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merakiclosed · 4 years ago

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Princess of the tower

》Pairing: Thief!Jungkook x Princess!reader 》Summary: The thief of the town who goes by the name of JK finds the lost princess but didn’t expect to fall in love with her along the way. 》Genre: Fluff, a bit of angst, Disney!au/Fantasy!au , Strangers to lovers!au, Tangled!au (2010) 》Word count: 7k 》Notes/Warnings: Swearing, mentions of blood and fighting, manipulation, long-haired Kook because that’s a danger in its self.

The sky looked like a fresh blend of colours brushed onto a canvas. Pomegranate pink and papaya orange teased each other, daring to touch but not completely mixing. You’re tempted to close the shutters and go to bed, tiredness pulling at your being. But you were defiant, what good would tomorrow bring? It would be like any other day; clean up, read, paint, sing, cook.

Pascal sleeps on your shoulder when you look down, unconsciously he matches with the sun, his normal green scales changing golden. Sighing, you move your gaze to watch the silhouette of birds fly past, wishing to be as free as them. Reaching out, you touch the plants that wind around the tower, almost crying out to be touched and held as you caress the soft ridges with your fingers.

Finally, you stand up straight and brush the imaginary dust off your purple dress, the silk smooth on your skin. You can remember vividly the day that you made this with your own hands, sewing and cutting material for hours because you grew out of your previous one. Unfortunately, this was the cheapest material your mother could get you, meaning that all of your dresses looked similar. You were dying to get out of the tower and get some more material, experimenting and trying on different styles and colours. But that would never happen. You weren’t allowed out of the tower. It was mother’s number one rule, not under any circumstances were you to step foot outside of this tower.

Carefully, you set Pascal down on one of the pillows as you flop down beside him, trying to not wake him up. Gazing up at the roof, you find the multiple paintings you did, filled with flowers, birds and butterflies, thinking when your life will truly begin.

Your hand moves along the wall, almost like your mind is directing it without you. You never think too much whilst painting, it’s where you see the reflection of your own imagination and mind. Every colour is bold and painted with precise lines, curved yet defined. Small dots of gold contrast with the deep blue of the background, representing the floating lights. The same ones that you know will appear tomorrow night, on your birthday. You could only hope and wish that this year, your mother allows you to go see them.

“My precious daughter.” she cooes, pinching your cheeks making you wince slightly.

“Mother -”

“Would you let your mother brush your hair whilst you sing dear?” she interrupts you. Instantly you’re moving around, grabbing a chair and the brush, rushing to sit her down.

As soon as she is sat down you put a pillow on the floor to sit on, singing the song as fast as you can. Your hair reached the bottom of your bum, thick and tangled from having a busy day, though you don’t wince or groan when she pulls at a knot, too excited and nervous to ask a question. Behind your closed eyes, you briefly see the glow of your hair along with a Zapp at how fast the magic worked.

“Y/N -” mother begins to scold, but you couldn’t care less.

“Mother, I was thinking about what I want for my birthday. Wou- would I b-be able to go outside. To see the floating lights?” Your once confident voice trails off with uncertainty, “They only appear on my birthday and I need to know what they are” you plead, moving to show her the painting you did today, behind the closed curtains. But your grip quickly loosens when you hear her next words.

“Y/n. You want to go outside? You know why we stay in the tower, trust me mother knows best.” She says firmly, standing up towering over you. Her eyes are as dark as her hair as she looks unimpressed, “there are many bad guys out there, diseases that can wipe you out. You know what they do to bright things in the world. They eat them up.”

“You don’t ever ask to go out of this tower ever again.” she finalises, pulling at your dress harshly, “do you understand?” Her gaze is firm and hard making you nod your head meekly. Though, she wanted more than that as she grabs your chin roughly, tilting your head to look her in the eye, “Yes mother I understand.” She beams at you and kisses your cheek. Grabbing the keys, she heads for the door and with another kiss to your head along with a quick I love you, she’s gone again.

Not soon after you could hear laboured breathing coming from the door, the person bangs against the door, followed by a groan. Frantically, you look at Pascal who also has wide eyes, who then points to the frying pan, “Pascal you’re a genius” you whisper. You run behind the door, continuously hearing the stranger try and break the door, making it rattle and echo throughout the room. Any moment now and he’ll end up-

The door breaks off its hinges, the chain now scraping across the ground. It’s silent for a moment as you watch the man look around, failing to look behind him. “OW.SHIT” He shouts when you hit him in the leg with the frying pan, he whips around to look at you. Your mother’s voice sounds in your head of the hideous men with sharp teeth and ill intentions. But this man in front of you was nothing like that. His white shirt was dirty and rolled up to his elbows as underneath was a blue vest, wheat-like string buttoning it together. Brown pants are tucked into brown, leather boots that have clearly been worn for a long time as they are scuffed with mud splattered on them. When your eyes finally land on the satchel in his hand, he moves it closer to himself protectively, interesting.

Like deja vu, you hear another step of footsteps and instantly you know who it is. You and the strange man look at each other wide-eyed and shove him under the stairs, where the kitchen is and hide him behind the curtain. The man stumbles from your push as you take the opportunity to take the satchel out of his hands. Luckily, your mother only gets halfway before she decides to shout, “Y/n, did you want me to get the paint from the beach?” you know that she is doing this so that you don’t talk about going out of the tower, “Yes, mother.” And she’s gone, once again, thankful that you didn’t have to explain why the door was broken.

Cautiously, you creep towards the kitchen, coming face to face with the man, frying pan at the ready in one hand, the satchel in the other. You both looked at each other, he was young, possibly around your age judging by his face. His eyes were deer-like, sparkling with a hint of mischievousness in them, slightly round cheeks but sharp jaw and eyebrows as his black hair slightly hung in front of his eyes, obvious that he hasn’t had it cut in a while. His eyes scan your figure, wanting to roll his eyes, you look innocent and scared. It was obvious that if he shouted at you right now, you would cower. However, he notices the satchel in your hand, “that’s mine, give it back.”

Shaking your head, you hold it closer to you, “No. why are you here?” you foreign confidence when in reality you could feel your erratic heartbeat in your chest. He wasn’t threatened as his face showed confusion, making his nose scrunch up, “Is that all of your hair?”

Your mind starts to connect the dots, “Do you want my hair, is that why you are here? How did you find me?” you accuse, trying to sound threatening.

“I don’t want your hair, I want to get out of here. Now, give me my satchel.” You were shocked by his firm and deep voice as he hardened his gaze on you. Neither of you said anything, his ice-cold stare not wavering as you came up with an idea.

“No. I won’t give you the satchel until you take me to see the floating lights tomorrow night. You will take me there and in return, you’ll get your satchel.”

“That’s it? You want to see the lanterns?” he sounds bored. Well, he shouldn’t have broken your door! You unconsciously pout and nod, “Yes.”

“So, is this a deal then?” he says, cocking his eyebrow. This will be easy.

“Yes.”

“Well let’s get going then”

The words make you pause, you’ll be leaving the tower. Without your mother’s permission. It was against the rules. What if she comes back early. No, you can’t think of that. You either leave the tower now or stay and never be able to see the outside world, “well what are you doing just standing there princess, let’s get moving.”

Feet firmly planted, you look up to the sky that is bright but soft all at once, it looks bigger from down here, reminding you how small you are in a big world. Looking back, you see the plants that have grown thick on the tower, stone of grey peeking out as rigid pieces crumble to the floor. The grass is soft on your feet as you timidly take a step forward, the bottom of your dress soaking up the morning dew as you bend down to pick out a flower. The petals are vibrant and proud as you softly brush your finger along the soft texture. Your hair flows behind you in the grass, but you don’t care. Pascal takes in a big, deep breath of the fresh air, peering over at the young man. He doesn’t trust him.

The man looks at you unimpressed, but in reality, he finds it quite endearing as you look around. The scenery was normal to him, but watching you appreciate all of the little details makes him think more about taking things for granted. But he can’t think like that. He needs to leave you - somewhere safe of course- and run. All he has to do is steal the satchel from you when you sleep and then he will be on his way. He strolls up to you and plucks the flower out of your hand, causing you to pout, but soon turns into a shy smile once he places it in your hair, next to your ear. Firstly, he has to gain your trust.

Walking away, he hears your feet pad on the ground before you walk next to him, “So, princess what’s your name?”

“Y/n.” You say softly, looking up at him, he mulls over what to say before talking, “Mine’s Jk.”

Now fully in the forest, you take it all in. Trees that you once looked over, towered over you causing you to smile like a kid in the candy store, they were bigger than you imagined. You gasped at the sight of a bunny, running over to it, the motion causing it to squeak and hop away. Subconsciously you frown with a pout prominent on your face, you only wanted to pet it, the fur looked so soft! JK looks over at you, cocking his head to the side. How strange and innocent you were, shrugging it off he walks off, wanting to get this over and done with.

“Hey - wait up.”

The woman trudges up the stairs, huffing with every step, her shoes clacking against the stone. She can sense that something is wrong, the echoing doesn’t sound as harsh to her eardrums as before. Thoughts of something getting to her precious prize, causing her to fasten her steps before she abruptly stops, two steps before the top. The wooden door lays on the floor, pieces of wood aloof. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears, adrenaline rushing through her as she shouts out, trying to find her. Pots and pans on the floor, material is thrown all over. Nothing.

As she lays on the cold, hardwood floor, she thinks about all of the possibilities of what could have happened. She can’t lay around all day, she has to do something. Standing up, she pulls her black cloak over her head as her blood-red dress dances against the door, her boots crushing the debris. She will do whatever it takes to get her back.

You walked until it was dark, the atmosphere between you both was awkward for the full day, asking him questions but only getting either one-word responses or gestures of yes or no. Goosebumps appear on your arms from the evening chill as crickets start to sing in the swaying grass.

“I’ll get some firewood, stay here.” He commands, not waiting for an answer as he walks off into the woods. The green canopy almost looks black, drained of colour almost like it was muted under the artist’s hand. Every noise and russell from the bushes makes you jump, you’ve practically been alone for most of your life, but you were surrounded by the tower walls. You’re vulnerable under the moon that shines in the night. It was a weird experience, you’ve seen the nightfall and the sunrise, yet witnessing it outside was so much more magical. You only wish that your companion would be better, but at least Pascal is with you, though he isn’t much help as you look over to find him knocked out on the edge of the branch that you’re sat on. The familiar crunch of boots makes you gaze up at the man, his biceps bulging in the shirt that he wears.

The fire crackles as soon as he has light it, you watch him silently as he tears a bit of his shirt off to stop the bleeding of a scrape on his arm. Maybe, you can get him to talk if you become closer. Wordlessly, you scoot over to him and reach out softly to stop him, he looks at you with furrowed eyebrows wondering what you were doing. Winding some hair around the cut, he hisses as your small hands press harder onto his forearm, with a cautious gaze you look up at him, “Please don’t be scared.” The vulnerability in your voice is evident as he looks at you skeptically.

“Flower gleam and glow” Let your power shine Make the clock reverse Bring back what once was mine”

Jungkook watches you as if you were crazy, but confusion knocks into him once he feels a tingle in his arm, looking as your hair starts to glow. Staring at your face, the light illuminating your face. Your eyes are closed firmly, he observes the silent features on your face that draws him closer to you, you look so young, yet so worn out. Watching as delicate lips sing the song.

“Heal what has been hurt Change the fate’s design Save what has been lost Bring back what once was mine What once was mine.”

What and why were you in that tower?

Opening your eyes, he’s taken out of his thoughts, clearing his throat. Meekly, you look up at him as you unwrap your hair from his arm, the cut no longer there. You wait anxiously at what he will do next. You haven’t shown anyone other than your mother that.

“H-how long has your -uh. Magical Uhm. Hair been doing that?” He coughs when his voice cracks, not wanting to show how scared he actually feels.

“Forever. Something like this” You gesture to your hair, “has to be protected, that’s why my mother - why I never left the tower.” Your voice trails off at the end, still uncertain about what he is thinking.

His thoughts are running wild. He’s sitting there, in the middle of the night, with a girl who has magical hair. Is this a dream? Something like this doesn’t happen, maybe he’s going crazy. Maybe the guards have already taken him and this is all some sort of hallucination. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see you twiddle your thumbs, waiting anxiously. He had a perfect plan for tonight, wait until you fall asleep, take the satchel and run. He knew you wouldn’t be able to stay awake for long, yet he doesn’t think he can do it. If someone gets to you, you’re a goner. And for some reason, it makes his gut twist at the thought of you in danger, especially after you showed him your little trick. People like him, eat people like you for dinner. He yearns to know everything about you already, but he doesn’t think he can bring himself to do it. He’s not a good person and you don’t deserve that.

“Jungkook.”

“Huh?” You look up at him quizzically.

“My name is Jeon Jungkook.”

You gaze up into his deep, marble eyes where you could see tales - most likely fascinating, secrets and stories that he’s held up in his head for years. He was far more interesting than you, that’s for sure.

“How did you find the tower?” You questioned, averting your eyes to pascal as he sleeps peacefully.

“I ran, I didn’t plan the journey to the tower, I just ended up there.” He says with a humourless laugh, thinking about how he had run away from the guards at the palace, then proceeding to ditch the two others. His eyes unconsciously flicking to the satchel around your shoulder. Was all of this worth it?

You nod at him, not knowing what to say, you want to know what he was running from, why he never gave you his real name from the start, why he was so desperate to get the satchel. You had so many questions for people outside of the tower, but now sitting in front of him, Jungkook, your mind runs blank. Yawning, you rub your eyes, but you’re fearful of sleeping outside. Will someone attack you? Will it rain? What if a giant creature comes and gets you?

“Easy there, princess. I can see your head about to blow smoke from how hard you’re thinking.” Jungkook said in a small voice, presumably not wanting to disturb the quietness of the night. Laying down, pieces of wood stabbed your side, but it would have to do if you want to get to the lanterns tomorrow. Your head lays gently on the bark, the constellations that have witnessed centuries watch over you both in this small moment before you finally close your eyes drifting off to sleep.

Jungkook looks over when he hears your breathing slowing down, to see you knocked out like a light. Chuckling to himself, he can imagine how hard today was compared to being in that tiny room in the tower. He sits on the grass, leaning against the log you’re asleep on, looking at your figure. He was so curious to know you, he never heard anything about a girl being locked up in a tower, and surprisingly, he felt bad for you. So youthful and full of wonder, and he was youthful but full of danger.

Luckily, the town wasn’t far from where you slept, only a couple of hours in the morning and you finally saw the opening to the village. Even from afar, you could feel the energy that the people emit, vibrant clothing shining in the sunlight as people dance to the music. They move around each other like pebbles in the water, flowing around one another, as they fill each other with adrenaline-pumping happiness. You only see joyful faces as they bring the village to life. Chatter between sellers and buyers as if they were old friends. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before. Mother was wrong, there are good people in the world. Pascal looks in wonder, as he hides in the pocket of your dress, he’s never seen something like this in his life. If he thought your paintings were colourful, this was on a whole other level as they whizzed past him.

Purple seemed to be the main colour as it is splashed onto every bit of material you see, as you get closer you see a group of young girls that paint a mural on the floor, a star in the middle of purple paint. A picture of, who you presume are the king and queen with a young daughter in their arms, was in front of the painting.

Jungkook watches you silently as you smile widely, your eyes darting in every which way to take everything in. He gently grabs at your sleeve and tugs you towards one of the stands who does hair, sitting you in the chair. You look up at him questioningly, as the woman starts to braid your hair, making sure not to hurt you. She doesn’t question the twigs and leaves she finds, simply plucking them out. You sit in wonder, trying not to dart your head around to see more.

Your hair feels lighter and is easier to manage as you walk past the stalls. Briefly, you smell something sweet as you get closer to a particular one, your face lighting up at the sweetness. You pause your steps, taking a closer look at what it was.

Jungkook turns around to find that you’re not following him anymore, sending him into a panic as all he can see is a crowd of people. He’s familiar with his heart racing, normally from running away, but as he looks around he feels a different type of adrenaline, but all he has to do is breathe before calming down. His eyes are quick to find you, your purple dress matching perfectly with the theme as your hair flows down your back, flowers intertwined in certain strands. Walking towards you, he laughs when he sees your nose practically smudged against the glass that holds the doughnuts. You stare at him in shock, forgetting that you were supposed to follow him, causing heat to rise in your body.

“Do you want one?” He asks softly, nodding towards the sweet treat. You nod enthusiastically, causing another chuckle to rise from his throat as he hands the man behind the glass some money. You whisper a thank you as you take it from him, “what is this called?”

“It’s a doughnut.” He’s careful in calling you princess in the village, knowing it’s a sensitive topic and he doesn’t need to be at the center of attention right now, especially with all of the guards that he has seen. Tentatively, he watches you take your first bite, a giggle passes your lips once you’ve eaten it, taking another bite, clearly enjoying it as your cheeks fill like chipmunks. He watched fondly, before catching himself. No, he can’t fall for you. In a flash, he turns serious, cocking an eyebrow at you. Humiliation falls over you, at your obvious display of enjoyment. You’re not sure what you’ve done, but you still feel it as he looks at you with his sharp gaze. Lowering the doughnut, you avoid eye contact before nodding at him to continue with where you were walking to, giving the last of it to pascal.

However, you get distracted once again at a group of people dancing, their bodies speaking for how they feel. You have danced before, in the comfort of the walls you call home, but here where you see young girls skipping and weaving past the seas of people, smiling as if nothing bad ever happened, you realise that you’ve never truly danced. Forgetting about the moment earlier, you grab Jungkook’s hand and dance with him. His larger hands encased in yours as you follow the rhythm, being carefree of everything, feeling freedom run in your bones. You know that after tonight, life goes on as normal, so today you will be free of all of your worries.

Smiling and giggling you look up to find him mirroring your expression. His laugh is beautiful as you finally get to see him enjoy himself, maybe he has realised that he can also be carefree. Your feet pad against the stone floor, you know you’ll have to make up an excuse as to why your feet are battered and bruised when you get home, but right now you don’t care.

But you’re soon thrown out of this dream when his eyes widen, looking at something behind you. You go to look back when he softly puts your head in his chest, holding you close, your breath hitches at the contact of your bodies pressed together. The feeling of having someone so close was bizarre, even your mother didn’t hold you like this especially as long as this. Suddenly, he pulls away, holding your hand in his as he runs, shouting of guards impales your ears, clattering of boots and metal follow behind you as each step is calculated. Not used to the exertion of energy your breathing starts to get laboured as you both rush past people, it’s all a blur as your steps start to falter, Jungkook’s grip on your hand getting tighter. Your bare feet sting as they slap against the moss-laden rock, each stride of his were worth at least two of yours, his long legs and previous endeavours made this easy, barely breaking a sweat. With a good distance between you and the guards, Jungkook drags you around another corner and into a darker and smaller passageway. Abruptly he shoves you against the wall, causing you to wince, his body once again up against yours. In your pocket, you barely realise that Pascal is shaking, clinging onto your dress for dear life. But all you can do is look at his face, tight-lipped and his gaze is sharp as he listens for the guards, your breath hot against his hand that is against your lips, keeping you quiet. His own breathing is steady but slightly offbeat as for the first in a while, he is scared of being caught. He’s been running away from guards the whole of his life, but he couldn’t get you in trouble because of his actions. You can hear the guards getting closer, footsteps matching in beat with each other, trained to perfection as they rush past you both.

