#i don't want to see the doctor because it costs money and i don't want to be dismissed again

[conkreetmonkey]

Why houses can and will get more expensive forever and ever despite the obvious impossibility of infinite growth within a finite system!

If the economy is doing the best it ever has, why are homelessness, starvation and deaths of despair all skyrocketing? It's because poor people are too stupid to realize they should be thriving, experts say

10 self care tips that all involve buying products and won't actually benefit your mental or physical health!

Your 25-year-old children still live with you and don't have jobs because they're lazy and selfish, and if they tell you otherwise they're lying to you: 10 hot new insults to hurl at them when they dare to show their face in their own home!

How do we solve the labor shortage? We asked a business owner who rejects 800 applications per day, has 10 fake listings up on Indeed, and isn't actually looking to hire anybody!

Why does nobody want to have kids anymore? It's because they have too many rights, experts say

"Gen Z lacks professionalism and I refuse to hire them" says man who hasn't returned an email in 20 years, has never proofread anything, has a website designed by blindfolded chimps that hasn't been updated since 2011, steals tip money, and flagrantly disregards labour law

30 fun ways to turn your beloved hobby into just another sisyphean chore!

10 ways to reduce your carbon footprint by atoms at a huge quality-of-life downgrade while some guy in LA who was born rich burns ten trillion tons of diesel per day because he likes the smell and strangles sea turtles for fun!

Tech CEO sets $10,000,000,000 in cash ablaze while naked and smeared in his own feces, indecipherably rambles about armadilloes controlling the senate when questioned: here's why this was actually a genius business move and he totally deserves to make 4000x the salary of an actual doctor or engineer!

"I desperately need more workers!" says man who just fired 35% of his entire talent pool and permanently burnt bridges with them to pad quarterly report

Incredibly rich man who's fumbled 5 marriages says divorce and abortion should be outlawed to boost birthrates (and for no other reason)

END OF THE ENTIRE FUCKING WORLD? Landlord who owns 37 properties only sees 1.5x profit increase this year, as opposed to last year's 2x

Why [country that's doing far better than America in terms of median quality of life, stability, and happiness]'s economy is crumbling due to Not Pursuing Growth Recklessly Enough

Special: we pretend the cost-of-living crisis is a complex issue and not a simple matter of monopolistic, state-backed price gouging for 13 whole paragraphs! Experts A. Bushbeater, H. Emandhaw, and Wish E. Washi are consulted to meanderingly talk about how complicated and unsolveable things are!

Is the solution to the climate crisis for you to live, eat and work in ways that would be considered abuse if done to an animal despite more than enough resources for everyone being produced, but a huge fraction being discarded to create artificial scarcity?

Why housing prices going down will actually cause housing prices to go up somehow, and you should give up all hope and learn your fucking place as a serf in the neofeudal oligarchy we're building on your backs. (but pretty please have at least 3 children)

Why it's their own fault they're in inescapable debt and we should shit on them for it: the then-18 year olds we swindled into taking massive, high-interest, non-bankruptcy-eligible loans that all their parents and teachers pushed or forced them into SELFISHLY want to be free of this burden after 40 years of barely scraping by! Here's 10 reasons why a contract you signed as a teenager should bind you until you die.

From eating your pets to selling pieces of your body to drinking your own piss for pay-per-view fetish content: 15 tips for saving cash this December!

Unemployment drops to all-time low! (after the government changed the definition to exclude anyone who's ever eaten an apple from counting as unemployed)

[Billionaire Owned News Media Voice]

Is getting enough sleep actually harming you in the long run? We spoke to an Economics Expert who says: Yes!

Eating! The newest luxury fad you should be skipping out on.

What's it like for the working class? We spoke to Three Trust Fund Kids to find out!

Feeling burned out? Our sources suggest the answer is working more!

10 Reasons why an Equitable Humanitarian Utopia would actually be a total bummer!

This billionaire CEO is just like you! His bones definitely do not taste delicious.

[fireheartedpup]

I thought I could ask my grandma for help and she asked why I don't have a job 🥲

[fellthemarvelous]

Deny. Defend. Depose.

It is clear to those of us that live in America, the only people we truly have on our side are ourselves. The ruling class has made it clear we don't matter to them.

Luigi Mangione was arrested and happened to have every single piece of evidence on him that law enforcement was looking for, including the parts for the ghost gun, inside his backpack (that he also got rid of in Central Park containing the Monopoly money???). Either he was trying to get caught or that evidence was planted. And when he was being forcefully pushed into the jail, he hollered back to the press about "injustice" and "being an insult to the intelligence of American citizens and our lived experiences."

The people have now turned against corporate America and the CEOs and billionaires are fucking terrified. Nothing the news stations are saying to us are changing our minds. The American people have finally united over this issue and there is no going back for us. Whoever did kill Brian Thompson (and theories abound on the game The Adjuster is playing because no one plays Monopoly alone) exposed the very real divide that exists between every day citizens and the extremely wealthy. Things were easier for them to control when they were able to divide us, but now that we are aware of how uncertain our future is in America and seeing just how little we matter to the people who take our money, we have realized that we have more in common with each other than the people who control every aspect of our lives. We are waking up.

There isn't one person in this country who hasn't been a victim to the predatory scam that is private health insurance. Medical debt is the leading cause of bankruptcy in America, and many of us are one ambulance ride or hospital stay away from homelessness. We all know people who have died because the insurance company denied them the treatment they needed or waited until it was too late for an approval of a medical claim to matter anymore.

Recently, I decided to be tested for autism and ADHD. Not life-threatening or anything, but my life is still in shambles and I want to know if I'm going untreated for something else. Before being tested though, I was informed that the insurance company (Aetna) has said that they were going to cover the full cost of the testing I was having (which was six hours of testing by the way). She even made sure several times that they were, in fact, going to cover it in full and they said yes.

The same day that Brian Thompson, CEO of another horrible healthcare company, was murdered in broad daylight, I received a call from that doctor's office with the woman telling me that Aetna was now telling her they never agreed to cover my testing and that they are going to bill me for $1600 (where the hell am I supposed to get that?) and she is fighting them, but considering our lives don't matter to the people who tell us what healthcare we are and are not allowed to receive, I don't think they will feel compelled to change their minds because they are bloodsucking parasites who only care about lining their pockets while I don't even have $6 lying around, let alone $1600!!

Corporate America leeches off our taxes. They take and take and take and we see nothing in return. They raise prices on insurance coverage and then deny us the very coverage that we pay for. They poison our food, price gouge our poisoned food, and then force us to pay for the treatment we get when the food makes us sick. Corporate America profits off of our hard work, our taxes, our health, our lives, our deaths.

I don't know if this will reach a larger audience or not, but I wanted to talk about it on Tumblr because this platform seems to be a crossroads for every type of creative soul. I initially brought up this idea on TikTok earlier, but I want to see if it can get traction in other places as well since I have fewer than 3,000 followers on TikTok (and I have seen a small few express interest in my idea in the hours since I posted the video.)

We're busy being lectured by politicians and the news media because while they are clutching their pearls at what happened to Brian Thompson, the rest of us do not give one single flying fuck about what happened to him. As CEO of a for-profit health insurance company, he signed off on denied claims and death for those of us who struggle to make it from one day to the next. The sicker you are, the poorer you are, the more they force you to struggle and pay. The love to deny coverage because regardless of whether we live or die, they already have the money we are forced to pay them.

I don't condone murder at all, but I also don't care that he was murdered because he was guilty of murdering so many more people in this country through legal means because it's profitable. The CEOs are scared and there are wanted posters with their names and faces popping up in places. Every CEO of every healthcare company is guilty of murdering Americans and they continue to go unpunished for it because "it's just business".

So (if you've read this far) all of this previous rambling is to say that I keep thinking about how I want to make an impression. I want to continue upsetting the billionaires and the CEOs because corporate America is full of murderers who are legally allowed to decide whether we live or die based on which outcome will give them more money.

I have thought about the idea of creating a wall/constructing a wall somewhere as an art piece or something (making a statement) that will somehow honor the memory of people who died because insurance denied them care.

I know I definitely want it to say something along the lines of "In memory of those murdered by for-profit healthcare systems in corporate America". Something blatant. Loud. Something they are forced to look at every single day. Somehow. The wall could have images of those who are gone, or names of the person who died with the name of the insurance company responsible for their death underneath. Just something to make it clear that we see them for what they are. Something to avenge those who were sacrificed so billionaires and CEOS and shareholders could brag about record profits. Something that shows the whole world that American citizens are waking up to who the real monsters are.

The Adjuster (whoever he is or is not) has fanned the flames of revolution in America. He managed to unite us in a way I can't even recall before. It's not over. We know what happened to Brian Thompson was just the beginning, and corporate America only just now realized how much we actually hate them. A single shooter has sparked an awakening in America that is starting to snowball into something much bigger.

So if there is anyone out there who might be interested in collaborating on something like this, please let me know. I know we are all tired and demoralized and we have no money. I want to make a statement though, and I love doing that through art or writing. Collaborating with other people who have been through this same shit will also probably help us unite even more.

This is a watershed moment in American history.

In the words of Kanan Jarrus, Jedi Knight,

"There is a future for us. One where we're all free. But it's up to us to make it happen."

[ms-demeanor]

On insurance: I still live with my parents and don't know a lot yet about the sorts of things adults usually have to spend money on. I've always been skeptical of things like insurance and credit cards because it seems to me they wouldn't be selling that if they didn't expect to make money from it. I talked to my cousin a while ago about credit cards and basically came to the conclusion that they do that because they're betting on the customer getting sloppy and letting their debts stack up, and the way you beat that and get money from credit card companies is just by being careful.

I'm a little more confused about insurance though because it seems much more straightforwardly like a gamble they will simply not take if it won't pay off for them. Like, you don't go to a casino because every game they play at a casino is one they've done the math on and have determined that statistically most people will lose money on most of the time. Is insurance not kinda the same? Where they estimate the risk and then charge you an amount calculated to make sure it probably won't be worth it for you?

I know if you have a car you legally need car insurance so everyone knows you can pay for another car if you crash into someone, and I gather that here in the US at least health insurance companies have some kinda deal with hospitals so that the prices go down or something, and there's a reason I don't fully understand why not having health insurance is Really Bad. But we get to pet insurance, or like when I buy a concert ticket and it offers ticket insurance in case I can't make it to the show, and surely if they thought they were gonna lose money on that they just wouldn't sell it, right? Or they'd raise the price of it until it became worth the risk that something bad actually will happen? Wouldn't it only be worth it to buy insurance if you know something the insurance company doesn't?

So the deal is that most people don't use their insurance much, and often insurance companies will incentivize doing things that will make you use your insurance less.

So, for example, you can get a discount on car insurance if you have multiple cars because people who insure multiple cars are more likely to be responsible drivers (the ability to pay for multiple cars stands in as a representation of responsibility here). The longer you go without an accident, the lower your premiums get because that means that you are not costing your insurance company anything but you are paying into the system. The car insurance company's goal is to have the most responsible, safest drivers who never get into car accidents because they can predict (roughly) how much they're going to have to pay out to their customers and they want the number they pay out to be lower than what's paid in. So they try to discourage irresponsible drivers by raising their rates and encourage responsible drivers by giving them discounts.

Health insurance companies often do the same thing: I recently got a gift card from my health insurance company because I had a visit from a nurse who interviewed me about my overall health and made sure I had stable blood pressure and access to medications. It is literally cheaper for my insurance company to give me a $100 giftcard and hire a nurse to visit me than it is for me to go to my doctor's office a couple of times, so they try to make sure that their customers are getting preventative care and are seeing inexpensive medical professionals regularly so that they don't have to suddenly see very expensive professionals after a long time without care.

Insurance in the US has many, many, many problems and should be replaced with socialized healthcare for a huge number of reasons but right now, because it is an insurance-based system, you need to have insurance.

We're going to use Large Bastard as an example.

Large Bastard had insurance when he had his heart attack and when he needed multiple organs transplanted. He didn't *want* to be paying for insurance, because he thought he was healthy enough to get by, but I insisted. His premium is four hundred dollars a month, and his out of pocket maximum is eight thousand dollars a year. That means that every year, he pays about $5000 whether he uses his insurance or not, and if he DOES need to use the insurance, he pays the first $8k worth of care, so every year his insurance has the possibility of costing him thirteen thousand dollars.

The bill for his bypass surgery was a quarter million dollars.

The bill for his transplant was over one and a half million dollars.

His medication each month is around six hundred dollars. He needs to have multiple biopsies - which are surgeries - each year, and each one costs about twenty thousand dollars.

Without health insurance, he would very likely be dead, or we would be *even more* incapable of paying for his healthcare than we are right now. He almost ditched his insurance because he was a healthy-seeming 40-year-old and he didn't think he'd get sick. And then he proceeded to be the sickest human being I've ever known personally who did not actually die.

Health insurance costs a lot of money. It costs less money for people who are young and who are expected to be healthy. But the thing is, everybody pays into health insurance, and very, very few people end up using as much money for their medical expenses as Large Bastard did. There are a few thousand transplants in the US ever year, but there are hundreds of millions of people paying for insurance.

This ends up balancing out (sort of) so that people who pay for insurance get a much lower cost on care if they need it, hospitals get paid for the care they provide, and the insurance company makes enough money to continue to exist. Part of the reason that people don't like this scheme is because "insurance company" could feasibly be replaced by "government" and it would cost less and provide a better standard of care, but again, with things as they are now, you need to have insurance. Insurance companies are large entities that are able to negotiate down costs with the providers they work with, you are not. If you get hit by a car you may be able to get your medical bills significantly reduced through a number of means, but you're very unlikely to get your bills lower than the cost of insurance and a copay.

Because of the Affordable Care Act, which is flawed but which did a LOT of good, medical insurance companies cannot refuse to treat you because of preexisting conditions and also cannot jack up your premiums to intolerable rates - since Large Bastard got sick, he has had the standard price increases you'd expect from aging, but nothing like the gouging you might expect from an insurance company deciding you're not worth it.

Pet insurance works on the same model. Millions of people pay for the insurance, thousands of people end up needing it, a few hundred end up needing a LOT of it, and the insurance companies are able to make more money than they hand out, so they continue to exist. This is part of why it's less expensive to get pet insurance for younger animals - people who sign up puppies and kittens are likely to be paying for a very long time and are likely to provide a lot of preventative care for their animals, so they're a good bet for the insurer. Animals signed up when they are older are more likely to have health problems (and pet insurance CAN turn animals away for preexisting conditions) and are going to cost the insurance companies more, so they cost more to enroll (and animals over a certain age or with certain conditions may be denied entirely).

This weighing risk/reward is called actuarial science, and the insurance industry is built on it.

But yeah it's kind of betting. The insurance company says "I'll insure ten thousand dogs and I'm going to bet that only a hundred of them will need surgery at some point in the next year" and if they're correct, they make money and the dogs who need surgery get their surgery paid for out of the premiums from the nine thousand nine hundred dogs who didn't need surgery.

Your assessment of credit is correct: credit card companies expect that you will end up carrying a balance, and that balance will accrue interest, and the interest is how they make the money.

And it is EASY to fuck up financially as an adult. REALLY EASY. But you are still likely to need a good credit score so you will need a credit history. That means that the correct way to use a credit card is to have a card, but not carry a balance.

To do this, never buy anything on the card that you can't afford. In order to avoid needing the card for emergencies, start an emergency fund that is at least 3 months of your total pay *before* you get a credit card. That seems like a *lot* of savings to have, but from the perspective of someone who has had plenty of mess-ups, it's a lot easier to build up a $10k emergency fund than it is to pay off a $10k credit card debt.

If you don't understand how interest works on credit cards, or why a 10k savings is different than a 10k debt, here are some examples working with $10k of debt, 23% interest (an average-ish rate for people with average credit), and various payments.

With that debt and that interest, here's how much it costs and how long it would take to pay off with $200 as the monthly payment:

Fourteen years, and it would cost you about twenty four thousand dollars in interest, for a total amount paid of about thirty four thousand dollars.

