#i had so many things i wanted to do and i just. cannot

[mossworth]

Guys, queers. Specifically my fellow queers.

I work at a library. We do this thing where, every so often, we weed the collection. It hurts to see books go, but it's necessary to make sure there's room in the library for new materials.

I have seen so much support for the library in text, and I've seen folks pass around those beautiful "queer your library" flyers. Keep doing that. That's great. Nothing wrong with that. But you HAVE to turn your words into action. We MUST remember to actually go to our local organizations and libraries and actually, with our own fucking hands, interact with these materials we want to see more of.

My branch is medium-sized for a library, maybe a little small. We don't have as many materials as I'd like, but we have fundamentals. Tell me why, even with all the verbal support I've gotten from my local community for the library as a resource for our LGBT+ community, every single trans biography and a good chunk of our vaguely queer theory books were on the list. This isn't a scheme to take the books off the shelves, it isn't another bigoted American governmental push. The only thing we look at when we weed is how long it's been since the last time the item was checked out.

Three years.

No one in my community interacted in any meaningful way with the few books on trans life and history we physically had on the shelves for three fucking years.

I promise you the materials you want and need are there, but this isn't a horde. This isn't a static safety net. You have to use them. You MUST use them or, in the future, maybe in three years, they *won't* be there anymore.

This isn't a vague post, there's no one person I'm hinting at or calling out. I'm not even talking directly to anyone who's directly in my line of sight. I just want everyone to hear this. Big library, small library, whatever. Doesn't matter. Please, we cannot be losing our shelf visibility like this.

[kira-sucks-lawlipops]

I used to work the front reception desk at a hospital that charged exorbitantly for patient and visitor parking. This was an undercover parking lot with a boomgate at the exit, not street parking as in the video above. It cost $13 an hour, for everyone at all times of the day with no exceptions.

Want to wait for a loved one who will be in surgery all day? That'll be a hundred bucks. Come here twice a week for dialysis? Another hundred, but every week for the rest of your life. The real kicker was that it never reset or expired. We had people who came into the emergency room, ended up getting admitted into a ward, and didn't think to do anything about their car sitting in the parking lot for days on end, racking up hour after hour of fees. Then when they finally got discharged, they'd call us from the garage in tears because the ticket machine was telling them they needed to pay thousands of dollars just to go home.

There was one loophole to this. If a ticket malfunctioned at the boomgate, we could press an override button to open it manually. This was for "emergencies only", so we couldn't do anything from the ticket machine, and we couldn't trigger it without receiving a call from the boomgate.

For five years, anytime anyone asked me any sort of question about parking, I would tell them to ignore the ticket machine entirely, go directly to the boomgate and press the 'assisance' button. And then I would let them out of the parking lot.

I probably cost the hospital more than my salary in parking fees.

Why did I do this? Was it out of selfless love for my fellow human beings? A deeply-seated belief that charging people for being sick is evil? A desire to fight the man in whatever small way I could?

Not really.

Don't get me wrong, those things did apply. I think parking fees at hospitals are evil and should be abolished. But my strongest motivator for always letting people out of the parking lot was because that was the easiest way to solve the problem.

Basically the entire time I worked at that hospital I was always 1) too busy 2) too exhausted and 3) not paid enough to care about dealing with the parking lot. The tickets were buggy, the machine was always malfunctioning and the system was exploitative. Why would I ever make that my priority when I had access to a magic button that instantly made the problem go away?

Now pay attention class. Why have I told you this story?

Because it applies to 90% of people whose job it is to monitor parking lots.

I cannot count how many times I've been in some shopping mall or convention centre or whatever, stuck a ticket into a machine and decided that actually I don't want to pay that much for parking here today. So I just drove to the boomgate and pressed the button to call for help and then was allowed to leave for free. All you have to do is say that you already paid at the machine but now the gate isn't reading your ticket correctly. The person who has to resolve that problem for you will almost always choose to hand you a 'get out of parking jail free' card rather than actually try to deal with it.

The only time I've ever gotten challenged was one guy who told me to reverse and come into the parking office (lol no), but I couldn't recerse because there were other cars behind me so he had to let me go. If you are not one for lying just crumple the ticket up a bit or scratch out part of the barcode. Don't say you lost it (some places charge at the boomgate for lost tickets), say the machine can't read it and then say hello to free parking for life.

May 31 2016 - Collin Kennedy, who is a cancer patient, used expanding spray foam to disable a parking meter at the Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg where he gets his treatment. He says the fees are a tax on the sick. [video]

[wow-thisismylifeiguess]

Sentient Gotham

- Bruce regularly chats w her. Like, full blown conversations. He can see a physical manifestation of her like she’s right in front of him, but completely invisible to everyone else

- Zatanna does not believe him. She’s Gotham born and bred and a powerful magician, but she cannot sense a living breathing Gotham the way Bruce claims he can

- Constantine does believe him, but it’s mostly to spite Zatanna

- Gotham calls herself Bruce’s mom and frequently whines about him not calling her that

> “I had a mother. And a father. They’re both dead.” > “WHEN WILL YOU STOP BLAMING ME FOR THAT?!” > “When I’m convinced it’s not true.”

- Bruce’s kids also don’t believe him about the whole ‘I talk to Gotham’ thing for a long time and think he’s either lost his mind, he’s schizophrenic, or that he’s fucking w them

- they do eventually see and speak to her themselves

- Jason first sees her right before his death, which was an incredibly difficult task for her. It’s a combination of reasons. 1) like Bruce, Jason is a Gotham City native and has deep ties to the city, 2) he has deep ties to Bruce, 3) she was also there to comfort Bruce because she knew he wouldn’t be fast enough. But Jason sees this gorgeous woman who cradles his cheek and murmurs soft words to him that he’ll only end up remembering many years later

> “Your father loves you. He tried. So please don’t hate him. It’s my fault, not his.”

- Bruce frequently wonders why it’s him who can see her and no one else, to which she always just says it’s because he’s her son

- Bruce’s connection to Gotham…changes him. He is human, at least…mostly. But there’s an otherworldliness to him that grows over the years which he’s stupidly oblivious to for a very long time

- Gotham has beef w Alfred purely because he’s British

> “I could’ve raised you better than that man!” > “I do not tolerate disrespect for Alfred.” > whining, “But babyyyyyy. He’s an outsider!”

- she adores Bruce’s kids and frequently whines about how they don’t believe she’s real. But at the same time, Bruce is her absolute beloved

- after Jason’s death, she’s the one who basically sends Tim Bruce’s way to stop his self destructive behavior. Tim had been taking pictures of Batman and Robin for a while, but Gotham had fogged over his mind just a little bit to prevent him from putting the pieces together about their identity. When she stops, it finally clicks for Tim and it’s what leads him to becoming Robin

- the kids all have their moment when they finally can see and speak to her. It happens at different times, but the important reason as to why they’re able to do so is due to their relationship to Bruce and the length of time they’ve been around him. It comes at the moment where they’ve reached optimal and absolute trust in Bruce

- Bruce does actually call her ‘mom’, but it happened once and she will never let him forget it

> Bruce getting worked up during a conversation w Gotham in front of Dick and Tim > “Dick….who is he talking to?” > “You don’t want to know.” > “My mom won’t stop badgering me- No. No. I didn’t say that. I didn’t call you that! You can’t prove anything!”

- Gotham comforts Bruce often when he feels like he’s not enough. His failures weigh heavy in his heart, but she’s always there to talk him through it

> “Why me? Why am I the one you picked? I’m not enough. I never will be.” > “You are and you always will be. Bruce, you do so much for this city. For me. For your family.” > “It’s not enough.” > “You are only mostly human, Bruce Wayne. You have done things no one else could ever hope to do. If any one else were in your position, they would not have nearly enough strength as you do.”

- several months later, after Bruce is just idly going over case files, he remembers the ‘mostly human’ part of what Gotham said to him. He’d glossed over it before in his depressive spiral, but now he’s like !?

> “Gotham….” > “Yes, my dear?” > “‘Mostly human’. Care to explain what that means?” > awkward laugh, “Uh…..” > “Gotham.” > “I didn’t do it on purpose! I had no control!” > “Gotham.”

- order of who sees Gotham:

Bruce (obviously)

Jason (first time)

Tim

Duke

Jason (second time)

Steph

Dick

Cass

Damian

- the last three take a while but mostly because they’re not Gotham natives. Dick’s a little bitter about it because he practically spent his entire life in Gotham

> “You’re a traitor.” > “WHAT DID I DO?” > disgust, “Blüdhaven.” > “Oh. Whoops.”

- While Gotham is Bruce’s #1 Supporter™️, she is at times critical of his behavior and decisions. Particularly about things that damage his relationship w loved ones and things that he chooses to do in order to hurt himself

- she finds ‘Brucie’ to be distasteful

> “I didn’t raise you to be a whore.” > “You didn’t raise me to begin with.” > “STOP DENYING ME PARENTAL RIGHTS!”

- Gotham is, obviously, restricted to only appear within Gotham City’s borders. She’s only able to break through that restriction a handful of times, w the first being when Jason dies. There are a few other instances and she’s popped up on the Watchtower and jumpscared Bruce by accident. The JL were very confused and incredibly amused

- She’s able to take on the form of anyone, but sticks to a unique appearance of a woman w long black hair and pale skin. Her eyes are white and she’s typically dressed in a suit

> young Bruce, in awe, “You kind of look like me if I were cooler.” > “You’re plenty cool, Bruce.” > adult Bruce, tired, “Why are you in a suit?” > “Because I look cool, Bruce. You said so yourself.” > “I was ten!”

- she once offered to take on the appearance of his mother and Bruce shot it down so fast. She never brought it up again

- when Clark found out about her, he believed Bruce immediately. He’s the only one Bruce ever told who believed him right off the bat

> “You…don’t think I’m insane?” > “I do.” > “Then why would you lie and say you believe me?” > “Because I do. You’re insane about a lot of things, Bruce. But you sounded too serious when you told me about this, so why would I ever think you’re lying?”

- Gotham begrudgingly likes Clark

> “You hate Alfred for being an outsider, but Clark is in your good graces?” > “He’s an alien. It’s different.” > “He’s also from Metropolis.” > “Shhhhhh, don’t remind me. I’m trying to be blissfully ignorant.”

[eepy-cookies]

A relaxing yet quiet Birthday

Characters: Shadow Milk Cookie / Sage of Truth x Reader Genre: Fluff Summary: Today was your birthday, and yet someone does remember your own birthday. Disclaimer: This is made for fun so be aware of ooc!

Birthday is a just a normal day, is what a cookie would normally thought, and yet you knew it was just a normal day- except you the cookie witch proposed a a festival in your kingdom this month to attract many cookies to celebrate the Bloom Festival even if the year is not good.

As the project president you made sure that every cookie was behaving well and on board to make sure that the festivity was going well. And thankfully they all did, including the beast cookies.

Burning Spice Cookie would refuse, but putting him as a patroller in case thieves and bandits likes to appear he is on the job. Plus rewarding him with good food would also make him cooperate well after all he was a huge help.

Mystic Flour Cookie would do nothing in apathy, but she too was curious about the unique festival you made, she also made her own botanical garden area and it has become an attraction to cookies who needed a good quiet corner as log she puts on "please remain silent and relax" and it worked on introverted cookies who likes to be quiet.

Shadow Milk Cookie on the other hand was about to do a theater but you need to make sure that he doesn't cause deceit when performing since he and the rest of the beast cookies are untrusted to some cookies in the kingdom. Heck even Candy Apple and Black Sapphire Cookie are behaving well as his minion assistance, but they also do want to enjoy the festival too. Pure Vanilla insisted on him making a theater to perform perfectly well as long you were watching him much to his dismay.

Over all the end of the festival was today and you can finally get all the cookies to relax after the festival, plus they were all paid well since every cookie was relaxing well and even if there was a bit of chaos but its mainly on the thieves and bandits there is no worse case scenarios and even if there is, a presence of the higher up cookies can handle them plus for even safety measures you cast a spell on the cookies on your kingdom for an extra surveillance to ensure employee safety incase something happen, you had no idea how much it saved them from hardships.

And now here you are, walking around as every cookie you see greeted you and thank you for your hard work. Heck you even saw Burning Spice Cookie was enjoying his meal and laugh and gave you a pat on the back and Mistic Flour joining him for a meal and smiled at you, she looked relaxed. They told you that the festival was supposed to be boring but thanks to the unique attractions you propose they got the role they desired.

You are glad that they are doing well and they got a good amount of rest needed and plus the customer cookies were enjoying themselves buying souvenirs and following the rules safely things were going well for you.

And yet you cannot rest.

You walk up to where the theater where Shadow Milk Cookie is, and right on time Candy Apple Cookie being ordered by Shadow Milk Cookie put you to the reserved front seat as they all begin. And you do admit the theater was enjoyable and there was some good laughs here and there, thus the performance was a success and thus made once announcement.

"And a FINALE thank you to (Y/N) Cookie for creating this AMAZING festival and a HAPPY BIRTHDAY to you (Y/n) Cookie!"

"?!"

Your face went red as the crowd goes wild and started saying Happy Birthday to you as Black Sapphire Cookie was recording this moment for the laughs.

...

..

.

"Shadow Milk Cookie! I can't believe you did this to me, I thought I kept my birthday a secret!"

"Ppfftt! Oh COME ON now darling, Not everyone knows that today is your birthday~ After all I know the perfect details about you!"

"Oii..."

You stared at him confused for a moment but when he noted 'not everyone' the instant you knew...

---

[You remember a good memory, a proposal to create the best festival to all cookies as soon as possible for a week. Not all cookies where on board and feel anxious but Sage of Truth found potential in your proposal and decided to accept this festival proposal.

Because of this you and Sage of Truth are good friends ever since, it allow him to gain the experience of more knowledge and plus and a creation to create festivals for the cookies to have a newer better purpose something so enjoyable yet healing.

Sage of Truth was genuinely looking forward on your festival project and thus help you plan, create problems and solutions in advance in case something happened, and finally looking at cookies who hides the good talents to create something for the festival.

But he soon notice that he was able to get closer to you in the process.

You even gave him a mini doll as a souvenir and as thanks for his participation, and he kept it securely close to him under his hat at all times.

Even if he was sealed in the tree, he was able to get the doll you gave him close to his chest.]

---

And when the sunset is happening and the night market has begin along with the singers getting ready to perform for the fans who are also enjoying the festival.

This has been more livelier for every festival you made and because of this you were content with your project living on and even now.

"Say, Shadow Milk Cookie..."

He looked at you with a curious smile, "Shall we walk together in the stalls, just the two of us?" You ask with a smile and yet his eyes were widened and blush with glee happy to hear that you still want to hang out with him.

"Of course my darling~"

With that you two hold hands just like in the past, it doesn't matter whether or not Shadow Milk has become. To you he is still the same cookie that you love no matter what.

After walking around trying the food, drinks, and mini games, the two of you were gazing at the botanical garden booth watching the night sky that was now showing fireworks. The two of you staring and admiring the night sky in fireworks as every cookie was enjoying the rest of the festival before the closing.

And before the clock reaches 12 am, you looked at Shadow Milk Cookie and leaned closer to him, he noticed what you are doing and yet was blushing from the kiss on the lips. His eyes were wide and he was shaking and yet he decided to pull you to a hug.

He doesn't want to break the silence and yet, he went closer to your ear.

"My, you really are bold tonight~ My darling~"

You can't see his face, but his hair eyes showing hearts can tell you one thing. After this, you know what happens next.

[nalyra-dreaming]

It's so frustrating trying to have a conversation about Louis' narration. The last time I tried, someone accused me of being 'ship-brained' because they believe Loustat has nothing romantic about it and that there's no tenderness between them.I simply pointed out,as neutrally as possible,that we can’t fully trust what Louis has said about their relationship so far because he’s altered a lot of details,and that Armand is also a suspicious figure in Louis’ memories of Lestat. That’s it.But immediately, I got attacked for calling Louis an unreliable narrator and for trying to demonize Armand. Which is insane, because I never said Louis was completely unreliable, just that when it comes to his relationship with Lestat, things are complicated, and we can’t take his words at face value when assessing their love.It’s exhausting. You can’t have a nuanced discussion anywhere without people jumping down your throat.I have never said Loustat had a perfect marriage or was a perfect couple,just that things are more nuanced that what Louis narrated,I'm not waiting for Lestat to be the only truth and if i understand Rolin doesn't want another revisit and s3 will be modte likely Lestat' background + maybe some plot in modern story,I never believed that he would refute everything and Louis is a liar Iand Armand a big bad moustache curling villain.😮‍����

I'm accepting to be wrong and we can discuss anything without being always at each other throat

*sighs*

You know, the fact that people cannot see what a disservice they do Louis by making him into this one-dimensional, flat caricature of himself by removing all the problematic bits.... And I call that "problematic" - because JACOB called him/them monsters, and that it's good that they can be problematic...

