#daily hayley stories

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive (Thousands of Covid-related news stories! Daily updates!)

By Hayley Gleeson

Thousands of patients caught COVID in NSW public hospitals last year and hundreds died, fuelling concerns among infection control experts and healthcare workers that hospitals are not taking strong enough precautions against airborne viruses.

NSW Ministry of Health data released under freedom of information laws shows at least 6,007 patients caught COVID in hospital in 2023 and 297 died — about 115 laboratory confirmed infections and six deaths per week, on average.

Similar figures were recorded in the first few months of 2024, with 1,729 patients catching COVID and 86 dying between January and April this year. For context, about 2,100 people died from or with COVID in NSW in 2023, suggesting about 14 per cent of those were patients who contracted the virus in hospital.

The data was released following an application by lawyer Peter Vogel who, for 18 months, was pointed between the Ministry of Health — which initially denied holding "complete and accurate records" of hospital acquired COVID infections — and the Clinical Excellence Commission, which directed Mr Vogel back to the Ministry of Health, which eventually released the data he had sought.

The figures are only a snapshot of the pandemic's ongoing impact on hospitals, and NSW Health would not clarify how it is collecting data on hospital acquired COVID infections or provide more detail on deceased patients' ages and genders, or data for previous years.

Still, experts say infection control protocols in hospitals are not good enough, with some doctors warning widespread indifference to COVID is costing too many lives and adding unnecessary pressure to a health system already under strain.

Hospitals know how to stop COVID spreading Stéphane Bouchoucha, president of the Australasian College for Infection Prevention and Control, said the new figures were "concerning and tragic" especially for the families of people who had died.

"We know how COVID is transmitted and we know how to prevent healthcare associated infections," Dr Bouchouca said — by ensuring good ventilation and air filtration, testing and contact tracing, isolating infected patients and requiring healthcare workers to wear masks.

If hospitals were recording similar numbers of deaths from golden staph infections, Dr Bouchoucha said, swift action would be taken. "But I think people react differently because it's COVID — 'It's alright, it's a respiratory disease, it's not so bad' — trying to minimise the fact it is still a healthcare associated infection," he said.

"This is the core business of infection prevention and control … The premise that we can allow some deaths, to me, is wrong."

For months experts and healthcare workers in several states have been warning that too many patients are catching COVID in health facilities, with Victorian data showing about 9 per cent of those who caught the virus in hospital last year died.

In NSW, hospitals have shifted from an "emergency" pandemic response to managing COVID in line with other transmissible infections. Local health districts now must conduct their own risk assessments and adjust infection control protocols accordingly. Staff are no longer required to wear masks unless they're caring for COVID patients, when they must use N95 respirators, which are significantly more effective at preventing transmission of respiratory viruses than surgical masks.

But some doctors say that guidance is not always enforced, with healthcare workers in some hospitals choosing to wear surgical masks around COVID patients. Others are concerned that COVID testing is not conducted frequently enough and that staff are discouraged from ordering PCR tests to save money.

'The government has some really serious questions to answer' Amanda Cohn, NSW Greens spokesperson for health and a former GP, said she was "surprised" to learn that data on hospital acquired COVID infections and deaths had been released because she had repeatedly asked Health Minister Ryan Park and Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant about it. Dr Chant told a Budget Estimates hearing last October that the Clinical Excellence Commission — the lead agency for infection prevention and hospital acquired infections — did not "collect and aggregate" it in a "systematic way".

"I have been reassured by the chief health officer that NSW Health is 'conscious of taking every step we can to minimise the risk of [COVID] transmission' in hospitals," Dr Cohn told ABC News. "But these figures make me very concerned that that's not the case."

Dr Cohn pointed to a recent study by the Burnet Institute and the Victorian Department of Health which found testing hospital patients for COVID on admission and staff wearing N95 respirators could prevent hundreds of deaths statewide and save the health system tens of millions of dollars each year.

"To know that those things aren't happening in New South Wales, meanwhile thousands of people are catching COVID in hospitals that should be safe — I think the government has some really serious questions to answer," she said.

Of particular concern, Dr Cohn said, is NSW Health's policy on taking transmission-based precautions — requiring healthcare workers to wear N95 respirators only when dealing with patients who are confirmed or suspected to have COVID.

"Only taking precautions after you know somebody is confirmed to be infectious is not good enough," she said, adding: "We need to see leadership from the health minister."

Dr Cohn said she had also spoken to many medically vulnerable patients who reported having to ask hospital staff to wear masks. "We would never expect people to have to individually ask their surgeon to wash their hands, we just expect that high standards are followed when we go into a health facility, that you will be safe."

Are hospitals prepared for future pandemics? Marilyn Cruickshank, professor of nursing at the University of Technology Sydney and a board member of the International Federation of Infection Control, said there were several factors likely influencing the drop-off in infection prevention and control efforts in NSW hospitals. These include high levels of exhaustion among healthcare workers since the onset of the pandemic, sector workforce challenges and budget restrictions — all of which are causing "strain and tension" in hospitals.

From a policy perspective, she added, high rates of vaccination against COVID and fewer deaths in recent years mean the "perceived risk" of the virus is much lower now than it was in, say, 2020. "It's not just that people don't want to do the right thing," Professor Cruickshank said. "There's a story behind it."

Still, she said, the new data suggests current infection prevention measures are "not good enough". "From a personal point of view, I would like to see staff continuing to mask in hospitals" using N95 respirators, Professor Cruickshank said — particularly those in emergency departments and wards that care for immunocompromised patients or other vulnerable groups like newborns.

"As healthcare workers, we should ensure that our hospitals are as safe as we can make them," she said. "So to me, it's a patient safety issue to try to keep the levels of hospital acquired COVID as low as possible."

However the "biggest change" she'd like to see is more support for hospital infection control teams, which need "good epidemiological skills and the resources to be able to quickly respond to outbreaks".

"Unfortunately, I don't think COVID will be the last pandemic that we see — there will be others in future," Professor Cruickshank said. "So we need people who are trained up to be able to deal with whatever comes next."

'It's too late for my mum' but we can still protect other patients For Ravi Fernando, whose 79-year-old mother Thelge died in hospital in August 2022, it's frustrating and upsetting to know patients are still dying after catching COVID in a place they should be safe.

Mr Fernando's mother was admitted to St George Hospital in Sydney's south after suffering a subarachnoid haemorrhage due to a ruptured brain aneurysm in late June 2022. She had successful emergency surgery and, for a few days, seemed to be recovering well in the ICU. But soon she began deteriorating and the hospital informed Mr Fernando that Thelge had caught COVID, most likely from one of her nurses.

A quality management consultant who has worked with aged care facilities, Mr Fernando was shocked but not surprised: most of the staff in ICU were wearing surgical masks, not N95 respirators, he said — some wore them down around their chin. "Maybe I should have raised concerns, but I wasn't in that frame of mind at the time," he said. "But I remember noticing that because back then, COVID was still a big deal."

Thelge was intubated and given antivirals only after Mr Fernando requested them, which still bothers him, but she died a couple of weeks later. An investigation by the Healthcare Complaints Commission (HCCC) found there was no evidence that her death was caused by COVID: St George Hospital's assessment concluded her COVID infection "did complicate the management" of her presenting condition but did not contribute to her death.

But Mr Fernando strongly disagrees. "She was clearly recovering before she got COVID … there was no question about that. Of course, aneurysms are complicated, so you never know, but there was a clear trigger for her deteriorating," he said. "The death of a loved one is distressing regardless. But when you know that it was preventable, it's very distressing."

Had St George Hospital "genuinely listened" to his family's feedback and improved its infection control protocols, he added, more deaths could have been prevented (the HCCC said it was "satisfied" with the hospital's COVID safe protocols). "It still would have been too late for my mum, but at least others are not going to be hurt in a similar way," Mr Fernando said.

ABC News requested interviews with the Health Minister Ryan Park and Kathy Dempsey, NSW Chief Infection Prevention and Control Practitioner and Healthcare Associated Infection Advisor at the Clinical Excellence Commission — NSW Health declined on their behalf.

NSW Health also did not respond to specific questions including about whether it was comfortable with current levels of illness and death in hospitals, if it would be reviewing infection control policies and whether it had conducted audits and upgrades to ventilation and filtration systems.

"NSW Health continues to closely monitor and assess the way we respond to acute respiratory infections, including COVID-19, to keep patients, staff and visitors to our health facilities safe," a spokesperson said.

"We remind the community if they are experiencing cold or flu symptoms, they should stay at home, where possible, to protect others. If someone has cold or flu symptoms and they need to go out, they should wear a mask to protect others. Symptomatic people should also avoid visiting high risk settings like hospitals, aged and disability care facilities or people who are at higher risk of severe illness."

[whileiamdying]

Björk Talks Goths and Ravers, Men and Women, Life and Death, Utopia and Cornucopia

Björk, 2024. Courtesy of Vidar Logi

GQ treks to North Africa for an intimate conversation with the ever-evolving creator about her latest metamorphosis.

By Hayley Campbell January 17, 2025

This story was featured in The Must Read, a newsletter in which our editors recommend one can’t-miss story every weekday. Sign up here to get it in your inbox.

In the north of Tunisia is a former fishing village where the buildings are uniformly white and blue, and the quiet is pierced with a Muslim call to prayer five times daily. It’s awkward to get to, so of course Björk found it by accident—not by land, but by sea. In 2006 she had bought a boat at the bottom of Europe, maybe Croatia; she can’t remember. It was something like out of National Geographic, she says—“a small, fat boat, kind of like the Land Rover of boats, made to sail through ice.” This boat would become her home for three years, but soon after she bought it, something broke. Looking at the map, the closest place to go for help was the marina not far from where we’re currently sitting. “I walked up here, and I was like, What the fuck?”

When Björk talks about Sidi Bou Saïd it’s like she dreamed it. In fact, having spent years telling friends about finding “the best village in the universe,” she came back five years ago to confirm that she hadn’t. There are no cars here, apart from those belonging to the few tourists who’ve insisted on driving there and gotten stuck. The driver of my dusty, seatbelt-less taxi dropped me at the edge of the village, wordlessly slapped his thighs, and pointed to the narrow streets, a gesture that said, You’re on foot from here. Up twisting alleys and stone steps so worn by centuries of feet they look bowed, I find Björk: an Icelander in winter, delirious with African sunlight. She wears a high-neck, asymmetrical dress in multicolored pastel and neon, with jet black hair, messy eyeliner, layers of red lace tights, and—despite the perilously San Franciscan angle of the cobbled streets—camel-colored platform tabis. A swan dress may have stood out on the red carpet in 2001, but here among the stray cats she looks beamed down from space. This is Björk on vacation.

