#but waste an hour trying to get this email out to a client

[lilgynt]

worst day at this job is still leagues better than good day at my old place but lord all mighty this fucking place can give me a headache for hours on end

[steddieas-shegoes]

It’s been done in every which way but Eddie being in an accident of some kind that leaves him paralyzed, but his doctors believe he could walk again with intense physical therapy

He’s stubborn and absolutely hasn’t dealt with any of the trauma of the accident and takes it out on his physical therapist, Steve, who is used to patients being pretty angry about their situation

He always meets Eddie where he is though, tries to keep a smile on his face and joke when appropriate and even shares his cookies from his lunchbox with him

Eventually, Eddie starts making some progress, but instead of being happy about it, he panics and cancels all his PT appointments for the week

Steve tries calling, texting, emailing, doing everything he can to encourage him to keep going, but it all goes unanswered until Gareth, one of Eddie’s closest friends, calls him on Eddie’s phone

He’s depressed and he won’t get out of bed, he’s given up. He’s tired of being in pain and having to try to so hard just to move his damn legs a little

Steve isn’t usually this personal with clients, and tells Gareth he can’t discuss anything medical with him due to patient confidentiality, but insists he should try to drag him to the office the next day before it opens

And somehow, probably through guilt, Gareth manages to wheel a very sullen and grumpy Eddie into the side door entrance to the office at seven in the morning

Steve tells him to come back in an hour to pick him up and Eddie ignores the goodbye Gareth says to him

And Steve pretends nothing is wrong at all, goes through the usual temperature and blood pressure check, asks how he’s feeling and gets a grunt in response, asks if there’s any pain and gets an eye roll

But Eddie met his match in Steve because Steve then pushes him to the center of the workout room, where a large mat is out and a walker is set to the side

“What’s that?”

“Your walker.”

“I don’t need one seeing as I can’t fucking walk.”

“You are today.”

And Steve knows he’s pushing and he hates being pushy

But he knows what his clients are capable of, and he knows without a single doubt in his mind that Eddie is ready to use the walker for five to ten minute increments. He has the leg strength and the stubbornness, he just needs the belief in himself

“Do you want me to hurt myself worse?”

“Of course not. And if you get tired, the seat on the walker is right there. But you can walk and you will walk.”

“And if I call Gareth to come get me right now?”

“Then I don’t believe my services are of value to you anymore and I’ll wish you the best.”

It pained Steve to say it because he knew he was fucking good at what he did, maybe the best in town. His clients often had to wait for his availability to open for weeks or months at a time because of how many people were referred to him

But he said the right thing because Eddie huffed, groaned, and cursed under his breath before wheeling himself to the edge of the mat to hold onto the walker

He pulled himself up

His legs were shaking from not being used for the last few days more than the bare minimum, but his determination was clear

Steve slowly pulled the chair away as Eddie unlocked the brakes of the walker and glared at Steve as he took one step, then two

Sure, he was relying pretty heavily on the walker, maybe more than Steve would’ve liked to see, but he was moving

He made it across the mat and then locked the brakes, sat down on the pad on the walker, and gave a sarcastic grin to Steve

“Happy?”

“Are you?”

And maybe Eddie wasn’t ready to be asked that because he was suddenly sobbing, covering his face as tears flowed down his cheeks

Steve gave him a few seconds before moving to kneel in front of him, pulling his hands away

“You deserve to have your life back, Eddie. You’ve been lucky to have the chance to walk again. Let’s not waste it, okay?”

Eddie spent the rest of the session walking across the mat and taking breaks every two minutes or so

It was better than Steve even expected, but he reminded Eddie not to do too much at once

Eddie didn’t miss any more appointments with Steve, and every appointment, he seemed to be more charming and flirty, more like “the old Eddie” according to Gareth, who drove him most days

Steve never admitted it out loud, but he knew what he felt for Eddie was different from other clients. It felt more personal, and it felt like it could be more someday

When Eddie graduated to a cane, Steve’s services were officially no longer needed

And Eddie decided that he should probably take Steve out on a date

“Since I can walk and hold your hand now,” he winked.

Steve should say no, but he doesn’t

Because holding Eddie’s hand feels even more right as his boyfriend than it did as his physical therapist

[zorosimpclub]

late night at the office – Zoro NSFW

characters: zoro roronoa x fem!reader (he's your boss)

boss employee relationship, praising, degrading, light choking | smut | 18+ only – MDNI

word count: 5.5k

She glanced at the clock, it was 8PM and most if not all of her co-workers had gone home. She was assigned to this project by her boss, Zoro – the man was ruthless. He made her repeat her work if there was one small error. Sometimes even when there were 0 errors. That's how ruthless this man was. Today was no different, the client deadline was a few days away but he made her scrap her whole progress and start again.

Zoro sat in his office watching cameras his employees like a hawk, checking on each and every coworker he had. Until he looked at her, seeing her upset. His eyes narrowed and opened up his emails to write her one.

I need to see you in my office.

Minutes turned into hours until she received his email. She held her breath when she saw a small pop up flash on the corner of her laptop screen.

This can't be good, she thought. Sighing, she got up and made her way to his office, stopping right outside. She hesitated a little before finally mustering the courage to knock on it.

Zoro leaned back in his chair, checking through emails as he heard her footsteps outside his office.

“Come in.”

He looked up from his laptop, and fixed his gaze on her. He gestured to a small seat in front of his desk and waited for her to take a seat. She gulped slightly and sat down in the chair, she had no idea what to expect. Zoro was usually really hard to read and today was no different.

Zoro had folded his hands on his desk, looking at her with his sharp eyes. He didn’t waste any time – he didn’t believe in sugarcoating things and was a man of practicality.

”I see you work so hard yet you can’t seem to meet my expectations. I don’t know it your not trying hard enough or you’re just not good at your job."

She felt her lip quiver, he was harsh…there was no surprise there. She bit her bottom lip to fight herself from crying and waited for him to continue talking, knowing that he didn’t just call her into his office to just tell her that.

“I want this project done by the end of the week, I don’t want to hear any excuses. If you can’t get it done by the end of the week…you’re fired, is that understood?”

He wasn't really going to fire her, at most, he was planning to transfer her to another department. He didn't know why he was being such a dick to her...well, he did. Lately his bright eyed employee has been pissing him off. She keeps occupying his damn mind... that infectious smile of hers, her beautiful, innocent eyes...all of it. He didn't know how to feel and it was easier to get rid of her than just dealing with.

"I understand." She spoke up meekly, holding onto her composure so that she didn't burst out crying.

Zoro could see her eyes, they were filling with tears. For a brief moment, he almost felt bad for her. Almost. He let out a sigh and spoke softer whilst remaining stern.

“Good. You can leave but I want the first version of the draft first thing in the morning."

She gasped a little and looked at the clock in his office, "But Mr Zoro, it's 9PM now..."

She already knew what he'd say, it didn't matter because he was definitely going to ask her to pull an all nighter if necessary. It's not like he cared since he usually left the office quite late and in fact, this wasn't the first time she was working late. She wasn’t entirely sure that he had a life outside the office. He was the hardest worker she had ever met, always the last to leave but somehow the first to arrive.

Zoro's eyes locked onto hers.

“Do I need to repeat myself? I don’t care if you have to pull an all nighter here or at your house, as long as you submit the first draft tomorrow morning. That’s all I care about right now.”

At least she had the option to take her work home and work from there if needed. She stood up and excused herself, "Understood."

In the end she decided to finish as much as she could before leaving, she did work better here after all. She began typing away before she heard her co-worker Sanji settled down next to her briefly.

"Y/N my love, you're still here? I'm about to leave now, did you want me to give you a ride?" Sanji asked.

Zoro let out a soft groan as her placed his head against his palms, thoughts racing in his mind. He couldn’t take it. After she left his office, his heart pounded a little. He wanted to tell her that he wasn’t going to fire her and that he was harsh on her. He got up and walked out only to see Sanji next to her.

Zoro smirked a little sadistically, he knew what was going on with them. He wanted to hear Sanji ask her out and he wanted her to reject him. Again and again. He went to the water cooler to hear their conversation more clearly.

"Ah thanks Sanji but I don't think I'm leaving any time soon, I have this due tomorrow and it's much more peaceful here than home so I figured I'd stay until I get this done." She smiled softly at Sanji before typing away at her laptop.

Sanji huffed and leaned closer to her before whispering a joke in her ear, to which she giggled.

Zoro rolled his eyes as he heard Sanji’s whisper, hearing her giggle. His jaw clenched a little, he didn’t like her so close to another man, especially Sanji. It felt like he was so close to seeing her date this man, she’s too beautiful to be with someone like Sanji.

He drank some water, hearing Sanji make another remark, hearing her giggle again. He was getting jealous by the second.

He walked towards her desk and raised his brow at Sanji – he had always hated this man. Something about the way he spoke to her made him despise him.

"Why are you still here? Aren't you from the sales department?"

Sanji let out a chuckle, seeing Zoro walk towards his desk. A smug face on Sanji, as he spoke.

“Ah, yeah I’m in the sales department. I was just here for a client, I just happened to see her beautiful face and decided to visit.”

Zoro rolled his eyes again, he knew he was trying to make a move on her. Anyone with eyes could see how desperate he was towards her.

Zoro was furious but kept his calm, tone stern. "Yeah? Well she has something due in the morning so why don't you just leave instead of slowing her down?”

Sanji gave him a playful grin, his eyebrows raised.

“Wow! Mr. Zoro you are pretty protective of her, you should be careful otherwise someone might think you have a thing for your pretty little employee.”

Zoro's face got red as his fists clenched, he didn't like when people saw through him. He couldn't even respond to Sanji’s claims.

"Shut up." Zoro stormed off to his office, feeling a little embarrassed. Did that moron just practically confess for him?

Y/N blinked once. Twice. Thrice. What just happened? It all happened so fast. Why did Zoro get flustered like that?

She shook her head and sighed, "Anyway Sanji, I'm going to get back to work, please feel free to leave. Thanks for offering me to take home but I think I'll just get the late night bus back."

Zoro had his fists clenched, he wasn’t expecting Sanji to be so loud and put those words in her head. It made his blood boil in his veins as he slammed the door to his office with one hand. He sat at his desk, pushing his fingers through his hair. Why was his heart beating so fast? Why did he care so much about another man calling a woman beautiful? He didn’t know. He shook his head, this was getting ridiculous.

Time went on as he heard Sanji leave, the office became silent. It was all him and her.

Zoro couldn’t stand it, he watched from his desk. Seeing her stretch and hearing her tired yawns. Something in him got him to stand up and walk over to her desk. He towered over her.

“Its late, you should go home. You look tired.”

"But I haven't finished yet. I work better here." She shot him a soft smile and continued typing, feeling awkward that he was just standing there. She sensed some tension – what type of tension, she wasn’t sure quite yet.

With him, it was a mixed bag. He has been really kind to her but in a professional, stern way. But he’s also straight up been a dick to her, she wasn’t sure what to think.

He let out a sigh, his attention locked onto her soft smile, he couldn’t look away…it’s like he was mesmerised.

“I know I gave you that deadline earlier but I’ll give you more time. Just leave and get some rest, you need it.”

She perked up a little, "Thanks but I think I can finish up in a couple of hours..." It was obvious that he felt bad, he always does and she was grateful that he showed care for her. But she really wanted to prove to him and herself that she wasn't just going take the easy route.

He stayed silent, watching her type away on her keyboard. He felt like time was going incredibly slow, watching her fingers type. His eyes roamed from her hands to her face, back to her hands then back to her face. His face only got redder at the sight, damned feelings he thought.