And so I sat down, and listed a few things JACOB said - with sources!

Louis does lie (he literally says “not everything Louis says is a lie“ in this video)

Louis is problematic

Louis was very repressed

Louis is a snob

Louis has many guises (and Jacob looks forward to s3, TVL!)

Louis is the problem (I saw the tweet (here is one referring to the Taylor Swift song), but it's referred to in this comment as well, as well as other things, too)

Louis knows deep down some things are not true

Louis presents Lestat as a monster bc he‘s angry

The way some people want to remove eeeeeeeeverything that makes Louis in the slightest bit problematic or even an active participant of his own story, and thereby reduce him to this victim only ... this shell is beyond me. I get where it comes from(!), namely from bad stereotypes and racist inflections that have unfortunately been employed again and again at other points - but heaven help, this show is NOT that, and JACOB has already stated all these already - and this need to scream anyone down who dares to point these out is preventing any possibility of real discussion in this fandom - and honestly, THAT is actually the true shame.

Also, re Loustat - ALSO Jacob:

"They are in a romantic relationship in the books. They’re married by the end. Maybe Anne Rice didn’t fully know what their relationship was at first – the style is very different in the first book. Lestat is this kind of goblin monster torturing Louis. But when you look back with the context from further books, you see this man was just very repressed and so hurt by what happened between him and Lestat that he couldn’t acknowledge him as his lover, as his partner, as his great love. But by the second book, they’re absolutely a couple. And because we’re adapting the whole of The Vampire Chronicles and taking things from later books and repurposing them, the idea of telling this story and them not being a couple… well, there’s no show! Their love story, as messed up as it is, is the heart of it."

And:

"Well, scenes from a divorce is probably Armand, and then scenes from a marriage feels more fitting to Louis and Lestat."

What else is there to say....

Our cast gets their characters. Jacob gets Louis.

Now if only the fandom could accept that, too...

[help-help-i-need-an-adult]

That bit where “you can’t possibly be (fill in the thing here) because you’re so smart!” thing has made me want to fist fight adults my whole life.

They usually meant it as a compliment but it always made me see red. I still see red when I hear someone say something similar about a kid now.

I’m dyslexic and was diagnosed as such in 2nd grade. I’m also convinced I’m autistic and ADHD but haven’t bothered to get a diagnosis as an adult.

DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY TEACHERS WERE LIKE “I never would have guessed you were dyslexic!”? BITCH, YOU’VE HAD MY IEP SINCE BEFORE THE SCHOOL YEAR STARTED! DID YOU NOT READ IT?!

No. They didn’t. Not till I said something to force them to do their jobs.

The worst example was 7th grade French.

I’d been quiet about the fact that my French teacher was marking down my tests because my spelling wasn’t correct. My IEP specifically said “if it isn’t a spelling test, you can ask this kid to go back and fix it after the test, but spelling cannot count against their grade.” Anyway, I was used to it taking a few weeks before a teacher got around to reading my IEP because it was usually at the bottom of a large stack of them due to my last name being at the end of the alphabet. And one or two C’s at the beginning of the year wasn’t anything I couldn’t come back from.

Well… it never got corrected. He didn’t stop docking points for spelling.

After what I deemed was plenty of time to get his shit together, I confronted him about it.

Now, I’ll tell you, I was in an advanced French class that was designed to give gifted middle school kids a head start on their high school foreign language. We had to be recommended by name by the 5th/6th grade foreign language teacher to qualify for this class.

So I told him “you can’t lower my grade for spelling” and he said something along the lines of “that’s part of the point. It’s French.” And I was like “no, really. You can’t do this to me. I’m dyslexic.”

And guys. This grown ass man looked at a 13 year old kid and with his full chest said “I wasn’t supposed to have any of you in this class.”

Any of you.

It’s a good thing I was already mad or that would have made me cry.

I’d been othered plenty in my life up till then for being weird, clearly a baby queer, having a mom that called teachers out for not using standard English, being dyslexic, etc. This was just the first time that a teacher had been that blatant about it to my face. No attempt of being politically correct or gentle or anything. No, “I never would have guessed!” as a way to try and make it a compliment.

Just flat out “you are not supposed to be here. You are not good enough or smart enough to be here. You existing has made my life harder when you weren’t allowed to do so.”

I marched out of his class and went straight to the Special Ed teacher who’s “class” (it was really a study hall for kids who had a learning disability of some variety and needed the extra help or was at least entitled to it by the state) I had right after French. I would usually use that time to finish my homework so I wouldn’t have to do it at home. Sometimes my homework was already done so I’d help the other kids. The teacher would check in with me to make sure I didn’t need any help, but I never did.

Well, now I needed help.

She could tell I was mad because I’m not subtle and, ya know, the previous class hadn’t ended yet. She asked what was wrong and I didn’t mince words. She told me to stay put and then she marched out of the room.

I wish I’d followed her. I can only imagine the new asshole she ripped him.

Sure enough, statring the next day, every little bit of my IEP was being followed to the letter in French class. From my spelling not counting to the jerk using a microphone for my hearing and sticking me in the back of the class with the speaker instead of just turning one desk 90° and letting me sit there.

I fought for the desk instead of the microphone but he was following the IEP so I didn’t win that one. Besides, now that my needs were being met, I was getting some of the best grades in the class, and therefore belonged in the back “privileged smart kids” seats that he’d put me in.

(Yes, the man segregated his rows by your class grade. We all knew who was doing well and who wasn’t by where he sat you.)

On the bright side, I met a good friend by sitting in the back.

He wasn’t an employee at the school when I returned for 8th grade.

Anyway.

Gifted kids just get neglected because the school feels they can get away with it. They don’t react well when theres a gifted kid with an IEP and knows not to let them get away with it.

They treat those kids like shit. They tell those kids they are special and the future but also that they are a burden and shouldn’t be with the actually smart and special children.

These kids bounce back and forth between class rooms full of other neglected gifted kids and class rooms full of other neglected special needs kids. In the former they are treated like the dead weight and in the latter they are treated like the teacher’s assistant so the teacher doesn’t have to help the one kid who needs the most help in the class, because “they’ll get that kid through this group project. It’s fine.”

These children and bored to tears in one scenario and ripping their hair out from frustration in the other.

Not smart enough and too smart all at once. Out smarting the adults around you but somehow never doing well enough to get all A’s.

Constantly battling the teachers, good and bad over your needs.

Watching your friends fall through the cracks because they weren’t lucky enough to have a parent who worked in this system and taught them how to fight it. Watching some of them deem themselves stupid when they AREN’T but everything is telling them they are and they’ve stopped trying and other friends never learn the basic skills like note taking because they read in class and still get good grades.

Neither one of these friends knowing the point of school is to learn and not to pass tests because the school is telling them it’s all about grades and tests and so you watch all of your friends lack the actual knowledge they’re supposed to be gaining.

“You’re supposed to give me the multiple choice questions.” “You asked me to help you study. If you can’t answer the question without the multiple choice, you don’t know the answer.” Non of the other gifted kids at the table seeing my point and the other kids in our friend group saying “this is why I don’t bother.”

Our school system is so fucked.

That is all.

people misunderstand what ‘gifted kid’ actually means but it’s ok it’s fine it’s cool it’s good

[zooophagous]

PLEASE say more about your cultural understanding of tattoos if/when you feel up to it; your perspective on it is really interesting!

I can only really speak from my own perspective on it as a fairly recent initiate into tattooing, but the way tattoos have been viewed in the past (even the very recent past) had changed very quickly with new technology.

Finer lines become possible, and greater variety of colors, so the necessity of sticking to thick lines and heavy black with few color options is no longer the case. Improved technology means more styles become possible to tattoo in, and as such instead of the restrictions of the media informing the tattoo, tattoos are now available in a wide variety of art styles and the art world and overall cultural zeitgeist now heavily influence tattoos instead of tattoos by necessity having their own set style guides and language.

This means more mass appeal, you can do almost whatever you want art wise now and many tattooers are fine artists in their own right. So now we have more and more women and young professionals into it and not just bikers, gang members or sailors as the stereotypes used to hold.

So now tattoos are trendy for everyone, as the nation slowly but surely sheds its puritanical leanings. But now that tattooing is no longer an underground art form and is largely regulated and legalized, a new underground form of it lives on.

Thanks to online buy-anything sorts of sites like Amazon, Temu and Wish, it's easier than ever for the garage, apartment or party to host impromptu tattoos. And because it is often very difficult to get someone to agree to teach you how to tattoo, almost all of these people are self taught and receive instructions via youtube.

So why then, if you can get anything you want as a tattoo, would people still go for these dubiously sanitary pieces by untrained artists?

Part of it is related to why tattoos may have existed in the first place- they denote your culture, your people, who you belong to. For a lot of the apartment tattoo getters, they're allowing their friends or family members to practice on them as a sign of love and trust.

Part of it is cost. Cheap things always have a market, even if they're not good.

But part of it I think is nihilism. That is, a sense that you have no future, nothing to live for and therefore nothing to lose. Many young people cannot envision themselves in old age and many of them tell you they'll likely die young. So why not, then, get the bad tattoo? The tattoo is temporary because life is temporary. We lead such short desperate lives that refusing a tattoo because of some imagined professional setting you might be in seems as asinine as thinking one day you might be a billionaire. It's just as unattainable.

Throw in a little postmodernism, a little dadaism and you have the perfect storm for the rise of ignorant style tattoos. They're not good, but that's largely the point. They don't have to be. In fact the ugliness is largely the point of this art form. Much like how Duchamp's Fountain was never meant to be a beautiful piece of sculpture but rather a biting satire, ignorant style tattoos become the response to the former underground artform of tattooing going mainstream and suddenly costing thousands and thousands of dollars, and people showing off wealth with perfectly technically done sleeves.

It's for obvious reasons a very divisive style of tattooing, and now even legitimate shops are turning out things that look "bad on purpose" but are technically well applied when examined closely. Personally I think most of them are ugly as shit but what the Hell do I know I'm just some bitch.

[la-gotica-fantasma]

8 realistic situations to add to your writing -

Disclaimers: I cannot stress enough that I am not at all trying to tell you what to write, these are just some concepts / prompts. - My title does not mean that your more lovey-dovey scenes are unrealistic, I just couldn't think of how to title this - Some of these are scenes that have been used in my writing, so if by the off chance you are using any of these, please don’t copy the dialogue word for word. :}

ROMANTIC -

1) When both of them are cuddling / holding hands and one of them starts sweating.

★ “Ugh! I love you, but I don’t love all this sweat you produce!” “But it’s my love for you seeping out of my pores!” “I couldn't care less what it is. Off!” “Fine, your majesty.”

2) Each character hating their mother in law / partners mother

★ “Mom is asking to visit.” “And do what?” “I’m not sure, check up on everyone?” “She can check up her own ass for the stick I know she’s lost up there.”

★ “Well, your mother is no saint.” “She never claimed to be!” “Uh-huh, and when has mine?” “Circa-” “Okay! Truce?” “Truce.”

3) Character X bringing up a pet peeve they have with Character Y at a family gathering.

★ “Character Y does this one thing when they eat- they never scoop up their food with their fork, they’ll just attack it! Sometimes I can’t stand it.” “You never told me that bothered you?” “It didn’t bother me enough to mention it.” “Not until a family dinner?” “I didn’t mean anything negative by it-” **cue Character Y aggressively attacking their food with their fork** “Okay, I get it! We’ll talk later.”

4) Character X and Character Y bake with each other, except realistically.

★ “Character X, why are your arms wrapped around me?” “Because I love you.” “I love you too but I also love being able to actually mix the ingredients together.”

★ “Get the eggs!” “You told me to stop buying eggs because ‘inflation will kill us all’.” “I wasn’t wrong but, UGH-! I need eggs!” “Well I got them anyway, but still.”

★ “Stop touching things!” “How am I supposed to bake without touching anything?!” “You aren’t!”

5) Planning lies they'll tell in 5 years when people ask how they met.

★ "What if we say that we were playing bumper cars and I hit you so hard I fell into your car?" "Hmm.. how about we say that I was going to my best friends wedding and I was all down and glum, but a friend of mine told me to 'have some fun' and that maybe I'd meet someone special at the wedding, and that's when I saw you. You and a little yellow umbrella that I've seen in so many places before, and we just talked about our past together?" "I think that's been done before." "By who?" "One of the most popular rom-coms ever aired."

★ "We could say I saved you from-" "I'm gonna stop you right there." "Fine. What's your idea then, if you're so smart?" "We tell them we met in a psychiatric ward." "Wow. Exquisite thinking." "Just imagine the looks on their faces!"

PLATONIC / ROMANTIC -

6) Those moments where neither party can decide on something so they do nothing, only for them both to yell out what they want and it coincidentally be an agreement.

★ “What do you want for dinner?” “I’m not sure, what do you want?” “I dunno.” **cue them both lazing around, doing nothing for minutes** “Spaghetti.” “It’s like you can read my mind.”

7) Character X asking Character Y how their day went, and Character Y just breaks down in tears- not because their day was bad, but just because Character X asked.

★ “Hi, how was work?” **cue ‘ugly’ sobbing** “Oh no, was it really that bad?” “No- It just- It was just- sweet to- ask-”

8) Stuff that should be awkward really not being awkward at all.

★ “Did you just fart?” “Yeah.” “Okay, good.” “‘Good’?” “Good that it’s not a gas leak.” “Yeah, I had to force it out a little bit.” "So definitely not a leak." "Definitely not."

p.s. Your writing is captivating as always suga, and I am abidingly proud of you and your work. <3

Morbid affection,

- Tipsy ᓚᘏᗢ

[crownmemes]

Criminal Sentences, Vol. 25

(Sentences from various sources for criminals and/or dangerous muses. Adjust phrasing where needed)

"I want to liberate your truest self: the beast that prowls around your heart."

"A wise man would walk away from this house and make a concerted effort to forget everything that occurred last night."

"We had an arrangement. You don't come here."

"Don't play games. I'm not in the mood."

"I'm not so easy to kill."

"I really want to apologise for, you know, the massive crime I've committed."

"The thing is, what you're asking, it isn't easy - and it sure isn't free."

"Are you worried I'm going to shoot him or something?"

"The next time you come in here without my permission, you and me are going to have a problem."

"Listen, I have just left a very enjoyable evening with some old friends to come and murder a hired contract killer for you, so let's tone down the judgement a tad, shall we?"

"I think if you wanted to kill me, you'd have done it already."

"Everyone has their weaknesses. Don't mind me as I find yours."

"You should know that I've had eyes on you recently, so I know everything."

"I've always been preternaturally inclined to violence. I was exposed to it from an early age."

"What were you trying to prove by doing this? Just showing me that you're good at sneaking into places you're not wanted? I already knew that!"

"I've tasted success, and it's a meal I now wish to devour."

"Holy christ, you're a morbid fuck!"

"I'll be sure to call next time I need someone threatened."

"You have no sense of the terrors I will bring onto you."

"You don't even know what you're dealing with, do you?"

"Some of us get harder as we get older, and some of us get soft."

"Who the hell are you to order me around?"

"You're not going to survive coming after me."

"People like you and me, we don't get to ride off into the sunset - but we get to stay around and watch the stars come out, and that's not nothing, I suppose."

"We don't have to trust each other, we don't even have to like each other, but we have to work together on this."

"You should be more afraid of me."

"Death excites you, doesn't it?"

"Do you have to enjoy my discomfort quite so much?"

"Because I murder with will and not like a blind animal, you think me a monster. Yet, how many corpse have you left in your wake?"

"If you want my help, you'll do as I ask."

"Do not fool yourself; you cannot lie to me."

"You're a very suspicious person."

"Do you still have that rocket launcher?"

"Do you carry a knife everywhere now?"

"You offer me a normal life. Why do you think I want that anymore?"

"Why are you consulting with that traitor?"

"That's really not the legal loophole you think it is."

"I just realised what you're most afraid of."

[tarnishedxknight]

Ashelia froze for a moment. Did... did Larsa not know Gabranth was Landisian? Well and why not, she supposed. I didn't know Basch was Archadian, not until last night. "Yes. He and Basch lived there until they were sixteen. Basch told me last night. As I said, we... we discussed a great deal many things..." Ashe said with an air of sadness, almost as if she was lamenting who she was before she knew the information she'd learned during that conversation. One can never go back to being innocent or ignorant, even if they wish to, she thought.

At Larsa's comment of Gabranth not speaking of his Landisian blood, Ashe sighed a little. "I think it is more that... he wished to leave it behind him. So did Basch. I've known him all my life and yet... all these things he told me last night, he was saying for the first time. I never knew he had Archadian blood, never at all. I don't think my father knew that either. Or if he did, neither one of them ever informed me." It didn't change her view of Basch, not really, but it did... change her view. Overall.