A sigh of relief from him as you smile up towards him, “that was an adventure” you laugh. The adrenaline that pumped through you was certainly a new experience, though your feet are paying the price as you look down at them. Jungkook copies you and looks at how red and bruised your feet are making him grimace. He opens his pouch in his pocket and hands you some coins and points to one of the stalls, “I’ll stay here, are you alright buying your own shoes?”

Looking around you don’t see any of the guards and nod at him, slightly uncertain. You’ve only socialised with two people, but you can do this! You can totally do this! Hesitantly, you walk up to the stall before looking back to Jungkook to find him standing with a smile and two thumbs up. Briefly, you look down to Pascal who nods at you, a small smile on his face. You nod your head again and continue forward, with timid steps before looking around at the shoes on show before finding a pair of loafers, white with a golden pattern on the front, matching perfectly with your dress. The woman that owns the stall laughs at you before guiding you to try them on. You smile widely at her before giving her the coins, to which she accepts with a small smile, her eyes crinkling into crescent moons. Putting them on your feet, you wiggle your toes before skipping back to Jungkook. He smiles at you watching your eyes brighten up, talking animatedly about how you think they’re pretty and soft. Again, he can feel his heart skip a beat. But once more he ignores it. He’s not meant for you.

Unknown to both of you Pascal notices the looks he gives you and tilts his head, maybe he isn’t as bad as he thought.

As the sun descends and an ashen moon rises into the darkness he walks you along the beach, where a river lies in front of the castle. A small rowing boat sits upon the pale yellow of the sand, still against the calm waves. Jungkook unwinds the rope from the wooden pole and throws it into the boat. Holding out a hand he helps you get in as he pushes it off into the ocean, jumping in after, making the boat rock. You yelp and hold on to the side, crouching into a ball as you can feel it rock beneath you. You hear him laugh as he sits down, not bothered by the sway of the waves. He grabs the paddles and starts to row, you watch as his face contorts into concentration, his tongue bulges against his cheek, his once injured hand gripping the paddle with a tough grip, veins run along his forearm. A foreign feeling surges through you as you watch him, butterflies invading your stomach.

Soon enough you’re in the middle of the river, as he stops rowing, wiping off the sweat that formulated on his forehead with the back of his hand. Swiftly, Pascal crawls to the side of the boat and seats himself on the wood, waiting for the lights to warm up the sky. One particular question has been nagging in the back of your head ever since you saw the lanterns, “why do they send them off every year on my birthday?”

“The lanterns?” You nod.

“The daughter of the King and Queen was taken on this day and was never seen again. They hope by sending these lanterns off that she will find her way back.” He sighs, running his fingers through his already unruly hair. You know that he is hiding something as he avoids your eyes, looking out in the water. Before you can say anything a singular light floats up into the sky followed by thousands more. Gasping, you jump to the edge of the boat, trying to get a closer look, ignoring the tilt of the boat in your excitement. Lanterns illuminated like stars against the inky black night, the water merged the reflection of those in the sky, an autumn orange. Inside each lantern holds a small candle, lit with a prayer, calling out for the lost daughter. The pale silk hand-painted with the same star you saw earlier.

A cough from behind you causes you to look back, to find Jungkook sat with two lanterns in his hand and a sheepish smile on his face. Gasping, you reach forward to grasp one, and softly it floats between your fingers and into the sky, circling around Jungkook’s. The world feels like it’s shifted, warm and bright even in the crisp night. Turning around, you thrust the satchel in his hands, “You took me to the lanterns. This is my end of the deal.”

Shaking his head, he pushes it away, “I don’t want it.”

Tilting your head in confusion, he continues to look in your eyes, his eyes uncharacteristically soft, leaning closer to you, “I don’t know how you’ve done it, but you’ve changed me. You made me question everything that I’ve done if only I had met you sooner.” you can feel his breath on your face, his gaze wavering to look down at your lips as you unconsciously lick your lips. Your heart is hammering in your chest as you scoot closer to him, resting your hands on his knees. Your lips centimetres apart before the boat rocked, but it wasn’t due to the waves. A dark shadow cast over the both of you, laughter of three people getting closer to the boat, “well, look what we have here.” A rough voice calls out.

Looking up, you find your mother standing next to two men who are easily 6 foot in height, scars all over their bodies. Slamming their boat into yours, you go to topple over the edge beforehand reaches out and pulls you into them, “My sweet, precious daughter.” Her familiar scent engulfs your senses, her bony frame hugging you in a death grip. Jungkook heaves in a breath as his wet form is slung into the boat, coughing up water. The two men hold him in a vice grip, hauling him up by his arms as his body shivers from the cold.

Struggling to get out of your mother’s grip, Jungkook looks up at you and shakes his head, telling you to stop. Ignoring him, you continue, “Let him go.”

“Oh no, sweetheart. He took you from me, we can’t have that can we?” her patronising voice sings in your ear. One of the men punches him in the gut, as the other kicks his back legs causing him to fall to his knees, the wood digging into his skin from the impact. “And these lovely boys helped me, aren’t they sweet,” she says, grabbing your chin and harshly tugging it to make you look at them. An uppercut to head and he spits out blood, “Mother. Stop.” your voice is filled with panic, watching helplessly as they repeatedly punch him and kick him. Your mind goes wild, why isn’t he fighting back? Pascal watches on with wide eyes, knowing that he can’t do anything, feeling useless.

The pain that he feels is excruciating but he doesn’t do anything other than let it happen. He hears your blood-curdling screams but it comes in and out like waves, his sight becoming blurry as they continue. He deserves this. The stealing, the robbing, the slowly falling in love with you. He doesn’t deserve to be in your life. He screams as he’s cut in the shoulder, the knife shortly ripped out of him to be plunged into his left side. His blood is hot as it pours out, burning his cold figure. Looking up, he finds your face covered in tears, eyes bloodshot as you kick and scream for your mother to stop. You were one of a kind. He didn’t know how you did it, but you made him want to change for the better. He didn’t want the crown. He didn’t want wealth. He wanted you. But fate had a cruel way of showing him that he couldn’t have you. Another stab, another scream. Not from him, but you. He smiles weakly at you as he can feel himself about to pass out, his skin turning paler by the second.

“Mother, please,” you beg, tears cascading down your face like lava.

“Boys.” She says simply, both of them stopping and holding a bruising grip on his arms. His head sags, not having the energy to look up at you anymore.

“P-please. Please… Let me heal him and then you can take me. I’ll l-live with you forever. You and me. I’ll never go outside, I’ll do everything you ask of me. Just let me heal him and let him go.” You sniffle and choke on your words, breathless from screaming. Your mother cocks her head to the side before looking back to the two men, “Shoo. Take the crown and go.” A sick, twisted smile coats their faces as they both look at each other before jumping into the boat you came on, picking up the satchel and rowing away. Jungkook slumps to the floor, weakly holding onto his side.

Her grip on you disappears and you throw yourself to the floor, “Jungkook.” You frantically try and stop the blood, but too much has already been lost, “You’ll be okay. You’ll be okay.” you whisper, pushing down on one his wounds causing him to wince.

“Y/n.” you ignore him, grabbing your hair in your hands to wrap around him, before pale hands grip yours, “I can’t let you do this.” A single tear makes its way down his face, his hands are cold against yours signifying that you don’t have much time left.

“Please, please let me do this or you’ll die.” you softly caress his cheek, moving some hair out of his face, “If I let you do this, you’ll die.” he whispers, eyes blinking rapidly to try and stay awake. His breathing is heavy as he wheezes. Gently, he wraps his arms around you and brings you into him as your body shakes, “I love you.” With all of the energy that he can muster he snatches the knife from the floor before grabbing your hair and cutting it in one swipe. Jagged lines of hair fall to the ground, as you gaze at him with wide eyes.

A piercing screech comes from your mother, “what have you done?” she shouts, pulling her cloak over her, as she stammers around the boat before reaching the edge. It was like it was in slow motion as she topples over the edge and into the water, her arms flaring, struggling to keep afloat before her body slowly sank, as her body ages before you.

Jungkook’s grip around you becomes weaker, his breathing getting slower. Your heart sinks to your stomach, as you watch him take his last breath. “No, no, no, no, no” you whisper, choking as a sob threatens to tear at your throat. Pascal climbs on top of him, eyes sad as he watches the both of you, beneath him he can feel Jungkook’s breathing slowing down. Your hands shake as you watch blood ooze from his wounds, and you burst like a dam. Salty tears run down your face, racking with sobs. This was your fault, he didn’t deserve this. If only you would have stayed in the tower. If only you didn’t fall in love with him.

“Flower gleam and glow” Let your power shine Make the clock reverse Bring back what once was mine.

Heal what has been hurt Change the fate’s design Save what has been lost Bring back what once was mine What once was m-mine.”

Your voice cracking continuously as you breathed the song. It was a bittersweet moment as the lanterns around you continued to float around you, full of life, burning into the ever glowing night sky, almost like they were mocking you. Light beamed around you, a golden hue spiraled around the both of you like it was dancing to a song before bursting, like a firework, into the star that has been engraved into your memory since this morning.

A wave of dizziness crashes over you, making you lose balance, your hands scraping against the wood. Flashes of memories burst through your mind. A small hand touching bigger ones. Chubby legs that look like they’re learning to walk for the first time. A mobile hanging from above the crib. And a star. The same star that you painted on your ceiling. The same star that’s been in front of your very eyes this entire day. Another flash and you see a man and a woman. The parents of the lost daughter.

Gasping, you see Jungkook getting up and holding his head in his hands, his body feeling sore. Throwing yourself at him once again, you swallow thickly holding back another sob. Gradually, he lifts himself up whilst keeping his arms around you, “It’s okay. It’s okay.”

“J-Jungkook. I-”

“It’s fine, I know,” he whispers, kissing the top of your head as he manoeuvres your body to sit in his lap. “Y-you know what I am?” you sniffle, looking up at him, watching as he nods. “There was no way that you weren’t the missing princess. A girl that was kept in a tower, magical powers and the fact you looked identical to the picture painted on the wall in the middle of the village? I put it together fairly fast”

Leaning up, you kiss him softly on the lips but soon gets broken as you both start smiling uncontrollably, “Let’s get you home, princess.”

The balcony stood over the village, the open porch in front of you was held with detailed pillars, painted in a brilliant white. The architecture fitting perfectly with the village buildings, get standing out in the most ostentatiously way as the castle stood the tallest. Guards surrounded the both of you, causing Jungkook to be on his toes. If this all goes wrong you’ll both be jailed for life. The white stone of the castle glistened in the summer sun as you both wait anxiously.

Heels clack on the polished floor, steps full of purpose as you clutch Jungkook’s hand tighter. Two people; a man and women step out. A gasp escapes them both as your eyesight gets blurry. Your parents. Your mother runs towards you and embraces you, knocking the wind out of you as she storks your cheek as if you were made of glass, her bloodshot eyes smiling at you with love, “y/n.”

“Mother, father.” you smile at them taking a hand each in your own.

“This is Jungkook. He helped me get here.” You say as you turn around to face him. Your dad walks towards him, boot heavy on the ground as he embraces him, “thank you for bringing my daughter home.”

Smiling at the sight, you pull Jungkook towards you and squeeze him tight, “thank you.” you whisper into his chest, feeling the rumble of his chest as he laughs, “anything for you princess.”

Pascal squeaks from Jungkook’s shoulder before turning blue, when all of the attention is on him from his celebration of joy, making you all laugh and coo at him. The princess of the tower was finally free.

Please comment and reblog, tell me what you think!! It took me around 2 weeks to write this and I’m sorry if the ending isn’t as good :(( But I still hope you enjoyed

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evansyhelp · 4 years ago

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✧ TEXTURES – A TUTORIAL BY EVANSYHELP.

In this (long and image-heavy) tutorial, I’ll be showing you how I make textures, as requested by a very kind anon. I use Photoshop CC 2019 but you should be able to replicate my methods on most editing software. Please like or reblog this post if you find this helpful!

Index.

Ethically Sourcing Your Images.

Finding The Right Image.

Making Your Texture.

Other Tricks I Use.

Quick Recap.

Making Textures Without Images: Speedrun.

Outro.

Ethically Sourcing Your Images.

I will be explaining a couple quick ways to make textures without any images at the end of the tutorial, but since my personal favourite way involves images and that’s specifically what the anon requested, that’s what the majority of the tutorial will be focused on.

The first step, naturally, is finding an image to use. My personal favourite site is Unsplash, but there are plenty of options out there.

What you need to keep in mind is what kind of license the images have. Unsplash is free for personal and commercial use with no attribution required, which makes it perfect for things like this. There are more sites like this in my free for commercial use masterlist (linked at the end of the post), but unless you’re using them in products you’re selling (like graphic commissions), the commercial aspect isn’t something you need to worry about. Just check the site/photographer’s rules to make sure you’re allowed to edit the images for personal use, and whether attribution (credit) is required.

Another important thing to keep in mind is that these sites typically never allow you to redistribute the images as they are. That means you can’t just go to Unsplash’s texture category, save the images without any changes, and reupload them in a texture pack on Tumblr. That’s stealing. We don’t do that.

Finding The Right Image.

Knowing what kinds of images will make good textures is a learning curve. My first couple texture packs are rough compared to what I make now, because I basically taught myself with no guidance and learned through trial and error. But with practice, I learned what worked and what didn’t.

You want your images to be HQ, either with no ‘subject’ (ie. a person) or with a large background. Higher contrast is better but not super necessary. You should hopefully be able to envision what kind of texture you want to make before you even touch the image.

Making Your Texture.

For the majority of the tutorial, this is the image I’ll be working with. Credits can be found in the link at the end of the post.

Open your canvas. You can make specialised textures, like 100px for icons or 540px for Tumblr graphics, but I personally prefer to make them large for versatility. I’m using 800px in this tutorial. Once you’ve chosen your size, upload your full-size image into the canvas. This is where the fun begins!

Drag the image around into a nice position. Or use Edit > Transform to rotate, flip, and warp the image in different ways. Or use Edit > Free Transform (Ctrl+T) to change the size or the angle more precisely. Or probably some combination of all three! With Free Transform, make sure this aspect ratio anchor is selected so you don’t butcher the quality of the image, unless you’re warping it intentionally:

This is all very individual to each image you use. You might want to flip one, shrink another, put another at a 30 degree angle. Just experiment until you end up with something you think would look awesome as a texture. For the sake of providing a good example, I flipped this image vertically, shrunk it to 80% its original size, and rotated it until it looked like the smoke/cloud was coming from the bottom right corner. This is what we have:

Then we move onto enhancing. Textures work best when there’s a lot of contrast because it’s easier to manipulate the blending modes. So if your image isn’t already high contrast, these adjustment layers (Brightness/Contrast, Levels, and Selective Colour) are your new best friends:

If you don’t see this on your Photoshop, go to Window > Adjustments and it should pop up. Again, just experiment, because different images will require different things. Essentially, you want to make the darks darker and the lights lighter. Something I like to do is add a Selective Colour layer and use the Black slider. Pick out the primary colour of the image, and then Whites, in the drop-down menu, and move the bottom slider (left to lighten, right to darken) until you’re satisfied. Like so:

So with those Selective Colour settings and the following Levels settings, here’s the before and after of my image.

Much better contrast! If you want to end here, you can, but I personally prefer grayscale textures a lot of the time because it makes it more versatile. Instead of being forced to make a blue graphic because this image is blue, I can make any colour graphic I want with one simple black and white Gradient layer. Photoshop does have a default Black & White adjustment feature, but I prefer using Gradients.

Pro tip: if your image doesn’t have a pure black, you can keep the darkest parts of your image dark by using the left slider, shown below.

A lot of the time, I’ll also decrease the opacity of that Gradient layer, to somewhere between 80% and 95%, so just a hint of the original colour comes through. This gives it more dimension in my opinion, while still keeping it mostly neutral. Here’s 100% vs. 85%:

You may find that you want to add a little more contrast after. With this texture, I decided to grab another Selective Colour layer, pick ‘Black’ in the drop-down menu, and pull the Black slider up to +40. I also settled on 95% opacity for the Gradient. And here’s the final product!

Other Tricks I Use.

That covers how I make a lot of my easier textures, but here’s a quick run-through of other, slightly more complex tricks. I’ll be working with this image (again, credit at the end of the post):

This, of course, is not as obviously texture-worthy as the previous example, but I love textures with strong lines, so here’s how the magic happens! I wanted to get rid of the detail on the bottom half, so I used the Polygonal Lasso tool to select it:

Then I used the eyedropper tool (the 4th symbol under the polygonal lasso in the image above) to select the blue of the sky and, on a new layer, painted that selection completely blue. I decreased the opacity to 90% just so it wasn’t a total block colour, but not enough that you can really see the lines. I repeated this process for the sky, so it looked more consistent with the bottom half.

Then, using the eyedropper tool again and making a new layer for every colour, I went in with a small soft paintbrush and painted out the harsh vertical lines on each segment of the stripes. I didn’t want to make them totally perfect, but I painted over the bulkiest interruptions.

I added a black and white Gradient layer, using the slider tool I showed you before to darken the darks and lighten the lights, and decreased it to 50% so that it wasn’t totally black and white but still more neutral than the original. Here’s the result:

Another fun way to shake things up, which unfortunately will require Photoshop (CS6 should be fine, not sure about earlier versions), is the Filter Gallery. Go to Filter > Filter Gallery, and you’ll find a TON of effects that change your image drastically. Most of the default settings are nightmarish, but you can play around with the settings panel on the right.

Here’s just a few results that are possible with the Filter Gallery, labelled for convenience. You can view the HQ versions in the link at the end of the post.

Quick Recap.

So you don’t have to reread this obnoxiously large tutorial every time you want to reference it in the future:

Choose a HQ image.

Resize, rotate, flip, and/or warp.

Enhance the contrast.

Black and white!

Paint over problem areas!

Filter > Filter Gallery.

Making Textures Without Images: Speedrun.

We’re almost done! There are some tools built directly into Photoshop that can allow you to make textures completely from scratch, and I’ll briefly cover my favourites here.

The first is pattern fill layers. I spent too many years not appreciating the patterns feature in Photoshop, but they’re great. Go to Layer > New Fill Layer > Pattern, click ‘OK’ on the box that pops up, and another box will pop up to let you choose your pattern.

By themselves, they are UGLY. It can take a while to figure out how to use them. But if you change the scale, change the blending mode, and change the opacity, you have thousands of textures at your fingertips. And if you add two or three together? Billions of possibilities. I can do a more in-depth tutorial on patterns if y’all are interested, but here’s two examples I just whipped up in a matter of minutes, using two patterns on each:

The next feature is gradient fill layers, and the gradient tool. Go to Layer > New Fill Layer > Gradient… to select a gradient (or make your own!) and an angle, OR use the gradient tool (featured below) to drag the gradient across your canvas manually. On its own, boom, that’s a gradient texture. Paired with a pattern or put through the Filter Gallery? Even better!

The last is brushes. Brushes can be great for textures because there are so many kinds. You want to make a paint splatter texture? Paint splatter brush sets are everywhere! You want to make a smoky texture? You can get brushes that look like smoke! Smudged? Scratchy? Grunge? Halftone? Light leaks? Torn paper? Brushes have your back.

With all of these features (and things like actions, too!), your saving grace is going to be this little cog wheel shown below, and the list you’ll find under the Reset/Save/Load section. There are SO many more options built directly into Photoshop that you don’t even see right away, because you have to add them manually from this little cog wheel.

