#can't do that with the rice cooker though so it's going to force me to start trying to change that

[jedi-bird]

Crockpot is washed and put away. Rice cooker pan washed and the unit wiped down. If nothing else both of these are going to force me to stop putting of chores until later. My shipment of new nerdy shirts arrived, so the first load is currently washing. Cats have been fed, medicated, and played with for the night. Tomorrow will be more laundry, building more shelves (got the brackets today so we're good to go), and prepping food for dinner. I'm trying to convince myself to write tonight but now that I've sat down I'm exhausted and might just go to sleep early.

[nowoyas]

Koi no Yokan 6: hide behind whatever you can (Nishinoya Yuu x Reader)

First - Prev - Next - M.list - Ao3

Summary: As exam week drags on, you spend the time out of practice and largely being bothered by your latest pastime.

Warnings: general series warnings

Word count: ~3000

Exam week drags on. You wonder a million times over the course of the week whether you made the right decision in joining, whether it's a good idea to even keep talking to Noya. He's nice, whatever his intentions are don't seem malicious, but the problem with having friends who insist on knowing you is that at some point he's going to want to actually know you. And now he has your number, which he's using liberally.

Each morning the week of exams, you get a text: good morning! Please marry me!. Even though he doesn't track you down before school, though it'd be easy, he goes out of his way to say that much to you and leaves you alone unless you reach out to him first.

And you, lonely in the afternoons like you always are, always reach out.

[name] to Noya at 16:15

[name]: I don't think I'm allowed to bully you for the popsicle thing anymore

Noya: oh PLEASE tell

[name]: [image attached. Image description: a bowl of cooked white rice with what appears to be a handful of crushed potato chips piled on top.]

[name]: this is what the 4pm dinner of CHAMPIONS looks like. I should go to culinary school

Noya: oh yeah there's no way I'm letting you bully me for the popsicles ever again

Noya: why are you eating dinner at 4pm???

[name]: bored

Noya: come over then. I own at least one video game

[name]: no I have this luscious spread of food

[name]: I worked so hard to put rice in the rice cooker and then ruin it with spicy potato chips

[name]: how do you know I even care about video games???

Noya: you called volleyball *pvp don't let the ball touch the floor*

Noya: *pvp*

Noya: that's gamer words, [name]-san

[name]: …I can’t believe this

Noya: don't you wanna see Soba and her toe socks? :(

Noya: she's pacing around the house

Noya: she misses you already

[name]: …fine alright I'll come over when I'm done eating my Sad Rice Surprise GOD

[name]: bribing me with a cat.

[name]: unbelievable.

You only come over twice that week, but the rest of the time is interspersed with stupid jokes, cursed dinners you just threw together, and idle chatter just to keep your brain off of how quiet your house is. Once while you're making dinner, he calls, which forces you to make a real dinner instead of doing fucked up shit to a bowl of rice.

The entire time, he asks questions. They're half-prying, you think, little things like what are your hobbies and do you like to cook?

"I don't, really," you admit, stirring a pot absently. "I like all the individual actions, and I like making a meal come together, but I don't like putting in all this effort if I'm the only one eating it. Food only tastes good if someone else gets to eat it, you know?"

"But you get to eat it. And what about your dad?"

Silence stretches between you as you look for a reply. "He usually gets convenience store bentos instead of eating my food. I guess I'm probably not that good at cooking, haha!" That's great. Saying haha out loud is super convincing.

"That can't be right. You sent me a picture of your dinner earlier this week that looked like some real gourmet shit."

"What, the plain white rice topped with hot chips? Or the fried rice that I overseasoned?"

"Yeah!" He pauses. "If you bring me some at school, then someone else gets to eat it, right?"

"…are you just trying to get me to cook for you?"

"Guilty." You can hear him smile over the phone.

Still, it's… not a bad idea. "Fine. Lunch tomorrow after exams?"

"Deal! I'll come pick you up."

You smile, fall back into easy chatter as you add some spices to the pot. "Then I'll see you tomorrow."

~

As the final final exam closes and you are all dismissed for a short lunch, Yachi scrambles to grab a folder from her bag and approach you. She drops the folder on your desk, closed, her eyes alight with excitement as she speaks.

