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magicalbats · 11 months ago

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Tavern Nights (Sampo x reader)

Rating: R-18+

Word Count: 5949

Warnings: Afab!reader, gendered language, alcohol, coercion, manipulation, just generally skeevy/predatory behavior, age difference, size difference, public fondling, public nudity, implied public blowjob

A/N: My second commission from the donation's for Parm. I was once again lucky enough to get permission to post this for everyone to read and (hopefully) enjoy, and I am very glad for that. I just don't think Sampo gets enough love! Someday everyone who's been sleeping on him will regret it, I promise you that! Anyway, thank you so, so much for working with me on this @rabbbitseason I had a blast! ❤️

⭐

It's been a long, long time since he last frequented The Tavern as much as he has in just the past week alone. When he was young and still figuring out his place in this expansive universe, he’d spent countless nights here simply taking in the ambiance and the drink, with maybe even a bit of gambling on the side here or there. Maybe a bit of fucking too, when he found an interesting partner to take into one of the frequently used back rooms. And the Masked Fool’s had no shortage of interesting people.

But now he was older, arguably wiser and not quite so easily taken in by all the revelry and merrymaking of the familiar old haunt. In truth, he hadn’t thought he’d ever visit this place again after willingly parting with his mask. Sparkle drove a hard bargain though and after spending too much time with her on Penacony it was hard to tell her ‘no’ and actually mean it.

He’d tried. Really, he had. But he hadn’t meant it.

She’d seen right through it, of course.

Sparkle isn’t with him tonight, nor had she been at his side the previous time either. Just that first fateful evening, wherein she’d pretended to be the good little chaperone accompanying her charge back to where he belonged (according to her, at least) like a shepherd returning the lost sheep to its flock. She’d ditched him quickly enough after that but he was fine with it. Glad, actually, because he’d managed to find someone much more his speed than ole’ miss Sparkle who in many ways had proven herself nothing but trouble.

“Mister Koski! I wasn’t expecting to see you again so soon!”

His poor heart practically melts into an unrecognizable puddle right then and there as you come bouncing over to him with an excited grin on your face. He couldn’t even remember the last time someone had been so excited to see him, if ever such a person had existed at all. It does his ego a world of good, and he pins you with a dotingly indulgent smile when you come to a stop before him.

“Now, now. I told you to drop the formalities, didn’t I kiddo’? Just call me ‘Sampo’.”

“Okay, mister Sampo! Will do!”

Cute. He thinks it’s really quite cute in a way that doesn’t seem particularly fair to him, or any other man with a working pair of eyes and a functioning cock, but he isn’t about to tell you that. You were already fidgeting before him like you were flustered under his attention, or perhaps excited to be on the receiving end of it, and he didn’t want to break the illusion just yet.

In terms of young rookie Fools, you were perhaps the most bright eyed and bushy tailed he’d ever met. He’d seen more than his fair share over the years, had even been one himself at some point in the far distant past, but he’d never known one quite like you. Even putting aside your obvious fascination with him (only partially owed to his usual charms, he's willing to admit) there was something about you that just screamed … naive and a little too trusting. Like ‘please take advantage of me’ was stamped across your forehead in permanent ink.

Sampo wonders, not for the first time, how exactly you ended up here with a dainty little mask perched atop the crown of your head like a hat. A somewhat unsettling hat, albeit, but a hat nonetheless. It looks like the blank face of a doll, which he finds rather fitting for you, with a full set of luxurious lashes but no eyes and no hair. Just an adorable button nose and a tiny mouth set in a neutral pout. He probably would have found it a bit creepy had it not only added on to just how very interesting he considered you to be.

“Alright, enough of that. I’m just stopping in for one last drink before I head out.” He tells you with a velvety drawl. “Would you care to join me?”

At some point he was probably going to end up regretting this but for right now at least he deemed that a problem for Future Sampo to worry about. In the present, he was much more keen on having some fun with you first before any silly notions like impropriety or moral obligation managed to sink its claws into him.

At your eager nod, he reaches out to take your shoulder in what most would likely consider a too friendly gesture but you don’t even bat an eye at it when he steers you towards the back of the establishment. Finds a nice unoccupied booth in the corner, away from all the other Fool’s who have largely gathered around the bar to have their drinks and play cards with one another, the wagers of which could have ranged from anything as mundane as simple credits to the outrageous sort he’d seen on more than one occasion here. A long lost relic from a forgotten civilization, once, or even a mutually assured self destruction button courtesy of miss Sparkle herself. It was her favorite toy, after all.

Much to his satisfaction, you obediently sit when he nudges you into the booth, scooting over along the bench to give him some space to join you. Bending at the waist when a chorus of hoots and hollers rises up behind him, Sampo has to lean down and get close to your ear in order to ensure he’s heard over the raucous noise.

“What can I get you to drink, sweetheart? It’s on me.”

There you go squirming again, looking really quite pleased as you sit up a little straighter and round your shoulders for him. “Whatever you’re drinking is fine.”

How precious.

“Ooh, now that might turn out to be a bit dangerous if you’re not careful. I have a feeling I’m a tad more experienced than you when it comes to, uh, drinking.”

If you find the sleazy note in his voice at all off putting you certainly don’t show it, looking up at him with the kind of bright faced confidence only someone in their youth can pull off. ‘Take advantage of me’, indeed.

“Don’t worry, I can handle myself.” You tell him candidly. “It’ll be your mistake if you underestimate me.”

Was that a challenge? If he didn’t know any better, he’d think you were doing this to him on purpose.

“Pft. I bet. Okay then, just sit tight. Don’t say I didn’t warn you though. I’ll be back momentarily.” He starts to straighten up but not without sliding his hand down from where it had reached out to brace against the backrest of the booth seat just behind you. Perfectly casual about it, Sampo palms the top of your head in a quick, harmless pat that shifts the little mask and ruffles your hair just so before pulling away entirely. He doesn’t stop long enough to take in your reaction or gauge what you think about it. He doesn’t really need to.

This was not the first time he’d touched you in such a seemingly off handed manner and he already knew you were preening under the attention. No matter how many times he’d tested the waters the reaction was always the same. You liked him. Wanted him to keep touching you like that, either knowingly or unknowingly, he couldn’t yet say for sure, but he was more than happy to give it to you regardless of the reason. Lucky you.

He returns to the table a few minutes later with a freshly made drink in both hands, watching carefully from under the fringe of his hair when he sets yours in front of you. It’s a dark, murky looking concoction that seems to announce in no uncertain terms that it’s potent and strong with just a glance. As expected, you don’t look quite so sure of yourself anymore when you take in the thick consistency inside the stout glass.

But you keep a brave face, which he has to give you credit for, especially when you don’t hesitate to pick it up at his nudging insistence. The first tentative sip has you choking at the taste even as you desperately try to blink away the tears that come into your eyes, and he can’t quite stop himself from laughing at your expense.

Sampo doesn’t push it on you anymore than that though, finding it much more entertaining to watch you slowly try to drink it all down completely of your volition. He doesn’t even need to wheedle you or coerce you into it. You just do it — because you had something to prove? Or was it because you wanted so badly to impress him that you were willing to get yourself drunk just to accomplish it? He isn’t entirely sure on that front either but it doesn’t actually matter. You were doing exactly what he’d hoped you would and that pleases him a great deal.

By the time an hour has gone by, you’re slumped against him in the booth with your head tilted back, resting along his bicep where it’s curled over the back of the seat. He’s kept you talking for the greater portion of your time spent together, alternating between one triviality or another just to ensure you don’t accidentally doze off on him. He could now name your favorite color, the school you’d attended back on your home planet and the breed of your first pet. You hadn’t struck him as the sort to be fond of Pettu Hamsters, bizarre little rodent-like beasts that laid eggs and curled themselves into tight balls for protection, but you’d assured him that you were quite fond of them. Given the no nonsense look you’d leveled on him, he believed you.

“And you know what happened next?”

It’s obvious you’re a little too relaxed to be self conscious anymore, and he doesn’t say a word about it when you not so subtly shift closer to him on the bench. You’re practically pressed right up against his side now but, still, he doesn’t make his move yet. Sampo may have technically been working to pull one over on you but that didn’t mean he was going to be a pig about it.

“I’d never seen a meteor shower like that before. All up close and personal, right outside my window. It was pretty cool but kind of scary at the same time.” You’re rambling about nothing in particular. Just a fond reminiscence of the long list of firsts you’d experienced upon leaving home, which Sampo listens in on as much as he needs to. There were a few other first time things he wanted to introduce you to, provided you didn’t fall asleep on top of him before then. “I thought for sure one of them was going to slam into the ship and — and vacuum us out into space! All I remember going through my head at the time was that I didn’t want to die like that. I can’t imagine it would feel great. What do you think?”

You tip your face towards him with the sluggish, heavy lidded lethargy of someone well and truly buzzed. Sampo just chuckles as he tips his chin down, cheek braced against his propped up fist for support.

“I think you’ve had enough to drink for one night, darling. What was that you said earlier about being able to handle yourself?”

Unmistakable fluster creeps across your expression, distant though it may be under the hazy mask of intoxication. “I didn’t know you’d get me something so strong. Are you sure you weren’t purposely trying to get me drunk?”

Feigning hurt, Sampo draws his brows together in an overly affected lift and places his opposite hand over his heart. “Why, I never! Such a serious accusation to lobby at a gentleman of my esteemed standing. Just ask anyone here, missy, and they’ll tell you exactly what kind of upstanding, trustworthy guy Sampo Koski is!”

You giggle at his theatrics and reach over to weakly shove at him. Your arm seems to immediately lose all of its remaining strength though, and rather bonelessly flops down to stretch out along his thigh. He can see his moment to strike fast approaching but it still wasn’t the perfect time. Soon, very soon, just not quite yet.

“You’re funny.”

“We’re all a bit funny here, I’m afraid.” He murmurs, dropping his voice to a slyly suggestive drawl again. “You’ve still got some growing to do if you want to fit into that mask on your head. Want some pointers?”

Huffing softly at the suggestion, you visibly muster up the strength to send him a weak look of warning. “I’m already grown. I wouldn’t be sitting here with you right now if I wasn’t, would I?”

Sampo sends a slow look of appraisal down at your chest, noting the weight behind the thin material of your blouse while images of what your bare breasts might look like dance through his head. Yes, there certainly would be no denying that you were of a mature build and filled out in all the right places.

“Mmm, if we’re talking physically then you’re right, of course. I doubt anything I say would help you get any taller.”

“Hey.”

“But I wasn’t talking about that,” He goes on, ignoring your interjection. “I meant your future as a Masked Fool. You haven’t drawn Aha’s gaze yet, have you sweetness?”

“… no.”

You look like you want to pout about that, and Sampo chuckles at the petulant tug of your mouth. Seriously too cute.

“Oh, but fret not, little one.” He coos. “You’ve got me here to show you the ropes, don’t you? I promise I’m a good teacher.”

You seem to think about that for a long moment, giving it the due consideration of someone who hasn’t yet picked up on the scam. Not that he could really blame you or the alcohol making your eyes look so heavy and tired. Sampo was good at the game. Always had been, even when he was younger, and his technique had only continued to improve over time. Most people assumed him far too goofy and painfully obvious to harbor any ulterior motives after he started laying it on thick enough. That was the real angle to his schemes, once you got right down to it. Hiding in plain sight was in many ways his specialty.

“What will you teach me?” You finally ask, roving your attention up towards his face once again. The way you look at him is so unassuming and guileless that he knew he could have offered you a tropical vacation home on Jarilo-VI and you probably would have bought into it without question. Poor thing.

The muscles along his back gradually start to tense with the building anticipation of finally making his move, of pouncing on his chosen prey to claim it for himself, and he leans down, practically engulfing you in the mass of his much larger frame. You feel as tiny sitting next to him on the bench seat as you look, far outclassed by his much taller, broader build and such a sharp contrast to your feminine stature. He could have easily overpowered you if that was how he’d wanted to go about it but, well, Sampo Koski was never one for doing things the hard way if he could help it.

His face now hovering just over yours with precious room to spare, he slowly reaches up to brush the tips of gloved fingers under your chin. Your lashes flutter at the touch, threatening to slide shut, but an attention grabbing upward nudge prompts them wide open again.

“There are a few things I can think of,” He purrs, secretly delighting in the way you start to squirm for him. Nervous or eager? He’d find out soon enough. “An old dog like me has his trusty bag of tricks, rest assured. I’d be happy to share some with you, if you’re interested?”

Your mouth parts, a tiny pink tongue inching out to glance over your lips and wet them. It almost makes him crack. Almost throws all of his self control and restraint right out the window, but he forces himself to wait. To let you respond first before he goes in for the kill. It would make everything so, so much more satisfying in the long run.

“Okay.” You finally murmur. “I’m game.”

“Glad to hear it. Shall we seal the deal and make it official then?”

A small sound of confusion slips out of you but then he’s leaning the rest of the way in, closing the scant distance. You don’t protest or pull away. Just watch him with wide, fascinated eyes as he tilts his mouth to slot against yours, and a dull jolt works through your body at the contact. He keeps it brief and gentle, a mere brushing of mouths, before pulling back enough to pin you with a lopsided smirk.

“There. Now it’s a promise.”

Tentatively, you reach up to touch your bottom lip. “Is that how all the Fool’s make their promises?”

He shrugs broad shoulders, tracing shapes along the side of your neck with blunt fingers. “Only the really fun ones.”

Extending his thumb to prod the underside of your chin, Sampo carefully nudges your face back up at him until your hand finally falls away and you comply, offering him a vaguely flustered look.

“Another, for good luck?”

The first real glimpse of uncertainty flashes across your face at that. You hesitate, flicking a quick glance behind him at the rest of the bar and —

“Oh, don’t you worry your pretty little head about them.” Soothingly, he cups your cheek in what otherwise would have been a comforting gesture had it not been for the way he gives the roundest part of your face a quick, mostly harmless pinch. “They’ll mind their business so there’s no need to get shy on me now. Besides, I’ve already kissed you once haven’t I? What harm could one more do?”

You still don’t appear to be totally convinced but you give him a brief, stilted nod anyway. He’s pretty sure it’s the unmistakable gleam of excitement he can see reflecting back at him in your gaze, unsquashable despite your obvious nerves, and Sampo feels a smoldering hot rush of victory sear through his veins when he leans into your space again.

His mouth brushing over yours in a light, coaxing caress, you simply sit there for a long moment of indecision like a frozen, petrified statue. So still he isn’t even sure if you’re breathing. But then, thoroughly dashing that impression against the floor, you come alive under him all at once. Give a squirming shudder and press up into him, fervently kissing him back as if in outright challenge. He feels your lips trembling against his and he can’t quite keep the leer off his face when he increases the pressure to kiss you just a little bit harder, claiming you as his own.

The discordant noise of revelry and drinking, Fool’s eternally at play, seems to highlight the poignancy of what’s happening in the booth situated in the far back while at the same time it also recedes to a far distant thrum of vague sounds. Like everyone else in The Tavern was on the other side of some great, reverberating tunnel. His attention is focused entirely on you and the way you slowly bring your hand up to tentatively brace the palm of it against his chest. Your fingers feel dainty, something small and fragile, and he quickly decides to return the favor.

Sliding his own hand down off your cheek, over the line of your neck and past the soft jut of your clavicle, he takes a slow pass over one breast. They’re big but his hands are bigger still, and it easily cups around the full weight of it behind your blouse. You react like he’d electrocuted you, jolting in your seat as your head tips back and your lips slacken, dropping open as if to moan. But he just follows you, keeping his lips sealed over yours so he can plunge his tongue into that cute, hot little mouth and truly taste you for the first time.

Noising an incomprehensible kitten mewl against him, you close your hand around his shirt and give it a halfhearted tug. Like you wanted to pull him in closer but you weren’t quite confident enough to follow through on that urge; like your head was spinning a shade too fast from the alcohol as much as the surge of physical responses in your body to make any sense of what was happening and act on it.

Sampo can tell you’re enjoying it though. It doesn’t exactly take a genius to figure that out.

The proof is as plain as if you’d spoken the words aloud. You don’t bite at his tongue when it invades your mouth to explore every little nook and cranny inside, nor do you pull away in revulsion when he leisurely fucks it towards the back of your throat in slow, suggestive motions. You also don’t attempt to slap his hand away when it comes back up to caress over the fullest part of your breast again. He can feel your nipple rapidly stiffening underneath the layers of your clothes, responding to him with a great deal of eager enthusiasm that has you shuddering and pressing your legs together. So sensitive.

He could really exploit that if given half a chance.

At length, he breaks apart from the kiss with a low, seedy exhale of deeply felt masculine pleasure. Peers down at you with an easy, self satisfied grin, but you look to be a bit out of it and lost in your own little world. With your head tipped back and rested against his arm where it’s still curled over the top of the booth seat, you merely blink up at him through a hazy, distant gleam in your eyes. Panting softly, as if you couldn’t quite catch your breath while he was idly fondling your tit. Hardly any wonder there, given how much you seemed to be feeling everything in stunning high definition, but he wasn’t quite done with you yet.

“Oh my, it seems like someone is having a good time now. I wasn’t expecting you to look at me like that, kiddo’. You’re gonna’ have this old man falling in love if you’re not careful.”

Your breath catches in obvious surprise, a vaguely startled expression creeping onto your face. Sampo doesn’t give you a chance to question him or realize that he was only teasing though, and instead tips his attention downward to regard the weight of your chest. A fresh wave of innate satisfaction washes over him when you do the same, following his line of sight to peer down at yourself as well.

“You’re looking a little hot under the collar, y’know. Let me help you with that.”

Fingertips tracing the path over your breast, he reaches lower and you finally seem to snap out of it. You give a quick start, fumbling to get your hands down to try and grab at him, but even with both sets of digits locked around his blocky wrist it’s easy enough for him to tug your blouse free of your cute little skirt and get it inched up enough to reveal a smooth strip of your fluttering stomach.

“M - mister Sampo!” You squeak, halfheartedly twisting in a futile attempt to delay the inevitable. “We’re — we’re still in public, you can’t - -“

“Hush now, sweetheart. Your ol’ pal Sampo’s got you. There’s nothing to be afraid of. See?” With a taunting flick of his hand, your blouse rises up another inch or so, and with it so too do your eyes grow even wider. “No ones even paying attention to us over here so they won’t see anything. Trust me. I’ll make sure of that. After all, you’re mine now, aren’t you? Can’t have anyone else eyeballing the goods, right?”

Numbly, your gaze roves up to regard him again. There’s an unspoken question behind your expression, a sentiment that you hesitate to give voice to, and he just hums a playful little tune under his breath while he continues to toy the hem of your top. One more nudge is all it would take to reveal what sort of bra you were wearing and he couldn’t wait to find out. His bet was on something soft and girly, with a bow or maybe even a bit of lace? But first …

“Don’t tell me you’re really that scared, sweetness? Even with me here?”

Your brow pinches inward, creating an adorable little crease between them to go with the almost petulant pull of your mouth. An internal war wages, bloody and violent, behind your eyes while you no doubt weigh out the multitude of options at your fingertips. The truth or a deceitful lie, which would you ultimately decide? Sampo knew which one he would pick had it been him standing under the spotlight but he’d meant it when he said you still had a lot left to learn. That part, at least, hadn’t been facetious.

Finally making your decision another series of heartbeats later, you at last give him a mute nod. It pulls a soft, doting sound from deep within his chest and makes him feel all warm and fuzzy inside as he dips his face close again, rumbling a low sound of approval.

“Aww, you poor thing. It’s okay though. Just trust your old friend Sampo, okay? Here, I’ll even make it better with another kiss.”

This time you eagerly tip your face up to meet him halfway, and a soft sound of need puffs out of you when your lips meet again. He kisses you deeply now, claiming your mouth for himself and swiping his tongue inside with a possessive, demanding gesture that has you mewling faintly in response. As he’d half suspected you would, you positively melt under him like you were happy to give into the pulse pounding heat and the risk of the moment as long as he was there to guide you through it. To lead you and to teach, just as he’d promised you he would.

Thoroughly placated now, you don’t protest or make a move to stop him while he inches your shirt the rest of the way up, but you do shudder uncontrollably at the first waft against your exposed chest. Still fervently kissing you, Sampo cracks an eye open and peers out from under the fringe of his hair to look at what he’s working with. A dull thrum of pleasure promptly races up his spine when he sees that your tits are just as juicy and tantalizing as he’d thought they’d be, and he voraciously watches them heave within the confines of your pale peach colored bra. It’s a lovely shade that complements your skin tone perfectly but he’s a bit too impatient to simply admire it or the dainty blue bow on the front for very long.

You groan into his mouth, arching against the booth, when he casually slips a long digit under the middle center of the dainty undergarment but he just swallows the noise and tugs. Doesn’t even give you a moment to understand what he was planning to do, and your breasts spill out with a meaty jostle as the cups slide up and away. Your nipples are already stiff and aching when they hit the air, pointing up off your chest in demand of attention, and you finally tear your face from his with a threadbare, faltering gasp.

Sampo can’t quite find the wherewithal to follow after you and lay claim to your mouth again when he was so damnably transfixed by the sight of your bare tits, round and squeezable in all their fleshy abundance. He feels suddenly faint from how violently his cock instantly springs up in his pants to shove at the inside of the zipper, only vaguely aware of you turning your head away in bashful reproach while your hands come up to crowd together over your chest.

Oh, that wouldn’t do. That wouldn’t do at all.

“Come on, don’t be like that.” He coos at you, the usually soft inflection of his voice noticeably absent now. It seems to have been replaced by a deeper, gravelly edge that makes his customary sing-song fall short.

You don’t seem to mind though, much too preoccupied with softly whimpering when he takes one of your hands by the wrist and gently pries it away, curling it up and back so he can juggle it over to his opposite hand. Half restrained now, you can’t do much else but anxiously squirm in place when he reaches back down to lightly tweak the exposed tip of your breast between thumb and forefinger.

“Ahhn!”

“Mmm, these are awfully tender, aren’t they?”

He doesn’t really expect a response, which is good, because you can’t seem to catch your breath long enough to actually speak. All that comes out of your mouth are short, tender little gasps and the softest moans his old ears have ever heard. It sounds like the sweetest music and he makes an effort to file it all away for later, when he was back in Belobog and lonely in the middle of the cold, frozen eternity that had yet to see any noticeable improvements since the Stellaron Disaster there was neutralized. Maybe someday it would, hopefully even soon, but he wasn’t expecting to return from this trip to find lush fields of green stretching as far as the eye could see.

This night spent with you here in The Tavern was going to keep him comfortably warm for many more to come though, and he eagerly folds himself over you so he can bend down and seal his mouth around that pert, straining bud. You give a tiny little cry, a sensitive yelp that you quickly try to stifle, but not fast enough.

Releasing his hold on your wrist, Sampo snakes his arm around the back of your head and covers your mouth with his broad palm. You let out a muffled protest behind his glove and try to turn your head away but it’s no use. He’s so much bigger and stronger than you that he can easily hold you in place no matter how you squirm or weakly shove at his forearm. Still sucking on your sore little teat, his mouth working the fleshy nub to a tight coil, he rolls his eyes upward to look at you from this angle.

If he’d thought you were pretty before, now you were downright gorgeous. That hazy, flustered look of begrudging pleasure really suited you. Especially when it was because of what he was doing to you.

He isn’t sure how much more of the anticipation he can stand when his cock was already aching, practically throbbing inside his pants, and he at least disengages from your breast with a noted hint of regret some moments later. In the wake of his attentions your stiff little teat is left flushed a noticeable shade darker than when he’d started and glistening with a fine sheen of sticky, fast cooling spit. The sight alone makes him groan, low and gravelly, as he looks upon it with longing.

Oh, how he would’ve loved nothing more than to simply suckle at both of them for an hour or two but this was hardly the right place or time for him to indulge like that. Even what he had in mind for you had the potential to backfire with spectacularly disastrous (yet still amusing) results. It was time to get on with it before anyone’s attention was drawn towards the far back corner and curious interlopers came creeping over to check what was happening.

“You seem to be quite sensitive, darling. Even moreso than I initially thought, and somethiiiiing tells me you’re going to be a screamer so we’ll have to play it a bit safe.” He murmurs, teasing you with a quick wink as he straightens up and allows his free hand to slide down lower to pinch at the hem of your skirt.

Already askew from all of your fidgeting, it doesn’t take much for him to pull it up enough to reveal your panties moulded to the puffy outline of your cunt. Even just a quick glance assures him you’re wet and sticky given the way the matching peachy material sticks to you and he gives his tongue a soft click as if in reproach.