And you can download countless more patterns, gradients, and brushes from sites like Brusheezy and DeviantART. A couple tutorials on downloading and installing them can be found in the link at the end of the post, but remember, download these things ethically. If you want to sell products that use a custom brush, it’s your responsibility to find brushes that are free for commercial use. If you don’t want to credit the creator, it’s your responsibility to find resources that don’t require attribution.

Outro.

I think that’s everything, guys! If you found this tutorial helpful or otherwise enjoy my content, please consider supporting me on Ko-fi! I offer exclusive rewards, like custom graphics, to everyone who donates.

Due to Tumblr’s latest rules about links, you can find the credits list, the promised bonus tutorials, other important links, and the full-size HQ versions of the textures made in this tutorial over here.

Thanks for reading!

#rph #allresources #completeresources #itsphotoshop #chaoticresources #photoshop tutorial #photoshop resources #photoshop help #ps resources #ps tutorial #eh #eh: tutorial #tutorial #ps help #texture #*100 #*250

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theindiegamereview · 3 years ago

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Meet the creative team: “Spellstone”

Are you a collectible card game (CCG) fan? If so, read on, because this week we spoke to the makers of Spellstone, a free-to-play (F2P) casual story-based fantasy card game that features vibrant, colourful, hand-drawn art on hundreds of beautiful cards that you can acquire and use in battle, both against the computer and other players!

TIGR: PABLO and DUSTIN are artists who have worked on Spellstone's art, helping create some of the iconic characters Spellstone fans know and love. We asked them how they came to work on the game, as well as what intrigued them about this project.

DUSTIN: I was working as a contract artist when I was asked to create some sample cards for a potential CCG, which is something I'd always wanted to do. The samples I submitted eventually led to me getting a contract to create the initial art for Spellstone. After about four months, I was offered a full-time position. I had such a great experience working with the team that I jumped at the opportunity!

PABLO: Prior to starting work on Spellstone, I remember doing an art piece to test my skills. I greatly enjoyed that because I particularly liked this game's art style - which is actually similar to my own! There were still slight differences though, so I've had to adapt a little. Blending my own personal style into an existing one was challenging. But something that intrigued me about Spellstone was the variety of factions in the game. Each and every one opens up a big array of possibilities when it comes to creating a character. I felt my options were unlimited and I loved it!

TIGR: Spellstone features many different cards and characters. We wanted to know who conceptualises all this, and how much creative licence artists get when crafting a character. FERNANDO, currently the main artist for the game, gave us more insight.

FERNANDO: That Spellstone has such an immense variety of characters means it's a complete and delightful dish for artists. It's hugely gratifying to find such visual diversity with which to play with. You're completely free to create, as long as you respect the game's universe and visual language.

As for the process, the concept of what a card must look like and how it must be functional in terms of gameplay comes from the guys in the game design department. Very creative people... sorcerers maybe? I don't know. Haha!

From a brief but concise description they give me, I can get a sense of what kind of character and action they want to see in a card. Once I have all the information I need to start sketching, my favourite hour finally begins: creative hour!

If the card description involves an existing type of character, like a goblin, part of the fun has to do with the way you depict that character, situation, action and specific emotion. There's also some freedom to create from scratch if needed - that's exciting and challenging! Sometimes the ideas come from a mix of characters, and that's when the laboratory inside my mind starts working: I press a button and something cool, spooky or funny comes out - whatever the game requires. Other times, new concepts require that I look for approximate references of what's needed, so that serves as the starting point. No matter what, it's always a very enjoyable process. Sometimes we have to make corrections, that's true. But as with everything in life, this is necessary for things to work properly. You may have to redraw stuff, but finally the card is done - it works, it delivers and it entertains!

TIGR: In Spellstone, cards can be upgraded from a single to a dual to a quad, and we really like that this sometimes tells a "mini story" of of sorts through the artwork. Some are funny (we just love Honeycomb Lobber!), some cute (Bomb Spirit is soooo adorable when he’s angry!), some uplifting (Aurora Shaver ranks among our favourites), and some, um, a bit disturbing, to be honest (Cleaverstorm Hunter, anyone?!)! And some are just sad - we can't help but feel sorry for the poor li'l forest furries that presumably got devoured by Alphamech Stalker! We asked the team how they came up with ideas for all these tiny narratives, and MELINDA, one of the game designers, told us more.

MELINDA: When I was younger, there were a few creatures in video games that terrified me. One of those I remembered most was Medusa, an air jellyfish from Ecco: The Tides of Time. While traversing through a water pathway in the sky, Medusa would try to pick up Ecco the dolphin and fling him off the path. Tetraspout's concept came from that, and you can even see poor little dolphins getting swept up in its attack!

TIGR: We asked the team if there were any cards they particularly liked creating, or found challenging to conceptualise. IVÁN, a colorist who worked briefly on the game, chipped in, as did TONY and RHADA, two of Spellstone's game designers.

DUSTIN: I loved working on the goblin cards! You could get silly with them. Frogs were a lot of fun too - the variety of colours made them interesting. For me, the water cards were challenging but I grew to love working on them.

PABLO: My favourite characters are Goblins! You can play around with them, making them look funny even when the card is telling a dark story, like a massacre. All of the cards were challenging to create!

IVÁN: I enjoyed working on Hedron The Critical Threat, Zyd The Unhinged, and some awesome Insect cards that have yet to be released (as of the time of this interview). I mostly liked them because of their cool concepts and Fernando's awesome sketches. Hedron in particular was a technical painting challenge, as it has textures, transparencies and glow!

TONY: As something of an artist myself (/sarcasm), the card I am most proud of has to be Dinged Waptor. Or really any of the cards I did for the April Fool's event, which is about the only time the art team lets me anywhere near card art. :) For April Fool's, I decided it would be funny to try my hand at drawing some cards I felt players would enjoy. So the first year I drew some original characters that consisted of a few stick figures, a chicken, and a bomb. The response was good, so the following year I continued the tradition, eventually going through and tracing some famous cards like Winged Raptor. My one rule while making these cards was that I could not erase what I did!

RHADA: We used to sell boxes that contained two new premium cards instead of one. We thought of making both cards in the box thematically linked. At the same time, while brainstorming concepts for dragons, I thought we could try to make cards that formed a bigger picture on the battlefield when placed consecutively, side by side. The initial idea was a serpent whose artwork overflowed into a second card, and after some iteration, we stumbled upon the idea of a dragon dance. The result was very cool!

TIGR: With the Spellstone story campaign recently concluded, we asked what was next in store for Spellstone fans. Would there be anymore new characters and amazing art to look forward to?

TONY: Absolutely! While the main story has come to a close, we still look forward to adding new characters, cards, and art to the game that lets our artists have fun and shows off the world of Spellstone.

TIGR: And finally, the most important question of all: would real-life Spellstone merchandise ever be made available for fans of the game? We really want a plushie of the adorable Bomb Spirit (complete with detachable bombs, perhaps?), as well as his angry counterpart, Firebomb Spirit! Also for Quetee Que and Adorabilis, please! And would there ever be any actual physical Spellstone cards produced for collectors?

TONY: I would personally love to see real-life merchandise, but we currently do not have the means to take on such an endeavour. Maybe one day we can strike a partnership with a team that can make this happen!

We thank the Spellstone team for their time and all the wonderful art assets that accompany this interview! Check out the game here on Kongregate, on Steam, or on mobile - three different ways you can enjoy this fun, cheeky and adorable CCG!

P.S. We just had to include our favourite card: Darkwater Adonis - don’t be fooled by his charms!

#developers

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selfproducingfanfictionauthor · 5 years ago

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to be treated this way - chapter i

pair: shownu x reader

summary: When your alpha - sort-of - found his true mate, you’re stuck dealing with the aftermath and the coming of your next heat. So when your friend suggested a “dating service” to aid you, signing up seemed like a no-brainer. So, you’ve prepared yourself for the dominance, the adrenaline-fueled by fear and arousal and the constant out-of-this-world sex but when you meet Shownu, everything you know about Alphas is challenged. He’s soft - for the lack of better word. He cooks you meals, he takes you out on dates… all of which are not really necessary for an Alpha - Omega relationship… right? Whatever. You’d just really, really, wish he’d touch you now warning: this story may be slow-paced at the start, no other warnings for now - also, boo seungkwan’s appearance! a/b/o dynamics!

Many poets and writers have tried, failed and came close to describing what true heartbreak is. Such fundamental human experience is so universal that many men and women across history have drawn inspiration from it and created amazing works of art - sculptures, plays, books and songs. At the back of your mind, you remember reading something like - “If nothing saves us from death, at least love should save us from life” and although it’s beautiful and you certainly want to be saved, you feel like it’s too dramatic to apply to your own situation.

Even though you certainly feel like dying right now.

Mouth dry and head pounding, you blearily open your eyes to the sight of your blinking alarm clock. The numbers 1:03 pm mocks you in all its inherent cheeriness. Underneath the cocoon of your warm bed, you squirm, sweating and uncomfortable – feeling like you just want to crawl out of your skin just to reach the itch between your skin and bones. Fists closing and unfurling, you try to resist the urge to scratch, knowing that there’s nothing to find beneath, nothing to offer you relief.

Kicking off your sheets, you try to reign in the uneasiness. At the back of your ears, you feel the itch worsen, crawling down your nape burning down its path. Rubbing yourself against the scratchy texture of your bedsheets feels like heaven and hell alternating between five seconds – the brief relief only highlighting the torment of your hormones tenfold.

Time seem to pass too slowly as you try to muster the strength to get up. But your body refuses to cooperate, your limbs heavy and your mind foggy. This is what you hate the most about suppressants, the side-effects feels like punishment for being born an omega. Your head feels like it’s submerged underwater, and you don’t hear your apartment door opening with a bang.

“I’m here!” Seungkwan sings, grocery bags hanging from his arms. His eyes roam your kitchen before landing on you through your open bedroom door. At the sight of you, his mood drops. ”Oh my god, what are you doing!”

Your best friend rushes over to you and grasps your wrists, quickly pulling it away from your arms.

Streaks of scratches marred your neck and arms while you tremble. He notes with a small amount of relief, that at least, you didn’t break skin.

Aish, this girl.

Relief flood you at the familiar smell of your friend and his cool hands, drawing away from the heat marked by your nails. You let him drag you up to your couch. Sitting down, he grasps your wrists with one hand and reaches for one of the grocery bags with his other.

“Next time I see him, I’m gonna kick him in the nuts.” Seungkwan swears, agitated. Between the two of you, there’s only one person he could be referring to. You wince at the thought of Geun-woo, the alpha who had once frequented your bed. Pulling you out of your thoughts, Seungkwan fishes out a sheet of tablets and pops one open for you.

Trusting you to control yourself, he lets go of your wrists and hands you a bottle of water from the same bag.

“It’s not his fault he found his true mate, Seungkwanie.” You sigh, after swallowing the pill. You don’t know if it’s placebo or not, but immediately, the irritating itch and heat under your skin recedes.

The beta rolls his eyes. True mates, bah – people throw it around like a free pass. “True mate or not, it doesn’t mean he gets to drop you like a hot sweet potato – which you are, sweet and you look like a potato, woman, get yourself together! – and ride off into the sunset. Any decent alpha knows that omegas need weaning –”

Seungkwan goes off on a rant that you’ve heard on loop for the past week.

Geun-woo was a friend from the university. As alphas tend to be, he was popular and well-liked by your peers. His designation spurred him to be in the best shape he could be, drove him to win championship after championship for your university football team. After graduation, he went on to train for the national team and was – is – on his way to being a national athlete.

You could talk on and on about who Oh Geun-woo is to many people, but you could summarize what he was to you in three words: not your boyfriend.

The arrangement between the two of you was simple. You were adults, busy people living busy lives interrupted almost monthly by your heats and ruts. It was a logical and practical way to ensure that neither of you spend your vulnerable biological ~events~ alone. It was a good arrangement and after two years of it, you could honestly call Geun-woo a good friend.

However, the downside with spending such time so often with someone you’re not bonded with is you develop what experts call, a quasi-bond. It has all the effects of being bonded but dialed down by almost a hundred. You think it’s an exaggeration but you, an unbonded omega, really isn’t in the position to do so.

So when, Geun-woo found his true mate at some meet abroad, he dropped you faster than you could blink.

You don’t blame him, but man, it sucks.

Seungkwan glanced at you, sighing at your silence. Sending a prayer above, he fishes his wallet and takes out a card. “I have a suggestion.”

With your heat coming at you, barreling in the next two weeks, you’re just about open to any suggestion so, you hum behind your coffee mug, “The floor’s yours.” Well, at least the little of it that’s still visible under your clothes and knick-knacks.

“Before you say anything, know that I am suggesting this out of the goodness of my heart. But why don’t you consider this?” Seungkwan implored, handing you the card.

The black and purple card reads; “SS Matching Services” and under it, their company motto; “We’ve got the match for you.” With their office address and contact number.

“A pimping service?”

“Ya,” Seungkwan protested, red-faced, “Take your 19th century standards out of the gutter.”

His adamant protest startles a laugh out of you. For the guy who used to glare at anyone holding hands in public, your best friend has grown well. “Actually, it was worse in the 19th century but go off, I guess.”

Seungkwan leveled you with a flat look that had you raising your hands in surrender. No good can come from antagonizing the guy who just quite literally saved your life. “I’m listening.”

“Look, it’s just an option and it’s legit. Tough screening process too.” He takes out his phone and shows you the company’s website. Briefly, you glance at it before taking the card. Physically, it weighs like nothing but in your mind, it weighs like something amazing.

“How’d you know that?”

“My sunbaenim, uses this from time to time. It helps with his ruts. Win-win.” Seungkwan shrugs. You wonder which sunbae he’s referring to, given his many hobbies.

The website doesn’t look like it’ll give your laptop a virus, you’ll give it that. It’s classy and clean, and no random photos of just naked torsos. Good sign.

“You’re surprisingly blasé about this.” You laugh, eyes warm and surprised at how maturely Seungkwan delivers, only to laugh out loud at the sight of his burning ears.

You promised Seungkwan that you’ll check out the site but as soon as you got back to work, everything just swept you away.

That’s what happens when you work with kids.

Eyes warm with fondness, you quietly pat the bottom of one of your snoozing students. It’s nap time and your classroom has turned into some sort of sleepover area with all your students wrapped up with their soft blankets, nuzzling into their softer pillows. The early afternoon light filters into the room through the curtains, painting over the children with a soft glow.

Across you, another teacher takes the opportunity to get some of her own sleep in, curling herself protectively around two kids. Your classroom smells like baby powder and sweet treats, littered with small pastel chairs and tables. Its walls decorated with your students artworks and colorful cartoon characters.

This, this is one of the many moments that remind you why you became a pre-school teacher.

Many of your peers assumed it’s because of your designation. Omegas are naturally more inclined to take positions that require caretaking, given the innate desire to give care to others. Just like alphas are more likely to take positions that require leadership.

However, you muse, cooing as the young beta in front of you snuggle closer to your lap, many tend to gloss over the many manifestations of one’s designation. It’s true that by virtue of being an omega, you’re naturally more inclined to take care of your peers. Your so-called softness being the defining quality of your group.

But your omega manifestation is… a bit different. Sometimes, it makes you wonder how you got hired as a preschool teacher in the first place.

“Teach’r, sleepy time?”

Glancing down, you see the young beta pout at you. Waving away your thoughts, you slide down to her side and let the afternoon light lull you to sleep. All thoughts about your heat fading away quietly.

Soon, naptime was over and so is the day. Parents slowly trickle in, one after another, to pick up their children. Most of them harried from work, but still smiling at you and your co-teachers in gratitude.

“See you tomorrow, Rahui!” You call, as the last student leaves.

The little girl in her puffy sweater turns and smiles at you sweetly. “Bye, bye, teacher! Sleepy time!”

You flush at your student’s comment much to her mother’s confusion. After falling asleep earlier, you’d woken up to a clean classroom and several of your students hovering over you. Your pre-heat symptoms felt like they’re coming too fast for your taste.

Waving her off with a smile, you untie your apron and walk to the staff room where the others are. It’s almost 6 pm, and your daily staff meeting’s in session. In front of the room is your superior, an older bonded omega, with deep dimples on her cheek.

“Good job today, everyone.” She starts off, smiling at the soft cheers from everyone. “As you know…”

Your superior continues on to talk about the children’s upcoming activities. Vaguely, you hear her talk about a field trip, or is it a field demo? Shaking your head, you try to clear your thoughts but it seem like everything’s underwater, and no sound is escaping from her lips.

“… right, y/n?”

Blinking, you focus, and sent her a sheepish smile. “Sorry, you were saying?”

Your superior smiles forgivingly, “I was asking about that self-defense class you’ve been wanting to teach. When would you like to schedule it? Of course, pending approval with everyone’s schedule.”

Immediately, a large smile appears on your cheek. It’s approved?? You’ve been proposing that seminar for months. Most of the omega teachers were wary of the thought but warmed up to it recently. Especially when you mentioned how it’ll help them protect their kids – their students – more.

“How about two weeks from now?”

“Anytime!” You offer. The enthusiasm isn’t lost on your co-workers, some of them shaking their heads in amusement.

Your superior looks over your office board and hums at the chart. It contains all your schedules, including leaves, conferences to attend and heat cycles. With one look, your heart drops.

“Actually…” you start off, wincing at the thought of inconveniencing everyone because of your biology. “My heat is coming up in two weeks…”

Surprisingly, or not, omegas are actually quite liberal in discussing things like this. It’s simply part of the biology you live with. So your mortification is unfounded as your co-workers nod in understanding, quickly suggesting different dates.

Your superior nods, and glances at your work log book. “Well, we could schedule maybe four weeks from now to get you time to recover? Don’t forget to file your leave.”

Right.

“I still can’t believe she flew you in for her rut.” Jooheon’s laugh and disbelief reaches Shownu’s ears before he even steps inside. Smiling to himself, he finds his friends lounging in his living room, completely comfortable and completely unexpected.

Jooheon looks up at his arrival, “Hi, hyung! We let ourselves in!”

“I can see that.” Shownu nods in greeting, trying to remember who he gave his spare keys to. He’s pretty sure he didn’t make six copies of his set. Shrugging off his coat, he look on, realizing how his living room looks smaller with a bunch of guys occupying it. Jooheon and Minhyuk are on his couch, Changkyun’s on his stomach on the floor, playing with his phone and, Hyunwoo and Kihyun are by the window drinking a can of beer each.

That’s one, two, three… four, five…

“Hey, you’re home! And – are those protein bars?” The paper bag is snatched from his hand, before Shownu registers, blinking slowly as Wonho disappears once again into the kitchen.

The smell of jajjangmyeon invades his senses. Ah, yes, guys’ night.

Shortly after his arrival, everyone gathers in the dining room. With the two youngest improvising chairs out of the boxes Shownu hasn’t had the chance to unpack, having just moved into his new home a month ago.

To the eldest’s surprise, everyone pitched in with dinner, bringing different dishes and filling the dining table. Assorted cuts of meat are sizzling over the portable electric grill Wonho brought, several small plates of side-dishes and… are those buttered crabs he’s seeing? “What’s this?”

Minhyuk shoots him an amused glance over his beer, “You don’t really think we’ll let you off without a house warming, right?”

Shownu blinks, a small bashful smile forming on his lips, “But I’ve been here a month.”

An arm wraps around his shoulder and a weight shakes him back and forth. Kihyun rolls his eyes, getting into his personal space. “This is the first time we’ve been complete for a month! Just enjoy it!”

Jooheon hums, his cheeks filled with lettuce and meat from the grill. “Yeah, I mean, though it’s only Minhyuk-hyung that hasn’t been around, too busy getting his dick wet.”