"I picked these up from the print shop last night!" she says. "Are you free to put them up with me after school? Or tomorrow, maybe?"

"Oh, shoot, the posters? Let me see!"

She grins, opens the folder to show you what she settled on, and shit. They're super fucking professional-looking. They barely look like a high schooler was involved at any stage of the process. The lights of the volleyball gym shine a halo around Hinata's form. He's at the peak of his jump, preparing to spike. The words, The Crows return to the national skies once again and Return of the "Little Giant" frame him, a neat little box at the bottom including information about the request for donations and how to contact Takeda-sensei about donating to cap it off.

"What the hell, Yachi-san?" you breathe. "These are amazing. You made these?"

They're… really amazing.

You swallow down the lump in your throat. What have you done for the club? It's not like you're gonna be able to take credit for helping put them up. You wouldn't, anyway—all that's gonna entail is going around a couple shops and handing them out to willing shopkeepers. Hardly anything like this.

"You know how I said my mom runs a design company?" She rubs the back of her neck. "She's taught me a little here and there. Honestly, my first draft was no good at all, so she helped me think about it a little more, but…"

"But you made them," you finish. "You're amazing."

She goes fully red at that. "Eh? Um, n-no, that's not…"

"Woah," Noya breathes from behind you.

You yelp, jerk away from him. "Dude, you can't just—"

He laughs softly, eyes trained on the poster Yachi's shown you. "These are amazing!"

Yachi shifts nervously, avoiding both your eyes. "Um, thank you both."

"These are for the volleyball club?"

"All Yachi-san's doing. I'm gonna help her put them up… you said after school today, right?"

She nods, wringing her hands together. "Only if you're not busy."

"Not at all. Let's do it."

"Oh! Great!" She glances at Noya. "Um, Nishinoya-san, you came to steal [surname]-chan away, I'm guessing?"

He nods, beaming. "Someone promised me."

You laugh. "Right, right. Yachi-san, we'll talk later?"

She nods, and Noya barely lets you grab your bag before he's dragging you out of the classroom. He speaks brightly as he pulls you along—apparently towards the roof. The rainy season isn't quite over yet, but it's close enough and sunny out, so you'll let him have this. "Those posters Yachi-san made really do look professional. We're gonna look so cool with those!"

"Yeah." It comes out perhaps more bitterly than you'd meant for it to—you're not bitter, really. Really.

He pauses. Eyes you. "You okay?"

"Yeah, sorry. It's the last day of exams and I'm just a little exhausted, that's all."

The look on his face says he doesn't believe you, but he can't press it if you don't let him. You force a smile, pick up your pace so you're dragging him along. "Come on. You wanna try my cooking, right?"

~

His first bite of your food earns you another marriage proposal, thoughtless and breezy. You can't help but notice, as you sit and share lunches, that Noya isn't how he usually is—not quite as bright, not quite as high-energy.

Maybe you should ask him what's wrong. Then again, you don't really deserve to ask about it when you won't tell him anything real about yourself.

You push the last bite of food around your bento before sliding it to him. "Here. You get the last of it."

"Really? Thanks!" He snaps it up and talks with his mouth full once he has. "You really are a good cook, you know."

"Thanks."

"You're sounding all down again. What's up with you?"

"What's up with you? You're the one who's acting all like… normal-key."

"Normal-key."

"Yeah. You're normally high-key. Right now you're acting like a normal person. It's weird."

He sighs. "You actually noticed?"

"Of course I did. What's up?"

"That last exam kicked my ass. I don't think I'm going to Tokyo."

"What? Of course you are."

"I don't believe you," he grumbles. "I think it's cruel and unusual punishment to make us do all the exams back to back. Of course my brain was gonna shut down by the end."

"Why do you think you're gonna fail?"

"I'm not cut out for this! I was able to sort of focus with someone there to keep me on track, but the rest of the time I just get distracted and—and even during the stupid test it's like my brain just refuses to focus on that stuff!" He tosses his hands out in frustration.

You reach forward, pat his arm reassuringly. "You've been working hard. Did you finish the exam?"

"Barely. I didn't get to finish checking over my answers like you told me to, but the half I was able to check seemed alright when I could actually get my brain on them."

"Half is passing. More than passing, actually. You and Tanaka-senpai have both been working really hard, you know? And I was there for enough of it that I can say for certain—you're a smart guy. You're gonna be fine."