–

He left the office and grabbed both of them some takeout before returning – he convinced himself that he would do this for any employee and that it was just him fulfilling his duty as a boss. He pushed open his office door with his shoulder and placed the takeout on his desk.

He should email her to come have dinner since it seems that she hadn't already had it.

After hesitating for the tenth time, Zoro opened his email and wrote to her.

I need to see you in my office.

He wasn't going to tell her that he got takeout, she probably wouldn't come if he did.

She sighed and got up as soon as she saw the email pop up in the corner of her screen. Walking over to his office, she rubbed her temples to prepare herself for whatever the man was about to throw at her.

Zoro watched her walk over to his office, the sight of her just walking over was enough to make him lose his mind.

The moment she walked in he gestured for her to sit down, he put the takeout in front of her. She had no idea the amount of willpower he was exerting to not just kiss her.

She raised a brow not knowing what he asked her here for, there's no way he called her in here because he got her food...right? Maybe he was going to eat in front of her knowing that she hadn’t had any dinner yet but he can’t be that cruel…right?

"You called sir?"

Zoro stayed silent, his heart pounded in his chest. What if she thinks it's inappropriate he bought her food? He felt like the air in the office got thicker as he looked at her. He spoke up with a firm tone, trying to get away from his thoughts.

"Eat."

She looked taken aback and looked at him as if he said the most incredulous thing ever, he was joking right? She didn't know what to say but on cue, her stomach grumbled. She had completely forgotten to eat dinner…

He watched her stomach grumbled, making him feel a little amused. His lips twitched, his eyes darted to the takeout and back to her, wanting her to eat. She hesitated for a bit and leaned in to grab part of her portion. He leaned back in his chair, not taking his eyes off her as she began eating.

His lips twitched into a little smile watching her eat, she looked so cute eating. Hell, she looked cute doing anything he thought. Zoro reached for his food and started to eat, his gaze never leaving her form. She ate nervously in silence, the food was good but she didn't know how to take this. Maybe he just felt bad for barking at her earlier.

His gaze was fixated on her eyes, occasionally his stare would wander to her lips as she chewed. Her nervous look only made her all the more gorgeous to his eyes.

He knew she wasn't aware of how attracted he was to her, to be fair, he didn’t know how attracted he was to her until it was just them alone. It was getting harder for him to hide it, every time he looked at her he wanted nothing more than to hold her close to him.

Everything was fine until she bit into the hotdog, causing the sauce to squirt on her cleavage. She panicked and wiped it off with her finger before licking it clean.

Zoro almost bit the side of his mouth as he saw her. She was eating the hotdog so innocently. He nearly lost it when the sauce made contact with her cleavage.

The sight of her innocently licking the sauce up with her tongue was enough for him to want to pin her to the wall and kiss her. But he snapped back to reality, he quickly cleared his mind and coughed a little.

"Thank you for the food." She squeaked, breaking the awkward silence that had built up.

Zoro let out a small chuckle. He looked at what she was wearing and had an inappropriate thought that he immediately pushed away.

“You’re welcome, you still have sauce on you,” He pointed to a spot of sauce on her cleavage that she had missed.

Y/N squealed a little and got flustered as she looked down to the sauce. Zoro got up and walked around his desk, sitting on it. He was directly in front of her now. She felt incredibly self conscious with the sauce still on her cleavage but for some reason she froze. She couldn’t move or say anything.

Zoro could feel himself getting more and more attracted to her. He watched as she seemed to freeze, it made him want to do something about it. He leaned forward, his face getting closer to hers.

“M-Mr Zoro?”

Zoro smirked a little at her squeaky voice. She looked so adorable right now, it made him want to close the gap between them.

“You’re so adorable...” He whispered leaning forward even more, his face inches away from hers.

She was shocked, this is so unexpected. Was she so tired that she was hallucinating?

“Y/N…" He called name her softly. He took a deep breath, his gaze never leaving hers. He couldn't help but think about how badly he wanted to kiss her right now.

She closed her eyes, feeling his warm breath on her lips. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t think of him late at night, as harsh as the man was on her, he was often the object of her fantasies. In fact, she’d moaned his name as she pleasured herself countless times.

Zoro couldn't take it anymore, his eyes burning with desire. He couldn't resist any more, he leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the lips. It was more of a teasing kiss than anything else, but it she felt intense sparks.

The soft moan from her only fueled Zoro's passion. He deepened the kiss, his hands gently holding her face. He could feel her trembling against him, and it only made him want more.

He broke the kiss and dipped his head to her chest only to lick the sauce off without breaking eye contact. She gasped at the sight and tightened her grip on her chair. She wanted to touch him but she was too afraid to, she didn’t know how to approach the situation. Zoro pulled back slightly, his eyes twinkling with lust as he looked at her. He could feel the tension in the air, the desire radiating off of them both.

He couldn't help but chuckle softly, "You taste even better than I imagined.”

“Y-you’ve imagined tasting me?” She blushed deeply and locked her gaze onto his eyes.

“Well, you are pretty irresistible."

Zoro teased, his gaze never leaving hers. He wanted her, there was no denying it. He reached out and gently traced his fingers along her cheekbone, his touch sending shivers down her spine. She closed her eyes and leaned it to his touch, which left behind burning heat. Her body ached for him, it wasn’t a want anymore… it was a need.

Zoro could feel the heat radiating off of her, his desire for her only growing stronger. He leaned in closer, his lips mere inches from hers.

"I want you," he murmured, his voice low and husky. "Let me show you how good I can make you feel…”

She looked up at him with those big doe eyes that he loved so much and nodded slowly.

Zoro's heart raced with anticipation as he leaned down to claim her lips once more, his hands running through her hair as he deepened the kiss. He knew he shouldn't go this far with her, but he couldn't help himself. He’d worry about the mess tomorrow. She fluttered her eyes shut and kissed back passionately, letting her hand roam his body shyly.

The kiss was intoxicating, and Zoro found himself lost in the heat of the moment. He groaned softly against her lips, his body responding to her touch. He broke the kiss for a moment, their breaths heavy and ragged.

"You're so fucking beautiful.”

She watched as he loosened his tie and smirked at her. She bit her bottom lip and squeezed her thighs together in response to how attractive he looked.

“Mr Zoro…”

Zoro reached out and undid the first button of her shirt, his eyes burning with desire.

"Don’t you think you need to be punished? For flirting with other men, hm?” he questioned, his voice husky with need.

He took of his tie and tied it around her eyes, blindfolding her. She gasped and stayed still, part of her feeling like it was on fire.He trailed his hands over her skin, unbuttoning more of her shirt as he went.

"I can’t believe I get to do this to you.”

She didn’t stop him, after all she did want him in every way. He took this as a sign to continue unbuttoning her shirt. His heart pounded in his chest as he exposed more of her skin to the cool air. His hands were shaking slightly, not from fear or hesitation, but from the overwhelming desire coursing through him.

"You’ve been driving me crazy.”

She gulped visibly and leaned her head back, exposing her naked neck and clavicle. Zoro's fingers brushed against her soft skin, tracing delicate patterns on her skin as he leaned in closer. His lips grazed her neck, his breath warm against her skin.

"You're making this very hard for me," he murmured against her skin.

He leaned down and took one of her nipples in his mouth, flicking his tongue sensually around it. A moan escaped from under her blindfold as she arched her back, offering more of herself to him. Her other nipple hardened at the sensation, begging for the same attention. He chuckled darkly and grazed his teeth against her as he gave her other nipple a pinch.

Her body trembled with anticipation and need. "Zoro," she panted, her voice filled with desire and longing. "Please...”

“Patience sweetheart. I did say that you were going to be punished didn’t I?” He sucked, bit and licked her nipples before lifting her skirt and moved her panties to the side. His rough hands slid over her mound, teasing her sensitive folds with his fingers.

"Look at you, dripping for me to touch you." he growled against her skin. "I'm going to fuck you until you scream, is that okay sweetheart?”

She grinded her hips on his fingers and nodded, begging to feel them inside of her. Unable to resist any longer, Zoro thrust his fingers inside of her, groaning at the feeling of her slick walls squeezing around him.

"You're so tight," he moaned, his pace becoming rougher.

She moaned and bucked her hips faster. It felt so good, she couldn’t even think straight. That however changed as soon as he slipped his fingers out of her, she moaned in protest and she heard something ruffling near her. She felt herself be lifted from the seat by her waist and laid down on the table.

“I think I have some space for dessert.”

Before she could ask what he meant, she felt something wet trail along her pussy. In an instant, she gripped his hair and ground herself against his tongue. Zoro moaned around her clit as he alternated between licking and sucking, loving the way she was writhing against his mouth. He moved to the side, sliding his tongue inside of her as he thrust two fingers inside of her.

“Mr Zoro!" she cried out, her body shaking with pleasure. Her hips bucked against his hands as she came undone, her moans echoing in the empty room.

As she finally came down from her orgasm, Zoro pulled his fingers out of her and stood up. He gave her a wicked grin.

"Now it's my turn." He pushed his pants and boxers down, freeing his already hard cock.

He took off her blindfold and yanked her to his chest.

“Now look at me when I fuck you," he growled, his voice dangerously low. He pushed her chin up, forcing her to meet his eyes as he thrust into her, claiming her body completely. Her body was slick with their combined fluids as he slowly started to pick up speed, slamming into her with a primal groan.

He gripped her hair, pulling her head back as he took what he wanted from her. He peppered kisses and bites on her neck as he pounded mercilessly into her tight hole.

“Do you know how many times I’ve dreamt of fucking you like this?”

She gasped, her body arching into his as he hit her sweet spot. "Mr Zoro…" she moaned, her voice filled with desire and lust.

"T-Too much." she panted, her body trembling under his relentless thrusting.

“Good. Your punishment is cumming over and over again until you can’t think straight, are we clear, princess?”

“Yes," she whimpered, her body throbbing with need. "Please.”

He thrust into her so deep, she swore she could feel him hitting her cervix. She could feel every inch of him pulsating inside of her, claiming her like he would never get to touch her again. His fingers found her clit, rubbing it roughly and sending waves of pleasure through her.

He withdrew from her slowly, only to push back in hard, his muscles rippling as he hit the spot that made her scream out his name. His hips snapped with each hard thrust, driving him deep inside of her.

She held her breath as his balls slapped against her ass in all the right places. She could feel herself getting closer but the pleasure was overwhelming, making it nearly impossible to think straight. Her body tensed, her walls clenching around him in anticipation.

Her cries of pleasure and pain mingled together, echoing through the room. Her climax hit her hard, her body shuddering underneath him. Zoro’s own climax was imminent, his cock throbbing inside her.

“Look at you, you’re such a little slut aren’t you? Pretending to be innocent with those big pretty eyes but here you are, taking dick from your boss like a cumslut.” He chuckled dryly and pushed her against the door, her chest rubbing against the door every time he thrusted into her.

Zoro lightly gripped her neck and fucked her senseless, he wanted to have her like this every day. Everyday whilst everyone outside had no clue what was going on inside. Her eyes widened, both from the pleasure and surprise of his grip on her neck.

She couldn't help but moan loudly, her body arching off the door in response to his rougher actions. "Y-yes, Mr Zoro!”

"That's it, moan my name princess." He groaned out, thrusting harder into her. His grip on her neck tightened slightly, not enough to hurt her but enough to leave a mark if anyone were to find them like this.