“Really now, are you sure the possibility of getting caught isn’t exciting you? Well, you’re a hundred years too early to try and pull one over on Sampo Koski, I promise you that.”

He shifts back into his seat to settle in next to you again before releasing his hold on your mouth. You promptly suck in a much needed lungful of fresh air, swaying somewhat unsteadily on the bench, but the reprieve is short lived. Grabbing you around the middle, Sampo effortlessly manhandles you around so he can pull you half into his lap, partially sprawled out across the seat and perfectly positioned over the tent in his trousers. Your little mask has been almost completely dislodged from its perch atop your head in all the shuffling, and he reaches up to pull it the rest of the way off while his other hand busily works on his zipper.

“How about this,” He starts, using his most effective and well practiced salesman pitch, feeling much too hot and reckless to reconsider the wisdom in this move. If you finally decided you’d had enough of him and all his pawing it wouldn’t be hard for you to put him out of commission for the foreseeable future in this particular position. But, well, he didn’t really think he needed to worry about that too much. “Let’s keep that mouth of yours busy for right now and I’ll make it up to you later, huh? Whaddya’ say? I promise it’ll be worth your while.”

Panting and flushed, you slowly lift your face to regard him. A bright, sparkling gleam flashes through your eyes and you grin, looking like you were seconds away from bursting out into uncontrollable, wild laughter. You looked like a kid on Christmas morning being handed the one present she’d wanted more than anything else in the whole wide world and that youthful, beaming enthusiasm just makes his balls draw up achingly tight in heady anticipation. He couldn’t wait to sink himself into you. Any part of you. It didn’t really matter which, when you had him so painfully stiff in his pants and more worked up than he could recall being in a very long time.

“You’ve got yourself a deal, Mister Sampo.”

He almost laughs too, feeling the familiar bubbling sensation gleefully rising in his chest, but it’s swallowed up and doused by a shaky groan of relief when he finally manages to fish his cock out. It was starting to make more sense to him, why you were here rather than anywhere else in the vast cosmos, but he didn’t care enough to dig for any real answers.

All that mattered was that you were interesting and you were fun, and as long as the two of you were having fun together then everything else was irrelevant to him.

⭐

Crossposted: here

#honkai star rail #star rail #sampo koski #sampo x reader #self insert bullshit

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heretodestroyou · 2 years ago

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heart-shaped sunglasses.

pairing(s); matthew lillard!william afton x reader

fandom; five nights at freddy’s [movie]

w/c; 592

trigger/content warnings; slightly unholy thoughts from william about you in your uniform, fem!reader, (reader wears lipstick, has boobs, is called 'girl' by william and has medium-length hair), heavy lana del rey influences (diet mountain dew), mentioned that reader smokes cigarettes, age gap (william is late 40s, reader is mid 20s), no explicit romance but it's heavily implied there's mutual pining, written from william's pov, reader knows his real name, not proof-read, NO use of y/n, lmk if i missed anything.

stella speaks! at this point someone reblogs/tags me in a shitpost about this man, i add tags while my brain is inconsolably horny, and then all of a sudden i'm writing a new draft. and yes, ik lana wasn't really a thing in 1990s, but for now let's pretend he's still a silver fox in the 2020s.

tags; @truecobblepot bc ofc🫶🏽🫶🏽

inspired by this post and the shenanigans that ensued.

“I just wanted to know how much I appreciate you staying late these past couple weeks.”

William’s voice is smooth, he’s demeanor calm, the slight tilt of his head and the casual clasp of his hands in front of him giving no hint to the turmoil in his brain.

You’re his employee. His best employee, no less. He can’t afford to lose you, to drive you away. So he’ll make sure you’re not looking him in the eye when his roam your body.

The words that come from your mouth are sincere. He knows this. He doesn’t much care in this moment however. That red vest is pulled across your breasts, and the top button of your shirt is undone, your tie looser now that the building is empty.

It’s his fault, how tight your uniform is on you. He has your size on file, but he always orders a size down, just for him. He doesn’t pay mind to the way teenage pizza boys and older brothers here with siblings watch you, because he knows he’s miles better than they are.

His eyes linger in the plastic heart-shaped sunglasses hanging from your collar, and he nods towards them. “And those? I do hope you haven’t been wearing those all day.”

It’s a gentle correction. No matter how much William favors you, he still must keep his image up. You shake your head. “No, I just got them out of my locker when I closed up with Robyn.”

“Where did you get them?” He asks, leaning forward. The movement is subtle, but he knows you catch it.

“It was a gag gift from some party,” you answer, taking them off your vest and sliding them on. William's breath barely catches in his throat. The frames are the same shade as the blood red lipstick you love wearing.

It’s your signature. It’s how he knows you’ve been in the break room, paper coffee and water cups stamped with your lips in the trash, lipstick printed cigarette buts in the back alleyway that he’s convinced himself are prettier than anyone else’s.

William's brain is rapid firing all kinds of signals, ranging from you're nearly 20 years younger than him, to why have I never felt this was about my ex-wife?

Everything about you seems to catered to William's preferences. You hold eye contact with him and customers, you're great with kids (including his!), and you actually appreciate the care he takes of his animatronics.

He chuckles as you look around his dim office with your heart-shaped sunglasses. "Well, now, look at you. Never was there ever a girl so pretty." You giggle, tugging on a strand of hair and sliding them up into your hair. "That's so sweet, Mr. Afton!" William chuckles. You're picture perfect and William is damn well aware that he's no good for you. "Please, call me William. It's only fitting that we remain on first name basis...as of your promotion to assistant manager."

Your eyes widen, and you let out a little gasp. "Do you really mean that, Mr. Af-- William?"

God, the way your lips form his name is intoxicating. He nods, his demeanor wavering slightly as you beam at him, thanking him.

It’s a power move, he knows. A selfish one, no less. But he can’t risk losing the one competent employee. And besides, the assistant manager’s uniform is closer to his, the pale purple shirt and darker tie, black slacks and black shoes (of your choosing, of course).

And who is he to deny himself that view?

#william afton x reader #william afton x you #william afton #five nights at freddy's #fnaf #five nights at freddy's movie #fnaf movie #lana del rey #diet mountain dew #heart shaped sunglasses #🖋️ — my writing #🐻 — five nights at freddy’s

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theamityelf · 4 months ago

Note

I’m surprised no one’s pointed out how junko is there in the mini thh, so if imposters dead by chapter 3, Mikan would literally have a tiny junko with her and even if he’s not dead she would know she’s here. That feels like it would have a huge impact on how chapter 3 would go! Like would Mikan really kill and thus die for her beloved when her beloved is RIGHT THERE? It feels more likely to me that she still Did That to Makoto, but she’s not the killer, because her beloved is right there with her always! Maybe even literally sewn into her clothing. Which would be funny and gives me the mental image that Junko’s holding a small sign that reads “please get me away from her crazy ass I miss being able to walk”

(Mini Classmates AU Masterlist)

For this exact reason, I don't have Impostor dying until Chapter 4, lol! (I don't know whether I've said this yet, but my intention was for Impostor and Peko to do the honorable sacrifice murder/death in Chapter 4, instead of Nekomaru and Gundham.)

The tidiest way for everything previously said in this AU to still be true without getting too messy about the Mikan and Junko situation is to say that Mikan remembers her beloved and that her beloved was killed by Makoto but not that her identity is Junko. Just, that's the single omission in her memory.

BUT, it's way more fun to indeed get messy about the Mikan and Junko situation, so let's do that for at least this post, lol! (Whether it stays canon outside of this post remains to be seen, but I do love the idea.)

Because YES:

Junko having to deal with an obsessed, coddling Mikan is delightful! All of the weird attention she's been giving her cage of kouhais gets directed solely toward Junko.

There might be some amount of Junko using her or trying to manipulate her, but honestly I don't think there'd be much of it. She's already pretty far gone; Junko would find her boring.

Mikan showing her as much affection as is safe for a tiny person, if not more! Petting her head, kissing her face, tickling her tummy with a forefinger almost the size of her whole body...and perhaps squeezing her a bit too tight. Apologizing profusely if it hurts, but not really meaning it because she's accepting all kinds of feedback as positive. Junko is just biting and kicking Mikan's hands, she's playing dead, it's the best. (Lowkey kinda want Mikan to straight-up lick her, like a postage stamp.)

After all that, people are definitely going to feel bad for Junko. Like, they need to rescue this poor fashion model from Mikan's twisted affection. And Junko can play wounded gazelle so well.

A different character being the killer (also due to the despair disease) would be so fun. The trial would be so messy. Nagito would be so much more hostile toward Mikan than the actual killer.

This means Mikan sticks around and Makoto has to just know that she's still around. Nagito has reason to be super protective and cagey about Makoto even before the Remnants revelation.

Does Mikan stay in Remembering Mode for the rest of the killing game, or does she revert to amnesia after the trial and have to deal with the way everyone looks at her now? Maybe Makoto tries to encourage people to reach out to Mikan, but he can only do so much when Nagito isn't letting him anywhere near her. Plus, he is still traumatized by what she did, even if he's trying not to blame her. He's not exactly eager to be within grabbing distance of Mikan, even if Nagito weren't keeping him away.

Imagine if Junko didn't know what was going on. Like, she's still Ultimate Despair Junko Enoshima, but she doesn't have her school memories. She still doesn't know any of these people. She had a plan, but that plan was "sixteen people locked in a school", not "thirty-two people of varying sizes trapped on a set of tropical islands". She doesn't know about the Remnants of Despair. She's never met Mikan. She can arrive at some educated guesses as to why the weird nurse might be fawning over her, but it's still weird!

#danganronpa #mini thh au #mikan tsumiki #junko enoshima #junkan #ultimate imposter #nagito komaeda #makoto naegi

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tinycozycomfort · 2 years ago

Text

rest in the cup of my palms (part two)

pairing: no outbreak!joel miller x art student f!reader

chapter two: do you feel it, too?

series masterlist | previous chapter | next chapter

series summary: you went back to school to find out who you are—to make another leap in the hope of self discovery. when you finally find that first glimpse of yourself, it’s in someone else. what happens when the mirror tries to pull you in? or you’re everything joel could’ve hoped to find. he doesn’t let go easily.

chapter summary: you fight hard to keep old habits at bay. joel falls into his head first.

warnings/tags: no outbreak, no use of y/n, (for everything) -> mutual pining!, possessive behavior, smut (w individual tags to come), ellie is joel's daughter, ellie and reader attend the same university but reader is in post-grad, age gap (joel is late 40s, reader is not), alternating pov, slow-ish burn / (for this chapter) -> semi-public dry humping, kissing, mentions/fantasies of p in v sex, possessive thoughts, no one is drunk but everyone blames the wine, joel miller loves his kid!

word count: 5.3k

rating: explicit (18+ only! mdni)

A/N: i'm in shambles over the response to the first chapter, this series is my baby and it means so much that you guys liked it. thank you a million times for reading!

read on ao3 / main masterlist

“The wait begins as soon as I wake up. There is never any “after”. Life stops from the moment he rings the doorbell and enters.”

Annie Ernaux - Getting Lost

───────

Joel hasn’t touched the plastic tube since he brought it home last week.

It’s become something he has to hide from, a nagging thought that pulls at his pant-leg like a child, clawing for his attention—open me, open me. Over and over he hears it, while in the office or cooking dinner or folding the wash, a whisper that begs him to reach in and claim his prize. When he’s really tired, brain damp from the days he has to work, the voice pours into something smoother, and suddenly it's that pretty girl—the one who’d made the thing—asking for the same; to be peeled back and stretched wide for him, cunt and heart and all.

He finds himself losing a lot of very real time in the fantasy, chunks of his life spooned out to make room.

The compulsion isn’t unfamiliar; it’s one that Joel thinks has something to do with his protective nature—or maybe that he’s seen enough living through the filters of hurt and mistrust—that makes him cling to the things he finds precious.

It traces back as far as the girls in grade school, when they would bring him little home-made valentines and wave him kisses first stamped onto open palms. He grew enamored with them, picking them flowers and scribbling symbols of promise in their note-books—the very beginnings of his acts of service. His heart would swell with it, a cartoonish thing, growing and pumping until he could keel over to one side from the size. He chased it in those early years, back somewhere between the brothering and fathering, moving through many someones he could fawn over, easing his need to possess.

He can feel the need rising now, for the first time in too long, his body hurtling itself towards the ledge of something scarier, and he welcomes it. His hands itch for it, for the kind of love with teeth, that bites and tears into the edges of a substance much meatier, providing a place for the points to pierce and hold. He won’t call it what it really is, prefering to stomp out the whisper that warns him of its arrival—obsession. He likes to use less severe terms: thoughtful, involved, fascinated.

Knowing better in his age, he tries at least to be realistic during waking hours, and around Ellie, reminding himself that he has a hard time stepping down when he builds his hope high enough. He moves instead to just dreaming about you—in little tidbits and at guest-star capacity—to tide himself over until the week rolls back around.

Now, on a new Monday, he lets his daughter head off to class before he allows himself the privilege of unwrapping his reward.

He fishes around in the back of the hallway closet where he hid the case, retreating to his room to finally have his time alone with the creature he’d made of the object, letting it free from its cage.

He pops off the cardboard top of the roll, pulling the drawing out with the very tips of his fingers to not smudge something on accident. The sound of it sliding out sets his skin alight—this gift is one he asked for, but it feels like it was given to him all the same. Sharing a piece of you with him so freely, he feels special.

He’s gotten used to seeing himself around the house, Ellie’s ever-growing library of renditions of him are fixed to the fridge by mis-matched magnets and framed in little glass panels in her room. It leans on the side of betrayal to have someone else’s version of him up, but he just wants to see it—if it’s as intense as he remembers it. As different.

His knuckle follows the curl of the paper to flatten the image, tacking it up to the wall with painter’s tape to avoid damaging the surface, like his daughter taught him. Joel sits on the corner of his bed and feels a hot wave of emotion fill his chest.

He looks hopeful. It’s a garment he’s never seen himself wear. He’s soft and shy and child-like, face penciled in with detail that reads like a well-worn novel, bending and twisting to the curve of his expression. It’s a finely crafted summary. It’s guide-lines. It’s instructions, the very important parts of him spelled out in bold, black charcoal, with the gray shades of his complexion filling in the gaps.

Was he that easy to pick apart?

He’d seen some of the other drawings, the way everyone else had chosen to capture solely his pose, perfectly articulating the crook of his elbow or the network of muscle under the skin of his calf.

But you’d chosen to show him.

Something about it looks so familiar, enough to bring forward a memory of the conversation that had him feeling the briefest pass of deja vu—of you glancing down at the ground, quieted maybe by his proximity or his compliments; bashful.

He walks out into the living room where Ellie keeps her sketchbook, the one with all the references. He thumbs through it—she’s given him permission to see this one—and flips to the page he remembers watching her use last week. And when he sees it, he feels like he’s going to faint.

It was you.

That was your face his daughter had been so beautifully replicating. Upon examining the fragmented portrait, he sees a striking resemblance to the one you’d made of him. They’re the same. Not the likeness, of course, but the visage. You knew what he felt like—had felt it yourself.

He already knew you, before you’d even spoken a word to each other. He admits that Ellie was only capable of piecing together so much of you, and even with the extra bits he’d caught in your brief meeting, he feels like he’s missing out. He wants to see the whole picture. You, in totality.

When he arrives at the school building, he’s overtaken with a wash of what he thinks might be stage-fright. It makes him feel sick, stomach rolling with an embarrassment that scorches like youth—fight low and flight high—and his body starts to feel sore with the effort it takes to keep himself from fidgeting.

Ellie’s teacher meets him in the hallway and passes him his slip, and he hums his way down to the bathroom to undress, admittedly working up the courage to confront you.

As he enters the classroom, his excitement bottoms out. You’re not there. He keeps sweeping the room with his eyes, hoping you somehow had been hidden amongst the other bodies. He tries to sell himself the idea that you’re just in the bathroom, or on a break or late, but the wooden bench you’d sat in last week is obviously untouched.

He clambers onto the stool, trying to replicate his pose from the previous lesson, much more uncomfortable now that he has nothing to distract him. The two hours are painful, and he finds himself counting seconds to fill the minutes in increments of ten until he can leave.

His back hurts when he stands.

On his way out, the blonde woman hands him a little flier, two pieces of neon copy paper glued together to make a double-sided image, advertising the group show this coming Friday. Ellie has already reminded him more times than he can count, but he takes it from the woman with the best smile he can muster, slipping out the door in a stride he’s hoping doesn’t come across as wounded.

───────

The on-campus gallery is what someone a lot kinder than Joel would call cozy—a tight, short chamber with no windows and a single entrance, like a trap.

He’s too keyed-up to be kind. He feels like nitpicking.

The metal door at the head must have been an afterthought, kicking back into the frame loudly every time someone walks through, nothing implemented to catch it. A continuous beam of fluorescent lighting wraps around the room in an all-encompassing spotlight, cooking the smell of fresh paint off the wall. It reminds him of picture day, or apartment hunting or something else equally unpleasant.

He was always going to come to this, because he can’t imagine a version of himself who wouldn’t support his daughter, but he’s not happy about it, and he’s starting to feel dizzy from the too-fast swirl of anxiety in his stomach.

Ellie had removed herself from his side the moment they made it into the building in search of her friends, with just a squeeze of his forearm and an ‘I’ll introduce you later’ left in her wake. He’s clung tightly to the wall ever since, making his way around the room to look at all the drawings, again and again and again until he feels like he’s on a track.

Discomfort is a factor, but most of his indignation has to do with not seeing you in class—pointed at himself for the absurdity of his expectations—the voice in his head taking a bitter turn. Were you avoiding him? Would you not attend this, either? Did he do something wrong? His mind rambles on as he fiddles with his imitation cocktail glass, the shiny slip of plastic sticking to his fingers. There’s still a generous portion of what has to be five-dollar wine pooled at the bottom, bitter and opaque enough to stain. The woman who poured it for him did so nearly to the top, maybe sympathetically, disregarding that there was money obviously trying to be saved—deeming his cause a worthy one. He doesn’t even want it, really, nauseous at the idea of actually finishing it, but not having something in his hand was winding him even tighter. So he nurses it—even as it goes warm between his grasp, more unappetizing now than it had been twenty minutes ago—sip after sip to try and appear engaged.

Eventually Joel grows tired of waiting, for Ellie to come back or for you to come at all or for this night to just be over, and picks a drawing to pause in front of. It’s a portrait of someone he’ll never meet, another graceful stranger coming together in an amalgamation of grays. He can hear people walking behind him, talking quietly and occasionally stopping to look over his shoulder at it in passing.

“Hm. Quite the fan of my work, are you?” He almost ignores the comment, thinking it's for someone else, as it usually is, until there’s a figure taking up too much of his periphery.

He’s a little dazed when he looks over, the hot, sour wine settled now in the pit of his belly, buzzing with a flare of something not-missed. He’s prepared to see more than one person beside him, perhaps a couple that had been talking near him rather than to him, but when he swivels his neck, it’s you. You’re just as pretty as he remembers, the face that he looks for in his sleep, but this time you’re not as shy, staring at him straight on—maybe similarly loosened by the pale yellow liquid in your own cup.

Heat gathers at the rim of his jaw—his neck is red by now, he’s sure of it. Already exposed and driven by the faint whisper in his mind, he opens his mouth to speak without thinking, “You weren’t there this week.”

You make quick quotes with just your pointers half-heartedly, “‘Sick,'” and breathe a laugh, “Had a few academic duties to fulfill. Gotta keep the scholarship intact.”

There’s a thick moment of silence, but he can’t look away, eyes weighty and cheeks stinging. It’s awkward but he finds comfort in it, embracing the adjustment like it's a step towards better connection.

Someone brushes his arm as they walk by and Joel uses it to his advantage, “Do you want to step outside? It’s a little hot in here.”

There’s a flash of something like surprise across your eyes, but you shrug, “Sure.”

He crowds behind you as you walk step-in-step out the unarmed emergency exit, just to feel the closeness of your body, much better than the distance he’d felt in your absence on Monday.

The night is worse than cold but it feels good against the heat in Joel’s chest. He can smell your perfume wafting back as he follows your movements, and it makes him pant. He’s ill, has to be—that or the wine was stronger than he thought, because the weird tie he feels is one he can’t explain as being healthy or normal or not fucking scary. But when you turn on your heel to face him, taking a seat on a hip-high planter in a secluded outer corner of the building, it feels right. Natural.

He shuffles so that he’s far enough for you to be safe from his touch, and he shoves a hand in his pocket for good measure, “Thank you again for the drawing. It’s really beautiful.”

“Yeah, of course. Thank you for saying that.”

He wants to say something more, like you’ve captured me in a way that makes me hopeful about myself, but settles instead for, “My daughter liked it a lot, too.” It’s a bold-faced lie, but he thinks that keeping your gift a secret would look less appealing.

“Is she here?”

“Somewhere, yeah. Ran off the second we got in. I’m not a comfort anymore, I guess.”

“Is she yours? Comfort, I mean.” You pick at the crown of the cup, rolling it gently in your hands like its real glass, and you both watch the fuzzy pattern of light that catches on its uniform surface. Joel wonders if you have a comfort of your own—if you need one.

“Is it bad if I say yes? It feels cheesy but the kid is my rock. Dunno what I’m gonna do when she grows up.” He shoves at the concrete under the toe of his boot. It didn’t taste as bad coming out as he thought it might. He hasn’t said that out loud to anyone other than himself, but you look at him like you know exactly what he means. The delicate beginnings of a smile crest on your face, cheek pinched, void of all the uncomfortable sympathy he's gotten from Tommy and Maria at the few things he made the mistake of revealing. He can’t find it in himself to stop now with your gesture, feeling relief in having a place to voice his heartbreak, “Honestly I’m scared, but not just for me, y’know? I worry about what she’s gonna find in the world. I just want to keep her safe.”

“She knows it, I’m sure. I know what it feels like to have no one to root for you—I would’ve killed for that. The only thing you can do for her is be there when she comes home,” You’re looking down again, and he doesn’t like whatever’s made you want to pull back from him—be shy, “Spend time with other people you care about and that care about her. Make that network for her to lean on.”

“All I got is my brother. His wife too, sometimes. My nephews. A few years ago it was just me and him. Ellie—that’s her name. She, uh, isn’t ‘mine’,” he makes the bunny-eared quotes with the hand holding his drink, “Not by blood, anyway. But she popped up out of nowhere and I don’t know how to go back to being on my own.”

“It’d be good to have a network of your own, too—if you’re up to it. It’s hard to do, trust me, but I don’t think I could do a lot without my friends.”

“Oh, sweetheart. I don’t think that’s in the cards for me anymore. I can’t conjure up much of anything worth listening to these days. Forgot how.”

“Don’t do that. You have a lot to say—you’re plenty. Just start with one person. There’s always time to make more.” He knows you’re talking to him, but it feels like you’re also talking to that little boy inside of him, small and unloved and still bleeding.

“Do you need any more? Friends.”

You look up from your lap, pushing a piece of your hair back from your face like you need to get a better look, searching for a way you could be misinterpreting him, “I might have room. You have a recommendation for me?”

He reaches out, grabbing the empty cup from your grasp, stacking it with his own and depositing them by your side. He doesn’t miss the way you watch him, how you widen the spread of your legs on instinct, enough to suggest his entrance. He wades out on one leg to bring himself in, testing the water.

Your lips are parted, and when he looks into the opening between them he imagines he’s seeing to the center of you, and everything else keys out. Cars pass by on the strip of street behind him, driven by ghosts, providing nothing but a low song for your bodies to dance to together, his chest swaying closer to yours with every breath. You move with him, and it feels rehearsed, like all of the steps you've taken to get to this moment were purposeful, done in perfectly orchestrated succession for the hundredth time.

“Do you feel that, too?” He asks, wanting to know if he’s reading too much into it, feeling that sweet edge of thoughtful-involved-fascinated scrape his skin like a sharp knife, “Do you? Like you know me?”

“Yes,” you breathe, and it’s all the permission he’s ever needed.

He leans in, lips skating yours, the warm cave of your mouth begging to be explored. He tries so hard to take his time, soft brushes tethering you to each other with the weight of everything he’ hasn’t had the time to say. His whole body is pins and needles—a fierce heat that floats so high it feels like ice. You sigh into him, the start of a moan, and his composure snaps. Service, he reminds himself, act on it—it feels almost divine when he thinks about all the ways he could pledge his loyalty, ready to bend at your altar every day of his life if it meant you’d sing for him again.

