must have cost him so much, watercolours here are rare, all of these charcoal pencils too.

“Time you -”

“You said you missed drawing, that you wanted your own supplies. So when I saw them I knew they would be perfect… you do like them right?”

“I love them… than you so much link.”

It’s a bit of a struggle to stop myself from tearing up from how kind it was, thankfully he seems to have taken pity on me now as he cuddles up with me next to the fire. Moving me to lay against his side as we watched it crackle late into the night.

[bad-traffic-smp-ideas]

Welcome to Bad Traffic SMP Ideas, an experimental gimmick blog with a twist!

Hello! Instead of showcasing the many good ideas this community has come up with, this blog highlights all the "bad" ideas created with our beloved smps in mind.

I, the Head Watcher, will be your guide on this journey through the wonderfully horrific concepts I've collected for future traffic series smps. Enjoy your trip! ^^

[QnA + tag system + more below the cut!]

What is a "bad idea?"

It's whatever you want it to be! The "[blank] Life, but _" format works really well for series concepts as a whole, but "bad headcanons" are welcome too! Go wild, friends <3

"Someone already sent in my same idea! Can I submit it again?"

Sure!! Most of the time, I won't even realize it's been said before. This blog has been going for so long now and I have bigger priorities, I won't penalize you for sending in a "repeat" ask :)

(There is also the #additions tag for adding onto specific ideas, although it isn't used very consistently. If you would like your ask to be added to a previous post instead, just ask!)

"What does the queue look like for this blog?"

Currently, it posts once per day, and there's usually ~100 posts in the backlog waiting to be posted.

For complicated personal reasons (but mostly me being a busy uni student), that most likely won't be changing anytime soon. I don't get around to stocking this blog very often and I would rather have it be slow and consistent than have random bursts of activity then silence. I know this is frustrating for people, but this is my personal passion project, and I don't want to needlessly stress myself out over something I started for fun :)

"I sent in my idea two months ago! Where is it?!"

Probably still in the askbox! Very rarely do I actually delete asks, I promise I don't cherrypick the ideas I like and discard the rest. But since I know the wait is frustrating, this is my policy to deal with it:

If you've sent in an idea and it hasn't posted yet, you can send me an ask describing your idea and ask to have it moved up in the queue. You can also send in a separate ask when submitting an idea if you want to have it posted sooner rather than later.

(If your idea is connected to recent events in smps, etc it will most likely be moved up anyway so it posts while still "relevant," although this is somewhat limited to my familiarity with the event. It never hurts to ask!)

"Wait, this blog has a TV Tropes page?!"

APPARENTLY. I didn't make it, but I'm a HUGE fan of it, and it's probably more organized than my actual blog. Go check it out, I'm famous guys <3

Housekeeping + Rules:

Mostly common sense things + be a decent person, etc. This isn't a place for discourse, so please leave that elsewhere. There haven't been any serious issues, but if there ever are I'll create a more cohesive list of rules.

Admin Info:

You can call me Pho! I saw the @/badmccideas blog and got inspired to make this around the end of Last Life in November 2021. My main is @phosphorus-noodles :)

Currently, I'm the sole mod running this blog. This may change in the future, but please don't ask to join the team unless I ask for more help! This project is my baby, and I'm very protective over it ^^'

Tagging System:

#bad traffic idea - catch-all tag for bad ideas

#bad headcanon - specifically for headcanons, not concepts (not consistently used, so if you can't find a headcanon tagged with this it's probably under the previous tag)

#not a bad idea - anything that's not a bad idea (announcements, admin notes, reblogs, etc.)

#good idea - personal favorite submissions <3

#admin - posts from yours truly :)

#ask - ideas sent in via ask

#submission - ideas submitted

#reblog - anything reblogged

#additions - inconsistently used, but meant for building upon existing specific ideas

#life series predictions - used whenever there's a new season on the horizon to try to predict where apollo's dodgeball will fall

#blog lore - mostly for fun, not that serious or consistent lol, feel free to filter this tag or join in with the fun! :)

If you've made it to the end of this post, congrats! I love you <3

[bellestarot]

Taylor Swift & Travis Kelce Reading

August 06, 2024

Right Now

I think that recently they have been facing some disapproval about something. He feels that maybe he sounded too harsh in the way he responded or expressed his opinion about something, and he has been feeling stressed because of a comment he made recently.