“Oi!” their youngest protests, ears burning and nearly spitting out his drink. “We are eating.”

Wonho heartily “taps” Changkyun’s back, laughing. “We’re all adults here. It’s not as if you haven’t heard or said anything worse, Kyunie.”

“Yeah, daddy~” Hyungwon hits, reminding everyone of one very particular incident in college that featured a younger Changkyun and a girl from the bar, and the very thin walls of their shared apartment.

Changkyun flushes before rolling his eyes, “At least I get some. Can’t say the same to you.”

Scoffing, Minhyuk raises his hands, “Excuse me, I have no problem with that.”

Before Minhyuk starts to dive into his sexual exploits, Kihyun saves the day and shoves a piece of meat into his mouth and diverts the conversation to work.

Over food and drinks, Shownu and his friends catch up on their personal lives – not having as much time to get together as before. Not with Wonho’s celebrity coaching taking off, Jooheon and Changkyun’s new artist, Kihyun’s voice academy and Hyungwon’s and Minhyuk’s modelling.

Sometimes, Shownu feels left behind by the big dreams his friends are living but every day, he wakes up and goes home happy as a chef and food blogger. His appetite thanking him for the career path he chose. Besides, as Changkyun said, he could go big time if he wants, it’s just a matter of self-promotion which he’s terrible at given his shy personality.

Dinner passes by with a blur and they find themselves nursing their last beers when Jooheon circles back to Minhyuk’s vacation.

“So, hyung. How does it feel to fulfill your sugar baby dreams?” The young alpha jokes, his dimples appearing on his cheeks as he elbows Minhyuk.

Stars appear in the latter’s eyes and with a dreamy sigh, he responds jokingly, “Just as I’ve always dreamed.”

The one of the only two omegas of their group has never shied away from talking about his exploits, his looks and all the advantages he gets from it. Often, he jokes that’s why he became a model – to be admired and to fulfill his duties to the world and bless them with his godly looks.

“She flew me to her family’s island, and we spent her rut and my heat underneath the blanket of stars.” Minhyuk recounts, all dreamy-eyed, “I felt really spoiled.”

“I bet.” Kihyun remarked, smirking. “Is this the girl you’ve been telling us about?”

Ignoring Hyungwon’s cough of which one, Minhyuk nods, “Yes!” and turns to Shownu, “She’s actually friends with Nayeon – who, by the way, is asking me about you, hyung.”

Shownu blinks, before handing a can of beer to Wonho across him. “Me?”

“Yeah, she asked why you never called her.”

A chorus of ooh’s echoes in the room followed by a few gruff laughter. Shownu ducks his head and nurses his drink. Nayeon’s a nice girl, a model that he met when Minhyuk called in a favor for him to substitute as one of their shoot’s models after the original model called in sick. She gave him his number on a piece of paper before departing with a sultry look and a flying kiss.

Contrary to popular belief, Shownu is not dense – or, more like, he’s not that dense.

“Ah,” Shownu starts, “Um. I don’t think we’re looking for the same thing.”

Wonho pauses and eyes him, before levelling the younger guys with a look that has them catching their teasing remarks and keeping it to themselves. Wonho has known Shownu the longest and knows that though his friend’s an alpha, physically, through and through, his disposition often throws people off.

He’s soft when others are hard. Soft-spoken, patient like a saint and very careful with his actions and words. Wonho doesn’t even remember if he’s ever seen his friend get angry or aggressive in the span of their long friendship.

A romantic at heart, through and through.

“Well,” Kihyun claps, breaking the quiet, “You know, no point in pursuing something that you know’s a dead end, right?”

Minhyuk pouts, sometimes a little bit insensitive in his enthusiasm, “But she’s cute! And she’s an omega too! Besides – wait—how do you even deal with your ruts?”

Shownu’s face lights up like a lantern, the drinks doing nothing about the flush crawling up his neck. It’s not like he’s never spent it with someone, but every time, after the week of his rut, he always feel tired and empty. So for the past ruts, he’s been dealing with it - “Alone, with suppressants.”

“Yah, I thought you’d stopped taking those!”

Constant use of suppressants for an alpha fucks up their cycle and even their moods. Wonho knows this the best because he was on it for several months back in college, before he started becoming confident enough in his newfound muscles and height.

“I did.” Shownu nods, assuring his friends. “I don’t use them anymore. Just when I’m… you know. It’s just easier to deal with.”

All the alphas in the room scoff under their breaths. Yeah, it’s easy if easy felt like walking and dancing on hot coal in the middle of the hottest summer day. It’s not as if their eldest can’t get a woman just by standing by the bar, being his awkward self.

At their little corner, Jooheon and Changkyun glance at each other, years of friendship evident in their wordless communication. Changkyun tilts his head, eyes widening and jaw clenched, “Go”, he mouths.

Jooheon pouts, “Do you know how hard it is to get into their mixers, punk?”

Shrinking at Changkyun’s flat stare, Jooheon rolls his eyes and sends a prayer to the universe asking for good karma.

“Hyung, what do you think about dating services?”

Notes: The stage is set for our two protagonists! I tried to incorporate as much world-building and character backgrounds as I can without it being over the top. Please leave comments and asks! :) I’m trying to stick to weekly updates. Also, support Monsta X’s next comeback!

#shownu x reader #monsta x shownu #monsta x imagines #monsta x fanfiction #abo dynamics #seungkwan cameo appearance #because im a moncarat #seungkwan's a pimp #sort of #alpha shownu #omega reader #quite the lore for abo #monsta x comeback #monsta x x reader #monsta x #son hyunwoo fanfiction

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frodos-bizarre-adventure · 3 years ago

Text

@gingerreggg whee it still continues

Heads Up- Part 7 (Joseph x Bust!Caesar)

▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪

"You sure this is the right place?" Joseph asked Suzi as they toured the art supplies section of the local shopping center.

"Sure! Loggins and Messina are Professor Lisa's main suppliers of art materials! They also offer them wholesale for cheap prices. We're gonna need it..." she whimpered, eyeing her wallet sadly.

"Professor Lisa?" Joseph asked. "As in...Elizabeth Joestar?"

"Oh, you know her?" Suzi exclaimed.

"She's my mom, I didn't know you were a student of hers..." Joseph sighed, Suzi apparently not having made the connection with the Joestar surname. Having his mother be a renowned professor in the field of visual arts was quite a burden on Joseph. He wasn't especially close to her, and the few memories they had together were of her being strict and of high expectations. She was distant both physically and emotionally, yet the weight of her achievements rested heavily on Joseph's shoulders.

He was glad to have a little apartment to himself once he turned 18. A small place he could call his own, and have a little freedom to express himself.

Though as of the moment, it was no longer a home solely his.

"I wonder how Caesar's doing back home, alone." Joseph whispered to Suzi.

"Oh, relax," she laughed, as she felt the types of clay on exhibit trying to find one matching Caesar's consistency and texture. "I made sure the door's locked and he has stuff to keep occupied, he'll be perfectly safe."

--------

Caesar cautiously thumped his way across the house. It was the first time the clay bust had been left home alone since the day he came to life, and he felt uneasy.

He'd promised Suzi and Joseph he wouldn't cause any more trouble after last night's fiasco. Still, Suzi felt it was better off to be safe than sorry, and spent the early morning Caesar-proofing the house. She removed any platforms low enough for Caesar to jump up on-- she'd measured his highest jumps at five inches-- to keep him from trying to climb up dangerous places, and she'd also put bubble wrap on hard objects such as table legs and sharp corners in case of him bumping into things.

Caesar frowned. He felt he was being infantilized, treated like a baby. He chuckled snarkily to himself in hindsight, given that he was after all only a week old, and whether that would classify him as a baby, even with a grown man's mind and personality.

And besides, as much as he detested admitting it, he knew what Joseph said the previous night was true. He indeed was just a helpless, limbless chunk of clay. He could only bounce his heavy, squishy torso slowly across the floor with much exertion, and hardly anything more. Who knows what could happen if he'd found himself alone outside?

Yet he still felt a sense of yearning for the great forbidden outdoors, as he looked dreamily out the window. He wondered how far he could possibly go. He'd managed to make it to Joseph's lawn last night, and couldn't think how much further he could have gotten if Joseph hadn't caught up with him. Hopping on his neck was slow and hard, sure, but if there was one upside to being made of clay, it was that he never felt tired or sore from moving the way he did, and briefly contemplated if he could have explored a good distance in his new world hadn't it been for Joseph's advantage of legs.

But each little squeak of his varnished torso with each hop reminded him of Joseph's painstaking effort he took the previous evening to repair him. How he'd gone out of his way to make sure Caesar wasn't in pain, and was always in tip-top condition. How he'd shown him genuine friendship even if the artist was silly and exasperating at times. Hell, the very fact that he'd kept Caesar at all instead of disposing of him or destroying him out of fear was already something the stubby clay being was already very grateful for, and he felt that, after all he'd done for him, it was better off not giving poor Joseph any further heartache.

He turned his eyes toward the books and art supplies that Suzi left behind for him on the living room floor. Perhaps there was a better use of his time than getting himself into trouble.

------

"This much for a dollar?" Suzi cheered with glee. "Sure, we'll take it!"

"How much clay do we need?" asked Joseph, lugging several other blocks in a heavy basket. Suzi had insisted on different types of clay closest to the kind that Joseph had made Caesar from, to test which one would suit him the best.

"Not enough to make a whole body, of course!" she giggled. "At least not yet."

"So do we like, start by giving him an arm? Or some pecs?" Joseph giggled mischievously, imagining the possibilities.

"We'll get there bit by bit," Suzi reassured. "Soon he'll be a complete person!"

"I hope so," mumbled Joseph doubtfully. "I hope we complete him in time for me to graduate..." Joseph scratched his head.

"Well, I think we better get going home now." Suzi said, double-checking the supplies to make sure they had all they needed. "I'm sure Caesar's been waiting."

------

"Hey, Cae," Joseph announced as he entered the house. "Sorry we took so long."

There was no familiar greeting thumps this time, however, so Joseph went to the living room to investigate.

And then his jaw dropped.

Caesar, during their absence, was painting.

He'd found Joseph's art box, the same one he'd meddled with on the first morning, and, using one of Suzi's paper sheets on her clipboard as a canvas, was using a watercolor palette. Joseph watched in amazement as Caesar, dexterously gripping the paintbrush in his lips, dipped the brush into the paint, and with a coordinated rotation of his head and a flexing of his mouth, he streaked the brush across the paper, forming a line of color on the sheet.

The painting itself wasn't much: it was little more than an abstract mess of different, haphazard streaks of color looking like a cross between a kindergartener's doodle and a Jackson Pollock painting. But the fact that it was made by someone without limbs and only a few days old was a tremendous achievement in itself, and Joseph couldn't hold back a tear of joy.

Caesar was so preoccupied with stroking the brush, that he scarcely noticed Joseph entering the room until Joseph called his name. Caesar flinched in surprise, dropping the brush as his mouth popped open in shock.

"Joseph! I-I didn't know you were here! I'm sorry," he said apologetically, making a few hops on the floor to turn himself to face Joseph. "I was just bored and wanted something to do, I hope you don't mind."

Joseph gestured to the painting with great amazement. "I didn't know you had such a talent for art!"

Caesar looked up at Joseph and grinned.

"I am art," Caesar said proudly, trying to stand as tall as he could, which was just a bit more than Joseph's knee-height.

"How did you do it?" Joseph asked.

"A lot of patience, a lot of persistence and a lot of bouncing," Caesar replied with a chuckle. Joseph couldn't help but notice, as Caesar smiled, that his nose had flattened slightly and his front teeth were slightly crooked, likely from their unintended use as substitutes for fingers.

"You've done a wonderful job, but I think you overdid yourself," Joseph said, gently lifting up Caesar off the ground. "You need just a little bit of fixing," Joseph said, imagining the struggle of Caesar having to use his nose and teeth to move things around.

It was hard being just a head.

-----

"Okay, this won't hurt a bit," Joseph said, as he gently squeezed Caesar's soft clay nose back into shape.

"Ah, that's better," the bust replied, as he sat once more on his birthplace: Joseph's working table. "I couln't help but squish my nose a bit to push that art box of yours along."

A wide grin crept across Joseph's face.

"Well, the good news is that you won't have to do that anymore!" he said, gesturing to a large block of clay on the opposite end of the table, still wrapped in a thin layer of plastic.

Intrigued, Caesar carefully bounced closer. "What-- what's this? What does this mean?" he asked, perplexed.

Suzi followed into the room with a huge smile, carrying another clay block.

"We're making you a body, Caesar!"

Caesar's eyes grew wide with surprise. "Could...could you really do that?"

Joseph shrugged. "I don't know, but I think it's worth a try!"

"We're gonna experiment a bit on how to pull this off," Suzi said, peeling off the plastic covering of the clay block. "We guessed we'd build on you bit by bit so you gradually get used to having more of a body."

"Gee, I never thought," Caesar said, gratefully. "Let's do this."

-----

The two artists began with a stub of a right arm, all the way up to an elbow. Perching Caesar onto the workbench, they began to outfit him with the stump, using Suzi's anatomy reference guide to scale and sculpt the limb.

"I wished I had that book sooner," Joseph laughed, as he smoothened Caesar's newly attached arm nub. "Then I wouldn't have settled for making only a bust."

Soon the stubby appendage was tacked on, and Joseph began to paint. He stroked and blended with the same amount of dedication he'd given Caesar's head, shaping it as to merge with Caesar's shoulder seamlessly, texturing it perfectly as to look almost like human skin, until at last, painted and sculpted, it looked perfect, like a natural outgrowth of Caesar's rudimentary body.

"Go on," Joseph said encouragingly. "Try to move it."

Caesar strained and struggled to do just that, staring at the new limb intently, with determination, but the elbow-length stub refused to budge. Not even a wiggle or a twitch, no matter how hard Caesar tried, the arm stub remained a motionless deadweight.

Caesar looked at Joseph, clearly worried.

"Jojo...I can't."

Joseph felt a sinking unease. He reached out to touch Caesar's skin. His head and neck felt oddly warm like always, warm like a living person's skin despite being textured, and having a consistency, like clay. But there was a sharp divide where the new arm met his torso-- beyond that line, the clay of the arm felt cold and lifeless to the touch. It felt dead.

"Something's wrong," Joseph said. Suzi came over for a closer look.

Pulling out a pin from a box of supplies, she sharply poked the arm stub. "Feel anything?"

"Nope," Caesar sighed.

"How about this?" she asked, poking a bit higher.

"Still nothing."

Suzi poked the arm higher and higher, but Caesar felt nothing. But after several pokes, she reached the line where the warm, living clay met the useless stump.

"Ouch!" Caesar cried as Suzi jabbed him finally at a spot he could feel.

Suzi shook her head. "Maybe it's because it's incomplete? Should we try finishing a complete arm and hand?"

"I'm not really sure how sentient clay bust anatomy works," sighed Joseph, "but I suppose it's worth a try. After all, Caesar only came alive once I completed his head."

Caesar shuddered at the prospect of coming alive before his head was completed, but sighed in relief that he only did animate once it was.

"Just hold on for a while, alright Cae?" Joseph said in an attempt to reassure the anxious bust. "Hopefully you'll soon have a body."

Joseph sat down and ruffled his brown messy hair in frustration.

This, as it turned out, was a lot more complicated than it had first seemed.

---------

(Previous Chapter)

(Next Chapter)

#jjba #jojo's bizarre adventure #gingerreggg #hands of life au #bust!caesar #sculptor!joseph #heads up #battle tendency #caejose #caesar x joseph

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lovemollywho · 5 years ago

Text

Thoughts of the Past - The Show

Alright everyone, with quarantine and everything going on I've had time to revisit this story. I've finally figured out how to link the other chapters so feel free to catch up on that. Hope you enjoy!

CW: Angst

Previous Chapter // Next Chapter

Lorcan looked at himself in the mirror one last time before realizing that his outfit wasn’t going to get any better than this. He left his hair down and kept the slight stubble on his face because Elide had once said he looked adorably rugged like this. His button-down white shirt was cleaned and ironed and he threw on a black blazer over that. However, he realized all too late that his black dress jeans had a hole in one of the knees from when he had stumbled home drunk during one of the last benders and hadn’t realized it but it seemed pretty on-brand for him anyway, last he laced up his boots, grabbed his keys, phone and wallet and walked out the door.

————-

Elide was nervous. She wanted to wipe her palms on her dress but then remembered that it cost more than seven months of her rent. Aelin said she found it at the back of her closet but Elide knew that the dress had been bought specifically for her. Price tag still on, her jaw dropped to the floor when she saw that it was Dolce and Gabbana….and was over 7,000 dollars. Elide protested but Aelin had insisted and if Elide was being honest with herself, she looked good. The dress was black and strapless with a lined boning bustier that exposed the smooth skin of her torso, cinched at the waist with a tea-length tulle skirt that made her feel like a ballerina with four-inch black stilettos that gave her some hight. Her hair was pulled into a low chignon with a few stray strands, red lips and smokey eyes completed her look. She looked hot, and she knew it. She only hoped that it was enough to cover that she felt like vomiting. She glanced at the clock on the back wall, the show would be starting soon, and while this wasn’t her first exhibit there was still this vulnerability of having people see and judge the experiences that she brought to life in her art.

Deep breath in. You can do this, she whispered to herself, but first, she needed to dry heave in the bathroom.

————-

Lorcan had stopped and turned around so many times on the way to the art gallery. There was just so much that could go wrong that he worried nothing would change. Then he remembered that it wasn’t about him - it was about Elide. But he also didn’t want to screw anything up and embarrass her again, but he had to at least apologize. However, she could just through a drink in his face and be done with him, but she might also forgive him, and so his thoughts went. It wasn’t until he turned the corner of Fifth and Main did he see Rowan and Aelin waiting for him. They were laughing together about who knew what and he felt a twinge of jealousy that came and went so quickly Lorcan was ashamed he had even felt it at all.

Aelin spotted him first and offered him a small smile. She had been a huge help the past few weeks after his meeting with Elide in the coffee shop. At first, she was stubborn and mean, refusing to let him speak and giving him a piece of her mind but eventually Rowan calmed her down and she was willing to listen. Having Aelin on his side was a step in the right direction but she wasn’t Elide. Lorcan took a deep breath as he got closer to the couple and Rowan placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Ready?” Rowan asked, but Lorcan’s mouth felt dry and he could feel the panic rising into the throat. He didn’t want to mess this up, he wanted a drink…or two…or a whole bottle. He swallowed thickly, trying to get some moisture onto his tongue but it wasn’t enough. He wasn’t enough. He didn’t even know why he was trying. He took a step back away from Rowan, ready to turn around and go home but then he felt a hand squeeze his and looked to find Aelin’s fingers interlacing with his.

“I don’t understand art,” Aelin said loud and clear looking at him straight in the eye. Whatever he had expected her to say, that wasn’t it.

“What?” he asked still so confused. “You go to art opening’s all the time, Ace you’re house is like a goddamn museum.”

She shrugged a shoulder nonchalantly. “I went because I grew a socialite. Going to art openings was good publicity, and I supported so many other forms of the arts that it would have seemed rude not to.” She squeezed his hand again before letting it drop. “Before I met Rowan, I would just pick a piece and stare at it, until eventually, someone came along and state their opinion and I could agree or disagree, or make something up entirely. Point is, art is like literature. You can say that the artist used blue paint to symbolize the ever-persistent sadness and someone is bound to agree with you. Or disagree with you. Lorcan art is subjective. It’s okay to have an opinion even if it’s entirely wrong.”