To save $10k at $200 a month would take four years and two months.

Here's the same debt at $300 a month:

4.5 Years and it costs about six grand (again, just in interest - sixteen thousand dollars total). Saving ten thousand dollars at three hundred dollars a month would take just under three years.

Here's the same debt at $400 a month:

3 years, about $4000 dollars (fourteen thousand dollars total). Saving ten thousand dollars at $400 a month takes just over two years.

The thing is, with all of these models you're going to end up paying one way or another. Insurance vs out of pocket is you weighing the risk of losing a fair amount of money by signing up but not using the system, or potentially losing a catastrophic amount of money by not signing up.

For credit cards they really only work if you know you're never going to need them for an emergency, because an emergency is what you're not going to be able to pay off right away. I didn't have an emergency fund when Large Bastard had his heart attack and needed surgery, or when we moved between states suddenly, or when we moved between states suddenly AGAIN and needed to pay storage costs, or when Large Bastard needed a transplant, or when Tiny Bastard got in a fight with my MiL's dog, and the fact that I didn't have an emergency fund is still costing me a lot of money.

So, young folks out there: what's the takeaway?

Get insurance. Get the best deal possible, which usually ends up being the one you sign up for early. You may think you can let it ride without insurance, but man in the six months between when I graduate college (and lost my school insurance) and when care kicked in after 90 days at my job I got electrocuted and needed to go to the ER. If that hadn't been a worker's comp payout I would have had thousands of dollars in bills. Something could happen. You could break your leg, you could get hit by a car, you could suddenly find out that you actually have heart disease at twenty, you could develop cancer. Have insurance, you need insurance. You legally need car insurance in the US, and you financially need health insurance. If you have a pet, I think it's a good idea for them to have pet insurance.

Credit cards are not for emergencies, they are not for fun, they are not for buying things that are just ever so slightly out of your budget, they are for taking advantage of the credit card company and managing to get by in a system that demands you have a credit score. ONLY put purchases on your credit card that you already have cash for. Before you get a credit card, build up an emergency savings so that you aren't tempted to put emergency charges on your card.

If you DO end up with an interest-bearing debt, pay it off as fast as possible because letting it linger costs you a LOT of money in the long run.

Stay the fuck away from tobacco and nicotine products they are fucking terrible for you, they are fucking expensive, and they are not worth it put the vapes down put the zyns down put the cigarettes down I will begin manifesting in your house physically i swear to fuck. Knock that shit off and put the cash that you'd be spending on nicotine into a savings account.

Take care, sorry everything sucks, I promise that in some ways it actually sucks less than it did before and we're working on trying to make it suck even less but it's taking a while.

[hellfire--cult]

Edit of Eddie: pitifulbaby

Chapters: Masterlist (Go here to see list of chapters, plotline and general warnings.)

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader

Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Non-Traditional Omegaverse, Slow burn, Modern!AU, Mechanic!Eddie

⚠️18+: sexual tension, drinking, characters are drunk, clubbing, flirting and pining, i won't spoil the content of the chapter

wc: 14.5K

A/N: It's been... months. I know this. I got into a real bad writer's block and I am not sure it is entirely gone, but I have finally finished this chapter after struggling. I don't like how it turned out, feeling like I was all over the place with the idea and no matter how many times i proofread I just cannot get it right, but I hope that for the next chapter I do better! I hope you enjoy it and I am so sorry for taking so long!

Anyways, Enjoy! ❤️ And don't forget to always support me by hitting the reblog button or leave a comment!

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CHAPTER 16

“Wayne…”

“It’s not that bad Eds, with the medication and all–”

“You don’t understand pops. This– Fuck Wayne… You can’t leave me like this, with this condition of mine I– I have no chance of a partner… I will be alone…” He couldn’t lose Wayne. He didn’t want to believe what he read in the doctor’s verdict after many tests done on the old man. 

The medication would only stall the end. There is no chance that lung cancer can be cured, and if there is any at all, it should have been caught before the spread… which did not happen in this case.

“Eddie, you don’t know that… And you don’t know if I will leave you son, don’t get rid of your old man just like that.” And Eddie could see Wayne’s eyes glistening with tears through the camera on his phone. He knows his uncle did not like these results either. He knows. Eddie could only think of the test results and knew how much money the chemotherapy sessions would cost. He knows that medication and hospital bills will go off the roof and Wayne’s retirement money is not going to cover it all up.

So Eddie has to make a decision. He needs to make money, lots of it, and his auto shop in the city is doing amazingly well. He needs to leave Wayne behind at Hawkins, even if it hurts him. He needs to take care of Wayne. His friends are here too, and Argyle was also planning to move here. He wanted to at least try to keep Wayne healthy. As long as he possibly can because with Wayne gone…

He would end up all alone.

He lets out a grunt as he secures the last lug nut of the center hub of a tire with his impact wrench. He turns it off and places it on the floor, rubbing the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. He looks at his watch and stands up, wiping his knee that he used for kneeling.

“Gareth, did you finish the–”

“Yes, I fucking did, and it was a bitch, and I don’t ever want you to put me through that again.” The younger man whined as he tried to scrub off the excess of grease that was on his hands. Eddie winced at the sharp tone of his voice, but Gareth needed to learn how to do it, sooner or later.

It’s not an everyday occurrence to fix someone’s motor. A point where it’s not working but not broken enough for replacement. Breaking it apart, bit by bit in order to find the problem of it all and then putting it back together. It’s extensive, and it hurts your brain but someone’s gotta do it, and Eddie had already done it several times-

“I will put you through it whenever I want. Remember that you take thirty percent of what this person pays for fixing it. It’s not a cheap fix, maybe you can finally go to Hawaii.” Eddie chuckles and Jeff snorts in the background as he stops inspecting the motor of a car in order to laugh. Gareth scrunches his nose at both of his friends.

“It’s not wrong for me to want to be on a nice beach, drinking a coconut and then splashing on Caribbean water later on! Maybe even have a nice cute Hawaiian girl dancing next to a palm tree.” Gareth sighed dreamily while Eddie and Jeff turned slowly towards each other and let out a very ugly laugh. 

“Okay, um, nice imagination there Gar.” Jeff chuckled as he went back to checking his own car and Gareth simply huffed, puffing his chest out.

“You’ll see the pictures and you’ll envy me.” And he pushed by Eddie, walking towards the large sink that’s at the back where the toolboxes are. Eddie has a smile on his face as he then shakes his head and hunches over to see Gareth’s work on the engine. He inspects the bolts’ placing, if the vents were positioned correctly and–

“Boss, she’s back.” Jeff sings with a wiggle of eyebrows and Eddie raises one of his at him and then turns his head to see a woman, arms crossed over her chest, office attire on, short black skirt, black blazer with a baby pink blouse peeking from the V cut.

Compared to Eddie, who was wearing a white wife-beater and some overalls covered in grease, one strap down, and a messy bun on his head to keep the hair out of his face, and probably more oil. His eyes scanned the woman again, from head to toe, and he felt a little bit excited about seeing her.

“My favorite customer.” Eddie smiles as you tap your foot on the floor, wearing your low heels that are formal yet somehow modern.

“I swear to god Eddie, I am cursed. I am losing my patience with my car.” You whined out which only made him roll his eyes. For the past two months you and he had become friends, your car had to go into his shop many times because one week was the oil tank coming off and the next it was your radio malfunctioning, and Eddie had told you, time and time again–

“Your car is shit sweetheart.” You only gasped at his words and shook your head.

“No, it is not! It’s a little old, yes, but– It still runs.” You said, proudly so, sticking your nose up which only made Eddie squint at you.

“Mhm… and what happened to it now?” He asked with his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes followed yours, and he noticed it. He saw how your eyes flickered to his biceps, how they puffed thanks to the press. He held back a smirk as your eyes found his again, your posture becoming straight once more.

“Well, I feel the brake pedal a little bit hard to press. It started this morning.” He tilted his head in confusion at that because he had looked over your brakes, and they looked fine, almost the best thing in your whole car. His eyebrows were furrowed together as he scratched the back of his neck in thought.

“Alright. Let’s go see.” And you gave him a nod before walking out from the open garage door. Eddie looked to his side as he followed right behind you and Jeff only winked at him before proceeding with his own car. Eddie rolled his eyes but then, when they centered back, they fell on your behind.

The skirt hugged you tightly, and it was the right shade of black for you. It wasn’t too short nor past your knees. It was a simple office attire, something that shouldn’t get him going the way it is. And it has been happening more and more as time went on. Ever since that stupid night where he got to taste you, even if briefly, it was enough for him to admit the attraction he had for you.

He had been trying to push that urge away. You are a friend, you two share the same group of people, and it would be stupid to enter into a physical relationship with you… But fuck if he didn’t want to turn you around, get your ass on top of the hood of your car and raise your skirt far enough that you would reveal yourself to him.

He wanted to wreck you, ravish every single part of you and his curiosity of how you are in bed sometimes gets the best of him. The whole year filled of pent up anger and frustration over you didn’t exactly leave. Even if you were at the top of his hit list before, you were also this forbidden fruit for him.

He had looked at you many times when he was supposed to despise you in body and soul. He hated himself when he caught his eyes staring at your cleavage more times than they should. Your body as it moved when you went clubbing with the whole group. Your lips against another person’s and how they moved gracefully against them.

And now, he tasted them. The softness, the flavor… and fuck he wanted more of that. It was greedy, he knew that, and he would have stopped these thoughts and these urges…

If it weren’t for the fact that he knew, he absolutely knew, you felt it too.

Ever since you broke up with Billy, the physical touches became more frequent, tentative, testing, and only just barely. A graze of fingers, a press on the shoulder, a bump, a shove. He could feel your eyes, he could feel you scanning him from head to toe whenever you all got together. 

He noticed how unsatisfied you were, whenever you complained about the hookups you had been having lately. He wondered if you were ever fully satisfied with Billy, but maybe your feelings made you feel like you were.

And he wanted to show you just how good he could make you feel. He wanted to show you what his body could do, what his urges could impulse him to do, and what his tongue could provoke. He wanted to brand himself in your brain and on your skin, mark himself in your memory. 

He wondered now if he could make a dent in your hood from how hard he would pound–

“Are you listening to me?”

Your voice took him away from his thoughts, and he nodded at you as he wiped his hands with the rag he had in his back pocket. You had turned around, at some point, and to be completely honest, the need of tainting you didn’t leave him one bit as he saw your scrunched-up face.

“Let me check the pedal, first and foremost.” With that, he rounded your car that you parked at the front of his shop, and he opened the driver’s seat. The smell of your perfume filled his nostrils and he took a deep breath in and leaned down, bending over to reach the brake pedal and press on it. 

Only for his hand to stop in the middle of it as a laugh exploded out of him.

“What? Why are you laughing!?” You asked, confused and stunned as he straightened up and held his hand up that now held something, your face flushing in embarrassment as you choked on your words.

“Isn’t this fucking adorable.” In his hand was a small hand-sized plushie, a Squishmallow to be exact, and it was a little bat. He squeezed it a few times and he assumed it was kind of like a stress ball for you. 

“I– It must have… fallen from my purse…” You wanted the earth to swallow you whole, Eddie could sense it, so he chuckled and squeezed it hard.

“I might keep him as payment. Matches my tattoo.” And he noticed your eyes drifting to his right arm and then back at the plushie, rushing over to him to try to snatch it away, only for Eddie to be quicker and move his hand all the way up. You frowned at him, a challenge in your eyes.

“You know what I will do if you don’t give it back.” And oh he knew. He is expecting it. He yearns to feel your body against his like that time with the Pringles can. The way you clawed up on his body, your nails digging into his shoulder as your chest was almost at his eye level when you tried to reach for the can. 

“You cannot do that now, your ass will show.” He only smirked at you as your mouth opened and closed, like a fish, and you looked at the bat plushie in his hand. “You didn’t have to make an excuse in order to see me, Peach.”

You scoffed at him and shook your head as embarrassment washed over you. He could easily keep pushing your buttons, but even he knows about work schedules. Begrudgingly, he handed over the small plushie to you and you snagged it out of his hand in a second with a glare in your eyes.

“I didn’t. You and I both know that.” You turned around to face your driver’s door, putting the plushie inside your bag again as you fixed things around and Eddie couldn’t contain himself. He wanted to have a smell of your perfume coming off from you. He leaned close, breath at the back of your neck and his voice three tones lower, sending shivers and electricity down your spine.

“Do we now?” He saw your shoulders tense slightly and he wished he could see your face. More confirmations that this thing was not one sided. He took a breath in and your scent is floral today, sort of, matching the air around you, the incoming spring. 

What he didn’t expect you to do was to turn around with a small smirk on your face, a cocky one and it made his eyebrow go up in question. Your eyes stayed on his as he tilted his head to urge you to talk.

“Sounds like you were the one who missed me, Munson.” 

And that really sent him close to the edge. He wanted to shut that pretty mouth of yours up. He wanted nonsense to come out of your lips. He wanted his name to be said, to be yelled as you unravel under his touch. Drooling so much that you wouldn’t be able to formulate words. 

“Cocky, aren’t you Peach?” You rolled your eyes at him, those pretty eyes he wants to see rolling to the back of your head. 

“But you are not denying it.” 

And oh you are playing a very dangerous game here because–

“Eddie, I’m sorry to interrupt your flirting session–” Gareth interrupted and Eddie almost growled at his friends as you stuttered, looking at his friend.

“Gareth– It’s not–”

“Sure, whatever you two say. Eddie, Mr. Gomez called. Said he wants to book a service for his collectible.” And Eddie groaned at that, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers. He was the only one in the shop who had enough training and experience to work with delicate cars. He is the only one that can take this kind of tedious and slow job.

“Right.” He sighed in defeat as he slowly turned to look back at you, his arms crossed over his chest. “That’ll be a hundred bucks.”

Your mouth fell open as your hand raised and swatted his shoulder, finally letting out a held-in chuckle from his throat, prompting you to smile as well. The relationship was different, yet it wasn’t. There’s just this back and forth between the two of you, more than simple bantering, more than simply getting on each other’s nerves. 

And he takes full responsibility for it, the question is… do you?

“No. You even tried to kidnap Carlisle.” Eddie frowned at the name, not understanding what you meant for a second, to then snort out, his eyebrows raising up in surprise as he looked at you.

“You named the plushie Carlisle? Are you serious?” You gave him an offended look and raised your nose at him. He wanted to crack up, but he held it in, you looked way too adorable to say anything about it.

“You named your Mustang She-ra.” He groaned and rolled his eyes, hating the day he told you about how he always puts a name on his most precious things. His electric guitar is called Gilda, while his van is called Kratos. 

“At least she is known, I don’t know where you got a name like Carlisle–”

“Twilight.” And Eddie could only hold it in for one more second before snorting and looking away from you, pressing his fist to his mouth. You only rolled your eyes at him and gave him a small shove on his arm which only prompted him to keep chuckling. 

“Of course it’s Twilight.” He only comments as he turns to look at you again. You flipped him off as you got into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut. He smirked as he crossed his arms over his chest. “No payment?”

“You want a kiss or something Munson?” He knows it’s a joke, he knows it is but he also feels and hears the suggestion, the small and indirect invitation. He only smirks as he bends forward, his crossed forearms coming to a rest on the rolled down window as his face moves close to yours. 

Your eyes express confusion, but your body movement betrays you as you don’t move away from him, not even an inch. His grin is visible and his gaze holds fire and want as he quickly looks over your lips and then back at your eyes.

“Can’t get enough?” His voice was low, and you felt your whole body grow goosebumps at it and how intensely he looked at you. It was just one push and your lips would touch his, you could taste him again, and even more than before… but you can’t. You both can’t.

So you pushed him off on his shoulder, making him chuckle and stumble away from your driver’s window, still looking down at you. You cleared your throat as you started your car again and fixed the rear-view mirror. Your eyes lit up and looked at him once more.

“Oh, today we’re doing the pre-game at my apartment, so just bring whatever you wanna drink Munson.” His eyes widened slightly at that but still nodded at your instruction. It’s been a while since the group went out clubbing, and it would be the first time he and you would also go out on good terms. 