They have been having a lot of fun together; I think Taylor feels very young with him, as if they were teenagers. This has reflected strongly in their relationship because their bond has been growing stronger every day. It seems that with him, it's always fun; it's never boring to go out and enjoy themselves.

One of them feels that they expect too much; it's like the other person never has enough time for them to be together. Both he and she are very busy people, so it can be understood that maybe they both feel this way, as if their work occasionally hinders the relationship.

Taylor feelings towards Travis

He makes her question sometimes whether they could start a family together. This thought crosses her mind occasionally, and I see that she is a bit indecisive about it because Taylor values her freedom a lot and loves traveling to other places. So, she is unsure if she would ever step out of the spotlight and leave her life on stage to take care of a child.

But she doesn’t want to marry him. I don't see this as something she considers doing because she really doesn’t believe that if they got married, it would last. She thinks that if it happened, a divorce would come quickly. So yes, she considers having a child with him, but maybe not as something planned, more like something that just happens, rather than a planned event and a marriage.

I think she is considering breaking up with him.

Because she wants to be free.

She somehow feels trapped being with him, and she wants to explore everything she can while she is still alive.

Because she loves her work a lot, she puts her career first, so it’s as if there is no room for love because she already has music. She already has the fans, and I think she lives for her art.

And to be honest, she doesn’t give any hints that she wants to break up with him anytime soon. In reality, she’s been keeping it to herself, so she can just spring it on him at some point.

And she feels like she’s living a lie in some parts.

Because maybe in the beginning, it made more sense for them to be together, maybe because they matched better or there was a more adventurous and unknown energy, but now it’s as if she’s seen it all.

Travis feelings towards Taylor

Travis feels that with her, he can be more himself, as if she takes him out of his shell or breaks down some of the walls he’s built over the years because of his profession or something like that, and she’s managed to access a very real side of him.

Travis has a very playful personality, but he actually loves learning new things and enjoys talking about interesting subjects, and Taylor brings out that side of him quite a bit.

This makes him feel more comfortable in his own skin.

He feels that he can talk to her about everything, and he thinks she is very intelligent.

Every time he talks to her, something new opens up. Maybe she has very reflective thoughts and impactful statements that really surprise him with a side that many people might not know about Taylor, and this makes him even more intrigued to get to know her better and talk to her. I think he really likes talking to her on the phone as well, but he prefers to do it in person.

He notices that after meeting her, he earned a lot more money. It’s like he hit the jackpot, and he got the grand prize because he gained more attention in sports. He got more attention on television, and people started to know more about him, so he appreciates that materialistic side after meeting Taylor.

He certainly talked to her about marriage, and he probably heard something he didn’t want to hear because, as I mentioned, it’s not something she considers, maybe not with him, and that made him a little hurt. But it was more because the idea of the two of them together might not move forward in terms of fame and money.

Near future to them

I don’t see this relationship lasting in the future. In fact, I see both of them going through new experiences. I think Travis will achieve something great, maybe in his career or a financial opportunity that will bring him a lot of happiness.

Meanwhile, I see Taylor going through a spiritual process, maybe an awakening where she will gradually let go of her addictions. This doesn’t have to be related to drugs; it could be related to overworking. Repetitive habits she has—something in her routine will change, and she will be pushed to go through this awakening.

I see one of them still clinging to this relationship. Perhaps after the breakup, it will still be difficult to move on or truly forget, while the other person will be emotionally fine with it and enjoying life to the fullest.

So, I don’t see either of them suffering from this relationship, really. I see both of them moving on. I think Taylor will get over it in a very positive way, and she will continue making music after this breakup, maybe through stage performances.