His accent. "Mm. Yes, how strange it is that Gabranth seems to have an accent different from those of Archadia. He's been there so long, why has he not lost it? Basch lost his. I vaguely remember him speaking differently when I was a small child, but he gradually spoke more and more like a Dalmascan, until I forgot that he'd been anything else."

Ashe fell silent - a feat not easy for the talkative and opinionated former princess - while Larsa spoke of his mentors and of Drace specifically. It seemed that he'd been scooped up by Drace just as Ashe had been by Basch, in that moment when their own questioning might have spiraled out of control had they been left to their own devices. Ever the protectors of us, they are, she assumed.

"I don't think it's childish at all, Larsa. Finding out that one's father wasn't really his father is not small matter. I think you are entitled to your disarray, frankly. And I think those closest to you will understand that you are upset and need your space." At least... they should.

But as Larsa began to speak of Dalmasca, and her father, and all that she and Basch had suffered, Ashe felt antsy and uncomfortable. Yes, she was sad, angry, and grieving, but she had a problem with being lumped together with Basch. The levels of their suffering were, in her mind, not even close to the same.

"Basch suffered greatly," she insisted after listening to him share his thoughts on the subject. "I was spared the worst of it, I feel, save for losing my father and my sadness over the loss of Dalmasca's sovereignty. He was starved and tortured, denied freedom and light and food and sleep at times. For two years. I cannot even begin to imagine what that must have been like for him."

She couldn't help the way her mind wandered to the man responsible... Gabranth. How could Basch's own twin brother do this to him? To her father? How was this man that Larsa admired so much, his actual father, be the same man who had committed such heartless and cruel acts? Given Larsa's mental disruption over this whole affair, however, Ashelia refrained from asking those questions. She didn't want to upset her friend.

Instead, she smiled at him. "I think it would have been different, if you'd been Emperor. You would have changed Archadia for the better, Larsa. I know it. And together we could have changed Ivalice." Such chances were lost now, but there was comfort in the possibilities, even if they were only fantasy.

"Give yourself time. Apologize when you are ready," she said encouragingly, knowing how hard apologies were, especially for awkward situations such as these. With regard to Basch, though, she drew in a long breath and released it as a thoughtful sigh. "I think he might tell you some things. But if I know Basch, he may at times say that his brother's story is not his to tell. Perhaps he thinks certain things too personal for him to share, and that Gabranth should do so himself. But he will tell you some things. We can go see him, if you like. I know he would love to speak with you."

Larsa did not expect to be unfrozen at all, let alone in the future. When he had snuck upon Gabranth's ship set for Pharos he did it to ensure the peace would be possible. The last thing he remembered was running towards fallen Gabranth and then... Light. (Marvel AU) - tarnishedxjudgement

@tarnishedxjudgement

Noah didn't have the same abilities and resources in this time period with which to inform himself of anything and everything that was going on around him. He was in the dark, most of the time, unless directly informed of things, a condition he hated. Being at the mercy of others he neither knew nor trusted for information was not a position he usually found himself in.

It was the reason he hadn't known about Drace being found after him until she was brought one day to the training compound. Inexplicably, after executing her in his own timeline, here she was again, seemingly from another. The entire experience was wholly jarring, but not nearly as jarring as losing his only son.

So often had Noah thought of Larsa in the months following his revival in this strange time. Thoughts invaded his peace, his sleep, his ability to function, until he found himself so erratic and unhinged that he did not recognize himself anymore. Even Drace found it difficult to comfort him, and she had always been a master of that feat. There was no closure to be had, no second chances, no going back... and that knowledge was eating Noah alive from the inside out.

But once again, information had been kept from him, and yet another arrival from Ivalice to the Avengers compound was neither expected nor necessarily wanted. Would it be another Dalmascan? Gods forbid a Rozarrian. And the way the people of this time seemed to think that all Ivalicians got along and would be happy to see each other was beyond irritating to him. Nevertheless, when he was specifically summoned to greet this newcomer, Noah begrudgingly left his quarters to do so.

What he saw... stopped him dead in his tracks. Within seconds, his expression betrayed him, and within a few more, he was on his knees, his legs giving way in disbelief of the sight that lay before him. It was little Lord Larsa, looking just as he did when last Noah laid eyes on him, perfect as can be.

He knew he should say something, but words betrayed him as well as his own legs had. Instead, he merely stared, the absence of his helm serving to display to the boy all the shock, confusion, and relief at seeing him standing there. Finally, he forced out the only two words he felt he could say without falling apart.

"My lord..."

[newttxt]

20 questions for fic writers

thank you @strawhattery for @ing me, even though i do feel like it's a not-so-subtle urge to finish my current wips... (i need the kick)

for reference/those who only see my art, i used to be a fic writer who occasionally drew. that's obviously changed, but i am trying to write more, so you can find me at pseudoanalytics on ao3.

1) how many works do you have on ao3?

44, but only 35 are linked to me (9 are anonymous...)

2) what's your total ao3 word count?

347,773 😰

3) what are your top five fics by kudos?

while i nodded, nearly napping (suddenly there came a tapping) [haikyuu, ushiten]

redacted :/

the inherent romance of classical conditioning (or, the fine art of emotional recognition) [haikyuu, sakuatsu]

you're really pushing it (but you're going much too slowly) [haikyuu, ushiten]

redacted :/ (sequel to the first redacted...)

4) what fandoms do you write for?

most of my fics are so old i can't bear to look at them, but i'm trying to write more for one piece. then i've written a decent amount of haikyuu, pacific rim, and star wars.

5) do you respond to comments? why or why not?

initially? i absolutely do! but as any of my friends will tell you, i struggle to even reply to dms or texts. so alas. i drop off pretty quickly

i LOVE comments though, and i eagerly read and reread them frequently ;__;

6) what's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

oh sheesh. you may only ask once (so be prepared for the reply) which is a bad end for pacific rim 2. or i guess... a worse end. it's also a bit of a role swap au, if i remember correctly.

7) what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

i... honestly don't know. i typically write happy endings. i like to write "missing scenes" and post-canon, so things tend to be rather open-ended or to just lead into the next part of canon. my memory is also not my prize-winning quality, so i can't really remember how my fics ended pre-2018ish.

8) do you get hate on fics?

i know i've gotten some ruder bookmarks, but not typically, no. i get more hate on art or in my ask box, but i honestly just delete it all, so it never sticks.

9) do you write smut?

yes, though its debatable if it's "smut" so much as "sex in such an irreverent context that it becomes humor." i cannot take sex seriously, so alas, i rarely write it seriously. i use it more as comedy and a tool for character studies. i do enjoy a stoic character's facade getting cracked open.

10) do you write crossovers?

i don't write legitimate crossovers, with characters from different medias intermingling, and frankly, i rarely do au's either.

but if i have one weakness, it's that i am ALWAYS a sucker for a pacific rim au. yes, i am rotating a one piece version in my head.

11) have you ever had a fic stolen?

i had a sakuatsu one reuploaded to wattpad under someone else's username. they deleted my author's notes and added their own, as if they'd written the fic, too. hilariously they even used my art for the cover.

it got taken down, but idk why. i never reached out about it.

12) have you ever had a fic translated?

yeah! i've had 5 translated, and i've had 2 turned into podfics, which is cool.

13) have you ever cowritten a fic before?

nope. i'd be terrible to work with, tbh. my writing process is a holdover from my journalism days, and the steps are a mystery even to me. i think i'll stick to drawing art for other ppl and their fics.

14) what's your all time favorite ship?

i will hold to the fact that it's asanoya from ao3. they were the first ship i got really invested in, and i see their impact on everything i ship to this day. they were my "blueprint," if you will. i still get smiley when i see art for them!

on the flip side... terezi/vriska was also a formative ship for me. but i won't discuss that.

15) what's the wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

rip go ahead and start talking (i'll pick up the slack). it's my 1-of-2-chapters ushiten fic that i should just mark as complete, since the first chapter can stand alone.

16) what are your writing strengths?

hard to determine your own strengths, but i think my dialogue/characterization are pretty strong, especially since i still regularly flex those muscles when writing comics. i also think i'm funny.

17) what are your writing weaknesses?

writing.

but seriously, i am so bad at sitting down and just hammering out a fic. don't get me started on outlines or longform works. i'd rather grab my pencil and start drawing, i'm afraid.

18) thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

i think there are ways to interweave words or terms in other languages, but overall, i'm a fan of just standardizing everything into one language. if your character understands it, i think all readers should be able to understand it. and i'm not a fan of when you're expected to scroll to the end for a translation; i think it interrupts the reading flow.

this is a generalized opinion though. i think there are ALWAYS storytelling exceptions, so if the other language usage is really important to your theme/intent, i can see why you would do this!

19) first fandom you wrote for?

please don't do this to me. it was maximum ride. yes, the james patterson books about the kids with bird wings. i wrote 4-5 fics, i was in middle school, and — as far as i know — they are still up on ff dot net. no, i won't elaborate.

20) favourite fic you've ever written?

hands down, it's the sakuatsu domesticity simulator. it's not necessarily my best work in terms of writing skill, but i also drew over 50 images for it and html coded it into an interactive story. i'm just proud that i started a big project by myself and i actually finished it!

it's my dream to someday make a whole visual fan novel. i feel like the domesticity sim was the first step.

oh boy i'm bad at tagging but if @syrupfog, @lawsbbygirl, @macabrekawaii , @bmouse, or @cooknumber3 want to go for it... :))

[taurasiluv]

OFF THE RECORD. 02 — bar schuffle — 3.1k words

summary: nicole cannot escape breanna for the life of her, as much as she wants to.

content warnings: stewies kinda evil and weird this chapter... she will get better trust,

msg from sen: we're so back.

breanna quickly caught up with nicole’s fast pace. she kept her distance in between them but ensured that nicole got home safe. it wasn’t that far of a walk, a couple minutes at most, but it felt like forever for nicole. she just wanted to get away from breanna and be alone without the constant feeling of her checking her out.

when they finally got to the door of her dorm, nicole leaned against the wall while breanna stood across from her. her height was always shocking to her. from the first time they met nicole mentally noted how she had to crane her head up to even look at breanna in the eyes. “so..” breanna said, scratching the back of her head awkwardly.

“thank you for the walk home, i’ll text you details about our next meeting later.” nicole said, now looking in her bag to find her keys. she managed to fish them out, unlocking her door and waiting for breanna to leave.

—

the next day, nicole went through her usual routine of going to the newspaper room before her first class and eating breakfast in there. usually, she was alone doing this, usually watching something on her computer. but today, ryan was sat in there.

when he saw her come in, he pushed out the chair next to him with his foot.

“how did you know i was gonna be in here?” nicole groaned.

“bianca told me.”

“i should’ve never let her come in here with me that one time.” she frowned, getting her bagel and computer out of her bag.

“spill nic, i want details!”

nicole looked at him, confused. “details on what?”

“you know… your new escapades with the breanna stewart,”

nicole’s face soured at the implication of her friends words, “there are no escapades! i hate her guts and working with her proved that to me even more.”

“she can’t be that bad, right?”

“she hit on me like 3 separate times in a 30 minute interview session, ry.”

he grimaced, leaning back in his chair, “yeah that’s pretty bad.”

“how’s your girl? isn’t she also on the basketball team?”

“yeah, morgan tuck. shes really nice, i think i got lucky.” he laughed.

nicole rested her head on the table in front of them in defeat, “fuck you.”

“we’re going to teds tonight if you wanna come, by the way. good luck with ms playboy! ” ryan said, getting up out of his chair and patting nicole’s back on his way out.

—

much like nicole, breanna also went about her day like normal. getting her ass busted at practice, eat, nap, go to class (sometimes), and then go practice again.

after all of that, she finally was able to relax a bit. she flopped back onto her bed and pulled her phone out of her back pocket. she did the usual, checking texts, scrolling through instagram for a bit til a certain post caught her eye.

it was nicole on her feed. a post from summer of her and her friends at the beach. breanna couldn’t tear her eyes away from nicole in a bikini, she swallowed dryly and without even realizing it, double tapped the post.

she quickly unliked the post and threw her phone across the room in embarrassment from the realization of her action. now, nicole is gonna think she was stalking her or something. she got her phone back and checked her instagram again, deciding to just follow her. she set her phone on the bed to the side of her and stared at the ceiling for a bit to think.

breanna was known for many things. basketball, being able to drink anybody under the table, her apple pie, and of course, the fact that she’s hooked up with just about the entire storrs female population.

she didn’t think it was a bad thing, she just wanted sex and who could blame her, she had a lot going on. she didn’t mean to break these girls hearts, it just happened to happen after breanna would sneak out of their apartments in the early morning hours and not text or call back ever.

but something about nicole was different, she couldn’t place her finger on it. maybe it was the chase or maybe it was something else. breanna wasn’t given much time to think about it because soon enough she heard knocking at her door,

“come in!”

moriah opened the door and walked in, leaning against the doorframe. “we’re going to ted’s, you wanna come?”

breanna thought about it for a moment, sitting up in the bed and resting her back against the wall. “do we have early practice tomorrow?”

moriah shook her head ‘no’, breanna hopped off her bed. “whos driving?” she asked as she picked up a white tank and jeans off of her floor to wear.

“brianna i think—why the hell are you wearing dirty clothes?” mo asked, giving her a look.

“shut up! i haven’t done laundry yet. now get out!” she said, pushing the shorter girl out of her room and closing the door.

—

nicole found herself sitting at her vanity, wondering why she was even going to this dumb bar anyways. she didn’t like partying and she had a deadline at midnight that she had to meet. yet, she sat in front of the mirror and doing her makeup to go out.

she searched her closet about 50 times over to find something cute to wear, eventually landing on jean shorts and a white crop top. by the time that she was fully dressed and ready her phone was being blown up by what she can only assume is ryan telling her he’s outside waiting for her.

she flipped the phone over, tapping the screen to turn it on and scanning over the notifications she received while she was getting ready. texts, snapchat, instagram…

as her eyes went over the instagram notification, she noticed a particular name. in disgust and disbelief, she picked up the phone and clicked on the notification.

bre_stewart30 liked your post.

when she clicked on the notification, it showed her the post that was supposedly like,

a picture from this last summer.

she grimaced in disgust. she really was already obsessed with her.

she shook it off and threw her phone into the small handbag that was swung over her shoulder and made her way out the door. when she was finally sat in ryan’s car, she took out her phone and handed it to him. “you’re never gonna guess who liked a post from summer,”

he took the phone and looked at the notification and post in question, “maybe it was an accident?” she shrugged, handing the phone back and starting the car.

“yeah sure, if she didn’t stare at my tits for 30 minutes yesterday i would maybe believe it was an accident.”

he shrugged, driving the car shortly down the road to the small bar nearby campus. it was the place everybody went, especially the athletes. it was only a small thought that crossed nicole’s mind that breanna might be there, telling herself that she probably wasn’t going to be drinking on a weekday to ground herself.

it wasn’t long til she was getting out of the car, walking in with ryan and immediately making a beeline for the bar. she ordered some fruity cocktail and chatted it up with ryan and the bartender for a bit.

it was the normal chatter for awhile, it wasn’t necessarily packed, but it sure was full. it became even fuller when the doors opened and in poured the entire women’s basketball team.

fuck.

nicole scanned the group walking in, immediately spotting the tall senior. she was in a white tank top, one that showed off her very slim yet muscular figure and nicole just couldn’t rip her eyes away. ryan gave her a small smack on the arm and she came back to his attention. “stop staring! you look like a fan!” he grumbled.

he was unfortunately right, so nicole spun around in her chair, facing forward towards the bar and continuing to talk with the bartender. it was fine for a while, breanna didn’t come up to the bar yet so she hadn’t had to see her yet, and maybe she wouldn’t.

“hey! ryan!” nicole heard a voice behind them, ryan turned in his chair to see who it was. all she could see from her peripheral vision was his smile. she turned around in her seat to talk as well, as to not look like an asshole, but she was very rudely met with morgan tuck, moriah jefferson, and of course, breanna fucking stewart.

“hey, princess,” she grinned, walking up to her.

“are we in an interview right now?” nicole asked, crossing her arms over her body.

“umm.. no?” breanna said, confused and looking around to see if she was missing something.

“then don’t fucking talk to me.” she spat venom at the taller girl.

breanna could feel the sudden eyes on her, moriah grimaced at the interaction and tugged on the back of breanna’s tank top to pull her back to decrease the odds of anything bad happening. “just walk away, stew,” nicole could faintly hear moriah whisper into breanna’s ear.

breanna shrugged and spun on her heels. turning around to walk back across the bar to the booth that was somehow fitting the entire women’s basketball team in it. “she’s such a bitch,” nicole muttered under her breath, turning back to ryan.

“you could at least try to be nice to her? maybe it’ll make the project go down a little easier.” he suggested to her with a shrug of his shoulders.