Björk, 2024. Courtesy of Vidar Logi

We were supposed to meet in Iceland, but Björk looked at her calendar and realized that if she didn’t take a holiday right this second there would “never, ever be one, ever.” She needed a break; she has just finished work on a film, Cornucopia, that is the culmination of 10 years of her life. It documents one night, in Lisbon, of a five-year, 45-date world tour whose production was so elaborate that the film begins with a written statement trying to explain it; the set was a “monster” so elaborate to transport that Björk did other stripped-back shows—“Björk Orkestral,” where she would turn up at the venue with nothing but a dress in a bag—to pay for it. “I did say to my manager, Listen, I will only do this one time—sorry!” she says, laughing. “Even though it's sold-out, it doesn't pay for moving all these screens everywhere.…”

GQ: Why was this live show so complex?

Björk: I had been working in VR and 360 visuals for a few years. I was just thinking in 360, and I was working with a lot of animators: seven VR videos with seven different teams. A lot of this stuff, some of it was in the VR videos that a lot of people didn't see, even though we took that to 19 cities. It's very particular people that go to a digital exhibition to stand in a queue and see VR. And then I was like, “Okay, this is very elitism. How many people own a headset? Let's bring it out of the headset and put it on a 19th-century stage.”

When we started working on it, we got 27 screens—they open and close; that had never been done before. And also in the back there's an LED screen that's high-def, and then in front of that is normal projection, and then there's a gauze that goes in front of it. We were trying to create magica lanterna for the 21st century. We were trying to make VR analog.

Björk's Cornucopia concert in Lisbon, 2023.Courtesy of Santiago Felipe

The songs in the show jump around from different albums, largely from the last 10 years, but together they tell a story of “a modern marionette who alchemically mutates, from puppet to puppet, from the injury of a heart wound into a fully healed state.” How did you pick them?

I would say that Vulnicura [2015] was obviously a heartbreak album, and it was quite the saddest thing I've ever done—and a dark thing. So Utopia [2017] was the inventing of a new world. It was very like, Oh, this apocalypse has happened, let's go take the women and the children and go to some island with no conflict and play flutes. And so it was kind of almost like a sci-fi story, on purpose, like a fantasy. But I thought it was helpful because when you start from scratch building something, then you need to start in a very ideal way, in some ideal place.

Saying it goes straight from a heart wound to a fully healed state is an oversimplification of the story, as anyone who’s had a broken heart will know.

Yes. The tail of the dinosaur comes and you have to deal with it. Which is songs like “Sue Me,” but it's random in life anyway, how that works out. You kind of have something that feels bad that happens to you, and then straight after, you fix it and work it out. And then after that, maybe suddenly three years later, the tail of that hits you back. So time is kind of irrelevant anyway.

I wondered how much of the Cornucopia story was autobiographical in a larger sense. Are you the marionette?

Am I the marionette? [Laughs] I mean, I think it's a bit of both, of course. Sometimes when you are trying to be superpersonal and you try to boil the essence out, and then you come out with a sentence, and then other people read it and they go, “Oh, that's so universal,” and the other way around. What's so great about music is you can map out all the emotions there are, if such a map exists, and then you would put a song that fits each emotion in each box. Sometimes you are writing a song and the verses are what happened to you, it's very personal, but the choruses are something that happened to your friends five years earlier, but it is the same emotion. It's dealing with the same thing.

The songs I've written that most people think, “Oh, that's obviously a love song,” like “Come to Me”—a really old song of mine—that's written to two friends. The verse is to one friend and the chorus is to another friend, but it's definitely not erotic. So people go, “Oh, that's so sexy. What a sexy song.” And I'm like [Björk looks confused], “Thanks!” And then some other songs that for me are super erotic, I will hide it so much that people don't notice it, because it's so precious to me that I want it to be a secret between me and the lover. So it is kind of random, you know?

Björk's Cornucopia concert in Lisbon, 2023.Courtesy of Santiago Felipe

Buried in the story there seems to be a battle between mind and heart. Which one do you trust?

Well, I’d like to add some things into the mix if I could, like the soul and the instinct. I think some decisions I make are just instinct. A gut instinct, and I don't know why. I think mind can be helpful too, but it can also get in the way. But I think we need all of it, to be honest. That's the simplest answer. And I think a lot of my songs are me kind of talking myself into almost like a lesson or a class where I'm trying to learn, and I'm trying to become, hopefully, a more, I don't know…I wouldn't say better person, that's not what I'm aiming for, but just to grow. I would like to think of myself as somebody that's still growing. Very often in the lyrics, that's what I'm sort of looking back and forth at: There's moments where I will reveal my doubts, and then very often solve them in the same song.

In Cornucopia, Björk invites us to imagine a future and be in it. She sings of hope, children, utopia; in the animations, spores float, stamen twist, and shapes like calla lilies spin and unfold behind seven Icelandic flutists. It doesn’t appear in the film, but in the live shows a video message from Greta Thunberg would play before the encore—Cornucopia was both art and a political statement. Unsurprisingly, Björk has worked in environmental activism for 25 years (she is currently trying to save Iceland’s wild salmon) and is a person who needs to be in nature—preferably by the ocean, like here in Sidi Bou Saïd. She found living in New York to be stifling. Shortly before the pandemic hit, she returned to Iceland full-time, put her suitcases in the attic, and set down roots on an island that is ruled, largely, by women.

Björk's Cornucopia concert in Lisbon, 2023.Courtesy of Santiago Felipe

One song that always stuck out to me is “Tabula Rasa” from your album Utopia. There's a line in it where you say, “It is time / For us women to rise, and not just take it lying down / It is time / The world, it is listening.” It made me think of your experience with Lars von Trier in Dancer in the Dark, especially given what's happening with Blake Lively in Hollywood at the moment.

Yeah, that even made the Icelandic news. That line, I wrote it like a year or two before #MeToo. And [back] then it felt like saying something really rude. It was so obscene just to come up with a sentence like that. And now it's like drinking water—thank God it's no big deal! But then it was like, [gasps]. You know, at the moment Iceland has 11 ministers. Seven of them are women, four guys. We have a female prime minister, female president, female bishop, female head of police. I was born in a good country. It is not perfect, but I was spoiled. So I think also going to other countries and just feeling this sort of silence, you cannot speak out, it was like, What the fuck? It's so weird to be Icelandic because people say, “Oh, you're such a feminist.” And I'm like, “Well, I'm just like everybody where I come from. I'm normal.”

You say in the film that in order to survive as a species we need to define our utopia. Do you think it's matriarchal?

I work a lot with guys. I love guys. And obviously, in my life, when you look at the track lists or the personnel of all my albums, I've been blessed with incredibly talented people and friends and family. I also love DJing with a lot of bro-y techno music. I love both. I love super feminine, delicate stuff. I mean, look at me, my music—it's both. But I think now, it seems to be the world we are living in—especially in Iceland, with all these women—it could maybe assist us to transition. I mean, let's face it, it is 2025. People keep acting like the 20th century was five minutes ago. No, it was a quarter-century ago. We're 25 years into the century and we're still behaving like it's the ’80s or something. So we have to somehow do this transition, also politically and environmentally and also obviously with the queer world. It took a big jump, but then there was a backlash. In a way, you could look at Trump winning as some sort of a #MeToo backlash.

Björk DJ's in Montreal, 2016.Santiago Felipe / Getty Images

So I'm not giving you a yes or no answer to that question. I think sometimes, yes, it's great to get women to run some school or something, because some guys have fucked it up for 100 years. But sometimes women can also do strange things. They isolate somewhere, and left on their own terms they do also fucked up shit. So I don't think there's one solution. I think it's a balance.

In talking about utopia, there’s a lot of talk of hope. It reminded me of something Nick Cave said in his book Faith, Hope & Carnage. He said, "Hope is optimism with a broken heart." Do you agree?

I respect that's where he's coming from, and that's very Nick Cave. [Laughs] You can keep it! [Björk mimes pushing something away] I think musically, he's dealing with goth, he's dealing with industrial. Just to talk purely about the sound world, [bands] like Einstürzende Neubauten and The Birthday Party—that was all kind of the remains of Europe torn after World War II. How can we, the goths, stand up and become little gargoyles? That's not my universe. My home is more rave. And if you want to write about the philosophy behind rave, it's very sort of, “Let's take ecstasy and dance for eight hours.” [Laughs] So it's a slightly different philosophy. I'm not saying it's better or worse, but it is kind of like prankster energy. It's humor, and it's sort of tricksy.

So I think I look at hope in another way. I mean, obviously there are a lot of sentences about hope in my lyrics. I'm not going to quote myself here—I'm too shy, or the coffee hasn't kicked in yet—but I did say, “Hope is a muscle, hope is a muscle.” A lot of people have used that phrase—I don't own it. Hope is something you need to be intentional about.

You need to work on it so it grows?

Yeah, I think I'm more coming from that point. And for example, in the lyrics for “Utopia,” I can't remember exactly because I can’t remember words [laughs]... But you have to be intentional about the light.…

[We’re interrupted by the call for the second of the Muslim daily prayers—Dhuhr—which happens shortly after noontime. Björk turns her face to the window with a look of ecstasy.]

Oh, here we go! Yes! I love it. Five times a day. I'm so happy! What was I saying?

Is it hard, in environmental activism, to give people hope?

Musicians are not politicians and we are not industrialists. There’s a lot of things we're not. But one thing we are is we [are people who] work with imagination and we know how that works a little bit, and that sometimes you have to imagine something that doesn't exist, and that can be superhard. And it doesn't only go for fantasy or some song or some books or whatever, it also goes for just trials and difficulties in everyday life, like the environmental issue that we have to deal with somehow. It's almost like an attempt to exercise a muscle. The same way you can catapult yourself with sound to a new world... You are in one mood, you put on a song and you go to another mood. You are intentional about your hope and you pull yourself to a new place. You can also do it with environmental agendas or climate accords.

Björk, 2024. Courtesy of Vidar Logi

Do you think your idea of hope is colored by growing up in Iceland, a country that doesn’t even have an army?

Yeah. And we have a lot of optimism in Iceland: For 600 years we were a colony—we just got independent, like, 70 years ago—so we are just like, “Go, go, go! This is fun. This is our best period we've ever had!” Especially when it comes to culture and identity. In Iceland, we were just like, “You just keep your wars. We don't want any of that.” We were far away on an island. I think also coming from being a colony for 600 years, we didn't want that history and the aesthetics, especially as artists. We wanted 21st century, which was more biotech, nature and technology working together. Listening to techno in the fields, off your headphones, on ecstasy. Do you know what I mean?

Sure.

I'm not saying I do that now! But I think it describes us and where the joy lives and where the pain lives. The pain is there. But the goths from Nick Cave’s generation, that's like an East-West thing, and we're like a North-South thing. It's a different polarity, I think.

Well, speaking of goths, you sing towards the end of the film that love will keep us safe from death. Do you think that’s true?

Yes. I think, again, it's the hope-keeper that's speaking, of course, but it's also trying to teach someone to love. But when you are in love, it's both. It's a contradiction because you're both in the moment. You're in the moment when you're in love, but you see eternity, so death doesn't matter. But when you're not in love, you're not in the moment and you also die, or you fear death.

Björk's Cornucopia concert in Lisbon, 2023.Courtesy of Santiago Felipe

You feel vulnerable.