Lorcan ran a hand through his hair. “You told Ellie all the time that the artwork is amazing, you would sit on our couch and debate the use of color or texture. I can’t - I can’t do - I can’t do shit like that Ace”

“I’ve had years of practice with pretentious rich people.” she deadpanned. “Do you think she’s talented?”

“Of course I do. I love how she gets so into her work, that she’ll come home with new canvases and create something, anything, and that you can see the pieces of her soul into whatever it is she created. I think she’s the most beautiful thing on the planet when she’s in her paint-splattered overalls, with a bandanna keeping back her hair, while she blasts music. Or when she can’s find her paintbrushes because she’s lost them in her hair.” Lorcan fingered Elide’s ribbon hair tie that he’d been wearing for the last couple of weeks after he found it in the bathroom. “I love her.” he sighed.

Rowan had been silent through this whole exchange but offered him an understanding smile. He breathed in deeply and slowly exhaled and Lorcan followed the motion in return.

“Okay,” Lorcan said running his hands through his hair one more time. “Let’s go.”

————-

“Your pieces have always been stunning, but this seems to a first for you Miss. Lochan. Normally you provide us with about four or five pieces in collaborations with other artists but this is a whole new level. You have thirty-five pieces here tonight, all from you, all tying around a singular theme. Would you care to explain what brought about this sudden change?”

Elide smiled at the reporter, she knew that this question was coming but still it was hard to put into words.

“For so long I was afraid of myself. There are so many other great artists in the world, my cousin Manon Blackbeak for instance, and it’s hard to not compare myself to other people. However, the story that I am telling tonight with these pieces needed to be let out. I think one of the best things about being an artist is that we can tell stories in a different way, even if it isn’t our story. I hope that people like it but I also know that this story isn’t going to be for everyone, and that’s also okay.” Elide shrugged. “What’s important is that someone somewhere can relate to it and that they will get to experience it because I decided that it was time for me to create outside of my comfort zone.”

The reported smiled while Elide was talking, the sound of cameras clicking the only signal that an interview was going on and that this wasn’t just a conversation between strangers.

“One last question, the title of the collection,‘Thoughts of the Past’ what do you mean? There aren’t any historical events that are featured so why this title?”

Elide’s smile faltered for a split second before answering. “While there aren’t any historical events there is a history, and I think it’s up to people to find their own answers about what that history is.”

The reported nodding and offered her hand, “Thank you so much for your time, Miss. Lochan, it was a pleasure to meet you.”

“Same to you, enjoy the rest of the show.”

Elide took this time to briefly look around the room. It was a great turn out, invitation-only but almost everyone had RSVPd yes. Elide walked over to the open bar and the very cute bartender offered her a smile and a wink. “What can I get for you?” He asked, placing open palms on the counter.

“Soda with a lime, please.” She answered, offering him a smile in return.

“Really?” he asked already putting ice in a glass. “It doesn’t seem like your drink.”

“Only on show nights.”

The bartender’s eyes widen a little as he realized that he was speaking to the artist of the hour.

“You made all of this?” He asked placing her drink in front of her with one hand and gestured around with the other.

“Guilty.” She responded, squeezing the lime into her drink before taking a sip. The bartender whistled. “Damn, this is all really good. You must be really happy.” Elide tried to keep her smile in place. Was she happy? She was proud of her work, she was glad for the amazing turnout, but was she happy? Before she had a chance to respond to the bartender she heard her name being called from across the room. Looking over she saw Aelin waving her down with Rowan in tow behind her.

“Excuse me,” she said to the bartender before rushing over to where the couple stood.

“Holy shit El, this is amazing!” Aelin gushed pulling Elide into a hug once she got closer. “Like I knew you were talented but this is a whole new level for you.”

Elide blushed. Hearing praise from strangers was fine but when it came to her close friends and family Elide couldn’t help to be more self-conscience - these were the people who knew her, knew the emotions she hid within the paint or other media.

“You did all this in a month?” Rowan asked, looking around.

“It started as a way for me to get my feeling out, you know? I couldn’t talk to him, it was too much, and I was so tired of fighting. So when things got a little too hard I would sneak away and paint.” Elide shrugged and took a sip of her drink.

Aelin and Rowan shared a look with each other that Elide tried to ignore. She didn’t want their pity, it’s why she had never talked to them about it before.

“I just wish he was here though, you know. Like maybe now that it’s all out in the open.” Aelin opened her mouth and then shut it, looking to Rowan for help.

“What am I missing?” She asked, looking at Rowan. He sighed and pointed. Following his finger, she felt her heart stop and start again as she found the familiar back of the very person she was talking about. She whirled on her two friends a hiss falling from her lips.

“Surprise?” Aelin questioned, placing jazz hands up. Elide let out a groan and turned back to where Lorcan was standing at one of the pieces she did after the breakup. He was just standing there, not moving and Elide felt her heart tighten.

“You don’t have to talk to him E.” Rowan started. “He just wanted to come to support you.” Elide took another sip from her drink suddenly wishing that it was something stronger.

“I mean, he’s here though, so you might as well talk to him,” Aelin suggested. Elide didn’t respond and headed in the opposite direction from where Lorcan stood.

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Let me know if you wanna get tagged <3</a>

@nalgenewhore @safewithintheheart @bibliophileaddict

#thoughts of the past #lorcan x elide #throne of glass #Throne of Glass series #I don't think anyone is reading this but I'm just writing for myself at this point

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withabackpackandcamera · 4 years ago

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March 30th, 2021

Day 7: A Last Day of Leisure By The Pool and Beach

Sadly, today was our last day in Maui and we were determined to make the most of the limited time we had left before our red-eye flight back to Los Angeles. Because Cynthia had to get up for an early morning start for her interview, I did the same and decided to get out of bed at sunrise to maximize my morning.

While Cynthia was interviewing, I went downstairs to the beach to see how things looked at sunrise. As I headed down and looked around, I realized that sunrise was definitely not as exciting as sunset on the westside of Maui. Something else I noticed was that the sidewalks behind the hotel, the beaches, and the pool area at the resort were, surprisingly, already starting to get busy even though it wasn’t yet 7:00am. I briefly strolled along Kaanapali Beach and took in the view of the beach before it got too crowded and too busy. What beautiful morning weather to enjoy on our last day!

Once I was done with the beach, I walked back to the resort to see the grounds in the daylight. I roamed around the pool grounds and took a look at some of the five pools. I checked out the flamingos, parrots, and coy fish in the ponds near the hotel lobby before rounding back to scout out an area that we could claim next to the pool for the morning. Luckily, though the pool area was starting to get busy and some people had scoped out their spots, there were still plenty of pool chairs left for us to pick from. So, while waiting for Cynthia to finish up and come down, I chose two pool chairs positioned in the sun knowing that it might get too cool if it gets too shady next to the pool.

Before long, Cynthia came down to join me by the pool. After securing our pool towels for the day, we chilled in the sun next to the pool before I decided to take a dip in the biggest pool in the area: the family pool. I jumped in and swam in the cool water for 45 minutes or so. Because it was still early in the morning, the big kid slide in the middle of the property was not yet open for use, so I just swam around in the pool (because I didn’t have any pool equipment to mess around with) until it was time for brunch. It was really nice to finally jump in a pool after a couple of failed attempts over the last few days.

After grabbing some complimentary tote bags from the Westin on our way up to get ready for breakfast, we cleaned up before finally heading over to Down The Hatch again, this time for a much-anticipated breakfast. Since the restaurant stops serving breakfast pretty early and lines are a known thing at Down The Hatch, we made sure we got there with plenty of time so as to not miss out on their yummy breakfast menu. And luckily, the line wasn’t too bad by the time we arrived. For breakfast, we had their Spinach Avocado Benny and Southern Style Chicken Benny, each served with deliciously crispy home fries, and an order of Banana Bread Mini French Toast with Lilikoi Cream Cheese. Oh my goodness. This breakfast was OH SO GOOD!

We took our time enjoying our very delicious breakfast before turning around and heading to the Royal Lahaina for our very-well-deserved massage sessions we had been looking forward to. When we first booked this trip, we knew we wanted to splurge on some nice spa massages to reward us for the last few difficult months of work and job hunting. Ultimately, after looking around at options and prices, Cynthia decided that going with the massages at the Royal Lahaina would be most economical. Because Cynthia’s session was scheduled before mine (because we couldn’t book a couples massage), I dropped her off so that I could head to the Westin to check out of our room. After I checked out, I drove back over to the Royal Lahaina and checked in for my lomi lomi massage and was offered a free hot stone massage with it! Nice! My hour-long lomi lomi was amazingly calm and relaxing, and I think that at some point, I may have fallen asleep as a result of the much-needed relaxation. But on the other hand, because it was so relaxing, I didn’t get any of the knots and strains in my shoulders and right calf muscle massaged out and still had them after the session. If only I could have ordered exactly what I wanted done… Oh well. It was still super enjoyable!

Once the massage session was done, I regrettably left the spa room and met with Cynthia outside. Because she had an informational call scheduled around this time, I left Cynthia to her call and walked over to Kahekili Beach to kill some time while waiting for her to finish. With the sun out in full force, I enjoyed a hot and pleasantly beachy walk along the water, stopping every now and then to photograph some of the crashing waves and rip curls that looked so cool.

When Cynthia finally finished, we headed back to the Westin to enjoy some more beach and pool time. It was so nice to just sit and chill without too many to-dos to check off. And it was really nice to just sit by the pool and relax. Not that I did any of that, haha. I actually spent much of the afternoon swimming and sliding down the big slide into the pool before doing it again. And again. And again! SO MUCH FUN! I shot down the slide six times or so before I ran over to grab Cynthia to coerce her into trying it out as well! Because it was so fun!

After thinking it over and talking to some other tourists, Cynthia finally decided to give it a try and after a long wait in line, she finally went down the slide… albeit slowly, haha. But good for her for trying a slide again after the traumatic experience she had the last time I got her on a water slide in Orlando… Once Cynthia was done with the pool for the day, I went down the slide two or three more times before calling it a day at the pool as well. But I wasn’t done with the water. I couldn’t stop there on my last day in Hawaii! With the remaining time I had left before an early dinner, I ran over to Kaanapali Beach to take one last dip and swim in the Hawaiian waters. By this point in the afternoon, the tide was starting to rise and the waves were starting to grow bigger and bigger. It was crazy to experience the (relatively) big waves and the rising and undulating tide while floating and swimming in the water! With every incoming wave, it was crazy how high I floated up and how far the beach floor dropped beneath me. Imagine how fun it would be to ride these waves with a boogie board or a floatie!

Once I was done with the ocean, I went back to the pool to grab Cynthia so we could head out to our early dinner at Paia Fish Market on Front Street. The wait at the restaurant was a little longer than expected so Cynthia took that opportunity to go find gifts for people while I waited in line and eventually ordered the food. We picked Paia Fish Market for dinner because we wanted to finish off the trip with some highly-rated fish tacos and Paia Fish Market provided us with just that at a cheap-enough price! I ordered the fish taco dinner, which consisted of two fish tacos (one was with Cajun seasoning and the other was with butter, salt, and pepper) with coleslaw and cajun rice, for myself and ordered a Cajun shrimp taco and a butter, salt, and pepper fish taco for Cynthia. After Cynthia returned with her first round of gifts, she left again to buy some Honolulu Cookie Company cookies while waiting for our food since we found out last minute that the cookie store closed early. By the time our food came out, Cynthia was still waiting to buy the cookies. So I went ahead and ate and waited for Cynthia to come back to eat some of her food before we raced out of the restaurant to make it back to the resort for our last sunset of the evening.

Before we arrived at the resort, Cynthia had already decided that she would take it easy and slowly make her way to the beach at her own pace. So when we got to the Westin, I ran through the resort first to get to the beach, the entire time eyeing the sky and horizon in anticipation of the beautiful upcoming sunset. Once on the beach, I realized that the perspective I was looking to capture sunset from was not immediately available in front of me. So I ended up rushing down the sidewalk that connected the back of all the resorts along the beach for half a mile or so until I approached a bend in the shoreline. There, I stopped and looked back as the sun was setting and realized that this spot would probably be my best bet for capturing some sunset landscapes. I walked onto the sandy beach and pulled out my camera and tripod and quickly set up for the sunset photoshoot.

The scene was incredible. As the sun set, the sky was painted in a variety of oranges while the clouds provided beautiful textures in the clear, muted blue sky. Wow! And along the horizon, as I was photographing sunset, I also glimpsed a couple of silhouetted boats floating by, providing me some great photographic pieces to place in the foreground of my sunset landscapes. The sunset on our last day was extraordinarily beautiful and spectacular! And probably the best one I saw while in Maui! So lucky to have had the chance to witness a fantastic sunset on my last evening in Maui!

Once I had made my way back to the Westin after the sun had disappeared from view, I caught up with Cynthia, who was in line making use of our free drink tickets. Before long, she had come poolside with my Frozen Mai Tai and her cocktail of choice. As we sat next to the pool and listened to live music being played at the restaurant behind us, we sipped at, and then chugged, our free cocktails and celebrated our last evening in Maui, soaking it all in as our vacation came to an end.

After one last glimpse of the beautiful resort and pool area, we left to pick up our luggages from the valet guys at the front and rushed to the car to reorganize our stuff before speeding along to the airport to catch our flight back to Los Angeles. I can’t believe how quickly our seven days of island life on Maui flew by! So sad to leave this tropical island paradise called Maui and head back to work in busy, traffic-y L.A... But alas, all vacations must come to an end...

5 Things I Learned/Observed Today:

1. Pool chairs, beach chairs, and cabanas with front row views of the pool or the beach definitely get scouted out and claimed early in the day at beachside resorts. But if you wake up at sunrise, chances are that you’ll probably be able to grab a nice place to lounge for the day before they’re all reserved and taken! Also, it’s important to take into account the position of the sun throughout the day and the shade coverage of the resort buildings to make sure you get the ultimate poolside/beachside spot!

2. Even while on vacation in Hawaii, tons of tourists are still really active in the wee hours of the morning! Walking around at sunrise, you see runners and joggers, yoga people, walkers, and bikers. I guess people need to keep their beach bods ready!

3. A lomi lomi massage is a traditional Hawaiian massage that uses gentle, continuous, flowing massage strokes in combination essential oils. To me, it feels pretty much like a Swedish massage. It’s so very, very relaxing and soothing! The only issue... it doesn’t go deep enough (like deep tissue) to relax really tight and worn-out muscles from a lot of physical activity.

4. After experiencing and seeing some big waves here in Maui, I can say that waves in Hawaii can get PRETTY big! When you combine these big waves coming in with the steep dropoff in the water, it makes the perfect formula for a strong rip current that can pull you further away from shore. Definitely be careful when out in these active Hawaiian waters!

5. Restaurants and shops close so early in Maui! As you have seen me write in previous posts, you can really get screwed over if you start looking for dinner places late in the evening after chasing sunset because a lot of restaurants seem to close before or around 9:00pm. Makes it difficult to eat what you want to eat without planning far in advance or rushing to dinner last minute before it closes. Shops similarly close earlier than you think, so plan accordingly and look at their closing times online before you head out with plans for the day.

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landeg · 4 years ago

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31 Days of Apex: A Retrospection

I participated in the incredible #31DaysOfApex challenge hosted on Twitter, where fans created new content for every day of July based on a one-word prompt. I’ve signed up for/started lots of similar challenges in the past but always ended up having to drop out or trail off before the end... but this time, I managed to complete something for every day of the challenge!

My only goal was to make something by each day’s deadline, and it was a really interesting exercise both in technical skill and also in my management of not only my time, but my expectations and energy. Below, I go into more detail behind each piece.

To preface; the beginning of this challenge coincided with the beginning of a new personal time-management exercise where, for 5/7 days a week, I would only go on the computer at night. Combined with the deadline, this had an interesting effect on my time management and the quality of certain pieces.

Day 1 - Memory

From the start, I wanted to use the challenge as an opportunity to do more studies and to push myself wherever possible. This was the first piece I did and I had more time to work on it, so I used it as a digital painting study. I still think it’s a strong piece and it’s probably my favourite of the month. Symbolically, this character’s backstory doesn’t match up with her own memories, so the idea is she’s missing information she can’t quite place or remember, and this both scares and comforts her.

Day 2 - Blood

Another digital painting and lighting study that didn’t work out as well as the first, mostly due to time constraints meaning I couldn’t scrap it and start again. While I don’t like how it turned out, I did learn a lot. The character on the right is a field medic, and my intent was to show the calm after a successful rescue.

Day 3 - Mercy

Some days I relied more on the humour of a piece’s concept than the skill of its execution, though I also liked how this piece turned out artistically. After two days of intense studies, though, this was very quick and easy for me to turn out as it relied on existing skills.

Day 4 - Prize

This one thankfully came together very quickly, which I credit to the two previous painting studies making it much easier to achieve what I wanted. The character is searching for the disembodied head of the man who killed her parents, who is now acting as a robot, hence the vaguely half-machine-half-human silhouette in her hand.

Day 5 - Family

Another quick, simple illustration under a time crunch. The character framed by the nameless foreground figures has no memory of herself or her family.

Day 6 - Noise

For some pieces where I was under a time crunch, I experimented in an opposite direction; instead of studies, I played loosely with different techniques/brushes/etc to see what came out. This was a lineless style I ended up employing a lot when short on time. The piece pictured here was just one of four alternate colourways, presented in a pop-art style. The character is almost always depicted with thick coverings over her ears, so I thought she might be sensitive to auditory overload. This particular piece was retweeted by the character’s voice actress!

Day 7 - Mask

More relying on humour for lack of time/a better idea. A fun experiment in colour, though.

Day 8 - Healing

Another technically “easy” piece but with a stronger concept. It was actually pretty hard to get the reflection & condensation elements balanced right. The character pictured has a narrative thread relating to an old ex he has trouble moving on from.

Day 9 - Weapon

While obviously another joke, and made to be finished quickly, it was surprisingly difficult to get the duct tape and knife to read clearly without over-cluttering the lineless image. This little ‘bot is a drone used by one of the playable characters to hack areas of the map; it’s not NORMALLY an offensive weapon. This image was promo’d in a video stream by the character’s voice actor!

Day 10 - Truth

I only had less than an hour to finish this one by the deadline, but I still tried to experiment with silhouette and colour. It was surprisingly hard to get the interior silhouette to be legible. The outer silhouette is a playable character (not easily readible unless you’re familiar with his design) and the inner silhouette is his sister, whose disappearance he is trying to investigate.

Day 11 - Shield

A fun, self-indulgent one. Had a blast simplifying the game’s characters down into little caricatures. The character in the centre has abilities related to shields and protection, so many other people were drawing him for the prompt; I wanted to try and flip it, so I picked other characters he would be friendly with, and picked a non-lethal, lighthearted setting.

Day 12 - Ruins

Short on time so did a quick lighting study. A recent game plot has changed one of the areas of the map, submerging it in water and leaving it to “ruin”.

Day 13 - Hero

Another painting study. Really didn’t like how this one turned out, but had to turn in something, and I did learn a lot in the process. If I’d had more time I probably would’ve scrapped it and started again. This characters had recently been revealed to have been manipulated by another character who used gas-based offenses, whom she admired.