Even with the breakup, they don’t fight. They seem to be okay with each other. So, it’s not going to be a chaotic breakup, but I also don’t see them being friends afterward, hanging out together, because someone will feel that the way it ended wasn’t fair.

[v3nusxsky]

Lunch date

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*A/n~ i was going to write NSFW with this prompt however the fluff works best here it is coming tho. A new story will be released soon ;) this is a bonus chapter I will still update later and for todays fun fact ironically this was written while I was eating cookies*

TW~ eating d!sorder

Prompt~ sleepy fluff just fluff fluff fluff please (I'm going to very loosely continue the one shot body image in this one. So if you read that one shot this one will make more sense, however it can be read alone)

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

Since that night in your room, Larissa made every effort to ensure you were getting the correct amount of food. She was gentle but persistent on the subject which eventually broke down your walls. Any information you offered about your eating disorder was eagerly listened to and stored in her brain so she could find the best ways to help you. So when you revelled that you often skipped meals if you were alone due to the fear of eating more than everyone else, well the only logical solution was to have lunch together. These lunch dates were a routine that you grew to look forward too. On the good days, company was amazing and you felt good just sitting in silence, enjoying her company and eating. On the bad days you would sit and anxiously watch how many bites Larissa had compared to yours, picking at your own food and pushing it round the plate. Those days you'd struggle only to be met with comforting words and reassuring touches to your arms or knees. Never in your life had anyone put this much effort into ensuring you ate and were well. It was an odd feeling but not one that wasn't welcomed. Over time Larissa learned your safe foods, and the foods that you couldn't even look at without panicking. When Larissa started to make you both foods that you'd not longer ate out of fear or just foods you'd been too scared to try, you became aware of the part of her desk that had your safe foods safely tucked away in.

The impossibly loud bell rang out as you were mid way through a sentence, signalling lunch was here. Today was definitely a bad day for you, and as the students fled the room to go and have a well earned lunch you debated not going to Larissa. You'd had bad days before which she had dealt with beautifully as always. But this was different. You knew the principal was stressed with the recent events at Nevermore and the last thing you wanted was for your bad day to burden her. In an attempt to protect Larissa, you settled at your desk ready to work through the lunch break. Your lesson plans would provide an excellent distraction from the guilt that was gnarring at your stomach. You felt worse by not going. But it was for the best. Right?

Wrong. Oh how you were wrong. Larissa anxiously waited for you assuming you'd just ran over into lunch. You'd be there soon right? You'd never missed lunch with her since that night. The halls went quiet as the students settled in for lunch and still there was no you. Larissa couldn't explain the feeling but somehow she knew. Something was wrong. And that's what lead her to your classroom. Peering through the little glass window she was met with the sight of you hunched over your desk scribbling notes. With a small sigh she knocked on the door watching as you jumped straight of of the chair in shock. Making her way to you she could see that you were fighting and internal battle here.

"Y/n? Are you quite alright? I was worried when you didn't come to my office like normal dear." Her gaze was unwavering as she observed your reaction and behaviours. She was pretty good at depicting the bad days from the good based on your body language alone. Today was most definitely a bad day. You looked tired, shoulders slouching ever so slightly and your delicate arms wrapped around your middle as if you were holding yourself up. All things easily missed if she were anyone else but herself.

"I-I I'm sorry I just it's bad today and you have so much going on I don't want to make you deal with me I'm sorry I didn't want to worry you I just I can't add more to your already full schedule." You rushed out the panic evident in your tone as you dropped your head down in guilt. You only wanted to take something off her plate. After all she wasn't required to help you at all. The relationship you and Larissa had engaged in was growing more than a boss and employee and maybe even more than friends at this point. This terrified you. How could anyone want to be with you? Negative thoughts continued to swirl round your head in a never ending cycle causing you to miss the reply to your rushed statement.

"Are you still with me little one?" She hummed out eyes softening as she could see you were heading well on your way to a panic and anxiety attack all in one."y/n? Can I touch you please? I'd very much like to take this to my office. It's a lot more private there dear."