Yeah. So it is two emotional states. So it's more trying to describe those two emotional states. Obviously, it was also a piss-take on “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” which, of course, for the goths and the nihilists, it's their logo. So I was trying to find a logo for the post-optimists. I call myself post-optimist. Not postapocalyptic but post-optimistic. And so, obviously, in the 21st century we're talking about love and emotional intelligence and compassion. And when you are in that moment, fully loving and fully in the moment, you don't care about dying in 40 years or 100 years or whatever, it just goes away. So it is like a strange contradiction. So that's what that statement in the end of that song is about, that love will save us from death. But it's not literal, like some action movie.

It just feels like it will.

It's an emotional stance, that when you are in love and you are in the moment, death becomes irrelevant, it doesn't matter. And then, of course, if you can also, on your moment of death, be in that emotional state, which we all hope for, then also death doesn't matter anyway. So it's a win-win.

How do you feel about death generally? Do you fear it?

I think I am the sort of person who's always very excited about 50 things. So I'm more worried about, “Will I get it all done?” I want to do this and I want to write that song, and then I want to go and dance in that club, and then I want to taste that food. The good side of that is obviously enthusiasm; the shadow side of that is impatience. I just have to calm down—it's not all going to happen in one whack. You have to just chill. But also, that sort of archetype or character is usually not that worried about death. It's other things that they worry about, like running out of energy to do things.

Also, being a singer, when I meet my friends who are singers and we talk about the voice and how we maintain the voice and what we eat and how we sleep and how we exercise and train, it's a mindset of a singer, which is in some ways not far away from an athlete. But it's different because athletes often just work for 20 years or whatever. Singers can sing until they die. But it's sort of about working with a different instrument every five years, learning, adapting to it.

Björk's Cornucopia concert in Lisbon, 2023.Courtesy of Santiago Felipe

Because your equipment physically changes?

Yeah. Growing with it. So it's like energy management. I see it with my friends who are singers. Since we were 20, I had to be like, “Oh, I probably should not drink five bottles of cognac the night before I do a concert. That's probably a bad idea.” I had to learn that when I was 20. So by the time I was 40 and all my friends were like, “What the fuck? I can't do everything I want anymore?” I'm like, “I learned that 20 years ago.” So having to navigate your body and your limitations and what you can do with it, you have to learn it young. But then it also helps you, because then when you get older, you can still do all these things. So when you say “Are you afraid of death?” I'm not afraid of that moment, because that sounds quite poetic to me. And also, I have a lot of emotional courage. It's more about navigating energy. But so far, I've enjoyed doing it. I like writing on each album songs that I can only sing with the voice I have now.

So each album is like a time capsule not just of your thinking but of your physicality?

Yeah. I'm not trying to sing the songs I sang when I was 19, which would be ridiculous anyway. Also, I'm blessed because I'm a singer-songwriter, so I write my own songs. So I'm hoping that when I have a deeper voice and I'm singing about subject matter that probably someone my age is interested in, that something reflects in that, that I don't even know about myself. Obviously, you just do your best as a musician. And then 50 years later, you listen to it, you go, “Oh, that was okay.” Or, “That was awful.” You just give it a go. So I think it's actually good for the songs you are writing, each five years or however long it takes you to make an album: The soul you have at that point and the emotion you have and the body you have, that it all is the same. I think it gives, hopefully, an added...I don't know what word to use. Humanity, probably.

Björk performs in Paris, 1990. Martyn Goodacre / Getty Images

Is that progression something you notice in the work of other artists?

Yeah. You can see it especially when you read the books back to back. Like now, I'm [revisiting] all of Anaïs Nin’s diaries, which I loved a lot, but I haven't read them for 20 years. They just came out on audiobook, so I just listened to them on the plane. I find it so interesting. In my 30s, obviously, I understood, “Okay, this is a woman who’s inventing female psychology. She's groundbreaking, she's a pioneer. She's working with Otto Rank. She's doing the first psychologist in New York, female, and taking only female patients.” Such a groundbreaking document. But then also you have her books from over 50 years. Just that progression is insane.

There'd be stuff in the books she wrote when she was older that you wouldn’t have even noticed in your 30s—sort of like broadcasting at a frequency only dogs can hear, right?

Exactly. Absolutely. I find that really beautiful. And I'm actually understanding more and more how much she influenced me. Not literally, obviously, in my music, or her words or anything, but just that stamina of, “I'm going to document all my life. I'm going for the long haul.” She's actually very optimistic. She's a bridge-builder. She's a bridge-builder because she loves women, she loves men. She's like, “Why should I choose?” And I don't mean that sexually, I just mean as partners or companions. It's just one big bridge-building to humans, and very soulful and very optimistic and very playful, evading all boxes that she gets put in. She’s slippery in that sense. And then when there's drama, she goes there. I was just listening, and I was like, “Oh, this is so cheerful. I really need this for my holiday.” And then I sat in the airport and there was literally a scene where she loses her child in the hospital. She was writing that in 1935! And so detailed.

People barely speak about that even now.

Exactly. And she's describing every single thing that happened, giving birth and its death and the pain. Such a pioneer. So she's both taking in the dark and the light. I really like her stance on life.

I asked you about death originally, but it sounds like your feeling towards death is much the same as with hope: that it’s an activating idea rather than an end in itself.

Yeah. I have some friends who are goths and nihilists and it's that binary in their lives. I don't have that; I've got another one. But there's another darkness: nature, eruptions, volcanoes, destruction. And when I do techno beats, they're quite destructive. It lives elsewhere.

There's another line I wanted to ask you about. You sing, “He sees me for who I am.” Do you think you're received by the world in the way that you think you truly are? Do you think people get you?

I'm not really bothered by it because…I don't know, I don't want to blame astrology on all of it, but I'm four times Scorpio, whatever. I like hiding. It is weird that I am a celebrity. I'm the wrong person for it. I like hiding; I like layers. It's comforting for me, and the people who get me, they get me. How can I say it? I feel gotten. [Laughs] I've been gotten in my life. And the fact that I'm still doing what I'm doing and people are interested—you flying over here or whatever—I'm like, “Great!” But I put out an album in Iceland when I was 11 that was a bestseller. I didn't like the energy—being an A-list celebrity. That's not me. I'm not the cheerleader in the class, I never have been. And the same with when I became A-list in the ’90s, in London. I would've tolerated it—the paparazzi and whatever—if I could write music from that stance. But I couldn't. It was too narcissistic. I had to go somewhere and hide, and come out two years later with an album. I don't write in the limelight, I write in the dark.

Hayley Campbell is a writer and freelance journalist based in London.

[saltyluminaryvoid]

His Saving Grace

Chapter Two

1114 Klaus x future daughter reader

I recommend re-reading chapter one as I made some major changes. I know I promised this update two years ago, but university got in my way and when I came back to these old stories a lot of re-vamping took place.

Masterlist

The year is 2030, Y/N the daughter of Niklaus Mikaelson and Hayley Marshall. A powerful young witch which threatens the survival of Malivore. In retaliation Malivore unleashes a time fay to return to the past and kill Klaus to ensure his survival.Y/N is Hope’s younger twin, now that no one remembers who she is the job is left to y/n to stop Malivore.

                   “You still live in the silences between my thoughts.”

Y/N resisted the urge to sign impatiently as the crowds around her soared and rejoiced as the pastor preached. The loud voices screaming into her sensitive ears, highly agitating her short temperament. Y/N hated church, she was by no means an atheist but she was a witch and a woman living in a time where she could be hanged for simply defying authority. So with that in mind Y/N had begrudgingly entertained Alaric, to keep up the role as godly saints whom attended church every Sunday. 

For the past weeks tempers were high within the household, Alaric and Davina could only watch as she battled silently with her demons.  Putting up a saintly farce everyday in the village as boys swarmed for her hand in marriage and village girls scowled jealousy. As someone who was influenced by the strong women in her life, to always be true to ones self and to never shape shift into society's ideal, the pretense (and the besotted men) were killing her. Alaric was getting far too accustomed in his daily ritual of turning away marriage proposals from haughty mothers and corpse like men. 

Pulling her away from her thoughts was the strain of her far too tightly, bonded corset. Thank the old gods she was from a thousand years into the future. Now Y/N realized why her Aunt Rebekah mostly if not always bit the heads off every man she met. If I had to suffer almost seven hundred years in such a tightly wounded corset which restricted most movements I would have done the same Y/N thought impatiently. As the preacher vivaciously expelled the devil with the crowd, Y/N reaching a breaking point silently casting a notice me not charm and made her way to the exit, silently huffing as she straightened her ankle length, grey dress which carried a turtleneck-like neckline. She wore a pristine, white shirt underneath whose sleeves puffed loosely around her arms but knotted tightly below her elbows. On top of her grey dress carried a loose brown corset of sorts held together by a length of ribbon criss-crossed. This corset did not converge in the middle, rather it showcased about five inches of the grey vertical striped pattern upon the bust and midriff as to emphasise her figure. Stitched upon her grey skirt was a length of brown which stopped at least six inches above her grey ankle length skirt, but it was gauged elegantly upon her right thigh allowing an elegant stylish slide flow. After all she was her Aunt’s niece and secretly she hoped it pissed off the conservatives in the crowd. Oh yeah! that speech about playing the part was not translating so well into her everyday life. 

Finally reaching a safe distance, out of sight from zealous fanatics just upon the edge of the forest, she dropped the spell. Huffing a sigh of relief all Y/N now needed was a pack of cigarettes or some weed to make 1114 much more bearable. 

“That’s quite the trick you pulled back there, little strega.” Now that snapped Y/N from her inner thoughts. Spinning around in a quite unlady like fashion, for this period at least, more than ready to confront the intruder. Only to be left dumbfounded to the stranger standing before her. But with a practiced ease which came from years of sneaking out and around  the Salvatore Boarding School, Y/N layered on her oh so innocent Mikaelson charm. “I’m sorry, what did you just call me?, I have to say I’m not aware of that particular term!” Lies, her mind rang out. Play cool, Y/N thought, talk him up just to get close enough and wipe his memory. Now that particular trick was her favourite. The stranger smirked coyly at her, “I think you know exactly what I mean, liten heks.” Y/N paced herself now, he knew old norse. Whomever this stranger was, he was clearly quite wealthy at that judging by his smooth velvet and silks in comparison to her simple cotton dress. Now she had to thread carefully, wealth clearly meant high influence and political sway in a community as small as this one. And that meant possible exposure, this man was a threat, Y/N deemed carefully.

“Now, now liten heks, the stranger went on, I mean yours truly none harm.” My heart is void of ill contempt and malevolence for one with such great power and beauty. As he spoke he drew closer towards her, his face now completely unobstructed from the mist of the early morning. Y/N exhaled softly, the stranger a man’s whose face see had seen everyday in her New Orleans home, a demon who hunted her from birth, Finn Mikaelson. But if he was standing before her, that meant the brotherhood had not yet daggered the Mikaelsons. This younger and less vengeful ghost was still a threat to her but quite possibly an accomplice. The fae had yet to reveal itself it was either supplementing its diet with animals or news of children going missing had been covered up. 