“in her fucking dreams.” she scowled, sipping on her drink and giving mean glances over to breanna’s side of the bar.

it’s not like she could see her, she was surrounded by other women and her jock friends, all chatting. it made nicole’s blood boil, that they didn’t see breanna for who she really was—a conniving, sex obsessed, asshole—but rather the sweet basketball superstar who won them 3 national championships. nicole could see how that was nice and all, but she could never push past her feelings towards breanna’s actions.

“have another drink, maybe stop death glaring her,” ryan said, pushing his beer towards her for her to sip on. nicole shot him a look next, which made him put his hands up in surrender, “or not! that works too.”

that managed to make nicole smile a bit, laughing at her friends words. she took a large gulp from his bottle before handing it back to him. “wanna just go drink in your apartment? i wanna ditch this place.” she said, frowning.

he nodded and paid their tab. they walked out of ted’s and into the packed parking lot. a couple making out to their left, two frat bros yelling at each other—a bar fight begging to start—to their right, and somehow directly in front of them: breanna fucking stewart.

it’s like nicole was cursed with never being able to get away from her.

ryan sighed, knowing he was about to be forced to break up whatever cat fight these two got into within the next ten minutes.

“i’m not going home with you stewie! stop trying!” nicole said, walking forward to push past her.

“wait nicole! i swear im not trying to take you home,” breanna said, reaching out to grab her arm.

nicole stopped in her tracks and moved in front of her, eyeing the woman suspiciously. “then what the hell do you want?”

“just let me talk to you for a second,” she said calmly, leaning against the toyota behind her. nicole thought over her options carefully. the one about pushing past her and getting the hell out of here was sounding real good at the moment. but against her best judgment, she turned around, looking up at breanna with a scowl and her arms crossed over her body.

breanna really couldn’t help it. she tried, but she still laughed. the sight of a mere 5’4 nicole staring up at her with the cutest scowl she’s ever seen. “oh my god i hate you,” nicole muttered, realizing why she was laughing. she began to walk away again, still scowling. but she couldn’t get far because breanna’s stupidly long wingspan grabbed her again, stopping her in her tracks.

“5 minutes, that’s all i need.”

nicole turned around begrudgingly, looking at breanna with the same look she had in the bar. “5 minutes. that’s it. no more no less, your times started.”

breanna laughed gently at her attitude before starting what she needed to say. “look, i get you don’t like me, but you could at least try to pretend? maybe it’ll make this all easier on you. i swear im not that bad.”

nicole rolled her eyes, “that’s what you had to say? some bullshit about how ‘perfect’ you are? do you just want me to protect your pretty little public image?” she complained, her anger growing.

“let’s just be civil, okay?” breanna asked, stepping forward towards her.

nicole gulped at her sudden closeness, her mere presence made her feel small.

“can’t bet on it, stewart.”

“let’s go back to my place? maybe we can work it out there,” she said calmly, her hand resting on nicole’s arm.

“stewie i told you this was strictly professional. i’m not about to be another one of your hookups.” nicole explained, crossing her arms over her body.

“cmon nic, i see how you look at me!” breanna grinned.

the shorter girl noticed how breanna’s eyes wondered down her body, specifically landing on her cleavage and lingering there longer than nicole ever would’ve liked.

“whatever. we can hang out, call it project bonding or something. just text me,” nicole said, giving her a look. “just it has to be in public and in daylight!”

breanna grinned like a little kid on christmas morning. “okay! i’ll text you!”

nicole rolled her eyes and walked away.

—

stewie

today at 12? i’ll take you to lunch at dog lane ;) read 8:03 am

nicole saw the message before promptly slamming her phone down and going back to sleep, horribly hungover from the previous night.

stewie

not 2 double txt… but i didn’t mean the winky face if that scared you ! i will behave ! sent 8:24 am

after about the fifth buzz from her phone, nicole finally opened her eyes enough to look at her phone. the bright light made her head pound even more but she managed to read the series of texts breanna sent. she groaned at breanna’s weird way of texting and sent back a simple “okay, see you soon” and turned her phone back over to return to the land of sleep.

breanna on the other hand, was currently on the court getting her ass ran by her coach. geno yelled at her while she ran laps for showing up to practice hungover—moriah lied to her about early practice—and apparently not running fast enough.

geno finally let her stop and breanna made her way to the locker room to catch her breath and get water. she sat in front of her locker, fishing her phone out of her duffle and sorting through the notifications. she saw nicole’s reply back to her text and grinned.

breanna heard a voice behind her, a familiar one, “what’s all the smiling about?” she turned around to see saniyah standing there.

“going on a date with newspaper chick tomorrow!”

saniyah gasped, punching her in the shoulder, “no way! i thought she like, hated you,” she said, she took a pause to think before she remembered where breanna had disappeared to in the bar last night, “does she actually want to go or did you corner her in the parking lot, bre?”

“she’s going on her own volition! i’m not that much of a perv,” breanna said, side eyeing the girl stood up next to her.

saniyah rolled her eyes, “we both know that isn’t true. at least you’ll win the bet,” she shrugged.

“well it’s a lunch date… that’s not exactly sexy.” breanna laughed, spinning on the bench to face saniyah.

“daytime sex is in stew, get with the program,” saniyah laughed, rolling her eyes sarcastically, sitting down with her. “but why aren’t you taking her to dinner like a gentleman?”

“cause she said in public and daylight… this is a long term investment hookup, keep up.” she deadpanned.

“you’re such a loser oh my god,”

—

nicole paced her bedroom, her arms crossed over her body and her hand up to her chin. she had been like this for a couple of minutes, attempting to decide if this was even a good idea to go or if she should cancel and go back to sleep. she was still hungover, felt horrible, and didn’t even really want to see breanna.

eventually she stood still and sighed, deciding to just get ready. what’s the worse that could happen?

she made it to the cafe around 12 and saw there was still no breanna, not surprising. but she took her seat and ordered a smoothie to hold her over til breanna arrived. after a couple minutes of scrolling through instagram and sipping on her smoothie, breanna was at the door. she walked in and spotted nicole and waved with a goofy grin plastered on her face. nicole waved back, attempting to hold back the smile on her face.

“are you—did you get here on a hoverboard?” nicole asked, seeing the board in her hands.

“uhhh… maybe….” breanna said, her hand coming up to the back of her head to scratch it. she sat down, tucking the board under the table. “what did you get?”

“why did you want to go out so badly?” nicole asked, idly stirring the straw in her smoothie.

“cmon, just wanted see you, pretty girl.” she said smugly, leaning forward.

nicole could feel herself physically recoil. “i hate you stewart, im not gonna sit here and let you try to flirt with me, go find another chick to hook up with.” she said sternly, grabbing her bag and beginning to get up.

“wait! i didn’t mean it, i just want to get to know you better,” breanna said, a lie really, but she couldn’t let nicole get away that fast.

“we both know you’re lying, stewie, fuck you. i don’t want to hear anything you have to say.” she spat, walking out of the small cafe.

breanna followed behind her on her hoverboard. nicole turned around and saw she was on it and couldn’t hold back the laugh that began to come out. “you look like an idiot on that thing.”

breanna sped up on it, spinning donuts around nicole. “my scooter got stolen and i don’t have a car,” she frowned.

“i don’t understand how anybody likes you,” nicole said, pushing past her and back to her car.

[stormyweaver]

taking a break from my silent screaming to type up a proper reply. i'm also doing a readmore mainly bc i don't wanna have spoilers to the fic to pop up on someone's dash who hasn't read through yet (which, if you're reading this and you haven't already what're you waitin' for?! GO GO GO!)

There is SO MUCH. So much I loved. I'm gonna try and touch on everything but just know this story as a whole is an absolute TREAT.

Okay first of all, I adore Delta and Omicron's dialogue. There's just something so satisfying about the concern/care Delta's showing mingled with juuuust the right amount of amusement, and it's PERFECT parallel to O's snark and current misery/mortification. So many times I went back and forth between feeling sorry for O and just wanting Delta to keep offering him tissue packs.

That fit once they're at the resort? Oh dear GOD i have never been struck so speechless. I could feeeel the relief flooding through me AND THEN HE GRABBED HER ARM AAAHHHH Josaline is currently living out my fantasy and listen, listen if she IS the antagonist I still am all for her living her best life IS THAT BAD--

And the shower scene. Oh. The palpable release. *chef's kiss* Both satisfying in O actually getting to let off some steam and also indulging my humiliation kink lol. The perfect combo!

Also THERE'S A HUSBAND?! DUN DUN DUUUUUUN

also also is Voster trying to explain to O what I think she's trying to explain to him because- if so... NOPE i'm gonna be patient and wait. like a patient person would. yep. *gnaws on the bars of my cage*

I truly cannot wait to see where this goes, and reading that you already know what's going to happen just has me so giddy for the next installment! Tbh there's more I could say but for now I'm gonna re-read bc this is now my favorite snz fic ever.

OH WAIT ONE LAST THING bc i wasn't sure: Do you have any inspiration for Omicron appearance wise? You've done such a lovely job of giving us little tidbits without actually giving him away, which I enjoy because I can piece together a vague idea without having to stick to one particular look.

That being said, IF you had any references I would definitely not say no to viewing if you'd ever wanna share :3

Best Laid Plans - Part 2

Details: 12k, M sneezes, M/F (for now..)

Summary: A secret agent is going undercover for a few days, and his target has a sneeze fetish. It’s time for him to put his research to the test.

PART 1 - PART 2 -

AAAA EVERYONE ♥️ I am overwhelmed TwT. Thank you so much for sharing your likes, comments, reblogs, asks, and tags QwQ. My original stuff means a lot to me, so I’m really, REALLY touched that people enjoyed this!! To everyone who left kind words, you give me soul power 💕 I hope this part hits as hard as the first one did, and that you all like it!

Also wanted to quickly shout out @themiseryandcompany, @bestwhumpist, @juxtaposedrose, and @stormyweaver for going so hard in the tags!! Seriously kicking my feet and squealing, I felt spoiled by your commentary, thank you so much for all the love🥹

These are original characters, all in their late twenties and early thirties!

(Warnings: Unrealistic science, Mess Lite™, fake contagion themes [nobody can catch this cold], exhibition / humiliation themes [main character gets horny in public], feeling pleasure from sneezing, masturbation).

THIS STORY IS NSFW!

-

It was a little after 1930 in this timezone, standard military time. They’d started their final descent to the landing strip with the beginnings of a sunset smeared across a cloudless sky. And during the flight, Omicron learned three key pieces of information.

Firstly, he absolutely could not stop sneezing. It was simply impossible. He’d swaggered to his plushy recliner with hubris and paid for it about 57 minutes later after dutifully repressing every single rising urge that niggled his sinuses over the course of the hour. It grew and grew in him, increasingly worrisome in its size, until the tickle was just too strong to hold at bay. No amount of snorting, nose blowing, or finger rubbing would ward it back.

It forced him at metaphorical gunpoint to the closet-like bathroom, blindly staggering through tears and wrenching hitches, where he dropped to a crouch and then to his backside with almost a dozen cataclysmic sneezes. Each one worked his lungs like a bellows, dizzying him until he saw spots, winding him until he felt breathless. By the end he was wrecked, and clinging perilously to his self control. He realized then that his sneezing wouldn’t bring him to orgasm alone; it could only lead him to the edge and trap him there until he finished the job himself. Which he obviously couldn’t do in the agency’s aircraft lavatory.

So. He gave up on the ‘don’t sneeze until the jet lands’ plan.

Instead, Omicron washed his face, dried his hands, and resigned himself to minding his nose’s whims. His original hypothesis was correct - if he did nothing to deter his sneezes, they’d come at regular, but controllable, intervals. This remained consistent as long as he didn’t make the other critical error.

Which led him to the second issue: if his mind strayed too far toward anything sneeze-related, he armed the tickle with more ammo. His sneezes became unwieldy if he held them back, yes, but they also magnified to arousing proportions if he imagined literally anything tickling his nose. This was the hallmark of Dr. Voster’s virus - the ‘suggestion sneeze.’ So to avoid a case of blue balls, Omicron did his best not to ruminate on the ceaseless, beckoning sensation that lived in him now. This was by far the most trying aspect of his predicament.

And the third and final bit of info was an exasperating realization: Agent Delta was a chronic and committed blesser even in these circumstances.

“H-ah.. DZSshuh!” 

“Bless you.”

Omicron resisted the urge to rub his nose, and instead treated it to a dab from his beleaguered tissue. Any motion more substantial than that would goad it into further misbehavior. He wasn’t interested in another stumbling trip to the bathroom.

“Sir.” He sounded as congested as he felt; his voice was locked up in his sinuses. “You really don’t have to bless me every time.”

Delta patted Omicron’s knee. The two of them sat side by side, despite the sea of empty seats around them. “Aw, Omicron, you keep saying that. I really don’t mind.”

I mind, groused Omicron. That’s why I keep saying it. His gaze drifted to the porthole window and all the little, passing structures beneath. The ground drew closer meters at a time, just as the tickle, yet again, tugged him closer to a conclusion he’d given up fighting. He blinked wetly against the sensation, then let his eyes fall shut. The image of the tiny cars cruising down below lingered, each one speeding undeterred to a destination. They were perpetual. Indefinite. And it was far beyond Omicron’s ability to stop their momentum.

He felt the tickle lurch forward, ripping his breath into a shuddering, “-hUH!hh.. mbb..” Omicron swatched his finger beneath his nose, pausing when the tickle reprimanded him with a lancing spark. “eh-HEH!..hh..”

Hurry up already, he chided with a daring snub to his nose. His nostrils pulsed erratically, aggravated, and another gasp shivered out of him. “h-hh-hh.. HAH-TZSS!sss’uhh..”

“Bless you!” chirped Delta.

It was a particularly unsatisfying sneeze, and ridiculous as it was he felt mocked by his own nose. Omicron sniffled, sniffled again, trying to flare the tickle into action. But it wouldn’t budge. He dug at his eyes with his palms.

“Does your head hurt?” asked Delta.

Omicron dropped his hands and leaned his head back against the seat with another defeated sniffle. “Ndo, sir. Mby head doesn’d hurt.”

“Do you need more tissues?”

His fingernails bit into the palm of his hand. “Ndo, sihHH-”

Unwilling to endure another hygiene lecture, Omicron flinched both elbows to his face and kept his nose there. He heaved through a series of increasingly yearning breaths, light on the inhales, heavy on the exhales, shoulders lifting and dropping each time he thought the sneeze might grant him mercy. In the end it left him wanting. He dropped his arms and panted, eyes still closed, cheeks streaked with tears.

Delta cleared his throat and Omicron lulled his head in that direction, squinting through sticky eyelashes. His superior held a fresh pack of tissues in offering, and Omicron’s cheeks heated. How many of these did he bring??

He didn’t snatch them, but it was a near thing. Delta’s smile tilted with sympathy, and Omicron prickled like a wet cat. “You can vent your complaints to me if you want, I don’t mind.”

“Not sure what you mean,” he muttered through gritted teeth, scrubbing his nose with intentional strength. It stung, but served it right. 

“It’s okay to be grumpy, Omicron.” Delta spoke like he was soothing a startled horse. “I’m sure this is a tricky situation to manage.”

What remained of Omicron’s professional decorum disintegrated, and he snapped with a waspish, “What would you know?”

Delta’s eyebrows flew up and Omicron’s blood flashed cold. He hadn’t meant to say that. 

“P...Pardon mbe, sir,” he mumbled and lowered his tissue with a sniff. “I apologize. That was uncalled for.”

“Yes, it was,” Delta agreed, his tone contemplative. “But it was also very out of character for you. I’ve seen you stay composed during triage for a gunshot wound. Just what about this has you so out of sorts?”

Admitting to Delta that there was more to this than simply sneezing - disclosing the induced erections that were slowly eroding his self control - would be professional suicide. Even if this side effect wasn’t Omicron’s fault, it was his responsibility to manage. This was a chance to prove himself, and if he screwed it up he’d never get this chance again. That’s just how it was at the agency.

He’d have to lie. Lie until he could deflect. 

“Dnothi’g, sir,” he said. “It jhhust tih.. iih..ckles-hh..hH..” Omicron’s eyelids fluttered and he crushed his crumpled tissue to his face. 

Please, please, please, he found himself begging as the itch crawled around behind his eyes. Give me a good one.

Against his better judgement, a smoky silhouette sprung to his mind’s eye. Something lithe and graceful, skulking through his nasal passages heedless of the sorry state of them. It glided across raw nerves, pausing to snuggle against their warmth as Omicron sliced his lungs with a gasp. Then dragged the breath back out on a groan. Fuck, he could feel it. Could feel the dimensions of the tickle as it prowled and pawed, arched and sprawled, coy in its torture. He could feel his nerves recoil, his nostrils spasm - a panicked cry for action.