Before, when clubbing, you two stayed as far away as one could, the only incident where he got close being the one where a guy didn’t understand the word ‘No’. Now there’s no need for that separation, for that space… Would you two dance together? Hopefully not… because you don’t trust yourself not rubbing your body seductively against his. And he doesn’t trust himself in not grabbing your hips to pull you flush against him.

‘Get yourself together.’ You repeat in your head to yourself. Eddie is a friend. Just that and nothing more. He can’t be something more. It’ll ruin it. Curiosity be damned.

“Alright, we’re going to Scorpion, right?” You nodded at the name of the club, and he gave a hum of approval and tapped on the hood of your car to get you going. “Go before you are late to an important meeting or something, Miss Executive.” 

“I do my job well, what can I say.” Your voice is confident when saying that and Eddie has no power in teasing you about it. He liked it when you were sure of something, much more when it came to yourself. “See you later Eds.” 

“See you later Peach.” You gave him one small smile before you got out of his parking and drove off. He let a loud sigh escape his lips as he looked towards the sky, not noticing he was holding one to begin with.

How the fuck is he going to survive you tonight?

He remembers the outfits you wore when going out, and he had stared more than once in a single night. He hated you more than he did at the time for catching his eye. The dislike he felt for you gave him the stop sign to not flirt with you, but now– the only stop sign there is, is doubt.

He is perceptive, been so since a teenager, but you feel like a challenge. He never once doubted when approaching a woman to take home for the night, never had a long-term lover either, but you are different. Everything is different. 

Even if you two have the same attraction and same need, how can he be certain that it won’t be weird afterwards? How can he be certain that it won’t destroy the group you two finally can enjoy together and in peace? Is he ready to sacrifice that in order to have a piece of you? 

Now let’s say you two do end up having sex and continue doing so… what happens when one of you two decides to end it? Go for an actual relationship? How are you two going to face one another once that whole sex-buddy thing wilters into nothing? He doesn’t even know himself. He had always been confident but– this situation was new.

You’re no stranger. And that makes everything much more harder than before. 

“Eddie! Mr. Gomez!” He can hear Gareth screaming from inside again and he turns with a groan and a frown on his face. 

“I am going! Fucking christ!”

Those kinds of thoughts might need to be left aside for now.

—--------------------------------

You looked in the mirror to look at yourself one more time. You felt your heart race slightly from time to time and your belly turning as well, as if you had butterflies from nervousness and anticipation blooming inside. 

And you know why. And you hate the fact that you know why.

You had cursed at yourself when you promised you wouldn’t shave and yet you still grabbed the razor that was sitting on the corner of your bathtub. You said you wouldn’t do a lot of make up to impress, yet you did a full face. You also said you were going to wear something comfortable tonight, not wanting anything but to have fun with your friends.

And now you had some high-rise oxford pants with a short crop top that had long bell sleeves, and high heels on your feet. Pants you often used to show off your ass when dancing. You wanted to literally punch yourself because you know who you want to show off to. 

Why would you do this? To get some reaction from him? You already made up your mind that nothing was going to happen between the two of you. It cannot happen. The circle would break if you do… but maybe you end up not liking it and he feels the same way and you two end up as friends only?

That would be the best outcome. But what if you do like it and he doesn’t? That would make you feel horrible, and you know it because you want him to like it. To like you. To worship your body. You want him to remember you and even consider you his best. Maybe it is to show him what he has been missing for so long if he hadn’t been a douche from the start. Maybe it is because you just have an ego problem.

Either way,  Eddie has made his way into your brain almost every day… and even in your dreams.

The first time you dreamt of him was after the quick peck you gave him back at his house. You went to sleep, a little bit of a carousel going on in your head thanks to the alcohol you drank that night, but even the spins didn’t stop your mind from imagining things. 

You remember it, vividly so. He was at the end of your bed, standing and looking down at you. You were naked and felt as if you were burning all over, goosebumps forming in need of touch. His touch. 

He was shirtless, and you could imagine it perfectly thanks to all those mirror stories he posted on Instagram. You could remember every tattoo he had. His chest, his neck, his arms… You remembered them all, even the smaller ones, and you wished you knew the ones on his back if he had any.

He leaned down, planting a kiss on your collarbone first, and you could feel the stubble on his face tickle you, send shivers down every skin cell of your body, goosebumps worsening. His hands, his big ringed hands that also were filled with ink, trailed your sides, exploring you and taking in every dent, curve, and chuckling at the feel of that chicken skin he provoked on you. 

The chuckle sounded too real, so low that you truly believed he infiltrated your dream with a superpower he hid from all of you. Had he engrained himself in your brain so badly that you didn’t miss a single detail? You hadn’t noticed how much you’ve been wanting him till that night, and your body and brain let you know of that fact.

‘You won’t be able to fuck someone else ever again after me. Trust me on that Peach.’ That’s what he said before trailing his lips down your body, making you arch your back as his teeth often nibbled at different parts of your skin. You wanted those nibbles to turn into bites, teeth marking you, making you bleed, digging into the cells of your body until you were consumed by him. 

He was reaching that part of you that ached for touch, for friction, for satisfaction. That part of you that can try to make the fire inside you diminish if touched or worsen it, but you wanted to find out. His lips kissed your hips, hands gliding downwards as you looked down at him only to see him looking back with a grin on his face.

You let out a moan as you parted your legs for him to slot better in between them, his teeth biting a little harder at the skin on your hip in approval. You saw him slowly lay down on his belly, his smile never leaving his face as you felt a breeze on your wet center. It felt too real, too vivid, too lucid. You felt the coldness of it, the air, the pleasure around your clit thanks to it. 

But your body betrayed you that night and you jolted awake when your phone loudly rang, and the first thing you felt was the wetness between your legs. For Eddie. For Eddie Munson. You were wet for your past enemy, who became your friend, and now–

You didn’t know if you wanted to kill the person on the other side of the phone or thank them for stopping you from imagining stuff like that. It was just a wet dream you had and a friend was the protagonist. Those things happen, they’re normal… The problem was that the normal thing would be to feel weird and disgusted by it, but you felt the complete opposite. 

You wanted the dream to continue. You wanted that dream to go on and dream of what it would feel like to have his tongue on you and inside of you. You wanted to know if your imagination was kind enough to let you feel it entirely, just like everything else. But it cannot happen. You should have been glad it stopped where it did.

But the dreams didn’t stop, and sometimes you found yourself daydreaming in your office about them again, making you straighten up or jolt whenever you caught yourself doing so. You couldn’t let your body indulge in it, and much less your mind. 

It was no use. He just kept appearing in your instagram stories, and your eyes always looked for him in every room whenever you knew he was near or was going to be present. You are always eager to see him and it drives you mad. He drives you mad. And you hate him so much for making you realize–

That you want to ride him until he sees the earth from the moon or beyond.

Back in the present, you clench your eyes tightly so that you could forget those images, or how he leaned over today and his breath hit your face as well as his stupid cologne. It was leathery today, but also the hint of car oil lingered on him, which only made your stomach turn harder. 

He knew what he was doing. You knew what he was doing. Is he brave enough and has the guts you don’t have to take the risk? Does he have the same lingering thoughts you do? The what ifs? The consequences of it happening? If he didn’t he would have done something already… right?

You can’t take that step yourself, afraid of ruining it all. You finally can be at peace in your circle of friends, you repeat this to yourself every time you think about him as more than just a friend. When you think about his naked body against yours. When you think of how he would feel inside of you.

Would he be able to satisfy you? Fill you?

You doubt it. But, what if–

You jump in your place as a loud ring snaps you out of your thoughts. Your intercom goes off as it yells at you that your friends have arrived. You took one last look at yourself and nodded as you promised that this thing you were doing wasn’t for Eddie. It’s just a passing attraction. Something that will die down soon if not indulged. 

You sprayed one last bit of perfume before heading out of your room and into the living room area. You looked at the screen to see Robin smiling close to the camera with Steve and Jonathan behind her, waving at you. You shook your head at the goofiness of your friend and pressed the button to let them in, hearing the buzz through the speaker. They walked in and you unlocked your front door for them to just walk in.

You could feel your stomach turning a bit still, wondering if he would be in time, or if he was coming at all, and… the dread of seeing him with someone tonight. You didn’t think of that. Oh god, you didn’t think of– Why are you worrying? Isn’t it best if he goes with someone else tonight? Maybe if you see him with another woman, these desires will vanish… but what if it does the complete opposite?

What if you wish to be her? But he is nothing to you, just a friend, that’s it… You shouldn’t care if he goes with someone else, you really shouldn’t but why do you feel like you would be sort of hurt about it? Why do you feel like you are losing? 

What did Eddie Munson do for your brain to be this mushed because of him?

You couldn’t think too much of it because Robin walked in, holding a bag as if in victory, letting you know she brought vodka for tonight. You winced towards Steve as he walked in through the door, already sighing at the night ahead of him as designated driver for her and Jonathan. Argyle was the designated driver for Nancy, Eddie and you. 

“I swear Robin… I know it’s been a while since we’ve gone out but–” Steve started only to receive a glare from your best friend as Jonathan closed the door behind him.

“It’s been months! Plus, we can finally pregame all together!” And you were excited for it too. The pregames before being Eddie’s friend were a little tense, always on edge of saying the wrong thing in front of one another and making the night a bitter one.

Now another type of edge is nestled within you. Between you two. But it’s as if you cannot control yourself when around him. You always give a remark, a word, or a sentence with a double meaning, or you always one-up him in his closeness. If he brushes his thumb against yours, you brush your five fingers at the top of his hand. 

If he makes a joke with a flirty tone, you follow it through… like today, asking him if he wanted to kiss you again. He was the one who continued it, getting close to you, testing you, not even in a teasing manner. You know it’s not one-sided. This thing that is going on is affecting the two of you, and it’s a matter of never doing anything about it or… waiting for who breaks first.

“Chill Robin, it’s going to be a calm night.” Is what you say but do you truly believe it will be? The twisting in your stomach came again so you walked towards your kitchen to get some beers out as the rest walked in, ready to prepare the glasses, snacks, and drinks. You immediately popped open a can and took a chug out of it, wanting to quench whatever was inside your stomach.

“Is it?” Jonathan asked with a chuckle, looking at how you immediately started drinking. You glanced at him and gave him an innocent smile, receiving a roll of the eyes back as he leaned over the island counter to grab a beer himself. 

“Ugh…” Steve groaned as he looked at the beer, crossing his arms over his chest. “This is certainly not fair.”

“I drove us home last time. I held myself back because I knew you wouldn’t.” Jonathan chuckled and his boyfriend only glared at him in response, opening his mouth to say something to him only for the ringing to start again.

Goosebumps raided your skin from neck to toes. You moved a little too quickly as you walked out of the kitchen to rush to the intercom, looking at the screen. You felt your stomach twist when you saw him putting a cigarette out with a stomp as Argyle talked to him. Nancy was only shaking her head as she looked into the camera and waved. 

You bit your lip as you pressed the button, taking a deep breath in as it buzzed. Eddie looked up into the camera before walking in and he smirked, flipping his middle finger up towards you and that made the tension in your stomach loosen a bit. A chuckle escaped you as you shook your head at his antics. 

You can do this. If you keep this friendly banter like you always do it will be an easy task. It should be. You took a swig of your beer as you looked at the door and then back at the kitchen. 

You have to appear uninterested because if you do, you will believe it. You have to believe it. Nothing can happen between the two of you, and it should be clear that it shouldn’t because your friends are in the kitchen, and more are coming up. This wouldn’t have happened months ago. Eddie entering your home wouldn’t have happened, ever. 

You should appreciate what you have and stop asking for more. Stop desiring for more. Stop dreaming for more. It’s enough as it is, what you two have is enough. He’s been a great friend to you, letting you vent, lending you a shoulder, making you laugh, and it should be enough…

But that stupid fucking kiss always comes back.

The door opened making your head turn to see Argyle walking in first and immediately walking towards you to give you a kiss on the cheek as a greeting. You rolled your eyes as you smelled the weed on him already.

“Hello hello, my dudette.” He smiles at you as he looks behind him, making your eyes follow his gaze. Your breath catches in your throat as you see Nancy walking in, followed by Eddie who is holding a six-pack with one hand, the other stuck into the pocket of his denim jacket. Black shirt hugging his torso, tightly, the tattoos poking out from the small V-neck it has.

Your eyes drifted lower to see his signature dark pants with a few rips here and there, and then you went upwards again to see him in his– Your eyes widened when you just now realized he had his hair down. Your heart seemed to stop as you held your breath in because you only saw his hair down in those half-naked pictures he took of himself in front of his bathroom mirror. 

And fuck– fuck–

“For fuck sake Nancy, told you you tightened it too much.” Eddie groaned out and you had to look away, you had to. But you couldn’t. He had you in a trance as Nancy rolled her eyes at him.

“Not my fault your hair is frizzy and untamed today!” You tried to control your own breathing a bit. He definitely caught you off guard with this one. You fucking swore his hair was tied up downstairs when you saw him on the intercom screen. 

You snapped out of it by Steve yelling at Robin to stop. You sighed in relief as your eyes finally left his figure, landing on the kitchen’s open door, and seeing Steve taking the bottle out of Robin’s claws. You smiled knowing that she must have poured too much vodka on her drink, never knowing how to measure correctly.

“Oh the rest is here, Nance you’re gettin' lucky tonight!” Argyle yelled, not realizing just how loud his voice was. You snorted and looked away for Nancy to not see you laughing, covering your mouth with your free hand.

Eddie chuckled seeing Nancy’s reaction, her face beet red, but your snort made his gaze turn towards you and– God fucking damnit. You’re not playing fair. You really aren’t. He felt the sharp intake of breath that entered his lungs as he scanned your body, slowly, taking every inch of you and your outfit.

He knew it was going to be a hard night for him if he was going to hold back, but he never thought he was gonna go to war. 

His hungry eyes scanned your figure, your neck, your shoulders, down your body, taking in every fucking detail he could. Your breasts, your hips, your thighs, your inner thighs… He was desperate to taste you, to try you, to have you. 

“Don’t laugh!” Nancy’s yell made him snap his head back to his best friend as she continued talking, “Eddie needs a ponytail.”

The man mentioned only rolled his eyes, landing on yours again. You were already looking at him, and he noticed the little gleam behind them thanks to your whole facial expression, your body language.

The way he noticed how your breath picked up, your chest moving a little more elaborate than a normal pace, or how your eyebrows were sort of tense. Your eyes were open, yet he noticed how your top lids were slightly dropped. Your hands were gripping the beer can, tightly, and your legs were crossed while standing. 

He could almost smell you from across the room.

“Here Nance, take these to the kitchen while Peach gets something to tame all this.” Eddie motioned to his hair and Argyle only laughed as Nance grabbed the six-pack from Eddie’s hand and walked into the kitchen.

“Can’t give you any tips my dude, my hair ain’t the same form as yours.” Argyle says before following behind Nancy. Your eyes followed them and then went back to Eddie who was already looking at you with a smirk on his lips.

“Can you tame it?” 

And that question shouldn’t have made your entire insides turn. It shouldn’t mean anything but him talking about his hair, but you know it has a second meaning. You know it. He knows you know it and that’s why he does it. 

So you always play along. Because you know it affects him as much as it affects you.

“I bet I can.” Your voice was low, eyes staying on his as you talked. His head tilted slightly in amusement, the tip of his fingertips itching to reach towards you, show you exactly just how untameable he was. 

“Would like to see you try Peach.” And he took a few steps towards you, slow, boots hitting against the wooden floor, loud steps that matched the volume of your own heartbeat. He reached out and grabbed the can out of your hands and took a swig out of it. He then put it back in front of you, waiting for you to take it as his eyes held a challenging gleam, as if this was another test.

You knew he was playing cat and mouse with you, but you didn’t know who was who. Were you the mouse? Were you the cat?... No, you weren’t mousy anymore. You two were the hunters, but neither dared to pull the trigger to get the prey.