Joel brings a hand to the side of your neck, thumb digging into the pulse point at the corner of your jaw to bring you forward, licking into your mouth in search of more noise. He groans when you relax into his hold, so pretty and willing, and works you until you’re just as fervent, daring to suck his bottom lip between your teeth—going for blood.

The voice in his head is yours again—open me, eat me, unhinge your jaw and swallow.

He slots his other hand around the bone of your hip, pulling you nearer to the ledge of the planter, pressing his cock into your inner thigh as it swells to life. You gather his shirt in your hand, a tight fist, shifting yourself against him so you can grind into it instead. No one else exists, no one else could ever exist in this moment, or any moment you attend, for the rest of forever. He wants to fuck you, to see how far the attachment could go, how far he could reach down before he finds a warm, bed-shaped slot for him to rest in. He wants to live inside the body of someone who sees him so clearly. He wants to know every thought in your head before it comes to fruition.

The wine tastes better coming from off your tongue, and he’s gleaning the flavor from every corner of your mouth like he can achieve a second-hand high. His full weight is rocking into you with enough force now that he has to plant a heel in the ground to keep you both from tumbling. He risks a thumb in your waistband in the flurry, tugging at it in the hope of another invitation.

Before you have a chance to decide, the loud press of the swing-door at the front of the building opens, and Joel staggers back, remembering where he is and why.

You look winded to say the least, hair bent from the imprint of his hand, mouth in a perpetual ‘o’, and he’s scared to see the state of his own face, not to mention the visible strain of his cock in his pants. He kicks an ankle out to try to adjust, heaving through an open maw at the thought that you might be affected in that way as well, picturing the slick wet in between your legs—a beautiful sheen from just his mouth on the top half of your body.

You shimmy off the edge, straightening your shirt and he immediately steps back in for more, draping the full breadth of his hand against your collarbone, curling the tips around the top of your shoulder.

“Joel. I— I need to go inside.”

“What’s wrong, sweetheart? Are you okay?”

You lay a hand over his with a squeeze and he retracts it, “Yeah. I just wasn’t expecting… I don’t know if I can do this right now.”

He can feel his breath restricting, heart plummeting down so far it feels like it’s landed in the ball of his foot; the second time this week you’ve pulled away. He thinks back to the face you made at him in the gallery, back before he fucked this up. Maybe you never meant for this to happen at all.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper, voice strained, “I just need a little time. Just some time, I’m sorry.”

“No, no I understand. Don’t be sorry. Will you take my number? Just in case?” He wants to make sure you’re okay after this, if you want that, and selfishly he wants to give you a way to have him, knowing this might be the last time he runs into you. He’s too afraid to leave it up to chance.

“Yeah, yeah okay,” You pass him your phone with shaky fingers.

“Only if you want to, honey,” He’s disheartened by the whole thing, but he doesn’t want to make you uncomfortable, so he’s careful to double-check, even if it’s a blow to his hope, “You don’t have to.”

“I know. I’m just—the wine, sorry. I think it was bad.” You huff out a strained laugh, “I want it. Your number, I mean. Promise.” You practically shove the thing at him and he takes it this time, entering the contact with as little squinting as possible to save himself from any further humiliation.

───────

You all but run into the bathroom in the back of the building, needing a moment alone to consider what the fuck it is that’s going on right now—what’s been going on since he walked into your class two weeks ago and overstayed his welcome.

You stumble in, bracing yourself against the porcelain basin, switching on the faucet to drown out some of the pounding in your head. You’d been lying when you said the wine was catching up to you—very much sober—but now, in this suffocating, gray room, you feel like it must have at least accelerated the churning in your gut.

You let water gather in your hands, bending to dip your face in the too-cold pool between them.

Every day has been mostly encouraging if not indifferent but this feels like the start of a bad dream you won’t be able to wake up from, dragging you right back to that dark box you’d been existing in. He came in from nowhere, kicking down your reserve, for what? For a fuck? To enjoy you in passing? Or worse, to stay? You’re unsure which would be harder to receive.

And it’s unfair—for him to show up right at the point of being fully on your own, as soon as you’ve chosen to avoid getting caught up in that part of your life. You’re past the point of surrendering your time—know better than to want to be bogged down by a crush or the preconceived idea of the perfect stranger.

You don’t know him, and you don’t need to.

But you want him so bad it hurts; so bad you had to fake a cold to skip class because you couldn't face the idea of seeing him for the last time. You debated skipping the grade for the exhibition too, but you used any excuse to convince yourself he might not show. You weren’t sure who his daughter was, or how enthusiastic she was about the program, so you figured it was a fair shot. You outwardly willed him not to come, at yourself in the mirror and in the shower and out loud the car, all while secretly praying he’d be in attendance, right up to the moment you saw him.

When you stand up, staring at your rigid body in the plastic mirror above the sink, you’re pained at the sight. You look tired, shoulders tense and eyes bleary. Stray beads of the cool water stick to your skin, refusing to dry in the lingering humidity, balling up together to drip into the open lip of your shirt. You can barely feel it falling over your chest before being soaked up by the material. You feel outside yourself.

Someone starts to knock at the door, a quick and invasive interruption to the moment of absolute panic you’d been enjoying. You managed to twist the lock shut on the door at least, so you click your heel against the tile in a wordless someone’s in here, but the knocking persists.

“Occupied.” You try, wet hands slipping against the edge of the sink. This shit isn’t normal. None of that even comes close to normal.

Still, the heavy thrum against the hollow metal continues, and you take a deep breath before practically ripping it out from the socket of its frame. When you have it open, Ian’s posed between the V of the slot, face bewildered.

“Really, truly, I love you, but what the fuck was that?”

───────

Four days from the start of spring break, you’re out at some stranger’s place off Maple, invited by both Ian and your roommate—making it a little harder to get out of—in a joint, well-intentioned attempt to make you leave the safety of your room. A party will be nice, they’d explained, nothing serious, and a week off’s supposed to be fun, right?

The house is pretty, but whoever owns it has demanded everyone remain out on the cobblestone patio, uneven flooring making for a jagged line of bodies packed too tight to fit.

A fire burns in the middle of the yard, billowing out puffs of smoke you know will linger in your clothes for at least two washes. You swipe at some soot that's gathered in the bowl of your jacket sleeve absentmindedly. There’s no music tonight, maybe because there’s real school tomorrow—the elementary school down the street not quite on the same schedule—and you start to think going out on weeknights is quickly becoming more your speed. There's just the soft blanket of everyone murmuring, trying to stay warm in the chill of the wind.

Ian’s prepping some guy across the fire to meet you; you can tell by the look on his face, like he’s planning something elaborate. You smile at him, at least amused by his effort to help you forget the weekend. He’s right, it is spring break, and Joel is nothing but a consequence of your stress-induced impulsivity.

Still, despite your efforts, you’re thinking about him again, even if to punish him. You can still feel the line of his cock against your thigh, pressed hot and heavy into your body like an offering. You rub your thighs together, cursing him for giving you enough material to fantasize about for weeks—your punishment in return.

Ian crosses the circle with your new prospect, and you tilt your cup in mock cheers. Behind him he mouths hot and nice, tell me what you think. You nod, and the guy steps forward to block the flame. He’s handsome, airbrushed face and sweet cologne and long, thin fingers, nothing like how someone else’s had felt at the junction of your hips.

You swallow, hard.

You honestly don’t hear a word that comes out of his mouth from the second it opens, not even to catch his name. Instead, you think about how nice it’d be if you could pay attention, how much easier it would be to fuck someone you thought was nice and safe and not at the forefront of every free moment you’d been afforded in the last two-and-a-half weeks. About what a relief it would be for him to mount and rut into you without consequence—no emotional burden, just boring and lukewarm like the last bite of something you can’t find a place to throw away. It’s always been easier when you didn’t want more. Yet now you want every night, hold out a hand in your dreams and let him into the part of you that has already carved out a hole in his shape.

This guy couldn’t pull your mind off of Joel even if he was fucking you.

When he offers to grab you a drink, you agree and then head into the house, like you’re not supposed to, as soon as his back is turned. There’s a few locked doors, and then one at the end of a hallway that opens up into a bathroom. You slip in, not bothering to switch on the light in an attempt to hide out from being found.

Here you are searching for reason in a dirty mirror above another sink, with nothing but the weak glow of a plug-in air freshener to guide you, too soon after the last time.

You’re angry, suddenly, at how far he’s burrowed himself into your head, with so little to go on. He’s doing nothing but showing you yourself, a tired tactic to get you to fall in love with him while you do all the work. He was just pretending, right? He couldn’t actually want to love you. You groan, when the fuck was love even part of this equation?

You dig your phone out of your purse. The lock screen is bright—bold lettering reminding you it’s nearly midnight—but you click into your contacts anyway, because it’s not like you’re going to call him or anything. His page is still open, the Texas area code populating under Joel - Ellie’s dad—typed out with caps and all like that’s his only meaningful identifier. You scroll to see where he’d punched in ‘just in case‘ in the notes section of his info-card, and that decimates the cliff of restraint you'd barely managed, sinking in on itself under you.

Your hands are wet with unease, held hostage by the way he’d read your thoughts out loud. You did feel it too, that searing weight of knowing—of being acquainted with him despite only meeting once before. He had to have been honest in at least that confession. You ask yourself for permission—‘was he going through this as well? what exactly was he feeling? would he explain if you asked?’—until it turns into selling yourself justification—‘you could just fuck him, right? that’s all this has to be, right?’.

Yes, you decide. Just another test of will—you can do it. You can pass.

Your finger hovers over the number, closing the screen and opening it again and again and again until you just bite the bullet and fucking press it, the screen going black as you shove it against the side of your ear, covered again in darkness.

He picks up within two rings.

“Hello?”

“Hi. Joel,” You offer him your name like a secret, “It’s me. Did I wake you up?”

“No, sweetheart. Are you okay?”

“Can I come see you?”

#joel miller fanfiction #the last of us fanfiction #tlou fanfiction #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller smut #pedro pascal characters #joel miller fic #joel miller/reader

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plus-size-reader · 2 years ago

Text

Peace

Troy Otto x Plus size!reader

Word Count: 3842 words

Warnings: None

Summary: The reader comes across Troy’s notebook while he’s out, and notices something strange.

—————————————————————————————————

You hadn’t meant to snoop.

Jake had asked you to find Troy, said he had to talk to him but didn’t have the time to track him down. He was a busy man, after all, and if Jeremiah needed help, he couldn’t exactly make him wait.

So, you agreed.

You took off toward Troy’s room, assuming that given the time of day and schedule for rounds, that was where he would be.

He wasn’t.

His bedroom was unoccupied by the time you reached it, but not empty.

On the floor, out of place in the immaculate space, was that leather-bound notebook he carried with him all the time. It was one of his most prized possessions and you knew he would be missing it, if he didn’t realize it was gone.

That was it.

By all accounts, you were trying to do something nice. You figured it had fallen out of his back pocket when he was getting dressed or rushing out the door to get to his post.

You had to find him anyway, so when you did, you could take it to him.

It was innocent, at least, at first.

You had only good intentions and you weren’t even going to open it, but almost on instinct, as soon as you touched the leather, you flipped open the front cover. Whether out of curiosity or habit, you weren’t sure but it didn’t matter.

All that mattered as soon as it was open was the ink, dried to the page and committing his every thought, as if recording for posterity.

On the first page, he’d written his name, followed by a date. If you had to guess, you’d say that was the day he obtained it.

It was interesting.

Troy’s handwriting was delicate and even, and you could tell that he put time into every single letter and number. Like he knew they would be there forever and couldn’t handle a mistake.

You smiled, letting yourself sit at the foot of his bed, your fingers tracing each letter as you read them.

For the most part, his notebook was filled with what you would have expected. Factual scribblings and miscellaneous numbers that held no meaning to anyone other than Troy.

In all honesty, you barely understood what you were looking at.

…but it didn’t matter.

Troy had been carrying this time with him everywhere he went since you’d met him, and never once had you held it like this. Never had you looked upon the pages, or even asked what he was always writing.

You just let him keep his secrets, because everyone had something that was just for them, but now that you were seeing it, you didn’t regret picking it up.

No matter how wrong it was.

You felt like, for what was probably the first time, you were seeing Troy for who he was and he wasn’t even in the room with you.

The next few pages were less interesting, though just as telling, with every inch of the paper covered with dates and times.

The watch schedule.

After that, you found what seemed to be a detailed list of miscellanious items, and quantities that had to be supply logs from his runs. You could tell because of the delicate little checks beside each thing, telling you he'd cataloged them.

That was who Troy was.

Organized and meticulous, even when he was within his own private thoughts.

It continued on like that for a while. Page after page full of numbers, little symbols and time stamps, but you didn’t skip over a single one. You took your time considering each little marking, far more than you’d ever studied anything in your life.

It was almost as if you were reading a roadmap and you couldn't forget a single detail, which in a way, you were.

This notebook was a reflection of Troy, and not just who he presented to people on the outside, but the real Troy.

This was the closest thing he’d ever keep to a personal journal, and while it didn’t contain any written feeling or sentiment, you could feel it.

With each word you read, and each number you attempted to quantify, you got it. You understood who he was, more and more.

In a way that he could never have expressed to your face.

You were remarkably relaxed as you read, considering you were actively betraying the personal privacy of one of your closest friends, but that all came to a screeching halt as you neared the center of the book.

There, above everything else you’d seen so far, you found something that surprised you. Something within the collection of thoughts that actually confused you more than anything else had.

It was you.

There, on those worn pages, was you. Or, at the very least, some sort of tribute to you. The resemblance was stark, and you couldn’t have explained it away if you tried.

Which obviously wasn’t what you expected.

Still, you didn’t move to make anything of it at first. You knew Troy well enough to know that there could very well be drawings of every single person he’d ever seen hidden within the covers.

Maybe he just didn’t want to forget the people he knew. Maybe he didn’t want to forget their faces.

That would have been a perfectly reasonable thing to do considering the world you lived in, and how frequently people left your lives.

The second drawing was harder to explain away, and by the time you reached a seventh page, you couldn’t deny it anymore.

They were all of you.

Each one was different, and just as great a resemblance, but they were all of you.

You could feel your face scrunch up slightly as you considered what you were looking at, before eventually turning back to the first drawing of many and just looking at it for a while.

It was good.

A simple pencil sketch, with harsher lines and shading in some areas, where Troy had deemed necessary and softer, lighter emphaisis on others. Complete, of course, with the date in the corner.

It looked a lot like you.

The first one, the one that had caught your attention in the first place, was of your face. There was a soft, almost serene smile on your face and you looked happy.

You looked pretty, if you could look pretty in a pencil drawing.

The second was farther away, and featured you in the middle of cleaning your hand gun on the picnic table. The third was of you reading, your back against the shed and a sharp look of concentration on your face.

Did you really twist your face up like that when you read? You must have.

There were a few others, all capturing you as you existed, in the exact way you must have looked and you couldn’t help but feel like you were watching yourself through Troy’s eyes.

It was strange.

Still, you didn’t stop your quest and continued looking from page to page, until you came to the most recent drawing.

The last drawing in the set.

This one featured you, sitting in front of a roaring fire with the full expanse of the desert at your back. By all means, it was no different than the others, but for some reason, it felt different as you studied it.

You looked peaceful, almost comfortable, with a wide smile on your face and it would be a lie to say that you didn’t find it beautiful.

It was.

That was when it dawned on you.

You remembered this, remembered sitting in the dirt like you were on the page, telling the militia jokes and listening to their stories about what life was like for them before the fall.

Troy had been so quiet that night. This notebook of his had his full attention the entire night, and at the time, you thought he was taking notes, strategizing and planning out your next moves.

…but he wasn’t.

If the date in the corner of the page was correct, that meant he was doing this that whole time.

His mind wasn’t wondering to far away possibilities, or bloody disasters that no one could prevent except for him. His was watching you, studying the lines of your body and the contours of your face.

Listening to your voice and doing his best to capture the emotion on your face to the page, so that it didn’t have to live in his memories alone.

Wow.

You were quiet for a moment as you thought over the implications of this, or if they were any implications at all, only stopping when you heard the sound of Troy’s truck coming up the road.

It had to be him.

It was always him.

At the sudden distraction, you released a breath you didn’t realize you were holding after a moment, and forced yourself to close the notebook, but you didn’t put it down.

You couldn’t.

For some reason, you felt like if you allowed the leather to separate from your fingers, it would go away somehow. Like, if you set it down, what you now knew would be lost to you forever.

So, rather than be caught in his room without explanation, you tucked the book into your back pocket, where Troy often kept it on his own body, and left.

In a lot of ways, it was the perfect crime.

There was no way that Troy could actually prove that you had been in his room, and considering the fact that you were sure he didn’t realize his journal was missing, he wouldn’t know you’d seen it.

He didn’t have to know.

…but part of you didn’t want that.

Part of you didn’t want to get away with what you’d done, to get away with reading his notebook and learning what you had without something changing.

Everything had changed.

This proved it, whether Troy meant for it to or not.

You decided not to say anything at first.

Not because you didn’t want to, but because you didn’t know how. It wasn’t as if you could just go up to him and ask why he’d been sketching scarily accurate portraits of you in his spare time.

So, until you could make up your mind about what you wanted to do, you decided to do nothing.

Instead, you focused your energy forward toward where Troy was, unloading his pack and guns from the back of the truck with Cooper and Blake.

They weren’t scheduled for a run this morning, at least, not to your knowledge but you didn’t have time to care about that. The important thing was that they just got back and they were too preoccupied to notice you.

…but you weren’t preoccupied.

Not anymore.

In fact, as you looked upon Troy at this moment, you felt like you were seeing him for the first time. Like, you finally had a point of reference for how he thought and what happened inside his head when he got all quiet.

Like you were looking at a brand-new person.

You tried to think back to the way he looked at you, looking over that notebook of his, that soft concentration consuming everything else around him. Maybe if you saw the world like that, it would be better.

If you saw him the way he saw you.

In your head, Troy had always been this untouchable force. He was stoic and solid, barking orders and burying everything he felt no matter how unpleasant it may have been, but that wasn’t all there was to him.

There couldn’t be.

As you watched him and took note of the way his face faltered as he scanned the crowd, you saw it. A glimmer of something that wasn’t quite as untouchable as you would have thought.

He was unsure, and given the way, he winced slightly after slugging on his pack, tired too but that wasn’t all. There was a silent joy in the way he wiped the blood from his hands and a whisper of adrenaline clear from the pep in his step.

How was it possible?

Had he always been this complex and you’d just managed to miss it? Or was it simpler than that? Maybe you didn’t want to notice because you couldn’t handle the gamble.

You couldn’t handle being let down, not by Troy. He was too important to you, and if you were to fall too hard, you knew you’d never be able to claw your way back up.

Not that you had much of a choice now.

You had picked up that notebook, and there was no taking that back. The most you could do now was keep going, and deal with what followed with as much grace as you could muster.

“Hey, there you are”

It was the sound of Troy’s voice that brought you out of your head, but not in time to actually prepare yourself for having to face him.

The best you could do was smile, desperately hoping that your face didn’t look as guilty and conflicted as you felt.

“Yeah, here I am,” you tried, willing yourself to focus on the conversation at hand and not on the way the midday sun made his eyes sparkle. Was he watching you like you were watching him?

Stop it.

“I was supposed to tell you to find Jake. He was looking for you” you forced, giving the blonde a soft smile before continuing on your way, brushing past him only slightly in your hurry.

You couldn’t do this.

How were you supposed to just go about your life like you didn’t know he was silently studying every little thing about you?

How did you do that?

“Y/N, wait up. What’s going on?” Troy called out, shocked by your uncharacteristic briefness and evidently choosing this very moment to start caring about other people’s feelings.

Perfect.

You stopped, considering your options for a second as you waited for him to meet your side, his boots keeping time with his usual stride.

On one hand, you could just abandon your original plan and tell him about the notebook, confess that you’d read it and that you had seen the drawings. On the other hand, you could keep it hidden and say nothing, but that was a bandage at best.

Eventually, you would have to give it back.

So, you took a deep breath and made up your mind. Today was going to be the day that you faced Troy Otto and the feelings you had for him that you’d been steadily burying since you’d met.

You didn’t have any other choice.

It was unceremonious, all things considered, the way you just pulled the small book from your pocket but you didn’t really care. Of all the things currently fighting for the top spot in your mind, finesse didn’t even crack the top ten.

There was no getting away from this and the longer you tried to play it off, the worse it was going to be for both of you.

There was probably a perfectly casual explanation that you just had yet to consider. All you could know for sure right now was that you were never going to know if you didn’t give Troy a chance to explain himself.

“You found it” he allowed, gingerly taking the book from your hands and inspecting it lightly before returning it back to where it belonged.

Safely away in the back pocket of his jeans, away from prying eyes like yours.

“Yeah, I found it.” you could practically feel your blood dropping in temperature as you forced yourself to take the leap. “And I read it too”

Troy’s blood ran cold as soon as you spoke.

You read it? What did that mean? Most of what he’d cataloged in that book wasn’t something you would have been able to understand, even with as clever as you happened to be.

It was an extension of what happened inside his head, and if he was being honest, Troy was lucky he could understand what he’d written most of the time.

It wasn’t possible that you’d read it.

It just wasn’t possible.

“What do you mean?” his words were much more pensive this time, as he waited for you to explain yourself.

Troy was smart, and he knew better than to incriminate himself, even if technically he hadn’t done anything wrong. The drawings were creepy, sure, but not necessarily disallowed.

“It’s a good likeness. It could have been a lot worse. I mean, I didn’t even know you could draw” you shrugged, telling him everything he needed to know without having to actually admit to what you both knew out loud.

It was the most painless option, but knowing that didn’t stop Troy from panicking as he considered what this might mean for the two of you in the future. Of course, he wouldn’t blame you for whatever choice you made.

He’d crossed a line, again.

“You weren’t supposed to see those” he tried, ultimately preparing himself for the yelling or screaming that would follow your discovery.

It was strange.

Troy knew that when he started the sketches, but for the life of him, he couldn’t stop once he’d started. There was just something about you, and the way you looked when you were completely in your element.

It was like the rest of the world fell away, and even if for a moment, he wanted to capture it.

…but there was no way for him to explain that to you without making the whole thing a lot worse than it already was.

After all, the only thing more inappropriate than drawing you without your permission or awareness would be justifying it with unreciprocated feelings of admiration.

Feelings he could hardly rectify within his own head, let alone out loud to you.

“Why do you draw them?” you wondered, heading back down the hill toward your own cabin, Troy following you gingerly.

You had no idea what you were doing here, or what difference this whole thing would make but you knew that you had to talk about it. You had to figure out where to go from here, and you’d rather do it without an audience.

This definitely wasn’t the business of anyone else at the ranch.

He sighed, watching you out of the corner of his eye as you moved, making no motion to say anything else until he spoke. “Got bored” he tried, his voice wavering in a way you’d never heard before.

“Don’t lie. It’s okay, I just want to know why” you shrugged, practically pleading with him to tell you the truth.

You didn’t blame him for assuming the worst. That was just who Troy was, and who he would always be, but you weren’t angry with him for this.

You were just surprised.

Most of the drawings, kept between important data he’d collected, were of you out in the world, going about your day and unaware that you were being watched.

Which, to some, may have been unsettling but you didn’t think so. You knew Troy and you knew that in order for him to put the time and effort into these, they were important to him.

Because you were important to him.

All you wanted was to hear him say it.

“Truth?” he hummed, more for himself than you as he bought just a little more time before you finally stopped, just far enough away from the center of the ranch to have some privacy.

You nodded, trying to ignore the way his gaze shifted around your face before finally dropping to the dirt.

“You’re real. Real and beautiful” Troy shrugged, in what had to be the most pitiful attempt at minimizing himself that you’d ever seen.

This wasn’t who he was.

Troy was strong and self-assured. You had never seen him doubt a decision or second guess a choice once in all the time you’d known him unless that was just another one of his illusions you’d never looked twice at.

Sensing you weren’t content with just that, he continued, laying his soul bare in a way you’d never expected.

Not from him.

“You know that feeling when you’re staring them down out there, and you know that if you make one wrong move or miss anything, that will be it?” he questioned, clearly referencing the dead and the thrill he got from the sick little game of chicken you’d had to put a stop to quite a few times before.

“Yeah, but what does that have to do with me?” you started, only to stop again when Troy continued, “The feeling after, when they’re all dead and everything is okay again…that’s how I feel when I’m around you”

Troy paused, his eyes meetings yours for a moment as he breathed, clearly trying to gauge your reaction to his confession so far.