“h-YEH!hh..oh.. hh-HEH-” 

Omicron panted as the tickle receded, plumeing into an indistinct but irritating mist. Like a phantom it spread through him, coating his quaking membranes as it drifted deeper.. deeper.. deeper still. It filled his nose with a sensation too ambiguous to do much more than hopelessly itch. His hiccuping breaths eased to stillness; he was trapped on this plateau, punished by a tickle that wouldn’t grow. It merely wanted to endure. A bit frantic, Omicron tried to grasp onto a more solid visual. It didn’t matter what it was, it could be anything, just so long as- 

“Agent Omicron?”

The torturous mist evaporated, leaving his nose singed and no longer imminently sneezy. It took substantial restraint for Omicron not to pound his armrest in abject, miserable frustration. He blew his nose in defeat, raked his sleeves over his cheeks to clear the tears, and sniffled. His nose squeaked in reply. 

“.. I don’t think I can adequately communicate how annoying this is, sir.”

“Well, it really must be a bother if it’s making you pout like this.”

Omicron puffed up in offense and casted for a snide reply before he remembered that this was his boss. He bit his tongue, figuratively and literally. “It’s true this is testing my patience,” he said, “but I assure you that it won’t impact my performance. I’ll achieve nothing less than exceptional results. And respectfully, sir, I’m not pouting.”

Then he shimmied in his seat to face the window.

Agent Delta considered him with a skeptical eye, and as someone who knew the extent of his subordinate’s gifts he was right to do so. Deception was something of Omicron’s specialty. Trained in the art of information extraction, he excelled at becoming whomever a target wanted to see: a cautious creative type, a severe and dismissive businessman, the gullible boy next door or the leather-clad motorcyclist your friends warned you about. This ability, among other qualities, landed him this case.

But tricking a stranger he’d researched for weeks and swindling his superior officer were two different beasts.

“As you say,” Delta conceded to Omicron’s back. 

The jet’s landing gear grazed the runway.

+ + +

The destination was tropical, but close enough to a coastline that the heat wasn’t stifling. Their resort hotel was nothing short of opulent, offering amenities such as: a grand carpeted staircase, bellhops in uniform, and over a dozen glittering chandeliers. They’d changed into their civilian clothes before entering to better blend in. Well, blend was a strong word for Agent Delta; he wore Bermuda shorts with an equally garish aloha shirt printed with hibiscus flowers. Omicron doubted it was an officially sanctioned garment. He himself donned something understated - khaki shorts, boat shoes, and a white v-neck t-shirt. A pair of gold aviator sunglasses sat on top of his head.

He’d done what he could for his nose. When he caught sight of it in the jet’s bathroom mirror just before they deplaned, he could understand why Delta kept needling him. The skin was blushed an obscene red, the color deepest at his nostrils and fanning out across his septum, cupid’s bow, and as far up to the bridge of his nose. He also hadn’t been aware of how much it moved on its own, incessantly prodded by the tickle inside. Looking at himself too long just made him feel sneezier, and Omicron had braced his hands on the bathroom counter with helpless hitching until he coughed out a single, underwhelming, ih’BZSch!

Now watching Delta check in at the front desk from across the hotel lobby, Omicron tempered his trembling nostrils with a touch of his index finger. Settle down, he bargained. Stop teasing me.

His phone vibrated against his thigh. It was a burner; he got a fresh phone for every assignment and didn’t keep a personal cell. A glance at the number told him exactly who it was. He lifted it to his ear.

“Make it quick, Doctor,” he said. “I’m onsite.”

“Well, hello to you too, Mr. Grouch!” Dr. Voster trilled. His mood further soured at her enthusiasm. “New phone again, huh? How’d you know it was me?”

“I memorized your number.”

“Because I’m your favorite?”

Omicron wrinkled his nose. “I memorize all my numbers. Don’t get excited.”

“You really know how to make a woman feel special, O.”

“Did you want something?” he asked, eyes on Delta as the man chatted amiably with the clerk. His nostrils twinged and he gave them an appeasing rub. “I’m busy.”

“Just checking in. How’s your nose doing?”

As if to answer, the tickle squirmed. Omicron snorted reflexively and rubbed more sternly against his sore septum.

“You’re calling at..” He checked his watch. “..1:15 in the morning your time to ask about my nose?”

“Your viral load should be pretty high by now,” she replied, sounding wide awake despite the hour. “I want to know how it feels.”

“It feels-” He’d been gearing up for a snarky remark, but it died on his tongue. Between one breath and the next something changed. His nostrils slowly flared, grazing his finger where it rested against his lip.

“… it feels?” prompted Dr. Voster.

To his credit, Omicron tried. “I-hht.. h’tzuh..” 

But then his eyes flickered shut as he became entranced by that incurable tickle. It advanced slowly, enormous in his nose, lumbering forward and promising him a bounty. The swell would have intimidated him if he hadn’t been waiting for the better part of a day. He dropped his finger from his lip and braced his hand against the wall instead. If this was as big as it felt, he’d need it to stay on his feet.

“hUH-… ugh..” A sharp sniff, and a mutter under his breath. “..chhome on.. h-hh-!”

Fuck, it was oppressive. Omicron cinched his eyes tightly shut as he eased a breath through his tingling nose. It didn't hasten the advance, only threw gasoline on a raging fire. The tickle licked at his nasal nerves, which began to spasm in alarmed reply. Suddenly he was gulping down air, hitching so loudly it felt lewd.

“hah!hh.. uHH!h.. HUH-.. HUH-.. HUH-!”

The fire burned on, colossal and all consuming, demanding so much of him that his lungs filled to the brim. He could feel his head ratcheting by degrees, twitching back even when he could take no more air. If he could open his eyes, he’d probably see the shimmer of those fancy chandeliers. The tickle seethed for an agonizing moment. A quiet ache of pleasure twisted his gut. And then-

“WRRUZZSSSSHOOO!!”

Ecstasy. 

“HHHH-!.. RRIHSSSSCH’YUU!”

It scraped through him thoroughly with a crack of throbbing relief. Dazedly, he hitched anew. In, in, in-

“h-hH-HH-” And out in one fell swoop. “HPT’ZSSSCHOOO!!..nnngh..”

Omicron thanked himself for the foresight of leaning against the wall. Otherwise he’d probably be on the ground, or at the very least staggering aimlessly as his sneezes tossed him around. His nose didn’t seem to know what to do, other than grant him another.

“HAH’DIZSSSH’uh!”

And another.

“HEH’YIIZSSCHOO!ohhh..”

He gasped for breath, the hand holding his phone routing to his sternum. He could feel his heart hammering, his chest heaving. Each time he sneezed, his abs clenched. And with each release, a cloying ache spread through his groin. He was probably erect by this point but-

“Hih-.. HIHBISSSH’YAHhh!”

He didn’t want to stop. Omicron breathed deeply into the tickle, feeling it paint the inside of his nose with a swath of sensation. Something speared into his sinuses - the probing tip of a paintbrush, a thin piece of twine, a fiendish little intruder intent on undoing him.

“IIH’TIZZSCH’iu!!”

His lungs emptied and replenished themselves with another single, flowing breath. Despite his light-headedness and unsteady legs, Omicron felt himself smiling. 

“HHHH!.. EHJZZSSHUE!!’hhhooohh by god..”

It resonated pleasantly, like he struck his body with a tuning fork, and the trancelike need to sneeze, gasp, sneeze finally ebbed. The tickle receded, mollifying his nose in its tide. He could still feel it floating around in his sinuses somewhere, sated for now but impossible to fully satisfy. And of course his dick wasn’t satisfied in the slightest. His balls ached terribly. He’d had the good sense to arrange himself before entering the hotel lobby, fully aware he might find himself in this predicament in public. Again.

A voice spoke intelligibly, muffled against his shirt. Oh right, the phone. He put it back to his ear.

“What?” he panted.

“Did those feel good?”

He sniffled and fended off a full body shiver. “Don’d all sdeezes feel good?”

“Mm. Yeah.” Her tone was weirdly stilted. “Well. So. This is awkward, but I might have-”

Omicron tuned her out as he gathered himself. He was in dire need of a tissue, and he’d caught his own shirt in the crossfire of those last few sneezes. A quick scan of the room confirmed that just about every guest and employee saw him letting loose without even an attempt to cover his mouth. Many people were staring, including Agent Delta. The man was agog, but as Omicron stared back, he got the prickling feeling that it wasn’t him Delta was looking at. It was a second after that when he heard who exactly caught his superior’s eye. 

“Bless you.”

He clocked the voice before he turned, which gave him a split-second to prepare his expression. He arranged a look of chagrined surprise and hung up the phone on a still-nattering Anita.

“Oh!” He jumped, and flashed a shy smile. “Thagk you.”

She was taller in person, with legs a mile long and hair falling in thick waves to her waist. She wore burgundy lipstick, accentuating the plush shape of her mouth. A voluptuous woman, her Bohemian ensemble framed her curves and flowed around her like a modern renaissance painting. Her jewelry spoke of wealth, her painted nails spoke of elegance, and her eyes concealed a careful fire. 

She held out a pair of sunglasses. Mine, Omicron realized.

“You dropped these.”

He took them from her with a chuckle. “Ah, jeez, that’s embarrassi’g.” He sniffled and didn’t miss her swift glance at his nose. “I really mbade a spectacle of mbyself. Sorry about that.”

“Not at all,” she said. Her voice was dark velvet, soft and sophisticated. “I’m sure you couldn’t help it.”

Omicron juggled his phone and his sunglasses, keeping his eyes on her as he unearthed a half-empty package of travel tissues. He kept up his sniffling, in part for her benefit and also because his nose dripping onto his shirt was an imminent concern.

“Yeah, I’b kind of a mbess todahhy..” He tried to keep his eyes open even as they fogged with emergent tears. His voice scratched against a tender throat, tremoring around little hitching hiccups. “I do-hh!T huh.. don’t eved doe where th.. hh-hH!..mbghh, where all thad came fromb I-hhH!.. ndormally don’d sdnee-”

It overpowered him suddenly. He just barely rushed a tissue to his nose in time.

“hiH’TISsh’oo!” Back to the regulars, and just one didn’t quite cut it. Omicron huffed his way to a second. “..uh.. hck’KSSH’u!.. ugh..”

“Bless you,” she said.

That took care of the itch (for now). He wavered on his feet, fawn-legged from his earlier fit, and muttered a guttural “Pardod be” as he ducked away to noisily blow his nose. It took several tissues before he deemed himself presentable and by the time he got all the used ones shoved into his shorts pockets, he turned back around to see his sunglasses being offered to him again. 

Omicron chuckled hoarsely as he took them from her. “I should probably start carrying a spare pair, at this rate.”

There was an amused tilt to her lips. “Perhaps.”

He shared in her smile until the pause between them stretched a little too long. Then he jolted into awkward conversation. “Ah, um- where’s my manners, jeez, I’m Nicolas.”

Nicolas Foster, his cover for this operation: an under-the-weather tourist in town for a destination wedding.

She inclined her head to him gracefully and held out her hand. “Josaline.”

Josaline Jewel, his target: business mogul of the fashion world with a clothing line, makeup brand, and lucrative designer bag collection all sold exclusively online. The agency suspected her of extensive cybercrime; Omicron’s job was to uncover any signs of money laundering, malware manufacture, or identity theft.

“I’d shake your hand,” he said with a self-conscious scrub of his palms against his shorts and another self-deprecating laugh, “but I’ve been sniffly all morning, I’m sorry.”

“Oh?” Again her gaze flashed to his nose when he wrinkled it with a sniffle. “Are you not feeling well?”

He sniffled again as he fiddled with his sunglasses, bashful. “I’m still hoping it’s the jet-lag, but it feels like I’m coming down with something, yeah.”

He punctuated this with a wrist swipe beneath his warm, chapped nostrils. They flared to caution him against further meddling. Josaline crooned in sympathy.

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

Doubt it, he thought to himself as he offered a warm smile. “That’s really sweet of you to say. Thanks.”

Omicron researched sneeze fetishes as thoroughly as he cased intel on Josaline Jewel. Operatives observed her engaging with unfamiliar men at industry events or galas, escorting them off the dancefloor and into private quarters. All these men had two things in common: they were shorter than she was, and they were at the time afflicted with sneezing. Though she didn’t seem deterred by illness, the agency lacked further details. To fill his void of knowledge, Omicron dove headfirst into a world of niche kinks; he read and watched a towering amount of sneezy content, some of it about fictional characters he’d never even heard of. But he left the experience a more educated man, enlightened and prepared to perform. Now it would be a game of discerning Josaline’s preferences.

“What brings you to town, if I might ask?” Josaline asked. She took a hesitating step in her peep-toe wedges and Omicron followed the cue to walk with her.

“A friend’s wedding,” he said, and it became obvious that his increasingly wet sniffles required maintenance. He sighed as fished around for his last clean tissue. “He’s an old college buddy, super nice guy. The wedding’s not until next week, but I had some time saved up at work and the flights were cheaper on weekdays, so..” Tissue acquired. “..I guess it worked out pretty well.”

“Do you enjoy traveling alone?” she asked, setting a sedate pace across lush carpet and spotless tile. “I find it invigorating, but it can be a little lonely now and then.”

He blotted gently at his nostrils. They fussed at the treatment, jerking and fidgeting against his fingers. Yes, that’s right, Omicron goaded. Tickle me. Go on. The virus humored him, unfurling and sauntering forward with ambition. Instantly his eyelids got heavy, and his voice grew heady.

“Oh, I couldn’t afford this place by mys-.. mys-hhelf..” He kept the tissue tucked to his face this time, muffling his voice and obscuring her view of anything but his fluttering eyes. “I’m hhuh-” 

The tickle got to work, trailing feather-light fingers along his nasal walls. They writhed, trapped and helpless to the whims of a persistent itch. It stroked sensitive places, unhurried and secure in the knowledge he could do absolutely nothing to stop it. He tried to speak around the buildup, each breath a little blip or sigh he couldn’t repress.

“Ho, sorry, I’m rooHH-!.. uh.. rooming with another frihhend whose… als-uHH’h..H-H!” 

He paused as the tickle escalated, now lounging indulgently as it guided him to a gasping high. Its approach was always rhythmic, an everlasting titillation that magnified as the tolerance of his nose diminished. Omicron shot Josaline an apologetic glance over the edge of his tissue and found her looking right at him. For the first time she lost composure, and hurriedly ducked behind a lock of her hair.

“.. Are you alright?” she asked, staring at the floor as they continued to stroll.

Omicron cringed through another playful swipe of the tickle, like fingers made purely of fluff skimming up the length of his nose. He gasped hugely, certain it would come, but then let it out on a near-moan. “..ohhh, sorry- it’s this cold, I-.. Iyyiieee..HH! iG’GZZSCHhu!”

It was a little stronger than he thought it would be. Instinctually he flashed a hand out and anchored his grip to whatever was nearby. The tickle gave him another long, firm stroke and his nerves begged mercy. 

“HIH!PPSSHh’oo!” And another lancing tickle, like washing your car with a sponge, running your hand along a cat’s back, a frictionless glide but it was malicious in its softness and it agitated his nose into rebellion. With one hand, Omicron sealed the tissue more tightly over his nose and mouth. “MMPPHSssh!”

He emptied his remaining air in a desperate blow. His nose tingled with temporary relief. The single, brave tissue did its best, but he’d absolutely need to wash his hands and find another fresh package as soon as possible. Picking his head up, he balled up the trash and knuckled his nose with his fist.

“Sorry, that was gross, I’m-” Genuine anxiety prickled in him as he looked up and realized his other hand was clasped firmly to her upper arm. That was an accident. Omicron flinched away and clung white-knuckled to his disguise. “-SO sorry, oh jeez, I really didn’t mean to grab you like that, I wasn’t- I just, I had to sneeze and then it felt like it was gonna be a big one so I-.. guess I reached for whatever was around, I wasn’t thinking…”

Josaline stood and silently let him run out of steam. A molten heat pooled in her irises. A rose tint glazed her cheeks. She lifted her purse, an understated but expensive clutch with a golden chain, and popped it open.

“Not at all, Nicolas.” Her words melted from her lips. “I truly don’t mind.”

She slipped a swatch of white fabric from her bag and shook it. It unfurled like a flag of surrender, and she held it out with a coy smile. He lifted his finger once again to his nose to graze it just beneath his itchy nostrils and felt a telling touch of moisture. His ears flushed and her smile grew.

“Oh gosh, sorry, that’s..” Cupping one hand over his nose, he reached with the other. “Thank you, Josaline.”

Omicron took the handkerchief and paused when she didn’t let go. Their eyes met.

“I do hope this won’t be the last we see of one another,” she told him. 