Day 14 - Rest

I was going to be away from mt computer until after the deadline, so I decided to make a traditional piece. I ended up enjoying it so much I tried to take the time to do a few more traditional pieces later. This piece was sort of a comedy of errors; I had to do it while I was out, and the pen I had brought with me to ink my sketch ran out, so I had to make do with a blue ballpoint pen, and I was missing several colours of coloured pencil. I think the finished piece reflects how rushed it was, and it did’t meet my concept, but I do still like it.

Day 15 - Skull

Another quick one but I wanted to experiment with a different line style. Wanted a sort of “graffiti” effect. One of this character’s skins includes a skull-shaped mask.

Day 16 - Growth

Extremely quick play on words because I didn’t have the time to work on anything meaningful and couldn’t think of anything better!

Day 17 - Home

Another traditional piece, this time by choice and with more time. Markers. It looks extremely like some janky art school homework on 2 point perspective because it extremely is. Perspective and backgrounds are very difficult for me - they just don’t “click” - but I had a lot of fun with this one. I kept my mistakes intact because I didn’t want to edit it too much. A lot about the technical perspective is wrong, but I think I achieved the “mood” I wanted. This location is a bar owned by one of the player characters where many of the other characters are shown to meet.

Day 18 - Sky

Very happy with how this one turned out, even though there are still lots of problems. Markers again. There’s a lot I would fix next time, and I think technically it’s lacking, but there are some specific areas I feel happy to have achieved, such as the almost brushed texture of the curved metal above his shoulder and the values of the shadow/reflections on the underside of the head piece. I’m also happy with how I was able to draw from my shoulder rather than my wrist when inking the curved lines, something I struggle with.

Day 19 - Target

An experiment in pushing the lineless style I’d already been playing with for a stronger likeness. The pose and expression in this could both be pushed more but I like the result. This character had just learned that one of the other players, whom she had trusted, was actually sharing her secrets with her enemy, and she didn’t know which one it was.

Day 20 - Friendship

I had this one concepted from when I first looked over the prompts. It was a fun challenge trying to simplify all the elements into the lineless, blocky style while being legible. This character has a strained relationship with one of his friends, and finally pushed her too far with his selfishness, and she now no longer responds to him.

Day 21 - Scar

Quick joke. This character was introduced briefly as a red herring for another character before being killed off. He was stabbed through the chest by another character’s hand, hence the scar pattern.

Day 22 - Dream

I wasn’t sure about this one while I was making it but I ended up liking how it turned out. I wanted to capture the character’s robotic legs bent at an unnaturally straight 90 degrees, like a Barbie doll. The flat background and lighting make it feel like an indoor stage. The little “electric sheep” are inspired by iDogs.

Day 23 - Meal

After a few days of not having time to really spend on any piece, it was fun to get to spend time on concepting and composing this. I always admired these kinds of watercolour-like food illustrations and this is the first time I’ve had any success in creating one myself. I concepted and sketched out the individual items traditionally before working out the composition within the box digitally. Each food item/utensil is inspired by the different characters’ design elements. Only two of the now-current characters are excluded due to plot reasons. In particular, I like how one of the character’s dome-shaped shields acts as the base and cover of the box.

Day 24 - Hobby

Wasn’t a fan of how this one turned out. I think the likeness is a bit off, and his facial anatomy is skewed. But I also like how the general composition, tone, and bee turned out. This character’s concept art originally imagined them as a beekeeper who would use smoke to fight.

Day 25 - Fear

An incredibly rushed piece that I intended to go back in and add more detail to, similar to day 4, but I actually took a step back and decided I liked the blocky, flat-colour version. This character is the youngest of four, all of whom are MIA or worse, along with his father, and his mother is losing her memory. He’s talking to her through a handheld holographic device. This piece gained more traction, most likely thanks to the subject matter since this is a popular character.

Day 26 - Holiday

I didn’t want to do a religious holiday like Christmas or Easter. A lot of other people also interpreted the prompt as a vacation, but I had already done a sort of “beach vacation” piece for day 11, so I instead went for a “public holiday” and chose NYE/NYD. This was fairly quick but the lighting was an interesting experiment. I knew this one wouldn’t be as popular because it wasn’t as “flattering” but I personally really like it. The girl on the left is kind of goofy and completely un-self-conscious and I think it’s captured here.

Day 27 - Music

Really didn’t like how this one turned out. I don’t think the likeness is good at all, the lighting is poor, and the gold detailing feels lazy. But I liked other elements, such as the pose and the clothing.

Day 28 - Treasure

This is my least favourite of the entire month, but I also had the least time available to work on it before the deadline so I had no opportunity to scrap it and start over, which I sorely wanted to do. The likeness is terrible, but more than that the base anatomy is off, the pose is stiff, and the lighting/colours are cheap. I wish I could’ve done better by this character; but, I am glad I had something finished at all.

Day 29 - Skin

This was probably my third attempt at this picture and I’m still not happy with it, but again, I had to finish something. I almost considered scrapping the concept entirely and choosing something easier but ended up seeing it through. The concept itself is actually recycled from an older piece of mine for an entirely different fandom, because I didn’t think I did it justice then, either. Would still like to revisit this concept with this character and take more time.

Day 30 - Trust

After a few days of feeling really dissatisfied and uncomfortable with the art I’d been making, I finally more time to dedicate to a piece, and I’m overall happy with how this one turned out. I decided to go for a different medium entirely with pixel art, which also gave me the opportunity to try and animate it. I started off confident and then started to get worried towards the end, but all the elements came together when I added the portal colour effects. This is an alternate reality version of one of the player characters, who appears through a portal and allows that character to escape the facility she’s being kept in, encouraging them to trust the “voices” she hears which are actually versions of herself trying to help her. This piece was retweeted by the official Apex Legends Twitter account!

Day 31 - Freestyle

I had this planned out early in the challenge and I’m really, really happy with how it turned out. It’s probably tied with my favourite along with the very first piece (how fitting). I was worried about how I was going to capture the movement without over-complicating the lineart, having so many people in one image, etc. before I realised the focus was entirely on gesture, and then everything clicked. I went for a thicker brush, which forced me to conserve my lines, and tried to simplify each character down to the bare minimum needed to recognise them. They’re also all wearing new non-canonical outfits so I used their familiar colour schemes for the same purpose. It’s not perfect, but I love it, and it’s everything I’d hoped I’d be able to end the challenge on.

I really, really enjoyed the entire month and the way it tied in with my new time management schedule. It gave me some achievable short-term goals which added up to this long-term achievement I can now look back on; I learned a lot both about balancing my energy and about technical skills, I found ways to stay motivated, and most importantly I learned to not get caught up on the individual slip-ups and pieces I didn’t like as much and to instead focus on the bigger picture. Thank you to everyone involved in organising and supporting this event! I found so many other incredible fanartists, writers, and content creators through this challenge and I can’t wait to see the bonus content released over August!

#31 Days of Apex #31DaysOfApex #highlights

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lovemesomesurveys · 4 years ago

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What Rhymes With “AIR”?

1. Are the walls of your room bare or do you have things hanging up there? I have some stuff on my walls.

2. When’s the last time you went outside to enjoy the fresh air? I briefly went outside at night on the 4th of July to see the fireworks from my driveway with my family. Prior to that I hadn’t been out of the house since May and before that it had been since March.

3. Do you watch the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air? Sometimes.

4. When’s the last time it felt like you were walking on air? I had one bad floating feeling experience from a bad edibles trip. I literally felt like I had to hold onto something to “stay grounded.” I also ended up getting sick. It wasn’t a fun time. I found out the hard way after that time that it didn’t take much of an edible for me to get high lol. It tricks you cause it can take a bit to kick in, so you think you need more, but nope.

5. Have you ever been on air, on a radio station? Yeah. I used to call to request a song sometimes back in the day and my call was on air a few times.

6. Have you ever felt like all of the air was coming out of your lungs? Yes.

7. Has it seemed as though anything has ever disappeared into thin air? Have you ever pulled an idea out of thin air? Yes! So frustrating. I’ll be using something and then put it down for a sec, only to not be able to find it where I thought I put it. Like for instance, it happens a lot when I’m wrapping presents. The pen or scissors I’m using always seem to “disappear.” RIP to all the pens that seemed to just vanish, too, throughout my school years. And yes, I’ve also pulled ideas “out of thin air.”

8. Have you ever wanted to be on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire”? I enjoyed playing along while watching and I even had a computer game version, but nah. I wouldn’t get far at all and it’d be embarrassing. I don’t do well with being put on the spot either.

9. Do you know a billionaire in real life? No.

10. Would you like to be an heir or heiress to a fortune? I mean, I wouldn’t have been opposed to it if I was haha.

11. Would you be able to successfully get away if you ever came across a bear? I mean, there’s no way of knowing for sure, but I hope so?? Well, I hope to never be in the situation in the first place, obviously, but you know. There are people who have certainly been quite lucky in that situation and others not so much, so. I know you’re supposed to remain calm and not run, which I could probably do cause I’d likely freeze up in fear. I’ve seen videos of people, some of them have been children, who successfully got away.

12. Where’s your favorite place to go? How long does it take to get there? The beach. The closest one is like 2 hours away.

13. How often do you err on the side of caution? I’m a cautious person. And also just a big scardy cat.

14. How often do people say they’re angry with you? People don’t say that, but I know people have been upset, frustrated, disappointed, and irritated with me.

15. Do you own any long underwear? Long underwear? No...

16. How much Tupperware do you own? *shrug* A lot.

17. What color is your underwear right now? Blue and gray.

18. Do you still sleep with a teddy bear? No. I have a few stuffed animals that always sit on my bed, though.

19. What pair of your shoes has the most wear and tear? My Adidas Superstars. They’re not too bad, but you can definitely tell I wore them quite often.

20. Do you like to play Solitaire? Ha, I haven’t played since I played the computer version as a kid on like Windows 98. I played that and messed around in Paint quite a bit, ha.

21. Do you or your family own a full set of silverware? Yeah.

22. What do you have to take everywhere with you? My bag with my medicine, hand sanitizer, phone, wallet, and straws. I’d also have to take a mask with me everywhere.

23. Would you like to visit Delaware? I hadn’t really thought about it.

24. Last time you received dental care? It’s been awhile.

25. If you could go anywhere in the world, where would it be? I’d want to really think about that if I could only choose one destination. There’s a lot of places I’d like to travel to one day.

26. Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego? Did we ever find her? I don’t remember, ha. I used to watch the cartoon as a kid and I think I had a computer game, too.

27. Are you satisfied sitting here, taking this survey, or would you rather be elsewhere? Right here in bed is the best place for me to be right now.

28. Last time you sat in a barber’s chair? I last got my hair done back in early February.

29. Do you own any cans of compressed air? No.

30. Do you have a swivel chair at your desk? I don’t have a swivel chair or a desk.

31. Do you prefer an armchair or a rocking chair? A reclining armchair.

32. Would you rather have a beanbag chair or a hanging swing chair in your room? Hanging swing chair.

33. What’s the last non-survey related questionnaire that you had to fill out? This like 4 page questionnaire that one of my doctors hands out every visit. It’s the same exact questionnaire, too.

34. Are there any crimes that you feel make someone deserving of the electric chair? Yes, like serial killers.

35. Do you know anyone who uses a wheelchair? Yeah, me.

36. Do you know anyone who is on welfare? Yes.

37. Do you play Modern Warfare? Nope. Never had an interest in playing that.

38. Do you ever feel like life is unfair? Of course.

39. Have you ever visited Times Square? No. I’ve never been to New York, but I’d love to one day. I wasn’t sure when I’d be able to go before everything this year, but now I really don’t know.

40. Do you tell people to “take care” at the end of a conversation with them? It’s not something I regularly say, but yeah sometimes.

41. Where is somewhere that you would like to move to? I’m not sure.

42. What is something in your home that needs to be repaired? A couple things.

43. What kind of sleepwear do you own? I wear leggings and oversized graphic tees for pjs and my normal attire.

44. What skin care products do you use? I haven’t been using any.

45. Do you have any spyware on your computer? Apple computers come with all that stuff.

46. Do you own any sportswear? What sports? Nope. Not a sports fan.

47. Do you like Fred Astaire? I know who he is and I’ve seen clips of his dance scenes, but I haven’t actually watched any of his films. Well, I’ve heard his voice work in the Santa Clause is Comin’ to Town movie/cartoon, but that’s all.

48. How long does it take you to prepare a meal? The only thing I cook is ramen, which takes like 10 minutes or so (I’m including the time to boil the water).

49. Do you know anyone named Pierre? No.

50. Are you going nowhere fast? It has and does feel that way. :/

51. How often do you have a nightmare? Not often, thankfully.

52. How often are you able to catch something in mid-air? *shrug*

53. What do your lawn chairs look like? We don’t have any lawn chairs.

54. How many chairs are at your dining/kitchen table? We don’t have a dining/kitchen table either.

55. Favorite type of footwear? Adidas sneakers.

56. When’s the last time one of your senses were impaired? From what? I wear glasses if that counts?

57. Have you ever been in a hot air balloon before? Noooo.

58. Do you have a good health care plan? Yes.

59. Last time you went to the hardware store? I don’t go to the hardware store.

60. Have you ever played foursquare before? Yeah, I liked playing that in elementary school.

61. Do you own any types of eyewear? Yep, my glasses.

62. What brand of cookware do you have a lot of? Cuisine Art, probably.

63. Nothing can compare to: You. 🎶 Ha.

64. Have you ever worked in a childcare center? No.

65. Do you have a “beware of dog” sign on your gate? No.

66. Have you ever attended daycare as a child? No.

67. Are you very aware of your surroundings? Yes.

68. Have you ever had an au pair or a nanny before? No. My aunts, grandparents, or older brother babysat me.

69. Do you know anyone who has had an affair? Yes.

70. How much are you willing to spend on airfare? I don’t know, it would depend on certain factors regarding the trip.

71. Who do you care about the most? My loved ones.

72. Are you more likely to choose truth or dare? Truth, never dare. Or just not play at all, ha.

73. Have you ever seen the Blair Witch Project before? Yeah. Major cringe.

74. Do you like the name Claire? Would you spell it with or without the I? Sure. I like the spelling with the “I.”

75. Last time you went to a fair? When I was a kid.

76. What can be done to make life more fair? Gah.

77. How much are you willing to spend on cab fare? I don’t know. Again, it would depend on certain factors.

78. Do you have a lot of flair? No.

79. Do you own flare jeans? No.

80. Is there a glare on your computer screen right now? Yes.

81. When’s the last time someone glared at you? I say my doggo gives me attitude and “the eye” sometimes, ha. Like when I tell my parents or brother that I gave her treats, so don’t let her trick you into getting more. She gives me a look like, “gee, thanks a lot for ratting me out!”

82. What type of hair do you have? (color, length, texture, etc) How often do you wash it? Red, long, wavy hair. I wash it every 2-3 days.

83. Do you know the difference between a rabbit and a hare? Yeah.

84. Do you like to eat eclairs? I haven’t had one in a long time, but they are delicious.

85. What do you consider to be your lair? My room.

86. A female horse is called a mare. What is a male horse called? A baby horse? A male horse is a stallion and a baby is called a foal

87. Have you ever used Nair before? Did it work? Blech, yeah I tried it when I was like 13/14. It worked, but it smelled SO bad.

88. Has anyone ever told you to “grow a pair”? No.

89. What is something that you own a pair of? Shoes.

90. What is a rare quality that you have? I can’t think of one.

91. Last food you pared? I don’t peel or chop anything.

92. Do you know someone who is a debonair? No.

93. Do you like to scare others for fun? No.

94. What is something that scares you? The present and the future.

95. Do you like Sonny and Cher? “I don’t know if all that’s true, but you got me and baby I got you. Babe. I got you, babe.”

96. Do you know how to share? Do you like to share? Yeah.

97. Have you ever played a snare drum before? No.

98. What do you do with your spare change? Put it in one of my purses/bags.

99. Do you know how to put on a spare tire? No. I’ve never tried to.

100. Have you ever gotten a spare while bowling before? I think so.

101. When’s the last time you wished someone would spare you the details? Recently, when someone shared something that was TMI.

102. Do you win games fair and square? Yes. I like to just have fun and friendly competition, there’s no need to cheat or get upset about it.

103. Do you know how to find the square root of something? Yeah.

104. What are the characteristics of a square shape? 4 equal sides.

105. Have you ever been called a square before? Haha, yeah, jokingly. Well, the times I know of, ha. An “L-7 wienie.”

106. Do you prefer the elevator or the stairs? Well, I have to take the elevator.

107. Do you ever stare at other people? No. I’ve had to deal with that (people staring at me) all my life, though.

108. How often do you swear? Not that often.

109. Do you ever “swear on your life”? I don’t say that.

110. What do you like to “tear up”? An order of boneless wings from Wingstop, ha.

111. What type of wares would you sell? I don’t have anything to sell.

112. What kinds of clothing do you like to wear? Comfy clothing--leggings and oversized tees.

113. Have you ever had a pregnancy scare before? Nope.

[a-zebra-is-a-striped-horse]

#personal #text #survey #surveys #long survey

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merakiclosed · 4 years ago

Text

Princess of the tower

》Pairing: Thief!Jungkook x Princess!reader 》Summary: The thief of the town who goes by the name of JK finds the lost princess but didn’t expect to fall in love with her along the way. 》Genre: Fluff, a bit of angst, Fantasy!au/Disney!au - Tangled!au, Strangers to lovers!au 》Word count: 7.1k 》Notes/Warnings: Swearing, mentions of blood and fighting, manipulation, long-haired Kook because that’s a danger in its self

Sighing, you move your gaze to watch the silhouette of birds fly past, wishing to be as free as them. Reaching out, you touch the plants that wind around the tower, almost crying out to be touched and held as you caress the soft ridges with your fingers.

Finally, you stand up straight and brush the imaginary dust off your purple dress, the silk smooth on your skin. You can remember vividly the day that you made this with your own hands, sewing and cutting material for hours because you grew out of your previous one. Unfortunately, this was the cheapest material your mother could get you, meaning that all of your dresses looked similar. You were dying to get out of the tower and get some more material, experimenting and trying on different styles and colours. But that would never happen. You weren't allowed out of the tower. It was mother's number one rule, not under any circumstances were you to step foot outside of this tower.

Your bare feet echo in the empty room as you descend to your bedroom. Along the staircase you run your hands along the carvings that were like a tale of a story that was long forgotten, remembering the day you spent on the hard work. Were you 15 at the time? Maybe, the days are all forged together. Gazing up at the roof, you find the multiple paintings you did, filled with flowers, birds and butterflies, thinking when your life will truly begin.

Faintly, you could hear the familiar echo of shoes on the stairwell causing you to shove the paint palette down and draw the curtains to hide the painting. Quickly, you get down from the fireplace, getting ready to greet her as the chain and lock sound heavy against the door. Pascal stays on your shoulder, tightly clinging on to the material as he blends in with the purple of your dress, hopefully to hide from the woman.

“My precious daughter.” she cooes, pinching your cheeks making you wince slightly.

“Mother -”

“Would you let your mother brush your hair whilst you sing dear?” she interrupts you. Instantly you're moving around, grabbing a chair and the brush, rushing to sit her down. Gently, you place Pascal on the windowsill.

“Y/N -” mother begins to scold, but you couldn't care less.

“You don't ever ask to go out of this tower ever again.” she finalises, pulling at your dress harshly, “do you understand?” Her gaze is firm and hard making you nod your head meekly. Though, she wanted more than that as she grabs your chin roughly, tilting your head to look her in the eye, “Yes mother I understand.” She beams at you and kisses your cheek. Grabbing the keys, she heads for the door and with another kiss to your head along with a quick I love you, she's gone again.