The fae according to the texts preferred a warm tropical climate, for if their wings were exposed to cold they would simply fall apart. A fae’s lifeline was linked to her wings, losing them could kill the fae but iron to the heart worked just as well. All in all, the upcoming winter was now days away and left no time for procrastination which meant Y/N directly disobeying Alaric to seek the creature out herself. A venture she had no luck in, the fae who boasted of powerful magics was able to cleverly keep herself hidden. 

“Not one for much words I see.” Finn Mikaelson was now standing toe to toe with her. That’s quite alright, he continue as he played with a stray curl. Y/n flinched away slightly as he stared into her eyes, carefully examining the details of her face. “If I didn’t know better, I could have mistaken you for my Freya.” Finn whispered as he continued to tug upon her curl. It was low and if not for her keen hearing it would have been swept to the winds.  Y/N kept her head high and passive, thinking to herself how much of a leering creep her elder uncle was becoming. Quite unlike all accounts of the uptight, wet blanket her uncle Kol always described. As his hand came up to caress her face, Y/N instinctively jumped back, conjuring fire within her palm which she kept safely tucked behind her. Finn only smiled sheepishly, “I seemed to have forgotten my manners, in the presence of a young lady.” I deeply apologise, I do not know what came over me, my lady.

Y/n relaxed slightly and utterly confused as the man introduced himself. As he began to speak on what not, Y/N could only stare at his face in a daze. It would take her some time to sort herself out, only to realize he had disappeared only to leave behind a simple envelope in her hand. Y/N thought back to the genuinely baffled daze Finn fell into as she made her way into town. To onlookers her face was almost dreamy, as if paying much more attention to the envelope she twirled in her hands rather than her path. But rather Y/N was silently contemplating the latent abilities of the fae and just how she could manipulate Finn into helping her.The fae a creature in the future known for its deceitful ways but that though made her wonder just how much accurate Alaric’s information truly was. It was done before, the supernatural popularized lies like silver bullets and garlic to throw suspicion off of them so what if the same was done with the fae? As Y/N ventured into the town’s market lost in her thoughts many eyes followed her, women and young girls gossiped of her weird behaviours and wayward thinking.

________________________________________________________________

Bloody hell, Y/N thought to herself. Now while the young witch prided herself on being a fashionista, dresses were her absolute nightmare, well behind her murderous grandparents and malivore of course. I do have my priorities in order, thank you very much.

Somehow Davina had managed to convince the stubbornest Mikaelson into another deathtrap these humans called corsets. Y/N huffed, begrudgingly following her “parents” out of their temporary home. While she was ecstatic to receive the dinner invite to the Mikaelson home hours prior from Finn which came in the form of the mysterious envelope he left behind, she still heavily detested that damn corset suffocating her. There was just no space to hide her knives!, What’s a girl in multiple skirts and a stuffy attire supposed to do to defend herself when all her knives were confiscated on this occasion. 

But nevertheless Y/N compiled it only to see her family again while also plotting to defy Alaric once again on his no knives at the dinner table rule. I mean, its not really a family reunion if someone didn’t have a devious plan in the works. 

________________________________________________________________

Servants scattered frantically to the sides, keeping their heads bowed as the feared Mikaelson hybrid descended the grand staircase stepping onto the foyer. Holding an impassive mask, Niklaus surveyed the immediate area ensuring the preparations to his liking. Stepping to the right of the grand foyer Niklaus strolled into the grand sitting room which doubled as a music room, the soft notes of the harp eased his twirling mind. 

Taking a seat on a velvet cushioned armchair, with hands clasped elbows resting on his knees and eyes closed Niklaus thought back to the hauntingly familiar pup no he corrected himself, child. Days had passed since their first encounter and thoughts of the child haunted him. In the strangest of ways he craved her presence, but not in a way a lover does. But this vastly unfamiliar pull deep inside him yearning and pushing his self control. But if Niklaus didn’t know any better he would have called it fatherly love and as unbelievably usurp that idea sounded in his head, he couldn’t help but let his mind linger on the possibility. Barr the facial similarities and attitudes that crossed with his, perhaps it was her life that resonated with him he knew all too well the struggles of an abused orphan. 

Just maybe when he meet her today, try not to give away how he always crept away at night to watch over her. By the old gods, what would Elijah think of his stalker like behaviour. If his enemies only knew of this attachment, if he only knew. Niklaus sat and wondered of the possibilities, so lost in his thoughts he nearly missed his guests arrival. 

__________________________________________________________________

Dinner surprisingly went smoothly, Klaus was utterly entertained by the ideas and thoughts of the young woman before him. Her guardian agitated him deeply with his distrustful glances and cold demeanor. 

Y/N on the other hand was on edge for an entirely different reason. As much as she wished to truly enjoy the rare company of her family, she could not help but be worried about the whereabouts of Finn. Given the  strange behaviour she witnessed earlier from him and his sudden disappearance she could not help but ponder the worst, especially given the current circumstances. It could be entirely possible Finn had aligned himself with the fae in order to rid himself of Klaus and the others. As far as she recalled, Finn had never been too particularly fond of the vampiric lifestyle and it is certainly within his motives to fix the balance of nature and forever end the vampire lines.

The rest of the night in the company of the Mikaelsons continued smoothly, with the exception of Kol getting a little too drunk and flirting with Davina. Y/N was able to enjoy the company of her lively Aunt. Soon came the peak of the full moon and the makeshift family slipped away to trap the fae. As Davina gathered the necessary ingredients for a binding ritual and Alaric his iron weapons, Y/N shared her suspicions of Finn and him possibly knowing her true identity. Both had agreed that Finn would be a potential suspect in aiding and plotting with the fae to get rid of the Vampire Sire line, him included. With caution in mind, the trio made their way towards the woods where Y/N last spoke to Finn. Since, Finn was most likely aligned with fae, the two would track him using Y/N’s blood, a plan which quickly came to a stop when the magic revealed the family together in their manor. 

Relief didn’t last as the winds picked up around the trio and both Y/N and Davina picked up the excited whispers of dead witches. The brotherhood so it seemed had finally succeeded in crafting the daggers it was only a matter of time before they used it. Huh, maybe it was her paranoia seeping in earlier and Finn was just too ashamed of his earlier behaviour to make an appearance at dinner.

@physically-a-cheesecake​ 

@goldencassy​ 

@sujusfs14499​ 

@alyssatjuhhh​

[purplesurveys]

1948

How have you been doing? Ball of nerves as ever, but it being 2:48 AM at the moment is helping. I'm usually at my happiest these hours of the day, because I feel like nothing can disturb my peace ever.

Anything you're looking forward to? My dad is coming home tomorrow! :) I'll also be catching RM's docu in the cinema twice this week – once with Reena, once on my own. I think I'll also be seeing Andi this weekend. Then next month, I'm seeing Seventeen for the second time!

Do you or anyone you know play the violin? I know JM's sister was taking lessons when we were still often in touch, but idk if she's kept at it.

Do you have a nice view out of the closest window? I wouldn't call it nice – it's just an ordinary view as it's the neighbor's house.

What is one of your favorite breakup songs? Speaking directly from experience, I listened to Hayley Williams' Why We Ever nonstop when everything was still fresh. There was nothing ahead of me but pain and anguish, and that song was just the precise outlet I needed at a time when I had no other agenda but to cry and keep crying.

Thennnnn when I was taking the steps to want to start feeling better, I found that Hayley's Dead Horse and The All American Rejects' Gives You Hell helped a lot.

Do you know anyone named Georgia or George? No but I know a Georgina.

What age did you learn how to ride a bike? I never learned how to, lol. I cannot balance myself on two wheels even if my life depended on it...which is ridiculous because I like roller skating and ice skating.

Are you currently listening to music or watching TV? Yeah I'm listening to some music while doing this.

What is your morning routine? The first thing I usually do after checking the time is to open Reddit to check if there's any breaking news I should know about. Once I'm done checking my feed, I go to either Facebook or IG to watch Reels to put me in a lighter mood before having to get up.

Between 8:30-8:55 (it depends how lazy I am that morning lol) I'll get up so I can take a shower, let the dogs out to pee and play with them a little bit, make my coffee, then it's off to work I go until 6 PM.

Are you someone who gets easily agitated by hearing someone chewing? Tbh no. There are other sounds I find much more annoying.

What was the last text you sent? I was asking Angela if she knew any spots in our area that's open til late so I can pick up a meal – at the time, I had on-ground work til 12 MN and was feeling like rewarding myself with food. But yeah where we live most places close like 9 PM or 10 PM so I wanted to see if there's any option where I can grab a bite past midnight.

What did you last have to eat? Pizza and nachos at the KTV bar we were at earlier.

What's your favorite kind of oatmeal/porridge? Pass to oatmeal. I had that every single morning from the ages of 4 to 9 and told myself I'd never have another single solitary spoon of oatmeal ever again. I've kept to that promise the last 17 years and plan to keep it up hahaha.

Have you ever ate a whole pizza in one sitting? I've ordered a box of pizza all to myself but I have never finished the entire thing in one go. That sounds kinda gross lmao like imagine how much your face would grease up? :((

What are some things you are grateful for? Having a home; and beyond having a home, living in a home that has remained consistently safe from typhoons. Having a job, and one that pays well enough for me not to worry about going hungry or going broke (unless I get into a medical emergency, but that's a different story). Speaking of health – I'm also grateful for my immune system. I'm generally very healthy and am not vulnerable to illnesses, not even cough or colds. Having access to quality education all my life. Having a car and never having to think of commuting. Having clothes. Having access to clean water and electricity. Never had to resort to being a breadwinner. Christ there's so many things I enjoy on a daily basis that others need to work 10x as hard for, and it's both frustratingly unfair and a reminder to be grateful everyday.

What's the last thing you done while outside? *Did. Well I was at Makati for work today, and a quick synopsis of the work needed to be done was that we were at a karaoke bar and had to ask patrons if they wanted to join this singing contest that one of my brands is currently holding lol. We needed to hit a quota of 15 so we were there from 8 PM to 12 MN looking for interested parties.

How often do you do laundry? Twice a week.

Have you already had your birthday this year? Yeah, it was 8 months ago. HOLY SHIT it's December? I'll be 27 in 4 months??????????

Last thing you done before this survey? *Did. Played with the pets.

Do you like sleeping with multiple pillows? Yes, I need two to sleep comfortably. 

How many candles do you have in your bedroom? I don't have any. In theory, having scented candles would be nice, and I did try having them around for a certain period of time; but I've had a lifelong fear of fire so candles and I were never meant to be a match, hahaha.

What emojis have you used the most here recently? Eh just the ordinary :)

What color is your favorite shirt? My current favorite shirt is white. It has purple text in front and some super vibrant and colorful graphics at the back.

Do you currently smell food cooking? Nope.

If you were given $1,000 to spend at one store. What's your store of choice? Nike.

How much sugar do you consume on a daily basis? Not much. I barely eat as it is but I also don't like sweets, so.