She moaned his name, her body trembling from the intense pleasure and the sensation of being taken by him. "Ahh...”

Her eyes rolled back in her head, lost in the pleasure he was giving her. "Mr Zoro!" She cried out, her body shuddering under his rough treatment. She couldn't believe how much she craved this dominance from him. Zoro leaned in, his free hand running up her leg and over her thigh, his fingers finding her clit again.

He circled her clit slowly, teasing her further as he continued to fuck her against the door. "You're mine to claim whenever I want, understand?”

Her body convulsed around his fingers and his cock, her voice barely more than a whimper now. "Y-yes, Mr Zoro!" She panted, her eyes locked onto his. There was no denying the truth in her words—she belonged to him completely.

Feeling her submission, Zoro groaned deeply, his hips snapping faster as he took her roughly against the door.

"And you'll always remember this, won't you?" He asked, his voice thick with lust and possession.

"Y-yes, Mr Zoro," she panted, her voice barely audible over their heavy breaths. "I'll always remember this."

Hearing her confirm his words, Zoro felt a rush of power course through him. He gripped her tighter, biting his bottom lip as he drove deeper into her, claiming her in every sense of the word.

Her cries of pleasure mixed with his name filled the room, echoing off the walls. Her body arched off the door, meeting his brutal thrusts with unyielding desire. This was their dance—one of dominance and submission, pain and pleasure—and she was his perfect partner.

“I’m going to fill you up with my cum, got it?”

"Please, yes!" she whimpered, feeling his thick cock throbbing against her sensitive walls. The thought of him filling her up with his seed sent shivers of anticipation down her spine.

"That's my obedient princess." He groaned out, his voice low and rough with lust as his hips pistoned into her. His pace grew more rapid, his cock sliding in and out of her with brutal speed as he prepared to unleash his seed inside her.

“Fuck! Take my load!”

“Mmph!" She gasped, feeling him pulsing inside of her. His cum filled her up, claiming her in the most intimate way possible. She cried out his name as the intensity of the sensations washed over her.

She screamed, her body shuddering under the pleasure. Every muscle in her body was taut with anticipation as he continued to empty himself into her. His hips bucked wildly against hers, driving him deeper still as he claimed her completely.

"Look at me when you take my cum."

He snarled, yanking her head back by the hair, forcing her to meet his gaze as he exploded inside her. His words snapped her back to reality, and she finally registered the loud grunts of his orgasm echoing around them as his cum shot into her, filling her up and making her sob out his name again.

He pulled out of her and carried her to his chair before sitting down with her in his lap. Panting heavily, she felt him shift her so that she was now sitting in his lap, her legs dangling slightly. Her body trembled from the aftermath of their intense lovemaking, her heart still racing from the sheer intensity of it all.

“So…” she started.

He looked down at her, his eyes dark and smoldering with lust. "So," he drawled, running a rough thumb over her swollen lips, "you just fucked your boss huh?" His voice was rough with satisfaction and pride.

She blushed and hid her face with her hands.

Chuckling softly, Zoro wrapped an arm around her, pulling her closer.

“It's alright, I won't fire you.” he teased, his other hand traced gentle patterns on her stomach, trying to soothe her blush. “In fact…from now on, this is your duty.”

He growled low in his throat, nibbling on her earlobe as he started to grind his hard cock against her still-sensitive core.

"Every day during work, you come to my office and let me have my way with you, understood?”

“Y-yes, Mr Zoro," she whispered, shivering in pleasure at the thought of the things he would do to her.

“Good girl." He murmured approvingly before leaning down to capture her lips in a slow, deep kiss that left her reeling. As he held her close, he couldn't help but feel a sense of satisfaction knowing that from now on, this beautiful woman was his to claim whenever he wanted.

“Oh and your work is actually good, I was just being harsh on you because I wanted to not like you." He admitted sheepishly “I was never planning to fire you, sorry for being rude to you.”

She blushed and cuddled against him, her heart fluttering with happiness. "Thank you, Mr Zoro." She looked up at him, her eyes shining with adoration and desire. "I'm glad I didn't disappoint you.”

“Zoro.”

“Hm?” She looked at him, a little puzzled as to why he was saying his own name.

“Just Zoro.” He smiled at her and captured her lips into a sweet kiss.

"Yes, Zoro," she breathed, returning his kiss eagerly. A warm shiver ran down her spine as he continued to touch her in ways that made her body tremble with anticipation. She was his now, completely and utterly.

"That's a good girl." He whispered against her lips before pulling back to look into her eyes.

"Now, let me drive you home." His tone was both commanding, leaving no room for hesitation or refusal. He wasn’t going to let her get the bus alone, definitely not at this hour. She nodded.

–

Once they reached her home, he parked the car carefully. His hand gently guided her out of the vehicle, their connection undeniable. As they stood on her porch, he leaned down and captured her lips once more, his tongue teasing and tasting her mouth.

He pulled away and stroked her hair lightly, “In all seriousness, this wasn’t driven by lust. Well, part of it was… but I do like you. A lot.”

His words sent a shiver down her spine, making her heart race even faster. She looked up at him, her eyes shimmering with desire and a hint of admiration.

"I... I like you too, Zoro…do you want to come inside?" she whispered softly, biting her lower lip nervously. A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips as he took her hand,

"Alright then, let's continue this inside." His voice was sweet but seductive, his grip firm yet gentle.

-–

As always, feel free to request a fic! :) Here's my third Zoro fic (I cannot stop writing about this man helP RJSGIOEJ) anyway, please lmk if you enjoyed this one! seeing comments on my last few fics made my day (maybe that's why i'm churning out these fics so fast??? LMAO) <3

[daydream-cement]

Organs in the Wash Ch. 5

Miranda Hilmarson x Reader

Authors Note: Sorry this has taken me so long!!! Hope you guys enjoy this text chapter.

Living with Miranda was proving to be a pleasant experience. You took up responsibility for the cooking while she cleaned. At first she vehemently opposed it, but you felt the need to make yourself useful somehow. During the day, you both seemed to be ignoring the way she held you close as you slept. The proximity helped with the recurring nightmares, but it made defining your relationship even harder. Was ‘friends who hold each other close at night’ a thing?

Until the killer was caught, Miranda had been assigned to watch after you. With her home all the time your days became filled with old Star Trek reruns, board games, and the occasional silent couple of hours where you worked on your computer. When you needed to work, Miranda occasionally took the time to step out of the apartment to call her boss, hoping to hear any news on how the case was progressing.

After wasting away the afternoon debating which of the Marvel movies was the best, Miranda had stepped out to take one of those calls from Adrian.

“What do you mean we don’t know where he is? We know everything about him yet he is nowhere to be found?” Miranda was trying to lower her voice, but the anger rising up in her made her voice clear as day through the front door. You closed your eyes and leaned your head back against the back of the couch. This entire experience left you constantly anxious, recognizing the killer could find you and attempt to finish the job.

“I don’t care! The longer he is out there, the longer she is in danger!” You heard a slamming noise and realized Miranda must have thrown her hand against the wall in frustration. Miranda was going mad knowing there was someone out there who was determined to hurt you, “No! How dare you make that insinuation?”

Miranda’s voice grew quieter as the anger diminished. It was getting harder and harder to make out the sound of her voice, “I was assigned to protect her. I’m doing my job… Yes.. Okay… Bye.”

When Miranda pushes the front door open, you push random keys on your computer to make it seem like you have been working. Miranda runs a hand through her hair and takes her place next to you on the couch, only this time she scrunches up a blanket by your hip and uses it as a pillow. You glance out of the corner of your eye and her legs are dangling off the far end of the couch and her eyes are closed.

“Everything okay?” You urge, hoping she wouldn’t keep secrets from you; especially when they pertained to your own safety.

“Just work stuff. We will find him.. Don’t you worry.” Miranda adjusted her position, curling up on her side and shifting upwards. The blanket now lay partially on your lap and her head rested on your thigh so she could bend her long legs to fit on the couch. You couldn’t help yourself when you dropped a hand to her face to pull the hair away from her cheek.

“I trust you.” Your trust for her was endless, but your trust for her coworkers had its bounds.

“I’m not going to let anything happen to you.” Her words were soft as she turned her face into your hand, secretly hoping you wouldn’t pull away. Miranda must have repeated this phrase twice a day, everyday since you had come to stay with her.

“I know.” You whisper. Not long after, you are back to working and Miranda flicked on the tv to watch a movie. Her head remained in your lap, her left hand tucking under the blanket to rest against your thigh.

Work wasn’t all too challenging today. Moreso emails to send regarding recent decodings you had sent out to clients. With the final click of your mouse, you sent your last email and closed your laptop.

Eventually, you decided it was a good idea to get up and take a shower rather than sit and veg out with Miranda once again. Her groan of annoyance when you had to move her made you affectionately roll your eyes.

Today was the first day you felt safe showering without Miranda sitting just outside the bathroom door talking to you. Even with her on the couch, you knew no harm could befall you while you got cleaned up. It was hard for your mind not to wander to the killer and his whereabouts. There was always the chance he could be staking out Miranda’s apartment, waiting for the moment when she was gone or you were both vulnerable to strike. He could have forgotten about you due to the pressure of police searching for him, but this seemed highly unlikely as you knew he was a madman.

You had been so pleased when Miranda turned up back to the apartment on your second day with a bag of your toiletries and clothes. At no point had you even mentioned this to her, but the act only showed her thoughtfulness. Being able to shower with your favorite shampoo and body wash was more of a godsend than you would have thought.

Upon exiting the shower, you wrapped the towel Miranda had given you around your body. Reaching from the door handle, you could hear a man's voice from the living room, instantly turning your blood cold. You listened closely and realized Miranda was having a heated discussion with him.

“-beyond the bounds of professionalism and you know it Hilmarson. Sleeping in the same bed, really?”

Miranda was quick with her retort, attempting to explain away his assumptions that she wished were true, “She’s terrified, Adrian. I can’t leave her alone on the couch thinking that she could die at any second.”

“This is more than that and you know it.” Adrian wasn’t convinced. While his relationship with Miranda was far from perfect, he knew she was a hopeless romantic, so the odds of her falling for you were high.

“Even if it was, you have no say over how I run my life. You and I aren’t-”

He sounded like he was begging on his knees, “We could be! I know things ended on a sour tone, but I think we could really make things work!”

“Adrian.. Honestly… We can’t go down that path again. You are-”

You rolled your eyes at the sound of him cutting her off once again. His omission told you everything you needed to know about the history between the two of them, “In love with you. Miranda, after everything we have been through. Don’t you think we should give things another shot?”

“I- Do you have anything else to discuss about the case? If not, I think you should leave.”

The desperation in his voice made your nose crinkle, “Don’t do this. Miranda. Don’t-”

“Get out, Adrian.” You were shocked at how Miranda’s voice showed no signs of anger or sadness. It made you wonder what she would be like after he was finally out of the apartment.

Silence filled the apartment, but there was no creak of the front door to indicate he was coming or going. Pulling the towel tighter around yourself, you open the bathroom door, finally stepping out into Miranda’s bedroom. You moved quietly, not wanting Adrian to have the opportunity to hear you.

You were pulling a shirt over your head when the sound of the front door slamming shut made you jump. The final portion of their conversation must have been whispers or nonverbal as you expected him to have left already.

Miranda came flying into the bedroom, throwing herself on the bed as she raged aloud, “How dare he? I mean, honestly?”

You choose to play dumb, yanking down your shirt the rest of the way and pulling shorts from the drawer Miranda had given you in her dresser, “What happened?”