But you weren’t going to let this fucker get away with doing these kind of things so he would make you drool over him, to make you look desperate for him. Your body though… your body wants to see him squirm.

You grabbed onto the can and slowly brought it up to your lips, your eyes focused on the lid as you looked at the small drop of beer that was there, where his lips were just mere seconds ago. Your tongue darted out, and you looked back up at him before licking the lid clean from the beer.

His smirk dropped, his cockiness gone, as all that’s left was fire. A fire that was spreading rapidly and you were holding onto the large folding fan, intentionally waving it with a smile on your face. You fucking–

“Alright, I’ll find something in my room.” You talked and took a full on sip of your beer before turning around and walking towards your room. Eddie’s eyes immediately fell on your ass, as you swayed it side to side and he only scoffed at the situation, at himself. 

The idea of not having you so easily is what made you more tempting, and it made him even more desperate to get you. He wonders if one fuck would cut it. If one fuck is all he needs for his curiosity to be over with you. If one fuck is enough to satiate this need to completely destroy you, ruin you, and make you lose your goddamn mind.

He doubts it.

He follows you across the living room and then goes into your bedroom. He takes a look around and now, enclosed in a space with you, in a space that is only yours made your perfume, your scent, grow tenfold. It almost makes him dizzy and fold over from how sweet, yet inviting it was. He wanted to press his nose in the crook of your neck and breathe you in, let you engrave yourself in one of his senses. 

“Tidy.” Is the only thing that comes out of his mouth as you walk towards your vanity to open one of your drawers. You felt your heart beating in your chest as your eyes drifted to the mirror to look at your queen-sized bed and your imagination started being evil with you and your body.

Flashes of him pinning you against your bed came in a rush, like a camera shutter, picture through picture. The positions change in every single one. You gulped as you felt your center throb in need, so you straightened up and clenched your legs together, looking back down into the drawer.

If you had looked at him for just one second there, you would have noticed how he was now looking at you. His eyes ablaze, breathing growing elaborate as his nostrils flared… 

“Well, of course, I had guests coming.” You finally grab a simple black hairband and close your drawer to then turn to him, ready to hand it over. “Here you go.”

A boyish smile broke on his lips as he walked over to the vanity’s chair to pull it out and sit on it, facing the mirror.

“You said you could tame it. Prove it.” You were stunned as you looked at him on the mirror. He wants you to do his hair? You cleared your throat as you got behind him and he straightened up as his eyes followed you, as if they had daggers in them just piercing you through.

“I don’t want to hear pain complaints, Munson.” He only chuckles at you, his smile making the butterflies in your stomach multiply for a split second.

“Oh, don’t worry about that.” And you didn’t catch the ulterior meaning of that. Your hands went towards his hair, touching it for the first time. You started brushing it a little bit with your fingers, your nails scratching his scalp a few times, sending shivers through his whole body as you kept going.

“I’m not gonna use a brush, it will just make the frizz worse Eds.” You take the time to comment as you feel the static on his hair. He sighs, nodding at your response.

“I know. I couldn’t find my comb today, so Nance brushed it out.” You groaned at the response, your eyes furrowed in a confused frown.

“Nance has curls, she should know that you don’t brush them.” He lets out a snort at your response, and you are glad that even if you feel that attraction towards him, there’s no awkwardness between the two of you. It calms you down, knowing that if nothing happens, because nothing will, your friendship will still be there.

“Right? And then she blamed me for breaking her hairband!” He complained, making you giggle as you examined his hair. Your tongue stuck out in thought as you grabbed hair from his sides and you pulled them back to hold them together. You looked at him through the mirror and you held your breath as he tilted his head to the side, examining the new look.

You didn’t think a half ponytail would make a difference on his face but– fuck it fits him. You’ve never seen him with one before, and now you hate yourself for being the one who discovered this new look. The butterflies returned, and you shifted on your legs as your core throbbed once. 

“Um… do you like it?” You asked, trying not to sound strained as if you weren’t about to choke on your own drool. “I think that a bun is going to be untameable in a room full of sweat.”

He only chuckles at your thoughts and doesn’t miss the way you gulp or shift in your place as you look at him. Do you really think he doesn’t notice? Do you really believe that he is not looking at your every move?

“It’s different but– Can’t say I dislike it. It’ll do for tonight.” You nod and let go of the hair. You are now more precise in the amount of hair you are grabbing, combing it with your fingers before pulling it back. You want to mess with him as you see him close his eyes, enjoying the moment. You bite your lip, smirking, and you pull hard on his hair, making his head reel back.

“Oops– sorry–” But your voice is cut off as a groan, a growl to be precise vibrates in his throat, his adam’s apple going up and down, and you hear him take a sharp breath through his nose. His jaw clenches as his eyes open and– 

“I dare you to do that again, Peach.” 

Your whole body burns. The way he was looking at you is just– it was strong, threatening but not in a bad way. Not in a murderous way. It was something else… something that gave you the feeling that if you followed through and pulled his hair back again, the thin line that was separating ‘Friendship’ and ‘something else’ was going to break.

You want to pull it back. You want to. You want to see what he would do if you played the brat. You want to know what he would say. You want to test it, to try it, to taste it. Taste him. 

But you let go just a bit as you nod, taking a deep breath in and looking back down at the hair, trying to not let him see how flustered you got, how nervous you feel.

“Sensitive.” Is what you managed to reply with, trying to keep the act that it was just a playful act and that it didn’t faze you. Trying to keep the act that you are not fucking horny for the man that is sitting in your room. Trying to keep the act that you do not want him to push you onto the bed and take you like a fucking animal.

Eddie’s body is a furnace. He wonders how much he can push you to the edge until you absolutely break. Until you are begging for him, until you grab him by the shirt to kiss him senseless, for him to experience a true kiss with you. What the fuck did you do to him? He has to pull himself together. Even if he is willing to take the chance and make a move, it doesn’t mean you are willing to take that same risk.

He understands you and respects you above all. If it happens, it happens, but it would never be without your consent. But he is not reading the signs wrong. He is reading them correctly and very attentively. 

Right now you could have followed his lead, but you didn’t, so he will back off… for now.

“No, it took me a while to grow all this amazing hair. I won’t let you yank it and destroy it.” His tone became playful once more as you tied the bun behind his head. He smiled again towards you and you returned it, a little forced. He wants to smirk knowing that he made you a little nervous, not in an uncomfortable way.

“You’re a fucking idiot.” Your hands finally leave his hair and he looks into the mirror and turns his face a couple of times, a raised eyebrow in exaggeration that makes you roll your eyes. 

“Acceptable.” You scoffed at his simple response and he chuckled, getting up from the chair and towering over you once again. He turned to look at you, his eyes finding yours as your bodies stood a little too close to one another. You didn’t know if you were breathing correctly or not at this point. “Thanks Peach.”

“N-No problem.” Fuck, you stuttered. “Anyways, let’s go back with the others before they think we killed each other.”

“I mean, we could have also fucked, but yeah, we should go before they drink everything.” And just like that, as if he hadn’t said the most shocking thing, he walked out of your room, leaving you completely frozen. You were staring at the door, mouth slightly open, eyes completely still in position as your blood began circulating again.

Your body was on fire, your mind a mess, mixing with his scent and with his words, making matters worse for you. You felt your heart beating in your chest as little butterflies flew all about. 

You have to keep your head centered, your mind needs to recollect itself because you cannot show this in front of your friends. And that made you look at yourself in the mirror, face relaxing a bit as your shoulders slump down a bit. Friends. Yeah. You need to keep yourself under control, you are not an animal. You can fight this urge, you had before in your life with other people, you surely can now.

He is a friend. This crush, this attraction, will pass if not indulged.

You managed to take a deep breath before walking out of your room, grabbing your beer from the vanity, and seeing your friends having moved their endeavors from the kitchen into your living room. Your eyes fall on Eddie immediately as he sits down on your couch next to Steve, beer in hand and listening to his best friend.

“Now that’s a new hairstyle.” You heard the freckled man comment as you walked towards the chairs they grabbed from your dining table, putting them around the coffee table where all the drinks and snacks were placed. You sat down next to Robin who was preparing Nancy her drink, making you wince at the amount of rum she was pouring in.

“Robs, maybe let others manage the drinks?” You commented, making your friend glare at you, putting the bottle down.

“Why? You got something to say about my bartending abilities?” And Nancy only winced next to her, taking the glass Robin was preparing and pouring half of the rum into an empty cup. Robin’s mouth fell agape as she looked at her girlfriend.

“You do make them pretty strong baby.” You noticed Robin’s blush and you held in a smile as you looked to your front, seeing Eddie looking at the same thing, his eyes clashing with yours with a smile on his face.

You were both happy your two friends finally made it official, but it was still pretty funny to see Robin blush after acting tough and dominating in the flirting stance of the relationship. It’s a funny dynamic to watch. Robin huffed and helped Nancy fill the rest of the glasses with coke as you took a sip of your beer.

“So, this bouncer is a regular at Jonny’s?” Eddie asked as he looked at Steve and then back at Jonathan and the latter nodded as he drank a bit of his drink.

“Yeah, he’s gonna let us go in for free, even give us two free drinks and VIP section.” At his words, Steve frowned.

“You sure he isn’t trying to come onto you? Does he know you are taken, my love?” Steve’s voice was syrupy, making you giggle into the can as you looked back and forth, but you had to be honest and say that… it did sound compromising on the other guy’s part. 

“Pretty sure, he is married, has two gorgeous kids even.” Jonathan smiled but the mention of kids only made your stomach curl slightly. You looked down at your can, not noticing the pair of brown eyes staring at you, gaze softening as he watched your body language. 

“That doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to suck your cock Jonathan.” Eddie says and that made you spit your drink into your can, followed by your laughter, making him smile while looking at you. “You know I’m fucking right!” and you could only nod at that.

“Y-Yeah! It– It doesn’t mean anything Jonathan, oh my god…” You coughed as you tried to stop your laughter, the comment catching you completely off guard. The rest of the group was laughing except for the couple that was just frowning, one in confusion and the other in anger.

“I– I swear it’s not, it’s just– He is a regular with his other friends…” You knew Jonathan was putting the puzzle together in his head while Steve only groaned exasperated, shaking his head at his boyfriend.

“We’re not going.” His voice was low as he took a sip of his beer and everyone, including yourself gasped and started complaining at him. Argyle even stood up, pointing a finger at him.

“The other guy already compromised, when he sees Jonathan with someone else, he can’t say ‘no, you cannot go in!’” He stated and you nodded wildly, looking at Steve with pleading eyes.

“If he does, his intentions would be obvious! He just won’t invite Jonathan again!” Eddie nodded at your statement and looked back at his best friend. There was a hidden intent in his mind to try to convince his friend. 

He wanted to watch you dance in that outfit.

“Yeah man, he already told Jonathan he would let him through.” And Steve only groaned in defeat, rolling his head exasperated. 

“Fine. But I will punch his face in if he tries anything at all and I hope I don’t see him in the bar either after this.” He takes a sip of his beer while Jonathan rolls his eyes, sitting on the floor next to Argyle once more. Everyone else let out a sigh of relief and the music played in the background. 

And after a few drinks, cans of beer, and a few little games–

“Okay no, I didn’t say that! I said–” You yelled with a slight slur as everyone else tried to hold in their laughter, Eddie chuckling as he shook his head.

“You literally said, HEAR ME OUT, when I sent you a video of Venom… of Venom, Peach!” You were laughing, your eyes slightly red as you sat next to Nancy in the backseat, Eddie sat in the passenger seat, and Argyle was driving, completely sober. Nancy was cracking up as she patted your shoulder a few times.

“You’re fucking right though!” She said to you and you turned to face her and nodded wildly with excitement in your eyes.

“Right!? It’s the tongue!” And you two could hear a groan of disgust from Eddie and Argyle at the front of the car. Eddie was buzzed as well, eyes glossy from laughing the whole drive to the club. He has been going at you from a past conversation you two had with your weirdest crushes. 

He thought his were weird… he was wrong.

“It’s– He can literally eat you alive in two bites!” Eddie yelled as he ran his hands over his face trying to stop laughing and Argyle only nodded his head, looking at Eddie for a second.

“Hot.” And Argyle’s response made the three intoxicated people in the car start laughing once more. When Eddie and you are together with your friends, the flirty bantering drops completely, and it’s moments like these that fill you with joy. It’s just when the two of you are alone that somehow the flirty remarks escape your mouth.

You don’t want those moments with your friends to be filled with awkwardness, or nervousness if something were to happen between Eddie and you. You might lose that forever, and not to mention losing Eddie as a friend. You doubt that friendships remain the same after having sex with each other. 

But the beer in your system tonight… it’s being your worst enemy at the moment.

After parking and getting together with the others, you all walked the block towards the club. You could hear the music thumping already, making your excitement grow as you all went forward to the VIP line that was forming outside. Eddie stood behind you as Jonathan stood in front of you all. 

His hand rested on your lower back as he guided you in front of him through the line so people wouldn’t bump into you, and you couldn’t even feel the chill of the night because of it. Not even after everyone got inside after Jonathan proved that the guy, the bouncer, was actually being friendly with him. The club felt humid, hot, and you still felt the lingering touch of Eddie’s fingers on the small part where your skin showed between your top and pants.

Your mind needed a distraction from it all, but when you turned and saw how the lights of the club hit his face just right, you felt your stomach do a complete turn, twisting into itself. He was smiling as Steve laughed about something to him while you all walked towards the bar. You had to get yourself together, this cannot happen, not at all. Your urges can be satisfied with someone else, or by yourself. 

But you weren’t the only one who couldn’t look away. Eddie noticed it. All the time. He knew that his mind, even if hazy, wasn't playing any tricks on him. He looked at how you leaned over the bar, giggling with Robin next to you and pointing to the card to see what you would order. His eyes scanned all over your body, slow, and uncontrollably so.

The alcohol is making his desire even worse than before and his rational mind is slipping away slowly, that little thread of doubt of making the next step disappear each second and song that passes. 

His eyes widen with Steve when he sees the bartender hand you a bucket full of ice with champagne and redbulls inside while Robin grabs various glasses. You turn with a smile on your face as you walk over to them again, Eddie crossing his arms as he scans you.

“Well, you gonna share?” He manages to speak loudly over the music as you smile up at him and shake your head.

“Not with you Munson!” You giggled at him as Nancy guided you all to an empty small table for you to put the bucket on. He laughed as Steve rolled his eyes, huffing again for not being able to drink at all as they walked to the table.

“Robin! Get your hands off the champagne bottle!” Eddie yelled as he snatched the bottle from Robin’s hands, causing the blonde to pout at him.

“Fuck off Eddie!” Suddenly, the table rattles as someone deposits another bucket filled with ice and beers. Steves turns his head to see Jonathan smiling widely.

“Invitation from the bouncer. His wife is the cashier of the bar!” Steve only rolled his eyes while everyone cheered for the free drinks. Eddie popped off the champagne easily as you jumped in excitement next to him. He chuckled as he began pouring the drink halfway into the glasses. You helped by pouring the redbulls in, filling them all up to the brim. Everyone except for Argyle and Steve grabbed glasses and clinked them together before starting to drink.

The buzz was good, minds becoming even more blurry and hazy than before, yet keeping the consciousness intact, except for Robin because she always poured too much alcohol in her glasses at the pregames. Steve was trying really hard to take Robin’s drinks away but she only avoided him, grabbing Nancy’s hand and yours with the other. You giggled as you tried to keep your drink steady in your hand as Robin pulled you both into the dancefloor. 

You laughed when Nancy and Robin sandwiched you in between them as they grind against your body, listening to SZA playing in the speakers, the lights blinding you slightly, making you a bit dizzy in a fun way. You took a sip of your glass as your hips moved from side to side, slowly, unaware of the brown eyes that looked at your every move from across the dancefloor.

Eddie chugged his champagne down, his eyes moving away from your body to try to think of something else, for someone to catch his eye and to occupy his mind but nothing worked. The spin in his head only made him turn his head towards you again. Jonathan was chuckling, pecking Steve on the mouth many times, trying to make his boyfriend laugh, and it seemed it worked. 