He found nothing.

You knew the feeling he was talking about. The relief that flooded your body when the adrenaline peaked after the danger had already faded away and you could revel in what you’d accomplished.

…but the drawings.

You didn’t understand how they were related.

So, clearly following your train of thought, Troy fished the book out of his pocket and opened it, pausing only briefly before showing you the page he’d ended on.

It was further along in the journal than you’d gotten in your initial search this morning but it would seem that there was a reason for that.

It was another drawing of you.

This time, you were curled up in your sleeping bag, fast asleep. It wasn’t entirely different from any of the others, but considering that it was the one he’d chosen, you knew it was special.

It was his favorite.

This was the first one he’d drawn. The one that had started the habit that he’d yet to break, even now.

You had been out with the rest of the militia. Under his direction, you’d wandered too far away from the ranch and bunked down for the night in a cave, but for the life of him, Troy couldn’t sleep.

He couldn’t quiet his mind and he certainly couldn’t have hoped to get any sleep, so he picked up his notebook. At first, he was just going to read over his notes from the outpost, but then he glanced over at you.

You were too peaceful and too beautiful. It made him feel something he’d never felt and some part of him felt like if he didn’t commemorate it somewhere, that feeling would just slip away and he didn’t want to let it go.

He couldn't let it go.

“I won’t say I love you, because I don’t think I’d know even if I did, but I draw these because they remind me of what I do it for,” Troy muttered, admiring the graphite as if he’d done it a hundred times before, and maybe he had.

“They remind me of what peace feels like”

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chienmechant · 1 year ago

Text

impera ghouls' fav art medium, from an art school dropout

found this in my notes app, i previously sent them to @gravehags but i'm posting it here because why the fuck not.

mountain's kinda obvious, but he really likes working with natural materials. enjoys woodworking and land art. despite his size, has very deft hands and is extremely delicate. makes a trip to the farm each season to get some beautiful fresh and golden hay to weave it into ornaments and jewelry. and let me tell you that's a testimony to his skill cause i literally cried over hay last october and I had to soak it in water to be able to bend it. the texture was disgusting and i got destroyed at the critique anyway lol

i've already said it before, but cumulus is totally into stamp carving and linocuts. 11/10, very calming, probably has rough hands since you have to use lots of white spirit to get the ink of off the lino, and you gotta use a special rough scrub to get ink out of your skin. puts her creations everywhere, gives you and the ghouls little cards and patches she printed herself :)

cirrus and sunshine probably share the screenprinting workshop. it's a very delicate craft, especially when you go for traditional paper stencils. but worry not, ghoul claws are sharper and more precise than your average cutter. though, a intricate multi-colored stencil implies there's a lot of drying time involved, especially on fabric. they always have some kind of brunch during that time, with tea and snacks and such. invite you to join them if you happen to pass by. (it's them printing the merch i know it)

aether makes very cool metal sculptures. he's got both the strength and the patience for it. you know those adorable little bird-shaped garden ornaments made from scrap metal ? yeah he did some because the local old ladies are always commissioning him to make them. also the workshop's babysitter, has to keep an eye on swiss and dew when they start beefing with a circular saw in their hands.

rain is very skilled in needlework. originally considered himself a better painter, since he's got a sharp eye and is good at color theory, but discovered all the ways you can use embroidery and sewing with an artistic approach during a workshop in his first year. sewed a costume made out of dried orange peels and called it 'orange leather' once. also interested in book binding. will get snappy if the others call him a little grandma while he's embroidering.

phantom is a photographer, and a pretty good graphist as well. he's too shy to admit it, but he really does know how to present his work. has the cleanest portfolio around, and is probably a huge perfectionist. i mean, perfectionism is kind of a must in art school but bug is an anxious wreck (give him a hug). very gentle, handles the lenses and lights with lots of care. mainly photographs landscapes and nature mortes, but enjoys taking portraits as well. makes a lot of self-portraits and will very shyly ask you to pose for him.

aurora makes little pop-up zines. it's a prefect way for her to give way to both her gentleness and chaotic nature. while pop-ups may look tedious to make, it's actually lots of fun, and you can get pretty chaotic with it too. has a whole collection of patterned and textured papers, she made most of them. probably has a 'cool paper stash' she hasn't touched because she doesn't want to 'waste them' and said paper is like christmas wrapping paper from 2016 (it's me i'm guilty).

dewdrop is more interest in contemporary art, especially sculpture. little guy has no patience and likes to break stuff, i see it as a match made in heaven. uses his fire ghoul abilities to burn different matters and experiment with them. kinda see him as my friend who burnt a humongous quantity of human hair for a project. was pissed no one cuddled him for two days because of the smell.

swiss is totally a performance artist. i mean, technically, all of the ghouls have a huge affinity with it, but swiss especially. a big fan of contemporary composers like john cage and karlheinz stockhausen, as well as bauhaus performance art. he likes to let loose, have fun exploring his body's and voice's capicities in an artistic light. probably submitted some kind of sextape as a project, but it's okay because the professor likes provocative stuff.

bonus : all of them probably were nude models for the evening classes at some point. i haven't included anatomical study in the hcs because no one in their right mind would enjoy sitting on a stool and drawing greek statues for 8 hours straight, but none of them would mind being the models. although they'll probably ask you for a massage afterwards because of how tiring it is to stay in the same position for so long.

#cyan talks #ghoul galore #nameless ghouls headcanons #nameless ghouls #nameless ghouls x reader #the band ghost #nameless ghoulettes #aurora ghoulette #sunshine ghoulette #cumulus ghoulette #cirrus ghoulette #ghost bc #swiss ghoul #aether ghoul #dewdrop ghoul #sodo ghoul #rain ghoul #aeon ghoul #phantom ghoul

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irrlicht-ghostfront · 1 year ago

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HC time!! I have some HCs about Hazbin and its characters, and I wanted to jot them down somewhere (so I don't forget bc my brain is the size of a dead pea) Some of them I'm standing by until they get disproven (and will stand in anything I write) and others are more wonky (for when they seem applicable)

These will likely be mostly about Alastor bc whaddya mean he's my fave?

Apart from being a radio host, Alastor was also the on-call handyman for just about anything when he was alive - while he kinda only wanted to repair radios, he eventually became the man for everything

The children wolud also call him "the teddybear doctor" because his stitches for their toys were the best

Mimzy kept sitting on the jukebox in her bar and thus breaking it, requiring Alastor to fix it at least every two weeks

The Vees are the newest Overlords, and they're basically a 3-in-1 deal - they might not be considered Overlords if they aren't in a group

Alastor knows how to use most modern technology (and how to fix it) he just dislikes it

Alastor meets Rosie and Mimzy at least twice a month

Alastor's always wanted to partake in a stage production but everyone else was too afraid of him to actually get anything done

Alastor's father killed his mother - it was an accident but it still happened

Alastor cooks most meals in the Hotel - nobody else can really be trusted in the kitchen. Charlie accidentally exploded the stove, Vaggie rations the food, Husk just won't, Niffty's food can only be consumed by Alastor and while Angel has the skills, he doesn't have the experience

Valentino and Alastor have never really spoken to one another

Velvette and Alastor would get along splendidly - albeit only over text

Charlie thinks Vaggie's wings are the coolest thing and she's read all about proper wing care

Alastor reads Niffty bed-time stories sometimes - they always end in the most gruesome way possible

Alastor owns several hats he'll never wear but he keeps them clean because they were a gift from Rosie

Husk and Alastor play poker for fun

Niffty brings Alastor pretty rocks she found

Vox has a room dedicated to his Alastor-merch (this one's canon)

Alastor likes fluffy things

Alastor has hooves, but unlike Angel he isn't ashamed of his feet - he wears shoes because hooves and indoor flooring don't mix well

Before the Hotel, Alastor and Niffty were squatting in Husk's house

Vox was a scamartist - he sold useless products over the TV

Vox was stalking several people he thought were pretty, often young girls

In Hell, Alastor suffers from Chronic Waste Disease

Alastor has white scars all over his body - they were a result of several bottles falling onto him when he was a boy

Zestial is perfectly capable of speaking normally, he just doesn't to fuck with people

Rosie collects husbands like stamps

Susan thinks Alastor is a bad influence on Rosie and does not approve of their relationship (they don't have a relationship but Susan has selective deafness)

Alastor is far-sighted

Alastor stores his souls in furbys

Velvette is the only one left with a brain in the Vees

The remaining Egg Boi adopts Alastor as his new boss and nothing Alastor does can get rid of him

Okay that was it I think! I'm sure as soon as I hit post, I'll think of more but this will do for now :D

#hazbin hotel #ramblings #hazbin alastor

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hidelias · 1 month ago

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A bend in space-time Season 1 - [Chapter 6: A pain in the ass]

Chronological markers: this scene fits like a deleted scene from season 1 episode 2, around 32:25 (after Allison and Viktor's talk). TW : Addiction - Petty crimes - Post Traumatic Stress Disorder - Anxiety & anxiety attacks - (Child) captivity & confinement.

Additional note: I chose to always refer to Eliott's page character as Viktor, even while writing about season 1.

Suggested soundtrack : Paloma Faith - Never Tear Us Appart

---

March 25, 2019 - 10h51 am

I tried to calm down in Diego's room, but my mind was a storm. I tried to wash away my anger in the cool water of the bathroom sink, but seeing Klaus's packet of 'chocolate' on the edge of the bathtub made me want to stomp on it. Instead, I finally went back downstairs for - yet - another coffee. Really, it's a good thing I bought several packs, because I can see that Five has already happily raided them.

Once again, I find myself sitting alone at the large wooden dining room table, waiting for the black nectar to run through the machine. This dimly lit room has become something of a refuge for me, since I've been staying at Hargreeves Mansion, perhaps because it's the one that feels most like home. Ironically, it's also the place where I'm most likely to run into someone.

Suddenly, there's a noise in the corridor. Light footsteps. Someone approaching. I stiffen in my chair, trying to regain my composure and hide the tumult of my emotions. Then I see him enter and I can immediately guess who he is: dark hair, oversized black jacket, shifty eyes. Viktor, whom I've never met before, his keys in his hand.

There's a moment of awkward silence, then he clears his throat and says to me:

"Hi. Um, I'm sorry, have you seen my music case? Black and gray. About the size of a briefcase." These very concrete words snap me back to reality. "Oh. Yes, I think I've seen it, next to the shopping bags over there".

I point to the spot by the fridge. I guess Viktor's heard of me by now, just like Five. So has everyone else. He expresses no surprise at finding me there. And looking for his sheet music has just calmed me down a great deal, as if everyday life had come back to me.

"I'm Rin," I say, and he nods. "I know you are. It's nice to meet you."

I don't know if he means it - I suspect he's used to putting on a poker face - but I can see him trying to smile. Then he rummages under the shopping bags, his hands a little shaky, and pulls out the case that was definitely there. He quickly inspects it. Clearly, for him, it's a precious object.

"Did you see anyone touch it?" "No, I didn't see anyone."

And given that all the bags were on it, nobody will probably have noticed. The coffee's finished brewing, and I get up to go to the machine. I take my now usual mug, stamped with the umbrella like the rest of the dishes. It looks like a nerdy collectible, which is somewhat ridiculous. Clearly, Reginal Hargreeves has never moved on.

"Would you like a coffee?" Viktor hesitates, while beginning to unpack his sheet music to check their condition, and finally nods. "Yes, thank you."

So I pull a second mug from the shelf, pour him a hearty glassful of the black liquid, and return to sit at the long table while he finally closes his case, reassured. His gaze meets mine briefly, and he frowns imperceptibly for a moment before saying:

"You already look exhausted after forty-eight hours".

It's not a question: it's an observation, and I let out a heavy sigh as Viktor takes his place opposite me, his sheet music on the adjacent chair. I sense him as someone whom life has made reserved, with decent social skills possibly damaged by a kind of loneliness.

"Yes… but it's nice to meet you too. Klaus talks about you from time to time".

Everything I know about Viktor I learned from Klaus and from the back cover of his book at the bookshop. He looks down into his coffee, thoughtful for a moment. Then, after a few seconds, he repeats, as if to himself:

"He talks about me from time to time…" I shrug. Having uttered Klaus's name has just brought back a shiver of anger. "Sometimes, yes. You know how he is, he doesn't say much about his life. But sometimes something comes out of the blue, especially when he's high. I think he admires your talent for music."

I don't know if Viktor has ever noticed how good music is for Klaus. Maybe it's the same for him, as it is for many people. Like coffee or other psychoactive substances, music acts directly on our nervous systems. By now, I feel Viktor is touched by my words, and when he speaks again, he's finally a little more assertive.

"I'm glad to hear it. He takes a sip of coffee and looks again at the wood of the table. "Are you a musician?"

There's curiosity in his voice this time, and I notice a certain sadness in his gestures. Even though I've only known him for a few moments, in some ways he reminds me of Klaus: a good soul who's pretty much screwed up, trying to protect himself behind walls. I can't help but blame their father. Now that the eulogy is over, I feel I'm allowed to think whatever I want about him again.

"I sing a little," I say only in all sincerity, "but I don't play any instruments. To be honest, my mother couldn't afford it and I don't know if I would have been able to. But I have a lot of admiration for people who can do that.

Five would no doubt joke that I'm into 'a different kind of string theory', and would overwhelm me with equations again. Viktor doesn't seem disappointed by this answer, even if he would have liked to find someone who shared his passion.

"It's already very good. I'm sure your voice is clear and fair". I laugh softly, as it amuses me that he can detect this simply by conversing. "I don't know. Basically, only Klaus and my shower curtain have ever heard it."

Viktor smiles, and I notice that I didn't feel any anger this time when I said Klaus's name.

"How did you and Klaus meet?"

I look at him, but his gaze doesn't stay in mine. I take a sip of coffee. How I met Klaus…

"That depends," I say. "There's the meeting he remembers… and the one he doesn't."

To be honest, I won't discuss the latter here. Besides, I don't think Viktor will be particularly surprised to hear that Klaus often forgets events. I inhale deeply.

"We met in police custody."

Perhaps this won't surprise Viktor either: I don't think he has any illusions about Klaus's acquaintances. I just hope he won't be too disappointed in me, as things were starting out rather well. He leans back against the back of his chair, somewhat uncomfortably.

"Oh. Um… Why were you in custody?"

His question is very cautious, and I feel I don't have to answer if I don't want to. But after all, Allison and Diego already know, and I have no particular reason to hide it from Viktor. And the answer is actually easier than it sounds.

"I don't even know what I'd stolen that day, or where I'd been taken. It happened all the time: we ended up meeting there regularly, he and I. And police custody, you know… it's the only place I can't teleport myself out of. It only makes things worse." I blink, and carry on, feeling Viktor's gaze on me. "I don't do that anymore. Not for ten years. Seriously, I don't do it anymore."

Viktor nods, clearly relieved. And I don't think he'll dig any deeper.

"What a mess", he whispers to himself, but with a kindness that relieves me. Deep down, he's right. And cautiously, he adds: "Are you… are you the one, visiting him in rehab?"

Oh. So Viktor knows that.

"Yes. When he's allowed to. It's far from my favorite place in the world. And sometimes… I don't even know he's been sent there. This time, for instance, I had no idea." I shake my head gently. "Even when he was diagnosed, he designated me as 'relatives' representative."

And none of the Hargreeves. By the way: I don't know if Viktor knows about his brother's diagnoses. But in any case, Klaus himself doesn't remember much either. Viktor's expression becomes noticeably softer, and I get a better-than-ever glimpse of the sensitivity beneath his silence.

"He's lucky he bumped into you. For quite some time, too, I'd say."

His sincerity is clear, but he quickly turns serious and hesitant again, half-hidden behind his mug of black coffee. As if contemplating whether or not to ask. And then finally, he seems to gather his courage, and asks:

"If you think you can tell me… do you then know if…" He pauses for a second, as if this question brings him back to himself. "Do… do you know what he's been diagnosed with?"

Now he looks at me with concerned eyes, and I stare back at him, all the while wondering if it's fair for me to talk about this instead of Klaus himself. However, he'd be incapable of telling something he can't remember, and I sense that Viktor means him anything but harm. I don't touch my coffee any more, just trace around the cup with my finger.

"Does the term 'chronic PTSD' mean anything to you?" Viktor listens to me in a focused way, and I can see that my words are echoing a certain way. "'Chronic PTSD'," he repeats, blinking. "That refers to some kind of trauma, doesn't it?" I meet his gaze then return to the wooden table. "It's… it stands for post-traumatic stress disorder. You know, doctors, they talk fast, so I didn't understand it all, but… you know how Klaus is."

Maybe there's no need for a long explanation. Even without knowing Klaus for ten years, one can easily sense his avoidance behaviors, his constant reminiscences of intrusive memories, as well as his obvious dissociative episodes. His agitation and delusional fragility, too. I rub my tired eyes.

"I don't know everything. But it's obvious that part of what hurt him… he has no choice but to relive it over and over again. The ghosts… they never stop haunting him, and neither do the memories. No matter how hard he tries to silence them".

Viktor just listened to me without moving at all, his expression serious and pained. I'm not sure I'm telling him anything new, but I can tell that hearing it from an outsider hits hard.

"I…" He hesitates, but finally decides to speak. "Maybe you should know too…"

I frown, as I see his breathing quicken somewhat. My attention is on him, like a tight rope. I know there's a lot I don't know about Klaus's past, even if bits and pieces of it have occasionally reached me in a fragmented way.

"Our father… when… when we were younger. He…" Boy, this sentence is off to a bad start. And I cross my hands under the table, as if to force myself to focus. "He used to give each of them… 'special training' sessions".

I immediately note that in this sentence, Viktor describes himself as a silent spectator, and this fact pains me as much as what I know I'm about to discover. I see him reach into his pocket and pull out a round tin, swallowing a pill without even taking a sip of coffee. He's struggling with his words now, as if his throat is too tight to let them go.

"Klaus's took place… in a mausoleum."

My eyebrows furrow. I appreciate his efforts, and keep quiet, so as not to close the fragile path that has opened up. He takes a deep breath.

"He would stay there for hours. Sometimes for days. With 'them'".

I look down at my knees. Unfortunately, for the fragments of memories collected over the course of troubled nights, I think I knew without ever having put it that way.

"He was locking him up?" Viktor looks at me above the darkness of his umbrella coffee cup, and his fingers are probably trembling a little despite the pill he's taken. "I believe so."

Several seconds pass, during which I simply can't produce a sound. Like Viktor, it's now me struggling to free my throat from the knot that has formed there. It doesn't matter if the intention was to push his power further, faster. What kind of human is capable of that?

"Fuck" is the only thing I manage to say.

Like a huge blow to my face, I regret having yelled at him earlier, and it's now Reginald Hargreeves that my anger is directed at. I told Klaus the other day that we'd had 'very different lives'. I had no idea how different. And I feel pretty bad about saying that to him.

"I'm sorry for all of you," I say, painfully.

Because the truth is, I also feel sorry for Viktor. I haven't read his book, I probably should have. I can imagine that growing up here as an 'ordinary' child was a different but terrible kind of curse. His wrist has no more tattoo than mine. And although he doesn't say anything, I can see that his expression has become firmer again. Perhaps he has no desire to inspire pity.

"We all have our problems," he says, "we just have to deal with them".

With different strategies and varying degrees of success. I nod, and we both silently drink our coffees again. Now I'm completely calm, almost too calm, and a form of resolution is growing in my mind. I look at Viktor again.

"Klaus… it doesn't change the fact that - sometimes - he can be a real dickhead".

And with those words, a smile stretches across my face, so much so that Viktor can easily see the affection nestled within my insult. He laughs softly, with a brittle breath, and approves.

"An absolute pain in the ass". His laughter fades into a sincere smile, and he finally sets curious eyes on me. "But you like him that way, don't you?" "Yes. And it's really too bad he doesn't remember how much I owe him".

---

Notes:

It wasn't an easy chapter, but I think Viktor's personality is what helped me write it.

Even in ten years, there are still many things left unsaid between Klaus and Rin, simply because there are issues he cannot talk about, not deliberately anyway. I tried my best to respect the characters, including Rin. It wasn't easy, but I think this chapter is important.

Rin's last sentence is not insignificant. Could there be a mystery brewing jusst as coffee?

Any comment will make my day! ♡

---

A bend in space-time, the masterlist :

- Season 1 (complete): Table of contents - Season 2 (complete): Table of contents - Season 3 (complete): Table of contents - Season 4 (in progress) : Table of contents

#the umbrella academy #umbrella academy #hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #fanfic #fanfiction #umbrellaacademy #the sparrow academy #umbrella academy fanfiction #umbrella academy fanfic #tua fanfic #tua #klaushargreeves

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nayvwriter · 4 months ago

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Writing Year In Review

I was tagged by @ninadove to share some snippets of my works from 2024! Expect a lot of nexomon fics showing up. I did try to not just pick nexomon fics...

January

Two fics to pick from, both full of persona 3 spoilers, but this snippet shouldn't be too spoilery:

I have been made a tapestry with but a stroke of pen, an agreement I cannot break until the very end.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/53223901 I am a tapestry, the only poem I've ever really written.

February

"But you don't need to worry about me," Elizabeth continued. "I'm not the one who called you here. I'm just here to make sure everything's stable." Then who had called us?

again... everything is full of spoilers...

https://archiveofourown.org/works/53536003 I heard you in a dream

March

nexomon time :)

Coco imagined Hope, their friend, at the mercy of a Tyrant. They were only a bronze tamer – they'd only been a bronze tamer for less than a week – they wouldn't stand a chance. He had to warn them. Coco ran. The Tamers made a brief attempt to stop him leaving the outpost, but Coco was faster than anyone there, unencumbered. All they could do was shout that he wasn't supposed to go that way – he knew that, thank you very much. He didn't want to be running towards a Tyrant either, but – he had to make sure Hope was okay.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/54633652 Hope's Renegades, which if you've been following me you've probably seen me talk about a LOT. my masterpiece, or so I like to think.

April

Omnicron's children still fought against the humans, yet humanity survived. Metta had been the first to take a human form, before Nara's 'death', justifying that perhaps understanding humanity would help Omnicron's line defeat them. The others picked it up afterwards – Omnicron called it foolish, and yet since nothing else seemed to stamp out the humans it was worth a shot. Nara, too, took up the habit, hiding away with the humans and teaching them how to work in harmony with Nexomon. And when the time came, her chosen human, Ulzar, led an army against Omnicron and his children. One by one, they fell. Ventra was defeated through her arrogance – thinking a mere human could never best her, she allowed herself to be disadvantaged, fighting in a great building she could not fly from. Arqua, they lured onto land through her rage, and killed her when she could not summon the oceans for her protection. Luxa was struck down as he flew in the skies, his huge size working against him as he was attacked from all sides. Fona carried his fire with him, so they fought him where nothing around them could burn, prepared for the infernos he would summon. Grunda they fought from the air, now open to them from Ventra's death.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/55292992 The Era Of Omnicron, nexomon again.

May

Didn't post any new fics in May (unless you count the incredibly spoiler-filled Amelie and Lydia ramble) but I did post new chapters of Hope's Renegades.

'Do you think they're dead?' Coco sent. 'Nora didn't know.' If they were dead, then – well, it could still change things. But at least they couldn't show up out of nowhere and take Hope away, like Hope had worried about in their darker moments. They didn't want to lose their friends. 'Is it bad that I'm more scared that they're not?' Hope sent. 'I don't know why you're so convinced your parents can't be anything good,' Coco sent. 'I sort of get it – I accepted a long time ago that mine aren't coming back, and Mentor is the only parental figure I need. I wouldn't want him trying to let me go. But I don't think he'd do that.' 'Maybe not for you, but I'm wondering if he might have known my parents too,' Hope sent. 'At the least, he knew someone who did.' 'Yeah… I don't know what to say to that,' Coco sent. 'But… you're fifteen and a gold tamer, and you have us. Your parents don't need to mean anything unless you want them to.' '…Thank you, Coco,' Hope sent sincerely. They wished they could believe that.