"[name]-san…"

You pull back, only for him to catch your wrist.

"Will you still marry me even if I fail my exams?"

"You're not going to fail. But yes, if you ask me nine hundred and seventy-five more times, I'll think about it."

"Yes! Okay, so, that aside—what's up with you, really? Don't think I didn't notice you trying to deflect earlier."

"See?" you grin as the warning bell for the end of lunch sounds. "Smart."

You do not let him wriggle an answer out of you. Today, you escape with your life.

~

Yachi seems to blossom as your outing together stretches on. Some shops, you enter together, always the same script: Hi! We're managers for the Karasuno volleyball club and the club is currently looking for donations to fund us as we work towards Nationals. Would it be okay if we left this poster with you to hang up?

Invariably, the answers are positive, especially after seeing the posters. On occasion, the two of you will split up, one of you taking the establishments next to or across the street from one another, but every time you enter together, you can tell how much more confident she is already.

This is good for her.

The constant compliments on her professional-level work bolster her. The good response to the poster-hanging requests has her shoulders relaxing more and more. You think that, probably, once she gets used to manager stuff, it'll be second nature to her. She'll grow into this role beautifully, and by her third year she'll probably be just as ethereal as Shimizu is to you now.

You keep your charming little smile on your face and speak politely as you distribute posters. By the time it's getting late enough to think about dinner, you're basically done. You briefly consider asking if she wants to grab dinner at one of the places nearby, since you're already in town, but instead you walk her to the bus with that same strained smile.

"Thank you so much for your help! I don't think I could have gotten all those handed out without you."

You laugh, shake your head. "Nah, you would've been fine. You're a natural at this stuff."

"What? B-but I was completely falling apart at the start there. If I didn't have you to work off of, I would never have been able to get the words out right and probably would have totally gotten shut down."

"Uh, not once they actually looked at the posters. Did you hear any of those shopkeepers talking about them? I'm telling you, they're amazing. You probably didn't even need to say anything and they would've put them up anyway."

She rubs the back of her neck, cheeks red. Of course she has to be cute, too. She's done all this cool stuff, and you haven't even gotten a fucking permission slip signed.

"I-it's sort of amazing hearing you praise me so highly," she admits. "I mean, you never seem to try really hard at anything, but you just get it."

You blink. "Uh, no. I'm—trying a lot harder than I'd like to admit. It's probably the reason I don't have the energy to get excited about anything. I use it all trying to do stuff well and hiding the fact that I'm trying."

"What? But, you're so cool, though! I mean, you've got Nishinoya-senpai head over heels for you! And you've probably got it together better than anyone else I know! I mean, during practices you're always saving me from getting hit and stuff and I can barely react at all until I would've already been hit… I think you're probably way better at this than me. And you're already starting to get everything with volleyball, right? You follow along way better than I do during practice."

You shrug. "That's just because Noya-senpai took the time to explain it to me. We could always sit down and compare notes over lunch or something so we both understand it better, now that we're not tutoring?"

She smiles, nods. The bus arrives, and you wave her off, turning to make the trek back to your house in silence.

You'll probably quit once she's confident enough to stand on her own. At least they'll have a good manager to rely on.

~

You survive the weekend the way you always do, but suddenly, it's intolerable. You pace restlessly around the house for the first few hours alone, and then put on shoes and go running, half-expecting Noya to materialize out of nowhere to run with you. But he doesn't.

You've given yourself until Monday to get a signed permission slip for the Tokyo games.

There's a chance that your father comes home this weekend, so you spend most of the weekend pacing and hoping he will, permission slip in hand. It takes hours, too many, until you're once again waking up on the couch to find him standing in the doorway, hurt in his eyes.

"Can you sign my permission slip?" you ask in lieu of a real greeting. "It's for some away games for the volleyball club. We're going to Tokyo."

"Tokyo? Wait, volleyball club?"

You raise up the paper. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure it's blanket permission for later games and stuff, too. But, you know, you said it was a good idea the other day, so it'd be nice if I could actually participate." The lie doesn't even taste bad in your mouth.

"Oh, right. When did I say that?"

"When you gave me the debit card for groceries? What, were you just completely ignoring me?"