She sat up and shifted to lay on her stomach so she could look at you while she spoke, “I can’t believe he could come back here like that. His wife is sitting there at home and he is coming by my apartment asking me to ‘give things another shot’?”

“Who?” You inquire.

“I-” She paused, realizing she had admitted to the affair before revealing the identity of the man. Miranda saw this as one of the most embarrassing and regretful decisions she had made, so admitting it to you was painful, “My boss… Adrian..”

“Ahh…” You weren’t interested in passing judgment, but it was hard to find the words to respond to an omission such as that.

“It just… happened and it- it was wrong! I know that, but I thought we were in love.”

“Well… If you were in love, maybe he just isn’t over you?” You drop to the bed next to her, only you are on your back staring up at the ceiling.

“Fuck love. It’s a disease. People die from it.” Miranda huffed, the anger she had for Andrian completely taking over. You knew her words were based on the conversation she had with Adrian, but you couldn’t help but feel your heart break at her words. Perhaps you had gotten the wrong idea from her, taking her kindness for interest.

Miranda’s presence was requested down at the station and Robin had to drag her kicking and screaming. Before she left, she promised to be home in an hour. You sat nervously at the edge of the bed, counting down the seconds until Miranda said she would be home.

You were scared out of your wits when you heard knocking on the front door of Miranda’s apartment. She had only been absent for twelve minutes and now you were going to die. The knocking persisted and you could hear Adrian’s voice from the other side of the door, calling your name.

Much of you wanted to not answer, but he knew you would be home. Where else would you be? Fear was coursing through you as you approached the front door, even with the thought of a ‘friendly face’ on the other side.

“This is Adrian Butler! I need to speak with you about your case.” Hearing his voice up close was the final confirmation you needed to crack open the door and look at him. He offered you a wide smile, “Good afternoon. How are you?”

From the previous night’s discussion about him with Miranda, you were only willing to offer him a soft smile and short reply, “Good, I guess… And you?”

“Well. I wanted to discuss your case with you,” From the way he attempted glancing over your shoulder, you knew he wanted to enter the apartment to chat, but you held firm. The door would only be open enough for him to see your face. Talking in the hall would have to be good enough for him. He pursed his lips and tapped his foot in annoyance before beginning his spiel, “You could really help us with this case. We have received three anonymous letters to the station. All of which have displayed the killer's interest in finding you. If you would be willing to put yourself in harm's way, just for a moment, we will be able to catch him.”

“I- What does Miranda think about this? I should really-” You bite your lip, feeling as though Miranda wouldn’t like the idea of you putting yourself in the position to be harmed by the man Miranda had worked so tirelessly to protect you from.

Adrian let out a soft laugh and shook his head, “Hillmarson wants this case to be over with just as much as you do. We will have you go back to your apartment and wait for him. We will have officers on site, so you will be in no danger.”

His tone was intended to be comforting, but his words nullified whatever comfort he tried giving. You repeat the most frightening portion of his statement back to him, “Back to my apartment?”

“Just for a night. Then we will nab him and you will be able to resume your life completely unafraid. I’m sure Miranda will appreciate this as well.” From how Adrian described this, it seemed to be a compelling enough argument. Knowing it would help Miranda was enough for you to put up with the insane amount of anxiety you would have as well.

You swallowed and nodded, agreeing to what he was asking of you, “If Miranda thinks I will be fine and it helps her… then, yes. I’ll do it.”

“Grab whatever you need. I’ll take you there now.”

[grecoisms]

title: a heap of broken images (3/4)

pairing: kim wexler x lalo salamanca

rating: M

summary: 

"If she wasn´t driving, she´d close her eyes. Let her imagination run amok. Then she could see the outlines of him, a haunting: dead and dark, like the path she used to take home when her mother was drunk and she would not sit next to her in the car, the act more out of defiance than fear."

"—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden, Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not Speak, and my eyes failed" t.s.eliot - the waste land

.

Four in the afternoon finds Kim at her desk, paperwork done, eyes burning, brain foggy. Adrenaline from the aftermath got her so far, but eventually she bought herself a sandwich and a coke from the vending machine downstairs to give some energy, lest she lose the rest of her bravado. And she has to work, because when there is nothing for her brain to do, the darkest of thoughts comes a-visiting. 

The fact that Jimmy still hasn't called does not help.

She eats her cold turkey sandwich more as a duty than hunger, but takes her time to savor the coke which calms her squeamish stomach. Objectively, she is done for the day. De Guzman has his new cell, she put in a good word for him in the report and plenty of written requests on his behalf - mostly asking for extensions regarding the trial. Her and her client's ways are now seemingly separate, until, of course the prosecution decides to sink their teeth into this particular narrative. And that moment will come for certain. What's more: Lalo threw in the family card, so when (if-if-if) trial comes, she would need to be ready and play onto his hands. 

Son of a bitch of a case, she thinks around the billionth time she got that call in the morning. 

As she finishes the last of her drink, she opens the case file Jimmy has put together, and searches for the family he has created out of nothing. Flotsam, jetsam. He spurred a solid story. A wife, two children, a mother-in-law. A house with a lawn. Dream come true. 

The number she finds goes straight to voicemail; the email bounces back. Her only hope now remains an address, near Bellehaven. Deep in thought, she plays a rhythm with her pen, and weighs her options, but in her mind's eyes, she is already planning the journey. The whole thing could be over in two hours.

  No harm in trying, is there?

.

According to the file, Beth McKinnon lives with her two children and her mother - the children's maternal grandmother - near Bellehaven Elementary school which the older boy, Christopher, and the younger girl, Ella, has been attending since 2001. 

Looking around at the neighbourhood while driving, Kim has once again has to grudgingly congratulate Jimmy's taste: it's a better part of town, with freshly painted playgrounds and newly renovated, stocky little houses in a neat line, tinting both the faces and the sun a bit brighter. Even the grass seem greener in the yards, pun intended. One could hardly imagine a murderer living here, no siree. 

The McKinnons live at the far end of Princess Jane's lane, in a yellow house radiating joy even from afar, with windowpanes and the doors white as baptism day. It's a house which Kim has only seen in magazines, and she understands not why her heart grows so heavy as she gets out of her car, May sun unrelenting on her bare neck. 

It takes her two knocks and the bell to get an answer. 

Then a woman opens the door, probably Beth: harsh expression on an otherwise kind face. Behind her, a small hall, with a small mountain of shoes leaning on each other, alongside the height chart on the wall, with Tom and Jerry stickers on it, and from the slight smell of popcorn Kim knows at once that this family is, at least, a real one.

"Yes?" Beth sounds suspicious, and Kim cannot blame her. If a sharp-looking woman in black and white would turn up uninvited at her door after work, she might have difficulty opening her doors.

"Mrs. McKinnon" she says. "I´m here to talk about Jorge de Guzmán."

It´s the flash of a second, but her eyes widen, just so. Deer in the headlights, caught at a crossroads. She can sympathize, she can wait, while Beth bites on her lower lip.  It takes a bit of scrutiny, but then something must speak for her, because despite her hesitation, Beth opens the door wider.

"You better step in." 

Inside, there are more shoes, just at the corner of the entrance. 

Two of them, Kim notes, are brand new. 

Beth leads her to a room just adjacent to the hall. A kitchen, which is so far from Kim's childhood experiences that for a second, she feels lost. Almost forgets to take off her shoes. 

It is a cramped up little thing, with yellow walls and warm lights, with handwritten notes and childish drawings on the fridge, jam-smeared and juice-spilled with fingerprints. Cups and plates in the sink and the smell of stew with vegetables - holy halo. The clock above the door has the shape of a cat, its whiskers serving as its hands.

"Want a glass?" Beth asks but is already pouring her some water from the faucet.

"Sure." Kim answers, glass already in her hand, watching the mother's hands pale from squeezing another glass. 

Neither of them drink. They just stare at each other across the room. 

"So, what about him?" Beth's voice is defiant. She is trying to guess who Kim is and what she wants. 

"Saul Goodman sent me." lies Kim, handing Jimmy´s card to her. "Everything is fine, but we might need your help again."

"If everything was fine" the woman points out. "You wouldn't be here."

A clever woman. Kim decides to play it straight.

"We may have to continue with the trials. You won´t need to undergo any unnecessary hearing, just show up, like you did before. No speaking, just your presence."

Beth does not move. Does not blink.

"I do not know what you uhm, arrangement entailed with Mr. Goodman, but I can assure you the same compensations. Or more, regarding the urgency of this matter."

Still no blinking, but a lot of brightness and wetness in her eyes. 

Tears. 

Kim looks away, tactful. 

The cat whiskers ticks twice as loud in the silence as it usually would. She wonders if it ever kept Beth McKinnon wide awake at night. 

Then something touches Kim's elbows and she winces despite herself. 

"Mom" says Ella, fair-haired and yawning. "Can I have a ginger ale?"

Her fingers have a layer of salt on them, which she wipes on her white cotton pants. She has no socks on. Beth, who must have turned her head away for tactical reasons, does not notice any of this.

"You already had one, so no." she says, strictly to the cabinet.

"I'm thirsty."

"Here, have my water" says Kim. "I haven't touched it."

The girl looks up at her, eyebrows knitted in a very adultlike manner. 

"But you are holding it." she says. 

Kim smiles, again, despite herself. 

"It means I didn't drink from it" she explains, then hands her glass to Ella carefully.

"What do we say?"

"Thank you" repeats the girl dutifully, after having had her sip. "Why are you dressed like a penguin?"

"Ella!" Beth exclaims. "That is not a nice thing to say!"

"I'm a lawyer. This is how we dress sometimes."

"Do you get points if judges laugh at you?"

"I wish that was the case" laughs Kim. "Would make my job much easier!"

"Here" Ella hands the glass back. "We will have to dress in black and white soon."

"We?" asks Kim. 

"Me and Chris. The end of school is here, silly." she beams up at the lawyer twice her size. "Are you going on a vacation too?"

"Ella - " starts Beth in a tired voice. "Give the lady some rest, please."

"It's okay, it's a good question actually." Kim crouches down. "I have a lot of work to do, but I have always wanted to visit the Grand Canyon."

"That's a good one" Ella agrees with a serious nod. "I will add it to my travel list. Do you want to know where we are going?"

But before she can whisper the secret to Kim, her mother intervenes. 

"Ella" her voice is sharp, bearing no disagreement. 

The little girl falls silent, and Kim stands up, her linen shirt rustling, crumpling in the movement. 

"I need some time alone with the lady now" says her mother evenly. "You remember what I told you about adults talking?"

"That I can join in when I´m older" It would be comical, the disappointment of the girl, but she is so serious in her curiosity, with clever, round eyes. "But Mom...."

"No, no. Put up some socks and clean Chris´desk. He will be home soon."

"Can I turn on the radio?"

"Yes, but only till the fifth volume, okay?"

"Okay." 

Ella leaves, but not before tiptoeing towards her mother to hug her clumsily, lovingly, careful not to touch her mother´s shirt with her salty fingers. Then suddenly, it´s the two of them again: Beth and Kim, heaviness like a rope around them. In what must be their shared bedroom, Ella turns on the radio, the song playing but a murmur: slow and thick like honey, and hazy like a dream. 

It is Beth who breaks the silence first. 

"Mr. Goodman assured me it was a one-time thing" her voice is softer this time, if Kim seeing her daughter broke some of the ice. "Assured me that the man who we will be helping is an innocent man, wrongfully put to trial. He called me, that lawyer of yours. Said we would get a nice sum of money which he then paid us in advance. No questions asked, just smiling in court." She waves her hand around the kitchen, with an open, beckoning expression. Hopeful, despite hope being a hemorrhage - once it starts, you just bleed and bleed.  