Eddie’s drunken mind couldn’t help but wander to more dangerous territory, a place where you are still not there, and Eddie is thankful for that. When he sees Nancy or Steve, he wonders if there is someone out there for him. He wonders if he even has a chance. He wonders if there is someone out there that won’t let him be alone for the rest of his life like he always thought he was going to end up as. 

But even his intoxicated mind sometimes connects dots, and he is stricken by the realization that… if he makes a move on you, what is going to happen later? What if it escalates into things he is not used to? What if he curses you with who he is? With what he is? Would you even want him if you knew half of what he was and is going through?

That only prompts him to grab another can of beer from Jonathan’s bucket. He opens it and starts chugging it, only to feel a presence by his side. When he looks down, his eyes clash with yours. You are smiling, and by how your eyes are half lidded, he knows you are drunk, just like he is. 

And fuck you look hot like this.

“Give me one?” You asked, innocently, your hips swaying slightly to the rhythm of the music still, and his eyes darted downwards to them before looking away and getting a can out of the bucket. He was about to hand it over to you, your hand reaching out to grab it, only for him to rip it away again, making you pout. “Hey!”

“Magic word?” He grinned at you, wiggling the can in his hand. Your friends were oblivious to you two, already used to the antics of bothering one another. Nancy and Robin were making out on the dancefloor, Jonathan was pulling Steve towards it while Argyle seemed to spot someone and disappear into the crowd. 

You stared at his hand and then back at him. The buzz made you bold, your worries slipping, your thoughts disappearing, making the impulsiveness take over. You wanted to mess with him. You wanted to tease him. You wanted to be mean, desired, try to make that thread that separates friendship to something else waver a bit. 

You took a step forward, your body sticking to his, and your eyes never left his in every movement. His eyes didn’t widen, but his breathing became elaborate as you raised yourself on your tippy toes in order to get closer to his face. You could smell the beer from his breath, the wooden cologne, the sweat, and it made your insides turn and melt in need. 

His eyes went back and forth between your eyes and lips, not knowing where to stay. He felt his belly burn and ache, twist as your perfume invaded his space, your body heat invaded his own, and all worries started to vanish again. All thoughts, all rationality were rendered stupid as he looked at your lips. 

“Please…?” It was soft, a whimper, a moan almost. Eddie’s brain short-circuited, not noticing his arm lowered as his eyes looked into yours. You were so close, and all he needed to do was wrap his arm around your frame and lean down, take your lips into his, kiss you stupid, senseless, make you yearn for more.

You were trying to keep a cool exterior, but inside you were in flames. Would it be so bad to have a taste? Would it really cause all the chaos your sober mind conjured up? Would it be so bad to kiss his lips again? To tangle your tongue with his? Take him properly? 

He tilted his head slightly at you, the music, the people, all just became muffled background noise. He could feel your chest moving up and down, your breathing turning quick. He didn’t even smirk, not a grin, as he lowered his head towards you, his voice lowering a few tones, but loud enough for you to hear him. His lips were almost brushing on yours as he spoke.

“Please what, Peach?” 

You felt your knees becoming weak, wobbling slightly at the closeness. Your heart was in your throat, beating intensely, making your breathing elaborate. His eyes were stuck on yours, waiting for your next move, for your next retort, to know if you would continue or if you would back out. 

And you don’t want him to win. Not this. Not like your Mario Kart plays. He cannot win this. You won’t be the one to break. You placed your hand on his hip, giving it a soft press and you saw how he closed his eyes and you don’t know if it was the alcohol, or the vibrations of the bass in the club, but you felt tingling on your fingertips and what sounded like a groan vibrate in his throat before he opened his eyes again.

“Please Eddie…” His stomach turned at your whimper, at your pout, at the needy look in your eyes. You both don’t know what you were asking for any more. Your eyes were going back and forth between his and then his lips. He could feel his hip burning where you were grabbing him, his heart racing in need as his head moved forward, a magnet. He was going in and you noticed.

But it was short-lived, as you snatched the can out of his grip thanks to him being distracted and you took a step back and away from his lips. His eyes were wide, looking at you as you opened the can, moving your hips happily from side to side to the rhythm of the music, not looking at him at all. 

You took a sip, and even if you wanted to look at his reaction, you turned and walked back into the dancefloor. Your nerves were all over the place, your mind twirling like a carousel because of the adrenaline, the alcohol, and the worry that the sober you will deal with the next day. And Eddie watched you walk away, his eyes burning and he did a quick turn to grab a can himself and chug it down.

He was angry. Oh so fucking angry.

He didn’t want anybody right now. He felt like a predator and he had to calm down. He had to drink alcohol for his mind to shut off, afraid of how he could act here, in front of all of your friends. He could care two shits for the strangers, he would fuck you in the middle of the dancefloor to show you who’s in fucking charge here.

Eddie didn’t like that thought. He cracked his neck and chugged the rest of the can down, hoping the alcohol would take effect soon. He spent the night talking to Argyle once he came back, who was not the dancing type, just like Eddie was. He had seen a few of his past hook ups walking by, batting their eyes at him, but he didn’t want anything to do with them. His arousal plummeted at the thought of sleeping with them.

After an hour, Argyle said he would be back only to leave Eddie alone again, but not for long. Someone patted his shoulder and he turned around to see Steve holding Robin up with Nancy on her other side while Jonathan held all their coats.

“Robin is already blabbering nonsense.” Steve stated and Robin giggled, wobbling in her place as she shook her head.

“You– are nonsense, dingus~” She slurred and Eddie couldn’t help but laugh and nod, looking down at Nancy.

“I am assuming you are going with them?” He asks, noticing his tongue is a little slurred too, his anger slowly lifting up as his friends offer distraction.

“Yeah– Can’t leave her alone you know?” He nodded at that and patted Steve on the shoulder and leaned forward to whisper into his ear.

“Go to Jonathan’s. Just in case.” At that Steve sighed and nodded, making Eddie chuckle.

“I’m not stupid, of course I’ll go to Jonathan’s…” He looked back at Robin who suddenly made a gagging motion and he immediately spurred into action, straightening her up. “Alright birdie, time to go before you make a mess of yourself publicly.”

Jonathan wobbled towards Eddie and gave him a kiss on the cheek and then a pat before walking out of the club first. Steve guided Robin out and Nancy gave him a hug and Eddie knew she was also drunk, hugging her back.

“Alright Nance, go take care of your girlfriend.” At his words, Nancy only giggled in delight as she pulled away and bounced a bit in her place.

“Girlfriend, she is my girlfriend, yes, I gotta go take care of my girlfriend!” With that, she rushes away from him, leaving him alone at the table where you all gathered your drinks. He looks around, the people dancing and walking around and he realizes it’s just you, him and Argyle… who he hasn’t seen in a while. 

So he ventures forth. He leaves the table behind as he walks through the crowd of people, rounding the dance floor, and in just two minutes he spots Argyle with a chick. Eddie wanted to holler at his friend, but by the way she was dressed and from pictures Argyle showed him… this was the girl he had been seeing lately. His perfect date and match as he called her.

He took a step forward and he felt his mind spin slightly and now he is feeling that last beer he chugged. He felt light, with a good buzz, his limbs relaxed as he looked into the dancefloor, and his eyes immediately found you.

You were dancing alone, a little bit of sweat on your forehead, moving your head from side to side to The Weeknd playing through the speakers. His feet moved automatically towards you, unable to control himself. His anger from before was coming back up again, but it wasn’t in full force. 

You were oblivious to your surroundings, not noticing you were dancing alone at all. The beer you stole from Eddie was still in your hand as you took sips, your hips going from side to side. You wanted the distraction, because your mind was becoming less rational, less conscious of your decisions, impulsiveness taking hold of your body movements the more you drank from that can of beer. 

Some people call it liquid courage, but for you tonight, it was liquid demise. Much more when a strong hand pressed on your shoulder, making your eyes open and turn around, trying not to tumble in your place. Deep brown eyes with red all around were looking down at you with an eyebrow raised in question. 

His forehead was a bit sweaty, so his fringe was sticking to it. His hair was a tad greasy, making it look kind of wet, which only added more to the look. Your stomach only turned even more at the sight, and he leaned forward, his breath hitting your ear which made your center only pulse for him, asking for him.

“Everyone else left Peach. Argyle is with Eden in a corner here.” He whispered to you and you nodded a bit, but words were stuck in your throat from how low his voice sounded, of how close he was. His breath sent shivers down your spine as it hit your ear, squirming at his mere presence. You licked your lips as you took a sip of the beer and he pulled away.

“What happened?” You slurred and Eddie only laughed at your tone making you pout. He noticed the pout and he bit his bottom lip in order to not succumb to the alcohol’s impulsiveness.

“Robin was about to pass out. Nance went with her.” And it dawned on you that you two were alone… the only friend in the club was occupied, distracted, eyes averted from the two of you. 

“How come you are not drunk?” You yelled through the music with your pout intact and he rolled his eyes, which was a bad idea because his head only whirled around and he only laughed, making you tilt your head confused but still smiling at his display.

“Oh, no, I’m drunk– Trust me, that last beer is starting to hit.” And you noticed the slight slur in his words, making you bite your bottom lip as you saw him smile, his canines showing in the middle of the purple lights of the club. 

The song ‘Pray for me’ started playing and you threw your head back in delight as your hips started swaying seductively, taking a sip of your beer. Eddie’s smile slowly dropped as his eyes scanned the expanse of your exposed neck, the sheer sweat and glitter on your skin as he throbbed inside his pants for you.

You opened your eyes again, a smile on your face as you let the impulsiveness of irrational actions take over. You grabbed his hand, ignoring the shock that was sent to your fingertips, smiling innocently at him.

“Dance Munson!” You yell through the music as you turn around in order to give your back to him. He sucked in a sharp breath as you moved in front of him. His eyes roamed your body as it moved from side to side and his hands itched for more. You were still holding his right hand and his throat bobbed as he felt shockwaves through his body thanks to your touch.

You knew what you were doing, but you couldn’t care anymore. Your rational mind was gone, even if conscious and knowing what you were doing, you cared two shits for the consequences of your actions. Will you regret it the next day? Probably, but right now you just want to bask in this attention, in this need. 

You took a sip of your beer as you moved lower, your ass almost touching him as you swayed it, and then straightened up again. Your breath catches in your throat when the hand you were holding lets go and starts gliding over your arm, slowly, and then goes downwards to grab onto your hip. 

A strangled moan escapes your lips when his body is suddenly pressed against yours. His chest on your back, and his hips against yours. His other hand went to your hip but moved a bit more to your front, pressing the side of your belly with the tips of his fingers. That simple action made your pussy clench onto nothing. 

You feel his hips moving slowly against yours and you press your ass onto him even more. You have danced close to Steve and Jonathan before, even Robin, but with him it was different. This wasn’t just a friendly dance. This is so much more. Every touch means so much more than just that. Every movement was intentional now, the alcohol controlling the both of you as the music guided your hips.

His face came close to your ear, his breath hitting your skin again, and your heart jumped to your throat as his fingers dug into your hips, your flesh, and it was making those areas burn. Your hips moved very slowly, never stopping as he talked lowly to you, tickling you.

“What do you think you are doing Peach?” You licked your lips as a sigh escaped them afterwards. In all honesty, you didn’t know, your mind is not ready to think of an answer to that right now. What were you doing? What was your plan? What’s going to happen?

That’s something you can worry about tomorrow.

You slowly turned around in his arms, looking up at him, squinting your eyes. His face was close, his breath and scent driving your senses to an overdrive. Your eyes were half-lidded thanks to the intoxication in your body, and his face was showing hints of redness as well. His right hand rested on your hip still while the left one moved upwards, getting hold of your waist.

“I’m just dancing… with a friend.” He wanted to laugh at your response. You were such a fucking bitch. You still dared to call him a friend after your words, after your ass pressed against his dick. His face became stern as he looked down at you, his fingers giving a warning press onto your hip.

“You are overdoing it tonight, sweetheart.” It was a threat, a line he was drawing between the two of you. You knew you were. You knew you were being a fucking idiot, but you couldn’t help it. Your eyes were fixated on his lips, and you shouldn’t do this while drunk. You shouldn’t but– when else were you going to?

Your arms went upwards and wrapped around his shoulders, the can of beer gripped tight on your left hand as you looked up at him. You pressed your chest against his as the hand on your waist moved towards your back, splaying his palm over the expanse of it to press you into him. 

You two were drunk. Not smashed, but you can both blame it on the intoxication. It’s a good excuse. A perfect one. This is just the alcohol’s doing, just the stupidness of the drinks you took through the night taking effect. It was an opening, a leverage, an opportunity.

And you were going to take it.

“Oh, and you aren’t?” You mumbled as you pressed yourself closer to him, and everything around the two of you ceased. The music became low, suppressed, and reverbed even, as your ears pulsed at each bass drop. His body was broader than yours, his body felt hot against yours as his hands gripped you, his head lowering with a smirk in his face.

“Did I? You sound bothered.” Your lips were almost there, about to touch, even if barely. His breath was mixing with yours. You could smell the beers, and you could feel how hot the air around you two was. His fingertips were driving you insane, and your impulses talked for you. 

Fuck this. 

“Shut up Eddie.” And you connected your lips to his. Your brain short-circuited, completely, it felt as if the oxygen left it, leaving only fog, haziness, bliss. You sighed into his lips as he breathed out a moan, a very low satisfied moan. 

He didn’t hesitate to move his lips against yours this time. This wasn’t going to be a peck. He needed to kiss you correctly, as it should have happened. His grip on you became stronger, his blood pumping rapidly through his body as the alcohol and hormones started to fight his consciousness, what little was left. 

You dropped the can to the floor, not caring where it landed, there wasn’t much left anyway, you needed to grip his hair, get your fingers through his locks the way you have been wanting to do for so long. So you did just that. Your hands ran from the back to his neck towards his scalp, fingers digging where they could, the tightness of his half ponytail already loosened through the course of the night, letting your nails run freely.

Your lips melted perfectly with one another’s, satisfaction in both of your hearts, but you know this won’t fill you. You know this satisfaction is temporary, a small victory, so you will enjoy this for as long as you can. 

He groaned into the kiss when he felt your nails scratch his nape. He felt himself twitch in his pants, wanting friction against you as he let go more each second that passed, which was dangerous. The hand on your hip traveled south, and ended grabbing a handful of your ass cheek, making you moan in surprise. 

He took your moan as an opportunity to slide his tongue into your mouth and fuck– fuck he was ruined. He was in trouble. You were so sweet, even with the beer taste still lingering in your mouth, on your tongue, you tasted so sweet. Like a fucking peach. He couldn’t help the possessive moan that escaped him as he gripped your ass tightly once more. 

You felt wetness pooling between your legs, the idea of doing something you really shouldn’t adding to the adrenaline, to the sensuality of the situation, but you couldn’t care less right now. All you could think about was Eddie. Eddie and his taste. Eddie and his tongue. Eddie and how fucking good of a kisser he is. Eddie and his big hands grabbing onto any part of your body that he could right now. Eddie and his tattoos. Eddie and his shirtless pictures. Eddie and the happy trail that always peeks out when he takes them. 

His tongue danced with yours, desperately, sloppily, all saliva and teeth, as if this was something you two have been yearning to do for more than you actually think. And maybe it was indeed that way. You just wanted to keep kissing him, but you also wanted to take him home. You wanted to fuck him. You need to fuck him. 

And Eddie won’t be satisfied with this. He knows it. Even in his drunken mind, he knows he won’t be happy until he has you completely. He fucking hates you for this, but he just decided to not care for the consequences. Sober or not. If he doesn’t have you anytime soon, he is going to explode, that’s how he feels. He needs to consume you. Taste you. Claim you. At least once.

You two don’t know how many minutes you spent it making out, like two horny teenagers, but you didn’t care. You didn’t care at all. Everything else didn’t exist right now. It was just the two of you, and your eyebrows twitched as you opened your eyes through the kiss and–

Oh, you were completely drunk. Opening your eyes was a mistake.