Do you have any ice cream in your freezer? I don't think so.

What's the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word "chaos"? Politics.

Do you own anything that has an animated character on it? Sure.

Have you used a microwave today? Yes, I've used it to heat up my breakfast + Max's food.

What's the last book you read? I can't remember which one but it was definitely one of my Ambeth Ocampo books.

What's something that always makes you cringe? K-pop fancalls. I cringe at all of them, even the non-problematic, wholesome ones. It's a Me Thing, I guess lmao, but I just have a hard time visualizing the idea of getting to interact with your actual favorite celebrity. I know I'd run the fuck away if I hypothetically had the opportunity to talk to BTS HAHAHAHAHA let me admire you from a distance!!!

What's a word or phrase you say a lot? "What the fuck" and variations of it "what the f" "what the freak" "bruh what" "what the heckity" "dafuck" hahahaha

What's something that always makes you emotional? Jungkook's reaction to the Love Letters fan song. Literally have never watched that segment without me crying along, especially during the part where he finally breaks.

How many times have you changed clothes today? Just once.

What's on your mind currently? Well now I'm thinking about the Jungkook video because I talked about it, haha. I'll probably watch it again (and cry again) after posting this.

In what ways have you changed over the past year? I'm...idk. A lot more jaded, deflated, pessimistic? I've run out of fucks to give, too. I've grown apart from my teammates because I feel they don't like me; and after a year of trying to be close to them and those efforts being unreciprocated, I've stopped caring whatsoever. At least I can tell myself I tried. In short, being a director sucks and has stripped me of emotions. I hate that.

Do you really care about others opinions of you? ^ Clearly, no.

What's your favorite pasta? Fettuccine.

Do you currently see anything yellow? Yes.

What did you last try to do and failed? Not get scratched by Max.

Does your bathroom have a certain theme or color scheme? Not really.

If you have Netflix or any streaming service... what's your favorite shows to stream? Friends.

Are you currently wearing anything red? Nopes.

What was the last thing that caught your eye while shopping? This cute cheetah print bag. Maggie's Christmas wishlist was anything with cheetah print so I went ahead and got it.

What's a social media site you have no interest in? Threads.

Have you ever tripped and fallen in a public place? Sure.

When did you last buy a dairy product? Friday.

What's the last song you sang out loud? Ikaw Lamang by Silent Sanctuary.

[sometimesiammybpd]

tw / / mentions of suicidal thoughts, self destruction, self harm

i have tried to use tumblr so many times. i have tried to journal to any degree for so long and each time, i just end up dropping out before it ever gets started. and among the thousand other things i already hold against myself, it makes me more frustrated and upset. i don't know. i don't know if i can make it work this time or if it'll even make a difference for me, but i mean, it couldn't hurt. i also write cringe as shit so there's that.

hi. my name is hayley and i am 21 y/o. i am a transfem girl (MTF - very pretransition) and i was officially diagnosed this year with borderline personality disorder. i'll write a post later on more about myself that isn't focused on squarely on the bpd, but i have too many thoughts in my mind about this and i've felt like i can't speak about it. i consider myself to be a decent person, but a lot of my life has been defined by my bpd. even when i didn't know i had it or even considered it. it runs in my family and i knew there was always a chance. my mother is undiagnosed but has every single sign of it. my twin sisters both have it to different degrees of severity and then there's me. ever since i could first remember, i just . . . did not feel normal. not just in the trans way, although i definitely felt that in my own way. i always reacted dramatically to situations. the smallest things have always set me off and i do have memories from back when that i can see was me splitting at times then.

and i can't help but think about the teen who just turned thirteen and knew something was wrong, but had so little of an outlet to turn to that it only got worse and worse.

or when i bullied myself publically over discord between fifteen to seventeen that yeah, was for attention, but also was me literally not able to handle the way i felt about things and myself and just fucking everything at the time.

or when at eighteen, i got on grindr and put myself in an incredibly dangerous situation which led me to draining my car battery in a really bad neighborhood and almost freezing to death literally, all for sex that i never even got. that's a whole other story that i'll tell at some point. cause i don't talk about any of this stuff. i couldn't tell you if it was because i just am that stubborn or because i can't accept this is real. cause then it leads me to sit by myself and think about all the people i've hurt and the friendships i've destroyed because i couldn't control myself and everything was making me split . . . but that no one believed me because i wasn't diagnosed and so it seemed like i was trying to make fake excuses for shitty behavior. (side note: i was making excuses at the time, but i also did know something was wrong that was making this worse. i don't make excuses for it now, so let's make that clear real fast lmao.) the one that really hurt me was when i lost the person i loved after only a week of dating because of them making me split and them not being able to handle it.

point being, i think about how much of a difference it would have made at that point as well as how much i wish i didn't know now. i mean, i am glad to know. i am relieved to have an answer but it just makes me feel more broken at times. because all i hear in my head is that i'm faking it. and what's worse is the amount of suicidal thoughts and tendencies i feel on a daily basis. i don't know which specific bpd i have (like quiet bpd for instance) but sometimes i even wonder if i have it. because i don't have crying spells like a lot do. i don't split in the "typical" way. i get angry. so fucking angry. when things overwhelm me or overstim me or just i don't know, it turns to anger. i just get pissed off and start throwing things and kicking things and honestly acting like a toddler. and i don't know if it's bpd or not sometimes because what variant (is that the right term) would that even fit under??? and what's worse is trying to keep a stable job with unmedicated bpd. cause yeah, i can't afford medication.

i had an episode a couple days ago at work where every single thing went wrong one after another and it led me through the rage to crying to numbness all within a couple hours. i literally felt like i was so close to shutting down mentally. the big moment for me was when i couldn't take anymore and threw my phone across the room and then kicked the hell out of the office trashcan. the trash went everywhere and i just broke down crying. i wanted to kill myself so bad. if i was home, i don't know what i would have done. it was the lowest i've been in a while and that says something to me. all i could feel was suicidal thoughts; the feeling to just end it because it won't get any better. and i have severely cut myself before. i don't do it a lot but my arms do feel not normal to not have scars on them. like as if i deserve it because it's the least i could do after hurting as many people as i have. oh yeah, moving on? never heard of it /hj (and i wish i wasn't)

i don't know. all of this scares me, all of the time. my friends do their best to understand and help but half the time, i'm fighting myself not to cut them off. i am really really good at self-sabotage. i appreciate them so much because i am a bitter person. i am angry and upset every day and i will be honest that i don't see the good in the world anymore. and it makes me really difficult to deal with. that's what i appreciate the most about them. i'd die for all of them even if at times, i am wishing they'd fuck off and never be in my life again because i'd be better off alone.

the point of me making this blog by the way is for me, but it's also for anyone out there who may have bpd or has bpd. it's scary and not easy to live with. and if you don't know if you have it and you just feel so abnormal and broken and all that shit, i have been there. and i wanna help so people growing up at the age i was when this started happening for real can feel like they are able to find the answers instead of feeling hopeless for so long. cause i wouldn't wish those times on even my worst enemy. anyways, yeah.

[lovesongbracket]

Reminder: Vote based on the song, not the artist or specific recording! The tracks referenced are the original artist, aside from a few rare cases where a cover is the most widely known.

Lyrics, videos, info, and notable covers under the cut. (Spotify playlist available in pinned post)

Girls Like Girls

Written By: Lily-May Young, Owen Thomas & Hayley Kiyoko

Artist: Hayley Kiyoko

Released: 2015

“Girls Like Girls” tells the story of a young girl actively looking to start relationships with girls currently involved with boys. In an interview with US Weekly, Hayley described the song as a “female anthem for a girl stealing another guy’s girl”, subverting the common theme of “guys always.. stealing other guys’ girls”. According to Hayley in an interview with Elite Daily, she didn’t have any artist that she could relate to when she was growing up, and so, she decided to tell her own stories. Kiyoko describes “Girls like Girls” as a story that she believes others can relate to: “There’s not a lot of representation for young girls who are best friends who might fall in love. A big point for me was to respect that and keep it real, so people can realize it’s not just a joke.” In a personal essay written by Kiyoko for Paper, she said that “Girls Like Girls” was born on a rainy day where she had a writing session with Owen Thomas and Lily May Young. “Growing up, everything I did was always about girls. I took dance because of girls. I got involved in student council because of girls. Not that I ever expected any of them to like me back, but I just felt comforted being around them, even if I could never date them. So there we were. The song “Girls like Girls” was born."

[Intro] (Boys) (Boys) Boys, (Boys) (Boys) [Verse 1] Stealing kisses from your missus Does it make you freak out? Got you fussing, got you worried Scared to let your guard down Boys, boys Tell the neighbors I'm not sorry if I'm breaking walls down Building your girl's second story, ripping all your floors out [Chorus] Saw your face, heard your name, gotta get with you Girls like girls, like boys do, nothing new Isn't this why we came? Gotta get with you Girls like girls, like boys do, nothing new Girls like girls, like boys do, nothing new [Verse 2] Always gonna steal your thunder Watch me like a dark cloud On the move collecting numbers I'ma take your girl out We will be everything that we'd ever need Don't tell me, tell me what I feel I'm real and I don't feel like boys I'm real and I don't feel like boys [Chorus] Saw your face, heard your name, gotta get with you Girls like girls like boys do, nothing new Isn't this why we came? Gotta get with you Girls like girls, like boys do, nothing new Girls like girls, like boys do, nothing new [Bridge] I've been crossing all the lines, all the lines Kissed your girl back made you cry, boys [Chorus] Saw your face, heard your name, gotta get with you Girls like girls, like boys do, nothing new Isn't this why we came? Tell me if you feel it too! Tell me, girls like girls like boys do, nothing new Girls like girls like boys do, nothing new

At Last

Written By: Henry Warren & Mack Gordon

Artist: Etta James

Released: 1960

Originally recorded by: Glenn Miller and His Orchestra feat. Pat Friday & John Payne, 1941

A song originally written in 1941 by Mack Gordon and Harry Warren and originally performed by Glenn Miller and His Orchestra for the 1941 movie Sun Valley Serenade, this ballad found its greatest success in the hands of the late Etta James in this 1960 recording. The tune became James' signature song. The song is featured on several “best of” lists, including inclusion in the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry and induction into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.

[Verse 1] At last My love has come along My lonely days are over And life is like a song (Oh, yeah, yeah) [Verse 2] At last The skies above are blue My heart was wrapped up in clover The night I looked at you [Bridge] I found a dream that I could speak to A dream that I can call my own I found a thrill to press my cheek to A thrill that I've never known (Oh, yeah, yeah) [Verse 3] You smiled, you smiled Oh, and then the spell was cast And here we are in heaven For you are mine at last

[cynthiav06]

I don't know if you're taking story requests, but I hope you won't turn down my suggestion to write a one-part humanfanfic. Subject: Hayley Marshall is the only daughter of a poor family. When she was only 13 years old, her parents were killed because of a debt they couldn't pay, leaving her completely alone. But the situation will soon change. King Mikael's servants found the young girl sleeping on a bench outside and immediately brought her to King Mikael. This allowed Hayley to receive the necessary training and become the first female bodyguard in King Mikael's palace. From the age of 13 until he was 18, she was Lord Klaus' bodyguard. Hayley had managed to maintain her professionalism over the years, but her feelings confused her. Could it be that she has romantic feelings for Klaus, who is feared by everyone, trapped by rules, and who must soon marry a lady he does not love for the good of his people?