"You would think once you buy a house, it´s all easy. You made it, you think foolishly. Have a family, a house with a backyard, a job nearby, no worries. But reality is harsher, no? You have a mortgage on the house, and the two incomes become one when your husband dies. Strange, how nothing is how you planned it."

Her hands tremble as she touches her forehead with them. 

"You are not going on a vacation, are you?" it isn´t a question. 

It all makes sense now: the shoes decked in the hall, ready for inventory. The cleaning and packing. The sudden shush, the mood swings. Big changes. 

"If I didn´t have children, I would accept" whispers Beth, lowering her hands from her face. One of her nails is chipped, and is painted a different color than the rest. Ella must have done it. "But then again, they are the reason I accepted this farce in the first place."

"We can meet each other halfway, still." Kim suggests. "It doesn´t have to be like this."

"Like what?"

"Black and white. You are obviously under great stress, and we tend to make hasty decisions when we feel there are no other options." Kim steps a bit closer. "We can arrange so that your children wouldn´t have to go to court next time."

Beth narrows her eyes. 

"And the next? Or the one that comes after? Can you give me a guarantee that it will be over the next time?"

"I can only guarantee you will be well compensated each time. Might be one more time, might be two. But we can promise you immunity, just like at the beginning."

This makes the mother laugh. It is a joyless sound.

"You cannot promise anything like that."

No, she cannot. Jimmy promised this woman something that he could not fulfill. A familiarity. 

"Are you afraid of the police - is that it?"

"Police is one thing" Beth complies, fidgeting with the hem of her navy-blue shirt. "It´s the man I would be defending I'm mostly worried about."

Kim feels her throat and mouth dry. Yes, she can see how Jimmy sweetening the deal with reassuring this widow would make sense then, when he only had to worry about one trial, and not several. Strange, how nothing is how you planned it.

"You have..." she starts, but she finds that she cannot finish the sentence. Hears how empty she sounds all of a sudden. 

"Nothing to fear?" Beth's spine goes rigid. "I might believe you - have I not seen that man in the courtroom. My god, you can make him act as polite as he needs to be, but I knew him by a single stare. He is a vile one. " 

The blame in her look is blatant: perhaps blaming herself for believing, and blaming Kim for trying, for her mere presence here. 

"Would you deny it?" 

She would not. 

Or worse, she cannot.

  Then the entrance door opens, and before she can register, a lanky boy around twelve dashes across the kitchen, jumping up and down, fists closed before him. 

"For God´s sake, Christopher!" Beth snaps. "How many times do I ha... what is that?"

Kim, who was born and bred near the tough sandhills of Nebraska countryside, already knows what that is. 

A scream proves her hypothesis. 

"I found it just next to the door" Chris holds up the lizard like a prize. "His name is Nepomuk."

"Bethany" the grandmother turns into the kitchen, panting, grey hair in disarray. "I´m sorry, I tried to stop him, but he wouldn´t listen."

Feeling more and more like an outsider, Kim decides to make her exit the exact moment the lizard lurches forward the open sink, just inside the pile of dirty plates and cutlery, followed by even more screaming.

When she looks back, she sees Ella, with her crown of hay, peering out from her window, the sun blazing her face so that she resembles more like an angel than a child.

As for Kim, she waits for self-hatred to reach her around the same time she gets to the car.

Gets in, lets her head fall on the wheel, and tastes shame like a medicine.

.

It doesn´t come as a surprise that her phone is dead. 

Time to go home and hope. 

Driving home is a rare challenge today. Kim has always commended herself on her work-ethic, but what she feels now is a bone-deep fatigue, licking at her innards. Full, that is how she feels, spilling over the edges. Meanwhile, the sky stares at her sordidly in a solid, sturdy sort of blood red as if it was running a fever all along its spine that separates earth from the heavens. 

Horizontally consistent, vertically vast. 

She wants to lie down so badly and let go. Just for an hour. Half an hour. Around her wish and her figure, the terrain changes, but she does not heed it - has started driving unaware: white line fever taking over her, and underneath it all, perhaps a real fever is on its way. Her skin feels hot all over, wants to crawl out of her own skin because staying in it has become quite burdensome as of late. Crossing that infamous bridge will soon become relevant, and is already on fire, however she tries to look at it. 

If only Jimmy was here. It´s not a need, but a wish, a want. He could make this problem light, or at least lighter - would be experienced where she is not - would know the words that she lacks. 

Worse still, there is also the question of him, and how much viler he will become if he knows the plan won´t hold up perfectly. Yes, it is obvious he is dangerous - obvious not just to lawmen, but to an outsider as well. Beth McKinnon got so afraid, she decided to run in the opposite direction. A question begs itself: why doesn´t Kim feel the need to do the same? There was a choice to be made a day, no, two days ago: to be seen or not, by Lalo Salamanca. She chose the former path and, in turn, could have a glimpse at him - the mercury face, the shrewd smile, the tense intent behind his masquerade. Nonchalant at first glance, but Kim is experienced in facades. Knows a well-crafted disguise when she sees one and beholds Lalo as he is: ambitious and passionate, calculating and cunning - a man with a sea of fire for a mind. 

Still. Beth was right: right to reject her, right to run. No use of denying:  he is a violent man, Kim could see it from his stance, the slope of his wide shoulders and the column of his thick neck that he cradled ferocity from a young age; below the blood, bordering on the soul.

If she wasn´t driving, she´d close her eyes. Let her imagination run amok. Then she could see the outlines of him, a haunting: dead and dark, like the path she used to take home when her mother was drunk and she would not sit next to her in the car, the act more out of defiance than fear. 

Is this defiance then? she wonders, reaching the outskirts of Sawmill Village Apartments. During the journey home, the scarlet of the sky turned black, day turned to night. Against whom exactly? Or what? 

Defying her limits, her expectations? True, she wouldn´t have done anything close to this six months ago. Not even three. Now here she is, jumping right into danger, consequences be damned - all thrill, no thought, no care. Some stubborn part of her always wanted to stand out, stand apart from the crowd, ever since she was a girl with gangly legs. After, around the time her eighteen-year-old self realized she did not merely want to survive but succeed, she learnt to fight differently. Because you need to adapt then and overcome your nature, which Kim found the hardest for people to do. 

Or maybe, says her bolder voice growing stronger each day, you´re revolting against banality itself. Isn´t that why you hooked up with Jimmy in the first place? 

Started as a hookup. Became something more. 

Unnameable. 

Until, well, until Lalo named it, smiling as he said so, a smile that did not reach his eyes, not really. She wondered if anything reached those eyes, really. Anything of substance. Even as a prisoner, even in chains, he was putting together pieces in a game only he saw and understood, a game which Jimmy and her got caught in accidentally. 

Briefly, she hopes. 

Lalo named it, what she dared not. 

You love him. You love him. You love him.

A fact.

A weapon.

There was a thrill in it, this chess game, this haunted hunting. The knowing and yet not. Boredom was revolting to Kim - but was it always? She tries to remember if her wish to stand out as a teenager was her way of getting some excitement , but as she contemplates this while parking her car, she has a dawning sort of realization, and suddenly,  she comes back into her body, alert and awake, as if though shaken from slumber.

Stops the engine and looks into the rearview mirror, as if it was a wishing well.  

A woman nearing forty looks back at her. 

How she resembles her mother!

And just how alone she was as a child. 

There was no other way, she realizes, tired hand over tired face: she has always stood out, having been a pilgrim between schools, dreading the summertime without friends, a father who was a ghost, and a mother who should neve have given birth. 

And given what she inherited from her parent; she had never managed to revolt against shit. If anything, she followed in her steps obediently, doing exactly what she had done.

Running, always running. 

And now what?

Now Jimmy is in the desert, and she can transform Jorge de Guzman into Lalo Salamanca.

A fact.

A weapon.

.

The lights are turned on in the apartment.

Now this is a surprise. 

She can see it from below, the warm glow of the living room licking at the terrace, and an almost irrational fear floods her. 

Maybe the police found out their ruse. Or it´s already the cartel, sniffing around. Or another group, the people who tried to kill Lalo, perhaps waiting for her in the dark, with a shiv or a gun. And her phone is dead. 

A shudder touches her, top to bottom, head to toe. 

Her fickle and frequent visitor: Adrenaline.

Eyeing her car keys and thinking of the spare mirror and nail clippers she usually keeps in her compartment box; she shuffles through her chances. The power of surprise is with her, but nothing much. Cannot call the police, for various reasons - and who else is there to call now?

Kim takes a deep breath and with it, the risk as well. 

.

Upstairs, just before the apartment, there is a static sort of silence.

When trying to push the keys in, she finds the door open.

The car keys - Kim holds those in her right hand, fist closed, so that two of the keys can peek out from in-between the triad of her fingers. 

Index, middle, ring. 

Very slowly, almost softly, she yawns the door open, heart hammering in her chest, proof of life. The hammering is so loud in her ears, she fears it will betray her. 

And then just as softly, if not more slowly, she tiptoes to the living room, holding her breath, peeking to the left, towards the sofa. 

"Kim" says a raspy voice from her right, from the kitchen.

Kim would recognize this voice, his voice, anywhere - and turns to see, dropping the keys on the ground, forgotten.

Yet Jimmy´s voice does not match Jimmy´s face: he looks like Kim feels, there is a haunted look on his sunburnt face and dry eyes, eyes that have a thousand-mile stare. 

She opens her mouth to speak, but her words turn into tears, she is crying in earnest now - hot, honest tears. 

Holds her shaking shoulders while she holds his - is it possible that he got thinner in these two days?

"Hey" her husband says; her other half. "I' m okay. We're okay."

Whispers it with such conviction that Kim almost believes him.

.

Although it is not exactly a lie he tells her, it is a quite colored and censored version of the truth.

He went out to the desert, the plan went amiss, crashed his car, got lost, spent one night under the stars and another at a motel near Claunch. But he isn't sure where he was exactly, not until he reached Camino Cerrito.

And though Kim has an argument to each of his stories, and twice as many questions to ask, she doesn´t. Not tonight.  Not when Jimmy looks so pitiful, so pitiable: apart from his legs hurting, the burns and tidbit cuts, Jimmy also has a big bruise on his forehead, just below his hairline - blooming already into an angry, purplish color. 

When her eyes carve a question mark there, he tries to rebuff her in advance:

"I fell" and looks down, like a child caught in the pantry. 

Smiles, but even his smile seems to be in pain. 

Only when he is naked in the bath, all bare and vulnerable, does Kim dare to ask her first question, the first in her mind after ordering her heart back in its place.

"Did you bail Lalo out?"

Is he out? is what she wanted to ask, but thought it too crude, like she was asking whether an animal escaped its cage. 

"Funny story" says Jimmy, nodding, and looking anything but entertained. "Mentioned you have met. Knew your name and everything."

Kim rolls her eyes. She doesn't know it yet, but in a month, she will miss this lightness with every atom of her being. 

"Did he call me Mrs. Goodman?" 

"Yeah, he did" Jimmy´s mouth is a thin line. "But he is out and will be gone soon. Probably fleeing to Mexico after the stunt he pulled. Hopefully for good."

Silence follows, the comforting kind, the one you can sink into. Domesticity has many blissful corners like this, bus stops, as she calls in her head, where you can put down your baggage for a bit. She had never known a silence like this, not before Jimmy. 