You pulled away, recovering your breath as your head fell backwards, eyes closing as your consciousness started to slowly slip away from you. Eddie’s eyes widened, his protectiveness overlapping his lust and his intoxicated state. He held you tightly, feeling you grow limp with each second that passed. He was breathing heavily as he looked at you, shaking you a bit in order for you to open your eyes.

“Peach? You alright?” His worried voice felt like a distant echo. You just wanted to sleep, your mind feeling as if it were on top of a horse in a carousel. It wouldn’t stop spinning, and you were starting to feel so sick.

“Mmm…” It’s all you managed to voice out as you opened your eyes, just a bit, and Eddie noticed that the last beer hit you harder than it should have, and what you two had done just now probably made it worse. 

“Alright, time to go home, let’s get Argyle.” He held you close, and the only thing you felt was as if you were floating. The lights in the clubs were dizzying, your head swirling and your stomach ache worsening. You couldn’t even think of regret for all the drinks you took. You just want to be at home and make this uncomfortable feeling wash away.

You know you were being carried, moved, and it all felt like a rollercoaster. You don’t even know if you puked or not. All you know is that at one point the flashing lights stopped, the hum of an engine was heard, and then you swayed from side to side as your head laid somewhere. On something strong.

The often pinch on your waist waking you up from falling into slumber. More swaying, more ups and downs, and then your feet were no longer on the ground. There were warm lights, and the sickness sort of dulled through this whole amusement park tour you just did. 

Then, softness. Just softness. You could finally close your eyes, hoping for this feeling to go away. Hoping that tonight would be forgotten, or hoping that whatever happened tonight would be enough. Sleep overtook you quickly, easily, but your dreams decided to still invade you. Sober you will wake up tomorrow… and probably regret it all. 

But… that’s a problem for the you of tomorrow. For now, you’ll just enjoy this dream. One where a certain metalhead touches you all over, his tongue running on every inch of skin, kissing you senseless as he rubs onto you, caressing you. This was the only way it would happen, wouldn’t it?

And you slept soundly, with the scent of cologne all around you. 

The wooden cologne.

end of chapter 16

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A/N: I DONT' THINK I CAN APOLOGIZE ENOUGH FOR HOW LONG I TOOK IM SO SORRY.

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[foone]

The way it works is it's a surgery to make you immune to a bullet.

Note, that's not the same as being immune to bullets. You're only immune to a single shot: if someone shoots you twice, you're dead.

You can take the surgery again, though. The only real limitation is that you gotta wait 2-3 weeks between each time. But if you've got the money and the time, you can be as bulletproof as you want.

It doesn't "refill", by the way. Often when the surgery is explained people think it's like "a bullet a day" or "you can get shot once a year" or whatever. Nope! Once you've been shot it's just like you never had that surgery to begin with. If you want to "refill" that immunity? You have the surgery again.

No, there's no upper limit to how many times you can go, that we know of at least. There's one guy in Florida who has made it "his thing" to get the surgery as often as he can. He's currently up to about 50. Obviously there's some people online who've said they're gonna shoot this guy and lower his "record", just to be countrary.

Anyway I'm sure there'd be people who have even higher numbers (anyone who has "getting shot" as a major occupational risk, ie, politicians, soldiers, cops, and anyone doing any kind of residental survey in rural areas), but they only invented the surgery like three years ago, it's just simple math: you can't do much better than that guy.

The invention of the surgery hasn't done much to decrease gun sales, though. I mean, there's been a slight increase in people buying guns with larger capacity, for what I'd consider obvious reasons.

I did see an article suggesting that in the long run it might end up increasing the sale of guns. See their analysis is that two factors are going to drive up gun ownership:

1. People will be more willing to shoot at trespassers and thieves and such, because it'll be more like a warning shot: if they have some immunity, it won't be murder. So far that hasn't really happened as not that many people have the surgery yet. Although it's spreading fast, only major cities have surgeons trained in it, and often waits for surgery can be months long.

2. Conversely, people are going to be more likely to break in and rob and trespass if they know they can't be shot dead for it, because they got the surgery. There'll be a minor uptick in home invasions and such and this'll cause a big predictable panic among middle class homeowners who are now terrified some hooligan is gonna break into their house to steal their iPads. Thus they go throw money at security systems and cameras and guns.

So who knows at this point. If the cost (in both time and money) comes down, maybe it becomes super common for people to be so effectively invulnerable to guns that there's really no point in owning one?

I do agree with the common consensus that this is going to drive a big increase in crimes committed with knives and such. Why take a risk that your target might be immune?

Which reminds me of another thing to clarify because sometimes people online get this very wrong: it's only for bullets! You are not immune to getting hit by a car or poisoned or set on fire. Don't walk into traffic or anything, jesus.

Oh one last thing: there is a blood test that can tell if you have immunity, but it can't tell how many times you've had the surgery. You gotta figure that out yourself: so ask your doctor, search your emails, something. Every day I'm hearing from healthcare workers saying someone came in to get the blood test and it had to be explained to them that we can't tell how much protection you have: only if it's there or not. And I feel like a fool for having to say this, but REMEMBER to subtract any times you've got shot! (if you have been) Obviously!

EDIT: In light of recent events, people are sharing this post and arguing about it a lot, but let me be clear: grazes and small cuts do not count! The exact dividing line is too complicated to explain here (look up "circulatory shock" on Wikipedia), but basically if you don't end up with a big hole in you, the shot doesn't trigger the immunity.

That's how it works: you could have an ear blown clean off, and you'd still not trigger an immunity. So please stop spreading that idiotic conspiracy theory that a former president didn't have any immunity. You can barely run a high-school without being required to have immunity to hold the position, because what if someone shoots you? Come on! Of course he has immunity.

For all we know he's got some prototype experimental shit they use on president's that got him up to 200 in a couple days. There's endless rumors of the DoD funding billions in black budget items to that sort of thing, because of course. Who wouldn't want a way to make bulletproof soldiers? You don't think the soviets are pouring even more into it?

[khaire-traveler]

˖ ⋆ 🀧 Readings & Religion For Yogi - Fundraising For My Dog's Treatment ⚕⋆ ˖

I'm offering various readings and religious writings to help fund Yogi's (my dog) veterinary treatment! I'm hoping to raise $2,000 USD in total! Even if I can't meet the goal exactly, everything counts. ♡

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Detailed Explanation of the Fundraiser: I've decided to give away readings and religious writings for my dog's veterinary treatment. He has an acute glaucoma and will require eye removal surgery which is likely to cost at least $1,600 USD. So far, his combined appointments have cost $1,524 USD in total, without including his future trip to the eye doctor or surgery costs. If you're able, please donate or reblog my post. There's no pressure to donate, but I do appreciate it if you can!

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[kieran-granola]

Tim keeps stealing Jason's helmet.

Nobody can figure out why he does it. He doesn't wear them. As far as the Bats can tell he doesn't destroy them. And it doesn't look like he's taken to reverse-engineering Roy's tech in them either. No, it's like he just.... yoinks them and disappears them.

Jason gets progressively angrier about this because these helmets cost a ton of money, and like, yeah, okay, he has taken them off in the field for dramatic effect before... but he usually gets them back unless they're busted because he's not fucking made of money, Timtopher.

Unfortunately, whenever Jason confronts him, Tim is adamant that he hasn't stolen anything. And the thing is, Jason is sure it's him, but he doesn't have any actual proof he could use to wipe Tim's smug fake-innocent smile off his dumb, pretty face. There's no video footage, no prints from him that prove that he did it, and when Jason breaks into his place to look for his stash he doesn't find a single helmet anywhere.

It's maddening.

Jason: "Bruce, we have to talk about your kleptomaniac."

Bruce: "I have no influence whatsoever on what Selina does with her time."

Jason: "...I meant Tim."

Bruce: "Oh."

Jason: "..."

Bruce: "...Unfortunately I also have no influence whatsoever on what Tim does with his time."

Jason is pretty sure he has more white hairs than he used to because when will Tim's reign of terror cease? Please, he doesn't want to have to ask Bruce for money. It gets so bad that, eventually, Jason gives up on security measures and decides to just... Keep the helmet on at all times.

It's annoying, and it makes sleeping pretty unpleasant but God help him, you won't get away with stealing a single helmet more, Timathan!

Or so he thinks, at least... Until he wakes up without his helmet.

At this point Jason is considering giving up, because... how—what—no way!!!

But.

He still has one more thing to try and that's straight up haunting Tim. Like, he visits Constantine, uses what money he has left to buy a pair of inescapable magical handcuffs ("Don't ask." "I wasn't about to. What you like in bed's your business, big guy." "It's not like th—Ah fuck, you know what, think what you want.") and marches his way to Tim before cuffing them together.

Tim, blinking at the cuffs, bemused: "You didn't think that one through, did you?"

Jason: "Shut up."

Tim: "No, seriously, what if I need to pee?"

Jason: "Guess you better confess your sins then, or you and I are gonna get verrryyy well acquainted."

Unfortunately for Tim, Jason has the advantage there, because it turns out that the consumption of energy drinks does tend to translate to bathroom uses. Sure, Tim has been to boarding school with shared showers and locker rooms, and he did lose any and all sense of shame. But well... Sharing showers with your schoolmates is one thing, but peeing with your crush staring is another, and he's not an expert on romance but he's pretty sure that would be a faux pas.

With a soul-deep sigh, Tim drags Jason to his lab and finally shows him what he's been doing with the helmets.

Turns out, surviving a warehouse explosion is totally possible when one is wearing highly protective armor to spare their brain from any major damage. Sure, contusions and bodily wounds suck, but they can heal, and Bruce has very very good doctors available, as plenty of alternate universe!Jasons have found out.

Tim: "...and see, this is why I HAVEN'T stolen anything, because I just gave your helmet back to you!"

Jason: "Timothy. You're a maniac, and I'm gonna kiss you now."

Tim: "Oh, ok—hmpf!"

[unsolicited-opinions]

I used to run a doctor's office. If your doctor's office hasn't explained this to you, let me do it for them.

You probably don't know how much time your doctor and their staff spend fighting with insurance companies for routine, ordinary things. The stories you see online might leave you thinking that these fights are, if not rare, maybe occasional. A sometimes sort of challenge.

Nope.

It's every day. It's all day. Your doctor's office has employees who fight with insurance companies as a full time job.

This isn't an accident or a side effect of other market forces at work - this is the deliberate, calculated plan the insurance companies have chosen to implement. They know very well it is hurting patients and providers, and they're okay with that because their priority is to maximize ROI for investors and other stakeholders. They're in the business of business, and they don't give a single fuck about human beings or health care.

They've lowered reimbursements in primary care so effectively that primary care has only survived in many parts of the US by becoming a loss leader for larger health systems. You know how the local retail store gets you in the building by selling something at slightly below cost because they know you're likely to buy more once you're inside? It's like that, a loss leader.

The health system where you get your primary care often loses money when you see your PCP, but since your PCP refers you to speciality care inside their own organization, the system makes up the money when your doctor sends you to see their own systems' surgeons, endocrinologists, dermatologists, etc.

Smaller primary care practices literally can't survive. That's why there are almost no independent family doctors any longer. That's why it is so hard to see the same provider with consistency, someone with whom you can develop trust over time, who knows you and knows your challenges. United Healthcare and it's private healthcare insurance competitors have nearly finished killing off that kind of primary care.

Larger primary care practices (30-40 providers) might still be able to make ends meet independently through economies of scale and/or what they earn by doing their own lab/testing/imaging services in-house, but that won't work much longer if current trends continue. We're headed in the direction of just a handful of vertically integrated businesses running healthcare, and they are in the business of business, not health care.

The insurance companies deliberately create administrative barriers which make it expensive for your doctor's office to advocate for you because it moves administrative costs away from the insurance company and onto your doctor's office. This results in fewer paid claims when your doctor's office can't afford to hire another full time position whose only job is to argue with insurance companies and jump through their deliberately obstructive hoops. They want your PCP to be struggling to stay open. They want your PCP unable to afford the cost of overcoming the administrative burdens they have deliberately created for the purpose of denying you the health care your doctor thinks you need.

There are other words for this, but the most appropriate one is "evil."

I don't want to glorify murder or lionize Luigi Mangione, but Brian Thompson was a ghoul, his senior team are ghouls, and the for-profit health insurance industry is a disaster for Americans, even those Americans who don't yet see the problem affecting themselves. They will.

We need universal, single-payer health coverage, just like every other wealthy nation.

We're not going to get it any time soon, and things are about to get worse for healthcare in the US.

Set aside the damage RFK Jr is likely to do to an already patchwork public health system by attacking regulations and spreading misinformation. Let's look at other ways Trump and the GOP plan to worsen health care.

1. They're going to go after Medicare and Medicaid benefits. They'll seek to lower them and raise the bar which must be cleared to receive them.

2. They're going to seek to raise the age for social security benefits (above 70!), and reduce benefits paid, so the most financially vulnerable seniors will have greater out-of-pocket costs. Those seniors are going to struggle harder with out-of-pocket costs.

3. They're going to attempt to cripple the Affordable Care Act (AKA 'Obamacare'), despite the fact that the ACA has been a HUGE money maker for the private insurance companies.

4. This administration will be run by hyper capitalist billionaires. It will seek to deregulate wherever possible and promote supply-side economics (tax breaks for the rich and large corporations) at every opportunity. United Healthcare and its competitors, which already weild an obscene, horrific amount of control over US Healthcare, are about to get substantially more power.

It's bad, folks. It's a very bad time to be sick and it's going to get worse.

Alan Grayson was right in 2009. The Republican health care plan has been and remains:

* Don't get sick

* If you do get sick, die quickly.

[sooptea]

Saw that some folks don't know how American Private Insurance Works, so I wanted to show some real life examples of how mine works. For transparency I do not use United Healthcare (I have had them in the past), my numbers are from the insurance I have which is called Aetna; and the plan I use is available through my employer (so if I quit or get fired, I lose my insurance).

So, in my experience. Copays (the amount of money you owe upfront for an appointment) varries depending on what doctor you're seeing. I have to pay this every time I see a doctor, and if I do not have an FSA/HSA card then I have to pay with one of my personal cards.

For a Primary / Family Doctor $30 USD -

For a Specialist (Physical Therapy, Therapist, Orthopedics, literally any specialty doctor) $60 USD -

Urgent Care $75 USD -

Emergency Room $300 USD -

And where does that leave me, 6 months into my year plan (because this resets to Zero every time the plan renews)?

What Does that mean? That means if I went to a hospital today and had to stay overnight, I'd be responsible for $2,422.16 USD before my insurance would cover anything. And I would have to spend another $2,135.40 USD before they would 100% cover the cost. If I needed any surgery, any care, anything that gives a bill, I am responsible for it until I meet those "goals"

But the fun part? I don't know what that would mean for my primary care doctor visits after I meet my out of pocket maximum, because I have NEVER met either my deductible or my out of pocket maximum. Not because I didn't have expensive bills! But because they never fucking applied. Because all of this still hinges on you being IN-network. So if you go to a doctor that's out of network, those numbers are different! They're higher.

I did 13 sessions of physical therapy about 1.5 months ago. That was $780 dollars for the copays. Plus an extra $77.84 because of one of the things I was billed for was not covered with my insurance. Oh yeah, even if you go to an in-network doctor there are procedures that aren't covered by your insurance even if they're necessary. If they were out of network I would have been responsible for a total of $3,885 additional dollars on top of my $780 I paid in co-pays. And that would not have counted towards my deductible. It would have been towards my out-of-pocket max.

I have to look up local doctors in my town to make sure they are in network, people have to look up HOSPITALS to make sure they are in network. Our system is fucked up. I have had reoccurring chest pains since childhood that they can't figure out why, and anytime I get a flair up I have to figure out if I want to take the risk of it being a heart attack or not because it costs $300 to be seen by the emergency room (because urgent care cannot help with chest pain). When my father had a grand mal seizure and possibly hit his head, I as a teenager had to figure out in a moment of crisis if I needed to call 911 or not. Because my father is epileptic with a different type of seizure (partial complex) and while he had frequent episodes, he had not had a grand mal seizure for over 12 years at that point, and I didn't know if we could afford the ambulance. That was one of the most terrifying moments in my life, point blank, made worse because of how fucked up our insurance system is.