"I'm sorry," he says. He sounds like he means it. "Here, I'll sign it. Tell me about your volleyball club. Are you playing, or…" He takes the paper from you, scribbles on the appropriate lines.

"Managing for the boys' team."

"Really?" he raises an eyebrow. "Those boys nice?"

The surge of temper startles even you. "Yeah, 'too-san, they're really nice."

"I see," he says, and that's it. No more prying, no weird protectiveness you've always hated the idea of but seem to want to hear now, no questions. Just I see and a signed permission slip. Just easy lies.

That night, during the short period in which you're out of your mind, you reach for your phone.

[name] to Noya at 01:37

[name]: if this is stupid please ignore it

[name]: but when you see this can I have a picture of sobas toe beans?

[name]: its important

~

Noya to [name] at 06:12

Noya: [image attached. Image description: the underside of Soba the cat's front paw. One toe bean is black, while the rest are pink.]

Noya: [image attached. Image description: the same cat paw, except a single fingertip is pressing into it from off-camera. The paw pad squishes around the fingertip.]

Noya: wanna talk about it?

[name]: would it be completely impossible for you to believe I just wanted to see her beans at one in the morning?

[name]: they're good beans, senpai

Noya: you're right, they ARE good beans

~

He meets you as he usually does. On the way to practice that morning, he doesn't press about the night's bean request, simply chats you up like everything's the same as it has been. You fire back as best as you can manage, but your mood just won't seem to lift.

Morning passes like normal, and classes drag on. It feels a little pointless to be in classes right after finals like this when the term ends in a couple of weeks, but a lot of things feel a little pointless. You get used to it. Lunch, you consider talking to Yachi, but she's busy talking to her friends, so you pick over your food alone, staring out the window.

And then there's afternoon practice.

Though one or two guys complain about the heat, Daichi insists, and so everyone's wearing their jackets for your and Yachi's official induction. They display the backs proudly as Shimizu dispenses a club jacket of your own to each of you, shout a welcome that would have scared you shitless a few short weeks ago.

You look at the back of your new jacket, the white Karasuno High School Volleyball Club embroidered there, stark against the black. Bow. Give them the polite "I look forward to working with you!" and move on.

That night, walking home, Noya says: "Oh, right. I meant to ask this earlier, but I didn't want to ruin the moment."

"Dare I ask?"

"You were smiling really nice when you got your club jacket. Will you marry me?"

You pull the jacket in question tight around your shoulders and look away without answer.

Tags: @deeplightgarden @idonthaveanameideayet @dusstory

[akiradolce]

Subathon Over!

After 55 hours, my subathon comes to a close! There's a lot I learned from this experience. The first is that I'm able to do it, so that was a huge confidence boost! Even though, I found mild success with my subathon, there's a few things that I was upset with as well...

The first thing was that I was sick, so that was a huge upsetting part for me. I wasn't able to be 100% at full entertainer mode since I still had to focus on being healthy. That means a lot of the more physically demanding things were not possible. So no karaoke, no Ring Fit. I even had forcing push-ups/sit-ups/squats as an incentive. I ended up doing them, but it was the most I could do.

Another thing was that even with an active chat, I ended up feeling very lonely. I wasn't able to interact with my friends outside of the stream. The only few times I was able to was during BRBs and just before going to bed. Even on waking up, I immediately had to check on the stream to make sure it was still up or that no hate raids and trolls decided to cause trouble.

There's not much time for other people when tending to an "always on" stream. I was only able to speak to another person once through the entire 55 hours, which was after a friend raided my stream and I openly invited them to join since they weren't planning on going to bed afterwards. I didn't even speak to family at all during the whole thing.

Food was also a huge issue. From my experience with the stream, time was precious. Time away from the stream meant losing retention and potential contributions. I always felt like I was in a rush to get things done. Because I was sick, I also constantly needed water to refresh my system, even more than usual to help recover from whatever sickness I caught. I wanted to eat bit more substantial meals like pasta and chicken, but those are things that you can't just set on a stove and come back to. I didn't have roommates or family that were able to help or cook for me, so that was a huge struggle.