Not soon after you could hear laboured breathing coming from the door, the person bangs against the door, followed by a groan. Frantically, you look at Pascal who also has wide eyes, who then points to the frying pan, “Pascal you're a genius” you whisper. You run behind the door, continuously hearing the stranger try and break the door, making it rattle and echo throughout the room. Any moment now and he’ll end up-

The door breaks off its hinges, the chain now scraping across the ground. It’s silent for a moment as you watch the man look around, failing to look behind him. “OW.SHIT” He shouts when you hit him in the leg with the frying pan, he whips around to look at you. Your mother's voice sounds in your head of the hideous men with sharp teeth and ill intentions. But this man in front of you was nothing like that. His white shirt was dirty and rolled up to his elbows as underneath was a blue vest, wheat-like string buttoning it together. Brown pants are tucked into brown, leather boots that have clearly been worn for a long time as they are scuffed with mud splattered on them. When your eyes finally land on the satchel in his hand, he moves it closer to himself protectively, interesting.

Like deja vu, you hear another step of footsteps and instantly you know who it is. You and the strange man look at each other wide-eyed and shove him under the stairs, where the kitchen is and hide him behind the curtain. The man stumbles from your push as you take the opportunity to take the satchel out of his hands. Luckily, your mother only gets halfway before she decides to shout, “Y/n, did you want me to get the paint from the beach?” you know that she is doing this so that you don't talk about going out of the tower, “Yes, mother.” And she's gone, once again, thankful that you didn’t have to explain why the door was broken.

Cautiously, you creep towards the kitchen, coming face to face with the man, frying pan at the ready in one hand, the satchel in the other. You both looked at each other, he was young, possibly around your age judging by his face. His eyes were deer-like, sparkling with a hint of mischievousness in them, slightly round cheeks but sharp jaw and eyebrows as his black hair slightly hung in front of his eyes, obvious that he hasn't had it cut in a while. His eyes scan your figure, wanting to roll his eyes, you look innocent and scared. It was obvious that if he shouted at you right now, you would cower. However, he notices the satchel in your hand, “that's mine, give it back.”

Shaking your head, you hold it closer to you, “No. why are you here?” you foreign confidence when in reality you could feel your erratic heartbeat in your chest. He wasn't threatened as his face showed confusion, making his nose scrunch up, “Is that all of your hair?”

Your mind starts to connect the dots, “Do you want my hair, is that why you are here? How did you find me?” you accuse, trying to sound threatening.

“No. I won’t give you the satchel until you take me to see the floating lights tomorrow night. You will take me there and in return, you'll get your satchel.”

“That's it? You want to see the lanterns?” he sounds bored. Well, he shouldn't have broken your door! You unconsciously pout and nod, “Yes.”

“So, is this a deal then?” he says, cocking his eyebrow. This will be easy.

“Yes.” Out the corner of your eye, you see Pascal shaking his head, knowing that this was a bad idea.

“Well let's get going then”

The words make you pause, you’ll be leaving the tower. Without your mother's permission. It was against the rules. What if she comes back early. No, you can’t think of that. You either leave the tower now or stay and never be able to see the outside world, “well what are you doing just standing there princess, let’s get moving.”

The man looks at you unimpressed, but in reality, he finds it quite endearing as you look around. The scenery was normal to him, but watching you appreciate all of the little details makes him think more about taking things for granted. But he can't think like that. He needs to leave you - somewhere safe of course- and run. All he has to do is steal the satchel from you when you sleep and then he will be on his way. He strolls up to you and plucks the flower out of your hand, causing you to pout, but soon turns into a shy smile once he places it in your hair, next to your ear. Firstly, he has to gain your trust.

Walking away, he hears your feet pad on the ground before you walk next to him, “So, princess what’s your name?”

“Y/n.” You say softly, looking up at him, he mulls over what to say before talking, “Mine’s Jk.”

“Hey - wait up.”

The woman trudges up the stairs, huffing with every step, her shoes clacking against the stone. She can sense that something is wrong, the echoing doesn't sound as harsh to her eardrums as before. Thoughts of something getting to her precious prize, causing her to fasten her steps before she abruptly stops, two steps before the top. The wooden door lays on the floor, pieces of wood aloof. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears, adrenaline rushing through her as she shouts out, trying to find her. Pots and pans on the floor, material is thrown all over. Nothing.

“I’ll get some firewood, stay here.” He commands, not waiting for an answer as he walks off into the woods. The green canopy almost looks black, drained of colour almost like it was muted under the artist's hand. Every noise and russell from the bushes makes you jump, you've practically been alone for most of your life, but you were surrounded by the tower walls. You’re vulnerable under the moon that shines in the night. It was a weird experience, you've seen the nightfall and the sunrise, yet witnessing it outside was so much more magical. You only wish that your companion would be better, but at least Pascal is with you, though he isn't much help as you look over to find him knocked out on the edge of the branch that you're sat on. The familiar crunch of boots makes you gaze up at the man, his biceps bulging in the shirt that he wears.

“Flower gleam and glow” Let your power shine Make the clock reverse Bring back what once was mine”

“Heal what has been hurt Change the fate’s design Save what has been lost Bring back what once was mine What once was mine.”

What and why were you in that tower?

“H-how long has your -uh. Magical Uhm. Hair been doing that?” He coughs when his voice cracks, not wanting to show how scared he actually feels.

“Forever. Something like this” You gesture to your hair, “has to be protected, that's why my mother - why I never left the tower.” Your voice trails off at the end, still uncertain about what he is thinking.

His thoughts are running wild. He’s sitting there, in the middle of the night, with a girl who has magical hair. Is this a dream? Something like this doesn't happen, maybe he’s going crazy. Maybe the guards have already taken him and this is all some sort of hallucination. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see you twiddle your thumbs, waiting anxiously. He had a perfect plan for tonight, wait until you fall asleep, take the satchel and run. He knew you wouldn’t be able to stay awake for long, yet he doesn’t think he can do it. If someone gets to you, you're a goner. And for some reason, it makes his gut twist at the thought of you in danger, especially after you showed him your little trick. People like him, eat people like you for dinner. He yearns to know everything about you already, but he doesn't think he can bring himself to do it. He's not a good person and you don't deserve that.

“Jungkook.”

“Huh?” You look up at him quizzically.

“My name is Jeon Jungkook.”

“How did you find the tower?” You questioned, averting your eyes to pascal as he sleeps peacefully.

You nod at him, not knowing what to say, you want to know what he was running from, why he never gave you his real name from the start, why he was so desperate to get the satchel. You had so many questions for people outside of the tower, but now sitting in front of him, Jungkook, your mind runs blank. Yawning, you rub your eyes, but you're fearful of sleeping outside. Will someone attack you? Will it rain? What if a giant creature comes and gets you?

“Easy there, princess. I can see your head about to blow smoke from how hard you're thinking.” Jungkook said in a small voice, presumably not wanting to disturb the quietness of the night. Laying down, pieces of wood stabbed your side, but it would have to do if you want to get to the lanterns tomorrow. Your head lays gently on the bark, the constellations that have witnessed centuries watch over you both in this small moment before you finally close your eyes drifting off to sleep.

Jungkook looks over when he hears your breathing slowing down, to see you knocked out like a light. Chuckling to himself, he can imagine how hard today was compared to being in that tiny room in the tower. He sits on the grass, leaning against the log you're asleep on, looking at your figure. He was so curious to know you, he never heard anything about a girl being locked up in a tower, and surprisingly, he felt bad for you. So youthful and full of wonder, and he was youthful but full of danger.

Luckily, the town wasn't far from where you slept, only a couple of hours in the morning and you finally saw the opening to the village. Even from afar, you could feel the energy that the people emit, vibrant clothing shining in the sunlight as people dance to the music. They move around each other like pebbles in the water, flowing around one another, as they fill each other with adrenaline-pumping happiness. You only see joyful faces as they bring the village to life. Chatter between sellers and buyers as if they were old friends. It's like nothing you've ever seen before. Mother was wrong, there are good people in the world.

Jungkook watches you silently as you smile widely, your eyes darting in every which way to take everything in. He gently grabs at your sleeve and tugs you towards one of the stands who does hair, sitting you in the chair. You look up at him questioningly, as the woman starts to braid your hair, making sure not to hurt you. She doesn't question the twigs and leaves she finds, simply plucking them out. You sit in wonder, trying not to dart your head around to see more.

Jungkook turns around to find that you're not following him anymore, sending him into a panic as all he can see is a crowd of people. He’s familiar with his heart racing, normally from running away, but as he looks around he feels a different type of adrenaline, but all he has to do is breathe before calming down. His eyes are quick to find you, your purple dress matching perfectly with the theme as your hair flows down your back, flowers intertwined in certain strands. Walking towards you, he laughs when he sees your nose practically smudged against the glass that holds the doughnuts. You stare at him in shock, forgetting that you were supposed to follow him, causing heat to rise in your body.

“It’s a doughnut.” He’s careful in calling you princess in the village, knowing it’s a sensitive topic and he doesn’t need to be at the centre of attention right now, especially with all of the guards that he has seen. Tentatively, he watches you take your first bite, a giggle passes your lips once you’ve eaten it, taking another bite, clearly enjoying it as your cheeks fill like chipmunks. He watched fondly, before catching himself. No, he can’t fall for you. In a flash, he turns serious, cocking an eyebrow at you. Humiliation falls over you, at your obvious display of enjoyment. You're not sure what you’ve done, but you still feel it as he looks at you with his sharp gaze. Lowering the doughnut, you avoid eye contact before nodding at him to continue with where you were walking to and give Pascal the rest of it, as he hangs in your pocket.

However, you get distracted once again at a group of people dancing, their bodies speaking for how they feel. You have danced before, in the comfort of the walls you call home, but here where you see young girls skipping and weaving past the seas of people, smiling as if nothing bad ever happened, you realise that you’ve never truly danced. Forgetting about the moment earlier, you grab Jungkook's hand and dance with him. His larger hands encased in yours as you follow the rhythm, being carefree of everything, feeling freedom run in your bones. You know that after tonight, life goes on as normal, so today you will be free of all of your worries.

But you're soon thrown out of this dream when his eyes widen, looking at something behind you. You go to look back when he softly puts your head in his chest, holding you close, your breath hitches at the contact of your bodies pressed together. The feeling of having someone so close was bizarre, even your mother didn’t hold you like this especially as long as this. Suddenly, he pulls away, holding your hand in his as he runs, shouting of guards impales your ears, clattering of boots and metal follow behind you as each step is calculated. Not used to the exertion of energy your breathing starts to get laboured as you both rush past people, it's all a blur as your steps start to falter, Jungkook's grip on your hand getting tighter. Your bare feet sting as they slap against the moss-laden rock, each stride of his were worth at least two of yours, his long legs and previous endeavours made this easy, barely breaking a sweat. With a good distance between you and the guards, Jungkook drags you around another corner and into a darker and smaller passageway. Abruptly he shoves you against the wall, causing you to wince, his body once again up against yours. Briefly, you can feel how rigid Pascal has gone as he looks at the both of you with wide eyes. But all you can do is look at his face, tight-lipped and his gaze is sharp as he listens for the guards, your breath hot against his hand that is against your lips, keeping you quiet. His own breathing is steady but slightly offbeat as for the first in a while, he is scared of being caught. He’s been running away from guards the whole of his life, but he couldn't get you in trouble because of his actions. You can hear the guards getting closer, footsteps matching in beat with each other, trained to perfection as they rush past you both.

Looking around you don’t see any of the guards and nod at him, slightly uncertain. You've only socialised with two people, but you can do this! You can totally do this! Hesitantly, you walk up to the stall before looking back to Jungkook to find him standing with a smile and two thumbs up. Looking down, you see Pascal smiling at you with a nod, encouraging you. You nod your head again and continue forward, with timid steps before looking around at the shoes on show before finding a pair of loafers, white with a golden pattern on the front, matching perfectly with your dress. The woman that owns the stall laughs at you before guiding you to try them on. You smile widely at her before giving her the coins, to which she accepts with a small smile, her eyes crinkling into crescent moons. Putting them on your feet, you wiggle your toes before skipping back to Jungkook. He smiles at you watching your eyes brighten up, talking animatedly about how you think they're pretty and soft. Again, he can feel his heart skip a beat. But once more he ignores it. He’s not meant for you. Unknown to you both, Pascal watches the interaction and knows what is going through the young man’s head as he looks at you like you hold the universe. Maybe he isn’t as bad as he thought.

Soon enough you're in the middle of the river, as he stops rowing, wiping off the sweat that formulated on his forehead with the back of his hand. One particular question has been nagging in the back of your head ever since you saw the lanterns, “why do they send them off every year on my birthday?” Softly, you brush Pascals back as he sits on the edge of the boat, slowly falling asleep from the gentle caress of your hand.

“The lanterns?” You nod.

A cough from behind you causes you to look back, to find Jungkook sat with two lanterns in his hand and a sheepish smile on his face. Gasping, you reach forward to grasp one, and softly it floats between your fingers and into the sky, circling around Jungkooks. The world feels like it's shifted, warm and bright even in the crisp night. Turning around, you thrust the satchel in his hands, “You took me to the lanterns. This is my end of the deal.”

Shaking his head, he pushes it away, “I don’t want it.”

Tilting your head in confusion, he continues to look in your eyes, his eyes uncharacteristically soft, leaning closer to you, “I don’t know how you’ve done it, but you’ve changed me. You made me question everything that I’ve done if only I had met you sooner.” you can feel his breath on your face, his gaze wavering to look down at your lips as you unconsciously lick your lips. Your heart is hammering in your chest as you scoot closer to him, resting your hands on his knees. Your lips centimetres apart before the boat rocked, but it wasn't due to the waves. A dark shadow cast over the both of you, laughter of three people getting closer to the boat, “well, look what we have here.” A rough voice calls out.

Looking up, you find your mother standing next to two men who are easily 6 foot in height, scars all over their bodies. Slamming their boat into yours, you go to topple over the edge before a hand reaches out and pulls you into them, “My sweet, precious daughter.” Her familiar scent engulfs your senses, her bony frame hugging you in a death grip. Jungkook heaves in a breath as his wet form is slung into the boat, coughing up water. The two men hold him in a vice grip, hauling him up by his arms as his body shivers from the cold. Out of the corner of your eye, you see Pascal jumping onto the boat, subtly shifting towards you, but hides behind one of the paddles, his scales turning a murky brown.

Struggling to get out of your mother's grip, Jungkook looks up at you and shakes his head, telling you to stop. Ignoring him, you continue, “Let him go.”

The pain that he feels is excruciating but he doesn’t do anything other than let it happen. He hears your blood-curdling screams but it comes in and out like waves, his sight becoming blurry as they continue. He deserves this. The stealing, the robbing, the slowly falling in love with you. He doesn't deserve to be in your life. He screams as he’s cut in the shoulder, the knife shortly ripped out of him to be plunged into his left side. His blood is hot as it pours out, burning his cold figure. Looking up, he finds your face covered in tears, eyes bloodshot as you kick and scream for your mother to stop. You were one of a kind. He didn't know how you did it, but you made him want to change for the better. He didn't want the crown. He didn't want wealth. He wanted you. But fate had a cruel way of showing him that he couldn't have you. Another stab, another scream. Not from him, but you. He smiles weakly at you as he can feel himself about to pass out, his skin turning paler by the second.

“Mother, please,” you beg, tears cascading down your face like lava.

“Boys.” She says simply, both of them stopping and holding a bruising grip on his arms. His head sags, not having the energy to look up at you anymore.

“P-please. Please… Let me heal him and then you can take me. I’ll l-live with you forever. You and me. I’ll never go outside, I’ll do everything you ask of me. Just let me heal him and let him go.” You sniffle and choke on your words, breathless from screaming. Your mother cocks her head to the side before looking back to the two men, “Shoo. Take the crown and go.” A sick, twisted smile coats their face as they both look at each other before jumping into the boat you came on, picking up the satchel and rowing away. Jungkook slumps to the floor, weakly holding onto his side.

A piercing scream comes from your mother, “what have you done?” she shouts, pulling her cloak over her, as she stammers around the boat before reaching the edge. It was like it was in slow motion as she topples over the edge and into the water, her arms flaring, struggling to keep afloat before her body slowly sank, as her body ages before you. Pascal scuttles over, crawling on top of Jungkook’s chest, feeling the way his heart beat is slowing down.

Jungkooks grip around you becomes weaker, his breathing getting slower. Your heart sinks to your stomach, as you watch him take his last breath. “No, no, no, no, no” you whisper, choking as a sob threatens to tear at your throat. Your hands shake as you watch blood ooze from his wounds, and you burst like a dam. Salty tears run down your face, racking with sobs. This was your fault, he didn’t deserve this. If only you would have stayed in the tower. If only you didn’t fall in love with him.

“Flower gleam and glow” Let your power shine Make the clock reverse Bring back what once was mine.

Heal what has been hurt Change the fate’s design Save what has been lost Bring back what once was mine What once was m-mine.”

Your voice cracking continuously as you breathed the song. It was a bittersweet moment as the lanterns around you continued to float around you, full of life, burning into the ever glowing night sky, almost like they were mocking you. Light beamed around you, a golden hue spiralled around the both of you like it was dancing to a song before bursting into the star that has been engraved into your memory since this morning.

A wave of dizziness crashes over you, making you lose balance, your hands scraping against the wood. Flashes of memories burst through your mind. A small hand touching bigger ones. Chubby legs that look like they're learning to walk for the first time. A mobile hanging from above the crib. And a star. The same star that you painted on your ceiling. The same star that's been in front of your very eyes this entire day. Another flash and you see a man and a woman. The parents of the lost daughter.

“J-Jungkook. I-”

Leaning up, you kiss him softly on the lips but soon gets broken as you both start smiling uncontrollably, “Let’s get you home, princess.”

Heels clack on the polished floor, steps full of purpose as you clutch Jungkook's hand tighter. Two people; a man and woman step out. A gasp escapes them both as your eyesight gets blurry. Your parents. Your mother runs towards you and embraces you, knocking the wind out of you as she strokes your cheek as if you were made of glass, her bloodshot eyes smiling at you with love, “y/n.”

“Mother, father.” you smile at them taking a hand each in your own.

Smiling at the sight, you pull Jungkook towards you and squeeze him tight, “thank you.” you whisper into his chest, feeling the rumble of his chest as he laughs, “anything for you princess.”

Pascal squeaks, causing him to turn blue from having the attention on him from his little celebration of joy, causing you all to coo and laugh at him. Finally, the princess of the tower was home.

I hope you enjoyed this and I’m sorry for the ending not being very good! I tried to post this 3 times and every time something went wrong so I hope this time it works. :(( Please comment, like and reblog! Feedback is always appreciated, it gives me motivation! This is NOT edited. Sorry for any mistakes

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prettywordsyouleft · 5 years ago

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Through His Eyes - Part 8

Summary: Losing your sight after your accident was traumatic, and Jaebum’s guilt of knowing it should have been him instead creates an intricate bond between you both, as you overcome adversity and try to find your way in life again.

Genre: angst / romance

Characters: Im Jaebum x female reader

A/N: This story is emotional and raw compared to some of the content on my blog. It is in no way an attempt to glamourise or undervalue the lives of those who suffer from something similar. This story is purely fictional.

Through His Eyes will be posted every Tuesday at 10am NZST.

Index: Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 [M] | 13 - FINAL

“I’m home,” you called out after successfully unlocking the door to your apartment within the first three attempts and stepped inside. You turned and bowed to your new minder, Suzie, and fare-welled her before closing the door.