Just behind her, the elevator dinged. He blinked, only just noticing where exactly they were. She stepped back into the gilded lift, leaving him with her handkerchief and one last view of her burgundy smile. Then the doors closed. Omicron dropped his shoulders and blew a slow breath from his cheeks. Initial contact: not a catastrophe. Step two: arrange a serendipitous rendezvous.

Agent Delta appeared beside him. Omicron was certain he’d watched it all from a covert corner. He spoke softly, so as not to be overheard. “This is going swimmingly. Well done.”

Omicron ignored his heart’s little leap at the praise. He didn’t like to count chickens before they hatched. His mind raced to assemble all that he’d learned, the pieces of what intrigued her. “Thank you, sir.” 

“Nicolas.” Omicron looked at him, and resisted shooting the man a withering glare when Delta brightly grinned and said, “Your nose is running.”

“Yes, thank you, sir,” Omicron snipped. “I’m aware.”

He tucked into the handkerchief. It was a balm to his sore nose after so many cheap tissues. The cotton was of superb quality, probably with a thread count higher than his bed sheets back home. Omicron nuzzled into it to snuffle and blow; seconds later, he realized with dawning dread that this was the wrong thing to do. For while this handkerchief was freshly laundered, it was also steeped with an overpowering perfume.

The tickle took umbrage with this. It bristled in his nose like a startled cat, sinking claws into his tender membranes and whipping its tail angrily against the sensitized border of his sinus. He couldn’t even suck a breath in before-

“Tssh! Ih’TSsh!.. HSH’u!” He ripped his nose away from the handkerchief, holding the cloth away from him with revulsion. “Hih’KSSh!.. h’KZSh’iu! Ugh!”

“Ooh, bless you, bless you.”

The handkerchief disappeared, and without any other options, he buried his nose into the prayerbook of his hands.

“IHPsh!.. h’PZSsch!.. fugk, ednough, plhHE- HH!BZSSh!”

“Bless you!”

At last it abated. He could imagine the tickle huddled far back in his nose, growling low as it continued to lash its tail. Omicron sniffled behind his hands and coughed from the effort.

“It’s impossible to say whether she doused this intentionally or not,” mused Delta, studying the handkerchief. He tried to pass the offending item back to Omicron, who shrunk away from it. He didn’t want it anywhere near his nose. “She couldn’t have known you were allergic.”

“I’b dnot allergic,” Omicron argued through gritted teeth. Delta gave him a look that plainly said, I don’t believe you, but I’ll humor you because you’re irascible and sneezy. Omicron fantasized about strangling him with a garrote. 

They took the elevator up in silence. Delta passed over another package of tissues and Omicron plowed through several of them. More garbage to add to his pocket collection. He’d have to unload once he got to his hotel room, and used tissues weren’t the only load on his mind. His erection had yet to flag. It was easy to ignore during his conversation with the target, focused as he was on his work, but with nothing to distract him Omicron was getting tense and eager for alone time.

Which is why he balked when Delta tried to follow him into his hotel room. Omicron stopped just over the threshold. “Is this your room?”

“It’s our room.”

Omicron’s grip tightened on the doorknob. He’d been lying when he told Josaline he had a roommate. That was his cover story, yes, but not the actual plan. “I thought we were bunking separately.”

“I’ve reconsidered,” Delta replied, and while his tone was light there was a finality to his tone. “Sharing a room will reinforce our cover, and given this is your first high stakes case I’d rather stick close to support you on the ground.” He fixed Omicron with a pointed stare. “Unless there’s a reason you’d rather not share?”

Oh, you bastard, he seethed. You know what I’m going to say. Delta was already suspicious - giving him anymore ammo would just worsen things for Omicron. His hand slid off the knob. “Of course not, sir.”

There were so many reasons Omicron would rather not share a room with Agent Delta. He preferred solitude over company, silence over noise, and Delta was the opposite. The senior agent prattled about nonsense while awake and he snored very loudly while asleep. He hovered around Omicron all evening and compulsively blessed his sneezes and bullied him into watching crappy reality television shows. The hotel room was excellent, but small; there was no opportunity for privacy. The silver-lining was that there were two beds so they didn’t have to share.

After unpacking, discussing tomorrow’s plans, and sharing an array of delivery boxes from Panda Express while they watched some inane matchmaking show, Omicron collapsed into bed with a heavy head. All the congestion settled behind his eyes, and both nostrils were blocked as soon as he reclined. He jammed the charger into his phone with stuffy grunts of exasperation and then noticed the flurry of missed calls and text messages from Dr. Voster lighting up his screen. They were hours old, most of them berating him for hanging up on her and demanding that he call her back.

But it was late, he was tired, and surely by now she was asleep. He’d catch up with her tomorrow.

+ + +

Steamy hot water fell around him, sliding warm down his skin and thickening the air. Omicron tilted his head back. He hitched a single breath, and shuddered it out on a voiced sigh. “..huh..”

He braced his hands more securely against the shower walls and steadied his feet beneath him. He woke this morning with post-nasal drip and a too-big tickle in his nose. Just as Delta said before, it stockpiled power in his sleep and by the time he came to bleary consciousness, he could feel the itch in every nook and cranny of his respiratory system. It wanted out.

The tickle scuffled with his weary sinuses and his lungs snagged with a sharp gasp, “Hih!” and another slow, yearning sigh. “..hhuhhh..”

His prick throbbed and he brought a soaped-up hand down to grip the shaft. He was rock-hard, woke up that way, too muddled with arousal and tickling misery he could do nothing but stumble to the shower. Another grungy sniffle roused the tickle to action; it shimmied in the confined space, touching every nerve with its feathery borders. It was such an overpowering sensation that he couldn’t actually sneeze. Only suffer.

“h-H-HH!” Both he and the tickle waited, but to no avail. He deflated with a moan. “.. hhh-uuuhhhh..”

Omicron stroked himself, stepping forward to press an arm to the cool tile wall and lean his forehead there as he lost himself to the climb. Sneeze or no sneeze, he was going to come. Muggy air coaxed a dry cough, a snuffling breath, another flexing fidget from the tickle. It didn’t settle afterward, but instead began to twist and turn. Thrash and flail. His nose shuddered helplessly in the onslaught. Yes, yes, yes, chanted Omicron as his nostrils pulsed. That’s it. Tickle me.

He smoothed his thumb over his slit, arching forward. He panted hot breath against the sweaty tile. Water pounded down against his shoulder blades, muscles shifting beneath skin as the tickle wriggled and wormed against its prison. His nose frazzled at the attention, and Omicron’s parted lips flinched up with a little grin. He heaved with breath, whining his way through a monstrous buildup. All the while he pumped his hand at an increasingly feverish pace.

“..uh... hhUH-hh!.. HUH!’hh.. HAH-H-” His voice reverberated off the walls with obnoxious volume. The sound of wet skin squelching mingled with the patter of water on the shower floor. He gasped at the bolt of pleasure sparkling below his stomach. “-H-Hhh’oh-hh.. h’H-uhh..”

The arousal broke his momentum. He thumped a fist against the wall with an abysmally soupy sniffle. With warring sensations, neither could win. Omicron lifted his head to the shower spray to wipe his face and paused to chafe his index finger beneath his flitting nostrils. He slowed the rhythm of his other hand. You can do better than that, he challenged the tickle. C’mon, let me have it. He snorted, feeling his sinuses vibrate with the strain. Make me sneeze.

Wish granted. With a loss of sensation down below, the tickle rushed in to fill the void. It consumed him in an instant. Omicron inhaled as if the shower water suddenly turned to ice.

“HHHHH!! IIHDDZSSSCHHYOOO!!”

It was finally out, the start of what felt like a dozen. His whole body trembled, including his dick, and Omicron dazedly picked up the pace as his nose cramped with another powerful swell. Another butter-smooth gasp.

“HIIIIH!! EHTZZSSHHH’EH! Mmmbb-!”

A beautiful ache bled through his abdomen, mirrored in the tingling clarity of his nose. Fuck he didn’t know when Delta would be back from his morning run, but.. “nnnggh..HAAASCHHYUU!-uuooh..”

He’d never been a quiet man in bed and these sneezes were some of the best he’d had so far. His membranes twitched in relief each time, as did his prick, before another storm quickly gathered. Omicron instinctively sped up the tweak of his wrist as he rocked into each stroke. He wouldn’t last much longer; he’d been edged long enough. His flaring nostrils flew wide.

“h’YIZZSSSH’Iyuh!! hooh-.. hh.. H-HIISSCHH’OOO! hhhAH-!” 

The orgasm hit like a truck. It rippled through him, wrenched him forward, and it would have been perfect if the shower floor wasn’t so damn slippery. As he shook his way through the aftershocks, the tickle snuck up on him.

“iiGGXSHH’TT- AAH-” Nothing about him was prepared. It exited roughly through his congested airways and upset his equilibrium. His feet went out from under him and rolling with the momentum spared him a concussion from the slick tile. It didn’t spare his pride however when he heard a voice from the other side of the door.

“Bless you, Omicron! You okay in there?”

Fuck, cursed Omicron, back flat to the tile as the shower pelted water into his eyes. When did he get back?

“Fine!” he barked back. The slip-scare soured what remained of his orgasm and the inside of his nose ached with raw exhaustion. He touched a knuckle to the tip. Before Delta could ask, he added, “I dropped the shampoo!”

“Well, be careful,” Amused, now that he knew his subordinate was alright. “Sounds like that nose of yours means business today!”

Omicron covered his face with his hands and sighed.

+ + +

Sunshine coated the simmering pavement. People kept their sandals on as they milled about for fear of burning their feet. Couples cuddled together in upholstered loungers around the pool’s perimeter. Loners relaxed with books on couches sheltered by giant, colorful parasols. A dual walk-and-swim-up tiki bar bustled at the far end of the pool, surrounded by wading, tipsy tourists. This was an adult-only area, so aside from the group of trust-fund college grads squealing and shoving one another off the diving board, it was quiet and classy. 

Nicolas ignored wandering eyes as he maundered the water’s edge. 

After his ill-fated shower, Delta informed him there was surveillance of Josaline Jewel in this area and it was time for a fated meeting. He’d put on a pair of colorblock swim trunks and a thin cotton cream shirt he left unbuttoned over a waxed chest. He was not a big man, but his work kept him toned. Defined abs, firm pecs, broad shoulders with muscles that rolled across his back when he moved. He’d use them all to his advantage.

Deep in his sinuses, the tickle swelled. His nostrils weakly complained and he hushed them with a quick back-forth sweep of his finger. He’d use this too, when the time came.

An arm draped over his shoulders, dragging him in for a chokehold hug. “The whole team should take a vacation sometime,” Delta said fondly. “This is fun.”

Speak for yourself, groused Omicron. Irked as he was to have Delta here, it would help his cover. Acting with a partner provided an opportunity that single performances couldn’t. Besides, jerking off in the shower took the edge off his temper, so Omicron weathered the affection without complaint. He only pressed an elbow to Delta’s chest when his own expanded with a fast-rising urge.

“G-Gonnaahh-” He hiccuped a hitching breath. Experienced now in dodging, Delta leaned away as Omicron pitched haphazardly into his opposite arm. “hih’DZSSS’ooh!”

“Bless you,” muttered Delta, and mercifully didn’t complain about the distinct lack of vampire-sneeze etiquette. Some of these sneezes just got away from him, no matter how slow or quick they came on.

They both paused for more, but after a couple uneasy breaths, none arrived. Omicron checked the damage: no shirt stains, a slight drink spillage but not on himself or anyone else, and Delta wasn’t caught by collateral. Insufferable as his senior officer could be, Omicron would perish if he accidentally sneezed on him. 

Delta lowered his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose. “See her anywhere?”

Omicron scanned as they walked, swirling his stemless wine glass before he took a sip. “Not yet.”

“Maybe she left before we got-”

“Hello.”

They whipped their heads to the left and there was Josaline. She wore the widest brim sun hat that Omicron had ever seen, black with a dramatic dip, and streaked with a white ribbon that matched the chic blacks and whites of her asymmetrical one piece suit. She still wore heels, toes painted to match her nails, ankles crossed. Her smile peeked at them from under her hat and designer sunglasses.

Nicolas roused himself and gave her a helpless smile, as if he hadn’t meant to stare. “Hi.”

“Were you looking for me?”

He fished a hand at the back of his neck, flushed to his ears, and Delta playfully tightened his grip. “Yeah, he couldn’t stop talking about you.”

Nicolas elbowed him with a hiss under his breath. “Harry!”

“I’m Harry by the way,” Harry told her, swooping in to offer his hand. Nicolas wrestled out of his hold in the meanwhile, straightening his shirt with a huff. Josaline raised a hand to her mouth to hide her widening smile.

“You must be the friend Nicolas mentioned. The one he’s rooming with?”

“Oh, he told you about me, huh?” Harry smoothed back his hair and waggled his eyebrows. “All good things I hope.”

Nicolas took another sip of his drink as they chatted, wrinkling his nose to one side and then the other. A quick, strong sniff flared his nostrils wide. He let the breath go on a sigh. Josaline tilted back the brim of her hat.

“Feeling any better?”

“Ndot really,” he conceded, then moved to sit across from her on an empty lounge chair. His shirt fell open to frame his sculpted chest and she curtly inspected the view. His pecs jumped with a brisk sniff, then another. He knuckled more aggressively at his nose. “But I’mb dnot gonna let it spoil mby vacation, if I can help it.”

Feeling lousy wasn’t actually a lie. Omicron woke up in the thrall of the tickle, yes, but when he had the ability to think afterward he realized he wasn’t at his best. His throat stung when he swallowed, scraped sore from all his harsh sneezing. His abs felt like they’d been through a ruthless core workout. And there was a disconcerting malaise settling over him, a woozy feeling that he refused to acknowledge in hopes it might just go away. 

“Forgive me saying so, but should you be drinking in your condition?” she asked, nodding to his glass. He took a breath to reply but Harry interrupted with a booming laugh and an amiable slap to the smaller man’s back.

“That’s just lemon tea and honey,” is what he told Josaline and that was also true. He did lie to Delta about it just being a prop for his cover story though. In actuality, it took the edge off his aching throat. Harry carried on, unaware. “I told him to try a hot toddy but he’s a little goodie two shoes when it comes to nursing a cold.”

Nicolas narrowed his eyes, blinking as they began to glass over. All the while since he woke, the tickle in his nose continued to haunt him. Contrary to Dr. Voster’s claim to Delta, the sensitivity hadn’t diminished at all. He bodily turned from the conversation with his drink held far away from him. His other arm tucked snugly around his nose as he sucked in a shuddering breath. Then quaked in place.

“.. hik-.. iH-GZSShu!”

“Bless you,” chorused the other two. 

He picked his head up by hesitating degrees before giving it a sharp shake. More sniffling, a thick clearing of his throat. His gaze darted to Josaline, who glanced away when he caught her looking. “Pardod mbe.”

“You know what? Try not to ruin my vacation either,” Harry griped at him, then looked to Josaline. “Nobody wants to get within five feet of me with him around. He’s like a walking cold medicine commercial.”

Omicron’s eyebrow twitched. “Well at least I don’d snore.”

Delta shot him a look that Nicolas met with innocence and a sip of his drink. Omicron shouldn’t push his luck, but he refused to pass up the chance to take pot-shots at Delta while he could get away with it. Josaline giggled.

“I can tell you’re old friends,” she said as she looked between them. “Do you see one another often, outside of events like this?”

This spiraled into deeper discussion. Delta and Omicron rattled off fake trivia to all her questions, and asked about her in turn. She was vague about her work but fairly open about her personal life. Almost all of it was useless small talk, aside from a compelling instance when she told them she created the software for her website’s security certificate herself. Her competency in coding wasn’t something Josaline Jewel advertised to the public. 

Dr. Voster called him exactly three times during the chat, and each time he dumped her to voicemail. She knew he was working. Whatever she needed to ask him could wait, or ideally, be an email.

Soon the sun was past its apex and Omicron was running out of tissues. Mortifyingly, a passing poolside waiter brought him a little bin for him to toss his trash so he didn’t have to keep walking off to a garbage can. Over the course of their conversation Josaline’s attention gravitated squarely to Nicolas and both men took this as a cue.

Harry slapped his hands on his thighs and stood. “Alright, I’m gonna check out the casino. I’ll catch up with you later, Nick.” He winked. “Have fun.”

Nicolas waved him off with one hand and tended to his unruly nose with the other. His nostrils pushed against his fingers, pulsing irritably. The tickle seemed to get worse over the course of the day, and his sneezes were coming with frustrating regularity if he didn’t waylay them. He tried to strike a balance between holding back and letting go, observing Josaline’s reactions all the while. She definitely wanted him to sneeze as badly as he did, which is why he chose to press the flat of his forefinger hard against his septum until the urge receded. He huffed away the gasp he’d gathered.

“.. huh-hh, sorry, I’b probably ndot great combpadny right ndow..”