While I am busy with studies, I would never turn down such a kind request. Though I'm not sure it could be wrapped up in one part. But we will see.

Part 1

Hayley

He was late, Prince Klaus was late. Again. There were two rumors circulating to explain this. Either he does it purposefully to spite his father, or he really engages in a sex spree at night, leaving him exhausted in the morning. And if Hayley knew anything about him at all, she would bet it was the former. Her contract for being a bodyguard was almost at its end. With whatever money she had saved over the years; she could use that to leave for someplace else, be free, and see the world for herself. Why, then, did the thought of leaving elicit a pang of pain at every instance she thought of it. But now was not the time to be daydreaming of yet unachievable destinations.

With a long suffering sigh, she threw open the door to the prince's room. This would usually be an assured invitation for certain death but being privy to his personal life for so long a time of being his bodyguard had earned her some privileges and Klaus had no business telling her when to walk in his chambers if he counted on her to do the protecting.....

The thought vanished as soon as it spurred by the sight she just walked in on. Klaus, half-naked, clad in a towel,his hair partially drenched. Yes, she had seen this sight before, yes she should have been used to it but was she? She will be damned if she said yes. There was something alluring about him, even when countless people deemed him the personification of darkness. "After all, one must never mistake the allure of darkness. Even the purest hearts are drawn to it." It was something Klaus used to spout from all those philosophy texts he read just to criticise the writers on their limited understanding of human emotions.

"What's the matter little wolf? It's nothing you haven't seen before." A lopsided smile with those stunning blue eyes sparkling in mischief motivated Hayley to look away, her face heating in embarrassment for spacing out while staring at him and also due to the sight of his....

What in the devil's name was wrong with her?She was his bodyguard, not one of the flirtatious maids in the castle that swooned at the sight of him despite fearing him. Not one to lose, she quipped back equally as fast: " Not new but definitely soon to be extinct if you choose to while around and make us late for the fifth time this week to the King's daily briefings."

The sparkle in his eyes snuffed out at the mention of the King. A colder tone overtook his next response, "Yes, yes the ever important briefings from my father which are but his ruse to bare my inability to rule to the lot of his ministers and rub it in my face every other chance he gets. While I would love nothing more than to meet a swift end and be rid of these by all means let us hurry."

"Why are you yelling at me? Listen here Klaus, it's one thing to be furious at your father and entirely another to take it out on me. It's my job to do what King Mikael asks of me and I will not be made to deal with your temper tantrums." What an infuriating bastard Klaus was but she understood. With how much Mikael controlled his life, these little ways were his only means of rebellion, something his father couldn't punish him for since the meetings were public.

Klaus

He didn't like taking his anger out on Hayley, but usually it was too late by the time he was done with it. It's infuriating how she keeps drawing the line between them, keeping up that flimsy facade of professionalism. Despite all the years they have spent together, she so readily dismisses it as her job. He could still remember the first time they met:

"Boy, this is Hayley. She will be your bodyguard. No questions asked, boy. Learn a thing or two about fighting from the girl Niklaus. It just might elevate you to that of a soldier's level of expertise in fighting. " He had decided he would loathe the girl. No servant of his father was an ally of his. And a woman, no a girl, would protect him. It enraged him beyond any sense that he Klaus Mikaelson, the only heir of the warrior Dynasty, was being looked down upon by not only his father but not he had added some girl to the list. "You, I don't care what your name is, I do not require your services. You and I shall spar, and when I emerge victorious, you shall relay this to my father and have your services offered elsewhere."

He hadn't looked at her properly before but she certainly had a unique appearance. Brunette hair and eyes like nothing Klaus had ever seen. Hazel green. There was a spark of fury and resolve when he declared his challenge, and to his astonishment, the girl had the audacity to roll her eyes. "If, Prince, if. " And no one had ever made his title sound so much like an insult before. If he wanted to prove his father wring before, now he wanted the girl humiliated. How dare she assume such a tone with him.

So spar they did. And Klaus had never in his entire life proven so wrong. She fought with so much ferocity that it reminded him of a wolf cub he had taken in when he found it injured and had raised it into a wolf only for his father to butcher it. There was no clear winner, but Klaus might as well admit he had lost, given how exhausted he looked compared to her. "Ugh, were you in military training, too? Why the hell do you need a bodyguard if you fight this well? The king is nuts." He shut her mouth by slamming his hand over it. Did she have a death wish, and did she just call his father nuts? "Don't say that in open little wolf." She had taken such offense to that nickname, but he had an inch or two over her in height and was definitely more built. He would find out in passing years that the vpw he had made of loathing her would turn out to be impossible to uphold. Even then, and especially now. So as they both headed towards his father's court, he muttered in a voice only Hayley could hear, "Sorry, little wolf. Bad morning. I will make it up to you later." And for all her claims of hating that nickname, he could swear he saw her smile.

Hayley

By the time we greeted the King, all the Council members had settled themselves. There were more so than usual. What the hell was going on? She excused herself to her reserved position near Klaus's seat when King Mikael's booming voice thundered the words that somehow shattered her heart. "Niklaus, I have decided that you shall marry the Princess of Mystic Falls, Princess Caroline. Nuptials will take place two weeks from now."

That's all for part 1. Send me a query for part 2 as a reminder, and let me know if you actually like this.

[userparamore]

i just came across this article and wondered if anyone around knows if there's any truth to it? ive neither heard or seen Anything about it, not even about hayley having her own publishing company, so i immediately assumed it was a rumour. personally i'd be really annoyed if paramore pulled a taylor and started rerecording. other than being with atlantic since they were young (and the time they called her Harley) ive never seen anything about paramore having a bad relationship with the label, plus i don't know about anyone else but i'd much rather new music than to sit and wait while they rerecord 20 years worth of music. Really hoping it's just a rumour 😬

i don't think there's any truth to it. i'm pretty sure i saw tinyhotopicbitch on ig post about this on their story a few days ago along with a the daily mail article "reporting" on this. tinyhotopicbitch expressed that didn't think any of it was true (though i can't find the story now so i'm not 100% sure it was that account).

either way, i checked out the newspaper publishing this article, bc i had never heard about it before, and apparently it's a pakistani paper. i don't know why a pakistani paper would be the one to break these news? and what they write in this article isn't exactly comfirmed to be true either.

"The move comes after the band reportedly had a falling out with their management and hence wanted to reclaim their music."

where is this coming from? their contract is up? as far as we know there hasn't been any falling out and i can't remember paramore ever talking negatively about their management, the opposite in fact. mark has been with them since the beginning.

another thing is that this article quotes the sun as a source for all of this... which isn't exactly credible. on top of that the language is so sensentionalized it feels like gossip.

tl;dr: i don't think there's any truth to it

[popculturebrain]

Hayley Atwell Recalls Tom Cruise Taking Her Grandmother on Helicopter Tour of London: “Totally Disarmed Her Fear” The actress said "it was cute" watching the whole experience with her 'Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One' co-star. Hayley Atwell is recalling quite the memorable experience her Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One co-star Tom Cruise helped give to her grandmother. Subscribe to the Pop Culture Brain Daily newsletter for more stories like this!

[capettitwrites]

Blurb: In Verona's bustling streets, beneath the shadow of Juliet's iconic balcony, a traveler reflects on the weight of tradition, love, and the enduring objectification of women. As tourists flock to touch the bronze statue of Shakespeare's heroine, seeking luck in love, one woman confronts her own past and the cultural stories that shape us. 'To Be A Statue' is a poignant exploration of autonomy, trauma, and the silent strength required to reclaim one's narrative.

CW: Sexual harassment/assault, objectification, implied trauma.

They say that touching certain parts of statues will bring good luck. Rubbing the belly of a Budha, or a dog statue’s nose, or the Charging Bull’s balls. I’ve seen my fair share of bronze statues buffed by human hands, even participated in some myself. A little turtle on Il Porcellino in Sydney owes its shiny head, at least in part, to me and the daily pets I give it on my morning walk. Something about bronze statues just makes us want to reach out and touch. 

Verona, Italy was beautiful. A day and a half of cramped legs and turbulence was well worth it for the medieval town that meandered along the Adige River. The orange street lights glittered off the turquoise water. Foliage of trees and potted plants hanging from balconies doused the streets in green. Burnt orange and muted yellow bricks contrasted against the beige masonry of the Romanesque architecture that surrounded us. 

Yesterday, Hayley and I had visited the Arena. While only a third of the size compared to the Colosseum, we were absolutely struck by how much it imposed. The streets of Piazza Bra from the Arena danced like a rainbow with its colourful houses. In addition to the tour, we managed to get tickets to Giuseppe Zenatallo’s Aida and the tragic opera filled our evening. 

Today, Hayley and I stand in Juliet’s House. Well, her courtyard to be more precise. Amongst the crowds, we admire her balcony and the ivy-coated trellis her Romeo would have climbed. The gate at the back of the courtyard is heavy with the weight of lovers’ locks, names of couples daring to love like Romeo and Juliet shining out under the sun. I can’t help but be reminded of the love lock bridge in Paris and wonder how long before the government puts an end to this too. How long before the gate falls over and all those relationships shatter with it?

There’s a bronze statue of Juliet standing just below the balcony. The people queue to have a photo with her and we join the curling line. All around, the tourists chatter in a thesaurus of languages. As we come to the front, with Juliet’s dim face staring back at us, I remember how cruel humanity is. Locked into herself, the people laugh and fondle her breast. Only her clothed chest has been rubbed golden. 

‘It’s a tradition,’ Hayley whispers to me. ‘They say if you touch her right breast, it’ll bring good luck for finding your one true love.’ 

The more I look at her, the sadder her eyes seem. It’s a familiar sadness. With our eyes locked, the line between statue and person begins to blur. As if the day were Friday and we spoke in unison, I feel I’m the one encased in bronze, standing there having my right breast cupped and carressed for the good fortune of a stranger. Juliet takes my place in line with Hayley, carrying all my history. 

It seems easy to put that young girl, only age fourteen, in my place. In my memories, my fiery red locks turn into her coppery bronze. The girl in My Little Pony pyjamas, dancing to Hannah Montana, becomes the statue Juliet. When Aunt Petra helps Mum in the kitchen and her boyfriend stays, I’m no longer the one in the room. Juliet takes the fall. Dull bronze shining under his touch. Maybe it’ll bring him luck. Maybe he and Aunt Petra will be together forever.. 

I can feel tourists groping at my breast when Juliet wanders onto my high school oval. The boys crowd her like the sightseers at Casa de Giulietta. It wasn’t her fault that she began maturing so young. It was natural for her to have a D-cup chest by the time she started high school. She wasn’t doing anything wrong when she let them ogle her. As far as she was concerned that’s what gave her purpose. If being sexualised was the only time she was given attention then how can you blame her for letting them have their way?