You found yourself nodding watching as she took your hand in hers and held it tightly. She motioned to the door as an incentive for you to come with her, however your body was stiff. Her office meant food. You knew that. You really didn't need lunch. She really didn't need to concern herself with this. It was the arm coming round your shoulders guiding you to the door that broke your thoughts. Soon enough you were sat in the office seeing the usual set up of your lunch dates.  Panic and guilt made themselves present again. Larissa had gone through a lot of effort and you didn't even show. Tears silently trailed over your cheeks. Why couldn't you just be normal?

Soft pads of the older women's thumbs brushed the tears from your cheeks and she spoke in the sweetest voice it may as well have been angel Gabriel speaking. "Little one, it's okay. I'm not mad. Try to ignore the food for the minute and focus on my voice okay? I'm here. I'm not mad. And I'm not leaving you okay? "

This invoked a small nod as you tried to do just that. Focusing your gaze onto her beautiful sky blue eyes. You could get lost in those easily. The lighter shades mixing with the slightly darker shades swirling together creating its own unique shade that was hers and hers only. They say eyes are the windows to the soul and now sat here like this you could confirm it's accuracy. The women sat in front of you was pure of heart and soul and you could see that in her gentle gaze. Without realising you seemed to have calmed yourself right back down before the attack could reach its full height. The gentle strokes of her thumbs on your cheeks had helped greatly.

"That's it good girl. It's going to be okay.  Now do you think you'd like to try what I prepared today?" She questioned you the tone of her voice letting you know you could say no. It was completely up to you. The small nod she received caused her to smile and lead you to where the food was set up. "Little one how many? 3?"

You paused assessing the situation of the food in front of you. They were quite small and looked inviting. How many calories- no no no you wouldn't do this. You were going to be okay. Larissa is here and wouldn't give you more than you needed. You're safe. The next sentence you mumbled shocked yourself and the older women briefly.

"I uh um can I have four?" You whimpered quietly. What had you just done? Oh god. The panic began to rise but being vanquished when you saw the beautiful eyes light up and respond "you can have five little one"

"I only want four" you replied with your voice shaking

"Okay" her voice would solve world wars one day you swear it.

"Okay" you whimpered back watching as she plated your plate before doing the exact same for herself. Knowing this was a big step for you. Especially on a bad day. She was so proud of you, you could practically feel it radiating round the room.

You struggled carefully watching Larissa in a comfortable silence. Her smile was magnificent as she saw the empty plate. Immediately coming round to you and gathering you in her arms.

"Oh my darling girl, you did it. You did amazingly. I know that was hard for you but I'm so proud of you. Such a good girl for me hmm?"she whispered into your hair before absentmindedly placing a kiss to the crown of your head. The bell rang in the distance and it was then that you were glad for planning periods.

You stayed in her embrace just soaking in the comfort she was offering up. "I'm sorry for not coming myself Rissa. I just don't want to burden you're already so busy and everything is so hectic I just didn't want to be extra work..." you trailed off the emotion was thick in your voice letting on just how badly you believed you were a burden.

"Darling, you're never a burden. When you love someone it's never extra work. You did amazingly today little one I'm so proud of you. Remember you never have to face the bad days alone I'll always be here with you."

"I-uh- you love? Me?" You stuttered out not quite sure you heard her right.

"I do yes. You're absolutely beautiful inside and out what's not to love?" Her admission causing tears to fall freely once more. "Oh little one don't cry it's okay you're okay come here." Her arms opened and on instinct you threw your tiny body into her strong arms. You choked back your tears as you whispered "I love you too Rissa" into her neck.

Maybe you we're flawed. You knew this would never go away. But maybe just maybe you could deal with it. As long as you had her.

Word count~ 1754

*A/n~ I never originally planned a sequel but I love how this one could flow from Body image. I hope you're all okay and remember my messages are always open to any of you struggling. Remember to look after yourselves dear readers. *sips water and continues to write more for you all*