He opened his eyes to find Josaline staring at him from under her lashes. She’d taken off her sunglasses some time ago. “On the contrary, I find you captivating.”

Nicolas laughed, ducking his head to cough. “Really? Thad’s a relief. I was worried all… this,” here he gestured to his nose, “would put you off.” 

He punctuated with a sniff, the sound purely liquid, and rushed a hand to cup his nose while he tried to free the last of his tissues from the pack with the other. “Ugh, sorry-”

“Did you lose the handkerchief I gave you?”

Omicron feigned surprise, as if he hadn’t been waiting for her to ask. “Umb.. so-.. hah.” He scrubbed his finger under his nose, subduing his wavering nostrils. “I did use it, but I thig’k you had someb kinda perfumeb on it?..”

Her lips parted in shock, and Omicron knew at once that the scent on that cloth wasn’t intentional. Maybe it was a habit of hers, dousing her handkerchiefs in perfume, but she didn’t know it would actually make him sneeze. There was a faint, petal-like blush spreading across her cheeks and her thighs tensed more tightly together. Well, well.

Nicolas blinked wetly, as if the memory of the handkerchief was enough to make his nose tickle. Granted, literally anything was enough. “As soon’d as I-.. as I-yee…huh-” He blinked again, and again, each time a little harder and with more moisture in his lashes. With a swallow, he tried to hurry through the rest, “As I used ihht I.. st- st..”

He pressed a hand to his sternum as his chest jumped with a little sip of breath. The tickle fluttered in him, enticing. Omicron gave in for just a moment, letting his eyes fold shut, relaxing into the sensation of it. Sometimes the virus felt mechanical, automatic, indifferent to him and his reactive nose. Like a machine chugging ever onward, so did the tickle continue to toil. Tickling.. and tickling.. and tickling… Blind to his convulsing nerves, deaf to his snagging breaths, just carrying on with its function with no regard for the consequences.

Unable now to open his eyes again, Omicron spoke around compulsive gasps and breathed his words on the exhales. “hH!S’made be-.. h-HH!Bade be-uhhh.. snd’HIH!.. sdeehEEZZSSHOO!”

Nicolas snapped forward, sneezing over his lap, and belatedly raised a hand to his nose. It was running copiously. He wouldn’t get the job done with what was left of his tissues, unfortunately. He squinted against another hopeful tickle, begging himself now to keep it together. He really didn’t want to sneeze again like this.

A flash of white caught his eye. Josaline, her gaze boring into him with palpable weight, offered another handkerchief. He swallowed. It was identical in every way to the first, and Omicron suspected it smelled the same too. But this was what she wanted, and he was a professional. He would deliver.

He took it from her and began to unfold it with both hands to give her an uninhibited view of his face. As he began to wind up for another sneeze, he gave the tickle full control over every micro-expression. The fitful flare of his nostrils. The crease of his crow’s feet. His quivering, parted lips. The way his nose gathered grimacing wrinkles at the bridge when the urge became undeniable. His voice bled into his heaving exhales, unintentional but not unwelcome.

“H’uhh.. iIH!hhh..h-h-!hohh.. mbbggh..”

This was the worst part, when it crested to a peak but couldn’t quite get him high enough to tip him over. Throwing caution to the wind, he lifted the aromatic cloth to his face and breeeeeeeathed-

“KZZSSSCH!”

Rough, wrenched out of him in fury. As the methodical tickle gave way to a fierce burn, Omicron had just long enough to wonder if Delta was right: he might actually be allergic.

His eyes rolled closed and he shuddered helplessly into the handkerchief. “iih’TZSsh!” A tight breath and then, “iik’KISHH!... hd’IZSSH!.. Tshh! it’TZSH!”

There wasn’t time for anything else. No wavering gasps, no bleary moment of respite before the next volley. It was a quick trigger release, too itchy and ineffective to do anything but wind him. “-DSSH’uu!.. hd’DZSSH’oo!! ohh..HH!”

He heard Josaline stir in her lounge chair, and then felt the jostle of his own when she sat down beside him. A hand smoothed up and down the line of his spine, pausing to feel his back expand with a single, catching breath. 

“-ig’GEZSC’Hoo!.. GZSShuu!.. Chshh-IH’chzssh!.. HIH!chzsch! Ugh!” He finally managed a shaky blow into the folds of the handkerchief. A couple desperate hitching breaths and then he quickly committed to another. It cleared away most of the mess; he was able to free his nose for air.

His eyes were still locked shut, but he could feel his nostrils twitching like a rabbit’s. Rushing a finger beneath them did nothing. He sneezed against his hand. “iihpssh!... h’TZschh!h- hIKssh!! TIZSSCH’u!”

It felt endless, and nothing like the big, bad wolf sneezes that the tickle cooked up. No, these didn’t help anything. Each sneeze just somehow itched him more. “..hah-..hh.. hH’ZSSCH’yah!”

He nearly lifted the handkerchief back to his face and caught himself at the last moment. Loathe as he was to do it, he used the collar of his shirt instead. He had nothing else. Omicron lifted the corner to his nose, his nostrils so warm to the touch they felt feverish, and muffled what he could.

“MMFZSSH!.. hg’ISHH!..” At least it was slowing down. He sniffled, feeling muzzy, and finally cracked his eyes open. Tears streamed down his cheeks. He closed them again with a jumpy, “hih- IH!-..MMPHZSSH!!”

Omicron waited, tense, for the next one. It sizzled in his sinuses for a solid few seconds before dissipating in a wave of prickling dismay. It left his nose wary, on guard for the next attack, even as the virus insidiously labored away inside him. His shirt was a lost cause, so he shrugged it off and used it to blot at his face as he snuffled and hitched his way into presentability. Holy hell, that was more than he bargained for.

“Bless.”

A touch alighted on his bare arm. Nicolas picked his head up, squinting through puffy eyes and already cringing with apology. “Sorry,” he croaked. “I thigk I mbight be allergic.”

“Yes, so do I,” she breathed, and smoothed her touch to his back again. Without his shirt in the way, her palm glided up and down his skin. Her other hand thumbed a tear from the corner of his eye. “You poor thing.. I didn’t realize that’s what you were trying to say. Forgive me.”

They were both lying to each other now. Nicolas shook his head, both his hands coming to hold one of hers. “Ndo, ndo, it’s ndot your fault! I couldn’d explain itd well.” He gave her a pitifully tearful smile. “Had to sdneeze too bad.”

The tone shifted. Omicron could feel it keenly. Josaline squeezed, then let them go. Her hands lifted instead to cradle his cheeks, her voice dropping to a whisper. “I need to confess something.”

He blinked at her, wide eyed. “... Codfess whad?”

“I’m not the sort of woman to be repelled by all... this,” she said softly, with an equally soft graze of her thumb against one of his chapped nostrils. It flared in response, and Omicron fended off the visceral need to rub it. Josaline stroked him again, and his nose twitched away from her. The tickle bristled and he leaned out her hands, racked with fittish hitches. He jammed his finger beneath his septum, barely catching himself before a sneeze tumbled out. 

She watched him avidly as he battled back the urge, one eye squinted shut in a lopsided wince. Her attention honestly flustered him; Omicron never liked attention when he sneezed, and her gaze in particular stripped him bare. He lowered his finger reluctantly, and kept his hand hovering at chest level. The sneeze was stalled but certainly not gone.

He sighed his words. “S-uh.. Sorry, I-.. hooh, I bight.. I-ihhm godda-HH!” He wiped his head to the side. “iih’DZSCH’iew!! ugh, b’sorry..”

Her voice wavered. “Please don’t be sorry.”

“I-hhuh.. hkrrm!” Omicron cleared his throat, bringing the edge of his shirt up to his nose to blot and then, with great disgust, blow. He was going to burn this thing when he got back to his room. When he finished he looked away from her, painfully embarrassed. “I’m seriously so gross right now, I’m sorry-”

“Nicolas..” She slid a hand up his arm, splaying her fingers on his shoulder. Her other arm came around to rest at the juncture of his neck so she could toy fingers at the short, fine hairs on his nape. “I want to be clear. I’m not put off at all by your cold. Frankly, I think it looks very good on you.”

He frowned at her as the gears turned, then perked up when they slotted in place. “.. Oh!”

Josaline smiled wide enough to show her teeth, humming a little laugh. “I would like to kiss you. Is that alright?”

She drifted into his orbit as she spoke, her smokey stare flicking between his eyes and his lips. He nodded, and met her halfway. As their mouths met, she tugged down the brim of her hat to hide them from view. They kissed behind a black veil, his hand reaching to cup her jaw as she pushed a palm up the plane of his bare chest. With his nose so completely packed, Nicolas gulped air between passes of her tongue and chuffed soft, stuffy breaths against her skin.

Something about Omicron. He was suited to his job in many ways, one of which being his attitude toward infatuation and sex. Romance made his skin crawl, and physical intimacy was to him nothing more than a nice dessert. Delicious? Yes. Mandatory? No. He desired sex as much as he desired bubble baths or a night at the opera. He never let it distract him from his mission, even when at times it was his mission. It was a point of pride for him.

She eased him onto his back, kissing him deeply into the plush of the lounge chair. The new angle wasn’t great for his nose, shifting congestion in his head like tetris blocks until he whimpered against her lips. She finally let him up for air and he heaved in a breath, snuffling squeakily and then coughing when the air bottled up in his sinuses. He belatedly turned his head, and flushed up to his hairline.

“- guh, suh-sorry,” Nicolas whispered, his voice gravelly. “Can’d breathe through by dose at all.”

“Stop apologizing,” Josaline whispered back. She nudged the tip of her nose against his, nuzzling him even as she bit down on his lower lip to mumble around the flesh. “Can I help?”

He didn’t get a chance to reply before her tongue was back in his mouth. It was dark beneath the shade of her hat, with bits of sunlight dancing through the weave. While it was no mystery what they were getting up to under there, it was as subtle and as tasteful as public displays could get. She leaned more of her weight against him, pushing the planes of her palms up the span of his chest until he made another pleading sound.

Again she leaned back by an inch and again he tried to catch his breath. His nose fizzed with a wicked tickle. Sinuses immobile. Couldn’t agitate his nose with air. It would have to be something else, another method.. 

A bolt of inspiration struck.

“Josah-H!.. Josalind,” he mumbled. She was passing time sucking a bruise on his neck. “hah.. Josalind, cad you-”

She blew a puff of cool air over the patch of wet skin and smirked as he shivered. “Can I what, baby?”

“Hhhelp,” he gasped, and arched when she laved her tongue over his collarbone. His neck was sensitive, and Omicron resolutely continued even as he arched his back. “I’ll breathe better if I cad sdneeze, bud.. huh..” He sniffled in vain. The attempt ended in another disappointed cough. “.. id won’d combe.”

It was like he said the magic words. Josaline lifted her head and refocused her attention on his nose. It looked pitiful, so raw from rubbing and snubbing that the skin shined a brilliant red. His nostrils flared like a beacon, irregular but frequent. Nicolas gazed up at her, blotchy and half-lidded. She skimmed her pinky finger up the bridge of his nose, watching his eyes fall closed and his brows crunch and his nose wrinkle up beneath her touch. She sighed, besotted.

“I can certainly do something about that, but I’m not sure I should do it here,” she murmured. Fingers threaded through his hair, scritching lightly at his scalp. “I have things in my room-”

He slivered his eyes open. “Whhee.. cad d..” They fluttered closed again as he breathed, breathed!... And then sighed out a groan. “-ohh..We cad go to your roomb-h-H!.. hiiff you w-wand.. but..huh-”

Unable to help himself, one of his hands routed from her waist to his nose to grind beneath his throbbing nostrils. Just enough to take the edge off so he could finish what he was saying. His entire expression scrunched as he worked his nose, but he plowed onward.

“..I usually don’d ndeed buch,” he clarified. “Jusd thinking about id is edough to.. to…” He dropped his hand and snatched in a gasp so deep, his chest lifted Josaline where she lay across him. “HHHUH-!” But nothing came. He growled, his first real display of frustration in front of her. She comforted him with another rake of her fingers through his hair.

“Truly?” she asked, and when he fought his eyes open to look at her she seemed awed. “No.. external stimulation at all?”

Omicron knew of the methods to which she alluded, but Nicolas didn’t. He gathered his eyebrows together. “.. Ndo?”

“How do I help?”

“You cand just talk.” He anchored his hand back to her waist, his gaze glassing over. “About how buch id t.. tiihckles..”

She pressed her lips together, her cheeks beginning to darken. “.. could you demonstrate?”

Not the response he expected. He figured she’d want to take the lead, but Omicron was nothing if not flexible. “Yeahhh..h!IH-.. I usually thig’k about fhheathers or.. flowers or.. sombthig like..” He closed his eyes and conjured an image. “Like a little bug, crawli’g around up there.”

And just like that, it’s what the tickle became. Small, at first so unobtrusive as to be barely of notice but over time the irritation compounded. Omicron hauled in a hearty sniffle, coughing for his trouble, but the endeavor cleared up some of his consonants.

“It doesn’d know what it’s doing, but it’s tryi’g to escape and the luhh.. lohhnger it searches the.. huH!ohh.. the mbore unbearable it becomes.”

He could feel it zipping about, uncaring and unaware of how it stirred his haggard nose into motion. As it scampered along the length of a nerve, the membrane flushed and quivered. As its glossy wings grazed the tender pink walls, they shuddered. Another sensation pulsed further down; heat began to pool into his abdomen.

“And it’s tiih.. tiHII-!ckling mbe, but it doesn’t know that and I can’t tell it to stop and at this p-hhoint I don’dH! wantHH!- hhihht to..” 

The little presence adventured in the wrong direction, into more sensitive depths, so deep in his nose he didn’t know it could tickle there. Omicron moaned at the honeyed ache in his groin. He desperately wanted friction, but common sense kept his hips welded to the lounge chair. He felt the tickle flutter, then flit, and then begin to panic. It realized this wasn’t the exit.

“Ahhnd th-then.. it starts freaki’g out. It’s buzzing all around and maki’g my ndose itchier and itchier, and I’m st.. start-HH!h’ingHH!!h-to.. IIH!”

Omicron imagined the wet, cavernous expanse of his tortured sinuses, every inch of it undulating in agitation all because of one little tickle. And that tickle persevered even now, darting around in the abyss of his nose unceasing. A smile flickered across his lips as another pang of pleasure swirled through him.

“.. and I just want it to keep..HHHH!” He huffed a momentous breath and his chest jumped under her hands. Words carried on his pining exhale. “.. -want it to mbake mbe-HHHHH!” Tingles trailed down his spine as he uttered the last few words in a high, airy voice. “.. make mbe snhheeze… HHDZZSSSCCHH’OOO!!”

Sparks popped behind his eyelids and Omicron moaned helplessly through a wave of carnal delight. He didn’t come, but the sneeze was paradise. He hitched gratefully up to the next one in line. “HH! HH! HHHH-” Something billowy and soft tucked over his nose and he pitched into it. “EH’JZZSSHHH’IUU!”

He groaned into fabric, stretching restlessly on the lounge chair as his cock twitched again. It was confined to the tight pressure of his swim trunks, a problem Omicron couldn’t think clearly enough to solve as he huffed and puffed his way toward another humongous sneeze.

“-ah.. haH.. HAAASZZSSSH’UE!” And still his nose craved more. Who was he to deny it? “-iihHHIIZZSSHEW!! mmbb..” Once they started, they felt too good to stop. “.. uhTZSSSSCH!!iuuhhhhh..”

Omicron keened, muffled by the cloth snugged over his nose. The break afforded him a chance to snurfle into its folds and reach up to brace his hand over the one that held it there. Deep in his nose, the tiny intruder buzzed brainlessly against nerves flayed raw. They were defenseless, vulnerable and so, so very sensitive. His chest rose and fell with an increasingly staccato rhythm, his expression frozen with need. He needed t-to.. He hhhad to-!

“ehhHPBBZSSCCH’IIYUU!”

He seized into the cloth and collapsed back to the chair. Heat surged through his veins, wondrous but left wanting as his erection strained against the front of his shorts. But at last the attack on his nose abated; the tickle retreated to the dark, hidden place where it liked to bide its time. Omicron mustered through a long, alleviating blow into the sturdy fabric. Sinus pressure dissipated from behind his eyes, just enough to take the sharpest edges off his encroaching headache. Then he just laid there panting and steadying his hazy vision when he finally opened his eyes.

He noticed a few things.

Nearly everybody in the vicinity was looking at him, sunbathers and staff members alike. Josaline was not an exception. Her hand rested lax in his, where she’d held his shirt to his face as he sneezed. And blew his nose. And he had a visible erection, blocked mercifully by Josaline’s position to the wider crowd but absolutely not hidden from Josaline herself. And for the first time, Omicron thought, Oh shit. I might actually be compromised.