Juliet never grew past that point. Man devoured her before she became a grown up. Murder by lust. I think if she had the opportunity to live in this world a little longer, her eyes would have ended up looking like mine. Maybe her eyes were even the same shade ofshade of green. With age, they’d harden and grey. With age, she’d learn to hate her body. With age, she’d come to learn that Romeo never loved her. His infatuation was flighty and hardly worth the death she endured. Dream that the two resolved their families’ issues, that they spent their final moments with wrinkled hands wrapped around each other. Enjoy that innocence. 

‘Should we leave a message?’ Hayley asks and gestures to the wall below Juliet’s balcony. Littered in messages from young lovers in the hopes their love will last forever. Wandering closer, I see notes from Gloria and Chiara, Leo and Baby, E+R, someone named Armin. Messages that read ‘por las amores que te hacen’ and ‘que se lia conmigo’ and ‘I love my family so much’. People will do anything other than work hard for what they want. Relying on superstition and luck. 

I don’t want love. Not anymore. 

‘Yes,’ I answer and Hayley pulls out a paper and pen. She’s never been one to leave the house without some stationary on her. Writer’s habit, she jokes. Taking the pen in hand, I write down my wish. Maybe someday Juliet will make it come true. 

‘For love that liberates rather than confines. In the pursuit of dreams, may we shatter the bronze ceiling.

-Serena’

[destinyimage]

Bill Johnson: ‘This is THE Best Message I’ve Ever Heard’

Hayley Braun, a spiritual daughter of our church family, spoke at one of our most recent conferences.

She gave one of the best messages on the gospel I’ve ever heard. If not the best. I was amazed. Not surprised, as if such insight from her were unusual. It isn’t. What surprised me was the significant rate at which her insights continue to grow, as well as how good she was at communicating such profound truths. I was deeply moved.

The Bible says to “taste and see that the Lord is good.” Taste is experience. See is perception. What we experience in God will always affect what and how we see. And lest you think such encounters are dangerous, it’s the absence of encounters we should fear the most. Case in point: What would the apostle Paul’s ministry have been like without his Damascus Road experience? The Bible is one big storybook about the lives of people who encountered God and what they were like following that experience. Encountering God changes everything, as it should. But as true sons and daughters of God, we must value the simple as well as the overwhelming.

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This book was inspired by a profound encounter Hayley had with the Lord just a few years ago. I, along with many of our team, had a front-row seat, sitting in wonder at what God was and still is doing in the heart of this treasured one. And now, count- less people are being impacted by her story. She has inspired a generation to seek God first—not just an experience—but truly, seek the heart of a loving Father, whose goodness is beyond all we could have the faith or intelligence to ask for. Testimonies of God encounters have that effect.

This walk with Christ is a relational journey. It is often built up through our faithfulness in the simple moments of our lives, i.e., the daily reading of Scripture, prayer and worship in our homes, and taking time to show love and care to another. Every- thing along this journey is to be treasured. But it would also be irresponsible for me to imply that such overwhelming kinds of encounters with God are only for the spiritual giants of our day. It would be more correct to say that it is often the life-changing encounter that makes the spiritual giant. The point is, every one of us can and should pursue the Lord with all of our hearts, trusting Him to lead us into the kinds of experiences that best enable us to represent Him well, in a way that He receives the glory.

I have had several different moments where God touched me in life-changing ways. It has happened through the reading of Scripture, as in that moment when the Lord spoke to me out of Isaiah 60, on a Thursday afternoon in May of 1979. It has also happened as someone was teaching the Word in such a way that I knew what was being shared would change the rest of my life. That’s what happened to me when I heard my dad teach out of Ezekiel about the ministry to the Lord in the inner court, versus ministering only to the people in the outer court. I bowed my head and committed the rest of my life to learning this one thing. His teaching had that deep of an effect on me. The year was 1972. But I also remember an encounter I had with the Lord in October of 1995 that lasted all night. It was more of the over- whelming kind that I had no grid for. But it changed me.

These experiences are real and necessary. Tragically, many without such encounters teach against them. When I married my wife in 1973, it wasn’t to illustrate the theology of marriage. I married her to know her, encounter her, and learn to do life with her. Should we expect anything less when we give ourselves to the lover of our souls? I think not. And so, I limit the level of influence a person has in my life if I perceive that they are satisfied with lack. But don’t seek the experience. Seek Him.

Every encounter with God is an invitation to know Him. We see Moses’ prayer in Exodus 33:13, “Show me your ways that I may know you.” (emphasis added). Whenever the Lord unveils a part of His nature, it always comes with an invitation to encounter Him more deeply. The discovery of His heart, nature, and covenant is the great adventure we are all a part of.

Encountering God enables us to live with such an awareness of His heart and His presence that our instinctive response is to obey. In fact, the most natural response of a believer living in connection with God is to move in obedience. Great faith does not come by striving—it is the result of surrender. Our yieldedness to the Holy Spirit is what helps us to live in our divine purpose. In this way of living, it becomes natural for us to illustrate John 15:7, “Abide in Me, and let My Word abide in you, and you will ask what you will, and it will be done for you.” Living in the felt realization of His presence, with His Word filling our hearts, is a natural outcome of encountering Him. The result is that we become effective by praying for things that matter to Him, and the impossibilities of life bow to the name of Jesus through our lips.

Hayley Braun is one such individual who passionately burns for the power and presence of God in the way I have described above. She has been a valuable part of our leadership team for years, overseeing various parts of the ministry school and the church. But I have had the personal privilege of watching her journey of absolute surrender to the working of the Holy Spirit in her life. This encounter has brought forth an absolute boldness, a sharp prophetic gifting, and an anointing like never before.

I am so excited about this book. There is a great impartation available for every reader. But don’t just take it as a good story. Revelation 19:10 declares to us that “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” In other words, what He’s done in one speaks of what He wants to do in another. I encourage you to allow the teaching and stories in these pages to draw you into a greater hunger and surrender to the Holy Spirit.

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[365elephantsoap]

SIX

I think it was during the lock down when Talaura sent me a link to a soundtrack and told me to listen. It was the soundtrack for the musical Six and that soundtrack made its way into my daily listening playlist. It got played so often that the Cabbage discovered it in our shared Amazon music account and they started listening to it. So when Six was on the touring list for Kansas City this year, I bought tickets for the two of us. My first instinct is to tell you that this musical is like Spice Girls as the wives of Henry the Eighth, but that is a true simplification of the underlying fuck the patriarchy story that this musical tells.

It all starts out as a competition to decide which one of Henry’s wives had it the worst. Of the six, there were two divorces, two beheadings, one natural death and one survivor and history has not been kind when telling the stories for these six women. Because history is generally unkind when it comes to telling a woman’s story. I’ve heard a number of historical recounting in which at least three of Henry’s wives are described as manipulative and conniving. For sure, it was all of their own faults for whatever fate befell them. Even history lessons tell us that woman are asking for it, it’s the victim’s fault.

While The Cabbage and I sat waiting for the show to start, I overheard the two older ladies behind us discussing these women.

Isn’t one of them Anne Boleyn?

Yeah, well she angled for him for a while before he finally went for it.

What is not so funny about what I over heard is that it sounds very similar to an article I read with historian Hayley Nolan, author of Anne Boleyn: 500 Years of Lies. Anne Boleyn left court for at least a year to avoid Henry the Eight’s advances. Yet he still pursued her with written love letters.

The historians who do acknowledge this say it was a calculated tactic and sexual blackmail — the ultimate example of ‘when a girl says no, she really means yes. - Hayley Nolan

There’s a word we use now to describe his behavior. It’s HARASSMENT.

History has highlighted the so called faults of these six women. Temptress. Tease. Unable to produce a male heir. Didn’t look like their portrait. Conniving. Manipulative. Let me remind you. These women were Queens. Anne Boleyn was influential in passing the Poor Law which would require local officials to find work for the unemployed. Not to mention she birthed a daughter who would become one of the most powerful and longest reigning Queens in history. Catherine Parr, Henry’s last wife, was well educated and pushed forward education reform for women. Which one of them had it the worst and was asking for it?

The answer is none of them. None of those women truly wanted to marry Henry the Eighth. He treated his wive so badly that he made sure history would too. Henry the Eighth was the original Harvey Wienstein, except he was worse. Not only did he ruin reputations but he was a murderer of women. He’s the historical figure that should be forgotten. The patriarchy wants to pit us women against each other because it distracts us from the injustices they are doing to us.

You want to burn down the patriarchy? Stop falling for their bullshit distractions.

[daily-hayley568]

Could you do a head canon/imagine type thing with what you think Charlie Weasley would be like as a bed partner? ❤️

I Love The Way You Love Me|Charlie Weasley

pairings: charlie weasley x fem!reader

Summary: you love how Charlie loves you.. in bed

warnings: smut, 18+, p in v, fingering, oral fem!recieving, unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it)some rough sex , mostly soft sex, fluff, use of pet names. Oral male!recieving, riding, spanking, shower sex

A/N: first smut lol.

You and Charlie had been together for the last three years, officially. It all started after a wedding you were both in the bridal party of. During the reception, you and Charlie were outside the venue sharing a bottle of firewhiskey.

You had always been friends. Friends that flirted with each other, borderline romantic and platonic.

Next thing you know the empty bottle of firewhiskey was dropped, and Charlie had grasped your hand as you both found an empty shed. The door was closed shut and you were against it. Charlie’s mouth had found yours in a passionate lingering kiss.

Your tongues were intertwined and his hands that had been at home on your waist were now finding the hem of your dress. He pulled away and you whined from the separation,

“Is this okay?” A soft question in a heated moment, “Can I lift your dress up?”

“Lift it, Weasley or I’ll take it off myself.”

“Yes ma’am.” He chuckled, lifting the dress off of you.

“Merlin, you’re gorgeous baby.” He whispered kissing down your sternum. His fingers fiddling with the bra clasp. Before he lifted his head to ask, you unclamped it for him.

He chuckled into your chest, sending vibrations through your body. Your panties were soaked.

His mouth took a boob in his mouth. His tongue flicking it back and forth. His other hand didn’t dare to leave the other tit lonely and his hand squeezed and flicked it. Fondling it lovingly. You gasped a moan at the nipping from his teeth.

Charlie left your boobs and brought his face back up to you. “Do you want to do this?”

“Yes, fuck, Charlie.” You were needy and your hands struggled to unbuckle his belt. He chuckled dropping his pants and boxers and you felt yourself leak some more when you realized just how big he was.

His hand from your clothed heat and he chuckled huskily in your ear. “So wet and just for me?” You whined as you watched him swipe your juices with three fingers and put it in his mouth.

Charlie pulled your panties down in a haste. He patted your arse and you jumped wrapping your legs around his waist. You ripped off his shirt, practically drooling at his muscles and freckles. “Merlin, you’re so hot.” You muttered.

