#google has no answers for me

[theburialofstrawberries]

I do. God help me I do

[fuzzbuns]

Stupid joke based on birds i saw at my bird feeder

[jtl-fics]

Fluent Freshman - Part 11

PREVIOUS

FF could admit that he may not be working with a full tank at the moment.

He had not slept very well the night before.

He had watched a lot of horror movies (a genre that he generally does not consume because his mind is already a scary enough place).

He was not able to go see his Grandma and he was going to miss the traditional(tm) Black Friday extravaganza that he and his Grandma did every Black Friday since he was little and encountered the horrible truth about Santa and she’d let him in on when / where most of his Christmas gifts were obtained. (The answer was not the North Pole under the watchful eye of elves. He had cried himself to sleep at the revelation but Gran always had a way of making the worst moments of his life tolerable.)

He may have eaten just…a bit too much pie?

He definitely ate too much turkey.

His stomach is killing him because he had forgotten to take his pepto when he had slammed that five hour energy.

His heart may actually break out of his rib cage with how hard it’s beating in his chest.

He’s been listening to Andrew and Captain Neil go back and forth for the last hour and a half between discussing Aaron’s recent mess ups, to what they’ll do to one another with a locked door between them and the world, to Andrew complaining that Neil’s hand is sweaty, to Neil saying Yes and Andrew’s hand is no longer in Neil’s and-

He clenches his eyes close.

And Andrew has swerved back into the lane for the third time in the last five minutes while saying something unrepeatable about his plans for Captain Neil and the whipped cream.

FF does not handle swerving cars very well.

He hears Andrew say something that sounds like it could lead to a very uncomfortable yeast infection for Captain Neil didn’t properly rinse off afterwards.

The car swerves over the rumble strip.

A fear far stronger than his fear of what Andrew could do to him overtakes him.

“I don’t like swerving cars. So, I’m going to ask that you focus on the road and keep your hands on the steering wheel.” FF says so panicked that he sounds calm and he watches as both Neil and Andrew stiffen at the sound of his voice. “If you can’t, then I’m going to ask that you pull over and let me out.” He offers a second option and a part of him is just amazed that his voice doesn’t crack even once. “I’m fine with either option.” He says.

He says both are fine but…

Honestly he hopes Andrew chooses the first option as he looks at the dark and lonely highway.

He looks back up at the front seat and both Neil and Andrew are looking straight forward. Andrew’s hands are on the steering wheel.

“Thanks.” He says and returns his attention to back over Aaron’s head.

The rest of the ride to Columbia is blessedly quiet. Aaron and Nicky wake up when they get off of the interstate and Nicky has the good grace to try and wipe the drool out of FF’s hair while Aaron seems unbothered by the wet spot he left of FF’s shoulder.

They get out of the car and they each grab their own bag in exhausted silence. Nicky is barely managing to put one foot in front of the other and before FF can do or say anything Nicky is in his room and has locked his door.

The room that FF had been planning on sleeping on the floor of because Nicky had told him he could so that FF would not drink 20 5-hour energies over the course of the weekend.

But Nicky had looked really tired.

So he is given a general tour by a very quiet Captain Neil and FF forces himself not to think about the cooler that Andrew had brought to, what he assumes is, Andrew’s bedroom before it was brought to the kitchen. He gets shown where the blankets and pillows that Kevin uses are and FF nods in quiet acceptance even knowing that he is going to spend the night going over Katakana flashcards and maybe up his literacy on Kanji to a second grader’s level.

Captain Neil wishes him a good night while Andrew gives him a nod and it is the last time he sees Captain Neil that night.

It is not the last time he sees Andrew.

***

Andrew comes out of his room to go get two glasses of water nearly 2 and a half hours later. The house is silent and dark. He is pretty sure him and Neil are the only two up.

He is wrong.

He comes out into the living room on his way to the kitchen and finds FF going through flashcards at a rapid pace. He walks a little closer to see what it is but the flashcards aren’t even right side up half of the time.

He thinks about the car ride.

‘I don’t like swerving cars.’

FF had said it so matter of factly. He was uncomfortable with the swerving.

Andrew had told FF recently about the words he didn’t like.

It felt like FF was offering at least something of himself back to Andrew for the first time.

Andrew thinks about how once his hands had gone back to the steering wheel FF had leaned back into his seat and stared out the window.

Andrew has at various points tried to look up what FF’s circumstances were but searching news sites for someone named ‘Smith’ with no first name to work off of was an exercise in futility.

Neil has lamented many times to Andrew about his bizarre jealousy over how unknowable Smith is. “He’s learning new languages, keeping a low profile, and playing Exy. It’s everything that I wanted in my freshman year and couldn’t manage because Riko pissed me off so much! It’s just kind of hard to see someone living my dream.” He says.

Andrew had punched him in the arm for that one.

“My old dream!” Neil had said and Andrew almost punched him again for the smile he flashed but had ended up kissing his stupid pretty face instead.

Where was he?

Right.

FF didn’t like swerving cars.

It didn’t necessarily have to be the trauma that lead to that aversion. Andrew certainly hadn’t had anything scare him on a plane but he still hated flying.

Still.

“The flash card is upside down.” He says and watches as FF pauses in his shuffling before righting that card and flipping to the next one which was turned to the side as far as Andrew could tell.

FF should be asleep.

FF is not asleep.

It might be Andrew’s fault that his friend can’t sleep.

“It won’t happen again.” He says and FF turns and stares at him blankly for a few seconds before he nods his acceptance.

It’s nice having a friend who understands what he means without needing to explain every little thing.