[kayas-kosmos]

Because of what's happening on Twitter...

I've made a little diagram to demonstrate why billionaires and the ultra-wealthy are bad for society.

(Text in Image)

"If we view society as a body, every sector is like a different organ within the body that serves a function and works in harmony with other organs to maintain balance. Every part of the body is important for the whole thing to function."

"The ultra-wealthy want you to believe they are the beating heart and thinking mind of the society – they are the innovators who create our jobs and their brilliance drives society forward. They deserve to be at the top of society because they have earned that. Without them, the body won’t function because they are the most important part."

"In reality, they are more like a malignant tumour, sucking all of the blood (resources) away from everything else (people and the planet) to fuel its own infinite growth, depriving the rest of the body and slowly killing it. Workers create all of the innovation and keep things running, the ultra-wealthy take all the credit."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a public domain image so feel free to pinch it for whatever.

Elon Musk has put the careers of thousands of small business owners who depend on Twitter (myself included) in jeopardy by completely running it into the ground. Before this, Mark Zuckerberg had already been doing the same when he started pursuing Metaverse, making Instagram and Facebook much more unusable for artists. Do I really need to go into other examples of CEOs and very normalised practise of wage theft?

Meanwhile, the UK currently has the richest Prime Minister in its history. What is this man doing with this wealth? Continuing the Tory legacy of austerity in order to line his pockets and the pockets of his crony friends. This has resulted in a devastating cost of living crisis that continues to ravage the country as people's energy bills skyrocket out of control.

My diagram is pretty basic and lacks nuance, there's definitely more I could elaborate on with this comparison but I really don't have time. I just want people to get the basic point of how billionaires view themselves vs what function they actually serve. I'm also not here to debate whether some organs are more important than others since I'm not a doctor, that's not really the point here. And no, I don't care if people think I'm being harsh by comparing billionaires to a tumour. If they don't want to be compared to one they should stop acting like one. Jeff Bezos could end world hunger right now and chooses not to.

Also, I know a lot of people are going to come at me with the argument that billionaires give away massive amounts of money. First off, people like Jeff Bezos only give large sums of money to charity a.) for the sake of improving their public image and b.) because giving to charity allows them to write it off in their taxes. Also, charities in of themselves have a lot of problems, but that's a blog post for another day. Mutual Aid is a better way to help people directly. Really, the ultra wealthy need to be taxed, of course they do everything within their power to avoid taxes.

Also:

"Earning a lot of money" and "holding onto a lot of money" are two different things. You cannot be a multi-millionaire unless you hold onto that money. If you give away massive chunks of it to enrich society, you cease to be a billionaire.

Oh and this is worth a watch, too.

Furthermore:

Also before the inevitable great man comments:

Being a billionaire is a moral failing. Nobody needs that much money.

[Slight edit here - I made the assertion that a billionaire could not spend all of their money in their lifetime, but as someone in the comments pointed out it's very easy for them to completely waste billions in no time. Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg have shown that].

Anyway, if you would like to see more anti-Capitalist art from me, I am currently working on a webcomic called "Flowerpunk" - a story about a group of anarchists who are trying to save the city of Wyrdon from a supernatural plague known as "the rot." The comic heavily discusses disaster Capitalism and how the rich will use mass death and destruction as an opportunity to further line their pockets.

I also like to do little anti-Capitalist doodles relating to this project, which I plan to make into posters at some point.

Please consider donating a Ko-Fi also if you would like to help support this project. I am really struggling at the moment because I've basically lost a massive chunk of my client base due to this Twitter implosion and also because of the AI BS that has made it impossible for me to get any reach nowadays. The last year or so has been an absolute nightmare for my career because of all of this.

Thank you all for your continued support! Hopefully I can re-establish my audience here on Tumblr and wherever else I decide to go.

[lunasdreamytreats]

Best kept secrets

Baizhu x fem!reader

Warnings: NSFW // !PSUDO STEPFATHER/STEPDAUGHTER RELATIONSHIP! don't like, don't read // modern au // legal age-gap (Baizhu's in his late 30's, reader's in their early 20's) // drinking wine // reader calls their mother 'mama' // petnames (darling, little girl / good girl) // daddy kink (u call him it a few times and he calls himself it too) // mentions of drugs and aphrodisiacs // begging // oral (m+f receiving) // fingering // dumbification // bad writing (was still finding my writing style as i began writing and its not fully proofread)

Word count: 3.5k... (jeez i went crazy)

A/N: HBD MY LOVE 🥰 I love Baizhu sm, been planning this bad boy forever. Please enjoy and make sure to read the warnings carefully and lmk if I missed something ❤️

'How did this happen again?' You ask yourself as you accept another kiss from the man you knew as your stepfather. It feels so wrong, until you remember how your own mother is a cheating gold digger herself. Virtually your whole life up until a year ago had been on the move. Your mother would marry rich men who owned whole companies or company branches and either bankrupt them and leave or cause a scandal so they go out of business and leave. Over 19 years you’ve had a total of 10 stepfathers and you've never been really close with any of them.

As far as you know, the most recent one is the only one out of your stepfathers that has more than one source of income. He owns the only pharmacy in town while also working as a doctor. It must be taking longer to burn through it than normal, you thought, since you're still there.

You feel as if you should be grateful that your mother hasn't ruined it yet, because you've grown fond of life in this family. Your little sister Qiqi absolutely adores you as her big sister. Although your not sure if your mother knows about this, but your stepdad, Baizhu, absolutely loves being able to spend his money on you. Whenever you get off work he'll wait outside for you in the car with your favourite music ready to play. He'd drive around town with you for half an hour before going to pick Qiqi up from school. If you saw anything you wanted while driving, he'd tell you to quickly jump out and buy it with his card.

“Sweetie I don't care how much it costs if you want it I'll gladly get it for you.” Is what he'd say if you tried to protest in any way, in the end, you’ve just accepted it as him wanting to spoil you. Baizhu was very different to any of your other stepfathers, for one, he's making an effort to bond with you..... Oh and he's young, well, young compared to the others. At only 35 when they got married, he was 2 years your mother’s junior and 17 years your senior.

The 4 of you lived a fairly drama-free life up until tonight, when Baizhu came back home after dropping sweet Qiqi off at her best friend Yaoyao's house for her very first sleepover. He came in and asked you to come downstairs and sit on the couch, saying he needed to ask you about something important. You promptly closed the game you were playing and put the controller back, coming down to see Baizhu in the kitchen with a bottle of white wine and 2 glasses.

“Oh? What's the special occasion, Dad?” You asked before sitting back down with him.

“It's about your mother, (Y/N).” You froze slightly, wanting to ask him if anything bad happened to her. However, before you could speak, he placed one of the full glasses of wine into your hand.

"Do you know if she cheated on any of your other stepfathers, like any one of them?"

“Well I don't know for certain, but I've got a feeling she cheated on all of them, including my father.” You lifted the glass of wine up to the light and swirled the liquid around before continuing.

“Right when she leaves them, I found that either their companies crumbled, or they declared bankruptcy. Some less than 6 months after their wedding. It's happened way too many times to be a total coincidence.” Looking over at him, you saw a small sigh leave his lips as his eyes met yours. The low light of the lamps on the wall adjacent to him made his golden irises glow. ‘Oh fuck that's really pretty.... h-hold on a god damn second, that's your stepdad your talking about, dumbass!’ You quickly shook the thought out of your head and took a sip of wine to distract yourself.

“Why'd ya ask?”

“I saw your mother with someone and they were talking about how long until they can run off together....” You always had a feeling she had an accomplice her little scheme, but a whole ass lover all these years? Baizhu leaned forward in order to put the wine glass back on the counter and shifted to face you.

“Thank you for telling me this, my darling.” Eh why the lovey dovey language? He seems to be awfully calm for someone who just found out what a horrible person his wife is.

“Dad.... now that you've caught mama, when do you want us out of here by?”

“Hm? Why would I kick you out, darling?” Again with the darling! Is this really how fathers express their affection towards their children?

“I-I just thought since she's cheating on you, you wouldn't want her or her child arou-!” He's laughing? How? You thought he'd be annoyed. And yet here he is, not only not giving a toss about the current situation, he's laughing at it.... Why?

“Do you think I'd leave my cute, sweet little girl all alone without someone that loves her like I do? No no no darling. Besides, this is the best time to show you something that I've been planning this last year.” What could that be? You wondered. Come to think of it, from his plans for Qiqi's birthday party to things he's overheard at work, he's never kept anything a secret from you. He stood up and retrieved a piece of paper from inside a safe in the wall that he hid behind his back so you couldn't see what was written on it. As he sat back down, you managed to catch a small glimpse of the contents of the paper, you saw your signature there and what you can only assume is Baizhu's, both written in black ink next to each other at the bottom of the page.

'Oh! He must be holding the adoption papers we signed after the wedding'. You had another quick glance at the paper again before he folded it up and set it down on the table.... What?? You must be hallucinating because your pretty sure the words 'certificate of marriage' were at the top of the page. Hang on, if that's a marriage certificate, then why did you clearly see your signature next to Baizhu's?

“Did you see it, my darling?” Baizhu's words brought you back into the moment at hand, oh, that and his hand resting on your waist. The small gesture causing a shiver to shoot up your spine. “You’re my real wife. And you have been all this time.”

“How?” The reality of this situation hitting you like a boulder made your voice go hoarse, coming out like a broken cry. How was he able to hide something so big for so long? “How did I not notice it?”

“I'll be honest, I only got close to your mother so I could be with you, my darling. I knew what your mother was when I saw her, now she's the only one in the dark about it.” Baizhu's voice broke through the stifling silence around us. This is so weird, you’ve always thought your stepdad was a nice man, in personality, heart and looks. And you’ve told your friends about how you'd like your future partner to be like him. So should you go along with it?

“B-But what about the wedding night? Didn't you and mama have sex?”

“Nope, she ran off after the ceremony, I spent the night in your room.”

“W-what!? How the fuck did I not feel you?”

“Not when you've taken the deep sleep elixir I put in your food. I’d put it in whenever I knew your mother was going out for the night.”

“Oh, so that's why I hardly remember those nights.”

“Fuck, you're so cute when you don't know what to make of a situation, darling. I wonder what your reaction is going to be when I do this?” With no warning, Baizhu pulled you closer, onto his lap, and kissed your neck. The bold action made you gasp in shock. While you were distracted, he took the opportunity to catch you off guard again and kiss your lips. The kiss was just as he was, gentle and full of passion, yet demanding. Letting you know that although he’s being gentle, he’s still the one in control. He’s holding you so soft and tenderly, it makes this kiss feel like a natural part of life. Like your forgetting you two had a completely different relationship before...

That's how it came to you and your stepd- no, your husband making out in the open space of the living room. :)

'This isn't wrong. He's my husband.' You told yourself as you kissed him back. The grip his hands have on the flesh of your hips was so soft, as if he couldn't bare the thought of hurting you. Which, in a way, was true. He couldn’t bare the thought of being the reason you were in pain. As the kiss deepened, he felt more comfortable in exploring your body. His hands gently glide up your body before setting on your chest. His hands circle your body to where the dress zipper and bra clasp were.

As his arms pulled you closer, his fingers grazed the bit of exposed skin, making you shiver at the contact. Pulling away from your lips, Baizhu looked at you with love filled eyes and ran his finger over the neckline of your dress before hooking a finger on it and tugging at the fabric.

“My darling, can I?” He asked, rather breathless from the deep kiss. You could only nod in response until you find your voice. That was another way that Baizhu shows he cares, he was patient when you couldn’t get your words out. It was a thing you had struggled with for most of your life. And although it was a small gesture, it was something that mama never bothered to get right.

“Y-Yes daddy~” You managed to whisper a response, your head already felt dizzy and the neck kisses didn't help. Hearing daddy leave your mouth must’ve awakened something primal in him. With a newfound spark of lust in his eyes and a tightened grasp on you, his teeth grazed the skin of your shoulders. You reached behind your back to start unzipping your dress, only for your wrists to be pulled away and held back in one of his hands, while the other pulled the zip down slowly.

“Shhh~ darling, let daddy take care of you now.” An uncomfortable thought came into your head; ‘what if mama came back without warning to see her daughter, clothes slipping off, on her ‘stepdad’s’ lap making out with him?’ But don’t worry, Baizhu has a plan to deal with her if she comes back early. There’s no chance he’d allow this perfect moment to slip through his fingers again. After he pulled the zipper went all the way down, Baizhu started to gently draw circles on your newly exposed skin. The heat building up between your legs was getting frustrating, so you started to rub your clit on Baizhu's thigh to relieve yourself. Until he noticed and gently held your hips in place.

“Darling, I thought you’d let me take over tonight.. you know what happens to bad little girls that don't obey their daddies, don't you, darling?” Baizhu whispered, gently kissing the shell of your ear before continuing, “They. get. punished.” Taping your shoulder blade with each word. Each tap of his finger sent electrifying waves of pleasure down your whole body. You can’t help but lean into his touch, drunk on how quickly you crumbled under his teasing. One thing was for certain, however, the pleasure you felt was unreplicable.

“M'sorry daddy.. don’t punish me, I-I’ll b’good, please..!” You plead, hoping he’d be merciful on you. Since nobody can blame you for being needy. After a few minutes of drawing circles on your back, your dress and bra went flying off you, yelping when the cool air collided with your breasts. Smirking, Baizhu gave your hips a squeeze as his lips left a trail of kisses from your jawline down your chest, before latching onto the hardening nipple. Swirling around it with his tongue, he copied the motion on the other with his fingers, tugging whenever he sucked. All night, Baizhu had been focusing on giving pleasure to your most sensitive spots, like he already had a mental map of where he should focus on.

While your attention was taken up by the stimulation to your breasts, Baizhu let his free hand snake down, across your tummy to settle between your legs. One touch of his slender fingers to your puffy folds sent you jolting forward into his neck with a moan. Thing is, that one touch was only light, nothing much to most people. But to you? Mind-numbing. Actually, you don’t think you’ve ever been this sensitive to anything before.... it’s like your sensitivity to touch became enhanced. Could Baizhu have given you something to do this?

“You like that, don't you, darling? Good girl. Tell me, who’s making you feel this good?”

“Y-You daddy, s’you makin me feel good”

“Good. Fucking. Girl.” With every word, he swiped the pad of his thumb against the nub of your clit. Your hips subconsciously bucked into his hand with newfound lust. Like your body was chasing after his touch after he retracted his thumb. Baizhu's fingers ghosted over the outline of your clit, prodding at your hole. Easing the tip of his index finger inside while holding you steady. When your body relaxed, letting him know you were comfortable with him inside, Baizhu pushed you to the couch so you were laying on your back with him on top. The hand that’d been holding you steady now moved from your lower back to hold your cheek softly, catching any tears that fell over your eyes.

“Fuuck, you're clamping on me so tight.. I’ve barely even started with you, never thought a little foreplay would be all it takes to get you begging for me so soon, darling.” Don’t mind him though, he’s just being all mean and teasing you! He began slowly moving his finger in and out, slightly curving it to graze your soft inner walls. He added a second finger gently, stretching them apart in a scissor motion and continuing to touch places you couldn't dream of being able to touch on your own.

“Fuuck~ ur fingers~ s'deep!” It almost felt uncomfortable, keyword almost. The tender kisses Baizhu left along your body made any kind of discomfort you felt fade away. That is until a strange feeling came creeping into the pit of your stomach. A twisting and churning sensation like a knot threatening to make your insides explode.

“Ha~~! A-Ahh! D-Daddy, feels weird..!”

“Oh? A weird feeling, you say? That's your orgasm building up, darling.” His thumb quickly swiped against the sensitive nub of your clit, “Now be a good little girl and cum for me...” Your eyes peeped open at his words, only for stars to invade your vision as the knot came undone over his fingers and the couch. Your fucked out expression caused Baizhu to smirk in satisfaction, taking pride in being the only person to ever make you orgasm; other than yourself, of course.