June

"I'm still scared," she confessed. "What's going to happen now?" "I don't know," Blue said. "But humans are survivors, right? We're stubborn, we don't give up. Whatever comes, we'll make it through, Nexomon at our side – I'm definitely not letting anything happen to my friends. I promise. And you're my friend too." "Thank you," Deena said. "I… we'd better get moving if we want to make it back before sunset." Seeing Blue's beaming smile, Deena wondered how she'd ever wanted to let this go.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/56962774 peppermint humanity

July

so many chapters of Hope's Renegades (LITERALLY EIGHTEEN POSTED THIS MONTH I was posting daily for a while). almost wanted to share something spoilery but I'm not spoiling one of my favourite games so have an out of context snippet instead

They all knew what this meant, knew the choice they were making for the first time, and made it freely. No matter what lay ahead, they'd face it together. The challenges ahead might be more dangerous than anything they'd faced, but they had each other now. As long as they were together, they could be brave, could be strong. Now they understood what had brought them so close, instead of worrying about the mysteries behind their connection or surrounding them all – for the first time, they had let go of that, and were free to give all they had to each other. Now they could trust one another with everything they were… it felt like together, they could face anything.

August

Nara saw the girl again – she'd almost been expecting it. And the girl didn't seem quite so startled, either. But it was winter, now, and the girl was bold enough to nod to Nara and continue hunting on the ground for anything edible. She frowned, examining a plant as if she couldn't tell if it was edible. Nara was pretty sure it wasn't. It was winter, now, but with the humans in such decline the Nexomon were hardly wanting for more. They could afford a few losses. And the girl… Nara sort of liked her. Nara made her way over to a bush that had a few leaves on it and tapped her hoof next to it, sending out energy into it. Within moments, the vegetation was leafy and plentiful, enough to fill the girl's entire basket. It wouldn't last, so she might as well take it now. Nara picked a leaf and dropped it into the girl's basket, then stepped back and pointed at the bush. The girl seemed incredibly shocked – and so well should she. This wasn't just mercy, but kindness. If Father ever found out… Well, maybe it would be fine? He didn't punish Luxa or Arqua too much for occasionally playing with their food. (But that would only work if she killed the human at the end.)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/58014205 brambles, tagged as 'fluff with an unhappy ending'. yes it's nexomon again.

there were a lot of oneshots to pick from this month. eleven, to be precise, as well as the last chapter of Hope's Renegades and the first chapter of its sequel, and that's not counting the meta posts. wow.

September

He woke up with a start. The first thing he did was look himself over. Four orange-furred limbs and twitching ears – a cat, huh? Hopefully this was normal, but he had the feeling no-one would pay that much attention to him anyway. The body felt strangely familiar, and he was easily able to walk around. "C'mon Coco," Ross hissed, poking him. "It's the big day, remember?" Coco, huh? Not a bad name.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/58663802/chapters/149475909 Coco's Purpose, which I swear isn't abandoned-

October

okay this snippet actually does have hollow knight spoilers

The Knight reached the central chamber, staring at the chains that would bind it. The feeling became too much to ignore. It was scared. The Hollow Knight didn't want to do this. But it had to. It wasn't supposed to have fear. It wasn't supposed to have wants. It wasn't supposed to be. It had been given no choice because it was expected to have no ability to choose… though would the Pale King still have gone through with the plan if he had known, and if it had chosen differently? It had never tried to tell him. Hallownest needed to be saved. It was easier to let him and everyone else believe the Hollow Knight was just that – hollow. (Though some of the Knights seemed to suspect otherwise.) It had to do this. The Hollow Knight would be the last knight of Hallownest, long after the others fell… remaining eternally on guard. Protecting Hallownest, the kingdom they could no longer hear, the kingdom they knew nothing of any more. They couldn't wait here too long. Without any external stimulus, the Hollow Knight seemed to lose track of time very easily, and it didn't want one of the Knights shouting down the hallway to check it was still there. It had never exactly followed mortal timescales one-to-one… nor had the King exactly, the Hollow Knight remembered sitting with him once and only realising it had been hours when Ogrim had come to find them. Perhaps that would make their imprisonment easier. The Knight walked into the centre of the chamber and let the chains wrap around its arms. It had brought its nail. It did not know why it had brought its nail. The King had trained it in battle to make it stronger, but it shouldn't matter how strong it was physically. It shouldn't matter how strong it was at all. But a lot of things shouldn't matter. The King had many backup plans. For the first time, the Knight wondered if it was making a mistake. But it was by now far, far too late.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/59872954 the sealing of the knight

November

She glanced back. Back, towards the direction she'd come from. Back, towards the settlement of humans she'd just left. They didn't know her, didn't know what she was – that she was supposed to kill them all. She'd called herself Rose, a temporary name after the colour of her hair. They'd trusted her so easily, as she walked amongst them. She had seen it all – the human's kindness, their hope, their tenacity even after everything they'd been through. What she and her siblings had put them through. Monsters. They were monsters, Omnicron and his children, waging war against humanity, and no matter how stubborn the humans were they couldn't hope to win. Not alone. Not when every spot upon the world was controlled by a child of Omnicron that could command the elements themselves. The sea, the sky, the caves, the forests, everything was under their command. She walked amongst the forest, looking at the sun streaming through the emerald leaves, trailing her hand across a tree trunk. She stopped and looked at it, her five fingers spread out against the dark brown wood. They were cloaked in golden gloves, the same shimmering colour as accented the true forms of all of Omnicron's children. She wanted to remove her gloves, feel the bark upon human skin…

https://archiveofourown.org/works/60790342 fading thorns, Nexomon, written for the 100 minutes challenge (which is very very fun)

December

New Wirral was about the most multicultural place you could imagine, with people from not only different countries and backgrounds but different worlds. As such, there were many traditions practised on the island, usually with whichever of your friends you could drag into doing it with you, and most of them weren't widely known. It didn't help that not everyone had the same calendar, having arrived from different times – people tended to either use their own personal calendar starting from the day they got here, or (more often, at least if they'd been here a while) the one Ianthe kept for the rangers so they had accurate records. As midwinter approached, those traditions started coming into play. Given the bleakness of the world, it was a clear time for celebration to lift spirits, and that meant a lot of occasions. Clemence started making a whole lot of cinnamon rolls to share out on the winter solstice. Eugene, once he found this out, volunteered to help – this led to several other people pitching in as well. Kayleigh joined as well, confessing to Cass that it felt really nice to help out without pressure on her. Snow started falling outside as they baked, and Cass took Barkley out to play in it, which he seemed to appreciate quite a lot by the sounds of the excited barking.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/61711540 Like Chimeras, Cassette Beasts, also written for the 100 minutes challenge.

My fic output has been increasing over time, but you can see a very clear uptick when I got into Nexomon. So many oneshots and an entire 138k longfic (with a sequel in the works). This fandom has sucked me in hard. It did, of course, help that I had a lot of free time around that time... it also really helped that there were people leaving comments on almost every single fic and every single chapter of my fics in that fandom. you know who you are <3

I can't think of anyone to tag, but if you want to do this, give it a shot!

#nayv original #writing #nexomon #ask game #well close enough #Hope's Renegades

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loopylivy · 5 months ago

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My astrology observations: Virgo

As a Scorpio sun Gemini moon Leo rising

*I am not an expert AT ALLLLL!!!

When thinking of Virgo, detail oriented and grounded are the first two things that come to mind for me. Those things are less flashy than a lot of other characteristics, but that does not reduce the quality of these people by any means! In my experience virgos are kind and reliable friends. They keep their head on their shoulders, and one could even say they sometimes hover around the "mom friend" zone. Their groundedness often comes up for stuff like organization, but I'd also like to point out these earth signs are earthy and connected to their bodies as well. Two of my best friends are Virgos, and while both kinda nerdy, they both are good at dancing and rhythm.

Virgos are also often good thinkers. I get along with Virgos because they will have long conversations with me and aren't afraid to analyze stuff and play with ideas. IN other words these cuties are smarties!! And that's on Mercury, planet of communication (obviously everyone is different and it isn't all cause of the planet, but you get what I mean!). I do feel like they tend to be a little more concrete than an air sign with their thinking, but it depends on the person.

*Now, thinking out loud and playing with ideas (as I might with a virgo friend) does the communication + the earth + the mutable flexibility make for good communications with earth?? Could Virgos be good animal communicators? I know two Virgos with very green thumbs, so I could maybe say they are good plant communicators. Just ideas though...*

The other thing (which is kinda a stereotype/not just my observation) (which, please note, a fair amount of these posts are influenced by stuff I have read, not just my experiences) about Virgos is they are known to be helpers! In my experience this is very true. If you know the Bible story of Mary and Martha, Virgos definitely tend to be more Martha types. They step up to clean, cook, and do all the things no one else wants to do or isn't noticing. They might be grumpy about it, (and they would probably appreciate help!) but I think it also makes them feel better to make these improvements.

I have also seen (note: sample size, five) depression in virgo sun/ moon placements. When you see all the places that need help, unfortunately that also means you are locked into seeing a lot of problems. All the time.

Another thing to unpack. Virgo is the sign of the virgin/maiden. I feel there is a certain purity and earnestness in virgos. Even if they aren't abstinent or literally virgins, it's this certain gentleness and purity of spirit. I can't say all virgos have that, but I do think it's sort of a thing. And this "maiden-like" energy goes for anyone. I have a grumpy older male family member who is a virgo, but even he, world-weary as he is, has this certain sort of vulnerability in him. That's something I really appreciate as someone who can be a bit harsh in some ways.

If every sister sign is sort of an opposite and yet a mirror, it makes sense that Pisces goes with Virgo. While Pisces is very dreamy and impractical in opposition to Virgo, they share this similar sort of softness that I almost think of as "Disney Princess energy." Singing to birds that then help you clean feels very virgo like to me lol.

I also think that virgo work ethic can get you to a lot of places and present in a lot of different forms. Something I have noticed with earth signs is that they often get a stamp of being "worker bee" types as opposed to "creatives" BUT in actuality they can often bring their work ethic to a more "creative" pursuit and are in fact more prolific than a spacey air sign or a turbulent water sign might be. I know zodiacs literally are categories, but still, it's usually best not to box people in because there are a million different ways to be anything, including a virgo. In fact, I believe Virgo rules crafting, so in some senses virgos are also natural creators.

To conclude, I think healthy Virgo energy is about helping people, making the world a better place, caring for the earth, communication, crafting, and organizing / getting into gritty jobs instead of fleeing for the hills! Unhealthy Virgo energy is over criticism, carrying the weight of everything that needs fixing, pessimism, and losing the forest for the trees. I think as long as you remember why you do what you do and what you love, you will be on the right track. And don't be afraid to ask for help!!!!! (And non virgos - help your virgos!!! (That's a note for me too, haha))

To keep this celeb call out up, my favorite famous Virgo is Jack Black. Though to be honest, if I think about him too much I start to doubt the accuracy of the western zodiac compared to the Vedic zodiac. Because you could argue he has GOT that Leo star power in spades! However, you could also say he's earthy and very comfortable with his body. In fact, this is sort of another tangent, but it seems to me there are a lot of iconically famous Virgos: um, BEYONCE?? ZENDAYA??? Which for me begs the question: is it work ethic, earthiness, likability and that everyman humility mixed with genuine skill that is bringing virgos to fame? Or are they actually Leos??? (dun dun duhhhh!!!)

Jimmy Fallon is someone who falls into virgo with new and old dates. So he's my pick for favorite extra virgo virgo lol. He's likable but I would say doesn't have as much as that star like umph as a Beyonce.

Anyway, do you believe that I have a gemini moon?? I do be talking! If you made it to the end of this, you're a real one, let's get married.

JK! Unless...

#astrology #astrology thoughts #virgo #jack black #my sweet lil honey pots #virginity rocks #feminine power #systems rock #idk im just saying random stuff at this point

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eternalmayfly · 2 years ago

Text

🔧Peace Through Superior Fire Power

Here it is! I finally put it down into words. It's a bit of a jumbled mess of random thoughts and I apologize for that but here is the story of my S/I Seven and Vash. Please let me know what you think about it! How she feels about Meryl, Milly and Wolfwood are also mentioned in here. This post is ok to reblog!

CW: Mentions of alcoholism, blood, wounds, mentions of sex. Ask me to tag if you need anything tagged!

Seven’s story before meeting Vash:

Seven grew up in a large family with 12 other siblings. Due to the large size of her family, she was very reclusive. Most of her time was spent reading or tinkering to keep away from loud, screaming children. It should be noted that despite this, she adores her family above all else. Her family means the world to her. She left home at 16 to pursue an internship as an engineer in Augusta. She left without taking much money with her, so Seven was really scraping by on the small amounts of commission she got from her internship or taking up random jobs around the city. At one point, her desperate jobs cost her her eye, which she replaced with one she created herself.

Their first meeting and beyond:

Since everyone on Gunsmoke knows "Vash the Stampede," she was well informed on all the rumors about him. Much like everyone else, she believed there was no way a single man could actually reduce an entire city to ashes in one night and assumed all rumors about him were exaggerated. It wasn’t until her mentor told her about the custom gun that the "Humanoid Typhoon" carries that she became interested. While everyone else was after him for the $60 billion dollar bounty, she wanted that gun. So when Vash the Stampede rolled into town, she took her chance and made off with his gun. Of course he noticed instantly and chased her down until she gave it back, but that didn’t stop her. Seven is incredibly stubborn. Despite giving his gun back, she attempted this multiple days in a row. After the 4th time, Vash had enough and was about ready to hand her over to the sheriff, but the two of them struck a deal. Vash would let her study his gun, and in exchange, she would repair it.

Seven did such an excellent job at repairing it that Vash was thoroughly impressed. Most people he took it to would complain it was too complex to repair, but she had it back to normal in record time. Another deal was agreed upon with them where he would bring her parts from his trips and she would fix his gun every time. It worked in Seven’s favor, as Vash would often bring large hauls back with him, meaning she didn’t need to spend money on spare parts.

This exchange lasted for a couple of years while the two became friends. Seven thought it strange that she continued to grow but Vash never changed in appearance, but she chose not to question it. Her hard labor and simple joy of drinking spiraled into a bit of a drinking problem for her once she turned 21. Vash would often bring a bottle of whiskey with him as well as parts for payments, and she would chug the whole bottle in an hour.

It started to change between them when Vash drunkenly stumbled into her home one day. He was drenched in blood, and his coat was torn in multiple places. He was so wasted that she couldn’t understand a single word he said. She quickly took him in and roughly patched up his wounds to the best of her ability using torn cloth and alcohol. Seven was very aware that Vash had no one else to turn to. Anyone would kill him for the price on his head. This was the first time she saw just how badly scarred he was. Seeing multiple chunks of his flesh simply missing made her gag, but she held strong once she saw Vash look violently insecure about all of it. It was the first time they had a real heart-to-heart where Vash talked about his refusal to kill anyone, the reasons why he can’t stop moving, and the things that scared him. Seven listened to all of it, and on that day she realized all the rumors about "Vash the Stampede" really were overdramatic. She saw Vash for who he really was: A "man" who wants to protect everyone on the planet and spread a message of peace and equality.

Their meetings started turning from gun repairs to simply hanging out. She offered her home as a safe place for him to stay when he wanted a break from being on the run. During this time, she was introduced to Meryl, Milly, and Wolfwood, with whom she became good friends. Wolfwood and her butt heads a bit, but she was thankful there was someone out there looking out for Vash. Vash had made it clear that Seven was never allowed to go with them, and she was okay with following this rule. She knew how dangerous it was to follow him around, and she wasn’t ready to risk her life like that.

One night when Vash visits alone, the two of them get a bit too drunk, and it gets handsy between them. They end up sleeping together, and it makes things a little awkward between them. Seven begins to realize she has feelings for Vash, but Vash is terrified of commitment. They try to move past the event, but each time they hang out again, the air feels tense as their feelings for each other get stronger and stronger, even though they stay quiet about it.

Fast forward a bit, and the Augusta incident happens. Seven and many others thankfully escaped due to Vash’s vigilance in scaring everyone out of town, but as she sees the town reduced to ashes in the distance, she’s horrified to know Vash is still in there. Seven, Meryl, and Milly were all forced to watch in horror, not knowing if Vash was even alive anymore. She chose to go with the insurance girls, as her home had now been destroyed and the man she was in love with was now missing.

The three temporarily settled down in Jenora Rock. During this time, Seven’s mental health started to spiral. Vash was hated even more, as not only had he leveled a second city, but he blew a hole into the 5th moon. Every Time she walked outside, someone would be gossiping about Vash, usually in a nasty manner. Her drinking problem became much worse because of this. Meryl and Milly would often find her passed out in the streets in the middle of the night after drinking her sorrows away.

Despite her drinking problem, she was able to get herself a small home and a job in Jenora Rock, making it her new home. A while after settling in, Milly brings her a letter from Wolfwood in which he says he has something she’s going to want to see. Seven is fearing the worst—that Wolfwood found something that signified Vash was dead.

What she didn’t expect was for Wolfwood to knock on her door late one night, bringing with him a man with long blonde hair and a scruffy beard. As soon as he greeted her, she knew it was Vash. She threw herself at him and punched him as hard as she could in the stomach (making him double over in pain), but then proceeded to hug him and cry as hard as she could.

She hurled insults at him while he held her and comforted her. Wolfwood left to give them room and speak with the insurance girls.

From there, Vash tells her the truth about him. That he’s not human, that his brother is after him and all the humans, and that he has to stop him. He talks about how, after the Augusta incident, he spent the time living a hidden life as a man named Eriks because he wasn’t ready to face the world. Unfortunately, Wolfwood wasn’t going to let him keep that peaceful life, but he knew it was for the best. He realizes from the obscene amount of empty beer bottles that Seven’s drinking problem had worsened while he was gone.

Seven is normally closed off, but already tipsy and shaken by Vash’s reappearance, she spills her guts. She’s nearly in tears the entire time, insulting him for leaving all of them unaware if he was alive or not. The way she speaks causes Vash to break down as well. He admits the same feelings but keeps saying he’s scared because people who get close to him always get killed. The two have lots of back and forth with tears, laughter, and stories before they end up sleeping together once again.

After it, they hold each other, and that’s where their relationship starts. Vash keeps the harsh ground rule that she is never to follow him or get in his way, and she agrees. All she knows is that when he holds her, she sees some happiness form in his dark, cloudy eyes, and all she wants to do is give him the life she knows he deserves.

He’s more than "Vash the Stampede" or "The Humanoid Typhoon." He is a broken man, backed into a corner by the world.

#🔧Peace Through Superior Fire Power #ok to rb #rambles #self ship #f/o post #seven #self ship community #selfship #self ship story

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odaclan · 2 years ago

Photo

Oda Nobukatsu’s seal stamp.

Caption: This seal stamp has the same double-ringed horseshoe shape, like his father Nobunaga’s Tenka Fubu seal. It also has the same size. The inscription says ika kaidai 威加海内, which means “Impose one’s authority in all within the seas (all over Japan)”. A valiant declaration, not inferior to his father’s.

I’ve actually already posted a (different) picture of this seal a very long time ago, but I happened to see this recently, with the caption comparing it to Nobunaga’s Tenka Fubu, so I thought I’d share it again anyway, and have a longer chat about it.

Ika Kaidai is a phrase taken from the classical Chinese poem Song of the Great Wind (大風歌 Dà Fēng Gē), written by the Emperor Gaozu of Han (Liu Bang) after he won against one of his final enemies, and became the supreme ruler of China. The full sentence within the poem goes like this:

威加海内兮帰故郷

wēi jiā hǎi nèi xī guī gù xiāng

Now that my authority ruled over all within the seas, ah, I return to my homeland.

You’ll notice that this does not actually mean “I will conquer”, but “I have already conquered”.

The problem with Sengoku slogans that are taken from Chinese classics is that, much like with Tenka Fubu, one is never sure if the person had intended it to adopt the original Chinese meaning, or if it has since been imbued with Japanese sensibilities and thus have a different meaning/intention in the new usage.

If this Ika Kaidai is supposed to mean what it originally meant in Chinese, then that’s a rather bold claim to make (”I have already conquered the nation”).

I wonder if this seal implies that the theories saying he actually was Nobunaga’s successor as the new head of the Oda clan is true, and he was not just a stand-in “regent” until his nephew is of age. Some theories say that Nobunaga already had conquered the “Tenka”, after all. Not literally conquered the whole nation, just that he’s already viewed as “the ruler of the land”. The letter bearing this seal was written during the battle of Komaki-Nagakute in 1584.

I’ve seen a museum article saying that, purportedly, Tokugawa vassal Sakakibara Yasumasa saw this battle as Hideyoshi launching a coup d’etat against “his master”. Since there’s no full transcript of the documentation that I could find online, I’m not sure if he meant “master” singularly, and that Nobukatsu is in fact the new lord of the Oda; or if he meant “masters” in the sense that Hideyoshi was rebelling against the Oda clan as a whole, so Nobukatsu may well be really just a temporary lord managing the clan’s affairs in place of his toddler nephew.

#artifacts #artifact #Seal #seal stamp #oda nobukatsu #samurai #sengoku #japanese history #Warring states #Warring States Period #Warring States Era #Sengoku Era #Sengoku period

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olderjodijournals · 17 days ago

Text

Monday, July 1, 2002

Stamps went up 3 cents. 37 cents is a bit much to be mailing as many letters as I have to Paula. Besides, unlike Mary, I never hear back from her, so I’m gonna cut my letters to once a month to her. She never even emailed me back.

Tom signed us up for AOL, but last I knew he couldn’t get it working, so we may stay with Earth Links.

So far, my 195 photos have been viewed 19 times (no downloads yet), the rats being the most viewed, believe it or not. I have 7 albums in all – 1 land, 2 rats, 2 mice and 2 dolls. One of the dolls and one of the mice albums has yet to be viewed. I emailed Mary about it, but they don’t get their mail too often so they might not know about it yet.

My dolls are really nice compared to what I saw which was mostly paper dolls. Paper dolls, can you believe it? Boring! A lot of Barbies, too.

I decided to begin a new collection as soon as I can – a rat and mouse mug collection. This site makes mugs, t-shirts, prints, mousepads, key chains, etc. Besides, my dog and cat mugs are getting rather old.

Sure enough, one of the prairie dogs was looking up at the window at me, silently pleading for a treat, so I threw a carrot out. There are a few baby prairie dogs out that are quite cute.

A slew of new dolls hit PG. They have a really nice 30” showgirl for $149. I may get her instead of Chari sometime next January. I won’t be able to make woman dolls so easily that require special outfits that I can’t get just anywhere, like at a department store. I’ll probably have to buy these kinds of dolls. It’d be easier, anyway.

A couple of days ago I emailed PG to get a date on when Carmencita was mailed and they told me she went out on the 18th. That means she should be here by Tuesday, though after 7 dolls, I certainly do know better.

Whatever was eating at my throat and energy levels the last couple of days is gone.

Tuesday, July 2, 2002

I just realized that I haven’t seen that many iguanas this year, though I don’t know why.

Those vultures are huge! I just tried to get a shot of them, but they flew away. These things are bigger than some small dogs! I did get a good quail family shot, however. It’s a bit hard to see the babies, but they’re oh-so-cute! They’re barely palm-size, and it’s so cute how they follow Mom around.

My 195 photos have now been viewed 29 times. Still no downloads, though. I’m adding two more albums; a third doll album and a wildlife album. That’ll make 9 albums in all.

We couldn’t get AOL to work. Of course not! After all, you wouldn’t think God would allow us to save a whole $100 bucks a year, would you? At least he ought to be really happy with me for this album thing. After all, I’m serving the public for free.

I got rid of the Carmelhead, as I’d call her. I have one too many crazies as it is, so now I have 5 rats: Little Buddy, Little Ratsy, The Spotless Ratsy, The Carpet Rat and Blackie. I have 3 mice, too: Pearl, Cutie and Half-Patch.

Got a quick note from Mary thanking me for the letters and promising to answer them as soon as she can, but she’s been sick, she says. She says she even told her family not to visit. I don’t know in what way she’s sick, be it physical or emotional.

I can’t wait till the 11th. It’ll be interesting to see what happens to Hope if anything. Also, the 22nd. That’s when Mary may know if she’ll be hanging around longer or leaving for Florida.

Wednesday, July 3, 2002

Damn this doll curse and damn that post office! I already sent a message to PG, telling them that they let the last doll sit on their shelf for a month without even trying to deliver it, so could they give them a call to double-check for Carmencita? I’ll have Tom leave a note in the box, too. Either way, I know that if I haven’t gotten her by now, I’m in for a wait, as usual.

Why does this always have to happen to me? Why?

In other news, I was standing at the kitchen sink yesterday evening at 7:30 when I heard sirens. My first thought was, oh no! My worst nightmare’s come true, but I didn’t do it! I swear. Whatever they’re here for, I didn’t do it!