My advice if I were to ever do this again, and to anyone reading that's looking to do a subathon, is to make food ahead of time. Make a huge pot of chili in a slow cooker, get a rice cooker, buy family sized lasagna that take like 1hr30 to cook in an oven. Depending on the success of your subathon, DoorDash could be your friend. In my case, I wasn't able to justify DoorDash or any other delivery service. The only outside food I got was Taco Bell, which was an incentive, and not by choice.

Another huge issue was finding ways to keep the stream active with clear info. I definitely feel like I should have prepared a bit more beforehand, but I was unable to make the proper preparations due to being basically bedridden up until the day before the start day. I would have gotten a YouTube playlist set up for when I slept and set up labels that could let people know what the next incentive was. I think the worst thing was not having moderators able to help. Because everything had to be done by myself. Changing titles, tracking incentives and rewards, removing troublesome users. I also unfortunately had an issue with the marathon timer, where I had to manually add time. A lot of the workload made it hard to focus on providing an engaging stream.

Even though I struggled a lot, I ended up creating a lot of fun and memorable moments. I would definitely try this again in the future, but with my experience on how I handled this, I would know a bit better on how to handle everything. My only regret was not being able to reach my follower goal during the event and having to dip into my own savings just to continue streaming while I'm in Japan.

[purplepadlock]

hey wait, upon review

My power messed up my ears...

it could just be the English version but the phrasing seems very specific. Back in the early chapters of the manga, Nana took advantage of the flaws of Talents in order to kill some of her classmates. The way this is phrased makes it seem like The Watcher's power evolved to a point where he ended up going deaf - like the human body can't handle the strain of Talents once they get too strong and so they start messing up. Or the Talents evolve so far that they force themselves to become necessary for the wielder.

The Watcher can't hear without his Talent, so... Maybe, instead of Nakajima using his Talent to appear like an Enemy of Humanity, it's Nakajima's Talent using Nakajima to appear like an Enemy of Humanity so that he needs to keep blocking himself out of people's views.

Like, could Sachiko eventually become unable to walk because of her Talent and eventually need to teleport everywhere?

Going even further: we know that, from the post-island/mainland arc, Soma had the power to release electricity - and he kept saying he couldn't really control its strength. What if it started off controllable and gradually evolved to be impossible to use carefully? The brain also makes use of electrical charges, so maybe Soma's more aggressive personality only happened/was made much worse by his power evolving over time - his Talent was trying to goad him into becoming more reliant on it and using it to his advantage more often. It failed though, because Soma wasn't stupid; he didn't want to use it in places where it could easily kill him. Not that he realized the warehouse was ---

Soma seemed confused as to why he went to the warehouse in the first place, having sensed that it was dangerous. He then goes on to prove that he isn't stupid and knows full well how his Talent works by comparing the location he's in to a rice cooker and describes the properties of joule heat.

And truthfully, I never really understood how Nakajima got Soma to do this. If he had some brainwashing ability, surely it would have been used more later on? No, I think Nakajima was talking to Soma's Talent. The Talent wants to be necessarily, to be depended upon, and Soma was strong enough to push those thoughts down and not be tempted. That is, until Nakajima decided to address the currents within him. His final words are "Somebody help me!" - he clearly doesn't want to use his Talent, but his Talent wants to be used, regardless of the outcome.

...Of course, this is all dependent on how the original Japanese version is phrased and I can't really check that because I do not know Japanese :(

in Chapter 100, we meet The Watcher / Red. Maybe it's just his demeanour but the guy seems a bit older than the main cast. I think this now confirms that Nakajima's transformation was induced by Tsuruoka because he

seems to be older, so it's definitely not age-related

uses his Talent more than any other character we've seen, so it's definitely not based on how frequently a Talent is used

now it's possible that Kyoya - who is around 30 years old and his Talent probably activates to protect him against even minor things like paper cuts or dry skin - wasn't affected by the transformation because his Talent makes him invincible and seems to prevent him from changing physically, but it could also have been a subtle foreshadowing that Tsuruoka is responsible to some extent. I even think that Tsuruoka wanted to operate on Kyoya partially to (try to) induce the transformation

I have always thought that the sudden shift in Tsuruoka's motives was suspicious and that he was responsible to some extent, but now I'm convinced that that is what Looseboy wants. Heck, considering the range of its abilities, it may be (and honestly I'm thinking the chances are high) that Nakajima using his Talent to appear like an Enemy of Humanity.