She washes his back with care, but as she tries to wash the back of neck with the wet sponge, Jimmy´s hand grasps hers, cutting the motion. 

"Kim, I´m sorry." His voice is small - but his eyes are big. "You never should have had to go there, to him."

"Does it matter now?" she replies, sensible, reaching to cup Jimmy's face. "Went to the Detention Center on my own accord, it's not as if someone put a gun to my head."

Though the sentence comes without a thought, she regrets the words almost instantly. It's almost as if someone closed the blinds on Jimmy´s face, painting it dark, shallow. 

"It was like he was gloating" he shudders, refusing to look at Kim, staring at the wall, eyes glossing over. "Like he knew. Knew that he has in his pocket now that he has met you, now that he knows you."

"He better remember me," Kim replies. "I saved his ass today."

"What?!"

"They tried to murder him in his cell this morning. With a home-made shiv."

"Jesus" this makes Jimmy look at her, sudden-pale under the sunburn. 

"Oh, I guess he omitted this part when you talked?"

"Well, it wasn't a long chat. Kept staring at his neck, though. I thought he had had an accident, or I don´t know, some... nasty action."

Kim laughs despite herself. 

She missed Jimmy so much. 

"Nasty action?" 

"He strikes me as a man who has a taste for deviance."

A muscle jumps in the inside of her thigh. She ignores it. 

"Well, I am not sure whether he liked being choked or not, but pleasure wasn´t exactly the aim of the assailants."

"Who knows these days?" Jimmy mutters, repressing a yawn. "Wait, so did you..."

"Represent him against prosecution? No, but I was about to. They sent Khalil, from the DA's, another lawyer from the center, and a detective, too."

The water cools while she recounts today´s events, some part of her soul hoping that it will encourage Jimmy to open up as well. 

"... and then I wrote to NMC, asking for extension. By the way, Khalil is furious with us, so there's that."

"Well, hopefully it won't matter anymore, I guess - with Lalo being gone."

Strange thing, the double entendre: gone as in distance, gone as to death. Kim feels the hair on her arms stand, trying to imagine Lalo Salamanca´s body in blood, but finds she cannot.

"You think they will try again?" she asks in a low voice.

"Dunno" says Jimmy slowly, as if tasting the words with care. "But that's not our problem anymore."

Ache in his eyes, but not his heart, surely. 

This man of hers, he survived, he always did. 

"Was it worth it?" she whispers, passing her hand through his dry hair, lighter by a shade.

"See for yourself" grins Jimmy, and lets some more water into the tub, while Kim goes through the duffel bag on the couch.

Inside, there lies an unseen amount of cash and a coffee mug, with a hole in its middle.

.

In her dream, Kim is balancing a duffel bag with innumerable shoes stuffed in it and a shiv that is made out of keys. In this world of dreams - as it goes - there exist dream laws, according to which the duffel bag and the shiv have the same and equal amount of weight.

No questions asked, especially because Kim has only one leg in her dream, so this balancing act is close to a well-versed miracle. She doesn´t question this, obviously. She is too busy balancing and making sure none of the items fall, because in this world, in this state, that is the worst thing that could happen, surely. 

She can´t let it go. 

Can´t let go.

Can´t.

Then - because this is a dreamworld, and not the real one - Jimmy comes to help her quite quickly, no questions asked, and she feels so relieved, that she might just fall on her knees herself.

Oh, but wait: that would defeat the purpose itself.

"Jimmy!" she says, loud in the syrupy texture of the dream space. "Quick, take the bag!"

But as he steps closer, it becomes apparent that he has no hands and thus cannot help her.

She says his name again, and in turn, Jimmy opens his mouth to speak.

Surely, to console her. 

It's not consolation, however, that comes out of his mouth. No calming words. Kim is not sure it's a human voice, a human noise - it's something subhuman, a shriek, a shrill noise that´s like a...

"Someone's ringing the bell" she groans, reaching for Jimmy in the dark, shaking him up. 

Jimmy whines into the pillow, frustrated. 

"What time is it?" he moans, words muffled by linen.

"Four forty-two." 

They hadn't eaten dinner - just went straight to bed, clothes discarded on the floor, worries forgotten. Now, in the early hours of the morning, half their soul still in sleep, stiffness in their joints, it's hard to stand up straight. 

A phone starts to ring - Jimmy´s, in the kitchen, thrown just next to the aquarium. Kim doesn´t have it in her to ask. 

"I'll get it" he mutters. 

Half-awake, Kim staggers to the front door, barely aware of her surroundings - and therefore forgets to ask who is standing outside their door.

Opens the door, trusting and blind.

"Hey" says Lalo Salamanca, smiling his wolfish smile, eyes alight. "Can I come in?"

[seidigardensystem]

Silence is Not Your Enemy

Dear Therapists,

I know now that most of your clients show up and talk almost nonstop for the fifty minutes they spend with you each week. They engage with you. They talk to you. They actually respond to your CBT strategies and the two of you are able to dance the steps needed to change thinking and behaviors. It is your normal and their normal, however it is anything but my normal.

I started graduate school and the first set of counseling tapes we had to watch were the Gloria tapes. We observed Carl Rogers and Albert Ellis conducting sessions with the client called Gloria. She chattered away the entire time with these two men. It totally flabbergasted us, and when we saw you next we told you how the school showed us some fake counseling tapes because no one talks that much in their sessions.

Oh how you laughed.

Us non-talkers really provide a challenge for you. It is a challenge and you have to step outside of the box and outside of your comfort zone. It is easy to personalize our behavior and think that somehow you are doing something wrong. It might touch your ego and wounds in such a way that you feel the need to defend yourself or even blame us for our inability to talk. We are resistant. We are not ready. We are avoidant. We are attention-seeking. We are difficult.

Please, we need you to rise to the challenge. Working with trauma means working with dissociation. Working with trauma and dissociation means working with attachment wounds. We are not just anxious and we are not just avoidant. We are disorganized in our attachment style because part of us had to be attached to our caregiver to survive and could not know about the abuse that the other part of us had to endure. Not all parts live in the present and we replay this out with you.

We push and we pull. We need you and then we hate you. We love you and push all the boundaries by texting and emailing and demanding additional sessions and then we sit here in complete silence as you try not to pull your hair out. You offer us a coloring page and markers, which we take. We spend our fifty minutes in complete silence, coloring a picture of a bird with your colorful sharpie permanent markers. Markers. We were never allowed to have markers as a kid. (To be fair, we once took a black permanent sharpie to the kitchen chairs, table, countertops, and drew a line on the wall all the way down the hall to our bedroom and drew a line on every fancy dress we owned from the waist to the hem.)

The forbidden item in our hands told us that you trusted us not to make a mess. You trusted us to keep the markers on the paper. You even colored with us on our own page. We would pick a color out, hand it to you and point to which part of the picture we wanted you to color and you obliged. Coloring was not your thing. Trying to be creative stressed you out a bit, but you did it with us anyway.

When the fifty minutes was up, you remarked what an expensive coloring session we had. You were convinced we had wasted a session. You thought nothing happened in that little hour and you were down on yourself for not being helpful. You were convinced that talking had to occur in order for the session to be productive. They call it talk therapy for a reason, I suppose. Except, the session was productive. The session was helpful. The session was healing in ways you could not see, because as you like to point out, you have yet to develop the ability to read my mind.

Many of the most helpful therapies, for us at least, are the ones that do not involve talking. Silence can be very powerful and it is not your enemy. There is so much work happening in our brains that you cannot see and your talking CBT interventions won’t be able to touch. It doesn’t mean you are doing anything wrong. Don’t get trapped in your own mind, but stay present with us. Being present with us is the most essential tool you need.

You were present with us for fifty minutes. You were attuned to us for fifty minutes. You were calm. You were engaged without pressuring us to talk before we could. You allowed us to process. You were nonjudgmental and we felt no shame. You made the session about us and not about an agenda. We hope you are able to see how much healing occurs in a small session just like that.

Sincerely,

Your client

[caffeinesam]

The business world created a kind of ecology where the lowest submitted price earns the contracts, so the shittiest possible outcome is likely guiding the hand of the market. To make things worse, as someone who did work in estimating road and construction world, I know that to circumvent the process and maximize profits one of the tactics is to flat out lie on the estimates and just bet on unmentioned extras to go beyond the budgeted price.

In the public sector it's endemic; the clients' own estimators often knowingly left out important data so that there could be supplementary work claims later on when the, known but unbudgeted, issue popped out on the field. This is where the margin profit actually lies, and we can make the price on the fly without the constraint of submitting the lowest price.

So, it's no surprise that we got a shitty infrastructure and shitty everything while paying too much.

But where I'm trying to go is surveillance capitalism, tech bros, billionaires and Open AI's endeavors. Such culture of systemic backstabbing is present in every sphere of capitalism, it's become the only way they're able to meet with shareholders' demands for constant growth. So there's a sort of disconnect between corporations, their employees and the ordinary citizen; in that the employees and citizens are scrutinized by corporations and considered suspect in every one of their dealings because the corporate ecology is a kill-or-be-killed world, the sort that humanity tried to escape for most of its short existence.

And we succeeded! ...for the most parts and to a certain extent, for most of prehistory. But the corporate world seems more like a bald eagle's nest or baby turtles rushing through the waves hoping to swim unnoticed than a collaborative effort to beat the odds that nature put before us.

People are relatively honest individually and collectively, they are naturally uncomfortable stealing and lying to their peers. But corporations choose to ignore this and invest billions every year in surveillance tech that costs them far more than whatever they save in stolen time from their employees or stolen goods from their less fortunate customers.

You see the paranoid mindset of a corporate meeting does not stem from the people sitting in the room, it comes directly from the culture of profit and growth and the fallacy that the lowest bidder takes all. The sneakiest bidder does. This leaves us consumers with security cameras and a suspicious wheezy guard watching us choose between the seven different brands of canned tomatoes at the grocery store while tons of CO² are emitted each day just to store the potentially incriminating footage of someone tying their shoe and maybe slipping something worth $4 in their pocket?

There is a whole wasteful economy that exists around not being able to fathom that people are not even considering stealing an individual ¾ grip box socket from that locked shelf in the hardware store. By the time your employee goes back to the task they were doing before the customer needed them to unlock it, you have paid three times the item's profit margin in lost time.

But hey, tech bros peddling a smiling and polite panopticon are so convincing. It sounds so convenient and reassuring to have all this technology working for you 25 hours per day 8 days a week! See your employees nap and think on the job live! Only it never happens.

All the while gazing upon the good citizenry's every move in a desperate search for some loss to prevent, they plan how they will next evade paying their taxes or cutting a employee's salary on a technicality. And yet again, it does not spawn from the people signing the emails but of a construct that arises from their getting together. A delusional entity stroking their own self-importance, hiding the hypocrisy of their ways to their hosts' view behind a veil of policies and red tape.

Little wonder then, that as the tech billionaires start reflecting on the broken planet they're leaving to the future and how they should handle the situation, they can't see their safety assured in numbers. They can only imagine we would treat them as they treated us.

Well. Maybe they're not wrong. But still. I like to think we're not as evil as they are. That we would merely eliminate any mention of their influence and strip them of any riches and let them wallow in their own self-pity for all the eternity that their cybernetic, genetically enhanced dystopian wet dream would make them live. But I digress.

So their solution is to flee. Either promising running away on a floating city ironically shaped like a turtle, building an apocalypse-ready bunker or inviting rich people and not-as-rich servants to follow them to Mars, the only solution their brain-rotten minds could muster was to run away before we could get our hands on them.