Then I thought of the new rental. After all, they’re like the freeloaders only without the music; always something going on back there. Sure enough, I peered out back and saw an ambulance there, though I couldn’t tell what happened. All I saw were a few adults and a few kids milling about, then a woman came from either the side or the back of the house and got into the passenger side of the ambulance before it took off.

Nothing going on back there that I can see of today. God, they’re an eyesore with all the shit they’ve got on their property, though like I said before, better seen than heard. There’s always someone home too, so maybe there’s an elderly person living there that needs caring for and that’s who the ambulance was for. Tom even suggested this. Remember, we live in a time when homemakers are bashed, even if they have small kids, so it’s unlikely that someone’s home all day without some other reason. Also, it’s very hard to afford even junk houses on just one income, and most people don’t make what Tom makes in this state. He makes excellent money for Arizona.

The more I think about it, the more I think it’s the house that ends up in front of us that I’ve got to worry about. It’ll be the closest house to us, something God will no doubt take note of. If the closest house to us in Phoenix had been the house across the street, then that’s where the blacks/Mexicans would’ve been fated to end up.

Tom and I made a few deals. He says he promises to bury the old plastic piping that keeps getting blown around this weekend that’s sitting in the wash, and he says we can get fences in January.

We’ll see, but with or without the freeloaders and Scot hanging over me like a dark cloud, being the never-ending shadow that exists in my life, I want this damn property fenced! I’m sick of having to worry about dogs approaching me whenever I go out. I’d feel a lot less exposed, and we wouldn’t have to lock the gate. Not unless I was planning on sleeping during cheek hours. Otherwise, locks would be useless against anyone up to no good, cuz all they’d have to do is cut the thing with metal cutters.

Anyway, I’d be willing to bet my dolls on Scot’s not lessening the home visits as the so-called end gets nearer. I think he’ll play this up to the end just like I’ve always said. And just because he hasn’t said anything, I’m not gonna assume I beat this class bullshit, either. If October 30th of ’03 were tomorrow, I still wouldn’t assume this was a closed chapter in my life. After the way I’ve been lied to, tricked and manipulated in every conceivable way, why should I believe anything I’m told now?

Because Scot came so late in June, I wonder if this means he’ll skip July altogether and come in early to mid-August after it’s been about 6 weeks? It’s just so asinine that I have to see him as often as I do over a letter. If I’ve got to be on probation, I shouldn’t be seeing him more than once a month. I’ve seen him 37 times already in the 13 months I’ve been home. What did those pigs say about me?! They no doubt said I was this dangerous monster from hell! Tom said that that would’ve been the impression that was given, too. Yeah, I’m sure it was. Always gotta exaggerate, the fucking pigs.

Though it would be nice if they’d magically disappear, I don’t want all the blacks and Mexicans to die; I just want them to leave us alone and get the fuck out of our lives! They’re not going away and I know that, so as long as they cannot interfere with our everyday lives, I’ll live with them. I have no choice. I just don’t want them ever again to make their business ours and to get me thrown in jail when they’re the perpetrators who provoked me and deserved whatever it is I might’ve given them.

But I know better now. There’ll be no words either out of my mouth or on paper should this ever happen again. In Arizona, you either beat your tormentors off your back or you simply sit back and take their shit till one of you moves.

Anyway, I’m guessing there’ll be about 10 more visits here from Scot, so when you add that, plus my visits to him, plus the times I’ve already seen him, that’s nearly 80 times I’ll just have to see him in a 2½-year period over a letter!

I’m just so afraid of being set up again! They already know we won’t fight back, though I intend to surprise them next time around now that I know the law better, but because I’ve sent a message to the state saying I’ll take whatever shit they feel like dishing out to me, that could make me a little more vulnerable to more corruption and abuse by this fucked up system.

Later…

Wow. It’s actually thundering out there right now. The winds are dead calm, though, and judging by the looks of the clouds, I doubt we’ll get any real rainfall. At least the clouds cool things off a bit, even if it makes for more humidity. It brings the renters outside more, too.

Later…

The usual slew of workers is in back now. It looks like this time around they’re working on their cooler.

We had a few minutes of rainfall, but now it’s clearing up.

No photo album viewing for yesterday.

Still no response from PG, either. Hopefully, they’re getting on the PO’s ass about delivering me the damn doll rather than just saying that they tried to. Or maybe they’re going to wait till it’s been 30 days from when the doll was shipped. In that case, the doll will just have to sit at the PO till then. Maybe not, though, if Tom will agree to put the note in the box.

Finished proofreading 1987-1993, so now I’ll begin 1994.

Thursday, July 4, 2002

PG completely blew me off yesterday. I was surprised. I expected some response, either way, not to be ignored. I guess this means they’re not gonna do anything for a couple of weeks or so. Meanwhile, Tom put the note in the mailbox at the PO. I know, though, that due to this doll curse that’s on me for whatever reason, she’s going to have to sit at the PO for a while, since she wasn’t back-ordered. In other words, I can’t simply order a doll and get it within the normal 7-10 business days. Tom thinks it’s in transit and that it’ll be here Monday, but I don’t think so. Not with the track record I have with getting dolls in the mail. This is San Diego we’re talking about coming from, not Boston. So how can it take that long?

Later…

Tom’s up now working on the car’s AC. It’s not gonna cost us the $300 to fix like we thought it would. It’ll cost about $30, but he realized just now that he needs an adapter he doesn’t think he has. Yeah, I knew we were gonna have to sweat our asses off tomorrow going to Scot, the restaurant and the doll store.

We ought to have two special accounts, I told him. The Breakage Account and The Freeloader Account.

Later…

I should’ve fucking known better than to think this AC bullshit would cost just $30. It turns out the problem’s not what he thought it was, but he doesn’t know what it is.

Friday, July 5, 2002

I’m ever so glad that someone created misters since the car’s AC is still broken.

Anyway, I was in and out of seeing Scot fairly fast. What held us up a bit was some girl who was talking about going out of town.

This time I asked him – don’t you remember? – when he asked how long I got. He chuckled and said that with 70 clients, he couldn’t. Then he said I could do the rest of it standing on my head.

Maybe, if he doesn’t wake me up or bring up classes again.

After we left him and hit Circle K for some drinks, we originally planned to go to the doll store, then to the Olive Garden, then to Walgreens, then maybe a pet store. But once we got to the doll store, I was like – oh, I have to have this doll! We can forget about Walgreens (I was going to look for a coffee bean grinder) and the pet store.

They had a 40% off the entire store sale, and I ended up getting this gorgeous 16” vinyl fashion doll. I was surprised it was vinyl. I could’ve sworn it was porcelain at first, but it’s a very hard vinyl Tyler Wentworth doll. It’s normally $80, but we got her for $47, plus tax which put her at $51. I rounded her off to $50 in my doll chart file.

Anyway, she has rooted brown hair in a high-pitched ponytail, light-painted eyes, and is as poseable as a Barbie doll. She’s dressed as a businesswoman, wearing a white cotton blouse with lapels that button down the front with elbow-length sleeves, a black knee-length wool skirt, black stockings and black velvet high-heeled pumps. For accessories, she has a black leather belt with a gold buckle, a white beaded necklace and dangling gold and pearl earrings. I polished her nails metallic carnelian.

I never thought I’d like a vinyl doll so much. She’s way more realistic-looking and better proportioned than Barbie. I can see myself getting one or two more of these. I don’t need a lot of them cuz they’re still overpriced for vinyl, but I want the black and the oriental ones they have. They’re just so nice for someone who was never really into vinyl before. Perhaps when they have another sale again, I can get another one. I’m on their mailing list now.

They also have porcelain fashion dolls, too. Maybe when we take classes Tom can make one of those, and I’ll make the doll they recommend starting on – the same sleeping baby JBS recommends. Yeah, it looks like we’re gonna be taking classes with them. But when we don’t know yet. Perhaps in the fall because they’ll have more daytime classes then.

Tyler also came with a portfolio containing pictures of other fashion outfits. I checked out the website I found in it. The dolls range from $50-$150. The average one seems to be $80-$120. Pricey, but nice. Perhaps I can make porcelain ones in the future and just buy their outfits. The outfits are a bit pricey too, at around $40-$60 apiece. I think they’re worth it, though. You can get dressed dolls, outfits, shoes and other accessories.

Their store was much bigger and nicer than JBS’s.

So, as of right now, I have 2 dismembered and dead dolls, 13 packed away, and 29 displayed throughout the house. On display, I have 9 blondes, 1 redhead, 7 brunettes, 1 with auburn hair, and 11 with black hair. Hopefully, soon enough, there’ll be another brunette, another redhead and another with black hair. PG finally emailed me back, saying they couldn’t call the post office and that they recommended we use UPS. Well, UPS does come here, but we don’t want people coming to the house, even if it’s not every day that I get dolls. The doll may’ve come in yesterday cuz now they’re saying it was shipped on the 20th. Tom will find out tonight if she’s there and pick her up on Monday if she is.

After we got the doll and asked more about classes, we went to the Olive Garden. It was pretty good, but as usual, I had to sit and listen to a screaming kid throughout it all. He got lasagna and I got Alfredo with shrimp, muscles, crawfish, scallops and mushrooms.

Saturday, July 6, 2002

Cool. They’re gonna send me weekly emails with my album statistics. So far my 223 pictures have been viewed 30 times with 0 downloads and 0 guestbook entries. Guestbook entries are where people can leave comments regarding your albums.

Sunday, July 7, 2002

Paula B is going to be one happy lady! I went and fixed up the dolls I no longer want which are a dozen in all. My original plan was to try to sell them at a consignment shop when I was making my own dolls, but then I thought about surprising Paula with them. I won’t tell her to look for them till they’re on their way. She’ll be one ecstatic puppy and will love each and every one of them. She doesn’t have the picky tastes I do, as far as I know. This will no doubt be the opportunity of a lifetime for her; getting 12 dolls at once. Not even I got that many at once! This is roughly $250 worth of dolls, too. She’s getting Anne, Edie, Mary, Christina, Katie, Ashley, Shauna, Melanie, Stephanie, Selena, Nakita and Misha. They range in size from 12” sitting dolls to 22” standing dolls. She’ll get 5 blondes, 1 redhead, 1 with black hair, and 5 brunettes. There are 3 with blue eyes, 3 with green eyes, 3 with gray eyes, and 3 with brown eyes.

I took pictures of them after I fixed them up and got them fully dressed right down to the shoes, with stands for 9 of them that bear their names underneath. Then I created another doll file, so now I’ll have a file on my own dolls, then any I give away or sell.

Instead of putting them all in one big box, as Tom pointed out, it’s best not to put all our eggs in one basket, so we’ll ship them in 2-3 boxes. It’ll be about a month, though.

I’m watching these adorable cottontails out front right now, eating the bread I threw out. I see that same quail family every day too, and of course, the prairie dogs.

Tom started burying the plastic pipes with dirt in two different places in the front wash. Eventually, he’s going to create a loop driveway and this is how he’ll drive over the wash.

Before, with no dirt on them, the wind would kick them up. This morning he caught a dog playing with them. Yeah, I remember seeing dogs playing with them a while back, and you know, that is really fucked up. Totally fucked up. This is Maricopa. The city’s where you’re supposed to have problems with dogs and trash!

“But we’ve got 100 times more land here,” Tom told me. “You couldn’t even fit this house on the lot in Phoenix.”

Yeah, but I’ll still feel much better when we get fences. Dogs even got into the trash bin and made a fucking mess so Tom put water in the old umbrella’s stand to put on top of the wire mesh that sits on top of the bin.

Anyway, we may open a PO Box here in Maricopa soon and get a bigger box that’ll allow for bigger packages. Being a small town, it should hopefully decrease the fuck-ups, but I don’t know. People are stupid, be it in big cities or small towns.

Tom re-inked my cartridges and I printed out some doll pictures for Mary. I mostly wanted to show her Tyler, but with my changed settings, I also wanted to show her a close-up of Bailey so she could see how realistic-looking she is. The sharper settings look better on the computer screen, but I don’t think they print out much better. I didn’t print them on the higher-quality setting either, so maybe that’s why they’re still a bit grainy.

Monday, July 8, 2002

Tom, who left a couple of hours ago, is to stop at the PO before work. If the doll’s there, he’ll email me a little later on. I told him not to bother if it isn’t, but watch, he’ll go and email me anyway to get my hopes up for a second there.

Anyway, he thinks it’ll be there, but with their track record, I don’t think it will be. I’d say it’s more likely I’ll have mail from Mary. If I’m right and it isn’t there, then I’m not gonna know what to believe. Meaning, I won’t know if it’s the PO’s fault, or if it wasn’t yet shipped. I still don’t see why it’s such a big deal to send me the dolls I order within a week. It’s like – just grab the dolls off the shelf I ordered and deliver them to the fucking address we give you! Is that so hard? Obviously, it is, and this tells me it’s a curse. If it had been a few dolls every now and then, then I’d say it wasn’t, but every single fucking doll?

I can’t swear to it, but I might’ve finally heard from the renters last night. I’ve heard faint spurts of music the last couple of nights. Two nights ago, it was louder at the back of the house than at the front, and even louder at the utility end, telling me it couldn’t be the renters. It was probably at Dan’s. Last night when I heard music at 11:00, I looked out back and saw no lights at the renter’s. Again I assumed it was either the renters or someone else entirely. But when I heard it later on as late as 1:00, the front light was on at the renter’s. It dimmed for a sec as if someone was going to turn it off, then changed their mind, so I don’t know for sure where it was coming from or if it was from multiple sources or what. In the backwash of light, I couldn’t tell if anyone was hanging outside. Unfortunately, they have evaporative coolers, which means that if they do have a house stereo turned up, they can afford to let the sound out through open doors/windows.

Also, they seem to have changed schedules with the seasons. They seem to be asleep throughout most of the days, then out and about at night when it’s cooler like the blacks were. The Mexicans were round-the-clock people, but mostly night creatures. In the winter, 4 out of 5 times I looked out back, I’d see people. I’d still really like to get privacy hedges of some kind someday. They’re not only an eyesore, but they’re just too visible for me. If they didn’t have so much shit in their yard and they weren’t constantly hanging outside, then it wouldn’t matter as much, though they’d still be nice. The whole idea of living out here is to escape civilization. Well, if we ever do have an Arizona room or a pool someday, I don’t want to have to see people most of the time I go out. They’re a little close for comfort, though the people next door are closer and the house across the street will be even closer once it gets here. I guess the land’s still for sale in front.

I couldn’t stand to live in a place with no AC during the monsoons! And I’m sure they don’t have any AC. Just the EC and a furnace.

Tom brought up the idea of getting 4 small evaporative coolers next spring that you stick in your window just like with air conditioners. Well, it’d certainly save money, but it’d bring in the smell of horse shit. I know from Phoenix that evaporative coolers don’t filter outside smells. I remember smelling all the barbecues in the area as well as the orange blossoms. However, just like with most things we talk about getting for the house or doing with the land, I’m sure it’s just that – talk.

What I’m gonna make damn sure isn’t just talk is the fences we agreed we’d get in January. I’m sick of our yard being a regular playground for Maricopa’s dogs that no one cares about. It’ll be perfect timing too, since by the time they’re up, the kids in back will be getting to that age where they can play outside with less supervision and I don’t want them thinking our backyard belongs to them.

Tom’s so wrong when he says it’ll take a couple of weeks to put up. Even I know it’ll take more like a few months.

Tom and I are now thinking that he might make a large sitting doll to sit on the loveseat in the den. A couch, a chair and a loveseat are a bit much for two people, so why not let some dolls use the extra seating space? In contrast to the black velvet, I’d like him to make a blond doll with green or violet eyes. That is if he wouldn’t mind. If he wants to make an Indian with dark hair and eyes, he certainly can do so.

The more I think about it, the more I believe the outcome would’ve been the same with or without a confession. What fucked me over was pleading guilty, having Paul for a “lawyer” who was my enemy, having the wrong judge, and telling the interview lady that I wouldn’t fight whatever was dished out to me. That’s what got me. I should’ve refused to talk to the pigs, no matter how much they might’ve spited me for it, pled not guilty, and gotten a real lawyer. It’s just that I was determined not to spend any more money on the black bitch than necessary, but what did it matter? We were destined to spend thousands anyway, so why not a few hundred more? I had no way of knowing this at the time, though, of course.

Back when I was having a rough time dealing with Teddy Bear’s blowing me off, I broke down and prayed to God to let me get over her. Then I kicked myself for it and said to myself, are you crazy? When you gonna learn that he doesn’t give a damn?

Yet ironically enough, I haven’t been so hurt over her since. Is it a coincidence or not? I don’t know. I mean, what if I prayed for the sun to rise and set? Could I then say the sun rose and set because I asked him to have it do so? What if I asked him, God, please protect and always watch over my current/future perpetrators? Never let them get caught or pay for any wrong they may do me. But once again, that’s a done deal. So I don’t know about this prayer thing. Given how few prayers he’s granted me, I’d say it’s just a coincidence. I’m getting over her on my own.

The more I think about it, the more I don’t think I want to live in a retirement community in the future. We couldn’t have neighbors as bad as we did in Phoenix, and we may have no choice but to get into the city once we start getting older and the doctor’s office becomes a second home to us, but I know that the people next to us are going to be the ones to have their screaming grandkids over practically every day, not to mention the barking dogs.

Just jumped up to throw a few pieces of bread out for the quails, prairie dogs and bunnies.

I got up to 125 pounds again, so I began cutting my calories a few days ago. I’ve lost 4 pounds. The question now is, do I want to keep going? Or just eat my way back to 125, then lose it again?

It’s clouding up out there. We’re now entering the official monsoon season.

Later…

Still no email. I’m not surprised and I am so done with the mail-order dolls. So, so done with them. Just as soon as I somehow manage to get the 3 I’m waiting on and fighting for, they can keep their discounts and free shipping coupons.

On the first, I changed the tattered flag to the iris flag.

About 45 minutes ago, I spotted movement just across Ralston behind a big tree. Three kids were huddled under a big tree, obviously trying to hide. Assuming they were up to no good, and assuming they might start a fire with a joint or a cigarette, I went out front with the hopes of my presence causing them to move on. After a second I came back in, and sure enough, the kids moved on, heading on down past Meadow Green. One was high school age or close to it and the other two were around 8. They had a medium-large white dog with them, too.

Later…

No email. I’d say that if he hasn’t emailed me by now, I was right about the doll not being there. The question is, did the PO give her away or are they just not letting me have her? Was she even shipped? Maybe we should’ve used UPS after all since it’s not like I get dolls every day, but because it’s a curse, it doesn’t matter who delivers them or who sells them. There’d still be problems and delays either way. Meanwhile, he can let me know if I got anything from Mary.

It just dawned on me that I forgot to write about Blackie’s grand escape a few days ago. The crazy shit got out the front door which I’d forgotten to latch. I spotted her under the TV stand that Ciara had been propped up on and knew it’d be useless to try to coax her into a tube, cuz as soon as I lifted it up, she’d be flying out of it. She’s no different than a wild rat, I swear! Finally, she ran across the room to the cage. After a few minutes, I coaxed her to climb up and into the top of the cage.

Blackie’s the biggest of the nutjobs. The Spotless Ratsy’s a little better, then Little Ratsy’s, with The Carpet Rat being the bravest, although none of them are tame. They’d never let me handle them. At least not willingly.

Later…

As soon as any music starts, I’ll open the kitchen window to see if I can gauge its location. I sure as shit won’t have any lights on so no one sees me. Not only so I can see out there better, but so that if it is the renters, they can’t see that they got my attention enough to cause me to look out back, cuz that’d just egg them on all the more.

If it is them, why now? Is it someone who just moved in with them or who’s visiting? Or did they just get a new stereo?

We also talked about getting me a new foam bed in January and turning the king-size bed I use into a twin that we put side by side in the master bedroom. Then the only thing will be dealing with the snoring, but at least I won’t be able to feel him. We won’t use the same sheets/comforter.

I have mixed emotions about doing this. I mean, do I really need to feel “normal?” I certainly don’t desire sex, so I don’t know. We’ll see. I may never be able to adapt to the fucking snoring he does anyway. No matter what we do, I still want a new bed cuz this one’s sagging at the side. Even the waterbed was nicer than this bed.

His lack of concern for what I may or may not want sexually is amazing. Then again, if there’s any one subject – no two subjects – he never cared what I felt about, it’s sex and my wanting a kid in the past. As I told him, I can’t promise I’ll never fool around on the side with a woman (though I highly doubt it), but doesn’t he care? He seems so indifferent to the idea of it that it surprises me. The idea of me getting it on with Teddy Bear back when I thought she was a person of her word didn’t seem to concern him one bit. Maybe that’s because he knows we’re each other’s number one, and most guys don’t mind the idea of two women if it doesn’t totally turn them on big time. But I just didn’t think Tom was ever like most guys when it came to sex in the first place. His near-zero appetite is usually a woman’s thing. Maybe it’s more common than I think, but I don’t see how because while I’ve heard of those who can’t rise and of those who squirt prematurely, he’s the first case I’ve heard of who gets hard but doesn’t cum. I still think it was about impregnating me, but I’ll never know for sure. Had we continued on with the sex, I may’ve found out one way or the other once I hit menopause, but if we’ve gone this long without screwing, we’ll almost certainly never screw again. I think that would be awkward for both of us. I think we’re used to the way things have been, and personally, I prefer it this way. The only sex that appeals to me in my mind right now would be getting it on with Teddy Bear, but since that’s never going to happen, I’d just assume stay celibate. I’ll probably keep going with the celibacy indefinitely which is all I can do for a few reasons: I can’t make myself desire him sexually, I can’t make him make himself desire me sexually, and I don’t expect to ever meet another woman I’m attracted to that’s attracted to me too, that I actually end up getting together with. Besides, if we did, it’d only be once or twice.

I’m just so thankful I haven’t been like I was 4 or 5 years ago – always wanting sex and desperately wanting a kid. That was one of the most miserably depressing experiences I ever had to endure. A definite, definite curse. No doubt about it. I just don’t see how something like that could’ve “just happened” without a reason. I just hope to hell it never happens again.

I ask myself, the screwy sex life you guys used to have bothered you, so why doesn’t it bother you that your husband doesn’t desire you sexually these days? I guess the answer’s because one, the feeling’s mutual, and two, I don’t think it’s a case of him not desiring me personally. I think he has no desires. Period.

Tuesday, July 9, 2002

We had a storm blow through, though it wasn’t too much of one. Some of the humidity seeped into the house. I can feel it till the AC kicks on. The storm has lowered the temperature, so that’ll save us a bit of money.

Tom just left for work. Good. I’m tired of his irritability. He gets all moody, defensive and impatient with me at times and it gets old.

He sure cracked me up earlier, though, when he got his fingers stuck in the bars of the rat’s cage for a minute. He’s lucky Little Buddy wasn’t Ratsy, Scuttles or Houdini. He’s even luckier he wasn’t the bear.

Woke up the same weight as yesterday – 121 pounds, so that was a bit discouraging and therefore I’m taking a break for today. I’m stuck too, and if I don’t go at some point, I’ll be up a pound or two come tomorrow.

When I asked Tom to guess my weight, he guessed 108. The man’s either just being nice or he’s completely blind, though all the muscle I’ve got from the regular workouts does weigh more than fat. I haven’t been 108 since jail, and if the freeloaders can keep from controlling what I eat, I probably never will be again till I’m an old, dying, sickly lady.

The Friday after next, after we see Scot, we’ll probably go to the Olive Garden one last time. We used half of the $40 credit, so we’ll use up the last half next time. I’ll probably get the eggplant and enjoy that to the tune of a screaming, whining kid. I swear kids weren’t this unruly before the late 80s to early 90s. There’s no such thing as discipline anymore and when there is it’s usually not in a good way. Why do people take babies to restaurants? I mean, you don’t take a baby to a restaurant. How rude!

Got a big doll poster from PG. Yeah, that’s all they’re good for. They’re pretty reliable when it comes to that and their catalogs. If the doll was mailed on the 20th, and I don’t know that it was since they keep changing their story, then the 10 business days would’ve been up last Friday and not Thursday. I forgot that Thursday was the 4th, but even so, it should’ve been here a week ago or even more. Especially coming from San Diego, but like I said – no more mail-order dolls! It’s too bad too, cuz I really like this company, but I’m sick of this shit. I really am.

Wednesday, July 10, 2002

Got up at 5:30 this afternoon. Sure enough, the indoor animals were ready for dinner, and the prairie dogs were just out front looking up at me as if to say, “It’s about time!”

I never did hear any music last night.