“Good girl... ” Baizhu glanced down to where you both connected, taking note of how his wrist was now slightly wet... Did you squirt over him? Or was it sweat? This encounter certainly left you catching your breath.. Your body twitched sporadically as your walls finally began to relax around his fingers, and you sighed in satisfaction. Feeling you come down from your high, Baizhu gently pulled his fingers out, awestruck at your essence which was now dripping down his digits.

“Daddy... love you” You reached your hands out and Baizhu took them in his own, helping your sit up and kissing your knuckles softly.

“Love you too, darling. Cuddles?” He asked, holding his arms out so you could come to him if you wanted. You practically jumped up and slid into his lap, burying your flushed face into his shoulder. ‘Oh, you’re the type to get all cute and cuddly after sexual encounters...’ Baizhu thought, but that’s fine, he’d give all the cuddles you could ever need if you asked. You feel him gently smile on the top of your head alongside wrapping his arms around your middle.

Of course, with all that Baizhu’s done for you tonight, you couldn’t just ignore how hard this encounter made him. His dick throbbed against the cloth holding it back, simply begging for him to do something to relieve it.

“Daddy, lemme help, wanna help it..” You attempted to slip off his lap to kneel between his legs, fully prepared to help him. But he tightens his hold on your body, preventing you from moving much.

“No darling, y’can help me from here.” Baizhu reassured, moving the fabric that concealed his cock out the way. It bounced back against his abdomen, splashing a little precum over his stomach. Your eyes widened, you’ve seen dicks before, (in sex-ed class), but nothing like this. His dick was much bigger than anything you ’ve seen, and certainly bigger than you think you can take. Noticing your unease, Baizhu gently took your wrist and brought your hand to touch it.

“Lemme do it with you, darling... help me feel good too, yeah?” With one arm still holding you tightly, Baizhu’s other hand joined yours, guiding you in jerking him off. Even under two people’s grips, his dick still twitched and pulsed against your hand. Biting your lip, you lean your head down to press small kisses and kitten licks to his swollen, red tip. You looked up at him, still with his tip nestled snuggly in your mouth, eyes trying to convey what you want; for him to use your mouth like a fleshlight.

At first, poor Baizhu didn’t know what to say; he didn’t want to lose his composure and ram into you so hard that it became more uncomfortable than pleasurable, but the look in your eyes conveyed that you were actually begging him to lose it. He let out a long, shaky breath before moving the hand that had been on his cock to hold your hair out of your face. He didn’t even realise he was holding his breath...

“Tap my thigh twice if it gets too much for you, ok darling?” You nodded and began easing more of him into your mouth. He almost couldn’t think straight with just his tip in your mouth, but seeing you slightly struggle to fit him in drove his size kink mad. Baizhu’s fingers raked through your soft hair before setting at the top of your neck, taking control back from you and moving your head along his shaft.

Muffled whimpers and gags mixed with Baizhu’s groans made it easy to lose oneself in ecstasy, so you never noticed the small commotion happening on the other side of the door; never noticed the amused smile on your lover’s face upon realising the trap he and the millelith set achieved it’s intended outcome. Not that you were meant to know about any of this anyway...

“Sh-! Shit, on your knees, darling” You nodded and slid his cock out of your mouth to get into position, obediently for your husband. Baizhu rose from the sofa, guiding his dick back into your mouth as soon as you settled down. This time, he allowed himself the chance to thrust his hips into your mouth, meeting the pace you originally set. His thrusts started slow and deep, becoming more desperate as the pleasure built up.

“god.. m’gonna cum darling” Baizhu’s hold on your hair tightened, pulling at the strands that were wrapped around his slender fingers. He had to lean against the nearest cabinet since his thighs were twitching so much, his legs might’ve given out on him. You have to say, Baizhu’s groans of raw pleasure were a melody you’d never get tired of hearing. Baizhu abruptly pulled out from your mouth, gently taking your hand off from his thigh to place it on his heavy, aching cock.

“Finish it off, darling.. y’did so well, wanna cum on your pretty face..” You nodded and dragged your hand across his dick, feeling the way the large bulging vein running along the underside of his shaft throbbed with need. You leaned a little further up, enough to press your lips against the sensitive skin just underneath his tip. Baizhu’s grip on your hair tightened as his free hand grasped his cock, giving it a few languid pumps.

“Keep still, sweet girl,” He could barely get the words out before the tight coil inside his slender body snapped. Creamy white cum painted your face in spurts and globs, a testament to the adoration that Baizhu had harboured for you for so long.

[nightmaretour]

I hate to do this, and it's a long shot I know, but things are getting desperate and it seems like I'm going to be waiting WAY longer than I should be for something that's fairly urgent.

I'm a disabled trans man living in the UK. Recently I was found to have severe anemia, and came up with my FIT test (gastrointestinal cancer screening) a few months ago, and was referred for a colonoscopy to find out the cause, since it looks like I'm having a slow but constant bleed through my GI tract. However, my referral has been awaiting review for over three months now. I'm not even on the waiting list, I'm waiting for someone to decide if I need to be on the waiting list. Since then I've started having GI symptoms such as pain, intermittent loss of appetite, etc. as well as my anemia worsening significantly.

This is of course pretty urgent, but it looks like I'll be waiting months longer once I finally get on the waiting list too. I really have no choice but to get it done through a private hospital, because of the time sensitive nature of, you know, potentially having cancer. I managed to put some money away out of the backpay I got from PIP, but it's not enough.

[ID: A screenshot of an email that's says:

Dear Mr (name blocked out in red),

Thank you for your website inquiry. For your information, the cost of an initial consultation with one of our consultant gastroenterologists is £280."

It then lists the names of 3 doctors as links, all blocked out in red. The email continues,

"The guide price for a colonoscopy is £2,339. For further information, including appointment availability, please don't hesitate to contact the medical secretaries (followed by three names redacted in red) directly on (phone number redacted in red) or call the private patient team on (phone number redacted in red). End ID]

Currently I have around £1,400 stashed away from PIP backpay I got after they royally fucked things up (however I may need to dip into this at points if I find myself struggling). Together the consultation plus the colonoscopy will cost £2,619, which leaves me about £1220 behind. I know I'm most likely not going to get that much from this, but I honestly have no choice but to try my luck here. I really don't know what else I can do.

I really don't like asking for money from people for nothing, but I have a Ko-fi store where I sell handmade screen printed patches, and I'll be adding more designs to it over the coming weeks when I have the time and energy to make new screens. I'm also offering commissions for custom band patches! (Due to Kofi's TOS I can't officially offer patches for bands without their permission.). Below are a few examples of my work:

[ID: 5 images of patches printed in white on black fabric, all sewn onto a worn looking black denim jacket. All are sewn on roughly in red floss, aside from the last one. The first says "only dates I want are tour dates". The words "dates" and "tour dates" are larger than the other text. All of the letter As are replaced with spade symbols. The second is the logo of the band Cop/Out, which is the band name with rough, jagged edges. The third is the logo for The Prodigy, which is the band name in sharp. Zig-zagging letters. The fourth is the logo for the band Subhumans, a stylised skull shouting into a microphone. The fourth is the horizontal silhouette of a crutch. With the words "Talk shit" above it and "get hit" below it. Unlike the rest it is sewn on in black, and the edge of an embroidered back patch is visible just above it. End ID]

I know a lot of people aren't doing well financially right now, and that there are people in far, far more dire situations who probably need your help far more than I do, but I would appreciate any purchases of patches or help you can offer so, so much. Even just sharing the post would be enormously appreciated.

Current progress:

£115/£1220

And of course as pet tax, here's Cynder :)

[ID: A photo of a female wild type leopard gecko laying spread out on a smooth rounded rock in a glass fronted tank. Her head is sideways and raised, looking at the camera with one eye. She looks relaxed and curious. Behind her a large piece of thick tree bark and a plastic cave can be seen. End ID]

[ljblueteak]

Just over here thinking about how House discusses the idea of Foreman turning into him in season 3 vs. Chase turning into him in season 8.

Here's how he talks about Foreman quitting in Resignation:

House: Foreman resigned. Wilson: Right. He give a reason? House: He said he didn't want to end up like me. I had a brilliant retort. Can't remember what it was at the moment. Wilson: You don't want to end up like you. House: Good point. Can I resign? Wilson: You could try bargaining with him, give him a raise. House: How much do you think it would cost to make him want to be like me?

Here’s the conversation House is talking about with Foreman in Family:

Foreman: I hate that in order to be like you as a doctor, I have to be like you as a human being. I don't want to turn into you. House: You're not. You've been like me since you were eight years old. Foreman : You'll save more people than I will. But I'll settle for killing less. Consider this my two weeks' notice.

And then the discussion with Chase in Chase:

Chase: You're incapable of human connection, so you want everyone to be like you. House: If I wanted you to be like me… I would be urging you to make a stupid, stubborn decision that blows up your life and leaves you lonely and miserable. You reassess your life when you've made mistakes. You didn't. You just got stabbed.

In both cases, House very much understands why they don’t want to be like him (or the him that’s commonly perceived), though his response to Foreman in person is very different from how he talks to Chase. And of course in season 3, Cuddy's trying to convince Foreman that ending up like House isn't such a bad thing while Chase and Wilson are trying to convince House to show Foreman that he’s not really “evil.”

In The Jerk, here’s how Chase puts it to House:

Chase: If you want [Foreman] to stay, tell him. House: I don't and there'd be no point. Chase: You do. And the point would be to make him feel like he's wanted. House: He doesn't need that. Chase: All right, then. It'd make him feel like maybe you weren't evil. He needs that. Talk to Foreman.

In Human Error, it’s Wilson’s turn to tell House to show Foreman that he’s not evil and that he does care.

House: Nothing I can do. He doesn't want more money, better working conditions, doesn't even want a better job. He wants to not be me. Wilson: Because he thinks you're a cold-hearted bastard without any regard for anyone but yourself. House: He's right. Wilson: You need to show him that you really do care…. He's not afraid to be you, he's afraid to be who he thinks you are.

I’m curious what others would have said to Chase if he’d raised concerns about turning into House with them…where are these Chase and Wilson scenes when you need them?

Side note: I love that Chase knows House can and does care about people, but that he doesn’t necessarily care about the things about them that other people might. And that’s fine with Chase in a way that Foreman doesn’t want to be okay with. For example in Human Error, Esteban is told that someone from House’s team is personally examining Esteban’s wife. He’s upset and wants to see House, not just a team member. He explains the massive risks he and his wife took to see House and Chase says, “He doesn't care. I'm sorry, but that's who he is, that's who you risked your life to see. And you made the right choice.”

[punkshort]

Will you eventually do a Swept Away, likes and dislikes post for Joel? The little taste of his character is just delicioussss, he’s so mysterious. I’m dyingggg to crawl inside your brain and see how his character is going to unfold 😍💋

I would love to! I love getting this ask because it always gives me good ideas for future chapters, so thank you!

Let's jump in:

Likes:

1. Sunsets: he loves the colors and how every day is different. He loves it because it's a work of art that everyone in the world can appreciate, no matter who you are.

2. Boxing: it's the only form of exercise he actually enjoys. He really likes taking his anger out on a punching bag, and he tends to hold in a lot of anger from his job.

3. Money: I mean, come on, that's not a big surprise. He likes to live comfortably and without having to worry about the cost of anything. And, sure, when he slaps his black card down and someone does a double take, he feels a rush of pride.

4. Cigars: he didn't used to like them but they have grown on him throughout the years. A colleague of his convinced him to join a cigar club and he found it was a great way to network and rub elbows with the elites.

5. Poetry: he will never admit it, though.

6. Filet Mignon: he loves a perfectly cooked medium rare steak. When he was choosing which restaurant to lease space to on the first floor of his hotel, he only looked at steakhouses because he liked the idea of having a good steak a mere elevator ride away.

7. The Natural Look: he prefers women who don't use too much makeup or plastic surgery/fillers. Almost all of the women he knows, whether through set ups or spouses of his colleagues, all look like they've gone to the same doctor and had the same procedures. He likes women who are comfortable in their skin and aren't fake.

8. McDonald's French fries: it's his Achilles heel. Every now and then after a long, boring art gallery opening or cocktail party, he will instruct his driver to go to McDonald's on the way back to his penthouse to get some fries.

9. Private Jet: he loves being able to come and go whenever he pleases, anywhere he wants. And he especially loves not having to go through security and be surrounded by people squished into a tin can. He likes that he can stretch out and eat a good meal and even sleep in a real bed when he travels, which is often.

Dislikes:

1. Kale: it's a vile weed and he won't touch it.

2. Surprise parties: he absolutely loathes being surprised. Especially when it's been a long enough day and he thinks he's going home to relax and suddenly his penthouse is filled with fifty people drinking all his booze and making a mess of his home and he has to pretend to enjoy it.

3. Lifting weights: he thinks it's obnoxious and he doesn't care about glamour muscles but his trainer always makes him do one day a week where he lifts weights. He gets it over with as quickly as he can.

4. Satin sheets: too slippery and his pillow always ends up on the floor.

5. Campfires: he hates the smoke from campfires because it gets stuck in his clothes and he has to send everything he was wearing to the cleaners right away before it spreads to other fabrics.

6. Lillies: they remind him of funerals.

7. Tea: he could never find a tea he actually enjoyed. All tea tastes like hot water with a dash of some vague flavor and it's just never worth it. Unless he's sick with a sore throat. Then he might have some.

8. Boats: he tends to go out on yachts and sailboats quite a bit, but he doesn't like the open water. He gets seasick and he always has to take pills beforehand.

9. Golf: because all my Joels hate golf, for no particular reason.

[lordelmelloi2]

we need help again...

I hate hate hate hate to make this post but we could really use some help. Mostly because I am uninsured until my job opens enrollment for its health insurance in June and on the eve of us signing the apartment lease tomorrow, I have contracted strep throat from my coworkers. Hooray!

I'm gonna try and get an appointment at the community health center doctor's tomorrow because I straight up don't have the money or time to go to the CVS minuteclinic across the street. They said it was $139 for a strep appointment without insurance, I said hell no... If I wait another day I can try and get a sliding scale $40 appt at the doctors. Right now is just stressful because we need money and because they didn't give us our security deposit back I'm not going to have enough money for my bills the beginning of the month. Plus there are literally THREE prescriptions I have asides from however much a Z pack will likely cost and one of them is an ointment from a compound pharmacy that I don't have money to pay for~!!!! 😭😭😭

Asides from that I am afraid that we miscalculated how much we have for rent for May so I'm trying to see about covering those costs so we aren't paying 3 days late into the month of May for our May rent first month. I really don't want to have a bad first impression with these people. They've been very kind to us so far with renting this new place but I don't want to push the limits.

I've already asked my dad for help but he wasn't able to spare enough for us to be totally covered + he needs me to pay him back by August. During the month of April I also applied to multiple credit unions for personal loans and got rejected...

So my total expenses are:

- Medication/Doctor's visit (including pre-existing prescriptions that I haven't had the money to pick up) ($160)

- Phone bill ($75 for this first month, should be going down next month as verizon charges my account with different coding)

- costs for rent/move (like hopefully $200 idk. I think we can swing the last hundred)

In addition: Because of my history of struggling with commissions due to my psychiatric disability, I don't really want to do this but if you donate a sum above $100 you can ask me to digitally paint something for you. Please no complicated requests or anything since I've been struggling with art for years now from depression/anxiety etc. but I would feel indebted to you if I didn't do anything. If this is something you'd like please DM me/send me an ask off anon.

* As for why we have been so financially fucked this month. Our current apartment complex (yes the one with the leaks, roaches, harmful construction noises etc.) has kept our security deposit which has us out $300 that we could've used towards the new place. They have fucked us over one last time.

My paypal as always is at: paypal.me/roseod

And please share if you can. Every reblog/donation of even a small amount is appreciated. Thank you all so much for supporting me.