He chuckled as his tip prodded your entrance before he entered you. You moaned grabbing at his shoulders your nails leaving marks in his flesh. “You alright, love? Are you okay?”

You nodded your cunt clenching around his dick, “It feels so good, Charlie.” You whispered.

Charlie pulled out of you and thrusted his hips into yours. Your moans of pleasure and calling out his name made him thrust into your cunt faster.

You sucked on his neck nipping at it. It was sure to leave a hickey on his collarbones.

“Fuck, Charlie! I’m almost there.”

“Me too, baby. Come on!” Your cunt clenched before you came and released into him. Moments later he came into you.

“You’re so hot.” He praised kissing you again and again.

After he pulled out, you cleaned each other up. As you both got dress you notice him shove your panties into his pocket, it made you grin.

You two said it was a one time thing.

It wasn’t.

More late nights, more can I come overs, more I need you right nows, all turned into a first date at Florean Fortescues. Soon later you were an official couple. You moved in together after one year.

He still treated you like a goddess in the sheets. Charlie was so sweet in bed. He always asked if you were okay, made sure to always ask, and afterwards he’d run you a bath and you would bathe together.

One night was your traditional muggle movie night. The movie was long forgotten when Charlie picked you and carried you from the living room and dropped you on the bed.

He kept talking about how he couldn’t watch the movie when you were sitting there only wearing a satin robe. He pulled off the robe and grinned.

“You’re always so pretty.”

You flushed.

Charlie kissed your stomach following the line until he was at your heat, eye contact from that position made you even wetter. If Charlie was supposed to be really good with dragons; he was awesome at giving head.

“Babe, come on!” You whined. He just chuckled and his mouth was on your heat.

“What? You want this?” He asked pulling your clit lightly. You moaned. “Yes, Charlie!”

He chuckled diving into your heat. He lapped at you. His tongue swiped it before he added two fingers pumping in and out of you. You were screaming. Your hands going through his hair.

“I’m almost there, baby!” You cried.

You finally released onto his fingers and Charlie grinned sucking on his fingers and swallowing your juices. Holy shit that was hot.

Charlie hovered over you kissing your lips. You took the chance to flip you. He was now pressed against the bed and you were on top of him. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and you dragged your tongue down his happy trail, making sure to keep eye contact.

You pulled his shorts and underwear down to release his length. Charlie sat up leaning against the headboard, “I want you ride me baby.”

You grinned climbing onto his lap sinking yourself into him. You moaned and grabbed his shoulders. After adjusting, you began to roll your hips into him.

“Fuck! Just like that baby.” Charlie hissed.

You turned the rolling into bouncing thrusting Charlie into you. His dick continuing to hit your deep spot. “Perfect, you’re so perfect.”

With the praises you bounced faster, moans falling out of the both of you. He smacked your ass, “Come on, just a little faster! I’m almost there baby girl.” You bounced as fast as you could slamming himself into you. It felt so raw. It felt so good.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Charlie released himself into you and you obtained his juices. You clenched again and released yourself into him. You sighed in exhaustion kissing his shoulder.

Charlie also loved shower sex.

Sunday Mornings were Charlie’s favorite. You would get up lazily. You’d decide to get into the shower after brushing your teeth.

It usually with him pounding in you into the wall.

Your legs were wrapped around his waist and he slammed himself into you and you cried loving it all.

You also loved giving him head in the shower. You took his length in your mouth. The parts you couldn’t take in your mouth you pumped the base with your hand. He’d moan and pull your hair. Hed release himself in your mouth, and you’d swallow it. You’d stand up licking your lips with a grin.

When Charlie couldn’t sleep, cockwarming always helped. You had offered it the first time he couldn’t.

“I cant sleep.” Charlie muttered into your ear.

“Would cockwarming help baby?” You asked turning to face him in bed.

He nodded, “Only if you’re okay with it.”

“If I wasn’t I wouldn’t have offered it Charlie.” He smiled pressing a kiss to your head. He slipped himself into your cunt. When you heard his even breathing you knew he had fallen asleep. With your head on his chest you agreed.

You loved how Charlie made love to you.

[hochmvt]

It felt to Isaiah that the longer he kissed Hayley, the more relaxed she became under the gentle touch of his hands. As if the walls she had painstakingly built around herself with much dedication and labor were slowly crumbling, not because they couldn't withstand the wind and weather, but perhaps because Hayley was beginning to scrape the mortar from the bricks in the same place Isaiah was. So that light leaked through the porous openings of the material to illuminate its interior.

And just as Isaiah was delighted that he could bring Hayley some consistency amidst the tumult of her life, he was also saddened that her days of contentment were so infrequent. In the fast-paced world of the 21st century, where a person's title and salary often determined their worth in society, where anonymity and a dog-eat-dog society were unfortunately a daily reality, it was easy to forget what this was all about. The blonde had experienced difficult situations at an early age, had come into contact with loss and grief quite young and had been forced to find terms and solutions for feelings that he could neither name nor understand at the time. Perhaps that had brought him closer to where he was today. That he tried to find something positive in every day: Whether it was finishing a script, sending a postcard to his mom, meeting someone interesting, finding a curly in his bag of regular fries, $5 in his jacket pocket, or sitting on the hood of his Chevy in the evening, ending the day, whether it was good or bad, with a beer or a Coke and taking time to pause. His past had taught him humility, modesty and frugality and he tried to carry these qualities out into the world. Not to make a missionary commitment to a higher goal or to emulate the utopian idea that he could make the world a better place, but rather to make people who were close to his heart aware of the simple things in life and to enjoy them together with them.

“It's easy if you know what to look for...” he began and looked up at her, his hand gently stroking her side and lingering there a little; primarily because he had such respect for the situation (and for her too) that he didn't dare move and ruin the moment. Who knew if she would like it if he touched her somewhere else. “We tend to look for the major things in life and deem them to be the most positive and valuable because of their rarity. Instead, beauty's all around us. You, for example, were so beautiful at the campfire, how you told these stories and created so much wonder in their eyes and minds... That was my highlight of the day. Well, apart from... this. Obviously...” he smiled and looked up at her, leaned forward slightly and kissed her once more. And as he leaned back and looked up at her, he felt his heart warm, his smile becoming coy and reserved before he lowered his gaze shyly and gently stroked her thigh with his hand. He didn't know what she wanted, how she had imagined or pictured this evening. His gaze briefly returned to the bed, then back to her, chewing on the inside of his cheek.

Hayley had agreed to accompany him outside to smoke a cigarette. He had put one arm around her as he took the first deep drag and blew the smoke upwards. Gently stroking her back, he placed his hand on the back of her neck and smiled up at her, studying her eyes and looking towards the forest, then back down at her. “We could do a night hike, too, I've heard there's a lake somewhere hidden in there. That'd be fun, wouldn't it? And maybe we'll see some night creatures, too,” he suggested, smiling at her and playfully pinching her side with his last words. He liked the way they treated each other; the pleasant balance between seriousness and nonsense, between physical and mental intimacy, no matter where they were.

He kissed her. Isaiah had actually kissed her. Hayley’s mind was … well, it was a mess. A buzzing, chaotic mess. She could still feel the warmth of his lips against hers, the gentle way he’d pulled her in, like he was holding something fragile. And she was not fragile. Hayley didn’t do fragile. She was tough, unshakeable—that was her whole thing. But the way he looked at her right before; those deep, searching eyes like he cared so much, it almost hurt to meet his gaze … oh, she was so enamored. The way he’d kissed her so slowly, so softly, as if he was giving her every chance to pull away.

She could tell he was thinking about her, her comfort and her boundaries—things she barely even thought about. And that threw her. Hard. She’d never thought she’d be the girl with her head spinning over one kiss, yet here she was, wanting to hold onto that moment; she almost wanted to laugh at herself. It scared her too, but she was already too far gone to deny it. She really, really liked him—careful, thoughtful Isaiah. And, though it felt strange to admit, maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing after all.

Hayley’s gaze softened as she looked into his eyes, feeling the the warmth of his fingers tracing lazy patterns along her back. She swallowed, her heart beating just a little too fast as his words lingered in the air between them. “I don’t think I’ve ever had days like these,” she murmured, a small, almost non-believing smile on her lips. Her hand rested on his shoulder, fingers brushing through the hair at his neck. “You’ve made it so easy. Easier than I thought it could be.” She paused, searching his face, her voice softer as she added, “Guess I should be thanking you instead.”

For Hayley, life had always felt rough—like sharp rocks and steep hills, a constant climb. Her past was all edges, like jagged cliffs that had shaped her, hardened her, taught her how to keep her footing even when things felt unsteady. She was used to that: a world that bit back, that demanded resilience just to make it through the day. But this was like stumbling into a patch of wildflowers on the edge of that rocky path, a softness she hadn’t even realized she was missing, or even needed. Isaiah had hit her like a warm rain in the desert—unexpected, unfamiliar, but undeniably life-giving. With him, as of now, she didn’t want safe. She wanted to feel.

[dailyyelyah]

day 888

[the-forest-library]

November 2022 Reads

Longshadow - Olivia Atwater

Marmee - Sarah Miller

Dracula - Bram Stoker

Red, White, & Royal Blue: Collector’s Edition - Casey McQuiston

Scattered Showers - Rainbow Rowell

Ship Wrecked - Olivia Dade

Astrid Parker Doesn’t Fail - Ashley Herring Blake

The Man I Never Met - Elle Cook

Kiss Her Once for Me - Alison Cochran

Before I Do - Sophie Cousens

A Cosmic Kind of Love - Samantha Young

When in Rome - Sarah Adams

How to Excavate a Heart - Jake Maia Allow

Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory - Martha Wells

Foundryside - Robert Jackson Bennett

Maybe an Artist - Liz Montague

Ride On - Faith Erin Hicks

The Sea in Winter - Christine Day

So Much Snow - Hyunmin Park

Fry Bread - Kevin Noble Maillard

The Electricity of Every Living Thing - Katherine May

All the Living and the Dead - Hayley Campbell

It Didn’t Start with You - Mark Wolynn

Dickens and Prince - Nick Hornsby

The Future is Disabled - Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

The Sioux Chef’s Indigenous Kitchen - Sean Sherman

Waxing On - Ralph Macchio

Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing - Matthew Perry

We Were Dreamers - Simu Liu

Have I Told You this Already? - Lauren Graham 

Surrender - Bono

Bold = Highly Recommend Italics = Worth It Crossed out = Nope

Thoughts:

So, obviously the standout this month was Dracula - nothing could compare to reading this novel through Dracula Daily and the entire tumblr experience of it all. What an absolute treat. 

This was a much better reading month than I remember it being. Although, I do remember absolutely loving Marmee. Little Women is my favorite book and hearing the story through the matriarch’s tender recollections was just lovely. 

Also, if you haven’t read Olivia Atwater yet, make that a goal for next year. Longshadow has been my favorite read of hers so far, but they are all so comforting and cozy. 

Goodreads Goal: 377/400 (this is a silly number - do not attempt this)

2017 Reads | 2018 Reads | 2019 Reads | 2020 Reads | 2021 Reads |

2022 Reads