Being that it was coming up on 6:00 and starting to cool down, sure enough, I could see a couple of adults and a few kids out back. I really don’t like looking out back there to see 5 people milling about. I don’t know why it bugs me so much, but it does. I know I’d rather see people 500’ away than hear them 3’ away, but I’d really rather not have to see them either. Especially when it’s so often.

I caught and scared off a couple of dogs from tearing up the pipes that poor Tom worked so hard at covering with dirt. Fuck these fucking dogs! Oh, I can’t wait till we get fences!!! Doesn’t anybody in Arizona besides Mary allow their dogs indoors?

In better news, I was completely stunned out of my mind to learn late last night from Tom when he emailed me from work that the doll had arrived. He headed out before I got up and should have it in the car right now. He’ll be in around 2 AM.

I’m trying a new wallpaper changer at this wallpaper site that has the nicest wallpaper pictures I’ve ever seen. They’re all high-res. and they all fit nicely on my screen. They have a huge variety, too. Even skaters, dancers and gymnasts. The two catches are that you have to use their wallpaper changer program in order to use their pictures at all, and you can only download up to 5 a day unless you pay $20 for a year’s membership. I noticed Tom’s got this thing (Webshots) on his computer, too. I was surprised since he never cared about wallpaper.

I’m having some problems with it, though, so I don’t know if I’ll keep it. It keeps stopping on me and defaulting to the pictures I’m using for my screensaver, which are the skaters, dancers and gymnasts. I’m using flowers for wallpaper. Trying to, anyway.

Thursday, July 11, 2002

I finally got Carmencita, and for two fucking weeks the mother-fuckers at the PO had her sitting on a shelf. Again they claimed they attempted to deliver it on the 24th when she arrived. Why the fuck do they do this? I mean, they have to deliver it sooner or later, so why not sooner? Do they just get off on making people wait?

They haven’t yet done this with the back-ordered dolls so hopefully PG will ship the remaining two a day or two after they receive the new shipment, rather than 5, and the PO will let me have them as soon as they get them. What? Do they have so much extra shelf space that they can afford to simply stick boxes on shelves till they feel like giving them to the people two weeks later? Or even a month later like they did with the last doll?

Anyway, I’m glad she finally made it home. She looks much nicer in person. She’s 22” and dark-skinned. I polished her nails silver in contrast to her dark skin. I left off the headdress and the feathered cape. I didn’t like how they looked. I’ve got her holding her maracas, though. Instead of having the stand hold her by the waist where it’s more noticeable, I have her held by her upper thigh like one of my all-porcelain ballerinas, Patrice.

She’s got a fabric-covered stand and what appears to be a different, yet nicer outfit, than what’s in her picture. The picture’s outfit looks like it’s plain white material, but mine’s shiny and more of a pearly white. I like it much better, though I can’t get the bottoms to fit as in her picture. They’re awfully low and she’s a little thin-waisted, but still very nice. I like her a lot. I’m sure I’ll never want to sell or give her away.

Anyway, she has brown eyes and hair. Her curly hair hangs just past her ass and goes to her knees when pulled straight.

Her costume is accented with orange, purple and green beads as well as gold sequins.

Tom was tired as hell when he got in. There was a typical crisis at work. I guess the imaging machine went on the fritz. Tom wonders why they don’t give him more money after they brag about what a hero he is when he fixes things.

Doesn’t he know by now we’re destined to be used and ripped off?

I downloaded about 23 Webshots pictures from samplers, then my daily 5 that are allotted to me until and if I become a member. Their pictures are gorgeous - excellent clarity! They make things look good like lakes and woods, something I was never gung-ho on looks-wise, as opposed to tropical and desert scenes. Sunflowers – not my favorite flower – they make them look great! This is total kick-ass professional photography.

Later…

I added one of the Giselle dolls to Paula’s collection, but as I’ll tell her, she’s a fixer-upper more or less. She needs a stand, eyelashes, and either a new outfit or work done on the one she’s in (I had cut the lining out under the lace skirt). Meanwhile, the other Giselle sits naked and bald on my closet shelf.

Now I can get 10 Webshots pictures a day instead of 5. I log in as Tom after I’ve logged on as myself, and that’s how I double what I get. I have 38 pictures so far and I can live with getting 10 a day. It’ll give me something to look forward to and it’ll save us $20. That’s 70 pictures a week, minus any I may delete. Sometimes they don’t look as good as I thought they would once I display them on my desktop.

I decided that September 1st would be a good time to order Christmas Jewel, whom I’ll just call Jewel rather than Chris since I shorted Christmas Glow’s name to Chris. She’d be $24.98 with free shipping and $18.73 if they really did screw up by letting me have two more 25%-off coupons. The membership comes with two, but I may have 4. We’ll see. I doubt it, though. However much she costs, we’ll have a Maricopa PO box by then and hopefully they won’t throw her on a shelf for 2-4 weeks before giving her to me. I can’t blame PG for the PO’s fuck-ups. It’d be nice if half their dolls weren’t out of stock, but I can live with that.

I wish I were as black as Carmencita. Not just because it’s a great time to be black in today’s minority-loving society, but because it’d hide my zits, veins and other blemishes.

Saturday, July 13, 2002

Believe it or not, my doll came yesterday, but I didn’t get it, of course, cuz the PO was closed when he got the notice. I have to wait until Tuesday. So the non-back-ordered dolls are late and the back-ordered ones are early.

Tom’s computer’s been having problems. Well, of course. It’s not even two years old.

His birthday balloon’s still hanging on. Makes me think it’ll survive forever, though it is getting lower.

The community Webshots people sent me my weekly statistics on my online photo albums.

I forgot to watch the news on the 11th for any information regarding Hope’s trial. I couldn’t find anything pertaining to her when I looked online, so if there ever was a trial, I guess it wasn’t worth mentioning. Everyone must be the same color then. Therefore, it’s more important to cover the poor, poor abused blacks who are really the abusers themselves which nobody wants to believe, rather than the innocent baby whose ribs were broken by its sick mother. In today’s minority-loving society, news would travel faster concerning “cases” like mine than cases like Hope’s.

Now I can get 15 pictures a day. That’s because we set me up with a new email address. They’re such nice pictures that I printed out a few.

I still watch old reruns of Charlie’s Angels. I could never get sick of them. The show is so 70s, too. If they were creating the show today, at least one of the angels would be black or oriental. In fact, that was the case with the movie they made based on the series; one was Asian.

Monday, July 15, 2002

We’re going to be bombing in a few hours. I’m so fed up with these crazy rats that I’m considering cutting them down from 4 to 2. Naturally, Tom’s pressuring me to keep animals I don’t want, but what kind of pets is this? I can’t tame them, I can’t associate with them in any way except to hand them food. They won’t let me handle them. They just won’t.

I sent Tom’s birthday balloon off and it slowly sailed up and away. It was in view for quite a while. It moved slower than the last one and was easier to see cuz of its colors.

I tried calling Paula yesterday morning, but she said she had to call me back cuz something was going on there. What it was, she didn’t say, and as I figured, she never did call back.

Tuesday, July 16, 2002

I did cut out a couple of the crazies. So now I have 3 rats and 3 mice. Much easier to handle.

It’s pretty cloudy out there now. Cloudy enough to have the blinds open. It’s nice for a change when it’s cloudy. You get sick of the constant bright sunshine. It also lowers the temperature somewhat. Early in the morning is gorgeous at this time.

I saw a giant white dog and a giant black dog walk across the property in front. Fortunately, they stayed off of ours and out of our shit. Oh, I can’t wait for the fences! They won’t be up, though, till close to the end of the probation. Well, of course, right? Isn’t that what I said all along?

I also saw a black snake this morning. I guess they’re afraid of quails. The quails chased it back down into a hole. Then it popped its head up and looked around for a while after the quails split, then it pulled itself up and out of the hole and down into another a few feet away. I hope it hasn’t eaten too many of my prairie dogs! When it emerged again a few minutes later it slithered off into the brush. The prairie dogs must sense danger close by cuz I haven’t seen them yet.

Nothing ate the jellybeans I threw out yesterday morning. After we set the bombs off we went to Circle K for some junk and I got some jellybeans. Not liking citrus flavors, I threw out the orange, green and yellow ones.

The best news of the day is that I received Murganah and a letter from Mary.

Murganah is absolutely gorgeous! Just beautiful and she’s definitely the best PG doll yet. Strangely enough, though, she has painted nipples that show through her sheer blouse. I love her colorful, shiny outfit and her gold glitter eyeshadow. I didn’t know she had this eyeshadow. I couldn’t see it in her picture, but when I took pictures, I shot facial close-ups, so it’d be visible. Then I uploaded them to my online album. Of course, I’ll be enclosing pictures for Mary, too.

The total viewings on my albums are now up to 103 with 1 download on a land pic.

In Mary’s letter, she praised me and thanked me for being there for her, then she told me she’d been depressed. They really put their foot down about letting people out to make evening phone calls and she’s bummed out about it cuz she can’t talk to Todd, who works in the daytime. Maybe she’ll be able to find a DO willing to let her out sometime in the evening so she can call him. In the meantime, at least they can still write to each other.

Another favor - she asked me to look up some site on coping with depression and stress and to print out what I could find, but I couldn’t get to the address she gave me. She either gave me the wrong address or they don’t exist anymore.

She said Hope may get 40 years. What is that really – 12 years? I’m confused, though. I thought the 11th was her sentencing. And why is she going to trial – because she refused to plea bargain? Why is her case taking so long? She’s been there over a year and they’re just now selecting her jury? I don’t get it. Whatever happens, I hope she gets what she deserves and is never allowed custody of any kids.

I doubt it, though. I’m sure she’ll get some kind of a break. Good things happen to bad people all the time.

In response to my comment about the humidity with the onset of the monsoons, she said she was glad to be inside with air conditioning. She said she had a heat stroke last November when they shut the AC off. Yeah, I know all about heatstroke. That’s why I can’t believe that they can make people live in tents in a desert. Arizona and its sick laws never cease to amaze me!

She didn’t say anything about when she was leaving. Just that she wouldn’t mind staying there, even if prison is supposed to be easier. Yeah, I wish she’d stay there, too. I wish Pérez would return so she could find out for sure if she got my letter, and of course, I wish Teddy Bear would return. If Pérez tells her she didn’t get the letter, then I’ll either think it wasn’t mailed or she didn’t get it, which could mean Teddy Bear didn’t get hers either.

I didn’t know this, but some inmates wear what’s called a Taser belt under their clothes so that the guards can zap them if they go crazy. Hope and Monster will have to wear these.

I hear so many people on TV bragging about how wonderful this country is, but is it? I mean, look at us – we won’t allow a woman to be president, but we’ll pay the freeloaders to sit on their asses all their lives. We allow people to marry people of different races, but not of the same gender.

So just how great are we really?

Naturally, this is just talk at this point, but Tom’s thinking about getting an old truck next January with the stock money. He said that instead of fixing the AC on this car, he’ll either keep it as a backup or sell it. Meanwhile, he’ll get a cheap, 20-year-old truck to fix up.

It’d be nice if we could have a truck for hauling in the fencing, among other things, of course.

With Paula not being so bright, I was able to quiz her yesterday on the phone about dolls and was told what I figured she’d tell me – that she’d collect more dolls if she had the money. Space-wise, her place is small, but she is looking for a bigger place.

I just hope she can stay out of jail! Yeah, her life’s pretty much the same old, same old that’s getting worse. She just can’t stop hanging with the wrong guys. After she laughs about the fun she and this guy have in the woods, she goes on to list all kinds of horrible things about him. Things that are obviously stressing her out big time. When I tell her she should dump him, she goes, “I know,” then she says she’s gonna kiss his ass to get him to drop the charges he filed against her. Then maybe they can have a relationship.

She is one mixed-up woman!

The guy shoves her into a wall one minute in front of Justin, then tells him the next that he’d never hurt her. Meanwhile, the guy’s supposedly charging her with stalking and threatening to do bodily harm. She said she thought she had one 90-day suspended sentence, but her PO informed her she had two. The PO also told her to go to court and try to get the charges dropped or else she’ll violate her.

They also wouldn’t waive her $270 fine and she says Justin rang up a huge phone bill too, but they credited some of it.

The lady cop she slugged has been harassing her, she says.

On top of all this, she’s driving with a suspended license. It makes me wonder – does she just not care or does she want to go to jail? Even she herself said she wasn’t going to make it.

Not at the rate she’s going.

I asked about the email and I guess Justin deleted it without even bothering to show it to her.

Wednesday, July 17, 2002

Damn these mother-fucking dogs! I’m sick of our land being a playground for Maricopa’s dogs! And Tom’s only giving them more to play with by trying to bury those pipes. I told him he was just going to have to redo them over and over again. Dogs dig. They’ll just keep digging them up no matter how much dirt he throws on them. He’s better off throwing them under the house till the place is fenced in.

Our latest leak curse is right by my shower. I stood inside the shower stall with water streaming onto the doors and Tom said he didn’t see it leaking. I think it’s coming from underneath and that somehow a connection between the pipes, which are in sections, pulled loose. When the water pools in that area, it seeps through the wood and up into the carpet.

In other news, I didn’t receive a reply when I sent Paula an email, not that I expected one.

I have a dentist’s appointment at 11:00.

Friday, July 19, 2002

Just got back from Scot a few minutes ago. Still no mention of classes.

Good, cuz I’m taking classes for me. Not for the state.

This time, instead of asking how many years I had left, he said I had a little over 15 months, then I’d be done.

“Well, I hope so,” I said. “That’s what I was told nearly 3 years ago, so I don’t believe anything till I see it.”

Tom said it’d be best if I kept my doubts to myself so he doesn’t feel challenged and like I’m putting down his profession. Yeah, he doesn’t need to remind me about Arizona’s little sensitives. It’s just that I don’t see how Tom can be so gullible as to believe it’ll be over 10/30/2003 just cuz they say it will be. Have they ever told us the truth yet? So why should he believe them now?

Anyway, if they prolong it, I’m sure it’ll be my fault just like most everything else seems to be and that I won’t fight back. I’ll just sit back, take whatever shit they dish out to me, and God can go on protecting those involved. I know most people would tell me I’d be crazy not to fight any extensions they may try to throw at me, or else this shit will never end, but you know what? The judge said this is over on October 30th of ’03, so October 30th of ’03 it is which means there won’t be anything to fight. If the courts can’t keep their word, then I’ll just have to keep it for them. Maybe I’ll casually mention moving out of state to Scot the last time I see him. That way word may get back to anyone who might be thinking of taking advantage of me, and the prospect of my being not so accessible might deter them.

I nearly stepped on a snake on our way there. As soon as I stepped out the side door, I saw a black and white striped king snake (at least I think it was a king snake) that must’ve been getting a drink by the AC that’s by the door. As soon as it saw me coming down the stairs, it ran under the stairs, then under the skirting of the house. The movement startled me until I realized it was a harmless snake.

It was a cool-looking snake. I hope to see it again long enough to get a picture of it.

Yesterday afternoon and early Wednesday morning, a big black snake was out front. Both times it ended up in the brush surrounding one of the big trees by the wash.

I’ve been putting a fresh bowl of water out in the wash every day. The prairie dogs and rabbits love it.

I never did get to see the dentist on Wednesday. Her daughter had appendicitis. I was pissed too, to have come that far in the heat and humidity. It was cloudy throughout most of the trip and even rained some, but still, we went all that way for nothing. It wasn’t till after we’d left that she tried to get a hold of us.

While I was there I got a free sample of tooth-whitening gum. I’m sure it doesn’t really whiten teeth, but it’s got a nice refreshing taste anyway, so I had Tom pick some up at the grocery store. I’ll be seeing the dentist on Monday, I hope. We made the appointment early to beat some of the heat.

Paula, or probably Justin, sent an email saying they couldn’t get into my online photo albums, so I asked if they wanted me to send pictures on a CD. Then I discovered a way to send them links to take them directly to each album. I’m still waiting for a reply as to what they want me to do.

Meanwhile, I’ve been updating my doll albums which has been taking forever! That’s cuz of the higher resolution I’m now using. I’m also going to add a 10th album called Assorted Pets which will consist of pictures like the pigeons, Bunny, guinea pigs, etc.

Later…

I emailed PG asking when the last doll I’m expecting was shipped. Hopefully, they’ll let me know soon enough, and they’ll give me the correct date, too.

It’s back to being like June weather-wise. It’s hot and clear, but not so dry that my hair’s full of static. I’m gonna get a small humidifier sometime in October so I don’t have to deal with that again when it gets really dry.

All my uploading is done. I have 10 albums and 245 pictures in total. Someone downloaded 6 doll pictures yesterday. I know they had to be either pictures of Joy or Barbies, cuz that’s a very small album and those are the only pictures in it till the Fairy of Cork and others join it.

I threw in a couple of other dolls for Paula. She’ll be getting a total of 15. Wish I could be there to see the look on her face! I just hope she has room. I’m sure that somehow she’ll make the room, even if it means buying and putting up some cheap shelves. She’ll be getting Anne, Edie, Chris, Christina, Giselle, Misha, Ashley, Nakita, Selena, Melanie, Stephanie, Shauna, Gloria, Katie and Mary.

I made a second doll picture file. One’s for the dolls I have (porcelain), and the other’s for the dolls I’m giving her, plus the two I took apart, and my vinyl dolls, except for Tyler.

I currently have 28 porcelain dolls, plus Tyler displayed. They are Patrice, Colette, Ciara, Autumn, Pine Leaf, Sacajawea, Jade, Joy, Bailey, Summer Dream, Asha, Nyla, Murganah, Carmencita, Angel, Falling Star, Praying Spirit, Valentine, Emerald, Mei Lin, Meagan, Victoria, Tiffany, Maria, Rapunzel, Twinkle, Sugar Plum and Lollipops.

I’ve written just under 230 pages since my release.

Saturday, July 20, 2002

I never heard back from PG. Makes me think they haven’t shipped the doll yet. I just sent another message to let them know I didn’t hear back from them yesterday and would like an answer today.

I also left Paula a message last night, never hearing from her via phone or email. I hope she’s not in jail. Of all the times I ship something to her, it’d really suck if she went to jail now for 3-6 months.

I just upped and called Paula. She answered, saying she’d call me back. She sounded rather depressed.

Just got a message saying they left a message saying they shipped the doll on the 12th. If this is true, she should be here between the 23rd - 26th.

Sunday, July 21, 2002

I don’t know what the hell’s going on with Paula. She never called me back and there’s been no answer at her place. I just hope to hell she isn’t in jail so she can get the dolls! Of all the times I send her something other than a letter, it’d sure suck if she wasn’t home. I hope someone else could claim the packages and make sure she gets them when she gets home if this ends up being the case. I wouldn’t know if they emailed me since last night, cuz our modem is fucked up.

God, I wish our stuff would stop breaking and leaking!!! Just 3 months. 3 months without anything breaking or leaking! Why is that so fucking much to ask for??? A lousy 3 months!

Anyway, I’m having fun editing MP3s, but it’s a time-consuming job. I sit there fine-tuning old journals while the files save and compress themselves. I’m on the 1994 journal now.

Tuesday, July 23, 2002

Got lots to update on. For starters, I got the Fairy of Cork. She’s cute and her fiber optics display is much nicer than Chris’s. It’s more colorful, displaying more of my favorite colors. Chris only displayed green and red with a touch of blue. I’m sure Paula will love her, though. I doubt she’s ever had anything like the dolls I’m sending her and I doubt she ever will, either. I think this will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for her.

Anyway, this fairy’s not attached to her wings which is what the fiber optics are attached to. She’s supposed to sit on a seat up against the wings that are attached to the back of the seat, but I thought she blocked too much of the wings. Therefore, I stuck a Kelsey doll on it. Kelsey dolls are slightly smaller than Barbies. This doll looks better on it. Meanwhile, I put the fairy on a shelf in my office. The only thing is that she’s battery-operated also. I thought she was a plug-in.

Other than that she’s 14” with red hair and green eyes with purple glitter eyeshadow.

I got two letters from Mary. The letters themselves were brief. The bulk of what she sent was book parts. I’ve got about 32 pages to type up.

So Hope’s trial is done from what she told me. The day after she sent the letter was the day the verdict was to be in, but I don’t know what it is or how she went from looking at 40 years to life, but this is what Mary told me. I know this is Arizona and that Arizona will practically hang a person just for breathing wrong, but she must’ve done more than break her baby’s ribs, as bad as I know that alone is. Maybe Mary can fill me in more cuz I just looked again and couldn’t find squat online.

Are those of us who supposedly sent threatening letters that much more entertaining than the child abusers?! If Hope’s kid were black, that’d be different. Then they’d plaster her story all over the place, calling her a racist.

The for-sale sign’s gone. I don’t know if it’s cuz someone knocked it down or if that property is sold. All I can do is what I always do when it comes to any new neighbors – hope they’re white and not trouble-makers. Especially not trouble-makers, but as I learned, all I can do is take whatever shit people dish out to me. The only one that suffers when someone fucks me over is me and the only one that suffers when I try to fuck someone else over is also me, so I won’t even bother to think about any kind of complaints or retaliation. It’ll either be useless or get me thrown in jail.

It looks like the shower leak’s fixed that he caulked, so that’s good. Also, he epoxied Ciara’s stand, my big 38” doll.

I switched back to my old wallpaper changer cuz Webshots was getting to be a pain, always wanting me to compress files and not saving pictures from other sites into my wallpaper directory. It’d save them to the directory, I’d just have to create a whole new file in order to add them in. With this one, I don’t have to do that. I still have Webshots on my computer, though, so I can still get pictures from them, then export them to my directory/changer.

I finally called and spoke to Justin and Paula after Paula said she’d call me back and never did. Without telling her what I was sending, I told her to stay out of jail so she could get the 2 or 3 packages I plan on shipping. Also, I hope she’ll at least be kind enough to call and let me know when she gets them. Hopefully, her PO won’t shelve them for a month before letting her know they’re there. I wonder how it is that they know when a package contains something that’s back-ordered. Unless it’s just part of the doll curse that’s on me, and hopefully not on her too, the PO has some way of knowing which dolls were back-ordered. Those are the ones I get as soon as they arrive.

Tom didn’t even have to wait in line for the fairy. This time they put her in the box they left him a key to.

Anyway, I spoke to Justin as well, answering a few computer questions for him. I told him I’d hang up with him and go send him direct links to all my albums and to let me know if it worked, and it did. I figured it would, cuz it worked for Mary. I’m still going to enclose a picture CD in one of the doll boxes for them.

He tried to get me to tell him what I was sending his mom, promising not to tell, but I knew he would. I gave him hints, though. I said there were 15 of them and that they consisted of a good variety. Also, like I told Paula, she needs to start making as much room in her place as she can.

Naturally, in spite of how dumb his poor mom is, Justin’s obviously not very bright himself. His writing was the equivalent of a 5-year-old’s, rather than an 11-year-old’s. Even an 11-year-old should know that ‘didn’t’ isn’t spelled ‘dint’. They must suspect I’m sending dolls, though, cuz I find it really hard to believe they could be that stupid.

All Paula had to say was the usual – how much stress this guy brings her whom she has so much fun in the woods and who dropped the charges he filed on her. I asked her, but what if he files charges again and doesn’t drop them?

“Then I’ll do 90 days in jail,” she said, “but God help him when I get out.”

I just don’t understand why she’d want to hang out with someone who could land her in jail, let alone put all the stress on her that he does. I don’t know, maybe she likes it in a sick, twisted sort of way. My own sister gets off on abuse from men.

Anyway, I told Justin that Tom would load up IM software so we can do instant messages.

I sent album links to chickenmax to see if they’d pick up their mail from me since I knew it would automatically notify me as soon as it was. They never picked it up and now I’m not sure what to think. Is it them shutting me out, or is it someone else altogether? Neither one makes sense at this point. If it was them, why ignore my mail when they could either block me out or change their address? If it’s not them, wouldn’t they either read the mail out of curiosity or let me know, hey, we don’t know each other?

Well, either way, I won’t be sending anything else.

I saw a roadrunner eat a baby prairie dog yesterday. I didn’t know they were carnivorous, but some birds are, so why not?

No cheeks today. I wish he’d show up on a day when Tom and the car were gone, so I could have the pleasure of saying “no” to anything freeloader-related, though I will say “no” the next time he wakes me up.

I thought we were going to get stormed on yesterday evening, but all we got was some wind, one little rumble of thunder, and a tiny bit of rain.