“Um-..” he squeaked. All he could hear was a rushing noise, like standing in a wind tunnel, his heart banging against his ribs. Cold sweat broke out over his skin. “Um-..”

Josaline was similarly speechless. Paralyzed, even.

Did she not like it? Was it the bug thing? Fuck, he should have gone with pollen or something, that was more mainstream or at the very least, comparatively less weird. What was he thinking?! He thought this ‘sneezing untouched’ method might entice her, but a hell of an idea that was. Dr. Voster and her ridiculous pursuits. ‘Sneezing by suggestion,’ his ass. Now he was sprawled out here on display with a cock harder than diamonds and he’d just blown his nose into his shirt and practically into her hand-

Don’t panic, he counseled himself through shaking breaths. This is salvageable. Just play it off with a laugh, apologize for everything, then tactically retreat, regroup with Delta, fess up, come clean, apologize AGAIN-

“I-I’ll go,” he said, barely present as he gathered his shirt and held it in front of his crotch to stand. “I’m really sorry, very sorry about this. I just… um..”

Delta will be so pissed that he’ll take me off the case and the agency will put me on probation and I’ll be sorting files in the office for the rest of my career and they’ll never let me live this down, I’ll be the laughing stock of the force, I’ll-

A hand caught his wrist. He looked down and there was Josaline, coaxing him with soft, careful touches to sit back down. She smoothed hair off his sweaty brow.

“Relax,” she told him. “No one knows. They only looked because you were loud, and nothing more.”

If she meant that to be reassuring, it didn’t help. Everybody and their neighbor just watched him obnoxiously sneeze and moan for what might have been several minutes. So much for subtly, which was his entire job description as an agent. He was a disgrace to the force. Omicron buried his face in one hand, elbow propped on his knee. Nebulous plans to cut his losses and find a new job stalled at the sound of her chuckle. 

“And didn’t I tell you to stop apologizing?”

He shrunk inward, painfully embarrassed and hissing a whisper into his clammy palm. “Yeah, but that was-”

“It was incredible.” 

Omicron snapped his head up, blinking the blur out of his eyes. Josaline’s flushed cheeks and smile came into focus. She scooted closer to him, pressing her bosom to his arm and tucking her head in the crook of his neck. She raised the edge of his shirt, still piled between his limp hands, to dab beneath his nose. Omicron startled, recognized the feeling of something wet on his upper lip, and lost what remained of his composure.

“Could I not be a disaster for just five seconds? Please??” he demanded of the universe, of the virus, of anyone, and turned his head away to clean himself up without help. Sniffling and scuffing his nose prompted retribution. It tickled like a dangling string. Omicron ducked forward. “..h’HIDZssch!!”

Josaline swayed with him and pressed a kiss to his throat. She trailed her lips up and up even as he rushed to wipe his nose. “Listen, Nicolas,” she said against the corner of his mouth. “There is something else I need to confess to you. I want to introduce you to someone.”

Omicron’s nostril wrinkled as it was bestowed a kiss. “.. intro..hh.. duhhce me to someone?”

“Yes.” Silken breath glossed over the bridge of his nose. “To my husband.”

Everything grinded to a halt. 

It was a good thing she expected him to be floored by that news. Husband? Husband?? The word echoed around in his head, immaterial; he couldn’t grasp the concept. There was no intel about a husband. Nobody mentioned a husband. She’s married? How can she be married!? His eyes jerked to her left hand, bare of a ring. She followed his gaze with a charming smile.

“Neither of us wear one,” she explained. “We married for practical reasons, and we aren’t interested in exclusivity. He and I consider ourselves free to explore as we like.”

She’s… married. The fact churned sluggishly in his mind, untethered and unexpected. She’s married. So..

“..uhh..” Omicron contributed intelligently. “Uh, s-so.. huh-” 

Oh for fuck’s sake. He fought tooth and nail to keep his eyes open, watching Josaline bite her lip as the last sliver of light disappeared. Now the tickle was just kicking him while he was down. It snagged him by the lungs and hurled him forward over his lap.

“-eHTCHZSS’hoo!”

“Bless you,” Josaline purred, stuck to him from shoulder to hip.

Omicron tucked his fist beneath his nose with a couple convalescing sniffles. “-nguh, thagk you..” Another sniffle, sharper, and a crinkling blink to disperse the dark spots floating in front of his eyes. “So, you want me to.. meet him?”

“While my husband and I have similar tastes,” she continued delicately, “we find it more gratifying to seek pleasure with others than with one another. However..”

Here she guided him to look at her with a single finger to his chin. 

“.. very rarely, one of us will meet someone special. Someone who would please us both. Together.” 

This conversation was going at light speed while Omicron was still floating in space. He nodded, buying himself time, trying to gather more than just the word husband. So his mortifying sneeze-fit failure was actually a success, to the extent that Josaline wanted him to meet her husband, who also had the hots for sneezing? Presumably? Possibly? But wait, nothing in the files ever mentioned a husband, so that meant this was a secret husband..

“Do you understand?” Josaline asked. “What I’m proposing?”

Ménage à trois, his strategic mind supplied. Ménage à trois with the suspected cyber criminal’s secret husband. 

Suddenly, and Omicron truly didn’t know how, everything was turning up aces. Not only did he have intel on a secret husband but he’d get to meet the guy. Talk to him. Learn more about Josaline through him. Find some incriminating indication that she actually was a white-collar mastermind screwing thousands of people out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. And then he’d get his ass kissed by everybody at head office and they’d crown him King of Spies and give him only the coolest assignments henceforth. Maybe he’d get a fancy company car.. or a commissioned self-portrait in a tuxedo.. or..

Omicron jolted, as if coming awake from an impromptu nap. Shit. He rubbed both hands over his face, dismayed when they came away sticky. The humidity must be getting to him. Moist air always made him groggy. 

“Nicolas?” Josaline looked a little uncertain now.

“I’d love to,” he blurted, then ducked his with a sheepish sniffle. “Ah, I mean.. if that’s-.. if you’re offering..?”

“If you’re comfortable?” she asked back. Nicolas nodded, maybe a little too quickly because his head felt like it was on a string five feet in the air. Josaline broke into a toothy smile, reaching to smooth thumbs over the puffy skin beneath his eyes. “Really?”

“Well, I-... as long as you’re both okay with it,” he replied. His nose creased at the bridge when she nuzzled the tip of hers to his. Omicron hiccuped a breath, and huffed it against her lips. “I-hhah..”

“Dinner tomorrow night,” she promised him, watching avidly as his expression contorted. Omicron squirmed his nose in a bid for it to behave, but Josaline wasn’t having it. She kissed just beneath his nostrils as they flared against her own. Lurking in the recesses of his sinuses, the tickle emerged. “We’ll ask him.”

Then she sealed her lips over his as he contended with the damage in her wake. His nose felt full of fuzzy bits, and with his nose as his only source of oxygen, Omicron was forced to keep stirring them with air. Each inhale swept them in a wind, sending them spinning against every inflamed atom of his nerves. They moved deeper, joined by more, an escalating infestation drifting deeper into his sinuses until he was dizzy with it.

“mmm!” he hummed into her mouth. Both her hands sunk into his hair, holding him still, keeping him locked to her lips as the tickle grew and grew. He sucked a hitching, shaky sniffle that whipped all the fuzz into a storm. Omicron whimpered again, higher and sharper. “-MM!”

Only when he set hands on her shoulders did she part from him with a soft sound, and even then she did it reluctantly. By now Omicron was lost to his gasping ascent. “hih-..hIH!h.. IHT-!” On the cusp, he whirled to the side and rocked with a perfunctory, “-DZSHH’iew!!”

She draped her arms around him, tugging him into her side as he fussed with his nose. Nicolas topped backward with her to the lounge chair. “Bless.” 

“Ugh, thagks,” he snuffled and shifted in her arms to see her better. “Had to sndeeze, I’m sor-”

Josaline pressed a finger to his lips to silence an impending apology, and when she was sure he’d gotten the message, she trailed her painted nails along his bottom lip. “It’s a date, then?”

Nicolas smiled. “It’s a date.”

/tbc! 

I know what happens next, I just have to write it! Thank you so much to everyone who’s stuck around for part 2, I really appreciate you!💗Hope to see you again at part 3 ^w^

[bomberqueen17]

continuing

I had decided that my strange periodic insomnia was caused by alcohol-- even half a beer and i found myself in bed at 10, tossing and turning until 11:30, waking at 1 and being up for the day.

But it's now happened twice this week, after I gave up alcohol entirely two weeks ago. so. it's not the booze. mayhap i will not-celebrate with a beer. :(

Anyway. Apart from that, I have also fallen entirely off the wagon of attempting to make to-do lists. I was trying, and then finding I would do a random assortment of things anyway, and then I was having the best appearance of success by going back at the end of the day in filling in the to-do list with the things I had already done, and then checking them off. very satisfying, but not actually in any way useful. like.... i could try to get a better idea of what i can get done in a day, was my thought, but then i don't know that that's actually useful.

the problem is. i still don't know how to either make or follow a to-do list. they are not useful to me. i can appreciate them, but i cannot follow them. the medication I'm taking is supposed to start showing effects in another week, so we'll see then. I've had many of the side effects for a while now, though most of them have settled in. I eat a lot of fiber and drink a lot of water now, which is probably generally good for me idk.

But! I think part of my problem with to-do lists is that I have been writing, and at a fairly furious pace, and somewhat-obsessively, and so it's not surprising that other things are falling by the wayside.

I am trying, therefore, to make a goal, to finish the draft of this novel by March. This seems like a reasonable goal, and seems like a thing I would do anyway, and so making it a goal is sort of pointless, but it feels like a useful thing to do anyway?

I would be very excited to actually finish a draft of the novel.

It will need edits, and structural ones, but I don't know how to do that, but I don't have to know how to do that yet. By finishing the draft I will know how it ends, and will be able to go back and prune it into a shape that actually supports the ending.

The ending is... setting up for a sequel, alas, but, that's not all bad. I realized I couldn't wrap the whole thing up without cutting out most of what I'd written to step up the pace a lot, and I don't want to do that. I think it's got plenty of meat in it and makes sense to be.... maybe not quite that long but mostly that long. And the sequel is extremely complex and involves a bunch more characters, so I might as well just start fresh.

Anyway. It would be super rad to finish a draft and then edit. I have only done this a few times in my life and it would give me a lot of new skills. So-- March, is my goal. I can set goals!

We'll see.

[scentedpeachlandcreator]

I hope u're doing well! I've been reading ur blog like since 5-7 days ago, and I truly appreciate all the knowledge u share. I had decided not interact until now because, while I understood many concepts at first, some things suddenly became confusing as I kept reading. I would really appreciate it if u could explain everything I need to know from scratch to fully master the Law of Assumption and the 4D/3D concepts (I read one of your Google docs but I really got confused in some—if not most—parts.) English is not my first language, so some expressions make it harder for me to grasp everything completely. That’s why I’d be extremely grateful for a more detailed breakdown. And also, if it's not too much trouble, could you explain to me how to get CONSCIOUS to the void tonight? I know that every night we get to the void but I haven't been conscious, and I've been trying for 1 or 2 months at this point. I would really appreciate it if you could do it! Thank you so much for your time! Please continue with u so wonderful blog !!! ✨♥️

𔘓 Hello lovelyyy!

How are you? Thanks for liking my blog i appreciate it alot.

Anyway here's the breakdown:

What is the Law of assumption:

The Law of assumption is a universal law that states what you assume to be true without proof will become a fact, but that comes with persistence in the assumption.

How to manifest:

★ pick your desire: you can choose whatever desire you want to manifest, it can be multiple, a list of them, and even the unrealistic ones, there's no limit.

★ declare that you have it and accept it: of course that would feel weird at first, but the moment you decide that you already have your desires and that they're yours then it's done, accept that you have it in your imagination. (It would feel natural with times)

★ have faith: have faith in the Law and in your imagination, the Law cannot fail you and never will, your assumption has to happen because it's a Law.

★ persist: no matter what your circumstances are, and what happening in the 3d does not matter, because even if things are going worse in the 3d, you still have your desires, they are yours from the start and nothing will take it away from you, so keep sticking to your assumption and being loyal to it, you know it is real and you believe that you already have it.

4D and 3D?

When it's comes to understanding the concept of the 3d and 4d and how they both work, many individuals tend to think that both of them are seperated, but that entirely wrong, they both work together and they're not seperated.

Example:

Imagine with me the 4d (aka your imagination) as an empty pitch black room, when you imagine something or make an assumption, your desire appear instantly in the empty room, and now you see it, you have it, but let's just say you start spirling, doubting, affirming the opposite, your desire that is in the empty room start fading away and is replaced by the negative ones where you say "i don't have it" and that What the 3d gonna reflect, but if you persist in your assumption no matter what the 3d shows you, your gonna keep that assumption alive in your 4d, in the empty room, then the 3d will reflect your 4d and you'll see it physically.

That Basically how the 3d and 4d works, the 3d is just a relfector, a mirror (3d) reflecting your reflection (4d).

To understand more about the 4d and 3d read this.

What does it mean creation is finished?

Creation is finished implies that whatever you wanted already exist in your consciousness, there's million and infinite of realities where you're already the Version of yourself that is living their dream life or having that specific desire.

If you want to understand more: read this.

What does it mean to live in the state of the wish fulfilled?

I know you heard this term already but i'm about to make it simple for you: the state of the wish fulfilled is a feeling you have, the knowing feeling that your desires are yours and there's no point in looking for it in the 3d, because you just decided that it's already yours, you won't feel like "waiting" for your desires, "looking for your desires", "Desperate for your desires to show up", or "being impatient for your desires", you know you have it and that it's done, there's nothing for you to do but keep living in that state until it's show up in the 3d.

Read this and this.

How to use the Law of assumption to induce the void state?

Now before i say anything, i recommend you to read this and this to understand more about your pure consciousness aka the void state.

★Pick an affirmation for example:

"i Always induce my pure consciousness easily and effortlessly"

"everytime i fall asleep i Always end up in my pure consciousness"

"i Always wake up in my pure consciousness whenever i fall asleep"

★Believe in yourself and in your power: that is really essential, it's comes with the powerful and strong believe that you could do it and that you're already a master at inducing your pure consciousness.

★Persist in your assumption: no matter what happens in the 3d, no matter how many times you wake up in your old shitty reality and still find yourself there, keep persisting that you did induce your pure consciousness last night and that you're a master at it, do not give up, i'm telling you, that your assumption are more powerful than what the 3d throw at you, the 3d is just reflecting you old beliefs and assumption, so stick to your assumption and keep being loyal to it.

Ta-da! Easy right? Now i don't want you to stay in this shitty Reality and lock tf in!

If you have any questions you can check out this post, and this post and this post, this one and this one.

Xoxo, Eli

[sorasbacktothevoid]

My Side of the Story

Sorry for any confusion, English is not my first language.

Past few weeks have been hard for me and tumblr made it so worse. I am disgusted by people on this app.

To explain clearly, I said that I had entered the void before but I just manifested a few things but did not manifest no manifestation abilities or being able to enter the void again. I clearly stated that I was going through personal issues and wanted to enter the void again. Trauma dumping about your life and trying to make me feel bad for you when you have no empathy for me is crazy.

I explained so many times but people don't want to scroll and read the posts I made so I will explain clearly.

I participated in a discord challenge with @gorgeouslypink and entered. The instructions were written in the discord but the discord was deleted. I CANT GIVE INSTRUCTIONS BECAUSE THEY WERE DELETED. For the people in the discord, I try my best using my memory and a Google doc where me and other participants wrote down what we did every day. I cannot share the Google doc because it have people's emails with their names attached to it and other participants told Pink herself not to share because they wanted privacy and someone even dmed me on my page asking me not to share. So the only thing I shared in discord was what I could remember and audios Pink provided.

The audios are not my property for me to share. They are Pink's. I messaged her but she didn't respond and my 3d was worse so I wanted to try copy the discord challenge again so I can enter the void.

I really put my best efforts into entering the void while also helping the discord participants but my 3d got very bad and now people are now lying saying I ghosted the discord and calling me names. No I did not ghost. I clearly explained myself that I was having issues in my 3d. This is how you treat someone who going through hard time and tried to help you? By spreading lies and hating on them?

Also Pink did finally reach out to me and said she would share the audios. I dont know why she has not yet but that is not my fault.

Also the people making dumb rumours that I am Pink because I like IVE are very dumb. They are most popular group in Japan right now and I even went to concert with 50,000 people attendance. Do you think all of them are Pink? It's so stupid.

I do not owe anyone anything. I was open about my struggles and I wanted to be kind ans try and help other people too but when I couldnt, I got no kindness in return, just hate and ungratefulness. No empathy, just trauma dump and rumours. And if you really think I am to blame for you not entering the void, you are a joke and you will never enter the void. I am struggling to but atleast I take accountability.

This community needs serious help.