***

FF thinks he might have double-dosed on the 5-hour energy.

He also thinks he might currently be able to see through time.

His flashcards are making so much sense right now.

Then Andrew had come up and it truly was a miracle that he did not shit himself considering the sheer amount of apple pie still making its way through his system. That’s a lot of fiber for one body and he’s sure the 2-3 Five Hour energies he has taken are not helping his plight in that regard.

“It won’t happen again.” Is what Andrew says and in an instant FF feels his stomach drop to his feet. He nods blankly and watches as Andrew nods back before the man went to the kitchen and left with two tall glasses of water.

‘It won’t happen again’

FF has asked Andrew for TWO favors today.

TWO WHOLE FAVORS.

WHAT WAS HE THINKING?

The answer was that he WASN’T.

Even if FF had paid back one of those favors with the sheer power of his granny’s pie there was the case of the secondary favor he’d asked for in the car.

‘It won’t happen again’

There won’t be anymore favors for FF. He’d used up any mercy his grandma’s pie had bought him.

He considers the time pulls out his phone and goes through some saved text files on his phone.

It’s time for guns even bigger than his grandma’s apple pie.

He takes another five hour energy and knows that he won’t be sleeping a wink. He looks up groceries stores that are open this early on Black Friday, he grabs his wallet and with immense fear in his heart grabs the keys Aaron had dropped into a bowl by the front entrance.

He needs the ingredients for his great-grandma’s brownies.

Do your civic duty and: CAST YOUR VOTE TODAY ABOUT MEMES

NEXT

Per y’all’s requests:

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As stated before if you’re up here and I spelled it right but you didn’t get a notification there might be something switched around in your settings that won’t let me tag you properly?

[moeblob]

TIL "Lay On Hands" is a paladin healing skill and I am blessed by this knowledge.

[hungergamesheadcanons]

Post-revolution Annie just posts random videos of Finnick and their son on the internet and they always go viral because people have only ever seen Finnick as playboy extraordinare and now they see Finnick being a dumbass father who's trying his best and it's very endearing and 90% of the time the camera pans out to an unimpressed Johanna or Katniss and it's great

[theemporium]

franco colapinto is too young for me but seeing how he's been behaving in the paddock... i may not be too old for him 😭 like i applaud his determination to flirt with everyone he meets in the paddock, especially the older women lmao

I saw a few tweets about him flirting with that journalist and I honestly cackled😭

[tennessoui]

me thinking about what couples counseling question i want to have them answer at the end of this chapter that shows their deeply fucked up relationship hehe

[rohirric-hunter]

I saw a post where someone was lamenting the fact that some kids will "learn" completely made up "facts" from ChatGPT because they think it's a search engine with access to all the world's information and they said it was perfectly understandable because the kid did exactly what people told him to do, which was to look things up.

So, like, is it okay for me to say this now? Will people get it and not send me anonymous death threats this time? Here goes:

When people, especially kids, ask a question, "Look it up," is not a good answer. It's a dismissive answer that indicates you don't care if they get the right information or not. If you don't know the person and aren't responsible for them then that's fine, but if it's your friend, your student, or God forbid your child, you can't say that to them.

[033h]

I can’t help but love men who dress well however I fear this will always be my greatest downfall. Need a guy who dresses like shit next probably.

[indigozeal]

WHY

WHY IS VAY ON STEAM

[askchilchuck]

Would you consider yourself to be a "simp" for your wife?

Gah, hold on, Puck showed me how to look up all these stupid terms… He pulls up Safari, and painstakingly types each letter into his phone. He squints at the screen, eyes drawn to the AI generated answer.

That’s a little extreme, don’t you think? I’d say I’m just a normal husband to her. She doesn’t have to do anything she doesn’t want to, and I’m not gonna push her just because she’s my wife.

[aeolianblues]

I'm not an extrovert. At all. In everyday life, I'm a yapper, sure, but I need someone to first assure me I am okay to yap, so I don't start conversations, even when I really want to join in sometimes! It's just the social anxiety acting up. God knows where from and why I lose a lot of my inhibitions when it comes to talking to people about music. I don't know where the confidence has suddenly sprung from. I've made a crazy amount of friends in musical circles, either just talking to people about common music or (since it is after all in music circles) talking to bands about their own music. I let out a sigh of relief any time an interaction goes well, because in truth it's going against my every instinct. I wish I could do that in everyday life

[fyodior]

im gonna ask a question i absolutely should know the answer to. why does yuuta wear white

[moeblob]

Look, there's so much that I love about certain otome but I really don't finish every route every time ?? But 7'scarlet, Steam Prison, and Norn9 all got completed! So they get the rec spots!

Honorable mentions: Nightshade (ninja otome, same artist as Norn9 thus I love it even if I haven't completed every route - Switch) Period Cube (I also fully complete it and the art is very nice imo and I enjoyed it a lot but it has really bad reviews from like. everywhere I see. but here's my shill of appreciation anyway - PS Vita) Sweet Fuse (it's just really fun to yell at men for being sexist - PSP)

But genuinely, there's a lot out there! Do the research on the game before you buy them! Not all otome are for everyone.

[dkettchen]

[always-a-slut-4-ghouls]

I don’t get why people feel like the Duolingo owl is threatening, if I ever feel like he is I just get mad at him. I could fight an owl. I don’t know if I’d win, but I don’t think I’d lose (two things that can apparently coexist). I think I’d survive at least and that’s not really winning but also not losing.

You wanna be so threatening? Da bør du drepe meg!