If the Saudi turtle town is probably the dumbest one, the bunker idea is the most striking example of paranoid delusion. One security consultant made a presentation about this, wish I could find it*, in one segment he spoke of how he met with twelve tech billionaires who wanted to know what to do to maintain control of the resources of the bunkers. The concerns were somewhat valid but the startling response to the idea of "being a kind and understanding leader" seemed baffling to them. They went on to hiring Navy SEALs to guard the food, rationing said food from a room where only they had access or even isolating themselves from the others, even suggesting implanting mind control chips into the other occupants to avoid any uprising.

It was surreal to listen to.

So as in Army of Darkness**, we're stuck with these incompetent wannabe anti-heroes, holding the wheel to our future in their pudgy hands and seeing themselves as the only worthy of survival. Which to them is to throw as many people under the bus as they can so they don't come for their head! So forget my last analogy, at least Ash knows that his own self-interest is also dependent on every one else's survival. Plus he has the unhappy-go-lucky dumbfuck badassery to back his ego.

*not really, I'm just well-inspired and it feels good to write some shit so fast and I don't want to break my flow I even have a urge to pee that I'm holding in since half an hour lol like dude it's only a short search away but I don't want to lose my idea

**that's it I lost the plot of my own ideas, thanks a lot brain fog, but to be fair it's not that bad

[thelivelead00]

Introduction: In today’s fast-paced insurance industry, connecting with potential clients at the right moment can make all the difference. With the Affordable Care Act (ACA) health insurance market constantly evolving, it's crucial for brokers and insurance agents to stay ahead of the curve. One of the most effective ways to do this is through ACA live transfer leads. These leads offer a direct, real-time connection to individuals actively seeking health insurance solutions. At The Live Lead, we specialize in providing high-quality ACA live transfer leads, helping your business grow by connecting you to prospects who are ready to take action.

What Are ACA Live Transfer Leads?

ACA live transfer leads are leads generated from individuals who have shown a genuine interest in ACA health insurance. These individuals have either completed a form online or engaged with a lead generator, expressing a need for coverage. Once they’ve been qualified, they are directly transferred to you in real-time via phone call. This live connection allows you to speak with the prospect immediately, enhancing your chances of converting the lead into a sale.

The Benefits of ACA Live Transfer Leads

Real-Time Connection: With ACA live transfer leads, you're not chasing down cold leads or spending hours trying to connect with prospects. Instead, The Live Lead connects you with potential clients in real-time, ensuring that you can seize the opportunity when it matters most.

High Intent Prospects: The individuals we transfer are actively searching for ACA health insurance. This means you're not dealing with people who are uninterested or unsure; you're speaking to potential clients who are ready to make a decision, which increases your conversion rates significantly.

Save Time & Resources: Cold calling or emailing is time-consuming and often results in low conversion rates. By using live transfer leads, you can focus on speaking directly to high-quality prospects, saving time, effort, and resources.

Improve Close Rates: Engaging with a prospect when they are in an active mindset to purchase boosts your chances of closing the deal. The immediacy of a live transfer ensures that you’re meeting potential clients at the optimal moment in their decision-making process.

Why Choose The Live Lead?

At The Live Lead, we don’t just provide any leads—we ensure you get quality ACA live transfer leads that convert. Here's what sets us apart:

Exclusive Leads: We understand the value of exclusivity. That’s why the leads we provide are exclusive to your business. Once a lead is transferred to you, no other agents or brokers will have access to that same lead, allowing you to focus on closing the deal without competition.

Customizable Lead Criteria: We work with you to customize the criteria for the ACA live transfer leads you receive. Whether you're targeting a specific state, demographic, or type of coverage, we can tailor our lead generation process to suit your needs.

100% TCPA Compliant: We take compliance seriously. All our leads are fully compliant with the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), ensuring that you won’t face legal issues when following up with prospects.

Flexible Pricing Plans: Whether you’re a solo agent or running a large brokerage, we offer flexible pricing plans to suit your budget. You only pay for the leads you receive, ensuring that your investment goes directly into growing your business.

How ACA Live Transfer Leads Can Transform Your Business

The healthcare market is competitive, and standing out requires more than just knowledge and expertise—it requires a strategy that connects you with prospects in real-time. With ACA live transfer leads from The Live Lead, you can improve your sales process, minimize wasted time, and close more deals.

By leveraging real-time lead transfers, you're able to focus on what you do best—selling insurance policies. With prospects who are ready to take action, live transfer leads give you a head start, helping you build a stronger pipeline and grow your revenue.

Conclusion

In an industry where timing is everything, ACA live transfer leads are a game-changer. By partnering with The Live Lead, you’ll gain access to high-quality, exclusive leads that can transform your sales process and significantly boost your close rates. Stop wasting time on outdated lead generation methods—start maximizing your results with real-time ACA live transfer leads today!

[jcmarchi]

Develop Processes for These Web Design Tasks

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/develop-processes-for-these-web-design-tasks/

Develop Processes for These Web Design Tasks

Web design tasks tend to start small. We may do them and not think much about it at first. But they can eventually become inefficient.

You’ll likely take notice of the issue as you try to do them at scale. The more clients you have, the more difficult it is to manage. Things that used to take a few minutes of your day can turn into hours.

Developing processes for these tasks can help. It’s all about finding ways to create efficiency in your workflow. You can cross items off your to-do list faster and without cutting corners.

How does it work? And what tasks can be streamlined? Here are a few examples to help you get the most out of your time.

Use Tools to Speed up Software Updates

The age of content management systems (CMS) has brought a constant stream of updates. Apps like WordPress require a lot of attention. The core software, plugins, and themes all need to be updated.

The process isn’t too bad if you manage a single website. But it can also get out of hand rather quickly. Keeping track of new versions across multiple sites is difficult. And it’s too easy to miss an important update.

The right tool can help, however. Some services allow you to manage multiple sites via a dashboard.

These tools are a game changer for busy web designers. You can perform maintenance tasks within a singular user interface. They list available updates and can even alert you to security issues.

Keeping your CMS up to date is critical. The right tool can streamline the process and save you time.

Bulk Browser and Device Testing

Modern web browsers are outstanding. But there are plenty of outdated apps still in use. And we can’t forget about the wide range of mobile devices.

Ensuring our websites work across all screens is tedious. A litany of tests is required to verify that everything looks good and works correctly.

Automation can make a positive difference in this area. Browser testing tools will run your site on multiple devices. They’ll then provide screenshots to help you spot any issues.

These tools don’t replace hands-on testing methods. But they will provide you with a heads-up regarding what to look for. Plus, you can use them to test on lesser-used browsers and devices.

The idea is to gauge how your site works across platforms. And do so without spending a lot of time.

Keep Track of Your To-Do List with a Task Management App

How do you keep track of your projects? You’re wasting time if you’re using email or handwritten notes. These methods require fumbling through mounds of content.

Sure, your inbox has search capabilities. But what if you have thousands of messages? And thumbing through a stack of paper isn’t exactly efficient.

A task management app may be what you need. This category has come a long way in recent years. And there’s one for just about every niche. Popular tools like Trello and Asana come to mind.

Even better is that many work across platforms. That means you can look things up on your phone or computer. You can stay in the loop regardless of where you are.

Collaborative features can help you communicate with stakeholders. For example, you can check in with a colleague directly – rather than creating an email chain. And multiple people can cross items off their to-do list.

But even solo freelancers can benefit. Simply having a single point of reference is helpful. You’ll be less likely to forget something.

Automate Client Invoicing and Payment

Billing-related tasks are often a pain. They take precious time away from your projects.

And speaking of which, invoices are time-sensitive. This clashes with other things you have going on. It’s not ideal when you’re working on a tight deadline.

Old-school accounting software can help you create invoices. However, it often lacks the polished automation features of specialized platforms. You still have to get those invoices to your clients somehow.

Several cloud-based providers will do the dirty work for you. They’ll take your input and automatically email an invoice to your clients. An integrated payment gateway will collect your hard-earned money.

But these services offer more than just time savings. They also make it easier for clients to pay on the spot. Thus, your invoice is less likely to sit on their desk collecting dust.

Tax time is also simplified. Earnings and expense reports can be generated and shared with your accountant.

Make Your Web Design Business More Manageable

Every aspect of your web design business can benefit from repeatable processes. That covers technical areas like CMS updates. And it also applies to more mundane tasks like billing.

The ideas above are only a starting point. Think about other tasks that could use some attention. You can then identify ways to streamline them.

It may be easier than you think. Sometimes, it’s a matter of finding the right tool. Several apps cater to web designers and freelancers. And they can transform your workflow.

Don’t panic if you’re feeling stuck and falling behind on projects. Refining a process or two can make all the difference.

Related Topics

[thelistingteammiami]

Ways Real Estate Agents Can Save Time on a Listing

Time is your most important resource when you work as a real estate agent. The day starts with anything from traveling to specific properties to communicating with sellers and prospective buyers and ends before you even know it. Therefore, finding effective methods for making the most of your workday is crucial to staying on top of your listings and closing each deal in a quality manner. Here, we’ll provide some ways that real estate agents can save time on a listing and explain how these techniques can put precious minutes back into your routine.

Make a Priority List for Each Property

Managing multiple properties at once is all in a day’s work as a realtor, but this can get very hectic very quickly. Each property will naturally be at different stages in the selling and closing process, and you need to be able to track where each is at a moment’s notice. Creating a series of priority lists for each property can help you see all your day’s activities at a glance and decide which ones are the most deserving of your attention. Doing so gives you the time necessary to complete pressing tasks.

Streamline Your Email Replies

It can also help to streamline your communications with clients, especially when it comes to email. Traditionally, emails require you to sit down and compose several passages worth of information. Working this way can take hours, depending on the number of updates you need to send or questions you need to answer. However, by limiting your emails and contacting clients with audio messages and voice-to-text, you can cut out some of the monotony and get back to the rest of the action. Just ensure you test these solutions before incorporating them into your workload.

Consider Virtual Staging Services

Another way you can save time on a listing as a real estate agent is by hiring virtual staging services for your property photography. Staging is also one of the largest time sinks when it comes to listing a home for sale. But, with the aid of professional photo editing, you don’t need to spend time rearranging rooms to get the perfect picture. Virtual staging can save both time and money by taking this task off your plate and creating attractive images for you to use on listing profiles.

Delegate Some Responsibilities

If you’re finding yourself pressed for time, you can delegate some of your tasks to other professionals in your company. While this isn’t possible for everything, there are smaller administrative tasks that an assistant can perform instead of you, allowing you more time for other things. Every little bit helps when you’re trying to keep up with several listings at once, whether it’s taking calls or scheduling new appointments.

Time isn’t something you can afford to waste as a real estate agent, so even minor changes to your routine can prove beneficial. With the adaptation of a few of these techniques, you might find that you have more availability for other aspects of your role.