“You’re home much earlier than I anticipated.”

You sighed heavily, stepping into your slippers and following the ramp up into the living area. You were now used to calculating your steps in the back of your mind as you did other tasks, and placed your bag down on the table before heading to the refrigerator. Feeling in the door for a bottle of water, you pulled one out and took it over to a chair at the table. “Don’t ask.”

“You seem unhappy, was your day bad?” You heard another chair pull out and your mother sat down, reaching for your hand gently. You frustrations eased with her touch, and you forgot all about your initial barrier of continuing the conversation.

“I have to do a group project.”

“On what?”

“We’re reading a classic novel called Jane Eyre at the moment and instead of doing an essay on it, which I would have much preferred, our lecturer has assigned us into groups of four to come up with a presentation on a topic within the novel. And of course, none of my partners are happy they got stuck with me.”

“I’m sure they aren’t that put-”

You placed your bottle down with more force than needed and shifted your head towards her direction. “They must think blind people are deaf as well, because they didn’t seem to realise I was nearby when they started to complain about having a disadvantage!”

“Oh.” Your Mum shifted uncomfortably in her seat, no doubt feeling angry hearing of another incident of you being singled out. You felt sorry for her having a daughter that faced so many woes within her education, when in the past you had never caused her any need to be concerned about your academics.

“And to top it off, others were very happy to not have me in their team. Do they think I can’t do the project because I’m blind?!”

“You work even harder than the average student to make sure you don’t fall behind. I’m sure when they realise that, they’ll be more accommodating towards you.”

You shook your head. “It shouldn’t be that I have to prove to them that I’m good enough though. They have no idea who I am, and how many offers I used to get from artists and galleries for my work in the past.”

“But that isn’t who you are now, Y/N,” she reminded gently, and you snapped your head towards her again, anger rising within your chest. She seemed to sense it and reached for your hand once more, which you shook off immediately. “It’s hard I-”

“IT’S ALWAYS HARD, ISN’T IT?!”

Getting up in a rush, you stumbled towards your bedroom and then slammed the door shut, panting heavily with your outburst. Soon the tears came and you sank to the ground, wrapping your arms around you for comfort. Ignoring the knocking and the calls on the other side of the door, you felt ashamed for taking your mood out on her. You hated that even when you were hurting the most, you still felt guilty towards how much she did for you every day and the sacrifices she had taken to help you.

“But for one day, I wish she would just allow me to complain without giving me the known answer,” you mumbled aloud before burying your head into your arms.

Two days went by and your mood had darkened further with the lack of faith from your fellow partners with the presentation. Since it was the weekend, your mother went to help your Aunt run her vegetable store, which you welcomed greatly.

You didn’t intend to move from bed for the entire day.

Around mid-morning, your stomach had other ideas however, so you relinquished to the hunger and went out to make some breakfast. Once fed, you stood within the middle of the living room, wrestling with your options. Bed had been your original safety zone, but now that you were up, it was tempting to go on your computer and waste your day listening to Youtube videos, catching up with online friends in the blind community, and peruse some trivial websites. After grabbing a bottle of water, you headed back into your room and opened the curtains, wincing at the same time as rejoicing in the bright light invading the room. It was an odd experience, you hated the intensity of the light at times, yet it made you feel as close to normal in your greyscale world as you could be.

“Let’s check my emails first,” you said to yourself as you set about the computer, mimicking the sounds the accessibility settings did as you navigated your way around the device. You opened your emails one after the other, listening through the message the robotic voice delivered and then discarded or replied to them as necessary. You were onto the last email when you froze, listening to the message as a cold sweat rushed over you.

“Y/N is invited to the opening of Lee Jaemin’s debut art exhibition, by the title of Expressive. The event-”

The computer started making incomprehensible sounds as you banged on the keyboard to make it stop talking, your breathing becoming erratic. You held your hands to your heaving chest as the sentence repeated over and over in your head, your body shaking at the idea of the girl opening her own exhibition. She had been your biggest competition throughout the years and had always come second to you in major events. Now with you out of the competition, not only had she been able to take your places within the local art scene, but was also offered what you had been working towards earlier this year.

For the first time since the accident, you hated Im Jaebum. For those first few moments, as you digested the information, you cursed your love of GOT7, of kpop, of even knowing the seven men existed. As your body shook all over with anger, you wanted nothing more than to return to the day you had won the exclusive pass and decline the opportunity.

You wanted your career back.

Yet, just as fast as it came, your mind travelled to that fateful moment, your once seeing eyes widening as you noticed the faulty beam first. Your instant reaction to save him, and the weight of the beam hitting you before it all went black. As the tears fell rapidly, your thoughts stopped on every gesture Jaebum had done for you since your world had turned upside down. The anger subdued for a bit, as you coped with the intense grief and guilt you suffered from wishing the beam onto him briefly instead. You rocked back and forth in the chair, unable to cope with the rapid directions your emotions were taking you, hoping your thoughts would ease off.

Instead, your needs narrowed onto one thing and you eventually stood up, heading out of your room as you roughly wiped the tears aside, as if the removal of them would assist in your blind search through the apartment for what you required. Feeling yourself around the walls, you found the storage closet and began using your hands and other senses to locate what you knew your mother hadn’t thrown out like you had insisted her to. It didn’t take long, your fingers falling upon the well-known texture of canvas, shifting along to find four others beside it. You yanked them all out from their hiding spot, tapping around on the ground for any of your tools. You found a bag and pulled that out as well, stopping when you banged into something as you moved the bag. You took that out too and then dragged your discoveries out around you, dropping in between it all and taking a steady breath.

You felt irrationally calm in that moment, and not because you were finally surrounded by what your life had consisted of. The need to feel each object in a slow, methodical examination outweighed anything else, letting your fingers run over every inch of each item. You became familiar all over again with how your tools felt, brushes and sculpting tools all being recognised by your hands. You soon realised the item next to the bag was the prized vase you had made earlier in the year, the ribbons awarded to it still attached. Your attention soon turned to the canvases, the bumps and textures making you think of all the Braille lessons so far, except the words were spoken in an art form, with no distinct answer as to what each piece was. For an immeasurable time, you attempted to guess what was which piece you had created. Every time you thought you had an answer, the next bump of paint would throw you off, frustrating you further. By the fifth canvas inspection, you were rigid, unable to understand anything you were touching.

The pent up emotions built until you could no longer suppress them and you got up, throwing the canvas down with a heavy thud. The sound it made seemed to provoke some kind of release in you and so you bent down, fumbling to find something else to throw, becoming fully invested in destroying everything you had just spent intricate effort in deciphering. The more noise, the more vigorous your actions became until the sound of the shattering clay hit you as if you were shattering your own heart. You crouched down in exhaustion from your emotions, crying consistently until you heard the keypad signal go off.

You didn’t have any energy to move to greet your mother, or to do anything about cleaning your mess either. You waited for her scolding to begin but the rushed feet towards you sounded too heavy to be her. You were confused and for a moment, you guarded yourself, not knowing what to expect.

“What…” You heard Jaebum utter and this was enough to make your legs give out, a cry leaving your lips as you landed on the shards of clay. “Y/N what are you doing?!”

“How did you know the passcode?” you asked tiredly, not giving him any help in lifting you away from the destruction scene. All the same, he attempted to pick you up again, your body trying to fight but had no energy left to leave any effect. He placed you down on the couch and you glared at what you hoped to be his direction. “Im Jaebum!”

“Your mother called me,” he explained, his hands ceasing in their examination of injuries. He shifted back, concerned at how you had spoken. “She told me you were having a hard time and so I said I would come and see you today in between my schedules. I was outside banging and pressing the doorbell, but you didn’t hear me at all. So I used the code I’ve seen you put in.”

You didn’t answer, unable to decide if you were angry with him for interrupting or thankful for his presence.

“Why were you doing that?” he questioned softly, his hands slowly returning to your legs. “Y/N, you’re bleeding.”

“I don’t care.” You looked away from him and tried to push his hands away. He grabbed your hand instead, his gentle nature having an effect on easing your frustrations. Even so, you attempted to hold onto the agitated emotion for as long as you could. “You should just go.”

“I’m not leaving you like this, you should see this place!”

“I wish I could!” you blurted out, and his grip on your hand eased off. You got up shakily from where he had put you and walked back down to where you had been. He grabbed you before you stepped on anything and you pointed to it desperately. “This is me, this is my world. Do you see how shattered this all is now? That is me!”

“Is it really?”

You nodded fervently. “You told me to express how I feel so I am! I’m sick of becoming something new. I am not an English Lit major, but an Art and Design student! I created all of this myself! Now… now I can’t even paint a single line across a piece of paper! Whilst people who I had worked hard to impress for years are now giving Lee Jaemin all the opportunities I was aiming for, I’m here in sweatpants and a tee with no hope of looking good to anyone, let alone impress them that I am someone to invest in. I’m here unable to do anything I want to because, because-”

“Because of me,” Jaebum concluded from behind you, lowering his head to your shoulder and his body began to shake with his own emotions. You moved around in his arms and hugged him tightly, both crying until you could no longer.

For some time you didn’t speak, not having any words to share with each other. And then you felt Jaebum move away from your side, his hands reaching for something on the ground. “This is beautiful.”

“What is?”

“This sunrise over a building top,” he mentioned and your mind went towards the artwork you had created after watching their You Are music video. “It’s captured beautifully.”

“It was inspired by you.” “It was?” You nodded and felt Jaebum move back to your side again, his hand reaching for yours and passing you the canvas. You felt the weight within your hand and sighed.

“I painted it after the You Are MV.”

“Ahh.” He was silent again, but moved back to the mess upon the floor. From his examination, three of the canvases were salvageable, whilst two remained helpless on the floor with the ceramic vase.

“I guess there is a lot of mess to clean up,” you said sadly, lowering your head and holding onto the sunrise canvas more preciously than you had all day.

“But we can clean it up and heal from it together,” he replied firmly, referring to more than the physical mess you had made.

You smiled, nodding your head. “I like the sound of that.”

_________________

[Part 9]

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mrlnsfrt · 5 years ago

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Is This Love?

It is said that once in the old days in an Eastern city a poor old beggar, his body shrunken and sick and covered with sores was sent to one of the great hospitals, and after being there for some days, was taken to the operating room. In those days they did not have anesthesia, as they have now, and the patient could hear all the preparations for the ordeal.

So before the surgeon began his work on this poor old wreck of a human being, he turned to the young medical students who were in attendance and using scholarly Latin, said to them,

"Let's perform an experiment on this worthless body."

He thought his language wouldn't be understood, but this old beggar was once a great scholar himself. Although he had drifted away into liquor and sin, and had gone down the primrose path until he was just a wreck, he still understood Latin. So he lifted himself on one elbow there in the operating room and said, in perfect Latin,

"Yet for this worthless body, Jesus Christ has died.

And so, what might often seem to us like a worthless body, a worthless person, a worthless, shattered, character; has infinite value. Because for this worthless one, this worthless life, Jesus Christ has died. And that puts an infinite worth on every human being. A human being is infinitely valuable, and this includes you.

Is this love?

But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. - Romans 5:8 New Living Translation

God’s love for us is beyond our ability to comprehend. I have heard some Christians even criticize those who they perceive to overemphasize God’s love towards us. But I often wonder how can we fail to talk about what the Bible itself emphasizes? The Bible is the story of God desiring to save humans. God initiated the process, God paid the price, God offers us the rewards for free.

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. - Romans 6:23 English Standard Version

So I don’t think it is possible for anyone to ever talk too much about the love of God nor do I believe anyone will ever exhaust this topic. What I do wish to explore in this post is the ramifications the God’s love has and ought to have in the lives of the believers.

Is This Love?

Since God loves me even though I am imperfect. If Jesus died for me while I was still a sinner. How should this impact how I view myself? How much value does my life have? Imperfect as I may be, Jesus thought I was to die for. This should have a profound impact on how I think about myself, how I view myself and on how I feel about myself. After all Jesus tells us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. I wonder how someone who hates herself could manage to love her neighbor.

"The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these." - Mark 12:31 New American Standard Bible

Here is another thing that came to mind as I was thinking about God’s great love for me. God cares much more about my heart than He does about my appearance.

But the LORD said to Samuel, “Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” - 1 Samuel 16:7 New Living Translation

What I find fascinating is how easy it is for us to care much more about our appearance than our hearts/character. After all, everyone can see my appearance and make a snap judgment. Only people who really know me well are aware of the content or quality of my character. But this also causes me to wonder. Why do I care more about the snap judgment of those who know me least, than about what those who know me best think about me.

Allow me to elaborate. My spouse, my kids, my family members, my closest friends, those who are in close contact with me, and/or those who are often in contact with me, have to deal with my character. They have to deal with my heart. My appearance matters less to them. If my tie is not perfectly straight or if part of my hair is a bit out of place, they will not think differently of me, because they have a knowledge of me that goes deeper than my appearance.

When I invest in my character, I am investing in those people who are closest to me, the ones I love most and who love me the most. When I am honest, dependable, loving, forgiving, kind, compassionate, those closest to me benefit the most. Although strangers will also benefit from those qualities. Also, those who admire you for your character, for your heart, will feel much more strongly about you then if their opinion of you was made up mostly due to your appearance.

Is This Love?

I have a daughter, she is 6 years old. I want to empower her. I want her to feel safe and confident in my love for her. I also want her to know that her heart, her character, matter much more than her appearance. I want her to invest her time, thoughts, and energy into developing who she is, and not waste time and money on improving merely her appearance. I don’t mean to say that her appearance does not matter. Appearances do matter, but I like to differentiate between accentuating natural beauty and modifications that end up being the equivalent of lies.

Smile, a smile looks good on you. Care for your body, keep it clean and healthy! You know what’s really good for your skin? Staying well hydrated. It is also great for your hair and eyes and nails. You know what looks great on you? A good night of sleep. Exercise, eating lots of fruits and veggies, all these things contribute to bringing your greatest potential to actuality. You become your better self when you invest in your health. Now I know it takes more effort, it takes more time, it won’t be a quick fix that you can do yourself after a short youtube tutorial.

I can see the appeal of just wanting buying precious metals and hanging them from new holes you perforated on your body. I can see how it is much faster to paint your face than to make the effort to change your lifestyle. I can understand how immediately looking healthier can be more appealing than the long journey to a healthier you. So you can choose to buy the precious metals to hang from your body, you can paint your face, and you can look different. But you are still the same, and at some point you will have to remove those things, and does your identity hold when all those things are removed? Have you learned to accept and love yourself? Or do you feel the need to cover up, hide, mask, distract, in order to have the courage to face the world?

I want my daughter to know that her natural beauty is more than enough. That the color and texture of her hair is just fine. the shape of her eyes, the color of her eyes, the length of her eyelashes, the shape of her nose and chin, are all fine. She is of infinite value. Her value is not connected to her appearance but rather to her character. She is of great value because Jesus died for her. People love her because of who she is. She can be brave, and kind, and refuse to give up, and these qualities add to who she is. These qualities make up who she is, as opposed to cosmetics that cause her to hide and contribute to her becoming unsure and unhappy with her natural self. I want her to be confident in who she is in Jesus and not how well she compares to arbitrary and unrealistic standards of physical beauty.

There’s a recent article by Samantha Murphy Kelly, posted on CNN Business entitled “Plastic surgery inspired by filters and photo editing apps isn't going away.” On this article she discusses how an increasing number of people have an unrealistic obsession with correcting subjective flaws. This article also points out how people continue to make more unnecessary changes to their appearance which may cause them to lose perspective of what they really look like.

Some, like public relations executive Karla Barbosa, are proudly embracing the concept. She recently broadcast her treatment of a gold microinfusion facial -- a procedure that uses small needles to reduce the size of pores and with the intention of making the skin look airbrushed -- to her more than 31,000 followers.

"It's like a real-life filter for your face," she captioned the clip. "Seriously. GLASS SKIN." As Barbosa explained to CNN Business, "If you want to tweak a photo a bit more to feel a bit more confident ... or get a facial or botox filler to make you feel more confident ... that's up to the person and how they feel." - CNN Business

Self-acceptance

In order for me to properly love myself, I need to came to terms with who I am. Not trying to hide, not trying to make superficial changes, but seeing myself for who I am and accepting reality. The challenge is that not only is there a temptation regarding my appearance, there are also many things regarding my character, my heart, who I am at my core that I dislike. When I take time to examine myself it becomes clear to me that I disappoint myself much more often than I could possibly disappoint anyone else. My natural tendency is to refuse to forgive myself, refuse to accept myself, and demand that I improve myself. “I will grab my own bootstraps and lift myself out of this mess.” In this process, which is doomed to fail, I also alienate those around me, I push people away because they too are flawed, they too need to improve and so I push my personal unhappiness upon them, lest they experience joy in their current state of imperfection.

So I turn to self-help books, apps, gadgets, gismos, possessions, substances, surgical procedures and anything else that promises me a quick fix and that will help me feel better or stop caring, even if just briefly. But I do not feel comfortable turning to Jesus. Because when I cannot accept myself, I become almost angry at Him for accepting someone so pitiable as myself. How could anyone love me? And so I begin to doubt even the gospel.

Forgiven much = love much

When I realize who I really am, God’s love grows exponentially. God’s grace becomes even more amazing. When I realize that Jesus died for me, the worst sinner of them all. It changes everything!

This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”—and I am the worst of them all. - 1 Timothy 1:15 New Living Translation

I realize how terrible I am, and that Jesus died for me and suddenly I feel deeper love and appreciation and amazement at God. I feel like singing praises to God. I desire to spend time with Him. I want to pray. I want to study the Bible. I want to share with others.

There is a story found in Luke 7:36-50 that illustrates this. I strongly recommend reading the whole story but main idea is found in verse 47.

Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.” - Luke 7:47 ESV

The insight I gained from this story is that as we become aware of our sins, our imperfections, all the times we fall short of the glory of God, we also experience greater love for God for His love and willingness to forgive us. When I am hiding my sins and blaming others for my shortcomings I feel like a pretty good person. I feel like it should not be too difficult for God to save me. I compare myself with those around me and feel superior. I build an armor based on works and refuse to truly examine myself. I stop confessing sins because doing so makes me feel vulnerable. I prefer to live a superficial life that looks Christian from a distance, but I refuse to delve into the vulnerability and messiness that true dedication to Christ demands. Looking at myself without the “makeup,” without the “jewelry,” (literal or symbolic) is painfully humbling, but on the other side of it is a deeper more authentic walk with Christ and the true experience of salvation. Not based on anything I do, but wholly dependent on what Christ did and does for me.

Is this love?

Out of this authentic experience with Christ and His great love for me comes a deep desire to serve Him and demonstrate my love for Him.

If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. - John 14:15 Berean Literal Bible

Finally, I find myself serving God out of a deep and sincere desire to do so. Not out of fear, not only out of a sense or responsibility and duty, but out of a joyful, grateful, thankful heart. I find myself obeying because I love and not because I fear. I want to do my absolute best, I want to go further, I want o to do more, out of love. I fall in love with Christ and it changes absolutely everything in my life.

Now I face life from a place of deep love for Jesus, ready and willing to love my neighbor as myself. I am finally willing to be vulnerable for the sake of the gospel, because when I am weak, then I am strong.

Therefore I am content with weaknesses, with insults, with troubles, with persecutions and difficulties for the sake of Christ, for whenever I am weak, then I am strong. - 2 Corinthians 12:10 NET Bible

#love #practical #life

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