I know it’s a waste of time worrying about us getting old and dying while we’re still in our 30s and 40s, but I fear the end and that we’ll be alone and helpless. How will I take care of him if he gets really sick or senile when he gets old? How will I see him if he’s in a nursing home? What if he dies first and I’m forced to kill myself, knowing I couldn’t go on without him, and wouldn’t want to, even if I had all the money and transportation in the world? What if someone killed my husband, like some pig on a macho car chase that I couldn’t get to in order to kill them before I killed myself?

What if, what if, what if! Wish I could quit the what-ifs! But that’s easier said than done when it comes to Tom, my one and only true blessing in life. It’s not that I don’t have any other blessings, but most of those are material.

Ironically, ever since I quit wanting a kid, babies don’t always seem to be everywhere I go, though I don’t think it’s a coincidence. Back when I wanted one, it was in everyone’s conversation, on every billboard I’d pass by – everywhere. It was as if something up there wanted to torture me all the more, though it is still on TV like crazy. Yeah, I saw part of a documentary where a teenage gang-banger was expecting. She’s totally the kind that makes my blood boil.

Yesterday’s trip to the dentist went well. No cavities. They did X-rays like they say they do periodically. They did it right there in the chair, too. At the other place, you had to go into this little x-ray booth.

She asked me if I was still drawing, then I remembered the pictures I sent her. I told her I got sick of that and had hopes of becoming a dollmaker. She said that sounded cool and that maybe I could show her pictures. I asked for her email address and sent her the links to my albums so she could see what I have already, besides the critters and the land which we also discussed.

She complimented me as usual, telling me she likes my hair color.

Got a good-sized sample of toothpaste and another whitening kit. The stuff really works. I think this will be the last time I’ll need to do this for quite a while.

On our way out of the waiting room, the doctor asked if we knew the man waiting for the next appointment, a guy who was also from Maricopa. He told us where he lived and we both knew the streets he mentioned. He has a conservatory business at his place. Tom got his web address. We might go check it out sometime, as well as this place in town just 10 minutes from us that has porcelain doll signs. I don’t know if they sell them or just make them or both.

Later…

Another pretty rainbow off in the distance. It’s clouding up out there, but I don’t know if we’ll get a storm or how much of one we’ll get if we do.

We went the way we usually don’t go on our way back home yesterday and saw that they were paving more of the main road. Just two years ago we were 7 miles from any paved roads. Soon we’ll be just about one mile away!

Anyway, after leaving the dentist’s, we went to Fry’s Electronics. He got a new computer case and a new modem, in case the one we were using was no good. It was okay, though, so we’ll keep it as a backup. After an hour’s worth of work, Tom got us back online. At least we were only unable to go online for a day and not weeks.

I also got some white paper as well as decorative paper with a big tulip. At home, I sent in for the $3 rebate on the white paper.

Our last stop was Denny’s. Not only was the food great (my T-bone was cooked to perfection and cut very easily), but the people were civilized for a change. It was just our luck that no screamers were near us. The oldest kid around us was around 10.

Wednesday, July 24, 2002

Time is making it easier to deal with not seeing Teddy Bear, though I’ll always think about her and wonder about what happened. I still don’t see how something I wrote could get her in trouble. I’m the one who has to pay for other people’s actions, remember? I’m still pretty sure she changed her mind. If she’d either lost my number or didn’t get my letter, that’d be one thing, but to have lost the number and not gotten my letter? I don’t think so.

As much as I would’ve loved for her to keep her word and come see me, I realize that seeing her could’ve been a bad thing. With my being attracted to her and my having feelings for her, I could’ve been torn between her and Tom, not that I’d have left Tom. I still believe he’s the only one who could ever accept me as I am and deal with our living arrangements as he has. That’s where I’m glad he’s not your typical red-blooded man, or else the not sleeping together wouldn’t fly with him so well.

Anyway, I guess I’m meant to be both faithful and celibate, but that’s okay. I can live with it for I have Teddy Bear in my fantasies and she’ll always be in my memory.

With the way I’m so fed up with society as a whole, I think to myself, just as soon as some bitch or some cock pisses me off bad enough or threatens to kick my ass in a place where I have no visits from Tom or commissary to lose, you’re going to lose it like never before. After so many years of being held back for various reasons, you’re going to explode on them so badly. They’re gonna think they can flatten you cuz you’re short, and you’re going to show them that no they can not just step right on you and snap you in half as if you were merely a twig.

Then I tell myself, no you won’t. You’ll sit there and you’ll take it and you won’t fight back. You’ll make up some excuse as to why you didn’t fight back, you’ll send them the wrong message, they’ll take advantage of you, they’ll get away with fucking you over, and God will see to it that you suffer just because you thought of fighting back while he protects and worships the ground your perpetrators walk on. And no, you wouldn’t have nothing to lose if you did fight back. You’d get in hot water somehow cuz you know you can’t get away with shit. You’re punished with other people’s evil deeds as well as for things you didn’t even do, so you sure as hell would be made to pay for things you did do, even if the person deserved what they got from you.

Words cannot express how frustrated and angry I am at God for protecting anyone who ever did me wrong. People have beaten me, stolen from me, lied to me and so much more, yet they never ever had to pay the consequences for it. I’m not saying they should all be thrown in jail, I’m just saying that it’s rather sad to know that while people are walking away from murder, I’m paying for stupid, piddly-assed shit. I pay for other people’s hatred, vindictiveness, stupidity, misunderstanding, incompetence and greed, but who pays for wronging me?

I look out my office window. I see a tiny portion of the house two lots away and I wonder? Am I one day going to fall victim to its occupants for 7 years while I’m completely powerless to do a damn thing about it? And all because they might think I look too Jewish or because they have connections in law enforcement?

As I learned the hard way time and time again – I don’t have to go looking for trouble. Trouble does a fine enough job of finding me on its own.

There are about 250 million people in the US. I figure about 80 million of them are black. Wouldn’t it be oh so awesome if one by one, they could all drop dead?! I’d settle for just a few million. And they could up and die suddenly too, for no apparent reason, leaving the surviving blacks baffled and fearing they’ll be next.

I thought about typing myself a threatening letter supposedly from them, but it wouldn’t do me any good. First of all, it could be determined that the printer that printed the thing lives in this house. Also, unless it was the last piece from the package, it could be determined that the paper came from this house. Even if they couldn’t prove it was my paper and my printer that printed it, all they’d do is say, “Well, we couldn’t find any fingerprints, they say they didn’t do it, so there’s nothing we can do.”

Of course, I know they wouldn’t do anything even if they did have physical evidence. Between God and the Jew-hating law enforcement officials that can’t believe non-whites would fuck over a white person and don’t want to, there’s simply no revenge and no justice in this case. They won. They won in Phoenix and they won in Maricopa.

Anyway, Tom tried to set up IM software so Justin and I could do instant messages, but it wouldn’t work. Also, I don’t think I dig the idea of swapping messages with an 11-year-old kid. I have enough mixed emotions about Paula as it is. I mean, I do care about her or else I wouldn’t write her or send her dolls, and I know she can’t help being the way she is, but I get sick of the flakiness. When I think about it, though, she’s never done me any harm, so associating with her can’t hurt. Besides, she’s all the way on the other side of the country. It’s not like we’re neighbors. It’s the little things that bug me. An example of that is how I asked her to let me know when she gets the packages, though they won’t be mailed for another week or two, and she said she would. I know better, though. I won’t hear about them either way till one of us catches the other by phone, though maybe Justin will mention it. It’s no biggie, though. I mean, I’d rather have to wait to find out if she got the dolls and what she thought of them than to have Jew-hating blacks and Hispanics playing their music for us, trashing our yard, then ultimately getting me tossed in jail to be led on by someone I end up crushing on.

I was so, so crushed out on her! We just didn’t have enough time together in the end there. Our time together, in the end, went too fast. How I wish we’d established our little thing for each other sooner than we did! I’m sure we both liked each other pretty much from the get-go; I just wish we’d known it.

Back to the dolls - it’s a damn good thing they don’t have a conscious, the poor dolls. It may sound mean to say this, but those dolls would be so miserable if they did. Instead of being in a nice, spacious modern house, they’re going to be in a cold, damp, small, old and ugly place, having to hear Paula, Justin and God knows how many other people, screaming and yelling about this and that.

Later…

Justin said he saw the pictures, but Paula didn’t. I’m not surprised. Paula’s always so wrapped up in her own little world. One kind of has to feel sorry for her, though. Her life’s been the same as long as I can remember and it doesn’t look like it’s ever going to change.

I’m hearing more thunder this evening, but seeing fewer clouds. Tom said they said it could storm tonight, but I don’t know yet if it will.

During the daytime, I hear this squeaking sound that I figured was some bird doing a weird chirp, but I learned today that it’s the prairie dogs making the noise. I noticed I was hearing a lot more of it these last 2 or 3 months. It’s always the same pitch that lasts for a second. It was really weird, though, cuz I saw a prairie dog do it while it ate lettuce in front. It’d munch away, then open its mouth to emit a squeak, then eat some more, let out another squeak, and so on and so forth.

Thursday, July 25, 2002

We were having problems with the instant messaging thing. Besides, I decided I just didn’t want anyone bugging me while I was online. Especially some mixed-up kid.

I finished the clip Mary sent me. This clip was when she ran from Justin in Florida with Gretchen to New York where she and her homeless brother were stuck in a hotel with less than $100 to their names.

Talk about hard times and curses! My heart totally goes out to her and Gretchen both for all their pain and suffering. It serves as a reminder, particularly in Gretchen’s case, that we can’t always count on God to help us and that sometimes God does give us more than we can handle. Again I have to ask myself – how much of God is for real versus wishful thinking? Sure, we’d all like to believe that there’s some loving, guiding salvaging force out there, designed to protect us, but when we consider how much more bad than good there really is in this world, I don’t see how that can be possible. Not for the most part, anyway. It just seems that any good, loving God wouldn’t allow innocent babies to be killed. I know there are those who would respond to that statement by saying that he has his reasons, but I’m sorry. I just don’t see what kind of reasons could possibly justify the slaying of an innocent child. Nothing about what happened makes “sense.”

If only Mary cut ties between them sooner than she did. I cut the ties between Doe, Art, Larry and Tammy and never again can they or will belittle me or try to control me. I pulled back and looked at them as people, not parents and siblings, and when I didn’t like what I saw, I put biology aside and walked away.

I wish more people could do the same when the situation calls for it.

It burns me up to think of how many times Doe and Art smacked me around only to get away with it, while I lose time, money and freedom to bullshit words.

So when the thought of my curses and life’s unfairness gets me down, I think of Mary sitting in a jail cell, feeling like a complete failure for not saving her daughter. For not having the courage to say “no” to abuse, be it physical, sexual, verbal or mental, until it was too late.

Friday, July 26, 2002

Damn Mary and her not putting enough postage on envelopes! I told Tom not to bother making the time to pick this latest one up and to let it get returned to her. Speaking of messages, I’ve obviously sent one saying: I’ll bitch about it, but Tom will make the extra time to pick it up in the end anyway.

Not anymore. She should know by now what’s too much to be stuffing in one envelope, so anything with postage due is going right back to her till she gets the message and gets her postage straight.

Tom stopped at a hardware store after work and got a round wooden base for Joy. This will make me feel a lot better as her metal stand alone isn’t very stable. For the bigger, heavier dolls, you really need a heavy wooden base, versus paper-thin metal.

He also got a couple of ceiling fans, so the den and living room will finally have them.

Sunday, July 28, 2002

Here I am just trying to get over Teddy Bear, then I see someone on TV that reminds me of her, be it her physique, her mannerisms, her voice, and it brings back some of the hurt, the longing for her, the missing her, the never getting to know her, etc.

And something didn’t want to punish me when it sicced these freeloaders on me? Right!

I wonder just how many others she may’ve led on like this. People who do this don’t usually leave people hanging just once. It tends to become rather habit-forming (Kacey and Al were prime examples). Am I the only inmate, though? I couldn’t have been the only one to be crushing on her. Just how many others have joined the R. D. Johnson fan club?

Questions, questions and never any answers!

I may love a babe in uniform, but I hate pigs and that’s exactly what she turned out to be in the end – just another pig with a badge, despite how cool she was in jail. I wonder if I’d have been as attracted to her if she hadn’t been in uniform?

Maybe I was wrong in assuming this summer’s monsoons would be fierce. Almost every evening it looks like we’re gonna get slammed, but it never happens. All we get is a little wind, a few rumbles of thunder and shit for rain. If it were going to be a fierce summer, it would’ve been by now. Guess this is why they call this the desert!

Although the storms are cool, the lack of them has its good points, too. No losing power, no potential wake-up calls. I got the freeloaders as potential wake-up calls just as I did in Phoenix and that’s enough.

I had a great idea for the base of Joy’s stand. I decided that after he cuts it smaller dimension-wise and square in shape rather than round, I’ll take the same material used to make her dress and cover the base with it. I also have spare scraps of carpet that I could use for future bases as well. That’d look cool.

I saw a documentary on a penitentiary in Louisiana that opened after the Civil War. This was right after slavery ended and this is what the freeloaders used as an excuse to become the mean, hateful criminally inclined assholes they still are today. We’re to blame too, though. All we were doing was breeding criminals by making them slaves, and simply turning them loose in the end was where we fucked ourselves over. They should’ve either remained as slaves or been deported back to Africa where they belong.

Later…

I looked at Jade and decided – why wait for future bases when I can carpet yours? So I took her off the base, traced the circular base on the back of a piece of carpet where the netting is, cut it, cut a hole in its center to go through the pole her waistband’s attached to, then slipped it on and down onto the base. Then, to keep the ends from lifting upward, I secured them down with glue. Now I’m washing a bigger piece of carpet that many a rat has peed on. When it’s washed I’m going to cut a thin strip of it to glue around the sides of the base. Then she’ll look more or less like she’s standing on a mound of blue carpet.

Monday, July 29, 2002

I was pleasantly surprised to get an email from Paula herself. First she called, but I was asleep. In the email, she answered my questions as to what colors she likes/dislikes (I was curious) and the answers couldn’t have been better. She said she likes red, purple, white and green and hates orange and black. Well, as it turns out, I have a doll for her in purple, a doll in red, 3 dolls in white and 3 in green. None in orange or black. I decided to take the gold dress I had on Anne and put it on the new Irish fairy I just got that came in a green outfit.

So, as it will turn out, she’ll get 1 doll in purple, 1 in red, 3 in white, 3 in green, 3 in blue, 1 in gray, 1 in rust, 1 in white with blue and another in white with sea green. There will be 1 redhead, 2 with black hair, 5 blondes and 7 brunettes. There’ll be 4 with blue eyes, 4 with green eyes, 5 with brown eyes, and 2 with gray eyes.

He cut the wood of Joy’s base, making it square at 9” in diameter, rather than a 12” circle. Then I cut a slit in the fabric to go through the stand’s pole. Then we tacked the material underneath.

No, the shower leak is not fixed after all. It looks like my worst fear is right and that it’s leaking from inside the wall, down out on the carpet in the front right corner of the shower stall itself, but you know what? As I said to Tom, we are not going to succumb to fixing every single goddamn leak in this house! Nor are we going to be reduced to fixing every single fucking thing that breaks. Especially when they shouldn’t be breaking so soon! If we spend our lives fixing everything that breaks, we won’t have a life. I’m at the point now where I’m so beyond fed up with our shit breaking that one tends to reach a point where they simply stop fixing things. I’ll shower in his shower from now on till that breaks too, many years sooner than it should.

I don’t know, maybe if whatever’s put the breakage curse on us sees that we won’t bother to up and run to fix things as soon as they break like broken car ACs and leaky showers, it’ll give us a break for a while. Yeah, for about a month.

Later…

I don’t believe this. I simply do not believe this! What broke today? Now the sprayer on the bug spray container burst!

“But the thing was old and they’re cheap and I can pick one up when I go out today to see my mom and do other errands.”

But I don’t care if the damn thing was old and cheap. He can play this down just like he does everything else, but I just want a week in our lives without breakage!!!

And a month without the freeloaders. That one’s impossible, though, of course, for quite a while, if ever. I know Scot is coming this week or next and I don’t want to be woken up. He hasn’t woken me up since February, so it just seems like it’s about time to lose sleep over these freeloaders yet again.

Always with me, always with them. Oh, how I want to believe 15 months is all I have left of this shit, but I can’t. I just can’t. First they told me it was over, then a handful of months later I was promised a year of probation and that I wouldn’t be jailed even if I were convicted, so why should I believe it’ll finally, truly be over in 15 months? There’s nothing to say that it will be. If I can go a whole year without the freeloaders controlling anything I do, anyplace I go, anything we spend our money on, then I’ll believe I’m finally free and clear of them. Until then, I’m still very much their victim, like it or not. They’re just victimizing me in different ways than they did during the first few years.

The sucky thing about his working nights is that his car’s here all day, but hey, I’ll decide when I let who into my house, so if Scot does stop by while I’m asleep – tough. I just wasn’t in the mood for company, I’ll tell him, and he’ll just have to live with that. If he’s not going to call first, then he’s going to have to deal with the fact that I just may not want company every now and then, though I’ve always let him in so far. That’s only because he either caught me when I was up, or it was before I put my foot down and made a no-playing-form-if-I’m-asleep rule.

I still want him to come around just once when I’m out, but I know God will never see to that. Even more so, I want him to come around when Tom’s not here and when I’m awake just so I can say “no” to the freeloaders. Never yet have I been able to say “no” to anything freeloader-related. I’d like to have that privilege if only once, but again, I doubt it’s an honor God would be willing to grant me. Protect thy freeloaders, you know? That’s God’s motto. Actually, it’s more like “Protect Jodi’s tormentors!” That’s his real motto.

And I thought those stormin’ Mormons were oh so bad compared to the blacks and Mexican welfare bums?!

Later…

Well, the freeloaders didn’t cause me to lose sleep today, but see? It’s just like we were all living together again; when they’re not actually waking me up, I’m fearing that they will.

Always with me, always with them.

PG’s selling a 40” sitting doll for just $80.

Tuesday, July 30, 2002

Paula is going to be one lucky bitch! Tom got a few boxes that are 18x18x18 and some bubble sheeting and I managed to squeeze all 15 dolls into one box. Then I added a few things like that Hairdini that drove me crazy trying to figure out, the messy comb-in pink streaks I didn’t like, a couple of rings, a bracelet, a necklace, a parrot watch I never wear, some dental floss, emery boards, glitter perfume, barrettes and a few other odds and ends. Of course I threw in the picture CD and a letter, too.

Rabbits and prairie dogs are hanging out front regularly now. I saw a prairie dog lay down for the first time ever. It lay up against the water bowl.

Got 4 envelopes from Mary today. Each had a brief 1-page letter. Most of it was book stuff. I got about 50 pages to type up. Fortunately, she numbered the envelopes so I’ll know what order to type stuff in. She worries she’s overwhelming me, but it’s not like I’m working full-time yet with dolls, so I have the extra time.

I will say this, though, and that’s that I’m glad I’m not the one who’s going to have to organize this book in the end! I’m just typing what she gives me, then some editor or publisher can take it from there.

She asked that I change words and sentence structuring when I feel it’s necessary. I told her I’d use my best judgment. I may change her directions for starters. She has Idiot’s dad referring to New York as “out there” from Florida. Well, typically Florida is “down there,” New York’s “up there,” and the West Coast is “out there.”

She asked for rainbow and storm pictures, so I printed out a few shots I took.

She asked if I was having fun watching all those storms. All those storms?! What storms? This has been the wimpiest monsoon season in the decade I’ve been out here. We’ve had lots of clouds and humidity, but shit for rain. I think Phoenix has gotten way more rain than we have.

If she’s truly guilty, then I’m glad Hope was found guilty like she said she was. She’s to be sentenced next month. She’s looking at 40 years which really means about 12. Even so, you’ve got a long time to do, Hope! I’d kill myself for damn sure!

I just cannot believe she’s had the same celly for over 6 months. Why couldn’t we have been cellies from New Year’s Day, the day we met, till I left?!

She’s hoping to stay in Estrella rather than be shipped to Florida. That’d be nice. I just wish I knew when Teddy Bear will return, if ever! Could be soon, could be years, could be never, though I’d think that at some point they’d stick her back there.

She says that where she goes and for how long is up to the judge, and she’s trying to do things like get her GED to help, but as I told her, I wouldn’t put too much stock in the judge acknowledging her efforts. I suggested she not count on him to be pleased with what she’s done to help herself. I’m only speaking from personal experience. I bent over backward for this state. I knew they’d want me to see a therapist, so I went out and got one before sentencing, yet the fucking cock of a judge had already made up his twisted mind, before he ever laid eyes on me, to go along with the DA’s ludicrous recommendation of 6 months for words on paper. I did this, I did that, but nobody gave me a chance. No one gave a damn.

She says she’ll be on heavy probation when she gets out, but is ok with that as long as she’s free, though I know she won’t be “free.” Freer than in jail or prison, but no one on probation or parole is “free.” I asked her what her probation will entail and for how long she’ll be on it once she’s out. If standard probation could be as overwhelming as it was for me in the first 5 months, I can only imagine what intense probation is like! Sure, anything’s better than jail/prison, but sometimes I’ve felt like my probation isn’t probation, but rather an extension of jail.

Oh, how I hear her as far as wishing for a laptop goes! I missed my computer so much while I was in jail. Can’t imagine life without it!

Wednesday, July 31, 2002

I did some cleaning, did my workout, printed out the grocery list, so now I’m free to read, write, watch TV or whatever.

I was surprised to find I have a 29” waist at 125 pounds. I’m surprised it’s not 1-3 inches bigger. The combination of the crunches and the zapper really helps. It’s been a while since I’ve “dieted.” Working out won’t make me lose weight, but it’ll keep my weight where it’s at, and I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I’m not going to lose weight. Just like you can’t have thin curly hair or thick straight hair, middle age and skinniness just don’t go together. Not without drugs, a serious lack of eating, or some medical problem. It’s simply not natural for 95% of those over 30 to be thin and I wouldn’t lose the weight even if I could. Why lose weight I’d only pack on two weeks later?

I’m pleased to see that Scot has skipped July altogether as far as bugging me here at home goes. I thought he would. More so, I hoped he would. I still don’t think I’m gonna get 3 months off from him here, though. I think the time I did was only a fluke. It makes no sense to come less often when I’ve got more of a reason to run and then start coming more often when that reason lessens a little with time. Something else was no doubt going on in his life that actually took higher priority than me.

Paula is one fucked up individual. It’s sad. It really is. I told her to dump this cock that filed charges on her that he dropped, warning her that things wouldn’t get better and that he’d probably file charges again. Well, she didn’t dump him and he did file charges again. So now she’s got a show-cause hearing on August 15th.

After asking myself numerous times how she can keep putting up with the same old shit from the same old types of guys, the answer’s as clear as it was when I asked myself that about Tammy. She likes it. She truly likes it. It’s both sad and sick, but some people are like that. No one can be so dumb and naïve as to just happen to get with the wrong guys this many times. She’s obviously actively seeking this type out. It’s bad enough that they’re cocks, most of which are sickos, but to make bad news even worse, these are Ricans she’s going after.

Just like there are pain freaks out there, there are stress freaks, too. I honestly believe she enjoys the stress, the anger and the frustration. She’s an aggressive person who loves a good fight. Paula would be absolutely miserable if she suddenly had a good life with good people in it. That’s just not for her.

I’m not going to bother emailing her because half the time Justin doesn’t let her see the email. In an email I sent last night, I said I wasn’t smart enough to figure out the Hairdini and maybe she could. Then Justin replies saying: yer smarter.

Yeah, I am. At least when it comes to who I hang with. One can only advise a person so many times not to hang with users and abusers whether or not they’re related to us, but it’s up to them to do what they’re going to do.

Her selfishness really irritates me at times. All she wants to do is bitch about her fucked up men when we talk. Never does she ask about me, about Tom, etc. She did ask if it was hot out here, but that’s about it. It gets so frustrating. I try to change the subject and talk about something more cheerful, but then she goes right back to the usual shit she cries about.

I’m going to be talking to her less and less and writing less and less, too. I’m sorry for her, but it gets old. It really does. I’m not going to “dump” her and I’m not going to try to change her. I’m not Dureen. But I am going to avoid contact with her more often. That is after I find out if she got the package okay, then, if I can get a word in edgewise throughout her non-stop babbling and bitching, I’ll see if I can find out what she thinks of the stuff.

I can relate to and understand her selfishness to a degree. Abuse tends to make a person selfish, cuz whether or not you get off on it, you’re so wrapped up in your day-to-day survival that you’re just not in a position to be thinking of others.

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