[mortraveling]

How To Make Your Dream Vacation Even More Enjoyable

How To Make Your Dream Vacation Even More Enjoyable Vacations are already incredible as it is. But you can always make your time off even better. No doubt that you had a few regrets about your previous vacations; usually how they were too short or how you didn’t get the chance to visit that one place you wanted to. That’s why in this article, we are going to share a few tried and tested strategies from veteran vacation enthusiasts to help make any dream holiday even more incredible. Ease The Transition What’s the worst thing about any vacation? The fact that it has to end, of course. There are a few things you can do however to make taking off the proverbial bandage less painful. For example, if you come back from the holiday on a Sunday, your Monday is going to be a nightmare. If this is the case, make sure to check your work emails before your first work day to get some insight into what was going on. If possible, aim for a return date that falls on a Saturday. Similarly, if you leave home in a rush and leave it a mess, coming back is going to be all the more painful knowing you have to waste time cleaning up. You can easily make this easier for you by hiring a professional service like Valencia Pro Cleaning Agency to take care of the mess for you. Don’t Be Afraid Of Planning One thing that makes a vacation even better is the sole anticipation. Most of the excitement we have actually comes before the actual vacation. So don’t be afraid of the preparations, booking, and planning way in advance. Just think of it as a nice way to build up the excitement. Try New Things Out What is the best time to make the most of your vacation? Make it last as long as possible. Or at least make it appear longer than it is. How? Don’t be afraid of trying out new things. Break out of your routine and try something as exciting as rock climbing, long hikes, kayaking, zip-lining, pottery lessons, or anything along those lines. Make Every Day Count The people who truly enjoy their vacations are happiest when socializing, exercising, relaxing, and engaging in spiritual activities. That’s why you should make your days during the vacation as eventful as possible. Start with some light exercising in the morning, sightseeing in the afternoon, and getting to know the locals in the evening. Be sure to try out new dishes, do some reading, meditate, and connect with the people around you. Don’t Let Your Work Drag You Down Some people try to stay as far away from work as possible when on a vacation. If you’re not one of them, make sure you are in control of how much time you are spending on work. If your boss is making you reply to emails or take calls from clients, you are only going to start hating your work. But if you plan out a schedule for work obligations you cannot dodge during the vacation, you’ll stay in control and it won’t weigh you down as much as it might otherwise.  If you want to stay on top of everything, spend an hour every morning while you’re having your coffee and before everyone wakes up to go through emails and resolve any issues. via Blogger https://ift.tt/QTPNpD0 March 12, 2023 at 10:30PM

[coderruhul]

Elance Tips: 5 Ways to Avoid Wasting Time As a Freelancer.

Freelancing on the web is about freedom - working for yourself, dumping the drive and orchestrating your plan for getting work done anyway you please...and work networks like Elance can assist with making this progress smoother than any time in recent memory. In any case, with this freedom comes the requirement for obligation and discipline. Being on the web resembles being in the best mall, exhibition hall or library on the planet. Google can be the dearest companion or most awful foe of a web-based freelancer.

A lot of interruptions can hinder finishing freelance tasks and searching for new ones. The following are 5 methods for trying not to sit around as a freelancer.

1. Limit Online Interruptions. Nowadays, it tends to be difficult to remain useful while dealing with a PC because of the quantity of internet-based interruptions. Know about time spent on email and diversion and data sites like YouTube, Facebook and Wikipedia. If important, utilize a clock to assist with continuing to chip away busy working tasks free freelancing course.

2. Remain Coordinated. Time spent searching for business messages and desk work is time squandered. Foster a hierarchical framework that will assist you with finding all the data you want about a business as fast as could be expected. As a freelancer, you're not paid for undertaking and money the board. Attempt to make the cycle as effective as could really be expected.

3. Have Clear Objectives. Assuming you comprehend your freelance objectives, working just on errands that carry you nearer to your goals will be more straightforward. Try not to extend yourself excessively far as you attempt to produce pay. By restricting your concentration to a specific range of abilities, you have a vastly improved possibility of turning into an expert as opposed to a "handyman."

4. Abstain from Under Charging. While you're making a low hourly rate and undercharging, you are possibly expanding the number of hours you want to work. Decide your least OK hourly rate and work out the hourly rate for each task before you acknowledge it.

5. Abstain from Working for Free. Of course, this sounds like an easy decision, yet the requests for free work can be concealed in many pretenses. Challenges where just a single freelancer is paid and potential businesses who request that you complete work as a "test," are normal instances of free work. Broad corrections are one more type of free work. Ensure the correct strategy for each task is determined before you start work. Primary concern - - on the off chance that you esteem your experience as a freelancer, abstain from working for free.

Winton Churchill is the pioneer behind Shoeless Advisors, Inc., a worldwide preparation and counseling organization. His firm assists clients with tracking down ways of putting their abilities, administrations, items and professional experience on the worldwide market. In 2007, Winton made Huatulco, Mexico his main living place and splits his time between Huatulco and San Miguel de Allende.

So you're at last prepared to begin handling freelance copywriting positions yet you are thinking about what styles to use inside your direct mail advertisement. If so then, at that point, proceed with reading. Over the following couple of minutes, you will learn five key freelance copywriting tips that specialists use to increment transformations inside their direct mail advertisements. Please visit here https://www.facebook.com/amazingtechbangla for more details.

[liquorkingdom]

Why do people prefer to buy liquor online.

A glass of wine on a relaxing evening is something everyone enjoys. Well, we all do, right? Back in 2018, consumers drank 7.9 billion gallons of booze. Regardless matter whether it’s a glass of wine with dinner or a beer at a ball game, booze is a vital element of social culture. Simultaneously, seeking the products we need online is increasingly turning into the norm.

Obviously, this is a novel approach of get alcoholic beverages. Are you having trouble locating an online liquor store? You can get all the answers below.

Buying alcohol online is the greatest alternative when time is of the utmost and you cannot afford to waste it traveling to the liquor store, hunting for something special, or spending an excessive amount of money. Although ease of use and financial savings are two apparent benefits of purchasing alcohol online, they are not the only advantages of doing so.Amrut is actually preferred by a lot of people.

Here are three reasons why you should buy your alcohol online:

Making Room

Liquor orders made online follow the same convenience trend as those for hardware and clothing. You may now purchase the most popular brand from the convenience of your own home computer or mobile device. You can find Kyro Gin at a lot of places.

This saves you the time and effort of traveling to the shop, navigating its aisles, and waiting in line.

There are a number of online retailers of alcoholic beverages that provide customers with the option of same-day delivery. Indicating that in the event that you have a hankering for a glass of wine after a particularly trying day at work, you may be able to have the jug waiting for you within a couple of hours of placing your order on the internet.Nordes Gin has the finest taste of all.

Get Amazing Deals and Discounts

On frequent times, internet booze merchants will routinely provide great offers during the Christmas season. Considering the price of holidays like Christmas, that money will go a long way.Glenallachie has an affordable price.

Likewise, internet retailers also present us with wonderful deals and discounts and demonstrate their dedication towards their clients. If you’re an online shopaholic, expect to receive incredible discounts and bargains in your email every time you visit their website.

3 - Discover Uncommon Types

There may be just a few known wine labels available at your neighborhood supermarket, while the big names dominate the shelves. However, if you go to an alcoholic beverage retailer, you'll have access to an extensive assortment that's easy to navigate, which makes trying out new brands much less of a chore.

When you buy liquor on the web, the businesses you frequent learn about your preferences. From that knowledge, they can assist you make precise acquisitions that best meet your taste demands. They can introduce you to a wide variety of beers, wines, and spirits that you would not have otherwise tried.

[childrenareevil]

A Timer to Increase Productivity

If you're looking to boost your efficiency, it's time to bust out the egg timer. If you don't have many hours with your grandma, chances are that you don't see the old-fashioned timer more often nowadays. If you're looking to time something in the kitchen, the built-in oven or microwave timer typically works. If they need to keep track of the number of seconds and minutes, who doesn't have their favorite smart phone timer application? If you're looking at getting a serious productivity boost and increase your productivity, you must go analog.

A Timer is a great tool!

The world has mastered the art of distracting you when it comes to the work place. Gmail as well as Outlook email clients inform you when new messages are arriving. Instant messages appear out of out of nowhere, your phone vibrates and rings incessantly and text messages don't stop ringing. These devices are made to draw your attention. While this could improve the efficiency of communication, it's robbing us of our productivity. Every time you turn away from your task, even for a second your brain must analyze the new information, determine its importance and then either deal with it or decide to delay it. The interruption in your focus can completely take you off the task, or cause your brain to reengage. You're wasting time and effort trying to find your way back on the right path. When you use a online timer customized timer you're making yourself focus only on the job at the moment and not focusing on anything else. You'll be able ignore distractions and focus on the task at hand if you set a time limit. Your timer acts as a fence that keeps your mind from wandering off.

Why Go Analog?

The traditional egg timer, which might have been your jailer during childhood time out is now free! If you wish to to concentrate on a single task it is essential to have as clear a vision as you can. There are programs that help achieve this, like Write Room. This program allows you to block out the rest of your computer so you can only use an essential word processor. It opens you up to many distractions by using a timer in either your cell phone or your computer. Emails, RSS updates, instant messages, texts, voice mails...you name it! Worse, if you do something on one your devices, it might result in your "away" or idle status to change to "active" and encourage people to reach you for personal or work-related issues. Do not let these time-bandits get at you!

Set reasonable limits

It's difficult to completely turn off everything. Instead, you need be able to concentrate on a single task and remain completely detached from the rest of the world. When you do this, bosses as well as clients and loved ones can get somewhat annoyed. Instead, set an appropriate amount of time for your goal. If you're working on a bigger project, you can reduce it into essential elements. Take time out, then plug back in and determine what you can do to deal with something else. By creating time limits, and enforcing them using a physical and non-distraction-based timer, and utilizing some good old fashion willpower and planning, you'll be able to see your productivity sky rocket!

[sashutt]

How to increase productivity using the Timer

It is possible to increase your productivity using the egg timer. If you don't have many hours with your grandmother, chances are you won't be seeing the old fashion countdown timer more often these days. If you have to count down the seconds of things in the kitchen, the built in microwave or oven timer typically works. If they need to keep track of the seconds how many people don't use their preferred smart phone timer app? If you're thinking of getting a serious productivity boost it's time to go analog.

A timer is an excellent tool!

The world has mastered the art of distracting you in the work place. Gmail as well as Outlook email clients inform you when new messages are arriving. Instant messages appear out of nowhere, your phone vibrates and rings incessantly and text messages keep ringing. These devices were specifically made to catch your focus. This can improve communication efficiency however, it can also decrease efficiency. Your brain must be able to evaluate any new information you take a break from your work. You are able to decide its importance, handle it, or put it off. It's possible to get distracted completely or force your mind back to work. You're wasting time and attention trying to return to the right track. It's possible to force yourself to concentrate on the task at the moment by using countdown timer. You'll be able to ignore distractions and focus on your task when you have set an amount of time. Consider your timer as a fence; it keeps your attention from wandering off.

Why should you go to analog?

Now you can free yourself from the egg-timer that could have been your prisoner in childhood. If you want to to concentrate on a single thing it is crucial to have as good a tunnel vision as you can. There are tools that can help you in this regard, like Write Room. This program allows you to completely block the other components of your computer, so you can only use a basic word processor. If you're using a countdown timer in your computer or mobile phone you're exposing yourself to a myriad of distractions. Emails, RSS updates, instant messages, texts, voice mails...you name it! If you are doing something with your device this could cause your "away" or idle status to change to "active" and prompt others to contact you for personal or work-related issues. The time thieves should not be allowed to get you down!

Set Reasonable Limits

You cannot turn off everything to focus on one thing throughout the day and shut off from the world. Bosses, clients and even loved ones can be a little touchy when you drop off the face of the planet in this manner. You should set aside time to finish your project. You could also break down larger projects into smaller parts. Take a break and then resume work. By simply setting time limits, enforcing them using a physical and non-distraction-based timer, and utilizing some good old fashion will power and planning, you'll see your productivity increase dramatically!